This book revises the traditional view of consciousness by claiming that Cartesianism and Descartes' dualism of mind and body should be replaced with theories from the realms of neuroscience, psychology and artificial intelligence. What people think of as the stream of consciousness is not a single, unified sequence, the author argues, but "multiple drafts" of reality composed by a computer-like "virtual machine". Dennett considers how consciousness could have evolved in human beings and confronts the classic mysteries of consciousness: the nature of introspection, the self or ego and its relation to thoughts and sensations, and the level of consciousness of non-human creatures.

丹尼尔·丹尼特,哲学家、认知科学家,1942年生于美国波士顿,1963年哈佛大学学士,师从W.V.Qtline,1965年牛津大学哲学博士,师从 G11bert Ryle。1971年开始任教于Tufts大学,创立认知科学研究中心并任主任一职。首部著作《内容与意识》出版于1969年,随后出版《大脑风暴》(1978),《行动余地》(1984),《意向立场》(1987),《意识的解释》(1991,中译本,北京理工大学出版社,2008),《达尔文的危险观念》(1995,中译本,上海科技出版社,即出),《心智种种》(1996,中译本,《心灵种种》,上海科技出版社,1998),《大脑儿童：1984—1996论文集》,《自由之演化》(2003)和《打破魔咒：宗教作为自然现象》(2006)。另与Douglas Hofstadter共同编辑《心智之我》(1981,部分内容中译为《心我论》,上海译文出版社,1988)。