I'm not sure it's that clear. What about a person who is on drugs to the point they clearly don't know what reality is happening around them, but they are able to speak and move and such? I'm not sure I'd call that conscious, but by most definitions it is.
replyYou would just say that they have an altered experience of consciousness from the norm.
replyIndeed, doing a first aid course we were pointed out that sleeping is different from being unconscious. You can wake someone from sleep pretty quickly. You can't bring an unconscious person back in the same way.
reply>We're pretty clear on the distinction between a conscious and an unconscious human.
replyYou are using unconscious as a synonym for asleep, which is not the same thing as having no conscious experience due to dreams. We are clear on the distinction between a dead human and an alive human however.
Those terms are not really how we use the word "conscious" in any other situation though. With a definition like that you would say a rock is unconscious (I guess reasonable), a pretty cold bacteria is unconscious (hmm.. ok I guess?), and a warm bacteria is conscious (now I'm not on board anymore).
replyWe have to be WAY more specific in what the word even means!
Now discuss whether a bonobo, a dog, a cat, a mouse, an ant, a bacterium is conscious.
replyAnd you’ll find it’s not as clear cut.