These questions are being keenly debated in fields as diverse as cognitive science, neurophysiology and philosophy. The Journal of Consciousness Studies is a peer-reviewed journal which examines these issues in plain English.

A New Multi-Disciplinary Subject?

Over the last few years, research into consciousness has at last become accepted within the academic community. As John Searle puts it, raising the subject of consciousness in cognitive science discussions is no longer considered to be ``bad taste'', causing graduate students to ``roll their eyes at the ceiling and assume expressions of mild disgust.''

But why are we interested in consciousness? Most people are interested not just because of the academic and interdisciplinary challenges, but because of their personal experience - we have consciousness, we experience it; perhaps we even think that we ``are'' it. But, if we are to make progress in studying consciousness, we will have to think about it very clearly, and engage in serious constructive dialogues between a variety of viewpoints. And that is the purpose of this journal.

The field of consciousness studies is at a very early stage, characterized by crude theories, most of which are unlikely to stand the test of time. We prefer a broad, diverse and open conceptualization - including political consciousness, and ecological consciousness (for example in the sense of Bateson's ``ecology of mind''), but we do not wish to define for our authors exactly what any of these terms mean. We seek to provoke a spirited debate by actively seeking serious opposing views, for example from cognitive science, biology and philosophy.

The Journal of Consciousness Studies covers this broad field by:

• Presenting serious peer-reviewed scientific and humanistic papers
  in non-technical language:
  

Andy Clark: I am John's Brain The brain and its "agent" debate the provenance of thoughts in the charming language of an old Readers Digest article. Illustration: Jack Buckmaster Full text

• Including philosophical critiques of contemporary research:
  

Special Issue: Zombie Earth Contributors include: Daniel Dennett Owen Flanagan John McCarthy Jaron Lanier Mary Midgley Charles T. Tart Todd C. Moody Illustration: Paul Caro with thanks to the Times Higher

• Considering submissions from all disciplines and viewpoints:
  

Dipankar Home & Andrew Robinson: Einstein and Tagore: Man, nature and mysticism

• Encouraging a robust and lively debate on the full range of issues involved:

Rick Grush and Patricia Churchland described the Penrose-Hameroff theory of quantum coherence in microtubules as "no better supported than any one of a gazillion caterpillar-with-hookah hypotheses", to which Penrose and Hameroff reply:

• It's not that we're in Wonderland
  But p'raps their heads are in the sand

^{Illustration: Jack Buckmaster (with apologies to John Tenniel)}

Critical Reviews

The complete text from which these are extracted is available.

• Do we need this journal? . . . Yes, we do: there is no other journal quite like it, and one day we shall, I think, look back to its appearance as a defining moment . . . and at the price, it's a snip!
  Jeffrey Gray, Nature
  
• With JCS, consciousness studies has arrived.
  Susan Greefield, Times Higher Education Supplement
  
• There is a need for a journal that will publish high-quality work on consciousness while being at the same time less tied down by rigid views as to the suitability of material than most journals. One hopes that the promise of this first issue will be fulfilled.
  Brian Josephson, Times Higher Education Supplement.
  
• It is pleasant that we are promised discussions in the humanities as well as in science, with papers on culture and on the philosophy of mind slated for future issues. It will continue to have something for everybody.
  David Chalmers, Times Literary Supplement.
  
• A volatile mixture of refereed articles, interviews and conference reports from all camps (reductionist to mystical) in one of the most exciting areas of research and theory-making.
  Gene Feder, The Lancet.
  
• Its advisory board is a roll-call of the biggest names in consciousness publishing.
  John Cornwell, The Tablet.
  
• You guys have a marvelous magazine. You publish a lot of things that would not be published in routine philosophical and scientific journals, and that seems to me exactly right at our present state of the investigation of consciousness. We don't know how it works and we need to try all kinds of different ideas.
  John Searle (recorded interview with Anthony Freeman).

Full Text of Selected Articles

JCS is a traditional printed publication -- most of our subscribers like to read every article and we pride ourselves in the quality of our editing, printing and binding. Besides, at only $45 for six issues, "at the price, it's a snip!" (review in Nature magazine). However we have a thriving email discussion group, jcs-online which is archived here and have included the full text of a representative sample of refereed articles from JCS itself:

• David J. Chalmers, Facing up to the problem of consciousness (Volume 2, No.3)
• Daniel C. Dennett, Facing backwards on the problem of consciousness (Volume 3, No.1)
  
• Andy Clark, I am John's Brain (Volume 2, No.2)
• Todd C. Moody, Conversations with zombies (Volume 1, No.2)
• Jaron Lanier, You can't argue with a zombie (Volume 2, No.4)
• Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose, Conscious events as orchestrated spacetime selections (Volume 3, No. 1)
• Bernard J. Baars, Understanding subjectivity: Global Workspace theory and the resurrection of the observing self (Volume 3, No.3)
• Arthur Deikman, "I" = awareness (Volume 3, No.4)
• Thomas Metzinger, Faster than thought: holism, homogeneity and temporal coding (from Conscious Experience)
• Robert Forman, What does mysticism have to teach us about consciousness (from Tucson conference)

For free printed offprints of other articles, email sandra@imprint.co.uk

• Special Offer for new subscribers
• Special Issue: Explaining Consciousness: The Hard Problem
• Editorial board
• Contents: Vols 1-3
• Submitting papers and books for review
• Other consciousness resources

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