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The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul: Learning and the Origins of Consciousness
A new theory about the origins of consciousness that finds learning to be the driving force in the evolutionary transition to basic consciousness. What marked the evolutionary transition from organisms that lacked consciousness to those with consciousness—to minimal subjective experiencing, or, as Aristotle described it, “the sensitive soul”? In this book, Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jablonka propose a new theory about the origin of consciousness that finds learning to be the driving force in the transition to basic consciousness. Using a methodology similar to that used by scientists when they identified the transition from non-life to life, Ginsburg and Jablonka suggest a set of criteria, identify a marker for the transition to minimal consciousness, and explore the far-reaching biological, psychological, and philosophical implications. After presenting the historical, neurobiological, and philosophical foundations of their analysis, Ginsburg and Jablonka propose that the evolutionary marker of basic or minimal consciousness is a complex form of associative learning, which they term unlimited associative learning (UAL). UAL enables an organism to ascribe motivational value to a novel, compound, non-reflex-inducing stimulus or action, and use it as the basis for future learning. Associative learning, Ginsburg and Jablonka argue, drove the Cambrian explosion and its massive diversification of organisms. Finally, Ginsburg and Jablonka propose symbolic language as a similar type of marker for the evolutionary transition to human rationality—to Aristotle's “rational soul.”
640 pages, Hardcover
Published March 12, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 17, 2019
This is a long and detailed book, which took several days of careful reading to make it through; definitely not one for sating casual interest in the topic. That said, it provides a convincing account of the evolution of conscious experience and the mechanisms by which it functions, providing new ways to look for the presence of consciousness in different animals. I may not agree with all the ideas presented or conclusions drawn, but I can already tell this is work I'll be citing a lot moving forwards on this field.
November 3, 2022
'The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul: Learning and the Origins of Consciousness' is a mammoth: 482 pages of text, 62 pages of notes, 72 pages of bibliography and an index of 28 pages. It took a decade to write.
Eva Jablonka is a microbiologist & evolutionary theorist with a Ph.D in genetics. She is especially known for her interest in epigenetic inheritance, and she co-authored the landmark Evolution in Four Dimensions: Genetic, Epigenetic, Behavioral, and Symbolic Variation in the History of Life with Marion Lamb. That book was published in 2006 by MIT Press, and on the strength of this book I’ve added it to my TBR. Simona Ginsburg is a chemist with a Ph.D. in physiology.
The title is a bit misleading in the sense that the moniker ‘sensitive soul’ might sound New Age-ish, but make no mistake: this is as scientific as non-fiction can get. Jablonka & Ginsburg use the term ‘soul’ as an hommage to Aristotle, and the next two quotes elaborate a bit on that, and at the same time set the stage:
"The Aristotelian soul is the dynamic embodied form (organization) that makes an entity teleological in the intrinsic sense – having internal goals that are not externally designed for it but that are dynamically constructed by it."
&
"From an evolutionary point of view, understanding the transitions that resulted in the three Aristotelian goal-directed systems is enormously challenging. The first problem, understanding the transition to the first living system, to the nutritive (/reproductive) soul, is still not fully solved, although great strides have been made in this domain. Very little is known about the second, understanding the transition to subjective experiencing, the evolutionary origin of the sensitive soul. The third, understanding the transition to rationalizing, symbolizing animals, to the rational (human) soul, is one of the hottest topic in present-day evolutionary-cognitive biology, and progress is being made. All of these goal-directed systems are the products of chemical and biological evolution, and there is an evolutionary continuity between them."
The book has two distinct parts: the first a history of the biological conceptions of ‘consciousness’ and some of its philosophical foundations – from Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, Herbert Spencer, Charles Darwin and William James, via Pavlov and Skinner to contemporary neuroscience. The second part looks more closely at major (neuro)biological transitions in the evolution of the mind, and basically sketches the evolution of neural systems and how learning ties into that. It should be stressed that most of the book is about minimal animal consciousness, not about human consciousness.
Instead of trying to summarize the book in more detail, I’ll quote some of the praise I found on the MIT website – and I can say after having read it, none of it is hyperbole.
(...)
Last year I read 'Contingency and Convergence: Toward a Cosmic Biology of Body and Mind' by Russell Powell, a true intellectual feast. Ginsburg & Jablonka’s book touches on many of the same themes, but frames them differently. Powell’s book is about the nature of evolution, minds, and the possible implications for astrobiology, Ginsburg & Jablonka focus on learning and the evolutionary history of neural systems, including a chapter on jellyfish and the likes that was more informative than Jellyfish by Lisa-Ann Gershwin.
