Consciousness: A Strategy for Behavioral Decisions

Abstract

Most multicellular animals have a nervous system that is based on the following three components: (1) sensory cells gather information and send it to processing units; (2) the processing units use the information to decide what action to take; and (3) effector neurons activate the appropriate muscles. Due to the importance of making the right decisions, evolution made profound advances in processing units. I review present knowledge regarding the evolution of neurological tools for making decisions, here referred to as strategies or algorithms. Consciousness can be understood as a particularly sophisticated strategy. It may have evolved to allow for the use of feelings as a ‘common currency’ to evaluate behavioral options. The advanced cognitive capacity of species such as humans further improved the usefulness of consciousness, yet in biological terms, it does not seem to be an optimal, fitness-enhancing strategy. A model for the gradual evolution of consciousness is presented. There is a somewhat arbitrary cutoff as to which animals have consciousness, but based on current information, it seems reasonable to restrict the term to amniotes.

Is food preference innate instinct driven or human's free will?

“…This conscious ability offers the possibility to let our brain manage the systems of our body in an automatic, highly energy efficient way with a strong intervention option. On top of it consciousness offers a strategy for behavioral decisions (Grinde, 2023).…”

How to Form the Human Brain

“…Feelings were presumably introduced by evolution some three hundred million years ago in the amniote (reptiles, birds, and mammals) lineage (Grinde, 2016a). The evolutionary rationale was to improve complex behavioral decisions (Grinde, 2023). As behavior is basically about moving toward what is good for the genes and away from anything detrimental, feelings tend to be, respectively, positive (pleasure/rewards) or negative (pain/punishment).…”

Describing and explaining consciousness

“…I have presented a possible evolutionary explanation for consciousness in detail elsewhere ( Grinde 2016 , 2018 , 2023 ); here, there is only space for a short summary: The role of the brain is to gather relevant information, make behavioral decisions based on the information, and orchestrate the execution of these decisions. Consciousness represents one of the algorithms that evolved for the purpose of improving the survival value of behavior.…”

“…In my mind, our capacity to understand the neurobiology of consciousness is roughly at par with our knowledge of other advanced brain functions, such as how minor variations of air pressure outside the ear are transformed into extremely intricate sounds or how the brain can fine-tune the 200 or so muscle movements per second required to speak ( MacNeilage 2010 ). In fact, consciousness may not be the most complex or demanding function ( Grinde 2023 ).…”

“…Somewhat surprisingly, the consciousness app does not appear to be particularly advantageous in evolutionary terms, as indicated by the observation that other species with advanced consciousness (such as apes and former hominins) either are extinct or struggle to survive ( Grinde 2023 ). The recent (biological) success of Homo sapiens seems to be due to one specific outcome of consciousness, i.e., the capacity it gave us for cultural evolution.…”