Nobody knows how consciousness works – but top researchers are fighting over which theories are really science

By Tim Bayne, Professor of Philosophy, Monash University

Science is hard. The science of consciousness is particularly hard, beset with philosophical difficulties and a scarcity of experimental data.

So in June, when the results of a head-to-head experimental contest between two rival theories were announced at the 26th annual meeting of the Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness in New York City, they were met with some fanfare.

The results were inconclusive, with some favouring “integrated information theory” and others lending weight to the “global workspace theory”. The outcome was covered in both

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