For a wee bit of critique: I would have liked a bit more sections on (the neurology of) mental representation. To me it felt as if Ginsberg & Jablonka don’t fully engage with this part of the consciousness problem, especially as I’ve read Alex Rosenberg’s 'How History Gets Things Wrong: The Neuroscience of Our Addiction to Stories' – a book specifically about that. I would have liked to read the authors’ take on what Rosenberg wrote.
Anyhow, what makes this book a joy to read is its enormous scope, and what makes it truly amazing is its attention to detail on nearly everything it touches: this is no quick pop-science overview of the latest research, no, this is the real deal: interdisciplinary scholarly work of the highest order.
The book is clear and self-contained, and requires no previous knowledge, but at times it is tough reading nonetheless – especially parts of chapter 8 were beyond my level of interest of understanding. This will be different for different kind of readers, but this is obviously an academic book, so your mileage may vary.
Jonathan Birch’s 7-page critical essay on the book in Acta Biotheoretica is well-worth reading, he summarizes it in just two sentences: “Ginsburg and Jablonka’s thesis, in short, is that second-order conditioning involving novel, compound stimuli is a signature of consciousness. This kind of learning cannot happen, they claim, if the stimuli are not consciously experienced.”
If the subject matter interests you, I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Together with 'How Molecular Forces and Rotating Planets Create Life: The Emergence and Evolution of Prokaryotic Cells' by Jan Spitzer – coincidentally about the first Aristotelian transition – it is the best book I’ve read all year.
I’ll leave you with a whole lot of quotes and insights I wish to preserve for myself.
(...)
Full review on Weighing A Pig Doesn't Fatten It
Eva Jablonka is a microbiologist & evolutionary theorist with a Ph.D in genetics. She is especially known for her interest in epigenetic inheritance, and she co-authored the landmark Evolution in Four Dimensions: Genetic, Epigenetic, Behavioral, and Symbolic Variation in the History of Life with Marion Lamb. That book was published in 2006 by MIT Press, and on the strength of this book I’ve added it to my TBR. Simona Ginsburg is a chemist with a Ph.D. in physiology.
The title is a bit misleading in the sense that the moniker ‘sensitive soul’ might sound New Age-ish, but make no mistake: this is as scientific as non-fiction can get. Jablonka & Ginsburg use the term ‘soul’ as an hommage to Aristotle, and the next two quotes elaborate a bit on that, and at the same time set the stage:
"The Aristotelian soul is the dynamic embodied form (organization) that makes an entity teleological in the intrinsic sense – having internal goals that are not externally designed for it but that are dynamically constructed by it."
&
"From an evolutionary point of view, understanding the transitions that resulted in the three Aristotelian goal-directed systems is enormously challenging. The first problem, understanding the transition to the first living system, to the nutritive (/reproductive) soul, is still not fully solved, although great strides have been made in this domain. Very little is known about the second, understanding the transition to subjective experiencing, the evolutionary origin of the sensitive soul. The third, understanding the transition to rationalizing, symbolizing animals, to the rational (human) soul, is one of the hottest topic in present-day evolutionary-cognitive biology, and progress is being made. All of these goal-directed systems are the products of chemical and biological evolution, and there is an evolutionary continuity between them."
The book has two distinct parts: the first a history of the biological conceptions of ‘consciousness’ and some of its philosophical foundations – from Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, Herbert Spencer, Charles Darwin and William James, via Pavlov and Skinner to contemporary neuroscience. The second part looks more closely at major (neuro)biological transitions in the evolution of the mind, and basically sketches the evolution of neural systems and how learning ties into that. It should be stressed that most of the book is about minimal animal consciousness, not about human consciousness.
Instead of trying to summarize the book in more detail, I’ll quote some of the praise I found on the MIT website – and I can say after having read it, none of it is hyperbole.
(...)
Last year I read 'Contingency and Convergence: Toward a Cosmic Biology of Body and Mind' by Russell Powell, a true intellectual feast. Ginsburg & Jablonka’s book touches on many of the same themes, but frames them differently. Powell’s book is about the nature of evolution, minds, and the possible implications for astrobiology, Ginsburg & Jablonka focus on learning and the evolutionary history of neural systems, including a chapter on jellyfish and the likes that was more informative than Jellyfish by Lisa-Ann Gershwin.
