ASEBL Journal – Volume 10 Issue 1, January 2014
second-order mapping. As Damasio phrases it: “core consciousness occurs when the
brain’s representation devices generate an imaged, nonverbal account of how the
organism’s own state is affected by the organism’s processing of an object.”10
It is important to note that in order to create core consciousness, “it does not matter
whether the object is present and interacting with the organism or is being brought
back from past memory.”11 In other words, a memory of an object is just as capable of
producing core consciousness as the object itself. If, at this level, a memory is treated
identically to a present object, then a purely fictional object should be just as capable
of producing core consciousness. Damasio has more recently hinted as much: “As in
the case of actual motor interactions with an object, recalled or imaginary motor
interactions can modify the protoself instantly.”12 Imaginary interactions (including
narrative) would thus be capable of affecting (and effecting) our selves on a basic
cognitive level.
Core consciousness, however, is only the foundation of what we commonly refer to
with the term “consciousness,” which more closely resembles what Damasio calls
“extended consciousness.” This emerges out of additional levels laid on top of core
consciousness. To begin with, every time core consciousness is produced – hundreds
of times a second – a new “core self” is produced and records the changes made to the
protoself through interaction with the external world. The core self is like a still frame
of the self in its environment. When these still frames are put together, if we extend
the metaphor, to form a movie of an individual’s life we get the “autobiographical
self.” The autobiographical self is in turn dependent upon “autobiographical
memory,” or the ability to recall past instances of core consciousness. That is, the
newest frame in the reel can be affected by any other frame in the movie if brought
into the present through memory.13 “Extended consciousness occurs when working
memory holds in place, simultaneously, both a particular object and the
autobiographical self, in other words, when both a particular object and the objects in
one’s autobiography simultaneously generate core consciousness.”14 Consciousness as
we generally conceive of it, then, is the result of the interaction between our physical
selves, our environment and our own lived history including our mental repertoire of
memories and stories. In this sense the stories we hear or read are part of who we are
and how we experience the world.15
Indeed, our innate narrative impulse may do more than simply change our selves, but
may be how those selves are instantiated to begin with: “Implicit storytelling has
created our selves, and it should be no surprise that it pervades the entire fabric of
human societies and cultures.”16 Thus the fireside hunting tale, the bedtime story, the
soap opera and the Realist novel are all products of our consciousness at the same
time that they shape that consciousness.
There are several things worth underlining about this account. Fundamental to
Damasio’s conception of consciousness and the self is the idea of mapping. The brain
is constantly updating maps of the self, non-self objects (including memories) and the
relationship among all of them. It is on the basis of this map of the self – or simply,
the self – that value can be calculated, how we decide what is worth our attention or
an expenditure of energy in the interest of homeostasis. As the self changes, what is
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