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462 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| June 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 4| Page 462-463 Nixon, G. M. Response to the Commentary of Marty Monteiro Response to Commentary Response to the Commentary of Marty Monteiro (The Question of “God”) Gregory M. Nixon* I enjoyed reading Marty Monteiro’s commentary, but in his first sentence, he interprets me as saying, “Consciousness is not only an interactive process exclusively for human beings but pertains to all beings in the universe (pan-experientalism).” However, panexperientialism means only that experience permeates the universe, and experience is most often non-conscious (in my view). Conscious experience – experience reflected back upon itself through communally understood language symbols – is the sole province of humanity, at least on this planet (or so it appears). On the other hand, right after this, Monteiro correctly notes the finer details of my distinctions. I see experience as universal thus it is the fount for our conscious form of experiencing. I am not quite clear what he asking for when he wonders about “consciousness” without experience. He develops his own terminology but seems to equate experience with witnessing, a distinction I reserve for conscious experience only. So, in this sense, a newborn does indeed experience its birth (otherwise why all its fuss and bother?), but it does not witness (or remember) it from some outside vantage point, such as that provided when self and world are severed after crossing the symbolic threshold, and “one” becomes conscious of the experienced world and one’s own experiencing. Monteiro grasps the outlines of “Hollows of Experience” quite well. He even uses my text to answer his own question with regard to how experience-mind-consciousness could arise from matter or from a brain. However, Monteiro often attempts to squeeze my ideas into the framework of his own, and he sometimes loses me in the process. He tends to assert his interpretations as facts, leaving me uncertain how he came to this knowledge. Monteiro insists that the concept of God “as a creative-unifying force (CUF) holds.” Even with the friendly acronym CUF as a stand-in, I still see the concept of “God” as disunifying, at least here on Earth since the word is historically loaded and most often means something quite distinct from one speaker to another according to their culture or religion. I quite agree that there must be a “creative-unifying” principle that precedes and permeates existence, but I have no idea if this universal potential is indeed a physical force, as Monteiro states, or if it warrants being called God when it is thoroughly unconscious in itself, as I hold, and perhaps only existent as potential. However, I do use the phrases void consciousness and awareness-in-itself to indicate this ultimate source, but note that aware but aware of nothing is not really anything we (with the possible exception of the most advanced mystics) can really begin to grasp. It Correspondence: Gregory M. Nixon, University of Northern British Columbia, Prince George, British Columbia, Canada Email: doknyx@shaw.ca Websty: http://members.shaw.ca/doknyx ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 463 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| June 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 4| Page 462-463 Nixon, G. M. Response to the Commentary of Marty Monteiro is only the potential for awareness of something by something else. It is “void and without form”. Only through its random and anomalous fluctuations are experienced sensations and form created, and so the process of being (or existence) unfolds. As experience is internalized in matter-energy fields, form becomes objective entities and the external world we witness today begins to appear (see Whitehead, 1978). Can we use the term “God” and not imagine a personality or even a being? The only way I can accept a term like God is by divorcing it from all human-created contexts or connotations that resemble personhood and bringing it right back home to human experience. Since we ultimately arose from this non-conscious awareness-in-itself, our symbolic conscious form of awareness is also consciousness for this unnamable source. (Quantum vacuum or quantum flux has no more an imaginable referent than does God.) In other words, the experience of sensations and emotions in all of creation is the original source experiencing itself, and we ourselves are the conscious experience of the source; we ourselves are the conscious sense organs of “God” and therefore directly participate in “God’s” creative unfolding. “God” exists, feels, and thinks only insofar as we do. I don’t think the term “God” is justified by this conception of the inconceivable, but if it communicates the mystery of a creative source, I could live with it. I’ll close with a potent quotation from Nikos Kazantzakis (1958), who, through the character of Odysseus, expressed this thought more beautifully than ever I could manage: Thrust these few words deep in your minds and lash them tight: the more our journey widens and new roads unwind, the more God widens and unwinds on this vast earth. It’s we who feed him, friends; all that we see, he eats all that we hear or touch, all that thrusts through our minds, he takes for his adornments and his strutting wings. Soon as we see these savage thorn trees on the sands he too sprouts thorns and strings us with ferocious rage, and when we hear the wild beasts prowl, he too grows wild, growls savagely and scares poor man out of his wits. (p. 384) References Kazantzakis, N. (1958). The Odyssey: A modern sequel (trans., intro., synopis, notes: K. Friar). New York: Simon & Schuster. Monteiro, M. (2010) Commentary on Nixon's Three Papers. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research. 1(3): 373-376. Whitehead, A. N. (1978). Process and reality: An essay in cosmology, corrected edition, D. R. Griffin and D. W. Sherburne (eds.). New York: Free Press. Original 1929. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

838 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Article How Consciousness Creates Reality Claus Janew* Abstract The present text is a very abridged version of a book I wrote out of the desire to examine the structure of our reality from a standpoint unbiased by established teachings, be they academic- scientific, popular- esoteric, or religious in nature.1 We will begin with seemingly simple interactions in our daily lives, examine how they originate on a deeper level, come to understand the essentials of consciousness, and finally recognize that we create our reality in its entirety. In the course of this quest, we will uncover little-heeded paths to accessing our subconscious, other individuals, and that which can be understood by the term "God". And the solution to the classical problem of free will constitutes the gist of the concepts thus revealed. You do not need to bring previous philosophical knowledge to the reading of this text, but simply an interest in fundamental interconnections, a certain openness and the willingness to think along. This abridged version, however, comes at a price. Since I had already left out all non-essential points of discussion in the German "long version", in the present text entire topics had to be dropped, along with additional perspectives, arguments, details and in-depth discussion of concepts. The result is a treatise which explains the most fundamental results of my research and their respective central argument, and which, so I hope, serves as a stimulus for a more extensive examination of reality. May it bring you thoughtful pleasure and subtle delight. Keywords: consciousness, creation, reality, relativity, existence, universal continuum. * Correspondence: Claus Janew, Independent Philosopher, http://www.free-will.de E-mail: clausjanew@yahoo.de Note: This article is based on my work originally completed in 1998 in German. It is translated from German by Nathalie Sequeira. 1 Die Erschaffung der Realität (The Creation of Reality). Dresden, Germany: Sumari, 2009. → amazon.de ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 839 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality The relativity of existence The very first question we must necessarily pose is why anything exists at all, instead of there simply being nothing. Doubtlessly, this nothingness would be equivalent to a state in which everything exists. This is because everything could not be differentiated, since the assertion of any difference implies the non-existence of the respective other at the point being regarded. Let us examine this by means of a concrete example: Take a vase and put it on the table before you. You look at the vase and can only identify it as such because it ends somewhere at its top, its bottom, to its left and its right sides. The vase's characteristic form is determined by its limits. But how does a limit become evident? By the fact that beyond it, something else begins, something which, in this case, is different from the vase. We can say that the vase is surrounded by an indispensable halo of other things. You can recognize the vase as well as its surrounding objects because their (mostly reflected) light is received by your eyes and perceived by your consciousness. The surrounding objects each differ in color, form, and position, that is, they have a manifold effect upon you. If they all had the same effect, we would obtain a nebulous continuum that would still suffice to delimit the vase. It does not make an essential difference whether the vase stands on a table that is set or empty, because nothing affects you as specifically as the vase's form, whether the surrounding objects are differentiated amongst each other or not. The vase does not exist in its surroundings; it is delimited by a halo of its non-existence from which it stands out by way of its characteristic effect. Each thing and each object of its surroundings has such a "shadow" of its own existence. Where these halos overlap, they form an area from which all the regarded objects stand out, and thus, a background of collective non-existence. But even a halo that is common to a group of objects still exists as such, and its own shadow then consists of the various objects themselves. A background of non-existence common to all will always remain hidden. It is a continuum from which all that exists arises. Nonetheless, a relatively continuous and general halo such as a bare wall can come sufficiently close to the characteristics of this background to serve as a perceivable representation of this halo. For simplicity's sake, I will speak of an "imaginary halo" in all cases in which such a diffusely existing halo can represent this hidden, imaginary background. Nothing can exist for you that does not have a specific effect upon you. And without having an effect upon someone else, neither can it exist for them. So if you stand with your back turned towards the vase, it could simply disappear. You can only ascertain whether that "really" happens by asking another person about the vase's state of being while you have turned away. 2 This person, let us call him Hans, probably sees the vase and will tell you so. For Hans, the vase exists, and when he tells you so, it also exists for you - because you assume (!) that Hans is telling the truth. 2 Mirrors and similar replacements for the human observer would not change the situation significantly, as you can easily ascertain. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 840 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Now regard the vase again. It exists for both of you and thus has a greater range of existence, since its existence is hardly reduced if one of you does not perceive it, as long as the other reports its existence (only a shadow of a doubt remains that the other may be lying). The vase still exists for both together. Furthermore, an object can exist more intensely depending upon how relevant it is to us; either within a selected spectrum of effects (such as the reflection of light in the form of a vase) or within a broader spectrum including all recognizable influences (e.g. the vase is flying at 80km/h towards our heads). I label this relevance with which the object distinguishes itself from its halo as intensity of existence, to stress the fact that something irrelevant also is less. An object will seldom fade into its surroundings as would a veil of mist, such that generally some qualitative difference between the object and its halo will be detectable. However, since the observer unites all the effects upon him- or herself, that is, also abstracts from their qualitative differences, an object can not only exist or not exist within the total impression, but also exist more or less. Summing up our reflections, the existence of each thing is relative. It is dependent upon the observer's viewpoint. A particular object, such as the vase, can only exist for a particular observer. Its existence for several observers, in comparison, is only possible if they are connected amongst each other - i.e., communicate with each other - to establish its existence together. Then, for the observers as a collective entity the object will have a greater range of existence and thus exist more. Even for the single observer its intensity of existence will increase, since it will have a stronger effect upon him by way of the connection with the other observers. Nevertheless, the vase flying at you alone will already exist intensively. When you attempt to dodge out of its way, during which in the worst case you will knock over Hans, he will also not remain unimpressed. Its effect will rub off onto him, so to speak, and thus the vase will gain in range of existence. Within the point of observation that encompasses, i.e. connects, both observers, a larger range of existence usually will signify an increased intensity of existence - and vice versa. Then in turn we can compare different points of observation with each other, which will create yet another, comprehensive one. The difference between "realer" and "less real" is thus a difference in range of existence within this broader viewpoint. The absolute universal continuum A modification of existence is achieved by shifting the point of observation according to specific rules which, however, themselves can change with this shift. For example, although we may usually move to another location by driving, as soon as we arrive at an airport we are also presented with the possibility of flying. By following the rules inherent to the shifting of viewpoints, we will arrive at increasingly unknown points of observation. In a coherent infinite universe, we can "go" infinitely far. Somewhere along the line we must then also be capable of arriving at a point of observation at which nothing exists for us. Let us imagine at this point an extremely dense fog that prevents us from recognizing anything in our surroundings, even our own bodies. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 841 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality It also swallows all sound. Then we also switch off our other senses. Finally, we let the dense fog penetrate our thoughts and isolate them from each other. They can no longer refer to each other and also become increasingly frayed themselves. We don't even know who we are anymore, we are disconnected from ourselves. There is nothing anymore. Absolute discontinuity, absolute continuity, absolute identity. (Nevertheless you should read on). We seem to be largely disconnected from the infinite diversity of the universe anyway - in the sense that we are not in connection with it as such, and as such it does not exist for us. Therefore, it did not take long for us to disengage ourselves from the rest too. The path in the other direction, on the other hand, is infinitely long. It means the increasing existence of all possible things. But since on this path we encounter an infinite variety of experiences, it is far more interesting. However, at its "end", absolute continuity = absolute identity awaits us likewise, as we shall see right away. Let us take a pencil and draw a few solid squares on a blank piece of paper. We have thus created a world, a point of observation. The respective outermost squares mark the limits of our viewpoint. Now, we can erase all the squares, one after the other, and all of the last one except a dot, with which we reduce the volume of our viewpoint to zero. That is the point at which nothing exists anymore. Instead, we can also add more and more squares, which in this example only differ by nature of their location. The original volume will become continuously filled with squares, have no more points of reference except its edges, and extend infinitely to take up further squares.3 In the end, there are no points of reference anymore in this infinity, that is, all is identical. Although this identity is never reached, it is tended towards. A similar situation is to be found in reality at large. In a diversified and coherent world, an expansion we follow will also lead to the expansion of the connections with other things and thereby to their expansion, which in turn will include yet other things, and so on. Thus, a thriving economic enterprise will also expand its cooperation with its partners and contribute to their growth. Furthermore, the business will find new partners and involve them in the same way. In an infinite world, there is no reason for any insuperable limit to this process. Even if only one of the infinitely many paths exhibits infinite expansion, this still suffices to conclude that the imaginary halo will be completely filled, because this one path will then incorporate all other paths. It will reach anything whatever, even the most improbable, since in infinity anything is possible, inside as well as out. Therefore, this infinitely distant point of observation is an absolute continuum. It is hidden behind the existent and evident behind its respective halo, where it awaits realization. We do not know the whole journey, but we know its destination - the absolute identity of all the existent and therewith simultaneously non-existent. In itself this identity is meaningless and resembles an infinitesimal (infinitely small) point without differences. It can only exist for a discrete (relatively discontinuous) real world; in 3 Outlines of squares would also be filled as soon as they begin to overlap. They would not restrict infinity in any way. Infinitely thin lines, however, would not result in a single existing square. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 842 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality "reaching" it, it immediately reflects upon some sort of separation. Since absolute identity now lies in every direction (see above), it is present, in final consequence, in every random point of our world. In view of its derivation, I would like to call this point the absolute universal continuum. The infinite path of its approximation describes what is meant by it, but there are, as already suggested, also shorter paths. A point in itself is always the same. Only the paths leading to it are different, which is why it can only attain specific meaning with these paths. And this meaning is of capital importance, as we will yet see. Already do we anticipate a connection between the infinitely large and the infinitely small. To this point we have discussed the effect of the surroundings upon the observer. Conversely, every observer is not only an object for others - he affects other observers -, but in addition himself consists of objects that refer to one another, and thus exists on his own by embodying the entirety of his inner interactions. He is a point of observation. If he interactively incorporates his surroundings, he only extends this point of observation. The self-existence of the observer is at its least within him. Pure self-existence of another thing naturally is equivalent to its non-existence, that is, it dissolves in the imaginary, because pure self-existence can be anything random. The "imaginary" thus is a mass of self-existent things, "pure being", independently of an external observer. And the relativity of existence describes the transition to it. The logics of circumscription Wherein exactly does the entirety of an existing object consist? Obviously not only in the object itself, but it rather also encompasses the object's relationship to its halo, an interaction. To perceive something, you must constantly oscillate between it and something else, by which you notice a change in what you just observed and inscribe this into one predominant, more or less distinct differentiation - one that delimits the object of your attention. For example, we can only distinguish a car in comparison with its surroundings. But the car also interacts with its environment independently of you as an observer. It draws in air and emits exhaust gases, it stands or rolls on the ground, is steered and reacts to that, and so on. Without this exchange with its nearer and more distant (gas station, oil rig, manufacturing factory) environment it would not be a car or at least not this car. A variety of interactions and other objects is manifested in this object, it cannot be traced back to one particular thing. 4 However, we never discern its entire underlying diversity. What we respectively designate as a car - typical build, rolling means of transportation, stinking gas consumer - thus can only be a successive approximation of that totality which is embodied within it. 4 At first, we regarded the existence of an object as independent of the structure of its halo (however not of its own structure). Here, now, we also take into account its diversified non-existence in the surrounding objects, which not only exist differingly, but also relatively independently. These surrounding objects first differ amongst each other, and only become relevant to the object when they are interconnected within it. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 843 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality After all, this approximation itself does not appear as a formless mass, but is composed of many different parts, such as seats, wheels, and motor. It is only in their characteristic combination that we discern its essential core. While we oscillate back and forth between the parts, correlate them comparatively or trace their interrelations, the back and forth movements circumscribe a car. Without these lateral movements, only an undifferentiated, infinitesimal "effect" would remain. There is no "car in itself", because it consists only of its details. Nonetheless it is more than them, namely, their entirety. What does the "more" of this entirety mean? New functions (driving, transportation, etc.), that only pertain to the whole car and not to its fragments? Certainly. But they themselves are also a circumscription. Even every single function - such as "driving" - circumscribes and is itself circumscribed. It represents a mutual effect. It would be a contradiction in itself to try to reduce the car to any one side (or - one step further - to the sum of all sides or the oscillation between them). As soon as we attempt to pinpoint one aspect of the whole, we lose hold of the others, which are then missing, and thus we constantly vacillate between several moments - a relatively self-contained process. It is exactly upon this reciprocity - and not upon a "substance" - that the relative stability of the perceived is based. A distillate of the complicated oscillations emerges that is naturally sufficient as such, as an approximation of the complete object. If, however, we are satisfied with neither this approximation nor with the constant vacillation between parts and functions, all we can do is to relinquish one (or a number of) sides (the "contradiction in itself" leads to separation), or, is the vehicle to remain intact, to penetrate the interwoven circumscribing circles to thus discover that more comprehensive structure which leads to them. For instance, we can open the hood, scrutinize the construction plans or study the process of production. Surely this deeper structure also holds an approximation, if a more detailed one. Actually, it contains yet more oscillation than the initially regarded surface. But relative to this surface it can appear to be more static, as the far-off assembly of motor and dynamo may seem more static than the spinning fanbelt under our nose. The deepest level we can arrive at is the absolute universal continuum. One the one hand, we may regard it as the fully unfolded secret that ultimately connects everything. On the other, we find its absolute identity at every infinitesimal point of the real world, as established in the previous chapter. On the one hand, every circumscription is an individual embodiment of the universal Whole. On the other, it delineates one specific center point. When we concentrically and increasingly narrow down a specific circumscription, it becomes increasingly diffuse, all the way to that infinitely small point which corresponds to the infinitesimal, undifferentiated "effect" we would "perceive" without lateral, reciprocal movements (the car "in itself"). And since we always only recognize a limited relationship of reciprocity, to us its infinitesimal center - for the time being - is coextensive with the universal continuum. Until now, we have almost exclusively spoken of the absolute universal continuum expanding infinitely behind each discrete object. Here, however, we see it completely within the "tangible" proximity of the center point. How does that go together? Well, to reach the universal continuum, we must go an infinitely long way upon which the diversity ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 844 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality perceived grows into the infinite. But it is exactly the infinity of this distance that allows this diversity to overlap into a simple appearance that we can grasp in our delimited world. If we limit ourselves to a particular point of observation, the diversity of an interrelation decreases towards the middle, so that we do not recognize its underlying wealth. The diversity that we can still perceive melts, things converge. Looking into the circumscription, the ultimate meeting point and ultimate detail is central infinitesimality. It is only when we allow ourselves to penetrate into expanded points of observation, that is, when we dive down into the center, that we unfold the things that are in identity there and tend divergingly, so to speak, towards the absolute. 5 We can realize it only through infinite development. Nevertheless, limited objects, observers, or points of observation together with their center points anticipate it as a whole. Although the absolute universal continuum in itself has no meaning, but only exists in its reflection, it attains an individual meaning in these specific viewpoints. Although any further unfoldment of hidden structures modifies this meaning, it continues to contain the universal continuum in the form of newly circumscribed infinitesimal points, as well as in the indestructible imaginary halo. We simply cannot rid ourselves of the identity of the continuum. Especially of its infinitesimality we can say that it reaches through everything that can potentially be unfolded - in infinite depth. And its effect is just as incessant. We will soon discuss this. Enfoldment and unfoldment If we take our analysis of the relationships we have discerned to lesser depths, we arrive at what David Bohm called the "implicate order", the hidden relationship of all things to all others. We have seen how an object enfolds its varied background, how it emerges from the overlapping or entwining of highly intricate interrelationships. We observe a circumscribed entity, whose hidden richness we can unfold by "looking more closely". On the other hand, that complicated order enfolds itself into different forms (sub-entities). We observe various objects. The implicate order of the background thus unfolds their diversity, an explicate order. After the hidden has unfolded into the visible, the explicate must in turn influence the implicate, since the effects of the explicate forms must, in a world of ultimately all-sided reciprocity, finally also reach the implicate order. For example, the unfolded effect of a car type upon its buyers influences the manufacturing enfolded therein, and even before buying it, we relate the car to its manufacturer (brand, nationality, etc.). On the whole, we are dealing with a permanent reciprocal transition from one order to another, whereby each side (on the one, the production or construction plan, and on the other, the produced vehicle) is maintained by this dynamic: the construction plan by 5 What that means exactly in existential terms will become clear when we discuss dynamic existence. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 845 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality positive test reports, and the vehicle by the fulfillment of its planned use. Each side enfolds (contains, encodes, processes) the other in a certain way and unfolds it again in a modified form. It is a movement of wholeness (holomovement). The exchange between enfolded and unfolded order of course is not always visible and can take the most varied paths. In quantum physics it operates - according to Bohm - much more directly than in classical interrelations. Generally speaking, however, it is clear that each part is also connected to the all-encompassing whole, even when this does not appear to be the case in unfolded forms of movement. Like the implicate order itself, the transmitters of effect also are hidden at some point on the way towards it. After all, even every transmission itself must enfold the background "crossways", that is, the implicate order surrounds the real objects. It unfolds their interrelation as a whole. Because as a result of its fundamental ability to unfold, the limit of the observable stands for the rest of the Universe. The hidden proximity of its ultimately universal (!!!) diversity establishes the proximity of a hidden complexity - independently of the number of known intermediate steps in which it enfolds. The reality funnel An unfolding circumscription "raises" an object from the infinitesimal. It gives it a meaning by interrelating its inner properties amongst each other and with the external. The relationship between this reciprocity and its infinitesimal center welds the object into a single entity that in consequence also enfolds itself as such and co-determines the next unfoldment. The interrelation between center and periphery thus basically is an interrelationship of depth and surface. It is the holomovement of enfoldment and unfoldment that itself is partially unfolded (fanned out). While diversity reaches its maximum at the outer edge of a sort of crater or funnel that it forms in circumscription, it is reduced towards the middle and further outside. The uppermost edge circumscribes the center, towards which we "slide" into the depths of the hidden, and from which the funnel shape arises. 6 Although we infer an enfolded structure towards the center, its larger depth remains hidden to us, since what we can recognize there is but a continuation of the known. In implementing this ever-narrowing speculation, we asymptotically approximate a zero point, that is, we delineate border lines that rapidly come closer to each other (the funnel's stem), which will only meet exactly in the infinite - the place where we also assume the universal continuum to be. Nonetheless, there can only be one identity of the absolute (!) universal continuum. That means that every object must also be connected through its inside (center) with the outside (halo)! 6 Furthermore, the oscillation between depth and surface circumscribes its own enfoldment and unfoldment. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 846 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality This unity is not yet realized (not "posited", were it up to Hegel). But it is in the process of so becoming by means of the holomovement, which is merged into the circumscription by interrelating external objects, that is, the existing halo, and which encompasses their enfoldment/unfoldment into/from the hidden depths of the whole. 7 Altogether the individual "breathes in" his interrelated surroundings and spreads himself into them through his (re-)actions. This movement forms a complete funnel and holds its middle asymptotically open towards the infinite depths, whereby this infinitude ultimately is the same as the one we could tend towards outside the circumscription. All the internal comes together with itself by means of all the external and vice versa. The edge of the crater symbolizes the most visible circumscription, while the existent halo falls off outwards and conceals the imaginary background. Inside, the circumscribed whole condenses until it reaches the infinitesimal center of the funnel, which in the depths of the increasingly enfolded collapses with the absolute universal continuum. The latter envelops the point of observation as "vision". Consciousness - the infinitesimality structure Let us now turn to the processes that lead to the decision between diverse possible paths of development of a system. Firstly, they have to do with the reality funnel's "horizontal" level, with the circumscription of a whole by means of its structure. Like holomovement, the circumscription of an object - be it complex or simple - is oscillation. It traces the relationships to other objects and thus also the tendencies to 7 If we are consistent and include the existing halo in the circumscription, this imaginary background lies within the existent. In some respects, the halo can be regarded as the "space" of all infinitesimal points. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 847 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality reinforce some of these relationships and to establish new relationships in those directions. It does this on the outside, in contact with the surroundings, as well as on the inside, since even inner circumscription (of the center) delineates pre-stages to relationships that can be further unfolded. What, then, does "conscious" mean? The fundamental trait of being conscious is the interaction with something that is perceived, for example the discussed vase, which therewith circulates in a consciousness loop. This loop extends beyond the observer when he holds the vase in his hands - then he interrelates with an external object - or remains exclusively within the observer when he gives the vase away. An infinitesimal effect, however, would disappear in the same instant as it "affects". It could hardly become conscious. This means that on the one hand a conscious effect must circulate in the form of a circumscribed whole. The image of an object is stored. On the other hand, that preserving repetition circumscribes the entity of perceiving part and its object: it establishes a point of observation. We visualize tendencies between which we are to decide in the same way. Imagine you are a hunter who is chasing a bunch of poachers (somehow I find chasing these more pleasant!). All of a sudden, the track forks, and you must decide between one of the two paths. In your mind, you jump back and forth between the left and the right track. You are aware of both paths, which themselves are sufficiently circumscribed, in an overall reciprocal relation. This reciprocity describes the framework of the possibilities that are relevant to you in that moment. Your consciousness loop of course only allows a choice between the one or the other track. Even though the oscillation delimits itself with respect to its undifferentiated surroundings, it still requires a further definition, a de-cision. This definition within the yet undetermined dissolves the loop by realizing one alternative more strongly, and by leading to new possibilities with the continuation of your path. In this, a conscious choice must spring from the entity of the reciprocal relations itself. It must entirely unite the indeterminacy of the alternative to be chosen with the determinacy of the decision - and not only mix known doubts with unknown certainty, with which basically everything would be predetermined. Total unity is given as long as we do not divide the reciprocal relationships into single parts. Furthermore, such a division is not even possible if we want to comprehend its full meaning. We call such comprehension intuitive. The relation of reciprocity already is totality - namely, the indivisible unity of the alternative sides with the clearly circumscribed and thus determined, but neutral core at its middle. At the same time, however, it differentiates all these parts in the structure of its totality. That is why we prefer to speak, instead of a total unity, of an infinitesimal unity that is only total at respectively one point of the whole: at the center of the respectively analyzed relationship, such as here in the middle between the core of the whole and its periphery. And it is, finally, from this that the impulse arises: this one path is the correct one - and none other. We have not only intuitively taken in the situation, but also chosen freely. Consciousness is the infinitesimal unity of the concrete reciprocity loop with its neutrality at its center. It is consciously creative. Its free choices determine that which will be subsequently realized from the imaginary halo. But just as the universal continuum limits equivalence by reflecting upon a limited world, the impartial core of consciousness does ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 848 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality this in a more strict way: only with relatively determined structural changes can it practice freedom, implement decisions. Its informality, which in itself is diffuse, thus gives itself a framework of probable lines of action. This once again explains why we do not ascribe choice to the core alone, which in itself is meaningless, but rather to its infinitesimal unity with the reciprocity of the alternatives. Only this has something to chose from. And it encompasses a relative separation of the possibilities. Furthermore, coincidental influences and meaningful interconnections are also involved in the decision process. Like the hunter's logical considerations, they lead up to the moment of choice and there become identical with their unity. The decision is not arbitrary - for the hunter it has a meaning within his wider context without being strictly determined by it. Its permanent share in the infinitesimal unity can still lead to completely unexpected solutions: all of a sudden, we realize that we could pursue the poachers in a completely different way - through the air! But we must resort to one of the known aids to do this. We begin to deliberate the quickest way to engage a helicopter - a surprising third path that arises from the unison with the enfolded total context. It is of utmost importance for everything beyond this point that we understand the connection between the structure of consciousness and infinitesimality that we just introduced: Let us use the movement of an object from one place to another as a simple model. An object transitions into one that lies beside it. If this did not occur in infinitely small steps, the movement would occur in leaps. David Bohm advocated this latter view. In his opinion, the holomovement into and out of the depths closes all the gaps between perceived moments of movement, which enfold themselves into the hidden order, only to unfold again a bit further on. 8 In a similar way, single pictures at the movies appear as moving figures as they are projected one after the other. But how do we correlate the unfolded moments of movement in such a way that they appear to us as one movement? We compare the different frames and perceive the unbroken entity of their reciprocity. We recognize one changing scene. An optical illusion? Fine. But then, this illusion is so universal that we can no longer designate it as such. Because if we look "behind" the apparent continuity of movement, we will only find further "illusory movements" - in our case, the spreading of the light waves from the projection lamp, the film winding through the projector, the movement of electrons in the electrical cord, etc. 9 It is of no use to further divide these movements into discrete steps (even if we refer to quantum mechanics), because only wholes, which as such present structure, can have an effect. Otherwise they will remain infinitesimal. However, their structure contains infinitesimal centers, each part includes its own infinitesimality. We obtain a transition to the infinitely small at each point of the (holo-)movement. More 8 David Bohm, Wholeness and the Implicate Order. Routledge 1983, p. 200ff. 9 Please excuse the old-fashioned technology. It simply is more vivid. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 849 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality exactly put, the unity of structure and infinitesimality repeats itself at every point all the way down to its own infinitesimality. 10 All non-infinitesimal objects which can be further unfolded thus also remain connected to each other infinitesimally - not only by way of the identity of their centers, but because of the presence of such centers at every point of their transition. This total - better: infinitesimal - unit of infinitesimality and non-infinitesimality is what I mean by infinitesimality structure. We can expand the reality funnel yet further, fan out the diversity overlapped into one relatively simple image, whereby we bring new objects to light. In the movie example, we would penetrate into the film's production company, then into the life of the director, of the actors, the targeted audience, etc. The existing infinitesimality structure expands to a greater diversity which of course also has its own infinitesimality structure. Infinite expansion finally leads us to the infinitesimality structure of the absolute universal continuum - that point of reflection that all reality funnels already contain in individualized form. What does that mean? The infinitesimality structure of the infinite universe - the absolute unity (!!!) of all coarse, fine and direct connections - is included in every limited object or consciousness, where it plays an individual role. There, it is but less unfolded, relatively diffuse. It is more infinitesimal. Only at the extreme end of the respective funnel's stem does it merge into one central infinitesimal point. That is, the potential structure of the universal continuum is compacted into every concrete circumscription! Our permanent choice But of what significance is the ubiquity of infinitesimality structure to the freedom of choice? Since nothing exists without characteristic tendencies which reciprocally refer to each other, nothing is without selective consciousness. Every one of these consciousnesses, be it that of a human, a plant, or a growing crystal, in turn is interrelated in an infinitesimalitystructured way with all others. Accordingly, their decisions must also be interconnected: every partial consciousness makes its choices in mediated and direct connection with the respectively broader consciousness of its viewpoint. Although the relative separateness of the spheres of consciousness is sometimes large (within their entirety) and the point of observation always restricted (there may be few or improbable alternatives to choose from), the more all parts unfold, the more detailed does the connection between mediation and direct unity become, while the overall consciousness grows beyond its previous bounds. It projects an increasingly complex network of nested reality or consciousness funnels that was compressed asymptotically within it. It is in this way that we become ever more conscious of the cultural and ecological interconnections of 10 Zeno's paradox, by which infinitely small steps cannot result in any movement, is obsolete. Movement is a dimension that is not reducible (to moments). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 850 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality the world, and increase our possibilities of choice. We become more consciously responsible. However, whether we regard relatively separate or detailedly mediated spheres, the existent whole also means their unmediated connection. That is, the direct contact of any random circumscription with all others and to the absolute universal continuum is and remains given. Any decision we make should therefore immediately have an effect upon the decisions of all other consciousnesses; this will be noticeable, of course, only in those that are part of our current point of observation. In an infinitesimality-structured world, such decisions are made in every moment. Because since all preliminary "endpoints" of a change are circumscribed by others, they always contain various possible continuations. But "who" is deciding what the next step will be? And who could change the course of the sun? Here, we should remind ourselves that every situation not only includes the regarded object, but also the observer, the entire point of observation. Its entire consciousness participates in the permanent choice. Nevertheless the essentials can be predetermined. The sun inevitably sets. But whereby? Actually, only through the decision of a consciousness that has given rise to the situation. And that consciousness is enclosed - consciously or unconsciously - in each of the consciousness funnels involved. Every moment of a change realizes a choice of the whole, but limitedly unfolded, universe. In the deepest depths, it is our will that the sun sets. While we originally spoke of effects and interactions, we are now only dealing with different forms of consciousness. Of course consciousness means more than the fundamental ability to make a free choice. It communicates with others, feels and fosters individual intentions. It is in ceaseless exchange with its subconscious, without the which it is unthinkable. How does it attune the creation of its reality to other individuals and "God"? What personal use can we distil from these cognitions? This and more will be the subject of the next chapters. Projection and the creation of approximations Normally, we believe that the objects around us can also be seen by others. We have ascribed a determined range of existence to the vase on the table, which would mean that it exists for a certain amount of observers. Nevertheless, we begin to doubt whether every observer really sees the same vase. We perceive an object by including it in our consciousness. But this consciousness evidently differs from all others. It contains a completely individual combination of opinions, preferences, and memories, which it here relates to a vase, such that we become conscious of this vase in a different way than Hans standing right beside us. One observer may be a passionate collector, and the other a flower fanatic. And nevertheless, both say they see one and the same vase at yonder place. So, do their vases have something in common after all? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 851 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality No, strictly speaking, they don't! Since every detail relates to a particular whole, it is identical with none of the details of another whole. The different consciousnesses of both admirers only meet in the infinitely minute that is really accorded to both - but no longer represents a vase.11 How then do they succeed in agreeing upon one, only this one and no other vase? Of course, one communicates, makes a deal: you tell me what you see and I tell you what I see, and then you correct me and I correct you, etc. In so doing, each includes a bit of the other's viewpoint in their own, creates a new consciousness with this information, upon which the other in turn creates a new consciousness including the information from the first common consciousness, and so on. Of course, the observers now no longer perceive their original object. Instead, they have created an overall consciousness of both viewpoints, with which they are interwoven unto the infinitesimal. They circumscribe its wholeness, in which a common approximation of their individual vases now circulates. This is that vase with a determined range of existence. You can verify this construction of reality by means of a simple experiment: ask someone from your family to point at a random object. All those present should then follow the associations this object brings up. Exchange your impressions, observing all the while how you integrate the others' references, and how through this an object that is common to all crystallizes. This is not that which every single one of you now perceives, but it is the particular object contained within the new overall consciousness of the observers. Further differentiations, that is, new references, arise constantly, which can be adjusted equally constantly. The resulting approximation is the common - "objective" - reality of the communicating individuals. Of course we do not always have to start at zero. We already have internalized certain ideas and rules about approximations and their formation. (Almost) everyone knows "what" a vase is or "how" to speak. But if you also know someone who always understands what you say differently, it will be clear to you what we are talking of here. One question we have already answered in a different form remains: how can a single observer perceive something unified if such perception requires communication? You know it: his consciousness, his inner communication, circumscribes the object as an entity which continues to circulate as such within it. If a consciousness did not consist of interrelating partial consciousnesses - down into the infinitely small -, there would be no expanded, let alone structured objects of contemplation. Accordingly, collective approximations are formed like circumscribed entities. At first, no individually perceived object exists for another consciousness. It is infinitesimal, nonexistent. Only by means of communication, that is, reciprocity between different consciousnesses, is an approximated object acceptable to each side brought forth from the imaginary halo and individual knowledge. Nonetheless, that which we want to see, for example flowers in the vase, already existed before in a similar form for other observers. Mother had already put such flowers in that vase (in her vase). Even that upon which we are not focused is available in principle, it can at some time be brought up from somewhere else where it must exist, since everything 11 This example is taken from Jane Roberts, The Seth Material. Prentice-Hall 1970, Chapter 10. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 852 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality exists for someone. Only the decision in favor of a particular communication is made by each consciousness in association with its central zero point. The ensuing projection arises (via holomovement) from the world of its respective un-/subconscious.12 Despite our choice, then, we project objects which have existed long since as approximated from another perspective. To establish this, however, means that we were already conscious of these approximations before their projection. Because to what extent an object exists beyond our own world is measured by means of its more comprehensive range of existence, which we paradoxically must know. How is that possible? Let us imagine a cave whose dark interior we want to explore archaeologically. We light a torch and step over the border of our current viewpoint into another, the interior of the cave, where we become aware of several prehistoric paintings. Eventually, we return to the outside, but keep the cave entry in view. Now, the artifacts are again steeped in darkness. However, we know with relative certainty, that these target objects (still) exist (more precisely, that they will still exist when we go back to them) and keep the beginning of the path to them in our consciousness. When we enter into the cave anew, this time nothing wholly unknown emerges. Nonetheless, we will perceive the pictures slightly differently, alas, perhaps they even have been damaged in the meantime. Before we stepped into the cave for the first time, we were not conscious of its content as part of the enfolded universe. After we had unfolded it, it became subconscious through its re-enfoldment - a subtle difference that emphasizes the dynamic existence of the object. That means that it alternates between potential and actual existence, by which the potential is confirmed through its repeated realization and at the same time is preserved as such. This alone entitles us to assert that an object will also distinguish itself from the sea of randomness, even when we are not observing it. In this case, we are observing the circumscribing oscillation between existence and non-existence, which condenses in a real potential. While shifting our viewpoint creates things that may already exist similarly for others, the potential connects us with them and is therefore itself perceived as their approximation that is, as incomplete. Real dynamic existence is not, as you know, the only possibility of delineating a potential. With respect to worlds that are not yet accessible, we are dependent upon inferences or extrapolations whose continued validity we assume on unknown ground. The confirming side of the circumscription is itself still potential here, only verified in relation to known phenomena. This is the way we go about when we infer an implicate order from ex plicit movements. And it is in the same way that we come to the assumption that our subconscious extends into the infinite, potentially unfoldable universe. To sum up briefly, new objects are created through the interplay of three processes: the decision to create, the exchange with other consciousnesses, and their ascent from the subconscious. 12 …whereby that which is to be projected from there is altered and other free decisions take part in this, such that the exact form of the projected remains unknown until the very end. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 853 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality The freedom to unfreedom We had seen that consciousness' freedom of decision grows with an increase in its complexity. Firstly, simply because it can then process more alternatives. Inner impulses also have more opportunities of becoming conscious in reciprocity loops, to transmute into selectable/rejectable suggestions. 13 Increased sensibility means a heightened changeability of the reciprocal relationships and thus additionally increases the possibilities available within a determined span of time. Even if the consciousness should constantly decide in favor of similar alternatives or even of passivity, more infinitesimal relationships, more partial consciousnesses and their combinations, are introduced into this choice. More points of decision, as it were, "moments of freedom", are involved. We may object that a locked-up human being will hardly have more possibilities of freeing himself than a locked-up ape. But the abstract partial consciousness of its imprisonment is not much more complex than the ape's. Thus, by basing our judgment on this specific circumstance, we compare two evenly matched focuses of consciousness whose potential is barely different. We only confirm our own premise. However, if we broaden our viewpoint, the human immediately has more possibilities of choice than the ape: he can sing, talk to himself, ponder over the preconditions of freedom, etc. Thus, it is important how much complexity becomes conscious. If something exists as a relatively simple interrelation, such as, perhaps, a thermostat, then it will show a relatively determined (or random) behavior, - irrespective of its origins. At this point, it should be becoming clear to us that our focus of consciousness is the apex of an individual hierarchy which expands infinitely far into all other, for us mostly subconscious, hierarchies. Although we tend to view our subconscious from a (neuro-) physiological perspective, it would be foolish to restrict ourselves to our limited physics all the way down to the infinite depths. Instead, physics will expand into unknown directions like everything else. Therefore, we must not assume that our subconscious works largely as we know it to from our conscious reality. Doubtlessly, however, it disposes of consciousness, or rather consists of such. The infinite depths remain hidden from us above all because they are too encompassing, too complex for our current consciousness. Since we experience a restricted version of that reality, however, our potential, our leeway for making decisions, originally must have been broader. That again would mean that our current limitation basically is a voluntary, our voluntary one - if we identify ourselves with our entire hierarchy. Our more comprehensive consciousness "forgets" itself in our chosen embodiment to experience its unique viewpoint, just as the boss sometimes restricts himself to his game of golf. If he, on the contrary, removed the restrictions of the player and constantly thought of his office and clients, his swings would hardly resemble a respectable ball game anymore. While, after all, the golf player can still interrupt his game whenever he likes (albeit he will also try to avoid that of his own accord!), the freedom consciousness of the more 13 By impulses I mean the subconsciousness' signals or impetuses to act, which arise within our more comprehensive holomovement. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 854 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality encompassing individual must decrease "from top to bottom" to guarantee its chosen overall structure of individuality. The singularity of every level contributes to this. Thus, especially conscious access to more complex levels remains restricted. A mouse would find it difficult to bear if it all of a sudden were gifted with the understanding of a human - at best perhaps it could come to grips with a reduced version. Its mouse-ness contains the level of freedom it simply has at its disposal. The same is true of our human-ness. Like the mouse, we are not conscious of anything much higher that we could turn into. But we know that it must be there, because we exist as we are. It is upon this subconsciousness and its choice, then, that the relative intransigence of our current reality, but also our Self's capability of resistance, is based. Only sometimes do we feel the larger meaning of our experiences, that interrelation to a higher being which slips off into vagueness. However, this deep consciousness (down to the absolute point of reflection) ultimately encloses the more restricted focuses and the alternatives at their disposal. This consciousness chooses the same alternatives out of its oneness with the same core. Indeed, the infinitesimality structure of every consciousness unconsciously merges into that of the most comprehensive consciousness. Therefore, even the simplest of decisions still corresponds to a decision of the broadest and thus also to that of every other consciousness (just like the golf player's stroke corresponds to the end of his work day and the chauffeur's uniform). Giving ideals a chance In this context, let us hear how a deterministically inclined reporter interviews an undaunted philosopher about his memoirs: Determinist: If you were 16 years old once more, would you do everything the same way again? Optimist: No, I don't believe so. Determinist: But you couldn't remember the consequences of your actions. Everything would be exactly as it was then. How then could you know that some decisions were wrong? Optimist: I wouldn't know. But perhaps I would decide differently this time. Determinist: You mean, you would take another path by chance? Optimist: If everything were exactly equal to my situation back then, even the dice could not fall differently, right? Determinist: Right. So once again: based upon what facts would you decide differently? Optimist: Based upon my freedom of choice. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 855 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Determinist: Purely arbitrarily, that is practically randomly? Optimist: Not "purely": I would take all known facts into account and then decide. Determinist: But the facts were known to you back then too. Why should you evaluate them differently this time round? Optimist: Perhaps now I have other motives. Determinist: No, no. Everything is exactly as back then. You are the same person. Optimist: Possibly my subconscious has already decided differently, so that I feel pushed into another direction. Determinist: Then your subconscious chooses arbitrarily? Optimist: Yes and no. It also feels deeper impulses. Perhaps it will follow them, perhaps not. Determinist: But where then do you draw the line between arbitrariness and unconscious determination? Optimist: There is no line. Both arise from the same source. Determinist: And what is that? Optimist: The infinite. Determinist: Aha. In the end, then, someone infinitely distant decides. And who, please, should that be? Optimist: He is sitting right in front of you. We have described the transition from consciousness to the subconscious as a funnel whose walls symbolize the limits of the currently conscious, narrow down ever more and meet in the infinite depths. We can expand the range of the conscious permanently or only temporarily (dynamically), stretch the funnel or make a bulge in its stem, but none of all this will remove the funnel form. Let us now reap the fruits of our analyses: Higher complexity, that is, greater freedom of decision, allows our deeper beings (in our subconscious - but there, unfolded - depths) to find unity over things that appear to us as rigid circumstances or insoluble conflicts. In a more comprehensive frame of reference, the ape and the prisoner are in agreement with their guard. In the infinite depths, this voluntary attunement even merges into the identities of the sides and therewith into absolute freedom. The one's decision finally is that of the other. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 856 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Since every individual embodies the entire hierarchy, even the most limited of beings preserves a certain measure of free will and feeling of harmony with the larger whole. The infinitesimal connection of every random consciousness with the infinite reaches through all that is less or rather potentially conscious to it and meets it there. The decisions of all that is conscious and subconscious converge in the increasing depth of the funnel stem. They converge in the hierarchy of each single individual. In the dimension perpendicular to this, that of peripheral reciprocity, this identity becomes directly effective. Our limited consciousness itself decides. And, taking both (horizontal and vertical) dimensions into account, inner impulses and absolute identity flow together in their conscious effect. We perceive subconscious determination with a partial freedom of choice. Stated more simply, three things interact in decision making: the interrelation of the alternatives, inner impulses and "the" infinitely small center point. All this is enfolded down to the infinitesimal by holomovement, but is also unfolded. In its latter form, the alternatives are meaningful to the person making the choices because deciding between them is his action. He relates the upcoming to himself. In this process, the choosing self represents an enfolded form of the whole relating to the unfolded outer world. Inner impulses always lie closer to this enfolded form. They follow personal ideals from the same complex depths, and consciousness aligns itself with them (or their distortion).14 The relationship between ideal and alternatives thereby embodies the significance of the latter for the chooser. Meaning and impulse(s) unite themselves infinitesimally with the center of consciousness and thus will lead to a free, but not wholly arbitrary decision. The subconscious structures certainly do not all have the same weight for us, given we can differentiate between them (dynamically). On the other hand, their effects merge in our deeper being, which has a significantly larger overview than we do. We should therefore first trust its impulses. In each of them, our personal result of all the subconscious communications is expressed and assigns us an individual role within the overall movement of the universe. We can misunderstand them or reject them, but in so doing will probably not be doing ourselves a favor in the long run. Most people do know subliminally why they are in their current situation in life. I am certain that, after some attentive and honest self-observation, they will feel that somehow it all fits in. Even if you find yourself in an uncomfortable situation you cannot escape from, you may assume that you have chosen this situation yourself. However unconsciously a situation or action may come into being, the individual that experiences them - as infinite hierarchy - is fully responsible for both. Every currently limited aspect of consciousness, of course, can only take this responsibility upon itself partially, to the extent that its larger being has endowed it with consciousness and free will. It can, however, additionally restrict its degree of freedom or strive to expand it - it still determines what happens within its own flexible framework. In this way, it has the opportunity to make use of its "destiny" in the best possible way - in the interest of the purpose for which it wanted to experience it - and be it only to supersede it. 14 An ideal is not a fourth basic factor, but rather an alternative to an impulse when the ideal deviates from it. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 857 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Dynamic consciousness Something subconscious, as for example the cave paintings, naturally does not have to be more complex than what is currently conscious. If for example we (re-)cognize a vase, we already anticipate some of its uses: we can see it with or without flowers, on the shelf, as a present, and so on. We alternate between different points of observation that circumscribe the vase without having all of them present simultaneously. Additionally, we imagine how others see the vase, we partially immerse ourselves in their viewpoints.15 Every one of the successive situations - also when we handle the vase - is unique, individual. In each, all previously created ones sink back into the subconscious, while their reproducibility is maintained. The current consciousness thus moves through its subconscious. Sometimes, it emerges approximately at a point that has already been passed, in between however it discovers hitherto unknown reality settings. We can regard this shift of focus as a descending opening of the consciousness funnel, as a wandering bulge in the funnel stem. Finally, the bulge's, that is, the focus's movements are more or less consolidated into one object, one consciousness. If we bring back conscious impressions from other settings, such that all viewpoints experienced during a dynamic cycle merge into a new, quasi-static state of consciousness, we focus in the usual way we have hitherto discussed. I qualify the result as "quasi-static" because an absolute standstill is not possible - effect/existence means change. A state only becomes static through the circumscribing movement of the focus, whereby the dynamic and the static unite in an infinitesimality-structured way. We recognize a (also spirally) circumscribed entity. At this point it literally jumps to the eye that consciousness is nothing but its own dynamic. The circumscription of its whole consists in the constant alternation between the conscious and the subconscious! Through the permanent (approximatively) cyclic change in focus of consciousness, the subconscious is lifted to the level of the conscious without giving up its potentiality. Since every phase of change represents its own focus, it is not even possible that one focus be formed from all these! Instead, their unity consists in the infinitesimalitystructured entity of one overall and many single focuses. Let us attempt, once more, to understand the shaping of form by means of our example. When we look at a vase, we consolidate the possibilities of its use into one object without forgetting their singularity. The flow from situation to situation is contained in the vase without becoming static. The same is true of your current attitude towards life. The psyche fluctuates from moment to moment. If, in contrast I said "an object is the sum (or the integral) of its functions", that would be an inadmissible simplification. It is a unity of individuals. 15 We can also immerse ourselves completely. To do this, we start from what we know about the other, and then dive into our inner self. We have set a destination and the intention to arrive exactly at that destination. Then we open our inner being and with it the paths to other realities. If we succeed, we feel how we slip into the other's viewpoint, the other consciousness. If you think closely about how you normally put yourself into other situations, this method will not seem so very unfamiliar to you. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 858 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Nonetheless, we must differentiate between the quasi-static and the interaction with those focuses that remain subconscious. Of these, not more than a presentiment of their existence and the possibility of accessing them is preserved at our level. Regarded from our perspective, the path to them leads us into the ever less conscious, the ultimately allimplying whirlpool. On our way, we meet old habits of thought and programmed beliefs such as "I am only a tiny cog in the works", or "There is no happiness for me". We can still become conscious of such beliefs with relative ease, and send them back into the subconscious in a modified form, from where they restructure our (explicit) reality anew, as if by magic. Furthermore, we encounter processes we ignore, but which lead to such appearances as the vase, a car or a cup of coffee. We can also call these into consciousness, as soon as we wish to, without problems - to a certain extent. However, we can visualize more complex processes, such as that of climate change or "merely" that of speaking, at best fragmentarily, but cannot grasp them as a whole. The conscious and subconscious in these cases must cooperate as such. On dynamic existence All the same, even a suppressed dynamic must be consolidated quasi-statically to have a discernible meaning for - in every moment limited - consciousness. We already know it: the oscillation between the evident and hidden circumscribes a potential form of existence, such as the stone age cave paintings, but also every other object. Its range of existence results from the observer's dynamic, who in each of his own moments of movement perceives a different side of the object, connects all these views into one, only potentially complete object, and in turn "appends" this one to each partial version. Thus, for instance, he can assert that his house still exists in an intact form, even though he is only admiring the front view, or is dreaming of his home 1000km away. While he jogged around his estate, he circumscribed it dynamically. Now, he consolidates what he saw on his way. Of that, he quasi-statically circumscribes an image - a partial version. The same is true if in future, instead of running himself, he sends his son Hans to the back. The ensuing exchange of reports, yelled over the roof, describes a dynamic observation. Each bundles these into one quasi-static image to which he ascribes a potential reality. That not only means that dynamic must exist, but that existence always also is dynamic! When an object, circumscribed by real and potential viewpoints, exists less than another (as described in the first chapter), its approximation condenses more in the potential than in the immediately existing sphere. One's own home, 1000km away, is thus not as strongly present as one's current vacation residence. Creation of reality Communicating individuals act, as argued previously, in a fundamentally self-determining way. Thus, together we develop a world of common approximations that is relatively independent of our own existence within it. Collective reality is more stable than each individual that contributes to it.16 For this reason, each individual that wants to act within a 16 As a whole, collective reality of course is also individual. It is only collective within the dynamic of alternation between viewpoints. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 859 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality common reality must subordinate itself more or less to its norms. Its movements are subject to laws. The emergence of these laws also reaches far back. All consciousness was and is, as described, already interwoven subconsciously. Just as ours reaches into the conscious environment, our much more vast subconscious permeates the environment's subconscious part. Conscious creativity must conform to these interconnections and adapt to already existing forms. For example, a consciousness that submits itself to the physical level of existence cannot create anything that infringes against the physical conservation of energy, and must make use of the materials it finds on this level (especially the brain). All the individuals involved continue to contribute to the formation of reality - but now in a coordinated fashion. Sub- and half-consciously, a relatively stable frame of creativity has emerged, an agreement on what is possible that excludes everything beyond these boundaries. Existent approximations, dynamically anticipatable forms, and individual decisions unite to form a moderately modified reality. With an increase in the complexity of consciousness, its influence upon this creational process increases, but is then again qualified by the increasing complexity of creations. In the end, the common outer world (such as the forest we walk through) as well as the most intimate surroundings (such as the handkerchief in our pocket) are both to a high degree products of the coordinating subconsciousness, upon which the free will of the single consciousness has but limited influence. On the other hand, we should not underestimate this influence. Everything was at some point - consciously or subconsciously - chosen, and every hierarchy of consciousness (every infinite individual) in turn chooses from this set of available resources. The possibilities on each single level of course are restricted, but by no means null. Much of what was decided on a subconscious level can be discarded as soon as it has become conscious. And every conscious choice is followed by a modification of unconsciously created reality. As complete individuals, we encounter what we want to expect. By firmly believing that something we yearn for (or fear) will occur, the interrelation that is therewith built up will automatically bring forth adequate impulses that are integrated into our holomovement.17 We encounter corresponding answers in the guise of outer events. If we meet up with resistance, we will often note that it is an inner one - born from strong impulses or hardened beliefs and transposed symbolism (such as physical dirt for psychically felt "dirt"). We really should leave some of those as they are - we have chosen them on a deeper level with greater insight -, we could, however, easily redesign others. When we have altered encumbering beliefs and transpositions, we must guide the subconscious without making it more conscious than necessary. Like a trapeze artist before his leap, we concentrate upon our destination - and we will get there of ourselves. For example, we vividly imagine the I coinciding with our deeper impulses that we would like to be (including its feelings) over and over again, and we will develop into this being together with all its necessary "circumstances". The deeper our (undisputed) conviction is, the more probably will it come to be. 17 Belief is a unity of reciprocity (consciousness) and impulse, the spiral aspect of the infinitesimality-structured interconnection with the subconscious. If we also take the freedom of decision that is woven into the funnel stem into account, we obtain a dynamic consciousness that ever chooses its beliefs anew. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 860 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality Every law unfolds inseparably with the conditions and events under which or for which it is valid, since it is defined by them. But in line with what we said above, "laws of nature" must also be created - similarly to those of social co-existence, albeit much less consciously. Accordingly, they are broken or bent much less frequently. Nevertheless, we do not simply discover them, but always play a part in forming them too. It is only reasonable that our subconsciously chosen reality should offer us a scope of experience that allows us to develop further. With the advancement of our development, then, this scope of experience must also shift. For instance, we often only learn from extreme situations that sometimes may even call our current existence into question. It is to be hoped we will yet do so in the face of the impending climate change, re-emerging epidemics and the danger of nuclear terrorist attacks. Such situations, which contradict the drive to self-preservation, are unfolded unconsciously even though they are evoked by conscious decisions. Consequently, if we at least acted correctly now, it could happen that the surroundings came to our assistance of themselves - out of their inner being. After first attempts at environmentally conscious action, global warming had already begun to slow, and new natural causes for it were constantly made out (cold currents from the deep seas, a higher consumption of carbon dioxide in vegetation, and others). Even if the tendency points in another direction at the moment, we could discover, after more consistent action, that certain catastrophe once more will fail to come - "for very real reasons". It will only affect us if we capitulate to its "lawfulness".18 Playing with probabilities What actually forces us to make choices? Could we not pursue all possibilities that present themselves, realize all of them simultaneously? The hunter at the crossing has already noticed that he could follow both tracks by helicopter. But that is something else than to haste after the poachers on the ground. To really follow all paths, the hunter would have to "split" himself. He would have to create three clones of himself of which he would be the original or whole self. The three clones would not necessarily have to be as diversified as their creator, it would suffice for them to pursue their hunting task and stay in "radio contact" with the whole self. But they would have to split themselves repeatedly to make sure they didn't miss out on a single opportunity. And in the face of the explosive amount of possibilities offered at each crossway, the whole self's capability of differentiation would rapidly become overtaxed. Multiple probable (that is, at least tentatively dynamically experienced) paths thus embody different possibilities of self-restriction. By "definitively" taking one of these, we focus our consciousness upon this one and move away from the consciousness of the previous 18 Admittedly, most of the processes involved in global warming are not "truly unbending" laws of nature such as the first law of thermodynamics (a form of the law of the conservation of energy, which as a pure abstraction is meaningless and moreover a circular argument). Since however the "inner energy" of a system has already been linked to its "rest mass" ("conversion of mass into energy"), psychokinetic experiments once again point towards the fact that every concrete law becomes relative as soon as we begin to outgrow its "unconditional" range of validity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 861 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality potential. We want to pursue one of the probable realities and the self that condenses in it. This of course only makes sense if the whole self and with it also the clones not chosen remain intact, if they, in the end, contribute towards our total experience (as we to theirs). Once they have been made conscious, we cannot eradicate them, but at best conceal them.19 The consciousness of each alternative continues to operate autonomously. If we notice that we are on the wrong track, we can go back or put ourselves onto another by way of a shortcut. It remains at our disposal for another while. One of the other clones has followed it and perhaps has sent us that impulse which leads us to the certainty that we are going wrong. In consequence, we again decide in favor of this other - after our previous adventures only similar - alternative, while we still send yet another clone along the wrong track (perhaps it may turn out to be right after all, since there we may encounter the love of our lives!). In the end, we have combined our current (experience of) reality with the one that has continued to evolve subconsciously for us. When the choosing self changes his individual reality (in whichever way), this means a rearrangement of probabilities, which continue to affect each other. This rearrangement affects him (infinitesimality structure!) down to the infinity of his hierarchy of consciousness, which extends into all other individuals. With this, his decision also calls forth a modified weighting of possibilities in the others - in turn also into the infinite. Not only one new self is created, but rather all individuals are created anew, unique compositions of consciousness, each of which grasps the whole universe in a new way and is grasped by all other individuals in a new way. The individually chosen probabilities knit themselves together to a new collective reality in which we then find ourselves. Let us examine this participation a bit more closely: in a universe of infinitesimalitystructured processes of choice that does not exclude any form of existence, every possibility becomes real. Our free decisions affect other individuals, but to what extent they restructure their reality also depends upon their free decisions. That means that each of two communicating individuals can decide in favor of a world in which the other exists such as it is not in the other's predominant reality. If you decide to win over your opponent, that is what will happen. Nonetheless, he can also decide in favor of his own victory - and will experience that. In your reality, however, he has agreed to lose - as you have in his. The probability of your defeat remains dynamically existent, just as in this the probability of your victory (both have a broader range of existence than the illusion of one individual). The same is true collectively. And herein lies our greatest opportunity! It is not necessary to fight against all other individuals - the community we yearn for is already there, it most probably is even close by: in a subconscious world, everyone has decided in favor of it. It thus is entirely sufficient that we endorse this reality personally to make it prevalent for us. We will experience it as soon as we want to! If we want to live in a clean environment, we decide in favor of such a one, act accordingly, and are certain that all others are in agreement with us. If however we are not clear within ourselves on the conditions under which we wish to allow this reality to appear, then we will not experience it. And if we counteract basic needs of other individuals, we not only are wasting our energy - and 19 The new potential of a clone must of course not be smaller than that of its creator. It is only smaller within the context of the old possibilities. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 862 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality ultimately admit our impotence -, but also are certainly not acting in accordance with our original ideal. A creation thus consists in deciding in favor of a particular hierarchy of probabilities, we choose the mountain peak and therewith the order of rank of the other existing possibilities. Within this open hierarchy, we find every reality (some however at an infinite distance). The interrelations of all conscious and subconscious possibilities peak in the individual decision of one consciousness that in turn affects all other individuals consciously and subconsciously. In this way, the decisions of all individuals in favor of respectively subjective entities connect into a unanimous decision in favor of their common approximation. A collective reality is created, including a hierarchy of collective possibilities (which, strictly speaking, can only be perceived by all of them together and in turn is again individual - a part of the dynamic infinitesimality structure of unique totalities). Since, then, the infinitesimality structure of each (sub-)conscious encloses all possibilities, all decisions, each individual creation at the same time is an immediate act of the hidden infinity of All That Is. As we had already ascertained, the choice of the one is the choice of the other. With that, however, "God's" power of creation is inherent to every individual. All That Is As we recall, even the (funnel) center of every single infinite individual has a reflecting effect. By the absolute point of reflection described in the second chapter, however, I mean the divergent collapsing of all individual worlds in the universal continuum, which immediately also supersedes the universal continuum, but results in a neutral exchange between all worlds without transition. Here, the individual worlds as such are infinitesimally united with the absolute universal continuum. It is also true of this state of reflection that it is only of significance to real (also noninfinitesimal) worlds. It includes the individuality of each world dynamically and thus is always to be found within a real consciousness. Its only difference to the reality of this consciousness lies in the fact that it is not bound to it, but only displays a particular form of All That Is. Each of these specific forms is individual enough to make a subconsciousness and therewith creativity possible. While All That Is extends dynamically from the simplest particle to the infinitely distant universal continuum, it surprises itself in each form with its own power of creation. As a being that is meaningful as a whole, it embodies the most complex of possible consciousnesses. Some would certainly denominate it as "God", but it is a god who is constantly recreating himself. Let us look at this the other way around. We have spoken of the freedom of a consciousness to put itself in the position of others. This freedom must increase with the consciousness' complexity, because the greater the complexity we are conscious of, the more access points do we have to the subconscious. And by means of wide-ranging wanderings of our focus of consciousness, we in turn grasp a yet more complex reality. We can thus ascribe maximal freedom to the most complex of structures of consciousness, that is, to All That Is. It is an ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 863 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality infinitely complex structure at the brink of collapsing into identity. Accordingly, it must have the freedom to decide to limit itself in any of its ramifications. It is even nearly impossible that it would not make use of this potential (it would be extremely improbable). All That Is, after all, means that even the simplest structures are integrated into it as such a necessarily dynamic claim. We had ascertained that for a dynamic complexity to gain real significance it must be quasi-statically synthesized. On the other hand, it should remain dynamic and not condense in an object of the moment. If at all, then rather in the form of a real effective potential, a "funnel of possibilities" that exists as such. Thus, it is not only when listening to a melody or watching a film, but also in real life, that variations are conjured up, each of which we can focus upon while we perceive others subdued in the form of their background or halo. We mentally move between these probabilities and realize their superimposition in a respectively individual manner. Even the imaginary halo, in which the variations become subconscious, is included in our perception of evident objects. The subtle deviations, the potential inherent to the current situation becomes ever more indistinct towards the back (or the bottom or the inside), but still refers to our consciousness. We are aware of the conscious and subconscious context from which we choose our reality. Throughout this, the range of focus dynamic is not limited in itself, but merely in our consciousness. If we cannot put ourselves onto a particular level, that does not mean the end of the journey (towards the inside there is also no reason for a definitive limit). We are only incapable of deciphering that focus at our level of consciousness. Therefore, it may seem that our focus re-emerges without having accomplished anything - we awake from a "dreamless" phase. But we sense "there was something there", or, "there is something there". Our consciousness is inevitably connected to all others, and its dynamic in the widest sense is that of All That Is - the movement of one consciousness in different focuses and from individual to individual. The omnipresence of this dynamic requires an infinite velocity - the instant alternation between all realities, whereby our limited consciousness, as well as its corresponding experience of a "slower" fluctuation, only becomes possible by skipping several phases. This slower fluctuation nonetheless is a part of the experience of All That Is. In an infinitely high oscillation frequency, all other frequencies are contained. And because this oscillation at the same time is an oscillation between frequencies, they are all included as such. Awareness The absolutely free consciousness of All That Is thus is not characterized by its momentary reality, but alone through its unrestricted potential to assume any state whatsoever. There is only one absolutely free consciousness. And its potential consists of restricted focuses of consciousness to which its highly complex dynamic remains largely subconscious. Just as little can the most free of consciousnesses be conscious of all individual viewpoints simultaneously. Thus it also cannot know its potential in detail. It can, however, be conscious of its potential as such, as dynamic freedom in itself. This infinitesimal unity ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 864 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality between its momentary (quasi-static) focus of consciousness and its open dynamic is its awareness. But wherein does our awareness lie? In principle, our awareness cannot differ from that of All That Is. We are a branch of the absolute state of reflection whose permanent creation is an equally dynamic process as the universal reflection itself. Thus, the universal awareness in an individually modified form is also inherent to every restricted consciousness, that is, the connection to the infinite potential is open. It can therefore perceive this potential. Why, then, does it hardly make use of it? The same question reworded would be: why does the universal continuum's absolute state of reflection even divide itself up? It is division per se, an individual whose reality consists in its dynamic. And each of its phases involves an individual consciousness of itself. It thus not only consists of its awareness of its individual hierarchy, but precisely this awareness also contains a consciousness of its own (topmost) position. With this consciousness (in a certain sense, an additional reflection) it seems that we exclude ourselves from the universal dynamic. Depending on the chosen degree of self-consciousness, the channel of awareness becomes tighter or wider (of course, we are dealing with the funnel stem of consciousness). It cannot be completely closed… In short, awareness means consciousness/subconsciousness (infinitesimality-)structured whole. as a dynamically  Awareness can merely be delimited by thought; feeling it comes considerably closer to its essence. Thought, feeling and the yet deeper are united in it.  Awareness is not a quasi-static approximation. Instead of circumscribing a condensate, it covers the entire distance into infinity. All That Is extends through everything in the opposite direction.  Awareness is the natural reality of the subconscious, since it only exists dynamically. In this, it remains individualized down to the deepest depths, since it integrates all other focuses in a unique way. Hierarchy can only exist in the comparison of one-sided entities. In contrast, here we are speaking of the infinitesimality-structured unity of all-sided infinity and individuality - so to speak of an "individual all-sidedness" or "all-sided individuality". Please try to grasp the difference, the openness as compared to a mere consciousness, intuitively - with "pure" logic we almost invariably end up on slippery ground. Stated more simply, awareness connects the consciousness with the complete individual that encompasses all other individuals. Since awareness is conscious, it is influenced by the realized part of the individual. And every change in this awareness means a change in the awareness of all other individuals - but also the other way around, since they are all contained in each other. Ultimately, every individual influences all others to the same extent. This is true independently of their conscious relationships to each other. In a conscious comparison with others, an awareness can be more one-sided or more allsided, depending upon how generally all-sidedly complex it is in its conscious part. The ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 865 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality wealth of its deeper sense of potential must be correlated, that is, be loosely connected to the complexity of its perception. A cockroach is less fully aware of its flexibility than a human. (On the other hand, humans sometimes restrict their awareness to such an extent that in comparison it makes the cockroach appear to act with the intuitive far-sightedness of a genius. Like in a dream, it acts based upon millions of years of experience, without being conscious thereof in detail). An expansion of awareness thus means the expansion of the conscious complexity and/or of the palpable potential. Every little child already has an astounding awareness at its disposal and releases it in playing with reality. By way of its spontaneous actions, it unfolds from its being the natural flow of information and energy that aligns itself with an equally spontaneously "given" environment. This environment does not appear as "solid" as that of a grown-up by far; in play it can, for example, transform itself from a race track into a train station and finally into a horse stable. The child alternatingly enters into the personalities of its dolls and lets them communicate with each other. In the course of this, the difference between outside and inside disappears, in every doll a ramification of the child's self condenses (this actually began with the dolls' production to satisfy a demand, continued with their choice in the shop, etc.). Has the constant flow from one focus to another dried up in the adult? Occasionally, we also catch ourselves in mental role play. However, we distinguish neatly between "fantasy" and "reality". Yet we could just as quickly alternate between the real viewpoints of our fellow creatures, if we would only open ourselves to this potential. We would experience our reality, our self, in the most multifarious way, integrate these experiences in an encompassing awareness and throw all communicative blockades overboard. While we followed visible reality, we would also perceive alternatives behind it and gather wisdom from the interrelations with them. The feeling of community arising in this way would ultimately be capable of uniting dreamlike with physically orientated focuses, and thus take relationships between agents and situations into account that otherwise are completely lost on us. Closely connected to the concept of awareness is that of timelessness. The observed potential, all the changing viewpoints, do not necessarily represent a future reality. Put differently: the reality to which the potential points is past to the same extent. The dynamic of the focus of consciousness is cyclic, even though consciousness always develops in a certain direction.20 Timelessness describes the experience of a present without past and future, since it already contains both. It designates the present experience of change, the infinitesimal unity of rest and movement, the identification with the individual infinitesimality structure that dynamically includes All That Is. People experienced in meditation describe states of so-called "pure consciousness", in which the flow of object-bound occurrences comes to a standstill and only their own encompassing Being is sensed. I think this is an awareness of a deeper dynamic of focus, that even in the meditating consciousness is only unfolded to that symbol-less presence. By maintaining this core of individuality conscious after the meditation, the psychophysical world appears in a clearer light. The individual is more consciously aware of its inherent 20 The infinity of this development in finite terms means irreversibility - even though awareness always synthesizes all possible points of the way. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 866 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality reality than one who represses its deeper states. Thus, it can fearlessly head towards new experiences. The freedom to act "No one has free will…, if they are not in harmony with the universe, since that would mean they are outside of the Universe", says esoteric philosophy.21 But every experience is individual, and to change my individual world freely all I actually need to consider is the capacity of my consciousness. With corresponding resolve, I can imagine anything I am capable of grasping, even, for instance, that I live in a dark forest full of witches and goblins, or on a glowing cloud amidst a host of angels. The range of existence of the changes I call forth is irrelevant on condition that I also ascertain it individually: the angels react to my presence and confirm the reality of their world to me in every respect. Only when I reach limits with my intentions (within my conscious scope) do I begin to let go of other things that refuse to go along with my changes of reality. My self-consciousness is focused upon that part of reality that I have control over, while everything else becomes the outside that surrounds me. This outer part now enters my consciousness as something independent and forces me to differentiate between passive and active free will, of which the latter brings forth effects with a greater range of existence. The other individuals act more or less autonomously, and therefore I can only practice active free will optimally in harmony with their decisions - by putting them to good use instead of repressing them. They will then multiply my potential as they would that of a sensitive marketing expert, or of a president elected by the people, instead of restricting it. 22 Subconsciously, of course, everyone influences everyone else all the time, but does not determine them (neither their ideas, nor their actions). In a more comprehensive sense, the creativity of one is also our creativity, through it our individuality is expressed too. Let us recall: our own freedom essentially consists in the possibility of limiting ourselves to keep things in perspective. That means that the other's independence is a component of our own. We have chosen our current limits and at the same time created the possibility of encountering other aspects of our all-encompassing dynamic from a unique "outside" viewpoint. Our and their free decisions connect to form a new, respectively individually experienced reality. On the conscious level, we choose based upon inner and outer information, impressions and meanings as infinitesimality structure. These decisions affect other individuals internally and externally, are included in their subjective processes of decision, from where we are faced with them in new forms. Meanwhile, subconscious aspects of all sides tend to communicate more unrestrainedly. Their more complex communication does not immediately lead to a common nature and does not necessarily take place between essential 21 Translated from Gottfried von Purucker, Mit der Wissenschaft hinter die Schleier der Natur. Esoterische Philosophie 1988, p.168. 22 This is nothing but the described attunement of individual hierarchies of probabilities from the perspective of each of them. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 867 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 6 | pp. 838-867 Janew, C., How Consciousness Creates Reality beings, but within the sphere of limited consciousness the result unfolds to discrete partial decisions. Their possible restrictions thus spring from subconscious freedom. At the same time, decisions - be they conscious or subconscious - are based upon the interlaced identity of all moments of choice, which is but taken into account in increasingly varied ways with increasing complexity (or subconsciousness). 23 This identity, which permeates all levels of consciousness, guarantees a deep harmony between even the most autonomous of decisions. Our own fulfillment must therefore also integrate the others' freedom of choice, by simply respecting it and trusting it as we would our own spontaneity. It is exactly the free creativity of every other consciousness arising from its own unique experience that makes our own creativity possible and inspired. Therein lies the purpose of a multi-parted Creation. Freedom of decision can only lead to disharmony between individuals with a limited awareness. If our resolutions are not to collide with those of other (self-)consciousnesses, and thus perhaps to become only passively effective, they must harmonize with them on those levels of the decision process we are barely aware of. Otherwise, at least one side will feel repressed (or rather will realize itself in another probable world in which we will find ourselves disadvantaged) and will in this way diminish the hierarchy of our values and their fulfillment. Not even God can bring peace to our world if we do not want it. He incorporates our individual freedom as such, that is, without neutralizing it. Because of this, His decisions, if they are to become actively effective, must be attuned to the decisions of his limitedly aware creatures. And if their decisions do not harmonize amongst each other, even He will have to be patient. Active freedom - for whomever it may be - consists in the multitude of small changes that it can effectuate. The expansion of our awareness to other value hierarchies, however, opens up the prospect of making use of our common potential with an effectiveness that was out of the question as long as we held on to self-restricting beliefs. *** 23 This identity of course is also first constituted in this way, but then is infinitely compressed within the funnel of every (partial) consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| June 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 4 | Page 478-480 Smith, S. P. Review of Henry P. Stapp's Book: Mindful Universe: Quantum Mechanics and the Participating Observer (The Frontiers Collection) 478 Book Review Review of Henry P. Stapp's Book: Mindful Universe: Quantum Mechanics and the Participating Observer (The Frontiers Collection) Stephen P. Smith* ABSTRACT Stapp gives a very deep and scientific account of his ideas, that must now be taken serious. He is far from a New Age quantum guru here, even as he ventures into philosophy. Stapp finds agreement with Whitehead`s ontology, and with this revelation Stapp`s theory is now found more far reaching than what even Stapp is willing to admit. For example, Stapp makes heavy reference to an agent that carries intention and causal efficacy, but I am afraid that even Stapp`s very mature quantum mechanics is unable to define this agent into existence. I need only follow Whitehead to the logical conclusion. You can find this book at Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Mindful-UniverseMechanics-Participating-Collection/dp/3540724133/ref=cm_cr-mr-title . Key Words: mindful, universe, quantum mechanics, participating observer. Stapp (page 20) writes on Heisenberg`s appreciation of actions at the level of Planck`s scale: "The aspects of nature represented by the theory are converted from elements of being to elements of doing. The effect of this change is profound: it replaces the world of material substances by a world populated by actions, and by potentialities for the occurrence of the various possible observed feedbacks from these actions. Thus the switch from being to action allows - and according to orthodox quantum theory demands - a draconian shift in the very subject matter of physical theory, from an imagined universe populated by allowed possible physical theory, from an imagined universe consisting of causally self-sufficient mindless matter, to a universe populated by allowed possible actions. A purported theory of matter alone is converted into a theory of the relationship between matter and mind." Stapp (page 23) writes about the limitation of the classical physics approach, or approximation: "there is no need for, and indeed no room for, any effect of any probing action. The uncertainty arising from the non-zero size of the quantum cloud - that in the unapproximated theory needs to be resolved by intervention of some particular probing action is already reduced to zero by replacement of Planck`s constant by zero. Thus all effects upon the physically/mathematically described aspects of nature`s process that are instigated by the actions freely chosen by agents are eliminated by the classical approximation. Consequently, any attempt to understand or explain within the framework of classical physics the physical effects of consciousness is irrational, because the classical approximation eliminates the effect one is trying to study." It is quantum mechanics that Stapp (page 23-24) turns to in his investigation of the "purposeful action of a human agent." He writes: "One aspect is his conscious intention, which is described in psychological terms. The other aspect is the linked physical action, which is described in physical terms; i.e., in terms of mathematical entities assigned to spacetime points. For successful living the physical described action should be a functional counterpart of conscious intension; after sufficient empirical honing by effective learning processes the physically described aspect of the felt intentional Correspondence: Stephen P. Smith, Ph.D., Visiting Scientist, Physics Department, University Of California at Davis, CA E-mail: hucklebird@aol.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| June 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 4 | Page 478-480 Smith, S. P. Review of Henry P. Stapp's Book: Mindful Universe: Quantum Mechanics and the Participating Observer (The Frontiers Collection) 479 act should have a tendency to produce the intended experiential feedback. John von Neumann, in his seminal book, Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, calls by the name process 1 the basic probing action that partitions a potential continuum of physically described possibilities into a (countable) set of empirically recognizable alternative possibilities." Stapp (page 30) writes: "The channels through which the calcium ions enter the nerve terminal are called ion channels. At their narrowest points they are only about a nanometer in width, hence not much larger that calcium ions themselves. This extreme smallness of the opening in the ion channels has profound quantum mechanical imports." It is the "quantum Zeno effect" that permits the Planck scale effects to impact the nerve terminals in the brain. Stapp (page 36) writes: "The quantum Zeno effect can, in principle, hold an intention and its template in place in the face of strong mechanical forces that would tend to disturb it. This means that agents whose mental efforts can sufficiently increase the rapidity of process 1 actions would enjoy a survival advantage over competitors that lack such features. They could sustain beneficial templates for action in place longer than competitors who lack this capacity. Thus the dynamical rules of quantum mechanics allow conscious effort to be endowed with the causal efficacy needed to permit its deployment and evolution via natural selection." I must correct Stapp here, because it is now consciousness that does the selection and this is far from Darwin`s natural selection (e.g., see Amit Goswami`s "Creative Evolution"). Stapp`s account is different from Penrose`s, and other accounts. He (page 52) stresses the importance of the quantum Zeno effect: "The only macroscopic quantum effect that appears to survive the decoherence effects [in warm brains] is the quantum Zeno effect. This permits neuroscientist unfamiliar with quantum theory to have a very accurate, simple, intuitive idea of the quantum state of a brain. It can be imagined to be an evolving set of nearly classical brains." However, as Stapp indicates, some non-classical properties also remain. Stapp gives a very deep and scientific account of his ideas, that must now be taken serious. He is far from a New Age quantum guru here, even as he ventures into philosophy. Stapp finds agreement with Whitehead`s ontology, and with this revelation Stapp`s theory is now found more far reaching than what even Stapp is willing to admit. For example, Stapp makes heavy reference to an agent that carries intention and causal efficacy, but I am afraid that even Stapp`s very mature quantum mechanics is unable to define this agent into existence. I need only follow Whitehead to the logical conclusion. Stapp (page 105) writes: "I am merely proposing that Heisenberg's incomplete ontology be completed by accepting what I regard as Whitehead`s main ideas. ... I need to stress that the core idea that the events in our streams of consciousness are two-way causally linked to events in the physical world lies at the intuitive heart of daily dealings with reality." But a two-sided reality is not well described by a psychological window and a physical window. There are two windows all right, but what holds the two together is an emotive middle-term that can escape both windows leaving both scientist and theologian dumfounded! Did you think that the agent, or agents, were us little egos running around that must compete to win favor with Darwin? Think again! Stapp (page 121) pretends not to have answers to these questions: "why are the laws of nature so well structured to sport biological structures? Are idea-like qualities primordial? Or do they emerge from a world completely devoid of all mind-like qualities?" And this pretense is maintained even after Edward (page 124) accuses Stapp of "creationism." Again, who exactly is this agent? I think Basil Hiley (page 135) came closest to an answer: "To use consciousness to formulate the laws of quantum ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| June 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 4 | Page 478-480 Smith, S. P. Review of Henry P. Stapp's Book: Mindful Universe: Quantum Mechanics and the Participating Observer (The Frontiers Collection) 480 mechanics seems circular, unless of course you assume some kind of universal consciousness lying at the centre of being as is proposed by certain forms of Hinduism." The fact is that we are driven by our affections while being trapped in circular reasoning, until we one day realize that our emotions source the middle-term that holds our two sides together. References Henry P. Stapp, 2007, Mindful Universe: Quantum Mechanics and the Participating Observer (The Frontiers Collection), Springer. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

640 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy Article Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy Syamala Hari* ABSTRACT Consciousness and its relation to the physical body were thoroughly analyzed in the Indian philosophy of ancient times. This philosophy contains many concepts which can lead to scientific answers to some of the questions that brain scientists and modern consciousness researchers are concerned with. In Indian philosophical literature thought is often described as being very fast and one that never comes to stop. Properties of thought described in this literature are very similar to those of faster-than-light objects, known as tachyons in modern physics. It will be possible to describe mental processes and interaction of mind with ordinary matter, in the terminology of mathematics and physics and quantum mechanics in particular, by means of a theory based on this philosophy‟s concept that mind consists of superluminal objects. Key Words: consciousness, mind, matter, Indian philosophy. 1. Introduction Consciousness and its relation to the physical body were thoroughly analyzed in the Indian philosophy of ancient times. This philosophy contains many concepts which can lead to scientific answers to some of the questions that brain scientists and modern consciousness researchers are concerned with. In particular, we will discuss this philosophy‟s proposition that mind is faster than matter (hence faster than energy and light) and how this proposition sheds light on questions such as “is monism or dualism, which theory can better explain consciousness scientifically”, “is dualism necessarily unscientific?”, “How does a living brain create subjective experience?”, “is quantum mechanics necessary to explain consciousness in a brain?”. In Indian philosophical literature thought is often described as being very fast and one that never comes to stop (interestingly, according to today‟s physics, a faster-than-light object, known as tachyon, cannot be brought to rest). If mind indeed consists of superluminal objects then it may be possible to describe its properties and processes and its interaction with ordinary matter in the terminology of mathematics and physics and quantum mechanics in particular. We will use the brain-computer analogy to present some ideas from the ancient Indian Philosophy which helps modern researchers to find scientific explanation of how the physical brain and the mind work together and how subjective experience occurs in the brain. Indian Philosophy is often considered to be a mystery and incomprehensible probably because it was all written long time ago and in Sanskrit, a language not spoken today and also because consciousness is discussed here in the context of spiritual progress. Contrary to such myths this literature‟s analyses are objective and concerned with understanding reality and perception of reality rather than with faith and what one should believe in. In recent days, *Correspondence: Syamala Hari, retired as Distinguished Member of Technical Staff from Lucent Technologies, USA. E-mail: murty_hari@yahoo.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 641 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy some quantum physicists think that this ancient knowledge includes concepts which resonate with findings in quantum physics. 2. Consciousness, Free Will, Mind, and Matter in Indian Philosophy This philosophy makes a distinction between free will and all other aspects of what we call consciousness of humans and other living beings in modern terminology. All aspects other than free will, such as desires, logical thought, remembering, emotions, experiences, imagination and so on, are all seen as involving a certain memory, and can be amenable to scientific explanation but not free will. Briefly, this philosophy‟s view of consciousness is as follows: The physical body of a living being is like a piece of hardware. It is made up of matter. Every living being, human or animal, or any living organism (possibly excluding some primitive forms of life), has an accumulation of experiences and therefore an accumulation of information, in other words a memory (called Manas in this literature), which we will call mind in this paper. In this sense, mind is like a computer memory containing data and programs. Just like a computer's hardware and software do not know what they are doing, their own existence, and the meaning of their memory contents, both the body and the mind of a living being also do not really know anything but there is a certain Consciousness (apart from the mind mentioned above) that "knows". Consciousness is like the computer operator, as it were, and the one who "really knows" everything that is part of the living being‟s activity. Although a computer does not really know or understand anything it does, once it is equipped with stored information (both data and programs) and mechanisms to store, retrieve, and process information, it is able to exhibit or simulate many "intelligent" behaviors such as learning, planning, and pattern recognition. Machines which do not have these memory mechanisms cannot exhibit such "intelligent" behaviors. Hence machine intelligence is based on memory mechanisms and we may say that an artificially intelligent machine is “intelligent” but not “conscious”, where by “intelligent” we mean the ability to store, retrieve, and process information. On the other hand, human beings (and probably other living beings) are not only “intelligent” like the “intelligent machines” in the sense that they perform various functions in life using the physical brain (similar to hardware) and the information stored in the brain (similar to software) but they are “conscious” as well; they know what they are doing at least when awake. Indian philosophy emphasizes that there is “Consciousness” same as FREE WİLL, different from and independent of any living being‟s memory and its contents and mechanisms. Moreover, intelligence in living beings, unlike in computers, is not merely a material process but is a process of interaction between ordinary matter of the physical body and some stored information made up of faster-than-light matter. A living being‟s experiences and emotions are responses of this faster-than-light software to the sensory inputs. The difference between a living being and a lifeless stone is that the living being has the necessary faster-than-light information to create experience whereas neither the stone nor the computer have it. The stone‟s inability to create experience is perceived by us as lack of self-awareness. The philosophy makes a distinction between “information” and “Consciousness”; the former produces experience in response to external inputs just like a computer‟s software while “Consciousness” is the ability to “really know” and “choose”. As already said, what we call consciousness in modern terminology is divided into two components: one is free will and the other is mind, the source of “intelligence” explained ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 642 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy above. Free will is independent of all causes; it is the ability to decide consciously and independent of any reason from the past or present, and without expecting anything in the future. Manifestation of free will is not an unconscious nondeterministic random occurrence. Free will is independent of space and time; its existence does not depend upon any memory, and it is not bound by any rules or logic. It is said to be nishkarana meaning that it is not the effect of any cause. (After all, it is free; it would not be free if it depends upon anything else for anything!) Therefore its existence cannot be described nor its occurrence be predicted by means of a formula expressed in terms of space and time using some language such as physics, mathematics, quantum mechanics, or computer science or any other science! (Note that every language consists of a certain set of symbols and rules to manipulate those symbols). Existence of such free will needs to be taken as a postulate in any theory that tries to explain subjective experience. One may say that the above approach to consciousness is similar to the first type of approach that Chalmers criticizes (1995) as one that altogether avoids the “hard problem” by assuming that free will is outside the domain of science. However, to insist that everything we experience must have scientific explanation involves assuming the opposite, namely, that nothing exists beyond space and time; in my opinion, the opposite assumption is just as valid or as invalid as the former assumption that something does exist independent of space and time. In spite of asserting that free will is independent of space and time and not bound by logic, Indian philosophy can contribute to scientific knowledge of how experience occurs in our brains and we will try to describe this contribution in what follows. The mind, excluding free will is called Manas. Manas keeps accumulating more and more contents as life goes on. Manas is a sense like other senses: sight, touch, hearing, smell and taste; it is the sense of memory and logic. Manas is said to be sukshma meaning subtle (like “soft” in the word software) as opposed to the physical body which is sthula (like hardware) meaning perceivable directly by physical processes of seeing, touching, hearing, smelling and tasting or indirectly by physical means. Manas is different from the body in that neither of the two can be transformed into the other unlike for example, matter and energy which do transform into each other in specific situations. In this literature, Isavasyopanishad for example (Swami 1990; p 139), mind is often described as being faster than matter (hence faster than energy, that is, light) and that mind never comes to rest (Mukherjee 2002). Hence the assertion that the body and the mind cannot be transformed into each other is valid according to the theory of relativity. But it is possible for the body and the mind to interact with each other producing more mind and changes in the body. Interestingly, after failures of experiments to create tachyons in bubble chambers, Feinberg (1970) conjectured that tachyons probably cannot be produced from matter but that it is possible that tachyons do interact with matter; thus his view is consistent with the above view of mind and matter although he never associated tachyons with mind. If mind indeed consists of faster-than-light objects, then it is possible to describe its properties and processes in the terminology of mathematics and physics and quantum mechanics in particular. It may be possible subsequently, even to verify the theory using biological experiments. Using Bohmian Mechanics, in an earlier paper (Hari 2008), it is shown that a zero energy tachyon can do what an Eccles‟s psychon would do, that is, trigger exocytosis simultaneously across a whole dendritic tree by interacting with vesicles in multiple boutons and “collapsing” their two-state quantum wave functions into the state that promotes exocytosis. Although physicists (other than a few who believe in tachyons) usually tend to avoid tachyons in their work, it is interesting that Fred Alan Wolf (2008) recently stated some quantum field ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 643 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy theoretical concepts associating tachyons to mind. In the past, there has been at least one theoretical physicist, Late Regis Dutheil, a quantum physicist, a consciousness researcher, who proposed a model in which mind is a field of tachyonic or superluminal matter1. 3. Some Rationale for Dualism: 3.1 A Representation of Information is different From Information itself Chalmers (1995) points out that there is no convention followed by researchers as to the use of the word “consciousness” and that “as things stand, those who talk about consciousness are frequently talking past each other”. The same statement applies to the word “information” because “information” is used often without a precise definition assuming that the reader should know its meaning because it is such an easy word. There are a number of phrases floating around: “physical information”, “classical information”, “quantum information”, all of which represent a physical quality such as energy. In the context of the “hard problem” or “explaining consciousness”, one has to understand “information” as Searle (1980) explains: the living brain and mind deal with meanings. In this context, Shannon‟s definition of information does not apply because it is irrelevant to meaning or experience. In the previous section we said that a lifeless stone does not have memory mechanisms to receive inputs and generate responses and that this lack of ability to react is what we perceive as lack of self-awareness. Hence one may ask: why then is a computer which does have memory mechanisms and which produces apparently intelligent responses, not self-aware? That is because the computer carries only a REPRESENTATION of information but not any "real information" or “phenomenal information” (Chalmers 1995) which only exists in the programmer's head. Still, amazingly, once a REPRESENTATION of a piece of information is entered into the computer, it can add, subtract, or a draw a picture of it, and so on; it can do almost anything that a person can do with that piece of information and behaves as though it knows the information without "really knowing" it. So, there is a certain "real information" present in human beings and probably in all living beings that is not yet found in a computer digital or quantum. The same meaning may be conveyed by different words in different languages. Hence the meaning is different from any of the words which are used to convey the meaning. Meaning exists only in the brain but not in the words nor in the paper on which the words are written. Sometimes language is not even used to communicate information. For example, a right signal flashing from a car is an indication to others that the car is about to make a right turn. Thus the same piece of information can be conveyed in many ways and the means of communication always uses a representation. The representation may be in the form of words, sounds, electrical signals, and so on. A language is a mapping of information into words (symbols) which become sound energy when pronounced, and particles of matter when written on a paper, and become electrical energy when transmitted over a telephone line. Yet information exists only in the brain and is different from the language or signals that are used for its communication just like water is different from its container without which it cannot be 1 Dutheil, M.D. considered that the mind, though of tachyonic nature, belongs to the true fundamental universe and that our world is merely a subluminal holographic projection. He taught physics and biophysics at "Poitiers" Faculty of Medicine. He dedicated himself to research in fundamental physics from 1973 on. He was the author of "Superluminous Man" & "Superluminous Medicine". He was a joint Director in "Louis de Broglie" Physics Foundation in Paris. (Evellyn Elsaesser Valarino 1997) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 644 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy taken from place to place. We are so accustomed to using material representations to store or communicate our thoughts because we cannot help it, that we do not even recognize the fact that information and its mapping are different. In a digital computer or even in a quantum computer, we know that the meaning is not generated within the computer but the programmer assigns the meaning to strings of bits and bytes or qubits, all of which are in their turn, mapped to the states of some specific hardware units in the computer. Thus the computer carries only a mapping of information that is within the programmer‟s brain but does not actually contain the meaning. So when we talk about information (data and algorithms) contained in a computer, we are referring to the mapping contained in the computer, of a certain phenomenal information which is really outside the computer. If the computer is broken, we can still run the software on another computer provided we have saved a copy of the software on a storage device such as a CD (compact disc). The point is that software exists independent of any computer hardware although the software existence and features can be recognized only when it executes on a piece of hardware by receiving some inputs and producing some outputs. It is not that reductionists (those who argue that consciousness is a state of matter) think that a computer knows the meaning of its memory contents but they believe that the biological matter in a living brain somehow creates the meaning although any matter outside the brain does not. However, they have yet to prove what they believe. Indian Philosophy is dualistic in the sense that it asserts that just like in the computer, the living brain‟s software, namely, the mind is also “real information” and it is not a form of matter or a material energy field; it consists of tachyonic matter, and cannot be created from ordinary matter all by itself. (However, mind interacting with matter can produce more mind; see the next section.) According to this philosophy, the physical body and mind of a living being are two different components in the sense that one cannot be transformed into the other unlike matter and energy which do transform into the other in some situations. However, body and mind do interact. Life is the process of interaction between the body and the mind (in the computer analogy, this interaction is similar to execution of software). Life begins when mind starts interacting with the body and lasts as long as the interaction continues. At death, the body is no longer able to support the interaction (just like a computer with defective hardware does not support software execution). The reincarnation principle of eastern religions, Hinduism and Buddhism for example, states that a living being‟s mind does not cease to exist when the being dies but survives and that the surviving mind can start interaction with another body if a suitable body is found; in other words, take a new life. This can now be seen as nothing more than an inference from the computer analogy: a computer with broken hardware cannot run a piece of software which if saved on a CD, can be entered into another computer and made to run again! Needless to say that it is only an analogy and the principle itself is not yet proved by modern science. Indian Philosophy is known mostly as monism because it explains elaborately that Consciousness (same as free will) alone appears as the various forms in the universe, mind, matter, and all. The well known example given is that Consciousness is like gold and all objects in the universe are like jewels made out of gold. Since the philosophy also claims that this fact can be realized only by spiritual means beyond the mind and beyond all external means, the monistic part doe not conflict the dualistic part described above. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 645 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy 3.2 Desire, Purpose, Aristotle’s Final Cause and Free Will 3.2.1 Problem Solving and Inductive Reasoning Inductive reasoning sees a common feature, a pattern, or a relation in the data presented and generalizes the finding by assuming it to be applicable to new cases. Induction involves anticipation from experience (Von Wright 2000: p 13). Hence an element of uncertainty is associated with conclusions obtained by inductive reasoning. On the other hand, deduction is an inference process that generates conclusions from general rules and facts; therefore one can be sure that a deductive conclusion is true if the premises from which it is derived are true. The reasoning by which a scientist formulates a theory to explain the observed facts is inductive; that is why a scientific theory is usually accepted only after it is thoroughly tested experimentally. The reasoning by which a mathematician proves a theorem from already proved theorems and axioms is deductive and theorems are accepted unless a flaw is found in the logic of its proof. One need not be a scientist or a mathematician to be able to argue inductively or deductively. In daily life, we use both these types of reasoning often. For example, if we have to go out when rain is in the forecast, we take an umbrella with us. The reasoning that goes on in my brain when I pick the umbrella would be as follows: I recall from my memory a repeated observation (O) of people not getting wet in the rain if they use an umbrella. Then I make the assumption (A) that the observation will remain the same in the future and for all people (but usually not even aware of assuming so). Then from the observation O and assumption A my brain makes the inductive conclusion IC: “I will not get wet in the rain if I use the umbrella”. Then from IC and my desire D: “I do not want to get wet when I am out in the rain”, I deductively arrive at the conclusion DC: “I should have the umbrella with me”. Since IC is not a certainty and only an anticipation, for example, the umbrella may not work if the wind is too strong, philosophers discuss the so called Problem of Induction regarding the merits and defects of anticipation. We are not concerned here with justifying or finding fault with the assumption A; we will be concerned with another aspect of our thinking which is also related to the future and which occurs only too often. In the above example, one of the premises used to derive the conclusion DC is the desire D that I WANT to stay dry when it rains in the future; it is information about a future state of mine. D is essential for the conclusion DC because otherwise for example, a child for whom getting wet is fun may go out to play in the rain without an umbrella. Whether to take the umbrella or not depends upon whether one wants to stay dry or get wet in the future. All living beings and human beings in particular, almost always have a motive, a desire, or a purpose (called final cause by Aristotle) which makes them do whatever they do2, in order to achieve a goal. For example, a person takes a plane or a train because he/she wants to go to a place other than where he/she is at present. A cat jumps on a mouse in order to kill it. Note that jumping happens now and killing the mouse later but the cat has figured out that it should jump on the mouse first and it does just that. The point is that a desire or purpose involves a yet to be realized state of affairs. Yet, the desire to achieve an end is what starts the process of figuring out a means and implementation of the means for the sake of the end which is a future state when this process begins. 2 That need, want, and desire guide, determine, and induce action is Hume‟s theory also. He believes that reason does not oppose passion but that reason only helps us discern what is true or false. It does not tell us what to do, what to care about etc. It does not tell whether to act or not but only tells the consequences of an action. Furthermore, he believes that reason is inert since it does not initiate, but only channels the impulse to act. Unlike Hume and other philosophers, we are not interested here in the topic of whether the end justifies the means but interested only in the fact that the end is a future state when action begins. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 646 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy Of course, free will may play the most important part in initiating an action by choosing the purpose of the action. For example, free will may choose either to go or not to go on vacation; free will may also decide whether to go to New York or London. Once the choice is made, say London, it becomes the desire to go to London (and a content of the brain‟s memory). The appropriate action starts with buying a flight ticket to London and depends upon the information of the future state of being in London. Indian philosophy makes a distinction between desires or purposes and free will as follows: Note that we said above that free will “may choose” the desire or purpose and not “chooses” the desire or purpose because the desire or purpose of a given action may itself be the result of other desire/s or purpose/s and not necessarily the choice of free will. For example, suppose one chooses to go on vacation (call the desire W) because he/she wants to have fun by being away from home. Then W is the effect of the cause consisting of two desires: W1 = wanting to have fun and W2 = wanting to be away from home together. Since both desires W1 and W2 are already in the memory, W is a result of a past state of the brain but not a direct creation of free will. One can now see that given any action, it is difficult to judge whether the action is initiated by free will or some desires or purposes already existing in the memory. The distinction between desires or purposes and free will is that the former are contents of a certain memory (the mind) whereas the latter is not. Indian philosophy views desire as essential to the creation and maintenance of life in this world (Swami 1990: p 139); like any other content of the mind it is different from both lifeless matter and free will. In any given situation, prior to taking an action, one first thinks about what one wants (called volition, passion, desire, etc.) and then how to get it (reasoning). The how-to-get-it part is known as problem solving in computer science. Problem solving and planning are among those considered as "intelligent" behaviors by Artificial Intelligence (AI) experts. Today‟s AI programs solve many complex problems and come up with solutions more efficient and elegant than those which would have been obtained by human experts without the use of the AI programs. Note that these programs help the experts only with the how-to-get-it part of the thinking prior to the action to achieve whatever it is that the experts want to achieve. It is as though the programs do the reasoning for the experts instead of them doing the required reasoning in their minds. However, the program execution has to be started by an external input which then tells the program what to get3. For example, a chess playing program plays chess very cleverly and beats most chess players. When the opponent‟s move is entered and go-button hit, it causes execution of some instructions stored in the computer memory and the program generates a strategy for win. It is as though the go-hit has told the program that its goal is to win and take action accordingly and immediately because without the go-hit the program would not have run; the chess playing program makes no move by itself because it has no desire to win! The input tells the program what its future state should be, namely that it should be the win state. Once this information is entered into the memory by a go-hit, it becomes part of the information of the very first state in the subsequent execution process. Every state in this process is the result of a past state or past states and the digital computer obeys the causality principle of classical physics. The computer enters a state because of what it has gone through but not because it wants to get into a future state. A quantum computer would play the chess game much faster and using cleverer strategies because it has much more capacity for storing information and parallelism for processing. Still, the algorithmic capacity of a quantum computer does not extend the class of functions computable by a conventional Turing machine and just like in a digital computer, a program execution can be 3 This is in accordance with Hume‟s view (415): “Reason is and ought to be the slave of passions and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them” ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 647 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy started only by an external agent whether it is a human being, or living being or another computer program, or any other physical device. On the other hand, human beings almost always do whatever they do because they want to be somewhere or get something or be somebody, etc. The "want" or desire is all about a future state. This desire (or motive, purpose, goal etc.) needs to be input to the computer from outside in order that it starts the search for the problem solving strategy and then carry out the strategy whereas in a living being the desire is somehow created internally. 3.2.2 Causality: In the previous section, we saw that actions of living beings are often initiated by desires and purposes which are associated with future states of the living being. The search for an appropriate course of action and the action itself depend upon some information about a future state; for example, if I want to go to New York I will take a bus to New York but not to Philadelphia. Therefore, in my brain, information about a future state causes a change to its present state by initiating the appropriate action. This state of affairs seemingly violates the causality principle of classical physics that a cause should always precede its effect. It also seems to violate the causality principle in relativity theory which limits causes to the past light cone of the event to be explained (the "effect") based on the principle that causal influences cannot travel faster than the speed of light. Hence, if actions of living beings are initiated by information about some future states as said above, then an interesting and yet-to-be-answered question is “Are such actions consistent with the principle of causality of either classical or relativistic physics, and if not how does one justify them?”. In the present context, the paper “Causality and Tachyons in Relativity” written by Caldirola and Recami (1980) is particularly interesting. In the section with title „Can a Tachyonic Observer Inform Us about Our Future?‟ of this paper, the authors conclude that a tachyonic observer can convey to an ordinary observer the effects on a future event E of the anti-signals (negative-energy signals) sent by himself to E so as to physically influence E. Hence the tachyonic observer seems to be doing the job of the how-to-get-it reasoning of section 3.2.1. According to Hume (1990, p413-418), one‟s reason does the same job by telling that individual the consequences of an action. Ever since the birth of quantum mechanics (QM) physicists believed consciousness to play a role in some quantum events (the collapse of the wave-function). Some physicists even hope that QM will be able to explain how free will occurs in the brain because QM is nondeterministic in the sense that it predicts probabilities of results of measurements but not the precise results. Beck and Eccles (1992) used QM to suggest that consciousness could be nonmaterial but nevertheless it can control matter. They proposed an explicit role for consciousness in one of the brain‟s biological processes, the exocytosis, a basic unitary activity of the cerebral cortex. The scientific community‟s interest in using quantum theories to explain how the brain works is increasing. In the QM literature, there is extensive debate about the compatibility of QM with the causality aspect of relativity physics. For now, most physicists seem to agree that QM obeys what some of them call the weak causality principle (Cramer, 1980). This principle states that a controllable message cannot be sent backwards in time in any reference frame. It is possible that an explanation of the apparent retro-causality of desires and purposes may be found using QM. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 648 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy 4. The Physical Brain Creates More Mind Not All By Itself but With the Help of an Already Existing Mind In the case of a lifeless computer, we know that programs can learn; they can even discover new formulas and theories from the data input to them. When a computer program learns, actually it creates in its memory new contents as patterns of states of its memory cells. The new information that the program is said to have discovered is obtained only by the programmer‟s assigning meaning to the computer‟s output consisting of numbers and letters (a certain language) corresponding to the newly created memory contents. The meaning to any language once again, is in the heads of programmers but not in the symbols of the language itself. So, the computer does not know the meaning of the new formulae it has created but the meaning is known only to the programmer or user. Another point to note here is that to create even such new patterns of memory cells though not new information itself, a certain piece of software is required to be present and complete execution in the computer; a machine which has no software or which cannot execute software cannot learn; in AI terms, such a machine cannot exhibit “intelligence”. As to the living brain, it starts learning from the moment it is born. Even if it does not learn new techniques of how to respond to situations, it constantly interacts with the environment and stores the experience and thereby creates new memory. Brain scientists do recognize formation of neuron patterns indicating creation of new memories. To be able to create new patterns of physical memory, similarly to the computer, the brain should already have some mind (brain‟s software) prior to interacting with its environment and it does according to today‟s brain science. Hence both reductionists and dualists would accept that the living brain (physical brain with mind) creates more mind upon interaction with the environment. Yet unlike the computer, nobody from outside assigns or can assign meaning to newly created neuron patterns but the living brain does it by itself. Reductionists claim that the meaning is a property of biological matter unlike the electronic circuits in the computer but they have yet to prove their claim scientifically. On the other hand, dualists think that mind is not a property of biological matter but have not yet attempted any scientific explanation of how such mind is created. By claiming that mind is made up of tachyonic matter, Indian Philosophy suggests a possible approach to a scientific explanation of why meaning, experience, and “real information” exist in a living brain but not in the computer or any physical means of storage or communication and how mind interacting with brain‟s matter can create more mind. 5. Subjectivity The word subjective implies: that perception of reality is highly personal, that perception is not independent of the individual perceiving it but conditioned by personal mental characteristics or states, that it is modified or affected by personal views, previous experience, or background. Let alone human beings, and consider a robot for a moment. A robot's inferences and conclusions are always subjective because they depend upon the knowledge it already has in its memory, which includes the heuristics entered by the robot's programmer as well all the so far received external inputs (vision, sound, motor, etc.), which the robot has saved. For example, two robots may read the same answer sheet of a student from an exam, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 649 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy and one robot may give a "pass" grade to the student where as the other robot may "fail" the student; this happens if the definitions of "pass" entered into the robots' memories are different. So, a robot can have its own point of view. The point is that human perception is subjective for a similar reason. We saw in previous sections, that ever since birth, human beings (in general, many living species) should have a software-like entity in their system, which we called mind, since they learn from the moment they are born. Therefore, what two human beings learn, perceive, remember, or experience from same situation in the external world tend to be different at least slightly. Indian philosophy insists that each individual is born with their very own karma (subconscious memory of past actions whose consequences will take place in the future) and vasanas or samskaras (subconsciously remembered skills, inclinations, likes and dislikes, etc.) and hence equipped with a personalized memory with software-like contents. Hence what any two individuals learn from or their perceptions of the same external environment are in general different because the perceptions and learning are responses of their software-like minds to the inputs from the environment. But is the ability to acquire subjective knowledge is all that consciousness really is? Is it something else or something more? The two robots in the example above make subjective judgments but they do not have an experience and do not know what they are doing. It seems consciousness is more complicated than subjective knowledge and inference. According to Indian philosophy, the subjective experience arises because of the ever present Consciousness observing the mind‟s contents and thoughts. 6. Summary Ancient Indian Philosophy makes a distinction between Consciousness (same as free will) and all other aspects of consciousness which involve memory; we referred to the latter as mind in this paper. In this literature, it is often stated that mind is faster than all senses (including sight) hence faster than light and that it never comes to rest. It is often stated that mind is a memory where all experiences, emotions, desires, etc. are stored. Mind is subtle unlike the physical body. When interpreted in the terminology of modern physics, the implication is that at least part of what we call mind is made of tachyonic matter. The proposal that the memory aspect of the mind is made up of tachyons provides a mathematical means to explain how brain creates mind and how mind acts upon the brain. It may be possible to verify this proposal experimentally as suggested in Hari (2008). To explain the views of Indian Philosophy on matter, mind and Consciousness, we compared the brain and its mind to the hardware and software of a computer, Consciousness being the computer operator as it were, and completely outside the computer and in control of it. References Caldirola P and Recami E. Causality and Tachyons in Relativity. Italian Studies in the Philosophy of Science. D.Reidel Publishing Company 1980; 249-298 Cramer J G. Generalized absorber theory and the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox. Physical Review D 1980; 22: 362-376. Chalmers David J. Facing Up to the Problem of Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies 1995; 2(3): 200-19. Hari Syamala. Psychons could be zero-energy tachyons. NeuroQuantology June 2008; 6 (2):152-160. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 650 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | Page 640-650 Hari, S. Consciousness, Mind and Matter in Indian Philosophy Hume David. A Treatise of Human Nature. Oxford Clarendon Press 1990; 413-418. Mukherjee B D. The Essence of Bhagavad Gita Chapter 6, verse 34. Academic Publishers, Kolkata (2002);167-169. Searle John R. Minds, brains, and programs. