Two concepts of consciousness in contemporary analytic philosophy of mind

Philosophy of mind is of the most significant branches in contemporary analytic philosophy. The problem field of analytic philosophy of mind covers a variety of issues which are related to the essence, origin and functions of consciousness. Expansion of mental duality concept is also connected with this branch of philosophy. The essence of this concept lies in dividing mental on the phenomenal and psychological mental. The first is a kind of consciously experienced state, the consciousness "in the first person"; the second is the explanatory basis of behavior, consciousness "in the third person." In turn, the phenomenal consciousness can be a qualitative or subjective. Phenomenal mental may have, in turn, a qualitative or subjective character. Taking the idea that the term "consciousness" has two important sense, it is possible to clarify the main issues that arise in this subject area. First of all we are talking about the nature of consciousness. Confusing of the two aspects of mental entails a lot of contradictions: in most cases, the researching object is replaced with a narrower concept of "psychological mental" or "phenomenal mental". The issue of psychological nature of consciousness lies at the intersection of neuroscience and philosophy. However, the main difficulty is still in phenomenal mental. Contouring its borders contributes to the gradual resolution of most of the difficulties that arise here. It is most likely that the solution to mind-body problem lies in the area that is closely linked with the position that mental naturally but not logically supervenes on physical. That is, for any substance in our world the special structure of neurons which is exist in his body entails the existence of consciousness. However, this assertion doesn't mean that the consciousness has physical nature, it is only shows that the foundation of mental experience is a complex set of neural networks, which is present in our body. On the other hand, such a statement makes it possible reductionist explanation of the psychological concept of consciousness, but phenomenal aspects of it are still not amenable to reductionist explanation. Thus, the focus of attention of contemporary philosophical research of consciousness needed to replace to the phenomenal aspect. Psychological consciousness must also be neuroscience's subject of study.

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