A Subconscious or an Unconscious Mind?

[RichardY]

Is there an unconscious mind? Perhaps making decisions in the background, maybe even with plans of its/their own, constructive and destructive. In which case what is really you? Subject to perhaps subliminal messaging. Freudian.

Or is there a subconscious mind? That contains your Values, Ethics, innate ability and the "muscle power"/perseverance built up over hard-work, number crunching and performing tasks of skill. Master of your Destiny, Atlas holding up the World, or at least a part. Randian or compatible with the Christian idea of a soul.

[Boss]

This is an interesting topic, from what I understand the conscious mind is the mind that gathers the input from reality/experiences. The subconscious mind is the mind that stores what the conscious mind sees as important like traumatic events, family, etc. And the unconscious mind is the mind that supposedly holds the consciously forgotten memories like what you wore and ate 6 years ago or any arbitrary forgettable date.

Does the unconscious mind exist? well if it is the mind that holds forgotten thoughts that cant be access consciously then I guess you can say it doesnt exist to the conscious mind. But it may exist to other conscious minds. Like when someone gets knocked out and doesnt remember it, someone else's conscious mind may have seen it so it can exist in that sense.

There is the thought experiment 
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

So if I had to guess I would say in addition to the conscious mind there is the subconscious mind and other conscious minds

[dysfunc_survivor]

Unconscious or a Subconscious is mostly semantics. What is consciousness? Since the word "conscious" means aware, unconscious or subconscious are oxymorons, but only from the perspective that what we by our conscious mind consider conscious. *phew* Does the unconsious consider the conscious conscious?

The conscious and the un/subconscious are merely aware of different things. The unconscious communicate to the conscious in ways that are mostly invisible to the conscious mind, unless you consciously pay attention to it. It mostly communicates in shapes, patterns and of course feelings and sensations. That's why things like music and art are important to humans; they are mostly patterns, which speaks directly to the un/subconscious if it has any quality.

[ofd]

It seems that the conscious mind rubberstamps and takes credit for what the unconscious mind does. The ACC makes sure that the unconscious mind can work on its own and isn't bother with interference from the conscious mind. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anterior_cingulate_cortex

See also http://science.sciencemag.org/content/303/5660/969.long for more details. 

[RichardY]

7 hours ago, dysfunc_survivor said:

Unconscious or a Subconscious is mostly semantics. What is consciousness? Since the word "conscious" means aware, unconscious or subconscious are oxymorons, but only from the perspective that what we by our conscious mind consider conscious. *phew* Does the unconsious consider the conscious conscious?

Alone, then the Unconscious or Subconscious would be oxymorons. I think the distinction being on how the mind functions together with the conscious, that is not within our direct conscious perception, but can be inferred indirectly through other peoples behaviour.

 

A thought experiment: A man walks into a Shopping Mall, after looking around for an hour he goes to eat at the Food Court. Now did he decide consciously after an hour, or did he decide to go to eat at the food court unconsciously when he came into the Mall, perhaps influenced with the smell of food? maybe he has become accustomed to it, so he's not even conscious of the smell.

[MRAllen440]

I will add in my .02 cents, here. I just finished Robert Wright's Moral Animal (recommended). His conclusion is that free will is just socialized instinct. Near the end of the book, a quote from Wright: "our conscious mind isn't privy to all the motivating forces." And from Darwin (within Moral Animal): "the general delusion about free will obvious... his motives [are] mostly instinctive." My take on Wright and Darwin's argument is that consciousness is developed from the unconscious mind. And, the conscious mind is just a tool of the unconscious. I thought it was an interesting argument, so I shared it here.

Also, in psychology, the term subconscious is no longer really used, but unconscious is. I like unconscious better too, because "sub" makes it sound inferior to the conscious mind, which it is not. The unconscious has been developed over millions of years and Stefan has mentioned, before, that it operates much faster than the conscious mind.

Great discussion here.

[villagewisdom]

On 4/22/2017 at 8:51 AM, RichardY said:

A thought experiment: A man walks into a Shopping Mall, after looking around for an hour he goes to eat at the Food Court. Now did he decide consciously after an hour, or did he decide to go to eat at the food court unconsciously when he came into the Mall, perhaps influenced with the smell of food? maybe he has become accustomed to it, so he's not even conscious of the smell.

