Lose your inner voice, lose your consciousness?

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Here is an interesting article about your "inner voice" and what it feels like to lose it.

http://www.sci-con.org/editorials/20030403.html

~~ Paul

[c4ts]

The voices in my head are telling me the others are laughing behind my back so I should kill them.

[hammegk]

Gee, I wonder what my cat says to himself, or that bat flying around to himself, or maybe that earthworm to itsself; do you think any of those critters use internal chatter to decide they are aware?

Or would you say they are not aware?

[c4ts]

They lack awareness on the human level. Or maybe the cat goes "meow" to itself in the head.

[uruk]

meow, meow, squeek, squeek, and wiggle, wiggle.

[Yahweh]

Originally posted by hammegk
Gee, I wonder what my cat says to himself, or that bat flying around to himself, or maybe that earthworm to itsself; do you think any of those critters use internal chatter to decide they are aware?

Or would you say they are not aware?

Cats, bats, and other mammels brains have many of the same structures in common, its not unreasonable to assume cats and bats are self aware. However, I agree with Stimpy when he says worms lack the structures necessary for self-awareness.

[Yahweh]

“I had lost the ability to converse with others … and to engage in self-talk. In other words, I did not have the ability to think about the future—to worry, to anticipate or perceive it—at least not with words. Thus for the first four or five weeks after hospitalization I simply existed.”

For some reason, this sounds very much like epiphenomenalism...

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Well, sort of. The only reason the guy knew he was sitting there like a rock was because he had experienced consciousness before. Imagine he was epiphenomenalistic his entire life, which means that there was no feedback from his consciousness to his brain. Then he'd always be a rock and would never think about consciousness at all. Something like that.

Yet another demonstration that epiphenomenalism is incoherent.

~~ Paul

[joyrex]

So what about the relation of inner and 'outer' voice (which is talking aloud). As people get older some have tendency to start talking to themselves. Somekind of amplification of the inner voice via hearing, perhaps? Sometimes I can sense, when having an inner dialogue with myself, these organs or some other stuff in my larynx or wherever & my tongue move, as if I'm talking..

[athon]

Dog:
'My balls are itchy'
*lick lick lick*
'My balls are still itchy'
*lick lick lick*
'Hey! Hey hey! Hey hey hey!'
'My balls are itchy again'
*lick lick lick*

Cat: 'This chair is mine. And this piece of carpet is mine. And this rug is mine. And this human is mine...'

Rat: 'I think I'll wait until everybody is nearly asleep before I start making as much noise in my cage as possible!'

Bird: 'That chick in the mirror is one might fine piece of-'

Fish: ' Hey, a castle....Hey, a castle....Hey, a castle....Hey, a castle....'

Athon

[uruk]

I wonder what type of inner dialog or voice a congenetaly deaf person would have?

[uruk]

Or would you say they are not aware?

I would think that they do have some level of selfawareness.