Consciousness as Reflexivity: Subjective and Empirical Warrants

Of the many cognitive processes and data structures pro-posed to account for conscious awareness (attention, accessibility, global broadcasting, intentionality, subjectivity), only reflexivity or self-knowing occurs exclusively in the conscious state. However, the viability of reflexivity as the proper index or principal defining characteristic of consciousness has been been questioned on the basis that it is either implausible or merely subjective. The implausibility objection proves to be based on a mischaracterization of conscious reflexivity as either a form of introspection, reflective elaboration, or intentional representation. Closer examination shows reflexivity to be none of the above, but rather a modal property of the cognitive state, and not a property of what is represented in the state. As for the objection that reflexivity is merely subjective, there are substantial objective warrants for each of its five properties which together support the contention that reflexivity has a basis in empirical fact and can be accounted the principal index of consciousness.