Boundaries of Mind and Consciousnes

What is the mind, and is consciousness synonymous with the mind? I believe the term “consciousness” is more apt when addressing the mind from a scientific perspective, whereas “mind” seems to imply a more metaphysical concept. Tononi’s dual-processing theory approaches the mind through the framework of consciousness and unconsciousness, but it encounters the problem of the blurred boundary between these states. In neuroscience, this boundary itself does not exist, and consciousness is simply the collective state of the neural network. Psychology, however, divides consciousness into emotion, cognition, and behavior. Philosophical psychology categorizes these layers into three components as well, with more granularity:

• [1] Phenomenal Consciousness: Often referred to by the term qualia in philosophy, this component refers to the experiential state of indescribable sensations. For example, it is impossible to convey the feeling of seeing to someone born blind. Another example might be the pain experienced from a blow to the testicles that women cannot perceive, or the pain of pregnancy and childbirth that men cannot experience. As Ramanujan once described his intuitive mental abilities, attributing them to a goddess named Namagiri, the origin of intuitive inspiration can be similarly enigmatic. Phenomenal experiences are biologically constrained; without direct experience, understanding is impossible, and even if I have had the experience, it is also impossible to convey the information to someone who has not experienced it. In short, sensations themselves cannot be fully converted into language.
• [2] Access Consciousness: This refers to executive functions used to rationally control speech and behavior and facilitate (logical) reasoning. It is related to working memory, which encompasses all types of short-term and long-term memories, such as learned experience, recollections, and general knowledge. It can be understood as the process of thinking about the sensations one experiences in [1]. Thus, unconscious or emotional control does not belong in this category. For example, consider a situation in which one is able to regulate emotional impulses and behave rationally in public, despite being extremely angry. In this case, it may seem as though one is controlling behavior consciously, but in fact, the behavior itself is not being consciously controlled, which is why it does not fall under access consciousness.
• [3] Self-Consciousness and Monitoring Consciousness: Self-consciousness involves being aware of oneself as the subject of experience—identifying oneself, questioning one’s identity, or becoming aware of the physical body associated with oneself. Monitoring consciousness seems to be the concept of meta-self-awareness.

The elements of the mind can also be categorized as follows:

• Phenomenal State: This is almost identical to [1] by definition.
• Representational State: This refers to the formation of an attitude toward a particular object.
• Action: This is the most complex and difficult aspect to define, and many different theories have been proposed to describe it.

So, which of these components constitutes the mind? In philosophical psychology, all of them are seen as necessary. After all, the functioning of the mind appears to encompass all of these aspects. The concept of mental causation arises here, exploring how physical and mental elements interact with one another. For example, infinite meta-cognition—thinking about thinking about thinking about…—as seen in [3] illustrates interactions between mental elements, which we may call psychic-to-psychic causation. In [1] and [2], there are cases of psychophysical causation, where a mental element affects a physical element (e.g., recalling a memory from two years ago and reaching for a photo album), as well as physical-to-mental causation, where a physical element affects a mental state (e.g., seeing a picture of oneself and experiencing a sense of disillusionment). From this analysis, it is clear that action [3] appears to have a connection with the mind. But is this really the case?