There are way too many possibilities to this scenario. He likely had hundreds of thousands of thoughts from the time he entered the mall to the time he ate. And those thoughts are in addition to thoughts that led him to go to the mall in the first place. He could be influenced by his habits. He could be influenced by his body signaling hunger. He could be a compulsive shopper and eataholic testing his resolve. He could be looking to fill some hole in his life or he could have simply planned his day before leaving and executed his plan. Hundreds of thousands of thoughts went into the decision. Some were conscious, most were not. Most are just running like water. I have seen data estimating anywhere from 50,000 to 200,000 thoughts per waking hour. Most are not even noticed any more than than the air that we breathe is noticed. It is the noticing of the thought that makes it a conscious thought. 

That leads me to the question of whether the unnoticed thoughts are unconscious or subconsious? Here's my theory.

Any thought that is unnoticed and then becomes noticed was unconscious but has become conscious. What I mean by this are all of those thoughts that are seemingly endless that carry the voices of our many ideas about ourself. I'm "this" or I'm "that" or I'm "like this or that". They are the thoughts that we live with every day upon awakening. We can know exactly what these thoughts are if we pay attention to them. An unconscious thought can become a conscious thought -- and vice versa actually. Repetitive activities lead to creating unconscious thoughts that just run their program and we can brush our teeth without really thinking about it. 

Subconscious thought would always be "sub" or "below" conscious awareness. A hunch, a feeling, an urge to go one way or another. A drive to be a musician or engineer or teacher would be subconsious. A subconscious thought would always be there as an urge or desire coloring our choices but unidentifiable as a specfic thought with sentence structure and story. "I just want it and I don't know why" is an example. This might be distinguished as follows. Do you desire the career or is there an unconscious thought pattern of choosing a career based on "following in your father's footsteps". You may desire that career or you may just do it because it is expected. The desired version is subconscious. The expected version is based on unconsious thoughts of yourself based on your "father voice". It could also be both.

Great topic. 

[Ianua]

Your query reminds me of the debate of whether light is a particle or a wave.  Definitions are essential. Freud was a neurologist by profession and his ideas are legion, but rarely understood.  I want to address a few points individually if I may.  I will define 3 terms that I plan to use.  

In Freud's model, the mind is made up of three components, the ego, superego and the id.  The ego is you, the real you.  It is what directs the body, interacts directly with the world, it may be strong or weak and may have different aspects, kinda like multiple personalities.  As you grow, you choose the real you and strengthen that one, integrating all others and absorbing their experiences and memories.  This is the normal state of development  People with abusive or neglected childhoods may never grow and have a stunted ego or multiple ones (without being DID)   The superego is a combination of your parents expectations and societal pressures.  It tries to force the ego to behave in certain ways based upon expectations.  These influences can be very strong and can cause extreme stress.  The id can be viewed as your inner child.  It wants, fears, needs but can't act.  I usually explain that my id may want to bathe in the blue raspberry jello filled reflecting pool at the Taj Mahal; the super ego pipes up and says DON'T waste your money and WHAT will the neighbors think? With both of them screaming in the background, the ego must try to mediate the demands of both, apply the reality principle and make a choice that quiets all of them.

Consciousness:  There are different states that a person can achieve that posses their own set of memories.  We use this facility when someone does an all night study session on red bull and then drinks it again during the test.  Drunks that experience blackouts are not unconscious, just in a different state of awareness and those memories will likely be accessible when he again blacks out.  The way the mind stores experiences, especially traumatic ones, can render them inaccessible to the parts of the ego at different states of consciousness.

The mind may force us to act irrationally, but it always is logical.  By examining why you act, especially in times of stress, you can discover what forces are pushing you to behave in certain ways.  This examination leads to a greater awareness of self and allows you a greater ability to understand what moves you.  

I did not address the main issue of unconscious vs subconscious since I am unsure what the OP means by those terms. Perhaps he would be kind enough to supply his definition.

[ofd]

There is also no reason to equate free will with the conscious mind. Neurons suddently don't change their nature and become active agents just because they are in the conscious part of our mind.

[dysfunc_survivor]

Another way of looking at conscious / unconscious / subconscious as just different organs. We tend to group them together and slap generalizations on them, as if they were of the same kind. This can be advantageous from some perspectives, but perhaps disadvantageous from others, just as consciousness usually is viewed from a rational, logical standpoint.

If I were to define the word conscious, I would say "the ability to see oneself". But again arises the problem with definitions. What is self? What is see? Does seeing include feeling? If so, consciousness involves more than just the rational understanding of self. Does it include "recognizing", as in being able to equate self to other?