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Archive 1

(Conceptual metaphors)

What many on-line reviewers miss about Jaynes' concept of consciousness is its definition as an analog world constructed bicamerally through conceptual metaphors.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.159.170.169 (talk) 21:38, 4 December 2002

Citations to the "Julian Jaynes Society" dominate this page and the "bicameralism" page

Wikipedia and NPOV are a joke. DarthSquidward (talk) 04:40, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

The Voice of God

There is no doubt that cultures all over the world heard the Voice of God. Everything points to this one, irrefutable fact. We no longer hear this Voice (except for schizophrenics ). Why? No one has answered this question better than Julian Jaynes. No one else has even come close to answering the question, "Why is there religion?" -- LKS 5/10/06
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.253.73.236 (talk) 23:46 & :47, 10 May 2006

  • I too hear a voice in my head *all the time*. It is not a rare or remarkable event for me, as possibly it was for the ancients. It proposes instructions and solutions to problems, recalls information, and offers a fairly continuous commentary on events. So frequent has this voice become that I regard as a central feature of my psyche and I identify it as (part of) Me. No doubt you all have the very same experience. I believe this pursuit of auditory hallucinations is a red-herring... the ancients' voices have not gone away. What has changed is our relationship to the inner voice and its increased frequency, as we have become habituated to the phenomenon. Jayne's view was that the ancient society, with its low level of technology and rigid caste system, did not present the continuity of novel situations that required rational, self-conscious decision making to determine a course of action. Most actions were pre-determined by prevailing circumstances. He proposed that living from habit, convention and instinct meant that people did not develop the sense of interiority that we recognise as modern self-consciousness. Instead moments of unusual novelty, stress or uncertainty stimulated an inner voice which was regarded with awe, identified as the voice of the societies king / god and obeyed unquestioningly without further reflection. Indeed, his theory is that it was leaders of the society - the appointed kings - who were most frequently called upon to deal with complex and novel circumstances and who had the privilege of most frequently hearing advice from the gods. Jayne missed seeing the possibility that, rather than receding into an aberrant hallucinatory phenomenon, the inner voice has become universal, mundane and everyday.
    213.70.98.66 (talk) 12:12, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
  • Since Julian Jaynes is quoted as being in correspondence with Dennett, I don't think he's trying to "explain the voice of God" but merely offer up an interesting epistemological idea that does not really address issues of "hard" consciousness or evolutionary psychology. If anything he's offering up a psychological, non-biological evolutionary concept of the development of religion. (Biological Evolution Does Not Work That Way, so Jaynes' theory of recent development of internal concepts of the mind in order to explain voices in our head is really about psychology of the contemporary human mind and the development of modern social/historical self-awareness, which may be deeply influenced by surrounding culture, and has little to do with deep philosophical issues.) Place a human in a different social environment, and he may or may not be less self-aware. I'm not sure Jaynes really articulates this properly, but his theory is an interesting attempt to test it to extremes. The most obvious parallel to Jaynes is the theory of oral vs. written culture, which is an historical/epistemological issue, not an evolution or theory of mind issue. If the Aztecs as claimed were distraught upon self-identifying with the voices in their head as a consequence of being exposed to infectious Written Culture memes, that would merely suggest interesting things about contemporary human psychology. I don't agree or disagree with Jaynes, just want to point out that his ideas have little to do with phenomenal consciousness or religion as a product of human psychology. Any entity capable of symbolic thought is likely to postulate ideals whether or not they believe them to be manifest, or immanent in their head, or attempts to categorize phenomena otherwise incomprehensable to the observer.
    BER
    216.15.63.67 (talk) 09:53 & 10:03, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

When did the breaking down of bicameral mind take place?

