Journal of Philosophical Investigations
January 26, 2026
Zeinab Mahdavi, Bakhtiar Shabani-Varaki, Tahereh Javidi-Kalateh-Jafarabadi
Contemplative pedagogy, grounded in a neurophenomenological understanding of consciousness as irreducible, embodied, and emergent, can reframe educational paradigms by integrating first-person experiential insights with third-person perspectives on neural, bodily, and environmental dynamics. The framework operates across four dimensions: internal awareness through self-exploration techniques, embodied action via autopoiesis and enaction, intersubjective empathy and compassion, and engagement with social and institutional contexts. This multidimensional approach cultivates consciousness holistically, suggesting education can foster deeply embodied and relational understanding, transforming learning into a process rooted in contemplative consciousness.
Journal of Philosophical Investigations
November 30, 2025
Saeid Karimi, Morteza Tabatabaie
Philosophical discussions of consciousness often distinguish between phenomenal consciousness—the subjective, inner experience of sensations like pain or pleasure—and psychological or access consciousness, which involves cognitive capacities such as reasoning and behavior. This article argues that this distinction can guide ethical judgments about moral status. Beings with only access consciousness, such as some advanced artificial intelligences, might deserve functional autonomy but not the right to avoid suffering. In contrast, infants and animals, who possess phenomenal experience, deserve the right not to suffer even without higher cognition. The analysis suggests that determining whether artificial intelligence could have phenomenal consciousness carries significant philosophical and ethical implications.
Journal of Philosophical Investigations
November 30, 2025
Tayyebeh Gholami, Hassan Hosseini-Sarvari
Cognitive science has undergone three major revolutions since the mid-20th century. Classical cognitivism, which relies on computational representation and symbolic processing, struggles to explain interactions between mind, body, and environment. The 4E approach—embodied, embedded, enacted, and extended—views cognition as dynamic, situated, and interactive, emphasizing the role of the body, tools, and environmental context. Integrating classical views with the 4E perspective may guide future research toward a more comprehensive and interdisciplinary framework, though methodological and operational challenges persist.
Journal of Philosophical Investigations
February 26, 2022
Samad Hosseini, Abbas Yazdani
Neuroscience's success in explaining mental states has led many scientists and philosophers to adopt physicalist methods, aiming to explain human nature solely through physical concepts. The main challenge to this view is consciousness, specifically the mind-body problem. This article argues that phenomenal awareness is the most important challenge to materialism. By dividing consciousness into "perceptual consciousness" and "phenomenal consciousness," it contends that scientific theories can at best explain perceptual consciousness, but phenomenal consciousness remains beyond the reach of physical sciences due to the inherent nature of mentality, unless a first-person perspective science is recognized.
Journal of Philosophical Investigations
March 19, 2025
Mohsen Japani, Masood Seif, Mohammad-Hassan Heidari et al.
Husserl transformed Brentano's inadequate account of perceiving temporal things into a layered theory of time-consciousness. He first examined consciousness of temporal objects, then the temporal consciousness of that consciousness, and finally the absolute stream of consciousness. By introducing concepts such as primary memory, primary expectation, retention, and protection, Husserl moved away from the centrality of the actual present now and the metaphysics of presence. Although he challenged the dominance of presence, he stopped short of bypassing absolutely present consciousness entirely.
Journal of Philosophical Investigations
December 19, 2022
Nafiseh Mostafavi
Mulla Sadra introduces a new type of intelligence called Wisdom intelligence (WI), or Al-Hikma al-Ghriziyya, proposing three general spectrums of its relationship with education; only one spectrum requires education in theoretical reason and training in behaviors, emotions, inclinations, and moods as prerequisites for attaining wisdom. Emmons pursues spiritual intelligence (SI) as the ability to enter higher spiritual states of consciousness and to solve problems for well-being, expanding a five-factor model of SI. The concept of spiritual intelligence is more general than Wisdom intelligence, and Emmons's three-factor model resembles criteria of WI, though Mulla Sadra takes a cognitive and philosophical approach to intelligence, focusing on the source and manner of achieving consciousness.