Department of Philosophy, Grinnell College, Grinnell, IA 50112-1690, USA.
Conscious Cogn. 2012 Jun;21(2):681-90. doi: 10.1016/j.concog.2011.03.012. Epub 2011 Apr 13.
It is widely accepted among philosophers that neuroscientists are conducting a search for the neural correlates of consciousness, or NCC. Chalmers (2000) conceptualized this research program as the attempt to correlate the contents of conscious experience with the contents of representations in specific neural populations. A notable claim on behalf of this interpretation is that the neutral language of "correlates" frees us from philosophical disputes over the mind/body relation, allowing the science to move independently. But the experimental paradigms and explanatory canons of neuroscience are not neutral about the mechanical relation between consciousness and the brain. I argue that NCC research is best characterized as an attempt to locate a causally relevant neural mechanism and not as an effort to identify a discrete neural representation, the content of which correlates with some actual experience. It might be said that the first C in "NCC" should stand for "causes" rather than "correlates."
哲学家普遍认为，神经科学家正在寻找意识的神经相关物，即 NCC。查默斯 (2000) 将这个研究项目概念化为试图将意识体验的内容与特定神经群体中的代表内容相关联。这种解释的一个显著主张是，“相关物”的中性语言使我们摆脱了关于身心关系的哲学争论，使科学能够独立发展。但是，神经科学的实验范式和解释准则对于意识和大脑之间的机械关系并不是中立的。我认为，NCC 研究最好被描述为试图找到一个因果相关的神经机制，而不是试图确定一个离散的神经表示，其内容与某些实际经验相关联。可以说，“NCC”中的第一个“C”应该代表“原因”而不是“相关物”。