08:46, 3 January 2007 (UTC)82.143.200.206
In his book Jaynes refers to the biblical myth of expulsion from Eden calling it a metaphor of awakening of consciousness.
So far I know this story is considered to be one of the oldest biblical myth - perhaps of summerian origin.
According to Jaynes breaking down of the bicameral mind took place in the second half of the second millenium B.C.
The summerian civilization ceased to exist on the border of 3rd and 2nd millenium B.C. Something might be wrong here...
Zlatan 03.01.2007
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.143.200.206 (talk) 08:46, 3 January 2007

  • No, not at all. The Genesis myth was a recension after the break down; the older Sumerian myth being drawn upon was, if I recall my Campbell, a more positive myth in which the serpent, a symbol of life (again following Campbell) bestowed it on the Adamic pair. That it was modified by the much later authors of Genesis into the current form of Trees of Knowledge and Life and the Fall don't augur against Jaynes's theories.
    --Gwern (contribs) 13:02 29 June 2007 (GMT)
  • Plus, as Jaynes makes clear, the version of the story which we have in Genesis is one that was written down well after the awakening of consciousness by the breakdown of bicamerality, and makes the story an allegory of that.
    12.214.62.215 (talk) 19:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • The breakdown occurs at different times for different cultures. Thus the The breakdown occurred in the Mayan culture well after it occurred in Greece and the Middle East. And the Incans were still bicameral when the Spanish arrived in the 16th century.
    What is important is not when the breakdown occurs in history, but where it occurs along the path along the path in the evolution of consciousness -- usually within a couple of hundred years of the establishment of a writing system (the externalization of thought).
    TimeDog (talk) 18:17, :18, :19, & :22 28, & 15:04, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Forgery Alert
In a series of acts that were at least technically included forgeries, an IP editor modified the preceding contrib (which is now restored to its state following its last edit by its originator), signed by a registered editor, and replaced it with the following text, without leaving any sigs or time stamps on this talk page, and without removing the originator's sig:

The breakdown (that is, the emergence of modern consciousness as we know it) occurs at different times in different cultures. The breakdown occurred in the Mayan culture well after it occurred in Greece and the Middle East. And the Incans were still bicameral when the Spanish arrived in the 16th century.
What is important is not when the breakdown occurs in history, but where it occurs along the path in the evolution of consciousness -- usually within a couple of hundred years of the establishment of a writing system (the visualization of language).

The insertion and changes (in the case of the word "when" only the addition of italics) that violated the integrity of the sig of User:TimeDog have now been marked here by bolding; they were made by 75.34.103.177 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) at 15:18, 22:40 & :41, on 19 August 2008
Forgery Alert

Much of the content seems to be copied from Marcel Kuijsten's "Myths vs. Facts About Julian Jaynes's Theory" and other sections of [1]. --ScottMainwaring (talk) 09:11, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

To those who insist on adding links to external articles in the Links section, if only one article appears it would seem that this article should provide a good overview of Jaynes’ theory for those who are new to the subject. S. Harnad’s article, which has been repeatedly posted in the Links section, is critical of Jaynes’ theory and heavily biased towards the phenomenal view. As it does not represent an objective discussion of Jaynes' theory, it should not appear in the Links section, but instead perhaps be discussed under Criticisms and footnoted. Provide a link to an overview of the theory and let people make up their own minds.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.224.2.78 (talk) 00:04 (2 edits) & :25, 25 December 2009

  • You link to a blank scribd page instead? There is nothing wrong with the link provided, but it seems IP editors are intend to remove it. Add links if they meet Wikipedia policies, but please do not remove links.
    Yworo (talk) 04:28, 25 December 2009 (UTC)
  • You are not the keeper of this page, or any other for that matter. If people think a link is inappropriate, they remove it. That's how it Wikipedia works. There are hundreds 100's of articles on Jaynes to choose from, posting a negative one as the only link from an individual who misrepresents the theory and is pushing his own ideas seems odd or agenda-driven. It's like posting an article by Rush Limbaugh as the sole link on Ted Kennedy's page. This biased, self-serving article belongs under Criticisms and deserves no special attention as the sole link to an article. I will continue to remove it and encourage others to do the same. This belongs on Harnad's page, not on Jaynes' page.
    —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.224.2.78 (talk) 05:29, :34, & :51, 25 December 2009
  • Please stop removing links. Wikipedia requires to provide links to all points of view if there are multiple. That is Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy. Also, please note that any given website may only be linked once. There is a link to the main page of julianjaynes.org, so further links to the same site may not be added, people can find the content by browsing the link. Also note that we may not link to copyrighted material which is not officially hosted by the publisher or one of the authors. Most likely a paper hostsed on a user page which does not belong to one of the authors is a copyright violation, and Wikipedia rules prohibit linking to copyright violations. Finally, if there is a abstract page, we link to that rather than directly to a PDF. Thanks.
    Yworo (talk) 17:12, :13, & :16, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

