A LIBRARIAN’S ORIENTATION
What this book explores
Susan Blackmore offers a compact tour of the questions that make consciousness difficult: subjective experience, attention, the self, free will, altered states, and the relation between mind and brain. She introduces major experiments and theories while showing why even the word consciousness remains contested.
EDITORIAL NOTE
Why it’s in the Library
This is a useful first map for travelers who want to understand the debate before choosing a theory. Its short form supplies vocabulary, questions, and scientific context without requiring prior study, making the rest of the consciousness shelf easier to navigate.
Good starting place if…
You want a brief, lively introduction to the central puzzles and competing theories of consciousness before reading a book that argues for one answer.
Know before you begin…
Although broad, this is not a view from nowhere. Blackmore is notably skeptical about a substantial inner self and sympathetic to illusionist interpretations of consciousness. The book distinguishes theories clearly, but her questions and conclusions sometimes lean toward that position; disputed interpretations should not be mistaken for settled neuroscience.