On Thu, 6 Mar 2008 08:51:01 -0800 (PST), zinnic gate.net>
wrote:

Not at all mystical unless you define thinking and daydreaming as
mystical. To add something else, I don't think I'm alone in having
the experience of being "lost in thought" with my eyes open and
paying no attention to my visual field when suddenly a fly or
other insect moves in that field and interrupts my thoughts. I
then focus on the contents of my visual field to determine what
the moving object might be. Or someone might shut the lights
off in my room ... or whatever disturbance/change might
occur in my visual field to disturb my train of thoughts.

Clearly, in some sense, I'm conscious of my field of vision even
though I may not be focused on it. So I agree (if that's what
you're driving at) that an aspect of mind (consciousness)
is involved with the physical field of vision when the eyes
are open. However, other aspects of the mind (thoughts)
were not involved. I was "most conscious of" my thoughts,
not my field of vision.

Einstein had a remarkable ability to remain oblivious to all
kinds of tumult and potential distractions when he was
thinking. So this ability to remain undistracted by sense
stimulation varies considerably in people. Yet, presumably,
he was not unconscious of sensory data when lost in
thought.

How do you map consciousness without knowing what
a person is thinking? That's my point. Consciousness
might be _mainly_ on thoughts ... not sense data.
Consciousness might be _mainly_ focused on
remembering a past experience ... not sense data.

In what way does it put a nail in what you call "psychic consciousess"
(whatever that is)?

If you mean psychic phenomena, the only way you'll stomp that
out is to kill everyone :)

Art
http://home.epix.net/~artnpeg