Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Consciousness-Body-Time: How Do People Think Lacking Their Body?

  • Empirical Study/Analysis
  • Published:
Human Studies Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

War captivity is an extreme traumatic experience typically involving exposure to repeated stressors, including torture, isolation, and humiliation. Captives are flung from their previous known world into an unfamiliar reality in which their state of consciousness may undergo significant change. In the present study extensive interviews were conducted with fifteen Israeli former prisoners of war who fell captive during the 1973 Yom Kippur war with the goal of examining the architecture of human thought in subjects lacking a sense of body (disembodiment) as a result of confinement and isolation. Analysis of the interviews revealed that threats to a normal sense of body often lead to a loss of the sense of time as an objective dimension. Evidence suggests that the loss of the sense of body and the loss of the sense of time are in fact connected; that is, they collapse together. This breakdown in turn results in a collapse of the sense of self.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. The sense of self is a broad, general term with many possible definitions (philosophical, psychological) and it is thus necessary to outline the borders of this term before progressing any further. Damásio (1999) sense of self is equivalent to the core consciousness. In the sense of self discussed in this article is close to Damásio (1999) autobiographical self (extended consciousness) or what Zahavi (2006) describes as personality. I don't think the last sentence has any place here, but correct me if I am wrong.

  2. The word "content" may seem vague, yet from a cognitive perspective we may simply say that "content" is information processing (Glicksohn 2001). Thus the sense of time is reduced to information processing, meaning that the sense of time can basically be deduced from the cognitive resource consumption necessary to process information.

  3. It is important to emphasize that we are not claiming that there exists any kind of dualism.

  4. Merleau-Ponty was one of the central thinkers to make an attempt at developing a theory not dependent on the representational framework—for a discussion see Dreyfus (2002). Noë (2004) continues in this manner, trying to generate a theory of perception which does not require representation. Although terminology of representation is used here, we do not claim that the world is represented perfectly in the brain; for more on this see Noë (2004). At the same time, Varela (e.g., Varela et al. 1991) and other central thinkers do not deny the importance of neurological activity or negate the possibility that exists neural activity rooted in the way that the body is present in the world. Rather, they oppose the approach of radical representationalism which claims that the brain is disconnected from the world. Indeed, we are convinced that there is no possibility of a brain in a vat, yet at the same time a discussion of neural maps is possible (even useful), as demonstrated by Damásio (2003, 1999). Moreover, representation—neural activity representing a certain situation of the body in the world—can also be applied in dynamic approaches to neuroscientific research using the phenomenological approach, yet the nervous system alone cannot provide us with information about the subjective experience (Cosmelli et al. 2007; Thompson 2007; Thompson and Varela 2001).

    In addition, the phenomenological approach rejects the concept of representation advocated by philosophy of mind (Zahavi and Parnas 1998; Thompson 2007). In fact, “The representative theory of perception claims that the rose affects my sensory apparatus, and that this causes a mental representation of the rose to arise in my consciousness. According to this theory, then, every perception implies (at least) two different entities, the extra-mental object and the intra-mental representation” (Gallagher and Zahavi 2008: 91). Indeed, this approach claims that the world is not represented neutrally and passively in one’s mind (Noë 2009) but that, since consciousness is part of nature and the mind is embodied, the mind extends into the world (Clark and Chalmers 1998) while representations do not reflect the world perfectly (Varela, Thompson and Rosch 1991, (see also the special volume of Review of Philosophy and Psychology (2012): 1–13).

  5. At the same time, it is likely that if this process continues for a prolonged period it will result in depersonalization, Dissociative Identity Disorder, and so on.

References

  • Becker, J. (1994). Music and trance. Leonardo Music Journal, 4, 41–51.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bermúdez, J. L., Marcel, A., & Eilan, N. (Eds.). (1995). The body and the self. Cambridge, London: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blackmore, S. (2004). Consciousness: An introduction. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blanke, O., & Metzinger, T. (2008). Full-body illusions and minimal phenomenal selfhood. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 13(1), 7–13.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cassam, Q. (2011). The embodied self. In S. Gallagher (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of the self (pp. 139–157). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Clark, A., & Chalmers, D. (1998). The extended mind. Analysis, 58, 7–19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cosmelli, D., & Thompson, E. (2011). Embodiment or envatment? Reflections on the bodily basis of consciousness. In S. John, O. Gapenne, & E. Di Paol (Eds.), Towards a new paradigm for cognitive science. Available online at http://individual.utoronto.ca/evant/Articles.htm. Accessed January 9, 2011.

  • Damásio, A. (1999). The feeling of what happens. New York: Harcourt Brace & Company.

    Google Scholar 

  • Damásio, A. (2003). Looking for Spinoza. Orlando: Harcourt.

