@BrightNoon,
I do not see how any of us can define consciousness without taking into consideration that, even as we perform the act of thinking on the matter, we are increasing our consciousness of the matter. This immediately brings to our awareness that this consciousness of which we are struggling to define is going through a constant changing process with every consideration of it.
How can such a thing be defined that is one thing at one second, and something else in the next second. It is like trying to define the wind as it changes from breeze to gust and back again. Is the wind to be defined as a breeze or as a gust?
My point is that this continuous alteration of our consciousness must not be left aside when trying to define it because it is crucial to the definition. I am not so sure our definitions are not being flawed for that reason.
As Salima has pointed out, there is certainly a 'degree' of consciousness, as an infant, that would not be anywhere near the same definition of what it becomes in a few years. But is that infant not still the same person? The exact same identity? Is the individual self of that person changed as the consciousness increases in awareness and ability? The identity is Salima the infant, Salima the child, the teen, the adult. All are Salima because that is the person born to the parents, continuing in that body and aging day by day. Nothing of the consciousness changes that identity. It is always Salima
However, the character of that identity does change as it develops various conscious reactions to experiences it faces in life. This is not biological, but purely capacity for reason and deduction.
Something here varies between individuals, and it is not brain size or composition, or the way that the biological process of the brain functions. What is different between individuals is capacity to reason and deduce; Consciousness. That is not identity or ego. That is ability.
There is no self. What makes us individuals is not some self spirit dwelling within that is Salima or Pathfinder. We are all matter with biological processes that help to sustain that mysterious life that brought us into this reality. In that regard we are the same, and no different than any other lifeform on the planet. There is no self, or spirit, in that composition of cellular structure. There is no consciousness in that material form.
What and who we are is a living part of the overall creation of this universe as a whole. No more or less than a leaf or a rock in the whole scheme of material regard. But a leaf and a rock cannot ponder their existence. An animal does not wonder about its origin or try to find reason in its choices. The human does; this is consciousness. Not identity or spirit; just consciousness. Consciousness is an innate ability to ponder reality and both, how it affects us, and how we affect it. This is not individual, this is universal among humans. The difference is the 'degree' of consciousness.
And this is where my point is made. It is only upon considering the degree of consciousness that we come to the HOW it defines the individual. And then we are specifically talking about WHAT and WHO a person becomes as their consciousness increases through the experiences of life and their choices within it. it is this development that creates not an identity, but simply a 'higher consciousness'. Who and what we are can better be defined by what degree of consciousness we attain, for it is this capacity that enables us to make the choices and decisions that we do, and ultimately what results come into our reality based upon those decisions.
I would say that the biological form of Salima becomes how she walks and nothing more. It is this higher consciousness that will live on and surpass the present material biology of Salima.
This is why it is so crucial for us to strive to enhance that degree of consciousness in every way that we can, and to be sure that, in so doing, we direct it toward the moral virtues of life that are beneficial to our species. This creates character that becomes far more valuable and productive than mere survival, and will assist in promoting our species instead of detracting from it. We cannot separate ourselves from our humanity by pretending that we are alone and living in our self.
There is no self. There is consciousness and what we do with it. What we truly are is 'ability' combined with 'decision', and the limits of the increasing of this ability is what defines both the future state of the species, and the future state of that ability. What that ability can attain is sheer speculation given the vastness of this creation and the many mysteries it comprises. There are many sciences and ideologies, but only one truth.
The real question should be, ' Do I want to enhance my 'degree of consciousness' or simply become a stagnant pool of biological function?'
... Merleau-Ponty certainly shines a phenomenological light on what experience is, but phenomenology is metaphysics-free (it has little to say regarding what experience is of) ... along the lines of Alva Noe (cognition as the dynamic nexus of brain-body-world), I think you would also find both Pfeifer and Bongard's "How the Body Shapes the Way We Think: A New View of Intelligence" (the robotics perspective on situated embodiment) and Rockwell's "Neither Brain nor Ghost: A Nondualist Alternative to the Mind-Brain Identity Theory" (a philosopher pushes the envelope of the situated embodiment concept) to be interesting ...
