The brain never ceases activity. When we lose consciousness, the change is not a

The brain never ceases activity. When we lose consciousness, the change is not a global shutdown but a gating event: the thalamo-cortical relay reduces or suspends the integration pathways from distributed neocortical circuits into the prefrontal cortex. In effect, the thalamus stops sustaining the recurrent loops necessary for global workspace access. The underlying cortical, subcortical, and brainstem systems continue operating, but without coordinated integration into the frontal cortex, consciousness does not emerge.