Systems of consciousness

The exteroceptive organs constitute a model of a whole system of consciousness. First, they are active organs, while all of them can respond to stimulation when they are passive, as when a light is suddenly shined in your eye, they normally engage in an active scanning of the environment. Your eyes dart about you turn your head or perk up your ears to hear sounds more clearly you reach out to touch things that interest you. Similarly, consciousness can be passively stimulated, but ordinarily it is an active process. 

The question of its ultimate reality is difficult, if one starts from the conservative view of the mind, where awareness is no more than a product of the nervous system and brain, the degree of independence or objectivity of the observer can only be relative. The Observer may be a semi-independent system with fewer characteristics than the overall system of consciousness as a whole, but it is dependent on the operation of neurologically based structures and so is ultimately limited and shaped by them it is also programmed to some extent in the enculturation process. Hilgard 26 has found the concept of such a partially dissociated observer useful in understanding hypnotic analgesia. 

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