---
abstract: |
  It is commonplace for both philosophers and cognitive scientists to express their allegiance to the
  "unity of consciousness". This is the claim that a subject’s phenomenal consciousness, at any one
  moment in time, is a single thing. This view has had a major influence on computational theories
  of consciousness. In particular, what we call single-track theories dominate the literature,
  theories which contend that our conscious experience is the result of a single consciousness-making
  process or mechanism in the brain. We argue that the orthodox view is quite wrong:
  phenomenal experience is not a unity, in the sense of being a single thing at each instant. It is a
  multiplicity, an aggregate of phenomenal elements, each of which is the product of a distinct
  consciousness-making mechanism in the brain. Consequently, cognitive science is in need of a
  multi-track theory of consciousness; a computational model that acknowledges both the
  manifold nature of experience, and its distributed neural basis.
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creators_name:
  - family: O'Brien
    given: Gerard
    honourific: ''
    lineage: ''
  - family: Opie
    given: Jon
    honourific: ''
    lineage: ''
date: 1998
date_type: published
datestamp: 2001-03-29
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dir: disk0/00/00/14/13
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eprintid: 1413
fileinfo: /style/images/fileicons/application_pdf.png;/1413/3/The_Disunity_of_Consciousness.pdf
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keywords: 'connectionism, philosophy of mind, phenomenal consciousness, single-track theory of consciousness, multi-track theory of consciousness'
lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:54:36
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pagerange: 378-395
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publication: The Australasian Journal of Philosophy
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refereed: TRUE
referencetext: |
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relation_type: []
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reportno: ~
rev_number: 12
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source: ~
status_changed: 2007-09-12 16:37:40
subjects:
  - cog-psy
  - phil-mind
succeeds: ~
suggestions: ~
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title: The Disunity of Consciousness
type: journalp
userid: 333
volume: 76
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