Topology Without Transduction: The Distinct Failures of Global Workspace Theory (of "Consciousness")

Global Workspace Theory (GWT) proposes that a mental state is conscious if and only if its content is broadcast in a global workspace. Baars (1988) developed the cognitive workspace account. Dehaene and colleagues (Dehaene & Naccache, 2001; Dehaene, 2014) developed the Global Neuronal Workspace (GNW) variant, identifying the workspace with a fronto-parietal network and proposing ignition dynamics as the mechanism of conscious access. This paper argues that GWT specifies a transmission and applies the consciousness label to it, while specifying neither what the transmission consists in nor what the consciousness label is supposed to name. GWT explains access, and the access it explains is one third of what its…