The conundrum

To Harvard University Professor Steven Pinker (2007), recent discoveries in consciousness research illuminate an Easy Problem and a Hard Problem.

• The easy problem is “to distinguish conscious from unconscious mental computation, identify its correlates in the brain, and explain why it evolved” (Pinker, 2007, p. 61). In other words, identify the functions of the different parts of the brain. Pinker says neuroscientists could probably solve the Easy Problem with enough funding and brainpower in about 100 years.
• The Hard Problem is explaining how brain function causes subjective experience. In other words, what makes people aware? “No one knows what a solution might look like or even whether it is a genuine scientific problem in the first place.” This Hard Problem is where Dennet’s (1991) observation about the enduring mystery of consciousness seems to hold. Pinker says, “Everyone agrees that the Hard Problem remains a mystery” (p. 61).