PAIN: The power and the pain (Part 1 of 2)PAIN: The power and the pain (Part 1 of 2)
All In The Mind
BBC Baghdad correspondent Andrew North was struck down with a debilitating illness after reporting on the US invasion in Iraq, paralysed with acute pain as his immune system attacked his nervous system. After witnessing pain in so many others, he was forced to confront his own. Over two programs, Andrew explores the perplexing experience of pain. In Part 1 - how power, or lack of it, shapes an individual's experience. All in the Mind's podcast this week features The Nature of Consciousness Debate with Paul Davies, Susan Blackmore and David Chalmers.
29:35•1 Mar 2008
Am I Conscious Now? A Festival Debate on Minds, Zombies and the Self
Episode Overview
- Asking yourself "Am I conscious now?" can act like a quick wake-up call and highlight how often life is lived on autopilot.
- The "hard problem" of consciousness centres on why physical brain processes are linked to any inner, first-person experience.
- Some panellists argue that free will and the feeling of a self inside the head may be persuasive illusions rather than literal facts.
- Experiences such as unconscious driving suggest multiple parallel processes, challenging the idea of a single conscious stream.
- Complex systems like ant colonies or the internet might gain rich emergent properties, raising open questions about collective consciousness.
“The process of asking the question, 'Am I conscious now?' is kind of like waking up in your life instead of being in a daze.”
What insights can experts and survivors share about addiction? Here, the focus shifts from substance use to another puzzle of the mind: consciousness itself. This archive episode of **All In The Mind** drops you into a lively festival debate where science, philosophy and a bit of mischief all collide. With a packed audience in Canberra, Natasha Mitchell hosts UK psychologist and writer **Dr Sue Blackmore**, philosopher **Professor David Chalmers**, and astrophysicist **Professor Paul Davies**.
Their starting point sounds simple: *"Are you conscious now?"* As Blackmore puts it, repeatedly asking that question is "kind of like waking up in your life instead of being in a daze", and you'll hear how this everyday experiment links to Buddhist-style mindfulness and the sense of self. Chalmers outlines the "hard problem" of consciousness: why brain activity should be tied to any inner experience at all.
Davies, coming at it from physics, asks how a mere thought can raise an arm, and why electrical activity in the brain seems different from the circuits in a watch. Together they tease out ideas like qualia, zombies (people who behave exactly like us but supposedly have no inner life), and whether consciousness could be an illusion or a basic feature of the universe.
The conversation opens up to collective and machine consciousness too: ant colonies, the internet, and meme-driven "global brains" all get a look in, without anyone claiming clear answers. The tone stays playful and accessible, even as the questions keep getting harder. If you're curious about how minds work – whether in addiction, pain, or everyday life – this debate gives your brain a workout and might shift how you think about your own awareness.
So, before you hit play, ask yourself: are you conscious right now?
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