Editing Consciousness (section)

==Etymology==
The words "conscious" and "consciousness" in the English language date to the 17th century, and the first recorded use of "conscious" as a simple adjective was applied figuratively to inanimate objects (''"the conscious Groves"'', 1643).<ref name="Barfield26">{{cite book|last=Barfield|first=Owen|title=History in English Words|date=1962|orig-date=1926|publisher=Faber and Faber Limited|location=London|edition=239 pgs. paper covered|author-link=Owen Barfield}}</ref>{{rp|p=175}} It derived from the [[Latin]] ''conscius'' (''con-'' "together" and [[wikt:scio|''scio'']] "to know") which meant "knowing with" or "having joint or common knowledge with another", especially as in sharing a secret.<ref>{{cite book|title=Studies in words|author =C. S. Lewis|year=1990|publisher=Cambridge University Press|chapter=Ch. 8: Conscience and conscious|isbn=978-0-521-39831-2|author-link =C. S. Lewis}}</ref> [[Thomas Hobbes]] in ''[[Leviathan (Hobbes book)|Leviathan]]'' (1651) wrote: "Where two, or more men, know of one and the same fact, they are said to be Conscious of it one to another".<ref>{{cite book|title=Leviathan: or, The Matter, Forme & Power of a Commonwealth, Ecclesiasticall and Civill|author=Thomas Hobbes|publisher=University Press|year=1904|url=https://archive.org/details/leviathan00hobbgoog|page=[https://archive.org/details/leviathan00hobbgoog/page/n62 39]|author-link=Thomas Hobbes}}</ref> There were also many occurrences in Latin writings of the phrase ''conscius sibi'', which translates literally as "knowing with oneself", or in other words "sharing knowledge with oneself about something". This phrase has the figurative sense of "knowing that one knows", which is something like the modern English word "conscious", but it was rendered into English as "conscious to oneself" or "conscious unto oneself". For example, [[Archbishop Ussher]] wrote in 1613 of "being so conscious unto myself of my great weakness".<ref>{{cite book|title=The whole works, Volume 2|author=[[James Ussher]], [[Charles Richard Elrington]]|page=417|year=1613|publisher=Hodges and Smith}}</ref>

The Latin ''[[:la:conscientia|conscientia]]'', literally 'knowledge-with', first appears in Roman juridical texts by writers such as [[Cicero]]. It means a kind of shared knowledge with moral value, specifically what a witness knows of someone else's deeds.<ref>{{cite book|title=Dictionary of Untranslatables. A Philosophical Lexicon|author=Barbara Cassin|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-13870-1|year=2014|page=[https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofuntr0000unse/page/176 176]|url=https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofuntr0000unse/page/176}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal| author=G. Molenaar|title=Seneca's Use of the Term Conscientia|journal=Mnemosyne| volume=22|issue=2|year=1969|pages=170–180|doi=10.1163/156852569x00670}}</ref> Although [[René Descartes]] (1596–1650), writing in Latin, is generally taken to be the first philosopher to use ''conscientia'' in a way less like the traditional meaning and more like the way modern English speakers would use "conscience", his meaning is nowhere defined.<ref name="Hennig">{{cite journal| author=Boris Hennig|title=Cartesian Conscientia|journal=British Journal for the History of Philosophy|year=2007|volume=15|issue=3|pages=455–484|doi=10.1080/09608780701444915|s2cid=218603781}}</ref> In ''Search after Truth'' (''{{lang|la|Regulæ ad directionem ingenii ut et inquisitio veritatis per lumen naturale}}'', Amsterdam 1701) he wrote the word with a [[Gloss (annotation)|gloss]]: ''conscientiâ, vel interno testimonio'' (translatable as "conscience, or internal testimony").<ref>Charles Adam, [[Paul Tannery]] (eds.), ''Oeuvres de Descartes'' X, [https://archive.org/stream/oeuvresdedescar10desc#page/524/mode/2up 524] (1908).</ref><ref>{{cite book|pages=205–206|title=Consciousness: from perception to reflection in the history of philosophy|isbn=978-1-4020-6081-6|publisher=Springer|editor1=Sara Heinämaa|editor2=Vili Lähteenmäki|editor3=Pauliina Remes|year=2007}}</ref> It might mean the knowledge of the value of one's own thoughts.<ref name="Hennig" />

[[File:JohnLocke.png|thumb|upright|[[John Locke]], a 17th-century British [[Age of Enlightenment]] philosopher]]

The origin of the modern concept of consciousness is often attributed to [[John Locke]] who defined the word in his ''[[Essay Concerning Human Understanding]]'', published in 1690, as "the perception of what passes in a man's own mind".<ref>{{cite web|title=An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (Chapter XXVII)|last=Locke|first=John|publisher=University of Adelaide|location=Australia|url=https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/l/locke/john/l81u/B2.27.html|access-date=August 20, 2010|archive-date=May 8, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180508053707/https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/l/locke/john/l81u/B2.27.html|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/133274/consciousness|title=Science & Technology: consciousness|encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica|access-date=August 20, 2010}}</ref> The essay strongly influenced 18th-century [[British philosophy]], and Locke's definition appeared in [[Samuel Johnson]]'s celebrated ''[[A Dictionary of the English Language|Dictionary]]'' (1755).<ref>{{cite book|title=A Dictionary of the English Language|author=Samuel Johnson|publisher=Knapton|year=1756|url=https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofengl01john|author-link=Samuel Johnson}}</ref>

The French term ''conscience'' is defined roughly like English "consciousness" in the 1753 volume of [[Diderot]] and [[d'Alembert]]'s [[Encyclopédie]] as "the opinion or internal feeling that we ourselves have from what we do".<ref>Jaucourt, Louis, chevalier de. "Consciousness." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Scott St. Louis. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2014. [http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0002.986. Originally published as "Conscience," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers], 3:902 (Paris, 1753).</ref>