    Google Scholar 

  • Depraz, N., Varela, F., & Vermersch, P. (Eds.). (2003). On becoming aware. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

    Google Scholar 

  • Descartes, R. (1641/2008). Meditations on first philosophy. (M. Moriarty, Trans.) Oxford: Oxford University Press.

  • Descartes, R. (1637/1996). Discourse on the method. (D. Weissman Ed.) New Haven: Yale University Press.

  • Flaherty, M. (1999). A watched pot: How we experience time. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gallagher, S. (2000). Philosophical conceptions of the self: Implications for cognitive science. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 4(1), 14–21.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gallagher, S. (2003). Bodily self-awareness and object-perception. Theoria et historia scientiarum: International Journal for Interdisciplinary Studies, 7(1), 53–68.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gallagher, S. (2005). How the body shapes the mind. Oxford: Clarendon.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Gallagher, S., & Zahavi, D. (2008). The phenomenological mind : An introduction to philosophy of mind and cognitive science. London: Routledge.

  • Gallagher, S., & Zahavi, D. (2010). Phenomenological approaches to self–consciousness. In E. Zalta (Ed.), Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/self-consciousness-phenomenological/. Accessed January 5, 2011.

  • Glicksohn, J. (2001). Temporal cognition and the phenomenology of time: A multiplicative function for apparent duration. Consciousness and Cognition, 10, 1–25.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Grassian, S. (2006). Psychiatric effects of solitary confinement. Journal of Law and Policy, 22(325), 327–383.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hartocollis, P. (1983). Time and timelessness or the varieties of temporal experience. New York: International Universities Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heidegger, M. (1996). Being and time. (J. Stambaugh, Trans.) Albany: New York Press.

  • Heidegger, M. (2011). The concept of time. (I. Farin, Trans.) London: Continuum.

  • Herman, J. L. (1992). Trauma and recovery. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hurlburt, R. (2009). Iteratively apprehending pristine experience. Journal of Consciousness Studies 16(10–12). Special Issue: Ten years of viewing from within: The legacy of F.J. Varela edited by Claire Petitmengin, pp. 156–188.

    Google Scholar 

  • Husserl, E. (1964). The phenomenology of internal time-consciousness. (M. Heidegger, Ed.) The Hague: M. Nijhoff.

  • James, W. (1890). The principles of psychology (Vol. 1). London: Macmillan.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • James, W. (1974). The varieties of religious experience. New York: Collier Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Janet, P. (1889/1973). L’automatisme psychologigue. Paris: Société Pierre Janet.

  • Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1999). Philosophy in the flesh. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Legrand, D. (2006). The bodily self: The sensori-motor roots of pre-reflective self-consciousness. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 5(1), 89–118.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Legrand, D. (2007). Pre-reflective self-consciousness: On being bodily in the world. Janus Head, 9(2), 493–519.

    Google Scholar 

  • Legrand, D. (2011). Phenomenological dimensions of bodily self–consciousness. In S. Gallagher (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of the self (pp. 204–227). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lenggenhager, B., Tadi, T., Metzinger, T., & Blanke, O. (2007). Video ergo sum: Manipulating bodily self–consciousness. Science, 317, 1096–1099.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lieblich, A. (1994). Seasons of captivity: the inner world of POWs. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ludwig, A. (1966). Altered states of consciousness. Archives of General Psychiatry, 15(3), 225–234.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Matthews, E. (2002). The philosophy of Merleau-Ponty. Chesham: Acuman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maure, M. (2009). The explicitation interview: Examples and applications. Journal of Consciousness Studies 16(10–12). Special issue: Ten years of viewing from within: The legacy of F.J. Varela edited by Claire Petitmengin, pp. 58–89.

    Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J. (2003). Remembering Trauma. Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

  • Merleau-Ponty, M. (2002). Phenomenology of perception (C. Smith, Trans.). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

  • Metzinger, T. (2005). Out-of-body experiences as the origin of the concept of a ‘‘soul’’. Mind and Matter, 3, 57–84.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mulhall, S. (1996). Routledge philosophy guidebook to Heidegger and Being and Time. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Neria, Y., Solomon, Z., & Dekel, R. (1998). An eighteen-year follow-up study of Israeli prisoners of war and combat veterans. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 186(3), 174–182.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Neria, Y., Solomon, Z., & Dekel, R. (2000a). Adjustment to the stress of war captivity: The role of sociodemographic background, trauma severity and coping in prison in the long-term mental health of Israeli ex-POWs. Anxiety, Stress, and Coping, 13, 229–246.

