Two authentic occurences should be recognized by contemporary scientists: (1) the rapid development of empirical knowledge, today, and (2) immediate and momentary consciousness. The latter is called immediate consciousness. Empirical, or natural, knowledge is acquired by being passed from an individual and momentary observation towards a collective and temporal universe. This is a change from absolute truth to probabilistic knowledge. Seven basic hypotheses are presented to permit knowledge of the probabilistic universe. I have chosen an emergentist explanation for this universe, with an evolutionary explanation in terms of increasing levels. I observe presently different levels and I move simultaneously between these levels with causal interaction. Therefore, there is only one universe. In most animals there is a level called organism, a level which encompasses the whole animal. In human beings and in some nonhuman animals, there is a small part which knows itself. This part is called mediate consciousness. Mediate consciousness is the observer's own past consciousness (observer's mediate consciousness) or part of the organism of other persons or nonhuman animals (other's mediate consciousness). Research on others' mediate consciousness is similar to research on any other part of animals. In this case, others' mediate consciousness is a part of an authentic universal occurence.
Consciousness; Epistemology; Systems theory; Mind