By that definition, many organisms, and even some computers, are conscious by virtue of the ways they integrate information.
That is, the question is whether a state is conscious by virtue of being disposed to give rise to a higher-order thought, or rather by virtue of being the actual target of such a thought.
Finally, according to David Rosenthal's "higher-order thought" theory of consciousness, what makes a person's mental state conscious is that the person is conscious of it by virtue of having formed a higher-order thought (or HOT) about it.
If acquaintance is a "built-in" feature of conscious states in virtue of which one can be aware only of intrinsic features of that very state, then on the plausible assumption that ordinary physical objects and their intrinsic features are not intrinsic features of mental states, one cannot have acquaintance with such objects or their features.
He becomes an aware man, an increasingly honest man and not too proud of it, conscious that the virtue can embody a multitude of sins.
Similarly Shoemaker (2003, p. 65): "The experiences are co-conscious … by virtue of the fact that they are components of a single state of consciousness …." Like subsumption, co-consciousness would require that there be experiential parts.
While social reality hampers the achievement of virtue, the individual, conscious of his inner freedom, must try to find all possible avenues towards moral fulfillment (Weiss 1928: 156).
According to functionalism, a state or process counts as being of a given mental or conscious type in virtue of the functional role it plays within a suitably organized system (Block 1980a).
Taller than everyone else, he has the bearing of a man conscious of having performed an act of shining virtue, a good deed in a naughty world.
revives Searle's arguments against Strong AI, and -- to my reading, at least -- implies that no computer, no matter how powerful, could become conscious simply by virtue of its function as an information-processing machine.
Mr. Khodorkovsky is no paragon of virtue.