    Google Scholar 

  • Neria, Y., Solomon, Z., Ginzburg, K., & Dekel, R. (2000b). Sensation seeking, wartime performance, and long-term adjustment among Israeli war veterans. Personality and Individual Differences, 29, 921–932.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Neria, Y., Solomon, Z., Ginzburg, K., Dekel, R., Enoch, D., & Ohry, A. (2000c). Posttraumatic residues of captivity: A follow-up of Israeli ex-prisoners of war. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 61, 39–46.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nisbett, R., & Wilson, T. (1977). Telling more than we can know: Verbal reports on mental processes. Psychological Review, 84(3), 231–259.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Noë, A. (2004). Action in perception. Cambridge: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Noë, A. (2009). Out of our heads. New York: Hill and Wang.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ornstein, R. (1969). On the experience of time. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Peace, K. A., & Porter, S. (2004). A longitudinal investigation of the reliability of memory for trauma and other emotional experiences. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 18(9), 1143–1159.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Petitmengin, C. (2006). Describing one’s subjective experience in the second person: An interview method for the science of consciousness. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 5, 229–269.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Petitmengin, C. (2007). Towards the source of thoughts: The gestural and transmodal dimension of lived experience. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 14(3), 54–82.

    Google Scholar 

  • Petitmengin, C. & Bitbol, M. (2009). The validity of first-person descriptions as authenticity and coherence. Journal of Consciousness Studies 16(10–12). Special issue: Ten years of viewing from within edited by Claire Petitmengin, pp 363—404.

  • Poeppel, E. (1997). The brain’s way to create “nowness”. In H. Atmanspacher & E. Ruhnau (Eds.), Time, temporality, now (pp. 107–120). Berlin: Springer.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Ramachandran, V. S., & Blakeslee, S. (1998). Phantoms in the brain. New York: Quill William Morrow.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rouget, G. (1985). Music and trance. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shabtai, N. (2000). Traumatic stress situations. Tel-Aviv: Shoken Publishers [Hebrew].

  • Shanon, B. (2001a). Altered temporality. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 8(1), 35–58.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shanon, B. (2001b). Being out side the dominion of time. Maps, xi(2), 48–53.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shanon, B. (2002). The antipodes of the mind. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Slater, M., Spanlang, B., Sanchez-Vives, M. V., & Blanke, O. (2010). First person experience of body transfer in virtual reality. PLoS One, 12(5). Available online at http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0010564. Accessed May 6, 2011.

  • Solms, M., & Turnbull, O. (2002). The brain and the inner world. New York: Other Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Solomon, Z., Ginzburg, K., Neria, Y., & Ohry, A. (1995). Coping with war captivity: The role of sensation seeking. European Journal of Personality, 9(1), 57–70.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Spinoza, B. (1677/2000). Ethica. (G. H. R. Parkinson, Trans.) Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.

  • Strawson, G. (1997). The self. In S. Gallagher & J. Shear (Eds.), Journal of Consciousness Studies, 4(5–6), 405–428.

  • Tart, C. (Ed.). (1969). Altered states of consciousness. New York: John Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thompson, E. (2007). Mind in life. Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thompson, E., & Varela, F. (2001). Radicalmbodiment: Neural dynamics and consciousness. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 5(10), 418–425.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vaitl, D., Birbaumer, N., Gruzelier, J., Jamieson, G., Kotchoubey, B., Kübler, A., et al. (2005). Psychobiology of altered states of consciousness. Psychological Bulletin, 131, 98–127.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Varela, F. (1999). The specious present: A neurophenomenology of time consciousness. In J. Petitot, F. Varela, B. Pachoud, & J.-M. Roy (Eds.), Naturalizing phenomenology: Issues in contemporary phenomenology and cognitive science (pp. 266–329). Stanford: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Varela, F., & Shear, J. (Eds.). (1999). The view from within: First-person methodologies in the study of consciousness. London: Imprint Academic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Varela, F., Thompson, E., & Rosch, E. (1991). The embodied mind. Cambridge: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vermersch, P. (2009). Describing the practice of introspection. Journal of Consciousness Studies 16(10–12). Special issue: Ten years of viewing from within: The legacy of F.J. Varela edited by Claire Petitmengin, pp 20–57.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wittmann, M. (2009). The inner experience of time. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, 364, 1955–1967.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zahavi, D. (2003). Husserl’s phenomenology. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zahavi, D. (2006). Subjectivity and selfhood. Cambridge: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zahavi, D., & Parnas, J. (1998). Phenomenal consciousness and self-awareness: A phenomenological critique of representational theory. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 5(5–6), 687–705.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zakay, D. (1998). Psychological time. Ministry of Defence [Hebrew].

  • Zakay, D., & Block, R. (1997). Temporal cognition. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 6, 6–12.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zubek, J. (Ed.). (1969). Sensory deprivation: Fifteen years of research. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Program for the History, Philosophy and Sociology of Science, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel

    Yochai Ataria

  2. Department of Psychiatry, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, New York, NY, USA

    Yuval Neria

Authors
  1. Yochai Ataria
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Yuval Neria
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yochai Ataria.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Ataria, Y., Neria, Y. Consciousness-Body-Time: How Do People Think Lacking Their Body?. Hum Stud 36, 159–178 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-013-9263-3

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-013-9263-3

Keywords

Search

Navigation