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 1980; 3: 417-457. Swami Rama. Wisdom of the ancient sages: Mundaka Upanishad. Himalayan International Institute of Yoga, Science, and philosophy of U.S.A 1990; 99, 139. Upanishads Sri Sankara's Commentary Isa, Kena, and Mundaka. Translated by Sastry SitaRama S. Natebran & Co. Printers and Publishers Esplande 1898; 9. Von Wright, Georg Henrik. A Treatise on Induction and Probability. Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd 2000. Valarino Evelyn Elsaesser. The superluminal hypothesis in The Other Side of Life. Plenum Press New York, 1997; 193-228. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 212-213 Cecil, M. Commentary on Tony Bermanseder’s “Physical Consciousness in a Self-conscious Quantum Universe” 212 Commentary Commentary on Tony Bermanseder’s “Physical Consciousness in a Self-conscious Quantum Universe” Michael Cecil* ABSTRACT This is my brief Commentary on Mr. Bermenseder‟s “Physical Consciousness in a Selfconscious Quantum Universe” in this issue of JCER. My point is that any attempt to explain human consciousness which focuses exclusively upon the scientific method for the understanding of consciousness—simply ignoring both the consciousness of the “self” and the origin of the consciousness of the “self” in the „movement‟ of self-reflection—simply does not fulfill the requirements set out by Thomas Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Key Words: thinker, thought, self, consciousness, movement, self-reflection. Mr. Bermenseder‟s essay “Physical Consciousness in a Self-conscious Quantum Universe” in this issue of JCER is, in my view, another valiant but futile attempt to establish the consciousness of the „thinker‟ as the „inertial frame of reference‟ for the understanding and description of all of human consciousness and experience; when, in fact, the consciousness of the „thinker‟ constitutes only one (and a very narrow one, at that) of the three dimensions of consciousness and experience (those other dimensions being the consciousness of the “self” and another dimension of consciousness existing prior to both the origin of the “self”, in the „movement‟ of self-reflection, and the consciousness of the „thinker‟ itself). And, in this, the approach taken by Mr. Bermanseder bears resemblance to the approach taken by Leon Maurer with his ABC Theory of Consciousness (see, Maurer, 2010); although it is far beyond my poor powers of cognition either to understand theoretical physics, or to determine with any degree of certainty which of these theories of consciousness more clearly demonstrates the utter futility of attempting to understand consciousness from exclusively the frame of reference of the scientific method; that is, the consciousness of the „thinker‟. The critical issue about the subject of consciousness—and what makes it so intensely and frustratingly difficult to understand in its totality—is that, while the question “What is consciousness?” can only be posed by the consciousness of the „thinker‟ itself; any attempt whatsoever by the consciousness of the „thinker‟ to answer that question is, necessarily, based upon the assumption that the consciousness of the „thinker‟ is not only the only dimension of consciousness; but, also, the only source of any legitimate explanation or description of the experiences of the physical/conscious reality; thus, necessarily, ignoring both the entire subject of psychosis, as well as the findings of both the Reichian and Jungian psychologists with regards to the consciousness of the “self”; to say nothing of the findings of the parapsychologists with regards to presentiment or pre-cognition; or, for that matter, the evidence from, primarily, the Eastern traditions with regards to memories of previous lives; memories which are necessarily beyond the frame of reference of both the consciousness of the „thinker‟ and the consciousness of the “self” as well. Correspondence: Michael Cecil, http://science-of-consciousness.blogspot.com E-mail: mececil@sbcglobal.net ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 212-213 Cecil, M. Commentary on Tony Bermanseder’s “Physical Consciousness in a Self-conscious Quantum Universe” 213 In other words, unlike any other subject to be investigated by the scientific method, any allinclusive understanding of human consciousness must necessarily strike at the very foundation of the scientific method itself; that foundation being the assumption that the consciousness of the „thinker‟ is, for all practical purposes, „omniscient‟ in its description of the physical/conscious reality. That is, while the ultimate goal of classical physics was to establish an all-inclusive physical theory rather than merely to preserve classical physics itself as that all-inclusive theory; so, too, the ultimate goal of even the scientific method must be to transcend the fundamental assumptions of the scientific method itself (rather than merely to preserve the scientific method itself as the reigning paradigm for the understanding of reality)—and the purported „omniscience‟ of the consciousness of the „thinker‟—for the purpose of attaining an even more inclusive understanding of the physical/conscious reality. Briefly, then, the entire paper consists of thoughts originating in the consciousness of the „thinker‟. But, for the totality of consciousness to be understood at all, it must be understood that what Mr. Bermanseder refers to as “first principles and causes” are “first principles and causes” only for the consciousness of the „thinker‟; and that, prior to all such “first principles and causes”, there occurred a „movement‟ of self-reflection, which was the origin of the „spatiality‟ of the “self”, as well as a postulation of the thought of the „thinker‟, or the “self” or the “I”, which established and maintains the continuity of the „spatiality‟ of the “self” (and the arrow of time in, exclusively, a forward direction) from one moment to the next; all of which, however, are direct observations of the reality of consciousness rather than “first principles or causes” to be believed by a „thinker‟. That is, any attempt to explain human consciousness which focuses exclusively upon the scientific method for the understanding of consciousness—simply ignoring both the consciousness of the “self” and the origin of the consciousness of the “self” in the „movement‟ of self-reflection—simply does not fulfill the requirements set out by Thomas Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Reference Maurer, L. H. (2010), How Unconditioned Consciousness, Infinite Information, Potential Energy, and Time Created Our Universe. JCER 1(5): pp. 610-624. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 657 Article Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework Ram L. P. Vimal* Abstract Previously in (Vimal, 2010a), we argued that: (i) it is necessary to link experience and function aspect of consciousness with the related structure or neural correlate(s) of consciousness (NCC); and (ii) nonconscious experiences are equivalent to relevant proto-experiences at various levels because both are precursors of conscious subjective experiences aspect of consciousness. Here, in terms of dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE (proto-experience/subjective experience) framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), we argue as follows: (I) Non-experiential consciousness is a part of functional aspect of consciousness and consciousness is more fundamental than experience because experiences and functions are two aspects of consciousness.I (II) Therefore, one could argue for the continuum of consciousness, experience, and function. (III) The origin of individual consciousness could be a ‗universal background of awareness‘ that is equivalent to virtual reservoir (where potential SEs are stored in superposed form, and a specific SE is selected via matching process) in the PE-SE framework. The interaction between zombies is relational but it would not lead to an individual consciousness in each zombie. 1 The origin of intersubjective consciousness is the interaction between individual consciousnesses, i.e., interaction between ‗I‘, ‗you‘, and ‗she/he/it‘, i.e., interactions between minds/brains and their environments. (IV) A specific SE is selected during matching process and conscious experience constructs the perception or SE of external objects. (V) The dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework is consistent with classical doubleaspectism in the sense of inseparability of mental and physical aspect, whereas it is consistent with double-perspectivism in the sense that the mental aspect is known via first person perspective and the physical aspect is known via third person perspective. (VI) Our conventional reality is subject inclusive or mind dependent reality (MDR), whereas the subject exclusive or mind independent reality (MIR) remains always unknown even in so called samadhi state of mind that claims to have direct perception (or consciousness as such), which may or may not be close to MIR.2 (VII) The hard problems are Types 1-3 * Correspondence: Ram Lakhan Pandey Vimal, Ph.D., Vision Research Institute, 25 Rita Street, Lowell, MA 01854 USA. E-mail: rlpvimal@yahoo.co.in. URL: http://sites.google.com/site/rlpvimal/Home. 1 It should be noted that interactions between zombies (molecule-by molecule like humans but have no SEs) would not lead to SEs aspect of consciousness although all instinctual impulsions are relational and zombies may have functions. 2 In other words, a MIR is literally inconceivable (since to conceive takes a mind) though this is a major delusion of almost all symbolic cultures (Nixon, 2010a). (Kant, 1787/1996) distinguished two worlds or realities (Sion, 2008): (1) Noumena, things in themselves (also called mind independent reality (MIR) or subject exclusive reality), which constitutes a transcendental reality that is unknowable because we have no empirical access. (2) Phenomena or things as they appear (also called mind dependent reality (MDR) or subject inclusive reality), which constitutes the immanent world of common experience and is maya or illusion. I do not suggest that a transcendental reality or MIR can be known by the human mind because mind will be involved in the process of knowing. According to (Vimal, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 658 explanatory gaps: Type-1 explanatory gap is how can SEs emerge from non-experiential matter (emergentism) or identical with respective neural states (identity hypothesis of Type-B materialism)? Type-2 is how can SEs pre-exist? And Type-3 is how can physicists claim that MDR is MIR? The hard problem of panexperientialism is how can experiences create the matter of mind independent reality? (VIII) The predictive behavior (developmental rhythmic call and response behavior) and then existential crisis contribute towards the emergence of consciousness. On the basis of evolution, (a) individual consciousness in rudimentary form might have occurred about 540 mya during Cambrian explosion,3 (b) symbolic, language-using, Homo sapiens (tribal-centric consciousness4) emerged at around 150 kya, and (iii) self-centric or object-centric consciousness might have emerged at around 10 kya. (IX) (a) The existential crisis, biological crisis, and predictive behavior can be interpreted as the motivation/cause of the formation of appropriate neural-networks, and (b) self (SE of subject) occurred in brain when selfrelated neural-network were formed and necessary ingredients of consciousness were satisfied. (c) The co-evolution and co-development (neural Darwinism) of mind and brain5 and the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework are necessary in a complementary manner for physicalism and panexperientialism.6 2010d), ―What is independent of subject? It is the external world, i.e., mind-independent reality (MIR: the world as it is, in-itself) that is brain-independent, but it is unknowable. According to (Kant, 1787/1996), thing comes to us only in appearance. One could argue that the MIR is the reality [or one could guess MIR] based on conjecture, an inference, or statement of belief. Whatever is known always involves brain. Thus, our daily conventional reality is mind-dependent reality (MDR: the world as it appears to us).‖ In samadhi state, the reality appears to be different from our daily usual conventional reality and is called ultimate reality, where mind is still involved so reality is still MDR. 3 mya: million years ago; kya: thousand years ago. (Nixon, 2010a) commented that the emergence of ―individual consciousness‖ in the Cambrian explosion may not be correct, perhaps species awareness might be true. One should note that (i) the amoebae came first, (ii) all instinctual impulsion is relational, (iii) no need for individuals, and (iv) individuals who may resist species instincts are very late on the scene, since we are them. My meaning of the term ‗individual consciousness‘ is ‗experiences and/or functions of an individual organism interacting with environment‘; which implies ‗relational‘ concept because interaction is mandatory for co-evolution and co-development (neural Darwinism). My meaning of ‗intersubjective‘ or ‗social‘ consciousness is interaction between individual consciousnesses as discussed above. I rely on (Hameroff, 1998) for the emergence of consciousness during Cambrian explosion. 4 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that how the individual can be place before the tribe. It appears that individual consciousness in rudimentary form might have occurred before intersubjective or social consciousness, which in turn might sharpen the individual consciousness. This is because for the interaction between two subjects such as I and You, ‗You‘ and ‗I‘ must exist before they can interact. In other words, ‗complete‘ individual consciousness might have developed in two stages: (i) initial or rudimentary individual consciousness (which requires organism-environment interaction) and (ii) then sharpened or full-blown individual consciousness. 5 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that it sounds good but he does not think co-evolution Deacon-style (Deacon, 1997) is related to the intra-cerebral neural Darwinism of (Edelman, 1989, 1993), though they could be made to relate. In the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), the theory of brain/language coevolution Deacon-style (Deacon, 1997) emphasizes the significance of behavioral innovations, which modifies the human environment; this leads to successive genetic adaptation, i.e., it is related to the co-evolution of brain and mind (including language). This is different from the developmental neural Darwinism (Edelman, 1989, 1993) in a sense that the latter is related to the co-development of new born because it involves co-tuning via sensorimotor interaction until adulthood. 6 The dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) (a) is somewhat similar to Type-B materialism in terms of physical aspect but is complementary in the sense of providing information related to mental ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 659 Inter-subjectivity can modulate the attributes of already created/occurred individual-self in self-related neural-network. Keywords: consciousness, dual-aspect dual-mode framework; experiences; conscious experiences; nonconscious experiences; non-experiential consciousness; functions; conscious functions; non-conscious functions; proto-experiences; subjective experiences; conventional reality; subject inclusive or mind dependent reality (MDR); ultimate realty, subject exclusive or mind independent reality (MIR); self; mind; awareness; panexperientialism; individual consciousness; intersubjectivity; social consciousness; universal background; virtual reservoir; physicalism; constructivism; existential crisis; predictive behavior; chaotic process; emergence of consciousness; double-aspectism; double-perspectivism. Table of contentII 1. Introduction 2. Conscious experience, non-conscious experience, and non-experiential consciousness 3. Continuum of consciousness, experience and function 4. Origin of experiences and consciousness: universal background and virtual reservoir 5. Physicalism (brain creates experience) versus constructivism (experience constructs brain) 6. Double-aspectism versus double-perspectivism 7. Mind-dependent reality (MDR) and mind-independent reality (MIR) 8. Hard problems 9. Existential crisis, predictive behavior, and chaotic process for the emergence of consciousness 10. Interaction between brains, inter-subjectivity, social consciousness, and origin of individual consciousness 11. Summary and conclusion 1. Introduction In (Vimal, 2010a, 2010d), we proposed that structure, function, and experience must be appropriately linked. In (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e), we proposed that function and experience are mental entities and are the two aspects of consciousness. For example, there is a structure ‗V4/V8/VO‘ color neural-network,7 which has a function of detection and discrimination of wavelengths of light and the experiences related to color vision.III aspect and (b) is somewhat similar to panexperientialism in terms of mental aspect but is complementary in the sense of providing information related to physical aspect. 7 The color area ‗V8/V4/VO‘ refers to visual area V8 of Tootell group (Hadjikhani, Liu, Dale, Cavanagh, & Tootell, 1998; Tootell, Tsao, & Vanduffel, 2003), visual area V4 of Zeki group (Bartels & Zeki, 2000), and VO of Wandell group (Wandell, 1999); they are the same human color area (Tootell et al., 2003). VO stands for ventral-occipital cortex. ―A neural-network may be composed of all those cells (including receptors for signal transduction and deeper ‗lower‘ parts of the brain) that are involved directly or indirectly in awareness. […] A neural-network consists of at the least (i) areas involved in stimulus dependent feed forward signals (such as LGN-V1-V2V4/V8/VO for color), (ii) areas related to cognitive and attentional feedback signals (such as fronto-parietal areas), (iii) self related areas (such as cortical midline structures (Northoff & Bermpohl, 2004)), and areas involved in wakefulness (ascending reticular activating system (ARAS) system)‖ (Vimal, 2010d). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 660 There are over 40 different meanings attributed to the term ‗consciousness‘, which were categorized in two general aspects: experience and function (Vimal, 2009e). In addition, some more aspects of consciousness are suggested by (de Quincey, 2010): (i) sentience, which is a ―primitive capacity for feeling and self-motion in any individual organism‖; (ii) awake/awareness that is the ―higher form of sentience where organism can be either conscious or unconscious, awake or asleep‖; (iii) interpersonal, which is (a) ―knowing or sharing the knowledge of something together with an other‖ (Hunt, 1995), (b) ―gateway to transpersonal consciousness‖, and (c) ―involving awareness not only of personal identity, but also of deep intersubjective foundation of all consciousness‖; (iv) personal that is ―individualized awareness with a sense of self identity‖; (v) reflective, which is the ―capacity for self to be ‗aware that I am aware‘ -- the gateway to altered states of consciousness: ‗aware that I am aware that I am aware …‘ ‖; (vi) unitive, which ―integrates all prior forms of consciousness into experienced unity‖; and (vii) dissociative that is the ―pathological failure to integrate prior forms of consciousness‖. In addition, (viii) another aspect of consciousness is intersubjective that is ―primordial condition and foundation for consciousness shared between all intersubjects‖, which is spirit as per many traditions. These seems to be experiential aspects of consciousness, which can be added to the 20 experiential aspects listed in (Vimal, 2009e). In this article, in terms of dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), my goal is to address: (i) conscious experience, non-conscious experience, and non-experiential consciousness, (ii) continuum of consciousness, experience and function, (iii) origin of experiences and consciousness, (iv) physicalism versus constructivism, (iv) dual-aspectism versus double-perspectivism, (vi) mind-dependent reality (MDR) and mind-independent reality (MIR), (vii) hard problems, (viii) existential crisis, predictive behavior, and chaotic process for the emergence of consciousness, and (ix) interaction between brains, inter-subjectivity, social consciousness, and origin of individual consciousness. 2. Conscious experience, non-conscious experience, and non-experiential consciousness In (Vimal, 2009e), we proposed that the meanings attributed to the term ‗consciousness‘ can be categorized in two aspects, namely, experiences and functions. Therefore, one can argue for the possibilities of (i) non-functional experience aspect of consciousness where a subject has experience without function (such as experiencing spandrels that have no known function) and (ii) non-experiential function aspect of consciousness or ‗non-experiential consciousness‘ such as a zombie/robot can have function but no experience; for example, it can detect and discriminate red from green but cannot have SEs redness and greenness. Thus, one could argue that it is the consciousness which is more fundamental rather than experiences; this hypothesis is based on the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). This may be somewhat appear contrary to the hypothesis ‗experience is more fundamental rather than consciousness‘ (Nixon, 2010b, 2010c), which is based on panexperientialism. This apparent contradiction may be due to the fact that functions are part of experiences in panexperientialism, whereas functions ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 661 and experiences are two aspects of consciousness in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. Furthermore, Nixon‘s hollows of experience seems equivalent to virtual reservoir in the PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), where proto-experiences (PEs) are close to nonconscious experiences because both are precursors of subjective experiences (SEs).8 According to (Nixon, 2010c), ―all that is outside of language is non-conscious experience [but see his 21 indicators in (Nixon, 2010b)] in a reality that is largely a construction of our biological human sensory and memory systems relating to the things in themselves‖ [p.261]. If language implies reportable entities, then it is access consciousness (Block, 2005); however, the experiential aspect of phenomenal consciousness (which is not reportable) is conscious experience such as in experiments related to (Sperling, 1960), where stimuli were presented for less than 50 msec unless non-verbal language could have been used mentally.9 (Rosen, 2010) elaborates further and critiques (Nixon, 2010b): ―Nixon effectively challenges the Cartesian paradigm of consciousness by demonstrating that experience is not limited to the reflective self-consciousness of human beings but pervades nature at every level [panexperientialism]. […] Nixon suggests that the current controversy essentially boils down to those thinkers who contend that all experience is conscious but distinguish reflective or selfconsciousness from other forms of consciousness, and those who identify conscious experience with reflectiveness, all other experience being taken as non-conscious. The author appears to favor the latter view, as is consistent with his goal of demonstrating that the terms ‗consciousness‘ and ‗experience‘ are not interchangeable. […] To me it seems the underlying issue is indeed largely a semantic one revolving around the question of how broadly one defines the term ‗consciousness.‘ […] I see no reason why the internalized sensations he refers to could not be considered rudimentary forms of consciousness, rather than as purely nonconscious experience. […] the two terms [consciousness and experience] are not interchangeable is rooted in a semantic predilection to equate all consciousness with fully reflective human consciousness, thereby disallowing the possibility of degrees of consciousness10.‖ (Nixon, 2010h) replied to (Rosen, 2010) as: ―For me, however, semantics, the meaning we apply to words, matters. In the essay I suggest that we change our common usage to better illustrate the way non-human animals and perhaps even plants experience their world. […] if experience 8 It is useful to differentiate subjective experience (SE, such as redness) and its content (such as ripe red tomato). To clarify further, another example is: I have conscious subjective experience of my room and the contents of this experience are laptop, table, phone, printer, file cabinet, and so on. 9 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that if such stimuli were reportable later, they were conscious experiences. If they were not even conceivable, they are experience without consciousness. 10 (Nixon, 2010a) commented, ―sure there are degrees of consciousness, but ALL human consciousness is framed by the primacy of self; that is, all human consciousness is self-consciousness, as philosophical phenomenology has taught us. (See (Zahavi, 2005)) That‘s why other forms of ‗selfless‘ experience should not really be called consciousness: we do not know what it is like to be a bat!‖ Since there is no consensus on the meanings attributed to the term ‗consciousness‘, it is useful to define which aspect or meaning an author is addressing to, for minimizing confusion. Some authors, such as Block, propose nonreportable experience as phenomenal consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 662 [internalized sensations] leads to more complex experience and finally to conscious experience, such momentary sensations are indeed ‗rudimentary forms of consciousness‘. But I emphasize that such experience is best considered non-conscious because it is not aware of itself and has no conceivable means of becoming aware of itself. […] When we become aware of such experiencing, the experience achieves a conscious quality.‖ Furthermore, (Monteiro, 2010).p373 commented (Nixon, 2010b) as: ―a relevant point not mentioned by Nixon is the existence of ‗consciousness without experience‘. This is the domain of the emergence of the primary mind or ‗cognition‘. […] You can‘t witness or experience your own birth at that very moment of birth, they don‘t coincide.IV One can think to the 'mind set' or person‘s cognitive process of ‗I‘ unaware to him/herself but consciously perceived as immediate experience by another person (mind-reading). Formally we can put this in a causal frame of ‗1st person cognition as cause‘V and ‗2nd person perception (subjective conscious experience) as effect‘ (Monteiro, 2009)‖. In my view, (Nixon, 2010b; Nixon, 2010h), (Rosen, 2010), and (Monteiro, 2009; Monteiro, 2010) can be bridged using the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), where (i) consciousness has two aspects experience and function,11 (ii) both non-experiential12 (i.e. functional aspect such as in zombies/robots)VI consciousness and non-conscious experience are entertained, and (iii) there is a continuum of experience, function, and consciousness. Rosen commented (personal communication in May 2010) as follows: ―I understand what you mean by ‗non-experiential consciousness‘ but, if ‗non-conscious experience‘ doesn't simply mean non-waking experience and doesn't mean non-reflective experience (as it does in Nixon's article), can you tell me what it does mean?‖ 11 (Adams, 2010a) commented, ―Vimal‘s central proposition is that ‗consciousness has two aspects, experience and function.‘ Superficially, I would agree. Consciousness entails the aspect of experience, and consciousness has functional efficacy. The two qualities sometimes seem to be independent, as has been demonstrated for various forms of implicit cognition such as blindsight and perceptual priming. Nevertheless, that does not imply that the two qualities must be, or usually are, independent. Most of the time, conscious experience is entirely congruent with its functionality.‖ As discussed in (Vimal, 2010e), there is an optimal definition of consciousness, which has the least number of problems and is AND type: optimal consciousness = conscious experience and conscious function. In addition, there is a general definition of consciousness, which accommodates most views and is AND/OR type: general consciousness = conscious experience and/or conscious function. Thus, the latter general definition encompasses the above Adams‘ view. 12 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that he cannot see how experience [function] can be non-experiential — or neither conscious or non-conscious. As noted above, Nixon seems to consider the functions (non-experiential aspect of consciousness) as a part of experiences in panexperientialism because only experience permeates the universe. However, in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, function and experience are two aspects of consciousness. Therefore, function can be non-experiential, such as functions of structure retina, zombies, hand, leg, and so on. The apparent problem is the different definitions of the terms; otherwise we do not seem to contradict that much. My definitions are derived from the meanings attributed to the term ‗consciousness‘ by various authors in literature; see (Vimal, 2009e) and also (Vimal, 2010e). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 663 The term ‗non-conscious experience‘ is defined in (Vimal, 2010e). To avoid circular definition, I need to define conscious experience first and then non-conscious experience: ―Conscious experiences include all types of subjective or first person [waking] experiences including such as: (i) sensory experiences as redness (Vimal, 2009f); (ii) ‗what exists when there is something that it is like to be that thing‘ (Nagel, 1974); (iii) phenomenal experience (Chalmers, 1996); (iv) reportable content experienced by living individuals (the ‗referential nucleus‘ of the concept of consciousness, according to (Pereira Jr. & Ricke, 2009)), emotional experiences such as happiness, experiences related to thoughts (such as imagination/creative thinking), the experience of nothingness13 in meditation, experiences as the result of dynamical processes in the embodied and embedded view of cognition, experiences related to social interactions (Pereira Jr. & Ricke, 2009); (v) experiences related to self (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007) and self-awareness (Perrett, 2003), and perhaps higher-order awareness (Carruthers, 2007; Rosenthal, 2009); (vi) experiences related to phenomenal time (Vimal & Davia, 2008); and (vii) inner/ outer experiences, hidden (other‟s) experiences via a process of theorization or simulation or both, singular-detachable-individual experiences, and shared experiences (Torrance, 2009), and so on. Non-conscious experiences are those experiences that are not conscious experiences; for example, experiences related to pre-conscious, subconscious and unconscious domains, slowwave dreamless deep-sleep, coma, vegetative, and anesthetized state. Non-conscious experiences can include experiences related to paradoxical awareness or awareness without being aware, such as subliminal perception and blindsight‖ (Vimal, 2010e). In addition, (Nixon, 2010b) has enumerated 21 indicators of non-conscious experiences. Since the term ‗consciousness‘ has over 40 meanings, which includes waking, non-waking and other experiences, and many kinds of functions; therefore, authors are encouraged to specify which aspect/meaning of consciousness they are addressing to avoid contradictions and confusions (Vimal, 2009e) as Rosen has also pointed out. However, (Nixon, 2010a) maintains that much of psyche (much of experience) is unconscious. Moreover, one could argue that all those experiences, which are not in a wakeful state, are regarded as non-conscious. From EEG point of view, (a) alpha (7-13Hz), beta (13-30 Hz) and gamma (30-70 Hz) waves are associated with wakefulness, (b) theta (4-7 Hz) waves with dreams and hypnosis, and delta (1-4 Hz) with deep dreamless sleep. However, meditative states may involve all brainwaves: delta, theta, alpha, beta, and gamma waves depending on meditation techniques and levels of meditation (Eklavya, 2010).14 13 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that if there is no witness (only unity with void) then how this could be conscious experience. Is the self not left behind? Presumably, in samadhi state, the self (SE of subject) merges with the SE of object, i.e., there is no difference between subject and object. Thus, self is not left behind; rather it is merged/unified with the SE of object. In other words, if a yogi is in samadhi state and his object is his enemy, the feeling of enmity disappears because yogi experiences that his enemy and he are the same person in terms of mental aspect such as feelings. 14 (Nixon, 2010a) commented, (Warren, 2007) claims that early on in meditation alpha waves predominate, but, as the meditation advances and awareness spreads, gamma waves predominate. This may be true because it all depends on meditation techniques and levels of meditation. Alpha waves are usually associated with ―relaxed wakefulness, and creative thought where attention may wander and free association is favored. They are also correlated with a generally tranquil, pleasant, almost floating feeling‖. Alpha waves are ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 664 Furthermore, one could argue for the following to minimize the semantic and circularity problems: (i) Conscious experiences might best be identified with waking experiences15, nonconscious experiences be associated with non-waking experiences such as dreams, and, in addition, there would be non-conscious states that would not necessarily even be experiential (e.g. comas). (ii) Since meditative states include waking state brainwaves, meditative states might be classified as conscious states for brevity. And (iii) the experiences related to controversial ‗paradoxical awareness or awareness without being aware‘ might be classified as ‗combined-state experiences‘ (Rosen, personal communication) that are both conscious and nonconscious experiences. In (Vimal, 2010a), the non-conscious experiences and non-conscious functions are considered as a part of the definition of mind (= experiences and/or functions: (Vimal, 2010e)) and/or awareness. However, the suggestion of (Nixon, 2010i), the term ‗psyche‘ in place of ‗mind‘ may be correct if psyche = experiences and/or functions. Furthermore, I agree with (Nixon, 2010i)‘s suggestion that conscious transcendence (or, better, transcendent awareness) which is a higher state of consciousness (Vimal, 2010e) can be considered as part of conscious experience. Furthermore, in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, ―A subjective experience (SE) is an expressed first person conscious experience [...] In general, PEs [proto-experiences] are precursors of SEs‖ (Vimal, 2010e). In other words, any experience that is not SE is PE. Therefore, a non-conscious experience is equivalent to a PE. To sum up, in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), consciousness has two aspects: experience and function. The non-experiential or functional aspect of consciousness is indeed possible such as in (i) the functions related to the detection and discrimination of stimuli without experience, and (ii) the domain of the (weak) emergence16 of the primary mind or ‗cognition‘. The non-conscious processing in cognitive brain leads to considered as ―the brainwaves of meditation‖ and ―an integral part of the relaxation process before sleep‖ (Eklavya, 2010). Beta waves are usually associated with ―attentiveness, selective attention, concentration & anticipation. They have been related to concentrated mental activity such as solving math problems, anxiety, and apprehension […] In meditation, beta waves have been noticed only in very experienced practitioners that too in a state of ecstasy and concentration‖ (Eklavya, 2010). Gamma waves are usually associated with (i) the processing of ―various attended stimuli (visual, auditory, touch) and the grouping of the various features of a given stimulus, particularly visual, into a coherent whole‖ and (ii) ―Buddhist meditation of compassion & music listening experiments‖ (Eklavya, 2010). 15 As per (Nixon, 2010a), remembered dreams are conscious; only external sensory input is left out. 16 According to (Chalmers, 2010), ―We can say that a high-level phenomenon is weakly emergent with respect to a low-level domain when the high-level phenomenon arises from the low-level domain, but truths concerning that phenomenon are unexpected given the principles governing the low-level domain. Weak emergence is the notion of emergence that is most common in recent scientific discussions of emergence, and is the notion that is typically invoked by proponents of emergence in complex systems theory. […] It often happens that a high-level phenomenon is unexpected given principles of a low-level domain, but is nevertheless deducible in principle from truths concerning that domain.‖ This is interesting, but how can we deduce SE such as redness from non-experiential physical aspect? This is the emergentism‘s explanatory gap that one needs to address. However, some functional aspects of mind could be weakly emergent. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 665 conscious experience, which in turn constructs the individual MDR via organism-environment interaction; here both phenomenal (non-reportable, where attentional feedback signal is not needed) and access (reportable, where feedback attentional signal is necessary) consciousness can be entertained. The same processes among many brains leads to social consciousness17 (inter-subjectivity), where access (reportable) consciousness (Vimal, 2009f) is necessary. 3. Continuum of consciousness, experience and function According to (Nixon, 2010b), ―If this continuum of experience — from non-conscious, to conscious, to self-transcending awareness — can be understood and accepted, radical constructivism (the ‗outside‘ world as a construct of experience) will gain a firmer foundation, panexperientialism (a living universe) may gain credibility, and psi will find its medium [p217]. […] [Experience is viewed as really consisting of] a continuum from momentary flashes into existence of ‗occasions of experience‘ (probably related to quantum fluctuations) to the boundaryless experience which blossoms into transpersonal awareness‖ (p.223). (Pereira Jr., 2010) has a little different view: ―I take ‗conscious episodes‘ to refer to content experienced by a subject in present time, and ‗experience‘ as the interaction of the individual‘s body, brain and environment (Pereira Jr. & Ricke, 2009).18 In this view, what conscious activity does is to individualize episodes in time, making them available to subjective experiences, which are then conceived as embodied (in the individual‘s material structure) and embedded (in the environment). … Instead of thinking of consciousness as ‗the arbiter of all realities‘, I view it as a sequence of snapshots in a sea of unconscious experiences. […] I find Nixon attributing the origin of human and non-human creativity to unconscious experiences, not to the conscious tip of the iceberg.‖19 17 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that this is reversed: Individual minds are intersubjectively drawn into pre-existing linguistic communities, and only after group mimesis & identification can minds become individualized (and this does not always happen!). In my view, this needs qualification: ―full blown individual mind/consciousness‖ is intersubjective phenomenon, but ―rudimentary mind or consciousness‖ (that is also relational and is usually based on organismenvironment interactions) can be independent of another subject as discussed before. 18 (Nixon, 2010a) objects the use of (Pereira Jr. & Ricke, 2009)‘s terminology. In my view, it is just different meaning attributed to the same term, which is common; for example, the term ‗consciousness‘ has over 40 different meanings (Vimal, 2009e). (Pereira Jr. & Ricke, 2009) have different view, which potentiates the hypothesis that consciousness has two aspects (function and experience) and hence it is more fundamental than experience. 19 Pereira Jr. commented (personal communication in May 2010), ―… for me conscious experiences are not coextensive with brain functions, since the experiences are made of information contents from the world, not from the brain (this position is similar to Max Velmans' Dual-Aspect Monism).‖ In (Vimal, 2010e), I have given two definitions: ―the optimal definition of consciousness is ‗consciousness is a mental aspect of a system or a process, which has two sub-aspects: conscious experience and conscious function.‘ A more general definition is: ‗consciousness is a mental aspect of a system or a process, which is a conscious experience, a conscious function, or both depending on the context and particular bias (e.g. metaphysical assumptions)‟ where experiences can be conscious experiences and/or non-conscious experiences and functions can be conscious functions and/or nonconscious functions that include qualities of objects.‖ Thus, conscious experiences AND conscious functions are coextensive for the optimal definition. The general definition accommodates most views including the views of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 666 (Adams, 2010b) critiques (Nixon, 2010c) as: ―Nixon believes that all organisms, even the lowly nematode, are capable of experience, and what they experience is change in the environment. Whenever there is any change in the relationship between an organism and its environment, experience is the result. […] sensory change is prerequisite for sensory experience. But it seems a bit much to attribute all experience to environmental change. Memories, thoughts, ideas, hopes, plans, regrets, questions, feelings, confusion, and much more, are all mental experiences, none of which necessarily depends on an environmental change.‖ (Adams, 2010a) commented further, ―I would like to express skepticism about the notion, held by (Nixon, 2010c) and Vimal that protoself-awareness (as I call it) exists simply in-itself, free-floating in the universe, disembodied, not necessarily attached to any living thing. That seems quite an arbitrary postulate, not supported by reason or evidence, and not confirmable or disconfirmable.‖ In my dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), (i) potential SEs preexist in superposed form in the mental aspect of each entity (hypothesis H1) (Vimal, 2010d) or SEs can be derived from a PE and 3 gunas (hypothesis H2) (Vimal, 2009b), (ii) all things are carriers of potential SEs in superposed latent unexpressed form, which is different from ‗all things have experience‘, and (iii) mental and material aspects never get separated. In other words, SEs do NOT exist simply in-itself and free-floating in the universe; SEs are NOT disembodied; they are necessarily attached to each living thing. Potential SEs are superposed in the mental aspect, which is permanently ‗glued‘ with physical aspect of each entity. Thus, my framework is not panexperientialism, where only experience permeates the universe; rather the mental aspect of my framework is somewhat similar to panexperientialism, and the physical aspect of my framework is complementary to panexperientialism. In my view, matter (thing-initself) is the property of unknowable mind independent reality (MIR); experiences construct the appearance of matter, which is consistent with my framework. According to Monteiro (personal communication in May 2010): ―I make a distinction between (i) external environment and through the recording process of internalization stored in memory and (ii) internal environment. A change in the ‗internal environment‘ is for example when an individual is in ‗imbalanced state‘ (shortage/surplus) striving for a ‗balanced state‘ (no shortage/surplus). An imbalanced state somewhere in the body generates ‗interaction‘ between relative ‗energy shortage‘ and ‗energy surplus‘ starting unconsciously at physical-biological level. A bodily shortage (e.g. nutrients, trace elements) fires a signal to a stored surplus element in the brain (e.g. from previously stored rewarded element). Through ‗interaction‘ between shortage-surplus elements in the body-brain, motivation (or e-motion=energy motion) transporting a ‗need‘ is aroused. Motivation, however, is a preconscious process (tacit knowing, fringe- proto- or sub-consciousness), and through trespassing a ‗threshold‘ can be attendant by a preconscious but functional mental process, called cognition (‗I‘). Though cognition is preconscious (‗I‘ cannot capture ‗I‘ simultaneously), it is functional trying to bridge the cleft between ‗I‘ and ‗You‘ and this can spontaneously, accidentally or randomly happen (outside Pereira Jr. and Velmans. In addition, potential subjective experiences are superposed in the mental aspect of all entities including experiences that are made of information contents from the world; and information is a dual-aspect entity in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 667 conscious control and steering) in the phenomenon of ‗mental interaction‘ or ‗cognitive interaction‘, a mental quantum event of which both persons are not aware. It goes too far to treat this extensively, but it is postulated and concluded that interaction at all levels is mental interaction, the highest functionality in nature and culture.‖ (Nixon, 2010j) states, ―I have previously stated somewhere that having a living body ties us in with all other living bodies and living material in general. I contain DNA and genetic codes that have evolved through my ancestors and, before them, from prehuman life forms and the earliest cellular structures. The body that I am is a microcosmic focus of all life on a particular genetic pathway. The inborn experience that comes with being a living physical body is part of my life (make me, in turn, a part of all life) and is further the foundation of the culturally reflected consciousness that makes intersubjectivity and self-identity possible. At the bodily level, experiential interactions take place without my learned self-identity reflecting upon them, so experience without consciousness certainly does take place. […] consciousness does not just ride like a boat upon a sea of unconscious experience. It interacts with it in a circle of mutual creativity. Our minds are part of the future evolution of our bodies and of living nature itself.‖ In addition, ―Our self is the ‗bag of memories,‘ as Ken Wilber once put it, through which we consciously experience, and nothing is but what is not‖ (Nixon, 2010g). Monteiro commented, (personal communication in May 2010): ―continuum must be specified. One can claim consciousness whether subjectively experienced or not, in the light of panexperientialism. From a material (physical-biological-cultural) perspective, a ‗gap‘ (non-causal transition) in development or evolution exists. That‘s to say one cannot postulate a ‗continuum‘ between the emergence of material elements (e.g. quantum leap) and between species (e.g. missing link). This also holds for the mental unfolding and development (mentalization) culminated in human beings. One can speak of ‗material-mental discontinuity‘. This has to do with the mental cognitive quantum collapse (through 1st-2nd person mental interference) or with other words man can never know in absolute sense the genesis of mind and matter or as conclusion ‗man can never escape his own body and mind‘ (even in OBE [out-of-body experience]). This does not imply that in a formal descriptive model one can postulate as an ‗axiom‘, matter as the primary initiating stimulus-object ‗to interact‘ with a referential stimulusobject (1st-2nd object) and from here deduct the primary initiating mental process of cognition to ‗interact‘ with a referential process of cognition (1st-2nd person) to feedback for the emergence of new matter (e.g. normative behaviour, new matter). What happens in the ‗gap‘ (mindmatter) between persons is the crux of the whole issue to account for perception. The ratio why this is the case, is extensively treated in my publication (with the tools of finality [goal] and causality [cause-effect] [between stimulus-need, norm-value and cognition-perception]) (Monteiro, 2009).‖ To sum up, in dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), experiences and functions are two aspects of consciousness; these two aspects (experience and function) must be linked to related structure, i.e., the neural-correlates of consciousness (NCC).20 If experience is 20 (Adams, 2010a) commented, ―But why ‗must‘ this be so? It is not obvious to me, so I take this simply as one of his [Vimal‘s] hypotheses. The ‗linkage‘ he refers to is unspecified. Vimal seems to agree that under normal ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 668 in continuum then related function must also in continuum and hence consciousness must also be in continuum: from unconscious to subconscious to conscious states. In other words, one could argue for continuum of consciousness, experience, and function rather than just only the continuum of experience because experience and function are the two aspects of consciousness; and non-experiential consciousness can be non-experiential functional aspect of consciousness (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). Moreover, as Monteiro commented, one must address the ‗gap‘ (mindmatter) between persons to account for perception. However, in this article, the continuum of consciousness and its two aspects is related to individual consciousness, where it is hypothesized that the rudimentary individual consciousness occurs before inter-subjectivity and is modified later by the interactions between persons. I argue that ‗consciousness‘ is a more general mental entity; conscious experience and non-conscious experiences are subsets of experience; and experiential aspect of consciousness and non-experiential aspect (i.e., functional aspect) of consciousness are subsets of consciousness21. 4. Origin of experiences and consciousness: universal background and virtual reservoir (Nixon, 2010c) proposes that experiences, which undergirt consciousness, emerge from a universal background of awareness: ―language not only describes but constructs the object being observed. Awareness observed is reduced to consciousness created, that is, it conforms to its concept. Consciousness then proceeds as an autopoietic manifestation of itself. I will later submit that experience in itself is the result of sensations generated at the point where minute entities like cells or even atomic or subatomic systems interact, but for this birth of sensation in interactive friction to be possible, there must be some sort of awareness-in-itself, a universal background of awareness out of which such primordial experiencing can emerge. This background may be aware but aware of nothing, as though in deep, dreamless sleep, a field of infinite potential, waiting, so to speak, for time to begin. How else can we account for raw experiential sensations without falling into infinite regress? […] Perhaps the experience that circumstances, conscious experience is usually (always?) tightly linked to its functional quality and both of those are linked to neural structure. (But we don‘t know what ‗linked‘ means).‖ The linkage is very tight because the mental aspect and the material aspect are ‗glued‘ together permanently; they cannot be separated in dual-aspect view, in analogy to two sides of the same coin, as discussed in (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d, 2010e), in the sense of optimal definition of consciousness; but ‗not necessarily‘ in the sense of general definition of consciousness. The term ‗link‘ is borrowed from neuroscience. Identity theory says ‗identical‘, meaning exactly the same, at least statistically. But, here, ‗link‘ means mostly correlation; for example, fMRI activity in the structure (physical aspect of) color neural-network is ‗linked‘ or ‗correlated‘ to the color-experience aspect (mental aspect) of consciousness, which is ‗linked‘ or ‗correlated‘ with color discrimination function aspect (mental aspect) of consciousness. 21 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that it is interesting, but it really does not communicate to him. Experience is either conscious or non-conscious or on the border. There is no third kind of experience. I agree with that experience is either conscious or non-conscious or on the border in panexperientialism. In dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, function is not experience, rather function is an aspect of consciousness, and other aspect of consciousness is experience. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 669 undergirts consciousness is unthinkable. I foreshadow my purpose here: What if awareness or experience is as all-pervasive and foundational as universal background radiation?‖ (p.246) The origin of consciousness,22 according to Nixon is ‗a universal background of awareness‘, which is like a plenum or virtual reservoir (such as the mental aspect of each entity, where our potential SEs are stored in superposed form and a specific SE is selected via matching process) as in hypothesis H1 of our dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework. 5. Physicalism (brain creates experience) versus constructivism (experience constructs brain) According to (Nixon, 2010c), ―The fundamental division in approaches to the question of consciousness is whether the brain creates experience or experience [creates] the brain. Obviously the sciences lean toward the former, though the neuroscientific proposal of the dynamic brain that changes as a result of experience softens this stance. Experiential practices that accept any sort of transcendence of bodily limitations, such as psi or meditation, assume the latter in the sense that the origin of awareness beyond the brain may change neural processing within the brain [p242]. […] When experience becomes conscious, it has itself become an object. No longer one with the environment, we now feel ourselves as distinct from it, opposed to it. In the same way, we become aware of ourselves in the world and self itself is objectified‖ (p.243). (Adams, 2010b) elaborates the above further as: ―question of whether or not the brain creates the mind. Most neuroscientists are sure that it does […] we have merely correlations between brain function and mental function; there is no proven causal connection. […] Another possibility, equally logical, is that the mind creates the brain. In other words, the brain is an intellectual construct we use to account for the varieties of our experience … no basis on which to choose‖. According to (Monteiro, 2010), ―To answer Greg Nixon's question ‗how does any material entity create mind, consciousness, or even just experience?‘ is not a matter of creation, but mental unfolding what is already present in matter from the beginning (from strong force in the nucleus of atoms till strong love bond in persons)‖ (p.374). It seems that (Monteiro, 2010) is using Bohm‘s implicate-explicate order or enfolded-unfolded view; Bohm‘s view is a dual-aspect, consistent with the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). According to (Jarvilehto, 2010), in constructivism, ―it is often unclear (at least to me) if reality is seen only as a result of construction of conscious experience, nonconscious processing playing 22 (Adams, 2010a) raised a question: From where could such proto-self-awareness arise? (Nixon, 2010c) proposes that proto-self-awareness arises from the universal background of awareness. In our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, all potential SEs are in superposed form in virtual reservoir (such as in the mental aspect of elementary particles) as in hypothesis H 1 (Vimal, 2010d); a specific SE is selected via matching process; in hypothesis H2, a SE can be derived from the interaction between one PE and three gunas (qualities) (Vimal, 2009b) and/or (ii) downward causation (Vimal, 2010b). I am assuming that the virtual reservoir might be somewhat equivalent to Nixon‘s universal background of awareness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 670 no role.‖ In cognitive brain research, ―the processing in the brain is endowed with some magical powers that make some of the brain processes conscious, whereas the rest of these processes stay at the nonconscious level.‖ In the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, consciousness has two aspects: experience and function (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). In hypothesis H1, potential SEs are stored in superposed form in virtual reservoir (such as every elementary particle). In hypothesis H2, a PE interacts with 3 gunas to result SEs depending on the kinds of 3-gunas.VII In both hypotheses, a specific SE is selected during matching process as discussed in (Vimal, 2010d). On the other hand, the SEs aspect of consciousness constructs the mind-dependent reality (MDR), i.e., conscious experience constructs the appearance or SE of external objects and to some extent can affect the processing of brain; however, experiences do not create/construct physical brain. Thus, Nixon‘s constructivism/panexperientialism framework (Nixon, 2010b, 2010c, 2010d) and (Pereira Jr., 2010; Pereira Jr. & Ricke, 2009)‘s framework (consciousness as a sequence of snapshots in a sea of unconscious experiences) can be bridged via the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework.23 6. Dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework versus double-perspectivism There is a minor but important difference between these two views: the double aspects in dualaspect dual-mode PE-SE framework are inseparable (and hence bypass many problems) whereas the two perspectives in double-perspectivism can be independent and are separable (hence has problems of substance dualism (Vimal, 2010e)). 6.1. Dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework and double-perspectivism (Adams, 2010a) commented on double-aspectism versus double-perspectivism: ―When Vimal finally does get around to explaining his double-aspect theory of mentality, deep into the essay, it is hard to follow the reasoning, and I think that is because it is really a ‗double perspective‘ theory, not a ‗double aspect‘ theory. In traditional double aspect theory it is proposed that there is one fundamental entity, call it mind-brain, that has multiple, apparently incompatible aspects, such as mentality and physicality. Thus, the apparently incommensurate properties of res extensa and res cogitans are really just two descriptions of the same thing, similar perhaps to how we identify Venus, when it is low on the horizon, as either ‗the morning star‘ or ‗the evening star.‘ It is the same planet, but we ‗see it‘ under differing aspects. The trouble with double-aspectism is that it simply displaces the problem without solving it or even addressing it. What is the nature of the thing-in-itself that constitutes the single underlying entity of which we have two aspects? Unfortunately, that cannot be known, as 23 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that it is still not clear how you imagine this ―bridge‖ to simply explain away all differences. It can be bridged because we all three groups agree that there are conscious experiences and there are nonconsciousness experiences. There are some differences: such as, function aspect of consciousness in our (Vimal and Pereira Jr. & Ricke) frameworks is separate from experience aspect, but functions seem combined with experiences in the pan-experiential framework. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 671 Vimal, Nixon, and I agree (along with Kant). There is no secretive person we can point to and say, ‗Aha! That guy is both Clark Kent and Superman!‘ We can only know the two aspects as they present themselves to us, but rest assured, the theory goes, there is no metaphysical problem here, because the underlying entity is a single, unified whole. But that is just child‘s play. […] However, Vimal‘s version (to the extent that I understand it) is perhaps better called ‗double perspectivism‘ because it does not make overt ontological claims about what is ‗really‘ out there. Instead, it focuses on the epistemological side of the question, and says something like ‗we see and understand mentality when we are in X state of mind (or mode of being) and we see and understand physicality when we are in Y state of mind.‘ What is really out there we cannot know, and maybe there is actually nothing out there, it wouldn‘t matter. What matters is how we describe the world according to what state of mind we are in. In this formulation, Vimal‘s approach is similar to Husserl‘s. Husserl described two modes of understanding, which he called the natural attitude and the phenomenological attitude, similar in some ways to the distinction between ordinary cognition and metacognition. In the first case, a person is simply aware of the world. In the second case, the person is aware of the world and simultaneously, aware of being aware of it. I think that Vimal‘s epistemological approach is a more fruitful avenue of exploration than traditional, ontologically based double-aspectism could be.‖ In dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), the reality is still the mind dependent reality (MDR) for both aspects of the same entity say mind-brain because mind is involved in both aspects. The mental aspect is first person perspective and its physical aspect is third person perspective. Here, the ‗perspective‘ refers to first person subjective experience for the mental aspect and third person measurements (such as fMRI) for the physical aspect; both are mind dependent reality. These two aspects can never be separated: they are permanently ‗glued‘ together (the brute fact: that‘s the way it is!) and they are not independent, in analogy to two sides of a coin. The evidence is from electrophysiological and clinical lesion experiments; if a certain area is lesioned then related function and experience are compromised.24 In addition, there are two modes, and hence the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework is extended form of old double-aspectism. This dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) is concisely summarized in Section 1.2 of (Vimal, 2010e). Briefly, ―There are three entities that need to be linked in a theory of consciousness: structure, function, and experience. Several materialistic neuroscientific models link structure with function well, but fail to link them with experience, leading to the explanatory gap [The dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework is complementary to neuroscience models; it complements them because it closely depends on them for linking structure with function including global broadcasting (Baars, 1988) and because it provides information related to mental aspect.] […] Addressing the explanatory gap mentioned above, (Vimal, 2008b) hypothesized that elementary particles (fermions and bosons) have two aspects: (i) material aspect by mass, spin, charge, force, quanta, and space-time, and (ii) mental aspect. Its 24 ―For example, a subject with visual form agnosia (e.g. Milner and Goodale's patient D.F. [(Milner & Goodale, 1995)]) cannot consciously identify a vertical slot, but can "post" an envelope through it without problem; while subjects with optic ataxia (e.g. those with Balint's (1909) syndrome [(Balint., 1909)])) can identify an object but cannot act appropriately toward it. The dissociations here appear to go along with damage to the ventral and dorsal pathways respectively‖ (Chalmers, 2000). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 672 components (the mental aspects of elementary particles and inert matter) are considered as the carriers of superimposed fundamental potential experiences in unexpressed form‖ (Vimal, 2010e). The superposition of potential experiences is based on the dual aspects of matter (wave/particle), where the mental aspect of the wave aspect is a wave-like function of experience. ―These possibilities are actualized when neural-networks are formed via neural Darwinism, and a specific SE is selected by a matching process. […] Under [hypothesis] H1, a specific SE arises in a neural-net as follows: (i) there exists a virtual reservoir that stores all possible fundamental SEs/PEs, (ii) the interaction of stimulus-dependent feed-forward and feedback signals in the neural net creates a specific neural net state, (iii) this specific state is assigned to a specific SE from the virtual reservoir due to neural Darwinism, (iv) this specific SE is embedded as a memory trace of a neural net PE, and (v) when a specific stimulus is presented to the neural net, the associated specific SE is selected by the matching and selection process and experienced by this net. […] A subjective experience (SE) is an expressed first person conscious experience that occurs, arises, or emerges due to the interaction between feed-forward signals and feedback signals in a neural-net. This requires that the interaction satisfies the necessary ingredients of consciousness (Vimal, 2009f) such as the formation of neural networks, wakefulness, re-entry, attention, working memory (Rowlatt, 2009), stimulus at above threshold, and neural-net PEs. […] PEs are precursors of SEs [and are non-conscious experiences (Vimal, 2010a, 2010c)]. […] The dual-mode concept was originally formulated in the framework of dissipative thermofield quantum brain dynamics (Globus, 2006; Vitiello, 1995) and explicitly incorporated into the PE-SE framework by (Vimal, 2010d). […] The non-tilde mode is interpreted as the material and mental aspect of cognition (memory and attention) related feedback signals in a neural-network. Since memory contains past information, the non-tilde mode represents the cognitively nearest past approaching towards the present. The tilde mode is interpreted as the material and mental aspect of the feed-forward signals due to external environmental input or internal endogenous input. Since input signals contain information related to the near future, the tilde mode represents the nearest future approaching towards the present. It is a time-reversed, or entropy-reversed, representation of the non-tilde mode. [There are two types of matching mechanisms: (a) the matching mechanism for the quantum dendritic-dendritic MT pathway, and (b) the matching mechanism for classical pathways, such as classical axonaldendritic neural sub-pathway]. […] In all cases, a specific SE is selected under two conditions: (a) the tilde mode (the material and mental aspect of feed-forward input signals) interacts with the non-tilde mode (the material and mental aspect of cognitive feedback signals) to match for a specific SE; and (b) the necessary ingredients of SEs are satisfied. When the match is made between the two modes, the world-presence (Now) is disclosed. Its content is the SE of subject (self), the SE of objects, and the content of SEs. The material aspects in the tilde mode and in the non-tilde mode are matched to link structure with function, whereas the mental aspects in the tilde mode and in the non-tilde mode are matched to link experience with structure and function‖ (Vimal, 2010e). Thus, the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) does not displaces the problem of MDR vs. MIR (thing-in-itself) without solving it, rather it does not even touches the unknowable MIR. What it (my framework) addresses is the linkage problem of MDR: how to link structure, function, and experience in MDR. This is because, as Adam noted, ―we can only know the two aspects as they present themselves to us‖. In other words, mental ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 673 aspect is known via first person subjective experiences and the physical aspect via third person objective measurements; both are MDR. According to (Nietzsche, 1968), ―In so far as the word ‗knowledge‘ has any meaning, the world is knowable; but it is interpretable otherwise, it has no meaning behind it, but countless.— ‗Perspectivism.‘ […] It is our needs that interpret the world […] each one has its perspective‖. ―Perspectivism25 is the philosophical view developed by Friedrich Nietzsche that all ideations take place from particular perspectives. This means that there are many possible conceptual schemes, or perspectives in which judgment of truth or value can be made.‖ In doubleperspectivism, the two aspects can be separated; they can be independent, interdependent, or dependent; therefore, double-perspectivism is closer to Cartesian substance dualism that has many problems (Vimal, 2010e). The double-perspective interpretation of my framework is incorrect in the above sense because it seems to lead to many problems, such as association problem, how do you associate a specific SE to a specific neural-net when there are two different states of mind (or more precisely the states of neural-network), whereas there are no such problems in my framework. In other words, my dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) is not double-perspectivism in this sense; but it is, in the sense of first person perspective (for mental aspect) and third person perspective (for physical aspect) in MDR domain. Perhaps, Trika Kashmir Shaivism (TKS) approach is somewhat close to double perspectivism. My framework is more fruitful because it is optimal (in the sense that it has the least number of problems) and I have inserted dual-mode in dual-aspect view; therefore it is called dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. 6.2. Incommensurability of mental and physical entities (Adams, 2010a) commented on incommensurable mental and physical entities: ―The fundamental question of why there seem to be two incommensurate entities is no easier to deal with than the presumption that there are, in fact, two incommensurate entities.‖ One can ask that on what ground we justify that mental aspect is incommensurable entity with respect to related physical (which is composed of material fermions and force carrier bosons) aspect? Is that because of (Feigl, 1967)'s category mistake that mind and matter are two different categories? If so, then this is related more to the problems in materialism that mind/SE is identical with related neural state or mind somehow emerges from brain. (Adams, 2010a) replied (personal communication in June 2010): ―For me, the answer is, introspective ground. It is only because of introspection that we are aware of any mental aspect in the universe. If there were no such thing as introspection, there would be no scientific evidence in the physical world of the existence of mentality. It simply does not ‗show up.‘ Mentality is only known to us through self-awareness, a phenomenon that is not susceptible to scientific detection. Those methodological grounds alone, I believe, are sufficient to distinguish the mental and physical as incommensurable domains. However there are other grounds, arising from philosophy of science, as you note, as well as linguistics, philosophy, phenomenology, and 25 Adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perspectivism . ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 674 intellectual history. […] I would like to know your explanation of how, exactly, mental and material are ‗permanently glued together.‘ There is no scientific evidence of that, so you must have some reasoned basis for that speculation. Personally, I do not think it is ontologically possible, as the two domains are incommensurable, to use Thomas Kuhn‘s phrase. However, I do think it is possible for a person to change mental perspectives and thus view an entity in various modes of understanding. For example, we can see a woman as a mother, a child, and a spouse, depending on the current ‗perspective‘ or mode of understanding. These different understandings do not make any claims about qualities or aspects of the woman herself, only differing attitudes or perspectives of the person making the judgment. That is why I suggested that doubleaspectism, for which you make unsupportable ontological claims, could profitably be replaced by a ‗double-perspectivism‘, which makes only epistemological claims.‖ In my view, there are at least two methods to know the conventional (or mind-dependent) reality: (i) introspection (first person perspective) that is responsible for our SEs (the mental aspect) and (ii) third person scientific measurements such as fMRI, electrophysiology, and so on that are responsible for the neural correlates of SEs or NCC (physical aspect). The SE and its NCC are correlated, which has its own problems. True, that these two aspects belong to incommensurable domains and lead to category mistake. In spite of this, in my view, there is no reason that they cannot be the two perspectives and/or two aspects of the same entity. Double-perspectivism leads to substance dualism in a sense that the one perspective can exist without other (motherhood can exist independent of sisterhood or wifehood); whereas in double-aspectism, an aspect cannot exist without other aspect, i.e., they cannot be separated. There is no evidence that a SE can exist independently with respect to its NCC. The evidence of both methods entails that they cannot be separated. Therefore, incommensurability and the category mistake cannot argue against inseparability of mental aspect from its physical aspect and hence against dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. Further details are given in Section 3.7 of (Vimal, 2010d). Furthermore, in MDR domain: ―When the long-wavelength light from red-ball is presented to this [color related V4/V8/VO] network, the matching (between stimulus-SEs and neuralnetwork-SEs that is also called neural-net-PEs) and selection mechanisms during the interaction between stimulus-dependent feed forward signals and cognition/attention/memory related feedback signals create a state, call it red-state. This red-state has two aspects: The mental/experiential-aspect is redness and the material-aspect is the material-aspect of the redness-related neural-network and its activity. […] When the red-state is created, its two aspects are observed depending on the observation. If observed subjectively then the network experiences redness. If observed objectively such as in fMRI we see activity in V4/V8/VO visual area. The relationship between the mental/experiential and material aspects could be 1-1. In other words, it all depends on how we perform an experiment on it. If a subjective experiment (first person experiment such as simply looking at the stimulus) is performed then the red-state (the state of the Red-Green psychophysical channel) is SE redness. If we perform objective experiment (such as an fMRI third person experiment) then the red-state is the V4/V8/VOnetwork and its activity. This is in analogy to wave-particle duality: if we perform wave-type (such as slit-interference-type) experiment, an electron is a wave; if we perform particle-type (such as in photoelectric effect), the electron is a particle; in other words, the electron has two material aspects: wave and particle‖ (Vimal, 2010d). In the sense of first person and third person ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 675 perspectives/measurements, this appears as double perspectivism. However, in sense of inseparability of the double aspects, it is dual-aspect dual-mode view. Furthermore, the double aspects cannot be separated; in this sense, they are permanently ‗glued‘; perhaps one can interpret identity theory similarly: the two aspects are identical and cannot be separated. For example, in a limited analogy of coin, no matter what do, the two sides of the coin cannot be separated such as slicing between sides will lead to another set of two sides again. However, how can they be identical: one is physical and other is mental? Perhaps, the term ‗link‘ or ‗correlate‘ is more appropriate. By the term ‗glued‘, I mean that both aspects will always be together; they cannot independently exist and cannot be separated. 6.3. Discussion with Adams The author (RV) had email discussion with Adams (WA) (personal communication in June 2010) as follows: 6.3.1. The brute fact problem WA: (Adams, 2010a) commented on double aspectism: ―No problem is solved and no progress is made with double aspectism.‖ RV: If the problem is MDR vs. MIR, then it is not solved because I have not addressed it, as MIR is unknown. If the problem is how to link to structure, function and experience and how SEs occur, then it is rigorously solved in (Vimal, 2010d). Our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework is optimal because it has the least number of problems compared to all other views including panexperientialism. The only problem is the justifiable brute fact (that's just the way it is!) of dual-aspect in every entity. WA: I do not see that dual-aspectism is a ‗brute fact‘ and it is incumbent upon you to explain why you think it is. I think dual-aspectism is a species of identity theory, and I did explain why I believe that. Identity theory is insupportable, in my view. Two sides of a coin have a simple transformation the converts one aspect into the other, namely the operation of ‗flipping.‘ Alas, there is no such transformation known between mind and brain and therefore the analogy is insufficient. RV: The brute fact problem is addressed in (Vimal, 2010d): ―One could critique that the PE-SE framework also has a ‗brute fact‘ of the mental aspect that has superposed SEs. [The brute fact is that an aspect is experiential.] That an aspect is ‗mental‘ is a ‗brute fact‘ feature of universe in the PE-SE framework, a way that reality is not derivable from anything else. Though this is true, but I argue that it is also the ‗real fact‘ that SEs, such as redness, are fundamental and irreducible and hence must inherently exist [in conventional reality, but not in ultimate reality of samadhi state]. […] Furthermore, the brute fact of ‗[potential] PEs/SEs superposed (unexpressed) in the mental aspect of strings or elementary particles, inert matter as their carrier, and a specific SE is expressed/selected when neural-network is formed‘ can be further unpacked. Since our SEs are fundamental and irreducible, they are the inherent facts [in conventional reality]; one could argue ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 676 that they are neither brute facts nor fundamental assumption. In other words, this brute fact is the real fact as mass, spin, charge, space-time, force, and quanta are facts. […] All theories have a brute fact somewhere ― the issue is plausibility and a parsimony that generates richness of explanation, and the PE-SE framework passes this litmus test. […] All metaphysical views have fundamental assumptions that still need to be addressed, for example, the PE-SE framework assumes dual-aspect entities, materialism/emergentalism assumes that SE emerges in neuralnetwork, dualism assumes substance-dualism, and holoworld framework assumes its own ‗brute fact‘, and so on. However, so far, the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework is the most optimum framework because it is parsimoniously optimized and the problems of other frameworks are addressed. […] the ‗brute fact‘ of dual-aspect (mental and material aspects) is justified on the ground that SEs are fundamental, irreducible, and inherent [in conventional reality]‖. The analogy of two sides of the same coin is in the sense that these two sides are inseparable. 6.3.2. The definition of mind WA: I refer to ―mind‖ as the mental entity known to all normal, adult humans through simple reflection. I find your definition, ‗mind‘ = experiences and/or functions to be ambiguous. While ―experience,‖ cannot properly be defined in any non-mental way, the term ―functions‖ can be defined in common sense, or in physicalistic terms and is thus ambiguous. I have explained my objection to the ambiguity inherent in functionalism. Thus, your definition of mind as experience/function is, in my view, potentially self-contradictory. RV: Our definitions of the terms ‗mind‘ and ‗function‘ appear different. My definitions (Vimal, 2010e) were derived from the over 40 different meanings attributed by various authors to the term ‗consciousness‘, which were categorized into experiences and functions (Vimal, 2009e). My definition of mind encompasses most views as does the general definition of consciousness = ‗(conscious experiences) and/or (conscious functions)‘, which includes panpsychism, materialism, dualism, dual-aspectism, dual-perspectivism, panexperientialism, and so on; however the optimal definition of consciousness = ‗(conscious experiences) and (conscious functions)‘ is limited to the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2010e). Thus, my definitions are not self-contradictory. 6.3.3. The association problem WA: ―You ask how I can associate a specific experience to a specific neural net. The answer is that I can only point to correlations found between activity in a neural net and a conscious human‘s report of mental experience. Such correlations (the NCC) are suggestive but at this time there no explanation, not even a plausible hypothesis, to support any sort of causal explanation. All we can say is that there appear to be correlated events. (And even that statement depends on a mountain of assumptions, such as that a person‘s report of mental experience is accurate, complete, infallible, fully communicable, understandable, and so on). In my view, you do not have a problem associating a neural state with a mental experience because you have tacitly assumed a causal relationship that is not supported by the evidence.‖ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 677 RV: The two perspectives in double-perspectivism could be independent/inter-dependent, leading to the problem of association (such as how a system can associate redness with red-green cells over billions of cells in less than 50-500 msec, which is the same problem for substance dualism). As you say, correlation does not imply causality and depends on many other assumptions. However, one could argue that the problem of associating a neural state with a mental experience can be addressed by co-evolution (adaptation and natural selection) and codevelopmental neural Darwinism, as detailed in (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). The dual-aspect dualmode PE-SE framework does not have association problem because the two aspects are inseparable. 7. Mind-dependent reality (MDR) and mind-independent reality (MIR) (Nixon, 2010c) critiques materialism and classical science that assumes MIR ~ MDR as: ―we do not and cannot know of anything outside of our conscious experiencing. […] To objectify a mind independent reality [MIR], then to look for mind in that mind-independent reality, is a bizarre sort of logic to say the least. […] On the other hand, the materialist would reply that, obviously, it is external reality that continually changes our conscious experience, but with the added assertion that consciousness itself is created by – is a product of – the material world and its interactions. […] It all begins with the established laws of science, which its adherents claim have validity beyond any conscious awareness of them. In other words, the laws of science are ‗the things in themselves‘ or at least a part of them. […] To imagine mind in a mindless nowhere is magical thinking indeed. We see that, to begin with, science assumes a worldview, a perspective outside of conscious experience, which is impossible and, finally, a fantasy. […] The only choices for materialism are to quantify, measure, and examine the neural correlates and declare them to be the thing in itself, as in eliminative materialism, or to quantify, measure, and examine the qualitative effects and declare them to be the phenomenon itself, as in experimental psychology.‖ Moreover, (Nixon, 2010c) uses language framework for constructivism: ―language not only describes but constructs the object being observed‖, which seems to be consistent with MDR. (Adams, 2010b) elaborates and critiques (Nixon, 2010c) as: ―language is the crowbar that levers conceptualized experience from ‗raw,‘ unconceptualized experience. Language lets us (actually requires us to) objectify our experience into the idea of a mind-independent reality [MIR] that can be studied by science. […] Invoking Immanuel Kant, Nixon reminds us that if there really is a reality ‗out there‘ beyond the mind, the mind could never know it. We know only our own interpretations of what we think we perceive and understand. What is really out there, in-itself, regardless of what we know or think about it, is simply not accessible. We know what we know and we don‘t know what we don‘t know. […] A more serious implication of Nixon‘s point of view is that if all we know and can know is our own conceptualization of the world, then science is a waste of time. […] We simply cannot know what the world is really like. We can only know our own experience26, which is itself highly constrained by language, culture, and prior conceptualization.‖ 26 (Nixon, 2010a) objected this: An important part of conscious experience is the construction of symbolic knowledge. The symbolic means that it is always our construction but what is referred to by the term knowledge ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 678 MIR according to (Kant, 1787/1996)(I.§8.i) is: ―What might be said of the things in themselves, separated from relationships to our senses, remains for us absolutely unknown‖. Commenting on subject-exclusive reality or MIR, (Nixon, 2010d) argues: ―The perspective from the subject-excluding objectivity of mind-independent reality is in fact an attempt to see ourselves and our experienced reality from a god‘s eye view, that is, from the beyondness first conceivable through the creation/discovery of the greater, all-pervasive reality experienced as the sacred. In this view, speech as narrative (and concept as image) was the vehicle that conveyed our ancestors across the symbolic threshold into a new, consciously-apprehended reality beyond the merely sensory or biologic (a reality that in our times has largely become desacralized and despirited as ‗objective‘).‖ One could argue that the mind independent reality (MIR) is always unknown no matter what we do because ‗to know‘ means we need to use our minds and then it becomes the mind dependent reality (MDR), not MIR; although, physics assumes that when measured objectively27 MDR is MIR, which is debatable. The following texts related to MDR and MIR are somewhat modified from (Vimal, 2009b): [1] Constructivism proposes that the ‗outside‘ world as a construct of experience. According to (Müller, 2008), ―Matter is a structure that crystallizes within mind‖, which seems consistent with ―'matter' is a mental construct of such a substance‖ (Wilberg, personal communication in (Vimal, 2009b)). This is a mind-dependent or subject-inclusive reality (MDR/SIR). There is also mindindependent or subject-exclusive reality (MIR/SER) that cannot be known, which is consistent with (Kant, 1787/1996). Thus, there is a serious explanatory gap between MDR and MIR that we need to address: the fact is that my car parked in my parking lot exists whether I see/experience/perceive it or not; moon exists whether we observe it or not.28 In my view, MDR = MIR  SEs of objects and/or subject in first person perspective  third person measurement such as NCC of SE  other factors that are not yet known (1) may be more or less correct. We cannot just make things up! Yes, science is a human construction. What else could it be? It is not reality in itself. All our concepts, tools, & measuring devices are human constructions. But science is still best approximation of reality that we have available. It is like a net we create to throw over Reality. By looking at the shapes of what we capture in that net, we may come to a reasonably close approximation of the things-inthemselves. After all, science works! (And advancing technology has proven that.) I agree with Nixon. However, there are explanatory gaps in panexperientialism, such as, how function, mind, cognition, and material entities arise from experiences. In panexperientialism, experiences are the only entities that permeate universe. Panexperientialists need to address this gap. There is no such gap in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. 27 (Nixon, 2010a) questioned: can there be total objectivity when all the measuring devices and their conceptual interpretation are subjective (or, better, intersubjective) human creations? Total objectivity is impossible but in physics we assume MIR ~ MDR. 28 Einstein asked “whether I really believed that the moon exists only when I look at it.” (http://decarteseinstein.blogspot.com/). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 679 where  indicates ‗and/or‘. In other words, my use of the term ‗matter‘ or Wilberg‘s use of the term ‗substance‘ (Vimal, 2009b) is MIR but it is unknown; MDR is SE of matter/substance; physics is based on the debatable assumption MIR ~ MDR, which may or may not be correct. MDR vs. MIR is further discussed in (Vimal, 2009j). [2] Since MIR is unknown in our daily life, the reality is conventional MDR for both mental and physical aspects. MDR can be in first, second, and/or third perspectives. In the first person perspective, SE (such as redness of ripe tomato) is a part of mental aspect. In the third person perspective, the related neural representation of the ripe tomato in the V4/V8/VO-color-neuralnetwork and the network structure together (such as anatomical grey and white matter and neural activities) can be considered as its physical aspect. In other words, the physical aspect is the related material structure such as neural-network and its neuronal firing activities. One could argue that the related MIR may be approximately close to this physical aspect (third person perspective entity) without mental construction; but strictly speaking MIR is unknown. In other words, physicists may argue that MIR may be close to third person measured anatomical structure and physiological (such as fMRI or single unit) recorded ‗neural firing‘ (spikes) activities (Vimal, 2009b). In other word, MIR is unknown, but physics assumes MIR ~ MDR, which is debatable. [3] Furthermore, SEs are part of MDR, whereas the physical properties (P) of matter (such as physical properties of water, salt, and reflectance of red-rose) without mental construction might be close to MIR (Vimal, 2009b). For example, consider the hypothesis H2 of the PE-SE framework: the ‗three mental-gunas‘29 for each kind of SEs (for example, 3 primaries for color; 3 gunas, namely sattva, rajas, and tamas for emotion; and so on) and the PE can be hypothesized to be in superposed form in the mental aspect of an entity until the interaction between them is needed for SEs (such as redness) and thoughts. In MDR, a trichromat and an achromat have different SEs for color-related stimuli; as a matter of fact SEs are personal; emotions are different for different subjects. Therefore, gunas seem to be the properties of neural-networks. However, external objects provide information (such as reflectance) for SEs as well. If this is correct then physical gunas are related to the physical properties of physical objects (external objects and also internal neural-networks), which can be considered as close to the attributes of unknowable MIR. One could ask then: do SEs-related physical gunas appear only when neuralnetworks are formed? And precisely how does this happen? For example, the formation of 3 visual channels (Red-Green, Yellow-Blue, and luminance/achromatic channels) involves 3 types of cones (long, middle and short wavelength sensitive cones) related to 3 primaries (red, green, and blue) in trichromats. In this manner, we can link structure (such as redness related V4/V8/VO-neural-network), function (such as detection, and discrimination of red from its background), and experience (such as redness). In hypothesis H2, one PE and 3 gunas for each 29 Gunas (Sanskrit term) are qualities; this term is borrowed from Vedic system. This implies that we can hypothesize that SEs can be derived from the interaction one PE and 3 relevant gunas (as in hypothesis H2 of our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework) discussed in (Vimal, 2009b). In that way, we do not need to hypothesize innumerable and intractable potential SEs in superposed form in the mental aspect of each entity (virtual reservoir in hypothesis H1 of our framework); virtual reservoir is equivalent to universal background of awareness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 680 kind of SEs reduce the innumerable SEs to countable and tractable number; they are in superposed form in the mental aspect of each entity until they interact, integrate, stored, and then lead to specific SEs for matching and selection mechanisms; further details are given in (Vimal, 2009b). (Vimal, 2010d) elaborates MDR and MIR further: Although one can still critique that the assumption of mental aspect in dual-aspect view is a ‗brute-fact‘, one cannot deny the real-fact that SEs are fundamental and irreducible in the mind-dependent reality (MDR), subject-inclusive reality (SIR), or our daily conventional reality in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. ―This is the rationale for hypothesizing that [potential] SEs are in superposed form in the mental aspect of fundamental particles and a specific SE is selected during matching and then the relevant specific neural-network experiences it. In the [unknowable] mind-independent reality (MIR) or subject-exclusive reality (SER), [potential] SEs are still in superposed form in the mental aspect of entities, but ‗what it‘s like‘ can only be experienced in MDR. […] What is independent of subject? It is the external world, i.e., mind-independent reality (MIR: the world as it is, in-itself) that is brain-independent, but it is unknowable. According to Kant (Kant, 1950), thing comes to us only in appearance. One could argue that the MIR is the reality [or one could guess MIR] based on conjecture, an inference, or statement of belief. Whatever is known always involves brain [and mind]. Thus, our daily conventional reality is mind-dependent reality (MDR: the world as it appears to us).‖ (Vimal, 2009a) uses Nāgārjuna‘s dependent co-origination30, and conventional and ultimate realities to elaborate MDR and MIR further: ―Our daily reality is based on our minds and hence it is mind-dependent reality (MDR) or subject-inclusive reality (SIR). Mind-independent reality (MIR) or subject-exclusive reality (SER) is not known. Even then physics assumes that MIR = MDR because physicists assume that laws although derived from human mind are independent of mind. If somehow we understand MIR and its relationship with MDR, we can get insight into subjectivity (subjective experiences or SEs, intentionality, and so on) because subjectivity = MDR  MIR [(minus NCC and other factors, see Eq. (1)]. […] According to Nāgārjuna, there are two types of realities: conventional and ultimate;VIII each has existence and nonexistence. The Nāgārjuna‘s conventional reality is basically mind-dependent reality (MDR), and his ultimate reality seems to be the reality experienced at the state of Nirvāņa (detailed later).31 Ultimate reality may not be MIR. The conventional reality of external objects is structured by an individual-mind, so it is MDR. When the mind/subject is excluded from the reality, then that reality is MIR. For example, the falling of tree in a forest, where there is nobody to witness or hear, is MIR. This is because the falling tree generates sound vibration in air, but nobody hears 30 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that but this goes all the way into idealism, does it not — indicating that matterenergy and space-time themselves are illusions and all is mind (that is, the mind of G.O.D.)? Nāgārjuna‘s dependent co-origination is organism-environment interaction, consistent with our (dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE and panexperientialism) frameworks. 31 Nāgārjuna hypothesizes two kinds of reality: conventional and ultimate. I interpret his conventional reality as MDR. I guess, his ultimate reality is knowable at Nirvāņa/Samadhi state attained usually via Buddhist meditation. I am not sure if his ultimate reality is MIR because MIR is unknowable, as per Kant. Therefore, MIR may be or may not be close to ultimate reality. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 681 it, and hence there is no subjectivity and this will come under MIR. […] The conventional reality (or MDR) entails that conventional/mind-dependent entities lack inherent existence and hence lack causal power. For Nāgārjuna, ‗Effects lacking inherent existence depend precisely upon conditions that themselves lack inherent existence‘ (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995)-page 121. This entails dependent co-origination (or interdependent arising) for conventional reality (or MDR), which lacks inherent existence. In other words, phenomena in MDR are conventionally existent, but empty of inherent existence.IX Nāgārjuna asserts that ‗a thing is empty or that it is dependently, one is not contrasting their status with the status of some other things that are inherently existent. Nor is one asserting that they are merely dependent on some more fundamental independent thing. ... Rather as far as one analyzes, one finds only dependence, relativity, and emptiness, and their dependence, relativity, and emptiness.‘ (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995) (p. 177). In physics, we assume that MIR is MDR when observations are successfully replicated at any laboratory and at any time, and they are not significantly different from each other, i.e., when the observations are independent of space and time. However, it is still MDR, not MIR. MDR is consistent with dependent co-origination from the Nāgārjuna‘s four conditions (efficient, percept-object, immediate, and dominant conditions), which entails emptiness (lack of essence) of causation. MDR is an illusion (māyā = that which is not); MDR ~ MIR + (mind, subjectivity, or SEs) [plus NCC and other factors, see Eq. (1)]; MIR ~ MDR  Mind.32 The selection of a specific SE in the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008a, 2008b, 2009c, 2009d) and enlightenment are also inherently non-existent and co-arise dependently. If dependent co-origination is denied, action and resultant change would be pointless, life would not have real meaning, and MDR would not exist. MIR is very hard to know because any process of knowing always involves mind. However, some insight into MIR and ultimate reality can be gained through MDR‘s reasoning, language, deep thinking process, meditation, and so on. To gain some insight into ultimate reality, Nāgārjuna suggests that one should acquire the state of Nirvāņa (via meditation).X Moreover, ‗if Nirvāņa is liberation from cyclic existence33 and hence from arising and ceasing, it follows that, from the ultimate standpoint, all things in samsāra [MDR] are actually just as they are in Nirvāņa … everything is both conventionally real and ultimately unreal. [p.250] […] That is, independent of conceptual imputation there are no objects, no identities, and so, no distinctions [i.e., the ultimate nature of things is inexpressible, inconceivable, and uncharacterizable, but one might directly perceive it in Nirvāņa state of mind] [p.251]‘ (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995). Nirvāņa is a complete cessation of samsāra; samsāra includes grasping (including Nirvāņa itself), delusion, attachment, craving, suffering, and the cyclic existence. Both Nirvāņa and samsāra are not inherently existent. It appears that the ultimate reality is experienced at the state of Nirvāņa. […] Furthermore, MIR seems to be MDR without subjectivity (SEs). There is no 32 Here, MIR ~ MDR – mind, where by ‗mind‘ is SEs; in general mind includes functions (such as detection, discrimination, cognition, intentionality, thinking process, reasoning, language, and so on) and SEs. 33 The term ‗cyclic existence‘ refers to the cycle of arising (birth), abiding (life), and ceasing (death) of an entity, a process, or relation for conventional truth (MDR). For example, (i) the cycle of suffering and happiness, (ii) the cycle of our birth, life, and death, (iii) the cycle of birth of universe at Big Bang, its life over billions of years, and its death during Big Freeze/Big Crunch, and so on. For ultimate truth, there is no cyclic existence. Thus, cyclic existence is not inherently existent in time and space for MDR. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 682 difference in entity between MDR and MIR. The physics and its laws presumably more or less remain the same in MDR and MIR. An alternative method for getting insight into MIR needs further research; for example, just imagine you are in the sea of EMR [electromagnetic radiation] but all your sensory systems are shut down.‖ Monteiro‘s hypothesis related to MDR and MIR is as follows (personal communication in May 2010): ―I claim for the existence of MIR as well as MDR to be complementary. I shortly make the statement, that both are right if the theory (model) is set up formally consistent and the experiment is brought under specified condition. What is ‗right‘ or ‗wrong‘ depends on the ‗perspective‘, which one holds. The mind can be MDR as well as MIR under specified ‗conditions‘. Perception is MDR, but the other side of the picture is cognition (‗I‘) as an autonomous process as MIR. An example of MIR is ‗creativity‘. It is relevant to define the ‗individual‘ ‗I‘ formally and unambiguously in the context of MIR abolishing the metaphorical personalized construct of ‗homunculus‘.‖ To sum up, the SEs aspect of consciousness constructs the MDR; mind-independent reality (MIR) is unknowable although mystics/yogis claim direct perception that is close to MIR. Furthermore, Monteiro‘s hypothesis is interesting because the cognition (‗I‘) or the ‗individual‘ ‗I‘ (if it is an autonomous process) and/or creativity might be MIR. 8. Hard problems (Nixon, 2010c) elaborates the hard problem of experiences as follows: ―I do not feel that it is the conscious quality of experience which is the Hard Problem, the unexplained mystery; it is the fact of experience itself which resists being plumbed. … Consciousness, I have suggested, is the name we give to the reflection of experience back upon itself through symbolic interaction and intersubjectivity. But it is not experience in itself. […] The Hard Problem of experience may be the only one that needs, if not an explanation, a response. … the Hard Problem is [1] ‗Did experience simply evolve from non-experiencing organic interactions?‘ or [2] ‗Did experience ‗dirempt‘ or ‗focus‘ from some sort of nonspecific, preorganic, experiential potentiality that was part of a universe of all possibilities?‘ On the personal level, the Hard Problem might be phrased as [3] ‗Was I in some way conscious before my memory of consciousness begins?‘ or [4] ‗Was the experiential groundwork for my individual consciousness already present before ‗I' began?‘ […] [substance dualists propose that] the basic form of self-aware consciousness we experience on a daily basis existed as a soul before this life and will exist after it … Consciousness, here [in evolutionary emergentism], is clearly an evolved product of various forces in an otherwise nonconscious, non-living universe. […] the material or spatial world itself is a product of perceptual construction that was preceded by non-perceptual experience within the vicissitudes of temporal duration: Experience of time precedes perception of space (or material). […] Hard Problem: [5] Did consciousness evolve through natural, materialistic processes in an otherwise non-conscious, non-experiencing universe? To answer ‗yes‘ is simply to take a stand with unprovable assumptions.‖ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 683 In PE-SE framework, hard problems are Types 1-3 explanatory gaps (Vimal, 2009h, 2009i): (i) Type-1explanatory gap is how can SEs emerge/evolve from non-experiential matter? For example, how can SEs emerge from brain or identical with brain-states? (ii) Type-2 explanatory gap is how can SEs pre-exist, i.e., how is it possible that our SEs (such as happiness, sadness, painfulness, and similar SEs) were already present in primal entities, whereas there is no shred of evidence that such SEs were conceived at the onset of universe? (iii) Type-3 explanatory gap is how can we say physics reveals mind-independent reality (MIR) when mind (subjective experience) is always used in setting up theories and observation? or ―How Do We Know What We Believe We Know?‖ (Glasersfeld, 1985). For conscious SEs, necessary ingredients must be satisfied (Vimal, 2009f), such as the formation of neural-network, wakefulness, re-entry (Edelman, 1993), attention, working memory, stimulus above threshold level, and neural-net PEs. Perhaps, Nixon‘s hard problem of experience is related to Type-1 and Type-2 explanatory gaps. In my view, perhaps, the answers of the Nixon‘s questions [1]-[3] and [5] are ‗no‘ in dual-aspect view as in panexperientialism. According to hypothesis H1, organism-environment interactions are necessary. In addition, co-evolution, co-development, matching and selection mechanisms are needed to select a specific SE via matching process. Details are given in (Vimal, 2010d). The answer of the Nixon‘s question [4], to some extent, is ‗yes‘ because either SEs pre-exist (or can be derived from the interaction of a PE and 3 gunas) and potential SEs are superposed in the mental aspect of each entity in the dual-aspect view with hypothesis H1, which hypothesizes that rudimentary individual consciousness is relational and is the result of organism-environment interaction. Intersubjectivity sharpens individual consciousness to its final form. Furthermore, there is another explanatory gap and hard problem of panexperientialism: It is not still clear how matter (in mind independent reality: MIR) can arise from experiences related to panexperientialism, perhaps, because we do not have relevant evidence and MIR is mysteriously unknown. For this, we need to have experimental data to test a relevant hypothesis. In mind dependent reality (MDR), experiences/mind can construct the appearance of matter, but that matter must pre-exist otherwise how can experiences construct the appearance of the matter, where the term ‗matter‘ is related to MIR? For example, how can experiences create the material aspect (NOT the appearance) of Taj Mahal, Empire State Building, or World Trade Center from Ground Zero? This is not clear to me. So far, this seems impossible to me! (Nixon, 2010a) addressed this explanatory gap as follows: ―These constructions you mention are the very epitome of experience made manifest. Nature could not manage this on her own. Somebody had an image, invisible in this world of matter-energy, and that image, that dream, became the ultimate source of these buildings — which consciously directed experience then constructed in this very world of matter-energy. In the quantum, isn‘t it thought that most energy fields are in the form of waves (‗state vectors‘) that, when observed (when conscious expectation is placed upon them), ‗collapse‘ into the bound form of photons or subatomic particles? The wave is a not in any particular state of ‗matter‘ (it is a vector of possibilities). Upon measurement or observation, a particular form is taken. Does this not indicate that experience gives matterenergy its particular form & structure? Note that this experience may not be conscious of itself, so (as Whitehead indicated) the forms or entities that matter-energy has already taken will ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 684 influence the form taken as the wave of potential (or state vector) collapses. Included amongst the forms of entities in the objective world, after all, are all sorts of experiencers, and their expectations of a continuing world affect the continuing (creative) collapse into more forms or entities. Behind it all is ongoing experience itself; thus, the world is a manifestation of ongoing experience, mostly being ‗in-formed‘ by the forms of former creative collapses. Put another way, the world process is itself experience happening, becoming manifest only temporarily.‖ It is an excellent explanation for the appearance of artifacts built by humans in mind dependent reality (MDR). However, energy, wave, particle are material entities; they are not experiential entities as per physics. We can, however, assume that each of them has a mental aspect that has experiences in dual-aspect view, but physical aspect cannot be excluded. One could argue that the gap still remains in mind-independent reality (MIR, thing-in-itself), and for natural material entities such as, rocks, mountains, rivers, trees, and so on. These material entities must pre-exist in MIR. Then only, mind can construct their appearances. In other words, matter must pre-exist before its mental construction for its appearance. Question is: where these material entities come from? How matter can arise from conscious or non-conscious experiences in MIR? It should be noted that there is a NO mind/consciousness/experience in MIR (by definition) and collapse needs mind/observer. Material universe must have existed billions of years without human mind/observer.XI If one assume that experiences existed before living entities appear, then this definition of experience is too broad or non-specific because one has to assume that any type of interaction is related to an experience. Thus, the closing of the gap is still unclear to me in the panexperientialism framework. 9. Existential crisis, selective process, predictive behavior, and chaotic process for the emergence of consciousness According to (Nixon, 2010d), ―I conclude that prehumans underwent an existential crisis that could be resolved only by the discovery-creation of the larger realm of symbolic consciousness we call the sacred. […] The self is founded with death at its core.‖ However, one could ask: from where symbolic consciousness and related SEs arise, which can resolve the existential crisis? One of answers may be: they must pre-exist to pick them out demonstratively (Vimal, 2009g). This is the conclusion of my discussion with Type-B materialist Levin. She used the most advanced theory of phenomenal concept strategy to defend Type-B materialism (Levin, 2006). The pre-existence of SEs is consistent with our frameworks. The existential crisis phenomenon is non-causal and non-seminal event, rather it is an epiphenomenon as per (Hersch, 2010): ―There can be no doubt the individual self-awareness of mortality is one of the great and terrible contradictions of conscious experience, but I contend that the crisis created by this knowledge is not causal, nor is it a formative event in the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 685 emergence of consciousness. To the contrary, I contend that the psychological impact of mortal knowledge is an epiphenomenon that had a late onset in the course of human experience.‖34 (Hersch, 2010) proposes a framework of evolution, selection, adaptation, predictive behavior, the internalization of organism-environment interactions, and the language for the emergence of intersubjectivity and then individual consciousness: ―All organisms engage in predictive behavior, but in the absence of consciousness, that behavior is genetically engrained rather than intentional. […] Again, in the case of non-conscious behavior, every organism must of necessity, have built into its genetically determined behavioral repertoire, predictions that have been selected for on the basis of patterned events [equivalent to Nixon‘s cosmic cycles] that actually take place repeatedly in its environment, and this behavioral repertoire will be passed on to subsequent generations. […] We have a tendency to view the process of evolution in morphological terms rather than behavioral terms, yet morphology can be aptly viewed as nothing more than an instrument of behavior that, at its most fundamental level, involves survival and reproduction, and it is from the standpoint of the predictive nature of all living behavior, that we must address the emergence of consciousness. […] The change begins when the predictive behaviors that reflect the interactions between the creature and its environment become turned inward amongst the group itself. […] It is the call and the response, in which the response in turn, becomes a call itself, that marks the emergence of the intersubjective conscious creature. Awakening to consciousness entails a leap to meaningful language, and language behavior involves, at its root, patterned, predictive, mutuality.‖ (Hersch, 2010) elaborates further the selective process for the emergence of consciousness: ―In the final analysis, it needs to be remembered that the interactions among and between various species have been determined by a selective process based on the random variation that takes place in the context of the entire constellation of physiological-behavioral differences that emerge among living organisms. There are no rules that determine what works at any given time, in any given place, and in any given ecological context. Among individuals and groups, competitive and cooperative behaviors, dominance and submission, are equally subject to selection pressures. Selection is the ultimate equal opportunity employer. Failure to understand this is the fallacy inherent in Social Darwinism.‖ The above hypothesis is somewhat consistent with the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) in a complementary manner. However, again, SEs must pre-exist to pick them out demonstratively (Vimal, 2009g). This seems somewhat consistent with the hypothesis of pre-existence of the continuum of experiences (Nixon, 2010b). 34 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that (Hersch, 2010) ignores a great deal of psychological evidence for death denial (Becker, 1973) at the mind‘s core. Becker‘s The Denial of Death (Becker, 1973) is interesting. In some sense, we all are involved in Becker‘s immortality project (or causa sui), in which we create, publish, and/or become part of something which we feel will last forever; something that will never die, compared to our physical body that will die one day. This gives us the feeling that our lives have meaning, a purpose, and significance in the grand scheme of things. However, this comes later after our basic needs are satisfied. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 686 The developmental neural Darwinism in the PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) is consistent with (Hersch, 2010)‘s embryologic development: ―It is difficult to imagine the exact context in which the transformation occurred among our ancestors, but we can see the process at work in child development. We are all familiar with the idea that in embryologic development, we see much of evolutionary development mirrored in the development of the embryo --- gills and the like. In this same fashion, we can see in the development of the child, the various stages by which consciousness emerges in microcosm. The newborn infant is not conscious, though from a genetic standpoint, it is both equipped and predisposed to acquire consciousness. At first the infant is entirely focused and reactively dependent on its mother. The mother, who is both programmed and conscious, calls forth the consciousness of the infant, and pop-psychology notwithstanding, is genetically compelled to perform the behaviors necessary accomplish this calling-forth. […] As the infant matures, the mother engages in rhythmic vocalizations that are the immediate precursors to language. These include cooing, repetitious phrases, and singing. 35 […] And so the child is awakened to a symbolic world of theory in which the meaning of things is engendered in cause and effect relationships --- reliably and predictably.‖ (Hersch, 2010) compares his embryologic development framework with Nixon‘s existential crisis framework as follows: ―To place this picture of the process of emergence of consciousness in microcosm in the context of Nixon‘s crisis of mortal knowledge, we might ask ourselves how the very same crisis awareness emerges in human development. Since I have not come across any academic literature that correlates anticipatory death terror with developmental age, I can only speculate. It seems to me that the terror engendered by the anticipation of one‘s eventual death develops quite slowly over the course of a lifetime.‖ (Nixon, 2010c) makes the case for rather sudden appearance of self-referential language; only a crisis can account for this sudden (over a few generations) transformation as per (Nixon, 2010a). In my view, if the existential crisis is the only factor that can account for this sudden transformation related to the appearance of self-referential language, then the related neuralnetwork must be formed over a few generations. Furthermore, the embryologic developmental aspect of language seems to imply that the existential crisis factor participates later in life‘s timeline. (Hersch, 2010) then examines the predictive behavior with respect to the embryologic development: ―Common sense tells us that the child acquires the name for things, categorizes them and thereafter, organizes them into predictive theoretical relationships. As difficult as it may be to grasp this idea, the situation is actually the opposite. The child experiences everything in relation --- in predictive interaction with the world --- and names things in order to clothe relation with symbolic objects (objectification). In this process, the child undergoes a transformation from a behaving creature that reacts to the world to a predictive intentional actor who acts upon the world. We see that theory (as prediction) precedes data.‖ 35 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that since humans are the only ones who do this with their young — speak to them as though they were already conscious — it begs the question of the origins of same in our species. I agree and it seems to entail that consciousness with its two aspects (function and experience) in rudimentary form pre-exists for intersubjective interaction. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 687 One could argue that the 3-5 years embryonic development of consciousness in infants appear equivalent to the emergence of consciousness over many generations in ancestral troop of wandering hominids (human-like apes).36 However, in all cases, SEs must pre-exist to pick them out demonstratively (Vimal, 2009g). The emergence of individual consciousness from social/tribal consciousness from the developmental rhythmic call and response behavior is argued by (Hersch, 2010) as: ―The individual [in ancestral troop/tribe of wandering hominids] may have been self-aware, but in a dimmer sense than we rugged individualists experience today. […] This does not mean that individuals did not come into conflict with one another. […] In contrast to Nixon‘s mortal knowledge thesis, I have asserted that conscious emerges from rhythmic call and response behavior spawned from complex sign behavior, and that call and response is perpetuated and elaborated in language behavior in ongoing intersubjective inter—ACTION. The faculty of symbolic interaction (language behavior) enables the construction of a shared predictive/theoretical narrative --- a socially constructed reality --- that functions to produce coordinated, collaborative, intentional (meaningful), and innovative, action among members of the fundamentally the eusocial human species. […] As I have explained, the emergence of tribalcentric consciousness in which the individual self is fully realized is not only consistent with a definition of consciousness, but it is the essence of consciousness that, Nixon and I agree, emerges in symbolic interaction among eusocial creatures. The immersion of the self in relation to a larger causal narrative that embodies tribal identity, takes precedence and this remains true today in the emergence of consciousness that can be observed in child development. […] we can place the emergence of the symbolic, language-using, Homo sapiens at around 150,000 years ago. […] The 140,000-year experiment with tribal-centric consciousness produced a stunningly rapid expansion of range for Homo sapiens. The most recent 10,000 year experiment in which object-centric consciousness, a cultural product realized in intersubjective relation, produces increasing economic efficiencies at an exponentially increasing rate, has resulted in a stunningly rapid expansion of population.‖ (Nixon, 2010h) replied to (Hersch, 2010): ―My thesis is that with the life threatening crisis of mortal knowledge the human awoke to his own existence and the mind itself now found a place between the environmental stimulus and the instinctual response system. […] in my statement of the genetic imperative to survive and reproduce, I ignore cooperative communities, which are central evolutionary features, as well. […] new categories of thought involved the prediction of future events. That is even clear from the archeological record. I‘m not sure where he thinks I deny this. I base thought on emotions because I asked myself, why were predictions made? To what end was foreknowledge needed? And the answer was always to fulfill needs that emotions indicated needed to be fulfilled. We certainly did use our new conceptual categories to predict and to build a new cultural world, but we did so for two reasons: We were biologically and psychologically compelled to do so. The former involves the natural emotions (or, as Hersch would have it, feelings) that arise from our embodiment and the latter involves the emotions that 36 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that many generations is not evolutionarily slow, and the definite evidence of symbolic behavior has only been found in H. sapiens. This is true, but one could argue the emergence of consciousness over many generations might be considered equivalent to 3-5 years embryonic development in infant. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 688 arose in response to the existential crisis of mortal knowledge. […] I can‘t agree that (symbolic) culture is a ‗product‘ of conscious action [i.e., the cause of symbolic culture is conscious action]; it is, instead, a simultaneous appearance. We cannot become conscious of our selves without intersubjectivity, and intersubjectivity is a cultural phenomenon. […] I too tend to favour the old idea that the development of the individual from the womb onwards loosely tends to recapitulate evolution – including in this case the cultural evolution of the self.‖ (Nixon, 2010c) proposes an alternative chaotic process for the emergence of consciousness: ―Another position derived from a combination of quantum physics and far from equilibrium thermodynamics sees experience of any sort creating experienced worlds from the chaos or semichaos of the unknown and non-experienced — the Kantian ‗things in themselves‘.‖ However, according to (Monteiro, 2010), ―the autonomous non-experiencing thing or chaotic unrelated process and experiencing is the borderline between meaningless and meaningful to be incorporated in a philosophy or theory. The meaningless autonomy of a process (Ding-an-sich) must be the axiomatic starting point. The question is how to build the bridge between meaningless and meaningful experiencing: 1) one has to postulate accidental random material object interaction to generate or activate the mind (mattermind); and 2) accidental random subject mental interaction to activate matter (mindmatter). Through interpersonal feedback, meaningful experiencing (perception) comes into being. The question is what happens in the non-causal gaps of mattermind and mindmatter‖ [p. 374]. In the dual-aspect PE-SE framework, self (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007) is SE of subject and is related to an adaptive pressure arising from self-organization, chaotic dynamics, and neural Darwinism (Edelman, 1993). Furthermore, (Nixon, 2010d) emphasizes the role of evolution, existential crisis, and chaotic processes for the emergence of consciousness: ―the evolution of language […] The existential crisis (the crisis of motivation brought on by the peripheral observation of inevitable mortality) didn't create syntax on the spur of the moment ex nihilo. It is a tenet of systems and ‗chaos‘ theory that when any system enters a crisis state, its organization will begin to degenerate or it will transform into a new system through ‗emergent evolution‘ (cf. (Pattee, 1995)). […] (Gallagher, 2001) is correct in positing a primary intersubjectivity from which individual subjectivity emerges. […] speech, though asserted by individuals, was experienced as a communal phenomenon‖. In my view, the existential crisis and chaotic emergent evolution may have helped the evolution of languages, but the individual self (SE of subject) (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007) might already have occurred in brain when self-related neural-networks evolved.37 37 (Nixon, 2010a) questioned: Do you imagine such a thing just spontaneously evolved? As noted, language & brain co-evolved (see (Deacon, 1997)), so one might say mind & brain co-evolved. What happened to human experience that led to the natural selection self-related neural-networks? I agree that since language & brain co-evolved (Deacon, 1997), so one might say mind & brain co-evolved. I guess, Nixon‘s rationale is that co-evolution involves real hard existential crisis and chaos, whereas soft easy going developmental rhythmic call and response behavior (predictive behavior) and/or spontaneous co-evolution is not ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 689 To sum up, in my view, (Nixon, 2010d; Nixon, 2010h) and (Hersch, 2010) are complementary to each other in some sense. Therefore, one can try bridging their two hypotheses by arguing that the developmental rhythmic call and response behavior (predictive behavior) of (Hersch, 2010) occurs first and then Nixon‘s existential crisis38 (Nixon, 2010d) occur later and both contribute towards the emergence/occurrence of consciousness along with: (i) the emotionally-based knowledge, (ii) genetic imperative to survive and reproduce, (iii) contributions from cooperative communities, (iv) social Darwinism, (v) predictive behavior to fulfill biologically and psychologically compelled emotion related needs, and (vi) the pre-existence of SEs. In PE-SE framework, the individual consciousness is modulated (not emerged) by the symbolic interaction among eusocial creatures. In other words, social consciousness emerges from the interactions among individual consciousnesses (or interaction between brains)XII. This is because an individual must pick out demonstratively a specific SE even in materialism so it must pre-exist say in a virtual reservoir: a specific SE is selected from the virtual reservoir containing all kinds of potential SEs in superposed form as in hypothesis H1 (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) or SEs emerge from the interaction of a PE and relevant three-gunas as in hypothesis H2 (Vimal, 2009g)).39 On the basis of evolution, (i) individual consciousness in rudimentary form might have occurred about 540 millions years ago (mya) during Cambrian explosion (Hameroff, 1998); (ii) symbolic, language-using, Homo sapiens (tribal-centric consciousness) emerged at around 150,000 years ago (kya) (Hersch, 2010), and (iii) self-centric or object-centric consciousness might have emerged at around 10 kya (Hersch, 2010). In summary, one can argue that predictive behavior, existential crisis, chaotic emergent evolution, and so on may all have their appropriate percent contribution in the evolution of individual consciousness and intersubjectivity; further research is needed to address the issue of their precise timeline and percent contribution. 10. Interaction between brains, inter-subjectivity, and social consciousness, and origin of individual consciousness (Nixon, 2010c) proposes that the origin of individual consciousness is inter-subjectivity (second person perspective): ―For the subjectivist, conscious origins tend to take off for more ethereal regions, above into the Great Beyond of transcendent spirituality. This is not the way we come to consciousness nor the way we experience it drawn through time. Percy, for example, sees going to cause co-evolution because it is within the normal range. However, in the life‘s timeline (of say 100 years), the sequence of developmental rhythmic call and response behavior occurs first because of newborn‘s development then the existential crisis such as death occurs at the end. 38 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that call & response may have led to protolanguage (cf. (Bickerton, 2000)). One could argue that since call and response behavior may have led to protolanguage (Bickerton, 2000) that leads to language, developmental rhythmic call and response behavior contribute first then the existential crisis in our life time line. 39 From my discussion with type-B materialists Levin and Papineau in (Vimal, 2009g), my view is that SEs must pre-exist to pick it out demonstratively and therefore materialism fails even after the most advance argument of PCS (phenomenal concept strategy) theory for type-B materialism. This failure supports our hypotheses H1 (Vimal, 2010d) and H2 (Vimal, 2009b). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 690 conscious experience as evolving neither from third person materialism nor pre-existing in first person spirituality. He writes that ‗there has come into existence a relation which transcends the physico-causal relations obtaining among data. This relation is intersubjectivity. It is a reality which can no longer be understood in the instrumental terms of biological adaptation‘ (1975, pp. 271-2). One might call intersubjectivity the second person perspective.‖ According to (Adams, 2010b), ―Nixon [(Nixon, 2010c)] tends to the view that subjectivity is self-knowing, or proto-knowing. While he supports the notion that the ‗self‘ is merely a narrative structure, somewhat arbitrarily built and maintained by conversations in society, he seems to at the same time believe that ‗The recognition of the self is, in a sense, the objectification of the subject by the subject...‘ The relationship between subjectivity and the self is never made explicit. The narrative self is the total set of stories we tell ourselves about who we are, but at the same time, ‗Subjectivity, then, is the experience of being the implied subject of discourse.‘ Nixon suggests (but does not state) that subjectivity is a prerequisite for development of a narrative self, for subjectivity is necessary to define intersubjectivity, the awareness we have of each other‘s minds.‖ In dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework, self is SE of subject (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007) seems somewhat consistent with Nixon‘s self and subjectivity.XIII However, the origin of individual consciousness is the virtual reservoir (equivalent to the Nixon‘s universal background of awareness) via relational organism-environment interaction, and this individual consciousness is later modulated by inter-subjectivity.40 (Nixon, 2010c) emphasizes language as a key factor for inter-subjectivity and conscious experiences: ―Language acquisition is the final threshold, which requires the assertion of experience in speech and a consequent sense of subjectivity, narrational practice and its pronouns that make reference to such subjectivity, and the intersubjective dynamic by which we recognize and help create subjects in other persons (and who reflexively affect our own subjectivity) [p. 257]. […] Being in itself or experience as such out of which our conscious experience arose is perhaps possible to identify with some attributes of the cultural construct we know as ‗nature‘. […] The view of primordial self-existence derives no doubt from the reification of the sense of self, the assumption that the self exists before language and communicates through language as another cultural tool. […] (Lacan, 1977) makes it clear that, for whatever reason, it is an error of immense proportion to simply assume that there is a world of experience ‗out there‘ or ‗in here‘ previous to or beneath or beyond language to which we have access. […] as Kerby indicated, this self has had its linguistic creation prepared for it before 40 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that it is unclear how this (individual consciousness is later modulated by intersubjectivity) could be unless you are referring to something mystical like the Atman or soul. I am not referring to Atman or soul as in Vedic system or religion, which is close to substance-dualism-andproperty-dualism; rather my framework is a dual-aspect view that has substance-monism-and-property-dualism. The problem seems that our definitions are different: Nixon‘s definitions are panexperientialism-based and mine are dual-aspect based. I do not see that Nixon is contradicting my view seriously on mental aspect (Vimal, 2010d). We both accept that individual consciousness is relational; in my dual-aspect framework, ‗relation‘ involves organismenvironment interaction, where environment may include all non-living and living entities (including other human individuals). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 691 its biological birth and it will leave linguistic echoes after its biological demise. […] all that is outside of language is non-conscious experience in a reality that is largely a construction of our biological human sensory and memory systems relating to the things in themselves. […] Thought is built within language and language is the activity of a people.‖ (Nixon, 2010c) discusses the decision making at preconscious level, the language hypothesis for conscious experiences, and the origin of conscious experience from nonconscious experience further as: ―Libet (e.g., (Libet, 1992)), though questioned by some, have persuasively revealed that most conscious decision making takes place an entire half-second after brain activation readings show that subconscious neural processing has begun, indicating the actual decision takes place preconsciously. […] Consciousness shades into the unconscious, into nonconscious experience, with vistas of information arriving both preconsciously and departing postconsciously. (Dennett, 1991) has famously insisted that consciousness does not even do that, that it is not even real but a mere side effect of language, the intentional fallacy. It seems clear, however, that even side effects have some reality. For (Velmans, 2009), consciousness has the vital role of making existence, things in themselves, real for us [p. 261]‖. If language is mandatory for conscious experiences, then how do we explain the conscious experiences of mute people who cannot speak, a subject who is isolated (such as in a prison cell) or animals that cannot speak? One could, however, argue for mental language for these cases.41 To address inter-subjectivity, we need to explain the second person perspective: ―The term ‗second person‘ is a grammatical term which describes the person whom the doer or the first person talks to. When you add the word perspective with the word it describes that something is being watched from the perspective of the second person.‖42 In the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework,43 intersubjective dynamics (second person perspective) is a part of developmental neural Darwinism where mind and brain (including self) 41 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that if deaf-mutes never even learn to comprehend symbolic interaction, they have no means to become conscious of themselves. It is possible to enter the world of the symbolic (in which one finds oneself immersed) without being to speak or even understand particular words. Feral or brutally isolated children, I would argue, are not conscious (as in self-conscious) but they are experiencing. I have made the case that nonhuman animals experience emotions but are not conscious of that experience (not self-conscious). Nixon‘s definition of conscious experience is restricted to self-consciousness (and/or Block‘s access or reportable consciousness), whereas my definition of SEs includes Nixon‘s and also Block‘s phenomenal (nonreportable) consciousness. Nixon would categorize the latter under non-conscious experiences. If this is correct, Nixon‘s conscious experience should be qualifies with ‗access or reportable‘ to avoid confusion. It should be noted that pan-experientialism has explanatory gap problems; the dual-aspect framework does not have such problem. The latter framework is optimal (that has least number of problems) and is complementary to Type-B materialism in a sense that the dual-aspect view argues for mental aspect in addition to Type-B materialism‘s physical aspect. 42 Adapted from http://www.blurtit.com/q163012.html. 43 Since every entity has mental and physical aspects in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, conscious robots are possible as discussed in (Vimal, 2010d). Our definition of mind = experiences and/or functions in (Vimal, 2010e) encompasses panpsychism. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 692 co-develop including sensorimotor tuning between ‗I‘ (first person perspective), ‗You‘ (second person perspective), and ‗s/he, it‘ (third person perspective). In other words, the intersubjective dynamics of second person perspective helps in co-tuning and co-developing the SEs of first person (‗I‘) subjective perspective with related neural-correlates of third person (‗s/he, it‘) objective perspective and second person (‗You‘) intersubjective perspective. This appears consistent with (Nixon, 2010f): ―I do not classify my approach within the philosophical dichotomy of realism vs. idealism. Instead, I embrace Terrence Deacon‘s coevolution of language and the brain, each affecting change in the other, which is to say conscious experience [of objects including other interacting human beings] may depend on the brain [and] the brain is in turn changed by conscious experience (since for me language and symbol provided the context for human (self) consciousness). However this begs the question of experience in itself, since most of our experiencing, I believe, is unconscious.‖ (de Quincey, 2010) compares the three (first, second and third person) perspectives: ―on the one hand, investigations of third-person, objective, correlates (e.g. neuroscience and cognitive science) and investigations of first-person, subjective, experience and phenomena (e.g. introspection and meditation), on the other. These two perspectives set the terms of debate in contemporary consciousness research: Is consciousness first-person subjective or third-person objective? How can we bridge the ‗explanatory gap‘ between objective brains and subjective minds? […] Although the second-person perspective has been almost entirely overlooked in Western philosophy of mind, the notion of intersubjectivity actually has had significant proponents in other disciplines-such as linguistics, social psychology, psychotherapy, and anthropology.‖ In addition, (de Quincey, 2010) proposes: (i) ―that intersubjectivity is foundational to both a philosophical understanding of, and an experiential engagement with transpersonal phenomena‖ and (ii) ―an evolutionary model of consciousness based on a distinction between intersubjective and interpersonal consciousness - a model that provides a philosophical foundation for the core insights of transpersonal psychology.‖ He argues that ―in addition to methodologies of firstperson subjectivity (exploring consciousness from ‗within‘ through meditation and introspection), and third person objectivity (studying external correlates of consciousness, such as brains and neurons), a holistic science of consciousness would also expand to include secondperson intersubjective methodology and epistemology44 - to account for the inter-reflexivity of consciousness (subjectivity-reflected-in-subjectivity) in ‗I thou‘ relationships. Whereas firstperson methodologies, such as meditative practices, lead to ‗monologic‘ consciousness (Whorf, 1956), second-person methodologies, such as Bohmian dialogue,45 lead to ‗dialogic‘ 44 See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology 45 ―Bohm Dialogue (also known as Bohmian Dialogue) is a freely-flowing group conversation that makes an attempt, utilizing a theoretical understanding of the way thoughts relate to universal reality, to more effectively investigate the crises that face society, and indeed the whole of human nature and consciousness. […] ‗when the 2nd person replies, the 1st person sees a Difference between what he meant to say and what the other person understood. On considering this difference, he may then be able to see something new, which is relevant both to his own views and to those of the other person. And so it can go back and forth, with the continual emergence of a new content that is common to both participants. Thus, in a dialogue, each person does not attempt to make common certain ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 693 consciousness (Bohm, 1985).‖ (de Quincey, 2010) further argues that ‗consciousness‘ (awareness) can be either ―contrasted with being unconscious (psychological meaning)‖, or ―contrasted with the complete absence of any mental activity whatsoever (philosophical meaning)‖. (de Quincey, 2010) argues for two kinds of subjectivity: In Subjectivity-1, ―subjectivity means, essentially, a capacity for feeling that is intrinsic, or interior, to the entity under consideration--a what-it-feels-like-from within. The key notion here is ‗experienced interiority‘ as distinct from vacuous (i.e. without experience) external relations. … experience doesn't ‗happen to‘ a subject, it is constitutive of the subject.‖ In Subjectivity-2, ―subjectivity means an isolated, independent, self-sufficient locus of experience. Classically, this is the Cartesian ego, wholly private, and independent of all reality external to it. In the first case, subjectivity-1, experienced interiority is not automatically self-contained within its own private domain-- it is interior, but not necessarily independent or isolated. The question of whether it is self-contained or interdependent is left open: It is possible for subjectivity-1 to be either interior and shared, or interior and private. In this second, Cartesian, case, the subject is not only interior, it is self-contained and private. Such independent egos, or subjects--Leibniz called them ‗monads‘--can communicate only via mediating signals, whereas subjectivity-1 can communicate by participating in shared presence. With subjectivity-1, interiority or feeling can be ‗intersubjective‘ and precede individual subjects; in subjectivity-2, interiority is always private, and intersubjectivity, if it occurs, is always secondary.‖ According to (de Quincey, 2010), (Kant, 1961) implies that as ―an object, the ‗I‘ becomes ‗me,‘ and the spontaneity of the ‗I‘ is obliterated. In short the subject can never become an object to itself. At best, the first-person ‗I‘ recedes, and in its place an objectified third person ‗me‘ appears. But this ‗me‘-as-object lacks the very autonomy and spontaneity that is the characteristic essence of the ‗I‘-as-subject. The ‗I‘ is autonomous, creative and now; the ‗me‘ is reflected, and therefore past (a habitual construct in memory, built up throughout a lifetime).‖ This can be interpreted in terms of our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2010d) where the two modes are: (1) the non-tilde mode representing ‗I‘ (in self-related feedback signals from cortical midline structures) and ‗me‘ (in terms of past in a habitual construct built up throughout a lifetime in memory) as the cognitive nearest past approaching towards present and (2) tilde mode representing the feed forward stimulus related signals which pertains to the nearest future approaching towards present. ―When the conjugate match is made between the two modes, the world-presence (Now) is disclosed‖ (Vimal, 2010d).46 ideas or items of information that are already known to him. Rather, it may be said that two people are making something in common, i.e., creating something new together.‘ (from [Bohm‘s] on dialogue)‖ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohm_Dialogue). 46 According to (Vimal, 2010d), ―We incorporate the dual-mode concept in our dual-aspect PE-SE (protoexperiences-subjective experience) framework. The two modes are: (1) the non-tilde mode that is the material and mental aspect of cognition (memory and attention) related feedback signals in a neural-network, which refers to the cognitive nearest past approaching towards present; and (2) the tilde mode that is the material and mental aspect of the feed forward signals due to external environmental input and internal endogenous input, which pertains to the nearest future approaching towards present and is a entropy-reversed representation of non-tilde mode. […] We ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 694 By proposing ego/alter-ego framework, (de Quincey, 2010) addresses the critical question on individual-subjectivity vs. intersubjectivity raised by many investigators: ―How can there be a circle of intersubjectivity unless there are subjects already present to start with?47 Mead recognized this problem and proposed as a solution that in the same moment the self encounters an alter ego-the moment ‗I‘ encounter ‗you‘-the concrete organism establishes a relationship to itself. ‗The self, as that which can be an object to itself, is essentially a social structure, and it arises in social experience‘ ((Mead, 1962/1967), p.140). The self is thus ‗first encountered as a subject in the moment when communicative relations are established between organisms.‘ ((Hohengarten, 1992), p. xvi). The self, thus, has two components: the theoretical ‗me,‘ my consciousness of myself, and the practical ‗me,‘ the agency through which I monitor my behavior (such as speaking)48. ‗The ‗I‘ is the response of the organism to the attitudes of the others; the ‗me‘ is the organized set of attitudes of others which one himself assumes‘ ((Mead, 1962/1967), p.175). Hohengarten explains: This practical ‗me‘ comes into existence when the subject establishes a practical relation to herself by adopting the normative attitude of an alter ego toward her own behavior. [...] such a conventionally constituted self is nonetheless a precondition for the emergence of a nonconventional aspect of the practical self: the practical ‗I,‘ which opposes the ‗me‘ with both presocial drives and innovative fantasy. […] Yet the self is intersubjectively constituted through and through; the relationship to a community is what makes the practical relation-to-self possible ((Hohengarten, 1992), pp.xvi-xvii. …). Mead‘s emphasis on the intersubjective constitution of the self, of the subject‘s sense of continuity and identity, accounts for self as an ‗individualized context‘ for the contents of experience. But it still does not account for the ‗metacontext‘--the non-individualized ontological context that underlies all contents of consciousness. […] the essence of human being was relationship, and Buber gave propose that: (i) the quantum conjugate matching between experiences in the mental aspect of the tilde mode and that of the non-tilde mode is related more to the mental aspect of the quantum microtubule-dendritic-web and less to that of the non-quantum sub-pathways. And (ii) the classical matching between experiences in the mental aspect of the tilde mode and that of the non-tilde mode is related to the mental aspect of the non-quantum sub-pathways (such as classical axonal-dendritic neural sub-pathway). In both cases, a specific SE is selected when the tilde mode interacts with the non-tilde mode to match for a specific SE, and when the necessary ingredients of SEs (such as the formation of neural-networks, wakefulness, re-entry, attention, working memory, and so on) are satisfied. When the conjugate match is made between the two modes, the world-presence (Now) is disclosed.‖ 47 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that individual subjects emerge in the process of learning to communicate symbolically. Language is haltingly co-invented by groups of speakers each of whom often finish what another has begun (as inspiration strikes). In this case, rudimentary language (felt to come from elsewhere, like the gods) precedes the internalization of language into thought and thus individual subjectivity. So, yes, 2nd person origin: Nixon likes it. In my view, this seems to imply that rudimentary individual consciousness (that is relational and occurs during organism-environment (‗it‘, ‗s/he‘, and/or ‗you‘) interactions) precedes intersubjectivity, which in turn sharpens the individual consciousness. 48 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that the monitoring of emotional experience & its direction is a key component of conscious experience. I love the way de Quincey brings in Mead (though not so much Hohengarten). Experimental data is necessary to test both hypotheses: individual consciousness is the result of intersubjectivity versus full blown individual consciousness is the result of (i) first organism-environment interaction for rudimentary individual consciousness, and (ii) then sharpening of rudimentary individual consciousness via intersubjectivity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 695 ontological status to the ‗between‘—a mysterious force, ‗presence,‘ or creative milieu, in which the experience of being a self arises. Relations, then, not the relata, were primordial, if not actually primary. ‗Spirit is not in the I but between I and You‘ ((Buber, 1970), p.89). […] Buber's vision-replacing the notion of substance with dynamic relations.‖ To sum up, the above inter-subjective hypothesis implies that self emerges during interaction between the subject (ego) and objects (alter ego and/or other persons) with contents of individual experience in the subject. However, this implication is controversial because (1) self as SE of subject without second person (You) is possible, especially during eye-closed meditation, but this happens after the sense of self is learned via language acquisition as per (Nixon, 2010a), and (2) ‗what is before interaction‘ is unclear (perhaps it is individual consciousness or self!)XIV. (de Quincey, 2010) critiques Buber: ―Buber is not always consistent about whether the relationship, the ‗betweenness,‘ is fundamental, or whether, as logic seems to require, any relationship must always be between some pre-existing entities.