For a wee bit of critique: I would have liked a bit more sections on (the neurology of) mental representation. To me it felt as if Ginsberg & Jablonka don’t fully engage with this part of the consciousness problem, especially as I’ve read Alex Rosenberg’s 'How History Gets Things Wrong: The Neuroscience of Our Addiction to Stories' – a book specifically about that. I would have liked to read the authors’ take on what Rosenberg wrote.
Anyhow, what makes this book a joy to read is its enormous scope, and what makes it truly amazing is its attention to detail on nearly everything it touches: this is no quick pop-science overview of the latest research, no, this is the real deal: interdisciplinary scholarly work of the highest order.
The book is clear and self-contained, and requires no previous knowledge, but at times it is tough reading nonetheless – especially parts of chapter 8 were beyond my level of interest of understanding. This will be different for different kind of readers, but this is obviously an academic book, so your mileage may vary.
Jonathan Birch’s 7-page critical essay on the book in Acta Biotheoretica is well-worth reading, he summarizes it in just two sentences: “Ginsburg and Jablonka’s thesis, in short, is that second-order conditioning involving novel, compound stimuli is a signature of consciousness. This kind of learning cannot happen, they claim, if the stimuli are not consciously experienced.”
If the subject matter interests you, I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Together with 'How Molecular Forces and Rotating Planets Create Life: The Emergence and Evolution of Prokaryotic Cells' by Jan Spitzer – coincidentally about the first Aristotelian transition – it is the best book I’ve read all year.
I’ll leave you with a whole lot of quotes and insights I wish to preserve for myself.
(...)
Full review on Weighing A Pig Doesn't Fatten It
January 3, 2021
'A long odyssey from Lamarck's inner feeling and the white noise of preconscious nervous systems to the symphonies and operas of the sensitive and rational souls.
Dennett on steroids.'
Dennett on steroids.'
Want to read
June 8, 20196/8/19 found it in the Wall St. Journal The Explosive Evolution of Consciousness https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-expl...
December 14, 2019
Hard read and time consuming. When finished it gives a view of how humans got their consciousness and dates back to cambrian explosion around 50 million years back
November 1, 2022
Another open-mind book by Eva Jablonka. Just read it.
April 7, 2023
my 10 year old daughter asked me recently: “ Dad, who and what are we?”
Me seizing opportunity (as I had just finished reading this book):
“….Each of us is a spatiotemporally boundaried functional and telelogical, dynamic organisational complex system,
consisting of multiple layers of nested subsystem hierarchies from atoms all the way to neural networks and modular minds, capable of unlimited associational learning,
engaging in making predictions regarding their actions on the self and world ….
and updating with precision such predictions with feedback and feed forward mechanisms
to allow for maximal probability of surviving and thriving through the maintenance of homeostasis,
guided by the Bayesian mathematical correction zone known as the Markov Blanket.
Additionally, Grossbergian resonances and complementarity between modular representations allow for self-reflective loops to form..
Mechanisms of language then accentuate these loops to allow the emergence of the complex multi-qualic experience we label as the Self”.
My daughter “….’kay.” ( while non-verbally giving me the look suggesting she thinks I’m a complete ****. Accurately so).
In my best Kuiil voice: "This is my review. I have spoken".
Me seizing opportunity (as I had just finished reading this book):
“….Each of us is a spatiotemporally boundaried functional and telelogical, dynamic organisational complex system,
consisting of multiple layers of nested subsystem hierarchies from atoms all the way to neural networks and modular minds, capable of unlimited associational learning,
engaging in making predictions regarding their actions on the self and world ….
and updating with precision such predictions with feedback and feed forward mechanisms
to allow for maximal probability of surviving and thriving through the maintenance of homeostasis,
guided by the Bayesian mathematical correction zone known as the Markov Blanket.
Additionally, Grossbergian resonances and complementarity between modular representations allow for self-reflective loops to form..
Mechanisms of language then accentuate these loops to allow the emergence of the complex multi-qualic experience we label as the Self”.
My daughter “….’kay.” ( while non-verbally giving me the look suggesting she thinks I’m a complete ****. Accurately so).
In my best Kuiil voice: "This is my review. I have spoken".
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews