Embodied Consciousness

The question of whether consciousness is embodied has been hindered by not first asking what the body is. The body as object—what you see in the mirror—is distinct from the body as subject, the lived body that cannot be seen. Consciousness is not merely housed in the lived body; it is identical to the lived body. The body as object contains no consciousness. Thus, the debate over embodied consciousness is resolved by recognizing that consciousness and the lived body are one and the same.

Study at a glance

Abstract

The question of whether consciousness is embodied has been vitiated by a failure to ask a more basic, and possibly obvious, question: what is the body? This chapter argues that the body you see in the mirror, the hands that you hold up in front of you, are instances of the body as object. But the body is more than the body as object. There is also the body as subject; the body as lived. You cannot see the lived body by looking in the mirror. The body as lived is that in virtue of which you see the body as object (and many other things also, of course). There is no question concerning whether consciousness is embodied in the lived body. Consciousness is the lived body; they are one and the same thing; the body as object has no trace of consciousness in it.