‖ Wheelwright summarizes Buber's position in Between Man and Man as: ―By nature each person is a single being, finding himself in company with other single beings; to be single is not to be isolated, however, and by vocation each one is to find and realize his proper focus by entering into relationship with others‖ ((Wheelwright, 1967), p.75). The betweenness can be interpreted in terms of the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework as follows: ―In the holoworld framework (Globus, 2004; Globus, 2006; Globus, 1987; Globus, 1995; Globus, 1998, 2002; Globus, 2005; Globus, 2007) when the interaction occurs between (i) the non-tilde future (an „alter time-reversed‟ quantum mode) approaching towards present and (ii) the tilde cognitive past („our‟ mode) approaching towards present and the conjugate match is made, the ‗world-presence‘ (‗Now‘/‗present‘) is disclosed in the match for the ‗belongingtogether‘ (Heidegger's (Heidegger, 1927/1962) zusammen-gehoeren of die Ursprung=belong together of the origin) of a specific between-two. […] In Vitiello‘s framework (Vitiello, 1995; Vitiello, 2004), consciousness is generated between-two during the interaction of the brain system and its world environment, which are the two quantum modes. […] Thus, the selected specific SE during conjugate matching between [two modes] (i) and (ii) is the real explicate state of the between-two in which the dual complex-valued modes belong-together at the juncture of the interaction of feed forward and feedback signals, for example, at V4/V8/VO neurons for color. […] The between-two is explicate, world-thrown. […] In quantum-thermofield framework (restricted panpsychism or panpsychism above coherence length) (Globus, 2009), subjectivity (intentionality) tunes the belonging-together of the between-two. […] The dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework has the dual-aspect everywhere in each mode and also in the between-two: coming from the past (cognitive feedback signals, non-tilde mode), coming from future (stimulus dependent feed forward signals, tilde mode)49 and the Now (between-two modes). For example, the mental aspect of a between-two is SE redness and the material-aspect of the between-two is the related V4/V8/VO neural-network and its activity when a trichromat views a red-ball. […] the ‗experience‘ is denoted by the between-two: ‗our thrownness in a world of qualities‘ […] 49 The terms ‗tilde‘ and ‗non-tilde‘ used for in Globus‘ holoworld framework and the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework are just opposite. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 696 Situatedness is not between-two but is one of the two. [...] The subjectivity (intentionality) tunes the belonging-together of the between-two modes (tilde and nontilde modes). What belongstogether is sensory input and situatedness, and this match explicates world-thrownness. […] One could argue that the between-two is fully phenomenal -- world-like -- in the belonging-together of sensory input, intentional input (subjectivity) and re-traces. However, the ‗world-like‘, the phenomenal or access awareness (Block, 2005) of world is mind-dependent reality. Thus, one could argue that the between-two (that denotes ‗experience‘ and, in my view, equivalent to SE in the PE-SE framework for bridging purpose) also depends on the subjects. That is why, one could argue that the between-two for achromats is black-white world and that for the trichromats is color-world. […] the ‗subjective between-two‟ in the holoworld framework can be considered equivalent to ‗subjective experience‟ in the PE-SE framework for bridging purpose. The between-two appears subjective because, for example, the between-two is the dark-gray ball for an achromat and the red ball for a trichromat for looking at the same long wavelength reflecting ball.‖ (de Quincey, 2010) elaborates (Jacques, 1991) position on the relationship between I, you, and he/she: ―Jacques has developed a theory of ‗being-as-speaking‘ and of the ‗being-who-speaks.‘ He parts company with most other intersubjectivists, by presenting a tripartite schema of the subject--not just ‗I‘ and ‗thou,‘ but one that includes also ‗he/she.‘ Self-identity, he says, results from integration of the three poles of any communication: ‗by speaking to other and saying I, by being spoken to by others as you, or by being spoken of by others as a he/she that the subject would accept as appropriate‘ ((Jacques, 1991), p. xv). He takes issue with Buber who claimed that human beings become I and derive their interiority only when they encounter a you. Jacques argues that a human being becomes a personal self only when, in addition to I-thou, the ‗otherness‘ of an absent third-party, he/she, is acknowledged.‖ These positions potentiate the hypothesis that first, second, and third person all interact for the emergence of full-blown personal self. The above inter-subjective hypothesis of (Jacques, 1991) implies that personal self emerges during interaction between all three perspectives: (i) first person (‗I‟), the subject (ego), (ii) second person (thou, objects: alter ego and/or other persons), and (iii) third person (s/he). However, one needs to explain the self during non-reportable phenomenal SE aspect of consciousness where attention is not necessary, i.e., (ii) and (iii) are missing. (Habermas, 1992) proposes that ego (self) is intersubjective process mediated via language: ―The ego, which seems to me to be given in my self-consciousness as what is purely my own, cannot be maintained by me solely through my own power, as it were for me alone--it does not ‗belong‘ to me. Rather, this ego always retains an intersubjective core because the process of individuation from which it emerges runs through the network of linguistically mediated interactions50 [p. 170] […] The idealizing supposition of a universalistic form of life, in which everyone can take up the perspective of everyone else and can count on reciprocal recognition by everybody, makes it possible for individuated beings to exist within a community--individualism as the flip-side of universalism [p. 186].‖ 50 (Nixon, 2010a) still thinks that this intersubjective core is fear, specifically mortal fear. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 697 This seems to address ‗what is before interaction‘ to some extent: the ‗self before interaction‘ is modified after intersubjective interaction via the process of individuation. This is consistent with the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). (de Quincey, 2010) proposes further that language is the key entity in the inter-subjective interaction (between first and second person) and in the emergence of social (inter-subjective) and individual consciousness while pointing out the problems of first and third person approaches: ―Language engages speakers and hearers in such a way that both participate and risk themselves in communication. In the process, consciousness intersubjectively creates and reveals itself. We can identify three central elements of Habermas' work-- the three ‗Ps‘: (1) emphasis on practice away from theory; (2) the public or intersubjective origin and role of language and meaning; and (3) the performative function of language [communicative action]. […] Language and meaning unfold from the ‗dialogical‘ reciprocity of ‗I-speakers‘ and ‗you-listeners.‘ […] It is here, in Habermas, where ‗intersubjective agreement‘ (through linguistic tokens) and ‗intersubjective co-creativity‘ (through shared experience) come together. The first is a foundation for consensual scientific knowledge established between communicating individual subjects (Velmans, 1992). The second is true intersubjective mutual beholding--where the experience of self, of consciousness, arises as a felt experience from the encounter. […] The standard approaches to the study of consciousness have bifurcated along apparently irreconcilable methodologies derived, respectively, from Cartesian-inspired philosophy of the subject (first-person epistemology) and from Hobbesian inspired philosophy of matter (thirdperson objects). In the first case, knowledge of the objective world remains problematic; in the second, knowledge of the knowing subject (of consciousness)--and therefore of all knowledge-is inexplicable and radically problematic. […] We all use all three ways of knowing--objectivity, subjectivity, and intersubjectivity--in one form or another most of the time. We all deal with external material objects, we all feel what it is like to be a being from within, and we all participate and communicate with other human beings.‖ In the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, the self (SE of subject) could be modified by the interaction between first (‗I‘), third (s/he, me), and second person (‗you‘) entities. The first-, second-, and third-person perspectives are elaborated further by (de Quincey, 2010) as: ―We tend not to notice the second-person perspective because it is right in front of our noses everyday. It‘s the medium in which we most naturally live. Whereas for third-person perspective we need to set up controlled (and artificial) laboratory experiments to induce (at least the illusion of) a separation between observer and observed, and thus step back, or step out of the stream of natural living and human interaction. This stepping-back allows us to notice the third-person perspective in action--because it's not ‗normal.‘ Similarly, for first-person perspective: in meditation (or other contemplative or introspective) disciplines we ‗withdraw‘ from the ‗normal‘ world, and the subjective perspective shows up in contrast. […] [In second person perspective, something] different happens in consciousness when we engage like this. Physicist David Bohm recognized this potential for consciousness exploration in his approach to ‗dialogue‘ (Bohm, 1985; Bohm, 1996). […] The ‗I‘ that encounters you (as the locus of another ‗I‘) is different from the ‗I‘ that encounters the world as a conglomeration of ‗its.‘ Who I am can be revealed (at ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 698 least partially) through my encounter with you, whereas I-as-‗I‘ remain entirely unattainable if I encounter the world as merely a collection of ‗its.‘ […] There is something about the nature of consciousness, it seems, that requires the presence of the ‗other‘ as another subject that can acknowledge my being. (When I experience myself being experienced by you, my experience of myself-- and of you--is profoundly enriched, and, in some encounters, even ‗transformed.‘) […] a second-person perspective to complement third- and first-person perspectives.‖ In dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, the self (SE of subject) that is modulated by second-person interaction is indeed different from the self that is modified by inert objects (third person interaction),51 which is different from the self-before-interaction (first person self),52 but in a complementary manner and seems to be consistent with above to some extent. (de Quincey, 2010) elaborates further various inter-subjective communal consciousnesses such as social consciousness as: ―Consciousness, in other words, was originally communal, a property of the group. This sense remains today in forms of consciousness referred to, for example, as ‗social consciousness,‘ ‗political consciousness,‘ ‗feminist consciousness,‘ ‗racial consciousness,‘ and is manifested in such diverse groups as church congregations, religious movements, political parties, sports teams and fans, and religious and political cults. […] ‗consciousness‘ implied a dialogic process--an interaction or communication between two or more knowing beings. […] Elements or facets of this emerging worldview would include, for example, the discovery of nonlocality in quantum physics (Albert, 1992); accumulating documentation of evidence for nonlocal psi phenomena (Schlitz & Braud, 1997); increased globalization of economies (Korten, 1995); awareness of ecological interdependence (Roszak, 1992); and, perhaps, even the globalization and interconnectedness of communications technologies such as satellite TV, telephones, and the Internet (Elgin, 1993; Russell, 1995). It is becoming less and less easy to deny our deep interconnectedness. We might also include in this list a growing awareness of the central [Nāgārjuna‘s] doctrine of co-dependent arising in Buddhism [(Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995)], as it continues to spread into modernist, Western societies and worldviews (Macy, 1991). […] We could say that standard third-person inquiry leads to a science of external bodies, first-person inquiry to an interior science of the mind, while second person engagement leads to a communal science of the heart. Whereas the ultimate ideal of objective knowledge is control, and the ultimate ideal of subjective knowledge is peace, the ultimate ideal of intersubjective knowledge is relationship--and, dare I say it, love‖ (de Quincey, 2010). 51 In other words, here it seems to be the self that arises during organism-environment interaction, when the environment is composed of inert objects (third person interaction) 52 According to (Nixon, 2010a), he and many of these sources do not think that ‗self-before-interaction‘ exists. According to pan-experientialism (that has problems) self-before-interaction is a non-conscious experience that arises from the universal background of experiences. According to dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (that has only one justifiable brute fact problem of dual-aspect assumption), self-before-interaction is the ‗SE of subject‘, which is potentially superposed with other potential SEs in virtual reservoir (as per hypothesis H1) or is the result of the interaction between a PE and 3 relevant gunas (as per hypothesis H2) in the mental aspect of each entity (fermions, bosons, space-time, strings, loops etc). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 699 One could argue second person perspective or inter-subjectivity is one of the necessary ingredients of social consciousness53 as it is the result of interaction between brains, minds, and their environments, which is consistent with the Nagarjuna‘s dependent co-origination (which involves organism-environment interaction) (Vimal, 2009a). (Nixon, 2010d) emphasizes that communion or inter-subjective consciousness precedes individual consciousness and is its source: ―Communion of this depth is not seen elsewhere in nature, to our knowledge. It apparently was something new on Earth, preceding selfconsciousness and personal identity. The foregoing demonstrates how primary intersubjectivity (see, e.g., (Gallagher, 2001)) is the garden from within which individual subjectivity later sprouts.‖ On the hand, ―‗Theory of Mind‘ or ‗mindreading‘ propositions (e.g., (Povinelli, 1999; Premack, 2004)) assume the primacy of a private subjectivity which must at a very young age somehow reason its way to comprehending other minds because others behave ‗like me‘. Primary intersubjectivity makes such ideas unnecessary‖ (Nixon, 2010d). The controversy of inter-subjectivity vs. individualism can be addressed hypothesizing that both are the aspects of consciousness complementary to each other: inter-subjectivity is more related to the interaction between minds/brains,54 which results the related social consciousness; and individualism is the property of single mind/brain interacting with its environment,55 which is related to the SE aspect of consciousness. One could argue that the SEs aspect of consciousness can occur in a single brain via matching and selection mechanisms in the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. When many brains interact with each other and with the their environment then social consciousness emerges via social interaction mechanism(s) that needs further research. According to (Nixon, 2010d), evolution might have played important role in the emergence of inter-subjectivity and individual subjectivity: ―Without archeological markers that indicate such activity or at least a species-wide fossil record of rounded skull bases that indicate the fallen larynx necessary for complex speech, there is no reason to guess that the leap into reflective 53 Here, the term ‗social consciousness‘ also includes ‗political consciousness,‘ ‗feminist consciousness,‘ ‗racial consciousness,‘ consciousness manifested in such diverse groups as church congregations, religious movements, political parties, sports teams and fans, religious and political cults, and so on. Other the necessary ingredients of consciousness are the formation of neural network, wakefulness, memory, re-entry (Edelman, 1993), attention, stimulus-above-threshold, neural-net PEs (Vimal, 2009f). 54 According to (Nixon, 2010a), ―intersubjectivity is more a social or cultural phenomenon than a physical one. Brains respond to our socially constructed modes of relationship. I agree with Bill Adams here.‖ The use of the term ‗minds/brains‘ in place of ‗brains‘ should address this problem because mind and brain are the two aspects of the same entity in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework. 55 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that the use of the term individualism may not be correct to apply it to a member of species acting according to species instincts. In my view, we differ because Nixon‘s framework is panexperientialism and mine is dual-aspect view, where individualism is the property of single mind/brain interacting with its environment (consistent with Nagarjuna‘s dependent co-origination); environment when includes human subjects (you, s/he) leads to full blown individual consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 700 conscious experience has been made. […] In his [Giegerich‘s] article ‗Killings‘ (Giegerich, 1993), he asserts that ‗humanization came about precisely through man‘s killing activities. The birth of the Gods, piety, soul and consciousness, culture itself did not merely arise from the spirit of killing but from actual killings‘ (p. 8). […] the reality of the mythosphere (Teilhard de Chardin, 1959), of the tribal and totemistic mind, also reveals the primacy of intersubjectivity. Intersubjectivity is a term open to many meanings but the way it is intended here is to imply something more than mere communication from isolated mental monad to isolated mental monad. […] I agree with (Lacan, 1977) and later phenomenologists like (Merleau-Ponty, 1973) in taking the step of assuming the initial identification with others, usually the primary caregiver(s), — obvious in the case of the fetus in the mother but continuing for the infant. […] (Gallagher, 2001) is correct in positing a primary intersubjectivity from which individual subjectivity emerges.‖ However one could still argue for first the emergence of individual consciousness from the organism-environment interaction, and then the interaction between brains and their minds leads to inter-subjectivity or social consciousness, rather than first the emergence of social consciousness or inter-subjectivity which then leads to individual consciousness. It is logical that inter-subjectivity in turn can alter/influence individual consciousness.56 Furthermore, according to (Nixon, 2010d), the origin of human self-consciousness is in the discovery of the sacred (symbolic consciousness): ―prehumans underwent an existential crisis that could be resolved only by the discovery creation of the larger realm of symbolic consciousness we call the sacred. Thus, although we, the human species, are but one species among innumerable others, we differ in kind, not degree. This quality is our symbolically enabled self-consciousness, the fortress of cultural identity that empowers but also imprisons awareness.‖ To sum up, in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), (i) the existential crisis and/or biological crisis can be interpreted as the motivation/cause of the formation of appropriate neural-networks (this is correct because experience alters the brain mapping as per (Nixon, 2010a)) including language related (Broca‘s areas, which include the ventral premotor cortex (PMv), Brodmann area 44 and 45) neural-network, and (ii) self (SE of subject) (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007) occurred in brain when self-related neural-network were formed and necessary ingredients of consciousness (such as the formation of neural-networks, wakefulness, attention, re-entry (Edelman, 1993), memory, and so on) were satisfied (Vimal, 2009f). In other words, the materialistic (or physicalistic)57 evolution, in Nixon‘s constructionist 56 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that he does not see this because the use terms like ―individual‖ are used very loosely. In my view, this is because Nixon‘s framework is panexperientialism and mine is dual-aspect view. 57 For the materialistic evolution two examples are: (1) (Cassirer, 1946a; Cassirer, 1946b) emphasized that ―the creativity found in the symbolic forms, but these are not Platonic forms dwelling eternally beyond Nature‖ (Nixon, 2010d). (2) Another example is: ―Neuroscientist Antonio Damasio (Damasio, 2003) agrees that human consciousness emerged as a necessary response to a biological crisis: ‗Confronting death and suffering can forcefully disrupt the homeostatic state. … The yearning for homeostatic correctives would have begun as a response to anguish‘ (p. 271). He seems to agree that ‗social emotions and feelings of empathy‘ that ‗already were budding in nonhuman species‘ would be enough to bring on this life-threatening anguish, and that memory-extended ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 701 framework (Nixon, 2010b, 2010c) (perception of matter or SEs of subject (self) and objects are constructed by mind in MDR), certainly played useful role in which symbolic consciousness (the sacred) may have contributed to self-consciousness to some extent. However, the co-evolution and co-development (neural Darwinism) of mind and brain and the dual-aspect-dual-mode PESE framework are necessary in a complementary manner. Furthermore, the emphasis on intersubjectivity (second person perspective) by (Nixon, 2010d) and (de Quincey, 2010) that individual self emerges from the interactions between ‗I‘ and ‗You‘ (two or more conscious brains) and their respective environment (dialogue philosophy) needs unpacking in terms of the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework.58 In other words, inter-subjectivity may modulate the attributes of already created/occurred individual-self in self-related neural-network (Northoff & Bermpohl, 2004; Northoff et al., 2006). 11. Summary and Conclusion We summarize the our analysis in terms of dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) as follows: (I) Consciousness has two aspects: experience and function. These two aspects can exist together or separate depending on certain conditions: experience, function, or both function & experience. In other words, conscious experience, non-conscious experience, and non-experiential (or functional) consciousness are possible when we consider the general definition of consciousness that accommodates most metaphysical views: ―‗consciousness is a mental aspect of a system or a process, which is a conscious experience, a conscious function, or both depending on the context and particular bias (e.g. metaphysical assumptions)‟, where experiences can be conscious experiences and/or non-conscious experiences and functions can be conscious functions and/or non-conscious functions that include qualities of objects. These are a posteriori definitions because they are based on observations and the categorization‖ (Vimal, 2010e). (II) One could argue for the continuum of consciousness, experience, and function because experience and function are the two aspects of consciousness59(Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). consciousness and imagination, unique to humans, compensated with hope and reverence. He even supplies an evolutionary rationale for the spread of such abstract thinking: ‗Those individuals whose brains were capable of imagining such correctives and effectively restoring homeostatic balance would have been rewarded by longer life and larger progeny‘ (pp. 271-2)‖ (Nixon, 2010d). 58 (Nixon, 2010a) does not see why, when neural changes can result from experience or behavioral changes. This is because pan-experientialism has many problems and dual-aspect has only one justifiable problem of brute fact of dual-aspect. A specific SE is selected via matching process when stimulus dependent feed forward neural signals interact with cognitive feedback neural signals. Since structure, function, and experience are linked, if one changes it should affect other. 59 (Nixon, 2010a) does not agree because consciousness is the quality of experience reflected back upon itself, not the other way round. We differ because we have different frameworks. Nixon‘s definition of conscious experience is limited to selfconsciousness (experience reflected back upon itself, i.e., reportable access consciousness). Nixon does not include ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 702 (III) The origin of individual consciousness could be ‗a universal background of awareness‘ (Nixon, 2010c), which is like a plenum or virtual reservoir (such as elementary particles). Our SEs of subject (self) and objects are: (a) stored potentially in superposed form and a specific SE is selected as needed via matching process60 as in hypothesis H1 or (b) derived from the interaction of a proto-experience (PE) with 3 gunas (qualities) as in hypothesis H2 of the dualaspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). (IV) Physicalism (brain creates experience) versus constructivism (experience constructs the appearance of objects including brain) can be bridged via the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework, where a specific SE is selected during matching process (Vimal, 2010d) and conscious experience constructs the perception/appearance/SE of external objects and to some extent can affect the processing of brain. (V) Since mental and physical aspects are inseparable, the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework is consistent with classical double-aspectism. However, since the mental aspect is known via first person perspective and the physical aspect is known via third person perspective, it seems consistent with double-perspectivism in this sense. (VI) The SEs aspect of consciousness constructs the mind-dependent reality (MDR); the mindindependent reality (MIR) is unknowable although mystics/yogis claim direct perception that is close to MIR.61 (VII) In the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework, hard problems are Types 1-3 explanatory gaps (Vimal, 2009h, 2009i): Type-1 explanatory gap is how can SEs emerge from nonexperiential matter? Type-2 is how can SEs pre-exist? Type-3 is how can we say MIR ~ MDR in physics? The hard problem of panexperientialism is how can experiences create matter in the mind independent reality? For example, how can experiences create World Trade Center from Ground Zero? Although it is understandable that experiences can construct the appearance of matter in mind dependent reality, but for this matter must pre-exist. non-reportable phenomenal consciousness in conscious experiences. In my framework, both access and phenomenal consciousnesses are in included in first person SEs. 60 (Nixon, 2010a) commented, ―You‘re not admitting it, but this does sound very much like G.O.D. & the creation of souls with individual destinies already decided. ―Superposed form‖? ―selected‖ by whom or what?‖ The concept of G.O.D. is close to substance-dualism-and-property-dualism. My framework is a dual-aspect view that has substance-monism-and-property-dualism. Dual-aspect‘s God is discussed in (Vimal, 2009c): God might be a big bag of all interactive processes in terms of dual-aspect view; of course, processes related to creation, maintenance, and annihilation are included. The quantum superposition of potential SEs in the mental aspect of each entity, the selection of a specific SE via matching process, and neural Darwinism are detailed (Vimal, 2010b), which is very important to understand our dual aspect framework. 61 (Nixon, 2010a) commented, ―So they lose their minds?‖ In my view, they (yogis) merge their minds with environment (any thing that surrounds a yogi including inert matter, force carriers, plant life, animals, human beings, and so on). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 703 (VIII) The predictive behavior (developmental rhythmic call and response behavior: (Hersch, 2010)) occurs first and then existential crisis (Nixon, 2010d) occurs later62; and both contribute towards the emergence of consciousness. On the basis of evolution, (a) individual consciousness in rudimentary form might have occurred about 540 mya during Cambrian explosion63 (Hameroff, 1998), (b) symbolic, language-using, Homo sapiens (tribal-centric consciousness) emerged at around 150 kya (Hersch, 2010),64 and (iii) self-centric or object-centric consciousness might have emerged at around 10 kya (Hersch, 2010). (IX) In our PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), (a) the existential crisis, biological crisis, and predictive behavior can be interpreted as the motivation/cause of the formation of appropriate neural-networks including the neural-network for languages, and (b) self (SE of subject) (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007) occurred in brain when self-related neural-network were formed and necessary ingredients of consciousness were satisfied (Vimal, 2009f). (c) The coevolution, co-development, and co-tuning via sensori-motor interaction (neural Darwinism) of mind and brain and the dual-aspect-dual-mode PE-SE framework are necessary in a complementary way to physicalism. Inter-subjectivity can modulate the attributes of already created/occurred individual-self in self-related neural-network (Northoff & Bermpohl, 2004; Northoff et al., 2006). Acknowledgments The work was partly supported by VP-Research Foundation Trust and Vision Research Institute research Fund. Author would like to thank anonymous reviewers, Gregory Nixon, Steven M. Rosen, William A. Adams, Marty Monteiro, Alfredo Pereira Jr., Marc Hersch, Tim Jarvilehto, Manju-Uma C. Pandey-Vimal, Vivekanand Pandey Vimal, Shalini Pandey Vimal, and Love (Shyam) Pandey Vimal for their critical comments, suggestions, and grammatical corrections. The author is also affiliated with (1) Vision Research Institute, 428 Great Road, Suite 11, Acton, MA 01720 USA; (2) Dristi Anusandhana Sansthana, A-60 Umed Park, Sola Road, Ahmedabad61, Gujrat, India; (3) Dristi Anusandhana Sansthana, c/o NiceTech Computer Education Institute, Pendra, Bilaspur, C.G. 495119, India; and (4) Dristi Anusandhana Sansthana, Sai Niwas, East of Hanuman Mandir, Betiahata, Gorakhpur, U.P. 273001 India. His URL is http://sites.google.com/site/rlpvimal/Home. 62 Since Nixon does agree, so it is debatable. My arguments is based on timeline in our life time of about 100 yrs as death occurs at the end of life, and developmental neural Darwinism occurs since baby is born and of course before death. Perhaps, Nixon‘s argument is based on co-evolution over millions of years, where I tend to agree with him and also (Hersch, 2010). Both predictive behavior and existential crisis may have percent contribution in the emergence of consciousness. 63 (Nixon, 2010a) commented that by ―individual‖, Hameroff presumably meant separate bodies. My impression is that (Hameroff, 1998) is talking about the emergence of consciousness that may include interactions between brains/bodies and environment during Cambrian explosion. He some times follows neutral monism (mind and matter are aspects of third neutral entity) (Hameroff & Powell, 2009), which is close to dualaspect view (in which there is no third entity). 64 As per (Nixon, 2010a), protolanguage (Bickerton, 2000) was probably in use by H. erectus, much earlier and symbolic self-consciousness was ca. 60 kya. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 704 Competing interests statement The author declares that he has no competing financial interests. References Acerbi, L. (2008). The Epiontic Principle, Time and the Laws of Physics. http://www.fqxi.org/data/essay-contestfiles/Acerbi_acerbiepionticprinci.pdf. Adams, W. A. (2010a). 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Explanation, Explanandum, Causality and Complexity: A Consideration of Mind, Matter, Neuroscience, and Physics. NeuroQuantology, 7(3), 368-381. Zahavi, D. (2005). Subjectivity and Selfhood. Cambridge, London: The MIT Press. Endnotes I (Nixon, 2010a) commented that this (consciousness is more fundamental than experience: similar to Hans Ricke‘s view) is backward to his view (experience is more fundamental than consciousness). My justification is that there are over 40 meanings attributed to term ‗consciousness‘ by various authors in literature, which were categorized in two aspects: experiences (about 20 meanings) and functions (20 meanings mostly from materialism) (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). Therefore, if we want to encompass most views then the term ‗consciousness‘ seems more fundamental then the term ‗experiences‘ because experience is just one of the two aspects of consciousness; other aspect is function. My hypothesis is: if multiple views/models explains the same data, then these models/views can be somehow bridged. When we look at just Nixon‘s point of view, i.e., ‗panexperientialism‘ (only experience permeates the universe) and reject other views especially when we reject materialism then Nixon appears correct because function is NOT another aspect of consciousness. He seems to have a different meaning of the term ‗function‘ than I have. My meaning of the term ‗function‘ is derived mostly from materialism (Vimal, 2009e). I do not reject materialism in some sense; rather I view it as complementary to the dualaspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). This is because matter is one of the two aspects; other aspect is mind (= experiences and/or functions). In panexperientialism, experiences construct matter‘s appearances (constructivism), i.e., the appearance of matter is NOT an aspect rather matter‘s appearance IS constructed from ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 710 experiences. I argue that mental aspect of dual-aspect view is close to pan-experimentalism and physical aspect is close to Type-B materialism to some extent. In dual-aspect view, a specific eigen-state of a neural-network and its activities has two aspects: mental aspect (such as redness: the subjective first person perspective) and physical aspect (such as redness-related V4/V8/VO-neural-network and its activities: the objective third person perspective such as anatomical and fMRI measurements). In other words, it is not the identity theory of Type-B materialism (single substance and single aspect). In identity theory, a specific SE is identical with its related eigen-state of neural-network, i.e., mental aspect = physical aspect = eigen-state. II Rosen commented (personal communication in May 2010) as follows: ―Given the ambitious scope of your article, it strikes me as having something of the quality of a book outline. I can see your table of contents expanded in a book-length treatment wherein you'd have the latitude in each chapter to treat your various subjects in greater depth and integrate these subjects in your overall presentation. This would include sorting out thorny semantic issues by making careful distinctions. For example, you could explore the distinction between ‗conscious‘ as an adjective (meaning ‗wakefulness‘) and ‗consciousness,‘ the noun. The potential semantic problem here is illustrated by the possibility of there being ‗non-conscious‘ (non-waking) experience but said experience still being understood as involving a certain level of ‗consciousness.‘ ‖ I agree with Rosen that this article can be expanded in a book and the semantic issue is difficult and must be addressed carefully. In (Vimal, 2009e), I assembled over 40 meanings attributed to the term ‗consciousness‘ by various authors. One of the meanings may be ‗wakeful‘ for ‗conscious‘ as an adjective and ‗wakefulness‘ for ‗consciousness‘ as a noun. Alternatively, wakefulness is one of the necessary ingredients of conscious (or subjective) experiences; others necessary ingredients are: the formation of neural-networks, re-entry, memory, attention, and so on as detailed in (Vimal, 2009f). III (Adams, 2010a) commented, ―But can such a structure perform the cognitive functions of detection and discrimination? Whole persons with minds (and brains) have cognitive faculties. To attribute cognitive abilities to a certain neural structure is to attribute to it qualities of mind. There is no scientific evidence that any neural structure has any qualities of mind, for the simple reason that the mind, being nonphysical, is not susceptible to scientific observation.‖ Adam raised an interesting question; however, this question is for materialism, which eventually leads to Levine‘s explanatory gap in materialism (Chalmers, 1995; Levine, 1983). A whole person consists of body, brain, and mind. A brain is composed neural-networks along with other structures. Mind is an entity that has functions and/or experiences. Brain and mind are related to each other. Cognitive faculties involve neural-networks. Since a neural-network has a specific function and the formation of neural-network is one of the necessary ingredients of experience, it has a quality of mind. Furthermore, in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, every entity has two aspects: mental and physical. Therefore, a neural-network also has mental and physical aspects; its mental aspect is composed of relevant function and experience; and its physical aspect consists of material structure (such as gray and white matter, ionic and neural activities, neurotransmitters, and so on). Thus, such as dual-aspect entity can indeed have all the qualities of mind. A specific SE can be experienced by the neural-network as long as it satisfies the necessary ingredient of consciousness, such as the formation of neural-network, wakefulness, re-entry (Edelman, 1993), attention, working memory, stimulus above threshold level, and neural-net PEs (Vimal, 2009f). (Adams, 2010a) further commented, ―If one were to insist anyway that a certain neural structure did indeed have qualities of mind, well then, the game would be up. If the brain has its own mind, there is no reason to study cognitive neurophysiology at all, since it would offer no explanation beyond studying the cognitive functions themselves, using cognitive psychology, for example, or psychophysics, or introspection.‖ This argument needs reconsideration because it misses an important component of mind and subjective experiences (SEs) and proto-experiences (PEs) aspect of consciousness: organism-environment interaction, namely, the interaction between cognitive feedback signals and environmental/stimulus dependent feed forward signals. The terms ‗mind‘ and ‗consciousness‘ are defined and elaborated in (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). The dual-aspect framework is complementary to materialism; therefore cognitive neurophysiology, neuroscience, psychophysics, introspection and all other sciences are useful for materialism and dual-aspect frameworks. Potential SEs are in superposed latent form in every entity. A specific SE is selected after matching process, as detailed in (Vimal, 2010d). (Adams, 2010a) critiques against the assumption ‗brain has/is a mind‘: ―The brain is fantastically complex, but it is just a machine, a biological machine made of protein, fat and water. We have never discovered anything about ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 711 a brain that would justify the assumption that it has, or is, a mind, just as we would not (or should not) claim that a thermostat literally has, or is, a mind. We know through first person introspection and through intersubjectivity (the mental capacity that allows us to appreciate the presence of each other‘s minds) that we have minds and to know something about what they are like. But we are not intersubjective with brains, or with thermostats, and have no proper reason to believe that they have minds of their own. […] He is trying to impute mental qualities to that tissue, specifically the quality of being able to have mental experience in the self-aware way we do when we identify and discriminate colors. But that cannot be right, for no one has any idea what it could mean for a piece of biological tissue to ‗have an experience‘ in the common sense meaning.‖ The term ‗mind‘ in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework is defined as ‗functions and/or experiences‘ in (Vimal, 2010e). As detailed in (Vimal, 2009f), the necessary ingredients of access (reportable) consciousness (that has two aspects: function and experience) are the formation of neural-network, wakefulness, attention, re-entry, memory, and so on. Therefore, photocell, thermostat, and so on (even retina) may not satisfy these necessary conditions of consciousness. However, these entities have respective function(s). Therefore, some, such as panpsychists, could argue that they have mind in a sense of function. The term ‗neural-network‘ is defined as a network of all necessary areas of central nervous system (CNS) including self-related areas, areas for wakefulness (including ARAS: ascending reticular system), attention, re-entry, memory, and so on. The neural-networks and all entities have two aspects: mental and physical in our framework. Since structure, function, and experience are linked, a neural-network that satisfies necessary ingredients of consciousness, has mind/consciousness/SEs; and hence intersubjectivity is possible via interactions between dual-aspect neural-networks of multiple brains/minds in our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). (Adams, 2010a) continues to critique, ―If you make a list of the qualities of a brain, and another of the qualities of a mind, there is little, if any overlap of the two lists, either conceptually or linguistically. To claim that the brain is actually the mind then is equivalent to claiming that the left kneecap is equivalent to the mind, or that the moon is equivalent to the mind. The claimed equivalence is arbitrary, not based on reason or evidence. Even as mere wishful fantasy, it is an unintelligible proposition. Epiphenomenalism and double-aspectism, to the extent that they are derivatives of identity theory, are equally unintelligible.‖ This may be materialist‘s or panpsychist‘s claim depending on how they define the term ‗mind‘; for its definition, please see (Vimal, 2010e); my view is dual-aspect. My framework is not derived from identity theory; rather former is complementary to the latter. It should be noted that identity theory of Type-B materialism requires the pre-existence of SEs to pick them out demonstratively as discussed with materialists in (Vimal, 2009g). The dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) is optimal (has the least number of problems compared to other views), rigorous, and precise as detailed in (Vimal, 2010d). IV (Nixon, 2010a) commented, ―of course, the infant experiences its own birth. There is no self to experience so the experience is non-conscious, but the living newborn body is certainly experiencing the changes it is going through.‖ It appears that Nixon combining functions aspect of consciousness, mind, and/or cognition with experiences and thus making experiences as fundamental, which is required in panexperientialism. This means, functions might be derived from experiences. In panexperientialism, if (i) conscious experiences are from first person perspective, (ii) functions are from third person perspective, (iii) the appearance of matter is constructed from experiences (constructivism), and (iv) experiences include functions, then functions might emerge (or might be derived) from experiences. If this is correct, then panexperientialists must explain precisely how this is possible and what relevant the mechanisms are: this can be called an explanatory gap in panexperientialism. On the hand, if we consider functions and experiences as aspects of consciousness and consciousness as fundamental, as in the dual-aspect dualmode PE-SE framework, then this problem does not arise. (Nixon, 2010a) replied, ―I have said before, I simply can make no sense of this — probably because, in an experiencing world with variously experiencing creatures all caught up on the struggles (or experience!) of life, there is no difference between subjectivity and objectivity. The ‗3rd person perspective‘, presumably the objective perspective (made possible by the separation of the subject from the object), appears only after humans crossed the symbolic threshold into formal language structures. Furthermore, as Merlin Donald (Donald, 1991, 2001) has convincingly argued, the mythic mind continued to draw few boundaries between the imagined and the real even after the symbolic crossing, so modern analytical objective thinking did not really emerge until the preSocratic Greeks began to write (and it went through several major stages after that as writing was codified & translations begun, the printing press invented, and the electronic era begun).‖ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 712 If the above is true, then evidence is needed for the lack of difference between subjectivity and objectivity before humans crossed the symbolic threshold into formal language structures. Moreover, the difference between subjectivity and objectivity is lost in modern yogis at samadhi state, which is obviously after the symbolic crossing. V In the hypothesis H1 of the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), SEs are fundamental irreducible entities in conventional reality; potential SEs are superposed in latent unexpressed form in the mental aspect of each entity. A specific SE is selected via matching process. In hypothesis H 2, SEs are derived from (i) the interaction of a PE and 3 gunas (qualities) (Vimal, 2009b) and/or (ii) downward causation (Vimal, 2010b). ―In western philosophy (mostly due to Aristotle: (384 – 322 BC), there are six types of causes [quotes and some of the texts are from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality]: (i) In the part-whole causation (material cause), the parts forms the whole. (ii) In the whole-part causation (formal cause: what form does the mind take? (Wurzman & Giordano, 2009)), whole (macrostructure) is the cause for the production of its parts. (iii) In the efficient cause, agents cause effects. (iv) In the final cause, there is a purpose or end for the sake of which a thing exists or is done. It includes ‗modern ideas of mental causation involving such psychological causes as volition, need, motivation, or motives; rational, irrational, ethical - all that gives purpose to behavior.‘ (v) In reciprocal or circular causation, entities can be causes of one another as a relation of mutual dependence. (vi) The doctrine of causal factor suggests that the same thing can cause contrary effects as atmospheric pressure can have opposite effect in various chemical or physical reactions‖ (Vimal, 2009a). There are 4 types of conditions. It seems that Monteiro is confusing cause vs. condition as per Nāgārjuna‘s causes vs. conditions: ―Nāgārjuna argued that the real causes should have powers as their essential properties and should have inherent existence. The causes that do not have these attributes cannot be real causes. Therefore, he proposes four ‗conditions‘ (efficient, percept-object, immediate, and dominant conditions) instead of such apparent causality to explain phenomena in conventional reality‖ (Vimal, 2009a). Perhaps Monteiro‘s ‗cause‘ is not real cause because it lacks inherent existence (as defined by Nāgārjuna). It may be simply efficient or immediate condition instead of cause. The dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d) is consistent with Nāgārjuna‘s dependent co-origination (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995; Vimal, 2009a). As discussed above, according to Nāgārjuna, so called ‗causes‘ are not ‗real causes‘ because theses ‗causes‘ do not inherently exist. Therefore, they are ‗conditions‘. This means, matching and selection processes for a specific SE from virtual reservoir (such as mental aspect of elementary particles and other entities) depend on ‗conditions‘ of matching between feed forward stimulus dependent signals and cognitive feedback signals. It is also possible that the SEs which appear irreducible in conventional reality (as in hypothesis H1) may not have inherent existence, i.e., SEs can be derived from or reduced to some entities that inherently exist (as in hypothesis H 2). VI (Adams, 2010a) commented, ―Presumably, that category would encompass the thermostat, photocell, and mousetrap. Yet Vimal still insists that such machines, such as a color detection machine, ―can detect and discriminate red from green‖ even though it cannot have redness and greenness experiences. That is a selfcontradiction, it seems to me, unless he uses the term ―discriminate‖ only metaphorically. No machine can discriminate red from green. Only a whole human (or other animal with supposedly similar cognitive capacities), can discriminate red from green. The human can observe a machine‘s differential output and metaphorically call it a discrimination, adopting Dennett‘s concept of the intentional stance, but that is an ersatz discrimination, not the real thing. Consequently, I agree that Vimal‘s robot performs functions, but I cannot agree that it is capable of discrimination or of any other cognitive function. I simply do not agree that behavioral functionality, in itself, ever constitutes a cognitive function. I would have to be specifically convinced of that. Oddly enough, later in his essay, Vimal says essentially the same thing, that behavioral functionality is an insufficient explanatory basis for mentality. I was not able to reconcile that later statement with this, his opening assertion of functionalism. Maybe when he says ‗discriminate‘ he only means ‗behaves differentially.‘ So while I did stumble with the opening of this essay, I did not fall down. The rest of it made a lot more sense to me.‖ There are over 40 different meanings/aspects attributed to term ‗consciousness‘, which can be categorized in two aspects: function and experience as detailed in (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). The term ‗discrimination‘ is defined as ―the process by which two stimuli differing in some aspect are responded to differently […] the ability to perceive and respond to differences among stimuli‖. The term ‗detection‘ is a discrimination of a stimulus (such as long wavelength light that appears red) with respect to ‗background‘ or ‗surround‘ (such as uniform white or dark background field) rather than with respect to another stimulus (such as middle wavelength light that appears green) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 713 as in discrimination. Discrimination is a function, which is a mental entity and is an functional aspect of consciousness; function can be conscious or non-conscious; cognitive function can be conscious or non-conscious also; consciousness has two aspects: conscious function and conscious experience; they are elaborated in (Vimal, 2009e, 2010e). As for machine, spectrometer can discriminate wavelengths, but wavelength is physics, it is not color; color is perception/SE. The terms ‗discrimination‘ and ‗detection‘ are a psychophysical terms (Vimal, 1997, 1998a, 1998b, 2000, 2002a, 2002b), but can be used for machine with appropriate context and qualification. Zombie, by definition, has only non-conscious functions. Robot is a dual-aspect entity as any other entity; and if necessary ingredients are programmed then we may have conscious robots in future (see last paragraph of section 3.13 of (Vimal, 2010d)). VII (Adams, 2010a) commented, ―Vimal‘s account of experience-in-itself differs importantly from Nixon‘s and Strawson‘s purely naturalistic versions in that Vimal invokes an Eastern cosmology associated with the Samkhya philosophy of India and the Bhagavad-Gita. I say this because of his reference to ‗the three gunas‘ that interact with ‗proto-experience‘ to produce ‗subjective experience‘ (‗PE interacts with 3 gunas to result SEs depending on the kinds of 3-gunas‘). I am no expert on Hindu philosophy, but my understanding is that these ‗gunas‘ are supposed to be the fundamental elements of nature, like earth, air, fire and water were for the ancient Greeks. The gunas are inherent to all beings (alive or inanimate), and determine, through their combinations and intensities, the nature of each being, including the nature of its experience. They can do that because they are not mere combinatorial units in the passive sense that we think of, for example, when we consider the elements of the periodic table, but they are the active, dynamic principles of existence: creation, preservation, and destruction, corresponding to the Hindu gods, Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, respectively. That is not unreasonable, because the truth is, when you get down to the axiomatic, irreducible principles of the mind, you simply must propose a first principle such as experience-in-itself or proto-self-awareness, that is outside the set that makes up the first principles of physics (gravity, energy, time, space, and so forth). It would be so much more convenient if the first principles of physics included something that could plausibly be applied to a fundamental analysis of the mind. Alas, that is not the case. But if you are forced outside of standard science for your basic explananda, then are there any constraints? Why not invoke spirits, ghosts, angels, devils, gods? You‘re out in the weeds anyway, so anything goes, it would seem. To avoid that uncomfortable situation, I think it is better to look to basic psychological principles that, while non-scientific, are at least observable and confirmable by introspection. And should we ever develop a well-defined first-person methodology of inquiry, we would be able to arrive at a consensus about such non-scientific, but nevertheless empirical first principles of mind.‖ My framework is the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d), which is somewhat close to Trika Kashmir Shaivism (TKS), where Shiva and Shakti are two aspects of the same entity, i.e., dual-aspect view. I critique Samkhya philosophy because it is Dvait-Advait (dual-nondual) Vedanta, which is somewhat close to Stapp‘s view (Stapp, 1996, 2006): at pragmatic/operational level it is dualistic, and at deep ontological level, it is non-dual or mentalistic monism. The Gunas (Vimal, 2009b) in my dual-aspect framework is somewhat different from the gunas used in dual-nondual Dvait-Advait Vedanta. I borrowed the idea of gunas from Samkhya‘s DvaitAdvait Vedanta, but in my framework, the one potential PE and three potential gunas are in superposed latent form in the mental aspect of each entity as in hypothesis H 2 of my framework. However, in hypothesis H1 of my framework, there is no gunas concept: all potential SEs are superposed in the mental aspect of each entity and my treatment is scientific and rigorous, as in (Vimal, 2008b, 2010d). Moreover, the idea of superposition differentiates my framework from TKS. SEs are not outside, rather they are one of the two aspects in my framework. In addition, I have introduced potential SEs in physics that remains invariant under PE-SE transformation; details are given in (Vimal, 2010f; Vimal, 2010g, 2010h). VIII Nāgārjuna discusses the two truths or realities, ―[XXIV.] 8. The Buddha‘s teaching of the Dharma Is based on two truths: A truth of worldly convention And an ultimate truth. […] 9. Those who do not understand The distinction drawn between these two truths Do not understand The Buddha‘s profound truth. […] 10. Without a foundation in the conventional truth, The significance of the ultimate cannot be taught. Without understanding the significance of ultimate, Liberation is not achieved. […] 11. Without a foundation in the conventional truth, The significance of the ultimate cannot be taught. Without understanding the significance of the ultimate, Liberation is not achieved.‖ (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995).p.298-9. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 714 IX Nāgārjuna argues: ―All phenomena are arisen, but arise as empty, and as dependent. [p.169] […] arising, abiding, and ceasing are not entities at all―they are mere relations […] the self as pure subject does not exist―nor do perception or perceptual objects exist as entities―yet want to affirm the conventional reality of perception, perceivers, and perceiveds, in general, we want to deny the inherent existence of phenomena and affirm their conventional reality. . [p.176]‖ (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995). X Nāgārjuna described Nirvāņa: ―[XXV.]3. Unrelinquished, unattained, Unannihilated, not permanent, Unarisen, unceased: This is how Nirvāņa is described. […] 9. That which comes and goes Is dependent and changing. That, when it is not dependent and changing, Is taught to be Nirvāņa. […] 17. Having passed into Nirvāņa, the Victorious Conqueror Is neither said to be existent Nor said to nonexistent. Neither both or neither are said. […] 20. Whatever is the limit of Nirvāņa, That is the limit of cyclic existence. There is not the slightest difference Between them, Or even the subtlest thing.‖ (Nāgārjuna & Garfield, 1995)-p.323-331. XI However, (Acerbi, 2008) implies that an observer is an entity that interacts with other entities: ―Examples of observers could be a galaxy, a cat, a photographic plate, a chunk of wood. Each of these observers is able to memorize and process information, each one in different ways: a packet of photons coming from a dog is handled differently by a chunk of wood, a photographic plate and a cat.‖ As per (Acerbi, 2008), whole universe can be an observer. In addition, (Grinbaum, 2010) discusses observers defined/implied by various investigators and then defines an observer as a system identification algorithm phrased in information theoretic terms: ―Quantum mechanical formalism has an orthodox interpretation that relies on the cut between the observer and the system observed (Dirac, 1930; von Neumann, 1932). This ‗shifty split‘ (Bell, 1990) of the world into two parts cannot be removed: the formalism only applies if the observer and the system are demarcated as two separate entities. Standard quantum mechanics says nothing about the physical composition of the observer, who is an abstract notion having no physical description from within quantum theory. One cannot infer from the formalism if the observer is a human being, a machine, a stone, a Martian, or the whole Universe. As emphasized by Wheeler, this makes it extraordinarily difficult to state clearly where ―the community of observer-participators‖ begins and where it ends (Wheeler, 1983). As a part of his relative-state interpretation, Everett argued that observers are physical systems with memory, i.e., ‗parts... whose states are in correspondence with past experience of the observers‘ (Everett, 1957). This was further developed by Rovelli, who claimed that observers are ordinary physical systems such that some of their degrees of freedom are correlated with some property of the observed system (Rovelli, 1996). […] a general definition of observer [is] phrased in information theoretic terms and [is] based on the intuition that the key component of observation is system identification. […] What characterizes an observer is that it has information about some physical system. This information fully or partially describes the state of the system. The observer then measures the system, obtains further information and updates his description accordingly. Physical processes listed here: the measurement, updating of the information, ascribing a state, happen in many ways depending on the physical constituency of the observer. […] Still one feature unites all observers: that whatever they do, they do it to a system. […] What remains constant throughout measurement is the identification [in spite of a change in the state of this system], by the observer, of the quantum system. […] An observer is a system identification algorithm (SIA). […] Particular observers can be made of flesh or perhaps of silicon. ‗Hardware‘ and ‗low-level programming‘ are different for such observers, yet they all perform the task of system identification. This task can be defined as an algorithm on a universal computer, e.g., the Turing machine: take a band containing a list of all the degrees of freedom, send a Turing machine along this band and put a mark against those degrees of freedom that belong to the quantum system under consideration. Any concrete SIA may proceed in a very different manner, yet all can be modelled with the help of this construction. […] The Copenhagen view of quantum mechanics traditionally described quantum systems and observers, epistemologically, as belonging to different categories. On the contrary, the view based on the relativity of observation, as proposed by Everett and later Rovelli, puts all systems on equal grounds and ascribes them only relative states. These two views are not as contradictory as they may seem. Relativity of observation has been understood by some proponents of the Copenhagen school (Fock, 1971a; Fock, 1971b; Hermann, 1935; Jammer, 1974). Information-theoretic treatment of the observer gives a chance to completely overcome the tension. On the one hand, the observer is a SIA [system identification algorithm] and is characterized by its Kolmogorov complexity [which is a measure of the computational resources needed to specify the object]. On the other hand, quantum mechanics can be reconstructed from information theoretic axioms and thus ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 715 seen as a theory of information (Grinbaum, 2007). This puts all systems on equal grounds, in the spirit of Rovelli, while emphasizing the idea of relativity of observation, in the spirit of Fock.‖ If the above is correct, then before life began, observers were interacting entities and collapses might have been occurring for them and the dual-aspect entities might be co-evolving and eventually neural-networks were formed and subjective experience (SE) aspect of consciousness occurred in our brains. Furthermore, it is an interesting idea that source might be the ‗universal background of awareness‘ (Nixon, 2010c) or eternal universal background of dual-aspect entities from where both aspects co-evolved via some still unclear mechanisms. This needs to be unpacked to address the Type-2 explanatory gap: how can SEs pre-exist, i.e., how is it possible that our SEs (such as happiness, sadness, painfulness, and similar SEs) were already present in primal entities, whereas there is no shred of evidence that such SEs were conceived at the onset of universe? [This footnote is the result of my personal discussion on (Smetham, 2010) and (Acerbi, 2008) in 7-July-2010-email to Graham Smetham and Michele Caponigro.] Furthermore, it is interesting to put observer and the system to be measured in the same category on equal grounds. In our dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework, (a) information is a dual-aspect entity; (b) observer is related to brain‘s cognitive feedback signals, (c) the system to be measured is represented by stimulus dependent feed forward signals, and (d) the interaction between observer and the system to be measured (implicate order) leads to the selection of a specific SE (explicate order) via matching process (Caponigro, Prakash, & Vimal, 2010), which may be interpreted in terms of dual-aspect information-theoretic treatment of the observer and the system to be measured. However, it is unclear that the observer is a system identification algorithm and is characterized by its Kolmogorov complexity (Grinbaum, 2010). XII (Nixon, 2010a) ―insists that experiencing (but frightened) proto-humans in groups produced language (in the form of myths) together. Group sharing, group awareness preceded the internalization of language as thought and as mind. Language = conscious experience. Therefore, intersubjectivity precedes subjectivity. How could you think individuals just became conscious, because of some brain mutation? Selfhood is learned.‖ Perhaps, my definitions in dual-aspect framework differ from Nixon‘s: In my framework, self is the SE of a subject; this conscious experience is selected via matching process (in analogy to SEs of objects) and embedded in self-related neural-network during co-development, sensorimotor interaction, and co-tuning during developmental neural Darwinism. ―Subjectivity refers to a [first] person's perspective or opinion, particular feelings, beliefs, and desires. In philosophy, the term can either be contrasted with or linked with objectivity [third person perspective].‖ ―Intersubjectivity is a term used in philosophy and psychology to describe a condition somewhere between subjectivity and objectivity [i.e., second person perspective], one in which a phenomenon is personally experienced (subjectively) but by more than one subject. […] Thomas Scheff defines intersubjectivity as ‗the sharing of subjective states by two or more individuals‘ (Scheff, 2006)‖. Thus, second person experiences (intersubjective SEs/consciousness or social consciousness) are because of the interaction between two or first person experiences, which implies that first person SEs (individual consciousness) must pre-exist. The first person SEs (individual consciousness) are the result of the interaction between (i) environmental stimulus dependent feed forward signals and (ii) organism (brain)‘s cognition/attention dependent feedback signals, which means the organism, environment, and SEs must pre-exist. SEs includes SE of subject (self) and SEs of objects and stored in virtual reservoir. Perhaps, panexperientialism combines both aspects (mental and physical) in a complicated manner because matter, mind, functions, cognition are derived from experiences and there is just one aspect that is experiences (panexperientialism is mentalistic monism close to idealism). Nixon agrees that the precise mechanism is unclear for how hard problems of panexperientialism can be addressed. In the dual-aspect dual-mode PE-SE framework (Vimal, 2010d), it is rigorous, precise and crystal clear how a specific SE is selected via matching process. XIII The following is adapted from the author‘s post #21 in Consciousness Research Forum on self (http://sites.google.com/site/rlpvimal/Home/2010-Self-page3-posts-21-30-network.nature.pdf): As per (Powell, Macrae, Cloutier, Metcalfe, & Mitchell, 2010), self is ―a collection of distinct mental operations distributed throughout the brain, rather than a unitary cognitive system‖, which needs further examination. According to (Northoff & Bermpohl, 2004), ―the processing of self-referential stimuli in cortical midline structures (CMS) is a fundamental component in generating a model of the self.‖ In a meta-analysis, (Northoff et al., 2006) suggest, ―Since the CMS are densely and reciprocally connected to subcortical midline regions, we advocate an integrated cortical-subcortical midline system underlying human self. We conclude that self-referential ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 716 processing in CMS constitutes the core of our self and is critical for elaborating experiential feelings of self, uniting several distinct concepts evident in current neuroscience.‖ In (Bruzzo & Vimal, 2007), we define self as the subjective experience (SE) of a subject, where the essential ingredients of SEs are the formation of neural-network, wakefulness, re-entry, attention, memory, neural-net protoexperiences (PEs), and so on. In addition, we propose that self ―arises from chaotic dynamics, self-organization and selective mechanisms during ontogenesis, while emerging post-ontogenically as an adaptive pressure driven by both volume and synaptic-neural transmission and influencing the functional connectivity of neural nets (structure).‖ Thus, one could argue that self could be unitary but it can involve multiple mental operations including ‗free Will‘, ‗agentic role‘, context, and/or as ‗the object of judgment/reflection‘. (Northoff et al., 2006) argue for 3 concepts of self: (1) proto/bodily self (involving sensory cortex and sensory processing), (2) core/mental/minimal self (involving medial cortex and self-referential processing), and (3) autobiographical, emotional, spatial and verbal, etc self (involving lateral cortex and higher order processing). (Trehub, 2007) ‗phenomenal self‘ might be part of the 3rd concept because core self is its prerequisite. Self in 1pp (first person perspective), 2pp, 3pp might have subjective, inter-subjective, and objective status. 1pp and 3pp being the mental (SE of subject) and physical (its neural-correlates) aspects of self seems consistent with dual-aspect view. (Trehub, 2007)‘s hypothesis is interesting that ‗core self‘ (‗I‘) is fixed and ‗phenomenal self‘ changes. However, if the latter changeable (phenomenal) self characterizes the former (subjective core) self, then how could core self will remain fix is not clear to me. XIV (Nixon, 2010a) commented, ―after all this you still do not agree that it is non-conscious (as in pre-conscious) experience!‖ Well, there is another explanatory gap of pan-experientialism: (i) where do non-conscious experiences come from? Nixon has assumed that they come from ‗universal background of awareness‘. But there is no shred of any evidence that there are such entities at the start of universe (Big Bang). And (ii) how are conscious experiences precisely derived from non-conscious experiences? Physics supports only matter (fermions) and force carriers (bosons) and says nothing about experiences. It is very hard to maintain pan-experientialism because it has many problems. (Nixon, 2010a) defended panexperientialism as follows: ―I do think you are wrong about the limitations of panexperientialism since I did suggest that ‗experience‘ must arise from a previously existing background of nonconscious and non-experiencing awareness-in-itself (like, say, the quantum flux or vacuum in an eternal present of potential existence). Plus the self most often means to me self-identity, or a being that is aware of itself as an existent (as opposed to a corporeal identity only). Similarly, subjectivity may be loosely associated with corporeal existence – knowing the boundaries & capabilities of the body that the creature is – but otherwise I would interpret the word to mean the sense of subjectivity, or, again, one's existence as a self interacting with other selves. […] The scientifically-based notion of the ‗quantum foam‘ or ‗quantum vacuum‘ is useful here. Non-conscious experiences are not ‗stored‘ anywhere in it, but they may be emergent with the creation of time & space. The theory is that this quantum foam ‗field of nothingness‘ in the absolute present that predates even the Big Bang (which is to say, ‗it‘ was present if not exactly existent before time began) is actually a percolating sea of potential existence, with sub atomic particles or singularities constantly popping into existence then nearly instantaneously popping out again as the ‗particle‘ (or singularity) meets its opposite-charged twin and they annihilate each other. Hawking has suggested that our universe began when one of the ‗particles‘ disappeared (perhaps into a black hole) before it could annihilate itself & its opposite. The ‗particle‘ that remained was all there was to existence so this singularity burst into time and change and the universe began. It is this ‗sea of nothingness‘ (like the void awareness of various eastern religions, perhaps?) that, being timeless, may be chaotically yet quiescently aware without being aware OF anything (something only the most advanced-detached mystics might understand). It is thus unconscious and unintentional awareness — a dynamic sea of potential being, a chaos of creativity waiting to happen. Further details are in (Nixon, 2010c). Addressing the question (how conscious experiences are precisely derived from non-conscious experiences) is the major topic of ‗Hollows of Experience‘(Nixon, 2010c) in which I look closely at the features of human language and how it allowed us the ‗mental‘ recursion to become reflectively conscious of our natural, somatic experiencing, or, to put it another way, to reflexively experience our own somatic experiencing. It's also the major theme of ‗Myth and Mind‘ (Nixon, 2010d) in which I look for the crossing of the symbolic threshold into language in prehistoric ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| September 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 6 | pp. 657-717 Vimal, R. L. P. Interactions among Minds/Brains: Individual Consciousness and Inter-subjectivity in Dual-Aspect Framework 717 times and speculate on what may have brought it about. I don't think the question could have been more thoroughly addressed (even if it turns out that I am mistaken).‖ So far, Nixon‘s framework sounds fine to me qualitatively, except how physical aspect arises from experiences is still not clear to me. The brute fact (that is the way it is with no further explanation) of panexperientialism is: it is only the experiences that inherently exist in the universe and nothing else. So one needs to explain everything from this. One could ask: Why is then pan-experientialism still controversial? Why is Type-B materialism still dominant? To address these questions, we need to make our frameworks more precise quantitatively and test our hypotheses; if still not rejected then we might have some general consensus slowly. (Nixon, 2010a) suggested to read Process & Reality (Nixon, 2010e; Whitehead, 1978) for how physical aspect arises from experiences. For the latter two questions, he replied, ―Hidden truths are called ‗hidden‘ for a reason. We seem to be material beings in a material world helplessly caught in the flow of time like leaves in a stream to the sea. But, as you must know, appearance is seldom the ‗real‘ reality.‖ The explanatory gap and hard problems of panexperientialism are discussed in Section 8 above. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

207 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 207-211 Bermanseder, T. Commentary on Michael Cecil’s “Towards A New Paradigm of Consciousness” Commentary Commentary on Michael Cecil’s “Towards A New Paradigm of Consciousness” Tony Bermanseder* ABSTRACT Cecil's attempt to delve deeper and to question the validity of this orthodox reductionistic approach to gain a better understanding of what this consciousness is thoroughly justified and is to be applauded. Cecil has indeed found the 'Rosetta Stone' of Quantum Physics in his valiant approach to couple the material reductionism of the orthodoxy with the 'perennial philosophy' or the 'wisdom of the ancients.' However, Cecil has failed to discern the greater picture in his self-relative decoding of the messages, found in the 'Rosetta Stones of the Quantum'. That is, Cecil has thrown the baby out with the bathwater in his attacks on the human thinking process. There is no requirement whatsoever to 'destroy' the reductionism of science in rigorous mathematical and logical argument and deduction. Key Words: consciousness, paradigm, reductionism, quantum, ancient wisdom. The aim to construct a self-consistent and comprehensive theory of consciousness has for long eluded the corridors of the scientific orthodoxy in its vision to embody associated labels like 'awareness', 'wisdom or sophia' or 'insight or gnosis' and other such related nomenclature in its pursuit to reduce all physically experienced phenomena to a model subservient to its modus operandi of the repeatable experiment and the falsification of the models so constructed. The scientific methodology so peripheralises the existence of the human mind as a physical effect, supposedly an emergent phenomena from a physics of a biochemical brain. This approach then draws a clear distinction between the causal nature of the physical origin of such things as thoughts and constructions of the mind and its images and the creation of thought-forms or memeplexes. Cecil's attempt to delve deeper and to question the validity of this orthodox reductionistic approach to gain a better understanding of what this consciousness is, so becoming, thoroughly justified and is to be applauded. Michael Cecil has indeed found the 'Rosetta Stone' of Quantum Physics in his valiant approach to couple the material reductionism of the orthodoxy with the 'perennial philosophy' or the 'wisdom of the ancients' in decoding particular, relatively unedited scrolls of antiquity such as the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi documents. However, Cecil has failed to discern the greater picture in his self-relative decoding of the messages, found in the 'Rosetta Stones of the Quantum'. In colloquial terminology, Cecil has thrown the baby out with the bathwaters' in his attacks on the human thinking process. There is no requirement whatsoever to 'destroy' the reductionism of science in rigorous mathematical and logical argument and deduction. For example, the attempt of Roger Penrose and his Correspondence: Tony Bermenseder, http://www.cosmosdawn.net E-mail: omniphysics@cosmosdawn.net ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 208 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 207-211 Bermanseder, T. Commentary on Michael Cecil’s “Towards A New Paradigm of Consciousness” collaborator Stuart Hameroff in the Orch-OR model (Penrose, 1989) for a quantum consciousness indicates that the orthodoxical rigidity is in a process of blending with the nonmaterialistic concepts proposed by Cecil throughout his essay. Cecil's deep and profound manner of expression has what Penrose and Hameroff are missing, vice versa. Cecil's rejection of the scientific formalism is in a sense the same as the dismissal or the ignorance as regards to the 'Gospel of Thomas' (GOT) of the reductionists as the key to the 'Rosetta Stone of the Quantum'. I am rather familiar with the GOT and the Book of the Revelations and have 'discovered' its significance in a similar manner as Cecil did. Where we differ in a clear polarization is in the interpretation of the archetypology embodied in the GOT and their related contexts. My critique of particulars so shall focus on those symbols and semiotiks and not on the generalities of the omni-science; which in my case fully incorporates the 'Thinker' as the 'Afterthought' of the 'Primal Consciousness' as the 'Forethought', e.g., from a omni-scientific perspective for a required NON-UNITY aka the metaphysical or archetypical Identity of the Void being both the Null-state and the Infinitum as a 'quasi oneness'. Only after the Nonexistence has become 'self-conscious' of its Nonexistence AS an eternity and a nothingness simultaneously; can ANY definition process begin to eventually (and before the existence of a physical measurable cosmology) create ITSELF as a UNITY, say as a Leibnitzian Monad or in Spinoza's 'Essence'. This monad then partitions in the Cartesian Mind-Body or the Wave-Particle quantum dyad or the Creator-Creation or Yang-Yin etc. as the 'good-evil' dichotomy of Cecil and then is 'induced' or 'programmed' to mirror and double itself in geometric progression (cellular mitosis); 1-2-4-... and with the recreation of the original monad of the Void in the MindBody=Mind+Body=MindBody+BodyMind in one form of many labels. This is to say that the DEFINITION becomes the 'Word of God' and the Logos of the GOT (and John.1.1) and 'God' as the undefined primal 'energy' (see my essay for details) can then learn how to count beginning with itself as The One. Cecil presumes erroneously in my opinion that this Oneness existed before it actually could exist as a consequence of the now accepted and understood nature of the mathematical infinity as a process of asymptotic approach, Cantorian or otherwise. The reader can easily discern Cecil's unfamiliarity and rejection of the scientific approach in mathematics and reductionistic logic. He describes the process of the human thinker as an emergent phenomenon, greatly limited and invalidated by the stimulus of the environments. Yet the Nag Hammadi document of the 'Secret Book of John' describes the creative process indicated above as just such a primal Unity dividing itself in the 'Perfect One' (God the FatherCreator) and 'Barbelo' (MotherCreation). http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/apocjn.html The 'Apocryphon of John' then calls this the 'Perfect One as the 'Forethought' BEFORE the existence of the 'Lover' as the Afterthought. This is crucial as the 'loss of the creation' defines the 'Loss of Consciousness' as the Environment of Michal Cecil's model of the limitations regarding the 'Thinker of Thoughts'. Cecil's cosmogony so continually searches for the 'Remembrance of Barbelo' in gnostic terminology. Cecil so correctly identifies the 'Forethought' as the Original all encompassing super consciousness and he also correctly identifies this to be spacially and temporarily independent. But then he loses consistency in belittling the thinking process itself. This is equivalent of saying, that the 'Remembrance of Barbelo' as the Afterthought cannot discern or discover itself as this Afterthought. The Afterthought is of course closely interwoven with ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 209 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 207-211 Bermanseder, T. Commentary on Michael Cecil’s “Towards A New Paradigm of Consciousness” cosmic intelligence in general and with human sentience in particular. So in reducing the human thinker to an unconscious traveller in the 'seas of self ignorance' Cecil belittles and denigrates the Creation itself. But the creation, namely the universe exists 'in forgetfulness' rather than in 'unconsciousness', when the unconscious self state is defined in a manner akin the dream state of the alpha dream state, say in human physiology. Michael Cecil admits and places great emphasis on the 'visions of the knowledge', the 'vison of the son of man'; the 'vision of the resurrection' and so on. Now this is valid indeed and relates to Cecil's fundamental idea of the Genesis symbol of Adam's creation as the Image of God. Those visions can also be described as individuated messages from the subconscious and so become triggers for their remembrances of Barbelo's Children, namely her Evean daughters as ambassadoras and her Adamic Sons as ambassadors of herself and himself, her partially forgotten lover and creator in a dimensional exile in a metaphysical and symbolic heaven from a materially real physical earth and cosmos. What Cecil misses is, that his Self-Reflection goes two ways and not just from the 'unknowable' God witnessing himself in Adam (any man and manifesting as Logos in the son of man) and as the Forethought mirroring itself in the Afterthought. The exile of Adam and Eve so become necessity to allow the Creation to grow in consciousness and self remembrance, not as the encompassment of the universe but as the individuals within it as the shards or pieces of the original creator-creation monad itself (in a holo-fractal cosmology). (For readers interested in the interpretations of scriptures and antiquity, please see my Note below) Reference Penrose, R. (1989). Shadows of the Mind: A Search for the Missing Science of Consciousness. Oxford University Press. p. 457. Note: Cecil's interpretation of the GOT and related scriptures and scrolls represents a form of poetic license in interpretations; which in my opinion are rather peripheral in his understanding of the contexts. For example, Cecil states "[i]n other words, the only description of consciousness which is, in any way, seriously capable of actually achieving the ultimate goal of the "science of consciousness" in the description of both human and animal consciousness is a description of consciousness which is based upon the acknowledgement that there are not merely one or two; but, in fact, three dimensions of consciousness: 1) The consciousness of the „thinker‟— symbolized by the "fig leaves" in Genesis 3:7 (see, also, Saying #37 in the Gospel of Thomas), and by the Third Seal (6:5-6) and the "beast of the earth" in Revelations 13:11 and Sura 27:82 of the Quran; 2) The consciousness of the "self"—symbolized by the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" in Genesis 3:3-6, and by the Second Seal (6:3-4) and the "beast of the sea" in Revelations 13:1 (which, together with the consciousness of the „thinker‟, comprise the dualistic or „fallen‟ consciousness); and,3) a non-dualistic, 2-dimensional „flat. space— and, thus, species non-specific—time-independent, “observing consciousness” Created „by and in the image of God. (Genesis 1:27)—represented by the “Tree of Life” in Genesis 3:24 which symbolizes the Vision of the “Son of man”/the “Vision of Knowledge”/the “Night Journey” of Mohammed; and by the First Seal in Revelations 6:1-2." In my opinion, this is not much better then a mishmash of scriptural archetypes thrown together to support a individuated agenda, say one coupled to a 'vision' from the visionary or the dreamer's subconscious triggering of aforesaid 'remembrence of the cosmic self'. It is hard to comment on the archetypes and symbols as they are not coherently displayed to support whatever premises are meant to be supported in scriptural evidence. But I shall give my alternative decoding of some of Michael Cecil's symbols as an alternative interpreation; which the reader will find to be self consistent in context and in detail. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 210 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 207-211 Bermanseder, T. Commentary on Michael Cecil’s “Towards A New Paradigm of Consciousness” 1) The 'fig leaves' depict the monadic duad from Eve as part of Adam (as the rib) suddenly realising that 'she' is or could become independent from her original maleness as the 'flesh of Adam'. This is 'reharmonised' and defined in GOT:114, when Jesus admits Mary Magdalene as a Male and also relates to John.20.17, when Mary is disallowed to 'touch' Jesus after the resurrection due to his non-ascension to the father and the subsequent meeting with the apostles who were allowed to touch him (Thomas). The 'fig leaves' so relate to the 'Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil' in a commonly understood sexual awakening; where this self realisation is however related to the potential of eventually bringing creator and creation back together again and from the inside of Barbelo (details are found in the 'Story of Bigmo's Balloon found on www.cosmosdawn.com). 2) The 'Beast of the Sea' and the 'Beast of the Earth' are the same as the 'man Gabriel' in Daniel.12.5 and the Angel in Revelation.10.2 with his left foot upon the earth and his right foot upon the sea and also as the 'two witnesses' of Revelation.11 and the 'two olive trees' of Zechariah.4.3. The Sea, from which the 'beast of the apocalypse' rises is a MIRROR and the 'Sea of glass' about the 'throne of God' in heaven in Revelation.4.6 and also the 'place of destruction' for the 'Whore of Babylon' as a FALSE IMAGE of womanhood in the archetype of Eve (then no longer as the flesh of Adam, but independent as the image of Barbelo) in Revelation.18.21. It is the shattering of the mirror of deception, symbolized by the beasts and the whore, which becomes the New Lake of the Fire and the Brimstone and the damnation of the false images as thought-forms and as memeplexes. In other words, every man and every woman are the two witnesses and the two beasts of the 'true prophet and the false prophet' self relative to the perception of the selfhood as either being encompassed by a wave of unity or being separated as such a wavelet and not eveloped by such a 'divine oneness'. This is the quantum solution for the collapsed wavefunction in the particular being dualised in the collapsed particle function within the waveness in the Schrödinger Cat paradox. The self-delusion shatters in a Möbian twist of the 'pole-shift' (Cecil's King's of the South and the North amongst many other things) and the doubling of reality in the breaking of the mirror of the deceptions of the cosmic self. The following excerpt from Michael Cecil found in his essay further exemplify the self-consistent and synergized cosmogony of the 'Rosetta Stone of Quantum Physics' in its proper decodements for the 'meanings' of the sayings in the GOT. The following translation of the Dead Sea Scroll 4Q392 and a related verse from Isaiah form the basis for any reader to understand the GOT as the key to existence. 4Q392: "[...] and dominions [...][...] a man [...] God and not to turn aside from [...] and in His covenant your soul shall cling and [...] words of His mouth [...] and God [...] heaven above and to search out the ways of the sons of man, they have no hiding place. He created darkness and light for Himself, but in His dwelling place is the light of their light and all darkness rests before Him as well. He has no need to distinguish between light and darkness, but for the sons of man He distinguishes them as the light of day, with the sun, and night, with the moon and stars. He has a light which cannot be searched out, nor can its end be known. For all the works of God are doubled in this manner. We are flesh, which does not totally grasp these things. With us for [...] for a sign and wonders without number. [...] winds and lightning [...] servants of the holy of holies. They are as couches before him [...]." - translated by Martin G. Abegg, Jr. Isaiah:45.7: "I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things." "The following statements of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas, then: From Saying #11: "On the day that you were one you became two." From Saying #19: "Blessed is he who came into being before he came into being." From Saying #22: "When you make the two one, and when you make the inside like the outside, and the above like the below, and when you make the male and the female one and the same…then will you enter [the kingdom]." From Saying #61: "I am he who exists from the undivided." From Saying #85: "Adam came into being from a great power and a great wealth, but he did not become worthy of you. For, had he been worthy [he would] not [have experienced] death…" From Saying #106: "When you make the two one you will become the „Son of man‟." can be summarized as follows: 1) Man was Created „by and in the image of God‟ (Genesis 1:27) with a non-dualistic consciousness which „came into being‟ before the dualistic consciousness (of the "self" and the „thinker‟) „came into being‟; 2) It is not merely possible but necessary to regain the experience of that nondualistic dimension of consciousness (beyond the dualistic consciousness of the "self" and the „thinker‟) in which all dualities are resolved; 3) The emergence of—that is, „the Fall‟ into--the dualistic consciousness from the non-dualistic consciousness is what is referred to in the Gospel of Thomas as death‟; and, 4) The term "Son ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 211 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 2 | pp. 207-211 Bermanseder, T. Commentary on Michael Cecil’s “Towards A New Paradigm of Consciousness” of man" itself—and its referent: the Vision of the "Son of man"—is to be understood as a manifestation or expression of the non-dualistic consciousness with which man was Created by God." "And the major source of this resistance to acknowledging the existence, relevance and importance of the third, non-dualistic dimension of consciousness is the classical‟ "scientists of consciousness"—that is, the perspective on consciousness of the consciousness of the „thinker‟ (which also, by the way, ignores the relevance and importance of the consciousness the "self" to an over-all understanding of human consciousness); symbolized in the fractal Prophecy of Chapter 11 of the Book of Daniel as the "king of the South", and in the fractal Prophecy of Chapter 13 of the Revelation of John as the "beast of the earth". " On this premise, the utter sublime existence of the GOT as a key to the universe and the reality of 'God' and the holistic and holographic universe - I agree with Cecil. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

490 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun Research Essay Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun William A. Adams* Abstract This paper distinguishes scientific and psychological time, and suggests how cycles of mentality define units of psychological time. This explanation explains the elasticity of psychological time and gives a broad account of the relationship between consciousness (mental activity) and time. Key Words: time, consciousness, psychological time, la durée, Social Self, creativity, intentionality, subjectivity. To the title question of this issue of JCER: “Time and Consciousness: Two Faces of One Mystery?” the short answer is, “No.” Time is mysterious. Consciousness is mysterious. But that is not a sufficient basis to link them. However, there seems to be a deep connection between time and consciousness, even though they are clearly discriminable entities. Why is it so difficult for a person to know what time it is? Why do we have clocks in every room of the office and the house, and just to be sure, wear a wristwatch? The computer, the cell phone, and the television constantly display the time. Radio stations report the time as a “public service.” Even my coffee pot tells me the time. We have no trouble knowing where we are located in space, but for time, we need a lot of help. This difficulty arises because psychological time, as experienced, is virtually unrelated to scientific time, the unrelenting arrow of Newton’s clockwork universe that all our household clocks and calendars track. Exact, uniformly divisible scientific time is not a good fit to the continuous elasticity of psychological time, yet scientific clock time is what we use to coordinate our social lives. Scientific time is like the rigid plaster cast a doctor puts on a broken arm to constrain the movements of living tissue. We force ourselves to conform to scientificsocial time, but like wearing the plaster cast, it is never going to be comfortable. My main point in this essay is to distinguish psychological and scientific time then try to explain how psychological time arises from mentality. However, I will briefly stick my neck out to suggest that scientific time may not be a fundamental fact of the universe anyway, and can safely be ignored in considering psychological time. * Correspondence: William A. Adams, http://sites.google.com/site/billadamsphd/ E-mail: bill.adams111@gmail.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 491 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun Scientific Time The idea that the universe (at least the heavenly universe) might be a giant machine stems from the days of Kepler, who in the early 1600s, formulated exact laws of planetary motion. The heavens became autonomous, deterministic and predictable. Newton’s Principia in 1687 and its theory of gravity congealed the idea of a clockwork universe. Although Newton never used that term, it became obvious to others that the new celestial mechanics was so well defined and exact, it was as if God had wound up a big clock at creation then stepped back to let the machine run its course. Oddly, Newton’s equations are entirely reversible, making equal mathematical sense running forward or backward in time, so the metaphor of the clockwork universe does not quite work despite its grip on the philosophical imagination. However, Newton did assume, and his equations required, a master clock that made absolute time a fundamental fact of the universe. That is what allowed him to define simultaneity for events occurring anywhere in space. Absolute time endured as a basic assumption of science until Einstein’s theory of relativity proposed that time was not absolute. The rate at which a clock ticks depends on whether it or its observer is moving and how fast. That idea was used in making Einstein’s prediction of the gravitational distortion of light, which was confirmed in observations of a solar eclipse. Newton’s master cosmological clock was thus debunked. The theory of general relativity does not use a universal clock. Frames of reference can be compared to each other without an absolute standard. Callender (2005) makes an analogy to money. Money is a convention that makes comparative valuation easier, but money is not a fundamental fact of nature. One could price a new car in units of hamburgers, as The Economist magazine sometimes demonstrates with exchange-rate theory (www.economist.com/markets/bigmac/). How many hamburgers would a dealer accept as payment for a new car? Ten thousand? Enough to feed a city for a month? The ratio of cars to hamburgers establishes the value of each, without reference to artificial money. In the same way, the units of time are social conventions that make comparisons of change easier, but that does not mean time is a fact of nature (see Sorli, 2010, for a technical version of this argument). Scientists do not agree whether time is fundamentally real or not. Time has been largely spatialized into the fourth dimension, space-time, in general relativity, but quantum theory seems to still need something like Newton’s absolute time. Nevertheless, I wanted to cast some doubt on the idea, accepted by nearly everyone, except relativity theorists, that scientifically described time is a fact of nature. It may not be. It may be just a made-up convention of science. Psychological Time Whether scientific time is a natural fact or not, it has little to do with psychological time, which is a subjective estimate of experiential duration. Psychological time is highly elastic, depending ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 492 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun on the circumstances of experience. Time goes by very quickly when you are enjoying your activity. Who has not been surprised to see the clock after enjoying a party, a sports event, or watching a good TV show? It is widely known that interacting with a computer can consume hours of clock time when experientially, it might seem like only a few minutes. You can “lose track of time” altogether while reading an engrossing novel. Your mind is in a world of imagination where the time scale might be years or centuries, yet scientific clock time ticks along as before while you read. When you put the book down, the difference can be shocking. Some experiences stretch psychological time beyond scientific clock time. Boredom makes psychological time move slowly, often excruciatingly so. A day at work is always longer than a day of recreation. I would guess that prison time is longer than time spent free. Music can slow down psychological time or increase it. Psychoactive drugs also can slow psychological time, although some increase its pace. Psychological time seems to run faster as we get older, and yet, in memory, individual episodes may seem like they went on forever. Dream time is a species of psychological time that seems to have no fixed relation to scientific time. Time disappears altogether during dreamless sleep, anaesthesia, and certain meditative states. When you recover from such states, you may not know how long you have “been out” until you consult a clock or otherwise deduce the passage of clock time from waking context. We can all think of examples of how psychological time, as a subjective measure of the pace of lived experience, is highly elastic and not easily aligned with scientific time. There is more to time than its pace. Scientific time also has qualities of continuity, duration, simultaneity, flow, and direction. It defines order, causality, repeatability, prediction, persistence, memory, infinity, history, and much else. Does psychological time have the same, or similar qualities and carry the same explanatory burden? Psychological time has many of the qualities of scientific time, but they differ importantly from their scientific counterparts. For example, experiences can repeat in psychological time. We have no problem recognizing an experience we have had before. So repeatability is a quality defined by psychological as well as scientific time. Yet no experience ever repeats exactly. The memory of what happened before is not identical to what actually did happen, and in any case you, the person having the repeated experience, are different now than you were before, so the experience cannot be a replica. This problem also occurs in science because the world is always changing. It was the basis of Heraclitus’ maxim that you can’t step into the same river twice. Scientists overcome variability with abstraction – often mathematical abstraction – as Newton did. However we do not have precise methods and language for abstracting (or even identifying) the essential features of experience. So, while repeatability is a roughly comparable feature of psychological and scientific time, the differences are significant. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 493 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun Likewise, we can see that psychological time does have qualities of continuity, duration, simultaneity, flow, and direction, with important differences from scientific time. It is a project beyond the scope of this paper to detail all the characteristics of psychological time. This discussion is only meant to establish that there are similarities and important differences between scientific and psychological time and to propose that psychological time is generated by consciousness. Bergson and Psychological Time The French philosopher, Henri Bergson, was the first in the modern era to give a thorough analysis of psychological time. He was more than skeptical of scientific time; he rejected it altogether, saying it is merely a derivative of psychological time. He argued that the construct of scientific time is built from enumeration of simultaneous observations that occur in psychological time. While psychological time is elastic, the count of simultaneities is not (Bergson, 1889/2001), so he turned his attention to analysis of psychological time. While Bergson’s analysis of psychological time is rich and complex, I will focus on just three of his major points: the self-existent nature of psychological time, its inherent indivisibility, and the relationship between time and self. The first two of these I disagree with and in explaining why I hope to present better alternatives. On the third point, the relationship between time and self, I find an important point of agreement that will also, I hope, illuminate my own approach. First I will briefly describe these three points of contact. Self-Existent Psychological Time? Bergson called psychological time la durée, usually translated as duration, but since that also has scientific meaning, I prefer the unambiguous term, psychological time. For Bergson, psychological time is a fundamental, inherent quality of consciousness that provides continuity and sequence to mental events, enabling memory. And, since memory is consciousness for him, psychological time enabled consciousness. Bergson’s axiom of psychological time as a self-existent quality of mind goes back to Newton’s absolute metaphysical clock, only now the clock was in the head. (Bergson wrote his dissertation on psychological time pre-Einstein). I will argue against the idea of a Newtonian clock in the head, but I do accept the fundamental status of psychological time. My objection is to supposing that the psychological clock is self-existent. Instead of supposing that mental activity conforms to the pace of an arbitrary psychological clock, I will propose that mental activity itself generates the clock. Indivisibility of Psychological Time ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 494 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun Bergson emphasized that psychological time is indivisible. Whereas scientists can divide time into indefinitely smaller units, limited only by available measurement technology, psychological time, he said, is continuous and indivisible because moments of experience blend smoothly into each other. Perhaps Bergson was taking his cue from William James’s (1890) stream of consciousness metaphor. While discrete episodes of psychological experience are discriminable, it is a mistake, Bergson said, to think of them laid out in a pre-existing homogeneous spatial medium, because experiences are not physical, not extended in space, and never wholly outside each other. Nor do experiences overlap, which is another inappropriate spatial metaphor. Instead, they interpenetrate and are thus indivisible. This explains why the past continuously flows into the present without any seams, gaps, joints or discontinuities. I will argue instead that experience and therefore psychological time are in fact marked by sharp discontinuities. The obvious example of such a discontinuity is dreamless sleep, where psychological time does not even operate. Upon awakening one can deduce or estimate that time has passed, and how much, but during dreamless sleep itself there is not sufficient cognitive capacity to make such a judgment, so we say that no psychological time exists during that period. At the subpersonal level where psychological time begins, experience is also interrupted by discontinuities of unconceptualized experience, what Merleau-Ponty called “hollows of experience” (Merleau-Ponty, 1968, cited by Nixon, 2010, p. 37), or alternatively, periods in which there is a complete absence of all experience, what I have called “the black hole of non-experience” (Adams, 2010). As a consequence of these phenomena, psychological time is gappy rather than continuous. Psychological Time and the Two Selves Near the end of Time and Free Will, Bergson (2001) proposed that there are two different selves, which he called a fundamental self and a social self. The fundamental self is intuitively understood as one’s sense of being alive, sentient, and psychologically developing. That description maps to what Damasio (1999) and Zahavi (2006) call the “core” self and what I have called the “sensorimotor self” (Adams, 2009). According to Bergson, it is the fundamental self in which indivisible psychological time flows continuously. Bergson also identifies a social self, a conceptual, linguistic ego oriented toward the world. Numerous writers, including James (1890), Mead (1934) and others, have defined a similar social self. Bergson lamented that we live most of our socialized lives outside our fundamental self, “the Social Self hardly perceiving anything of ourselves but our own ghost—a colourless shadow...” (Bergson, 2001, cited by Gunn, 1920, Ch. VI). Since the Social Self is oriented toward the world, most of our life seems to unfold in space rather than in time, he noted. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 495 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun This discrimination of two selves is critical to my discussion of how psychological time is generated by the nonintellectual, nonlinguistic, largely unconceptualized sensorimotor self (Bergson’s fundamental self) and how it is then interpreted by the social, intellectual social self. How Consciousness Generates Time It is helpful to imagine a structural model of mental activity analogous to a storage battery (Adams, 2010). Two poles, or electrodes, are separated by a directional flux that completes a cycle. The poles of mental activity are subjectivity and objectivity. That is a dualism, but not a Cartesian dualism. This dualism says nothing about mind and matter. It is only about the internal structure of mental activity. The Structure of Mental Activity In any mental activity, the subjective pole initiates each cycle. In perceptual observation, for example, it is the observer that does the observing. The observed object is passive. It doesn’t “do” anything. That is true even if the targeted object is a memory or a feeling. This principle is consistent with James’s (1912) description of mentality, in which mental events had to pass through memory to become static, passive, mnemonic objects before they could float down the stream of consciousness and be apprehended by the introspecting ego. The subjective pole of mentality is active because it is inherently self-relating (Adams, 2005). Subjectivity knows that it exists, and it exists is in a state of self-knowing. This intuition is what motivated the Cartesian cogito: I think, therefore (I cannot doubt that) I am. Subjectivity’s knowledge is proto-knowledge, where proto- means the earliest, most primitive form of something that can be hypothesized or inferred. Proto-knowledge is not knowledge in the ordinary sense, but the condition needed for ordinary knowledge. Proto-knowledge of its own existence is what defines subjectivity’s self-relatedness. Subjectivity exercises its self-relatedness by directing intentionality toward its alterity, objectivity. Intentionality is the most basic form of attention, a proto-attention. For example, it is the minimum mental relationship between an observer and observed. Intentionality is directional (always from subject to object) and effortful, which is why we talk about “paying” attention. Intentionality must be satisfied to complete a mental cycle. A technical term for that satisfaction is accommodation (Adams, 2005). When it occurs there is a moment of subjective self-recognition that closes the loop of the mental act by satisfying its intentionality. In ordinary terms we might think, “Yes, that is what I was looking for, “ or, “I recognize this situation,” or, “I created this thing.” Without accommodation, intentionality remains unsatisfied and the mental act incomplete. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 496 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun Accommodation differs from ordinary recognition in that it involves self-recognition alongside recognition of the object. It is a simultaneous recognition of two entities, not just one. Bergson (2001) hinted at a similar phenomenon: “La durée is the continuous progress of the past which gnaws into the future and which swells as it advances, leaving on all things its bite, or the mark of its tooth” (cited by Gunn, 1920, Ch. VI). I usually think of a patina of objectified subjectivity covering recognized objects, but I like Bergson’s metaphor of subjectivity recognizing its tooth marks on things. In ordinary experience, the self-recognition of accommodation constitutes the subjective feel of the experience, or as philosophers say, “what it is like” to have that experience. Stopping and Starting Time At the moment of accommodation, the intentional act is satisfied, complete, essentially canceled. At that moment, the cycle of mental activity is finished. Subjectivity is no longer in relationship with objectivity, and, without that bipolar structure, there is no mental activity. If there is no mental activity, there is no experience. If there is no experience, there is no psychological time. Time stands still each time we complete a mental cycle. We can identify that moment of stillness when it occurs just before the "aha!" phenomenon. I propose that it is also the stillness of zazen and other meditation. It is also the stillness of death. It is also the stillness of what I have described as the "black hole" of non-experience that defines nirvana, samadhi or "enlightenment" (Adams, 2010). Moments of absolute stillness occur all day every day, each time we understand or recognize something; each time we complete a mental act. But we don't notice these moments of timeless emptiness because they are not experiences. They are the opposite of experience, the complete absence of experience. They are black holes, or discontinuities in experience. So we skip over them in our understanding of experience. Once experience has stopped, how does it ever get started again? Subjectivity starts up the next mental cycle with a spontaneous, creative act. It projects an objectification of itself into the landscape of objectivity. That creative move is an inherent capacity of subjectivity, an eruption of the internal tension between knowing and being that constitutes its selfrelatedness. That move is the foundation of all human creativity (Adams, 2005). I have called the process of creative self-objectification psychological projection, and elsewhere described how it works (Adams, 2005). With subjectivity once again linked to objectivity, the bipolar structure of consciousness is restored and experience can resume with the subjective issuance of a normal intentional act targeting some aspect of objectivity. Another mental cycle then occurs, and the process of mentality continues, in tiny loops of activity, as the apparent flow of experience progresses, seemingly continuously, but actually via these discrete quanta of mentality. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 497 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun This is the basis on which I disagree with Bergson’s hypothesis that psychological time is indivisible. Experience is analyzable into these quanta of cyclic mental acts. In principle, where there is experience, it has duration, and when there is no experience, just after the moment of accommodation, there is no duration. Therefore, psychological time is not continuous, but lumpy, down to an ultimate granularity defined by the smallest single cycle of mental activity. However, in the ordinary experience of the Social Self, it seems like experience is continuous. The Ticking of Psychological Time Psychological time seems continuous in ordinary experience because we have been taught that it is. The Social Self is socialized. We understand experience to be a continuous stream just as we understand vision to reveal a coherent scene. But as research has shown (e.g., Noe, 2004), only very fragmentary visual information is available at the retina and visual cortex at any one moment, so our impression of seeing a smooth, full scene is entirely illusory, just a mental (or neurological) construction, not the fact we believe it is. Conversely, our perception of a scene may include large, obvious, and even bizarre elements that we do not notice because they don’t fit with the scene being constructed to meet expectations (Simons & Chabris, 2010). The inexorable conclusion is that the convincing impression we have of the visual world as a continuous, coherent plenum, is merely a construction understood by the Social Self, not a fact directly perceived. The situation is analogous with psychological time. We construct, tacitly in the Social Self, the understanding and then the intuition, of continuous experience, as Bergson described. However in my interpretation of that thesis, psychological time is discontinuous because experience is. Furthermore, since mental cycles can have different durations, the ticks of the psychological clock are variable. The duration of a mental cycle is a judgment we social selves make retrospectively, applying the construct of scientific time to mental experience. A mental cycle itself simply takes as long as it takes. There is no aspect of duration embedded in its operation as experienced. But considered from the social self perspective, we realize that the intentionality it takes to glance up at the clock on the wall is satisfied with the flick of an eye, and the more encompassing intention to determine “what time it is” runs only a second or two longer before it too is satisfied. Going to the store to buy milk takes considerably more clock-time to satisfy the most encompassing intentionality of that plan. Intending to earn a Bachelor’s degree from a university takes even more clock time to satisfy. So, while it is difficult to use scientific time to precisely measure the duration of individual mental cycles, it is clear that there are differences among them, and that the duration of a mental cycle of intentionality and accommodation is variable with respect to clock time. Rather than force the construct of scientific time onto mental activity, it makes more sense to say that the cycles of mental activity themselves define the units of the psychological clock. That would account for the apparent elasticity of psychological time, which should be seen, not ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 498 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun as anomalous with respect to scientific time, but as completely consistent with the pace of experience that drives it. Psychological time is thus manifest in proportion to what you are doing, whether behaving purposefully, perceiving, talking, or thinking. If you are not doing anything, you are not exercising intentionality, not churning through those mental cycles. If mental activity is at a low level, psychological time is drawn out, compared to scientific time, because mental activity defines the units of the psychological clock. We can see therefore that psychological time does not inexorably “pass” as does the time of Newton’s cosmological clock, but is created at a rate proportional to mental activity. In intense mental activity, psychological time runs faster (as later adjudged by the Social Self). At low levels of mental activity, psychological time runs slower (compared to scientific time). At zero level of mental conscious activity (dreamless sleep, for example), psychological time is undefined. The Mainspring of Psychological Time The pulsing of psychological time arises, as described, from cycles of mental activity. But what drives those? Ultimately, mental activity is driven by the nature of self-relating subjectivity. Subjectivity is not a static complementarity of knowing and being, but is animated in such a way that the epistemological function strives to subsume its own existence. In other words, knowing strives to overcome its alienation from being. Sartre (1947) used analogous concepts to propose that the project of the pour-soi is to eliminate the en-soi by becoming allencompassing (even though that is impossible). Hegel (1807/1967) said that the mission of subjectivity is to “sublate,” or actually destroy, objectivity. The point is that subjectivity’s selfrelatedness entails a directional dynamic intended to eliminate its alterity, to overcome objectivity by somehow converting it all into subjectivity. As far as we know that is a feat not possible to achieve, but, nevertheless, that dynamic is the driver of intentionality. The energy of that dynamic is conceptualized in ordinary (social self) experience as psychological motivation. Thus at the bottom of the explanatory stack for psychological time is this motivational principle: knowing strives to consume being. Conclusion: Time and Consciousness Can we imagine time without consciousness (mentality)? Scientists who believe in the view from nowhere can imagine autonomous, self-existent time. Isaac Newton certainly did. Modern physicists are less sure. But my proposal is that for psychological time at least, time without mentality is unimaginable. Conversely, can we imagine consciousness without time? Here, scientists have nothing to say, because consciousness is not scientifically observable or measurable. From introspective observation, we can describe certain experiences as virtually, or seemingly timeless, but that is only metaphorical talk. As I have described the relationship between psychological time and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 499 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun mentality, time is a consequence of mental activity when experience is retrospectively conceptualized by the Social Self. If experience is not so conceptualized, it is as if it didn’t happen because it remains unknown to consciousness, and from that perspective, has no duration, no time. Finally, if experience is interrupted, psychological time is stopped, because psychological time is generated by units of mental activity. Because of these interdependencies between time and consciousness, we can conclude that the two phenomena are distinct but deeply related. In the interest of brevity I draw this discussion to a close at this point. I have distinguished scientific and psychological time, and suggested how the cycles of mentality define the units of psychological time. This explanation accounts for the elasticity of psychological time and explains the relationship between consciousness (mental activity) and time. What I have omitted is discussion of memory, and related phenomena that arise from it, such as one’s sense of continuous self-identity over the span of psychological development. That remains a project for another time, so to speak. References Adams, W. A. (2005). What Does It All Mean: A Humanistic Account of Human Experience. Exeter, U.K.: Imprint Academic. Adams, W. A. (2009). The Three-in-one Mind. Unpublished manuscript. Online at http://sites.google.com/site/billadamsphd/works-in-progress . Adams, W. A. (2010). Empirical Introspection. Unpublished manuscript. Online at http://sites.google.com/site/billadamsphd/works-in-progress . Bergson, H. (1889/2001). Time and Free Will: An Essay On the Immediate Data of Consciousness. New York: Dover Books. Callender, C. (2005). Introducing Time. London: Totem books. Damasio, A. (1999). The Feeling of What Happens. New York: Harcourt Brace. Gunn, J. A. (1920). Bergson And His Philosophy. Online at http://www.ibiblio.org/HTMLTexts/John_Alexander_Gunn/Bergson_And_His_Philosophy Hegel, G.W.F. (1807/1967). The Phenomenology of Mind. (J.B. Baillie, Trans.) NY: Harper & Row Torchbooks. James, W. (1890). Principles of Psychology. New York: Holt. James, W. (1912/1971). Essays in Radical Empiricism and A Pluralistic Universe. New York: E.P. Dutton. Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, Self, & Society from the Standpoint of a Social Behaviorist (Ed. by Charles W. Morris). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Nixon, G. M. (2010) Hollows of experience. Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research. 1(3): 234-288. Noë, A. (2004). Action in Perception. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 500 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 490-500 Adams, W. A. Why Time Flies When You’re Having Fun Sartre, J.-P. (1943/1984). Being and Nothingness (Hazel E. Barnes, trans.). New York: Washington Square Press/Simon & Schuster. Simons, D. & Chabris, C. (2010). The Invisible Gorilla: And Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us. New York: Crown. Sorli, A. S. (2010). Physical time is run of clocks in timeless space. Prespacetime Journal, 1(2), 198-200. Online at http://www.prespacetime.com/file/PSTJ_V1%282%29.pdf Zahavi, D. (2006). Subjectivity and Selfhood: Investigating the First-Person Perspective. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

573 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness Exploration Time and its Relationship to Consciousness An Overview Mansoor Malik* & Maria Hipolito** Abstract Time is one of the most fascinating and fundamental concepts in human life. Yet the physical meaning of time is far from understood. Subjective experience of time is equally intriguing and mysterious. Time may be considered an illusion according to modern physics, but its psychological impact cannot be denied. This current paper explores the conception of time in many diverse contemporary fields such as physics, psychology, psychoanalysis, phenomenology, and anthropology. Disorders of time perception and neurophysiology of time is discussed. The idea of time as the creation of conscious mind is considered. Keywords: Time, relationship, consciousness, illusion, mystery, creation. Introduction The Oxford English dictionary defines time as: ‘the successive states of the universe regarded as a whole in which every state is either before or after every other duration, indefinitely continued existence, the progress of which this is viewed as affecting persons and things’ (Oxford Combined Dictionary, 1982). As expected this definition sheds little light on the nature of time, but inadvertently makes things more confusing by introducing other concepts such as duration. The human mind has always been fascinated by the mystery of time. Humans have reflected on the nature, origin, and flow of time from antiquity and continue to refine their understanding of time. They have used religion, mythology, philosophy, mathematics, and science to unravel the mysteries of time. Almost every culture has a myth about the creation and time. In Greek mythology, Chronos is the keeper of time. He comes from nothingness called Chaos, before which time did not exist. He helps avenge his mother Gaia (Earth) from his father Uranus (the Sky) for having her bear too many children. Chronos makes a sickle and cuts off the genitalia of his father when he comes to visit Gaia. This may reflect the pain and suffering human beings have always associated with time. Even though we may feel that we can influence what happens in time, we cannot influence the way that time itself progresses on. As the twelfth century Persian mathematician and poet Omar Khayyam wrote: “The Moving Finger writes: and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit, Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears washout a Word of it." * Correspondence: Mansoor Malik, M.D., Howard University Hospital, 2401 Georgia Avenue, Washington , DC 20060. Email: mamalik@howard.edu ** Maria Hipolito, M.D., Howard University Hospitat, 2401 Georgia Avenue, Washington , DC 20060. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness 574 Yet, despite the centrality of time in our life, time may not be a fundamental element of the universe. It appears that time is a way we have learned to organize the universe. As Ernest Mach (1960), the famous Austrian physicist and philosopher put it, “Time is an abstraction at which we arrive by means of the changes of things.” This conception of time may appear surprising and counter-intuitive to everyday life; however, a number of developments in many diverse fields tend to support this conclusion. This paper presents an overview of our changing understanding of time and its implications for mental health and related fields. Notion of Time in Physics In his Principia, Newton defined time as “absolute, true, and mathematical time, of itself, and from its own nature, flows equably without relation to anything external, and by another name is called duration.” He further noted “relative, apparent, and common time, is some sensible and external measure of duration by the means of motion, which is commonly used instead of true time; such as an hour, a day, a month, a year”. (Poincare, 1898). Thus, even in classical mechanics, we can only measure the relative time and that only through some measure of change and motion. In fact, it is mathematically possible to derive Newton’s laws of motion in a time independent fashion. However, at least theoretically it is possible to have a cosmic time and simultaneity in the universe in the framework of classical physics. In contrast, there is no notion of absolute time in general relativity. In fact, there is no absolute notion. All physical predictions have to be formulated as relations between physical quantities. Herman Minkowsi (1908) famously predicted the destruction of idea of time: “Henceforth, space by itself, and time by itself, is doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind of union of the two will preserve an independent reality”. This task was taken up by Einstein who abolished any sense of universal time through his theory of general relativity. When his lifelong friend Besso died, Einstein wrote a letter to Besso's family, saying that although Besso had preceded him in death, it was of no consequence,"for men who have knowledge of physics know that the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one." This points towards his idea of time as a “mere illusion” adopted by modern physics. Time becomes even more counter-intuitive in quantum mechanics, where time may simply be indeterminate in the quantum superposition phase events and there is even a possibility that quantum information may be sent "backwards in time", as exemplified by Aharonov’s "dual vector" theory (Aharonov & Bohm, 1958). This effect that has been experimentally verified in the the most common case, called Aharonov-Bohm solenoid, that knowledge of the classical electromagnetic field acting locally on a particle is not sufficient to predict the quantum-mechanical behavior. More interestingly, all laws of fundamental physics (i.e., the Dirac equation, Schrödinger’s equation, Maxwell’s equations, Einstein’s field equations of gravity, Feynman diagrams) are time reversible (Barbour, 1999). This is to say that at the most fundamental level, there is no preference for one direction in time (future) over the other ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness 575 direction (past). Physics provides no objective reason to believe that our present is in any way special, or more real than any other instant of time. However, at the macro level, the laws of physics, chemistry, and biology are irreversible. This is most clearly exemplified in the second law of thermodynamics that states the levels of entropy (disorder) increase in the universe as a whole. Thus, the arrow of time flows from the direction of less order to more disorder. However, even the second law of thermodynamic does not always guarantee a progression from the past to future. If we look closely, it is the entropy of any closed system (and the whole universe can be considered a closed system) that increases in the direction of disorder on average. For a single system, the entropy can either increase or decrease, thus the orientation of time is not absolute and for small systems (such as neuro-chemical processes) it may become nebulous and difficult to resolve. In quantum mechanics, if we take the universe as a whole then the progression of its wave function (containing all information about the geometry and matter content of the universe) can be represented by Wheeler-de Witt equation. It is quite perplexing to note that Wheeler-de Witt equation is necessarily time independent (de Witt, 1967). This has led prominent physicists (such as Julian Barbour and Carlo Rovelli) to conclude that time is an illusion and only emerges as a convenient tool of organization at a secondary level. Surprisingly this conclusion harkens back to similar insights gained from a number of other fields. Notion of Time in Psychoanalysis Freud emphasized the timelessness of unconscious processes. He showed how unconscious ignores time and temporal progression. For example, in dreams and fantasy where past, present, and future are united in one representation, he showed that certain aspects of psychopathology are also essentially atemporal. In a note added in 1907 to The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (1901), concerning the indestructibility of memory traces, Freud wrote that "the unconscious is completely atemporal." In his essay on the metapsychology of the unconscious, he further noted that the processes of the unconscious system are “timeless, i.e. they are not ordered temporally, are not altered by the passage of time; they have no reference to time at all.” Yet Freud struggled to reconcile his notion of unconscious time with his Kantian and Newtonian view of the psyche. He wrote, "If the philosophers maintain that the concepts of time and space are the necessary forms of our thinking, forethought tells us that the individual masters the world by means of two systems, one of which functions only in terms of time and the other only in terms of space." He believed that temporal dimension is accessible to us only as a function of acts of consciousness. Since these acts in turn depend on rapid, periodic, and discontinuous impulses from the unconscious-preconscious system, Freud believed that perception of time itself is discontinuous. He wrote, “I further had a suspicion that this discontinuous method of functioning of the system lies at the bottom of the origin of the concept of time” (Freud, 1925). Time in Anthropology ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness 576 Time is considered relative in anthropology in the tradition of Durkheim. Durkheim attempted a sociological explanation of all fundamental categories of human thought, especially the central concepts of time and space. He claimed that these concepts are social creations not merely transmitted by society. He pointed out that the social organization of the primitive community is the model for the primitive's spatial organization of his surrounding world. Similarly, temporal divisions into days, weeks, months, and years correspond to periodical recurrences of rites, feasts, and ceremonies. He wrote (1915): "A calendar expresses the rhythm of the collective activities, while at the same time its function is to assure their regularities." Perception of time differs across cultures. In the Judeo-Christian culture time is perceived as having a ‘linear’ form (i.e., past–present–future). We believe that the past is ‘behind us’, the future is ‘in front us’, and the present time is ‘where we are now’. This concept of time is based on the notion that time is linear and unidirectional. As Geertz (1973) pointed out, our awareness of ourselves and others as growing, developing and ageing beings across the life span is a major source of our perception of time as linear in nature. Other cultures do not perceive time as a linear and uniform phenomenon and their time calendars consist of multiple and simultaneously existing time categories. These categories may include ‘practical time’, ‘social time’, ‘religious time’, etc. Many indigenous cultures do not perceive time as linear and describe it as having a ‘circular’ or ‘cyclic’ form. Time is perceived as ‘static’ and the individual person is believed to be ‘in the centre of time’ (i.e., surrounded by concentric ‘time circles’). Life events are placed in time along and across the ‘time circles’ according to their relative importance to the individual and his or her respective community. For example, more important events are placed closer to the individual and are perceived as being closer in time; unimportant or irrelevant are placed in peripheral time circles, although they may have happened more recently according to linear concept time. In a study of concept of time in aboriginal Australians, Janca and Bullen (2003) showed that the Aboriginal view of time differs from the Judeo-Christian linear approach in a number of ways. For Aboriginal people, time is multidimensional and can be described “as a pond you can swim through – up, down, around.” In the aboriginal concept of time, it could not be viewed as purely functional groups of seconds, minutes and hours. Aboriginal people saw time as “being around you at every moment. You can’t pull time apart or separate it”. This conception of time is decidedly at odds with the psychological arrow of time that is considered to be a universal human perception. Phenomenology of Time In 1927, Heidegger published his critically important Being and Time, in which he attempted to use the phenomenological method to interpret the meaning of human existence (Clark, 2001). Of special interest was his emphasis on the way that past, present, and future aspects coexist and interpenetrate. This theory offered an alternative to the scientific conception of time as a serial order of three phases of past, present, and future, each of which can be isolated from another, and all of which are merely arbitrary ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness 577 linguistic notations for qualitatively similar segments of a continuous series of measurable bits. Husserl refined this notion of phenomenological time further. Using his phenomenological methods, Husserl analyzed time in his Lectures on the Phenomenology of Internal Time Consciousness (1928/1964). Husserl distinguishes between objective time in the world, inner time of experience, and a deeper consciousness of inner time. He argued that the deep time consciousness permits experience to have a temporal character, and provides the ultimate context for the identity of the ego as a temporally extended being. He used the perception of music as an example in his investigation. Though there are multiple disjointed notes in a piece of music, our mind perceives them as a smooth progression. If we were to become aware of all the notes at once, it would be a cacophony and not a symphony. Similarly, we organize separable units of experiential entities in the continuous modalities of past, present, and future. Merleau-Ponty (in Matthews, 2002) sets aside the conception of a ‘chronometric’ time. He traces time to memory or rather forgetting of the memory. Using the Heraclitus metaphor that one cannot step in the same river twice, he envisioned time as a river but this river is not coming from the past, passing through the present, and going to the future. Instead the river is static but we are moving in it. He explains that his apparent flow of time is a product of our “surreptitiously putting into the river a witness of its course”. It is only by considering ourselves as separate and distinct from the rest of the universe, that we perceive time as changing. In other words, we forget to place ourselves and our connections into the picture. Thus, objective time itself may be explained by the subjective experience of time. Neurophysiology of Time Perception Unlike for senses of sight, sound, touch and smell, there are no sensory organs to perceive duration. How then are intervals, durations, and sequences coded in the brain? Despite its importance to behavioral sciences, the neural bases of time perception remain a mystery. Much of what we know about time perception in the brain emerges from psychophysical experiments. One class of studies involves ways in which time perception distorts: for example, during brief, dangerous events, such as car accidents and robberies, many people report that events pass in slow motion as if time slowed down. Other studies have been able to quantify distorted time judgments during rapid eye movements (Eagleman, 2005; Morrone et al., 2005) or after adaptation to flickering or moving stimulation (Kanai & Verstraten, 2005). Several empirical studies have related disorders of temporal experience to abnormal psychological functioning in schizophrenia, depression and anxiety. Unspecified breakdown in the ‘biological clock’ has been proposed as a mechanism for disordered time perception (Prabhu et al., 1969). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness 578 In a series of experiments done since 1950s, Libet (e.g., 1979) was able to demonstrate a “backward causation” in the brain. Libet found that the awareness of the decision of a motor action in his study subjects came about 200 ms before the motor action had started as evidenced by EEG readings. Thus it appears that in the brain there may be a mechanism to transfer the information “backwards in time,” so that we act first but later on may retroactively “decide on the action.” Conclusions: Consciousness and Time Consciousness like time is difficult to define. What St. Augustine remarked about time can be equally true of consciousness, that when no one asked him, he knew what time was; however when someone asked him, he did not (in Smart, 1972). One of the key features of consciousness is what seems to be temporal synchrony — in contrast to the idea that our conscious perceptions are non-synchronized (Dennett, 1991). In fact at any given time nervous system is bombarded by a wide variety of visual, auditory and tactile input. What we perceive as the external reality is in fact the organization and interpretation of this sensory data and is one of the fundamental aspects of consciousness. As Julian Barbour has argued time may be a collage of haphazardly arranged moments whose continuity is an illusion of memory. Thus, it seems that time is a creation of consciousness. Henri Bergson attributed time to the innermost dimension of consciousness. Andrei Linde used the insight by Kluza and Klein about the possibility of large extra dimensions to develop a theory of consciousness, according to this view consciousness has a special extra dimension or “brane” in the super-string theory, thus the ordinary space time becomes a part of the “hyperspace” organized by consciousness (Smythies, 2003). Similar ideas are expounded by Penrose and Hameroff. In their Orchestrated Objective Reduction (Orch-OR) model, Hameroff (1996) conceptualizes consciousness as successsive quantum superposition of the tubulin protein conformations in the brain. He proposes that with each conscious moment, “a new organization of Planck scale geometry is selected irreversibly”. This leads to apparent illusion of time. Thus without consciousness, there would be no time. References Aharonov, Y., & Bohm, D. (1959). Significance of electromagnetic potentials in quantum theory. Physical Review, 115:485-491. Barbour, J. (1999). The end of time: The next revolution in Physics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, . Clark, T. (2001). Martin Heidegger. Routledge. Dennett, D. (1991). Consciousness explained. Boston: Little Brown. DeWitt, B. S. (1967). Quantum theory of gravity: I. The canonical theory," Physical Review, 160:1113. Durkheim, E. (1965). The elementary forms of religious life. New York: Free Press. Original 1915. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 573-579 Malik, M. & Hipolito, M. Time and its Relationship to Consciousness 579 Eagleman, D.M. (2005). Distortions of time during rapid eye movements. Natural Neuroscience, 8:850-851. Freud, S. (1901). The psychopathology of everyday Life. New York: Norton. Freud, S. (1925). The interpretation of dreams. Standard Edition 4. London: Hogarth. Geertz, C. (1973). The interpretation of cultures: selected essays by Clifford Geertz. New York: Basic Books. Hameroff, S.R., & Penrose, R. (1996). Orchestrated reduction of quantum coherence in brain microtubules: A model for consciousness. In S.R. Hameroff, A. Kaszniak, & A.C. Scott (eds.), Toward a science of consciousness: The first tucson discussions and debates. MIT Press. Husserl, E. (1964). The phenomenology of internal time-consciousness. Nijhoff, The Hague: Nijhoff. Original 1928. Janca, A., & Bullen, C. (2003). The Aboriginal concept of time and its mental health implications. Australasian Psychiatry, 11(Suppl1), S40-S44. Kanai, R., & Verstraten, F. (2005). Visual motion dilates the time. Paper presented at Ninth Annual Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness, Pasadena, CA, June. Libet, B., et al. (1979). Subjective referral of the timing for a conscious sensory experience. Brain, 102:193224. Lorentz, et al. (1952), Space And time, a translation of an address delivered at the 80th Assembly of German Natural Scientists and Physicians, at Cologne, 21 Sep 1908. In H.A. Lorentz, H. Weyl, H. Minkowski, et al., The Principle of Relativity: A Collection of Original Memoirs on the Special and General Theory of Relativity. Mach, E. (1960). The science of mechanics (trans. from the German). Open Court. Matthews, E. (2002). The philosophy of Merleau-Ponty. Acumen Publishing. Morrone, M.C., Ross, J., & Burr, D. (2005). Saccadic eye movements cause compression of time as well as space. Natural Neuroscience, 8:950-954. Poincare, H. (1898). La mesure du temps. Rev. Metaphys. Morale 6 1; English translation: \”The measure of time," in: Poincare H The Value of Science. Prabhu, G. G., Agrawal, A. K., & Teja, J. S. (1969). Effect of anxiety and depression on time estimation and judgment. Indian Psychological Review, 6, 16-21. Smart, J.C.C. (1972). Time (pp 126-134). In The Encyclopedia of Philosophy. London: CollierMacMillan. Smythies J. (2003). Space, time and consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 10(3): 47– 56. The Oxford Combined Dictionary of Current English and Modern English Usage (1982), London: Octopus Books. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 529 Research Essay Special Relativity and Perception The Singular Time of Psychology and Physics Stephen E. Robbins* Abstract1 The Special Theory of Relativity (STR) holds sway as a theory of time due to its apparently successful predictive structure regarding time-related phenomena such as the increased life spans of mesons or retarded clocks on jets circling the globe, and due to the relativization of simultaneity intrinsic to this theoretical structure. Yet the very structure of the theory demands that such very real physical effects be construed as non-ontological. The scope and depth of this contradiction is explored and, if these timechanges are indeed viewed as ontological effects within STR, an additional problem for the theory is introduced in the context of perception. The origins of this confused situation arise as a result of the fact that STR is an expression of a classical, spatial metaphysic – a framework that equally underpins current discussions of the hard problem. This metaphysic holds an inadequate concept of time and a failure to acknowledge the reality of simultaneous causal flows. These problems are developed against the background of an alternative, namely, the temporal metaphysic of Bergson – a framework that provides a profoundly different base for viewing both relativity and consciousness. Key Words: special theory of relativity, perception, singular time, psychology, classical, spatial, temporal, Bergson. 1.0 Introduction Physicists mislead us when they say there is no simultaneity. When the camera pans to the heroine tied to the rails and then to the hero rushing to the rescue on his horse – these events are simultaneous. (James J. Gibson2) * Correspondence: Stephen E. Robbins, PhD, Center for Advanced Product Engineering, Fidelity National Information Services / W126 N7449 Flint Drive / Menomonee Falls, WI 53051 Email: Stephen.Robbins@FISglobal.com 1 This paper is the essence of a talk entitled, “Special relativity and perception: Bergson’s debate with Einstein,” presented at Thinking in time: Henri Bergson (an interdisciplinary conference). UCLA-Berkeley, April, 2005. 2 Gibson, the highly respected theorist of perception, made this statement in a talk at the University of Minnesota in 1975. He had read a paper by the author the previous day which at the time accepted Capek's (1966) view that relativity adequately preserves the “becoming” of the universe, and which attempted to fold in psychological time as part of the relativistic structure of time. Gibson, however, appeared to have none of this. He is in effect alluding to the concept of the simultaneity of flows of time, a subject discussed at length by Bergson in Duration and Simultaneity (1922/1965) in his analysis of relativity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 530 In 1922, Henri Bergson engaged with Einstein in a spontaneous discussion under the auspices of the Société de Philosophie (Gunter, 1969, pp. 123-135). Acquiescing to an invitation to make an impromptu comment, Bergson noted, in the course of about 15 minutes of remarks, that the concept of universal time arises from our own “proper” or experienced time in our immediate environment. He drew attention to the concept of the simultaneity of flows. Our experience of simultaneity, he observed, arises from our experience of multiple flows within a single flow, whether it be multiple race cars racing side by side down the track, multiple melody lines within a single flow of a symphony, multiple musicians playing on the symphony stage, multiple women cooking in the kitchen, multiple family members eating at the table, a boat floating down a river with geese flying overhead, or Gibson’s hero coming to the rescue of a struggling heroine (using my own examples). This experience of multiple simultaneous flows within a single experienced flow is generalized to other perceivers, ultimately, he argued, to our concept of a universal flow of time. Further, this intuitive notion of simultaneity supports the very concept of relating an event to a specific time instant on a clock (as for example where an observer must relate a lightning bolt and a clock hand at 3PM as occurring simultaneously). Now, he noted, a microbe observer could say to our observer that these two events (clock hand at 3PM, lightning bolt) are not “neighboring” events at all, but are vastly distant and would not be simultaneous to a moving microbe observer. Nevertheless, to paraphrase his conclusion, he felt that this intuitive simultaneity must underlie the possibility of any time measurement at all in relativity, and was in fact the basis for reconciling the two notions. Einstein's reply is worthy of complete quote: The question is therefore posed as follows: is the time of the philosopher the same as that of the physicist? The time of the philosopher is both physical and psychological at once; now, physical time can be derived from consciousness. Originally individuals have the notion of simultaneity of perception; they can hence understand each other and agree about certain things they perceive; this is a first step towards objective reality. But there are objective events independent of individuals, and from the simultaneity of perceptions one passes to that of events themselves. In fact, that simultaneity led for a long time to no contradiction [is] due to the high propagational velocity of light. The concept of simultaneity therefore passed from perceptions to objects. To deduce a temporal order in events from this is but a short step, and instinct accomplished it. But nothing in our minds permits us to conclude to the simultaneity of events, for the latter are only mental constructions, logical beings. Hence there is no philosophers time; there is only a psychological time different from that of the physicist. (Gunter, 1969, p. 133) This was the totality of the interchange. And so it rests. Bergson's position is, to say the least, a minority opinion. Einstein's "time of the physicist" has been the accepted criterion of reality. The simultaneity of perception is considered, at best, suspect, and in practice, invalid. Stein (1991) essentially reprised and expanded Einstein’s argument, attempting to explain ongoing misconceptions of relativity, as he saw them, in terms of our continued naïve belief in the perception of simultaneous events – an illusion based on the high velocity of light. Thus, he argued in essence, the naïve or intuitive simultaneity that perception provides is founded upon the “fleeting motions” of “masses of elements” in the brain, all subject to the limitation of communication via the velocity of light, and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 531 implying therefore that at a small enough scale of time, perceptive simultaneity would break down. This is, in fact, a curious state of affairs. Let us allow that Stein expresses Einstein's view in somewhat extended form. Then this exposition of relativity and its inherent, relativized simultaneity of events entails, or at least places a fundamental constraint upon a theory of perception (cf. Hagan & Hirafuji, 2001). Stein is assuming a model, admittedly sketchy, of the processes in the brain underlying perception. Perception, however, is simply part and parcel of what Chalmers (1995) dubbed the "hard problem," i.e., the explanation of conscious experience, the “world-out-there” in depth, in volume, in quality. As the problem fundamentally involves our consciousness, the problem surely cannot be divorced from our model of time. It is a problem become ever more acute, far more so than realized in Einstein’s time and even just becoming so in Stein’s time. Neither Stein nor Einstein could claim to have a solution. We can ask an interesting question: what if the solution to the hard problem intrinsically relies on the simultaneity of events? Bergson had such a solution. As I have discussed it extensively elsewhere (Robbins, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004a, 2004b, 2006a, 2006b, 2007, 2009, in press a), I will only be giving a sketch here. Sufficient it is to say that this theory contains a prediction in the sphere of perception/action that contradicts the Special Theory, though it is a contradiction if and only if physics holds that the relativization of simultaneity is a real property of time, i.e., a real, ontological property of the matter-field and its temporal evolution. But this is the problem. 1.1 The Problematic Status of Relativistic Effects Let me begin with an overview of the status of physical effects assigned to STR. It is a difficult topic, one which faces every student of the subject. Relativity, it is well known, contains a feature which sees space units contracting and time units expanding depending on the motion of an observer. The most famous example is the twin paradox. In this case, twin Y leaves the earth at high speed in a rocket while his brother, twin X, stays on the earth. X is considered the stationary twin; he is at rest relative to Y. In motion at high velocity, Y’s units of time, according to relativity, expand. Simultaneously, his space units contract. Because his time units are so much larger, he uses fewer of them, and when he returns to earth, he has aged less than his brother X. In this paradox, then, the expansion of time units and contraction of space units is considered very real. If the earth-based twin has a long beard, grey hair, and occupies a wheel chair, and the rocket-riding twin returns looking like Brad Pitt at twenty, well, we have a very real, a very physical, effect. These expansions and contractions, then, have ontological status. If this is the case, Einstein’s “relativization of simultaneity” must be very real too. What is the relativization of simultaneity? It relates to fundamental problems of measurement. Suppose, Einstein had argued, two lightning bolts strike on either side of you, fortunately a safe one thousand meters away. You happen to have two very accurate stop watches in either hand. Both are perfectly synchronized to the millisecond. You click to stop each of them when you see the light from each bolt out of the corner of your eye. You are a very fast and accurate “clicker.” Behold, both watches show the same time. Further, you measure the distance from where you stood to the point where each bolt hit the ground. The distances are exactly equal. Assuming the light from each bolt traveled at the same velocity to your eyes, then the two bolts must have hit simultaneously. They traveled the same distance at the same speed, so they must have hit at the same time in order for you to have stopped both your watches at the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 532 same time. Therefore you judge these two lightning bolt events to be simultaneous. So far so good. But suppose another observer, we’ll call him Observer Two, is moving on a large flying disc (his reference system) at some velocity right past where you stand. Observer Two is moving on an exact line towards the bolt on your left and away from the bolt on your right. He too has two synchronized stop watches. Note, however, that for this moving observer, the light from the bolt on the left must strike him a little sooner since he is traveling towards it, while the light from the bolt on the right gets to him a little later since he is moving away from it. He stops his two watches at different times. He declares the two-lightening bolt events not simultaneous. Surely, we ask, he must know that he is moving! This explains the difference easily. But, said Einstein, perhaps he does not know that he is moving. Perhaps he thinks he is at rest. Perhaps he really is at rest. Perhaps it is you who are moving. How do we know? This became the essence of the first of two major postulates proposed by Einstein and which underpin his theory. The postulate is stated as, “the laws of physics are the same (invariant) in all inertial (reference) frames.” It can equally be called the “reciprocity of reference systems.” It implies that any observer has the right to declare himself at rest and all others in motion with respect to him. There is no way to tell who is right. The second postulate is the invariance of the velocity of light in all inertial frames. Where do the expanded time units and contracted space units come from? Well, since Observer Two doesn’t realize he is in motion (according to you), his clocks are not actually in sync. The method by which he must synchronize his clocks, Einstein showed, would be affected by his motion. One of his clocks will lag behind the other. Because of this, his measurements of distance and time within his own system will be affected. Einstein derived equations to allow us, as Observer One, to coordinate Observer Two’s measurements of distances and times to our measures, in fact to specify what his measurements will look like in his system in terms of distance and time values. Central to the equations is a constant for both systems – the velocity of light. Applying these equations to Observer Two and his reference system, we would assign him expanded time units relative to ours. We would also assign him contracted distance units. At this point, one can intuitively understand why these distance and time change phenomena might be called “measurement differences.” They are seeming squabbles over clock settings due to motion, but the problem of just who is in motion is very real. Observer Two, invoking reciprocity and declaring himself to be the system “at rest,” can of course use the same equations for our system and for our distance and time values, claiming we are in motion and our clocks are out of sync. Note what this implies for the simultaneity of events. The strikes of the two lightning bolts are relativized. They happen at the same time for one observer, at different times for another. Events that seem simultaneous to us may not be for another person. This means that what are simultaneous events for one observer may be successive events for another. This is to say, drilling down, that two simultaneous events for one observer, may, for another, be one event in his future, the other in his past. But what does this mean for the flow of time? What is the classical conception of time? The advance of time traditionally involved the vision of the “time-growth” of the universe along some universally defined plane we call the "universal present." Were we to build a “space-time solid” in three-dimensions, letting the third dimension represent time, we could build one with (very thin) bread slices. Each slice represents all of 3-D space taken at an instant in time. We proceed, adding slice by slice to the “front end,” gradually building a time-solid “loaf.” The universal present is reduced rather mundanely to a slice of bread in this exercise. The ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 533 flat surface of each slice is the universal “plane” of the present. In the classical conception, everyone’s “present” is on this plane. All simultaneous events live on this plane. To us, the two lightning bolt strikes were on this plane. Any event not on this plane is either in the past, or the future – for all beings. Figure 1. Planes of simultaneity in the space-time solid. But now we have the relativistic fact that what are simultaneous events for one observer might be successive events for another. This implies different planes of simultaneity. It can be visualized as slices at different angles through our time-loaf. For observer X, with a plane sliced at a certain angle (Figure 1), certain events which he is experiencing as simultaneous events comprising his "present" can yet lie in the future for observer Y, while others lie in Y's past. This vision of different futures and pasts for observers moving relative to one another makes it extremely difficult to conceive of a "universal becoming" with its vision of the growth of the universe in time along the plane of the "universal present." The conversion of simultaneities to successions, and successive events to simultaneous events, presents a troublesome difficulty for this classical conception, for the "plane of the universal present" seems to have disappeared – a single vertical slice cannot properly represent the “present.” There is, however, a natural route out of this dilemma, and it is simply to deny that there is any universal becoming, any motion of time, and to move instead to a conception of a static universe. Einstein’s great collaborator, the mathematician Herman Minkowski, made statements that were the most famously conducive to this view. “Henceforth space by itself, and time by itself, are doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind of union of the two will preserve an independent reality.” This conception is commonly called the “block universe.” In it, there is no motion of time. All is given, past, present, future, in one giant block. This is a very common interpretation of relativistic space-time. But let us remember, the ontological reality of this static block model entirely depends on the relativity of simultaneity being a fact. All depends on this relativization being a real property of the time-evolution (which we can no longer coherently visualize) of the matter-field. On this in turn depends the reality of the expanded time intervals and contracted space intervals of the rocket-riding twin Y. On this, in its turn, depends the differential aging of the twins X and Y, or the retarded aging of twin Y, as a real, physical property of matter, and the grey beards and real wrinkles. 1.2 Space Changes as Non-Ontological ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 534 When one begins to study the special theory, this is the first question that arises: are the changes in time and space real? It is extremely perplexing, for there is much to say that they are not real, and much to say they are. Here is a comment by the prolific physicist and physics writer, Paul Davies: How could the same thing [aging] happen at different rates?' I asked myself. I formed the impression that speed somehow distorts clock rates, so that the time dilation was some sort of illusion – an apparent rather than a real effect. I kept wanting to ask which twin experienced real time and which was deluded. ... I had to admit I could not visualize time running at two different rates and I took this to mean that I did not understand the theory. … It was then that I realized why I had been confused. So long as I could imagine the time dilation and other effects actually happening and could work out the quantities involved, that was all that was needed. (Davies & Gribbons, 1992, pp. 100-101) It is not comforting to see the mechanical resolution he finally accepts, simply “doing the equations.” But the contradictions are deep. Consider the initial and critical experiment to which the theory was applied, the famous 1895 experiment of Michelson and Morley. Michelson and Morley were trying to ascertain the speed of the earth through the ether. The ether was considered the all pervading, universal, fluid-like substance or medium through which energy is transmitted. Energy was considered to be propagated in waves. A wave requires some medium to ripple, in fact a wave is simply a ripple propagating through the medium. Without something like the ether, there could be no waves of energy. The earth was conceived as though it were a huge boat plowing through the ether, creating a bow wave or current. The Michelson-Morley experimental apparatus (Figure 2) sent out two light waves at right angles to each other. One went against the current, one went crosswise to the current. Figure 2. The Michelson-Morley apparatus (1895). The earth was conceived as a boat plowing thru the ether, creating an ether current or flow. The pipes/arms of the apparatus are equal in length, and an emitted light wave is split in both directions. The light wave traveling through the pipe in the direction of the current and back should have taken longer, creating an interference pattern or fringe between the two waves. However, no interference was observed; each wave takes the same time, creating a problem for the existence of the ether. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 535 When they ran their experiment, they obtained a strange result. The light ray running in the direction of the ether current and back should have taken longer than the light ray running crosswise. It did not; both rays took equal times. The result could be explained if the arm of the apparatus, in the direction of motion, in line with the ether flow, shrunk slightly, just enough to compensate for the theoretically larger time of travel of the light ray going though it. The light ray cheats by having a shorter course. Is such a contraction of the arm of the Michelson-Morley apparatus real, a physical fact? Let us remember that Hendrik Lorentz, a highly respected physicist of the time, some years before Einstein’s publication, originally proposed that it was indeed real. He advanced ether-based, electro-dynamical arguments in support of equations he developed for the foreshortening of the apparatus-arm in the direction of motion as a function of velocity. His equations expressed the degree of contraction and accounted for the same travel-times. The equations looked exactly like Einstein’s. But the contraction was unappealing to physics; it was rejected, or at least never accepted. Why was Einstein’s “contraction,” using precisely the same equations, accepted? Because the length became a space-time invariant. How does the length become such an invariant? By being subject to the reciprocal transformations of two observers in two different reference systems, either of which can consider himself at rest and the other in motion. Einstein’s perceived advance was to embed the Lorentz transformations within this symmetric, reciprocal framework, together with postulating the invariance of the velocity of light. Indeed, Einstein wished that his theory had been named “Invariantentheorie,” rather than relativity (cf. Horton, 2000). In special relativity, the Lorentz transformations have no meaning with respect to just one observer. There is no invariance with just one observer. Some form of transformation is required for an invariant. This symmetric system is required, and within it, either observer can declare himself at rest, and then attribute the length contraction to the other (in motion), adjusting the other’s space and time units to preserve the invariance of the velocity of light. Therefore as A. P. French (1968) states in his textbook on relativity, the length contraction is not a real property of matter, it is a measurement effect, “something inherent in the measurement process” (p. 114). In the textbooks I studied in the 1970s, the explanations of length contraction routinely told this story. The length contraction is not real. It is an effect of measurement only. The length is a space-time invariant, but no single observer has a claim on knowing the “true length.” The student is warned not to fall into “the length contraction is real” trap. In truth, we must remember, there is little choice. To say that it is a real effect is to say that the Michelson-Morley apparatus arm is actually contracting somehow. This is to revert back to Lorentz and his hypothesized contraction, an explanation in fact with a real, physical model at its base – the very thing physics refused previously to accept. 1.3 Time Changes as Ontological But as soon as the textbook turned to expanded time units or time dilation, the story was different. The problem was that there were real, physical phenomena for which time dilation appeared to be physics’ only available explanation. Mesons, for example, are particles that have a certain lifespan. At rest, they exist for a certain measurable period before they decay away. When moving at high velocity, they exist for a longer period. When Lorentz’s original equations are applied in this case, the increased time is perfectly predicted. Therefore time dilation is considered a quite real effect. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 536 If there is a doubt that this is considered a very real effect, we can propose a test. We could set up a tiny electric switch a distance from the start of the meson’s motion. The distance is just long enough that if the electron is not living any longer beyond it normal rest life, it won’t set off the switch, but if it is living longer, it makes it to the switch and sets off an alarm clock. The ringing clock is a very real effect. Physics would quite surely accept that the meson will ring the clock. The slow-aging Y twin with the grey and bearded X twin is simply another case of the time-dilation being considered a real effect. There is just one problem with all this. It ignores the reciprocity of reference systems. A tiny physicist on the meson should be able to say, “I’m not in motion, you are. I will never make the clock ring.” The rocketriding Y twin has perfect right to declare himself at rest, and the X twin in motion. The fact that he is on the rocket is of no account. The rocket engines could be considered to be holding the rocket’s place in space as the earth moves away from the rocket, but in truth, the mathematics of relativity is abstract and these physical considerations are irrelevant. Only the abstract reciprocity of reference systems is important. So now it is the X twin who ages less. So for whom is the aging less? X or Y? Has time really changed? Or should we just be saying that aging period too is a space-time invariant, just as the length contraction?3 But fast forward. An experiment was ultimately performed in which a clock was put on a jet and flown at great speed. When the jet landed, the clock was compared to a previously synchronized counterpart left on the ground. The jet-carried clock lagged behind. The Lorentz equation for the expanded time-interval accounted for the difference – another triumph for relativity. When the experimenters stepped off the jet with their retarded clock, no one on the ground stepped forward and argued that in actuality the plane was at rest and the earth moving at extreme speed relative to the jet, thus it is the earth-based observers’ clocks that should be retarded. Why not? Because obviously it is absurd. These are very real effects. They cannot be made to go away by invoking reciprocity. If the longer-living meson rings the alarm clock, the ringing is very real, it cannot be said that clock isn’t ringing by suddenly remembering reciprocity. The bearded twin, should it happen, would be very real, and the beard would not go away by remembering reciprocity. The symmetry implied by reciprocity clearly has been broken. 1.4 Space Changes as Non-Ontological – Again As far as I can ascertain, in the 1980s (perhaps earlier) another paradox began appearing in the textbooks called the “pole-barn” paradox. The “paradox” notion was now being applied to the length contraction. In this paradox, we have a longish, say, telephone pole. In its resting state, it is too long to fit into a certain barn. However, when the pole is launched into motion at a velocity near the speed of light and flies through the barn, there is a period where the pole, due its length contraction, actually fits into the barn. But this paradox is used as a parable for illustrating that we should not consider these real effects. It is unhesitatingly pointed out that the barn could be conceived to be in motion, and therefore the barn will contract. Now the pole does not fit. So the length contractions are not real, or in philosophical terms, they have no ontological status. This nicely holds the line with the interpretation of the MichelsonMorley experiment. 3 It was Langevin’s 1911 announcement of the twin-paradox that alarmed Bergson. He viewed this as an inappropriate interpretation and application of STR, voiding its invariance apsects. This precipitated his 1922 analysis (Duration and Simultaneity). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 537 One could ask something however. Just like the jet-carried clock experiment, why not perform a pole-barn experiment? We could rig a mini barn-like apparatus with frontend and back-end doors that open and shut at great speed, or some analogy. The device would capture a mini-pole moving at high velocity precisely when it fits inside due to its length contraction. If we can so unhesitatingly predict that the jet-carried clock will slow down, why would we not predict that the mini-pole would contract and be trapped in the barn? But this would be admitting that the length contraction too is a very real effect. It would signal the end of any pretense of usage of the reciprocity of reference systems aspect of the special theory. At present, physics deploys the reciprocity feature for length contractions, and unhesitatingly dumps the feature for time-expansion. It therefore rejects the relativization of simultaneity as real and simultaneously (or not simultaneously?) accepts the relativization of simultaneity as real along with its block universe implication. Those knowledgeable in this area may say, “But the twin paradox must be assigned to the General Theory (GTR).” This is due, it is thought (by some), to the accelerations involved with the rocket. Einstein’s General Theory, developed after STR, deals with gravity and acceleration. This is obviously questionable on face value. If it is the twin’s beard, i.e., the real, physical, obviously non-symmetric effect displayed in the aging that we are worried about, then the jet-carried clock and the meson’s increased life spans must be sent to the GTR as well. These are just as real and just as non-symmetric. But I will deal with this later. Suffice it to say for now that this gambit only adds to the confusion. One quickly discovers that there is an “explanatory pea” shuffling between the General Theory and the Special Theory. 1.5 The Question for the Problem of Consciousness Already a theory of consciousness has appeared (Smythies, 2003a) that assumes the standard vision of the implications of special relativity for time, namely that of the space-time block. Weyl, a physicist contemporary of Einstein, expresses the implications of space-time unambiguously: The scene of action of reality is not a three-dimensional Euclidean space, but rather a four-dimensional world, in which space and time are linked together indissolubly. However deep the chasm may be that separates the intuitive nature of space from that of time in our experience, nothing of this qualitative difference enters into the objective world which physics attempts to crystallize out of direct experience. … Only the consciousness that passes on in one portion of this world experiences the detached piece which comes to meet it and passes behind it, as history… (Weyl, 1922, p. 217, emphasis added) Weyl’s statement, implying that the experienced passage of time has no objective counterpart, would have had revolutionary implications had it truly been taken to heart. But relativists themselves do not seem to have been entirely clear on the implications of the concept of space-time, and the meaning of these statements had perhaps more radical ramifications than anyone cared to make clear to anyone. We will briefly examine these. The ‘Psychical’ Observer The extensions of time-extended objects are usually called "world-lines" in relativity theory, or sometimes “tracks.” “An individual,” says Eddington, “is a four-dimensional object of greatly elongated form. In ordinary language, we say that he has considerable extension in time and insignificant extension in space. Practically, he is represented by ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 538 a line – his track through the world” (Eddington, 1966, p. 57). The last five words – “his track through the world” – as Dunne (1927) pointed out, make his statement appear like hedging, for we must ask how the line can be both the observer and the observer's path. But Eddington makes clear within the same page that the track is indeed coincident with the observer, i.e., is the observer himself. “A natural body,” he says, “extends in time as well as space, and is therefore four-dimensional” (p. 57). Now the first problem that presents itself is the experience of the passage of time that humanity universally shares. If everything is given, if the universe simply exists as a four-dimensional, static block of space-time, then motion has become non-existent. “Changes then correspond to individuals moving along world-lines” – this is the acknowledgment of our experience of time's motion. But just what are these individuals? To any observer viewing such a system of fixed tracks or world-lines, the appearance of motion in the dimensions representing space could be produced by the movement of a three-dimensional field of observation along a track or fourth dimension orthogonal to the other three. Thus the field would simply "come across" events (as does the 1-D field of Figure 3). This time-traveling field of observation we can provisionally term a "psychical" observer, for the physical observer is defined as the track traveled over. This is exactly the move Smythies (2003a) accepted and utilized, envisioning “consciousness modules” moving along these tracks. Figure 3. One-dimensional field traversing events in a 2-D universe The relativists had a complex case to present, and the burden of a psychical observer, had it explicitly been acknowledged, would probably have been too much to bear. Not wanting to ignore the motion of time, however, expositors of this particular notion of space-time leave us with the non-committal statement indicating that the observer moves along his track, from which the reader may infer what he pleases. The reader usually proceeds to infer that the observer is nothing more than an organic, physical apparatus, and that this physical apparatus moves over its nebulous track in the fourth dimension. Obviously, however, a track that possessed reality to such an extent as to account for the physical characteristics of an imagined 3-D object moving along it would be, in every one of its cross-sections, physically indistinguishable from the object. Physically the track is the object extended four-dimensionally. Anything which we would consider moving along the track must differ from the track itself. Speaking of a body such as a clock or light ray moving over its track is conducive only to confusion, for the clock is physically a bundle of tracks and cannot move over itself. Some philosophers, such as J.J.C. Smart (1967), have noted this inconsistency. Yet, respecting the static, "all is given” nature of the four-dimensional manifold, have voted solidly in favor of the concept that “there is no time." They see the passage of time as a pure illusion. Unfortunately, while they scoff at the absurdity of a psychical ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 539 observer or of “consciousness running along world-lines,” they offer little to put in its place. You must at least offer a "theory of the illusion." Even while Smart is writing his essays on time, his hand fatiguing, the ideas flowing by, he is experiencing the "illusion" in all its trickery. Whence then does the experience of the "passage" of time arise? At least the admittedly mysterious psychical observer tried to answer the question. A Scale-less Manifold But there is yet another thing, for we have no right to assign any particular time-scale to this manifold. We cannot envision it as it would appear to normal perception, for this perception already entails a summation over a vast history of events. If the event/worldlines the psychical observer is crossing comprise a “buzzing” fly, the choice of scales is infinite. The fly can be merely a phase in a field of vibrating strings, an ensemble of electrons/protons with no precise boundary, a fly slowly flapping his wings, or the buzzing fly of our normal perception. We would then have to account for the means whereby the time-traveling field determines scales. Smythies would envision his traveling consciousness module as projecting a camera-like mechanism into the brain, observing the brain-tracks (Smythies, 2003b). Again, what scale is the “camera” observing – quarks, molecular activity, chemical flows? And how are any of these – quarks or whatever – unfolded into the world of golf balls and putting greens? This is simply what I have termed elsewhere (Robbins, 2002, 2007) the coding problem. How is the external world of golf balls and greens unfolded from this chemical/neural/atomic code? The contents of the tracks are supposedly projected on the consciousness module’s “screen.” Welcome to the homunculus, observing the screen. Nor are we clear why we seem to have a whole set of observation fields moving along in parallel and constituting humanity. Why are some of us not now fighting the Peloponnesian Wars – or are we? In any case, we could exhaust ourselves on the metaphysical, epistemological, and psychological facets of the static block reading of the implications of STR. Had psychology considered it seriously, an immediate question might have been: why are we storing memory in the brain? Clearly all events are preserved in the 4-D manifold, and the brain itself is vastly four-dimensional. If our psychic observer can go forwards, why not backwards too? Or is storage merely an illusion in the first place as we are merely coming across things that resemble past sections of the track, sections corresponding to remembering events? These and other questions might have occurred. One might wonder how STR can pose any dilemma for a theory of consciousness when relativistic effects such as time dilation only occur at any appreciable magnitude at extremely high velocities. The normal motion velocities of organisms seem such as to make STR’s effects irrelevant. However, the strange implications being noted here – the inability to account for the experienced motion of consciousness, the spectre of “psychical” observers as a questionable solution to this, the curious questions about memory – are all simply functions of taking a static, four-dimensional block model of space-time seriously. This model in turn only has a possible reality if we take the relativity of simultaneity seriously (as did Smythies), i.e., as having ontological status. Proposed STR-effects such as the twin-effect, even though occurring at extremely high velocities, cement in the ontological status of these effects, and therefore the reality of the relativity of simultaneity. It is not the “extremes,” for in the theory, the breakdown of simultaneity begins at the most minute of velocities. Further, as we shall see when reviewing the analysis of Hagan and Hirfjui (2001), whether or not the changes are taken as ontological, if STR is indeed valid, it places difficult constraints upon any theory of consciousness. Finally, in any case and regardless of discrepant orders of velocity, the Bergson model of perception, which I will briefly describe, generates a testable ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 540 prediction relative to action that contradicts an implication of STR, again, only if STR’s effects are taken as ontological. Let me state this emphatically: I am not denying the reality of increased life-spans of mesons, or retarded jet-carried clocks. These phenomena are very real. The crucial question is: how they are explained? If changes of space and time, as currently explained by the mathematics of relativity, are ontological, then the relativization of simultaneity must be real. We are forced to the static block universe. A theory of consciousness is then held by this constraint, despite the difficulties into which it would inevitably place psychological theory. Given all these immensely problematic and incomprehensible implications of the static block universe for a theory of consciousness, it is time to move to a different framework of thought on the subject. We shall now briefly view Bergson’s solution to the problem of conscious perception, a solution that goes to the source of STR’s problem. 2.0 Bergson and Time Let us begin with the heart of the difference between Bergson and Einstein. The “microbes” in Bergson’s comments are an index, in essence an index to the process of thought leading to the “objective” that Einstein must take to its logical conclusion. Bergson, in introducing them, had asked just what is the concept of “proximity” or “neighboring events” used in relativity to relate clocks to events? A microbe consciousness questions whether the clock and lightning bolt of the system of some observer are “neighboring.” A micro-microbe questions the microbe's judgment of what is “neighboring”; a micro-micro-microbe does the same to the micro-microbe, and so on. Logically, we are forced to take this to its conclusion. There can be no accepted judgment of neighboring (and therefore of simultaneity) as we descend scales until we end at the mathematical point. The mathematical point is the essence of complete abstraction. The question is, is time found at all at this abstract point-event? At the foundation of Bergson’s theory (1896/1912) was already a critique of the abstract space and time implied in Einstein’s theory-to-be. Abstract space, Bergson argued, is derived from the world of separate "objects" gradually identified by our perception. It is an elementary process, for perception must partition the continuous field that surrounds the body into objects upon which the body can act – to throw a "rock," to hoist a "bottle of beer." This fundamental perceptual partition into "objects" and "motions" is reified and extended in thought. The separate "objects" in the field are refined to the notion of the continuum of points or positions. As an object moves across this continuum, as for example, my hand moving across the desk from point A to point B, it is conceived to describe a trajectory – a line – consisting of the points or positions it traverses. Each point momentarily occupied is conceived to correspond to an "instant" of time. Thus arises the notion of abstract time – the series of instants – itself simply another dimension of the abstract space. This space, argued Bergson, is in essence a "principle of infinite divisibility." Having convinced ourselves that this motion is adequately described by the line/trajectory the object traversed, we can break up the line (space) into as many points as we please. But the concept of motion this implies is inherently an infinite regress. To account for the motion, we must, between each pair of points supposedly successively occupied by the object, re-introduce the motion, hence a new (smaller) trajectory of static points – ad infinitum. It is the core of Zeno and his paradoxes. Zeno, Bergson held, was forcing recognition of the logical implications of this infinitely divisible, abstract space and time. With each step, Achilles halves the distance between himself and the hare, but he never catches the hare; there is always a distance, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 541 no matter how minute, between pursuer and pursued. In the paradox of the arrow, the flying arrow occupies, at each instant, a static point in space, therefore, “it never moves.” In all four of the paradoxes, it is the infinitely divisible space traversed that is the focus. Motion, Bergson argued, must be treated as indivisible. We view the indivisible steps of Achilles through the lens of the abstract space traversed and then propose that each such distance can be successively halved – infinitely divided. Achilles, never reaches the hare. But Achilles moves in an indivisible motion; he indeed catches the hare.4 But the abstraction is further rarified. The motions are now treated as relative, for we can move the object across the continuum or the continuum beneath the object. Motion now becomes immobility dependent purely on perspective. All real, concrete motion of the universal field is now lost. But there must be real motion. Trees grow. People age. Stars grow cold. Galaxies collapse. Bergson would insist: Though we are free to attribute rest or motion to any material point taken by itself, it is nonetheless true that the aspect of the material universe changes, that the internal configuration of every real system varies, and that here we have no longer the choice between mobility and rest. Movement, whatever its inner nature, becomes an indisputable reality. We may not be able to say what parts of the whole are in motion, motion there is in the whole nonetheless. (1896/1912, p. 255) He would go on to note: Of what object, externally perceived, can it be said that it moves, of what other that it remains motionless? To put such a question is to admit the discontinuity established by common sense between objects independent of each other, having each its individuality, comparable to kinds of persons, is a valid distinction. For on the contrary hypothesis, the question would no longer be how are produced in given parts of matter changes of position, but how is effected in the whole a change of aspect.” (1896/1912, p. 259) Within the global motion of this whole, the "motions" of "objects" now become changes or transferences of state. The motion of this whole, this "kaleidoscope" as Bergson called it, cannot be treated as a series of discrete states. Rather, Bergson would argue, this motion is better treated in terms of a melody, the “notes” of which permeate and interpenetrate each other, the current “note” being a reflection of the previous notes of the series, all forming an organic continuity, a “succession without distinction,” a motion which is indivisible. In such a global motion, there is clearly simultaneity. The process of “objectification” which Einstein, in his response to Bergson, describes and accepts as leading us to the “real,” to objective events, and which leads Stein to his “fleeting motions” of masses of “elements,” is exactly the process warned of by Bergson. The “objects” of perception – purely practical partitions carved by the body's perception in the flowing universal field at a particular scale of time – are reified into the concept of 4 There is a mythology that these paradoxes have been resolved by Russell (1903) and/or modern mathematics. While Bergson showed that all four paradoxes have exactly the same root cause in an abstract space, Russell, having missed the point, actually accepted the fourth paradox as a physical reality. The mathematical “resolutions” are inherently limited to a spatial treatment and, in “taking a limit,” simultaneously invoke hand waving over infinity in the operation (cf. Bergson, 1907/1944, pp. 335-340). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 542 abstract, independent “objects” and their “motions,” and this is further rarified to “objective” space and time, with its objective, separable “events.” And following this path, Einstein is consistent. These “objective,” separate events are only mental constructs. They and their simultaneity are fully subject to the relativity logically inherent in their birth. 2.1 Physics on the Abstraction Hence, to Bergson, Einstein's “time of the physicist” is an artificial time. It can be argued, however, that this (artificial) path is exactly the opposite of what physics has found itself to be following. The concept of abstract space and time – this “projection frame” for thought originating in perception’s need for practical action – has been the obscuring layer that is slowly being peeled away. As Bergson argued, “...a theory of matter is an attempt to find the reality hidden beneath ... customary images which are entirely relative to our needs ...” (1896/1912, p. 254). The customary images are dissolving. The trajectory of a particle no longer exists in quantum mechanics. If attempting to determine through a series of measurements a series of instantaneous positions, simultaneously we renounce all grasp of the object's state of motion. In essence, as de Broglie (1947/1969) would note, the measurement is attempting to project the motion to a point in our abstract continuum, but in doing so, we have lost the motion. Motion cannot be treated as a series of “points,” i.e., immobilities. Thus Bergson noted, over forty years before Heisenberg, “In space, there are only parts of space and at whatever point one considers the moving object, one will obtain only a position” (Bergson 1889, p. 111). Lynds (2003), echoing Bergson, now argues that there is no precise, static instant in time underlying a dynamical physical process. If there were such, motion and variation in all physical magnitudes would not be possible, as they (and the universe itself) would be frozen static at that precise instant and remain that way. Consequently, at no time is the position of a body (or edge, vertex, feature, etc.) or a physical magnitude precisely determined in an interval, no matter how small, as at no time is it not constantly changing and undetermined. The inherent uncertainty introduced by this unceasing flow of time is the inescapable tradeoff required for the universe to change. It is only the human observer (enmeshed in the abstract space), Lynds notes, who imposes a precise instant in time upon a physical process. Indeed, Nottale (1996), noting Feynman and Hibb’s (1965) proof that the typical paths of quantum particles are continuous but nondifferentiable, now questions the fundamental assumption that space-time is differentiable, laying out a fractal approach to space-time, i.e., indivisible extents. The essence of differentiation – for a motion from A to B or the slope of a triangle – is division into ever smaller parts. A matter-field in a global motion, wherein the motions of objects are changes or transferences of state, implies a simultaneity of causal flows. It also implies a framework for the problem of perception. 2.2 The Classical, Spatial Metaphysic and the Hard Problem Abstract space and abstract time form what can be termed the “classical metaphysic.” STR dwells solidly within this metaphysic; it is only a refinement of the metaphysic’s implications. It is this metaphysic that resides behind the entire discussion of qualia and the hard problem (Robbins, in press a). As noted, the end result of this “principle of infinite division,” even could we legitimately conceive of an end of such an operation, ignoring the mathematical hand waving of taking a “limit,” would be at best a mathematical point. At such a point, there could exist no motion, no evolution in time of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 543 the field. Further, as every spatially extended “object” is subject to this infinite decomposition throughout the continuum, then we end with a completely homogeneous field of mathematical points. The continuum of mathematical points then, both spatially and temporally, can have no qualities – qualities at the least imply heterogeneity. That this is indeed the framework that the debate participants have tended to work within is attested to by a very common starting point, namely that the matter-field contains no qualities – objects have no color, there are no sounds, etc. This framework is also betrayed by the fact that the vast preponderance of examples of qualia are static – the “redness” of red, the taste of cauliflower, the feel of velvet, the smell of fresh cut grass. Seldom are qualities of motions ever discussed, e.g., the “twisting” of leaves, the “gyrations” of a wobbling, rotating cube, the “buzzing” of a fly. This glaring lack is coordinate with the fact that an abstract “time” that is simply another dimension of the infinitely divisible space is equally completely homogeneous. Any “motion” in this space, logically, has no duration greater than a mathematical point, then another point, then another. In fact, then, the debaters universally fail to realize that the perceived timeextents of these motions – the rotating cube, the buzzing fly, the whirling of the coffee surface with circling spoon – are equally qualities that arise, just as problematically as the “static” colors of objects, in the homogenous time dimension of infinitely divisible instants in this continuum (cf. Robbins, 2004a, 2007). Galileo, in initiating this metaphysic, equated the real with the quantitative (cf. Manzotti, 2008). Qualities, he felt, were contributions of the “living organism.” From this arose the distinction of primary and secondary properties of matter. Shape (form) is considered part of the quantitative realm and thus considered part of the “real,” not a quality therefore and not part of the hard problem. But the concept of a static instant is a fiction. This is why Galileo was even wrong when he assigned shape or form to his “quantitative” continuum, while thinking he was excluding qualities (contributions of the mind) therefrom. There is nothing static in the ever-transforming material field. The “edges,” “vertices” or “surfaces” of a rotating cube do not exist in an instant. Nor its color. There are no “instants.” The brain, simply a part of the ever transforming flux, cannot use in its computations what for it does not exist. Even form can only be derived by imposing constraints (invariance laws) over ever flowing fields (Figure 4). For a “Gibsonian” cube, the “edges” and “vertices” are but sharp discontinuities in these flows. Thus, Weiss, Simoncelli and Adelson (2002) argued, in developing a Bayesian model of form based on velocity flows, that form is always an optimal percept, based on the best available, but inherently uncertain, information. In essence, even the most veridical of forms is simultaneously an “illusion,” but yet the best partition of the transforming field the brain can offer. Figure 4. Optical flow field. A gradient of velocity vectors is created as an observer moves towards the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 544 mountains. The flow field “expands” as the observer moves. At right, the flow fields over the side of a rotating cube – expanding as the side rotates towards the observer, contracting as it rotates away, with the top a radial flow field. (Robbins, 2004a). “Form is only a snapshot of a transition,” said Bergson (1907/1944, p. 328). The eyes are continually in motion. Objects eventually disappear when, in experiments, the position of the object is fixed relative to retinal motion. The brain is at a loss in a static world. The brain is, and is embedded in, an ever flowing material field; it is tuned to this fundamental aspect of reality, and form is obtained by the application of constraints across these flow fields – information inherently uncertain due to the non-fixity. The misconception of “static” form, derived from the classic metaphysic and Galileo’s misassignment of form to the “quantitative,” underlies the qualia debate participants’ failure to grasp that the issue being addressed is the problem of the origin of the image of the external field. All seem to think that the origin of the image of the forms of the external world is no problem – these are easily “computable” and hence the image itself is no problem, only its “qualities.” They fail to grasp that the origin of the image of the forms in the field and of the objects in the field is just as much a problem as the (other) “qualities” of the field – the “rednesses,” the “velvets,” etc., etc. None of these is simply “computable.” It is the origin of our image of this field, any image, that is the problem. The brain is integrally a part of the abstract continuum of the classic metaphysic. Therefore, when light rays strike objects termed eyes in brain, the abstract, homogeneous motions of the external matter-field, all reducible in time-extent to mathematical points, simply continue in the portion of the field called the “brain.” Nowhere in the brain, taken as part of the abstract continuum, can there be anything but more homogeneous points/instants. There can be no actual time-extent of motions through the nerves, no “continuity of time-extended neural processes” – the logical time extent of any neural process is never more than a mathematical point, then another, then another. However one views these motions within the brain, e.g., as maintaining some structural correspondence or isomorphism relative to the always past transformations in the external field or as the processing of invariants in this structure of field motions relative to the body’s action systems, it changes nothing. Within the brain, taken as a part of this abstract, homogenous continuum, we can never derive qualities, whether qualities of objects (colors, smells) or of time-extended motions (ignoring that the “object” is a motion). We cannot explain how we see a cube “rotating” let alone a “blue” cube. Therefore, all qualia are logically forced, within this metaphysic, into the non-physical, or the mental, or somewhere, anywhere but the abstract continuum. But the step by which this generation of events unto and into another realm can occur, within the confines of the metaphysic, remains a dilemma. The structure of the metaphysic makes the step impossible, while leaving the nature of realms outside the structure – e.g., the “mental” – forever incapable of definition or of use to the science that currently operates precisely (though reluctantly less so) within this metaphysic. 2.3 Bergson on Perception Bergson’s “temporal metaphysic” is equally important to both physics and psychology. For psychology, it provides a very different framework for approaching the hard problem. In this temporal metaphysic, the indivisible or non-differentiable motion of the material field forms an elementary property of memory in the field’s motion – each (now past) ”instant” does not cease to exist as the next (the present) instant appears. It ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 545 is this “primary memory” – an attribute of the time-evolution of the material field – that supports our perception of “stirring” spoons, “twisting” leaves, “rotating” cubes. Quality is now inherent in this motion of the material field. At the null scale of time, the field is near the homogeneity envisioned by the classic metaphysic, but at ever larger scales of time where the oscillations of the field (e.g., the 400 billion/sec oscillations of the field as a “red” light wave) are “compressed” in the experience or glance of a moment, we obtain ever differentiating quality. Bergson realized in 1896 that this field is holographic – the state of each “point” in the field is the reflection of, carries information for, the whole. Noting that there is no “photograph” of the external field developed in the brain, he stated, “But is it not obvious that the photograph, if photograph there be, is already taken, already developed in the very heart of things and at all points in space. No metaphysics, no physics can escape this conclusion” (1896/1912, p. 31). But, as opposed to Pribram (1971), the brain is not simply a “hologram.” Rather, to place Bergson’s view in modern terms (Robbins, 2000, 2002, 2006a, 2006b, 2009, in press a), the brain is the modulated reconstructive wave “passing thru” the external, holographic matter-field. This brain-embodied reconstructive wave is specifying, always, an image of the past motion of the material field – a buzzing fly, a rotating cube. The fly’s wing-beats being specified have long gone into the “past,” but the indivisible motion of the field supports this past-specification. The image is right where it says it is – in the field. It is the field – the past of the field – at a specific scale of time. The brain dynamics supporting the specification determines this scale of time. The chemical velocities underlying these dynamics are responsible for this. Begin increasing these velocities (equivalently, the energy state) significantly – the fly transitions, from a buzzing fly, to a fly barely flapping his wings like a heron, to a motionless being, to a vibrating, crystalline structure, and on. Again, scale implies quality. We have specification of a qualitative field at a scale of time. This wave, specifying a portion of the field, need not cease during saccades. The continuous modulation of the brain (as a wave) is driven by the invariance structure of the external events (Robbins, 2008, in press b), e.g., the velocity flows defined over the sides of the cube as it is rotating conjoined with its recurring symmetry period. Due to the continuous motion of the field, this information is always inherently uncertain – we have always an optimal specification of the past motion of the field. In holography, a reconstructive wave, passing through a hologram and successively modulated to different frequencies, successively selects information from the multiple, superimposed wave fronts originally recorded on the hologram, and successively specifies each – a toy ball, a cup, a truck. If modulated to a non-coherent (non-unique or composite) frequency, it specifies a fuzzed superposition of the three. There is no “veridical” selection. So too, the brain, as a reconstructive wave, is selecting information from the transforming matter-field, where the principle of selection is based on information (invariance) relatable to the body’s action systems – hence the intimate feedback to and from its motor areas. In Bergson’s succinct phrase, perception is virtual action. The heron-like fly slowly flapping his wings is also a specification of the action possible to the body at this new scale of time, in this case, modulating the hand to leisurely catch the fly by the wing. Given the holographic properties of the field, where the state of each “point/event” reflects the mass of influences from the whole, simultaneously therefore a state of very elemental “awareness” of the whole, and given the field’s indivisible motion defining a primary memory, there is implied, at the null scale of time, an elementary form of awareness defined throughout the field. This is a field property. It is not elementary “constituents” with ad hoc intrinsic and extrinsic properties that must be “composed.” ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 546 This is the old metaphysic, spawned from perception’s derivation of “objects” and “motions,” still speaking. The specification, then, is simultaneously to a time-scale specific form of this vast, taut “web” of awareness at the null scale. This form of specification holds for frogs, for chipmunks and for humans. At the null scale, there is no difference between subject and object. Run the scaling transformation in reverse. The fly transitions – initially waves in the field undifferentiated from the perceiving subject, it becomes a crystalline, vibrating being, then becomes the motionless fly, then the heronlike fly slowly flapping his wings, then the buzzing fly of normal scale. Subject is differentiating from object. This is the meaning of Bergson’s statement: "Questions relating to subject and object, to their distinction and their union, must be put in terms of time rather than of space" (1896/1912, p. 77, original emphasis). The body/brain as a modulated reconstructive wave passing through a holographic universal field, specifying a virtual image of the past motion of the field’s nondifferentiable motion, and reflective of possible action at a particular scale of time – this is the elegant solution of the universe to the problem of specifying an image of the external world for its living organisms. Nearly fifty years before Gabor, this was Bergson’s insight. 3.0 Special Relativity and Perception For Bergson, the perceived world is the reflection of the possibilities of bodily action. Again, succinctly, perception is virtual action. As noted, the fly buzzing by, his wings ablur, is an index of the possibility of the body’s action. Were the fly flapping his wings slowly, like a heron, this would be an index of a yet different possibility, in this case, reaching out slowly and grasping the fly by the wing tip. Note that in each case, this index is simultaneously reflective of a scale of time, also a feature of our perception. That perception is indeed virtual action is indicated by our modern understanding of the processing areas of the brain with their reentrant connections. For example (simplifying greatly), visual area V1, which initially receives the retinal signals, projects to V4 (simple form processing) and V5 (motion processing). Simultaneously V4 and V5 project diffusely back to V1, modulating V1’s processing. While the visual areas project to the motor areas, simultaneously the motor areas feedback to the visual areas, modulating visual processing. In fact, counterintuitively, if we simply sever the connective tracts between the visual areas and the motor areas, the subject goes blind (cf. Weiskrantz, 1997). But supporting this resonating feedback in the neural architecture, there are underlying chemical velocities. It is the base rate of these chemical velocities that determines our normal scale of time, e.g., the world of normally “buzzing” flies. Chemical velocities are subject to modification by catalysts. Were a catalyst (or catalysts) of sufficient strength introduced into the systems underlying the computation and preparation of action, increasing the velocity of chemical processes, then we could expect that the time scale of perception would change. In principle, catalysts of sufficient strength would now allow the system to specify a heron-like fly, barely flapping his wings. By the principle of virtual action, this view of the fly is precisely a specification of how the body can act. The change of scale and form for the fly is not merely “subjective,” or a “subjective modification” of experience. This is an objective effect. Virtual action, straightforwardly, makes a prediction on action relative to the increase or decrease of the velocity of underlying processes. In principle, this is a testable consequence albeit difficult today. The question is, does Special Relativity also make a prediction, and if so, what? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 547 Figure 5. The Minkowski diagram. Let us consider the case of two observers, X and Y. We take the X system to be stationary, and Y moving relative to X at high uniform velocity. Assume there is a fly in X’s system. X, at his normal velocity of processes, i.e., at his time-scale, perceives the fly as a blur. The fly, which X is observing, travels one of X’s distance units using sixty wing-beats. It does this in one of X’s time units, say a second. Y, moving at great velocity, has much expanded time units (and contracted space units), the time units increasing as he moves nearer to the speed of light. However, this is as X computes these units relative to his stationary system. The complimentary case is Y’s (in motion) view of the space-time of X. The Minkowski diagram (Figure 5) shows this situation. The rhombus OFGH is gradually collapsing like a scissors as the velocity of Y increases. The tangent to the hyperbola, GF, drops lower and lower below X’s time unit, displaying that the time units of X, as Y sees them, are contracting steadily. Eddington (1966) had us imagine that at O, X lights up a cigar that lies along x1 and has a very longish length of one space unit. The cigar burns one of X’s units of time, being represented by the line t1 and extending to its first unit. Y would now see the cigar as burning longer for X, in fact, as the tangent drops as v increases, it would last many units of X as assigned by Y. This could equally be X himself, aging (a form of "burning") many more time units than Y. Simultaneously, the space units of X, as Y sees them, are increasing. Thus note that GH would fall outside the space unit of X – the cigar is longer. Now it might be said that the fly, flying the length of the cigar lying along x1, is flying a longer distance as far as Y is concerned since he determines X’s space units have expanded. But the distance that the fly traverses in sixty wing-beats – however great or small the distance is measured to be – this distance holds a fundamental “causal flow” or invariant that relativity and its measurement procedures cannot alter. If we mark this distance by two markers, A and B, the fly will buzz from A to B in sixty wing-beats, no matter what the reference system from which he happens to be viewed. It is the “sixty wing-beat distance invariant.” We start from this. The fly flies this distance every day, from the cereal bowl to the sticky spoon on X’s table, in sixty wing beats. Relativity, simply because Y goes into motion, contains no inherent justification for altering this. Assume that the rocket is moving at 80% the speed of light. Given Y’s view of X as having contracted time units, the same sixty wing beats require 1.66 seconds as assigned to X by Y. So, now we partition this sixty wing beats (an invariant causal flow) across the 1.66 seconds. In X’s normal system, at sixty wing beats/second, there are six wing beats in each 1/10th second, and X can normally perceive or discriminate one wingISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 548 beat per 1/10th second. Thus at six beats per each 1/10th second, he sees a blur. In the new partition assigned by Y, with sixty beats partitioned over the 1.66 seconds, X sees only 3.6 wing beats in each 1/10th second. It is less a blur. The fly appears to be buzzing more slowly. X’s time (his perception of the rate of events) is slower, despite the fact that his velocity of processes has not changed. This is clearly absurd, yet this is exactly what is required of the world of X if we ignore reciprocity, and if these transformations are ontological enough to support Y’s eventual return as more youthful than X. On the other hand, there is the effect on Y, whose time units are expanded and space units contracted. In Y’s moving system, a fly is buzzing across the table in the rocket cabin, again using sixty wing beats from A to B. It requires only .6 of the expanded Y-second for the distance to be covered. The invariant sixty wing beats are partitioned across this amount, therefore becoming ten beats per each 1/10th second, and thus the fly is now more of a blur, despite the unchanged velocity of processes. It can be argued, just as Eddington notes, that due to the rocket’s velocity, Y’s processes are retarded. But in fact everything in Y’s reference system is retarded, to include the fly and its buzzing from A to B. In effect, we have simply subtracted a constant across all motion values of the system, and the problematic modification of perception just noted still holds. In essence, psychology contradicts physics. In this analysis, I have stayed consistently within the implications displayed in the Minkowski diagram, that is to say, within the case where Y is consistently the one in motion, X stationary. If we want to set X in motion, we need another diagram, and the situation simply reverses. 3.1 The Role of Reciprocity What is wrong here? There is the strange picture of Y’s view of X’s altered perception of events in X’s own system. But let us ignore this. One aspect of the problem is more elementary. As noted, when we represent the situation of X and Y in the Minkowski diagram, we have fixed on one observer, X, and set all other systems in motion relative to him. The Minkowski schema represents the adjustments in time and space units necessary to preserve light-velocity invariance for all other systems. But it cannot represent reciprocity. We could equally have fixed on Y and set all other systems in motion with respect to him. This, again, requires another diagram, and so on for each observer upon whom we fix. Given this, we must ask the fundamental question: is the effect on either X or Y a real effect? Y, we know, could equally declare his system to be at rest, and X in motion relative to him. Clearly, the effects cannot be real from this perspective. The different “times” and “distances” represent only the observer’s method of keeping his measurements consistent with light-velocity invariance. STR, from this perspective, fails to justify, either for X or for Y, a different perception of the fly based on the observer’s motion. If we respect the inherent reciprocity of reference systems in STR, there is no contradiction with the relativity of perception. STR is at worst neutral with respect to a causal flow in time (the fly) invariant to both X and Y. Only if we insist that STR implies a real effect is there a contradiction. It must be clearly understood here that I am not denying the empirical facts, e.g., increase of life spans in mesons, or the retarded clock carried by the jet, or increases in mass. The empirical evidence is not in dispute. These are real effects. What is in dispute is the use of STR to explain the empirical evidence; it is used inappropriately in attempting to do so. The structure of reciprocity intrinsic to STR is being ignored. 3.2 Half-Relativity ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 549 “Half-relativity” is what Bergson (1922/1965) termed the asymmetric use of STR. The Lorentz equations are applied to the meson; the life span increase falls out via t’. End of explanation. As noted already, A. P. French (1968), in a textbook that attempts to maintain clarity, in a section entitled “Relativity is Truly Relative,” flatly states that the time dilation (just as the length contraction of the Michelson-Morley apparatus) as observed for a meson is not a property of matter but something inherent in the measurement process. He goes to the rare extent of actually showing two Minkowski diagrams, one for each observer (as though there were a small observer on the meson), to show the symmetry of the changes in each system. Just as Bergson (1922/1965) argued earlier, French notes that were an observer to compute t' as the meson falls to the earth, the tiny observer on the meson is equally allowed to say that he is stationary and the earth moving towards the meson. This is to say we have here, in French's terms, a "measurement effect." Thus, when French treats the twin paradox, he invokes the asymmetry introduced when the twin on the rocket turns around to return, therefore introducing a new inertial frame (pp. 155-156). STR is used to compute the different (shorter) “time” of the traveling twin for each leg of the trip, thus ascribing the magnitude of the difference to v (the rocket’s velocity). But he assumes, in conjunction with this, that it is the asymmetry introduced by the turn-around that is required to support the real (aging) effect, i.e., as a real property of matter. Clearly, if one twin is now gray and has a long beard, we have a change that is a real property of matter. Thus he argues that STR, factoring in this asymmetry associated with the turn-around and its acceleration, and due to the fact that a time difference value can be derived due to v, can indeed handle the twin paradox. Yet he has earlier painstakingly built the case, to the point of doubled Minkowski diagrams, that the structure of STR demands symmetry (reciprocity), and given this symmetry, it does not explain any changes as real properties of matter.5 In essence, the entire explanatory burden for aging as a real effect now falls on the asymmetry introduced by the change in inertial frame. But where is this theory, i.e., where is the theoretical framework supporting how and to what magnitude introducing an asymmetry affects the physiological processes underlying aging? Or why the asymmetry can be introduced into STR? More precisely, where is the theory that explains how introducing an asymmetry now allows the use of the Lorentz equations independent of, or outside of, the symmetric, reciprocal structure provided in STR? In the comparison between X and Y above, we only asked Y to be in uniform relative motion at velocity v, just as in the meson case, just as in the Michelson-Morley case. This comparison could care less about Y’s return or differential accelerations. We don’t need a rocket. While X sits by the kitchen table watching the fly, Y could travel by on his tricycle, and the same relativistic laws hold.5 Nevertheless, there are those that would simply classify this case as the twin-paradox, invoke the existence of accelerations, and move the problem and the effects involved into the General Theory. All of the effect can then be assigned to acceleration(s). This reaction is extremely problematic. If we seize upon any accelerating component of a motion (which one can always find, even for the startup of the tricycle) to allow us to get to the safety of the 5 I have been posed one objection or “solution” to this problem stated as follows: “The twin leaving and returning on the rocket ages less because his worldline between departure and return is shorter. And the length of the worldlines is observer invariant.” This is a strange misconception and misstatement. The “observer invariance” is only defined within the structure of symmetric (reciprocal) transformations created by both observers. There is no “invariance” with but one observer. But then it is this very symmetry that makes it impossible to use relativity to explain changes as real properties of matter. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 550 GTR, then what if anything is the province of STR? The physics would be in danger of becoming a shell game, shuffling an explanatory pea between STR and GTR. If we are doing this to avoid reciprocity, then the argument that STR, with its inherent reciprocity, fails to explain any of these effects is effectively conceded, and this lynchpin in its being a theory of time – its ability to explain these effects – is removed.6 Note again, it is not the aging effect, it is all asymmetric effects – jet carried clocks or long living mesons – that would have to be so moved into GTR for consistency. One dismisses the above comparison of X and Y into the GTR then only with difficult consequences.7 Thus others (as well as French) have argued, as Eddington (1966) appeared to believe, that the twin-effect is perfectly consonant with STR. But to stay fully within the context of the Special Theory without bringing in gravitational field changes, Salmon (1976) envisaged a rocket ship (A) departing earth and passing another (B) coming in the opposite direction at the same velocity. At the point of meeting, the two exchanged signals to coordinate their clocks. B continued on to earth where clocks were compared, and of course, in a triumph for the theory, an earthbound observer's clock showed a greater passage of time than B's. This appears to be ironclad, yet there is a problem. Reciprocity has not been avoided. The observer in A takes with him his own reference system. Since no reference system is privileged, he has equal right to declare himself at rest and everything else in motion relative to him, including the earth, the earthbound observer, and the earthbound observer's clock. When B passes A and signals are exchanged, will they then reflect a decrease in the rate of A's time? Hardly, given A is at rest. Only the author of the argument happens to believe A is in motion, but he forgot to ask A.8 6 Brillouin (1970) would argue that a reference system must be very massive to reduce all actionreaction effects. The tricycle, let alone an abstract “coordinate system,” would not qualify in his opinion. The same point however can be made with a more massive system going by the table. But I do not believe that Einstein was concerned at all with this distinction, the geometry being the overriding consideration. 7 The comfort of assigning this to the GTR arises from the tenet that acceleration breaks the symmetry or reciprocity of systems. I am aware that this is a fundamental tenet of GTR, but it is yet possible that the original analysis by which this tenet was derived is subject to question. Bergson argued simply that acceleration cannot be distinguished from velocity in the sense relativity claims – velocity is a rate of change in position over time, acceleration simply the rate of change of the rate of change of position. Wang (2003) refines this argument, deriving the generalized Lorentz equation for t’ in the context of acceleration. If we cannot integrate over infinitesimal velocities, he argues, as did Bergson also, we have undercut all of physics. Wang’s equation completely undercuts any appeal to the GTR due to acceleration in the twin paradox; in fact it implies a question to the foundation of GTR. 8 Davies (1977) resolves the twin paradox by flatly assigning the aging differential to the turn around at the target star and the homeward acceleration of the rocket (pp. 43-44). Yet, like French, he applies the Lorentz equations, claiming that he has also preserved the symmetry, a fact his table of durations (p. 44) obviously belies, for only the rocket clock shows a consistent, time-expanded 4.8 light years for each leg – the rocket is clearly the only object moving to Davies. Davies (1995) drops the clear emphasis on acceleration as the root cause of the aging. He does declare there is no paradox because the symmetry is broken due to accelerations in the necessary stop and return of the rocket, but never mentions this again. Ignoring the consequent inapplicability of STR, he again proceeds to apply the Lorentz transformations (with what justification?). In essence, he notes that that at 80% of the speed of light, earthbound twin Ann would see the clock of the rocket-twin (Betty) as running .6 of earth-Ann’s. Symmetrically, rocketBetty, viewing herself as stationary, sees earth-Ann’s clock as running .6 of Betty’s. This ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 551 The twin-paradox is disturbing precisely because it epitomizes, very concretely, the inconsistency relative to standard use of STR. It highlights a very real effect, e.g., a youthful man versus a hoary old one, that cannot simply be assigned to a measurement process. Interestingly, Einstein himself, in a (little known) 1918 article, attempted to preserve reciprocity and the asymmetrical effects together by arguing that indeed the rocket ship could be considered stationary, its motors only neutralizing the pull of the earth as the earth recedes.9 But he then argued that it would require such tremendous field changes to move the earth and bring it back that the earth twin would undergo rapid aging. The reciprocity and the paradox denying the reciprocity appear resolved (just as French argued). But now, ignoring the ad hoc, physically unrealizable fields, it is not clear of what use relativity is here at all. Its mathematics, with its intrinsic reciprocity, now does not accurately describe the phenomenon – we can clearly distinguish the two systems via gravitational effects – and it would seem logically prior to have a theory relating gravitational changes to a model of the physiological processes driving aging – this in itself being sufficient to account for the phenomenon without appealing to changes of “time” itself. The one-way application of the Lorentz transformations would then appear in retrospect to be but a convenient empirical description of these events, but a deeper theory would provide a model of the processes involved (as Lorentz himself attempted). 3.3 The Half-Relativity of 1905 Einstein, for all practical purposes, began assigning real effects due simply to v, ignoring reciprocity, in 1905. In the paper, he quickly invokes the reciprocity implied in the first postulate, having us envisage a rigid sphere of radius R, at rest in the moving system (1905/1923, section 4, p. 48). At rest relative to the moving system, he notes, it is a sphere. Viewed from the “stationary” observer, the equation of the sphere’s surface gives it the form of an ellipsoid, with the X dimension shortened by the ratio 1:(1 v2/c2)1/2. He notes (the reciprocity) then immediately: “It is clear that the same results hold good of bodies at rest in the ‘stationary’ system, viewed from a system in uniform motion” (1905/1923, p. 49). Two paragraphs from this point he notes the “peculiar consequence” that were there two synchronous, separated clocks A and B in the stationary system, and if A is moved to B with velocity v in time t, it will lag behind B by ½ tv2/c2 (section 4, p. 49). The structure of reciprocity is already being voided here – we are dealing only with an effect in the stationary system, not relating the two systems. The observer in the stationary system can simply move the clock from A to B to fulfill Einstein’s condition, and the effect is simply ascribed to v. This conclusion is quickly reinforced. Within another paragraph, Einstein, extending this to “curvilinear motion,” states flatly that this result implies that a clock at the equator must go more slowly, by a small amount, than one situated at the poles (p. 50), i.e., again two clocks in the same system. Physicists accept this equatorial clock retardation naturally as a real effect. The effect had to be factored in to Hafele and Keating’s jet-carried clock experiment. Yet symmetry holds for each leg – the outward and the homeward bound. In Davies’s scenario, it is rocket-Betty who returns having aged less, not earth-Ann, and he claims that he has resolved Dingle’s (1972) critique that in this case, “each clock runs slower relative to the other,” in other words, a critique which says precisely that there can be no ontological status here. Given the symmetry he took great pains to describe, Davies conveniently never tells us why earth-Ann does not also have the distinction of aging less. 9 A translation of this paper is discussed in Dingle (1972, pp. 191-200). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 552 reciprocity demands that the clock on the equator be stationary, the observer at the pole spinning around. Now it is not a real effect. This is likely not very tasteful. Yet this conclusion regarding v as already producing real effects in 1905 is doubly reinforced when it is considered that the equator-clock is an exact analogue to Einstein's future thought experiment (introducing GTR) of the rotating disk. Now the observer leaves the center of the disk, moving along a radius to the rim and back, while carrying a clock. Upon his return the clock is retarded. The thought experiment used this result as a very real effect. Yet why? The observer takes with him, at every point he occupies, his own proper time. He should return with the clock unchanged. Why is the problem of “real effects” significant? There are three reasons. Firstly, if STR is being used inappropriately as an explanatory device where the one-way use of the mathematics just happens to work, then physics should be searching for the true explanation. It could be extremely instructive, if only for the apparent return of the ether, which formerly housed some of these effects (again, in Lorentz's mind for example), in more sophisticated form as the quantum vacuum.10 Secondly, there is now the contradiction with the psychology of perception just discussed and which I hope would merit at least some review. Thirdly, if we cling to the idea that STR can explain real, asymmetric effects, then we are equally clinging to the reality of the relativization of simultaneity, i.e., to the real breakup of simultaneity into successive moments in time, and vice versa. It is this implication that I wish to further question. 4.0 The Relativity of Simultaneity In Figure 6 we picture three points, A’, B’, and C’ in Y's moving system placed along the direction of this motion. Each will be a distance L from each other. We will assume Y is at point B’, and the system is moving with velocity v. From the viewpoint of the stationary X, these three events are not simultaneous. The clock at A’ registers a time slightly behind that of B’, while the clock at C’ is somewhat ahead. The greater the value of v, the greater this lag and lead time respectively. Both times are given by Lv/c2 seconds. As v approaches the speed of light c, the maximum difference becomes L/c seconds. 10 There are probably any number of ways, for example, to account for the life-span increases of mesons without resort to the mystical “changes of time” required by STR. Thomson’s model of the electron, as just one possible example of an approach, saw the electron as a special case of an electric current. In motion, a current naturally generates a counter-EMF – a resistance to its own motion, a resistance increasing with velocity, unto a singularity at light velocity. So too would a single electron. Now if the meson is a group of electrons and positrons, where the positrons radiate away the group’s energy as a function of a certain synchrony, this being “decay,” then putting the group in motion will retard this radiation, the decay rate ever decreasing with speed, and increasing its lifespan. (Cf. for example, Aspden, 1969, 1972; Kessler, 1962). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 553 Figure 6. Planes of simultaneity (cf. Bergson, 1922/1965). If we drop a perpendicular from A’ to K’, this line will symbolize all the past events at A’. Since we see that the clock is slow at A’, and Y then supposedly looking at past events, this line displays the maximum reach into this past. Likewise the line upwards from C’ to H’ shows the maximum of the future. Now we can draw yet another line of simultaneity, this one running to (hypothetical) points D’ (between C’ and H’) and E’ (between A’ and K’). Its divergence from the original line A’B’C’ is a function of the speed v. Further, were the difference in v between the X and Y systems infinitesimally small, there would be a line barely divergent from A’B’C’ representing the fact that at even the most infinitesimal velocities, we see the breakup of simultaneity begin, radiating from the most minute point or distance from B’, increasing in degree towards A’ and C’. There are any number of such lines. What is the reality here? Imagine that Y is moving at an infinitesimally small velocity relative to X. For practical purposes, X’s line ABC and Y’s line A’B’C’ are virtually coincident. But yet, even at the most minute velocity, simultaneity has begun to break up at the most infinitesimal point or distance from B, increasing in degree as we approach A’ or C’. Now Y moves at a much higher velocity. X now notes the difference in Y's clocks. He is forced to assign events at A’ deeper and deeper into Y's past as v increases, and to assign events at C’ farther into the future. He does this by the very fact that he needs to keep the velocity of light invariant as per the Lorentz transformations. But Y can equally say he is at rest. He continues to note the simultaneity of events at A’, B’, and C’. He now notes the same breakup of simultaneity for X. Again the question becomes, is the conversion of simultaneity to succession real? Is it more than a notational convention required for the consistency of measurements between the two systems? Can this possibly be true of the flow of time? 4.1 The Simultaneity of Flows The intuition of a universal flow is partially preserved in relativity in the conservation of a “causal order.” On analysis, we will find multiple causal orders or flows within this flow as Bergson noted or even, as Gibson insisted in the opening quote, where hero rushes to save the endangered heroine. The simultaneity of flows is integrally bound to causal order and to a global transformation wherein the motions of “objects” are transferences of state. Consider two football players running down each sideline of the field at precisely equal velocity. A physicist (O1) at the fifty yard line notes the time against two synchronized clocks on each sideline as the players run by and ascertains that they have passed the same point simultaneously (Figure 3, e1 and e2). Of course a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 554 second physicist (O2), thinking the first in motion and noting this observation says the first is in error, the events were not simultaneous. Yet the two football players continue on, converging on a football equidistant from both that they both kick simultaneously (e3), kicking the ball twice as far as just one would have achieved. From the perspective of an instantaneous measurement, i.e., abstract time, their simultaneity is relativized. From the perspective of the two causal flows, the simultaneity of the flows is absolutely real. The second physicist cannot deny the effect of the simultaneous kick. One cannot simply relativize multiple causal flows. Figure 7. Two football players (e1, e2) converge on the ball (e3). It can be argued that e1 and e2 are not truly simultaneous just as O2 states, that simultaneity is achieved only at the point-instant of the kick. But we could replace the football players equally well with a huge cue stick sweeping down the field towards a billiard ball. Positioned at each yard line are O1’s measurement clocks. If the cue’s outside edges truly fail to pass the measurement clocks/points simultaneously, it will hit the ball at a slant sending it off at an angle. In sliding the x1 , x2 and t2 axes upwards towards e3, it can be seen that there will come a point as our very wide cue nears the ball at e3, that e3 will fall in the causal elsewhere of the light cones of each of the edges (e1, e2). This implies that the two outer edges could not possibly be squared in time for a flush contact of the entire cue surface with the ball if they are as non-simultaneous as claimed by O2. The global causal flow led by the cue’s frontal surface is fragmenting under STR’s treatment. Yet the cue strikes the ball precisely perpendicularly. Only one strand in this flow, one local flow, the causal order in STR invariant to both observers, is ultimately preserved. This is the chain of causal relations, <, the relation determining time-like and space-like events, defined upon a sequence of infinitely minute pointinstants extending through the time line t1 to e3. Were we considering the fly, no matter how infinite the “points” we place on this line, or the in fact multiple lines comprising the fly, this will remain sixty wing beats – an indivisible movement or flow. A global flow, whether fly or cue stick or hero and heroine, cannot be an invariant to all observers in STR.11 11 A comment on concepts expressed in Myrvold (2003) is appropriate here. Myrvold considers the relation eRe’ (where R = “realized with respect to”) in the context of extended objects. This requires taking a spacelike slice – in effect an instantaneous stage along some foliation of the object’s history. Failure to do this results, he notes, in paradoxes like the “pole and barn,” where, with the barn at rest and the pole in high velocity motion through the barn, there is a period where the pole just fits inside the barn, and conversely, with the pole at rest, and the barn ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 555 We must ask what is the causal validity or efficacy of this one local point-instant flow? The breakup of simultaneity, as we have earlier seen, drives downwards in space-time to the most infinitesimal of point-instants. At this mathematical point, as earlier noted, there is neither time nor events. As such, without the possibility of even an event, it is impossible to say that there is anything causal whatsoever with respect to this point, or with respect to a “causal” chain of such points. The abstract space and abstract time that support the classical concept of causality offers again an infinite regress. If this chain is infinitely divisible – an infinite set of “point-events” – then between each point we must introduce a “causal relation,” which is in effect to say a motion ad infinitum. Causality too will require indivisible extents. The fly, as a coherent biological system doing his sixty wing-beat trip, is precisely a global, indivisible flow. Were he taking his sixty wing beat trip to e3, the tips of his wings will stop precisely simultaneously, O2’s measurements to the contrary notwithstanding. When it was insisted earlier that this sixty wing beat flow be treated as invariant to both X and Y, this weakness inherent in STR’s treatment emerged. In the above, I have not attempted a formal definition of a causal flow. I am leaving this at the intuitive level where, for example, a fly, as a complex system in motion, is comprised of multiple processes acting in concert, be this multiple muscle systems, neurons firing, or chemical flows. Such a system could be as large, and larger, as a weather system such as a hurricane, or an evolving galaxy, or a collection of individuals all working together to play a symphony. The two football players with which we began were two seemingly isolable local flows. They could, however, have been two sailboats moving in unison before a vast pressure front. Or this could have been a vast magnetic flux sweeping the earth. The point is that we must ask if any such local flows, any more so than “objects” and their “motions,” are truly isolable from the global flow of the universal field. Are they more than transferences of state within the global motion? This global transformation is the classical “flow of time” invariant to all observers. 4.2 STR and Consciousness Hagan and Hirafuji (2001) analyzed the concept of the “emergence” of consciousness in the context of relativity. Emergence envisions consciousness arising (or being generated from) from the physical processes in the brain, analogous, it can be in motion, there is no such “pole-inside” state. This conflict is resolved, he argues, “by remembering that the states of the extended system of which one account speaks are states along spacelike slices of the system different from those of which the other account speaks” (p. 478). This is a not a justifiable modification of STR. The reference system of Figure 6 would be treated as a set of points, α. Another set, β, would be definite or realized with respect to α if in α’s causal past. Though seemingly applying to the cue stick example, we could not extend the system indefinitely, or it would extend across the entire universe, providing a plane of simultaneity. But, given Myrvold, what prevents this move? My earlier analysis relative to Figure 6 shows that the simultaneity of α begins to break up at the most minute interval relative to an observer in motion. But, there is a simpler reason why Myrvold is not a resolution. If the length contraction of the pole is being taken as a real effect in this paradox, the (very testable) implication is that we could actually trap the pole inside the barn, different spacelike slices or not. Such a real result (captured pole) is as much a contradiction as the twin paradox. If it is not considered a real (possible) effect, this is due to giving the reciprocity of reference systems its appropriate status, which is to say there is no ontological status to the relativistic contraction, and no “paradox” in the first place. Myrvold dismisses the paradox, considering it an example of misunderstanding, yet it is no more a misunderstanding than the twin-paradox where the “timechange” should have equally as little ontological status. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 556 said, to the glow arising from the filament of a light bulb. Their analysis deals a critical blow to the emergence concept, but a deeper reading indicates that doubt is cast on STR’s ability to support any theory of consciousness.12 Starting with what they term the extrinsic definitional problem, they argue that any emergent property or state of consciousness must be frame invariant to satisfy the requirement that the conscious state be invariant to another observer in motion. Hagan and Hirafuji aver that keeping the emergent property frame invariant might be achieved, but choose not to explore the difficulty, moving on to yet another (what they term “boundary”) extrinsic problem. In fact, it cannot be achieved. Our experience, we have seen, is marked by the characteristic of simultaneity of flows – the multiple melody lines within a single flow of a symphony, multiple musicians playing on the symphony stage, multiple women cooking in the kitchen, etc. From the standard view of relativity, from which Hagan and Hirafuji write, the simultaneity of any of the above systems (read experiences as well) should indeed breakup, simultaneity becoming succession, and succession becoming simultaneity. Recall the three points, A’, B’, and C’ of Figure 6, and the break up of simultaneity at the most infinitesimal interval. We asked if this can possibly be true of the flow of time? In the more obvious causal context of causal flows, e.g., our two football players, we saw that this cannot be true. One cannot simply relativize multiple causal flows. Yet this is precisely what relativity would do. Each of the experiences mentioned earlier, with their simultaneous flows, would begin to breakup relative to the motion, for example, of observer Y. This is why the “emergent” consciousness or emergent “property,” as Hagan and Hirafuji mention, would have such difficulty remaining frame invariant. More correctly, this is why the invariance is impossible. The experience would inevitably be distorted relative to the frame. But as I asked earlier, can we seriously believe this “breakup” of succession and simultaneity is possible, i.e., that it has any ontological status? Do we believe the symphony would become jumbled, the musicians playing out of time, the conversations at the table scrambled, the cooking women putting ingredients in the cake one after the other rather than together, etc.? One could question the relevance of the frame invariance requirement. So what, if from Y’s point of view, my consciousness is distorted? It is my consciousness and it is perfectly OK, the symphony is fine, the ladies’ conversation is fine. But this is the problem: if the theory (STR) is taken to indicate that this distortion would indeed be so from Y’s perspective, i.e., it has ontological status, despite the intuitive oddity of the claim, we must ask what good is the theory? Hagen and Hirafuji are not only demonstrating the difficulties with a theory of “emergence” in the context of current physical theory, but also the difficulties for relativity of supporting any model of consciousness. Let us move to the intrinsic definitional problem. Hagan and Hirafuji show that an intrinsic definition, while not requiring simultaneity, will always be incompatible with locality constraints. The difficulty here stems from the transmission speeds of the brain or, simply the very need or constraint for finite transmission. Under these constraints, the brain could not support a global state underlying an emergent property. The global state cannot inform the local dynamics of the boundary necessary to establish the physical extent of the emergent unit. But in essence here, I note, we have come back to the need for simultaneity, for this is an essential feature of any emergent property of consciousness or perception of which we can conceive. 12 Van Gulick (2001) maps in detail the many variants of emergence theories. It is not necessary to distinguish them all here. They all, in any case, fail to consider the problem of time. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 557 Stein (1991, pp. 158-162), as we noted, attempted to explain ongoing misconceptions of relativity, as he saw them, in terms of our continued naïve belief in the perception of simultaneous events – an illusion based on the high velocity of light. Thus, he argued in essence, the naïve or intuitive simultaneity that perception provides is founded upon the “fleeting motions” of “masses of elements” in the brain, all subject to the limitation of communication via the velocity of light and implying, therefore, that at a small enough scale of time, perceptive simultaneity would break down. Stein is assuming a model of the processes in the brain underlying perception. But it is precisely this “fleeting motion” of masses of “elements” that Hagan and Hirafuji demonstrate is subject to locality constraints and, in being so subject, cannot support the simultaneity inherent in conscious states or perception, at least not from an “emergence” standpoint. If, however, we only require a classical dynamics within the brain, under the locality constraint, to support a specifying reconstructive wave as per Bergson’s model, we escape the emergence difficulty, but this framework, with its non-differentiable time and simultaneity of flows, leaves relativity and its metaphysic behind. 5.0 Conclusion There have been other examinations of STR, of both its explanatory status in physics and as a theory of time. Bergson was perhaps the earliest. His argument in Revue Philosophique with physicist Andre Metz circa 1924 centered on the use of STR in explaining asymmetric effects (cf. Gunter, 1969, pp. 135-190). Metz could neither accept that STR is an inappropriate explanatory vehicle, nor could he conceive of the possibility that the increased life spans of mesons could be explained without resorting to STR. Deleuze (1966/1991) would reprise Bergson’s (1922/1965) general argument on time with respect to relativity. Dingle (1967, 1972) would make interesting critiques, particularly on the invariance of light. Brillouin (1970, pp. 77-85) would give a nonrelativistic explanation of the retardation of atomic clocks (and of the red shift). Earman (1989) would note that there has yet to be a relational, let alone a relativistic explanation of Newton’s humble bucket. Nordenson (1969) would argue that Einstein’s rejection of the classical flow of time, whether beyond “proximity” or anywhere even beyond the mathematical point, must surely undermine any meaning to his new procedure for clock synchronization. Rakić (1997), in proving certain logical inadequacies of the Minkowski metric, is reduced to declaring Special Relativity to be not an ontological theory, but concedes it a status as a “temporal” theory. Whatever meaning this concession might have, a theory with no ontological status is of little use; it is certainly not relevant to a science of perception or a theory of consciousness. STR, with its confused interpretation, its reflection of the classic, spatial metaphysic and its view of “time,” is an impediment to both physics and psychology. Physics has struggled to both reconcile STR/GTR with quantum theory (aggravated by the awareness of quantum theory’s non-locality) and simultaneously to understand and perhaps incorporate the role of consciousness in quantum theory. The theory of time is precisely the ground where psychology, the theory of consciousness and physics meet. In truth, with Bergson’s vision of time – with its non-differentiable flow, with its irreversibility derived from the fact that each “instant” reflects the entire preceding series, with its primary memory or true continuity wherein there are no mutually external “instants,” where the motions of “objects” are transferences of state within a global timeevolution of the material field implying therefore an inherent non-locality – one sees that Einstein’s two times, “a psychological time different from that of the physicist,” are in reality one. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| July 2010 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 | pp. 529-559 Robbins, S. E. Special Relativity and Perception: The Singular Time of Psychology & Physics 558 References Aspden, H. (1969). Physics Without Einstein. London: Sabberton. Aspden, H. (1972). Modern Aether Theory. London: Sabberton. Bergson, H. 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                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 971 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe Article Quantum Mind in TGD Universe Matti PItkänen 1 Abstract The basic difficulties and challenges of Quantum Mind program are analyzed. The conclusion is that the recent form of quantum theory is not enough to overcome the challenges posed by the philosophical problems of quantum physics and quantum mind theories, and the puzzles of quantum biology and quantum neuroscience. Certain anomalies of recent day biology giving hints about how quantum theory should be generalized serve as an introduction to the summary of the aspects of quantum TGD especially relevant to the notion of Quantum Mind. These include the notions of many-sheeted space-time and field (magnetic) body, zero energy ontology, the identification dark matter as a hierarchy of phases with large value of Planck constant, and p-adic physics proposed to define physical correlates for cognition and intentionality. Especially relevant is the number theoretic generalization of Shannon entropy: this entropy is well defined for rational or even algebraic entanglement probabilities and its minimum as a function of the prime defining p-adic norm appearing in the definition of the entropy is negative. Therefore the notion of negentropic entanglement makes sense in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds and is negative: this motivates the proposal that living matter resides in this intersection. TGD inspired theory of consciousness is introduced as a generalization of quantum measurement theory. The notions of quantum jump and self defining the generalization of the notion of observer are introduced and it is argued that the notion of self reduces to that for quantum jump. Negentropy Maximization Principle reproduces standard quantum measurement theory for ordinary entanglement but respects negentropic entanglement so that the outcome of state function reduction is not random for negentropic entanglement. The new view about the relationship of experienced time and geometric time combined with zero energy ontology is claimed to solve the basic philosophical difficulties of quantum measurement theory and consciousness theory. The identification of the quantum correlates of sensory qualia and Boolean cognition, emotions, cognition and intentionality and self-referentiality of consciousness is discussed. 1 Introduction The notion of Quantum Mind [66] has become a respected branch of science during thirty years since Esalem conference. The basic vision is that quantum superposition, quantum entanglement and state function reduction (or some of its interpretational equivalents) are somehow highly relevant for the understanding of consciousness. Whether quantum entanglement or quantum jump or something else is identified as a correlate for consciousness depends on theorist. The basic objections against Quantum Mind is that standard quantum physics - at least wave mechanics- leaves no room for quantum mind. Decoherence leading to a loss of entanglement is the basic enemy of quantum mind [54]. Experimental work however suggests that macroscopic quantum coherence prevails in cell length scale: the findings about photosynthesis provide an example of this [51]. There is also a growing evidence for macro-entanglement between different brains correlating closely with electromagnetic fields [59, 62]. Of course, the idea that wave mechanics is enough to describe living matter and also the belief that quantum theory - as we know it - is something final are only beliefs. There are many other similar beliefs: the belief on reductionism coded to the statement that everything above intermediate boson length scale is understood in recent day physics; the belief that living matter differs from inanimate matter only because it is very complex; the belief that experienced time and the geometric time of physicist are one and the same thing; the pragmatic belief that the problems of quantum measurement theory can be forgotten by saying that quantum theory is just a calculational receipe;... 1 Correspondence: Matti Pitkänen http://tgd.wippiespace-com/public_html. Address: Köydenpunojankatu 2 D 11 10940, Hanko, Finland. Email: matpitka@luukku.com. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 972 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe One could add one further not quite obvious item to the list. Dark matter and dark energy are one of the most notorious problems of recent day physics and it is just a belief that dark matter is nothing but some exotic X-ino having very weak interactions with visible matter and therefore does not have any relevance for the understanding of living matter. The basic message of this article is that standard quantum theory is not enough if one wants to construct a theory of Quantum Mind. A profound re-evaluation of the belief system underlying the ontology of the recent day quantum physics is needed. My own proposal is following. • The reductionistic dogma is replaced with fractality meaning infinite hierarcies both at the level of matter and mind. Consciousness is everywhere in a form of self hierarchy so that Quantum Mind involves more than brain. Biological bodies, cells, biomolecules, and even elementary particles correspond to the levels of the self hierarchy. Also higher collective levels are present. • Topological field structures implied by the new fractal view about space-time - I speak about many-sheeeted space-time- are essential parts of this hierarchy. The notion of field (or magnetic) body is one aspect of the many-sheeted space-time and one could even say that magnetic body is the intentional agent using biological body as a motor instrument and sensory receptor. EEG and its various fractal analogs can be seen as communication and control tools of of the magnetic body in this conceptual framework. The explanation for the strange time delays associated the the passive aspects of consciousness discovered by Libet [64] and the good hopes about understanding of fundamental biorhythms in terms of cyclotron frequencies of biologically important and Josephson frequencies assignable to cell membrane Josephson junctions [38] provide support for this vision. This conforms with the proposals that spin and more generally angular momentum are central for understanding consciousness and living matter [57, 59]. Biological evolution becomes evolution of consciousness and one cannot restrict Quantum Mind to microtubules, brain, or even biological body. • Self hierarchy has two physical correlates: the hierarchy of p-adic length scales and the hierarchy of Planck constants: both hierarchies have experimental support. A number theoretical miracle occurs: the length scale range 10 nm-2.5 µm involves as many as four Gaussian Mersennes expected to define preferred p-adic length scales since this they do so in the case of elementary particles. The effects of ELF em fields on vertebrate brain [53] and the strange behavior of cell membrane and cell interior suggesting strongly quantal ionic currents [49] provide physical support for both the hierarchy of Planck constants and p-adic length scale hypothesis. • In TGD Universe zero energy ontology (ZEO) replaces the positive energy ontology of standard physics. The motivation comes both certain philosophical dilemma which is very frustrating for a theoretician, and the crossing symmetry of quantum field theory justifies ZEO. ZEO assigns new macroscopic time scale to each elementary particle. For electron and quarks these time scale coincide with fundamental biological time scales (for instance, the .1 second time scale predicted for electron corresponds to 10 Hz fundamental biorhythm). Elementary particle physics and biology are therefore strongly interrelated in ZEO. • The identification of quantum jump as moment of consciousness and the notion of self emerge from a generalization of quantum measurement theory to a theory of consciousness. In this framework the experienced time identified as a sequence of quantum jumps and the geometric time of physicist cannot be identified [24, 25, 26]. The fact that the contents of conscious experience is about a four-dimensional region of space-time implies a new interpretation of memories [27]. Quantum jump replacing the entire geometric future and past with a new one: Libet’s strange findings about active aspects of consciousness [63] forcing in positive energy ontology the conclusion that free will is illusion provide support for this view. The challenge is to understand the arrow of time and why the contents of sensory experience is localized to a rather short time interval of about .1 second: this suggests a rather dramatic radical idea about how the arrow of subjective time emerges as a consequence of Negentropy Maximization Principle [23] defining the basic variational principle of TGD inspired theory of consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 973 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe • p-Adic physics extending reality to include also various p-adic levels is highly relevant for the understanding of the difference between living and inanimate matter. Negentropic entanglement is possible for p-adic variant of Shannon entropy making sense if entanglement probabilities are algebraic. One can say that this entanglement is possible in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds in which intentions could transform to actions by quantum jumps replacing p-adic spacetime sheets with real ones (this makes sense only in ZEO!). Maybe this is the mathematical and information theoretical quintessence of life. Before continuing a comment about the notion of consciousness is in order. This notion as also the notion of awareness implicitly codes for the assumption that consciousness is a property of a physical system- something mathematically analogous to mass or charge. The greek world ”nous” and finnish word ”tajunta” refer to activity rather than property and this meaning is more appropriate in TGD framework. Since it would sound rather artificial to talk about ”TGD inspired theory of nous” I will will use the standard term in the sequel although it is misleading. It should be also emphasize that I represent only those aspects of a rather extensive work documented in the books at my homepage, which seem to be especially interesting just now. In the following representation I am forced to leave out all details. They can be found in the books about TGD inspired theory of consciousness at my homepage [8, 9, 10, 12, 33, 13, 14, 15]. I have also summarized TGD inspired theory of consciousness in an earlier issue of JCER [56] but from different view point. 2 What are the problems of quantum mind theories? In the following I list briefly the basic problems of physics and quantum mind theories using a classification which is rather natural from the point of view of physics. 2.1 Some philosophical problems of quantum physics • ”Monism, dualism, or something else?” is the first basic question. Monism appears as two variants which are mirror images. Materialism has the problem that consciousness becomes something totally reducible to the state of material system so that free will must be an illusion if one believes in the deterministic laws of physics. This is in a sharp contrast to what we directly experience. In the idealistic framework one loses completely physics. The difficulty of dualism- pointed out very clearly by Chalmers [65] - is that it is very difficult to achieve consistency with the basic laws of physics which do not allow free will. It seems that one must have something new allowing to achieve consistency of the determinism of field equations with (partially) free will. • ”Reductionism or not?” is second key question. For me personally the realization that reductionism is a mere dogma was a painful process although it was from the beginning clear that TGD based view about space-time forces to challenge this belief. It was especially painful to take seriously the fact that even the reduction of chemical bond to wave mechanics alone is nothing but a belief since it it is not yet testable by perfoming numerical calculations. Gradually I became conscious about the many non-existing bridges of reductionism: the bridge from quarks and gluons to hadrons; the brigde from nucleons to nuclei; the bridge from atoms to molecules; the bridges from inorganic chemistry to organic chemistry to biochemistry: all these bridges are just figments of wishful thinking and implications of the reductionistic dogma rather than support for it. Also the widely accepted argument about living matter as something which is just complex fails to be distinguishable from a rhetoric trick. • ”Determinism or not?” is the third question. Also here it took time to realize that the belief that free will is an illusion does not reflect the reality but our limited tools for describing it. The physicists of previous centuries did not have any conceptual and mathematical tools to describe free will without giving up the idea about laws of physics. Most importantly, they did not know anything about quantum non-determinism. Perhaps it is some kind of cognitive inertia that physicists have been ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 974 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe ready to give up even the very notion of objective reality instead of accepting the fact that nondeterminism is real and concluding that one should find an ontology consistent with both quantum non-determinism and Schrödinger equation. • The notion of time is highly problematic. – The relationship between experienced time and the geometric time of physicist is poorly understood. Subjective time is irreversible and has only recent moment and past, geometric time is reversible and spans entire eternity. The assignment of experienced time with a 3-D wave front shifting in the direction of geometric time direction is in conflict with Lorentz symmetry and general coordinate invariance, which do not allow to identify a unique time coordinate as the subjective time. The natural basic object in general relativity is 4-dimensional space-time region, not time=constant snapshot. – In physics conceptual difficulties are encountered already in the phenomenological description of dissipation by adding to the reversible field equations phenomenological dissipation terms. Rather remarkably, the quantum mechanical formulas for the reaction rates in terms used to calculated dissipation coefficients involve integral over entire space-time so that quantum events have at least formally an infinite duration. Finite duration is certainly necessary by Uncertainty Principle. Somehow quantum jump seems to involve entire geometric eternity: as if it would take place between two geometric eternities. – There is also the problem of initial state. If the dynamics is deterministic and conservation laws hold, only a single solution of field equations is realized in classical physics and theoretical physics becomes useless waste of time since it cannot be tested. If quantum non-determinism is allowed, conservation laws still restrict the physical states to those having fixed net values. ”What was the initial state at the moment of Big Bang?” is the question which cannot be aswered in the framework of physics alone and one ends up doing metaphysics. Indeed, the recent crisis of M-theory- meant to be the final jewel in the crown of materialistic and reductionistic science- has led to the landscape problem, and many colleagues have given up the hope that ultimate theory could predict anything so that anthropic principle would be the only manner to connect theory with experiment. 2.2 Basic philosophical problems of quantum mind theories At least the following problems could be seen as basic philosophical problems of quantum mind theories. • What are the quantum correlates for consciousness? Entanglement has been proposed as a correlate of consciousness. For instance, in the orchestrated reduction approach of Hameroff and Penrose the period of consciousness ends with a state function reduction and quantum gravitation is believed to play a fundamental role in the understanding of consciousness. The believer in free will could see state function reduction or its generalization as as a natural quantum correlate for a moment of consciousness. The basic objection is that the randomness of state function reduction does not allow genuine goal directed free will. One could also argue that state function reduction generates entropy at least at the level of ensemble whereas intentional action should do just the opposite. Here one must however remember that entropy generation at the level of aspect need not mean entropy generation at the level of the member of ensemble. • How the determinism of field equations and Schrödinger equation can be consistent with the nondeterminism of the state function reduction? This question must be answered unless one is ready to give up the notion of objective reality completely or to believe in multiverse interpretation. These manners to circumvent the basic problem do not however leave much room for quantum consciousness theorizing. The closely related question about the relationship between experienced time and time of physicist has been already mentioned. • What is the quantum correlate for the notion of self? The quantum notion of self should be a generalization of the notion of observer which in quantum measurement theory still remains a structureless outsider. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 975 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe • What conscious information is? Can one give it a mathematical measure? Can one measure physically the amount of conscious information? Unfortunately the recent day physics can only provide measure for dis-information as Shannon entropy and the best that subsystem can achieve is no information at all if this picture is accepted. • There is a bundle of questions about the quantum correlates of various aspects of conscious experience. For instance, what is the quantum correlate of mental image, and what are the quantum correlates of cognition and intentionality, Boolean mind, sensory qualia, memory, and of emotions? • An especially challenging question relates to the quantum correlate for the self referentiality of consciousness making possible reflective levels of consciousness. What it means physically to be conscious about what one is (or perhaps only ”was”) conscious? Jack Sarfatti was well aware about this problem and in his dualistic approach talked about feedback loop but still used a trick in which one divides various fields to matter-like and mind-like. 2.3 Basic problems of quantum biology and quantum neuroscience The basic problems of quantum biology and neuroscience are closely related unless one is ready to believe that consciousness reduces to one particular function assignable to some particular part of brain (”consciousness module”). This kind of assignment can be imagined in engineerish neuroscience identifying brain as electric circuitry but does not have much sense in quantum mind approach. The first list of first principle questions includes at least the following ones. • What distinguishes between living and dead matter is certainly the fundamental question. In standard biology based on materialistic philosophy one tries to reduce the distinction to a list of properties which as such can be possessed by inanimate matter. Ability to replicate, to process information, to communicate, to form representations about the external world, the ability to selforganize to increasingly complex configurations, intentional behavior, ability to co-operate,.... could be properties of this kind. Up to self-organization the reduction seems plausible. It is easy to model self-organization (by say cell automatons) but it this dynamics is like the dynamics of traffic rules and neither classical nor quantum dynamics resembles it. Intentional behavior is impossible to understand in classical physics unless one claims that it is a mere illusion. This is the case also in quantum physics as we understand it since the randomness of the outcome of state function reduction seems to be in conflict with intentional behavior. Here one must however keep in mind that the individual subsystem performing a state function reduction could quite well experience it as an intentional action. In any case, standard view about state function reduction makes it difficult to co-operative behavior. • What distinguishes between biochemistry and organic chemistry? For instance, how biomolecules can find themselves in the dense soup of biomolecules and how can one understand the effectiveness of bio-catalysts? One might think that these problems are well-understood since we have learned what happens in DNA replication, transcription, and translation and we know the complex reaction pathways. The dynamics involved is very much like the symbolic dynamics of society (one can predict the day of practizing professional from knowing his profession but not from the knowledge of initial data of every possible elementary particle in his body). But what makes the soup of biomolecules a molecular society obeying a dynamics based on symbols? The description of biochemistry in terms of kinematics allows to construct complex reaction pathways based on the idea that each step of the reaction pathway requires a key which fits to a lock of a room containing a key to the lock to the next room [52] but can one really deduce this kind of kinematics from standard quantum theory? • Both biology and neuroscience characterizes subsystems of biological systems and brain in terms of functions they possess and one should also understand whether and how the quantum counterparts of functions emerge. The identification of various functions as time evolution of standard selforganization patterns is certainly a part of the answer. But what self-organization means? Conscious information is certainly the key notion but is the existing quantum theory able to characterize it? ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 976 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe • At the level of brain one of the key questions concerns EEG. Since EEG correlates strongly with the contents of consciousness it is difficult to believe that it is random side product of neural activity. What is then the real role of neuronal activity and EEG and its variants? Why EEG is needed? Signaling related to communication and control is what comes first in mind. But why this kind of signaling would be needed. Brain sends (receives) information but who receives (sends) it? • How macroscopic quantum coherence is achieved allowing quantum super-positions in long time scales? How stable quantum entanglement is achieved? These are difficult problems if one wants to understand quantum mind without generalizing quantum theory itself. Planck constant is simply too small so that dissipation rates are too high and coherence times and lengths are too short. Should physicists adopt a humbler attitude and consider seriously the possibility that the existing physics is not enough and try to learn from biology instead of saying that living systems are just complex? 2.4 Could anomalies help? Anomalies are the best way to end up with a discovery of something new. Of course, living matter as such is a gigantic anomaly but this does not help much. One should pick up the anomalies which are in sharp conflict with the existing physics and give a clear hint about what is wrong with our cherished assumptions. • In quantum mind approach EEG should be a quantal phenomenon since it correlates with consciousness. From the basic formula E = hf of quantum mechanics the energies of EEG photons are however ridiculously small as compared to the thermal energy at physiological temperatures. The strange quantal looking effects of ELF photons on vertebrate (why just vertebrate?!) brain at frequencies which correspond to cyclotron frequencies of biologically important ions such as Ca++ are however an experimental fact (see for instance [53]). The effects of magnetic field patterns on brain studied by Persinger and collaborators represent also an example of this kind of strange effects [58]. The strange findings about the behavior of cell membrane [49] suggest that ionic currents do not dissipate much. The recently discovered burning of water when irradiated by radiowave photons [43, 44] suggests that energetically these photons behave like photons of visible light. The recent findings about photosynthesis [51] suggest quantum coherence in cellular length scale. Is standard quantum theory able to explain these findings? Should one challenge the belief that Planck constant is just a conversion factor between units which can be put equal one with a suitable choice of units? Could Planck constant have a spectrum of discrete values? This would explain the strange findings since by E = hf relation low frequencies could correspond to high energies and dissipation rates -in the first guess inversely proportional to ~- could be very small. Large values of Planck constant would also increase the spatial and time scales of quantum coherence and might solve the basic technical problem of quantum consciousness theories. • Also biophotons [47] correlate with the state of living system but are poorly understood in the existing theoretical framework. • Libet’s findings about strange time delays associated with the passive aspects of consciousness serve also as a hint. Our sensory data has age which is a fraction of second and corresponds to a photon wavelength λ = cT to a length scale, which is of order of Earth size. As if sensory data would be communicated somewhere. Where? • Cyclotron frequencies of biologically important ions in a magnetic field .2 Gauss (smaller than the nominal value of .5 Gauss of the Earth’s magnetic field) are involved with the effects of ELF radiation on vertebrate brain. Also Schumann resonances are reported to have effects on brain. Are some kind of magnetic field structures involved? Earth’s magnetic field and perhaps also the magnetic field patterns associated with biological system itself with B = 2BE /5 for one important level in the hierarchy? As noticed in [59], the cyclotron energy scale of electron in pT range is in EEG range and pT range indeed characterizes the magnetic field associated with brain activity. Do also these magnetic structures carry Cooper pairs of electrons? ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 977 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe • ADP-ATP machinery is the core of energy metabolism and its description involves the problematic notion of high energy phosphate bond [50]. Does this notion really reduce to standard quantum theory? • The chiral selection of biomolecules in living matter [48] means a large parity breaking. This is a complete mystery in standard model which predicts extremely small parity breaking effects. Therefore chiral selection is extremely valuable anomaly helping to guess what kind of new physics might be involved with living matter. Somehow it seems that the parity breaking effects which are large in electro-weak scale appear in immensely zoomed up scales (scaling factors of order 1010 would be involved) 3 Some aspects of quantum TGD In the following I summarize very briefly those basic notions of TGD which are especially relevant for TGD inspired consciousness theory and quantum biology. The representation will be practically formula free. The article series published in Prespacetime Journal [41] describes the mathematical theory behind TGD. The seven books about TGD [1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 5, 7] provide a detailed summary about the recent state of TGD. 3.1 New space-time concept The physical motivation for TGD was what I have christened the energy problem of General Relativity. The notion of energy is ill-defined because the basic symmetries of empty space-time are lost in the presence of gravity. The way out is based on assumption that space-times are imbeddable as 4-surfaces to certain 8-dimensional space by replacing the points of 4-D empty Minkowski space with 4-D very small internal space. This space -call it S- is unique from the requirement that the theory has the symmetries of standard model: S = CP2 , where CP2 is complex projective space with 4 real dimensions [42], is the unique choice. The replacement of the abstract manifold geometry of general relativity with the geometry of surfaces brings the shape of surface as seen from the perspective of 8-D space-time and this means additional degrees of freedom giving excellent hopes of realizng the dream of Einstein about geometrization of fundamental interactions. The work with the generic solutions of the field equations assignable to almost any general coordinate invariant variational principle led soon to the realization that the space-time in this framework is much more richer than in general relativity. 1. Space-time decomposes into space-time sheets with finite size: this lead to the identification of physical objects that we perceive around us as space-time sheets. For instance, the outer boundary of the table is where that particular space-time sheet ends. Besides sheets also string like objects and elementary particle like objects appear so that TGD can be regarded also as a generalization of string models obtained by replacing strings with 3-D surfaces. 2. Elementary particles are identified as topological inhomogenities glued to these space-time sheets. In this conceptual framework material structures and shapes are not due to some mysterious substance in slightly curved space-time but reduce to space-time topology just as energy- momentum currents reduce to space-time curvature in general relativity. 3. Also the view about classical fields changes. One can assign to each material system a field identity since electromagnetic and other fields decompose to topological field quanta. Examples are magnetic and electric flux tubes and flux sheets and topological light rays representing light propagating along tube like structure without dispersion and dissipation making em ideal tool for communications [31]. One can speak about field body or magnetic body of the system. Field body indeed becomes the key notion distinguishing TGD inspired model of quantum biology from competitors. The magnetic body inherits from the biological body an onionlike fractal structure. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 978 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe Each part of the magnetic body can be seen as an intentional agent using the corresponding part of the biological body as a motor instrument and sensory receptor. The size scale of the magnetic body is in general much larger than that of biological body. Cyclotron frequency identified as frequency of photons able to exist as oscillations at magnetic body gives an estimate for the size of the magnetic body corresponding to a particular magnetic field strength. For 10 Hz frequency the size scale is of order Earth size. In this framework a fractal generalization of EEG and its variants provides a communication and control tool for magnetic body. The findings of Libet about time delays associated with the passive aspects and meaning that sensory data is a fraction of second old [64] could be understood as delays due to the finite velocity of light: it takes finite time for the signal to propagate from biological body to the magnetic body. This obviously means a profound modification of the views about what we are. The identification with the biological body could be understood as an illusion: a child looking a movie assimilates completely with the hero. There is a rich variety of illusions related to this identification of observer with the region of space from which the dominating contribution to consciousness comes from. 3.2 Zero energy ontology In standard ontology of quantum physics physical states are assumed to have positive energy. In zero energy ontology physical states decompose to pairs of positive and negative energy states such that all net values of the conserved quantum numbers vanish. The interpretation of these states in ordinary ontology would be as transitions between initial and final states, physical events. By quantum classical correspondences zero energy states must have space-time and imbedding space correlates. 1. Positive and negative energy parts reside at future and past light-like boundaries of causal diamond (CD) defined as intersection of future and past directed light-cones and visualizable as double cone. The analog of CD in cosmology is big bang followed by big crunch. CDs for a fractal hierarchy containing CDs within CDs. Disjoint CDs are possible and CDs can also intersect. 2. p-Adic length scale hypothesis [17] motivates the hypothesis that the temporal distances between the tips of the intersecting light-cones come as octaves T = 2n T0 of a fundamental time scale T0 defined by CP2 size R as T0 = R/c. One prediction is that in the case of electron this time scale is .1 seconds defining the fundamental biorhythm. Also in the case u and d quarks the time scales correspond to biologically important time scales given by 10 ms for u quark and by and 2.5 ms for d quark [30]. This means a direct coupling between microscopic and macroscopic scales. Zero energy ontology conforms with the crossing symmetry of quantum field theories meaning that the final states of the quantum scattering event are effectively negative energy states. As long as one can restrict the consideration to either positive or negative energy part of the state ZEO is consistent with positive energy ontology. This is the case when the observer characterized by a particular CD studies the physics in the time scale of much larger CD containing observer’s CD as a sub-CD. When the time scale sub-CD of the studied system is much shorter that the time scale of sub-CD characterizing the observer, the interpretation of states associated with sub-CD is in terms of quantum fluctuations. ZEO solves the problem of initial state since in principle any zero energy state is obtained from any other state by a sequence of quantum jumps without breaking of conservation laws. The fact that energy is not conserved in general relativity based cosmologies can be also understood since each CD is characterized by its own conserved quantities. As a matter fact, one must be speak about average values of conserved quantities since one can have a quantum superposition of zero energy states with the quantum numbers of the positive energy part varying over some range. For thermodynamical states this is indeed the case and this leads to the idea that quantum theory in ZEO can be regarded as a ”complex square root” of thermodynamics obtained as a product of positive diagonal square root of density matrix and unitary S-matrix. M -matrix defines time-like entanglement coefficients between positive and negative energy parts of the zero energy state and replaces S-matrix as the fundamental observable. In standard quantum measurement theory this time-like entanglement would be reduced in quantum measurement and regenerated in the next quantum jump if one accepts Negentropy Maximization Principle (NMP) [23] as the fundamental variational principle. Various M matrices define the rows of the unitary U matrix characterizing the unitary process part of quantum ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 979 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe jump. From the point of view of consciousness theory the importance of ZEO is that conservation laws in principle pose no restrictions for the new realities created in quantum jumps: free will is maximal. 3.3 The hierarchy of Planck constants The motivations for the hierarchy of Planck constants come from both astrophysics and biology. The biological motivations have been already discussed. In astrophysics the observation of Nottale [46] that planetary orbits in solar system seem to correspond to Bohr orbits with a gigantic gravitational Planck constant motivated the proposal that Planck constant might not be constant after all [20, 21]. This led to the introduction of the quantization of Planck constant as an independent postulate. It has however turned that quantized Planck constant in effective sense could emerge from the basic structure of TGD alone. Canonical momentum densities and time derivatives of the imbedding space coordinates are the field theory analogs of momenta and velocities in classical mechanics. The extreme non-linearity and vacuum degeneracy of Kähler action imply that the correspondence between canonical momentum densities and time derivatives of the imbedding space coordinates is 1-to-many: for vacuum extremals themselves 1-to-infinite. A convenient technical manner to treat the situation is to replace imbedding space with its n-fold singular covering. Canonical momentum densities to which conserved quantities are proportional would be same at the sheets corresponding to different values of the time derivatives. At each sheet of the covering Planck constant is effectively ~ = n~0 . This splitting to multisheeted structure can be seen as a phase transition reducing the densities of various charges by factor 1/n and making it possible to have perturbative phase at each sheet (gauge coupling strengths are proportional to 1/~ and scaled down by 1/n). The connection with fractional quantum Hall effect [45] is almost obvious. At the more detailed level one finds that the spectrum of Planck constants would be given by ~ = na nb ~0 . This has many profound implications, which are wellcome from Quantum Mind perspective. 1. Quantum coherence and quantum superposition become possible in arbitrary long length scales. One can speak about zoomed up variants of elementary particles and zoomed up sizes make it possible to satisfy the overlap condition for quantum length parameters used as a criterion for the presence of macroscopic quantum phases. In the case of quantum gravitation the length scale involved are astrophysical. This would conform with Penrose’s intuition that quantum gravity is fundamental for the understanding of consciousness and also with the idea that consciousness cannot be localized to brain. 2. Photons with given frequency can in principle have arbitrarily high energies by E = hf formula, and this would explain the strange anomalies associated with the interaction of ELF em fields with living matter [53]. Quite generally the cyclotron frequencies which correspond to energies much below the thermal energy for ordinary value of Planck constant could correspond to energies above thermal threshold. 3. The value of Planck constant is a natural characterizer of the evolutionary level and biological evolution would mean a gradual increase of the largest Planck constant in the hierarchy characterizing given quantum system. Evolutionary leaps would have interpretation as phase transitions increasing the maximal value of Planck constant for evolving species. The space-time correlate would be the increase of both the number and the size of the sheets of the covering associated with the system so that its complexity would increase. 4. The phase transitions changing Planck constant change also the length of the magnetic flux tubes. The natural conjecture is that biomolecules form a kind of Indra’s net connected by the flux tubes and ~ changing phase transitions are at the core of the quantum bio-dynamics. The contraction of the magnetic flux tube connecting distant biomolecules would force them near to each other making possible for the bio-catalysis to proceed. This mechanism could be central for DNA replication and other basic biological processes. Magnetic Indra’s net could be also responsible for the coherence of gel phase and the phase transitions affecting flux tube lengths could induce the contractions and expansions of the intracellular gel phase. The reconnection of flux tubes would allow the restructing of the signal pathways between biomolecules and other subsystems and would be also involved with ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 980 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe ADP-ATP transformation inducing a transfer of negentropic entanglement [35]. The braiding of the magnetic flux tubes could make possible topological quantum computation like processes and analog of computer memory realized in terms of braiding patterns[36]. 5. p-Adic length scale hypothesis and hierarchy of Planck constants suggest entire hierarchy of zoomed up copies of standard model physics with range of weak interactions and color forces scaling like ~. This is not conflict with the known physics for the simple reason that we know very little about dark matter (partly because we might be making misleading assumptions about its nature). Dark matter would make possible the large parity breaking effects manifested as chiral selection of bio-molecules [48]. What is required is that classical Z 0 and W fields responsible for parity breaking effects are present in cellular length scale. If the value of Planck constant is so large that weak scale is some biological length scale, weak fields are effectively massless below this scale and large parity breaking effects become possible. For the solutions of field equations which are almost vacuum extremals Z0 field is non-vanishing and proportional to electromagnetic field. The hypothesis that cell membrane corresponds to a space-time sheet near a vacuum extremal (this corresponds to criticality very natural if the cell membrane is to serve as an ideal sensory receptor) leads to a rather successful model for cell membrane as sensory receptor with lipids representing the pixels of sensory qualia chart. The surprising prediction is that bio-photons [47] and bundles of EEG photons can be identified as different decay products of dark photons with energies of visible photons. Also the peak frequencies of sensitivity for photoreceptors are predicted correctly [37]. 3.4 p-Adic physics and number theoretic universality p-Adic physics [18, 4] has become gradually a key piece of TGD inspired biophysics. Basic quantitative predictions relate to p-adic length scale hypothesis and to the notion of number theoretic entropy. Basic ontological ideas are that life resides in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds and that p-adic spacetime sheets serve as correlates for cognition and intentionality. 3.4.1 p-Adic number fields p-Adic number fields Qp [40] -one for each prime p- are analogous to reals in the sense that one can speak about p-adic continuum and that also p-adic numbers are obtained as completions of the field of rational numbers. One can say that rational numbers belong to the intersection of real and p-adic numbers. p-Adic number field Qp allows also an infinite number of its algebraic extensions. Also transcendental extensions are possible. For reals the only extension is complex numbers. p-Adic topology defining the notions of nearness and continuity differs dramatically from the real topology. An integer which is infinite as a real number can be completely well defined and finite as a p-adic number. In particular, powers pn of prime p have p-adic norm (magnitude) equal to p−n in Qp so that at the limit of very large n real magnitude becomes infinite and p-adic magnitude vanishes. p-Adic topology is rough since p-adic distance d(x, y) = d(x − y) depends on the lowest pinary digit of x − y only and is analogous to the distance between real points when approximated by taking into account only the lowest digit in the decimal expansion of x − y. A possible interpretation is in terms of a finite measurement resolution and resolution of sensory perception. p-Adic topology looks somewhat strange. For instance, p-adic spherical surface is not infinitely thin but has a finite thickness and p-adic surfaces possess no boundary in the topological sense. Ultrametricity is the technical term characterizing the basic properties of p-adic topology and is coded by the inequality d(x − y) ≤ M in{d(x), d(y)}. p-Adic topology brings in mind the decomposition of perceptive field to objects. 3.4.2 Physical and biological motivations for p-adic number fields The physical motivations for p-adic physics came from the observation that p-adic thermodynamics -not for energy but infinitesimal scaling generator of so called super-conformal algebra [39] acting as symmetries of quantum TGD [2]- predicts elementary particle mass scales and also masses correctly under very general assumptions [4]. In particular, the ratio of proton mass to Planck mass, the basic mystery number of ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 981 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe physics, is predicted correctly. The basic assumption is that the preferred primes characterizing the p-adic number fields involved are near powers of two: p ' 2k , k positive integer. Those nearest to power of two correspond to Mersenne primes Mn = 2n − 1. One can also consider complex primes known as Gaussian primes, in particular Gaussian Mersennes MG,n = (1 + i)n − 1. It turns out that Mersennes and Gaussian Mersennes are in a preferred position physically in TGD based world order. What is especially interesting that the length scale range 10 nm-2.5 µ assignable to DNA contains as many as 4 Gaussian Mersennes corresponding to n = 151, 157, 163, 167 [37]. This number theoretical miracle supports the view that p-adic physics is especially important for the understanding of living matter. p-Adic length scale hypothesis suggests the identification of metabolic energy currencies as energy quanta liberated as particle drops from space-time sheet to a larger one. These energy quanta correspond to increrements of zero point kinetic energy. Metabolic energy currencies would be completely universal and exist already during the prebiotic era so that metabolic machinery would build up around this preexisting structure. A simple (and also rough) model based on p-adic length scale hypothesis allows to estimate the increments of zero point kinetic energy. The quantum corresponding to about .5 eV has place in this hierarchy for which basic energies (those for which larger space-time sheet is very large) come as octaves of basic energy quantum [30, 34]. These energy quanta do not have interpretation in terms of molecular transitions and there exist anamalous lines of radiation from interstellar space both in IR, visible, and UV region [30]. 3.4.3 p-Adic physics as correlate for cognition and intentionality The philosophical for p-adic numbers fields come from the question about the possible physical correlates of cognition and intention [28]. Cognition forms representations of the external world which have finite cognitive resolution and the decomposition of the perceptive field to objects is an essential element of these representations. Therefore p-adic space-time sheets could be seen as candidates of thought bubbles, the mind stuff of Descartes. One can also consider p-adic space-time sheets as correlates of intentions. The quantum jump in which p-adic space-time sheet is replaced with a real one could serve as a quantum correlate of intentional action. This process is forbidden by conservation laws in standard ontology: one cannot even compare real and p-adic variants of the conserved quantities like energy in the general case. In zero energy ontology the net values of conserved quantities for zero energy states vanish so that conservation laws allow these transitions. 3.4.4 Life as something in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds Rational numbers belong to the intersection of real and p-adic continua. An obvious generalization of this statement applies to real manifolds and their p-adic variants. When extensions of p-adic numbers are allowed, also some algebraic numbers can belong to the intersection of p-adic and real worlds. The notion of intersection of real and p-adic worlds has actually two meanings. 1. The intersection could consist of the rational and possibly some algebraic points in the intersection of real and p-adic partonic 2-surfaces at the ends of CD. This set is in general discrete. The interpretation could be as discrete cognitive representations. 2. The intersection could also have a more abstract meaning. For instance, the surfaces defined by rational functions with rational coefficients have a well-defined meaning in both real and p-adic context and could be interpreted as belonging to this intersection. There is strong temptation to assume that intentions are transformed to actions only in this intersection. One could say that life resides in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds in this abstract sense. P Additional support for the idea comes from the observation that Shannon entropy S = − pn log(pn ) allows a p-adic generalization if the probabilities are rational numbers by replacing log(pn ) with −log(|pn |p ), where |x|p is p-adic norm. Also algebraic numbers in some extension of p-adic numbers can be allowed. The unexpected property of the number theoretic Shannon entropy is that it can be negative and its unique minimum value as a function of the p-adic prime p it is always negative. Entropy transforms to information! ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 982 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe In the case of number theoretic entanglement entropy there is a natural interpretation for this. Number theoretic entanglement entropy would measure the information carried by the entanglement whereas ordinary entanglement entropy would characterize the uncertainty about the state of either entangled system. For instance, for p maximally entangled states both ordinary entanglement entropy and number theoretic entanglement negentropy are maximal with respect to Rp norm. Entanglement carries maximal information. The information would be about the relationship between the systems, a rule. Schrödinger cat would be dead enough to know that it is better to not open the bottle completely. Negentropy Maximization Principle [23] coding the basic rules of quantum measurement theory implies that negentropic entanglement can be stable against the effects of quantum jumps unlike entropic entanglement. Therefore living matter could be distinguished from inanimate matter also by negentropic entanglement possible in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds. In consciousness theory negentropic entanglement could be seen as a correlate for the experience of understanding or any other positively colored experience, say love. Negentropically entangled states are stable but binding energy and effective loss of relative translational degrees of freedom is not responsible for the stability. Therefore bound states are not in question. The distinction between negentropic and bound state entanglement could be compared to the difference between unhappy and happy marriage. The first one is a social jail but in the latter case both parties are free to leave but do not want to. The special characterics of negentropic entanglement raise the question whether the problematic notion of high energy phosphate bond [50] central for metabolism could be understood in terms of negentropic entanglement. This would also allow an information theoretic interpretation of metabolism since the transfer of metabolic energy would mean a transfer of negentropy [35]. 4 Consciousness theory as extension of quantum measurement theory TGD inspired theory of consciousness [22, 16] could be seen as a generalization of quantum measurement theory. The notions of quantum jump and self self are the key notions. Negentropy Maximization Principle (NMP) [23] is the basic dynamical principle. NMP is mirror image for the second law of thermodynamics and states that the amount of conscious information gain in quantum jump is maximal. NMP reproduces standard quantum measurement theory for entropic entanglement and is in this case consistent with the second law since the non-determinism of state function reductions implies the increase of ensemble entropy. 4.1 Quantum jumps as moment of consciousness The starting point of TGD inspired theory of consciousness was the identification of quantum jump as a moment of consciousness [22]. 1. Quantum jump has a complex anatomy which however simplifies in ZEO. Quantum jump involves unitary time evolution leading from a state resulting in state function reduction to a quantum superposition of states: one could speak of multiverse. This step is described by the counterpart of the unitary process of Penrose and is coded by a unitary matrix U in the state space formed by zero energy states. U is therefore not identifiable directly as S-matrix of quantum field theories but contains as its rows all possible M -matrices which are what particle physicist tries to measure in laboratory. State function reduction and state preparation can be assigned to the opposite light-like boundaries of CD. A good metaphor is Djinn in the bottle. In U -process bottle is opened and Djinn comes out and creates a quantum superposition of all possible worlds. The wish of the observer is fulfilled and leads to a state function reduction. Actually there is an entire cascade of state function reductions starting from the level of the entire universe which splits the entangelement sub-systems already obtained in a step-wise manner to pairs un-entangled sub-systems. The splitting for a given sub-system occurs only if it is consisent with NMP. