The Primordial Emotions: The Dawning of Consciousness
Encyclopedia
The Primordial Emotions: The Dawning of Consciousness is a 2006 book by the Australian neuroscientist Derek Denton
. In it Denton argues that, if self-awareness and intentionality are intrinsic to consciousness, the primordial emotions such as thirst, hunger and pain (that involve feeling the self and directed motivation) are the likely precursors to consciousness; that consciousness may have evolved out of these feelings and before the emergence of cognition. This opposes the view put by Edelman
that consciousness emerged after the development of cognitive processes such as the ability to create a scene from diverse sensory inputs.
Derek Denton
Emeritus Professor Derek Ashworth Denton AC is an Australian scientist renowned for his research exploring the nature of consciousness in animals....
. In it Denton argues that, if self-awareness and intentionality are intrinsic to consciousness, the primordial emotions such as thirst, hunger and pain (that involve feeling the self and directed motivation) are the likely precursors to consciousness; that consciousness may have evolved out of these feelings and before the emergence of cognition. This opposes the view put by Edelman
Gerald Edelman
Gerald Maurice Edelman is an American biologist who shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for work with Rodney Robert Porter on the immune system. Edelman's Nobel Prize-winning research concerned discovery of the structure of antibody molecules...
that consciousness emerged after the development of cognitive processes such as the ability to create a scene from diverse sensory inputs.