What is the role of consciousness in the mind? Consciousness uses the functions of cognition and emotion to operate the mind. Cognition is basically all of a minds mental abilities related to knowledge and thinking. While sensing and feeling physical feelings are the more emotional functions of the mind.
People use their cognitions to understand the world around them. Emotions can assist in understanding as well, however they often slow down or inhibit cognition (such as when someone is drunk). Here is (Trigg, J and Kalish, M):
- In a nontechnical sense, perceiving, remembering, believing, and judging are examples
of cognition; imagining, idle thinking, wondering, and intending are not. In this sense, cognitionis what happens when someone takes in how things are or becomes cognizant of some
thing, event, or fact. Conversely, if something is cognized it becomes known somehow tosomeone. To say of someone that his cognitive faculties were impaired by drunkenness on
some occasion would be to say that his capacity to attend to, take in, or get to know hissurroundings was impaired by drunkenness on that occasion.
James Sully wrote in a book published in 1892 titled "The Human Mind" that there are three different mental functions - knowing, feeling and willing:
- By help of such a process of analysis carried out on a variety of psychological phenomena psychologists have come to distinguish between three radically different mental functions. These, which are pretty clearly recognized in our everyday distinctions, are known as Feeling, Knowing, and Willing.
- In order to illustrate the difference between these modes of mental manifestation, we may select almost any example of a familiar mental experience. For instance, I see an apple on a tree. I may be affected by the beauty of its colour glowing in the midst of its cool green surroundings. Such a mental state of delightful admiration would be properly described as a feeling or affective state. Or, again, if I happen to be a connoisseur of apples my mind may be stimulated by the site of the object to note its peculiar characteristics with a view to characterize the particular variety to which it belongs. Such a direction of mental activity would come under the head of knowing, cognitive process of intellection. And, lastly, if I happen to be hot and thirsty the sight of the apple may very likely insight a desire to pluck and eat it and prompt the corresponding actions. And in this case what goes on in my mind would be a process of willing, volition or conation.
- It can easily be seen that there is no mental process which cannot be brought under one or more of these three heads. Whatever state of mind we happen to be in, we shall always find that it is fully described by help of these three fundamental or primary functions. To be affected by some feeling, as wonder, love, or grief, to be following out some process of intellectual inquiry, or to be actively engaged in doing something or preparing to do something, this seems to exhaust all known forms of mental operation.