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 983 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe For the ordinary definition of entanglement entropy the process would lead to a completely unentangled situation. If the number theoretic entanglement entropy making sense for rational (and even algebraic) entanglement probabilities is allowed, the process stops unless the reduction of entanglement reduces the entanglement entropy. Therefore the number theoretic entanglement possible in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds can be stable and living systems are able to preserve their coherence. 2. Since the reduction cascade proceeds from top to bottom, one can speak about fractal formed by quantum jumps within quantum jumps. One cannot assign to the steps of this sequence any duration of geometric time. One can however associate to it an experienced duration and it is very tempting to assume that the experienced duration increases as one climbs up in the self hierarchy. 3. Quantum jump replaces the quantum superposition of classical histories (space-time surfaces, classical worlds) with a new one whereas ordinary state function reduction would do this for time=constant snapshot of Schrödinger evolution. Quantum jump does not spoil the determinism of classical dynamics or of Dirac equation since it occurs entirely outside space-time and Hilbert space. In quantum jump both the geometric future and past (defined only within measurement resolution) are replaced with new ones. The mysterious finding of Libet [63] that intentional action is preceded by neural activity can be interpreted in this framework without giving up the notion of free will. This raises a fascinating question about time scales in which the geometric past can be affected in quantum jump. Also memories stored in the geometric past can be affected in quantum jumps and the fact that memories are highly unstable suggest that the time scale is measured in years. It must be added that the notion of classical determinism in its standard form fails due to the special properties of Kähler action (vacuum degeneracy mathematically analogous to a gauge degeneracy but physically analogous to 4-D spin glass degeneracy). This failure provides a space-time correlate for the non-determinism of the quantum jump sequence. 4.2 The notion of self The notion of self is second basic notion introduced originally as a notion independent from quantum jump. It however seems that the notion of self could be reduced to that of quantum jump. 1. The notion of self can be seen as a generalization of the notion of observer. The natural first guess inspired by the standard notion of entanglement entropy was that self is a subsystem able to remain unentangled during a sequence of quantum jumps. Self would be a system able to preserve its quantum identity. In the case of negentropic entanglement a more natural interpretation is that expansion of consciousness rather than loss of it is experienced as self entangles with second system negentropically. Only entropic entanglement would lead to a loss of consciousness. Second condition would be that self is stable against splitting to unentangled subsystems. This criterion is satisfied if self corresponds to a system for which the entanglement between its subsystems is negentropic. Self experiences its sub-selves as mental images and even we would represent mental images of some higher collective self. Everything would be conscious but consciousness could be lost. The flow of consciousness for a given self could be due to the quantum jump sequences performed by its sub-selves giving rise to mental images. 2. The fractal structure of quantum jump suggests that the notions of self and quantum jump are one and same thing. The fractal hierarchy of quantum jumps would correspond to fractal hierarchy of selves. This fractal hierarchy is very much analogous and closely related to the hierarchy formed by physical systems extending from elementary particle level to arbitrary long astrophysical scales. The hierarchy of Planck constants and NMP with number theoretic entanglement entropy predicts that particle like entities are possible in all length scales. 3. By quantum classical correspondence self has also space-time correlates.One can visualize subself as a space-time sheet ”glued” by topological sum to the space-time sheet of self. Subsystem is not described as a tensor factor as in the standard description of subsystems. Also subselves of selves ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 984 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe can entangle negentropically and this gives rise to a sharing of mental images about which stereo vision would be basic example. Quite generally, one could speak of stereo consciousness. Also the experiences of sensed presence [59] could be understood as a sharing of mental images between brain hemispheres which are not themselves entangled. This is possible also between different brains. In the normal situation brain hemispheres are entangled. 4. At the level of 8-dimensional imbedding space the natural correlate of self would be CD (causal diamond). At the level of space-time the correlate would be space-time sheet or light-like 3-surface. The contents of consciousness of self would be determined by the space-time sheets in the interior of CD. Without further restrictions the experience of self would be essentially four-dimensional. Memories would be like sensory experiences except that they would be about the geometric past and for some reason are not usually colored by sensory qualia. As already noticed, .1 second time scale defining the duration of moment for sensory experience corresponds to that of electron’s CD which suggests that Cooper pairs of electrons are essential for the sensory qualia. 4.3 How experienced time and the geometric time of physicist relate to each other? The relationship between experienced time and time of physicis is one of the basic puzzles of modern physics. In the proposed framework they are certainly two different things and the challenge is to understand why the correlation between them is so strong that it has led to their identification. One can imagine several alternative views explaining this correlation [24, 25, 26] and it is better to keep mind open. The flow of subjective time corresponds to quantum jump sequences for sub-selves of self having interpretation as mental images. If mind is completely empty of mental images subjectively experienced time ceases to exists. This leaves however several questions to be answered. 1. Why the contents of conscious of self comes from a finite space-time region looks like an easy question. If the contents of consciousness for subselves representing mental images is localized to the sub-CDs with indeed have defined temporal position inside CD assigned with the self the contents of consciousness is indeed from a finite space-time volume. This implies a new view about memory. There is no need to store again and again memories to the ”brain now” since the communications with the geometric past by negative energy signals and also time-like negentropic quantum entanglement allow the sharing of the mental images of the geometric past. 2. There are also more difficult questions. Subjective time has arrow and has only the recent and possibly also past. The subjective past could in principle reduce to subjective now if conscious experience is about 4-D space-time region so that memories would be always geometric memories. How these properties of subjective time are transferred to apparent properties of geometric time? How the arrow of geometric time is induced? How it is possible that the locus for the contents of conscious experience shifts or at least seems to be shifted quantum jump by quantum jump to the direction of geometric future? Why the sensory mental images are located in a narrow time interval of about .1 seconds in the usual states of consciousness (not that sensory memories are possible: scent memories and phantom pain in leg could be seen as examples of vivid sensory memory)? Possible answers to these questions could rely on NMP if understood as a sufficiently general principle. Suppose that NMP translates to the statement that selves are eager to gain conscious information. The mere assumption that selves are curious leaves a lot of room for alternatives and one can imagine several models. Note also that geometric time can correspond to the local time assignable to space-time sheet or to the cosmic time assignable to the CD or to 8-D imbedding space. 1. The space-time in the geometric future above the ”upper” light-like boundary of CD represents the unknown where the news come from. Negentropic self has to some extent free will and can perform quantum jumps inducing effectively the shift of the quantum superposition of the spacetime surfaces towards geometric past. The news come from the future and represent sensory input and induce subselves as mental images. The population of sensory subselves would tend to be created ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 985 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe near the ”upper” boundary of CD. This would induce a breaking of time reversal invariance and spontanous arrow of geometric time. Self would be like a person in movie theater. Self would not move anywhere, space-time surfaces -the film- would move with respect to self. 2. One can consider also alternative view analogous to the standard view if one assumes that the CDs representing subselves can shift towards geometric future in the sequence of quantum jumps. Suppose that U process creates a quantum superposition over temporal positions of CD and that temporal localization takes place during the state function reduction process. Also now the strong form of NMP could force a drift of the sub-self population towards unkown defining the geometric future. The geometric time would be assignable to the larger CD. Also the first option allows drifting of subselves to the upper boundary of CS as a consequence of strong form of NMP. One might hope that spontaneous breaking of time reversal invariance alone could explain the induced arrow of geometric time so that the arrow of time would not be a result of intentional action. Following options represent attempts to understand the arrow of cosmic time as something analogous to diffusion in half-space. 1. Self is a subself of larger self and the corresponding CD could induce a breaking of time reversal invariance since the proper time coordinate for CD has only positive values so that a diffusion and even drift towards geomeric future could result. If subself is nearer to the lower boundary of the larger CD it tends to diffuse upwards and vice versa. In the middle of the larger CD, where the analog of cosmic expansion changes to contraction geometric time would stop. 2. Second option is based on the observation that the size scale of given CD must increase on the average during quantum jump sequence. These events correspond to phase transitions increasing the size scale of CD by a factor of two and could serve as correlate for cosmic expansion. When one fixes either tip of CD, the second tip moves towards future with respect to it in discrete phase transition like steps. This discrete time evolution might define a quantum correlate for the flow of cosmic time at imbedding space level [19]. 4.4 Quantum correlates of for various aspects of conscious experience The identification of quantum correlates of cognition and intentionality, of sensory qualia, Boolean mind, and of emotions [32] represents one challenge for Quantum Mind theories. As already explained, p-adic physics, the vision about life as something residing in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds, and the notion of number theoretic entropy provide a plausible starting point when one tries to say something about the geometric and quantum correlates of cognition and intentionality. Zero energy ontology makes possible the transitions transforming p-adic zero energy states to their real counterparts and having interpretation in terms of intentional action. 1. Quantum numbers characterize quantum states. Therefore the increments of quantum numbers for a subsystem should characterize quantum jumps and it is attractive to assign classify fundamental qualia in terms of quantum number increments. One application is the identification of principal colors in terms of color quantum number increments of quantum states [32]. This identification makes sense if one accepts the fractal hierarchy of QCD like dynamics allowed by p-adic length scale hierarchy and by the hierarchy of Planck constants. A concrete model is provided by the capacitor model of sensory qualia in which a large number of particles which same quantum numbers flows to a subsystem during quantum jump inducing the analog of di-electric breakdown (note the analogy with nerve pulse). Bose-Einstein condensation provides one possible realization. In this case one can say that the quantum numbers of the particle in question represent the basic quale which is amplified. 2. One could also speak about Boolean qualia and fermions provide possible correlates for them. The 2N many-fermion states of fermionic Fock space for N fermionic qubits define a basis of Boolean algebra. The entangled pairs of fermionic states associated with the positive and negative energy parts of zero energy states define quantal Boolean functions as sums over entangled pairs of many ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 986 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe fermion states. Negentropic entanglement could define a representation of a rule with entangled pairs representing various instances of the rule. Time-like entanglement would define a representation for a ”law of physics” and M -matrices would be fundamental representations of this kind. The increments of the fermionic quantum numbers could define Boolean qualia and one can imagine Boolean capacitor mechanism allowing to amplify a given Boolean statement. One should be also able to say something about the quantum correlates of emotions. Here the notion of negentropic entanglement might be the key concept. 1. Emotions have a quale like character. For instance, psychological pleasure and pain resemble their physiological counterparts- and quite generally there is a tendency to assign to emotions the attributes of sensory experience. It would be attractive to assign this positive/negative dichotomy to the increase/reduction of entanglement negentropy. Emotion would represent Boolean bit as the sign of negentropy increment. The destruction of generation of negentropic entanglement would therefore be the core element of emotional quale. The character of entanglement involved would determine whether the emotion corresponds to pleasure or pain, joy or sorrow, pride or shame. In the case of physiological pain or pleasure it is easy to imagine that the cause of pain destroys/creates negentropic entanglement. Pain and pleasure at this level relates directly to what happens to metabolism. This is easy to understand if the basic function of energy metabolism is to transfer negentropic entanglement. For higher level emotions the negentropy reduction or increase could be produced artificially to give an emotional content for something regarded as important. 2. Very often emotions are characterized by good-bad/right-wrong dichotomy characterizable by single binary digit. Perhaps emotions provide a representation of a high level summary about large amounts information, a kind of Boolean function of very many qubits. The function of neural transmitters can be often interpreted in terms of reward or punishment. Information and emotions seem to be closely related: peptides are often regarded as both information molecules and molecules of emotion [55]. This can be understood if the function of information molecule is to induce emotional response representing the information. 3. Comparison to a standard -be it moral rule, expected or desired behavior, or something else- is rather often an essential aspect of emotion. Comparison can in principle be represented as a quantal Boolean function involving the standard (say moral rule) represented in terms of negentropic entanglement. If the Boolean instance compared with the rule corresponds to an instance allowed by the rule, positive emotion results. Otherwise the emotion is negatively colored. One might also think that there is expectation for the result of comparison. If the outcome differs from expectedwhich corresponds to a flip of bit, positive or negative emotion results but could do so as a secondary representation. The above argument suggests that the outcome of comparison does not represent the emotion as such but there is a neural circuitry encoding the outcome to reward or punishment. 4.5 Self referentiality of conscious experience Self referentiality of consciousness is one of its most mysterious looking aspects. In a loose formulation one could say that system is able to be conscious what it is conscious of. This formulation however leads to an infinite hierarchy of reflective levels and therefore to a paradox. One can however milden the formulation by saying that self-referential system is able to be conscious about what it was conscious of (with respect to subjective time of course!) In this formulation quantum classical correspondence gives hopes about the understanding of selfreferentiality. Quantum classical correspondence means in TGD framework that not only quantum states but also quantum jump sequences have space-time correlates. The failure of classical determinism for Kähler action in standard sense of the word is responsible for this and relates directly to the basic properties distinguishing TGD Universe from that of standard model. This allows to imagine that quantum jump leading from a superposition of space-time surfaces to a new one also gives rise to a representation of the conscious experiences which preceded the last quantum jump at the level of space-time geometry. Reductio ad absurdum would transform to evolution of consciousness able to add to the existing hierarchy a new reflective level in each quantum jump. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 987 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe A possible concrete physical realization of self-referentiality is suggested by DNA as quantum computer model [36]. One assumes that DNA nucleotides and lipids are connected by magnetic flux tubes. Since the lipid layer of the cell membrane is 2-dimensional liquid crystal, the lipids are in continual hydrodynamical motion and this means in time direction entanglement of the orbits. The events in nearby environment and also nerve pulses affect this flow. This braiding in time direction defines a topological quantum computation. This motion entangles also the flux tubes connecting the lipids to DNA nucleotides so that when the topological quantum computation halts it becomes stored into memory as space-like entanglement. In TGD framework also the time-like braiding provides a space-time representation of the quantum computation which also gives to a conscious experience at some level of the hierarchy. References Books about TGD [1] M. Pitkänen (2006), Topological Geometrodynamics: Overview. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdview/tgdview.html. [2] M. Pitkänen (2006), Quantum Physics as Infinite-Dimensional Geometry. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdgeom/tgdgeom.html. [3] M. Pitkänen (2006), Physics in Many-Sheeted Space-Time. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdclass/tgdclass.html. [4] M. Pitkänen (2006), p-Adic length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/paddark/paddark.html. [5] M. Pitkänen (2006), Quantum TGD. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html. [6] M. Pitkänen (2006), TGD as a Generalized Number Theory. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdnumber/tgdnumber.html. [7] M. Pitkänen (2006), TGD and Fringe Physics. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/freenergy/freenergy.html. Books about TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness and Quantum Biology [8] M. Pitkänen (2006), TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html. [9] M. Pitkänen (2006), Bio-Systems as Self-Organizing Quantum Systems. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/bioselforg/bioselforg.html. [10] M. Pitkänen (2006), Quantum Hardware of Living Matter. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/bioware/bioware.html. [11] M. Pitkänen (2006), Bio-Systems as Conscious Holograms. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/hologram/hologram.html. [12] M. Pitkänen (2006), Genes and Memes. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/genememe/genememe.html. [13] M. Pitkänen (2006), Magnetospheric Consciousness. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/magnconsc/magnconsc.html. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 988 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe [14] M. Pitkänen (2006), Mathematical Aspects of Consciousness Theory. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/mathconsc/mathconsc.html. [15] M. Pitkänen (2006), TGD and EEG. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdeeg/tgdeeg.html. References to the chapters of the books about TGD and TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness and Quantum Biology [16] The chapter TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness of [1]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdview/tgdview.html#tgdconsc2010. [17] The chapter p-Adic Numbers and Generalization of Number Concept of [6]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdnumber/tgdnumber.html#padmat. [18] The chapter TGD as a Generalized Number Theory: Quaternions, Octonions, and their Hyper Counterparts of [6]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdnumber/tgdnumber.html#visionb. [19] The chapter TGD and Cosmology of [3]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdclass/tgdclass.html#cosmo. [20] The chapter TGD and Astrophysics of [3]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdclass/tgdclass.html#astro. [21] The chapter Quantum Astrophysics of [3]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdclass/tgdclass.html#qastro. [22] The chapter Matter, Mind, Quantum of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#conscic. [23] The chapter Negentropy Maximization Principle of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#nmpc. [24] The chapter Time and Consciousness of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#timesc. [25] The chapter Time, Spacetime and Consciousness of [11]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/hologram/hologram.html#time. [26] The chapter About Nature of Time of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#timenature. [27] The chapter Quantum Model of Memory of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#memoryc. [28] The chapter p-Adic Physics as Physics of Cognition and Intention of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#cognic. [29] The chapter TGD Based Model for OBEs of [8]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#OBE. [30] The chapter About the New Physics Behind Qualia of [10]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/bioware/bioware.html#newphys. [31] The chapter Quantum Antenna Hypothesis of [10]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/bioware/bioware.html#tubuc. ISSN: 2153-8301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| November 2010| Vol 1.| Issue 8| pp. 971-991 989 Pitkänen, M. Quantum Mind in TGD Universe [32] The chapter General Theory of Qualia of [11]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/hologram/hologram.html#qualia. [33] The chapter Bio-Systems as Conscious Holograms of [11]. http://tgd.wippiespace.com/public_html/hologram/hologram.html#hologram. 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arXiv:0910.4300v1 [physics.gen-ph] 22 Oct 2009 Quantum features of consciousness, computers and brain Michael B. Mensky P. N. Lebedev Physical Institute, RAS Leninsky prosp. 53 119991 Moscow Russia mensky@lpi.ru Abstract: Many people believe that mysterious phenomenon of consciousness may be connected with quantum features of our world. The present author proposed so-called Extended Everett’s Concept (EEC) that allowed to explain consciousness and super-consciousness (intuitive knowledge). Brain, according to EEC, is an interface between consciousness and super-consciousness on the one part and body on the other part. Relations between all these components of the human cognitive system are analyzed in the framework of EEC. It is concluded that technical devices improving usage of super-consciousness (intuition) may exist. Key–Words: Consciousness, quantum theory, brain, intuition May 12, 2009 1 Introduction One of the mysterious phenomena in the sphere of life is consciousness. It is of course closely connected with thinking and, more generally, with cognitive ability of human. Since thinking is a function of brain, it seems natural to suggest that consciousness is also produced by brain. Many people accept this point of view. This is however not evident because there is an essential difference between the phenomena of thinking and consciousness. Thinking is a direct analogue of computation if the latter is regarded in the broad sense of the word (as including for example logical operations). Consciousness, although well known to everyone, is something that hardly can be clearly defined. This is one of the reasons why many attempts have been undertaken to connect consciousness, and more generally, area of psychic, with another mysterious area, quantum mechanics. The latter is a regular branch of science and is therefore well elaborated with respect to its practical applications. However, conceptual basis of quantum phenomena, their radical variation from classical phenomena are not clearly understood up to now. The philosopher David Chalmers formulates the motivation for quantum theories of consciousness (or mind) as follows: “a Law of Minimization of Mystery: consciousness is mysterious and quantum mechanics is mysterious, so maybe the two mysteries have a common source.” Various ways to connect quantum mechanics with consciousness (or mind) were proposed by Wolfgang Pauli, David Bohm, Roger Penrose, Henry Stapp and other physicists (saying nothing of philosophers). In 2000 the author suggested an approach to this problem based on the Everett’s (‘many-worlds’) interpretation of quantum mechanics. This approach, developed later in a series of papers has been called Extended Everett’s Concept (EEC). It seems to be the shortest line of consideration connecting quantum theory with consciousness. What makes EEC convincing is that, at the price of only two simple postulates, a great number of mysterious mental phenomena are explained (see Sect.2). The nature of consciousness is not strictly defined in EEC (this is not necessary since the features of consciousness are well defined instead). Yet it is clear that consciousness, or rather complex consisting of explicit consciousness and super-consciousness (manifesting itself in the regime of unconscious), is a human’s ability providing the best possible orientation in the world. According to EEC, consciousness is not produced by brain, but is independent of it. The brain serves as an interface between conscious and the body. Although consciousness in EEC is directly connected with quantum features of our world, no structure in brain of the type of quantum computer is suggested. Rather the whole quantum world is a sort of quantum computer supporting the phenomenon of consciousness and superconsciousness. Instead of being an origin of consciousness, real quantum computers (even their primitive realizations existing now) can be used to construct models of quantum world demonstrating how the phenomena of life and consciousness may exist. Due to special features of human superconsciousness, it cannot be replaced by the action of any technical device or even any material system. However, technical equipment may be used to make usage of super-consciousness more efficient. 2 Features of consciousness in Extended Everett’s Concept (EEC) It is well known that quantum mechanics suffers from conceptual problems (paradoxes) that are not solved up to date. The reason of these problems is in fact contradiction between linear character of quantum-mechanical evolution and the assumption that during measurement in a quantum system it undergoes to reduction (i.e. the state of the system change so that it correspond to the measurement result). This contradiction is absent in the ‘manyworlds’ interpretation of quantum mechanics proposed in 1957 by Everett. This interpretation seems complicated since it is in conflict with our intuition based on classical physics. However, it correctly reflects the quantum concept of reality. It turned out that this interpretation enable one to understand what is our consciousness and explain some strange features of our psychic. The shortest line of consideration leading from quantum theory to theory of consciousness is followed in the Extended Everett’s Concept (EEC) proposed by the author in 2000. ment the state of the system changes so that it be in accord with the result of the measurement. Let for example the measurement makes distinction of the states ψi from each other, and this is done by the measuring device originally in the state Φ0 and in one of the states Φi after the measurement. This means that the initial state of the measured system and the measuring device ψi Φ0 goes over to ψi Φi after the measurement. What then happens if the initial state Pof the measured system is a superposition ψ = i ci ψi ? The initial state of the measured system P and measuring device is in this case ψΦ0 = i ci ψi Φ0 . According to the reduction postulate, i-th result of measurement will be obtained with the probability pi = |ci |2 , and the final state of the (system+device) will turn out to be ψi Φi (the state of the measuring device corresponds to the i-th measurement result). This picture of what happens in measurement is very simple and in agreement with our every day experience. Moreover, accepting this postulate, one may be sure that all predictions will be correct (agree with experiment). This is why reduction postulate is accepted by most of physicists. However this postulate and the above simple picture of measurement contradicts to linearity of evolution which is the main feature of quantum mechanics, perfectly confirmed by experiments. Indeed, the evolution of the quantum system (measured system + measuring device) during the period of measurement is presented by some evolution operator U (which presents the solution of Schrödinger equation). The requirement that the measurement distinct between the states ψi may be written as U ψi Φ0 = ψi Φi Then directly, from the linear character of the operator U , the following evolution law may be derived for the superposition as the initial state: U ψΦ0 = U X i 2.1 Contradiction in quantum mechanics: linearity versus reduction postulate In the generally accept4ed Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics measurement of a quantum system is described by the reduction postulate (suggested by von Neumann). According to this postulate, in the course of measure- ci ψi Φ0 = X ci ψi Φi i We see that linearity implies that the final state has to be not one of the terms ψi Φi (as is assumed by the reduction postulate) but the superposition of all them. This is a crucial point. The picture of reduction in measurement turns out to contradict to linearity of evolution in quantum mechanics. This contradiction is an origin of quantum paradoxes, for example known Schrödinger cat paradox. 2.2 Everett’s interpretation Conceptual problems existing in the conventional (Copenhagen) interpretation of quantum mechanics are overcome in Everett’s (many-world) interpretation [1, 2]. The way chosen by Everett is very simple. Instead of accepting reduction postulate (and therefore abandoning linearity in the process of measurement) he assumed that linearity is valid in all processes including measurement. The state of the whole (measured + measuring) system produced in the measurement process (i.e. in the process of interaction of the two subsystems) P is taken to be the above superposition i ci ψi Φi . The state of this form is called entangled state (of the measured and measuring systems). However, then one discovers that an unexpected feature appears in the Everett’s interpretation: typical state of the quantum world is a superposition of classically inconsistent (classically distinct) states, or classical alternatives. In the above example the states ψi Φi (for various i) differ from each other by the states of the (macroscopic) measuring device. For example, various i may correspond to various positions of the device’s pointer. According to our common sense any pair of these classical pictures of the world exclude each other. However, according to the Everett’s interpretation they coexist. Remark that now, for all further argument, we may forget why we came to this strange conclusion and what is the structure of the state obtained in the course of measurement. The only thing important is that, according to the Everett’s interpretation, classically distinct states may coexist in superposition. We shall call such states classical alternatives, or classical projections of the quantum state of the world. It is clear that this strange feature needs justification. It is made agree with the every day experience by the conjecture that classical alternatives are separated from each other by consciousness. This means that, while perceiving any of these classical alternatives, the observer does not perceive all the rest as if they were absent. All alternatives are perceived by any observer, but they are perceived separately from each other. This may be illustrated by simple formulas. Let us enumerate classical alternatives by index i. Then the state of the system (an observer + external world) may be written as the entangled state X Ψ= Ψ i χi i where χi is the state of the observer perceiving the i-th classical alternative, and Ψi the state of the external (in respect to the observer) world in the i-th classical alternative state. Remark that in this expression the most part of the observer’s body may be included in the “external world”, denoting by χi the state of only its brain (or even of some structure in the brain reflecting the state of the rest of the world). Another formulation of the same situation refers to the image of Everett’s worlds (the term replacing classical alternatives). One may think that the state of the quantum world is adequately presented by the set of classical worlds called Everett’s world. the world around an observer is objectively quantum, but subjectively he perceives it as one of the Everett’s classical worlds around him. In each of these worlds just the same observer exists, but the “copies” of the same observer know nothing about each other. The formulation in terms of the Everett’s worlds is considered sometimes more transparent. However, we prefer to speak of the set of classical pictures, or classical projections, of the quantum world. All these projections are perceived by consciousness, but separately from each other. 2.3 EEC: the path to theory of consciousness The author put forward the so-called Extended Everett’s Concept (EEC) [3, 4, 5, 6] which allows to go over from the Everett’s interpretation of quantum mechanics to some basic points of theory of consciousness. It is accepted in EEC that not only consciousness separate the alternatives but consciousness is nothing else than the separation of alternatives. This immediately leads to the consequence that the separation of alternatives disappears in the unconscious regime so that one obtains access to all alternatives. Therefore, in unconscious regime one obtains super-consciousness having access to all classical alternatives. This not only predicts ‘supernatural’ capabilities of consciousness but also explains why these capabilities reveal themself when (explicit) consciousness is turned off or weakened, for example in dream or meditation (the fact well known in all strong psychological practices). This explains not only parapsychology but such well known phenomena as intuitive guesses including great scientific insights. In fact superconsciousness is a mechanism of direct vision of truth. The simplicity of derivation of these strange (but many times confirmed) features of consciousness hints that the approach taken in EEC is correct. At the same time this approach does not point out what is the nature of consciousness and super-consciousness so that various philosophical interpretations of them may be accepted. Practically this means that the difference between such philosophical directions as materialism and idealism become relative or completely irrelevant. 3 Apparatus has no intuition but may help human to use intuition According to EEC, conscious (understood broadly, i.e. as an explicit consciousness and super-consciousness) is characteristic feature of life [6]. This makes possible direct (intuitive) vision of truth. This means that a living being can found its actions on the information, part of which is unavailable from the classical picture of the world perceived by it subjectively. This part of information comes from the alternative classical pictures of world included, as components of the superposition, in the whole quantum state of the world. A human may intuitively look for such information in order to make use of it. Primitive living beings exploit such information without being aware of it, but obtaining the corresponding benefit (increasing quality of their life). An important question is whether such information (which can be found intuitively) may also be obtained with the help of a sort of technical device (for example classical or even quantum computer). The answer is negative because inanimate material system can have no super-consciousness. However, a technical device, or inanimate material system, may be helpful in usage of superconsciousness by human. Let the material system denoted by ϕ is interacting with the human or/and with the external world in such a way that its state entangles with the classical alternatives: Ψ= X χi ϕi Φi i Here χi , ϕi and Φi are correspondingly the alternative states of the human, of the material system (for example computer) serving as the human’s instrument, and of their environment. Various values of the index i correspond to the alternative classical states of the world (various Everett’s worlds). We see that both the human and its computer have the components corresponding to all values of i, i.e. to all alternative classical pictures of the world. Consciously the human may perceive only the components corresponding to a single value of i. Subjectively he lives in a certain Everett’s world (the world number i, so that his state is χi ). He observes his instrument being in the state ϕi and the environment in the state Φi . Therefore consciously (subjectively) he cannot obtain information from the alternatives having other numbers, i′ 6= i. In the regime of unconscious, the human may use mechanism of super-consciousness. then he has access to all Everett’s worlds (all i′ , both equal and not equal to i). This makes intuitive conclusions available for him. However, 1) this intuitive conclusions about the environment’s states Φi′ are possible even without the material instrument ϕ, and 2) the instrument itself, without a human, has no super-consciousness and therefore cannot “transfer” information from one Everett’s world i′ to another Everett’s world i. We see finally that, since the phenomenon of super-consciousness cannot exist in technical devices or inanimate material systems, these cannot replace humans in obtaining (intuitive) information from “other Everett’s worlds”. One very important remark should be made. Although technical devices do not possess human intuition, they may be helpful for more efficiently usage of human intuition. In case of such structure of the world’s state the instrument ϕ may help human to take information from “other classical alternatives”. Indeed, two different situations may exist that can be used in different ways. 1) If the instrument ϕ and the outer world Φ interact, then some information about the external world’s state Φi is reflected in the state ϕi of the instrument. Therefore, exploring, with the help of superconsciousness, the states ϕi of the instrument (for various i) the human obtains some information about the external world in the alternative states Φi . 2) If the entanglement is caused by interacting the instrument with the human body, then it may be helpful in easier fixing intuitive signals about the external world. 4 What can quantum computer do? Quantum computer in the usual sense of this term is an information processing device working in the quantum-coherent regime. For realizing this regime, the set of the degrees of freedom (qubits) included in the information processing should be strictly isolated from its environment. This is the main difficulty for realizing quantum computers (although the requirement of isolation may be weakened by means of the error-correcting codes). For readout of the computing results, after the necessary cycle of unitary evolution of the computer, some observables of this quantum system undergo measurement. This causes decoherence of the quantum system and brings the results of computing process into classical form (which may be stored as long as is necessary). Unlike classical computer, quantum computer can be used for solving only restricted number of problems, but with much greater speed (because of quantum parallelism, i.e. possibility to parallely process enormous number of data). However, just as a classical computer, quantum computer is inanimate material system and cannot intuitively (super-consciously) acquire information from “other” classical alternatives (other Everett’s worlds). Direct vision of truth, although based on quantum effects, is feasible only for living beings. 5 Quantum computer: for consciousness model Quantum computer may be used for modeling the ‘quantum consciousness’ as the latter is assumed in EEC. Indeed, according to Everett’s interpretation of quantum mechanics, all classical alternatives evolve parallely and independently from each other. It is assumed in EEC (generalizing Everett’s interpretation) that ‘consciousness’ is nothing else than this independence (separating the alternatives from each other). The ‘super-consciousness’ is, vice versa, unity of all the alternatives as components of a superposition. Both the separation (independence) of the ‘alternatives’ from each other and their unity in the superposition may be illustrated in a quantum computer as a model. This could experimentally demonstrate at least the fundamental possibility that such ‘quantum consciousness’ may indeed exist (see [5]). This structure may be realized in a quantum computer in the following way. The quantum states evolving in a quantum computer are superpositions with a large number of components. Each superposition component carries some classical information (e.g., a binary number) and the evolution of the entire superposition ensures quantum parallelism, i.e., the simultaneous transformation of all these variants of classical information. In the model of quantum consciousness, individual superposition components can model the alternatives into which the consciousness divides the quantum state. The information contained in each component is a model of an ‘alternative classical reality’, i.e. the alternative state of a living creature and its environment. The problem in creating the model of this type is 1) to formulate a criterion of what will be called survival, and 2) to select the evolution law such that the evolution of every alternative (superposition component) be predictable, and survival in this evolution be possible (although not guaranteed). Of course, the task of constructing such a model is by no means simple, but it is basically solvable using a quantum computer. It is well known that ‘big’ quantum computers, which promise extraordinary new capabilities, have not been realized. However, this applies only to quantum computers with the number of cells of the order of a thousand or more. As for quantum computers with the number of cells around ten, they have already been realized. Evidently, the number of cells attained will increase further, though maybe slowly. It is conceivable that even with these ‘low-power’ quantum computers, which will be constructed in the relatively near future, it will be possible to realize the model of ‘quantum consciousness’. 6 Conclusion We considered in the present paper the approach to theory of consciousness based on the Everett’s interpretation of quantum mechanics. The approach called Extended Everett’s Concept (EEC) has been proposed in 2000 and elaborated in the subsequent years. The aim of the present paper was to analyze, from the viewpoint of this approach, the role of brain and possibility to replace brain by computer for fulfilling some functions. The main conclusions we came to may be formulated as follows: ◦ Consciousness is the inherent ability of the living beings to perceive alternative classical projections of the objectively quantum world separately from each other. ◦ Super-consciousness, or intuition (existing in the state of meditation, trance or dream), pro- vides access to all classical alternatives and usage of the obtained information. ◦ Brain, besides solving problems of managing the body, serves also as an interface between consciousness and the body, particularly composing queries for the super-consciousness and interpreting its responses. ◦ Feasible “artificial intellect” is a machine for calculations and other intellectual operations, but artificial life (being possible to get information from all classical alternatives) is not feasible by definition. ◦ It is possible to create technical devices which could improve interplay between brain and consciousness and thus increase efficiency of superconsciousness. The first concrete considerations on the connection of consciousness with quantum mechanics have been found by Wolfgang Pauli in the course of his collaboration with Karl Yung. In 1952 Pauli wrote in his letter to Rosenfeld (cited according [7] in the translation given by the authors of this paper): “For the invisible reality, of which we have small pieces of evidence in both quantum physics and the psychology of the unconscious, a symbolic psychophysical unitary language must ultimately be adequate, and this is the far goal which I actually aspire. I am quite confident that the final objective is the same, independent of whether one starts from the psyche (ideas) or from physis (matter). Therefore, I consider the old distinction between materialism and idealism as obsolete.” It seems that the concept of ‘quantum consciousness’ elaborated in the framework of EEC agrees with these thoughts of Pauli. Acknowledgements: This work was partially supported by Russian Federation president’s grant for leading scientific schools, support # NSh-438.2008.2. The author acknowleges the fruitful discussion with Wolfgang Baer. References: [1] H. Everett III, Rev. Mod. Phys. 29, 454– 462, 1957, reprinted in J. A. Wheeler and W. H. Zurek, editors, Quantum Theory and Measurement, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1983. [2] B. S. DeWitt and N. Graham, editors. The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics. Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1973. [3] M. B. Mensky, Quantum mechanics: New experiments, new applications and new formulations of old questions, Physics-Uspekhi 43, 585-600 (2000). [4] M. B. Mensky, Concept of consciousness in the context of quantum mechanics, PhysicsUspekhi 48, 389-409 (2005). [5] M. B. Mensky, Quantum measurements, the phenomenon of life, and time arrow: three great problems of physics (in Ginzburg’s terminology), Physics-Uspekhi, 50 (4) 397-407 (2007). [6] M. B. Mensky, Postcorrection and mathematical model of life in Extended Everett’s Concept, NeuroQuantology 5, No 4, 363–376 (2007) [http://www.neuroquantology.com]. [7] Harald Atmanspacher and Hans Primas, Pauli’s ideas on mind and matter in the context of contemporary science, Journal of Consciousness Studies 13(3), 5-50 (2006)

PHYSICS AND CONSCIOUSNESS arXiv:quant-ph/9510017v1 17 Oct 1995 Patricio Pérez Departamento de Fı́sica, Universidad de Santiago de Chile Casilla 307, Correo 2, Santiago, Chile ABSTRACT Some contributions of physics towards the understanding of consciousness are described. As recent relevant models, associative memory neural networks are mentioned. It is shown that consciousness and quantum physics share some properties. Two existing quantum models are discussed. INTRODUCTION A possible definition for human consciousness is that it is the perception of our own mental states. If we accept that mental states are correlated with physical states in the brain, then a scientific study of the phenomenon of consciousness should be based on an understanding of the properties of this complex organ. Especially during the second half of this century, physics has made important contributions in order to explain significant aspects of the functioning of the brain. A sample of this is the modeling of the mechanism for the propagation of a nerve pulse. We could also mention the application of statistical mechanics to the simulation of associative memory in the brain. Furthermore, quantum physics, which assigns a crucial role to the observer, suggests some possible routes towards the understanding of conscious phenomena. In this paper we describe in some detail these contributions of the physical science. PHYSICS IN THE BRAIN A basic aspect of the functioning of the brain is the permanent exchange of nerve pulses between its specialized cells (neurons). With the help of physics we have now a good understanding of the mechanisms of generation and propagation of these nerve pulses. Pulse generation is possible thanks to ion exchange, mainly potassium and sodium through the neuron’s membrane. In the resting state of the neuron there is a potential difference across the membrane that surrounds not only the body of the cell but also the branch like structures called axon and dendrites. The potential is such that it is negative in the interior as compared with the exterior. Under appropriate conditions a depolarizing localized stimulus will induce transient ionic currents through the membrane, which will change the sign of the potential difference. The creation and relaxation of this perturbation or action potential is successfully modeled with a simple electric circuit which has adjustable and time dependent resistances [1]. The propagation of the action potential along the axon may be represented by the solution of a wave equation. It is widely acknowledged that the memory capacity of a person is an essential ingredient in conscious perception. During the last fifteen years there has been an explosive multidisciplinary interest on models of neural networks, which among other virtues make possible quantitative modeling of associative memory. One of the most important associative memory neural network models is that proposed in 1982 by the physicist John J. Hopfield [2]. The basic ingredients of this model are the following: The network is defined by a set of simple processing units, all connected with each other. The state of the network at any instant of time is determined by the collection of the states of the processing units (or neurons), which could change from an initial configuration to a final stable state. The processing units, which mimic the neurons in the brain can be in any of two states, firing a signal (+1) or inactive (−1). The state of a given unit is assigned according to the states of the units connected to it and to the strength of each of these connections. These connections or weights are a simple model of the synapses between real neurons. Assuming a discrete representation of time, the state of neuron i at t + 1 is calculated as a function of the state of the other neurons at t as follows: si (t + 1) = sign X i wij sj (t) ! (1) where the updating is performed randomly or sequentially, one neuron at a time. wij is the weight of the connection between neuron j and neuron i, and sj (t) is the state of neuron j at time t. The function sign(x) gives a +1 whenever x is positive and a −1 when x is negative. Equation (1) may be interpreted as a a dynamical law which will govern the evolution of the network from any initial state to a final stationary configuration. Several properties of the Hopfield model may be obtained exploiting its isomorphism with a spin glass, a system which has been extensively studied by physicists using the tools of statistical mechanics. An important parameter, the storage capacity (αc ), which measures the ratio between the maximum amount of stationary configurations and the total amount of neurons in the network, may be calculated analytically for different choices of the weights. One possibility for the assignation of the weights is based on the Hebb rule [3], which establishes that whenever a a couple of neurons that are connected are simultaneously active, their synapsis is strengthened. An implementation of this rule has been studied by Hopfield and many other scientists. In this case αc = 0.144. The reasons why a neural network model as that described is interesting as an associative memory model are: -The final stationary configurations of the network may be identified with concepts memorized by a living being. -Synapses are modified through learning, which seems a well established fact among biologists. -Initial states of the network may be interpreted as stimuli presented to the living being, and the corresponding stationary states reached after applying the dynamical law may be seen as the concepts associated with the stimuli. QUANTUM PHYSICS AND CONSCIOUSNESS Quantum physics assigns an essential role to the observer of an event or experiment. Classical physics instead rests on the assumption that there exists an objective reality, which is independent of wether somebody is scrutinizing it or not. The relation quantum event - observer (assuming that quantum effects are important for our understanding of the properties of the brain) may lead us to think that quantum physics will explain consciousness. Let us consider for example the following words said by the philosopher J. R. Searle in his recent book ”The rediscovery of the mind” [4]: ”consciousness is not reducible in the way other phenomena are reducible, not because the pattern of facts in the real world involves anything special, but because the reduction of other phenomena depend in part on distinguishing between ’objective physical reality’, on the one hand, and mere ’subjective appearance, on the other; and eliminating the appearance from the phenomena that have been reduced. But in the case of consciousness, its reality is the appearance; hence, the point of the reduction would be lost if we tried to carve off the appearance and simply defined consciousness in terms of the underlying physical reality”. Referring to the wave function that describes the state of a quantum system, the physicist W. Heisenberg says [5]: ”The observation itself changes the probability function discontinuously; it selects of all possible events the actual one that has taken place... the transition from the ’possible’ to the ’actual’ takes place during the act of observation. If we want to describe what happens in an atomic event, we have to realize that the word ’happens’ can only apply to the observation , not to the state of affairs between two observations.” We may notice that both of the previous citations refer to the non separability between a subjective element (consciousness in the first, observation in the second) and the physical world. As we cannot reduce consciousness to the physical reality underlying it, we cannot describe quantum events independently from observations. Besides this parallel, we can mention other suggesting analogies between quantum physics and consciousness. Let us analyze the following statement made by the psychologist William James [6]: ”Our mental states always have an essential unity, such that each state of apprehension, however variously compounded, is a single whole of which every component is, therefore, strictly apprehended (so far as it is apprehended) as a part.” If we want to study the physical aspects of a mental state, classical physics probably would not be appropriate because in general a classical description is based on the decomposition of a system in a collection of simple elements which are independent and local. Besides, every element interacts only with its immediate neighbors [7]. The quantum description instead is based on a wave function which takes in account all properties of the system as a whole, and non locality becomes explicit in the act of measurement. Here non locality means that a measurement on a spatially localized part of a system may affect instantaneously other distant parts of it. Some people believe that the conscious thought is a non algorithmic activity, in the sense that it cannot be, in principle, simulated by a computer. This statement has been presented using mathematical[8] and philosophical arguments[9]. The mathematical argument is based on a form of Godel’s theorem. The philosophical argument establishes that if brain activity were algorithmic, then men would not have moral responsibility for their actions. From the other hand, in quantum physics we have the property that the result of a single measurement is not computable from the wave function that describes a given system, because it only gives information concerning probabilities to obtain any of a set of possible results. The act of measurement produces what is called the ’collapse’ of the wave function, and the state after this collapse cannot be predicted deterministically. If, with all the arguments presented above, we agree that the quantum theory is likely to help us in the understanding of consciousness, we could ask if there are some more specific models of brain functioning based on it. According to H. P. Stapp [7], an atomic process which is relevant for the dynamics of brain components is the liberation of neurotransmitter molecules in the region of the synapses between neurons. If this process requires a quantum description, then the collection of processes occurring at all synaptic connections could be described using a global wave function. At a given time, the wave function will represent a state which is a superposition of possible outcomes upon observing every site where these processes occur. If to each of these collections of single states we associate a macroscopic state of the brain, we could say that at any time the brain will be in a state that is a superposition of alternatives. When an appropriate stimulus is presented, one of the alternatives would be selected, activating what Stapp calls ’top level events’, which would actualize patterns of neural activity in the brain as a whole. Conscious perceptions are identified here with the feelings of these top level events. Although the connection between the physical state of the brain and the experience of consciousness is not fully explained by the model presented above, we could agree that a quantum approach introduces a non deterministic element in the flow of conscious thoughts. Sir John Eccles, a Nobel laureate in Medicine is also aware of this property. He combines his expertise in neurophysiology with quantum physics to build another interesting model of consciousness[10]. As Stapp, he starts focusing his attention in the microscopic processes occurring at the sites of the synapses. Eccles argues that the uncertainty observed in the generation of the nerve pulses, associated with the concept of ”dendron” allows for the possibility that the actions of a person be influenced by an agent external to the brain (a non material mind). A dendron is a collection of nerve fibers which propagate pulses coherently, and its presence in several parts of the brain seems to be well established. The goal of Eccles is to validate a dualistic model, according to which mind is non material, independent of the brain and would interact with it without violating the basic laws of nature (as energy conservation for example), thanks to the room left by quantum physics. CONCLUSIONS After this brief excursion to the state of the art on the contributions of physics towards the understanding of consciousness, we may become motivated to choose between two rather general approaches to the problem: - physics will bring us closer to the understanding of consciousness, however, we could never save the barrier imposed by the presence of certain immaterial agents which take part in the phenomenon (Eccles). - There is no reason why, some day we will have a full scientific description of conscious perceptions. This idea may be well illustrated by the words of Francis Crick: ”Our minds -the behavior of our brains- can be explained by the interactions of nerve cells (and other cells) and the molecules associated with them[11].” Or we may not feel forced to commit ourselves with an a priori position. It is very likely that everybody will agree that physics has contributed, is contributing and will contribute more to the understanding of consciousness. So, those who have the expertise of this discipline should be encouraged to dedicate their efforts to solve in part or completely this challenging problem. REFERENCES [1] Hodgkin, A. L. and A. F. Huxley, A quantitative description of membrane current and its application to conduction and excitation in nerve, J. Physiol. 117, 500, 1952. [2] Hopfield, J.J., Neural Networks and Physical Systems with Emergent Computational Abilities, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A., 79, 2554, 1982. [3] Hebb, D. O., The Organization of Behavior, Wiley, New York, 1949. [4] Searle, J. R., The Rediscovery of the Mind, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1992, p. 122. [5] Heisenberg, W., Physics and Philosophy, Harper and Row, New York, 1958. [6] James, W., The Principles of Psychology, Dover, New York, 1950, p. 241. [7] Stapp, H. P., Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics, Springer Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, 1993. [8] Penrose, R., Mathematical Intelligence, in What is Intelligence?, J. Khalfa (ed), Cambridge University Press, 1994, p. 107. [9] Bringsjord, S., What Robots can and can’t be, Kluwer, 1992. [10] Eccles, J. C., How the Self controls its Brain, Springer Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, 1994. [11] Crick, F., The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul, Simon and Schuster, London, 1994, p.7.

arXiv:1705.11190v3 [q-bio.NC] 24 Nov 2018 The Morphospace of Consciousness Xerxes D. Arsiwalla1,2,3 , Ricard Solé4,5,6,7 , Clément Moulin-Frier3 , Ivan Herreros3 , Martı́ Sánchez-Fibla3 , Paul Verschure1,2,7 1 Synthetic Perceptive Emotive and Cognitive Systems Lab, Institute for BioEngineering of Catalonia (IBEC), Barcelona, Spain 2 Barcelona Institute for Science and Technology (BIST) 3 Dept. of Information Technologies, Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF), Barcelona, Spain 4 Complex Systems Lab, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain 5 Institut de Biologia Evolutiva (CSIC-UPF), Barcelona, Spain 6 Santa Fe Institute, 399 Hyde Park Road, Santa Fe, NM, 87501, USA 7 Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain. E-mail: x.d.arsiwalla@gmail.com Abstract. In this paper, we construct a complexity-based morphospace wherein one can study systems-level properties of conscious and intelligent systems based on information-theoretic measures. The axes of this space labels three distinct complexity types, necessary to classify conscious machines, namely, autonomous, cognitive and social complexity. In particular, we use this morphospace to compare biologically conscious agents ranging from bacteria, bees, C. elegans, primates and humans with artificially intelligence systems such as deep networks, multi-agent systems, social robots, AI applications such as Siri and computational systems as Watson. Given recent proposals to synthesize consciousness, a generic complexitybased conceptualization provides a useful framework for identifying defining features of distinct classes of conscious and synthetic systems. Based on current clinical scales of consciousness that measure cognitive awareness and wakefulness, this article takes a perspective on how contemporary artificially intelligent machines and synthetically engineered life forms would measure on these scales. It turns out that awareness and wakefulness can be associated to computational and autonomous complexity respectively. Subsequently, building on insights from cognitive robotics, we examine the function that consciousness serves, and argue the role of consciousness as an evolutionary game-theoretic strategy. This makes the case for a third type of complexity necessary for describing consciousness, namely, social complexity. Having identified these complexity types, allows for a representation of both, biological and synthetic systems in a common morphospace. A consequence of this classification is a taxonomy of possible conscious machines. In particular, we identify four types of consciousness, based on embodiment: (i) biological consciousness, (ii) synthetic consciousness, (iii) group consciousness (resulting from group interactions), and (iv) simulated consciousness (embodied by virtual agents within a simulated reality). This taxonomy helps in the investigation of comparative signatures of consciousness across domains, in order to highlight design principles necessary to engineer conscious machines. This is particularly relevant in the light of recent developments at the The Morphospace of Consciousness 2 crossroads of cognitive neuroscience, biomedical engineering, artificial intelligence and biomimetics. Keywords: Consciousness, Brain Networks, Artificial Intelligence, Synthetic Biology, Cognitive Robotics, Complex Systems. 1. Introduction Can one construct a taxonomy of consciousness based on evidence from clinical neuroscience, synthetic biology, artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive robotics? In this paper we explore current biologically motivated metrics of consciousness. In view of these metrics, we show how contemporary AI and synthetic systems measure on homologous scales. In what follows, we refer to a phenomenological description of consciousness. In other words, that which can be described in epistemically objective terms, even though aspects of the problem of consciousness may require an ontologically subjective description. Drawing from what is known about the phenomenology of consciousness in biological systems, we build a homologous argument for artificial, collective and simulated systems. For example, in clinical diagnosis of disorders of consciousness, two widely used scales are patient awareness and wakefulness (also referred to as arousal), both of which can be assessed using neurophysiological recordings [57], [55]. We will use these scales to construct a morphospace of consciousness. The origin of the concept of a morphospace comes from comparative anatomy and paleobiology, where either quantitative measures or principal components from a clustering methods allow locating given items in a metric-like space, but it can also involve a relative position approach, as the one we will follow here. A related concept of the so-called theoretical morphospace, has also been defined in formal terms, as an N dimensional geometric hyperspace produced by systematically varying the parameter values associated to a given (usually geometric) set of traits [65]. More recently, morphospaces have been used in the study of complex systems, linguistics and biology [17], [72], [81]. A morphospace commits one to embodiment or form. In the context of consciousness, embodiment can be both, physical and virtual. Hence, a morphospace serves as a useful tool to gain insights on design principles and evolutionary constraints, when looking across a large class of systems (or species) that display complex variations in traits. For the problem of consciousness, we construct this morphospace based on three distinct complexity types. These considerations suggest an embodiment-based taxonomy of consciousness [8]. For practical reasons, many experimental paradigms testing consciousness are designed for humans or higher-order primates (see [19], [53], [92] for an overview of the field). In this article, we argue that metrics commonly associated to biological consciousness can also be meaningfully used for conceptualizing behaviors of synthetic The Morphospace of Consciousness 3 and artificially intelligent systems. This is insightful not only for understanding parallels between biological and potential synthetic consciousness, but more importantly for unearthing design principles necessary for building biomimetic technology that could potentially acquire consciousness. As evidenced by several historical precedents, bio-inspired design thinking has been at the core of some of the greatest scientific breakthroughs. For instance, early attempts at aviation in the 19th century were inspired by studying flight mechanics in birds and insects (the term aviation itself is derived from the Latin ”avis” for ”bird”). In fact, biological flight mechanisms are so sophisticated that their biomimetic implementations are still being actively studied within the field of soft robotics [66]. However, it so happened that rather than coming around to mimicking nature exactly, humanity learnt the basic laws of aerodynamics based on observations from nature and looked for other embodiments of those principles. This in fact, led to the invention of the modern aircraft by the Wright brothers in 1903, leading to a completely new way to build machines that fly than those that exactly mimic nature. Another paradigm-changing example of bio-inspired thinking leading to modern day technological innovation can be seen in artificial neural networks, which dates back to the 1930s with the first model of neural networks by Nicolas Rashevsky [76], followed by the seminal work of Walter Pitts and Warren McCulloch in 1943 [64] and Frank Rosenblatt’s perceptron in 1958 [78]. The field began as a modest attempt to understand cognition and brain function. Eventually, with the use of analytical tools from statistical physics, those simple formal models paved the way to understanding associative memory and other emergent cognitive phenomena [47]. Even though artificial neural networks did not quite solve the problem of how the brain works, they led to the discovery of braininspired computing technologies such as deep learning systems and powerful technologies for computational intelligence such as IBM’s Watson. These machines process massive volumes of data and are built for intensive computational tasks that the brain is not even designed for. In that spirit, the next frontier is understanding the governing principles of biological consciousness and its various embodiments, which could potentially lead to the growth of next-generation sentient technologies. Recent work in this direction can be found in [84]. Metrics of consciousness are also the right tools to quantitatively study how human intelligence differs from current machine intelligence. Once again, it is instructive to take a historical perspective on human intelligence as laid out by one of the founders of AI, Allen Newell in 1994 in his seminal work, ”Unified Theories of Cognition” [70]. Newell proposed the following thirteen criteria necessary for building human-level cognitive architectures: • Behave flexibly as a function of the environment • Exhibit adaptive (rational, goal-oriented) behavior • Operate in real-time • Operate in a rich, complex, detailed environment (that is, perceive an immense amount of changing detail, use vast amounts of knowledge, and control a motor system of many The Morphospace of Consciousness 4 degrees of freedom) • Use symbols and abstractions • Use language, both natural and artificial • Learn from the environment and from experience • Acquire capabilities through development • Operate autonomously, but within a social community • Be self-aware and have a sense of self • Be realizable as a neural system • Be constructible by an embryological growth process • Arise through evolution Current AI architectures still do not meet all these criteria. On the other hand, though Newell did not discuss consciousness back then, the above criteria are very relevant in the light of current research on neural mechanisms of consciousness [53]. While Newell’s criteria list signatures that are the consequence of human intelligence, for consciousness it is more useful to have a list of functional criteria that results in the process of consciousness. In this article, we shall discuss prospective functional criteria for consciousness. 2. Biological Consciousness: Insights from Clinical Neuroscience We begin this discussion reviewing clinical scales used for assessing consciousness in patients with disorders of consciousness. In subsequent sections, we generalize complexity measures pertinent to these biological scales and discuss how current synthetic systems measure up on these. 2.1. Clinical Consciousness and its Disorders In patients with disorders of consciousness ranging from coma, locked-in syndrome to those in vegetative states, levels of consciousness are assessed through a battery of behavioral tests as well as physiological recordings. Cognitive awareness in patients is assessed by testing several cognitive functionalities using behavioral and neurophysiological (fMRI or EEG) protocols [57]. Assessments of wakefulness/arousal in patients are based on metabolic markers (in cases where reporting is not possible) such as glucose uptake in the brain, captured using PET scans. More generally, in [57] and [55], awareness and wakefulness have been proposed as a two dimensional operational definition of clinical consciousness, shown in figure 1 below. While awareness concerns higher and lower-order cognitive functions enabling complex behavior; wakefulness results from biochemical homeostatic mechanisms regulating survival drives and is clinically measured in terms of glucose metabolism in the brain. In fact, in all known organic life forms, biochemical arousal is a necessary precursor supporting the hardware necessary for cognition. In turn, evolution has shaped cognition in such a way so as to support the organism’s basic survival (using wakefulness/arousal) as well as higher-order The Morphospace of Consciousness 5 drives (using awareness) associated to cooperation and competition in a multi-agent environment [96]. Awareness and wakefulness thus taken together, form the clinical markers of consciousness. Figure 1. Clinical scales of consciousness. A clustering of disorders of consciousness in humans represented on scales of awareness and wakefulness. Adapted from [55]. In neurophysiological recordings, signatures of awareness have been found in cortico-thalamic activity, whereas wakefulness corresponds to activity in the brainstem and associated systems [57], [55]. Abbreviated legends: VS/UWS (vegetative state/unresponsive wakefulness state) [56]; MCS(+/-) (minimally conscious state plus/minus), EMCS (emergence from minimally conscious state) [25]. This clinical definition of consciousness enables a practical classification of closely associated states/disorders of consciousness into clusters on a bivariate scale with awareness and wakefulness on orthogonal axes. Under healthy conditions, these two levels are almost linearly correlated, as in conscious wakefulness (high arousal and high awareness) or in deep sleep (low arousal and low awareness). In pathological states, wakefulness without awareness can be observed in the vegetative state [57], while transiently reduced awareness is observed following seizures [22]. Patients in the minimally conscious state show intermittent and limited non-reflexive and purposeful behavior [37], [36], whereas patients with hemispatial neglect display reduced awareness of stimuli contralateral to the side where brain damage has occurred [73]. The question is how can one generalize wakefulness/arousal and awareness for non-biological systems in order to obtain homologous scales of consciousness that can be mapped to artificial systems? As noted above, wakefulness/arousal results from autonomous homeostatic mechanisms necessary for the self-preservation of an organism’s germ line in a given environment. In other words, arousal results from self-sustaining life processes necessary for basic survival, whereas awareness refers to functionalities pertaining to estimating or predicting states of the world and optimizing the agent’s The Morphospace of Consciousness 6 own actions with respect to those states. If biological consciousness as we know it, is a synergy between metabolic and cognitive processes, the question one can ask is how should this insight be extended to conceive a functional notion of consciousness in synthetic systems? One way of doing so might be generalizing wakefulness/arousal to scales of autonomous functioning and awareness to scales of computational or informational processes. 2.2. Measures of Consciousness Specific measures of autonomy and computation/information processing have been discussed in psychometric [99] respectively neurophysiological studies [101]. However, applying these measures to artificial systems and comparing those values to biological systems is not always so straightforward (due to completely different processing substrates). Nonetheless, these measures offer a first step in this direction. For example, [99] introduce an ”Index of Autonomous Functioning”, tested on healthy human subjects (via psychometric questionnaires). This index aims to assess psychological ownership, interest-taking and susceptibility to external controls. This is similar to the concept of volition (or agency), introduced in the cognitive neurosciences [40], which seeks to determine the neural correlates of self-regulation, referring to actions regulated by internal drives rather than exclusively driven by external contingencies. Attempts to quantify awareness have appeared in [29], discussed in the context of a unified psychological theory of self-functioning. However, in consciousness research, a measure of awareness that has gained a lot of traction is integrated information [94] (often denoted as Φ). This is an information-theoretic complexity measure. It was first introduced in neuroscience as a measure applicable to neural networks. Based on mutual information, Φ has been touted as a correlate of consciousness [94]. Integrated information is loosely defined as the quantity of information generated by a network as a whole, due to its causal dynamical interactions, over and above the information generated independently by the disjoint sum of its parts. As a complexity measure, Φ seeks to operationalize the intuition that complexity arises from simultaneous integration and differentiation of the network’s structure and dynamics, thus enabling the emergence of the system’s collective states. The interplay between integration and differentiation generates information that is highly diversified yet integrated, creating patterns of high complexity. Following initial proposals [91], [93], [94], several approaches have been developed to compute integrated information [3], [11], [14], [15], [12], [13], [18], [20], [21], [39], [71], [75], [90], [100]. Notably the work of [15] is of particular significance in the context of this discussion as it develops large-scale network computations of integrated information, applied to the human brain’s connectome data. The human connectome data consists of structural connectivity of white matter fiber tracts in the cerebral cortex, extracted using diffusion spectrum imaging and tractography [41], [46] (see [4], [16], [5] for neurodynamical models used on this network). Compared to a randomly re-wired network, it was seen that The Morphospace of Consciousness 7 the particular topology of the human brain generates greater information complexity for all allowed couplings associated to the network’s attractor states, as well as to its non-stationary dynamical states [15]. However, the formulation of Φ is not specific to biological systems and can equally well be applied to artificial dynamical systems and serves as a measure of their computational or information processing complexity (which we interpret as cognitive complexity or awareness in biological agents). 3. Synthetic Consciousness: Insights from Synthetic Biology and Artificial Intelligence Although our understanding of natural systems can be strongly constrained by experimental limitations, the potential for exploring synthetic counterparts provides a unique research window. It has been suggested that artificial simulations, in silico implementations and engineered alternatives can actually be much needed to understand the origins of evolutionary dynamics, including cognitive transitions [83]. What can be achieved in relation to consciousness from artificial agents? Within the context of non-cognitive phenomena, synthetic biology provides a valuable example of the classes of relevant questions that can be answered. Examples are the possibility of creating living systems from non-living chemistry, generating multicellular assemblies, creating synthetic organoids or even artificial immune systems. Here advanced genetic engineering techniques along with a systems view of biology had been able to move beyond standard design principles provided by evolution. Examples of this are new genetic codes with extra genetic letters in the alphabet that have been designed and successfully inherited [63], synthetic protocells with replicative potential [86] and even whole synthetic chromosomes that have defined a novel bacterium species [50]. Ongoing research has also revealed the potential for creating cognitive networks of interacting microorganisms capable of displaying collective intelligence [85]. Of course, the criteria for consciousness, as stated in sections above, are not even remotely satisfied by any of these synthetic systems. They either have some limited form of intelligence or life but not yet both. Nevertheless, there have been some noteworthy recent developments in these areas. AlphaGo’s feat in beating the top human Go champion was remarkable for a couple of reasons. Unlike Chess, possible combinations in Go run into the millions and when played using a timer any brute-force algorithm trying to scan the entire search space would simply run out of computational capacity or time. Hence, an efficient pattern recognition algorithm was crucial to the development of AlphaGo, where using deep reinforcement learning the system was trained on a large number of games after which it was made to play itself over and over again (this aspect of playing itself is akin to training via social interactions as described later on) while reinforcing successful sequence of plays through the weights of its deep neural networks [82]. Most interestingly, it played counterintuitive moves that shocked the best human players and the sole game of the series that Lee Sedol, the human champion won out of five, itself was only possible after he himself adopted a brilliant counterintuitive The Morphospace of Consciousness 8 strategy. Thus, AlphaGo demonstrates a form of domain-specific intelligence. In contrast, biological awareness spans across domains. Moreover, AlphaGo is not equipped with any form of arousal mechanisms coupled to its computational capabilities. The same can be said for other state-of-the-art AI systems including deep convolutional neural networks, or deep recurrent networks. Both these latter architectures were inspired from Hubel and Weisel’s groundbreaking work on the coding properties of the visual system, which led to the realization of a hierarchical processing architecture [48]. Today deep convolutional networks are widely used for image classification [28] and recurrent neural networks for speech recognition [80], among countless other applications. The current interest of deep learning has been anticipated in computational neuroscience using objective functions from which physiologically plausible perceptual hierarchies can be learnt [103]. Recent developments have advanced this by virtue of larger data sets and more computational power. For example, there have been attempts to build biologically-plausible models of learning in the visual cortex using recurrent neural networks [61]. In summary, deep architectures have made remarkable progress in domain-specific AI. However, asking whether a machine can be conscious in exactly the same way that a human is, is similar to asking whether a submarine can swim. It just does it differently. If the goal of a system is to learn and solve complex tasks close to human performance or better, current machines are already doing that in specific domains. However, these machines are still far from learning and solving problems in generic domains and in ways that would couple its problem-solving capabilities to its autonomous survival drives. On the other hand, neither have any of the synthetic life systems discussed above been used to build architectures with complex computing or cognitive capabilities. Nevertheless, this does suggest that a future synthesis between artificial life forms and AI could be evaluated using homologous scales of consciousness to the ones currently used for biological life forms. This form of synthetic consciousness, if based on a life form with different survival drives/mechanisms and non-human forms of intelligence or computation, would also likely lead to non-human behavioral outcomes. These phenomenological considerations suggest at least two generic types of complexities to label states of consciousness, those associated to computational/informational capabilities and those referring to autonomous functioning. In the following section, we argue for a third complexity type, necessary to build the morphospace of consciousness, namely, social complexity. 4. The Function of Consciousness: Insights from Cognitive Robotics Based on insights from cognitive robotics, this section takes a functional perspective on consciousness [6], [7], [43], [68], [95], [96] eventually interpreting it as a gametheoretic strategy. In [95], it was suggested that rather than being the problem itself, consciousness might in fact be a solution to the problem of autonomous goal-oriented action with intentionality, when agents are faced with a multi-agent social environment. The Morphospace of Consciousness 9 The latter was formulated as the H5W problem. 4.1. The H5W Problem What does an agent operating in a social world need to do in order to optimize its fitness? It needs to perceive the world, to act and, through time, to understand the consequences of its actions so it can start to reason about its goals and how to achieve them. This requires building a representation of the world grounded on the agent’s own sensorimotor history and use that to reason and act. It will witness a scene of agents, including itself, and objects interacting in various manners, times and places. This comprises the six fundamental problems that the agent is faced with, together referred to as the H5W problem [95]: In order to act in the physical world an agent needs to determine a behavioral procedure to achieve a goal state; that is, it has to answer the HOW of action. In turn this requires the agent to: (a) Define the motivation for action in terms of its needs, drives and goals, that is, the WHY of action; (b) Determine knowledge of objects it needs to act upon and their affordances in the world, pertaining to the above goals, that is, the WHAT of action; (c) Determine the location of these objects, the spatial configuration of the task domain and the location of the self, that is, the WHERE of action; (d) Determine the sequencing and timing of action relative to dynamics of the world and self, that is, the WHEN of action; and (e) Estimate hidden mental states of other agents when action requires cooperation or competition, that is, the WHO of action. While the first four of the above questions suffices for generating simple goaloriented behaviors, the last of the Ws (the WHO) is of particular significance as it involves intentionality, in the sense of estimating the future course of action of other agents based on their social behaviors and psychological states. However, because mental states of other agents that are predictive of their actions are hidden, they can at best be inferred from incomplete sensory data such as location, posture, vocalizations, social salience, etc. As a result the acting agent faces the challenge to univocally assess, in a deluge of sensory data those exteroceptive and interoceptive states that are relevant to ongoing and future action and therefore has to deal with the ensuing credit assignment problem in order to optimize its own actions. Furthermore, this results in a reciprocity of behavioral dynamics, where the agent is now acting on a social and dynamical world that is in turn acting upon itself. It was proposed in [95] that consciousness is associated to the ability of an agent to maintain a transient and autonomous memory of the virtualized agent-environment interaction, that captures the hidden states of the external world, in particular, the intentional states of other agents and the norms that they implicitly convey through their actions. 4.2. Social Game Theory Hence, the function of consciousness is to enable an acting agent to solve its H5W problem while being engaged in social cooperation and competition with other agents, The Morphospace of Consciousness 10 who are trying to solve their own H5W problem in a world with limited resources. This leads our discussion precisely within the setting of social game theory. In a scenario with only a small number of other agents, a given agent might use statistical learning approaches to learn and classify behaviors of the few others agents in that game. For example, multiple robots interacting to learn naming conventions of perceptual aspects of the world [87]. Here the multi-agent interaction has to be embodied so that one agent can interpret which specific perceptual aspect the other agent is referring to (by pointing at objects) [88]. Another example is the emergence of signaling languages in sender-receiver games based on replicator dynamics described by David Lewis in 1969 in his seminal work, Convention [59], [60]. However, in both these examples, strategies that evolutionarily succeed when only few players are involved, are no longer optimal in the event of an explosion in the number of players [45]. Likewise in a social environment comprising a large number of agents trying to solve the H5W problem, machine learning strategies for reward and punishment valuations may soon become computationally unfeasible for an agent’s processing capacities and memory storage. Therefore, for a large population to sustain itself in an evolutionary game involving complex forms of cooperation and competition would require strategies other than simple machine learning algorithms. One such strategy involves modeling and inferring intentional states of itself and that of other agents. Emotion-driven flight or fight responses depend on such intentional inferences and so do higher-order psychological drives. The mechanisms of consciousness enable such strategies, whereas, contemporary AI systems such as AlphaGo do not possess such capabilities. In summary, interpreting consciousness as a game-theoretic strategy highlights the role of complex social behaviors inevitable for survival in a multi-agent world. From an evolutionary standpoint, social behaviors result from generations of cooperationcompetition games, with natural selection filtering out unfavourable strategies. Presumably, winning strategies were eventually encoded as anatomical mechanisms, such as emotional responses. The complexity of these behaviors depends on the ability of an agent to make complex social inferences. This suggests a third dimension in the morphospace of consciousness (shown in figure 3), namely, social complexity, which serves as a measure of an agent’s social intelligence. 5. A Morphospace of Consciousness As evident from our discussions above, consciousness research draws insights from a variety of disciplines such as clinical neuroscience, synthetic biology, artificial intelligence, evolutionary biology and cognitive robotics. Taken together, this suggests at least three complexity types (see figure 2 and table 1) that can be associated to consciousness: autonomous complexity, computational complexity and social The Morphospace of Consciousness CAutonomous Substrate Organism, nervous system, bots Parts Sensors, actuators, signalling cascades Emergence Self-regulated real-time behavior 11 CComputational Cognitive systems (brains, microprocessors) Neurons, transistors CSocial Interacting population of agents Individual agents Problem solving capabilities Signaling systems, language, social norms, conventions, art, science, culture Table 1. The three complexity types along with their respective substrates, components and emergent properties. complexity. As a generic definition of a system’s complexity C, we define X C = Isubstrate − Ipart (1) {parts} which is a measure of information generated by the dynamics of a system as a whole (Isubstrate ) minus the sum of that generated by its parts. While this is similar in spirit to integrated information discussed in an earlier section, it is generically defined for specifying substrate-specific complexity. This provides a general framework that includes the possibility of several different types of complexity, among which, CAutonomous , CComputational and CSocial will be relevant for labelling states of consciousness. Autonomous complexity CAutonomous measures the complexity of autonomous actions. In eukaryotes, autonomous action refers to arousal mechanisms resulting from coordinated nervous system activity; in prokaryotes, autonomous action refers to reactive behaviours such as chemotaxis, stress responses to temperature, toxins, mechanical damage, etc., all of these resulting from coordinated cellular signalling processes; in robotics, autonomous action refers to homeostatic mechanisms driving reactive behaviors. Therefore, autonomous complexity is the information generated by the collective dynamics of the complex system driving autonomous actions, over the information generated by a (hypothetical) uncoordinated copy of this system. On the other hand, computational complexity CComputational refers to the ability of an agent to integrate information over space and time across computational or cognitive tasks. In complex biological systems, this complexity is typically associated to neural processes, in artificial computational systems, it refers to microprocessor signaling. The distinction between CComputational and CAutonomous is specified by the tasks that they refer to, rather than the specific substrate. Finally, social complexity CSocial refers to the information generated by the population as a whole, during the course of social interactions, over the information generated additively by individual agents of the population. Unlike CAutonomous or CComputational , CSocial is not assigned to an individual, but rather to a specific population (its own species) with which the individual has been interacting. Nonetheless, as discussed above, these interactions are believed to have The Morphospace of Consciousness 12 contributed to the consciousness of an individual on an evolutionary time-scale, by way of social games. Note that CSocial as defined here, does not refer to group consciousness (we shall discuss that in the following section). Autonomous Computational Social Figure 2. Schematic representation of autonomous, computational and social complexity. Each complexity measure is illustrated as a whole (the large circles) constituted of its parts (the inner circles), their interactions (the arrows) and the emerging properties resulting from these interactions (the inner space within the large circles, in light grey). Autonomous complexity (left) refers to the collective phenomena resulting from the interactions between typical components of reactive behavior such as sensors (illustrated by whiskers in the top inner circle), actuators (illustrated by a muscle in the bottom-left inner circle) and low-level sensorimotor coupling (illustrated by a spinal cord in the bottom-right inner circle). Computational complexity is associated to higher-level cognitive processes such as visual perception (top inner circle), planning (bottom-left inner circle) or decision making (bottom-right inner circle). Social complexity is associated to interactions between individuals of a population, such as a queen ant (top inner circle), a worker ant (bottom-left inner circle) and a soldier ant (bottom-right inner circle). Using these definitions for the three types of complexities, we construct the following morphospace in figure 3. While this space is only a first attempt at constructing the space of prospective conscious systems, the precise coordinates of various systems within this morphospace might change due to the rapid pace of new and developing technologies, but we expect the relative locations of each example to remain the same. We start with the human brain, which is taken as the benchmark in this space, defining a limit case located at one upper corner with highest scores on all the three axes. She/he can perform computational tasks across a variety of domains such as making logical inference, planning an optimal path in a complex environment or dealing with recursive problems and hence leads with respect to computational complexity due to these cross-domain capabilities. On the social axis, human social interactions have resulted in the emergence of language, music, art, culture or socio-political systems. Other biological entities such as non-human primates [23], [98] or social insects would score lower on the social and computational axis than humans. Additionally, other species of vertebrates such as some types of birds and cephalopods have been shown to The Morphospace of Consciousness Biological agents 13 humans Artificial agents Non-human primates High Birds Social Cephalopods Ants Bees MADeep Cobots DAC-X TalkH Watson DON om ta u p o ton coma patients m protocells y C Au ti o Subsumption High High Siri l Low Kilobots a C. elegans Bacteria n Physarum AlphaGo Low Low Figure 3. Morphospace of consciousness. Autonomous, computational and social complexity constitute the three axes of the consciousness morphospace. Human consciousness is used as a reference in one corner of the space. Current AI implementations cluster together in the high computation, low autonomy and low social complexity regime, while multi-agent cognitive robotics cluster around low computational, but moderate autonomous and social complexities. Abbreviated legends: MADeep (multi-agent deep reinforcement system) [89]; TalkH (talking heads) [88]; DQN (deep Q-learning) [67]; DAC-X (distributed adaptive control) [62], CoBot (cockroach robot) [42], Kilobot (swarm robot) [79], Subsumption (mobile robot architecture) [24]. exhibit complex behavior and possess sophisticated nervous systems. These two groups have actually being enormously useful in the search for animal consciousness [31], [33]. Current AI systems such as IBM Watson [44], AlphaGo [82], DQNs [67] and Siri [2] are powerful computing systems over a narrow set of domains, but in their current form they do not show general intelligence, that is, the capacity to independently interact with the world and successfully perform different tasks in different domains [58], or as proposed by Allen Newell, the capability with which anything can become a task [69]. These AI systems are still clustered high on the computational axis, but lower than humans (due to domain-specificity). Also they score low on autonomy and social complexity. Synthetic forms of life such as protocells show some levels of The Morphospace of Consciousness 14 arousal, reacting to chemicals and stressors, but currently show minimal capabilities for computation or adaptation and no interactions with other agents [54]. Interest in the field of collective robotics has led to the rise of machines where emergent macro-properties, e.g. coordination (KiloBot [79], Multi-Agent Deep Network [89]) or shared semantic conventions (Talking Heads [88]) self-organize out of multi-agent interactions. These systems are designed to display simple forms of navigation, objectdetection, etc., while interacting with other agents performing the same task. However, they show lower social and autonomous complexity than most biological agents, and being embodied, they currently score lower on computational complexity than heavypowered AI systems such as IBM Watson and AlphaGo. Notice also that a large region in the central zone of the morphospace in figure 3 is suspiciously vacant. A similar observation was made in [72] in the context of the morphospace of synthetic organs and organoids. In both cases, such an observation points towards new classes of future machines. In the following section, we discuss two possible manifestations of future conscious systems. An important use of the morphospace within evolutionary biology is related to the actual occupation of this space by the different solutions. In the previous figure it is possible to appreciate that a large part of the space is empty. Along with the biological case studies, the set of artificial solutions remain (so far) in a lower part of the cube, thus indicating the small relevance played by the social context. Social interactions have instead played a leading role in shaping the minds of the organisms close to the left wall involving high autonomy and sociality. Here the nature of the social axis changes among case studies (as well as the underlying computational complexity). But the filter of evolution has a major impact: social insects are enormously resilient to many environmental challenges because no individual is more relevant than another. Redundancy and distributed computation define then as cognitive assemblies. In contrast, cognitively complex organisms equipped with brains and exhibiting cooperative behavior have been evolved to live together with others. 6. Other Embodiments of Consciousness The three dimensional morphospace discussed above provides us with a framework to also identify other types of complex systems whose levels of computational, autonomous and social complexity might be sufficient to answer the H5W of consciousness? This suggests at least two other embodiments of future conscious systems (based on the same functional criteria as above). 6.1. Group Consciousness In a sense biological consciousness itself can be thought of as a collective phenomenon where individual cells making up an organism are themselves not considered to be conscious (with respect to the three complexity measures defining the morphospace), The Morphospace of Consciousness 15 even though the organism as a whole is. But what happens when the system itself is not localized? We postulate group consciousness as an extension of the above idea to composite or distributed systems that display levels of computational, autonomous and social complexity that are sufficient to answer the H5W problem. Note that, as per this specification of group consciousness, the group itself is treated as one entity. Hence, social complexity now refers to the interactions of this group with other similar groups. This bears some resemblance to the notion of collective intelligence, which is a widely studied phenomenon in complex systems ranging from ant colonies [30], to a swarm of robots (the Kilobot in [79] and the CoRobot in [42]), to social networks [38]. But these are generally not regarded as conscious systems. As a whole they are not considered to be life forms with survival drives that compete or cooperate with other similar agents. However, these considerations begin to get blurred at least during transient epochs when collective survival comes under threat. For example, when a bee colony comes under attack by hornets, collectively it demonstrates a prototypical survival drive, similar to lower-order organisms. Other examples of such behaviors have also been studied in the context of group interactions in humans, where social sensitivity, cooperation and diversity have been shown to correlate with the collective intelligence of the group [102]. Following this, the notion of collective intentionality has been discussed in [49]. More recently, [34] have applied integrated information Φ to group interactions, suggesting a new kind of group consciousness. While it is known that Φ in adapting agents increases with fitness [32], one can ask a similar question for an entire group: what processes (evolutionary games, learning, etc.) enable an increase in all three complexity types for an entire group such that it can solve the H5W problem while cooperating or competing with other groups? 6.2. Simulated Consciousness Our discussions on complexity also suggest another type of consciousness, namely, simulated consciousness, wherein embodied virtual agents in a simulated reality interact with other virtual agents, while satisfying the complexity bounds that enable them to answer the H5W questions within the simulation. In this case, consciousness is strictly confined to the simulated environment. The agents cannot perceive or communicate with entities outside of the simulation but satisfy all the criteria we have discussed above within the simulation. How these embodied virtual agents could acquire consciousness is not yet known. Presumably by evolving across multiple generations of agents that adapt and learn to optimize fitness conditions. It is also not clear what precise traits or mechanisms would have to be coded into the simulation (as initializations or priors) in order to enable consciousness to evolve. The point here is simply that the same criteria that we have identified with consciousness in biological or synthetic agents in the physical world, could in principle be admitted by agents within a simulation and confined to their interactions within that simulation. This has parallels to the notion of ”Machine Consciousness” discussed in [77], which proposes that neural processes leading The Morphospace of Consciousness 16 to consciousness might be realizable as a machine simulation (it even goes further to claim that computer systems might someday be able to emulate consciousness). At the moment, these are all open challenges in AI and consciousness research. Examples of studies discussing embodied virtual agents can be found in the work of [27] and [26]. More recent implementations of embodied virtual agents have been using gaming technology, such as the Minecraft platform [1], [52]. 7. Consciousness and General Intelligence What do our discussions concerning consciousness have to say about theories of general intelligence? The idea that consciousness resides in select regions of a morphospace, that is constructed from function-specific types of complexity, has implications for any theory of artificial general intelligence. Namely, it suggests a specific decomposition of general intelligence into complementary types. In psychology, distinct manifestations of human intelligence have been discussed in the context of Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences [35]. Here we want to understand how the dimensions of our morphospace help group different types of intelligences. This works as follows‡. The autonomous axis reflects adaptive intelligence found in biological organisms. This encapsulates Gardner’s kinesthetic, musical and spatial intelligence (some of these also require computational complexity). The computational axis refers to recognition, planning and decisionmaking capabilities that we find in computers as well as in humans. These are tasks involving logical deduction or inference. Hence, this complexity refers to those types of intelligences that require computational capabilities, such as logical reasoning, linguistic intelligence, etc. The third axis of the morphospace, social complexity, relates to social capabilities required for interacting with other agents. This refers to interpersonal and introspective intelligence, in Gardner’s terms. These types of intelligences are also associated to the evolution of language, social conventions and culture. Then there are also other types of intelligences described in Gardner’s theory such as naturalistic and pedagogical intelligence, which involve a composition of social and computational complexity. As described above, the defining dimensions of our morphospace account for all of the multiple types of intelligences proposed by Gardner. Taking these intelligence (or complexity) types into account, while building artificially intelligent machines, elucidates the wide spectrum of problems that future AI could potentially address. In the light of both, Gardner’s theory and Newell’s criteria, our morphospace in fact suggests, that consciousness as we know it, manifests as a specific form of integrated multiple intelligence. Note that one ought to be careful not to claim that consciousness ’is’ general intelligence. Following William James, in cognitive psychology, consciousness is rather seen as a process [51]. We claim that this process constitutes mechanisms and phenomenology that realizes an integration of specific types of intelligences and their ‡ We thank Carlos E. Perez for bringing this point to our attention. A discussion about how Gardner’s intelligence types may be realized in machines using deep learning can be found in his recent book [74]. The Morphospace of Consciousness 17 associated complexities in such a way so as to meet survival goals. Intelligence, on the other hand, can be thought of as a task-specific capability, that by itself is not necessarily tied to any existential pressures [9]. However, currently we have yet to understand how many of the intelligence types mentioned above, especially the non-computational ones [10], can even be realized individually, let alone understanding the mechanisms that lead to their integration. Nonetheless, given the myriad of recent advances in humanmachine interactions, a complexity-based conceptualization of consciousness provides a practical and quantitative framework for studying ways in which interactions with machines might enhance our joint complexities and competences. 8. Societal and Ethical Considerations No discussion on conscious machines is complete without the very important issue of ethics. Both, the societal impact and ethical considerations of any form of advanced machine, especially conscious machines, for obvious reasons, constitutes a very serious issue. For example, the impact of medical nanobots for removing tumors, attacking viruses or non-surgical organ reconstruction has the potential to change medicine forever. Or AI systems to clear pollutants from the atmosphere or the rivers are absolutely essential for some of the biggest problems that humanity faces. However, as discussed above, purely increasing the performance of a machine along the computational axis will not constitute consciousness as along as these capabilities are not accessible by the system to autonomously regulate or enhance its survival drives. On the other hand, whenever the latter is indeed made possible, issues of societal interactions of machines with humans and the ecosystem, becomes an imminent ethical responsibility. It becomes important to understand the kind of cooperation-competition dynamics that a futuristic human society will face. Early stages of designing such machines are probably the best times to regulate their future impact on society. This analogy might not be surprising to any parent that has a child. Hence, a serious effort towards understanding the evolution of complex social traits is crucial alongside engineering advances required for the development of these systems. 9. Discussion The objective of this article was to bring together diverse ideas from neuroscience, AI, synthetic biology and robotics, that have recently been converging towards the science of consciousness. Following progress in these fields, we have attempted to generalize the applicability of current clinical scales of consciousness to synthetic systems. In particular, starting from clinical measures of consciousness that calibrate awareness and wakefulness in patients, we have investigated how contemporary AI systems and synthetically engineered organisms compare on homologous measures. Awareness and wakefulness can be abstracted to computational and autonomous complexity respectively. Additionally, using insights from cognitive robotics, we have discussed The Morphospace of Consciousness 18 functions that consciousness serves in nature, and argued that consciousness manifests as an evolutionary game-theoretic strategy. This made the case for a third type of complexity necessary to describe consciousness, namely, social complexity. These three complexity types allow us to represent both, biological and synthetic systems in a common morphospace. A morphospace is a useful construct to study systems-level properties of complex systems based on information-theoretic measures. The three complexity types comprising the morphospace described here, are representative of biological as well as synthetic complex systems. Using this morphospace, we have shown how various biological organisms including bacteria, bees, C. elegans, primates and humans compare to artificially intelligent systems such as deep networks, multi-agent systems, social robots, intelligent assistants such as Siri and computational systems as IBM’s Watson. Besides biological and synthetic consciousness, these considerations also suggest other possible manifestations of consciousness, namely, group consciousness and simulated consciousness, each based on distinct embodiment. In our discussion, social complexity was crucial for constructing the morphospace. Social interactions play an important role in regulating many cognitive and adaptive behaviors in both, natural and artificial systems [96]. In [95], it has been suggested that complex social interactions may have evolutionarily served as a trigger for consciousness. What is however not known is whether there are specific lower bounds on the scales of each of the stated complexity types, that an agent must cross in order to attain a given level of consciousness. Certainly, from developmental biology we know that both humans (and many higher-order animals) undergo extensive periods of cognitive and social learning from infancy to maturation. These phases of social and cognitive training are necessary for development of cognitive abilities leading to levels of consciousness attained in adulthood. Even though we may be far from understanding all the engineering principles required to build conscious machines, a complexity-based comparison between biological and artificial systems reveals interesting insights. For example, current AI systems using deep learning tend to cluster along the computational complexity axis of the morphospace, whereas synthetically engineered life forms group closer along the autonomous complexity axis. On the other hand, biologically conscious agents are distributed in regions of the morphospace corresponding to relatively high complexity along all the three axes (which suggests necessary, if not sufficient, conditions for consciousness). In terms of Newell’s criteria, excluding those that refer exclusively to human-specific traits (language, symbolic reasoning), the remainder are completely satisfied by all agents located in the high complexity region (of all three axes) of the consciousness morphospace. In contrast, current AI or synthetic systems do not checkout on this list. Though in 1994 Newell was not explicitly referring to consciousness, it is remarkable to note how those ideas to formulate theories of cognition and intelligence seem to reconcile with current ideas of consciousness. One could summarize the crux of Newell’s criteria as referring to agents displaying autonomous behaviors with cross- The Morphospace of Consciousness 19 domain problem-solving capabilities, which can be decomposed to (at least) the three complexity classes discussed in this paper. This perspective on consciousness opens several possibilities for future work. For instance, it may be interesting to further refine the morphospace described here. In particular, computational complexity itself may involve several sub-types involving learning, adaptation, acquiring sensorimotor representations, etc, all of which are relevant for cognitive robotics [97]. Another question arising out of our discussion is whether the emergence of consciousness in a multi-agent social environment can be identified as a Nash equilibrium of a cooperation-competition game. In a game where say two species attain consciousness, the population pay-offs in cooperation and competition between them are likely to reach one of possible equilibria due to the recursive nature of intentional inferences, where an agent attempts to infer the inferences of other agents about its own intentions. Multi-agent models might offer a viable approach to test ideas such as these. Acknowledgments We thank Riccardo Zucca and Sytse Wierenga for help with graphics. This work has been supported by the European Research Council’s CDAC project: ”The Role of Consciousness in Adaptive Behavior: A Combined Empirical, Computational and Robot based Approach” (ERC-2013- ADG 341196). RS acknowledges the support of the Secretaria d’Universitats i Recerca del Departament d’Economia i Coneixement de la Generalitat de Catalunya, the Botin Foundation, by Banco Santander through its Santander Universities Global Division and by the Santa Fe Institute. References [1] Aluru, K., Tellex, S., Oberlin, J., MacGlashan, J.: Minecraft as an experimental world for ai in robotics. In: AAAI Fall Symposium (2015) [2] Aron, J.: How innovative is apple’s new voice assistant, siri? New Scientist 212(2836), 24 (2011) [3] Arsiwalla, X.D., Verschure, P.F.M.J.: Integrated information for large complex networks. 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1124 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory Exploration Self-Awareness and Memory Narendra Katkar* ABSTRACT It is theorized that the brain has only frequency codes, carried by induced signals, including stimulations from light, sound or other senses, which travel through atomic composition of brain material and dissipate, creating tiny “gaps” or “holes” in atomic structure. These gaps or holes are assumed to be within the cellular and molecular composition in the interior of the brain. The true nature of memory is, in my view, the transformation or conversions of self-awareness signal into those frequencies of earlier received signals by passing through the infinitesimal gap in atomic structure created by said earlier signals. Key Words: consciousness, self-awareness, memory. Introduction Few theoretical physicists have argued that classical physics is intrinsically incapable of explaining the holistic aspects of consciousness, but that quantum theory provides the missing aspects (Searle, 1997). However, some physicists and philosophers consider the arguments for an important role of quantum phenomena to be unconvincing. Physicist Victor Stenger (1992) characterized quantum consciousness as a "myth" having "no scientific basis" that "should take its place along with gods, unicorns and dragons." The association of brain activity to conscious intentions was supposed to be the basis of the functional microstructure of the cerebral cortex. The nerve impulse causes the discharge of source molecules by the course of exocytosis; it was presented as a quantum mechanical model for it is based on a tunneling process of the trigger mechanism. (Schwartz, Stapp and Beauregard, 2004) Contemporary basic physical theory differs profoundly from classic physics on the important matter of how the consciousness of human agents enters into the structure of empirical phenomena. The new principles contradict the older idea that local mechanical processes alone can account for the structure of all observed empirical data. Several investigations and theories relating to brain function and physics were postulated as early as in 1955, 1958 and later (Bohm, Bohr). The only acceptable point of view appears to be the one that recognizes both sides of reality—the quantitative and the qualitative, the physical and the psychical—as compatible with each other and can embrace them simultaneously. (Pauli, 1955) * Correspondence Narendra Katkar, International Research Center for Fundamental Sciences (IRCFS), India. E-mail: narendra.katkar@gmail.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory 1125 In a complementary procedure, averaging techniques have been used to record the electrical fields generated by the brain in the willing of a movement, the promptness potential. In exquisitely designed experiments, Libet has discovered that in conscious willing has a cerebral activation about 200 ms before the movement. From pure basic physics point of view, a reader would be interested to know that while reading this manuscript, the words on the page are only a reflection of light. In other words, the reader receives light from the page. This reflected light induces or stimulates neuron “spike” in the brain, which re-activates the previously registered audio signals, i.e. Memory. Memory is reactivation of previously registered signals which were received through neuron spikes. Since childhood and early, a word, name or description of a thing exists in Inertia in the human brain before reactivation. Except for a new word, the searched meaning is again the reflecting light of the printed word from a Dictionary page or an audio description, which is then superimposed or juxtaposed with the new word visual. This phenomenon of brain mechanism is examined in many disciples concerning memory and perception. Normally, humans are inclined to assume that the memory functions like recording apparatus, which is a false assumption. The molecular mechanisms essential to the induction and continuance of memory are very dynamic and consist of divergent phases covering time periods from seconds to a lifetime. (Schwarzel & Mulluer 2006) The optic nerve contains retinal ganglion cell axons and support cells, leaves the eye socket orbit through the optic canal, leading towards the optic chiasm, which is situated at the base of the brain underneath the hypothalamus (Colman, 2006). An axon usually transmit neuron signal, an electrical impulse away from the neuron's cell body or soma. Large numbers of axons of the optic nerve terminate in the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN), which is the primary relay center for visual information received from the retina and it is situated inside the thalamus of the brain. (Goodale, & Milner, 2004).The optic radiation or the geniculostriate pathway is a set of axons from relay neurons in the lateral geniculate nucleus of the thalamus suppose to transmit visual information to the visual cortex. The critical question in cognitive neuroscience is about encoding and representation of information and mental experiences. It is not clear how the neuronal changes implicated in more intricate examples of memory, mainly declarative memory that necessitates the storage of facts and events (Byrne 2007). Memory Encoding is assumed as a biological event beginning with perception, passing through the brain to hippocampus where all sensations are collected into one single experience. Encoding is accomplished with a blend of chemicals and electricity. Neurotransmitters are released when an electrical pulse crosses the synapse which connects nerve cells to other cells. (Mohs, 2010). From basic physics point of view, all brain activity is of sub-atomic phenomenon, Whether an induced electrical discharge or internal self-induced electromagnetic activity, both manifest out of atomic compositions of brain matter. Fundamentally, there is no freely available signal, one of the atoms of sodium, potassium and calcium do discharge a small fraction of its own negative charge of the value of below 30 to above 50 mV. There are about 100 billion neurons in the brain, each of which forms synapses with many other neurons. The cell fires an electrical pulse ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory 1126 called an action potential, when the potential changes considerably. The charged atoms such as sodium, potassium and calcium direct the synaptic activity (ScienceDaily, 2011). In human brain, the memory capacity is the ability to store and recollect information and experiences. Since last century, scientists have formulated multimodal theories on Memory. Studies of memory provide interdisciplinary link between Cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Encoding of memory involves the spiking of individual neurons induced by sensory input, which persists even after the sensory input disappears. Encoding of episodic memory involves persistent changes in molecular structures that alter synaptic transmission between neurons. The persistent spiking in working memory can enhance the synaptic and cellular changes in the encoding of episodic memory (Jensen and Lisman 2005; Fransen et al. 2002) Simple Methods & Results Individuals from normal life (not patients) were questioned several times about their recollections of condition in deep sleep and the condition between sleep and waking state. Also several electroencephalography EEG data was analyzed which was observed, again of the normal individuals. Repeated questioning on recollection of condition in deep sleep and before and after waking up does confirm the “self-induced” signal is indeed related to old term “ego” and I, Me, including denials as well. The self-awareness brainwave signals are active from 5Hz frequency and above and not before in 0 to 4 Hz frequencies. The self-awareness has also a “witness” function, which then allows individual to recollect and recount. In 0 to 4 Hz frequency, the individual is in Deep Sleep and never narrates that condition (Katkar, 2013) From 0 to 12Hz to 40Hz and above appear in fully awake conditions. The self-induced data signals have content related to I and Myself, including denials as well. ‘I” is “Self Awareness” though “I” is manmade audio signal within a language. The self-awareness brainwave signals are active from 5Hz frequency and above. There are 1000s of sounds in the languages spoken around the world which correspond to “I”. Verily, the self-awareness signal is creation of the consciousness in the womb or before. Conversion of this into those induced signals is sensitivity to the world of information caused by receptor neurons. Above statement means that the consciousness as self-awareness signal has to convert further from 5 Hz frequency. Since it is not possible to enter into live brain to observe the source of brain or thought activity, an uncomplicated parallel is drawn from a Movie screen mechanism. The pictures of the physical world and the characters in effect are only light rays projected on the screen. They are the light frequencies on the film frames captured during shooting. The light from the projector passes through the film frames and converts according to matrix of dots into those light frequencies which were received during shooting, these then in totality covering screen appear as images and action (Katkar, 2013) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory 1127 Similarly, the data created by laser light on a Compact Disc is stored in a series of tiny dents and planes (called "pits and lands”) and programmed in a spiral data track into the top of polycarbonate layer. The programmed information is read by an inbuilt infrared semiconductor laser beam of 780 nm wavelength by a lens through the bottom of the polycarbonate layer. The reflected laser beam from “pits and lands” of a CD are converted into audio visual signals of the intensities of laser beams into different frequencies corresponding the “pits” dimension and remain original when reflecting off the “lands”. It is theorized that the self-awareness signal passes through the infinitesimal gap or hole within the atomic structure. This changes the frequency of self-awareness into the frequency of the received energy, which created the gap. More precisely, it is theorized that the self-awareness frequency converts into the frequency, which correlates the dimension of the gap or hole in atomic structure. In other words, the self-signal becomes the signal of the object earlier perceived. This conversion and reversal to self makes individual believe, having memory of the object. The normal brain function is millions of times conversion of consciousness through selfawareness, into frequencies of objects and sounds perceived. It is further theorize that when this activity is hyper and self-awareness signal is not coming back or does not reverse, the individual mental health is disturbed. Such condition of loss of self-awareness creates health and behavioral problems. So, does the world around send any information of its own natural condition? In the brain there is no projector, no light, no film to register external light, no screen to project the image of the physical world. Neither there is any mechanism of a compact disc for recording and reading. The image projected on the movie screen and in the brain correspond the light reflected from the bodies. In other words, in visual perception, the reflected light from the physical world, including humans etc, may not carry any information. Indeed, it is assumed that the light after reflecting does not carry any physical, physiological, chemical, biological, molecular or atomic information of the body perceived. At the instant of impingement and reflection (in light speed) the initial frequency of light is changed, effectively, attenuates and changed frequency has the color attribute. Color and luminosity are the attributes of light. Neither there are “physical bodies” on the screen nor in the brain (Katkar, 2013). Fundamentally, the assumed memory of physical world is, in my opinion, self-imposed “false memory”. This false memory held strongly or obsessively in the brain is conflict prone and creates disturbed mental conditions. It can be inferred that this memory, only for practical reason, embedded in the day-to-day lives of individuals, helps organize life. The memory reactivations from 5Hz up to 12 Hz appear between wake-sleep states. This is the condition where an individual is neither fully awake nor in deep sleep. The narration of images, called dream, are of different intensities hence the individual can sometimes narrate those images clearly and at other times he or she cannot recollect the images. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory 1128 The above two states of dream images correspond to high and low intensities of brain frequencies. Between 8 Hz and 12 Hz of brain waves do carry certain intensity of image resolution, which then, the individual recollects and narrates. The low intensity of image resolution, which appears between 5 and 8 Hz of brain frequency, is not clearly remembered. The individual may express indistinct recollections of some images, which are obscure visuals, manifested just after deep sleep condition. In other case, the frequencies are near to waking state as the intensity is higher hence the possibility of remembrance. In a few other cases, due to higher frequency activity, between 8 and 12 Hz, individual experiences ad-mixture of visual data which creates a non-cohesive image display or dream sequence. The energetic activity corresponding induced signals by sense perception is in fact consciousness is active in energetic form. In other words, active consciousness is energy. Discussion Research shows that these negative charge (neuron signals) carrying the light frequency information rest in the nucleus of lateral geniculate, with the frequency codes. When the external stimuli re-activate these past codes, the brain has the faint image of that physical perception. These electromagnetic frequencies are extremely weak. Since childhood, humans are creating a self-imposed embedded program through juxtaposing descriptive audio induced (language) signals with visual light produced signal in center of brain and these reactivate as memory. These, in pure physics terms do not represent the physical world. Indeed, in my view, the physical world does not have its own means to send its own information, either in light form or audio form. The supposed memory of physical world was tested simply by asking the individual to walk in one’s own house by closed eyes, where every object is in memory held by the individual as his/her own known physical environment. The individual could not walk freely more than three steps in bedroom to bathroom or in sitting (drawing) room to kitchen or in other places. This establishes that there really is no information of physical world in the brain and it also elucidated that by open eyes, the light frequencies from each object of one’s own environment invoked the previously available frequency codes, giving individual a sense of assurance of having “knowledge” of physical surrounding to move freely. According to basic physics mentioned earlier, the initial charge emission does in fact activate or excites other atoms in immediate vicinity, which appears as a network of neural activity. Whichever may be the cell, as described in five divisions of neurons within the retina, which are photoreceptor cells, bipolar cells, ganglion cells, horizontal cells, and amacrine cells. The basic circuitry of the retina is supposed to incorporates a three-neuron chain consisting of the photoreceptor, a rod or cone, bipolar cell, and the ganglion cell and the first action potential seems to occur in the retinal ganglion cell, which is the direct path to transmit the visual information to the brain (Purves, 2008, Ramachandran, 1998) which again must be understood as a subatomic emission out of one of the atoms in the cell composition, either out of calcium atom or potassium or sodium atom. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory 1129 The signal travels around 3 to 5 centimetres inside brain and terminates or dissipates in the atomic structure, creating, in my opinion, infinitesimal hole. Fortunately, the signals dissipate, otherwise they will excite billions of atoms, which in return will radiate and brain will become degenerate and burn off. In such case, Human being, after developing five senses, will not survive, even childhood. Samples of EEG signals show distribution of electromagnetic radiation of energy emissions. The amounts of energy observed are delta waves. A delta wave produced from deep sleep called slow-wave sleep is a high amplitude brain wave with a frequency of oscillation between 0–4 hertz (Walker, 1999; Kirmizialsan, 2006) and Alpha of 8–12 Hz detected strongest neural activity in the occipital lobe during awake and relaxed condition (Cantero et al. 2003). Theta wave is of 4–8 Hz (Cantero et al. 2003), and Beta is of 13–30 Hz and Gamma waves in 30–70 to 100 Hz frequency band (Berger; Gray, 1929, Fries P 2001, Llinas, Yarom, 1986). The brain activity or Mu waves are electromagnetic oscillations in the frequency range of 8–13 Hz and appear in bursts of at 9 – 11 Hz (Oberman et al. 2005, Churchland, 2011). It appears that all memory activation is dependent on a stimulus. A single external stimulus or even a self-induced becomes the cause of re-activation of latent memory. In fact, consciousness is self-awareness signal converting into inactive signal. Keeping self-awareness frequency cutoff from conversion into objective signals during wakeful state is the most extraordinary function which will lead to ultra or supersensory perception (if mastery achieved - author has experienced twice). The first few experiences will be perception of existence in a non-dimensional condition and other is of no-gravity state or floating state. Conclusion Human brain parts are inactive after death and the live brain is in my view only energetic activity. The true nature of Memory is theorized as the transformation or conversions of selfawareness signal into objective frequencies by passing through the infinitesimal gap in atomic structure created by earlier received signals. Above 5Hz, the self-awareness signal is transforming into objective frequencies and also having subjective function as witnessing, which declares, I see, I know etc.; and even in the negations. On the other hand, the self-awareness signal in 1 to 4Hz is subjective and not converted into objective signals. The research continues on how to keep self-awareness frequency from conversion into objective signals during wakeful state, which may lead to ultra or supersensory perception if mastery is achieved. In my view, the active human brain is an extraordinary “Game of Energy”. References Berger H; Gray, CM (1929). "Uber das Elektroenkephalogramm des Menschen". Arch Psychiatrika Nervenkrankenheit 87: 527–570. Doi: 10.1007/BF01797193. PMID 7605074. Bohm, D. 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"A mechanism for cognitive dynamics: neuronal communication through neuronal coherence". TICS 9: 474–480. General discussion: Roland, P. E., Larsen, B., Lassen, N. A. & Skinh0j, E. (1980),J. Neurophysiot. 43, 118-136. Hughes JR. (2008). Gamma, fast, and ultrafast waves of the brain: their relationships with epilepsy and behavior. Epilepsy Behav. Jul;13(1):25-31. PMID 18439878 Ian Gold (1999). "Does 40-Hz oscillation play a role in visual consciousness?” Consciousness and Cognition 8 (2): 186–195. doi:10.1006/ccog.1999.0399. PMID 10448001. Jamieson, Barrie G. M. (2007). Reproductive Biology and Phylogeny of Birds. Charlottesville VA: University of Virginia. p. 128. ISBN 1578083869. Jensen, O. and Lisman, J.E. (2005) Hippocampal sequence-encoding driven by a cortical multi-item working memory buffer. Trends in Neuroscience, 26, 696-705. Kirmizialsan, E.; Bayraktaroglu, Z.; Gurvit, H.; Keskin, Y.; Emre, M.; Demiralp, T. (2006). "Comparative analysis of event-related potentials during Go/NoGo and CPT: Decomposition of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory 1131 electrophysiological markers of response inhibition and sustained attention". Brain Research 1104 (1): 114–128. doi:10.1016/j.brainres.2006.03.010. PMID 16824492. Libet, B. (1990): The Principles of Design and Operation of the Brain, eds. Eccles, J. C. & Creutzfeld, 0. (Springer, Berlin), pp. 185-205 plus General Discussion, pp. 207-211. Katkar, Narendra (2013): Science of self-awareness and memory, International Journal of Research Studies in Psychology, January 2013, Volume 2 Number 1, 69-77 Mohs, Richard, C. 2010 "How Human Memory Works." 08 May 2007. HowStuffWorks.com. http://health.howstuffworks.com/human-memory.htm 23 February 2010. Oberman LM, Hubbard EM, McCleery JP, Altschuler EL, Ramachandran VS, Pineda JA. (2005) "EEG evidence for mirror neuron dysfunction in autism spectrum disorders". Cognitive Brain Research. Jul; 24(2):190-8 Pauli, Wolfgang, 1955, the influence of archetypal ideas on the scientific theories of Kepler. The Interpretation of nature and the psyche. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Posner, M. I., Petersen, S. E., Fox, P. T. & Raichle, M. E.(1988) Science 240, 1627-1631.Deecke, L. & Lang, V. (1990) The Principles of Design and Operation of the Brain, eds. Eccles, J. C. & Creutzfeld, O.(Springer, Berlin), pp. 303-341. Purves, D., Augustine, G.J., Fitzpatrick, D., Hall, W.C., LaMantia, A., McNamara, J.O., White, L.E. Neuroscience. Fourth edition. (2008). Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, Mass. Print. Ramachandran, V. S. and S. Blakeslee (1998), Phantoms in the brain: Probing the mysteries of the human mind. William Morrow & Company, ISBN 0-688-15247-3. Print. Reproducing Visible Spectra. Repairfaq.org. Retrieved on 2011-02-09. Schmitz D.1; Gloveli T.; Behr J.; Dugladze T.and Heinemann U. (1998). “Subthreshold membrane potential oscillations in neurons of deep layers of the entorhinal cortex”. Neuroscience, 85:. 999-1004 Schwartz, M. Jeffrey Henry P. Stapp and Mario Beauregard, 2004: Quantum physics in neuroscience and psychology: a neurophysical model of mind–brain interaction: Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B, doi:10.1098/rstb.2004.1598 Schwarzel. M.& Mulluer. U., (2006): "Dynamic Memory Networks", "Cellular and Molecular Life Science", ScienceDaily, 2011: Mimicking the Brain -- In Silicon: New Computer Chip Models How Neurons Communicate With Each Other at Synapses Searle, John (1997). The Mystery of Consciousness. The New York Review of Books. pp. 53–88. ISBN 978-0-940322-06-6. Stenger, Victor, "The Myth of Quantum Consciousness", The Humanist Vol 53 No 3 (May–June 1992) pp. 13-15 [1] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 10 | pp. 1124-1132 Katkar, N. Self-Awareness and Memory Thomas J. Bruno, Paris D. N. Svoronos. CRC Handbook of Fundamental Spectroscopic Correlation Charts. CRC Press, 2005. Walker, Peter (1999). Chambers dictionary of science and technology. Edinburgh: Chambers. p. 312. ISBN 0-550-14110-3. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1132

