Global Workspace Theory began with one simplifying question:

“How does a serial, integrated and very limited stream of consciousness emerge from a nervous system that is mostly unconscious, distributed, parallel and of enormous capacity?”

A great many therapeutic approaches can be viewed in a global workspace framework,

including traditional psychodynamics and depth psychology, but also cognitive behavioral techniques, and, indeed, many other kinds of carefully studied human functions. Making progress in understanding consciousness therefore has an endless number of ramifications – philosophical, metaphysical, scientific, medical, clinical, and practical. Throughout human history, people have perceived the conscious brain as the great nexus of human life, of social relationships, of their personal identities and histories, in encounters with new challenges.

There are numerous approaches to consciousness in the long history of philosophy, biology, the humanities, and the arts. This particular approach emerged through half a century of experimental studies on conscious and unconscious brain events. The emerging science tends to avoid traditional polarities between subjectivity and the brain – the “mindbrain dichotomy” – that is not supported by emerging scientific evidence. If there is a chasm between subjectivity and the brain, it has not been discovered so far.

Bernie Baars’ updated and collected works in ON CONSCIOUSNESS: Science & Subjectivity – Updated Works on Global Workspace Theory form a coherent effort to organize a large and growing body of scientific evidence about conscious brains. Global Workspace Theory (GWT) is a consistent set of ideas about consciousness based on a great deal of psychological evidence, going back over the last two centuries or more. We can now study the living human brain without invasive surgery. Several tides of evidence are joining in ways that make sense.

Global Workspace (GW) theory provides a widely used framework for our rapidly accumulating body of evidence. It is consistent with our current knowledge, and can be enriched to include other aspects of human experience. GWT has developed inductively, beginning with the best evidence available and emerging as a cognitive architecture. GWT provides a set of explicit assumptions that can be tested, as many of them have been in the last twenty years. Global Workspace Dynamics (GWD) is the most current version of GWT – attempting to take into account the complexities of the living brain. 

“A valuable reference for technical audiences and a vigorous intellectual hike for the layman.” —Kirkus Reviews