"Criticism" sec'n

(Re Julian Jaynes#Criticism)

Sleutels

A sentence i found in the "Criticism" section of the accompanying article,

Block's arguments have more recently been criticized by the Dutch philosopher Jan Sleutels.<ref>Kuijsten, Marcel (2007). Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness: Julian Jaynes's Bicameral Mind Theory Revisited. Julian Jaynes Society. pp. 303–335. ISBN 0-9790744-0-1.</ref>

is the result of some toning down, at some point in 2009, of the PoV of its original version of February 2008, but 25 months have not produced a level of specificity remotely comparable to what we already have regarding Block's and Dennett's contribution to the issue that Dennett describes as the claim of a "use-mention error".
I'm removing the sentence, intending no prejudice to its return if and when someone will provide several important aspects of Block's case that Sleutels has addressed, and which are regarded as telling by professional philosophers who are not associated with the JJSoc. I hope what i've gleaned abt Sleutels on-line will encourage others better suited than i to seek that kind of additional info. As it stands, the sentence says to little to be relevant: it really adds nothing meaningful at present to the evaluation of Jaynes or his theory.
--Jerzy•t 08:06 & 08:16, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Who is Sleutels?

Per http://www.hum.leiden.edu/philosophy/organisation/staff/sleutels.html, Dr. J.J.M. (Jan) Sleutels is an Assistant Professor in Metaphysics at the Leiden University Institute for Philosophy as of Dec. 2008, and presumably still. He has been publishing in philosophy since 1988, and published his PhD dissertation in 1994.
Per http://www.julianjaynes.org/about-society.php, he's one of five "Academic Advisors" of the JJSoc.
Per Google, he has (with "some entries very similar" to those counted)

173 for "J.J.M. Sleutels" OR "Jan Sleutels"

and

70 for "J.J.M. Sleutels" OR "Jan Sleutels" "Jaynes Society"

Per en:WP

no bio, but mentions in the two obvious JJ-related articles,

and per G-search of all WPs

no bio on any, but mentions, in one biblio list entry in nl:Eliminatief materialisme (cf. Eliminative materialism) and one in ext-lk list entry in nl:Paul Churchland (cf. Paul Churchland), in each case as author of the same work.
--Jerzy•t 08:06, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Does the section belong in the accompanying article?

I don't do a lot of bio work, but it strikes me that the section does not cover criticism of Jaynes, but of his best-known theory. It's not at all like criticisms of public figures who sustain criticism as war criminals or hypocrites. In particular, the section describes him as criticized for publishing outside the system of academic peer review, but no one believes that academics can't publish the same kinds of things that others can -- only that they don't enhance their academic careers -- unless the things they publish are in some way incompatible with academic standards for their fields, as some thot re Paul de Man#Posthumous controversy.
No doubt there has been definitive discussion of this question about WP bios in general, and its gist should be stated in this section. My own impression is that the question of Jaynes's notability or luck at personally formulating the secret of consciousness is not a controversy worthy of a criticism section, and that the questions of how much of his theory was right and wrong, and how important it will turn out to be in psychology and philosophy, are matters of fact that will not be soon decidable and about which people have speculations and prejudices that are as unworthy of encyclopedic discussion than whether Prince or the Danzig sucks worse.
In contrast, the criticism of bicameralism -- the substance of the section, please note -- is an ongoing matter of research and academic debate, the continuing development of a line of research and analysis, but should not be mistaken for criticism of him; that matters to science, but is just a minor sidelight to his life and biography. Shouldn't the section be removed from the accompanying article and copied to bicameralism with edit-summary entries that link the two articles? (And this whole "Criticism" talk-page section struck thru and copied onto bicameralism, with similar edit-summary entries?)
--Jerzy•t 08:06, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Consciousness is synonymous with what philosophers call "meta-consciousness"