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 325 Exploration The Universal Integration of Human Experience Robert Campbell * ABSTRACT System 4 generates nine Terms from a Primary Universal Set of four centers concerned with the species, a Secondary Universal Set concerned with the individual, and three Particular Sets that are concerned with the actions of specific Cells and Organs of each Host human being, according to the Form of physical circumstance. The three Particular Sets have expressive and regenerative modes and transform through a six Term sequence one Step apart, taking a total of twelve Steps for each Set to complete its sequence. The two Universal Sets each have distinct transform sequences that cohere together in the way they integrate all Particular Term transformations into three Cycles. Each Cycle consists of four Particular Transform Steps. This fully coherent universal methodology provides new insights that expand the horizons of the biological sciences consistent with the evidence. Key Words: universal, particular, species, individual, cell biology, organ systems, evolution, universal wholeness, hierarchies, cosmic order, organization structure, ontological structure of being. Introduction There are self-similar nested patterns that recur throughout phenomenal experience that are related to how things are structured to work. Despite the unlimited diversity of human experience all people are anatomically structured the same. We all have four limbs, ten digits on hands and feet and the same complement of internal organs and nervous system, yet our behavioural capacity can vary enormously from individual to individual. The same structural pattern with variations is in evidence throughout the vertebrate lineage from amphibians to humans. The quality that distinguishes us most from our animal ancestry is our creative capacity. Humans have developed sophisticated languages that allow us to deal with phenomenal experience in abstraction in ways that allow us to plan and work collectively in our social endeavours. We live in structured societies that reflect similar structural patterns. Phenomenal experience has nested self-similar characteristics consistent with System 4. This allows us to see into the structural mechanics of how each human Host, with a complement of Organs and Cells generates the physical behavioural Forms of each human being. The whole range of human thought, feeling and behaviour is embraced by the universal methodology of the System. The four active interfaces of Host, Organs, Cells and physical Form define a universal hierarchy such that each interface can have dual Particular and Universal meaning that introduces * Correspondence: Robert Campbell, P.O. Box 182, Karon Post Office, Phuket, 83100, Thailand. Website: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com E-Mail: bob@cosmic-mindreach.com Note: This article is based on author’s work of 2012. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 326 ambiguity into how we normally express meaning in words. This emphasizes the value of delineating how these four active interfaces of System 4 can generate only nine possible ways of mutually relating a universal inside to a universal outside across an active interface between them. Each way is called a Term in a matrix of mutual transformations that define the roots of meaning in any physical, biological or social context. Active Interfaces between Inside and Outside In other articles it has been shown that all phenomenal experience is dependent upon active interface processes between a common universal inside and a common universal outside, neither of which can be known to the exclusion of the other. All we can ever know is active interface processes between a common inside and outside. This creates the only boundaries that we can perceive in experience and thus the only things we can identify. Our sense perceptions and our technical instruments that supplement them all depend on active energy interactions across surfaces that define an active inside distinct from a passive outside in some way. Light generated within the sun is projected out to Earth and reflected from the surfaces of objects around us that the retina of our eyes pick up and transmit via energy processes across the active interfaces of neurons to the brain, where action potentials of more neurons interpret it, and so on with our other senses. We have also seen that there is a Universal Hierarchy of active interfaces between the Universal Centre and the Universal Periphery. The hierarchy is structurally required by the nature of Universal Wholeness to account for the diversity of experience as we perceive it to be. We implicitly have to integrate this diversity to make sense of it in a common framework of understanding of some kind. Otherwise our experience would fragment into mutually exclusive elements that would prevent us from interpreting events as meaningfully related. Universal Wholeness is a requirement implicit in a coherent universe. That is why we seek out universally valid scientific laws on the one hand and religious or spiritual beliefs on the other. The Universal Hierarchy Other articles demonstrate that the Universal Hierarchy of System 4 is represented by the four active interfaces. Term 9 of System 4 belongs to the Primary Universal Set and the four active interfaces proceed in a linear sequence that can be assigned words as follows: (1)Idea → (2)Knowledge → (3)Routine → (4)Form. We are all familiar with this universal hierarchy in our ordinary experience. For example if we have an Idea to build a house this directs our acquired Knowledge of how to go about it which in turn directs our Routines of behaviour erecting the house which gives Form to the final house consistent with the original idea. The atoms and molecules on the planet are prescribed by System 3and formed by System 4 into bricks, lumber etc., in the physical house. System 4 elaborates within the context of System 3 so even giving Form to the Idea of going to the store for groceries or eating a meal conforms to the hierarchy. The hierarchy is valid no matter what idea we wish to realize in form. It is universal. It also applies to businesses and organizations of all kinds. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 327 The hierarchy is universal in a broader self-similar sense as well. The human species is an archetypal Idea as an organized energy pattern that directs Knowledge implicit in our various organ systems such as nerves, glands, viscera, muscles, skin and sensory organs that work together to direct biological Routines of cells that allow us to give Form to thought and physical behaviour. We know that we share a common humanity. It is a more primary archetypal Idea distinct from a creative Idea such as building a house. Evolution has invested hundreds of millions of years of acquired Knowledge into our biological Routines that allow us to animate our physical Form as Host to build a house or go to the market. The archetypal Idea directs the implicit Knowledge that directs the Routines by which it works to direct our physical molecular Form, not vice versa. We often do not recognize that Knowledge is synonymous with the organization of phenomena in some way and this includes how the body’s organs meaningfully relate to one another. Atoms and molecules do not spontaneously self assemble into organized living species. Molecular Forms receive their direction from behind the physical scene, as we have seen in other cell articles. Biological processes are dependent upon the self-regulation of enzymes in highly recursive processes involving active energy patterns at active interfaces, that are together consistent with an overall archetypal energy pattern of the Host that directs Organs that direct biochemical activity in Cells that direct the physical molecular Form of the host. While a specific creative idea of a specific human individual may incur active neural cell processes these electronic patterns are superimposed on the archetypal pattern of the whole human being. We can thus write the Universal Hierarchy for all human beings as follows: (1)Host → (2)Organs → (3)Cells → (4)Form. The Host is an integrated energy pattern that can entertain creative ideas such as building a house that directs various Organs such nerves and muscles that direct Cell routines to mobilize and regenerate their biochemical resources accordingly to sustain their active physical Form as directed. We can also write this discretionary Universal Hierarchy in a general way as a succession of active interfaces numbered as Centres from a universal active centre inside to a universal passive outside or periphery. The universal active inside is represented by light L0. The universal passive outside is designated by darkness D with graduated levels between them: Fig. 1 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 328 Term 9 of the Primary Universal Set is thus characterized as expressive since it prescribes a universal pattern by which all humans can express themselves. This Expressive mode (UT9E) alternates with a Regenerative mode (UT8R) in its transform sequence. The Primary Regulation of Cycles As pointed out in other articles there are only nine possible ways that four active interfaces can be mutually related with respect to inside and outside. Each way is called a Term. Variants of these nine ways are possible if the numbered centers exchange places within each Term. Six of the nine Terms are defined by three Particular Sets that transform through a six Particular Term sequence one Step apart. These Particular Terms alternate between a seven Step expressive Term sequence followed by a five Step regenerative Term sequence, making a total of twelve transform Steps required for each Particular Set. In the regenerative modes of each Term, Centers 1 and 2 exchange places. The other three Terms are always Universal. Term 9 belongs to the Primary Universal Set and Terms 3 and 6 belong to the Secondary Universal Set. The Particular Term 8 has no Regenerative Mode because this Mode of Term 8 is a Primary Universal concern. In this case the Primary Universal Set transforms into the Universal Term 8 Regenerative Mode (UT8R) after two Particular Steps and then transforms back to Term 9 (UT9E) after two more Particular Steps to begin a new universal transform Cycle. The twelve Particular transform Steps are thus regulated into three Cycles of four Particular Steps each. This is essential to the self-similarity of how the whole System works, as we shall see. The Primary Universal Set and the Regenerative Term UT8R When the Primary Universal Term 9E transforms to UT8R Centers 3 and 4 transpose or turn around to face Center 2, while Center 1 transposes to contain Centers 2, 3 and 4, as shown in Figure 2. Fig. 2 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 329 In UT8R the Relational wholes R1 and R2 prescribe a countercurrent balance between C2 and C4 across C3, all within the context of C1. R1 represents an input from molecular Form (4) within Cells (3) as they relate to Organs (2) all within the context of the archetypal energy pattern of the Host (1). R2 represents a potential response of Organs (2) as they relate to Cells and their subjective molecular Forms (4) all within the same context of the Host. The response includes an anticipated need to act as distinct from an actual response because the Term is concerned with universally integrating the energy needs of the Host (1) over a span of time. It is regenerative in this respect. The molecular Forms (4) of Cells (3) must find a subjective and an objective balance with the needs of Organs (2) such as muscles and nerves as subjectively required by the Host (1). This relates a collectively organized motor response to collective sensory inputs from the environment as well as the energy resources needed to respond. These needs are balanced by the projections P1 and P2. The anticipated demands of Organs(2) as they relate to the energy patterns of the Host(1) are represents by P2. The molecular energy available in the Form(4) of food energy input to Cells(3) of the Host(1) is represented by P1. It must balance the anticipated energy demands of Organs(2) as they relate to the impending actions of the Host in P2. This represents a balance between available energy revenues P1 versus anticipated expenditures P2. It is budgeting. It anticipates a balance between demand and available supply for the Host, to meet the needs of the whole human being. In other words the available energy resources available to all cells must be distributed according to an anticipated priority of needs. This is more than the Primary Universal Term can do alone, because all the Universal Centers are open and unbounded. They relate to all people. The Primary Universal Set concerns the species. It requires the coherent operation of the Secondary Universal Set associated with a specific human individual, as illustrated later. The Related Transform Sequences of Both Universal Sets The Secondary Universal Set begins as Term 3 (UT3) in Step 1 of each four Step Cycle. In Step 2 it transforms to Term 6 (UT6) where it stays for Steps 2 and 3 while the Primary Universal Set transforms mid-Cycle to the UT8R Term for Steps 3 and 4. In Step 4 the UT6 Term inverts to an expressive mode of Term 2 (UT2E) which is an integrated creative idea of thought or behavior of the Host. This creative idea is distinct from but related to the archetypal energy pattern of the Host as a complete human being. It is superimposed on the living energy pattern archetype that sustains the whole human being. Between Step 4 and Step 1 of the next Cycle both Universal Sets transform back to their original positions, namely UT9E and UT3. This is summarized in the following table: Universal Set Primary Secondary Step 1 Term 9 E Term 3 Step 2 Term 9 E Term 6 Step 3 U Term 8 R Term 6 Step 4 U Term 8 R U Term 2 E Primary and Secondary Hierarchies and Archetypes: Term 3 can be described as the Transference of Idea into Form. It has a Secondary degree of universal access to the organized energies of the Void as they relate to a specific human being in a specific circumstance. Each human being is a Host of its Organs and Cells as these archetypal ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 330 patterns direct the Host’s molecular Form. Each human is an organized archetypal energy pattern. This Secondary Universal Human Archetype of each individual person is consistent with the self-similar Primary Human Archetype that embraces all humanity. In other words there is a self-similar nested hierarchy of archetypal energy patterns from Human Host to Individual Host to Organs and Cells. This Primary self-similar hierarchy exemplified in Term 9E synchronously directs the molecular biology of all humans. In other words it functions at a more Primary level than the Secondary Set that relates to each person. The two Sets must work in concert to generate the specific molecular Form of one human individual. They must be mutually coherent. The Quantum Energies of the Void The quantum energies of the Void are likewise hierarchically organized by the way Particular Sets that execute the work of cells are collectively integrated by the Universal Sets. The Particular Term 7 as illustrated in Figure 3 is a quantum memory term that is a formless component of the boundless Void. Term 7 has timeless or eternal characteristics, since it simultaneously reconciles the universal inside and outside as core elements of coalesced technique (C3=C4) within energy interfaces of the Human Host(1) and Organs(2). This is illustrated in the Figure 3 Regenerative Mode of Term 7. In this regenerative mode, T7R, the core elements of technique (C3=C4) throughout a human body are coalesced as implicitly being a specific regenerative aspect of the Host (1). This includes more than just the technique employed in one action sequence such as walking. The element of techniques employed collectively specify the Host’s character, thoughts, feelings and behavior, consistent with the personal and collective evolutionary history of the individual and humanity. This directs the host’s Organ (2) processes as a budgeted distribution of energy needs associated with the collective anticipated pattern of core techniques likely to follow in each Cycle. In the alternate Expressive Mode Centers 1 and 2 exchange places such that the core techniques (C3=C4) direct the energy patterns of Organs (2) first, that in turn animate the Expression of the Host (1). The associated expenditure of energy must be accounted for and balanced with the budgeted distribution in the Regenerative Mode. Linking Memory Recall with Sensory Input Fig. 3 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 331 Fig. 4 In Step 1 of each Cycle Term 7R is always synchronous with Term 4E which represents sensory input. For each human Host T4E means patterned energy input via vision, touch, hearing etc. from the physical environment to the central nervous system. For the Cell this means a signaling cascade, such as that initiated across synapses between nerves or by signaling chemicals in general. The latter relate first to Cell membrane processes in T1 that next transforms to the cascades to the nucleus in T4. The point is that T4 and T7 are coupled such that recall is always relevant to sensory input, whether it is a single cell or a human individual. In Step 3 of each Cycle T7E is always synchronous with T4R. These two Terms are always in opposite modes and they both have a coalesced pair. In T7 the coalesced pair is C3=C4. In T4 the coalesced pair is C1=C2. By comparing Figures 3 and 4 it is apparent that the two terms are reciprocals in this respect. The UT3 term cross-links or bridges these two terms to access recall consistent with sensory input. This is accommodated by the central coalescence C2=C3 in the UT3 term illustrated in Figure 5. The third synchronous Particular Term in Step 1 is T8E. In this Term R1 and R2 balance energy input with output in conjunction with the projections P1 and P2 respectively, within the context of specific Organs (2), such as muscles and nerves. T8E cannot be Universal because the context is specific to Organs (2) involved in an action sequence initiated subjectively to Organs by the Host (1). UT8R cannot be Particular because the context is all Organs (2) and Cells(3) subjective to the whole archetypal Host (1). There will be more on this later. Transference of Idea into Form – UT3 The Secondary Universal Term 3 has a central coalescence C2=C3 that binds countercurrent identities together between Idea(1) and Form(4) as illustrated in Figure 5. This central coalescence between inside and outside relates Organs(2) and Cells(3) as a behavioral unit to Idea(1) and molecular Form(4). It thus has eternal characteristics between internal subjective Idea(1) and the external objective Form(4) which give it access to the Void. In other words Cells(3) as coalesced with Organs(2) relate to the internal archetypal Idea(1), while Organs(2) as coalesced with Cells(3) relate to the external molecular Form(4). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 332 The Primary Universal Term 9 displays a four Step time-like succession from Idea(1) to Knowledge(2) to Routine(3) to Form(4) in sequence, consistent with each 4 Step Cycle. Each active interface in the Term is open and thus without specific boundaries or limits apart from those implied by the context, in this case the global human context being considered. As such the Primary Idea(1) is a Universal Human Archetypal pattern that defines all humans as members of a common species. In Step 1, this open Idea(1) includes all archetypal energy patterns of all Host human beings. It implicitly selects them from the Void for synchronous recall into Form. Fig. 5 Meanwhile the Secondary Universal Term 3 (UT3) is assimilating a specific animating action sequence for each specific human being via the C2=C3 (Organs=Cells) coalescence that links Idea(1) to Form(4). In Step 2 of each Cycle UT3 transforms to UT6 which represents a specific corporeal body of an individual Human Being with a separate physical Form. The Primary Universal Term 9 (UT9E) does not transform in Step 2. It proceeds to Step 2 which is the Knowledge(2) interface which succeeds the Idea(1) interface in Term 9. The corporeal body UT6 is implicitly invested with Knowledge according to its perceived circumstance as in Figure 6. In Step 2 this UT6 Term is also synchronous with the Particular Terms T1R, T2E and T5E. The T1R term is a gamma motor simulation that anticipates a capacity to enact a patterned response. T2E is an expressive Creative Idea R1 superimposed on the triad of closed centers representing archetypal forms of Host(1), Organs(2) and Cells(3). T5E is enacting a patterned action sequence developed in preceding Steps. This is illustrated in other articles at the following links: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4Terms.html http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4_Sequence_Steps.html . It can be noted here that in Step 3 the Primary Universal Term 9 must transform to a subjective concern with each specific Host to be consistent with the Secondary UT3 Term in Step 1 and the Transference of Idea into Form. In UT3 the Cells(3) interface is facing and coalesced with the Organs(2) interface from a subjective (left side) perspective and molecular Forms(4) are subjective to Cells(3). This arrangement is consistent with the countercurrent identities R1 and R2 within the subjective context of the Host(1) in UT8R of Step 3. As we shall see this translates as a budgeting concern with Routines(3) which is the third active interface in the time-like succession of Steps indicated by the successive active interfaces in UT9. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 333 The Step 2 Corporeal Body – T6 Fig. 6 In UT6 each individual person’s corporeal body explicitly displays a triad of closed shapes within the open context of molecular Form common to the operating field of the whole planet and the universe. The closed shapes of Cells(3), Organs(2) and the Host(1) human being are represented by the ellipses within the context of the open boundless molecular Form(4) interface. Consistent with Step 2 in UT9, we have Knowledge of our bodies and can identify the physical closed shape of a Cell or an Organ or a specific Host human individual. Each has a specific closed boundary or surface that is mutually dependent upon the other two members of the triad. All closed surfaces are members of a triadic relationship in some way, in all the Higher Systems. In this case our various sensory organs can feel, see and know our various body parts such that we tend to identify this physical body as being our “self” and constituting who we are. While common logic may tell us this is true, insofar as our Cells that constitute our Organs and Body clothe themselves in molecules, it is also clear from Figure 6 that the triad is independent from the molecular Forms (4) common to the whole universe. The triad works behind the physical scenes to sustain and animate each of us. There are three projections that relate the triad to the physical environment. One of the synchronous Particular Terms, T5E, is enacting a pattern of parallel action sequences in muscles throughout the Host’s body that requires mutual reconciliation with synchronous T2E and T1R terms in the other two Particular Sets that will result in action sequences to follow. All this must be consistent with a continual flow of coherent action in Cells(3) and Organs(2) throughout the body of the Host(1) as these three members of the triad mutually relate to the physical environment via projections P3, P2 and P1 respectively. This mutual balance is facilitated by the Knowledge(2) open active interface of the Primary Universal Term T9 (UT9E) in Step 2 of the Cycle. The energy supplies P1 available to the Host(1) must balance expenditures P3 of Cells(3) and P2 of Organs(2). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 334 Step 3 and a Coherent Balance between UT8R and UT6 Fig. 2 In Step 3 of each Cycle UT6 does not transform. Instead UT9 transforms to UT8R which coheres with UT6. The advance to C3 in UT9 concerns a Universal Routine of scheduling the distribution of available resources, necessitating the transformation to UT8R. The Routine interface is the third in the sequence of UT9. A second look at UT8R shows the countercurrent relational wholes R1 and R2 within the context of the Host(1), while in the UT6 triad Cells(1), Organs(2) and Host(1) are mutually linked in pairs by self-similar countercurrent identities that require them to have mutual boundaries. Because the active interfaces in UT8R are open and unbounded, the Host (1) interface can align with the Form(4) interface of the UT6 term, such that each human Host is identified with the molecular Forms common to the universe that clothe them, as common logic tells us. The countercurrent identities of UT8R link up the members of the UT6 triad in pairs within this dual context of molecular Form(3) and archetypal Host Idea(1). It must do this in counterclockwise order from C1 to C3, then from C3 to C2, then from C2 back to C1. Only in this order do the Cell(3) and Organ(2) interfaces align in both UT8R and UT6. Otherwise Organs and Cells would be at cross purposes resulting in degenerate cycles associated with disease. To help visualize how these Primary and Secondary Terms cohere together the three distinct linkages across each UT6 triad interval are described as separately follows: The Host (1) to Cells (3) Interval of UT6 (examine the diagrams closely): The open Cell(3) interface of UT8R aligns all cells of each human Host(1) in UT6. Across the interval between Host(1) and Cells(3) in UT6 the open Organ(2) interface of UT8R aligns specific closed Cells(3) of UT6 in each Organ(2). The countercurrent R1 and R2 in UT8R thus relates the molecular Forms(4) within all Cells(3) of each human Host(1) across the interval to specific closed Cells(3) in UT6 as specified for all human Organs(2) by the open interface of UT8R. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 335 The Cells (3) to Organs (2) Interval of UT6: The open Cell(3) interface of UT8R aligns with all specific closed Cells(3) of UT6 of each human being. Across the interval between Cells(3) and Organs(2) in UT6 the open Organ(2) interface of UT8R aligns with all specific closed Organs(2) of UT6. The countercurrent R1 and R2 in UT8R thus relates the open molecular Forms(4) within all Cells(3) across the interval from specific closed Cells(3) to each specific Organ(2) in UT6 as specified for all human Organs(2) by the open interface of UT8R. The Organs (2) to Host (1) Interval of UT6: The open Cell(3) interface of UT8R aligns with all specific closed Organs(2) of UT6 of each human being. Across the interval between Organs(2) and Host(1) in UT6 the open Organs(2) interface of UT8R aligns with each specific human Host(1) of UT6. The countercurrent R1 and R2 in UT8R thus relates the open molecular Forms(4) within all Cells(3) across the interval from specific closed Organs(2) to each human Host(1) in UT6 as specified for all human Organs(2) by the open interface of UT8R. These three pairs of linkages within this dual context require that all molecular processes in all cells within all organs of each human being conform to a Primary Universal pattern for all human beings. The triadic relationship between Cells(3), Organs(2) and Host(1) within the physical Form(4) of the external environment in UT6 find living compatibility with the relationship between Organs, Cells and their internal molecular Forms within the context of the Primary Universal Archetypal Host(1) of all human beings as required by UT8R. The projections P1, P2 and P3 of UT6 are each required to balance available molecular energy supplies with anticipated demand as specified by P2 and P1 respectively of UT8R. The latter P2 and P1 projections span each of the three intervals of UT6. Each of the P1, P2 and P3 projections around the triad of UT6 thus consists of a balance between P2 and P 1 of UT8R. The energy supplies and demands of the Host thus find a balanced distribution to Organs and Cells according to an ongoing priority of needs. Step 4 and a Coherent Balance between UT8R and UT2E In Step 4 UT8R does not transform. The corporeal body of UT6 inverts to a Universal expressive mode of Term 2 (UT2E). This universal creative idea term is aligned with parallel regenerative modes of Particular Terms 2 throughout the body that will be involved in a succeeding action sequence. It is also synchronous with a regenerative action sequence T5R and an expressive mode of T1E which identifies the parallel perceived needs and capacities of cells throughout the body to respond to the environment in a manner consistent with circumstance as integrated by the Universal Sets. In this UT2E term the triad (1, 3, 2) remains linked in pairs by UT8R in the same way as in UT6 except that they are not within an external context of molecular Form(4) as in UT6. The open ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience 336 Form(4) interface of UT6 has inverted to a position within all cells as they relate to the archetypal Idea(1) of the specific human Host(1) including the integrated creative Idea being entertained for a subsequent action sequence. This represents the molecular Form(4) energy resources anticipated to be expended and it must be reconciled with the three synchronous Particular Terms, T1E, T2R, and T5R. The R1 in this UT2E Term is called a creative idea in a development stage consistent with other Terms and Steps. This completes a budgeted distribution of available energy supplies in cells throughout the body to meet the creative needs of the Host. Fig. 7 This UT2E Term coheres with UT8R such that the expression of this creative idea takes place within the open Primary Universal Host Idea(1) as illustrated in Figure 2. This open Universal Idea(1) is the archetypal energy pattern of the whole human species. It represents the genotype of the species. In other words the expressive ideas of each specific human being relate to the whole human species. We are social creatures that independently respond to our social milieu. While this may entail ethnic and nationalistic agendas, identification with these subsumed levels of humanity to the exclusion of the whole of humanity isolate the former from the latter. Our cultural and national heritages are properly vehicles through which we can independently contribute to humanity in a global context. The age-old dilemma of “self and other” or “one and many” or “universal and particular” requires an appropriate recognition of universal values interpreted in context. Step 5 and a New Cycle At the end of each Cycle there is a discontinuity since both the Primary and Secondary Universal Sets both transform back to UT9 and UT3 respectively to begin a new Cycle with the same pattern of transformations. Since there are three Particular Sets transforming through four Steps in each Cycle there is always a complete complement of seven expressive and five regenerative Particular modes in each Cycle, albeit in different Sets, as shown in Figure 8. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 325-337 Campbell, R., The Universal Integration of Human Experience Universal Sets Primary Set Secondary Set 337 Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E Particular Sets Set 1 T8E Set 2 T7R Set 3 T4E T5E T1R T2E T7E T4R T8E T1E T2R T5R Fig. 8 The dynamic pattern of transformations is illustrated in the articles Intorduction to the System and System 4 Terms The Subsumed Level of the Cell Because of the nested self-similar character of how the System works the above description of how the human Host(1), Organs(2), Cells(3) and molecular Form(4) are integrated, this description can also be applied to how Host Cells(1), Organelles(2), Enzymes(3) and molecular Form(4) are organized and integrated. This methodology allows us to read down inside the cell to gene transcription, translation, and related epigenetic factors as introduced in other cell articles. The methodology can thus expand the horizons of science in far more meaningful ways. References: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/Human_Iintegration_Cell_article.html http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4Terms.html http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4_Sequence_Steps.html http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4_Sequence_Part_2.html http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/Gene_Expression.html ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   932   Article     The  Shock  of  the  Old   A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience       Milenko  Budimir*   Abstract   Here   I   present   a   description   of   some   transpersonal   experiences   that   occurred   as   a   result  of  meditation  practices  as  well  as  reflections  on  those  experiences.  I  connect   these   experiences   with   some   historical   precedents,   particularly   to   sources   in   the   Eastern  Orthodox  Christian  spiritual  tradition,  but  also  to  contemporary  sources  as   well   as   some   20th   century   philosophical   ideas.   Lastly,   I   describe   how   these   experiences   ended   up   shaping   a   new   worldview,   the   most   significant   and   lasting   being   a   deep   sense   of   interconnectedness   with   the   world.   This   sense   of   interconnectedness   further   lends   support   to   an   inclusive   rather   than   an   exclusive   understanding  of  religious  belief,  and  correspondingly  a  mystical  sense  of  the  world   and  humans’  place  in  it.     Keywords:  transpersonal  experience,  narrative,  self-­‐discovery,  spiritual  practice.     Introduction       This  essay,  thanks  to  the  editor  of  this  issue  of  Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration   and  Research,  has  given  me  the  pleasurable  opportunity  to  revisit  some  of  the  most   formative  episodes  in  my  life,  and  to  reflect  on  the  experiences  from  that  period  as   well  as  to  contribute,  in  some  small  way,  to  the  work  of  consciousness  research.  I’ll   be   writing   about   some   experiences   I   had   as   a   result   of   meditation   practices   I   engaged  in  during  a  few  years  in  the  early  1990s.  I’ve  always  suspected  that  these   experiences  played  an  integral  role  in  shaping  my  outlook  on  the  world  and  life  in   general,  but  to  date  I  have  never  reflected  much  on  them  at  all.  This  essay  gives  me   the  opportunity  to  do  so  almost  20  years  later.       The   primary   sources   will   be   my   memory   of   those   experiences   and   the   journals   I   kept  at  the  time.  Seeing  as  how  what  I  am  going  to  share  here  took  place  almost  two   decades  ago,  the  narrative  will  undoubtedly  be  a  mix  of  a  partial  reconstruction  of   actual  events  as  well  as  elements  almost  certainly  added  in  hindsight  which  may  not   be  an  entirely  accurate  reflection  of  the  conscious  experience  at  that  time,  but  may   reflect  more  the  attitudes  developed  after  the  experiences  themselves.  A  lot  of  this   exercise,  of  course,  will  be  one  of  constructing  a  narrative  out  of  a  few  “data  points.”   So   naturally   there   is   a   great   tendency   towards   smoothing   out   the   rough   spots   in   the   narrative  arc.  But  if  I  am  as  honest  with  myself  as  I  can  possibly  be,  then  I  think  I  can   *Correspondence:  Milenko  holds  an  MA  in  Philosophy  and  a  BS  in  Electrical  Engineering.  He  is  a   technical  writer  and  editor  and  teaches  philosophy  at  Cleveland  State  University  in  Cleveland,  Ohio.   He  can  be  reached  at  budimir@hotmail.com.       ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   933   reconstruct  fairly  faithfully  not  only  what  was  happening  at  that  time  but  also  how   these  experiences  impacted  my  life.       The  decision  to  record  some  of  these  experiences  was  likely  due  to  their  uniqueness   and  novelty  and  the  fact  that  I  was  attempting  to  figure  out  just  what  exactly  they   meant  and  how  they  fit  into  my  life  at  the  time.  Only  later  did  I  begin  to  discover  the   common   elements   that   my   experiences   shared   with   those   who   lived   centuries   before  my  time.         The   experiences   I’ll   be   describing   took   place   during   a   period   of   time   from   the   summer   of   1991   to   about   the   summer/fall   of   1992,   during   which   time   I   was   a   fairly   typical   college   student   in   Cleveland,   OH,   formally   studying   engineering   and   its   attendant   math   and   science,   together   with   a   budding   interest   in   philosophy   and   religion.   I   was   just   beginning   that   journey   of   self-­‐discovery   and   the   corresponding   doubt  and  questioning  of  the  accepted  truths  and  worldview  I’d  grown  up  with  and   into   which   I   was   socialized.   Prior   to   the   summer   of   1991,   I   didn’t   engage   in   any   meditative  or  spiritual  practices.  However,  after  the  summer  of  1992  I  did  continue   to   practice   a   personalized   style   of   meditation,   although   I   didn’t   mention   the   experiences  in  subsequent  journals.       In   addition,   my   ethnic   background   bears   mentioning   as   it   most   likely   had   an   impact   on   why   I   became   interested   in   meditative   practice   in   the   first   place.   Both   of   my   parents   are   of   Serbian   descent   and   were   born   in   Yugoslavia,   which   at   the   time   of   these  experiences  was  beginning  its  descent  into  break-­‐up  and  civil  war.  I  am  a  first-­‐ generation   American   who   was   raised   in   a   closely-­‐knit   community   of   Serbian   immigrants,   speaking   fluently   the   language   of   my   parents   and   their   homeland   while   becoming  increasingly  aware  of  the  isolation  and  provincialism  that  that  upbringing   could   engender   and   even   encourage.   In   addition,   as   the   civil   wars   in   Croatia   and   Bosnia   began   and   family   and   friends   became   much   more   interested   in   the   happenings   in   the   region,   and   especially   became   more   and   more   nationalistic   in   their   outlook   and   expressions,   I   felt   myself   becoming   somewhat   isolated,   existing   apart   from   these   feelings   of   solidarity   with   ethnic   Serbs   back   in   Yugoslavia.   Consequently,   it’s   probably   fair   to   say   that   at   least   a   part   of   why   I   took   up   meditation  in  the  first  place  was  to  create  for  myself  an  oasis  of  calm  and  dispassion   in  the  desert  of  heated  emotions  that  I  couldn’t  entirely  understand  nor  accept.       The  Experiences     I’m   not   quite   sure   when   I   first   began   to   meditate,   but   the   best   estimate   I   have   is   sometime   between   December   1990   and   the   spring   of   1991.   And   the   primary   impetus   at   the   time   was   finding   a   way   to   alleviate   the   new-­‐found   stress   I   was   experiencing   as   a   result   of   my   father’s   illness   and   subsequent   disability   when   it   was   not  clear  what  my  future  would  hold,  i.e.,  whether  or  not  I  would  continue  college  or   drop  out  and  find  a  job  to  support  our  family.  The  result  of  this  stress  was  muscle   tension   in   my   shoulder,   neck,   and   jaws.   I   didn’t   know   at   the   time   what   the   cause     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   934   was,   but   a   trip   to   an   ENT   specialist   revealed   that   it   was   simply   stress   and   a   prescription  for  Valium  quickly  relieved  the  symptoms.       After  the  prescription  ran  out,  my  doctor  suggested  techniques  to  alleviate  some  of   the  stress,  one  of  which  was  deep  breathing  exercises.  A  friend  of  mine  mentioned   that  he,  too,  had  had  some  experience  with  breathing  exercises  and  meditation  and   that  it  had  helped  him  calm  down  and  better  manage  some  of  the  stress  in  his  life.       So   the   first   form   of   deep-­‐breathing/meditation   I   tried   was   what   my   friend   had   suggested.  It  took  the  form  of  lying  down  on  a  bed  on  my  back,  legs  stretched  out,   arms   at   my   sides,   palms   facing   down   and   eyes   closed.   I   begin   by   taking   a   deep   breath   and   letting   it   out   slowly   and   consciously.   By   “consciously”   I   mean   being   mindful   of   the   act   of   exhaling.   A   useful   way   to   stay   mindful   was   to   say   to   myself   the   words   “in”   as   I   was   drawing   breath   in,   and   “out”   as   I   was   exhaling.   That’s   it.   Just   those   two   words:   “in”   and   “out.”   Even   when   the   mind   wandered   and   other   thoughts   entered  my  mind,  I  would  recognize  what  was  happening  and  slowly  again  begin  to   focus   on   the   words   “in”   and   “out”   and   gently   steer   the   mind   back   away   from   any   distracting  thoughts.       I  practiced  this  technique  a  few  times  a  week  with  some  moderate  success.  During   the   act   of   meditating   and   focusing   on   those   words,   I   was   indeed   calmer   and   more   relaxed   than   in   my   normal   waking   state.   And   even   after   the   meditation   period,   which   would   last   anywhere   from   15   minutes   upwards   to   an   hour   or   longer,   I   was   generally  more  relaxed  and  noticed  that  the  familiar  muscle  tension  in  my  jaw,  neck   and  shoulder  area  was  gone.  This  state  of  relaxation  would  last  anywhere  from  an   hour  or  so  up  to  the  rest  of  the  day  or  evening.       However,  one  result  of  this  technique  was  that  I  would  often  fall  asleep,  sometimes   for   an   hour   or   two.   Not   wanting   to   fall   asleep,   I   decided   to   try   a   different   posture.   This   is   where   I   began   to   meditate   and   practice   my   deep-­‐breathing   exercises   while   sitting  upright  in  a  chair.  The  posture  here  was  sitting  upright,  feet  flat  on  the  floor,   back  straight,  head  facing  forward,  elbows  bent,  arms  resting  on  either  the  arms  of  a   chair  or  palms  down  on  my  knees.  From  this  position,  I  would  begin  with  the  deep-­‐ breathing  exercises  again;  saying  to  myself  the  words  “in”  with  each  inhalation  and   “out”  when  exhaling.       After   practicing   these   exercises   for   a   few   months,   and   experiencing   the   kind   of   relaxed,  lower  stress  states  that  they  produced,  I  entered  a  different  or  new  phase   produced  by  these  meditation  and  deep-­‐breathing  exercises.  (Actually,  calling  them   “meditation”   is   probably   not   accurate   at   this   point   because   strictly   speaking   I   was   not  meditating  on  any  particular  subject,  theme,  word  or  mantra.  It’s  probably  more   accurate   to   refer   to   this   first   or   introductory   phase   as   simply   the   beginning   of   some   deep-­‐breathing  and  mind-­‐clearing  exercises  to  alleviate  symptoms  of  stress.)       ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   935   The   first   recorded   instance   of   this   new   phase   comes   from   a   journal   entry   dated   July   22nd,  1991.  As  far  as  I  can  make  out,  this  is  the  first  such  experience  I  had  while  in   this  meditative  state,  and,  as  such,  being  so  new  and  different  from  anything  that  I   had   experienced   previously,   I   thought   it   was   worthy   enough   to   be   recorded.   Here   is   the  entry  from  that  day:       While  in  a  meditative  state  tonight,  I  reached  the  point  in  my  meditation  in   which   I   almost   lost   consciousness   of   my   physical   body   and   was   only   conscious  of  my  mind  (or  soul,  or  spirit.)  …  Once  out  of  my  meditative  state,  I   felt  an  overwhelming  feeling  of  joy  and  love  at  this  brief  encounter  with  my   soul.       A  little  more  than  a  month  later,  I  recorded  a  similar  experience.  This  one  is  dated   August  25th,  1991:       While  meditating  tonight,  I  experienced  a  complete  loss  of  realization  of  the   existence   of   my   body   and   the   only   thing   that   existed   was   my   mind   (soul).   After  this,  I  felt  as  if  the  only  thing  existing  was  my  mind  and  the  room.  It  was   a  really  strange  feeling  to  say  the  least,  and  it  can’t  even  be  described  fully…     Note   that   in   the   first   experience   I   explicitly   stated   that   I   “almost   lost   consciousness”   of  my  body,  while  in  the  2nd  description  I  go  further  and  describe  the  complete  loss   of   body   consciousness.   Also,   in   the   first   experience   I   mention   the   post-­‐meditative   feeling  of  “joy  and  love”  while  in  the  2nd  description  there  is  only  a  mention  of  the   strangeness  of  the  experience  of  losing  consciousness  of  my  physical  body.       Then,  not  long  after  the  experience  of  August,  there  is  a  transcription  in  my  journal   of  a  well-­‐known  and  often-­‐cited  passage  from  Blaise  Pascal  that  is  said  to  have  come   after  a  profound  mystical  experience  he  had  one  night  while  praying/meditating.  I   can’t  recall  where  I  found  the  quote,  but  here  is  what  I  wrote  down  at  the  time:         In  the  year  of  grace  1654  Monday,  23  November:     Fire       God  of  Abraham,  God  of  Isaac,  God  of  Jacob,     not  of  the  philosophers     and  the  learned       Certitude.  Joy.  Certitude.     Emotion.  Sight.  Joy.       Forgetfulness  of  the  world     and  of  all  outside  of  God     the  world  hath  not  known     Thee,  but  I  have  known     Thee.     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   936     Joy!  Joy!  Joy!  Tears       of  Joy       My  God,  wilt  Thou  leave  me?     Let  me  not  be  separated       from  Thee  for  ever.       When  I  encountered  this  passage  it  obviously  made  a  big  enough  impression  on  me   at  the  time  that  I  thought  it  worthy  of  copying  into  my  journal.  I  probably  felt  that   way   because   at   some   level   it   must   have   sounded   a   lot   like   what   I   had   felt   during   some   of   the   moments   of   ecstasy   that   I’d   experienced   during   my   own   meditative   practice.  And  I  was  excited  that  somebody  else,  living  almost  350  years  ago,  would   have  described,  in  tone  anyway,  the  experience  that  I  just  had  myself.       After   transcribing   the   quote   from   Pascal,   there   follow   several   pages   of   transcriptions  from  various  sources  dealing  with  spirituality  and  mysticism.  Some  of   the   sources   include   St.   Augustine   and   writers   in   the   Orthodox   Christian   spiritual   tradition   most   likely   from   The   Philokalia,   a   compendium   of   Eastern   Christian   spiritual  writings.       While  I  don’t  know  what  the  direct  link  was,  I  can  mention  that  during  the  summer   of  1991  I  bought  two  books  that  influenced  my  continuing  meditative  practice.  One   of   them,   The   Art   of   Meditation   (1990)   by   Joel   S.   Goldsmith,   I   purchased   at   a   small   “New  Age”  store  that  sold  incense,  crystals  and  gems,  and  what  one  might  call  occult   books   and   resources.   This   book   had   to   be   one   of   the   first   (if   not   the   first)   that   I   encountered   which   offered   direct   instruction   on   how   to   meditate,   including   everything  from  physical  posture  and  breathing  to  what  to  read  before  beginning  to   meditate.       The   other   book   was   Introducing   the   Orthodox   Church   (1982)   by   Anthony   M.   Coniaris.  I’m  sure  that  the  reason  I  got  this  book  is  because  in  my  mind  there  was  an   obvious  religious  and  spiritual  component  to  the  experiences  I  had  had  and  so  I  was   trying   to   discover   what   the   religion   that   I   was   raised   in   had   to   say   about   these   experiences.   And   there   was   one   chapter   in   particular   which   focused   on   prayer,   in   which  I’d  underlined  quite  a  few  passages  referencing  the  results  of  prayer  and  the   need   for   prayer   in   human   life.   A   lot   of   what   I   found   in   these   passages   seemed   to   me   at  the  time  to  match  up  with  my  meditation  experiences;  the  emphasis  on  the  body   and  correct  posture,  the  experience  of  being  in  a  state  of  active  prayer,  the  results  of   prayer,  and  a  metaphysical  framework  with  which  to  understand  and  interpret  the   meditative  experience  itself.       A   few   more   direct   quotes   from   the   journals.   Here   is   one   with   some   more   details   dated  January  16,  1992:     While   meditating   tonight,   I   experienced   what   I   believe   to   be   some   sort   of   “vision”   of   light   or   some   “light.”   This   came   totally   involuntarily   and   at   the     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   937   instant   that   I   was   aware   of   the   light   (which   lasted   for   only   a   fraction   of   a   second)  I  felt  a  sort  of  “energy”  or  “peace”  or  “relief”  pass  through  my  whole   body.  To  be  more  specific,  I  cannot  find  a  right  word  for  the  feeling  I  had,  just   that  it  was  a  pleasant  almost  “heart  warming”  feeling  which  could  only  have   come  from  God.  (The  peace  that  passeth  understanding.)       A  few  weeks  later,  on  February  4,  1992,  I  recorded  another  experience:       While  meditating  tonight  (for  about  30  min),  I  again  experienced  that  direct   “light”  or  presence  of  a  power  far  exceeding  any  of  mine.  It  was  so  short,  that   it  could  be  described  as  a  flash  of  lightning,  instantaneously  accompanied  by   an  undescribable  [sic]  feeling  of  warmth  and  peace  that  filled  my  entire  body   and   soul.   Although   these   experiences   are   ineffable   and   to   a   large   degree   indescribable   in   words,   I   feel   that   still   my   rational   side   seeks   something   to   put  into  words…       About   2   months   later,   on   April   1,   1992   (no   joke),   I   describe   for   the   first   time   something   of   a   roadblock   in   my   meditative   practice,   even   going   so   far   as   to   cite   a   passage  from  Goldsmith’s  book  as  a  possible  explanation:       While  attempting  to  meditate  tonight,  I  realized  that  I  could  not  achieve  that   silence   or   peace   very   easily   without   trying   to   put   forth   an   effort.   My   only   possible   explanation   for   this   would   be   the   saying   from   the   book   The   Art   of   Meditation   that   our   periods   of   meditation   go   through   stages   or   cycles   (ups   and   downs)   where   at   one   time   we   might   be   in   a   valley   where   we   cannot   meditate   or   remain   in   silence   but   that   this   valley   is   usually   an   indication   that   we   are   ready   to   move   on   to   another   plane   of   meditative   experience.   This   seems  to  be  happening  to  me  at  this  present  time.       Then,   a   few   weeks   later   on   April   16,   1992,   I   transcribed   a   passage   from   The   Philokalia  attributed  to  St.  Maximus  the  Confessor:     The   highest   state   of   pure   prayer   has   two   forms…   The   sign   of   the   second   is   when,  in  the  very  act  of  rising  in  prayer,  the  mind  is  ravished  by  the  Divine   boundless  light  (emphasis  in  the  original)  and  loses  all  sensation  of  itself  or   of   any   other   creature,   and   is   aware   of   Him   alone,   Who,   through   love,   has   produced  in  him  this  illumination.  In  this  state,  moved  to  understand  words   about  God,  he  receives  pure  and  luminous  knowledge  of  Him.     There   follows   no   commentary   on   this   passage.   I’m   sure   the   understanding   and   connection  was  complete  for  me  and  there  was  no  need  to  state  explicitly  just  what   this  passage  meant  for  me,  in  light  of  the  experiences  I’d  had  over  the  past  several   months   and   being   aware   of,   for   the   first   time,   this   mysterious   “light”   which   St.   Maximus  references  in  the  passage.     Explanations:  Frameworks  of  Understanding       ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   938   Already  toward  the  end  of  the  last  section,  some  amount  of  interpretation  has  begun   to   creep   into   the   descriptions,   which   means   that   I   was   already   reading   spiritual   and   philosophical   literature   and   attempting   to   interpret   these   experiences   and   assimilate   them   into   either   my   existing   worldview   (whatever   that   may   have   been   at   the   time)   or   to   discover   what   role   these   experiences   played   in   some   new   under-­‐ standing   that   I   was   groping   toward   and   which   was   very   likely   becoming   more   obvious  to  me  every  day.     Two   sources   were   instrumental   in   beginning   to   shape   my   understanding   of   these   experiences;  the  Goldsmith  book  and  the  Coniaris  book  which  led  to  other  sources   of  Orthodox  Christian  spirituality.     The  Goldsmith  book  promoted  a  fundamentally  New  Age/Self-­‐Help  metaphysic.  His   was   not   an   Orthodox   Christian   understanding,   but   a   wider   ranging   interpretation   which   one   might   say   encompassed   a   pluralistic   Hickian   view   that   all   religions   share   some   aspect   of   the   Truth,   and   that   no   one   religion   has   sole   access   to   the   Truth.   This   is   evident   in   his   speaking   of   “the   Christ”   not   so   much   as   an   historical   figure   but   rather  as  a  kind  of  state  of  consciousness  which  the  historical  Jesus  himself  tapped   into  (and  which  is  often  referred  to  as  Christ  consciousness)  and  which  anyone  who   practices  meditation  in  earnest  can  also  attain.     Complementing   the   Goldsmith   book   was   the   work   by   Coniaris,   which   led   me   to   other  Orthodox  Christian  sources  that  would  be  consistent  with  my  upbringing  and   the   religious   world   I   knew   most   intimately.   The   most   important   of   these   was   The   Philokalia   and   another   book   I   referenced   at   the   time,   Christian   Spirituality,   a   collection  of  essays  from  theologians  and  religious  scholars  from  both  East  and  West   about  the  origins  of  Christian  spiritual  practice  from  the  beginnings  of  Christianity   through   the   12th   century.   Also,   later,   in   about   1993,   I   began   reading   the   classic   of   Russian  religious  spirituality,  The  Way  of  a  Pilgrim,  which  tended  to  confirm  what  I   had  already  picked  up  from  reading  other  spiritual  works.     Later   sources   would   include   some   of   the   writings   of   philosophers   who   could   generally   be   classified   as   existentialists   as   well   as   a   few   foundational   theological   ideas   from   Vladimir   Lossky   (1989),   which   remain   to   this   day   embedded   in   my   integrated   understanding   of   those   experiences   with   my   life   and   the   larger   world   around  me.     One   of   the   most   obvious   things   to   notice   is   that   from   the   very   beginning,   these   experiences   were   understood   in   a   religious/spiritual   context   and   not   at   all   in   a   scientific   one.   This   is   to   be   expected   and   entirely   in   line   with   my   upbringing.   However,  it  is  not  to  say  that  my  parents  practiced  meditation  or  that  they  had  the   same  or  even  similar  views  on  religion  and  spirituality  as  me.  In  point  of  fact,  some   of   their   views   were   for   me   rather   foreign   and   superstitious,   focused   as   they   were   mostly  on  rituals  and  charms  and  living  with  a  certain  fear  of  not  doing  the  correct   things   and   therefore   of   violating   what   they   took   to   be   some   type   of   divine   order   which,  if  they  strayed  from  it  would  bring  about  misfortune.       ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   939   What   I   did   see   from   them,   especially   from   my   father,   was   the   presence   of   traits   that   might   be   called   humility   before   a   mystery.   In   my   father,   that   showed   itself   in   his   daily  ritual  of  morning  and  evening  prayers.  My  father’s  side  of  the  family  did  tend   to  be  more  religious  than  my  mother’s  side,  so  that  while  I  fought  what  to  me  were   the   overtly   superstitious   elements   of   their   religious   beliefs,   the   soil   was   fertile   enough  for  me  to  begin  in  but  through  my  own  discovery  process  which  drew  from   my   meditation   practices,   my   readings   of   Goldsmith,   and   the   writings   of   the   early   Church  fathers  through  the  Philokalia,  I  was  able  to  forge  my  own  understanding  of   religion  and  spirituality  which  melded  these  influences  together.     Later,   after   these   first   theological   sources   were   absorbed   into   a   newly   emerging   understanding   of   the   experiences,   I   turned   to   philosophical   sources.   One   of   the   earliest   of   these   sources   was   Wittgenstein,   probably   during   1994.   This   is   the   time   during   which   I   first   came   across   his   writings   both   in   formal   class   settings   as   well   as   on  my  own.  And  of  course,  one  of  the  passages  from  the  Tractatus  (1922/98)  that   struck   me   instantly   was   the   famous   “What   we   cannot   speak   about   we   must   pass   over   in   silence”   (p.   74).   Saying   nothing   at   all   about   meditation   or   spirituality,   bringing   my   experiences   to   this   statement,   I   understood   it   to   be   not   only   about   language   or   linguistics   but   about   the   spiritual   life.   Particularly,   the   relation   between   those  things  of  which  we  cannot  speak  (i.e.,  do  not  have  the  words  to  describe)  and   the   consequent   silence   that   follows   that   experience   of   realizing   that   we   are   in   the   presence  of  something  which  is  a  brick  wall  for  our  normal  linguistic  understanding   of  our  world.  This  is  exactly  what  my  experience  had  been,  and  it  also  matched  up   with  the  spiritual  and  religious  writings  I  had  been  reading  and  tended  to  confirm   my  emerging  understanding.     As   I   read   more   from   Wittgenstein,   I   began   to   see   an   emphasis   on   two   points   that   lined  up  with  my  thoughts  and  experiences.  First,  an  interest  in  and  sympathy  with  a   kind   of   worldview   that   I   would   call   “mystical.”   This   idea   of   the   mystical   isn’t   understood  in  the  negative  or  pejorative  sense  of  mystifying  but  rather  a  realization   that   our   understanding   of   the   world   and   our   place   in   it,   if   one   was   intellectually   honest   with   oneself,   was   wholly   inadequate   and   primitive.   In   other   words,   when   confronted   with   the   vast   mysteries   of   our   existence   and   the   existence   of   anything   at   all,  the  best  we  could  do  was  babble  as  children.  And  this  was  expressed  in  his  other   saying  that  “It  is  not  how  things  are  in  the  world  that  is  mystical,  but  that  it  exists”   (p.   73).   And   this   I   connected   with   Heidegger’s   insight   that   the   first   and   foundational   question  of  metaphysics  is  why  is  there  something  rather  than  nothing?   Closely   related   to   this   insight   was   Wittgenstein’s   emphasis   on   the   limits   of   language   and  what  this  realization  imposes  on  us.  These  two  points,  to  me,  were  the  keys  to   understanding   how   Wittgenstein’s   philosophical   outlook   could   serve   as   a   kind   of   philosophical   confirmation   of   what   I   had   come   to   know   through   my   various   meditative  experiences.     After  Wittgenstein,  two  other  philosophers  were  of  interest  to  me:  Martin  Heidegger   and   Karl   Jaspers,   Heidegger   primarily   for   the   above-­‐mentioned   insight   into   the     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   940   origins  of  metaphysics,  but  also  for  his  continued  analysis  of  Being.  On  my  emerging   interpretation,   quite   a   bit   of   his   analysis   of   Being   could   be   understood   in   a   religious   and   spiritual   context.   In   fact,   it   began   to   appear   to   me   that   certainly   in   some   instances   the   word   “Being”   could   be   understood   as   a   stand-­‐in   for   some   of   the   traditional  aspects  of  the  mystical  experience  of  God.  And  thus,  in  a  lot  of  the  writing   that   I   read,   I   got   the   strong   sense   of   a   mystical   undercurrent   running   throughout   Heidegger’s  analysis  of  Being.     Then   there   is   Jaspers   and   his   notion   of   the   Encompassing.   This   again,   like   Heidegger’s  Being,  seemed  to  me  to  describe  one  aspect  of  a  certain  presence  of  God,   which   in   my   mind   was   linked   with   the   experiences   I   had   during   meditation.   However,  this  “God”  was  understood  not  in  a  popular  religious  sense  as  something   more  or  less  understandable  but  as  a  mystery  that  we  wrestle  with  and  struggle  to   understand.   Another   thinker   that   was   important   in   this   regard   was   Martin   Buber.   The   crucial   link  with  Buber  was  that  his  thought  provided  me  with  a  vital  link  back  to  personal   relationships   and   the   importance   of   these,   as   a   kind   of   being-­‐in-­‐the-­‐world   (like     Heidegger’s   Dasein)   and   not   simply   existing   in   a   detached   meditative   state.   It   is   as   if   he   answered   the   following   questions   that   I’d   had   trying   to   fully   understand   what   these  experiences  should  mean  to  me:  “OK,  now  that  you’ve  had  these  experiences  and   felt  a  oneness  with  the  universe  and  all  creation,  what  now?  How  do  you  integrate  this   experience   with   your   everyday,   everyman   existence   of   waking   up,   sleeping,   going   to   work,   having   friends,   loving   family,   eating,   celebrating,   mourning,   dealing   with   conflict,  love  and  sex,  etc.?”    While  he  certainly  didn’t  answer  all  of  my  questions,  he   at   least   pointed   the   way   back   to   a   kind   of   wholeness.   And   together   with   the   other   sources   I   had   read   and   absorbed,   I   was   ready   to   integrate   these   experiences   back   into  my  everyday  life  and  my  overall  worldview.     Shaping  of  Worldview:  Influence  on  Attitude   So  the  question  now  is,  what  was  the  most  immediate  or  proximate  effect  of  these   experiences  on  my  attitude  and  worldview?  Probably  the  first  and  most  important   effect   (and   the   one   most   closely   connected   with   those   original   experiences)   was   the   growing  sense  of  interconnectedness  I  felt  with  the  world.  Now  what  does  this  mean   exactly?  It’s  a  bit  hard  to  describe,  but  it  essentially  meant  that  I  felt  a  kinship  with   the  alive  world;  that  is,  not  with  buildings  and  roads  and  cars,  but  with  the  organic,   biological,  living,  teeming  world  of  life  –  whether  dogs  or  cats,  or  birds  or  squirrels,   trees,   flowers,   grasses,   bees,   flies,   what   have   you.   This   entire   world   of   life   was   somehow   transformed   from   an   objective   out-­‐there   world   that   I   had   little   to   do   with   to  a  deeply  felt  kinship  in  our  shared  mortality  and  the  sheer  joy  of  wonder  of  being   alive  and  conscious  in  this  mysterious  existence  we  found  ourselves  in.  And  this,  in   itself,  is  a  mystical  understanding  of  the  world.   Along  with  this  new  sense  of  interconnectedness  was  a  new-­‐found  sense  of  empathy   with  living  beings.  It  is  difficult  to  explain  this  feeling  of  empathy  fully,  only  to  say     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   941   that  it  is  connected  in  obvious  ways  with  the  sense  of  interconnectedness  with  all  of   life   explained   above.   And   even   here   it   is   not   so   much   explained   as   it   is   described.   Still,   I   can   try.   So,   I   found   myself   not   categorizing   living   beings   as   is   usual   for   people   to  do,  but  rather  sensing  for  the  first  time  our  similarities  and  not  our  differences.   Now,  this  might  be  open  to  the  charge  of  anthropomorphizing,  but  I  don’t  think  it’s   that.  Recognizing  that  one  has  something  in  common  with  other  living  beings  is  not   the  same  as  ascribing  uniquely  human  qualities  to  these  non-­‐human  beings.     So,   how   did   these   new   found   feelings   of   interconnectedness   and   empathy   reflect   back  onto  my  “human”  world?  As  I  mentioned  above  with  the  relation  to  Buber’s  Ich   und   Du,   the   feelings   of   empathy   and   interconnectedness   extended   out   beyond   the   biological  world  to  the  world  of  human  beings  and  human  relationships.  For  me,  this   most  directly  manifested  itself  in  my  understanding  of  the  wars  in  the  Balkans.  As  I   mentioned   earlier,   my   immediate   family   was   closely   involved   with   and   monitored   the   situation   in   the   former   Yugoslavia   but   mostly   with   an   assurance   (that   to   me   seemed  fairly  irrational)  that  whatever  was  happening  in  the  wars  the  Serbian  side   was   free   of   any   wrong-­‐doing   whatsoever   and   that   they   were   most   definitely   the   victims.  As  such,  the  reports  in  Western  media  sources  about  the  actions  of  all  sides,   but   mostly   the   Serbian   military   and   paramilitary   against   the   other   ethnic   groups,   including   reports   of   possible   war   crimes,   were   either   ignored   or   simply   brushed   aside  as  propaganda  about  the  Serbs.     For   my   part,   even   if   only   some   of   these   reports   were   true,   I   couldn’t   bring   myself   in   any   way   to   dismiss   them   or   condone   them   simply   by   virtue   of   an   ethnic   connection.   I   have   to   believe   that   my   experiences   in   meditation   and   my   change   of   attitude   led   me  to  question  these  judgments.  What  I  felt  most  deeply  was  that  it  was  simply  not   possible   to   condone   these   actions   in   any   way,   shape,   or   form   according   to   my   understanding   of   the   interconnectedness   of   all   beings.   And   so   I   struggled   greatly   with  reconciling  the  acquiescence  of  those  around  me  with  my  inherent  impulse  to   speak  out  against  what  “our  side”  was  doing.     In  other  areas,  I  began  to  see  how  quick  people  were  to  condemn  or  simply  excuse   the  suffering  of  others  as  their  own  fault  in  some  way  and  to  relieve  themselves  of   any   moral   responsibility   to   do   something   about   societal   conditions.   So   whether   it   was   poverty   or   homelessness   or   drug   or   alcohol   abuse   or   even   people   who   committed   crimes,   there   was   usually   a   snap   judgment   and   that   was   it.   But   something  in  me  felt  that  this  way  of  thinking  and  understanding  was  deeply  flawed   and  inaccurate  and  could  not  be  squared  with  the  changed  moral  sense  that  I  was   developing.     Now,  truth  be  told,  I  didn’t  alter  my  life  immediately  in  light  of  my  experiences  and   set  out  to  volunteer  and  help  in  some  small  way  to  cure  society  of  these  ills.  Part  of   the  reason,  I  suppose,  is  that  there  was  no  such  history  of  volunteerism  or  activism   in  my  family  history  that  would’ve  made  such  action  seem  logical  and  the  thing  to   do.  What  I  did  do,  however,  and  perhaps  what  was  the  most  open  or  live  option  for   me  at  the  time,  was  to  begin  to  bring  up  such  themes  in  social  settings  with  friends     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   942   and   family   and   argue   about   them,   which   nobody   had   ever   done   before.   In   short,   I   became   something   of   a   disturbance   in   a   cozy,   self-­‐sustaining   tale   of   correctness   and   perhaps  moral  superiority.  And  my  voice  was  one  of  “Wait  a  minute,  what  makes  us   so   sure   that   we   are   right?   What   makes   us   sure   that   we   are   doing   all   that   we   can   to   fully  accept  other  human  beings  as  our  moral  equals,  and  not  pre-­‐judging  them  based   on  our  incorrect  and  unjustifiable  prejudices?”     Lasting  Effects     There  are  two  other  questions  to  consider:  the  long-­‐term  impacts  of  the  experiences   on  my  attitude  and  worldview  and  how  I  understand  the  experiences  today,  i.e.,  as   phenomena  of  nature,  spiritual  phenomena,  or  largely  a  mystery.     In   terms   of   long-­‐term   impacts,   I   can   identify   several   lasting   effects   of   these   early   experiences.   The   one   thing   I   can   say   is   that   I   have   a   strong   tendency   to   see   both   sides  of  a  dispute,  and  hence  it  is  difficult  for  me  (or  rather  largely  unnatural)  to  be   dogmatic   about   the   correctness   or   rightness   of   one   side   or   one   argument   over   another.   So   the   end   result   is   that   I   find   myself   not   being   dogmatic   about   much   of   anything,  or  at  least  not  reflexively  and  intensely  so.     The   really   interesting   question   here   is   if   there   is   in   fact   any   strong   connection   between   this   attitude   and   the   meditative   experiences   of   long   ago.   One   could   explain   this   attitude   a   number   of   ways.   For   starters,   my   philosophical   training   may   be   largely   responsible   for   this   attitude   and   frame   of   mind   due   to   the   critical   thinking   skills   acquired   over   the   course   of   study   and   beyond.   Another   may   be   that   this   attitude   developed   over   time   organically   based   on   lessons   learned   in   a   large   and   often  argumentative  extended  family.     So  why  do  I  mention  it  here  if  a  number  of  equally  plausible  alternative  explanations   exist?   The   best   case   I   can   make   is   that   those   experiences   and   the   flashes   of   insight   I   gained  from  them  into  a  largely  interconnected  world  seemed  to  me  to  be  the  best   argument   against   the   narrow   parochialisms   and   the   small-­‐mindedness   that   all   too   often  makes  up  so  much  of  our  daily  lives.  So  for  instance,  it  just  didn’t  seem  to  make   much   sense   to   me   to   argue   vehemently   over   some   largely   abstract   issue   or   problem   when  in  the  end  what  really  mattered  was  how  we  treated  one  another.     Another   belief   and   character   trait   that   was   evolving   out   of   all   of   this   was   the   importance  of  human  community  and  sharing,  as  opposed  to  what  some  would  say   were   the   virtues   of   a   grandiose   and   mythical   “rugged   individualism”   or   even   “selfishness.”    Here  again,  the  realization  wasn’t  sudden  and  didn’t  express  itself  in   the   urge   to   disconnect   with   my   present   surroundings   and   go   off   and   live   in   some   kind   of   utopian   human   community.   The   best   way   to   describe   it   is   as   a   gradual   awareness  or  better  still  as  a  kind  of  rearrangement  of  perception.   In  religious  matters,  I  began  to  adopt  a  more  inclusive  rather  than  an  exclusive  view   of   religious   beliefs   and   systems.   That   is,   tied   in   with   the   anti-­‐dogmaticism     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   943   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 932-943 Budimir,  M.,  The  Shock  of  the  Old:  A  Narrative  of  Transpersonal  Experience   mentioned  above,  holding  to  an  exclusivist  position  with  regards  to  one’s  religious   beliefs,  given  my  interpretation  of  the  meditative  experiences  I  had  had,  seemed  to   me  absolutely  untenable.     As  for  the  question  of  how  I  regard  the  experiences  today,  i.e.,  as  a  phenomenon  of   nature,  culture,  the  spiritual  realm,  or  simply  a  mystery,  I’m  inclined  to  regard  it  as   being   a   combination   of   all   of   the   above.   The   side   of   me   that   was   educated   as   an   engineer,   with   studies   in   mathematics,   chemistry,   physics,   and   engineering   principles,  can  clearly  see  and  understand  an  explanation  in  terms  of  physiological   factors  such  as  brain  wave  activity,  endorphin  release,  etc.  However,  as  I’ve  already   pointed  out,  given  my  background  and  upbringing  and  the  predisposition,  one  might   say,   to   understand   such   events   in   a   religious/spiritual   context,   it   was   no   surprise   that  my  first  interpretations  largely  came  from  this  point  of  view.     Now  this  isn’t  to  say  that  those  first  interpretations  were  exhaustive.  Even  after  I’d   located  similar  experiences  in  the  descriptions  of  philosophers  and  theologians  and   ascetics   of   the   past,   the   experiences   themselves   remained   largely   a   mystery   to   me.   I   still   wanted   to   know   just   how   they   happened   and   why.   Also,   the   emotions   the   experiences  stirred  up  led  me  to  believe  that  these  couldn’t  simply  be  the  result  of   some   chemical   activity   in   the   brain,   but   that   there   was   some   deeper,   spiritual   significance   behind   them.   The   effect   may   very   well   have   been   one   of   reinforcement;   that   is,   the   experiences   themselves   first   served   as   a   stimulus   to   try   to   understand   them   in   and   of   themselves   and   place   them   in   some   kind   of   context,   and   then   secondarily  helped  reinforce  the  explanations  that  I  eventually  came  to  accept.   Once   again,   from   today’s   point   of   view,   I   can   easily   understand   how   it   is   some   combination   of   all   of   the   above   explanations.   However,   for   me,   I   don’t   feel   that   it   changes   those   powerful   first   impressions   of   long   ago,   and   the   way   those   impressions  influenced  and  shaped  my  subsequent  attitudes  and  worldview.       Works  Cited     Coniaris,   A.   (1982).     Introducing   the   Orthodox   Church.   Minneapolis:   Light   &   Life   Publishing.   Lossky,  V.  (1989).  Orthodox  Theology.  Crestwood,  NY:  St.  Vladimir’s  Seminary  Press.   Goldsmith,  J.  S.  (1990).  The  Art  of  Meditation.  San  Francisco:  Harper  &  Row.     Wittgenstein,   L.   (1993).   Tractatus   Logico-­‐Philosophicus.   (D.F.   Pears   &   B.F.   McGuinness,   Trans.).   Atlantic   Highlands,   NJ:   Humanities   Press   International.   (Original  work  published  1922).       ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com

arXiv:physics/0608309v1 [physics.gen-ph] 31 Aug 2006 Reality in quantum mechanics, Extended Everett Concept, and consciousness Michael B. Mensky P.N.Lebedev Physical Institute, 53 Leninsky prosp., 119991 Moscow, Russia Abstract Conceptual problems in quantum mechanics result from the specific quantum concept of reality and require, for their solution, including the observer’s consciousness into quantum theory of measurements. Most naturally this is achieved in the framework of Everett’s “many-worlds interpretation” of quantum mechanics. According to this interpretation, various classical alternatives are perceived by consciousness separately from each other. In the Extended Everett Concept (EEC) proposed by the present author, the separation of the alternatives is identified with the phenomenon of consciousness. This explains classical character of the alternatives and unusual manifestations of consciousness arising “at the edge of consciousness” (i.e. in sleep or trance) when its access to “other alternative classical realities” (other Everett’s worlds) becomes feasible. Because of reversibility of quantum evolution in EEC, all time moments in the quantum world are equivalent while the impression of flow of time appears only in consciousness. If it is assumed that consciousness may influence onto probabilities of alternatives (which is consistent in case of infinitely many Everett’s worlds), EEC explains free will, “probabilistic miracles” (observing low-probability events) and decreasing entropy in the sphere of life. 1 1 Introduction Paradoxes of quantum mechanics and the resulting so-called “problem of measurement” are known from the early years of quantum mechanics, but are not finally resolved up to now. An essential step in the attempts to solve these problems was made by Everett in its famous “many-worlds” interpretation of quantum mechanics [1, 2]. In our days the Everett’s approach became much more popular. One of the reasons is that it may in a sense be connected with the problem of consciousness (see, e.g., [3, 4, 5, 6, 7]). Here we shall discuss the approach called Extended Everett Concept (EEC) suggested by the author [8, 9, 10, 11]. This approach allows one to introduce the connection between quantum mechanics and consciousness in a very natural way. The resulting advantage is that some features of consciousness as well as some known but not yet explained phenomena of life directly follow from EEC. Moreover, it directly follows from EEC that these phenomena appear in a special state of consciousness which may be described as being “at the edge of consciousness” that may be identified as sleep or trance. In Sect. 2 we shall very briefly show how conceptual problems of quantum mechanics follow from the contradiction between its linearity and the postulate of reduction in the description of quantum measurements. In Sect. 3 the interpretation of quantum mechanics suggested by Everett for overcoming this contradiction will be presented as well as its extension (EEC) leading to the quantum definition of consciousness. Finally in Sect. 4 important consequences of EEC (such as the explanation of the phenomenon of life, free will and permanent support of health in an organism) will be reviewed. In Sect. 5 a short conclusion will be given. 2 Quantum measurements: theory and paradoxes There is no need to discuss the conceptual problems (paradoxes) of quantum mechanics in detail because they are well known. Let us only mention that all of them follow from special features of the concept of reality in quantum mechanics. These features were first explicitly formulated in the paper by A. Einstein, B. Podolsky and N. Rosen [12], reformulated later in a more convenient form by John Bell [13, 14], and experimentally confirmed in the experiments of A.Aspect [15, 16]. 2 The essential difference of the quantum-mechanical concept of reality from usual classical reality is that in quantum mechanics the properties of material systems, as they are observed in a measurement, may not exist before the observation (measurement). If for example the measurement shows that a particle is located in one of two points A1 , A2 , this particle may be located neither in A1 , nor in A2 before the measurement. This is the case if the state of the particle before the measurement, ψ = c1 ψ1 + c2 ψ2 , is a superposition of the states ψ1 , ψ2 localized correspondingly in A1 and A2 . According to von Neumann reduction postulate, after the measurement distinguishing between these two alternatives, the system having been previously in the state ψ goes over into one of the states ψ1 and ψ2 , with the corresponding probabilities |c1 |2 and |c2 |2 . This postulate corresponds to what is observed in real measurements, so the reduction postulate is accepted as the basis for the quantum-mechanical calculations. However, it contradicts to the linearity of quantum mechanics when the process of measurement is considered as an interaction of two systems (the measured system and the measuring device). Let the initial state of the device be Φ0 and the initial state of both systems, ψi Φ0 , goes over, after the interaction described by the unitary evolution operator U, into Uψi Φ0 = ψi Φi . Then it follows from the linearity of the operator U that the initial state ψΦ0 changes, in the course of the interaction, as follows: ψΦ0 → UψΦ0 = U(c1 ψ1 +c2 ψ2 )Φ0 = U(c1 ψ1 Φ0 +c2 ψ2 Φ0 ) = c1 ψ1 Φ1 +c2 ψ2 Φ2 . If one include in the description not only the measuring device, but also the observer as one more physical system initially in the state χ0 , and apply usual quantum-mechanical consideration to the three systems, then their evolution under the interaction will be given as follows: ψΦ0 χ0 = (c1 ψ1 + c2 ψ2 )Φ0 χ0 → c1 ψ1 Φ1 χ1 + c2 ψ2 Φ2 χ2 . (1) Thus, the linearity of the quantum-mechanical evolution requires that both alternatives 1 and 2 forming the initial superposition ψ exist also (in the superposition with the same coefficients) after the interaction with the measuring device. However, the description of the observation seems to require the reduction, i.e. surviving only a single alternative. The same is of course valid in case when many alternatives are distinguished by the measurement, instead of two of them. The contradiction arises between the linearity 3 of quantum mechanics and the picture of reduction presenting the observation. This contradiction is actually the reason of the quantum-mechanical paradoxes, or conceptual problems. We see also that the problem is not overcome by the observer as a physical body being included in the description of the measurement. The key role is therefore played not by the physical body of an observer but by her consciousness. 3 Everett (“many-worlds”) interpretation and its extension Everett’s interpretation is sometimes estimated to be logically complicated. However, it seems complicated only from the point of view of macroscopic, and therefore classical, picture of what happens in the measurement. From the point of view of quantum mechanics the Everett’s interpretation is quite simple. Indeed, it excludes the reduction postulate and recovers linear character of quantum mechanics in full volume. Thus the paradoxical character of quantum mechanics is overcome not by inclusion new elements in the theory (and therefore making it more complicated) but by exclusion most unnatural elements of this theory. The Everett’s interpretation is not so simple in its treating the picture arising before the eyes (in the consciousness) of the observer. We shall see however that this may be essentially simplified in the framework of the Extended Everett Concept (EEC). 3.1 Everett interpretation: taking quantum mechanics seriously The logic of Everett’s interpretation is very simple. We know that the evolution is linear in quantum mechanics. A measurement is nothing else than an interaction between the measured system and its environment (including the measuring device and the observer). Let us take these facts seriously and accept that the measurement is actually linear process. Then the state after the measurement has the form of a superposition, as in Eq. (1) or in 4 the corresponding formula with summation over many alternatives: X X ψΦ0 χ0 = ci ψi Φ0 χ0 → ci ψi Φi χi . i (2) i Assuming the linearity, Everett must then somehow interpret all terms of the superposition in the right-hand-side of this equation, i.e. all alternative readouts of the measurement. All alternatives are in his concept equally real and should be considered on equal foot. How it may then occur that the observer perceives only one of these alternatives? The answer may also be read off from Eq. (2). This formula means that the state of the observer is described also by the various components included in the superposition. The component χi describes the state of the observer in which she sees that the measuring device is in the state Φi thus pointing out that the system is in the state ψi . This is the picture of a single ‘Everett’s world’. The triplets ψi Φi χi , with all possible i, coexist, forming the “Everett worlds”, or, more precisely, alternative ‘classical projections’ of a single quantum world. All such “worlds”, or alternative classical realities, coexist and are equally real (should be considered on equal foot). 3.2 Extended Everett concept: quantum consciousness and life It is convenient for us to express the situation in the Everett’s interpretation as follows. All classical alternatives are perceived by consciousness (of the observer), however the alternatives are separated by the consciousness: each alternative is perceived independently from the others. Note that all the observers in a single Everett’s world (in the same classical reality) see the same, their observations are in complete agreement with each other. from the fact that the initial state with two obP This follows (1) (2) servers, i ci ψi Φ0 χ0 χ0 will go over, after the measurement, into the state P (1) (2) (1) (2) (the crossing terms with χi χj , i 6= j, cannot emerge). i ci ψi Φi χi χi We may now concentrate on the whole component of the superposition, Ψi = ψi Φi χi rather than on its factors ψi , Φi and χi . The right-hand-side of Eq. (2) takes then the form X Ψ= ci Ψ i . (3) i 5 This equation presents a state of the whole quantum world as a superposition of classical (more precisely, close to classical, or quasiclassical) states of this world. In the previously introduced terms, the whole world contains both the measured system and its environment, including the observer. Now, to move further, we do not need the picture of measurement in these details. Instead, we may talk about the state of the (quantum) world as it is reflected in consciousness, hence the superposition of (quasi)classical states of the world. Now we have to do a decisive step, leading to the radical simplification of the whole concept and to very interesting consequences. Taking into account that nobody knows actually what is consciousness, we assume that consciousness is nothing else than the separation of the alternatives. This identification of consciousness with the separation of the alternatives is a crucial point of the Extended Everett Concept developed in [8, 9, 10, 11]. In this assumption, two unclear concepts, one from quantum mechanics and the other from psychology, are identified and thus “explain each other”. The whole concept becomes simpler. More important is that this leads to new and very interesting consequences. First of all, this explains why the alternatives in Eq. (3) should be classical. Instead of the vectors Ψi (classical alternatives) we could make use of the other vectors (linear combinations of Ψi ) to present the state of the quantum world Ψ as a superposition. Why have we to take those vectors which are close to classical states? Why the alternatives in the description of consciousness are (close to) classical? The answer is almost evident. Consciousness is a feature (and the principal feature) of living beings. (Note that here the term “consciousness” means the most primitive, or the most deep, level of consciousness, differing perceiving from not perceiving). If the picture of the world as it is appears in consciousness were far from classical, then, due to quantum non-locality, this would be a picture of a world with “locally unpredictable” behavior. The future of a restricted region in such a world could depend on events even in very distant regions. No strategy of surviving could be elaborated in such a world for a localized living being. Life (of the form we know) would be impossible. On the contrary, a (close to) classical state of the world is “locally predictable”. The evolution of a restricted region of such a world essentially depends only on the events in this region or not too far from it. Influence of distant regions is negligible. Strategy of surviving can be elaborated in such a world for a localized living being. Therefore, classicality of the alternatives Ψi is a necessary condition for life. The very concept of life naturally arises in this way from EEC. 6 4 At the edge of consciousness It is astonishing that EEC leads to very concrete conclusions about some special features and unusual abilities of consciousness and, even more astonishing, to the concrete characterization of the conditions providing these special abilities. Consciousness is predicted to manifest its unusual abilities when it is almost turned off, i.e. is in the state similar to sleeping or trance. The reason is that in this case consciousness, when working with the given classical alternative, may obtain information from the quantum world as a whole, i.e. from “other classical alternatives”. This conclusion follows from the definition of consciousness accepted in EEC. If, in addition to this definition, the assumption is accepted that consciousness may influence on probabilities of classical alternatives, then EEC leads also to some well known but not yet explained features of living organisms (such as free will). 4.1 Information from ‘other classical realities’: Comparison of alternative realities and predictions Let the state of the quantum world be presented by Eq. (3) where each component Ψi of the superposition on the right-hand-side is a state presenting a ‘classical alternative’ of the world. Consciousness perceives these alternatives separately from each other. Moreover, according to the definition accepted in EEC, consciousness is identified with separation of the alternatives. Complete disappearance of consciousness (for example in case of death) means complete disappearance of the separation (just as no separation exist in the description of non-alive matter, with no phenomenon of life). If consciousness does not disappear but becomes weak (in the state of sleep or trance) then, arguing in the same logic, we have to conclude that the separation of alternatives becomes not absolute. The ‘partitions’ between the alternatives become transparent. When perceiving one of the alternative classical realities, the consciousness may then perceive also ‘other alternative classical realities’ (see Fig. 1). At the moment of returning to the full consciousness (absolute separation) some part of the information from ‘other realities’ may be kept and exploited in the usual work of consciousness with ‘its own’ alternative. The same may be formulated in another form: in case of partial turning consciousness off (in the state of sleep or trance) it can extract information from all classical alternatives, or, in other words, from the whole quantum world. At the edge of consciousness one obtains access to the whole quan7 tum world. This should supply additional (as compared with the regular functioning of consciousness) and quite unusual abilities. What are the features of these additional abilities of consciousness? We can immediately point out two of them. First, information ‘from other classical alternatives’, i.e. from various scenarios possible for a classical world, allows one to compare these scenarios and conclude what scenario is the best (favorable for life). Later (Sect. 4.2) we shall see how this information may be used. Second, in the Everett concept the quantum world as a whole (i.e. without separation of the alternatives) is reversible. Its image is a four-dimensional manifold rather than a three-dimensional space developing in time. When consciousness looks out from a single alternative into this reversible world, it can take information from any part of this world. Returning from the quantum world as a whole to ‘its own classical reality’, the consciousness may possess information extracted not only from ‘other (alternative) scenarios’, but also from any stage of these scenarios, including information from the future of each scenario. This argument hints that predictions made in sleep or trance may be possible. We see also that predictions should have relative rather than absolute character. Indeed, they depend on the concrete scenario: the predictions become true only if the given scenario will be realized in the course of the further evolution of ‘my own classical reality’. There are many evidences of successful predictions made by some people in sleep or in trance. Many of these evidences seem to be well documented. The consideration in the framework of EEC may explain both the feasibility of successful predictions and relative character of each prediction, i.e. its not full reliability. One may think that a prediction made in explicitly relative form (something will happen under the condition that something else will do) should be more reliable (if the predictions made by the same person are compared). 4.2 Modification of probabilities: Free will and probabilistic miracles Up to now our consideration was based only on the Everett’s interpretation of quantum mechanics and the identification of consciousness with the separation of alternatives. Let us now accept an additional assumption that consciousness may modify probabilities of classical alternatives. From the 8 point of view of an observer this means that, perceiving a definite (alternative) classical reality she may have influence on what alternative she will perceive in the next moment (next observation). Probabilities of some of the ‘next moment’ alternatives (which seem to be favorable) may be increased, while the probabilities of others decreased. Why this assumption seems to be natural in the context of EEC? It looks natural because in the framework of this concept separation of the alternatives is considered from two qualitatively different points of view. First, from the point of view of quantum mechanics (describing only non-alive matter, including although bodies of living beings when they are considered simply as physical systems), and second, from the point of view of psychology. There is only one universal probability distribution in quantum mechanics (|ci |2 in the previous example), but the probabilities may in principle be different from the point of view of the consciousness of a living being: various observers may elaborate different probability distributions for what alternatives they are going to see. There are two evident objections against this assumption. First one is purely mathematical. The probability of the ith alternative is naturally defined as the ‘relative number’ Ni /N of the Everett’s worlds of the definite type, such that just the ith alternative is realized in all of them. At first glance, this definition is unambiguous and should imply a universal probability distribution. However, this is not the case if the ‘number of Everett’s worlds’ is infinite [10, 11]. If both Ni and N are infinite, this ‘definition’ becomes ambiguous because of a paradoxical feature of an infinite set: its proper subset may be put in one-to-one correspondence with the whole set. Because of this, different probability distributions on an infinite set are compatible. This becomes obvious if one make use of a naive picture where each of the observers sends her ‘twin-observers’, one after another, into various Everett’s worlds. Let for simplicity we have two observers and two types of Everett’s worlds, E1 and E2 (with the infinite numbers of worlds of each type). One of the two observers may send his ‘twins’ according to the rule: each twin having odd number goes to a world of type E1 and each even twin, to a world of type E2 . The other observer may use another rule: each twin with the number divisible by 3 goes to an Everett’s world of type E1 while the rest are sent to the worlds of type E2 . Then the probability for the first observer to find herself in the world of type E1 is equal to 1/2, while for the second observer it is equal to 1/3. Nevertheless, in case of infinite number 9 of worlds and of twins, all twins will be distributed between the worlds, and each Everett’s world will obtain a single twin of the first observer and a single twin of the second one. There is another objection against the discussed assumption. If probabilities are not universal, then laws of nature may be violated, but they seem to always endure experimental check-up. The answer to this objection is that the experimental check-up is feasible only for very simple events (such as where an electron should fly etc.). For the events of this type consciousness hardly may modify probabilities because these events are not important from the point of view of living beings. Since laws of physics govern only such simple events (and rather simple combinations of them), the laws of physics should be valid. If the ability of consciousness to modify probabilities may exist, then it should concern only ‘significant’ (for life) events. Such events have much more complicated structure and cannot be reduced to simple events investigated by physicists. Therefore, probabilities of these highly complicated (from the point of view of a physicist) ‘significant events’ cannot be calculated with the help of quantum-mechanical formulas. The question about violation of laws of physics in the scope of such events (in the sphere of life) is therefore meaningless. Taking these arguments into account, we may assume that consciousness may modify probabilities of classical alternatives. How this ability of consciousness may manifest itself? First of all it is evident that ‘probabilistic miracles’ become possible under this assumption. This means that consciousness may increase the probability of an event which otherwise seems almost improbable. The probability may even be made close to unity. In the latter case modifying probabilities looks as a choice of a definite alternative. However, this is not a choice but only modification of probabilities, since all non-zero probabilities remain non-zero (although may become very close to zero). The event that is chosen by consciousness (and therefore looks to be a miracle) always has non-zero probability even without modification of probabilities. It is therefore feasible event even in ‘natural’ conditions, without any influence of consciousness. The realization of an event which is characterized by a low probability, does not strictly speaking violate any laws. Instead, it may seem a rare coincidence. For example, if someone says that she wishes to stop rain, and the rain stops, then this may be a probabilistic miracle, but instead it may be interpreted as a coincidence. There is one more class of well known and not exotic events which also can be explained with modifying probabilities by consciousness. These are events 10 realizing what is called free will. If I wish to go to the right and actually go to the right, how this happens? In fact, there is no explanation of this simple ability of consciousness. In the framework of EEC, if the modification of probabilities is assumed, free will is explained quite naturally. There are two alternatives: in one Everett’s world I go to the right, in the other one I go to the left. Both alternatives have non-zero probabilities. My consciousness modifies the probabilities increasing the probability of the first alternative. As a result, with a high probability I go to the right. I chose to go to the right. This was my free will. It worth noting that in most cases free will is realized ‘unconsciously’, i.e. in the state ‘on the edge of consciousness’ (in this case only a part of the consciousness is ‘almost turned off’, namely the part controlling the body’s movements). This is in accord with our prediction that the special abilities of consciousness should manifest themselves just in this state. We shall return to this important point in Sect. 4.3. 4.3 Unconscious: the miracle of life According to EEC, at the edge of consciousness it has access to information from the whole quantum world, i.e. from various classical realities (classical scenarios). Moreover, if consciousness may modify probabilities of alternatives, it may choose (make more probable) those alternatives (classical realities) that are favorable for life. Thus, the unusual information obtained from the quantum world can be used for improving quality of life. This may shed light on many phenomena in the sphere of life that are well-known and seem quite usual, but in reality have no explanation up to now. These phenomena may in fact be called miracles of life. Two important examples are, first, the health and its support and second, the role of sleep. It is commonly believed that health is supported due to the great efficiency of the organism as a self-regulating machine. However, it is difficult to imagine that an organism is efficient enough to support health during the whole life, despite of enormous number of unpredictable damages happening in this life. It seems almost evident that periodic usage of some data base is necessary for correcting these damages. But what is this data base and what is the mechanism of its usage, remains unknown. In the phenomenon of sleep, among many astonishing facts, the most strange seems the fact that regular sleeping is absolutely necessary not only for health, but even for very life. A man certainly dies if he is deprived 11 of sleep during few weeks. Why? The common opinion that sleep supplies rest for all systems of organism is evidently insufficient to explain absolute necessity of regular sleeping. Our consideration in the framework of EEC suggests an explanation of both these strange features of life: permanent support of health and necessity of sleep. During sleep (or rather during a definite phase of sleep, called paradoxical sleep) a man is at the edge of consciousness and therefore obtains information from alternative classical scenarios. She can compare various scenarios, particularly various scenarios for the body, and find out what scenarios are favorable. Returning, after the sleep, to the usual state, consciousness increases probabilities of just these scenarios. This is a mechanism of permanent support of health. It is known that paradoxical sleep of old people becomes shorter. Perhaps this is the main reason why their health is not supported well enough. In this explanation, the hypothetical data base containing recommendations for health is nothing else than the set of all possible scenarios for functioning the body. This data base is always actual because consciousness may compare those scenarios that start from the present state of the body. This returns us to the arguments of Sect. 3.2. Once more, now on a more concrete level, we may conclude that the mystery and miracle of life is connected with quantum definition of consciousness, as it is given in EEC. There is one more unsolved problem in biology that also could obtain its explanation in EEC. This is the problem of morphogenesis. How an embryo is constructed starting from a single cell? Where is a plan of the process of constructing it, step by step, or how constructing is controlled and directed? It is possible that the answer is analogous to the argument above: ‘consciousness’ (the primitive-level consciousness, or ability to somehow perceive, which is connected with a living being from the very beginning) periodically addresses to the quantum world as a whole, compare various scenarios of constructing embryo (various ‘building plans’) and then, returning to the usual state, increase probabilities of those scenarios that lead to the right construction. Of course, this is only a sketch of a possible explanation of the phenomenon, its main idea. 12 4.4 Flow of time and decreasing entropy in the sphere of life One of the problems permanently discussed in literature is how irreversibility arises if all equations presenting dynamics of physical systems are reversible in time (see for example [17]). In the framework of EEC this problem obtains natural solution: quantum world is reversible (and thus reversible is microscopical theory of non-alive matter, its dynamics), while pictures of (alternative) classical realities appearing in consciousness are irreversible. Indeed, in quantum mechanics irreversibility might appear in the course of reduction, but reduction is excluded from the Everett’s interpretation of quantum mechanics (see Sect. 3). In the framework of EEC we have, instead of reduction, separation of alternatives which is identified with consciousness. Thus, irreversibility appears only in consciousness. The quantum world as a whole, without separation of classical alternatives, is (in EEC) reversible. Its adequate image is given by 4-dimensional manifold with all times considered on equal foot. However, in the picture seen by an observer as an (alternative) classical reality, the ‘present’ time moment is distinguished, radically differs from the past and the future. It is the moment when consciousness chooses (with the help of modification of probabilities) the concrete alternative it will see in the next moment. While the quantum world looks as something given in its wholeness, an (alternative) classical reality is permanently becoming. Time moments in an (alternative) classical reality are divided on the past (when this concrete alternative reality is fixed), the future (when many alternative continuations exist1 for this concrete alternative reality), and the present (when the choice of future is performed). One more important unsolved problem is decreasing of entropy in the sphere of life where the processes of self-organization are not only possible but necessary. This contradicts to the general principle accepted in physics and confirmed many times: entropy may only be constant or increase. In the framework of EEC this contradiction disappears because the spheres where 1 Possibility of various continuations of a given ‘classical reality’ seemingly contradicts to the previous statement about ‘classical world’ being locally predictable. However, various continuations are in fact possible (although they cannot differ too much from each other) because the ‘classical reality’ is not precisely classical, but rather close to classical. This possibility may be characterized in an adequate way in terms of continuous quantum measurements (see [10]). 13 entropy correspondingly increases or decreases, are separated. The quantum world as a whole is reversible, and its entropy is constant. The entropy of a restricted region of the quantum world may increase. However, in the sphere of life (which includes consciousness working with alternative classical realities) entropy may decrease. Moreover, it is necessary decreasing for the set of classical scenarios realizing life. This is because consciousness regularly compare alternative classical scenarios and choose (by modification of probabilities) those of them which are favorable for life. The deep reason of decreasing entropy is that the concept of the goal arises in the sphere of life. Another important point is that entropy in the sphere of life characterizes not all possible classical scenarios but only those favorable for life (selected according to the goal of improving quality of life). 5 Conclusion We have seen that Extended Everett Concept (EEC) may give a quantum definition of consciousness: consciousness is separation of the alternatives. This puts forward a novel view of a difficult question, what is life. Possessing the ability to compare various classical scenarios and choose the most favorable of them, quantum consciousness turns out to be the very essence of life and explains such important phenomena in the sphere of life as free will and efficient support of health. Besides, EEC explains why decreasing entropy in the sphere of life is compatible with the general law of increasing entropy. It becomes clear that entropy in the sphere of life is decreasing because life is presented by a subset of specially selected scenarios. Consciousness, as it is defined in EEC, is a general part of two qualitatively different spheres of cognition. Being defined as a separation of alternatives, consciousness is a part of quantum physics, therefore, of natural sciences. Being a special phenomenon characteristic of living beings, consciousness belongs to psychology, therefore, to the humanitarians or, more generally, to the sphere of knowledge about spirit. Thus, quantum consciousness, in the sense of EEC, is a common part of, and provides a bridge between, these two spheres. This seems very interesting because the two spheres are often considered as having nothing in common (although the conceptual relations between them do of course exist and are actively discussed). It seems to us that EEC is one of few approaches that establish deep internal connection between natural sciences and humanitarians, penetrating deeper in the 14 nature of life and human consciousness. EEC lowers the draw-bridge (see Fig. 2) over the deep precipice dividing two spheres of cognition, the world of matter and the world of spirit. References [1] H. Everett III. ‘Relative state’ formulation of quantum mechanics. Rev. Mod. Phys., 29:454–462, 1957. Reprinted in J. A. Wheeler and W. H. Zurek, editors, Quantum Theory and Measurement, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1983. [2] B. S. DeWitt and N. Graham, editors. The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics. Princeton University Press, 1973. [3] Euan Squires. The Mystery of the Quantum World. IOP Publishing, Bristol and Philadelphia, 1994. Second edition. [4] Michael Lockwood. ‘Many minds’ interpretations of quantum mechanics. Brit. J. Phil. Sci., 47:159–188, 1996. [5] Andrew Whitaker. Many minds and single mind interpretations of quantum theory. In Ph. Blanchard et al., editors, Decoherence: Theoretical, Experimental, and Conceptual Problems, pages 299–307, Berlin etc., 2000. Springer. [6] H. D.Zeh. The problem of conscious observation in quantum mechanical description, Found. Phys. Lett., 13, 221, 2000. [7] Henry P. Stapp. Von Neumann’s formulation of quantum theory and the role of mind in nature. Found. of Phys., 31:1465–1499, 2001. [8] Michael B. Mensky, Quantum mechanics: New experiments, new applications and new formulations of old questions, Physics-Uspekhi,43, 585-600, 2000. [9] M. B. Mensky, Quantum mechanics, consciousness, and a bridge between the two cultures, “Voprosy Filosofii” (”Issues in Philosophy”) No.6, p.64-74, 2004 [in Russian]. 15 [10] Michael B. Mensky, Concept of consciousness in the context of quantum mechanics, Physics-Uspekhi 48, 389-409 (2005). [11] M. B. Mensky, Human and quantum world (Weirdness of the quantum world and the miracle of consciousness), Fryazino, Editorial “Vek 2”, 2005 [in Russian]. [12] A. Einstein, B. Podolsky, and N. Rosen. Can quantum-mechanical description of physical reality be considered complete? Phys. Rev., 47:777– 780, 1935. [13] J. S. Bell. On the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox. Physics, 1:195–200, 1964. Reprinted in [14]. [14] J. S. Bell. Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1987. [15] Alain Aspect, Philippe Grangier, and Gérard Roger. Experimental tests of realistic local theories via Bell’s theorem. Phys. Rev. Lett., 47:460– 463, 1981. [16] Alain Aspect, Jean Dalibard, and Gérard Roger. Experimental test of Bell’s inequalities using time-varying analyzers. Phys. Rev. Lett., 49:1804–1807, 1982. [17] H. D. Zeh, The Physical Basis of The Direction of Time, Fourth edition, Springer, 2001. 16 Figure 1: No separation, or non-alive matter (top diagram); separation, or consciousness (middle); weak separation, or ‘at the edge of consciousness’ (bottom) Figure 2: Lowering the draw-bridge: Identifying ‘Separation’ and ‘Consciousness’ gives ‘Quantum Consciousness’. This supplies a bridge between natural sciences and humanitarians, between the spheres of matter and spirit 17

Refuting Strong AI: Why Consciousness Cannot Be Algorithmic Andrew Knight aknight@alum.mit.edu Abstract While physicalism requires only that a conscious state depends entirely on an underlying physical state, it is often assumed that consciousness is algorithmic and that conscious states can be copied, such as by copying or digitizing the human brain. In an effort to further elucidate the physical nature of consciousness, I challenge these assumptions and attempt to prove the Single Stream of Consciousness Theorem (“SSCT”): that a conscious entity cannot experience more than one stream of consciousness from a given conscious state. Assuming only that consciousness is a purely physical phenomenon, it is shown that both Special Relativity and Multiverse theory independently imply SSCT and that the Many Worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics is inadequate to counter it. Then, SSCT is shown to be incompatible with Strong Artificial Intelligence, implying that consciousness cannot be created or simulated by a computer. Finally, SSCT is shown to imply that a conscious state cannot be physically reset to an earlier conscious state nor can it be duplicated by any physical means. The profound but counterintuitive implications of these conclusions are briefly discussed. Keywords: Physicalism; copiability of conscious states; strong artificial intelligence; physics of consciousness; computer consciousness 1 1. Introduction Will computers ever be conscious? Will it ever be possible to cheat death by uploading one’s consciousness to a computer? Will it ever be possible to teleport oneself by copying one’s brain on a distant planet? Is consciousness algorithmic? Can a conscious state be duplicated? In this paper, I aim to propose and prove a theorem about consciousness and then to discuss some of its several surprising implications. Single Stream of Consciousness Theorem (“SSCT”): A conscious entity cannot experience more than one stream of consciousness from a given conscious state. To prove SSCT, I need not define “conscious” or “stream of consciousness” nor prove that a conscious entity (i.e., a person) experiences a stream of consciousness at all. Rather, I simply need to show that if a conscious entity experiences a conscious state, and if it experiences a stream of consciousness, then it cannot experience more than one stream of consciousness from that state. If SSCT is correct, then if I am conscious now, I can expect not to experience more than one stream of consciousness moving forward. While there are lots of different paths that my present conscious state could take, I can only have one actual future, if I have a future at all. Though SSCT seems intuitively correct1, I will attempt to prove it in Sections 2 and 3. In Sections 4 and 5 I will discuss two particularly interesting implications of SSCT, including that consciousness cannot be simulated on a computer nor can it be physically reset or duplicated. In this paper I will assume that consciousness is a purely physical phenomenon (”Physical Consciousness”). Specifically, a person’s experience of consciousness depends entirely on an appropriate physical configuration of matter, and the person’s experience of a stream of consciousness depends entirely on a physical evolution of an appropriate physical configuration of matter. In other words, whether consciousness supervenes on physical state, or arises or emerges or is caused by physical state, I assume that different conscious experiences could not arise from the same physical configuration of matter. A related assumption, and the rough equivalent to the notion of Strong Artificial Intelligence (see, e.g., Searle 1980), is that consciousness is algorithmic and depends entirely on a process flow or computation (“Algorithmic Consciousness”). Specifically, a person’s experience of consciousness is entirely an emergent property of execution of an appropriate algorithm, the algorithm characterized by a process flow; the person’s experience of a stream of consciousness is entirely an emergent property of the process flow. The assumption that consciousness is purely physical has far more significant implications than is often recognized. For example, if a conscious experience arises from the particular configuration of some isolated physical matter – a brain in a vat, for example – then an identical 1 One interesting but inadequate rebuttal to SSCT is the Many Worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics, which will be addressed in the Appendix. 2 configuration of physical matter must produce precisely the same conscious experience. Everything about the two experiences necessarily must, by the very assumption of supervenience on the physical, be identical. The two physical configurations must produce exactly the same person having exactly the same subjective conscious experience. 2 If one is experiencing a tingling emotional excitement while skydiving, the other is experiencing a tingling emotional excitement while skydiving. One’s perception of identity and self-awareness is the other’s perception of identity and self-awareness. One’s perception of “now” is the other’s perception of “now” – and this fact is independent of whether or not the two conscious entities happened to be identical at the same time.3 Indeed, if the two conscious entities are spacelike separated, Special Relativity4 guarantees that there is no fact about simultaneity or temporal order anyway. There is no physical sense in which they are different; they therefore define exactly one subjective experience. It may be rebutted that two otherwise identical physical systems separated by space or time are distinct conscious entities that are not, as viewed from outside the universe, numerically identical. This rebuttal fails for several reasons. First, as currently understood, the laws of physics apply equally throughout space and time; whatever conscious state arises from the physical laws acting on one configuration of matter will be the same as that arising from the other. Second, the rebuttal distracts from the crux of the issue: whether a particular conscious experience of a particular person could occur elsewhere in spacetime. When a scientist wonders whether it will become technologically possible to teleport himself to another planet, or to upload his mind to a computer, or to escape death by simulating his consciousness in a million years, he is not interested in recreating a mind that is pretty darn similar to his or even seemingly identical as measured externally. He is interested in recreating his mind. He does not care whether some conscious person will awaken on a distant planet, he cares whether he will awaken on a distant planet. If physicalism is to have meaning, it must be accepted that among two identical isolated physical systems, if one produces a conscious person, the other produces the same conscious person. After all, if the only way to produce one’s particular identity and conscious experience is to create an entire duplicate universe with precisely the same history as our own, then physicalism has no more explanatory power than an appeal to the Divine. 2. Special Relativity Implies SSCT I will now attempt to prove that SSCT is a direct consequence of Special Relativity. Let us consider a few thought experiments to discover some of the implications of the assumption of 2 To borrow from the philosophy literature on personal identity, the conscious entity arising from each of the configurations must be both “type” and “token” identical, because any difference between them must be due to a physical difference, already posited to be nil. 3 Arnold Zuboff agrees: “This experience [across brains] of being you, here, now, would be numerically the same whenever, as well as wherever, it was realized” (1990). 4 Special Relativity asserts that information cannot travel faster than light. Two events in spacetime are “spacelike” if information from one cannot reach the other without exceeding the speed of light, “lightlike” if such information must travel at the speed of light, and “timelike” otherwise. 3 Physical Consciousness and its relationship to SSCT. Imagine that your brain (or whatever physical system determines your conscious state) at time t1 is in physical state S1 such that you are conscious – that is, state S1 is an appropriate physical configuration of matter from which emerges your conscious state C1. You have experienced a stream of consciousness due to the physical evolution of matter that led to state S1. Immediately after time t1, your brain is disassembled and soon thereafter, at time t2, reassembled back to state S1, from which it physically evolves to state S2, from which emerges your conscious state C2, at time t3. Note that reassembly at time t2 to state S1 necessarily produces the same conscious state C1. It should not make any difference whether the reassembly occurs at the same physical location or some timelike distance away, nor should the time interval between t1 and t2 matter. Nor should it matter whether your brain is destroyed and then recreated from different matter, so long as it is the same configuration of matter, given that two particles in the same quantum state are physically identical and indistinguishable. Given this hypothetical, what do you experience at time t 1? It seems apparent to me that you would experience a stream of consciousness flowing directly from C1 at t1 to C2 at t3 via C1 at t2, as if the stream skipped over the period between t 1 and t2. And it would be you, necessarily, because Physical Consciousness guarantees that if state S 1 corresponds to a conscious person, then the physically identical state later must correspond to the same conscious person in the same conscious state. This result would obtain even if t2 were a million years after t1 and the reassembly occurred thousands of light-years away. You would, it seems, experience a continuous stream of consciousness directly from t 1 to t2 and through to t3. Next, imagine that two copies of state S1 are created at time t2, one called Configuration A and the other B, and each physically evolves to the same state S 2 at time t3 (and in the same manner). Assume that while the locations of creation of both A and B are timelike to your location at t1, they are spacelike to each other. It should be clear that both configurations would be you – that is, you would experience consciousness emerging from the (identical) states of both configurations. Of course, this example is trivial because, given that these physical configurations are stipulated to evolve identically, your experience of “two” states is really just one conscious experience. The fact that the configurations are spacelike separated would initially seem to be problematic because there is not enough time for a speed-of-light signal to travel from one configuration to the other, but since the configurations and their physical evolutions produce identical experiences, no information need transfer between the two. 5 Next, imagine that at some point between time t 2 and t3, Configuration A is destroyed (or, at the very least, changed to a physical configuration that does not correspond to a conscious state of you). It should be clear that your stream of consciousness, which emerges independently from the physical evolution of Configuration B, is unaffected. Given the symmetry of the hypothetical, destroying Configuration B instead would likewise have no effect on your stream of consciousness. 5 Tappenden (2011) discusses the notion of physically identical people (“doppelgangers”) that are spacelike separated: “How can two doppelgangers zillions of lightyears apart whose simultaneity we know, from Special Relativity, is entirely relative to an inertial frame, how can they share a single mind?” His answer? No need for causal connection. 4 C2A A C1 C1 B t1 t2 C2B t3 tE Fig. 1. Assessing stream of consciousness when paths diverge. Now, with reference to Fig. 1, imagine that instead of either configuration being destroyed, an event (such as a quantum measurement event) occurs at some time t E between t2 and t3 such that Configuration A physically evolves to state S 2A at time t3, from which emerges conscious state C2A, and Configuration B physically evolves to different state S 2B at time t3, from which emerges different conscious state C2B. What now? There seem to be three possibilities: a) Your stream of consciousness ends at t E. b) Your stream of consciousness follows both paths. At time t 3, you experience both conscious states C2A and C2B. c) Your stream of consciousness follows a single path, either Configuration A or B. At time t3, you experience either conscious state C 2A or conscious state C2B but not both. Regarding statement a), why would your conscious experience from both configurations be extinguished simply because the physical evolution of Configuration B diverged from A? To make matters worse, what if state S2A = S2, which we already know from the previous hypothetical does correspond to a conscious state of you (namely, C 2)? How could the divergence of a physical system (Configuration B) very far away make any difference to a stream of consciousness that we already know would emerge from the physical evolution of Configuration A by itself? Sure, maybe your conscious experience corresponding to the evolution of Configuration B gets cut off, but why both of them? And, in any event, if divergence somehow does cause your stream of consciousness to end in both configurations, then signals must travel between them. Given that they are spacelike separated, your stream of consciousness certainly could not end at tE as posited and in fact could be delayed arbitrarily long depending on where in spacetime the two configurations were created. Statement a) is false. Regarding statement b), what would it be like to experience, simultaneously, two different streams of consciousness? Just because you may have never before had such an experience and have trouble conceiving of it does not prove that it’s false. Perhaps there is a higher conscious plane at which multiple streams of consciousness are possible. But the real problem with b) is Special Relativity. To experience a conscious state emerging from a physical configuration depends on the configuration – that is, the information contained in the physical state must determine, at least in part, the emergent conscious state. Therefore it would be impossible to 5 experience the conscious states corresponding to two spacelike separated configurations of matter. Only statement c) remains, which is consistent with SSCT. A more rigorous proof follows: I) Assume Physical Consciousness is true. II) Assume Special Relativity is true. III) Assume SSCT is false. IV) By I): Given a conscious entity CE1 whose experience of conscious state C1 depends entirely on physical state S1 of matter M1 and whose stream of consciousness SOC1 depends entirely on a physical evolution of matter M1, it is possible for matter M2, spacelike separated from matter M1, to be configured as state S1 and to evolve differently than matter M1, such that a conscious entity CE2 whose experience of consciousness depends entirely on state S 1 of matter M2 experiences a stream of consciousness SOC2, different than SOC1, from a physical evolution of matter M2. V) By I) and III): the conscious entity CE1 is the same conscious entity CE2 and experiences streams of consciousness SOC1 and SOC2. VI) By I), the experience by conscious entity CE1 of stream of consciousness SOC1 depends on information associated with the physical evolution of matter M 1 and its experience of stream of consciousness SOC2 depends on information associated with the physical evolution of matter M 2. VII) By II), matter M1 and matter M2 are timelike. Contradiction with IV); the three assumptions are incompatible. Therefore, Physical Consciousness and Special Relativity imply SSCT. The contradiction can be more easily understood by this simple example. Imagine two spacelike-separated physically identical conscious entities whose streams of consciousness begin to diverge. For example, one entity tastes a red apple and thinks, “Delicious!” while the other tastes a green apple and thinks, “Too sour!” It is not possible for any entity to have both of these competing experiences because they depend on physical configurations that cannot be connected by any signal traveling at the speed of light. Therefore, if there is a stream of consciousness experienced from the initial conscious state, there can only be one. In other words, conscious experience is limited by Special Relativity and must in some sense be localized relative to whatever physical matter created it, and this fact implies SSCT.6 One objection to the above hypotheticals is their technological impracticality and/or physical impossibility. It may not be possible, for example, to measure the precise quantum state of a brain (or whatever physical system creates a conscious state), much less to recreate it, in no small part because of quantum no-cloning. But is such precision necessary? If a computer is ever 6 A related argument in which state S1 produced by matter M1 and state S1 produced by matter M2 are assumed to be timelike separated, so that one occurs before the other, results in a different problem. Because the same conscious entity, if SSCT is false, would experience both streams of consciousness “simultaneously” (i.e., relative to the entity’s subjective experience), then one stream of consciousness would depend on information associated with a physical evolution that occurs in the future, implying backward causation. 6 to become conscious, certainly no one doubts that identical software could be run on a functionally equivalent, but physically very different, processor to generate the same consciousness. Analogously, in the case of Physical Consciousness, how good need a copy be so that the same conscious experience emerges? It may be the case that a large number of variations of a particular physical configuration would produce the same conscious state; i.e., S 1={S1a, S1b, etc.} is a large set of physical states of matter that produce conscious state C1. All we need for the above hypotheticals is a sufficiently adequate copy of a physical state – that is, some member of set S 1 – to create the same conscious state C1. Even if that turns out to be exceptionally difficult as a practical matter, we can be assured that eventually, by purely random chance, an adequate copy of S 1 should appear in the universe in the form of a so-called Boltzmann Brain. And if that turns out to be physically impossible – if the level of precision needed to duplicate a conscious state exceeded what was physically possible – then SSCT would logically follow anyway. 3. The Multiverse Implies SSCT Given that Special Relativity is now generally accepted throughout the scientific community, further proofs of SSCT are unnecessary. However, it is interesting to note that SSCT is also a direct consequence of Multiverse theory. Because the universe appears to be exceptionally finely tuned for the existence of life, the desire to avoid appealing to essentially infinitesimal probabilities or divine intervention has led many to embrace the Multiverse theory, which simply suggests in at least one form that every possible physical configuration of a universe that can exist does exist. In other words, instead of having to explain why the gravitational constant or the ratio of the masses of the proton to the electron or the values of a dozen other fundamental constants of nature are just right for the creation of a universe where intelligent life can evolve, it is easier for some to posit the existence of many (perhaps infinitely many) other universes having different constant values. If true, then there are many identical versions of you in other universes. The approximate distance to the nearest physically identical you has been calculated at around 10 to the power of 1029 meters and the distance to the nearest entire observable universe identical to our own at around 10 to the power of 10120 meters. (See, e.g., Davies 2006, p. 178.) These are mind-bogglingly and incomprehensibly vast distances, particularly when compared to the distance to the edge of our own observable universe, a paltry 10 to the power of 26 meters. Of course, given such vast distances, there is no way to observe or communicate with another identical you. While many scientists regard the Multiverse theory neither credible nor scientific due to issues of falsifiability, it is worth showing that it too implies SSCT. If the Multiverse is true, then there are lots of (perfectly) physically identical versions of me. Because my identity and current conscious experience is a direct consequence of physical state, all of the physically identical versions of me, then, must be me, and I must experience all of them. That’s not a problem... until some of those physical states begin to diverge. At that point 7 my identities either remain with them, in which case I experience multiple different steams of consciousness, or they don’t, in which case I experience just one. But since that must be happening right now, the fact that I don’t experience multiple streams of consciousness implies SSCT. A more rigorous proof follows: I) Assume Physical Consciousness is true. II) Assume Multiverse theory is true. III) Assume SSCT is false. IV) By I) and II): for any conscious entity whose experience of consciousness depends entirely on an appropriate configuration of matter, multiple such configurations of matter exist. V) By II) and III), at least some of these multiple such configurations evolve differently such that from these different evolutions, the conscious entity experiences different streams of consciousness. VI) I am a conscious entity and I do not experience multiple different streams of consciousness. Contradiction with V); the three assumptions are incompatible. Therefore, Physical Consciousness in a Multiverse implies SSCT. 4. SSCT Implies That Consciousness Cannot Be Algorithmic From a common sense point of view, SSCT simply asserts that there is nothing it’s like to experience different streams of consciousness from the same conscious state. So what? It turns out that SSCT implies several surprising conclusions that contradict various closely-held popular and scientific convictions. For instance, one consequence of SSCT is that Strong AI is false. If two conscious states could evolve along different streams of consciousness, then SSCT implies they cannot be the same conscious state. But all algorithms, except the most boring ones, can flow differently, depending on inputs. So imagine a computer running software that becomes conscious by nature of reaching a certain process in the software’s algorithm; it then proceeds to experience a first stream of consciousness. Later, the computer is reset to that earlier process. If Algorithmic Consciousness is true, then not only will the computer again be conscious, but it must be the same conscious entity subjectively experiencing the same moment of awareness and the same sensations. We know that it has already experienced the first stream of consciousness, so how could it experience a second (different) stream of consciousness from that same state? What would that feel like? It wouldn’t feel like anything – because it’s not possible. A more rigorous proof follows: I) Assume Algorithmic Consciousness is true. II) Assume SSCT is true. III) By I): because any computable algorithm can be performed on a general purpose digital computer or Turing machine, it is possible in principle for an executing algorithm to be reset to an earlier process of the algorithm’s process flow. 8 IV) By I) and III), the following is possible: A conscious entity CE 1 experiences at time t1 conscious state C1 emerging from process P1 of an algorithm. From time t1 to t2, execution of the algorithm flows to process P2 from which emerges the conscious entity CE1’s experience of conscious state C2, resulting in the conscious entity CE1’s experience of a stream of consciousness SOC from state C1 to C2. At time t3, the execution is reset to process P1, from which emerges a conscious entity CE2’s experience of conscious state C1. From time t3 to t4, execution of the algorithm flows to process P2’, from which emerges the conscious entity CE2’s experience of conscious state C2’, different from C2, resulting in the conscious entity CE2’s experience of a stream of consciousness SOC’, different from SOC, from state C 1 to C2’. V) By I) and IV): conscious entity CE1 at time t1 is the same conscious entity in the same conscious state as conscious entity CE2 at time t3. VI) By IV) and V): conscious entity CE1 experiences, from conscious state C1, both stream of consciousness SOC and different stream of consciousness SOC’. Contradiction with II). Therefore, SSCT implies that Algorithmic Consciousness is false. One might object that actual time matters – after all, in the above proof, SOC’ happens after SOC has completed. However, it should be noted that two different computers, both programmed with the same software, could be running process P 1 at the same time t3. What happens if the resulting processes then diverge? SSCT – and common sense – tell us that the diverging processes cannot result in diverging streams of consciousness. After all, what would it be like to be the conscious entity at time t3? Further, if these two different computers are spacelike, then simultaneity is relative and the fact of which computer experiences a stream of consciousness first is observer-dependent. Actual time does not actually matter; two entities experiencing the same conscious state will subjectively observe that state simultaneously. Therefore, Algorithmic Consciousness is false. Because consciousness is not algorithmic, no computer or artificial intelligence will ever become conscious. Further, if consciousness cannot be created by the execution of software on a computer, then it also cannot be simulated, in which case Nick Bostrom’s Simulation Argument (2003) is invalid. That of course does not imply that you aren’t living in a simulated environment – in fact I think it is quite likely that virtual reality technology will improve until humans (voluntarily, I hope) live their lives in a computer-generated environment – but it does imply that your conscious identity itself is not a simulation. Another implication is that efforts to upload one’s mind to a computer – whether to augment one’s mental processing power or to guarantee immortality – will likely be fruitless. That isn’t to suggest that information contained in one’s memory could not somehow be accessed and stored. Rather, a conscious person cannot hope to ever exist as software running on a computer. 5. SSCT Implies That Consciousness Cannot Be Physically Reset Setting aside the impossibility of simulating or uploading one’s consciousness onto a computer, SSCT also implies limitations to consciousness whether instantiated in a physical brain 9 or not. Because Algorithmic Consciousness supervenes on Physical Consciousness, the latter may be true even if the former is false. A nearly identical proof as the one in Section 4 may be given with regard to Physical Consciousness, although now the corresponding statement III), shown below, is suspect: III’) It is possible in principle to reset a physical configuration S 2, from which a conscious entity experiences conscious state C2, to an earlier physical configuration S1, from which the conscious entity experiences an earlier conscious state C1. Statement III) in Section 4 is true because an identical algorithm may be executed on entirely different physical devices. However, if consciousness depends on a sufficiently precise configuration of matter, it may not be physically possible to reset a physical state corresponding to a particular conscious state to an earlier one, which means that the above statement III’) may be false. So instead of positing statement III’), I will designate it an assumption called Physical Conscious Reset. Thus, the conclusion of the proof in Section 4 applied, instead, to Physical Consciousness instead of Algorithmic Consciousness is: if SSCT is true, then Physical Consciousness is incompatible with Physical Conscious Reset. Assuming Physical Consciousness is true, we will need to find some physical means to explain why and how a conscious physical configuration can’t be reset to an earlier conscious configuration – that is, why Physical Consciousness does not necessitate Physical Conscious Reset. 7 Setting aside logic, the problem with physical resetting can be shown visually in Fig. 2, in which a conscious entity in conscious state C1 emerging from physical state S1 at time t1 is destroyed; in Situation A, the physical state S 1 is recreated (not necessarily from the same matter) at time t2>t1, from which emerges an entity’s conscious state C1 and a stream of consciousness SOCA from the physical evolution to state S2, from which emerges the entity’s conscious state C 2, at time t3, which is then destroyed; in Situation B, the physical state S 1 is recreated (not necessarily from the same matter) at t4>t3, from which emerges an entity’s conscious state C1 and a stream of consciousness SOCB from the physical evolution to state S2’, from which arises the entity’s conscious state C2’, at time t5, which is not necessarily destroyed. Situation A C1 t1 C1 t2 Situation B C2 t3 C1 t4 C2’ t5 Fig. 2. Assessing the streams of consciousness in various situations. 7 Aaronson’s “freebit” notion is a possible solution (2016). There are others, but space prevents elaboration. 10 Without Situation B, there seems to be no logistical problem: the entity’s stream of consciousness SOCA flows continuously from state C1 at t1 to state C2 at t3 via C1 at t2. And without Situation A, the entity’s stream of consciousness SOC B flows continuously from state C1 at t1 to state C2’ at t5 via C1 at t4. But when both situations occur, we need to figure out what the conscious entity actually experiences as its consciousness flows from time t 1. It cannot actually experience both streams, of course, because SSCT, which is timeindependent, prohibits the conscious entity from experiencing more than one stream from the same conscious state (C1). If it could, it would subjectively experience them simultaneously, which is not only hard to imagine, but also means the entity would be incapable of experiencing SOC A until time t4, which could be arbitrarily far in the future. Further, without backward causation or signaling, how could it even be known at time t 2 that a Situation B would ever happen? So perhaps the conscious entity could experience either SOCA or SOCB but not both – if so, how is the selection made? What does the entity actually experience at time t 1? Does its stream of consciousness flow toward C2 or C2’? Assume for the moment that the choice is based on chronology: the entity experiences the chronologically earlier stream, SOCA, and therefore not SOCB. The problem is that at time t4, physical state S1 is recreated. And since the conscious entity experienced conscious state C1 that emerged from physical state S1 at time t2, then Physical Consciousness guarantees that the same conscious entity will experience the same conscious state C1 at time t4. Because that physical state S1 then evolves to state S2’, defining conscious state C2’, the conscious entity will indeed experience SOC B, a contradiction. But if we assume instead that the entity experiences the chronologically later stream, SOCB, and therefore not SOCA, a similar problem arises. The stream SOCB begins with conscious state C1 that emerges from physical state S1 at time t4, but SOCA is stipulated to have started at the same state; Physical Consciousness requires that the same entity experiences both. An additional problem arises if the entity experiences the chronologically later stream: whether or not the entity experiences a stream of consciousness from t2 to t3 depends on an event at some arbitrary future time t4, resulting in a reverse time dependence. As a final possibility, perhaps the conscious entity can experience both SOCA and SOCB because they don’t actually chronologically overlap and my earlier assertion – that the entity would subjectively experience them simultaneously – was incorrect. In other words, the conscious entity first experiences stream of consciousness SOCA and later experiences SOCB. The reset that occurs between times t3 and t4 is effectively a memory erasure such that the conscious entity can proceed to experience stream of consciousness SOCB without simultaneously (from the entity’s subjective perspective) experiencing SOCA. While the entity may report after time t4 that it experienced a continuous stream of consciousness directly from t 1 to t4 without any intervening experience, it is just deluded, because at time t1 it actually experienced a stream of consciousness that flowed directly from t1 to t2. The problem here is that SOCA and SOCB in fact do chronologically overlap, precisely at time t1: stream of consciousness SOCA flows from t1 to t3 and stream of consciousness SOCB flows from t1 to t5 – i.e., they both flow from time t1. Because physical state S1 at t2 is precisely the same 11 as state S1 at t4 (from which emerge precisely the same conscious state C 1 of precisely the same conscious entity), then state C1 at t2 has no better a claim to defining the “real” path of the entity’s stream of consciousness than state C1 at t4. When the entity reports after time t4 that it experienced a continuous stream of consciousness directly from t1 to t4, it is correct, because the experience of its stream of consciousness flowing from C1 at time t1 through C1 at time t2 must – physically must – be exactly the same experience as its stream of consciousness flowing from C 1 at time t1 through C1 at time t4. The apparently seamless transitions from C1 at t1 to both C1 at t2 and C1 at t4 are in fact real – or, at least, neither is more real than the other. 8 In other words, through all this analysis, we still don’t know what the entity experiences at time t1; does it experience SOCA or SOCB? If consciousness can be physically reset, then there must be something it’s like to be the entity at time t1. Unfortunately, every logical possibility leads to a contradiction, and if there is nothing it’s like to be in conscious state C 1 at time t1 in Fig. 2, then it is because the stipulated scenario is impossible. The above arguments show that if SSCT is true, then Situation A and Situation B cannot both occur, and that leads to larger implications. For example, imagine if, in Fig. 2, time t 1=t2 so that physical state S1 is just some arbitrarily chosen state defining an entity’s conscious state C 1. Situation B is therefore not possible, whether or not t4 comes after t3. In other words: a copy of a physical state corresponding to a past conscious experience cannot be created! The Single Stream of Consciousness Theorem does not merely imply that a conscious entity can’t be reset to an earlier conscious state, but that an experienced conscious state can’t be physically recreated at all. If I am correct, the good news is that philosophical issues of identity and self-location simply disappear. For instance, if the Philosophy Defense Force tells Dr. Evil that they have created an exact replica of him, which they will torture until he surrenders, Dr. Evil can ignore them, safe in the knowledge that they are liars and that he, and only he, is Dr. Evil. (See Elga 2004.) Also, Roger Penrose can stop worrying about the “duplication problem,” whereby a teleportation machine is used to create an exact physical copy of a space traveler on a distant planet but “the original copy of the traveler [is] not destroyed... Would his ‘awareness’ be in two places at once?” (1989, p. 27) The bad news is that we then have to find some physical mechanism that prevents certain physical copies from being made. A Boltzmann Brain just isn’t physically possible – but why not? Further, what is the physical mechanism that prevents copying or repeating a conscious state? If C={C1, C2, etc.} is the set of all conscious states that have already been experienced, and S 1={S1a, S1b, etc.} is the set of all physical states of matter that produce conscious state C 1, S2={S2a, S2b, etc.} is the set of all physical states of matter that produce conscious state C 2, and so forth, then the universe must physically contain this potentially massive amount of information and it must be instantly accessible to every physical configuration so as to be useful! 8 The problem becomes even more acute (and interesting) when the recreation event at time t 4 begins some time between t2 and t3; however, space prevents elaboration. 12 6. Conclusion In this paper, I attempted to prove the Single Stream of Consciousness Theorem – that a conscious entity cannot experience more than one stream of consciousness from a given conscious state – by showing that it follows independently from both Special Relativity and the Multiverse theory. I discussed some of the theorem’s surprising implications, among them that Strong AI is false, consciousness cannot be algorithmic, and a conscious state cannot be reset to an earlier conscious state nor can it be duplicated. The implications of SSCT may be counterintuitive and may motivate some to reject it outright. On one hand, it seems intuitively and even empirically true: there is significantly more direct evidence for SSCT – specifically, one’s own subjective conscious experiences – than that, for example, consciousness is algorithmic. On the other hand, its implications, only a handful of which were broached in this paper, range from odd to downright incredible. But given that SSCT logically follows from our current understanding of the physical world, it seems that either acceptance or rejection presents a quagmire. That should not be shocking, given that so little is known about consciousness and that, when acknowledged, it tends to be an annoying thorn in the side of physics. While I believe the arguments in this paper are sound, and that there is something unique about consciousness that has thus far been inadequately addressed or explained, I am also quite open to the idea that one or more fundamental flaws infect these arguments. 13 Appendix: Identity and the Many Worlds Objection to SSCT Neuroscientist Max Tegmark creates a “quantum gun” designed so that each time its trigger is pulled, it measures the z-spin of a particle in the state (|↑> + |↓>) / √2. It then fires a bullet only if the spin is measured down, which would be expected to happen with a likelihood of ½, and otherwise simply makes an audible click. He stands in front of the gun, in what he dubs a “quantum suicide” experiment (1998), and asks his assistant to pull the trigger, after which the wave state of the combined system becomes: (1) √ (| ↑>⊗ |𝑇𝑒𝑔𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑘 > + | ↓>⊗ |𝑇𝑒𝑔𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑘 > ) Because experiments are observed to actually have results, some interpretations of quantum mechanics require a nonlinear and irreversible reduction of the system’s wave state to a single outcome, such as | ↑>⊗ |𝑇𝑒𝑔𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑘 > in the present example. However, these “collapse” interpretations are infested by questions of when and how such a reduction occurs. One interpretation that avoids the issue of nonlinear collapse is the Many Worlds Interpretation (“MWI”) of Hugh Everett (see, e.g., Wallace 2012) which asserts, simply, that collapse does not occur and every term in a wave state corresponds to an actual world. 9 If true, then the wave state continues to evolve linearly with two terms, one in which the gun did not fire and Tegmark is alive and another where the opposite is true. Tegmark (1998) claims that one implication of this assertion, and even an empirical test of MWI, is a form of immortality: “Since there is exactly one observer having perceptions both before and after the trigger event... the MWI prediction is that [the observer] will hear ‘click’ with 100% certainty,” even though other observers can expect to hear “click” with only 50% likelihood. The experiment can be performed as many times as is necessary to prove MWI with arbitrarily high confidence. For instance, the likelihood of surviving 100 experiments if a collapse interpretation of quantum mechanics is true is one in 2 100, while the likelihood if MWI is true is 100%. He further notes that because in “almost all terms in the final superposition” the assistant believes that the observer is dead, if you repeatedly attempt quantum suicide, “you will experimentally convince yourself that MWI is correct, but you can never convince anyone else.” This is incorrect. According to MWI, every branch is equally real. So while MWI implies that nearly all branches after a series of quantum suicide events contain people who have witnessed the death of the experimenter, the single world in which the experimenter lives happens to be equally real and therefore contains people who are utterly astounded by his incredible luck. Indeed, the experimenter’s assistant, spouse, family, friends, and academic colleagues seem 9 These orthogonal terms are often characterized as different “branches” of the universe, or even entirely different universes. The so-called Splitting Worlds View by DeWitt (1970) is a popular interpretation of MWI, although Tegmark points out that this misrepresents MWI in part because the terms could interfere over time. Nevertheless, what are we to make, conceptually, of Expression (1) if not different branches or even universes? 14 authentic to him – and according to MWI they are authentic – differing from other branches only in their incredulity over living in a world in which the experimenter defied such incredible odds. 10 More importantly, the problem of identity infects both the quantum suicide thought experiment as well as MWI11 in general. Tegmark (1998) implies that because there is one conscious observer before the experiment and one conscious observer after the event, it must be the same observer. But imagine that on quantum suicide event #58, for example, the experimenter sneezes, so that any bullet shot from the gun would graze his head and cause pain instead of death. Which of the two observers – the unharmed one or the injured one – could the experimenter expect to be? After event #58, there are now two branches and, presumably, two conscious observers who can each equally claim to be the pre-event experimenter. But this does not answer the question of which of the two observers he became. This is a massive problem with MWI, so I’ll elaborate. Assume that an experimenter, Alice1, performs a quantum mechanical spin measurement on a particle, after which emerges experimenters Alice2↑ (who observes an “up” measurement) and Alice2↓ (who observes a “down” measurement). Is Alice1 the same person as Alice2↑? As Alice2↓? As both? As neither? What stream of consciousness does Alice1 experience as she does the experiment? Which result will Alice1 see? Which of the two post-measurement experimenters should Alice1 expect to become? MWI contradicts SSCT because if all terms in a quantum wave state correspond to an actual world, then Alice2↑ and Alice2↓ must be equally real. Given that a system’s wave state is believed to be its complete physical description, if MWI is true, then Alice1 cannot expect her identity to flow into just one or the other; if she could, then a nonphysical element (which would be lethal to MWI) must be introduced because nothing in the quantum wave state would determine one path over the other. To avoid the potential for dualism, Peter Lewis (2007) argues that Alice 1 can expect to become both Alice2↑ and Alice2↓ in separate branches, but later denies the concept of identity altogether: “I am not convinced that the pronoun ‘I’ picks out a person in any deep metaphysical sense...”. However, each assertion, while consistent with MWI, is intellectually jarring and requires further elaboration. First, what would it mean to become two different people with different minds and experiences? What would that feel like? If MWI is correct and if personal identity flows to all branches, then it has already happened to me uncountably many times; why have I not noticed? Why do I observe a continuous and singular stream of consciousness? Second, 10 David Lewis (2004) makes the same mistake. On branching, he states, “All your future selves, on all your branches, are equally real and equally yours.” On quantum suicide: “Your evidence against collapse, if you gain it, ... [cannot be shared] with a bystandard.” 11 Because DeWitt’s interpretation of MWI requires infinite mass and energy to support continuously splitting worlds, a clear violation of conservation laws, several “many minds” interpretations (“MMI”) have been proposed. Perhaps the best known, the Many Minds View (“MMV”) of Albert and Loewer (1988) proposed that brain states that are associated with mental states are associated with an infinite set of minds so that at each measurement, every possible outcome is observed by one or more minds. However, because “supervenience [of the mental on the physical] fails in relation to the question which minds end up tracking which terms of the state vector as new superpositions arise” (Lockwood 1996), MMV maintains dualist commitments, not satisfying to those who seek purely physical explanations. 15 how can the word “I” not identify someone? As I stare out from behind my eyes, as I introspect, it is clear to me that the word “I” refers to something very specific: my identity, my awareness, my consciousness. Lockwood (1996) agrees that identity flows into all branches and states that the remarkable conclusion of being “literally in two minds” is “no more remarkable... than the already utterly mysterious fact that, at a given time, there is even one ‘what is it like to be’ associated with my brain.” I find his assertion not credible, given that he has, presumably, amassed a lifetime’s worth of evidence that he has one mind and not a shred to suggest that he occupies two or more; it would certainly be more remarkable to discover that the latter was true. Further, he does not comment on the “what it’s like” identity issue prior to the experiment. David Papineau (2004) addresses this deficiency: if MWI is correct and he opens Schrodinger’s box, “I have no uncertainty about the impersonal structure of the future. I know for sure that it will contain a successor of David Papineau who sees a live cat, and one who sees a dead cat. All I am unsure about is what I will see.” One way to avoid MWI’s identity crisis is to simply deny Tegmark’s assertion that “there is exactly one observer having perceptions... before... the trigger event.” Saunders et al. (2010) suggest that every possible branch already exists; prior to a branching event, multiple versions of the experimenter already exist, but because they are identical, they cannot self-identify. Observer Alice, for example, remains with her own branch before and after the branching event, but until the branching event, she cannot “know which of these branching persons is she.” No dualistic theory is required to explain why her stream of consciousness follows one branch and not another, nor need we explain how a single mind fissions into two. The problem with the Saunders et al. solution is that the observers prior to the branching event are physically identical, which means that there is no sense in which they are different or have their own individual identities. Alice A and AliceB, prior to branching, must be the same person; if not, then nonphysical facts must be introduced to distinguish them. It is not that AliceA just cannot yet tell that she’s not AliceB; rather, because they are physically identical, there is no sense in which AliceA is NOT AliceB. AliceA inevitably experiences what it’s like to be AliceB and vice versa; every subjective experience of AliceA is experienced by AliceB; there are not two observers at all; there is only one person and one identity. We are left with the same unanswered question at branching: which person does Alice become? Finally, Ismael (2003) addresses the identity problem of MWI head-on: just before a measurement, “you are wondering what sort of result you will experience ... (not any of your externally indistinguishable counterparts, but you)...”. Unfortunately, she explicitly ignores her own question (“perhaps I needn’t be able to say beforehand which one of the post-measurement observers is me”) and instead focuses on making sense of the Born probabilities: “they tell her how surprised she should be...”. According to Ismael, when Alice1 branches into Alice2↑ and Alice2↓, there is no identity, no stream of consciousness, that flows from Alice 1. Rather, analyzing the situation post-measurement, Alice2↑ and Alice2↓ can each equally claim to be Alice1. 16 Ismael’s exclusively backward-looking approach fails to solve the problem. Assume that I am Alice1 and about to perform a quantum mechanical spin measurement on a particle. The postmeasurement versions, Alice2↑ and Alice2↓, may both exist or only one may exist, but whoever does exist after the measurement will have a specific temporal relationship to me, will share my memories, and will identify as me. It is reasonable to ask, prior to the measurement, which of the two I will become, and it is also reasonable to wonder what I will experience at the moment of measurement. If I do have a stream of consciousness and it chooses one path, then I will experience a continuous stream of consciousness from Alice1 to Alice2↑ (or Alice2↓). Of course, I cannot be certain before doing the experiment that my consciousness will choose one path, but for that matter I cannot be certain that there actually is any such thing as a stream of consciousness. Still, given the evidence of my experience and memories, it is reasonable to believe that I will do the measurement and then observe either up or down. In a continuous flow, I in fact proceed to do the measurement and then observe, say, up – or at least that is what I think happened, reporting as Alice2↑. But the flowing of identity from Alice1 to Alice2↑ conflicts with MWI, so what really happened? MWI apologists will, after the fact, explain my experience as such: now that the measurement is past, there is an Alice2↑ and Alice2↓, both of whom are conscious, self-aware, and identify as Alice, and both of whom would report the memory of a seamless flow of consciousness from Alice1. There are two fatal problems with this story. The first is that while we have an account of what each of Alice2↑ and Alice2↓ recalls experiencing after the fact, we have no account of what Alice1 actually experienced. We have no idea what it’s like to be Alice1 at the moment of branching. However, if we take MWI at face value, then Alice2↑ specifically remembers the experience of being Alice1 at the moment that she became Alice2↑ (an experience I’ll denote “12↑”), and Alice2↓ specifically remembers the experience of being Alice1 at the moment that she became Alice2↓ (an experience I’ll denote “12↓”). Alice1, who was one person, cannot have perceived, simultaneously, two mutually exclusive experiences. Further, she could not have perceived just one of those experiences, as that would require the sort of nonphysical reduction information that MWI was designed to reject. After all, if Alice1 actually experienced, say, 12↑ at the moment of measurement, then we have our answer as to which of Alice 2↑ and Alice2↓ inherited Alice1’s identity! Therefore, Alice1 could not have experienced either 12↑ or 12↓. But that’s just silly. Imagine that Alice0 is about to perform a measurement on a deterministic system for which only one possible post-measurement version of the experimenter (Alice1) would exist. In that case, there is no reason to believe that Alice0 would not experience 01. In other words, Alice0 would experience 01, Alice0’s identity would flow into Alice1, and Alice1 would specifically remember 01. So how could it be that the measurement of a nondeterministic system has the effect that Alice1 does not, in fact, experience what any future versions of her remember experiencing? Why is Alice1’s memory reliable but Alice2↑’s memory guaranteed to be wrong? MWI implies a weird type of consciousness in which one’s memories are not merely untrustworthy but are certain to be wrong. 17 The second problem with the MWI explanation is this: I, in fact, observed a measurement of up. The MWI response: “Yes, of course, but that’s because you’re Alice 2↑. Alice2↓ observed a measurement of down.” That may or may not be true, but it does not answer the underlying question: why am I Alice2↑? Why am I aware of the thoughts of Alice2↑? Why am I seeing out of the eyes, and introspecting the feelings, and experiencing the awareness, of Alice 2↑ and not Alice2↓? Why am I Alice2↑ and not Alice2↓? At this point MWI apologists may simply aver that I don’t understand MWI. “You are Alice2↑,” they repeat, annoyed, “and someone else is Alice2↓, and that explains why you see out of Alice2↑’s eyes. End of story.” And to that I would reply that they don’t understand identity. “To you,” I would say, “Alice2↑ and Alice2↓ are essentially identical, and except for the serendipity of sharing the same world with Alice2↑, you don’t see anything special about Alice2↑. But to me, Alice2↑ and Alice2↓ are extremely different. Specifically, Alice2↑’s eyes are giving me visual information, while Alice2↓’s are not. I can read Alice2↑’s thoughts and feel Alice2↑’s feelings, but not those of Alice2↓. There is something very different about Alice2↑, and even though you cannot know it, I do. MWI provides no plausible physical explanation for why I experience the feelings of Alice2↑ and not Alice2↓ – for why I identify as Alice2↑ and not Alice2↓.” It seems to me that there are four possible responses to the MWI identity problem, at least one of which must be true: a) There is no “I”. It is a false illusion that I am Alice 2↑ and not Alice2↓. b) There is an “I”, but I am in fact both Alice2↑ and Alice2↓. c) Consciousness is not purely physical. Something beyond physical facts determined that I would be Alice2↑ and not Alice2↓. d) MWI is false. Statement a) is, in my opinion, simply unfathomable. While zombies may engage in sophisticated philosophical debate over whether identity is an illusion, none of them can experience the overwhelming subjective evidence that my identity is not an illusion. Statement b) simply does not fit the empirical (if subjective) evidence: the fact that I see out of the eyes and experience the awareness of Alice2↑ and not Alice2↓. Clearly there is something different between Alice2↑ and Alice2↓. Even if Alice2↓ exists and is conscious, the “I” that experiences Alice2↓ is not me. I experience Alice2↑ and I do not experience Alice2↓, so statement b) is false. Left only with statements c) and d), if MWI is correct, then something had to distinguish my identity upon the branching of Alice1. The problem here is that MWI requires that the quantum wave state is the complete description of the universe, but nothing in the wave state indicates or could indicate which of Alice2↑ or Alice2↓ will inherit my identity. In other words, statement c) implies statement d), thus disarming MWI as a credible threat to SSCT. 12 12 MWI also suffers from an evidentiary problem. Because MWI implies that conscious Alice 1 branches into conscious Alice2↑ and conscious Alice2↓, it is instructive that I have excellent evidence that Alice 2↑ exists and is conscious (because I am her) but no evidence that Alice2↓ even exists, much less that she is conscious. Significantly, as MWI 18 is postulated to not allow communication between branches, the evidence for Alice2↓’s consciousness not only does not exist but cannot exist. The inherent unfalsifiability built into the very fabric of MWI should give scientists pause. 19 References Aaronson, S., 2016. The Ghost in the Quantum Turing Machine. In: The Once and Future Turing: Computing the World. Cambridge University Press. Albert, D. and Loewer, B., 1988. Interpreting the many worlds interpretation. Synthese, 77(2), pp.195-213. Bostrom, N., 2003. Are we living in a computer simulation?. The Philosophical Quarterly, 53(211), pp.243-255. Davies, P., 2006. The Goldilocks Enigma: Why Is the Universe Just Right for Life?. Houghton Mifflin. DeWitt, B.S., 1970. Quantum mechanics and reality. Physics today, 23(9), pp.30-35. Elga, A., 2004. Defeating Dr. Evil with self‐locating belief. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 69(2), pp.383-396. Ismael, J., 2003. How to combine chance and determinism: Thinking about the future in an Everett universe. Philosophy of Science, 70(4), pp.776-790. Lewis, D., 2004. How many lives has Schrödinger's cat?. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 82(1), pp.3-22. Lewis, P.J., 2007. Uncertainty and probability for branching selves. Studies In History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies In History and Philosophy of Modern Physics, 38(1), pp.1-14. Lockwood, M., 1996. 'Many Minds'. Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 47(2), pp.159-188. Papineau, D., 2004. David Lewis and Schrödinger's cat. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 82(1), pp.153-169. Penrose, R., 1989. The Emperor’s New Mind: Concerning Computers, Minds, and the Law of Physics. Oxford University Press. Saunders, S., Barrett, J., Kent, A. and Wallace, D., 2010. Many Worlds?: Everett, Quantum Theory, & Reality. Oxford University Press. 20 Searle, J.R., 1980. Minds, brains, and programs. Behavioral and brain sciences, 3(3), pp.417424. Tappenden, P., 2011. A metaphysics for semantic internalism. Metaphysica, 12(2), p.125. Tegmark, M., 1998. The interpretation of quantum mechanics: Many worlds or many words?. Fortschritte der Physik: Progress of Physics, 46(6‐8), pp.855-862. Wallace, D., 2012. The Emergent Multiverse: Quantum Theory According to the Everett Interpretation. Oxford University Press. Zuboff, A., 1990. One self: The logic of experience. Inquiry, 33(1), pp.39-68. 21

