Is consciousness an entity?

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Ayn Rand defined "consciousness" as the faculty of perceiving that which exists, but "faculty" is an attribute designating an ability to perform. How can consciousness, being a faculty, i.e., an attribute, take actions, if actions are actions of entities?

[softwareNerd]

Is fear, love or some other emotion an entity? What about reasoning? How about taste and smell? And, why does it matter (i.e. what makes you ask the question)?

Edited May 2, 2009 by softwareNerd

[hunterrose]

Attributes don't take action.

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Consciousness takes actions, such as thinking, feeling, etc. If attributes don't take action, and consciousness is a faculty, how can it take action?

[crizon]

Consciousness is an attribute because it is strictly tied to an entity: you.

Consciousness can't exist as an entity just like Warmth or Coldness can't, although you could say "they make stuff warmer/colder" (which is false, because they are not entities).

[Grames]

Ayn Rand defined "consciousness" as the faculty of perceiving that which exists, but "faculty" is an attribute designating an ability to perform. How can consciousness, being a faculty, i.e., an attribute, take actions, if actions are actions of entities?

Consciousness is an existent. The relationship between consciousness and thinking or feeling is that of an attribute and its exercise. This is exactly analogous to saying your legs carry you as walk from place to place, that your nose smells things, or that your eyes see things. This is a manner of speaking that shortens the identification of the full causal chain by substituting the first or Aristotelian "efficient cause" for the whole.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Consciousness is certainly not an entity in the Christian sense of being a soul that is somehow separable from the body; in Objectivism, consciousness (or the soul) is more of an ability that humans have to be aware of existence and aware of it awareness of existence and has the capacity to direct itself. In Aristotelian terms, it is a biological power, just as fish can breath under water and bats can detect things via sonar -- where it is clear that neither the breathing nor the sonar are entities, but rather biological capabilities.

Calling it the first line of an Aristotelian "efficient cause" can be misleading, since consciousness is not an entity that does something to something else. Consciousness does have efficacy -- i.e. you can consciously decide to reply to this essay and do it -- but it is not an entity, but rather an ability. In other words, you are the entity that has consciousness of existence.

[Grames]

Consciousness is certainly not an entity in the Christian sense of being a soul that is somehow separable from the body; in Objectivism, consciousness (or the soul) is more of an ability that humans have to be aware of existence and aware of it awareness of existence and has the capacity to direct itself. In Aristotelian terms, it is a biological power, just as fish can breath under water and bats can detect things via sonar -- where it is clear that neither the breathing nor the sonar are entities, but rather biological capabilities.

Calling it the first line of an Aristotelian "efficient cause" can be misleading, since consciousness is not an entity that does something to something else. Consciousness does have efficacy -- i.e. you can consciously decide to reply to this essay and do it -- but it is not an entity, but rather an ability. In other words, you are the entity that has consciousness of existence.

There is a specific way it can be misleading, which is I think the point of the thread. It can be an instance of reification.

As Ayn Rand makes clear in this exerpt from ITOE, parts are distinguished from attributes by their ability to exist apart from the whole. Consciousness is not physically separable from the rest of a person as parts of the body (legs, eyes) are. Consciousness is not an entity.

The correct format for speaking and writing that attributes actions to entities is as follows: Gills are for breathing in water, lungs are for breathing in air, legs are walking, eyes are for seeing, and brains are for thinking. In each of those examples the faculty involved is: respiration, ambulation, vision, and consciousness. These 'faculties' are are so named by singling out for special attention the distinguishing and most important action enabled by the respective body part. It is an error to think that consciousness exists apart from the brain. I think the OP is confused by sentences that attribute acts of thought to consciousness.

Consider 'consciousness' as a word used in a sentence in which it is the subject taking action. "Consciousness thinks about an idea". Is the sentence correct or incorrect philosophically speaking? It is incorrect.

After all, vision doesn't see things, it is not ambulation that does the walking, or respiration that does the breathing. Thus consciousness does not do the thinking. Consciousness is the thinking.