"Jaynes' definition of consciousness is synonymous with what philosophers call "meta-consciousness" or "meta-awareness" i.e. awareness of awareness, thoughts about thinking, desires about desires, beliefs about beliefs."

Jaynes specifically and explicitly ruled this definition out. (See the 1st paragraph of Chapter 1 in "Origin".) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 44.37.31.76 (talk) 19:33, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

This is indeed embarrassing. The whole article is either taken from the society page (including typo) or just plainly wrong. Could some native speaker please change this?--212.202.152.190 (talk) 09:24, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Jaynes at Princeton

Julian Jaynes was lecturing at Princeton past 1990. I had his seminar, Psych 319, the Psychology of Consciousness, in the spring of 1992. Smdyer (talk) 01:01, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Theory or Hypothesis?

I think that in their current stage, Jaynes' assertions re: consciousness should be considered an hypothesis rather than a theory, at least in the scientific senses of those words. http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Theory — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.137.55.250 (talk) 22:03, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

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Controversy

I didn't make any changes to the article but I wanted to point out that the sentence in bold below is an unsourced opinion and not a fact so it doesn't belong in the article. If someone holds the opinion that something "is not now considered to be biologically probable" then they have a name or names or a source of some kind, I was under the impression that with Wikipedia articles shouldn't have completely unsourced claims or opinions.

Jaynes was a polymath genius, his book and theory is written in a way that some parts of it can be true without the entire theory being correct on every point. Even if the exact neurological process doesn't involve the right temporal cortex, for example, it doesn't mean the entire theory is wrong. Darwin was wrong on some details of his theories, but that doesn't mean that evolution isn't real.

In general, Jaynes is respected as a psychologist and a historian of psychology. The views expressed in The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind employ a radical neuroscientific hypothesis that was based on research novel at the time, and which is not now considered to be biologically probable.[citation needed] However, the more general idea of a "divided self" has found support from psychological and neurological studies, and many of the historical arguments made in the book remain intriguing, if not proven.[23] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Akechi77 (talk • contribs) 23:34, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

The Theories

This article is mainly a bio. The theories need attention, but obviously should be expanded in other places in Wiki. Meanwhile, I intend to delete the current 2nd paragraph about "meta-consciousness" and "meta-awareness"... Jaynes tells us on chapter 1, page 1 that "consciousness of consciousness" is not what consciousness is... B.Sirota (talk) 17:11, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

As of 11/19, I hope the Theories section here in the bio will help. It still needs improvement, but not to be overdone. The 'Bicameralism' article is currently the only option to carry the bulk of 'J-con' and 'Bicamerality' and 'Vestiges'. B.Sirota (talk) 16:12, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Content Migration 12/20

Migrating the "theory" content from "Julian Jaynes" page to "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" as this has been suggested by others and is the standard across Wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DRTZ212 (talk • contribs) 02:31, 19 December 2020 (UTC)

Edits by 216.106.53.90, 20Feb

‎ On 20 Feb./21, an editor wrote that Jaynes's four hypotheses are "mutually exclusive". If this editor knows what the phrase means, then either the edit is vandalism, or an explicit source should be cited and attributed as someone else's opinion. It certainly is not what Jaynes wrote. This editor's other changes are similarly unhelpful or just confusing, in my opinion. I am ready to revert most of the edits, unless someone offers a good reason not to. B.Sirota (talk) 06:36, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

Category: American Zoologists?

Why is Jaynes in this category? The article mentions exactly nothing about any work he did in that field. IAmNitpicking (talk) 02:02, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

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