Man has always grappled with questions about the nature of
consciousness. What is
consciousness? Where is it formed? How can we tell if a
person is conscious and aware? Unless a
person is willing and able to respond, and tell us that they are conscious and
aware, is it really possible to tell whether they are aware?
In order to convince someone that we are
conscious and aware, we have to respond. David Owen feels command- following is the
only way to tell if a human being is conscious. But what about patients n a vegetative state –
are they conscious? How can we tell?
Patients in a vegetative state “show no awareness of their surroundings
and doctors have assumed that the parts of the brain needed for cognition,
perception, memory and intention are fundamentally damaged. They are usually
written off as lost.” Therefore they are
incapable of making responses. How can consciousness be indicated if these
patients are conscious but incapable of generating responses? Watch this video in which David Owen takes you through his work with patients in a vegetative state:
In
2006, Adrian Owen asked a 23-year-old woman in a vegetative state to imagine
playing tennis and walking through the rooms of her house and showed that
her fMRI (Functional Magnetic Resonance
Imaging) scans had brain activation patterns “strikingly similar” to healthy
volunteers who were imagining these activities. According to Owen, this could
be an indication that she was conscious.
It will however require validation to suggest
with certainty that such “specific brain activity is a true indicator of
conscious awareness…It will likely be years before we understand what the true
implications of this research. “ Steven Novella
To
learn more about the research related to consciousness and the I in you, watch BBC Horizon – The Secret You