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 949 Article How Often or How Rarely Does A Self-Transcending Experience Occur? Syamala Hari* Abstract Almost always, the self is involved in our perception of the world, thinking, and actions, but it does momentarily step aside now and then. I describe below a few of my experiences of selftranscendence that seem quite ordinary with nothing mysterious about them and they are all of short duration. To explain how the self is present or not in an experience, I describe some properties characteristic of the self such as its sense of personal identity and ownership of action. Manifestation of these properties in an experience indicates the presence of the self and absence of these properties indicates its absence. In an act of observation, full attention paid to what is being observed seems to push every thought, including the self, out of the conscious mind and keep it fully occupied with the act of observation. A characteristic property of the selftranscendent state seems to be that one can only recognize such a state as being free from self, but one cannot prove that it is so because the outward effect of the state may be the same as that of an alternative state where the self is present. Introduction In this article I will describe a few of my experiences of self-transcendence, and among other things their effect, if any is noticeable, on my view of the world thereafter. Since words, like “self” and “transcendence” may be interpreted differently by different authors, as far as possible we will try to be clear about how we use these two words and others closely related to them. In describing my experiences, I will stay away from the notion of the soul and consider ego and self as synonymous. We begin the discussion of my experiences with an analysis of what it means to transcend the self and therefore an analysis of related concepts such as properties characteristic of the self, selfawareness, awareness, and consciousness, rather than a personal experience. We do so because during the analysis we will see that all of us (ordinary people, not necessarily saints, yogis, philosophers, or monks) can and do have moments of self-transcendence although we cannot remain in a conscious state with no sense of self for hours together and much less days together or the whole life. We may or may not remember such moments because they are short and also because we do not introspect ourselves every moment to see if “I” is there or not. So, some of the examples we come across could be those of the personal experiences of many of us. I will describe below a few of my experiences of self-transcendence, but none of them is mysterious, or out of the ordinary life, or something in another dimension. Hence their effect on my life *Correspondence: Syamala Hari, retired as Distinguished Member of Technical Staff from Lucent Technologies, USA. E-mail: murty_hari@yahoo.com: Website: http://mind-and-tachyons.blogspot.com/ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 950 afterwards is also ordinary and I have no awakening to report. Clearly, narration of a self-transcending experience is an exercise in introspection. For me, the word self stands for what we mean by “I” in our daily usage in sentences such as “I know that”, “I do not know that”, “I did it”, “I did not do it”, “I want to be a teacher when I grow up”, or “this is my house”. We do not consider “self” and “soul” as synonymous. The word “mind” stands for one that thinks where thinking is all the following: As long as the body is awake, the mind immediately records in memory a description of every interaction with the outside world and produces emotions such as joy and sorrow as responses; we call these records experiences. It can recall these experiences though not always. The mind has desires and goals, and plans to achieve them using its reasoning capability. It labels events as past, present, and future but the present is very short (even non-linguistic minds have reasoning and time-labeling capabilities to some extent). It carries on similar processes even in dreams although not rationally and without external (sensory) input. It can initiate the body to act. It performs all these functions with an awareness of doing so and with a sense of “I” also called ego. The mind is aware of the self also. Transcending the self would mean a conscious state or an act where there is no awareness of “I”. This in turn, requires me to understand if there is a difference between being conscious (consciousness) and awareness of something and, if there is, what the difference is.1 Hence, we analyze awareness and self-awareness first because we are not concerned with unconscious states here; both the self-transcendent state and one with awareness of the self are supposed to be conscious states. Then we describe some behaviors, including some of my own, in which the self is involved and others in which the self seems to be absent at least momentarily. We will be able to recognize the presence or absence of the self at a particular moment by recognizing properties characteristic of the self. Manifestation of these properties in an experience indicates the presence of the self and absence of these properties indicates its absence. Some characteristics of the self we will recognize are: creation of a sense of personal identity distinguishing itself from others, ownership of action, presentation of a distorted view of reality, attachment to results of action, and a quick reaction upon receiving the results of actions whether initiated by the self or others. From our analysis of some experiences, it appears that one can only recognize a state as being free from the self, but one cannot prove that it is so because the outward effect of the state may be the same as that of an alternative state where the self is present. What Self is in Western and Eastern Philosophies In philosophical literature, Eastern, Western, ancient, or modern, the self is sometimes interpreted to be the same as the soul (a non-bodily entity associated with the body) and sometimes as ego. Whether self-transcendence is possible or not depends upon the interpretation. Hence we first take a brief look at how the notions of self and self-transcendence 1 Sometimes, some authors may not distinguish between consciousness and awareness depending upon the focus of their discussion. For example, the words self-consciousness and self-awareness are synonymous. Since selfawareness (being aware of the self) is slightly different from the concept of self although necessarily associated with the self, it is useful to define awareness of an object, mental or physical, and to distinguish between consciousness and awareness. Living beings have a set of abilities called consciousness and one of them is the ability to produce awareness as an internally experienced outcome in a particular situation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 951 are dealt with in Eastern and Western philosophies. An attempt to recall a self-transcending experience implicitly assumes that a conscious state without the awareness of self is possible; in other words, assumes that self is not the source of consciousness. This assumption seems more akin to eastern philosophies (particularly Hindu and Buddhist 2 philosophies) than Western philosophies in the following way. In Hindu and Buddhist philosophies and some Western philosophies, the self is said to be an illusion3. According to Hindu philosophy, the mind is not conscious! It only appears to be conscious, but there is a certain Consciousness (with big C and sometimes called the Supreme consciousness) different from the mind and matter that is the source of the sense of consciousness in our minds. Buddhism classifies various aspects of matter and mind and their interaction into skandas (aggregates) and postulates transcendent consciousness beyond the aggregates. A Buddha, that is, an enlightened one, is a non-aggregate being who is able to detach oneself from the aggregates. There are primarily two categories of consciousness: one is called mental consciousness which depends upon aggregates and the other is non-manifest consciousness unconditioned and unsupported by the aggregates. The former consists of mental perceptions formed as a result of contact with material world or perceptions of itself (self-awareness). Buddha consciousness, that is, non-aggregate consciousness or transcendent consciousness arises after withdrawal of all attachment to the aggregates. Thus Buddhism asserts that a state of pure consciousness not dependent upon the mind or matter exists. Western philosophies, particularly those that emphasize reason and scientific thought, usually do not seem to indicate the existence of consciousness beyond the mind although some of them may characterize the mind as immaterial4. According to the Gita (Bhagavad Gita, n.d.), all creation is made up of two kinds of prakriti (nature): the material and the spiritual. Both living beings and the material world are parts of prakriti. The prakriti of the former is called jiva-prakriti and is conscious whereas the prakriti of 2 The words “self”, “I”, and the phrase “I am” are used with different meanings in different religious works of both Hinduism and Buddhism even in ancient times. There is a lot more confusion in their modern translations. There are several branches of Buddhism and several interpretations varying from “no-self”, “empirical self”, to “true self”. However, they all agree that ego is an aspect of the mind and that there is a non-bodily entity in a person (which we call soul here), that, upon death, becomes one of the causes for the arising of a new birth. Buddhist perspective is that consciousness does not emerge from the brain or from matter (Luisi 2008). In a dialogue reported here, Dalai Lama admits that in Buddhism there is an implicit recognition of the difficulty of defining what consciousness is, but that it is possible to recognize consciousness experientially and identify it. On the contrary, Hinduism explicitly asserts that there is a certain Consciousness independent of matter and mind; it is indescribable but can be experienced directly with no involvement of mind and matter. 3 Descartes (1641/1901) argued that phenomena manifest in one’s experience are illusions because they depend upon sensory inputs to the self, but a subjective self is real because it is needed to experience the illusion. In contrast, Hume (1781/1967) considers the self as a bundle of perceptions and an illusion. 4 Descartes believed that body and mind are mutually exclusive substances; the body is a mechanically functioning system and simply the interaction of biological matter with nothing conscious about it whereas the mind is immaterial and the source of consciousness (Cottingham 1996). His famous expression, "I think, therefore I am" asserts that the self is the thinker, the consciousness, and the ultimate existence. Cartesian dualism is a subject of extensive debate by modern philosophers and scientists in various branches and led to the development of the socalled dualistic interactionism, monism, and dual-aspect theories of consciousness. However, neither the modern critics of Descartes nor his supporters separate self and consciousness. Prior to Descartes and ever since the Greek philosophers Aristotle, Plato, and others, Western philosophers considered the soul and self as the same; they were interested in the mind-body/world relationships and in self-development with regard to various metaphysical, spiritual, moral, and ethical aspects (Cottingham 1996). But they do not seem to make a distinction between consciousness and self explicitly. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 952 the latter called jada-prakriti is unconscious and includes inert matter. However, one should not confuse the limited consciousness of living beings with the all-pervading Consciousness of which the whole creation is a manifestation. Jada-prakriti, that is, material nature, is comprised of earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, intelligence, and ego (Bhagavad Gita 7:4). Every living being is a jiva (equivalent to soul in English), a non-material being who has chosen to associate and identify with a material body and to interact with the material world for sense enjoyment. Jiva survives bodily death. Jivas are infinitesimal sparks of Consciousness; the consciousness that a living being experiences is in relation to the being's physical body and depends upon the interaction with the Jada-prakriti. Hindu philosophy treats the self or ego as different from the soul5. The ego and the mind are things the soul carries as it were; they are qualities of the soul and are not conscious. Hindu philosophy believes that the soul can detach itself from the mind and ego, and get into the state of pure Consciousness by adequate effort in one’s life. Buddhism believes that some non-bodily components of aggregates survive bodily death similarly to the soul in Hinduism. Buddhism preaches that by detachment from ego and its cravings and being aware of the processes of mind and ego, the aggregates vanish and what remains is a higher level of consciousness free of all mental processes and worldly miseries. Nirvana is said to be one such state of a higher level of consciousness that is sometimes described as a state of nothingness or emptiness (cf. Nirvana, Wikipedia, 2011). All philosophers, both eastern and western, agree that the mind is dependent upon its memory for all its functions and that the sense of self and time (past, present, and future) are creations of the mind. Most theistic religions6 postulate that God is spirit but not matter, and that He is always conscious; they all preach their followers to surrender their selves to God (whom we have not seen!). It is a way of eliminating the role of self in performing various actions. However, Western religions do not explicitly point out that the self is not conscious by itself. Western philosophies do not explicitly state that the self is not the source of consciousness because they do not mention the possibility of an experience where there is no awareness of self. One Western philosopher who comes closest to the idea that reality not known to the mind may exist is Kant (1781/2003). He viewed the mind as being limited by its own abilities because it constructs our experience along certain lines (space, time, causality, self, etc.). Thus, thinking and experiencing give no access to things as they really are. No matter how sharp our thinking is, we cannot escape the inherent constraints of our minds. He also stated that God and souls are a matter of faith and unknowable by ordinary means. Jiddu Krishnamurti, a twentieth century philosopher, discussed concepts of self, memory, and awareness-without-the-self extensively. Although he claimed that he did not believe in any religion, his philosophy has similarities to Buddhist philosophy. Krishnamurti (1949) associated the self with memory: “It is the memory of yesterday – of possessions, of jealousies, of anger, of contradiction, of ambition, of what one ought or ought not to be – it is all these things that make up the I; and the I is not different from memory … memory is the self”. Here is another excerpt 5 The word “Atman” in Sanskrit is translated as self and very often misinterpreted to be the same as ego, particularly in the West. Ego, which is synonymous with “the self” in this article, is equivalent to “Ahamkara” in Sanskrit. Atman should be translated as soul and is different from ego or if Atman is translated as self then self should be interpreted as being different from ego. Atman is usually masked by ego but can get rid of it. According to Hinduism Atman is part of reality whereas ego or self is an illusion. 6 Buddhism never mentions God. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 953 from Krishnamurti’s (1953) work: "Mind is memory, at whatever level, by whatever name you call it; mind is the product of the past, it is founded on the past, which is memory, a conditioned state. Now with that memory we meet life, we meet a new challenge. The challenge is always new and our response is always old, because it is the outcome of the past. So experiencing without memory is one state and experiencing with memory is another.” Personal Identity and the Self Can one distinguish oneself from others without being aware of doing so? We need and use communications in the world that we live in. Communication, whether verbal or otherwise, involves at least two distinct entities, living or non-living, and therefore the act of communication depends upon the participating entities’ ability to distinguish themselves from one another. The essence of "I" is to consciously distinguish oneself from everything else in the universe. Here, the word “consciously” is important because, otherwise, a computer also distinguishes itself from everything else in the universe. That is why we are able to develop and use computer communications. If the programmer gives the name “I” to a robot, it will thereafter say “I know this”, “I did this”, and so on. But it does not have what we call self-awareness or any awareness in fact. So how does a computer or a robot distinguish itself from the rest of the world without being aware of anything? It is like this: The computer has a memory. The computer pretends to be aware of an object when a description of the object in some computer language is entered into its memory. Nowadays, many of us use personal computers and we are very much used to expressions like "the computer knows this", "it understands that", "it thinks", etc. In fact, we can precisely define what it means for a computer “to know” or “to be aware” of an object. Such phrases simply mean that the computer has a description of that object in its database. Once an object’s description is entered into this memory, thereafter the computer can perform any number of operations using that description. It can compare the object with other objects also “known” to it in the same way. It can add, subtract, compute functions of it, draw a picture of it, and so on. The computer can do almost anything that a person can do with that object and behave as though it knows and remembers the object without actually being aware of anything! Whether conscious or not, if one may say so, a memory can perceive an object in the following sense; a memory’s perception of an object is the object’s description that is stored in it. So, given any object material or mental, the computer either already “knows” it or does not “know” it according to the above definition. The computer’s knowledge divides the world into two parts – one which is known to it and the other not known to it. The computer establishes its identity (as the producer of a unique division of the universe) by the very existence of its memory as a common point of reference to all objects whose descriptions it contains. Now, the above definition of awareness applies to a human brain as well. Neuroscience tells us that a human being (or some other living being) is aware of an object, which may be material or mental, only when a physical representation (neural correlate) of that object exists in his/her brain’s memory (non-local or local or whatever the nature of the memory’s structure). Hence awareness requires creation of a record in a certain memory and therefore it is an outcome of a certain process. However, unlike the computer, we have this experience of being aware of objects, at least when awake. Therefore in the case of the brain, an experience associated with the neural record must also be created whenever the latter is created. Thus awareness of an ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 954 object or event (physical or mental) is the outcome of a process, a process that creates in a certain memory an experience that describes the object. So there must be a capability that enables the brain to produce awareness of whatever object is introduced to it7. Living beings have a set of capabilities that together may be called consciousness; one of them is the just described ability to produce awareness of objects (physical or mental). Another is to produce self-awareness. Since the self is an aspect of the memory as a whole, the process of production of self-awareness is much more complicated than the above described process of production of awareness of a content of the memory. Other abilities of consciousness include the ability to pay attention to an object and the ability to make choices consciously (unlike a computer), the socalled free will. Why did we go through the computer episode? It suggests that a memory is not necessarily conscious and that the sense of self may simply be one of the memory aspects of the mind because indeed, the mind is a memory. The episode also suggests the possibility that consciousness and the sense of individuality may be completely independent of one another. It raises the question, “If one with no consciousness can act with individuality, what about the opposites of both; in other words, can one have consciousness but act without exercising individuality?” The computer episode may also help to understand how self is related to delusion. Delusion and Self A computer can recognize patterns in the data presented to it. To do so, the computer needs some heuristics coded and entered into it beforehand. If heuristics are changed, the computer may find a different pattern when the same data are presented to it again. Or, if different heuristics are entered into two computers, then they recognize different patterns even if the same data are presented to them both. Hence the pattern that the computer perceives in the presented data depends upon some contents of its memory. In the case of the computer, the stored description of the pattern is purely material. It has no meaning for the computer. But not so in the case of the human brain, which creates a meaning and interpretation along with a neural representation of any observed object. The brain’s description of an object or an event has both physical and mental parts to it. The interpretation part is almost always based on values, experiences and desires all existing in the memory. It is similar to the computer’s interpretation of data to recognize patterns using the heuristics in its memory. Thus, how one perceives an event depends upon his/her past, that is, his/her personal memory and his/her self. That is why we say human perception is subjective8. Hence subjective perceptions of two people observing the same event can be different and usually they are. 7As already said, according to ancient Indian Philosophy, mental records are not conscious by themselves just like their associated neural records. Similarly, the process of creating mental records, that is, experiences, is just as mechanical (not conscious) as the process of creating neural records. Their thesis is that the mind may behave as if it is conscious (like the computer!) but is not really conscious. It appears to be conscious because of its source, Consciousness (with big C), which is beyond the physical body, the universe perceived by the senses, and the mind. Consciousness is the source of all creation and the source of everything that we ever know. Matter appears not to be conscious also because of the same source! 8 Searle (2000) describes subjectivity as follows: “Subjective conscious states … are experienced by some ‘I’ that has the experience, and it is in that sense that they have first-person ontology.” ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 955 If two people describe the same event in two different ways, which one is the correct description? What is the truth? This confusion arises particularly while judging one’s own action or another’s. For example, I may make a donation to a charity to claim tax deduction but think that I did so unselfishly and out of pure compassion because I often heard that it is somehow great to be selfless. Or, I might have made the donation selflessly but somebody else who did not may be jealous of me and say that I did it for the sake of tax deduction. They may also rationalize their stinginess by thinking that the particular charity is not properly organized. The self rationalizes because it wants to feel good and the desire to feel good is always there in the mind. Thus, involvement of self in forming a perception leads to delusion. Can One Be Conscious Without the Sense of “I”? (Is it possible to transcend the self?) Saints and philosophers have been answering “yes” to this question since a long time. But how does one get to that state, by trial and error? Well, they have also been suggesting various techniques to achieve self-transcendence. Here are some examples: Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950) known to some in the west, used to call the sense of self as the Ithought. He used two words “Self” and “self” in his teachings (Ramana Maharshi 1982). The former (with big S) is what remains when the sense of self ceases to exist; in other words, Self is the state of self-transcendence. He explained (Godman 2002): You see, the one who eliminates the “not I” cannot eliminate the “I”. To say “I am not this” or “I am that” there must be an “I”. This “I” is only the ego or the I-thought. After the rising up of this I-thought, all other thoughts arise. The I-thought is therefore the root thought. If the root is pulled out all others are at the same time uprooted. Therefore, seek the root “I”, question yourself “Who am I?” Find the source and then all these other ideas will vanish and the pure Self will remain. He talked about a technique called who-am-I or self-inquiry to remove the I-thought. The technique is to introspectively question oneself from where this thought is coming; he said that the thought of self disappears if one looks deeply inside for it (Ramana Maharshi 2007): For all thoughts the source is the I-thought. The mind will merge only by Self-enquiry “Who am I?” The thought “Who am l?” will destroy all other thoughts and finally kill itself also. If other thoughts arise, without trying to complete them, one must enquire to whom this thought arose. What does it matter how many thoughts arise? As each thought arises one must be watchful and ask to whom this thought is occurring. The answer will be “to me”. If you enquire “Who am I?” the mind will return to its source (or where it issued from). The thought which arose will also submerge. As you practice like this more and more, the power of the mind to remain as its source is increased. Self (with big S) is the same as Consciousness or pure consciousness free of the mind9. 9 Unlike the self that distinguishes itself from the rest of the creation, Self identifies itself with everything in the creation. In the experience of Self, there is nothing different from the Self. Some (Vivekananda and Krishnamurti among others) have reported an experience in which everything they see, hear, touch, eat, drink, and so on, as being ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 956 Krishnamurti’s talks and writings are all about being conscious, aware or observant without any involvement of self. “Only when the activity of the self, of memory, ceases is there a wholly different Consciousness, about which any speculation is a hindrance” (Krishnamurti 1946). Furthermore: “The memory of technical things is essential; but the psychological memory that maintains the self, the ‘me’ and the ‘mine’, that gives identification and self-continuance, is wholly detrimental to life and to reality. When one sees the truth of that, the false drops away; therefore there is no psychological retention of yesterday's experience” (Krishnamurti 1953). As already said, most religions preach surrendering to God. It is a way of transcending the self. Can One Be Conscious Without the Sense of “I” for a Few Moments? Obviously, it is not easy to practice Ramana Maharshi’s technique of self-inquiry or to stop the mind from thinking as Krishnamurti suggests and be conscious all the time without the sense of “I”. Nor it is easy to surrender oneself to God because we do not see Him nor hear Him and therefore do not know what if any, He is telling us to do in a situation. Usually, those who attend places of worship (of any religion) and read their scriptures regularly think of themselves as sincere practitioners of their religion and therefore think that they have surrendered themselves to God. But such actions do not necessarily imply that the self is surrendered; they do involve the self if the purpose of performing them is to derive the satisfaction of being a religious person. So, let us ask a slightly modified version of the question of the previous section as follows: Can one be conscious without the “I” at least for a moment? Since we saw in an earlier section that a property of the self is to distinguish itself from others, let us modify the second question further as: Can one exist in a conscious state even for a moment, without feeling separate from everything else in the universe? Let us simplify it further: Can one identify with (as opposed to distinguish from) one other or a few other beings, for a moment or longer, although not with the whole world? Identification Versus Separation This last question seems to be not as difficult to try to find an answer as the previous ones are. We all heard of the fairly common expression “to put oneself in somebody else’s shoes”. For example, sometimes, when a friend is in financial troubles, we may sympathize and try to help. Other times, we do not feel the same sympathy and may just pass a judgment like “he should not have spent beyond his means” or some other remark. Compassion and sympathy indicate that we have identified with the other person and felt his/her anguish and wish that the problem would go away just like he/she does: we have put our feet in the other person's shoes. When we are not compassionate or sympathetic, we have separated ourselves from the other person; their problem is not ours. Usually we identify ourselves with our immediate families; we are happy when they are all happy, we are sad when any of them is not doing well. We say that a mother's love for her children is selfless because she does things for them not minding her own comfort. When we love another person or an animal, a pet for example, we identify ourselves with that person or animal. So, we do have some selfless, not necessarily rare, moments in our lives. the same as themselves. (In section headings the self written with big S is not to be confused with this Self.) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 957 Most probably, every reader of this article must have given donation to one or more charities sometime or other, and I did too. I cooked food and served it in homeless shelters and gave money to charities collecting money for food for the poor and orphans purely out of sympathy towards the unfortunate ones but not with the purpose of claiming a tax deduction on my income tax returns. The source of those actions is selflessness. But its scope is very limited in terms of both time and effort. Did it have an effect on my worldview? Yes, in the following way: The effect occurred soon after identifying my self with the unfortunate; it is to feel compassionate towards them. My view of the homeless changed at least to the extent that, until then, I was not thinking about their problems and anxieties, but the act of identification made me do a little something about it. How long I continue to contribute to charitable work depends upon how long the effect lasts. Interestingly, the same action of charity may be done with or without involvement of self. If I make a donation to make a name for myself or for tax deduction purposes, such a donation is initiated by my self because it seeks some benefit for itself from the results of the action; the motive for the action is not selfless but is instead selfish. An action of charity is selfless only if I do it completely for the sake of the unfortunate. Hence the actual physical action can be the same whether it is initiated selflessly or by the self. Only an unbiased introspection, that is, one without the involvement of self can reveal the true nature (selfish or selfless) of an action. All living beings have an instinct for survival that makes us compete for resources. We kill other life to satisfy our hunger; we cannot help it. That is the way life is: “Number one comes first!” However, incidents like the following one reported on the web do occur sometimes. It may be true or not, but it is possible that the incident happened: Amar Ali was swimming near the Konodas Bridge in Gilgit when the tides swept him away into the roaring Hanisara (local name of River Gilgit). Israr, a fifteen-year old teenager, jumped into the river upon seeing Amar drowning. To the surprise and delight of hundreds of onlookers, Israr fought against the wild currents and was able to save the life of Amar. In this story, clearly the teenager overcame his sense of self and identified himself with the drowning person. He was not thinking as much about his own life as he was about the drowning person’s life. He felt the same urgency to get out of the drowning situation as the drowning person. That is why he jumped into the river. This is an example of risking one’s own life out of compassion. On the other hand, suicide bombers do more than risk their lives; they give up their lives not out of compassion but out of revenge towards a community or for a political purpose. This act is not initiated completely without self-interest because the purpose of the act is either to derive the satisfaction of harming the other community and/or to obtain financial benefit for the family. These purposes are given a higher priority in their brains/minds over their own survival. That is why a lot of preplanning happened prior to the act. The bombers do not identify themselves with their victims; they want their victims dead, which is not what the victims want. It is as though our self is at the center of an expandable balloon filled with what we may call a sense of identification or sense of self. I-thought is at the center of the balloon and identifies itself with our body and its associated experiences. For most people, the balloon expands to include their family. For some the balloon expands to include friends and for others it may enclose the community they were born into or the country they were born in or living in, and so on. In the mother-child example mentioned above, the mother’s balloon has the child inside. Whenever we love somebody without expecting anything in return for ourselves, our sense of self extends to include the other being. In a moment of love with no expectation for any returns, we are one with ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 958 whom we love; the sense of distinction, duality, separation, and all that the self or I-thought stands for disappear; hence it is a self-transcending experience. However, it is self-transcending in a limited way if the love is only for the person/s being loved but not for others. For example, if a mother loves her own children but is jealous of other children, her transcendence of self is limited. In the story of the last paragraph, when the teenager jumped into the river, nothing else in the world other than the drowning person occupied his mind, so he is not aware of his self at that moment. Afterwards, when the whole rescuing operation is over, Israr must have felt happy and even proud of himself when onlookers praised him; feeling proud in such an occasion is not bad but it simply indicates the return of the “I”. On the other hand, people like Jesus Christ and Mahatma Gandhi are said not to have had selfinterest ever in their whole lives; whatever they did was for the well being of others and without discrimination of any kind. This means that means their balloon of identification covers everybody and everything and all the time. They lived in the self-transcendent mode throughout their lives. In the Gita the Lord Krishna said: “That Yogi is the best of all Yogis who looks upon everyone as equal to himself [or herself] and considers happiness and unhappiness of others as his own” (Bhagavad Gita 6:32, Dhyana-yoga). The Bible says the same thing “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” (Matthew 22:39). Here, the first scripture is describing how a person in the state of self-transcendence would behave towards others and the second one is commanding us to transcend self in our treatment of others. Attention and self We forget our “I” when we are listening to somebody or something seriously. We have heard the phrase, the art of listening, and know how useful and powerful listening is. Listening involves paying attention to what is being heard. One can learn something only when one pays attention to what is being said, or heard, or read. The longer we can keep our attention focused, the better we learn. At the moment of complete attention, only the object of attention occupies the mind, there is no I-thought at that moment. Attention span varies from person to person. Vivekananda's memory was very sharp (Prosad 1997); at the age of only six, he could recite a whole book of Sanskrit verses. If he heard anything once he remembered it throughout his life. Once he read a book he could recall word by word of that book any time and any place. This was because whatever he did he paid his full attention to it. Usually for most people, the attention span is fairly short because mind wanders. For example, when we are studying for an examination and trying to concentrate, other thoughts keep on creeping in. Still, whenever we have learned a fact or a mathematical theorem for example, we must have paid attention to it while reading it or listening to somebody who said it; the self steps aside during moments of such attention. Of course, the memory is present during the act of observation even while paying attention, because what is learnt is recorded immediately in the brain. However, such recording of facts does not depend upon any contents already existing in the memory; the recording is similar to a person’s writing the observed facts on a clean paper directly; the paper has no influence on what is being written on it. Recording of what is attentively observed is unlike a computer’s recognition of patterns, described in the earlier section on delusion, where the pattern perceived by the computer depended upon the heuristics which were already contents of the memory; ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 959 here, the already existing contents influence what is being written at present. Thus one may say that a perception is what is recorded in the memory when the self participates in the act of recording whereas factual knowledge is what is directly recorded by consciousness without the participation of self10. Krishnamurti (1953) seems to agree with this notion of two kinds of memory: factual and perceptual; he calls the latter psychological memory. Here is an experience of mine in which I overcame stage fear by paying attention to what I presented rather than to my anticipated perception of me by the audience. My heart used to start pounding just before I proceeded to the platform. My supervisor, who observed me and understood my problem, suggested to me to try to speak slower. I followed his advice. To try to speak slower than I did before, I had to pay attention to each word I was saying and it worked! Anxiety and fear were out of my mind! I tried to speak slowly during only one or two presentations but stage fear is gone forever. While I listened to my own words, those words alone occupied my mind and the thought of how the audience will receive my presentation was not in the domain of my awareness. After a few attempts, my mind must have gotten used to directing my brain to speak slowly and pay full attention to what I was saying. Of course, while making a presentation, it is good to be sensitive to whether the audience is receiving clearly what one intends to convey. In that case, attention is paid to the audience’s response in the spirit of service but not in the spirit of what is in it for the presenter, success or failure. Hence one may look for the audience’s response either selfishly or selflessly. One only knows how it is done but cannot prove it to somebody else that it is done selflessly. Professors, particularly mathematicians and physicists, are known to be absent-minded. A wellknown story about Newton goes like this: Newton once invited a friend for dinner. The friend arrived as scheduled to dine with him. Finding him deeply absorbed in working out a mathematical problem, the friend sat down to wait. Sometime afterwards, someone brought dinner from the kitchen but only for one, and put it on the table because Newton had forgotten about inviting the friend. When Newton continued to work at his desk, the friend, in order not to disturb him, ate Newton's meal. A little later, Newton, having finished his work, finally looked up and was surprised by both the presence of his friend and the empty dinner plate. Looking at the empty plate he said, “If it weren't for the proof before my eyes, I could have thought that I had not yet eaten.” The point of the story is that all of Newton’s attention was focused on the mathematical problem and everything happening around him escaped his notice. In the state of absorption, Newton was thinking only about the problem and its solution; there is no thought of even “I” in that state. Full attention to an object whether external or mental, pushes out all other thoughts from the domain of the mind’s awareness. Solving a mathematical problem consists of a 10 The computer’s memory has two components: one is a database, which is a set of static records and is the passive component; the other is software, which is a set of instructions and the active component. When turned on, the software becomes dynamic and creates new records in the database using input data. Heuristics are software entities that the computer operator can turn on or off; s/he can enter the pattern directly into the database instead of seeking assistance from the software if s/he so chooses. (Of course, a computer user does not want to do so under ordinary circumstances.) On the other hand, a paper, although it is a memory device, has no software, the active component; the paper is similar to the computer’s database. The brain/mind is more like a computer than a paper in that the brain/mind’s memory has both passive and active components; the self is an active aspect of the memory because it is associated with the entire memory. But it seems that it is possible for consciousness to create records in the brain’s memory without involving the self just like a computer user can enter and save data in the database without invoking the software. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 960 sequence of thoughts to which the mind pays attention one after another while solving the problem. During that time, if one can concentrate, no other thought draws mind’s attention to it, nor does any sensory input from the external world draw mind’s attention. Attention to an object (physical or mental) is required to recognize or be aware of that object. One does not have to be a Newton to be so absorbed in what one does. When I was working on my thesis for my mathematics degree, I used to be absentminded the same way. When I was thinking about solution to a mathematical problem, I would not know if a visitor came even if they passed by me. I would not say hello to a friend even though I was staring at her; my eyes were looking at her but not I. Knowing me well, friends did not feel offended. They used to wake me up, so to speak, from my state of absorption and then I would respond. There seems to be an interesting effect on one’s mind itself of such attentive thinking, particularly when the solution to the problem occurs to the mind later but not while thinking about it. The object of thinking need not be a mathematical problem; it could be an idea in an essay or in a piece of poetry yet to be written or completed. We hear of people having a eurekalike experience sometime later, a few hours or few days later after having stopped thinking about it. The solution to the problem or what to write in the poem or essay strikes the mind suddenly like lightning from the blue, when one is not thinking about it. I had that experience many times. Since there is no related effort when the idea creeps into the mind (I might be thinking about something unrelated), awareness of self seems to be interrupted momentarily. The experience certainly has an element of surprise in it if not mystery. I do not know if psychologists and neuroscientists have an explanation of why the idea reveals itself so suddenly. Sense of Agency and self Often, religious people of any faith have something to say about how creative ideas occur to our minds. I have a Christian friend who is a firm believer. If I tell her that I am working on writing an article she would say, “Surrender yourself to the Lord. He will show you what to write! A Hindu poet of the fifteenth century and well known for his translation of the Bhagavatam, a book of stories of Lord Vishnu, writes in the preface that “He is the author and I write what He wants me to” (Bammera Potana 2004). Both statements imply that a writer needs to or does set aside the sense of self while doing creative work. They imply that creative inspiration occurs when the self retires from the scene of action11. As said before, surrendering oneself to God is a way of letting go of the self. In fact, one of the main teachings of the Gita is that the right way to do any work is to do it without the sense of agency, that is, without feeling something like “This task cannot be, or would not have been accomplished without my undertaking it”. Again, surrendering oneself to God is not at all easy because one does not know what God wants one to do. One may do what one’s self wants, or what one thinks is the best thing to do under the given circumstances but strongly believe that he/she has acted according to God’s will12. Such belief is usually a 11 In the context of discussing the relation between time and experience, Nixon (2010) expresses a similar idea: “It may be possible to somewhat escape the self-constructed prison of time-past through creative inspiration or spontaneous action in a crisis situation.” We have already seen in an earlier section, in the story of the teenager’s rescue of the person drowning in the river, how he overcame self in a crisis situation. 12 Scriptures (of any religion in general), are interpreted differently by different people making it difficult to understand the religion and much more difficult to practice it. Hypocritical but passionate practice of different ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 961 delusion created by the self. In the case of my overcoming-stage-fear experience, let us look into what was causing the anxiety when it did. One of the causes is the need to do well and thereby avoid failure. What is success? Approval of what I say by the audience and failure is disapproval by them. The anxiety arises because of forgetting that one cannot control others’ reactions or judgments and therefore trying to find a way to please the audience but not knowing how to do it. In other words, anxiety arises because of thinking that I am responsible not only for how I perform, but also for their reaction. When I pay full attention to what I say, but not to me, this sense of agency disappeared. Actually, if I paid full attention to the topic of my presentation when I prepared it, the sense of self was not present even during the preparation as we saw earlier. Here are two of my experiences in one of which I feel that I am the doer, and in the other, I simply implement somebody else’s instructions. I taught mathematics in a university in India. As part of my job, I graded students’ answer sheets after exams. Answers in the final exam were evaluated by teachers within the university as well as by external examiners and averages of internal and external grades were used to decide pass or fail and rank. Internal evaluators were, in general, generous because they wanted to compensate for any low grades from external evaluations that are usually rigorous. They wanted more students to score high grades and the department to have a good reputation. Students were also pleased to have secured good grades, so everybody was happy. Somehow, students’ grades from my evaluation were usually much lower than those from other teachers and close to those from external evaluators. As a result, the faculty members were not thrilled to see my grades. On my part, I was also happy if students got good grades. I did not intend to be mean to them. I could not even show partiality because students were not supposed to write their names on answer sheets. In mathematics, an answer is either correct or incorrect; usually there is no in-between. If I gave a full grade for an incorrect answer, I would be unfair to ones who wrote the correct answer; moreover, it misleads the one who wrote the wrong answer. I did not know how to change my evaluation scale to produce better results, but I was unhappy that I could not improve their grades. A few years later, I was a teaching assistant in a computer science department and used to help my professor with the grading work. He would give me a paper with instructions showing what grades to assign to different answers. I followed them and had complete peace of mind! Whatever grades students secured did not bother me as they did before. I was not responsible for what they got. Attachment to Results of Action and self When I was a student in computer science, my advisor had his first baby. At that time, I had a three year old child. In my house, we had an electric swing that I had bought for the child when he was born, but was not being used because he outgrew it. I thought it could be useful to my advisor and his wife to put their baby to sleep, so I asked my husband to take it out and check religions by different communities without proper understanding of their religion has been the cause of several wars throughout history. It is the abusive practice of religions that has created the generation of today’s suicide bombers. In any case, hurting someone is not a selfless action unless it is done for the sake of well-being of that someone or others, as in the well-known examples of a doctor performing surgery on a patient or a judge sentencing of a serial killer to death. Any action based in hatred, jealousy, vengeance, etc. implies the perpetrator’s separating himself/herself from the victim but not identification with the victim because the victim does not want to be hurt. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 962 whether it is still working. Two or three days later, I asked him whether he checked the swing; he said he did and that the swing was working, so I offered the swing to my advisor and he accepted the offer. He invited me and my husband to come over to his place and bring the swing. One evening we went to his place and, after some conversation, my husband opened the box, took the swing out and set it up. There it was: the swing looked fine but when the button was pressed it would not swing! I was totally embarrassed. Of course, our hosts did not complain at all, and after spending some more time there, we came home. But my mind was not at peace. I went on thinking, “I should have checked the swing myself,” or “Should I buy a new one and give it to them?” or “Why did I offer it in the first place?” and so on. I was thinking about the incident so constantly that I could not concentrate on the subject matter when I was in the class. A few days later, following the suggestion of a friend, I went to talk to the university psychologist about this state of mine. She praised me for being so concerned about keeping a promise, said that I need not worry because the swing could still work by pushing by hand, and other such words to calm me. One of them was that my advisor and wife were probably pleased anyway and might not think any less of me. When I heard that, the real reason for my unhappiness suddenly dawned on me. I was not worried for the young parents, but I was worried for myself; I was worried that I might have lost my advisor’s good impressions of me. I was worried that he might have thought of me as a disorganized person. Why I did not give them a new swing was also for the same reason: I was worried that if I did so, then he might think that I was overdoing things to win his favors because I already gave a gift to the baby. The realization put an end to my unhappiness. At the moment of realization, the introspection was not by my self; it was as though somebody else with no bias whatsoever looked at the contents of my mind and showed me what the real reason for unhappiness was. The realization also detached me from all consequences of what took place. Even if I believed what the psychologist said (that my advisor did not mind what happened), I would have probably overcome my unhappiness but not my self, and I would not have found the cause of unhappiness. A similar incident happened another time. Knowing that I was about to visit India, an old man who was a friend of my father asked me to bring him a radio. So I bought one that works on both 110 and 220 volts DC. The storekeeper tested it in front of me here in the U.S. and then gave it to me. I took it to India and gave the unopened box to my father’s friend when he came to visit us. He opened it and put the radio’s power plug into the power outlet before I could ask him to check what the DC setting was. The radio blew up at once, probably because the shopkeeper left the switch setting on 110 volts. We were all disappointed. Next day, I bought a new radio and gave it to him and we were all happy. This time there was no dilemma whether to buy another one or not because I was not worried about what he would think of me if I did or did not. I was free to buy or not to buy. I was not controlled by the anticipated results of the action. I bought a new radio anyway because I identified myself with him. I was one with him all along: when I first bought the radio, he wanted it, so I wanted it; when it exploded, he was disappointed and I was disappointed; when I bought it the second time, both of us were happy again. It is interesting how the self creates big delusion in this context. The first experience described above shows that my anticipation of the results of buying a new swing controls the self’s present action. The other experience shows that lack of any expectation as a result of the action allows freedom to act, how to act or not to act. However, the self always thinks that it is the initiator, doer, and controller of all actions, whereas it is actually being controlled by the past or ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 963 anticipated responses of its own actions from other Conclusion The principles that I have used in my analysis of an experience are as follows: The self is an aspect of the mind which, as defined in the beginning of the article, is a memory. When a perception of the self’s encounter with the world is created, the perception is dependent upon the contents of the memory and therefore may be a distorted view of reality. On the other hand, withdrawal of self from the act of observation brings awareness of reality. The same is true when one tries to evaluate or judge one’s own thoughts although, in this case, the objects of observation are internal to the mind/brain. After forming a perception, the self reacts. When somebody praises me I feel good; when somebody insults me I feel offended. All emotions such as joy, sorrow, pleasure, and pain are reactions to what the self receives from the outside world; they depend upon whether what is received is what the self wanted or not. Emotions such as anxiety and fear are responses to anticipation of future events, but the anticipation (an image of the future event) is already in the memory. Therefore, reactions depend upon the memory contents just like perceptions do. When the self initiates an action, it does so based on expectations, perceptions, and reactions. On the other hand, if I do not mind what another person says about me, then my ego is not acting up. If so, what others say or think will not affect my actions. Hence the self is not involved in those actions that are not based on perceptions, prejudices or anticipated results of those actions. My observation is that almost always self is involved in our thinking, actions, and perceptions of the world. As Nixon (2010) says: “Only rarely can we escape the context of self through which our life experience is filtered…” However, in the lives of ordinary people who have basic human values but who may or may not practice meditation, yoga, or other techniques of mind control, the self still steps aside momentarily now and then. The frequency of occurrence of such moments may vary from person to person. Introspection and analysis of one’s own experiences certainly helps understand the nature of the mind and may help to increase the frequency and duration of the self-transcendent state. As we saw above, a few moments of absence of self in my experience have nothing mysterious about them. Such moments may bring memories of similar moments to the mind of the reader. Acknowledgements I thank Greg Nixon for the various comments in his review and editorial corrections. I thank my son Pradip Hari for checking the correctness of the computer-related concepts. References Bammera Potana (2004) Bhagavatam. Rohini Publications. Chapter 1:18th verse. Online: http://www.telugubhakti.com/telugupages/Bhagavatam/Bhagavtam.htm Bhagavad Gita (n.d.). Online: http://www.bhagavad-gita.org/ Cottingham J. (Ed.) (1996). Western Philosophy: An Anthology. Blackwell. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 949-964 Hari, S., How Often or How Rarely Does a Self-Transcending Experience Occur? 964 Descartes R. (1901). Meditations on First Philosophy (J. Veitch, Trans). Original publication in Latin 1641. Online: http://www.wright.edu/cola/descartes/mede.html Godman D. (2002). Ramana Maharshi, His Life and Teachings. http://www.davidgodman.org/rteach/whoami1.shtml Holy Bible (1901). American Standard Version. Online: http://asvbible.com/matthew/22.htm Hume D. (1967). A Treatise of Human Nature. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Original publication 1781. Online: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4705 Kant, I. (2003). The Critique of Pure Reason (J.M.D. Meiklejohn, Trans.). Original publication in German 1781. Online: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4280 Krishnamurti J. (1946). The observer is the observed. Online: http://www.jiddukrishnamurti.net/en/1945-1948-observer-is-observed/krishnamurti-the-observer-is-theobserved-46-02 Krishnamurti J. (1949). 14th Public Talk (Ojai, California). Online: http://www.jiddukrishnamurti.net/en/1949/1949-08-28-jiddu-krishnamurti-14th-public-talk Krishnamurti J. (1953). On Memory. Online: http://www.jiddu-krishnamurti.net/en/the-firstand-last-freedom/1953-00-00-jiddu-krishnamurti-the-first-and-last-freedom-on-memory Luisi P.L. (2008).The two pillars of Buddhism: Consciousness and ethics. Journal of Consciousness Studies 15 (1): 84–107. Nirvana (2011). Wikipedia. Online: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana Nixon G.M. (2010). Time & experience: Twins of the eternal now? Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research 1(5): 482-489. Prosad N.S. (1997). Swami Vivekananda: A reassessment. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press. Ramana Maharshi. (2007). Who Am I? Enquiry. http://www.sriramanamaharshi.org/teachings.html# Ramana Maharshi. (1982). Who am I? In the teachings of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi (T.M.P. Mahadevan, Trans.). Sri Ramanasramam Tiruvannamalai India. Original in Tamil 1923. Online: http://www.sriramanamaharshi.org/whoam.html Searle, J.R. (2000). Consciousness. Annual Review of Neuroscience 23: 557–578. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 770 Higgs Report Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson Philip E. Gibbs* Abstract This is a live Higgs report from the webcast of CERN Announcement on July 4, 2012 plus viXra unofficial Higgs combinations and my analysis after the announcement. As expected, CERN has happily announced the arrival of a new Boson. The facts are that the boson discovered with a mass of about 125 GeV or 126 GeV interacts with a wide range of particles in exactly the way the Higgs boson should. Its decay modes to Z, W, b and tau have just the right ratios and its production has also been tested in different ways confirming indirectly that its coupling to the top quark is also about right. Its spin could be 0 or 2 but 0 is much more likely. All these features point to the standard model Higgs boson. The only fly in the ointment is its decay rate to two photons. This is nearly twice as large as expected. The significance of the discrepancy with the standard model is about 2.5 sigma. Key Words: Higgs live, Higgs discovery, July 4th, 2012, CERN, LHC, ATLAS, CME, viXra combination. Higgs Live plus viXra Combinations A year ago I started to get fired up about the prospects for the Higgs boson discovery as it become clear that the Large Hadron Collider was performing so well that they would either find it, or prove that it does not exist, at least not in the form most expected. We had three major progress updates from the LHC last year with the amount of data being analysed doubling each time bringing better and better signs that a signal was emerging from the noise. At first the heavier ranges for its mass were ruled out. Then, in December the last major announcement left many theorists such as myself cautiously optimistic that the Higgs boson has finally been glimpsed in its last refuge at a mass of about 125 GeV. Officially the physicists who speak for the experiments have remained cautious but now they have enough data to settle the matter conclusively. This years initial runs of the proton accelerator have already delivered as much collision data as it produced last year, and CERN has announced another meeting to update the figures once again. Rumours have spread that the new data contains the same signal seen before by both the large detectors CMS and ATLAS that have been searching for the Higgs boson at the collision points * Correspondence: Philip E. Gibbs, Ph.D., Independent Researcher, UK. E-Mail: phil@royalgenes.com Note: This Special Report is adopted from http://blog.vixra.org/2012/07/04/higgs-live-vixra-combinations/ ; and http://blog.vixra.org/2012/07/04/congratulations-its-a-boson/ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 771 of the Large Hadron Collider. If this is true then it is just possible that either or both of the teams that run the detectors will be able to tell us that they have seen a signal with the 5 sigma significance required to claim a discovery. If they don’t reach that goal individually, the combination of the two almost certainly will. As I write the auditorium at CERN is letting in the physicists who have been queueing all night for their place. Several will be live blogging from there but I will be reporting from home using the live webcast. Is 5-sigma necessary for a discovery? We have been assuming that a discovery announcement would require a level of significance of 5 sigma equivalent 30 a one in 3 million chance of the signal happening as just a background fluctuation is there is really nothing there. This morning some of the live bloggers are playing down this requirement which suggests that they might not reach 5 sigma but that the overall levels of significance could be considered sufficient. We will see what they actually say shortly. 08:55 Higgs applauded as he takes his seat 09:00 DG opens the meeting Incandela, CMS spokesman starts with pile-up slide. Pile-up could be an excuse for any anomalies. 8:24 Far too much detail for time allowed. 8:30 Amazing signal from combining 7 TeV + 8 TeV in diphoton channel for CMS ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 772 They have used 5.5/fb from 2012 data. Here is the exclusion plot ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 773 4lepton also looks good. Combined significance is 5 sigma! = Discovery WW looks OK too, only 8 TeV not combined with 7 TeV Mass of Higgs is 125.3 += 0.6 GeV, combined significance 4.9 sigma ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 774 All channels consistent with SM but diphoton a little enhanced 8:53: Now starting the ATLAS presentation Diphoton channel for ATLAS also showing a distinct signal. They get 4.5 sigma combining 2011 with 2012, used 5.9 sigma Signal is nearly twice the standard model Even in the 4-lepton channel the signal looks clear on the evnt plots ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 775 3.6 sigma in this channel In combined channels ATLAS reach 5 sigma at 126.5 GeV = discovery! Interesting that the mass value is still a little inconsistent with CMS. Both experiments are showing exvess anove standard model in diphoton channel. This is even nore exciting than the discovery DG says “I think we have it, do you agree?” “We have a discovery, a particle consistent with the Higgs boson” Now I have to combine those diphoton channels to see how significant the excess really is, BRB 11:47 This is what DG warned you against… The combined diphoton plot gives a 6 sigma signal. It is 2.4 sigma stronger than the standard model. This is what the signal plot lokks like. Rememner the grenn line is the standard model level, red line is background level ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 776 I will refine these when I have clearer plots to work from The slides are now online. 13:44 I have been occupied with other things but will add some more combos later. There are lots of plots to digitise, 14:10 For those patiently waiting here is the unofficial combination for ZZ to four leptons. Significance is an impressive 4.6 sigma ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 777 The signal plot shows that in this channel it matches perfectly the standard model Higgs For completeness here is the combination of the two low resolution channels across ATLAS+CMS. This one gives 7.4 sigma Notice that we have now eliminated any possibility of a second boson nearby, unless they are too close to separate. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 778 Congratulations, It’s a Boson Congratulations, It is a Boson. Have you thought of a name yet? CERN have happily announced the arrival of a new Boson but so far are being a bit cagey about what to call it. Is it the Higgs? Their caution as experimenters is perfectly laudable. They should show that they are keeping an open mind, but theorists are independent of the process of discovery and do not need to be so reticent. The facts are that the boson discovered with a mass of about 125 GeV or 126 GeV interacts with a wide range of particles in exactly the way the Higgs boson should. Its decay modes to Z, W, b and tau have just the right ratios and its production has also been tested in different ways confirming indirectly that its coupling to the top quark is also about right. Its spin could be 0 or 2 but 0 is much more likely. All these features point to the standard model Higgs boson. The only fly in the ointment is its decay rate to two photons. This is nearly twice as large as expected. The significance of the discrepancy with the standard model is about 2.5 sigma. It could be a fluke. We have learnt to show some healthy skepticism when it comes to observations of physics beyond the standard model. However it is also consistent with an enhancement due to the presence of another charged boson. If that boson exists it must have a mass at least a bit larger than the W otherwise the Higgs would decay to this particle in pairs and we would see the effect on the other decay rates. It can’t be too massive otherwise it would not enhance the diphoton rate enough. But it is likely to be possible to find a range of masses and properties that is consistent with all the observations. So it is not necessary to invoke any properties for the observed boson that are any different from the standard model. Separate new physics will suffice. So the observed boson passes several tests required by the Higgs and I think that it is reasonable to assume that is indeed the Higgs boson until some observation suggests otherwise. It will always be possible to think of other models that could fit the facts, but they are not likely to be quite as economical as the standard model. It would be a disservice to the theorists who provided the theory 50 years ago if we continue to refuse to acknowledge the clear nature of this discovery when there is no evidence to the contrary. They predicted it would be just like this and It is the Higgs boson. Congratulations to all the experimenters and theorists who made this dream come to life. Update: Here is the global Higgs combination. Is that conclusive enough now? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 770-779 Gibbs, P. E., Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson 779 References 1. http://blog.vixra.org/2012/07/04/higgs-live-vixra-combinations/ 2. http://blog.vixra.org/2012/07/04/congratulations-its-a-boson/ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1174 Exploration A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III Claudio Messori* ABSTRACT This series of articles present a physicalist account on the origin of human consciousness. What is presented is a cosmogonic model based on the centrality of Tension assumed as an intrinsic and irreducible ontological presupposition associated with a pre-energetic undifferentiated and totipotent proto-dynamic principle (dynamis), whose differentiation gives birth to a space-time system of correlative interactions between physical objects denominated differentiated tensorial fractals (or tangent tensions) and undifferentiated tensorial fractals (or qualia). To describe the structure and dynamics that qualify the fundamental space-time dimension we can make use of the holographic principle, fractal self-similarity and the role reserved to the twisting moment (torque) in certain dual torus topology. In this light, human consciousness is recognized as the ecological and neuropsychological result obtained from the joint action realized through the holographic module, between poietic function, syntropic function and mnemotropic function the meanings of which shall be defined in the articles. Part III of this series of articles contain: 4. Phenomenology of the transition between nonexcited and excited regimes of the Irreducible Relativistic Dimension: fundamental physical ontology; 5. Principle of Minimum Perturbation (PMiP) and Principle of Maximum Perturbation (PMaP); and 6. Phenomenology of the event-horizon and space-time. Key words: consciousness, states of consciousness, image-making, qualia, psychism, autoorganization, strange holographic attractor, syntropy, entropy, negentropy, mnemotropy, mnemopoiesis, confinement process, dynamis, holographic-fractal space-time, event-horizon, , toroid-poloid, tension, torque, Coriolis force, spin-internal motion. Dedicated to the Jungian unus mundus 4. Phenomenology of the transition between non-excited and excited regimes of the Irreducible Relativistic Dimension: fundamental physical ontology The fundamental level is to be found in the dynamics, in the idea of a physical process, which is something which, by definition, cannot be an independent unit, since it is always in between its beginning and its ending. Each process is the result of, and leads to other processes. In this way processes can be seen as forming an indivisible, dynamical pattern, a holistic structure, from which the geometrical structure of space-time is to be abstracted. Heylighen Francis (A Structural Language for the Foundations of Physics) The relativistic plane can assume two forms or two coexisting and integrated space-time dimensions, one irreducible (IRD, Irreducible Relativistic Dimension) and one reducible * Corresponding author: Claudio Messori, Independent Researcher, Str. Villaggio Prinzera 1, Fraz. Boschi di Bardone, Terenzo 43040, Italy. Phone: +393282876077; e-mail: messori.claudio@gmail.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1175 (RRD, Reducible Relativistic Dimension) which are to be found reciprocally in torque-torque coupling, and each of which presents two regimes: i) a non-excited regime (N-EIRD, Non-Excited Irreducible Relativistic Dimension; NERRD, Non-Excited Reducible Relativistic Dimension), ii) and an excited regime (EIRD, Excited Irreducible Relativistic Dimension; ERRD, Excited Reducible Relativistic Dimension). The irreducible form of the relativistic dimension in the quiet or non-excitated regime (N-EIRD, Non-Excited Irreducible Relativistic Dimension) constitutes the basic physical plane exempt from matter, energy, space, time, and can be described as a state devoid of structure (continuous, isotropic, homogeneous, imperturbed) and super-symmetrical [12] of a tension qualifiable as Implicated Tension, IT which bears within it a protodynamic principle (dynamis 1) that is undifferentiated and totipotent 2 .This state is indicated as an implicated endodynamotensive state. 1 In Aristotele by dynamis (equivalent to shakti in Vedic cosmogony) is meant the potency correlated to the action (energheia), efficient cause connected to the movement and its quantitative and qualitative effects, the inherent potency or intrinsic possibility of a body to be translated in an action (energheia) that may be realized or not, a value of reality only possible with respect to the real action realized. The mathematician and philosopher Arthur M. Young recognizes the action (energheia) its fundamental causative value deriving it from the notion of quantum of action as formulated by Planck: Let us also note that the purposiveness is associated with that aspect of light known as the principle of action (or least action). (….)What did Planck add to this principle of action that was not already present in the ideas of Leibniz? It was the notion that action comes in quanta or wholes, and that this unit is constant. Note that despite the tendency to refer to energy as quantized–a habit which even good physicists are given to–it is not energy but action that comes in wholes. Action = E x T (Energy x Time) = Constant (h) Action is constant, energy is proportional to frequency. (T is the time of one cycle.) (….) Wholeness is inherent in the nature of action, or decision, of purposive activity. (….) While mass is measured in grams, length in meters, and time in seconds, quanta of action are counted with no necessity of specifying the kind of unit. This implies their fundamental nature; actions precede measure, they are prior to the analysis which yields grams, meters, and seconds. It might be objected that action has the measure formula ML^2/T and hence cannot be dimensionless. The answer is that, though action has the dimension ML^2/T, we are taking the position that this particular combination of dimensions (known as action) is the whole from which time, mass, and length are derived. The reasons are as follows: 1. Action comes in irreducible quanta or units. 2. These units are of constant size, i.e., invariant. 3. The are counted, not measured. 4. Because indeterminate, they constitute the end point in the chain of causation and are therefore a first cause. (Source: http://www.meru.org/coast/Arthur%20Young-LightAndChoiceRefUniv.pdf) 2 This description of the fundamental ontological principle as Implicated-Tension that contains the dynamis is analogous to both the Taoist cosmogonic vision of the Tao Te Ching (The Book of the Way and its Virtue) where the Tao corresponds to the Implicated-Tension and Te corresponds to the dynamis, and the cosmogony of the Vedas, where Pradhana corresponds to the N-EIRD, Purusha corresponds to IT, Prakriti corresponds to the dynamis and Samsara corresponds to the alternation of EIRD↔RRD↔QD↔H-MD. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1176 Normally, by tension is meant the effect or the state produced by a difference in potential or by the application of a force but in the context of the N-EIRD the Tension/dynamis is understood not as the effect but as the presupposition (super-symmetry of implicated tension) of all the differences in potential, of all the interactions or forces and of all the physical and paraphysical relationships (psychism). The unique property ascribable to the N-EIRD, from whose excited regime (due to a breakdown in the tensorial super-symmetry) come all the confinement processes whether physical or paraphysical, i.e. the unique property ascribable to the non-excited state devoid of structure of the super-symmetry of implicated tension IT, which bears within it in a latent form (implicated) the totipotent and undifferentiated dynamis, is given by its irreducible symmetry of reflection, which assigns to the N-EIRD a property of reflection (reflectance3) equal to one (total). The passage from the non-excited to excited regime of the IRD occurs under the action of supraliminal selfperturbative phenomena produced by the auto-reverberation of the dynamis associated with the IT. The supraliminal auto-reverberation of the dynamis is tantamount to the breakdown in the tensorial super-symmetry of the IT. The breakdown in the tensorial super-symmetry produced by the twisting action exercised by the auto-reverberation of the dynamis on the IT determines the appearance of a frame of tensions tangential to the IT tensorial symmetry plane. The effect produced by the auto-reverberation of the dynamis on the tensorial super-symmetry is similar to that produced by the Van der Waals forces on the supersymmetry of a super-radiating atomic system 4: the auto-reverberation of the dynamis reduces the isotropy, homogeneity and continuity of the N-EIRD by introducing a discontinuous and unhomogeneous anisotropic factor, that results in the extraction of tensoriali objects (tangent tensions) as an effect of the fragmentation of the IT. The IT tensorial super-symmetry counters this frame of tangent tensions on its plane of symmetry generating torque 5. The istantaneous generation (zero time) of this torque impresses the propulsive action on the reflection/projection of the perturbation that results in the constitution of the EIRD. Put another way: - the N-EIRD has the capacity to reflect totally (total reflectance) any perturbative effect acting around it, such as to annul it; 3 Given an incident perturbation on a surface, the quota of perturbation that the surface is able to reflect is called reflectance. It is represented by the relationship between the intensity of the perturbation reflected and the intensity of the incident perturbation on the surface and is of an adimensional size. In optics, reflectance indicates the proportion of incident light that a given surface can reflect. This is represented by the relationship between the intensity of the radiant flow transmitted and the intensity of the incident radiant flow on the surface. 4 (….) in a small sample of two-level atoms (…) we have seen that the limitations to superradiance are due to Van der Waals interaction breaking the high symmetry of the atomic system: in other words, the Van der Waals forces make the atoms “distinguishable” from each other and reduce the high correlation of the pure symmetrical states. In multilevel systems, the”symmetry breaking” has another physical origin, but its effect is the same: the rate of superradiant emission is reduced. [M. Gross and S. Haroche: Superradiance: An essay on the theory of collective spontaneous emission. In: PHYSICS REPORTS (Review Section of Physics Letters) 93, No. 5 (1982) , pag 392]. 5 Torsion is a state of stress set up in a system by twisting from applying torque. Hence, torque acts as a force and torsion as a geometric deformation. In our case tension super-symmetry acts as a twisting-force and torque as the fundamental stress of space-time geometry. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III - - - - 1177 the supraliminal auto-reverberation of the dynamis associated with the IT (in the N-EIRD regime the dynamis/IT is all there is), generates a frame of tensions tangential to the IT tensorial symmetry plane; the reaction of the N-EIRD to the auto-reverberation of the dynamis associated with the IT consists in annulling the effect of the perturbation, in other words in neutralizing the twisting action triggered by the frame of tensions tangential to the IT tensorial symmetry plane; this neutralization is performed by reflecting/projecting the perturbation itself in toto (index of reflection or reflectance equal to 1); the result of this reflection/projection is the confinement of the explication of the dynamis-IT which is instantaneously circumscribed by what we might define as the holographic pattern of an enveloping fractal mirror; this confinement gives rise to the EIRD regime: a non-local holographic resonant toroidal differentiated (tangent tension→toroid) and undifferentiated (qualia→poloid) fractal-tensor foam, wrapped around a wormhole without structure and dynamic (void) [Fig. 4 and Animation 1]. Fig. 4 Biaxial or tetra-toroid, also coined as external toroid warped around an internal poloid, as drawn here has 27 identical loops. Compared with ordinary toroid coil, the main differences are twisted loops instead of the plain toroid loops and the involuted "donut hole". While 27 closed loops are presented to show a tetrahedron relationship, all loops can be one continuous twisting line. (Image source: http://harmoniouspalette.com/TetMold.html) Animation 1: Click on the link to watch the animation: http://vimeo.com/3945328 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1178 (Animation source: Hopf Fibration, by Daniel Piker) Phases of transformation in a toroid-poloid starting from two plain orthogonal toroid loops (spatially in phase but temporally out of phase), one associable with the values of the differentiated tensorial fractals/tangent tension (toroid) and the other associable with the values of the undifferentiated tensorial fractals/qualia (poloid). This non-local and resonant holographic diffusion with toroidal-poloidal topology of differentiated (tangent tension→toroid) and undifferentiated (qualia→poloid) fractal-tensor foam wrapped around a wormhole (vortex) lacking in structure and dynamics (emptiness/void/vacuum) which qualifies the EIRD constitutes the basic space-time fabric upon which are grafted all the physical and para-physical phenomena (psychism) that qualify the dimensions of the manifestation. Ontologically, the transition by reflection from the N-EIRD to the EIRD represents the first bifurcation, the original bifurcation in the genesis of the physical and para-physical phenomenological Universe. All successive bifurcations are derived from this via homomorphism (basic dynamic-structural equivalence) and translate the dynamic and structure of the EIRD, by contextualizing it. Since the EIRD is the product of the confinement of the auto-perturbation of the N-EIRD, the structure (fractal-proprochiral6) and the dynamic (monopolar-achiral tensorial potential) of the EIRD translate and in-form (contextualize) the properties of the N-EIRD as they are realized by the perturbation itself: i) the unity of the N-EIRD is translated and contextualized by the holographic configuration of the EIRD: holographically, each fraction of the EIRD contains the complete information recorded in the whole (property of reflection, tensorial composition, torque, space-time geometry) and each of its fractions can contain an unlimited number of secondary in-formation; ii) the totipotency of the N-EIRD is translated and contextualized by the absence of dynamics and structure of the void implicated in the EIRD regime and expressed by the internal zone (wormhole-vortex) delimited by the poloid in the toroidal-poloidal space-time geometry (Fig. 4); iii) the isotropy, homogeneity and continuity of the N-EIRD are translated and contextualized respectively by the self-similarity, invariance in scale and quasi- 6 Prochirality, or prostereoisomerism, is the property of a structure or process or an achiral part of them to become chiral if one of its two linking relationships is replaced by a new one (according to Hanson). This passage presupposes the existence of a stereogenic centre or a stereogenic axis or a stereogenic plane and corresponds to the substitution or addition of a variable or group of variables to the structure or process that desymmetrizes the achiral part. When this process of desymmetrization presupposes not one (prochirality) but two passages we speak of proprochirality. In the context of the EIRD, pro-prochirality is a property derived from selfsimilarity (similar ≠ symmetrical) of its fractal structure while the stereogenic centre resides in its torque (see Paragraph 4.). A process or a structure at n-dimensions is called achiral when it can be superimposed on its specular reproduction on n+1 dimensions. A process or a structure at ndimensions is called chiral when it cannot be superimposed on its specular reproduction on n+1 dimensions. Chirality is a pseudoscalar property that remains invariable with an operation of symmetry of the 1 s t order and changes sign with an operation of symmetry of the 2 n d order. A chiral structure or process can be in a position to rotate the plane of diffusion/propagation of a scalar/vectorial phenomenon in a levogyrous or dextrogyrous sense. This property is called rotatory power. When the structure or stereogenic process is a helicoidal/spiroidal phenomenon, the chirality deriving from it is called helicity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1179 continuity [13] of the fractal-proprochiral structure with toroidal topology of the EIRD; iv) the reflective property of the N-EIRD i.e. its capacity to consistently neutralize (tensorial polarization) the perturbations emerging within or around it, is translated and contextualized by the capacity of the EIRD to consistently limit (polarization of the cycles of tensorial hysteresis) the global effects given by the perturbations emerging within or around it, inducing them to occupy the lowest possible level of discontinuity, anisotropy and dishomogeneity (Minimum Perturbation Principle); v) the dynamis involved in the IT is translated and contextualized in the toroidalpoloidal space-time geometry of the EIRD, where by toroidal-poloidal geometry is meant a holographic and fractal-proprochiral frame that is dynamic and virtual (intrinsically non-observable) topologically comparable to a toroid-poloid spiroid affected by the propulsive (accelerating) action of a torque; vi) the ante rem absence of temporal collocation (non-instant) of the N-EIRD is translated and contextualized by the fractal lap times, the indeterministic component of the indifferentiated/qualia tensions which, in the toroidal configuration of the space-time dimension featuring a structure (fractalproprochiral) and dynamics (monopolar-achiral tensorial potential) of the EIRD (space-time in-fusion) occupy the internal structure (poloid), and prefigure time in a prescriptive and non descriptive form (contextualizing non-time is equivalent to prescribing its antithesis i.e. time); vii) the absence ante rem of spatial collocation (non-place) of the N-EIRD is translated and contextualized by the fractal lap times, the indeterministic component of the differentiated tensions/tangent tensions which, in the toroidal configuration of the space-time dimension featuring a structure (fractal-proprochirale) and dynamics (monopolar-achiral tensorial potential) of the EIRD are arranged on the full orbit of the toroid, prefiguring the dimension of space in a prescriptive and non-descriptive form (contextualizing non-space is equivalent to prescribing its antithesis i.e. space); viii) the opposition exercised by the N-EIRD towards the breakdown in tension symmetry provoked by the supraliminal auto-reverberation of the dynamis/IT is translated and contextualized in a form of internal resistance polarized in the spatial component of space-time which tends to keep the planes of the manifestation (EIRD, QD, H-MD) restricted to the fundamental N-EIRD regime. Thus the environs of the manifestation come to be affected by two opposing and complementary tensions: a) the tension of becoming (tension/energheia) of the confinement processes, polarized in the temporal component of space-time, according to which nothing-is-created-nothing-is-destroyed-everything-is-transformed, triggered by the process of original confinement that generates the stationary but non-stable dimension featuring EIRD structure and dynamics (the Born) and b) the intrinsic internal resistance of the Born towards its deliverance from the isotropic, homogeneous, continuous, imperturbed regime of the N-EIRD (the Non-Born). From the opposition that separates these two fundamental tensions (the becoming of confinement processes vs. internal resistance) is triggered the torque of the EIRD regime: the coupling of the torque-torque that links the N-EIRD regime to the EIRD regime is given by the coupling of the torque generated by the opposition of the N-EIRD to the explication of the frame of tangent tensions triggered by the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1180 supraliminal auto-reverberation of the dynamis and the torque generated by the opposing tension between the becoming of the confinement processes and the internal resistance of the EIRD [Fig. 5; Fig 6]. a) compressive phase (internal-space resistance) b) intermediate phase (tensorial symmetry) time) c) dilatative phase (becoming- Fig. 5 Image source (modified): http://www.worldnpa.org/pdf/abstracts/abstracts_2649.pdf Fig. 6: Lo Shu Torus (Image source: http://hans.wyrdweb.eu/tag/void/ ) If we combine the Expansion and Compression patterns a Torus (a Rotating Circle) appears. The Zero (the Void) is in the Center and Contains the Vortex. The Vortex represents another Cycle in which every structure/pattern is destroyed to start All Over Again. 5. Principle of Minimum Perturbation (PMiP) and Principle of Maximum Perturbation (PMaP) From the events that characterize the transition from the non-excited regime to the excited regime of the IRD we can extract two general principles. The first principle or Principle of Minimum Perturbation (PMiP) says that every physical system or domain of relational confinement (tensorial, oscillatory, stereodynamic) tends to occupy the lowest possible level of discontinuity, anisotropy, unhomogeneity, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1181 responding to an effect of perturbation acting inside or around it so as to reduce it to the minimum degree possible. The second principle or Principle of Maximum Perturbation (PMaP) states that when a domain of relational confinement is influenced by a perturbation able to trigger a transition of its regime, the domain itself possesses four ways to react to the perturbation: i) minimizing the perturbative effect by absorbing it and assuming a configuration that changes its own state reversibly (reversible transition) maintaining unaltered its own tensorial/oscillatory/stereodynamic identity (e.g.: water is always water whether in a solid, liquid or gassy state; adaptive biological function; physiological auto-poiesis); ii) minimizing the perturbative effect by reflecting it until it provokes a bifurcation which may generate a new order of phenomena, or new forms of the manifestation, or new domains of relational confinement (e.g.: bifurcation through reflection induced by the RRD and generation of QD; bifurcation through reflection bosons↔fermions; bifurcation through reflection from the domain of the prokaryotes to the domain of the eukaryotes); iii) partially absorbing and partially reflecting the perturbative effect by eventually assuming a new tensorial/oscillatory/stereodynamic identity without abandoning the type of relational confinement domain that the specific domain belongs to (e.g.: transition from the IRD to the RRD in the RD domain; transition of the Homo Abilis genus to the Homo Sapiens genus in the Homo domain); irreversibly losing its own tensorial/oscillatory/stereodynamic identity by transforming itself into its tensorial/oscillatory/stereodynamic constituents (destructuring of the relational confinement of the system with zeroing of its subsistence or condition of resonance; irreversible transition). iv) 6. Phenomenology of the event-horizon and space-time The event-horizon is a global property of an entire space-timeand is defined nonlocally in time. Jonathan Thornburg According to the standard cosmological vision, an event-horizon is a phenomenon of space-time singularity envisaged following Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity (the theory, which Einstein developed in the early 20th century, states that matter curves space-time, and it is this curvature which deflects massive bodies, an effect that we interpret as the influence of gravity) when a non-banal and singular gravitational phenomenon or a gyroscopic motion at relativistic velocity deform the space-time continuum determining an event-horizon (Fig. 7). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1182 7a) a black hole and its event-horizon or Schwarzschild radius (red ring) 7b) the Schwarzschild bubble (central fusiform figure in blue) at the centre of the space-time tunnel (Schwarzschild wormhole) generated by a black hole (the upper part of the figure; positive values) and its temporally inverted double (a white hole is the time reversal of a black hole), a white hole (the lower part of the figure; negative values) 7c) illustration of the pinch-off-phase in the zeroing phase (inward shift) of a Schwarzschild wormhole applying the Kruskal space-time diagram (note the directionality indicated by the yellow arrows of the horizon at the top and its anti-horizon at the bottom) 7d) illustration of the pinch-in-phase in the formation phase (outward shift) of a Schwarzschild wormhole applying the Kruskal space-time diagram (note that in the pinching point the directionality of the horizon and its anti-horizon twist and invert) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1183 7e) the unstable dynamic of the Schwarzschild wormhole describes a Twisted-Pinched Loop where the directionality of the event-horizon in the upper ring assumes positive values and an anterograde motion (black hole with its futurehorizon) until the twisting-reversing switch at the point of intersection (pinching point) with its anti-horizon, to assume negative values and a retrograde motion in the lower ring (white hole with its past-horizon). (See the animation: http://casa.colorado.edu/~ajsh/schwwbig_gif.html) Following the Catastrophe Theory and with reference to the initial conditions of the Universe, the pinching point represents the point of crisis which triggers the transition from the Pre-Quantum and Pre-Energetic Dimension to the Quantum and Energetic Dimension. In accordance with general relativity, the standard cosmological perspective (based on high-temperature phase transitions) interprets this catastrophic point of dimensional transition as a contraction of all the energy (matter) of the Universe into a single space-time point (or singularity, a place-event where energy-matter, density and temperature are infinite) to T=0 followed by the expansive phase of the Big Bang. Fig. 7 Graphical illustration of the Twisted-Pinched Loop (7e) taken from Schwarzschild geometry of a space(time) portion stretched in radial direction by a black hole formation (7a,b,c,d). Images (a,b,c,d) source: http://casa.colorado.edu/~ajsh/schww.html The Schwarzschild metric admits negative square root as well as positive square root solutions for the geometry. The complete Schwarzschild geometry consists of a black hole, a white hole, and two Universes connected at their horizons (red ring in Fig. 7-b-c) by a wormhole. The negative square root solution inside the horizon (lower half in Fig. 7-b) represents a white hole. A white hole is a black hole running backwards in time. Just as black holes swallow things irretrievably, so also do white holes spit them out (see the yellow arrows in Fig. 7-c). The wormhole joining the two separate singularities (black and white hole) is also known as the Einstein-Rosen bridge, if generated it would be unstable and pinch-in-off immediately. In standard cosmology black hole is classified by the only three properties that it possesses: Mass, Spin, and Magnetic Field. The simplest black hole has no spin and no magnetic field. This is called a Schwarzschild black hole. A black hole that has a field but no spin is called a Reissner-Nordstrøm black hole. One that has both a magnetic field and spin is called a Kerr black hole. Two other features can characterize a black hole: the accretion disk and jets. An accretion disk is matter that is drawn to the black hole. In rotating black holes and/or ones with a magnetic field, the matter forms a disk due to the mechanical forces present. In a Schwarzschild black hole, the matter would be drawn in equally from all directions, and thus would form an omni-directional accretion cloud rather than disk. Jets form in Kerr black holes that have an accretion disk. The matter is funneled into a diskshaped torus by the hole's spin and magnetic fields (confronta con Fig. 12). Compare the dynamics illustrated in Fig.7 with that illustrated in Fig 8 below: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1184 Fig. 8 Image source (modified): http://www.bcs.org//upload/pdf/quantum_holography.pdf The Heisenberg group G helix of resonance [the image below with its reversal above - ndr] after excitation by a π/2 MRI magnetic pulse. The pitch of the helix indicates the energy gain due to the longitudinal relaxation effect. This is typical of a single-frequency FID (Free Induction – thermodynamic- Decay). [Credit: Walter Schempp]. In accordance with general relativity, the standard cosmological perspective interprets spacetime as a mathematical continuum consisting of three spatial dimensions and a temporal dimension (which can assume both positive or anterograde values and negative or retrograde values), and whose decomposition into ever smaller parts is without a break, i.e. can have no end. This perspective leads to interpreting our physical Universe (mathematical ante rem) at the time of the Big Bang as a singularity, that is to say, as an infinitely small physical entity, i.e. devoid of extension, mathematically indefinible. But how can a physical entity (the Universe) derive from a mathematical entity (space-time) in the form of an infinitely small physical entity7 that is mathematically indefinible (singularity)? How can a plate of spaghetti derive from the emblée of the hat of a mathematical conjuring trick in the form of an ultra-compacted mixture of physically digestible ingredients that are mathematically undigested? 7 Qualifying a physical entity by the adjective infinite for spatial categories or eternal for temporal categories remains one of the indicators of the evident difficulty met by physicists, with the complicity of mathematician and philosophers, in dealing with reality when it is too large or small to be harnessed by the weft of analytical thought. The sole ambits that admit a legitimate and appropriate use of the binomial infinite-eternal are those that deal with mathematical bodies and those that deal with metaphysical bodies, however physical reality is not made up of either of these! Outwith these two ambits this binomial has to be replaced by the expression unlimited in time and space, where the adjective unlimited is not in fact a synonym of infinite-eternal because where the binomial infinite-eternal qualifies a body per se, the adjective unlimited qualifies a body in relationship with objective limits and/or subjects encountered by the observer in circumscribing it. If we confuse a physical body with a mathematical one we are confusing the object of the investigation with the tool used to describe it. If we confuse a physical body with a metaphysical (trascendental) one we are consfusing the difficulty we encounter in re-cognizing our finiteness with the tension we feel towards the possibility of a mysterious infiniteness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1185 If we did not have general relativity available, the mathematical precision with which the curvature of space (time) is calculated under the effect of massive objects of planetary and stellar dimensions would not be possible, compromising, for example, the orbital stability of the entire system of satellite positioning and making any space mission impracticable. Nonetheless, the paradoxes (straddling physics and metaphysics) that emerge in the presence of non-banal and singular massive objects like black holes or the Universe at the time of the Big Bang pose some unavoidable questions that still await an answer. Because of this, for some time physicists have been considering the possibility of providing an explanation for non-banal and singular gravitational phenomenae and for gyroscopic motions at relativistic velocity that deform space-time, without recourse to the concept of space-time as a continuum (which does not reconcile the continuous-infinite nature of the gravitational field with the granular-finite nature of the fields introduced by quantum mechanics) and without recourse to that of singularity as an infinitely small object (mathematically irreconcilable, to the extent that mathematicians, paraphrasing a celebrated Zen aphorism, have coined the expression: If you meet infinity in your calculations, kill it). With aim of unifying gravitation and quantum mechanics, in 1924 Arthur Eddington proposed as an alternative to the gravitational action of Einstein-Hilbert (action which in astrophysical environs describes how gravity emerges from the curvature of space-time in the presence of matter and energy), a gravitational action that is valid in the absence of matter (i.e. a vacuum). The recent re-elaboration of Eddington’s gravitational action, carried out by the astrophysicists Maximo Banados and Pedro Ferreira8, led to a hypothesis that at the time of the Big Bang spacetime was not continuous but was characterized by a minimum length, a non-continuous spacetime that excludes the idea of the Universe as a singularity and which, consequently, leads to elimination of the necessity to turn to the very concept of singularity. As for the meaning to be assigned to a non-continuous space-time, an alternative to the continuous one theorized by general relativity and that proposed more recently by the String Theory, the hypotheses currently in vogue orbit around four possibilities: i) ii) iii) iv) space-time is not continuous but discreet (granular or quantized; Loop Quantum Gravity); space-time is both continuous and quantized (theory of information9); space-time is neither continuous nor discreet but fractal [1]; space-time is a distribution of scalar fields (Auto-Reproducing Chaotic Inflationary Universe10). The description of these four hypotheses lies outside the scope of this work, what I am interested in underlining is that in the event-horizon (with its double, the anti-horizon) there is no longer a mere mathematical category of continuous mathematical-space-time curved by singularity-hypermassive object, but it can assume a non-banal, physical, as well as mathematical, consistency. 8 Banados M. and Ferreira P., Eddington’s theory of gravity and its progeny, 2010: http://arxiv.org/pdf/1006.1769.pdf 9 Achim Kempf, Information-theoretic natural ultraviolet cutoff for space-time, 2010: http://arxiv.org/pdf/0908.3061.pdf 10 Andrei Linde, From the Big Bang Theory to the Theory of a Stationary Universe, 2006: http://arxiv.org/pdf/gr-qc/9306035v3.pdf ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1186 In the context of this investigation, the event-horizon represents the boundary between the planes of the manifestation and traces the limits of observability and comparability of the phenomena that lie before and beyond the event-horizon. In this meaning it represents the inertial system of reference with respect to the phenomena correlated to it, in the sense that the phenomena generated by a transition (e.g.: N-EIRD→EIRD) refer to the inertial system/eventhorizon generated by the actual transition. The genesis of the event-horizon lies in the property of reflection of the dimension that triggers the dimensional bifurcation: N-EIRD→EIRD→RRD→QD→H-MD On the event-horizon all the physical and para-physical bifurcations (psychism), correspond to a vertical or horizontal shift from the domain of the manifestation upon which rests the bifurcation towards another domain or towards another plane of manifestation. The event-horizons are three plus one, one for each of the three dimensional transitions explicated (excited irreducible relativistic → excited reducible relativistic→ excited quantum→ hyper and middle dimension) plus the event-horizon involved in the original transition NEIRD→EIRD. The three explicated event-horizons are wrapped, kinked around the implicated (original) event-horizon and find themselves in a state of space-time superposition, that is non-local, (entangled) (Fig. 9). The space-time horizon of the original, fundamental events corresponds to the reflection symmetry horizon, mirror symmetry line generated by the transition between the regime of the N-EIRD and the regime of the EIRD. The EIRD, we will recall, is the product of confinement due to reflection of the autoperturbative state of the dynamis associated with the IT. The structure (fractal-proprochiral) and the dynamic (potential tensorial monopolar-achiral) of the EIRD translate and in-form (contextualize) the properties of the N-EIRD just as they are explicated by the total reflection of the auto-perturbative state of the dynamis/IT. The total reflection of the auto-reverberation of the dynamis/IT by the N-EIRD is comparable to the reflective action of a mirror with an index of reflection or reflectance equal to 1, i.e. total. This degree of reflectance is given by the fact that the N-EIRD is intrinsically and irriducibly isotropic, continuous, homogeneous and unperturbed, and as such behaves as an ideal reflecting surface. On the contrary, the reflection index of the EIRD, like the reflection index of any other dimensional state, cannot be equal to one but can only come close to one. We might compare the EIRD to the surface of a lake reflecting an image of the Moon. Not only is the image of the Moon on the surface of the lake not the Moon, but the image is the product of a series of conditions (the variables) that creat a relationship between the surface of the water and the solar light reflected by the lunar disc. Each of these conditions corresponds to a variation in state, i.e. a perturbation. Depending on a certain number of variations in state the image of the Moon reflected by the surface of the water will appear more or less deformed, more or less distorted with respect to the original. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1187 In our case, the image of the N-EIRD reflected by the EIRD is distorted for two reasons: - - first, because the EIRD is not a reflected image of the E/NIRD but is a specular and distorted image of the perturbation of the dynamis/IT reflected by the NEIRD; second, because the dynamics and structure of the EIRD are themselves perturbations which alter its reflective capacity (reflectance < 1). At every transition between a regime and the successive one, the distortion changes according to the perturbation which triggers the transition summed to the perturbation introduced by the dynamics and structure of the new regime. The EIRD, as a specular and distorted image of the perturbation of the dynamis/IT reflected by the N-EIRD, re-produces this perturbation by inverting it (just as on the acoustic plane a sound is an inverted reflection of its echo). If we assimilate the EIRD regime to a regime that is stationary but not stable of tensorial infusion that pulsates under the action generated by variations in the opposing tension between the internal resistance vs. the becoming of the confinement processes, this inverted re-production of the perturbation of the dynamis/IT reflected by the N-EIRD means that in the EIRD the propulsive-repulsive action (monopolar polarization) exercised by the torque during the projective-reflective phase of the DRIN-E→DRIE transition is re-produced by the introduction of a quasi-specular action of an opposite sign, giving rise to a dipolar polarization that pits acceleration vs. deceleration, repulsion vs. attraction. In this way opposing tension and therefore the torque of the EIRD becomes the site of a stereogenic centre able to desymmetrize the achiral part of the EIRD i.e. of desymmetrizing the becoming of the torque and with it the space-time geometry of the EIRD. The desymmetrization of the torque and the space-time geometry of the EIRD: i) ii) iii) is the triggering factor of the transition from the DRIE regime to the RRD regime, is the condition that is the origin of the Coriolis potential and the Coriolis force (EIRD→RRD transition), the force that opposes the desymmetrization of the torque 11 [14], is the condition that is the origin of (ERRD→QD) the energetic phenomenon (which contextualizes the dipolar polarization of the torque), space (which contextualizes the internal resistance) and time (which contextualizes the becoming of the confinement processes). The desymmetrization of the torque and of the space-time of the EIRD as a condition from which space and time originate (ERRD→QD) allows us to clarify what should be understood, physically, by space-time or the space-time continuum, terms made abundant use of in the context of this treatise and which I discussed at the beginning of this paragraph: - space-time or space-time continuum a) is the fundamental physical warp devoid of spatial collocation and devoid of temporal collocation given by the state of infusion that exists between the tension of internal resistance vs. the tension of 11 So contrary to all physical intuition, by rotating a fluid we make it change its physical properties, make it “stiff”. Taylor’s experiment remind us of the fundamental fact that the Coriolis force is not just deflecting moving bodies, but opposes their displacement by trying to restore them to their initial position. (Credit: Anders Persson) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1188 becoming, b) is made up of differentiated and undifferentiated tensorial fractals, c) features a monopolar-achiral tensorial potential, d) is affected by phenomena of hysterisis-tensorial polarization-resonance, e) is configured as a hologram and structured as a fractal-proprochiral (since the proprochirality of the EIRD regime is a property derived from its stereogenic centre). Space-time or space-time continuum or fundamental space-time geometry coincide with the relativistic excited IRD regime, where the confinement processes are fractals that are subliminal and coherent with the space-time geometry (state of in-fusion of resistance-space vs. becoming-time) immersed in a monopolar-achiral tensorial potential. But where is the sense in speaking of processes devoid of a temporal and spatial collocation if a process is such only in accordance with a spatial and/or temporal collocation of events? The physical reality of a process is made of spatial coordinates and temporal coordinates. Unquestionably, but we could also say that the coordinates we use to define space (or spaces) and time (or times) are convential indicators (just as Planck’s Constant is a conventional indicator of quantum granularity) which we have recourse to in order to orient ourselves in mapping reality, but they are not reality, they are parts of our mental/instrumental map and not of the territory. Questioning ourselves on what collocation to give space-time, which reality are we speaking of? The physical reality of the events that we collocate inside the ordinary coordinates of time and space clearly is not the same as that which we refer to when speaking of space-time. The physical reality of space-time responds to other coordinates, with respect to which our ordinary coordinates, albeit scientifically sound, vacillate until they become zero. Do we have available a paradigm and the linguistic tools to express this other space-time reality without plunging into contradiction? We could make use of the excess of sense of the symbol, the space-time dilation of the oniric experience, the alterity of spaces and times in the tension experienced in altered states of consciousness (i.e. shamanic experiences), languages and expressive forms of Dionysian art which belong to the underground pulsions of the unconscious and which are fully expressed through music, we could give ourselves over to the experience of space and time in meditative practices, but none of these possibilities can tell us what we should understand by space-time continuum in the context of relativistic physics. A process can be understood as a series of variations in state. To define a variation in state we must make reference to an inertial system with respect to which the variation or variations take place. In the ambit of the EIRD the reference inertial system is represented by its space-time eventhorizon. But here too the limits traced by our internal representation of external reality and by the language which expresses it pose us some problems: how can we say that the space-time continuum is something that apparently has nothing to do with the ordinary coordinates of space and time and, at the same time, establish that the space-time event-horizon traces limits on observability and the comparison of phenomena that lie before and beyond the eventhorizon? The existence of a line of demarcation between a before and a beyond already establishes a spatial and/or temporal collocation of events. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1174-1189 Messori, C., A Cosmogonic Model of Human Consciousness: Part III 1189 The many paradoxes and the many shadow areas that emerge in the attempt to interpret, understand and describe quantum, quantum-relativistic and relativistic phenomena force us to adopt an epistemological perspective that is open to paradox but that also suggests how to critically re-think the scientifically proven certainties that we derive from investigating and describing ordinary reality: are we absolutely sure that these certainties weighed against these paradoxes do not make the reality described by a scientific method less objective than we would wish it to be? As much as we force ourselves to be objective we will never be able to avoid the subjectivity that is intrinsic to being observers: reality ceases to be such as soon as it is observed, i.e., reality observed depends, at least in part, on the reality of the observer. This is true for ordinary reality and even more so for non-ordinary and paradoxical realities such as the quantum, quantumrelativistic and relativistic. Should our observation of reality favour certainties and view paradoxes with suspicion, it is because we have built a world of certainties that views paradoxes with suspicion. Are we able to integrate the paradox into our perspective of knowledge? Fig. 9 [Source: Concepts of a space-time warp: Warp Theory. At: http://portal.groupkos.com/index.php?title=Warp_Theory_101] In the EIRD dimension, the space-time topology is schematized by two complementary embricated toroids (replicants), united by and wrapped by a poloid which delimits a vortex: the loops that constitute the two toroids correspond to the internal resistance (compressive-accelerative phase of the hysteresis cycle of the TwistedPinched Hysteresis Loop; spatial component of space-time) and are composed of tangent tension differentiated tensorial fractals (of a positive sign those that make up the external toroid and a negative sign those that make up the internal toroid) while the loops that form the shared poloid correspond to the becoming of the confinement processes (decelerating dilatory-phase of the hysteresis cycle of the T-PHL; temporal component of space-time) and are made up of undifferentiated tensorial fractals, qualia (of a positive sign those that make up the external surface of the poloid and a negative sign those that make up the internal surface of the poloid). The two toroids are polarized in the spatial component of the space-time continuum (state of space-time in-fusion) while the poloid is polarized in the temporal component. The black hole-vortex (void) circumscribed by the poloid is devoid of dynamics and structure and is totipotent. (Continued on Part IV) Note: References are listed at the end of Part IV ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 981   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     Article     A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation     Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism  and  Transformation     Phil  Wolfson  MD*     Abstract:   A   longitudinal   historical   approach   for   portraying   and   examining   personal   transformation  is  presented  along  with  a  proposed  instrument—the  Transformational   Codex—for   cataloging   that   history   and   the   elements   that   compose   it.     One   element,   psychedelic  transformation,  is  then  discussed  in  depth  along  with  a  schema  for  viewing   transformations  that  may  occur  related  to  psychedelic  use  and  practice.       Key   Words:   transformation,   psychedelics,   spirituality,   consciousness,   dreams,   Buddhism,  empathogens     A  Longitudinal  View  of  Personal  Transformation     I   am   67   rapidly   approaching   68.     Aging   is   transforming   my   physical   capa-­‐ cities,  my  desires—fewer  of  them;  my  interests—perhaps  more  of  them;  my  sense   of   time—moving   faster   and   less   of   it;   and   the   immediacy   of   death   itself—close   by,   inevitable.    My  mental  abilities  have  yet  to  atrophy—so  I  am  told—for  how  would  I   know  if  I  lacked  them?    I  have  spent  my  life  transforming.    I  am  certainly  not  with   the  consciousness  I  can  remember  from  its  inception.    Nor  from  my  teenage  years.     Nor  even  from  my  thirties  and  forties.    Yet  I  have  a  sensation  of  continuity  and  that   commences  with  my  first  memories  at  about  3  and  includes  a  sense,  a  feeling,  of  me-­‐ ness.    I  seem  still  to  be  enough  of  the  me  that  arose  that  I  recognize  a  strand.   Life  is  truly  a  dream  and  my  experience  seems  more  and  more  a  mediation   between  me  and  my  past,  and  me  and  the  world  outside.    It  is  this  sense  from  which   more   profound   psychological   states   of   dissociation   arise.     I   am   fortunate   in   that   I   have   dreamt   the   entire   night,   every   night,   so   long   as   I   can   remember.     If   sleep   architecture   with   its   discontinuities   and   non-­‐dreaming   states   is   to   be   believed,   it   does   not   correspond   to   my   own   uninterrupted   experience   of   constant   nightly   movies.    The  usual  marking  of  day  and  night  is  more  of  a  slippery  transition  for  me   and  while  I  have  no  trouble  discerning  the  two  consciousnesses  from  each  other,  I   have   virtually   no   experience   of   being   fully   unconscious.     My   three   surgeries   with   general   anesthesia   gave   me   the   most   pertinent   information   on   ceasing   to   be— complete  darkness  being  the  sensation  from  which  arising  consciousness  emanated.   Before  that  sensation    of  darkness,  I  had  no  prior  sensation  of  existence  whatsoever.       All   of   this   convinces   me   and   highlights   my   sensation   of   a   stream   of   consciousness   that   begins   for   me   at   about   3   years   of   age,   also   emanating   from                                                                                                                   *Correspondence:  Phil  Wolfson  MD  is  a  practicing  psychiatrist/psychotherapist  in  the  Bay  Area  and  a   Founder  of  the  Evolutionary  Constructivist  School  of  Mind.  Email:  wolfy@wolfy.com,  Websty:   http://www.philwolfsonmd.com     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 982   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     darkness,  and  continues  unbroken,  like  a  moving  river,  a  dream  state,  during  each   24  hours,  part  of  the  time  in  contact—more  or  less—with  a  mediated  reality  outside   of   me,   and   part   of   the   time   just   with   me,   an   interiority,   that   also   has   an   awake   interiority  that  is  more  cognitive,  less  imaginal  than  night  dreaming,  but  with  many   of  the  same  elements,  sensations  and  removal  from  direct  sensory  contact.1     If   personal   life   is   a   moving,   shifting   stream   dream,   how   then   to   view   transformation?     There   is   that   classical   argument   in   Zen   schools   between   gradual   and   saltatory   transformations,   getting   to   Kensho   and   Satori.     The   same   dualism   occurs   in   Vajrayana   Buddhism   with   schools   making   differing   claims   on   the   means   for   transformation,   the   prerequisites,   the   rapidity   and   the   immanency.   If   I   have   learned  anything,  it  is  that  there  are  as  many  schools  as  there  are  humans  .  Even  my   dogs   have   their   views   and   requests,   which   they   espouse   in   their   own   ways,   according   to   their   capabilities   of   reaching   my   awareness,   and   my   capabilities   of   understanding   their   communication—some   of   that   an   empathic   mutual   understanding     What   many   do   agree   upon   is   that   they   experience   transformation   of   consciousness   and   life   behavior   both   gradually   and   also   in   sudden   spurts   of   fierce   energy   and   realization.     And   the   direction   is   not   always   pleasant.     Transformation   can   go   either   way,   through   unpleasant   experience   and   chosen   unpleasant   means,   and  through  pleasant,  even  ecstatic  states.    Transformation  can  be  courted,  seduced,   planned,   practiced   for   over   time,   induced,   and   can   be   involuntary,   unplanned,   damaging,   life-­‐threatening,   grievous   and   disabling.     Since   conscious   life   is   an   experience  related  to  a  seamless  existential  dreaming,  transformation  is  a  constant   moving   thing.     Peak   experiences,   as   per   Maslow,   may   entail   transformation—or   not,   whereas   transformation   may   contain   or   entail   peak   experiences—or   not.     Historically,   discussion   of   transformation   has   focused   on   mystical   and   sudden   transformations   that   are   often   only   partially   integrated   and   are   experienced   as   ‘stand  alone’  experiences,  unclassifiable  and  ineffable.2  While  such  significant  events     are   unforgettable   and   momentous,   they   tend   to   be   overemphasized   and   obscure   other   more   prolonged   experiences   of   fundamental   change   and   the   effects   of   deliberate  practices  aimed  at  transformation.       Here  is  my  definition  of  transformation:  A  change  in  one’s  core  conceptual  and   even  physical  structure  that  interrupts  the  prior  sense  of  self  and  induces  an  altered,  at   least  partially  different  sense  of  self  immediately  and/or  over  time  with  some  degree  of   persistence.   Transformation   is   a   reset   of   the   old   software   with   at   least   some   new   programming.     So,  my  experience  of  “me”  over  time  is  that  I  have  changed  and  that  this  has   been   reflected   in   my   contexts,   connections   and   behavior.     I   am   unable   to   isolate   a   single  experience  as  The  Transformational  Transcendent  Singular  Event  (TTSE).    I  am   unlike   Saint   Augustine   for   example.     Rather,   as   I   look   back   over   time,   there   have   been   numerous   transformational   moments   and   processes,   a   catalog   of   which   would                                                                                                                   1  Wm  James  (A  World  of  Pure  Experience,  in  William  James  Writings  1902-­‐1910,  Library  of  America,  1987,  pp.   1180-­‐82)  explicates  interestingly  on  his  experience  of  seamless  mind.   2  Cf.  Berenbaaum,  Kerns  and  Raghavan,  Anomalous  Experiences,  Peculiarity  and  Psychopathology,  pp.  30-­‐31,  in   Cardena,  Lynn  and  Krippner,  Varieties  of  Anomalous  Experience,  APA,  2000.     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 983   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     be   voluminous   and   necessarily   incomplete   because   of   faulty   memory   and   inadequate   retrieval—too   much   time   and   too   many   events.     If   this   seems   too   mundane,   not   sufficiently   spectacular,   one   factor   is   that   of   time,   which   blunts   immediacy   and   tall   peaks.   Nonetheless,   it   appears   to   me   to   be   a   truthful   representation  of  my  experience  that  goes  back  as  far  as  I  am  able  to  remember.    If   transformation  is  not  restricted  to  peak  experiences,  but  rather  to  an  awareness  of   change  over  some  time  scale,  it  is  clear  that  transformation  is  not  discrete,  has  long   slow  waves  and  sudden  lurches,  and  things  in  between.       Some   transformation   is   clearly   developmental   but   still   contingent.     For   example,   I   recall   falling   in   love   (FIL)   at   3   to   5   years   of   age.     After   we   moved   away   when  I  was  seven,    I  never  saw  any  of  the  three  girls  with  whom  I  played  in  my  early   Manhattan   apartment   house   culture.   Yet,   I   was   permanently   altered   by   an   aware– ness  of  attraction  at  that  age  that  made  me  scan  for  them  as  I  went  about  my  days   and   made   me   miss   and   think   on   them.       Dreams   of   them   occur   even   now—their   names   affixed   to   imagined   representations   of   them   as   adult   women   who   come   in   and  out  of  my  dream  life  on  occasion.  The  integration  was  my  experience  of  love  and   arousal   for   girl   strangers   with   whom   I   bonded   at   a   high   level—non-­‐sexual   but   aroused  intimacy.    In  that  same  early  period  I  made  close  friendships  (FNDS)  with   boys   and   had   a   very   different,   but   complex   and   loving   set   of   feelings   for   them— friendship   as   a   mode   arose   in   me—clearly   both   of   these   kinds   of   affection   transformational   and   not   inevitable.     Thereafter,   I   sought   out   both   experiences   throughout  my  life.  When  we  left  for  Queens  and  a  small,  isolating  private  house,  I   grieved   and   was   depressed   for   quite   some   time.     That   too   was   poignantly   transformational  as  I  learned  of  loneliness  and  the  inability  to  rectify  my  heartbreak,   and  the  arbitrariness  of  adult  authority—out  of  touch  with  my  love  and  need  for  my   companions.    Transformational  indeed.  In  childhood,  transformations  are  a  frequent   part   of   life   and   development,   but   from   the   adult   vantage   point   we   forget   that   we   were   incredibly   mutable   and   affected—by   love,   trauma,   and   the   vectors   of   growth   and   mastery.   Nevertheless,   the   notice   internally   of   the   occurrence   of   a   transformational  experience  is  set-­‐up  during  childhood.   A  taxonomy  can  be  developed  for  transformational  experiences:     Time  scale:  sudden,  short-­‐term,  or  prolonged.    Volition:  deliberate  and  just  as  planned,   or  not  at  all  as  planned,  or  inadvertent.    Integration:  integrated,  partially  integrated,   or   stands   alone.   Quality:   (increasingly   positive)   Ah   ha;   Aah   haa;   Aaah   haa!   Or   (increasingly   negative)  Oy,  Oy  vey,  and   Ouuuy  veeey.    Validated:     you  are  different,  or   not  different.    Self-­‐validated  over  time:    I  am  different  —  my  consciousness,  choices,   and   actions   are   different.     Duration:   a   lasting   change,   absorbed—fully   or   partially,   overridden,   or   deleted.     Awareness:   immediately   conscious,   semi-­‐conscious,   or   unconscious   (became   aware   downstream   from   the   event).     Clearly   these   are   continua  and  capable  of  being  placed  in  a  matrix:    The  Transformation  Codex.    I  use   codex  deliberately  to  represent  the  book  of  changes,  which  can  be  compiled  for  any   of  us,  at  virtually  any  stage  of  life.           ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 984   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation       The  Transformation  Codex   EVENT   Early   Love  FIL   Friend-­‐   Ship   FNDS   Leaving   Home   LHC   First   Psychoth   FPE   Mature   Love   FMLS   College   CIGA   Trip  LSDT   Sixties  SM   AGE-­‐-­‐   WHEN   TIME   SCALE   VOLI-­‐ TION   3  on   P   IA     INTEGRA -­‐TION   I   QUALI -­‐TY   VALI-­‐ DATED   SELF   VAL-­‐ IDATED   DURA -­‐TION   AWARE-­‐ NESS   AH   V+/-­‐   SV+   ALC+   SCs,  UCs   3AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   SCs,  UCs   2AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   Cs   3AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   Cs,   SCs,   UCs   3AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   CS   AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   Cs,  UCs   3AH   V-­‐   SV+   ALC+   Cs,  UCs   3AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   3AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   OV2   V+   SV+   ALC+   2AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   Cs,  UCs   Cs,   SCs,   UCs   Cs.   SCs,   UCs   Cs,   SCs,   UCs   2AH   V+   SV+   ALC+   Cs,  UCs   I   3  on   P   IA,  then     D+/-­‐   I   16   S   D+   I   17-­‐18   ST   D+   I   17-­‐18   ST   D+/-­‐   I   17-­‐20   21   20-­‐-­‐   P   S   S,  P   D+/-­‐   D-­‐   D+/-­‐   I   I   I   Family  FB   Loss   LOAC   Buddha   BP   Psyche-­‐ delic  PP   27-­‐-­‐   P   D+/-­‐   PI   44   S,  P   IA   PI   52-­‐-­‐-­‐   P   D+/-­‐   PI   40-­‐-­‐-­‐   S,  P   D+/-­‐       Key:     Transformation  Event  Time  Scale—sudden,  short-­‐term,  prolonged:    S,  ST,  P   Volition—deliberate-­‐just  as  planned,  somewhat,  not  at  all  as  planned:  D+,  D+/-­‐,  D-­‐ or—inadvertent:  IA   Integration—integrated,  partially  integrated,  stands  alone:  I,  PI,  SA   Quality—positive-­‐Ah   ha,   Aah   haa,   Aaah   haaa:   AH,   2AH,   3AH—negative-­‐Oy,   Oy   vey,   Ouuy,  veey:  O,  OV,  OV2   Validated—V+,  V-­‐  Others  concur  or  give  evidence  of  my  change.   Self-­‐Validated:   —I   am   different   and   my   consciousness,   choices   and   actions   are   different:  totally,  somewhat,  not  at  all:  SV+,  SV+/-­‐,  SV-­‐   Duration—A  lasting  change:  fully,  partially  overridden,  deleted:  ALC+.  ALC  +/-­‐,  ALC-­‐   Awareness   of   the   occurrence   and   nature   of   Transformation—immediately   conscious,  semi-­‐conscious,  unconscious:  Cs,  SCs,  UCs     For  translation  of  the  event  abbreviations,  see  below.       ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 985   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     To   play   with   this   classificatory   schema,   I   will   share   with   you   a   partial   temporal  review  of  some  of  my  transformational  experiences,  with  the  classification   as  above—to  validate  the  instrument  and  to  tweak  your  own  sense  of  history  and  its   partial  correspondences:   • Leaving   home   for   college   (LHC)—transformation—partial   independence   and   autonomy.   • First   psychotherapy   experience   (FPE),   at   college—transformation— reduction   of   tyrannous   super-­‐ego   influences,   finding   my   own   mind   and   speaking  it.   • First   mature   love   and   sexuality   (FMLS)—transformation—being   loved   by   another   fully   (or   as   much   as   possible   under   those   circumstances),   less   self-­‐ conscious  and  negative.   • College   intellectual   growth   and   assurance   (CIGA)—transformation— independent  thinking  possibility  enhanced  social  capacity.   • LSD   trip   (LSDT)—transformation—loss   of   fear   of   incipient   madness,   access   to   another   realm   of   mind,   enhanced   imagination   and   creativity,   unique   experience.   • Sixties   Movement   (SM)—transformation—citizen   of   the   world,   brotherhood/sisterhood,   loss   of   fear   of   confronting   authority,   physical   trauma,  enhanced  creativity  and  empowering  sensation  of  freedom.   • Family   building   (FB)—transformation—experience   of   the   absolute   love   of   children,   new   sense   of   wider   responsibilities   and   larger   sense   of   self,   enhancement  of  the  child  consciousness  within.   • Loss   of   a   child   after   prolonged   illness   (LOAC)—transformation—loss   of   orientation   and   meaning,   permanent   grief,   dissolution   of   marriage,   extraordinary  anxiety,  greater  coping  skills,  awareness  of  my  own  imperative   to  stay  alive.   • Buddhist   practice   (BP)—transformation—explicit   meditative   states   and   freedom  occasionally  from  grasping  and  attachment,  valuing  that  experience   and  seeking  it.   • Psychedelic   practice   (PP)—transformation—sudden   dissolution   of   my   self   and   reconstitution—deliberately   sought   for   its   transformative   power;   experience   of   group   mind   and   being   out   of   my   own   particular   body   experience;  improvisation  and  intuitive  mindfulness  and  creativity.       Examining   my   chart   indicates   the   variety   of   powerful   transformational   events  spread  over  a  lifetime,  their  different  experiential  time  frames,  my  tendency   to   focus   on   events   that   resulted   in   what   I   regard   as   long   term   and   integrated   changes,   and   the   mix   of   inadvertent   and   deliberately   sought   for   experiences.     The   list  is  suggestive  and  not  meant  to  be  exhaustive  by  any  means.    I  hope  it  provides  an   encouragement  for  others  to  look  at  their  history.     Some  limiting  factors:    To  reach  significance,  a  transformative  experience  has   to   be   at   the   level   of   an   Ah   or   an   Oy.     The   duration   of   an   experience   can   be   prolonged   and   over   years   of   time.     Aging   tends   to   diminish   former   peaks   and   there   is   an     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 986   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     undoubtedly   besotted   with   change—a   change   tolerance   factor—that   alters   the   drama   of   change   to   some   incalculable   effect.     Finally,   this   is   an   almost   entirely   subjective  method,  save  for  the  subjective  awareness  of  others’  views  of  our  sense  of   transformation,  which  has  some  verifiability  attached.       Psychedelics  and  Transformation:  A  Personal  Overview   One  set  of  the  transformative  experiences  I  have  sought  over  a  major  portion   of   my   personal   history   has   been   with   the   non-­‐compulsive   and   deliberate   use   of   psychedelic   substances.     As   with   most   people   who   repeat,   an   initial   powerful   experience   oriented   me   to   the   possibility   for   inner   work   and   alternative   experiences—that  I  would  be  different  as  a  result  of  use  and  these  differences  would   be   sufficiently   beneficial   to   explore   additional   trips   and   different   mind-­‐altering   substances.    I  will  present  a  schema  for  looking  at  the  allure  of  these  substances  and   their  transformative  powers.   First,  a  bit  of  background  to  situate  the  presentation  of  subjective  states.     Psychoactive   substance-­‐induced   alteration   of   consciousness   is   ages   old,   the   specific   history   dependent   on   humans’   particular   geographic   location   and   corresponding   native   plant   habitats.     Differentiating   between   our   equally   ancient   propensity   to   get   high   with   those   particular   substances   that   induce   intoxicated   states  and,  in  contrast,  the  often  difficult  journey  of  the  psychonautical  pioneer  is  an   imperative   for   clarity   about   psychedelic   use—although   there   is   certainly   a   mid-­‐ region   of   experience   where   recreational   use   meets   transformation,   and   the   inadvertent   is   always   a   potentiality.     The   remarkable   discovery,   perpetuation,   refinement   of   use,   and   sacralization   of   psychoactive   substances   in   early   and   stone   age   cultures   testifies   to   the   timeless   power   of   human   interest   in   transcending   “ordinary”  historical  and  cultural  realities  and  the  enduring  strength  of  human  mind   exploration.     Marijuana   use   dates   at   least   to   4000   years   BCE,   the   earliest   plant   remains   known   having   been   dated   to   that   time.   Humans   and   marijuana   have   co-­‐ evolved,   influencing   each   other   reciprocally   in   terms   of   cultivation   and   culture.   Mushroom   and   other   psychoactive   plant   use   in   Mesoamerica   is   undoubtedly   thousands   of   years   old   and   was   ineradicable   despite   the   deliberate   murder   of   practitioners  by  the  Inquisition  and  genocidal  suppression  of  indigenous  cultures  by   the   colonizing   Europeans.   In   fact,   Europe   was   desperately   poor   in   psychedelics   these   being   limited   to   the   toxic   tropane   alkaloids   contained   in   such   plants   as   mandrake   and   henbane   with   their   datura   like   effects.     European   consciousness   developed   its   particular   distortions   in   concert   with   the   addictive   and   easily   manufactured   toxin   known   as   ethanol—of   limited   value   for   mental   and   spiritual   transformation.    Most  remarkable  is  the  Amazonian  creation  of  ayahuasca,  or  yage,   the   admixture   of   two   separate   plants   that   had   to   be   bundled   to   create   the   remarkable   oral   DMT   based   experience   that   was   practiced   as   divination   and   personal  transformation  by  native  shamans.    Ayahuasca  use  has  recently  spread  to   North   America   culminating   in   the   US   Supreme   Court’s   recognition   of   the   União   do   Vegetal  (UDV)  with   hoasca  as  an  acceptable  sacrament  and  indispensible  part  of  the   UDV   Church’s   ceremonial   life,   much   as   peyote   for   the   Native   American   Church—   ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 987   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     deliberate   uses   of   mind   altering   substances   for   the   purpose   of   transformation   within  bounded  social  and  religious  frameworks.     As  to  the  allure  of  psychedelics,  the  most  potent  explanation  is  that  they  offer   the  possibility  of  a  transformation  of  consciousness.  That  may  occur  as  an  intimate   acute  experience  or  a  form-­‐shaking  permanent  alteration;  it  is  a  spectrum  of  effect   and   affect   that   has   incalculable   personal   and   social   consequences.     The   introduction   of  psychedelic  substance  use  to  masses  of  people  in  the  sixties  was  a  major  influence   on   the   immense   cultural   change   that   occurred.     Liberation   from   the   suppressive,   repressive  yoke  of  McCarthyism  that  had  penetrated  darkly  into  the  family  culture   of  the  late  40s  and  50s  was  in  part  due  to  the  mind  expansion  of  psychedelic  use  that   blew   up   restrictive   mental   fetters   and   fear   of   the   personal   imagination.     This   was   transmuted   reciprocally   to   and   from   new   cultural   and   political   formations.   If   the   entire   New   Left   didn’t   succumb   to   rigid   and   dogmatic   Leninism,   it   was   to   a   great   extent   protected   from   that   by   personal   mind-­‐expanded   experiences   that   escaped   control  by  all  ideologies  and  false  consciousness.  But  it  is  not  a  perfect  record  and   psychedelics   were   also   used   to   corrupt   and   control   humans.     For   example,   from   opposite   perspectives,   there   was   the   final   catastrophic   period   of   the   Weather   Underground;   and   the   CIA   has   had   a   compulsive   interest   in   using   psychedelics   adversely   to   extract   information   or   to   create   group   and   personal   confusion,   even   madness.     Some   aficionados   of   the   pure   psychedelic   experience   argue   that   the   unmitigated   experience   itself   is   sufficient   to   deliver   transformation.     There   are   others   such   as   me,   who   find   that   the   transformative   influence   of   the   psychedelic   experience  makes  a  quantum  leap  when  integrated  with  spiritual  practice,  such  as   Buddhist   contemplation   and   with   liberating   psychotherapy.     Unsupported   psyche-­‐ delic   experience   is   unpredictably   transformative   and   integrations   from   the   spirit   side   with   ordinary   lived   reality   are   more   difficult   without   recognizing   that   psychedelic   transformation   is   but   one   prong   of   conscious   intent   to   transform   ourselves  from  the  capture  of  the  corporate  materialist  culture.    That  is  not  a  simple   or  straightforward  task.     To  convey  the  varieties  of  psychedelic  experience  is  to  have  the  experience  of   words   faltering   as   descriptive.     Hopefully,   without   intending   to   reify,   or   circum-­‐ scribe,  I  will  present  a  taxonomy  of  experience  that  reflects  my  personal  history  and   observations   over   47   years   time,   since   I   and   a   small   group   of   new   friends   just   commencing  medical  school  in  New  York  City  dropped  acid,  i.e,  LSD.  With  this  I  am   attempting   to   convey   the   psychedelic   allure   and   am   using   states   rather   than   some   hierarchical   notion   based   on   levels   since   all   such   states   have   value   for   transformation.     The  Varieties  of  Psychedelic  Experience     1.  The  Mundane  State:  Conventional  allure  flows  from  curiosity,  a  desire  to  change   oneself,  temptation  for  forbidden  fruit,  and  emulation  of  others.           ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 988   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     2.  The  Personal/Psychotherapeutic  State:    In  1964,  I  was  a  young,  awkward,  and  self-­‐ conscious   male,   repressed   and   having   just   finished   a   psychoanalytically   oriented   psychotherapeutic   experience   that   had   helped   me   to   alleviate   some   of   the   pain   of   my  hypercritical  feuding  parents  that  I  had  introjected.    I  was  beginning  to  find  my   own   voice   and   guidance.     In   the   flash   dance   of   a   few   hours,   my   inner   structure   rocked  and  shifted.  LSD  and  I  met  and  I  passed  through  great  fear  to  feel  alleviated   of  self-­‐hate;  my  imagination  was  freed  to  inform  a  creative  new  consciousness.    Art   came   alive,   as   did   every   day   experience.   After   I   came   down   from   the   LSD   trip,   integration   included   a   deliberate   determination   to   hold   onto   that   freedom   informed   by   a   structural   psychological   awareness   that   had   been   obtained   in   the   intensity   of   my   earlier   psychotherapy   experience.   Subsequent   introduction   to   marijuana   freed   me   of   physical   and   sexual   awkwardness,   turned   me   onto   intimate   discourse,   a   heightened   closeness   in   friendship,   and   furthered   my   sense   of   being   a   creative   person.     This   was   not   completely   linear—there   were   ups   and   downs—and   took   place  with  absorption  in  the  growing   Movement,  a  sense  of  being  in  a  community  of   progressive   people   worldwide.   Psychedelic   use   in   that   formative   period   increased   my  self-­‐confidence  and  sensuality.    It  did  not  prevent  me  from  making  all  manner  of   errors  in  personal  and  political  life,  but  I  was  much  better  at  discernment,  moving   on,  kindness  and  forgiveness.     Psychedelic  use  invariably  affects  the  personal/psychological  matrix.  Starting   a   journey   forces   an   encounter   with   fear—of   the   unknown,   of   the   lurking   dangers   believed  hidden  in  one’s  own  mind—of  losing  it  or  going  too  far  into  the  irrational   and   unknown,   of   coming   back   madly   altered.     In   the   encounter   the   first   period   is   generally   absorbed   with   the   personal—relationships,   guilt,   love,   longing,   grief,   attachments,   self-­‐concepts.     This   encounter   opens   the   possibility   of   examination,   release,  and  change,  of  reframing  and  heightened  awareness  of  self  and  the  other(s).     A  bad  trip—usually  in  an  uncomfortable  setting  under  stressful  circumstances—can   result   in   fear,   paranoia,   and   recoil   from   the   opened   space   that   is   perceived   as   threatening.  Some  folks  never  use  psychedelics  again.    Occasional,  too,  young  people   and  others—I  know  personally  of  several  12  and  13  year  olds—suffer  with  mental   effects   that   damage   and   may   last   far   too   long.     Set—the   minds   orientation—and   setting—the   circumstances   of   use—always   affect   the   quality   of   significant   psychedelic  experiences.    Conscious  preparation,  good  location,  presence  of  support   and  friends  benefit  experiences  and  outcomes.     3.  The  Empathic  State:    Generally  any  psychedelic  experience  may  heighten  empathy   and   empathic   awareness—as   love   and   affection;   as   the   ability   to   see   another’s   point   of  view  and  put  oneself  in  the  other  person’s  shoes;  as  deep  respect  and  regard;  as   elimination  of  barriers  that  separate;  as  communion  with  nature;  as  a  transcendent   feeling   of   warmth   for   all   things.   In   the   eighties,   the   potency   of   MDMA   was   recognized  as  a  means,  a  tool,  for  heightening  the  quality  of  communication  between   people  and  for  fairly  reliably  producing  a  state  of  warmth,  affection  and  usually  non-­‐ sexual   sensuality.     Many   therapists   including   myself   introduced   MDMA   psycho-­‐ therapy   within   couples,   family,   and   group   contexts.     Because   the   experience   was   fairly  replicable,  generally  positive,  and  without  much  in  the  way  of  distortion  and     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 989   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     hallucination,  a  new  name  was  coined  for  a  cluster  of  substances  for  which  MDMA— Ecstasy—was   the   exemplar:   Empathogens.     Before   the   DEA’s   own   administrative   law  judge,  those  of  us  who  saw  MDMA’s  potential  for  positive  impact  were  able  to   demonstrate  its  medical  utility.    Despite  the  judge’s  ruling,  which  would  have  placed   MDMA   in   an   accessible   Schedule   II   classification,   the   DEA   went   against   its   own   judge’s   finding   and   placed   it   in   the   highly   criminalized   and   inaccessible   Schedule   I   group   of   substances   that   included   heroin,   and   other   banned   psychedelics.     In   the   years   that   followed   the   1986   ruling,   MDMA   use   soared   and   the   rave   phenomena   began—again   a   testimony   to   the   power   of   the   substance   to   facilitate   loving,   intimate,   sensual   experience,   even   with   huge   numbers   of   people.     MDMA’s   appeal   continues   to   be   based   on   the   facilitation   of   a   state   of   communion   and   community   larger  than  the  personal  self’s  usual  strictures  allow.    MDMA  consciousness  can  be   learned   and   generated   without   the   drug   on   board   as   part   of   an   expansive,   loving   daily  life.    Much  of  the  concern  about  brain  damage  due  to  serotonin  depletion  was   based   on   phony   research   that   was   retracted   from   the   literature   when   it   was   exposed.     After   almost   30   years   of   use,   24   of   it   in   this   continuing   prohibition   era   with  an  unimagined  scale  of  use,  100s  of  millions  of  doses  consumed,  my  informal   census  of  other  therapists  and  friends  who  were  there  from  the  start  fails  to  reveal   names  and  numbers  of  MDMA  brain  damaged  individuals.     4.  The  Egolytic  State.  For  the  most  part  the  psychedelic  experience  exerts  a  damper   on   egotism   and   ego   centrality.     A   sense   of   smallness   and   particulate   being   in   the   universe  may  be  a  fundamental  part,  i.e.,  I  am  truly  insignificant.    A  reduced  sense  of   attachment  to  material  goods,  awed  with  life  and  the  psychic  ground,  spaciousness   of  mind,  a  situating  of  the  self  as  but  a  speck  in  the  cosmos,  and  a  sense  of  ease  at   being   free   of   self-­‐inflated   importance   may   compose   much   of   the   trip.     For   some,   this   can   be   difficult   and   disorienting   as   a   loss   of   the   centrality   of   self   and   confusion   as   to   how   to   manifest   and   re-­‐integrate.     For   most   this   state   provides   a   welcome   relief   from   the   tension   of   being   a   particular   totalization   in   the   personal   world   and   the   competitive,  demanding  outer  life.     5.   The   Transcendent   Transpersonal   State   [TTP].     Stripped   of   ego,   personal   psychology  and  investments,  the  psychedelic  traveler  enters  the  ground  state  from   which  thought,  feeling,  form  and  formlessness  emanate.    It  is  as  if  the  source  of  mind   becomes  the  mind  experience  itself.    This  is  certainly  not  restricted  to  psychedelic   states.    In  the  unadorned  meditative  experience,  this  too  is  highlighted  for  periods  of   time.     An   apocryphal   story   from   those   who   travel   in   both   the   spiritual   and   psychedelic   realms   is   that   the   great   guru   drops   a   bizillion   micrograms   of   LSD   and   stays  beaming  and  untouched  the  entire  trip  time  and  is  in  his  nature  so  spiritually   elevated   that   the   drug   is   not   altering   or   transformative:   he   is   the   ground   state   itself.   Ram  Dass  amongst  others  is  fond  of  this  tale.    I  have  my  doubts.    In  the  psychedelic   state  is  the  flux,  the  movement,  of  stimulated  consciousness,  there  to  be  experienced   at  a  heightened  level  of  manifestation.    Some  psychedelic  experiences  are  difficult  to   recall   and/or   difficult   in   which   to   maintain   a   self-­‐observational   awareness.     However,   most   experiences   include   intense   observational   awareness.   Dose   is   a     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 990   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     factor—generally,  the  more  you  take,  the  more  self-­‐observational  awareness  tends   to  diminish,  and  the  more  the  trip  proceeds  like  a  roller  coaster  to  which  you  hang   on..  It  is  my  view  that  psychedelics  tend  to  make  mind  and  the  origination  of  mental   phenomena   more   available   for   experience   and   non-­‐judgmental   scrutiny   by   amplifying  the  phenomena  coming  into  being.    This  state  is  what  Tibetans  refer  to  as   Dzogchen   or   primordial   awareness   as   it   is   commonly   translated,   the   sunyata   state   in   Sanskrit,   and   in   the   less   developed   Western   explication,   the   state   of   awe.     By   learning  to  reside  in  a  non-­‐dualistic  state  of  mind,  by  choosing  to  enter  that  state,  by   having  experiences  that  create  faith  in  the  goodness  of  that  state,  then  spaciousness,   creativity,   and   compassion   can   arise   from   non-­‐attachment,   from   living   in   the   flow,   from  not  grasping  at  every  object  that  comes  to  mind  and  attracts  our  attention.     Within   the   Transcendent   Transpersonal   State,   a   multiplicity   of   experiences   and  views  will  arise  and  are  generally  not  pre-­‐programmable,  but  have  some  degree   of   specificity   depending   on   the   substance   ingested—different   substances   tend   to   produce   a   quality   of   experience   specific   to   those   substances—and   state   of   mind.   I   will  mention  a  few  by  description  that  I  class  as  Vistas.  This  is  certainly  not  meant  to   be  exhaustive:     5a.  The  Sensual  Universe  Vista:  traveling  through  space  as  on  a  rocket  ship,  or   being   that   rocket   ship,   I   encounter   extraordinary   forms   and   shapes.     Neon   colored   blazing   fractal   worlds   open.     Forms   emerge—animals,   beings   from   other   galaxies,   lovers   and   forgotten   friends.     I   morph   to   meet   them   and   my   morphing   morphs.   I   am   eaten   and   eat,   am   absorbed   and   absorb.     Sexual   encounters   may   occur.   Love   spills   everywhere.     Or   fear   brings   on   its   own   forms  and  monsters.    Psychological  themes  come  from  my  everyday  life  and   are  given  forms,  often  allowing  for  a  working  through  of  trapped  emotional   energies.    There  is  a  sense  of  great  exploration  and  great  bliss,  and  at  other   times  of  the  terror  of  being  alive  and  vulnerable.     5b.  The  Entheogenic  Vista:  A  personal  experience  of  being  a  god  or  deepening   a   relationship   to   the   personally   held   notion   of   god   may   occur.     One   may   have   a   sense   of   traveling   in   the   starry   cosmos   freed   from   all   constraint,   or   being   part   of   a   newly   created   and   unique   universe.   Buddhists   are   told   that   they   have,   as   do   all   sentient   beings,   Buddha   Nature.   In   the   psychedelic   realm,   I   became   the   Buddha   and   felt   that   meaning   and   that   responsibility.     I   moved   about   as   the   Buddha.     I   have   tried   to   maintain   that   sense   of   awesome   responsibility   in   my   usual   unenhanced   state,   with   modest   success   and   awareness  of  the  difficulty.    At  other  times,  there  can  be  the  sense  of  the  devil   within,   of   the   play   of   evil   and   the   hunter/murderer,   which   we   also   contain   and  constrain.    In  mind  travelling,  there  is  no  risk  in  exploring  this  aspect  of   us,  knowing  and  accepting  of  what  we  are  capable  yet  explicitly  reject.     5c.  The  Connection  Vista:    The  experience  of  connection  and  interdependency   gives   rise   to   feelings   of   gratitude,   love,   humility,   and   the   desire   to   benefit   others.     Our   personal   lifeline   extends   backwards   through   a   near   infinite     ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 991   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     unbroken   number   of   progenitors   to   the   unformed   stuff   of   the   great   earthly   soup   from   which   first   life   forms   emerge—this   may   be   experienced—and   forward  to  the  future  as  well.    I  have  felt  myself  to  be  much  as  a  mushroom   sprouts   from   the   great   mycelial   mass,   its   myriad   threads   stretching   underground  in  all  directions,  sprouting  beings  who  as  their  time  ends  return   to   the   rich   mulch   while   new   sprouts,   humans,   emerge—a   sense   of   vibrant   biological   immortality.     Or,   in   contrast,   the   direct   experience   of   the   human   mass   as   itself   a   cancer,   having   all   of   those   characteristics:   unrestrained   expansionism,  proliferation  in  all  directions,  lack  of  concern  for  others’  needs   and  requirements,  eating  everything  in  its  path,  out  of  control.    Or  as  group   mind,   the   experience   of   sensation   outside   the   confines   of   the   personal   body/mind,   in   resonance   with   the   others   with   whom   one   is   travelling   as   a   new  assemblage  of  the  multiple  consciousnesses  present  in  which  one’s  mind   is  experienced  as  intrapersonal  and  transpersonal.     5d.   The   Solipsistic   Vista:   I   am   the   source   of   all   that   I   experience.     I   create   it.     The   outside   realm—all   of   it—is   a   manifestation   of   my   mind.   This   passes   before  me  as  I  scan  all  of  my  creations  from  scientific  texts  to  great  vistas  and   friends   and   my   partner.     I   am   the   author   of   life   and   death.   Moving   about   within   this   perspective,   I   am   able   to   revise   what   exists   and   what   will   be—for   a   time—until   I   am   drawn   back   to   the   usual   perspective   of   subject   and   object.     That  experience,  while  a  false  consciousness,  increases  the  sensitivity  to  the   difficulty   of   being   an   interpreter,   removed   from   direct   experience   consciousness   with   only   mediated   awareness   of   the   external   and   personal   awareness  of  the  interior.    While  in  this  inflated  state,  I  am  god  and  master  of   the  universe,  prophet,  seer,  enlightened  being.    And  then  there  is  the  crash,   and  hopefully  great  humility.     Integration   In   the   post   psychedelic   condition,   integration   is   the   key   to   maintaining   transformation.     Integration   is   a   function   of   intentionality—conscious   and   uncon-­‐ sciously   maintained,   or   incorporated.   Integration   occurs   both   without   effort,   as   a   redesign  of  the  central  processor  of  our  minds,  and  voluntarily  as  a  deliberate  effort   to  understand,  find  meaning,  and  as  rectification  of  our  behavior  towards  others  and   towards   ourselves.     The   psychedelic   experience   in   and   of   itself   may   be   transformative   of   our   consciousness,   but   support   for   change   by   deliberate   and   disciplined   absorption   in   the   myriad   spiritual/emotional/psychological/activist   opportunities   for   increasing   clarity   and   breadth   most   probably   results   in   a   more   long   term   and   positive   transformation   of   self.   The   human   mind   while   extraordinarily  plastic,  adaptable,  and  mutable  is  also  built  with  a  great  rubber  band   that   returns   us   to   our   dominant   character.     This   serves   both   as   preserver   of   the   integrity  of  the  self  and  as  a  block  to  transformation—holding  onto  deluded  Self.     Grounding   in   the   world   of   the   interior   and   the   external   world—finding   balance—is   a   prerequisite   for   successful   psychonautical   voyaging   and   for   a   mind   expansion   that   is   in   essence   kind,   creative,   and   loosens   the   spell   of   the   propaganda-­‐   ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com   Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 981-992 992   Wolfson,  P.,  A  Longitudinal  History  of  Self-­‐Transformation:  Psychedelics,  Spirituality,  Activism,  and  Transformation     filled  social  world  we  inhabit  that  tells  us  what  to  think  and  feel  and  especially  what   to  desire  and  purchase.   To   conclude,   psychedelic   exploration   has   been   an   intense   part   of   this   culture   for   several   decades   and   part   of   the   human   world   since   its   beginnings.     Both   inadvertent   change   from   recreational   use   of   mind-­‐altering   substances   and   the   deliberate   pursuit   of   a   transformative   path   have   occurred   for   many   millions   of   people,   yet,   as   a   result   of   the   illegal   status   of   psychedelics,   there   has   been   a   restricted  discussion  and  sharing  of  experience,  despite  the  extraordinary  numbers   involved.     I   have   presented   one   schema   among   many   possibilities   for   sharing   and   conveying   transformations   that   occur   with   psychedelics   and   hope   this   inspires   both   research   and   sharing   by   others   of   the   qualities   of   mind   and   behavior   that   result   from  psychedelic  use  as  transformations  of  self.         ISSN:  2153-­‐8212       Journal  of  Consciousness  Exploration  &  Research   Published  by  QuantumDream,  Inc.                                                 www.JCER.com

