I realized a bit ago that no one had ever, to my knowledge, attempted to divide consciousness into its subordinate parts, and that, without any sort of formal analysis of it, no one would be able to seriously contemplate study of it. Consequently, I decided to take this great burden upon my own shoulders. After thinking a bit, I divided the mind and its relationship to the surrounding universe into six parts, which I named after the first few letters of the Hebrew Alphabet. What follows is my (very rough) classification of conscious phenomena:

Aleph: The Aleph is the basic observer. It that which observes the qualia. It makes no value judgements on what it perceives.

Beth: The Beth is that part of the mind which makes the simplest of value judgements. It is the Beth which decides that sugar and sex are good, while sadness and pain are bad.

Gimel: The Gimel is the "free will". I'm unsure as to whether it exists. It is that part of the mind which chooses deliberately and with logic.

Daleth: The Daleth is the "unfree will". It is what causes you to react unthinkingly. It makes the decision to run from fear, and controls each individual step when walking.

He: The He is the subconsious. Here there be the demons which haunt one's dreams. This is the section which Freud is (in)famous for (mis)exposing. This also controls semivoluntary actions, like heartbeat.

Vau: The Vau is everything external to the mind. It includes everything from one's digestion to the striking of Big Ben to the proper motion of the stars.

Obviously, some of these overlap and blur into each other. The Gimmel, Daleth and He, especially, are not firmly divided. This is only a rough sketch, and the subject is nebulous at best.

Any helpful comments, corrections or advice is greatly appreciated.

In Liber Null and Psychonaut, Peter Carroll also draws distinctions between various levels of consciousness according to their function. Briefly summarized, they are:

  1. Robotic: The level of consciousness in which we are "running on autopilot." We use this for any sort of task which, once learned, requires little to no actual thought. Also see muscle memory.
  2. Awareness: This is the level we operate on any time we are actively contemplating something. Carroll mentions that one's ability to enter this state more or less depends on the person's intelligence.
  3. Unconscious: This one should be fairly self-explanatory. This is where we go when we sleep. Or, more rarely, when we're completely wasted.
  4. Dreaming: Another self-explanatory one. Most frequently experienced while we're asleep. Useful in that it allows our minds some time to digest our experiences and come to terms with them, to think through difficult problems, etc. Carroll mentions a suspicion that one always operates in a state of dreaming that's masked by other states, much as the stars are masked by daylight.
  5. Gnosis: The state in which our mind is so wholly caught up in a single experience that we can focus on nothing else. Intense orgasms can elicit this state, as can extremely strong emotions or very deep meditation. According to Carroll (and many others), this level of consciousness is the key to using magic, as it keeps a person's subconscious doubts and lust for results from screwing with the outcome.

It should be noted that these levels of consciousness are not mutually exclusive. For example, dreaming and unconsciousness can clearly take place at the same time, and people can often reflect on certain things while performing some familiar mundane task.

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