consciousness
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈkɒnʃəsnəs/
ipa: /ˈkɑnʃəsnəs/
Forms: form: consciousnesses
Etymology: From conscious + -ness.
Senses: examples: text: To lose consciousness after striking one's head
text: Consciousness is universal and precedes even the formation of our solar system.
ref: 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 39:
text: Yet this is the level of organisation that does the actual thinking—and is, presumably, the seat of consciousness.
ref: 2013 August 3, “The machine of a new soul”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:
glosses: The state of being conscious or aware; awareness.
The state or trait of having cognition and sensation; cognition and sensation themselves.
examples: text: Although the Celebrity was almost impervious to sarcasm, he was now beginning to exhibit visible signs of uneasiness, the consciousness dawning upon him that his eccentricity was not receiving the ovation it merited.
ref: 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
text: The solitude and the savage freedom filled his heart with life and buoyancy. Again he was Tarzan of the Apes—every sense alert against the chance of surprise by some jungle enemy—yet treading lightly and with head erect, in proud consciousness of his might.
ref: 1913 June–December, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “Through the Valley of the Shadow”, in The Return of Tarzan, New York, N.Y.: A[lbert] L[evi] Burt Company, […], published March 1915, →OCLC, page 127:
glosses: The state of being conscious or aware; awareness.
The fact of having knowledge of a particular fact or matter; cognizance.
examples: text: the development of a feminist consciousness
text: This new anti-military consciousness surfaced at the Gay Academic Union Conference held last month in New York, where two broadsides and a meeting were held to discuss the situation. And in San Francisco, after a stormy meeting of Bay Area Gay Liberation (BAGEL), the group refused to co-sponsor a fund-raising event for former T/Sgt. Leonard Matlovich.
ref: 1975 December 27, Neil Miller, “Anti-Military Backlash Surfaces”, in Gay Community News, volume 3, number 26, page 3:
topics: government
politics
glosses: The state of being conscious or aware; awareness.
Acute awareness (of something) and belief in its communal relevance.
examples: text: The pantheistic mainstream asari religion is siari, which translates roughly as "All is one." The faithful agree on certain core truths: the universe is a consciousness, every life within it is an aspect of the greater whole, and death is a merging of one's spiritual energy back into the greater universal consciousness. Siarists don't specifically believe in reincarnation; they believe that spiritual energy returned to the universal consciousness upon death will eventually be used to fill new mortal vessels.
ref: 2008, BioWare, Mass Effect, Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Asari: Religion Codex entry:
glosses: A being with cognition.
Synonyms: awareness
witfulness
Hyponyms: coconsciousness
cyberconsciousness
double consciousness
ecoconsciousness
exoconsciousness
false consciousness
higher consciousness
hyperconsciousness
neuroconsciousness
nonconsciousness
preconsciousness
self-consciousness
selfconsciousness
semiconsciousness
stream of consciousness
subconsciousness
superconsciousness
teleconsciousness
Derived terms: class consciousness
clouding of consciousness
consciousness-raising
dysconsciousness
mainstream consciousness
phenomenal consciousness
raise someone's consciousness
stream of consciousness
super-consciousness
supraconsciousness
time of useful consciousness
unself-consciousness
witness-consciousness
Related terms: conscious
conscience
being-for-itself