In the heart of consciousness is subjectivity, this sense of having a self that observes one's own organism and the world around that organism. That is really the heart of consciousness.
Antonio DamasioWe may smile and the dog may wag the tail, but in essence, we have a set program and those programs are similar across individuals in the species.
Antonio DamasioThere's that effect that is very physical, very down there at the synaptic level, which really means microscopic cellular level, but also molecular level, because all of those structures are operating on an electrochemical basis and so the changes there are very important.
Antonio DamasioWhat happens [in a coma] is that you lose the grounding of the self, you no longer have access to any feeling of your own existence.
Antonio DamasioPeople who are great thinkers, in science or in art, people who are great performers, have to have that kind of capacity. Without that kind of capacity, it's extremely difficult to manage a high level of performance because you're going to get a lot of extraneous material chipping away at the finery of your thinking or the finery of your motor execution.
Antonio Damasio