Can Science ‘explain’ Consciousness ? M. K. Samal arXiv:physics/0002045v1 [physics.gen-ph] 24 Feb 2000 Non-Accelerator Particle Physics (NAPP) Group, Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore-560 034, India. (e-mail: mks@iiap.ernet.in) Consciousness is the process by which one attributes ‘meaning’ to the world. Considering Fφllesdal’s definition of ‘meaning’ as the joint product of all ‘evidence’ that is available to those who ‘communicate’, we conclude that science can, not only reduce all the evidence to a Basic Entity (we call BE), but also can ‘explain’ consciousness once a suitable definition for communication is found that exploits the quantum superposition principle to incorporate the fuzzyness of our experience. Consciousness may be beyond ‘computability’, but it is not beyond ‘communicability’. I. INTRODUCTION Among all the human endeavours, science can be considered to be the most powerful for the maximum power it endowes us to manipulate the nature through an understanding of our position in it. This understanding is gained when a set of careful observations based on tangible perceptions, acquired by sensory organs and/or their extensions, is submitted to the logical analysis of human intellect as well as to the intuitive power of imagination to yield the abstract fundamental laws of nature that are not self-evident at the gross level of phenomenal existence. There exists a unity in nature at the level of laws that corresponds to the manifest diversity at the level of phenomena. Can consciousness be understood in this sense by an appropriate use of the methodology of science ? The most difficult problem related to consciousness is perhaps, ‘how to define it ?’. Consciousness has remained a unitary subjective experience, its various ‘components’ being reflective (the recognition by the thinking subject of its own actions and mental states), perceptual (the state or faculty of being mentally aware of external environment) and a free will (volition). But how these components are integrated to provide the unique experience called ‘consciousness’, familiar to all of us, remains a mystery. Does it lie at the level of ‘perceptions’ or at the level of ‘laws’ ? Can it be reduced to some basic ‘substance’ or ‘phenomenon’ ? Can it be manipulated in a controlled way ? Is there a need for a change of either the methodology or the paradigm of science to answer the above questions ? In this article, I make a modest attempt to answer these questions, albeit in a speculative manner. II. CAN CONSCIOUSNESS BE REDUCED FURTHER ? Most of the successes of science over the past five hundred years or so can be attributed to the great emphasis it lays on the ‘reductionist paradigm’. Following this approach, can consciousness be reduced either to ‘substance’ or ‘phenomena’ in the sense that by understanding which one can understand consciousness ? A. Physical Substratum The attempts to reduce consciousness to a physical basis have been made in the following ways by trying to understand the mechanism and functioning of the human brain in various different contexts. • Physics The basic substratum of physical reality is the ‘state’ of the system and the whole job of physics can be put into a single question : ‘given the initial state, how to predict its evolution at a later time ?’. In classical world, the state and its evolution can be reduced to events and their spatio-temporal correlations. Consciousness has no direct role to play in this process of reduction, although it is responsible to find an ‘objective meaning’ in such a reduction. But the situation is quite different in the quantum world as all relevant physical information about a system is contained in its wavefunction (or equivalently in its state vector), which is not physical in the sense of being directly measurable. Consciousness plays no role in the deterministic and unitary Schrödinger evolution (i.e. the U-process of Penrose [1]) that the ‘unphysical’ wavefunction undergoes. To extract any physical information from the wavefuction one has to use the Born-Dirac rule and thus probability enters in a new way into the quantum mechanical description despite the strictly deterministic nature of evolution 1 of the wavefunction. The measurement process forces the system to choose an ‘actuality’ from all ‘possibilities’ and thus leads to a non-unitary collapse of the general wavefunction to an eigenstate (i.e. the R-process of Penrose [1]) of the concerned observable. The dynamics of this R-process is not known and it is here some authors like Wigner have brought in the consciousness of the observer to cause the collapse of the wavefunction. But instead of explaining the consciousness, this approach uses consciousness for the sake of Quantum Mechanics which needs the R-process along with the U-process to yield all its spectacular successes. The R-process is necessarily non-local and is governed by an irreducible element of chance, which means that the theory is not naturalistic: the dynamics is controlled in part by something that is not a part of the physical universe. Stapp [2] has given a quantum mechanical model of the brain dynamics in which this quantum selection process is a causal process governed not by pure chance but rather by a mathematically specified non-local physical process identifiable as the conscious process. It was reported [3] that attempts have been made to explain consciousness by relating it to the ‘quantum events’, but any such attempt is bound to be futile as the concept of ‘quantum event’ in itself is ill-defined ! Keeping in view the fundamental role that the quantum vacuum plays in formulating the quantum field theories of all four known basic interactions of nature spreading over a period from the big-bang to the present, it has been suggested [4] that if at all consciousness be reduced to anything ‘fundamental’ that should be the ‘quantum vacuum’ in itself. But in such an approach the following questions arise: 1) If consciousness has its origin in the quantum vacuum that gives rise to all fundamental particles as well as the force fields, then why is it that only living things possess consciousness ?, 2) What is the relation between the quantum vacuum that gives rise to consciousness and the space-time continuum that confines all our perceptions through which consciousness manifests itself ?, 3) Should one attribute consciousness only to systems consisting of ‘real’ particles or also to systems containing ‘virtual’ particles ? Despite these questions, the idea of tracing the origin of ‘consciousness’ to ‘substantial nothingness’ appears quite promising because the properties of ‘quantum vacuum’ may ultimately lead us to an understanding of the dynamics of the R-process and thus to a physical comprehension of consciousness. One of the properties that distinguishes living systems from the non-living systems is their ability of self-organisation and complexity. Since life is a necessary condition for possessing consciousness, can one attribute consciousness to a ‘degree of complexity’ in the sense that various degrees of consciousness can be caused by different levels of complexity? Can one give a suitable quantitative definition of consciousness in terms of ‘entropy’ that describes the ‘degree of self-organisation or complexity’ of a system ? What is the role of non-linearity and non-equilibrium thermodynamics in such a definition of consciousness ? In this holistic view of consciousness what is the role played by the phenomenon of quantum non-locality, first envisaged in EPR paper [5] and subsequently confirmed experimentally [6] by Aspect et. al ? What is the role of irreversibility and dissipation in this holistic view ? • Neuro-biology On the basis of the vast amount of information available on the structure and the modes of communication (neurotransmitters, neuro-modulators, neuro-hormones) of the neuron, neuroscience has empirically found [7] the neural basis of several attributes of consciousness. With the help of modern scanning techniques and by direct manipulations of the brain, neuro-biologists have found out that various human activities (both physical and mental) and perceptions can be mapped into almost unique regions of the brain. Awareness, being intrinsic to neural activity, arises in higher level processing centers and requires integration of activity over time at the neuronal level. But there exists no particular region that can be attributed to have given rise to consciousness. Consciousness appears to be a collective phenomena where the ‘whole’ is much more than the sum of parts ! Is each neuron having the ‘whole of consciousness’ within it, although it does work towards a particular attribute of consciousness at a time ? Can this paradigm of finding neural correlates of the attributes of consciousness be fruitful in demystifying consciousness ? Certainly not ! As it was aptly concluded [8] the currently prevalent reductionist approaches are unlikely to reveal the basis of such holistic phenomenon as consciousness. There have been holistic attempts [9,1] to understand consciousness in terms of collective quantum effects arising in cytoskeletons and microtubles; minute substructures lying deep within the brain’s neurons. The effect of general anaesthetics like chloroform (CHCl3 ), isofluorane (CHF2 OCHClCF3 ) etc. in swiching off the consciousness, not only in higher animals such as mammals or birds but also in paramecium, amoeba, or even green slime mould has been advocated [10] to be providing a direct evidence that the phenomenon of consciousness is related to the action of the cytoskeleton and to microtubles. But all the implications of ‘quantum coherence’ regarding consciousness in such approach can only be unfolded after we achieve a better understanding of ‘quantum reality’, which still lies ahead of the present-day physics. • Artificial Intelligence Can machines be intelligent ? Within the restricted definition of ‘artificial intelligence’, the neural network approach has been the most promising one. But the possibility of realising a machine capable of artificial intelligence based 2 on this approach is constrained at present [11] by the limitations of ‘silicon technology’ for integrating the desired astronomical number of ‘neuron-equivalents’ into a reasonable compact space. Even though we might achieve such a feat in the foreseeable future by using chemical memories, it is not quite clear whether such artificially intelligent machines can be capable of ‘artificial consciousness’. Because one lacks at present a suitable working definition of ‘consciousness’ within the frame-work of studies involving artificial intelligence. Invoking Gödel’s incompleteness theorem, Penrose has argued [1] that the technology of electronic computer-controlled robots will not provide a way to the artificial construction of an actually intelligent machine–in the sense of a machine that ‘understands’ what it is doing and can act upon that understanding. He maintains that human understanding (hence consciousness) lies beyond formal arguments and beyond computability i.e. in the Turing-machine-accessible sense. Assuming the inherent ability of quantum mechanics to incorporate consciousness, can one expect any improvement in the above situation by considering ‘computation’ to be a physical process that is governed by the rules of quantum mechanics rather than that of classical physics ? In ‘Quantum computation’ [12] the classical notion of a Turing machine is extended to a corresponding quantum one that takes into account the quantum superposition principle. In ‘standard’ quantum computation, the usual rules of quantum theory are adopted, in which the system evolves according to the U-process for essentially the entire operation, but the R-process becomes relevant mainly only at the end of the operation, when the system is ‘measured’ in order to ascertain either the termination or the result of the computation. Although the superiority of the quantum computation over classical computation in the sense of complexity theory have been shown [13], Penrose insists that it is still a ‘computational’ process since U-process is a computable operation and R-process is purely probabilistic procedure. What can be achieved in principle by a quantum computer could also be achieved, in principle, by a suitable Turing-machine-with-randomiser. Thus he concludes that even a quantum computer would not be able to perform the operations required for human conscious understanding. But we think that such a view is limited because ‘computation’ as a process need not be confined to a Turing-machine-accessible sense and in such situations one has to explore the power of quantum computation in understanding consciousness. We conclude from the above discussions that the basic physical substrata to which consciousness may be reduced are ‘neuron’, ‘event’ and ‘bit’ at the classical level, whereas at the quantum level they are ‘microtuble’, ‘wavefunction’ and ‘qubit’; depending on whether the studies are done in neuro-biology, physics and computer science respectively. Can there be a common platform for these trio of substrata ? We believe the answer to be in affirmative and the first hint regarding this comes from Wheeler’s [14] remarkable idea: “ it from bit i.e. every it – every particle, every field of force, even the spacetime continuum itself – derives its function, its meaning, its very existence entirely – even if in some contexts indirectly – from the apparatus-elicited answers to yes or no questions, binary choices, bits”. This view of the world refers not to an object, but to a vision of a world derived from pure logic and mathematics in the sense that an immaterial source and explanation lies at the bottom of every item of the physical world. In a recent report [15] the remarkable extent of embodiment of this vision in modern physics has beed discussed alongwith the possible difficulties faced by such a scheme. But can this scheme explain consciousness by reducing it to bits ? Perhaps not unless it undergoes some modification. Why ? Because consciousness involves an awareness of an endless mosaic of qualitatively different things –such as the colour of a rose, the fragrance of a perfume, the music of a piano, the tactile sense of objects, the power of abstraction, the intuitive feeling for time and space, emotional states like love and hate, the ability to put oneself in other’s position, the abilitiy to wonder, the power to wonder at one’s wondering etc. It is almost impossible to reduce them all to the 0-or-1 sharpness of the definition of ‘bits’. A major part of human experience and consciousness is fuzzy and hence can not be reduced to yes or no type situations. Hence we believe that ‘bit’ has to be modified to incorporate this fuzzyness of the world. Perhaps the quantum superposition inherent to a ‘qubit’ can help. Can one then reduce the consciousness to a consistent theory of ‘quantum information’ based on qubits ? Quite unlikely, till our knowledge of ‘quantum reality’ and the ‘emergence of classicality from it’ becomes more clear. The major hurdles to be cleared are (1) Observer or Participator ? (In such equipment-evoked, quantuminformation-theoretic approach, the inseparability of the observer from the observed will bring in the quantum measurement problem either in the form of dynamics of the R-process or in the emergence of classicality of the world from a quantum substratum. We first need the solutions to these long-standing problems before attempting to reduce the ‘fuzzy’ world of consciousness to ‘qubits’ ! ); (2) Communication ? (Even if we get the solutions to the above problems that enable us to reduce the ‘attributes of consciousness’ to ‘qubits’, still then the ‘dynamics of the process that gives rise to consciousness’ will be beyond ‘quantum information’ as it will require a suitable definition of ‘communication’ in the sense expressed by Fφllesdal [16] “ Meaning is the joint product of all evidence that is available to those who communicate”. Consciousness helps us to find a ‘meaning’ or ‘understanding’ and will depend upon ‘communication’. Although all ‘evidence’ can be reduced to qubits, ‘communication’ as an exchange of qubits has to be well-defined. Why do we say that a stone or a tree is 3 unconscious ? Is it because we do not know how to ‘communicate’ with them ? Can one define ‘communication’ in physical terms beyond any verbal or non-verbal language ? Where does one look for a suitable definition of ‘communication’ ? Maybe one has to define ‘communication’ at the ‘substantial nothingness’ level of quantum vacuum.); (3) Time’s Arrow ? (How important is the role of memory in ‘possessing consciousness’ ? Would our consciousness be altered if the world we experience were reversible with respect to time ? Can our consciousness ever find out why it is not possible to influence the past ?). Hence we conclude that although consciousness may be beyond ‘computability’, it is not beyond ‘quantum communicability’ once a suitable definition for ‘communication’ is found that exploits the quantum superposition principle to incorporate the fuzzyness of our experience. Few questions arise: 1) how to modify the qubit ?, 2) can a suitable definition of ‘communication’, based on immaterial entity like ‘qubit’ or ‘modified qubit’, take care of non-physical experience like dream or thoughts ? We assume, being optimistic, that a suitable modification of ‘qubit’ is possible that will surpass the hurdles of communicability, dynamics of R-process and irreversibility. For the lack of a better word we will henceforth call such a modified qubit as ‘Basic Entity’ (BE). B. Non-Physical Substratum Unlike our sensory perceptions related to physical ‘substance’ and ‘phenomena’ there exists a plethora of human experiences like dreams, thoughts and lack of any experience during sleep which are believed to be non-physical in the sense that they cannot be reduced to anything basic within the confinement of space-time and causality. For example one cannot ascribe either spatiality or causality to human thoughts, dreams etc. Does one need a frame-work that transcends spatiotemporality to incorporate such non-physical ‘events’ ? Or can one explain them by using BE ? The following views can be taken depending on one’s belief: • Modified BE [ M(BE) ] What could be the basic substratum of these non-physical entities ? Could they be understood in terms of any suitably modified physical substratum ? At the classical level one might think of reducing them to ‘events’ which, unlike the physical events, do not have any reference to spatiality. Attempts [17] have been made to understand the non-physical entities like thoughts and dreams in terms of temporal events and correlation between them. Although such an approach may yield the kinematics of these non-physical entities, it is not clear how their dynamics i.e. evolution etc. can be understood in terms of temporal component alone without any external spatial input, when in the first place they have arose from perceptions that are meaningful only in the context of spatio-temporality ?! Secondly, it is not clear why the ‘mental events’ constructed after dropping the spatiality should require new set of laws that are different from the usual physical laws. At the quantum level one might try to have a suitable modification of the wavefunction to incorporate these nonphysical entities. One may make the wavefunction depend on extra parameters [18], either physical or non-physical, to give it the extra degrees of freedom to mathematically include more information. But such a wavefunction bound to have severe problems at the level of interpretation. For example, if one includes an extra parameter called ‘meditation’ as a new degree of freedom apart from the usual ones, then how will one interpret squared modulus of the wavefunction ? It will be certainly too crude to extend the Born rule to conclude that the squared modulus in this case will give the probability of finding a particle having certain meditation value ! Hence this kind of modification will not be of much help except for the apparent satisfaction of being able to write an eigenvalue equation for dreams or emotions ! This approach is certainly not capable of telling how the wavefunction is related to consciousness, let alone a mathematical equation for the evolution of consciousness ! If one accepts consciousness as a phenomenon that arises out of execution of processes then any suggested [19] new physical basis can be shown to be redundant. As we have concluded earlier, all such possible processes and their execution can be reduced to BE and spatio-temporal correlations among BE using a suitable definition of communication. Hence to incorporate non-physical entities as some kind of information one has to modify the BE in a subtle way. Schematically M(BE)= BE ⊗ X, where ⊗ stands for a yet unknown operation and X stands for fundamental substratum of non-physical information. X has to be different from BE; otherwise it could be reducible to BE and then there will be no spatio-temporal distinction between physical and non-physical information. But, how to find out what is X ? Is it evident that the laws for M(BE) will be different from that for BE ? • Give up BE One could believe that it is the ‘Qualia’ that constitutes consciousness and hence consciousness has to be understood at a phenomenological level without disecting it into BE or M(BE). One would note that consciousness mainly consists 4 of three phenomenological processes that can be roughly put as retentive, reflective and creative. But keeping the tremendous progress of our physical sciences and their utility to neuro-sciences in view, it is not unreasonable to expect that all these three phenomenological processes, involving both human as well as animal [20] can be understood oneday in terms of M(BE). • Platonic BE It has been suggested [21] that consciousness could be like mathematics in the sense that although it is needed to comprehend the physical reality, in itself it is not ‘real’. The ‘reality’ of mathematics is a controversial issue that brings in the old debate between the realists and the constructivists whether a mathematical truth is ‘a discovery’ or ‘an invention’ of the human mind ? Should one consider the physical laws based on mathematical truth as real or not ?! The realist’s stand of attributing a Platonic existence to the mathematical truth is a matter of pure faith unless one tries to get the guidance from the knowledge of the physical world. It is doubtful whether our knowledge of physical sciences provides support for the realist’s view if one considers the challenge to ‘realism’ in physical sciences by the quantum world-view, which has been substantiated in recent past by experiments [6] that violate Bell’s inequalities. Even if one accepts the Platonic world of mathematical forms, this no way makes consciousness non-existent or unreal. Rather the very fact that truth of such a platonic world of mathematics yields to the human understanding as much as that of a physical world makes consciousness all the more profound in its existence. III. CAN CONSCIOUSNESS BE MANIPULATED ? Can consciousness be manipulated in a controlled manner ? Experience tells us how difficult it is to control the thoughts and how improbable it is to control the dreams. We discuss below few methods prescribed by western psycho-analysis and oriental philosophies regarding the manipulation of consciousness. Is there a lesson for modern science to learn from these methods ? A. Self The subject of ‘self’ is usually considered to belong to an ‘internal space’ in contrast to the external space where we deal with others. We will consider the following two cases here: • Auto-suggestions There have been evidences that by auto-suggestions one can control one’s feelings like pain and pleasure. Can one cure oneself of diseases of physical origin by auto-suggestions ? This requires further investigations. • Yoga and other oriental methods The eight-fold (asthanga) Yoga of Patanjali is perhaps the most ancient method prescribed [22] to control one’s thought and to direct it in a controlled manner. But it requires certain control over body and emotions before one aspires to gain control over mind. In particular it lays great stress on ‘breath control’ (pranayama) as a means to relax the body and to still the mind. In its later stages it provides systematic methods to acquire concentration (dhyan) and to prolong concentration on an object or a thought (dharna). After this attainment one can reach a stage where one’s awareness of self and the surrounding is at its best. Then in its last stage, Yoga prescribes one’s acute awareness to be decontextualized [23] from all perceptions limited by spatio-temporality and thus to reach a pinnacle called (samadhi) where one attains an understanding of everything and has no doubts. In this sense the Yogic philosophy believes that pure consciousness transcends all perceptions and awareness. It is difficult to understand this on the basis of day to day experience. Why does one need to sharpen one’s awareness to its extreme if one is finally going to abandon its use ? How does abandonning one’s sharpened awareness help in attaining a realisation that transcends spatio-temporality? Can any one realise anything that is beyond the space, time and causality ? What is the purpose of such a consciousness that lies beyond the confinement of space and time ? 5 B. Non-Self The Non-Self belongs to an external world consisting of others, both living and non-living. In the following we discuss whether one can direct one’s consciousness towards others such that one can affect their behaviour. • Hypnosis, ESP etc... It is a well-known fact that it is possible to hypnotise a person and then to make contact with his/her sub-conscious mind. Where does this sub-conscious lie ? What is its relation to the conscious mind ? The efficacy of the method of hypnosis in curing people of deep-rooted psychological problems tells us that we are yet to understand the dynamics of the human brain fully. The field of Para-Psychology deals with ‘phenomena’ like Extra Sensory Perception (ESP) and telepathy etc. where one can direct one’s consciousness to gain insight into future or to influence others mind. It is not possible to explain [23] these on the basis of the known laws of the world. It has been claimed that under hypnosis a subject could vividly recollect incidents from the previous lives including near-death and death experiences which is independent of spatio-temporality. Then, it is not clear, why most of these experiences are related to past ? If these phenomena are truely independent of space and time, then studies should be made to find out if anybody under hypnosis can predict his/her own death, an event that can be easily verifiable in due course of time, unlike the recollections of past-life ! • PK, FieldREG etc. Can mind influence matter belonging to outside of the body ? The studies dubbed as Psycho-Kinesis (PK) have been conducted to investigate the ‘suspect’ interaction of the human mind with various material objects such as cards, dice, simple pendulum etc. An excellent historical overview of such studies leading upto the modern era is available as a review paper, titled “ The Persistent Paradox of Psychic Phenomena: An Engineering Perspective”, by Robert Jahn of Princeton University published in Proc. IEEE (Feb. 1982). The Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) programme of the Department of Applied Sciences and Engineering, Princeton University, has recently developed and patented a ‘Field REG’ (Field Random Event Generator) device which is basically a portable notebook computer with a built-in truely random number generator (based on a microelectronic device such as a shot noise resistor or a solid-state diode) and requisite software for on-line data processing and display, specifically tailored for conducting ‘mind-machine interaction’ studies. After performing large number of systematic experiments over the last two decades, the PEAR group has reported [24] the existence of such a consciousness related mind-machine interaction in the case of ‘truely random devices’. They attribute it to a ‘Consciousness Field Effect’. They have also reported that deterministic random number sequences such as those generated by mathematical algorithm or pseudo-random generators do not show any consciousness related anomalous behaviour. Another curious finding is that ‘intense emotional resonance’ generates the effect whereas ‘intense intellectual resonance’ does not ! It is also not clear what is the strength of the ‘consciousness field’ in comparison to all the four known basic force fields of nature. One should not reject outright any phenomenon that cannot be explained by the known basic laws of nature. Because each such phenomenon holds the key to extend the boundary of our knowledge further. But before accepting these effects one should filter them through the rigours of scientific methodology. In particular, the following questions can be asked: • Why are these events rare and not repeatable ? • How does one make sure that these effects are not manifestations of yet unknown facets of the known forces ? • Why is it necessary to have truely random processes ? How does one make sure that these are not merely statistical artifacts ? If the above effects survive the scrutiny of the above questions (or similar ones) then they will open up the doors to a new world not yet known to science. In such a case how does one accomodate them within the existing framework of scientific methods ? If these effects are confirmed beyond doubt, then one has to explore the possibility that at the fundamental level of nature, the laws are either different from the known physical laws or there is a need to complement the known physical laws with a set of non-physical laws ! In such a situation, these ‘suspect’ phenomena might provide us with the valuable clue for modifying BE to get M(BE) that is the basis of everything including both physical and mental ! 6 IV. IS THERE A NEED FOR A CHANGE OF PARADIGM ? Although reductionist approach can provide us with valuable clues regarding the attributes of consciousness, it is the holistic approach that can only explain consciousness. But the dualism of Descarte [25] that treats physical and mental processes in a mutually exclusive manner will not suffice for understanding consciousness unless it makes an appropriate use of complementarity for mental and physical events which is analogous to the complementarity evident in the quantum world. V. CONCLUSION Where does the brain end and the mind begin ? Brain is the physical means to acquire and to retain the information for the mind to process them to find a ‘meaning’ or a ‘structure’ which we call ‘understanding’ that is attributed to consciousness. Whereas attributes of consciousness can be reduced to BE [or to M(BE)], the holistic process of consciousness can only be understood in terms of ‘quantum communication’, where ‘communication’ has an appropriate meaning. Maybe one has to look for such a suitable definition of communication at the level of ‘quantum vacuum’. VI. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS It is a pleasure to thank the organisers, in particular to Prof. B. V. Sreekantan and Dr. Sangeetha Menon; for the hospitality and encouragement as well as for providing the conducive atmosphere that made this article possible. [1] Penrose, R., Emperor’s New Mind and Shadows of the Mind, Vintage Editions, (1998). [2] Stapp, H. P., Chance, Choice, and Consciousness: The Role of Mind in the Quantum Brain, quant-ph/9511029 (electronic archive at LANL). [3] Nair, Ranjit, Consciousness and the Quantum in this conference. [4] Sreekantan, B. V., Scientific Explanations and Consciousness in this conference. [5] Einsten, A., Podolsky, P., and Rosen, N., (1935), Can quantum-mechanical description of physical reality be considered complete ?, Phys. Rev. 47, 777-80. [6] Aspect, A., Grangier, P., and Roger, G. (1982), Experimental realization of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm Gedankenexperiment: a new violation of Bell’s inequalities, Phys. Rev. Lett., 48, 91-4. [7] Rao, Shobhini, Neural Correlates and Consciousness in this conference. [8] Tondon, P. N., Exploring Consciousness–Neurobiological Approaches in this conference. [9] Hameroff, S. R., (1987) Ultimate computing, Biomolecular consciousness and nano-technology, North-Holland, Amsterdam. [10] Hameroff, S. R. and Watt, R. C. (1983), Do anesthetics act by altering electron mobility ?, Anesth. Analg., 62, 936-40. [11] Vidyasagar, M., Artificial Intelligence in this conference. [12] Deutsch, D. (1985), Quantum theory, the Church-Turing principle and the universal quantum computer in Proc. Roy. Soc. (London), A 400, 97-117; Feynman R. P., (1986), Quantum mechanical Computers, Found. of Phys., 16(6), 507-31. [13] Deutsch, D. and Jozsa, R. (1992), Rapid solution of problems by quantum computation, Proc. Roy. Soc. (London), A 439, 553-8. [14] Wheeler, J. A., (1989), Information, Physics, Quantum: the Search for the Links, Proc. 3rd Int. symp. Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, Tokyo, pp. 354-368. [15] Wilczek, F., (1999), Getting its from bits, Nature 397, 303-6. [16] D. Fφllesdal, (1975), Meaning and Experience in ‘Mind and Language’, ed. S. Guttenplan (Clarendon, Oxford), pp. 25-44. [17] Singh, N., Fundamental Laws of mental events in this conference. [18] Kaushal, R. S., Plurality of Consciousness in Vedantic Philosophy and its role in Scientific Observations in this conference. [19] Singh, R. K., A Physical Basis of Consciousness in this conference. [20] Sinha, A., Almost Minds? The Search for Animal Consciousness in this conference. [21] Sarukkai, S., Reality and Consciousness in this conference. [22] Iyengar, B. K. S., Light on Yoga, Unwin Publishers, London. [23] Krishna Rao P. V., Yoga and Transformation of Consciousness in this conference. [24] Srinivasan, M., Experimental studies on interaction of human consciousness with physical systems in this conference. [25] Narasimhan, M. G., The Emergence of Cartesian Paradigm and Its Impacts on Later Developments in this conference. 7

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 234 Exploration Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order Robert Campbell * ABSTRACT We intuitively sense that there must be such a thing as universal wholeness. We all need an integrating framework to make common sense of the diversity of our phenomenal experience. Undifferentiated universal wholeness must admit of the separate things that we experience. This necessarily introduces a Rift in Wholeness that requires discrete levels nested or subsumed within it. This is fundamental to the cosmic order and to the nature of being. There is one System of order that transcends and subsumes an open ended hierarchy of higher Systems that elaborate on it. Systems 1, 2, 3, and 4 are introduced accordingly. Although Systems higher than System 4 soon become beyond the grasp of human intelligence the first four Systems can take us very far and expand the horizons of science. They define the structural dynamics of the creative process that seeks to mend the Rift in Wholeness. Key Words: cosmic order, universal and particular, one and many, hierarchies, space and time, atoms, quantum of energy, the Void, yang and yin. The System: Introductory Concepts The System shows how the cosmic order works. There is only one System but it elaborates in an open ended hierarchy of discrete sub-systems nested within itself. Hierarchical order provides for a oneness to the diversity of the universe and allows us to meaningfully integrate our phenomenal experience. This implicitly imposes boundary conditions to specific phenomena, since there cannot be a physical boundary to the whole universe in preconceived concepts of space or time. There can only be a boundary between a universal inside as it relates to a universal outside across one or more active interfaces between them. Neither the universal inside or outside can be known to the exclusion of the other. Space and time derive from the way the hierarchy works not vice versa. We see boundaries as the closed surfaces of physical things, such as the atoms and molecules of trees, animals and people, all of which share a common inside and outside, neither of which can be known to the exclusion of the other. This deserves emphasis. All we can know is active interface processes between them. Each sub-system elaborates in discrete nested stages, each stage determined by the number of active interfaces between a common inside and outside. We may thus think of System 1, System 2, System 3, System 4, System 5, and so on. Each higher system elaborates on the lower systems that transcend and subsume them so that it remains One System of delineating the cosmic order. * Correspondence: Robert Campbell, P.O. Box 182, Karon Post Office, Phuket, 83100, Thailand. Website: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com E-Mail: bob@cosmic-mindreach.com Note: This article is based on author’s work of 1979, 1985 & 2005. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 235 Each higher system is complete and fully self consistent within itself, since each higher system must be consistent with the Lower Systems and System 1. Systems 1 and 2 transcend and subsume events in space and time. Cosmic insights that transcend and subsume the whole of creation are possible via System 2. The unaided intellect cannot reinvent the cosmic order in language, but the cosmic order can reveal itself directly in the private domain transcending creation. System 3 prescribes how atomic matter is synchronously projected as separate atoms linked up by light in a discontinuous universe on a cosmic scale. It is the primary activity from which space and time derive. Homologues of System 3 prescribe galactic, solar and planetary organization. Systems 4 and higher prescribe how biological process evolve and work to meaningfully integrate sentient experience nested within the subsuming context of System 3 wherever planetary conditions are favourable. Biologically living processes have a cosmic origin and are probably seeded by spores from interstellar space. There is no credible series of chemical accidents that can produce a living cell. A living cell is a highly recursive energy pattern that is distinct from the molecular forms that clothe it. The System is not mathematical. Mathematics, like all languages, has evolved from how the System prescribes the roots of meaning. There is nothing more fundamental than the System. The cosmic order cannot be reduced to language or algorithm of any kind. The lower Systems can nevertheless be represented by active interface processes consistent with how phenomenal experience is presented to us both in the public and private domain. Language evolves accordingly. One System must allow for all possible varieties of experience in the way that it integrates diverse elements as a whole. Since it must be all inclusive, it cannot be based on some ideas to the exclusion of others conceived in language, while it must allow for mutually exclusive varieties of phenomenal experience. It concerns the structure of being as distinct from the knowledge of phenomenal behavior. The descriptions of the Systems that follow are an introduction. The correspondence between the active representations of the Systems and phenomenal experience are advanced and require much study and reflection to assimilate and thoroughly understand. The inquiring mind will find them a challenge and a fascinating adventure of discovery. It pries open new windows of wonder. System 1 and Universal Wholeness System 1 transcends the whole of creation, the whole of history, the whole of space and time. It is an expression of universal wholeness. It can not manifest as a physical thing itself. That would define a boundary to it in space and time. System 1 must nevertheless specify boundary conditions or there could be no phenomena in experience. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 236 This requires that all phenomena must share both a universal inside and a universal outside. All we can know is the active interface between them. We can not know the universal inside or the universal outside as separate things in themselves. We can only know their active relationship at interfaces between them. Since active interfaces have an active universal Center inside it is convenient to call them Centers, so that we can speak of Centers 1, 2, 3 and so on associated with Systems 1, 2, 3 and so on. It is also convenient to represent the universal active Center inside as light that relates across one or more active interfaces to a universal passive periphery in darkness. Suns relate actively to the passive darkness of interstellar space. The fusion processes that generate light in the centers of suns are universal but we cannot know them to the exclusion of the passive outside. We can only observe as they emit energy across the active interface of the sun. This is picked up by the interface of our retina at the back of our eyes and transmitted by active interface processes of our nervous system that regenerate the visible reality that we subjectively see outside. Structural Representation of System 1 The universal inside or common center is active and it relates to the universal outside or passive periphery across an active interface between them. This may be represented graphically from two perspectives, one passive and one active. Between them one can intuitively grasp the structural nature of System 1. The active universal inside is represented by light, L. The passive universal outside is represented by darkness, D. Light is thus illustrated relating to darkness across an active interface between them. We see this confirmed in experience. Life giving energy comes to us from atomic processes within the sun. Energy is captured by plants within the molecular bonds of sugar to support the biosphere. It is the energy we digest inside our bellies that allows us to think and mobilize our bodies in response to our environment. Figure 1 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 237 The active perspective in Figure 1 is most important. The passive perspective in Figure 1 simply helps us to better visualize the active representation in higher Systems. We are concerned with intuitive insight into the structural dynamics of phenomenal experience. The creative energy disseminates from the active center, as shown by the white arrow in Figure 1, and there is reflux back toward the center, as shown by the black arrow. We see the reflux in the transformation of the atmosphere and the geological evolution of the continents over the past few billion years by plants and invertebrates that have deposited carbon. Organic life cycles arising from the planet in response to the sun relate back to transform the planet. There is likewise evidence for reflux of old heavy stars through the galactic center to regenerate stocks of primary hydrogen for new generations of stars. A Rift in Universal Wholeness The concept of universal wholeness, as represented by System 1, requires an interdependent twoness as a level of subsumption within it. We cannot conceive of undifferentiated oneness without distinction or attribute of any kind. Meaning slips away from us. In order for there to be a subjective and objective aspect to things we must be able to distinguish separate active interfaces as boundary conditions of phenomena. We identify things as separate interfaces with surfaces of some kind. This requires two active interfaces, one universal and unique and the other particular, representing many. Manyness can only find reconciliation with oneness in this way. This means that there is a fundamental rift in universal wholeness between the universal and the particular aspects of phenomena. It is this rift in wholeness that gives rise to the nested higher Systems that constitute the creative process. The creative process endlessly seeks to mend the rift in wholeness. As humans we likewise seek a unified worldview that we can creatively relate to in order to integrate and make sense of our experience. We all have a theory of everything that we intuitively relate to. For example if we believe that that physical death brings total psychic annihilation we believe this is true for every sentient creature that has ever lived anywhere in the universe. We do not believe that we alone are singled out for extinction. Science also seeks a grand unified Theory of Everything in Big Bang cosmology but it only accepts an objective perspective believing that all things exist in a preconceived spacetime continuum. The subjective mind that conceives of it is not acknowledged as a distinct reality inside. There is no universal inside, just a universal continuum outside that began in a primal burst of existence from nothing. That is the universal vessel in which all things physically exist outside. Mind, all mind, is an emergent property of physics. This objective perspective places us outside our own subjective understanding. The rift in universal wholeness allows for subsumed levels of differentiation in phenomenal experience that acknowledges both a subjective universal inside and an objective universal outside. This is an approach that has never been thoroughly explored before. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 238 The Universal Center and System 2 The only alternative to believing that events take place in a universal common outside in a spacetime continuum is to also acknowledge a universal center to all phenomena. This is a universal requirement for both a subjective and objective aspect to all phenomena consistent with System 1 and to a rift in universal wholeness. System 2 is represented by two active interfaces. Each shares a common universal inside with respect to a common universal outside, as required by System 1. One interface is universal and one is particular. The universal interface is unique and designated as Center 1. It is a manifestation of System 1 acknowledging Other than Self. It transcends the particular interface, designated as Center 2, which represents many of a universal kind. The universal interface is an archetypal pattern of Universal Being that each particular interface can structurally relate to in only two possible alternate ways. One is objective and one is subjective. The Objective Orientation of System 2 In the objective orientation illustrated in Figure 2 the universal interface is inside the particular interface. Center 1 represents a common subjective center to all particular interfaces represented by Center 2. Together they relate objectively outwards to other particular Centers 2. Other particular Centers 2 are perceived in a common outside designated as darkness D. Figure 2 In Figure 2 it can be seen that light disseminates from within center 1 (C1) through center 2 (C2) to the universal outside designated as darkness D. A graduation of patterned energy between them is designated L1. C1 is universal and unique, while C2 is particular and manifold. C2 represents any ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 239 number of particular centers in the objective world. Everything shares a common active center inside and a common universal outside in darkness, consistent with System 1. Although particular centers subsume hierarchical levels within them that are distinctions of kind, the only distinction of kind that is explicit in System 2 is that between the universal and particular aspects of experience in general. This is a very fundamental characteristic of experience. System 2, like System 1, transcends and subsumes the whole of space-time. As particular human beings this requires that we seek universal wholeness as a condition of living. We implicitly need a universal worldview to relate to. The Subjective Orientation of System 2 In the alternate mode of System 2, called the subjective orientation, C2 turns around to face C1. It now faces C1 that was formerly within it and through which it still derives its energies since they share the same universal inside. C2 now objectively faces the universal center of the universe distinct from itself. It is nevertheless a transcending subjective orientation in which C2 explicitly shares in the archetypal nature of C1 as Universal Being. C2 sees C1 as System 1 from the subsumed perspective of System 2. This is completely distinct from the objective orientation where many C2s are open to a common outside that they share. Experiences of this kind are cosmic in nature and private. They transcend and subsume the whole of creation. Neither interface can admit of more than one other active interface in this orientation if universal wholeness is to be preserved. The subjective orientation is One, whereas the objective orientation is Many. The subjective orientation is a private realization that bridges the rift in universal wholeness from which all creation proceeds. Figure 3 In the subjective orientation of System 2 one particular interface C2 can only share phenomenal experience with the universal interface C1 at the latter’s discretion. All active communication is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 240 one way, from the universal C1 to one particular C2. This must be so as a condition of universal wholeness. The two are coalesced as One but are two. Each perceives the other objectively outside but share subjective experience at the discretion of C1. Normal organic feedback to the particular human being’s consciousness is totally suspended. The particular human being can entertain no independent thoughts, forms, ideas, or actions apart from C1. This bridges the Rift in Universal Wholeness. The particular center C2 realizes that the universal center C1 is the living manifestation of truth, unity, harmony, love, compassion, justice, mercy, and cosmic order. Universal values are the ultimate reality manifest in Universal Being. In the passive illustration it is clear that C1 and C2 are mutually distinct as separate centers, yet they must relate to one another as one. They are an elaboration of System 1. In the active mode the two centers are shown mutually perceived as one by the double headed Z arrow. They both share the same inside, L0, and the same peripheral darkness, D, outside. It will be said that they are coalesced as one, although they are two. They must relate both as two and as one. C2 shares in the Universal Being of C1 at the discretion of C1. This is illustrated by the relational wholes R1 and R2. System 3 Generated by Two Sets of Three Centers System 3 is generated by two sets of three independent yet mutually related active interfaces or centers.1 The nature of the three active interfaces is identified by a universal hierarchy that specifies their step-like progression from a universal center or inside to a universal periphery or outside. There are only four possible ways that three centers can relate to one another with respect to a universal inside and outside consistent with Systems 1 and 2. Each way is called a term. Figure 4 1 Campbell R. System 3. http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System3.html, 1979, 2005. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 241 The Systems coexist and are not derived one from another in a temporal sequence. They are illustrated in the passive perspective in Figure 4. Terms 1 and 3 are objective. Terms 2 and 4 are subjective. Note that objective and subjective begin to compound within themselves. The four terms are shown separately in the active perspective in Figures 5. Universal Particular Figure 5 The two sets of terms as shown in the active perspective in Figure 5 cohere together as shown in Figure 6. C1, C2 and C3 represent Idea, Routine and Form respectively. For example we always give Form(3) to Idea(1) through a Routine(2) of activity. In other words Idea(1) gives direction to Routine(2) which gives direction to Form(3). This is the universal hierarchy of System 3. At a primary level the three active interfaces represent the photon(1), electron(2), and proton(3). Two Coherent Alternating Modes of System 3 In the objective mode in the bottom half of Figure 6 the Photon(1), Electron(2) and Proton(3) in each atom have mutually closed spherical surfaces that define spherical inner space with respect to linear outer space defined by the transmission of light. The universal Term 2 is confined within and tunnels through the mutually closed triad of particular Centers to intimately link them up in pairs. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 242 This universally invests each particular Center in the triad with subjective and objective characteristics with respect to the other two particular Centers. The top half of Figure 6 shows the formless and timeless quantum energy equivalents of each physical atom. Atoms are synchronously projected as a series of still frames linked up by light. All relative motion occurs as quantum jumps in position between space frames through the agency of the timeless and boundless Void. The Void is a master memory bank for Systems 3 and higher. Each particular Term 3 has eternal or timeless characteristics since it simultaneously reconciles the internal and external aspects of electrons(2) and protons(3) as constituents of photon(1) energy for each primary hydrogen atom. Collectively the quantum photon energy packets of all atoms constitute the boundless Void from which successive space frames are recalled in a cosmic movie. Routine and Form coalesce as elements of technique that constitute the Idea. Figure 6 shows how the universal and particular Terms cohere in alternating modes. Figure 6 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 243 System 3 prescribes the organization of the physical universe. Systems 4 and higher prescribe the organization of biologically living systems nested within the physical creation where conditions permit. All the higher Systems have Terms with closed triadic relationships as well as timeless and formless Terms. Only triadic relationships are mutually closed and exhibit surfaces. There are a variety of ways this happens in the higher Systems. The System 4 Hierarchy The four active interfaces are an elaboration of the three active interfaces that generate System 3. Knowledge is distinguished from Idea in System 4, since a monolithic Idea does not allow of diverse phenomena distinct from physical matter. The distinction thus derives from the same Rift in Universal Wholeness that gives rise to Systems 2 and 3 from System 1. Each higher System must elaborate on the nature of Universal Wholeness. This generates the creative process. The System 4 hierarchy is as follows: (C1)IDEA → (C2)KNOWLEDGE → (C3)ROUTINE → (C4)FORM It is noteworthy, even remarkable, that these four words structurally define coherent meaning within each of the nine Terms of System 4 as they dynamically relate to one another in the evolving matrix of interactions through the 12 Step Sequence outlined below. We can see that the hierarchy applies to any human activity. There is always an Idea that gives direction to our learned Knowledge that in turn directs a Routine of visceral and muscular activity that results in an altered Form of the body in concert with the Form of the physical environment. The hierarchy is universal and is designated by Term 9 of System 4. If we focus on the neurological and muscular processes that animate us we can see that the four words in the universal hierarchy have biological correlates as follows: C1 – Host (Idea): The Host human being is an archetypal energy pattern that is clothed in molecules in common with the whole universe. We have evolved over hundreds of millions of years as people housed within a physical body. We animate our bodies according to subsumed electronic ideas in our nervous system that we entertain and that we may commit our actions to. C2 – Organs (Knowledge): Knowledge is invested in our body’s infrastructure. It is implicit in the complement of Organs that make us up and that have evolved over a history of learning, including our evolutionary history as a species and the species that historically preceded us. The vertebrate lineage from reptiles to humans has a similar quadruped body plan of similar Organs that is archetypal in character and that allows us to benefit from an evolutionary history of learning. Knowledge implicit in our central and peripheral nervous systems allows us to meaningfully integrate our ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 244 experience including our personal history of learning and the synaptic connections that have developed. Knowledge embraces how Organs are organized to interrelate. C3 – Cells (Routine): Cells are the factories that constitute Organs and that manufacture our molecular forms through highly recursive biochemical Routines that are catalyzed by complex legions of protein enzymes that catalyze even themselves. They increase reaction rates by millions of times and are indispensable to the function of every living cell. Because enzymes remain chemically unaltered and employ phosphate ions as the energy currency of exchange, each Cell is a highly organized energy pattern that clothes itself in molecules according to its needs. C4 – Molecular Form: The physical universe is constructed of 92 naturally occurring atomic elements that chemically combine into inorganic and organic molecules of potentially endless variety in biological systems. Atoms and molecules have closed surfaces generated by System 3. They have opaque surfaces that allow us to see, feel, and interact with physical Forms through the physical Form of our own body. As the archetypal Host of our body we have an archetypal capacity to animate the molecular Forms of our body as we wish in response to our physical circumstance. We can thus reinterpret the universal hierarchy as it biologically relates to human behavior as follows: Host (C1) → Organs(C2) → Cells(C3) → Molecular Form(C4) Idea(1) → Knowledge(2) → Routine(3) → Form(4) The above four Centers define the meaning implicit within each of the nine Terms. The Transform Sequence of the Three Particular Sets Six of the Terms are particular and three Sets of Particular Centers follow through a repeating Six Step Term Sequence I, 4, 2, 8, 5, 7 one Step apart in the following order: Step 1.-T1 - Perception of need in relation to response capacity. Step 2.-T4 - Ordered sensory input alternately from the environment or simulated. Step 3.-T2 - Creation of idea as a potential action response or creative concept. Step 4.-T8 - Balanced response to sensory stimuli as a motor output to muscles. Step 5.-T5 - Action sequence of muscular activity with proprioceptive feedback. Step 6.-T7 - Sequence encoded as a unit memory for recall to T1 and another sequence. Because the three Sets follow one Step apart Terms 8, 7, and 4 alternate with Terms 1, 2 and 5. Term 7 is a memory term since the inverse of the number 7 is 1, 4, 2, 8, 5, 7 repeating. There are Expressive and Regenerative modes for most of the Terms. In the Regenerative mode Centers 1 and 2 exchange places. All of the Particular Terms except T8E have a Regenerative Mode that simulates an anticipated action as well as an Expressive Mode that is conditioned from past experience. The Particular T8E is always Expressive and acts as a pivot for transformations between Expressive and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 245 Regenerative sequences. A total of 12 Steps are thus required for all three Sets to complete 7 expressive and 5 regenerative Term transformations in their respective sequences. In each Step, Expressive and Regenerative Particular Terms from the three Sets interact to span and integrate past and future. The 12 Steps are divided into three 4 Step Cycles by the Universal Sets that transform sequences spanning 4 Particular Steps. Each such Particular Set Term Sequence follows a 12 Step path through the nervous system, synapse by synapse. The nervous system has evolved in just this way. There can be many parallel Particular Sequences active at once through parallel neural pathways since the nervous system is structured with the same number of synaptic junctions in each pathway. The Universal Sets integrate all Particular pathways into a coherently organized and meaningful activity. The Primary Universal Set and Its Transform Sequence Term 9 is the Universal Hierarchy UT9. The Universal Set begins each Cycle in the Term 9 position where it stays for Steps 1 and 2. The four active interfaces (centers) of UT9 prescribe the 4 Step Cycles. UT9 has universal access to T7R Host memories of the Quantum Sensorium called the Void. It identifies them as relevant Ideas(1) for recall in Step 1. In Step 2 the recall is Known(2). Then it transforms mid Cycle to a Regenerative UT8R term concerned with universally balancing available energy resources to fuel a priority of Routine(3) action needs in all the various Particular pathways. It budgets energy expenditures committed to an integrated plan of change in body Form(4) in Step 4. Each Cycle ends after four Steps when the Primary Universal Set transforms from UT8R back to UT9 to begin the next Cycle. The Term 8 Regenerative mode UT8R always belongs to the Primary Universal Set because it specifies the context as the Host species. The Primary and Secondary Universal Terms cohere together. The Secondary Set relates to specific Host human beings. The Secondary Universal Set and Its Transform Sequence: The Secondary Universal Set begins each Cycle as Term 3. UT3 is concerned with the Transference of Idea into Form, via the coalescence of Knowledge with Routine. As UT9 identifies relevant Host Ideas(1) as memories in the Void in Step 1, UT3 integrates them as a coherent action plan that can translate Idea(1) into Form(4). In Step 2 of each Cycle UT3 transforms to UT6 which is the Corporeal Body of a specific Host human being. UT6 does not transform in Step 3, but the Primary Universal Set transforms to UT8R which coheres with it. This works like the coherence in the Space Frame side of System 3. In this case it budgets energy resources to an integrated action plan entertained by the UT6 Host. In Step 4 UT6 transforms to a universal UT2E expressive idea term, where UT8R coheres with it again. This explicitly commits resources to an integrated planned idea entertained by the Host. At the end of each Cycle both Universal Sets transform back to their original positions to begin a new Cycle. Because there are three synchronous Particular Sets all twelve Particular Terms are represented in each Cycle but in different Sets. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 246 The Four Repeating Steps of Each Cycle: The two Universal Sets are in yellow circles. The three Particular Sets are in red, green and blue. Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 Figure 7 Chart of Term Transformations in Three Cycles: Step 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Set 1 T8E T5E T7E T1E T4E T2E T8E T5R T7R T1R T4R T2R Set 2 T7R T1R T4R T2R T8E T5E T7E T1E T4E T2E T8E T5R Set 3 T4E T2E T8E T5R T7R T1R T4R T2R T8E T5E T7E T1E Set U1 UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R Set U2 UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E Cycle 1 2 3 New sensory input from the environment comes via T4E in Set 3 in Step 1. Sensory input T4E in one Set of Step 1 of each Cycle is always coupled to memory recall T7R to begin a related simulation sequence. Memory recall must always be linked directly to sensory input in order for our thoughts, feelings, and actions to be relevant to ongoing circumstantial input. This must also be reconciled with the previous action sequence T8E (simultaneous motor instructions to muscles) in order for there to be a smooth transition from Step to Step. The regenerative terms at the spinal level are accommodated by gamma motor neurons that project to muscle spindles. A gamma motor simulation in T1R is followed by a muscle spindle simulation in T4R in Step 3 that generates proprioceptive feedback about body position in space. The regenerative simulation anticipates a suitable future result that is reconciled with the alternate T4E term in Step 1 of each Cycle. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 247 The Passive Representation of the Nine System 4 Terms Term 1— Perception of the Field (Particular): The separate centers coalesce in pairs, idea C1 with knowledge C2, and routine C3 with form C4. Perceived need thus relates to resource capacity to respond. Term 2— Creation of Idea (Particular): The C1, C2, C3 triad exhibits a known potential to enact idea in routine. Form C4 feeds back from the environment through routine C3 to find identity as a superimposed idea on the closed triad. Term 3— Transference of Idea (Universal-Secondary): C2 and C3 coalesce. Knowledge(2) contains idea(1). Routine(3) contains form(4). Idea(1) is thus transferred to form(4) through the coalescence of knowledge and routine. Term 4— Mental Work (Particular): C1 and C2 coalesce within C3 separate from C4. Idea and knowledge together relate through routine with external form. Sensory input alternates with proprioceptive simulated feedback. Term 5— Physical Work (Particular): Idea C1 directs knowledge C2 from within, which in turn directs routine C3, which finds a physical identity in form C4. Countercurrent propriocption feeds back from form(4) to idea(1). Term 6— Corporeal Body (Universal-Secondary): The closed triad Idea C1, knowledge C2, & routine C3 is behind the common physical form C4 of the universe. Each triad member projects independently through form, C4. Term 7— Memory Resources (Particular): Routine C3 is coalesced with form C4 as a quantized element of technique within knowledge C2, and idea C1. T7 eternally reconciles inside and outside as a timeless element of memory. Term 8— Creative Feedback (Particular): Countercurrent identities balance form C4 with idea C1 through routine C3, within the context of knowledge C2. Output balances input, and budgets resource distribution. Term 9— Renewed Perception of the Field (Universal-Primary): Idea C1 gives direction to knowledge C2 which gives direction to routine C3 which gives direction to form C4. This is the universal discretionary hierarchy of System 4. Figure 8 For better descriptions see: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4Terms.html . ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 248 The Active Representation of the Nine System 4 Terms Figure 9 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 234-249 Campbell, R., Introduction to the System of the Cosmic Order 249 Descriptions of System 4 Terms and How They Work: The descriptions opposite the passive representation of the nine Terms in Figure 8 are very brief and general. It is the active representations that generate the meaning implicit in each term and there are many subtleties involved. For a more complete description of each Term see the current article System 4 Terms or at http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4Terms.html . For a more complete description of how the Terms interact to integrate human experience see the two articles on the Human Nervous System. Part 1 shows how it works at the spinal level at the link http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4_Sequence_Steps.html . Part 2 shows how the cerebellum integrates sensory inputs with cerebral function and motor outputs synapse by synapse at the link http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4_Sequence_Part_2.html . For a description of how the Universal Sets integrate human experience see the article Universal Integration of Human Experience at the link: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/Human_Iintegration_Cell_article.html . It is a challenge to intuitively grasp how all this works as it does and why it must in order to be consistent with phenomenal experience as presented to us both subjectively and objectively. Once grasped however, many doors begin to open to unexplored vistas of wonder. The Higher Systems The higher Systems become very complex very quickly and they are not represented on the website. For example System 5 has twenty Terms. It consists of two interacting System 4's one objectively oriented and one subjectively oriented consistent with the lower Systems and an elaboration of them. Virtual images first occur in System 5. Each higher System has surprises that are not predictable from the lower Systems. It is not a logical progression in time. It can not be logically derived, even though it is logically self consistent. It can only be intuitively discovered. All the Systems are interdependent and coexist as One in an open ended elaboration of higher Systems that soon become beyond our reach. Nevertheless the various articles on the website should be sufficient to demonstrate that the first four Systems can take us very far beyond the current paradigms that guide us. For example System 4 can lead us synapse by synapse through the immensely complex intricacies of the human nervous system. The concepts are introduced under System 4 Terms. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1006 Article Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) Gregory M. Nixon* Abstract Herein, I review the moment in my life when I awoke from the dream of self to find being as part of the living world. It was a sudden, momentous event that is difficult to explain since transcending the self ultimately requires transcending the language structures of which the self consists. Since awakening to the world took place beyond the enclosure of self-speech, it also took place outside our symbolic construction of time. It is strange to place this event and its aftermath as happening long ago in my lifetime, for it is forever present; it surrounds me all the time just as the world seems to do. This fact puts into question the reality of my daily journey from dawn to dusk with all the mundane tasks I must complete (like writing of that which cannot be captured in writing). My linear march to aging and death inexorably continues, yet it seems somehow unreal, the biggest joke of all. Still, I here review the events leading up to my time out of mind and then review the serious repercussions when I was drawn back into the ego-self only to find I did not have the conceptual tools or the maturity to understand what had happened. Call to Adventure For the sake of structure (and because I owe so much of my psychological resurrection to the man’s writings), I will break apart this story and analysis into sections that accord with Joseph Campbell’s famous stages on the journey of the hero in his Hero of a Thousand Faces (1949/68). The hero’s journey is not a line of time going from past to future, but a circle that begins with the Call to Adventure, continues with crossing the Threshold from normal (social) reality into one much more dangerous but ripe with possibility. The hero must go through Tests, facing dangers (both fears and temptations), and heroes often fail. Then there is the Attainment (whether apotheosis or discovering of the treasure, etc.), followed by the Return back across that Threshold during which dangers of a different sort threaten while the adventurer attempts to reintegrate himself with society and with the selfidentity that the society has provided. For me, the whole circle is more like a twisting spiral, forever uncoiling from and recoiling toward an empty centre that can never really, in its essence, be recalled. Perhaps because it is always present. * Correspondence: Gregory M. Nixon, University of Northern British Columbia, Prince George, British Columbia, Canada. Websty: http://www3.telus.net/public/doknyx/ & http://unbc.academia.edu/GregoryNixon/ Email: doknyx@telus.net Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1007 The call began in discontent, which was as much a sign of the times as inner restlessness. I’m going to tell this story straight, without shame and without bravado, so you can believe me when I tell you that in my final high school years I was a robust and lusty youth, who was somewhat wild in the country. In Alberta, Canada, the youth revolution of the late sixties was late in arriving, so I was doing all the things an 18 year old male in the fifties ethos that preceded the hippy ethos would be expected to be doing. I had a regular girlfriend, “Ellen”, with whom I was at last having sex as often and as long as possible. Naturally enough, I cheated on her with any other girl who would accommodate me. I was an athlete who won the grand aggregate in track and field, and I played on the high school football team as the fullback and jokingly called myself “The King” even though my touchdowns were few indeed. Not sure why, but the joke spread and soon the other students were greeting me with, “Hi King,” in the hallways. Perhaps it spread because I hung out at a tough pizza joint on the north side of town called The King’s Inn. From there, our gang would raid the south side and get into memorable brawls, or we would defend our territory should any southsiders dare to enter the Inn. I had a rep, but I was mostly well liked because I liked to fight loudmouth bullies but was not one myself. However, I got drunk at least every weekend, sometimes during the week, and my schoolwork, sports, family life (such as it was), and relationship suffered. But I still felt restless. I yearned for adventure, to be sure, but also somehow felt that what the world was offering me had no real importance. Desire for conquest or fame was not the real me either. Fucking and fighting were ends of their own and a good way to laugh in the face of adult society. That put me in with a crowd who were in the non-academic stream or already out of school in the world of work. I did still did acceptably well in school in the matriculation (academic) stream (my mother pushed me) but the only subjects that held any interest were English and Social Studies, both containing stories of human adventure. I had emotionally divorced myself from home life, I thought, since my parents never got along and were soon to be divorced themselves. I disdained the few longhaired guys appearing in our town, the messy chicks with them, and the whispers of “drugs” that surrounded them. Everything changed when an acquaintance from class, let’s call him Jake, invited me to smoke some hash with him. I loved intoxication, so I was excited at trying a new way to achieve it. It was far the ordinary pot with its seeds and twigs that was being smoked at that time. It was Red Lebanese hashish, pressed and sent in an envelope to Jake from his Hari-Krishna sister now living in East Germany. We skipped school and smoked up in a little pipe made with a pen barrel stuck in thread spool. A broken pencil blocked the other end of the spool, and a needle-perforated tin foil pushed into the hole Jake had dug into the centre of the spool served as the pipe bowl. I learned quickly and the effect was very fast. This was not like drinking at all! The room tilted and the world seemed to be made of chuckles. I felt giddy and went with it while more experienced Jake went on about playing music and tasting apples. Suddenly I realized what a good guy this quiet, thoughtful neighbor from my classes was. It was the beginning of an eventful pothead friendship. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1008 Jake became my main smoking partner and it wasn’t long until we had graduated to headshop hookahs with almond extract flavouring the water and had hooked up with other heads around town. I was graduating high school and had finally discovered what the hippies and the burgeoning counter-culture were talking about: there was another way to be conscious! This way was open, laid-back, absorbed in the experience of the senses, especially music and psychedelic images. We were bound together by our discovery that what the social mainstream called a crime was in fact a gateway to warm friendship and higher consciousness. Mistrust of the establishment led many to abandon their old friends, schooling or employment and turn on, tune in, and drop out, as Timothy Leary suggested. I liked the scene, and I did drop my old friends, but I also entered university and hesitated to step fully into the new conformism of the hippy ethos, as I saw it. Within months of entering university, I had new friends, a new way of dressing, had given up all sports, never got drunk and violent, but was continuing to mess up my academic career by smoking the weed and experimenting with soft-core psychedelics. Threshold The lure of … something had me in thrall. I can look back now and call it higher consciousness, and there’s no doubt truth in that, but what, exactly, we were after at the time was not exactly clear. Jake and I would hit the library intent on reading up on eastern religions, meditation practices, or exotic rituals that were said to lead to transcendence. Most often, however, we ended up finding good stuff on various forms of psychedelics or more physical drugs that we had not yet tried, so we learned about that instead. Most of our education was in the streets, of course, and in the secret places where everyone shared what they had and all got high with good vibes in the air along with Janis Joplin, the Beatles, or the Jefferson Airplane. Of course, everyone had the fear of being caught, of the man bursting in upon us and locking us up like animals forever. In some people, this developed into a form of paranoia that interfered with the good vibes of the love generation. But, no matter, I had crossed the threshold. I did lot various psychedelics and a lot of weird things happened to me and to others, sometimes simultaneously, but, in retrospect, it was never out of this world, just weird. My high school friend, “Jarot” (from both football and the King’s Inn) and the little Japanese-Canadian girl that always seemed to follow him around with moony eyes, “Setcha”, joined our group of high-flying explorers. At the end of the first school year in April, everyone I knew seemed to go somewhere out of town; there were a lot of hippy meccas like San Francisco, or, in western Canada, Vancouver or Nelson, drawing people to them. The highways were crowded with hitchhikers, and Jake and I made our way amongst them to the big city of Calgary. There I quickly screwed up a job as an encyclopedia salesman (my official reason for going there) and we fell in with local tripsters. We dropped acid in a suburban house one night and this guy came in with his buxom young girlfriend. “Tell she’s got big boobs,” someone whispered to me, “She Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1009 really likes that.” So I told her, she giggled a lot, and then sort of followed me around after that. As we all slouched quietly around the living room listening to the latest sounds, I saw her watching me, so looked boldly back at her through my everpresent red shades. The vibe we exchanged as we looked at each other was stirring, to say the least. I had big can of apple juice on my lap and made of use of it by staring intently right at the girl while slowly ripping the paper in strips down the sides of the can. Her eyes widened and she asked no one in particular, “What’s he doing?” But she never looked away. Something real began to happen between us that may have been ectoplasmic sexual intercourse, if you’ll forgive corny expression. The sexual vibe was electric, in motion, going forth and back between us. I could see shadows in the air intermingling. I would say it was all in my mind, but the girl felt it too, going deeply red and moaning, moving her body lasciviously. I felt myself growing tense and nearing orgasm when I noticed that several people, including her boyfriend, were wide-eyed, watching the invisible exchange between us. I felt like a thief, so I abruptly rose and left the room, breaking the spell. The girl came after me, but I waved her off. A friend whispered, “It’s not cool to take another guy’s girl, man.” Confused and guilty, I left the back of the house and went up on the hill outside that seemed to overlook the whole city. Weird as the exchange had been, my slow awakening awe at the city laid out before soon overwhelmed its memory. What is really going on here? I wondered to myself, thinking of all the people living their lives like busy insects below me. For the first time, I felt a tingling above me, like a doorway in the air beginning to open. I felt a blissful anticipation, then a thought: “Dare I go through?” and the doorway seemed to withdraw and close. I did not go through and I was feeling sad yet hyper-aware as I walked back to the house through the neighbourhood. A police car pulled up and asked me to get in. I grew tense but not frightened when they asked me what I was doing on the hill. I told them – in sad, trembling tones – that I was looking for work in the city and had just been looking over the city wondering about my future. They nodded sympathetically and spoke encouraging words and dropped me off at the house. The car drove off as I went inside and was greeted like some sort of hero. The police car had apparently freaked everyone out to the core of their trembling souls, and they were deeply relieved I had, in their eyes, saved them all from eternal imprisonment. I mention this trip not because it has any deep significance but because it was the first time something completely other beckoned to me (at least the first time I had consciously noted it), something far beyond “weird things happening” (like the apple juice can incident). Though I had not gone through, I could not forget the edgeof-miracle sense that I had experienced. I told others about it and they pretended they knew all about it (“it’s nirvana, man”), but Jake was the only one who listened. I wondered later if the opportunity for what I imagined must be transcendence had occurred because I had shown compassion by being, for once, unselfish, and keeping my distance from a friend’s girl, despite the opportunity. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1010 Later, I returned to my small city home and Dad informed me he had found me a job in the Northwest Territories as a deckhand. It seems a Department of Transport official from Hay River had stopped by his barbershop and, upon hearing of my lack of employment (and likely my waywardness), had offered to hire me immediately as a deckhand on a D.OT. boat that put in buoys and light towers and kept the shipping lanes open for commercial transport on the Great Slave Lake. The season up there was just getting started as it was the end of May, so I shipped out on the Greyhound bus to Edmonton whence I was flown to Hay River on the shores of the big, cold lake and put aboard The Dumit, a government transport boat. I was excited by this new adventure, yet felt let down because so much was happening in the urban world to the south. I was going on one adventure at the cost of postponing another. I need not have worried. By early July I had been fired for drunkenly sleeping through my turn at night watch. The first mate who got me drunk would not speak up for me and I could not apologize to the old Scots skipper, who hinted if I did I could keep my job. We were deep down the Slave River at that time, and it took nearly a month to get back to Hay River, so I had a lot of time to think about it. There was much I had seen and done in that short time, certainly grown stronger and richer compared with the year spent sitting around and smoking pot, but I was anxious to check in on my friends, whom, I had heard, were living in cheap cabins in the forest by the Strait of Georgia on Vancouver Island. My quest still beckoned. I arrived back in my city just long enough to make rash, passionate love for two days to my still-abiding girlfriend, Ellen. I could not help but notice that, during the past year in the pot haze of university, I had not been so eager or vigorous. Then, with the callousness of youth, I left Ellen behind and caught a ride in a crowded little car with a group of acquaintances that took me right to Vancouver Island and even down from the highway on a curving gravel road to a little colony of cabins near the beach. Jarot, Setcha, and Jake were there in one cabin. Bill and Jay, two American draftdodging dealers, occupied the cabin nearby but were temporarily on a mission. “Well, Nixon is here. Now we can head down to California, right?” Jarot drawled as I arrived. It was nice to hear I had been awaited, but I had the vague intention of returning to university. After warm greetings and hugs, they dug out their bag of weed, which was nice, after the months in the north country, but nothing compared with hashish. I sensed some minor tension between Jake and Jarot that neither had with me, and I noticed how sexy Setcha looked in her skimpy outfits. Jarot, however, hardly paid her any attention. We smoked up, felt great, but soon ran out. Now what? I was the only one with money and I was willing to use it, but my friends only scored their weed from Bill and Jay who were not around. “I know where their private stash is,” Jake offered in low tones, as though he could not believe the words coming out of him. After intense discussion, we agreed that it might be okay if we took some out and left some money in the bag. Needless to say, we smoked most of it and Bill and Jay were not happy dealers when they returned and found cash instead of their primo bud. “Cash ain’t grass, man,” Bill Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1011 said mournfully. But it really was incredible smoke, since, as I recall, I went on a walk alone in the woods with my brain singing and zinging, the twigs crunching beneath my feet, and the squirrels darting from tree to tree. Suddenly everything went silent. Even my brain activity paused. I stood still with that hair-raising feeling that something was about to happen. I heard the noise, low and far off at first, then the wind picked up volume and seemed to soar right through me. A small thing to describe, but I was shaken. It was as though I were being given notice that there was more here than meets the eye; the uncanny was afoot. Bill and Jay eventually forgave us and we all set up a bonfire on the beach that night. Jake and Jarot talked passed each in quiet disagreement about our direction. Jarot confided in me what pain it was to have Setcha around. Jake confided in me how hot he thought she was. Across the fire, I misunderstood Setcha’s inward gaze, thinking she was looking at me with sexual challenge. I tried to lie down with her, touching her. She pushed me away in shock and I, just as much in shock, returned to my spot. Neither Jarot nor Jake stirred one iota but gazed steadily at the flames throughout. Later, Bill and Jay brought us hits of blotter acid we cut into little squares, one for each of us, and we tripped out in our cabins. One thing happened on that trip, but it was evidence of the rising tide against the gates of the normal me. We dropped the blotters, time went by, and nothing happened. Nothing happened and it showed; it felt heavy. We all withdrew into ourselves and busied ourselves with this or that, scrabbling around with a spot on the floor or absently turning pages in a picture book. Jarot scratched and yawned. We were waiting. When is something going to happen? We waited for the excitement to begin and in so doing became agitated and discontent. I watched everyone, Jake, cross-legged with his full black beard pawing away at something on the floor, Jarot looking around nervously, and Setcha trying to hum and move to some rhythm only she could hear. I felt edgy: there was a thought I was trying to resist. It kept coming closer and closer until it was on the edge of my mind. I resisted the apperception and sunk into myself, but it would not be denied: As clearly as anything I’ve ever seen in my life, the obvious was revealed to me and I felt the trapdoor of light open above me: “We’re animals!” I burst out with relief. Everyone looked at me in confusion. “Don’t you see? We’re animals, here in this room, on this floor, we’re animals!” “Yeah? So what?” Jarot said. My revelation was obviously not as profound to my fellow tripsters. “Is that a bad thing?” Setcha asked. “We know that already,” Jake said, then as his mental antenna opened up, he added, “Don’t we?” Jake and Setcha looked vaguely hurt and Jarot confused, so they all three returned to their mundane, inwardly focussed preoccupations. I was very excited and felt like a tractor-beam was pulling me up toward that invisible trap-door. “Don’t you feel it?” I asked trembling. Blank looks. “What?” Jake asked. “Don’t you feel the … ” I paused shaking my hands in frustration at the lack of words: “Don’t you feel like something is about to happen – something big?” Now they all three looked intrigued. I tried to explain what I was experiencing, but neither then nor now do I have the words. “It’s like a door is opening, just above me …” I tried, “like, like it’s beckoning, and I really want Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1012 to go through!” “Why doncha?” Jarot asked. Was there a hint of malicious curiosity in his eyes? “What’s on the other side?” asked Setcha. “What’s stopped you?” Jake. “I dunno. I’m afraid…” I managed, but even saying that word, fear, made the intensity of the moment lessen. I tried to get it back. “I don’t know what will happen. It’s big. I I might lose my mind, or die.” There, I had said it. I named the guardian fears on either side of the doorway, both to do with ultimate loss of self. With that, the opportunity began to fade. To get it back, I went from person to person, talking right to them. “Do you feel it?” I would ask. When we connected, the air seemed to lighten and the promise of paradise hinted again. Jarot had the least patience for me, though we did briefly link. “I don’t feel anything,” he said looking away. Setcha and I linked right away as she looked at me and listened to my words, but the link had some sharp edges and she broke it off immediately. Obviously, the strain of my imposition on her person by the fire was still with her, and understandably so. I talked to Jake, and his eyes widened as he felt the connection that wasn’t just between the two of us: the world seemed to be looking in on us. “Watch,” I said, and turned away and the world immediately turned away too. “Do you see?” “Wow,” he said (an expletive heard often in those days). Perhaps at that point, I needed more energy, another source. There was nowhere to go with this, I soon realized, and walked out into the forest again, which, itself, seemed about to awaken. The feeling faded, and soon I was left just walking and thinking about it. Days went by in stonerville with an oyster-bake consisting of oysters stolen from a nearby farm and an incident when we all showered in private campground and I had to pay off the irate owner to prevent him from calling the RCMP. Bill and Jay arrived back from U.S.A. (the country whose draft they were dodging) with a kilo of marijuana wedged between their radiator and the grill, as well a “surprise for the weekend”. We had already lost track of when weekends were, but in a couple of days they told us in whispered tones that they had “purple microdot acid, man. One thousand micrograms of lysergic acid dia-something or other in each hit1. First thing tomorrow.” Setcha and the chicks the Americans brought immediately began to plan dinner, as though tomorrow was some sort of special gathering, like a hoedown. Attainment “Attainment” is all wrong, for what happened on the trip was not really attained, that is, it is not an event that took place along the timeline of daily events. It is not my achievement, for it had little to do with my sense of self at all. Awakening might be better term, and awakening is not part of the dream narrative from which one awakens. It is the end of the dream, just as it brings this narrative to a sudden stop This is where the story ends. Up to this point, I have been telling a condensed tale, with varied settings and characters, and, hopefully, with something of a suspenseful 1 The microgam (µg) levels were never confirmed, of course, but 1000 µg is very high. See the Erowid site http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/lsd/lsd_dose.shtml, in which anything over 400 µg is heavy. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1013 plot. However, here the narrator exits so the narrative must be left hanging. For how can I go on when I, myself – this writer, this narrator, this teller of tales, this self – was superseded by his own source? I can say, time stood still, but what can that really mean in narrative since narrative is made of time as we know it? Both time and narrative have a beginning, middle, and end, and both contain events that cause further events and so on creating a linear unfolding as time progresses. Words will simply fall short (as others in this issue have several times stated), yet I must make an attempt with the poor metaphors of language to suggest my awakening from the dream of the language-enclosed self. We each took what looked like a purple Sen-Sen (licorice candy seeds), and the guys went outside to a shady spot at the edge of the evergreen forest overlooking the Strait below while the girls stayed around the cabins. We chatted, kept busy, but, really, waited. Eventually, “O wow” things began to be noticed or claimed, but the weird things happening were just events of the imagination, and I knew it. I settled into a spot with a view. I thought a bit but then my thoughts went utterly silent. Everything within was still, but instead of ascending or awakening I began a descent. I didn’t notice it notice it at first; I just felt heavy, drawn into the earth “What a thin shell is the ground,” I thought vaguely, and the fragility of the surface presented itself to me. Irrationally, I began to feel I was about to break through the ground and fall helplessly into the depths. I held tightly to my spot, imagining the surface was already wrinkling and cracking. I began to shake, just holding on. This went on for quite some time without anybody noticing. My terror slowly subsided and was replaced by utter abjection, a deep feeling of hopelessness crept upward into my brain. I heard a whispered couplet from a disembodied voice, “Drifting shadows desert the night, bringing darkness to the light,” and felt dead inside. Jake appeared, “What’s happening, man?” “I think I’ve lost my soul,” I heard myself say. “That’s not good,” he said, putting his hand on his chin somewhere beneath his thick black beard. He squatted down beside me, saying, “You can’t just give up. There’s got to be some way…” His words drifted off and we remained in silence while in the distance Bill and Jarot talked of American submarines that were said to have entered these waters. “There’s no hope for me,” I said, and in that context it seemed to make perfect sense. “But I’ll go on. I might as well live for others.” “Live for others,” Jake repeated thoughtfully then suddenly looked up. A bird cried. Jake, who never moved quickly, stood bolt upright with his index finger pointing up. I didn’t know what he was doing as he walked quickly out of our shady spot and up a nearby hillock into the sunlight. He beckoned me, the darkness dissipated, and I felt the tingling all around me begin again. I ran up that hillock, I ran into the light, and then everything, literally, happened at once. Remember, this did not take time, yet there was enough of me the observer present to recall that the tingling sparkles of light, like tiny sparks – more felt than seen – formed an invisible whirlpool right over my head. I felt, not myself, but my life energy, being pulled up into it. I tried to think, to comprehend, to warn myself, but Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1014 the thoughts entered the inverted whirlpool until they were spinning too fast for me to catch. My thoughts transformed from concepts into feelings (for that’s what they really were) and every feeling spun itself around a core to which it was attached, like the ribbons around a maypole wrapping themselves into extinction. It was too overwhelming, too powerful and happened too fast for me to resist. Those feelings returning to core awareness, I know today, were the essence of my self-identity — all the conditioned inhibitions as well the elements of vanity on which ego thrived. In an instant the thoughts that were feelings were pulled back into core being, and psychic energy reached such a point of intensity that in a jarring spasm of release I, the consciousness that was me, was jerked out of my head. This was sudden, this was dramatic, and it was definitely what Wolfson (2011, in this issue, p. 982) calls the Transformational Transcendent Singular Event (TTSE). Later when trying to write about it, I called, in the dramatic lingo of the times, “The Cosmic Hammer.” As you can see, it is impossible to describe. I can only say that, for once, or for the first time in a long, long time, I burst free of the interior isolation of selfhood. My senses awoke – and perhaps other senses of which I had been only subliminally aware – and, with an orgasmic thud, my being ecstatically escaped from my skull. At once, everything was alit and alive. It was the most extraordinary and possibly the most wonderful moment of life. I saw Jake and his eyes, too, were shining with joy. But one second later, the training of social life intervened. Jake and recognized each other and in joy we opened our arms and stepped toward each other for a soul embrace. But, Jake, a shy young man in ordinary life, suddenly froze. He looked at me in shock before we could even touch. “I can’t do it,” he said, pulling back. “What?” “I can’t… What does it mean?” he asked. The words sounded distant and hollow to me, and they did not seem to matter. The wind tore across me and I remained ecstatic. “What does what mean? What are you afraid of?” I asked. “You know what I’m afraid of,” he said. I clearly saw his inhibitions, but they seemed so foolish. “Of what, love?” Jake looked hopeful for a second then his face fell, “What kind of love?” he asked and his face fell. “What does it matter? We’re here!” I cried. I could see he was afraid that hugging another man in such a state implied homosexuality, but all such terms meant nothing to me at moment. “It doesn’t matter what it means!” I said and went spinning around to see the 360° panorama of the light, the wildflowers, and the forest around us. Jake wilted: “But … I don’t want that.” I couldn’t wait for him and began to wander off, but, in retrospect, there a slight diminishment to the intensity, but the wind blew through a bush full of quivering blossoms and called me away. I cannot describe the next hour or two, or however long we measure eternity, but I simply wandered about part of everything around me. This is not a metaphor: I felt myself merging with everything I observed in any sense or all senses. Corny as it sounds, butterflies paused near me, and birds kept singing even as I approached. I was those butterflies, I was that singing bird, and I was the bramble bush that took such pleasure (a pleasure I shared) in scratching my calves as I went by. Especially memorable was the wind. It blew with laughter wherever I looked and then blew Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1015 right through me, through my body. Today I still have no doubt: The wind was alive and playing with me, guiding me, though I realize that such a statement will cause a derisive smirk from the skeptical. I did not do anything during that period. Nothing crossed my mind, in general, though I did have one clear thought: I am not going to forget this. I know in the future my own mind will cast doubt on this experience, but I am going to resist. I will keep this moment alive. And so I have. According to an expert in mysticism, Ken Wilber (2001, etc.), I experienced a lower level of mystical experience, the sense of atonement (at-one-ment) or unity with Nature, which is found to be alive and responsive. I really don’t know about this, but I have been something of a pantheist ever since, even though I sometimes need reminding. The whole thing is not an object of knowledge to me, just a turning point. At some point, Jake found me. His brow was creased and he had apparently been thinking furiously for the past hour. “So what about death?” he asked me out of the blue. “What about it?” I said, “It’s nothing.” “What? What?” he asked, seemingly unable to grasp the meaning of my words. I had nothing to say, it’s true, but we soon discovered it was as though I suddenly spoke another language. Before I got to the end of the sentence, he interrupted because he could not follow me. Our rapport was broken and, at this point, communication was impossible. We walked back down the path to the cabins and were met by Setcha. I saw and felt a warm glow of affection rise in me. “Hi,” she said, and I took her hand. She was pleased and as natural as could be we walked hand-in-hand while she talked something about the cabbage rolls being ready. Once we got there I found I wouldn’t know what an appetite was if it was explained to me. I could not eat. I did, however, take great pleasure in every person I saw. I knew them. I loved them. I identified with them. There was nothing else. My mind was still silent, but I found that certain people began talking to me and could not stop themselves, as though there was just something they had they had to get through or some wound they had to reveal. It happened several times, sometimes taking only minutes for the speaker to be satisfied. I uttered hardly a word. Later, though, after dark, Setcha began a long, long talk about her dissatisfaction or frustration with something or other but could not quite get to the point. Bill sighed from the shadows, “You’re just afraid to be a woman.” “No,” she snapped, then added, “Well, maybe.” She left. Jake appeared again, even more haggard then before. He had a big revelation to tell me: “I’m a virgin,” he whispered hoarsely, as though his secret might unhinge the masses. “That’s why I didn’t trust myself.” It got confusing after that. I ran into Jarot and we had nice heart-to-heart. I was surprised to feel the heavy sadness he carried within him. He smiled with pleasure and only a little confusion when I told him that I loved him and understood. We went back to our cabin. Later, Setcha and Jake came in all bedraggled. We later learned Jake had told his terrible secret to Setcha, so they had found a place in the woods and managed, with some difficulty, to do something about it. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1016 The Return Perhaps I should call this penultimate section, The Revenge of Ego, for that is inevitably what occurred and continued for several years. Reintegration into society and my social self turned out to be disintegration. It is not pleasant tale. It took time for the objective self (the ego-self) to reveal its antagonism, but soon everything changed for me. I returned to university that fall and, driven by a need I did not have before, began to take philosophy courses, eventually changing my major. I – the culturally constructed self that says “I” – needed to deal with what had happened. On the bright side, I sought explanations in literature, philosophy, and sometimes in other people. I began my lifelong journey into learning. I found no answers in philosophy, of course, but did learn how to ask better questions. Something wonderful had been revealed to me, and I wanted to learn how it fit in my life, and perhaps how to return to that state. I did not realize that thought cannot think passed itself. “No one can jump over his own shadow,” as the enigmatic Heidegger (1987, p. 199) expressed it. I am still trying, however. On the dark side, I began to feel self-conscious in a whole new way. Since I have claimed all human consciousness is self-consciousness, I suppose I became selfconscious of my self-consciousness. I felt different from others. All their chatter and concerns suddenly seemed so mundane to me. I had no interest in partying, except to escape. Most strangely, I began to feel uncomfortable smoking marijuana. Unlike before, around others I watched myself, and pot just made the consciousness of self more debilitating. Alone when I smoked, thoughts arose that did not seem to come from me. I don’t mean they were voices; I just found myself dwelling darkly that now I was changed, unlike anyone else, perhaps I was crazy, and how could I love everyone? I found when I talked, stoned or sober, that most people did not understand me. Not that much has changed, but now I sometimes get to finish my sentences and take a thought to its completion, like I’m doing right here. The proud young man I had been was gone. In his place was nervous guy who spent most his time reading or looking into himself. My posture even changed. I felt, to say it outright, guilty. I began to abandon my friendships, preferring to vegetate in the basement of my mother’s apartment in which I lived. Ellen stuck by me and, in many ways, held me together. I became less interested in sex but she understood. I tried to explain to her what was happening, and, though her response was incomprehension, it was also compassionate. In this period, I grew manic. I could no longer sleep at night. The thoughts would come and grind on beyond my control. They most often used the pronoun “I” but if was me thinking, how come I could not shut them off at will? I accused myself of weakness in coming back to society, and I accused myself of insanity that I ever dared to transgress its constraints. I worried that maybe, in ignoring Jake’s fears of sexuality, I had in fact accepted what he feared. I had my own life as evidence to the contrary, but ego accused nonetheless. I wondered about Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1017 returning to the state of nature that I had experienced, and sometimes I wondered if death was the only way back. The thoughts were like an ingrown hair that continued to work itself deeper. The only way I could manage them was to think thoughts of my own, that is, think the thoughts inspired by philosophic or literary discussion or to write a creative academic paper. Philosophy, mad as it is, was my one respite from madness, but thinking in any form would not let me sleep. There were physical repercussions, too, and I refer to more than sunken physique and general nervousness. My arms and ankles began to itch and I scratched at them furiously, thinking the little purple lesions might be pustules. Eventually both my forearms were covered with scabs, as were my ankles. The doctor misdiagnosed me and sent to a dermatologist who, after some research, discovered I had lichen planus, a non-communicable itchy inflammation with cause and cure both unknown, apparently related to a mistake of the immune system. I still have it, but it is now under control with corticosteroids. Was this self-loathing? Exhausted and feeling that I was about to go over the edge, I finally got my doctor to make me an appointment with a psychiatrist. My sensible side was very much against doing this. It meant going to the establishment for help with something that began by escaping the establishment and, it seemed, much of enculturation. “Once they get their hands on you, they won’t let you go,” a troubled young man with experience in such things had once told me. It turned out he was exactly right, but what else could I do? My first session with Dr. Irlam lasted all of 15 minutes, since he had an appointment at the hospital. I told him I could not stop thinking and he asked me if I was hearing voices. “No,” I said, “not voices. But it’s not like me thinking them. They won’t stop.” “Do they accuse you or belittle you?” I admitted they did. He briefly explained that the brain is a complex piece of electrical machinery. Sometimes wires get crossed and things in the mind go haywire, too. When I asked why the wires get crossed, he admitted he did not know, but he assured me they had the pharmaceuticals and, if need, the medical interventions, to straighten things out. I admit I was somewhat relieved to hear this explanation and that I could be fixed so easily. He wrote me prescription for some sort of antipsychotic drug that came in a very big pill and told me take about five every day, and that I should “expect to be sleepy, at first.” Sleep sounded soooo good. When I left after my 15 minute diagnosis, I asked him what they called what I had. “Schizophrenia,” he said, and rushed out passed me. To make a dreary story short, the drugs, whatever they were worked wonderfully for sleep. I slept all through the night; in fact, I began to sleep all the time. I nodded off in class. I found isolated lounges on campus where I could go completely out. People walked around me unconcerned. There were a lot of layabouts in those days. However, whenever I tried stopping the pills, the sleeplessness came back. I got so tired it’s amazing I kept up with my schoolwork at all. If I took a drink of alcohol, I would nod off. I was caught in a trap. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1018 By the next summer, after two years in university, Dr. Irlam, who occasionally talked to me just to make conversation, decided my therapy was not progressing fast enough and he recommended electroshock therapy. I would not agree, but my father and one of my mature friends thought it would be a good idea. Ellen did not know what to think but did want me back as I was before. It involved spending ten days in the hospital psyche ward and receiving the treatment once a day while I was under total anesthesia. I resisted but I had no will. I was assured it was not like the electroconvulsive therapy depicted in the movies, but a much more gentle current. In short, I went through it, making friends with a quite few girls who doing group therapy for “suicidal impulses”, everyone one of them an abandoned young mother. I found my sense of humour appeared again and I made them feel good about things. The therapist encouraged me to keep coming after my 10 days was up. Ellen and I even managed to make out behind the white curtains around my bed once. Jarot and I drank wine in the chapel and laughed about life. Each time they administered the knockout anesthesia, I would crack a joke and try, unsuccessfully, to get a rise out of the anesthesiologist while I went under. I’ll never know whether the daze I was in for the next several years came from my dis-integrated self or from the medical treatment I was given for it. I know that today I have very vague recollections of my childhood years compared to other people, but I cannot know if there were any other repercussions. In my final year of university, I continued on the antipsychotic drugs and was sleepy all the time. I took a compressed courseload, so I could complete my degree, but I never could have managed if Ellen had not read chapters aloud to me then used the shorthand she was taking in business school to record my dictated essays that I would later type up into presentable form. Part of the bachelor’s degree I finally got should have gone to her. In any case, I graduated, worked part time in the local brewery then at the end of the summer took off for Europe with Jake and another pal. Before leaving, Ellen pressured me for the engagement ring I had promised her, but, when the time came, that is, when we were actually standing outside the jewellry store, I found I could not go through it. There was no one in my life at the time to whom I owed so much, but I knew that by buying that ring I was committing myself to the sort of life everyone else seemed to be living, but, dozy as I was, I knew there was still some great mystery out there for me to pursue. So, in an attempt to rediscover selflessness in what was perhaps the most selfish act of my life, I refused to buy the ring and in a week had left for the post-baccalaureate European tour. (Hate me, if you must, dear reader. Writing this I feel I deserve it.) The trip for the three of us was a bust. I was a drag on everyone, so, in Düsseldorf, Germany, the three of us went separate ways. One guy went to Spain, Jake to East Germany, and me toward Greece. I ran out of my antipsychotics somewhere hitchhiking through Austria, continued to sleep well, and have never used them again. In Greece, my land of dreams since reading Greek mythology in grade seven, I experienced something of a hard-won renaissance. I spent a year there, mostly failing at everything I attempted, but, eventually, I learned to socialize again. I had trouble relating to old friends once I returned to Canada, so I left for Edmonton, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1019 Alberta’s capital. Strangely, Setcha and I took up with each other and went through a short, disastrous marriage. I never much bothered with marijuana or psychedelics again, though other recreational pharmaceutical held temporary appeal for me when I was younger. But, by then, I was on my career path, such as it was, confined to teaching (I have no other skills), first in high schools then in universities. The irony never escapes me: How can I teach when I still have so very much to learn? Aftermath No, this is not one of Joseph Campbell’s stages on the journey of hero. The hero’s journey ended for me long ago, and I am no longer the hero of this life story. This is me looking back on a life that was unfolding in vigorous but predictable ways until it was inalterably changed by a series of events that took me to a profound awakening. I am unable to forget it and don’t wish to, but I have long ago moved on, as they say. I am now living the two lessons I learned from the crash of the cosmic hammer that broke me temporarily free from my self-prison. One is that the world and everything in it is alive, though our interaction with it has by now mostly been relegated to the unconscious. The other is that the ego is a prison. We need the self to negotiate through this world, but to be egocentric is the greatest sin against life we can commit. The self, i.e., self-consciousness, can be decentered and we can be aware, at least some of the time, from the primordial core that we really are, and which is more of the world than of our selves or even of our culture. If you said I was an animist, I’d say, fine, okay by me. Whatever might be ultimate reality, it is not out there (beyond this world), or in here (say, in string theory or quantum gravity), or in the source or origins (now in the past), or in the future (cultural utopianism or the afterlife). It’s right here, right now. The barrier is consciousness itself, and I see consciousness as self-consciousness, constructed and imposed by the symbolic interaction of cultural systems. Of course, without learning intersubjective selfhood, we would still be animals, not good, but still is sometimes devoutly to be wished. I never could quite accept the absolute finality of cultural difference found in postmodernism since I see the same light in others, no matter who they were. In fact, the light and life is not just in people — it permeates the boundary between self and other, period. I am thou, and thou art everything I can sense as well as the whole panorama of forces I can only intuit. I know we mainly live in a dream, probably our necessary conditioning, and that there is another awakening possible. I had the sense during those magic hours that I had awakened the dream; the experience was, to use a clichéd phrase that occurred to me then, a dream come true (very different than being awake within a dream). It was reality and I knew I had awakened from the dream of self in the same way we awaken in the morning and know we are no longer asleep. Now, in the mornings, I feel the weight of self come upon me with the first blinking of my mind; sometimes I remember that there is another awakening beyond that enclosure, except that it is not “there” but here, now, always. For the Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1020 time being, however, I must follow the dictates of my socialized self, slip into my habit routines, and get things done. There are many things in our cultural world (our lived reality) that dictate against awakening beyond self to discover that one is a living aspect of an interrelating living world. Jung called transcending the self awakening to the Self, a new centre of awareness that is really our original centre; as the doorway to the collective unconscious, surely Jung capitalized Self to avoid using the more connotative word soul. It’s a nice word, almost forbidden, and that adds to its attraction. Note that we awaken (or can awaken) to soul, not me to my soul or you to your soul. Soul is the soul of the world, the anima mundi that church authorities in previous times tried to obliterate by burning to death those who swore by it. But denial of the world soul goes very far back into prehistory, I believe, back to when shamans or prophets became priests and kings to dictate exactly how the sacred would be dealt with. Awareness in the moment amongst untamed forces held its peril. Fear and insecurity turned us into followers. To make us feel safe from life, we believed in the power of those who led us. To make us feel safe from death, we developed formalized belief systems that promised eternal reward for obedience. To make us believe that we loved and were loved, we became faithful patriots and parents. Anyone who wanted more was a danger to the community and an apostate. I feel we are most truly in touch with soul when we transcend our daily selves, and that may occur in moments of crisis, during intensely creative action, or, perhaps most importantly, when love overwhelms common sense. We cannot culturally avoid moments of crisis but we are constantly training ourselves to quickly and effectively contain them, so whatever awareness the moment of crisis has released is quickly dissipated. Creative action we seem to encourage, but every culture has developed ways to guide those impulses down socially acceptable channels. Love, however — not romantic love but the unhindered energy of universal love that I felt sear through me like that animated wind — has been most effectively repressed and transmogrified by the forces of cultural domestication. Aside from the containment in family, tribal, or national groups mentioned above, we have developed organized religion and a whole culture of caregivers and charities both of which offer sanctimonious substitutes for the transcendence of real love. But the most effective counter to the life force of love within us has been the constructed self, the individual ego, that confines us within acceptable attitudes and supplies us with cultivated roles that in subtle ways specify generic appropriateness. If one dares transgress such roles, one had better have the ready support group or at least the mindful conceptualizations at hand to help soul to re-integrate itself. The use of LSD may have rushed me through to Reality when I was not yet ready to deal with it. As Roland Cichowski wrote in this issue: Such a forced breaking of the veil, though, often leaves the experiencer shattered and in some ways dysfunctional if the mental thought patterns that might allow you to accept such a revelation have not had cause to develop, and are not in place. Even when they are partially there, as may have been Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1021 the case with me, you can fear for your sanity as I did. It is not for nothing that the spiritual traditions that use drugs require the guidance of an experienced shaman or guide. (2011, p. 976) Clearly, in my youth, I did not know how to live with what I had found or, perhaps, who I had found I was. I can call what happened the revenge of ego, but, given time I might have learned to embrace such awareness and become integrated with it. I do not deny it today, but I am unable to return to it. I am an exile every second of my life. I can blame myself but, since I must live, I generally live with gusto. Some of the blame, however, must go to my social system or culture. Peace and love are wonderful to live, but they have by now become social embarrassments to discuss in public. It has been a long time since the generational movement of peace and love collapsed or became transmogrified into the indulgences of the “me generation”. In retrospect, it seems that many women did not want to be truly liberated from their social roles and that many men were unwilling to embrace either peace or love since they felt them to be somehow effeminate. In short, we fear unbridled love as an inexcusable weakness. Even toward the end of my fateful trip, I wondered whether I dared live with the absolute love I felt while listening intently yet with an incredibly open mind to the needs of others. As I neared sleep, I concluded that such an open heart would almost certainly lead to martyrdom. Bleeding hearts are killed, I thought vaguely, and remembered with comfort my previous life. Later, on the shallow emotional level of the self, I was simply afraid that what I had discovered was dangerous to my sanity, perhaps even to my concept of masculinity, and certainly to any success I might wish for in life. Of course, back then in my “return” I had twisted everything backwards. Today I know: The walls of ego are made of fear. Yet my long return to functioning selfhood has left its mark, as well. Compensation is probably the most easily understandable psychological function of consciousness. I am probably regarded as stubbornly macho. I keep my tender heart mostly hidden and, even though I’m just passed 60, I still lift weights, can be aggressive to anyone who is aggressive to me or threatening to others, I still appreciate female beauty more than I should, and I sometimes catch myself swearing like a seaman — none of which are behaviours commonly seen in socially acceptable university professors. Self-transcendence is very real — more real than the moment I write this and you read it — and, as indicated by the Zen master, D.T. Suzuki (1964), such transcenddence takes back into the world, not beyond it. It is indeed the “discovery or the excavation of a long lost treasure” (p. 179). However, there is a price to be paid for this treasure, and it is the price of the self we each believe we are. Before we find ourselves amidst the light of the anima mundi, we have to enter a dark night of the soul. Our assumptions about nature, world, love, and being may have to die before we can be reborn, that is, reawakened to being. For me, this is the dream that needs to come true for all humanity, for all life, and it is not impossible that it is destiny. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | October 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 7 | pp. 1006-1022 Nixon, G., Breaking Out of One’s Head (& Awakening to the World) 1022 In a Dark Time A steady storm of correspondences! A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon, And in broad day the midnight come again! a man goes far to find out what he is— Death of the self in a long, tearless night, All natural shapes blazing unnatural light. Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire. My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly, Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I? A fallen man, I climb out of my fear. The mind enters itself, and God the mind, And one is One, free in the tearing wind. (Theodore Roethke, 1964) References Campbell, Joseph (1968). The Hero with a Thousand Faces (2nd ed). Princeton University Press, Bolligen Series XVII. Original 1949. Cichowski, Roland (2011). Self-transcendence as a developmental process in consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research 2 (7), 966-980. Heidegger, Martin (1987). An Introduction to Metaphysics, (R. Manheim, Trans.). Yale University Press. Original 1959. Roethke, Theodore (1966). In a dark time. In The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke (p. 231). Anchor Books/Doubleday. Suzuki, Daisetz T. (1964). The awakening of a new consciousness in Zen (pp. 179202). In J. Campbell (Ed.). Man and Transformation: Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Bollingen Series XXX — 5. Princeton University Press. First published in Eranos-Jahrbücher XXIII, 1954. Wilber, Ken (2001). The Eye of Spirit: An Integral Vision for a World Gone Slightly Mad (3rd ed). Shambhala. Original 1997. Wolfson, Phil (2011). A longitudinal history of self-transformation: Psychedelics, spirituality, activism and transformation. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research 2 (7), 981-992.

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 758 Editorial Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” Huping Hu* & Maoxin Wu ABSTRACT In this issue of JCER, we celebrate the discovery of Higgs Boson (or Higgs-like particle). Congratulations to CERN, Fermilab, people at LHC, people at Tevatron and all the theoretical and experimental physicists who made this discovery possible over the last 50 years! In the meantime, let us all contemplate what this discovery means and what it has to do with consciousness studies and be cautious about the new discovery since there are still unsettling issues. After introductions of articles in this issue, we shall focus our attentions on some of the phobic, allergic or even hostile but important issues related to the new discovery. The topics covered includes: Antidote to 20th Century phobia; “higgson” as the name of the new particle; quantum gravity & table top experiments; higgson as the shadow of universal consciousness; and the 2012 phenomena & Dawn of a Brave New World. This Editorial ends with a “mathematical” poem entitled “The Real ‘God Particle’ Please Stand Up.” Key Words: Higgs Boson, God particle, Higgs discovery, higgson, great triumph, particle physics, CERN, LHC, Tevatron, prespacetime, consciousness, scientific genesis. The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you. Heisenberg. 1. Introduction On July 4, 2012, the world witnessed a great triumph in 21st Century particle physics - the announcement of the discovery of the Higgs Boson (or Higgs like particle) by CERN [1]. Indeed, since the startup of the Large Hadron Collider (“LHC”), our sister journal, Prespacetime Journal, has given the most detailed and complete reports on LHC, its progress and its results by its editor-at-large, Philip E. Gibbs, based on viXra Log [2]. In this issue of JCER, we celebrate this great discovery: Congratulations to CERN, Fermilab, people at LHC, people at Tevatron and all the theoretical and experimental physicists who made this discovery possible over the last 50 years! And also a big thanks to Philip E. Gibbs for a job well done! In the meantime, let us all contemplate what this discovery means and be cautious about the new discovery since there are still unsettling issues. Correspondence: Huping Hu, Ph.D., J.D., QuantumDream Inc., P. O. Box 267, Stony Brook,, NY 11790. E-mail: editor@jcer.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 759 We start this issue with this Editorial [3] and Philip E. Gibb’s Higgs Report entitled “Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson” [4]. This is followed by three Higgs Essays: ““The Higgs Boson and the Power of Consistency” by Gibbs [5]; “Is It Really the Higgs?” by Matti Pitkanen [6]; and “Creatio Ex Nihilo: Single Mathematical Particle” by Dainis Zeps [7]. The above are followed by non-Higgs articles. The first article is “What We can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness” by Professor Imants Barušs [8]. The second article is “The Secret of Happiness” by Steven E. Kaufman [9]. The third one is “Ethology, Evolution, Mind and Consciousness” by Glen McBride, Professor Emeritus [10]. And the fourth through sixth are a series of articles entitled “Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism I, II, III” by Graham P. Smetham [11-13]. In the remainder of this Editorial, we shall focus our attention on some of the phobic, allergic or even hostile but important issues related to the Higgs discovery. The topics covered includes: Antidote to 20th Century phobia; “higgson” as the name of the new particle; quantum gravity & table top experiments; higgson as the shadow of universal consciousness; and the 2012 phenomena & Dawn of a Brave New World. This Editorial ends with a “mathematical” poem entitled “The Real ‘God Particle’ Please Stand Up.” 2. Potential Antidote to 20th Century Phobia in Science Whether one likes it or not, the phrase “God Particle” used in a book written by Leon Lederman [14] is getting very popular with the media and in the general public after the announcement of Higgs discovery by CERN on July 4, 2012. To be sure, literally equating Higgs Boson with the God Particle is inappropriate and unacceptable. But to ask the questions what God (or universal consciousness) has to do with the illusive Higgs field and its manifestation, the Higgs Boson, and whether there is a genuine God particle from which our Universe was born are both scientifically legitimate and socially responsible for obvious reasons. To make the inquiries, we first have to overcome our phobia and hostility to the word, notion and existence of God in science. Indeed, such phobia and hostility have been largely a 20th century phenomenon for various reasons some of which are our own increased closed-mindedness, arrogance and intolerance because science and associated technologies have given us some knowledge and abilities to understand, predict and manipulate Nature. We don’t know the definite cure or antidote for such phobia, hostility and even hysteria, but let all of us be openminded and read and contemplate the following from the compilation “50 Nobel Laureates and Other Great Scientists Who Believe in GOD” by Tihomir Dimitrov [15] as a potential cure or antidote: NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (1473-1543), founder of Heliocentric Cosmology: “To know the mighty works of God, to comprehend His wisdom and majesty and power, to appreciate, in degree, the wonderful working of His laws, surely all this must be a pleasing and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 760 acceptable mode of worship to the Most High, to whom ignorance cannot be more gratifying than knowledge.” (Copernicus, as cited in Neff 1952, 191-192; and in Hubbard 1905, v). GALILEO GALILEI (1564-1642), founder of Experimental Physics: “To the Lord, whom I worship and thank, That governs the heavens with His eyelid To Him I return tired, but full of living.” (Galileo, as cited in Caputo 2000, 85). “When I reflect on so many profoundly marvellous things that persons have grasped, sought, and done, I recognize even more clearly that human intelligence is a work of God, and one of the most excellent.” (Galileo, as cited in Caputo 2000, 85). SIR ISAAC NEWTON (1642-1727), founder of Classical Physics and Infinitesimal Calculus: “This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of His dominion He is wont to be called Lord God.” (Newton 1687, Principia). “From His true dominion it follows that the true God is a living, intelligent and powerful Being; and from His other perfections, that He is supreme, or most perfect. He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, His duration reaches from eternity to eternity; His presence from infinity to infinity; He governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done.” (Newton 1687, Principia; see also Caputo 2000, 88). SIR JAMES CLERK MAXWELL (1831-1879), founder of Classical Electromagnetic Theory: “Almighty God, who hast created man in Thine own image, and made him a living soul that he might seek after Thee and have dominion over Thy creatures, teach us to study the works of Thy hands that we may subdue the earth to our use, and strengthen our reason for Thy service; and so to receive Thy blessed Word, that we may believe on Him whom Thou hast sent to give us the knowledge of salvation and the remission of our sins. All which we ask in the name of the same Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Maxwell, as cited in Bowden 1998, 288; and in Williams and Mulfinger 1974, 487). MAX PLANCK (1858–1947), Nobel Laureate in Physics and one of the founders of Quantum Mechanics: “As a physicist, that is, a man who had devoted his whole life to a wholly prosaic science, the exploration of matter, no one would surely suspect me of being a fantast. And so, having studied the atom, I am telling you that there is no matter as such! All matter arises and persists only due to a force that causes the atomic particles to vibrate, holding them together in the tiniest of solar systems, the atom. Yet in the whole of the universe there is no force that is either intelligent or eternal, and we must therefore assume that behind this force there is a conscious, intelligent Mind or Spirit. This is the very origin of all matter.” (Planck, as cited in Eggenstein 1984, Part I; see “Materialistic Science on the Wrong Track”). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 761 “That God existed before there were human beings on Earth, that He holds the entire world, believers and non-believers, in His omnipotent hand for eternity, and that He will remain enthroned on a level inaccessible to human comprehension long after the Earth and everything that is on it has gone to ruins; those who profess this faith and who, inspired by it, in veneration and complete confidence, feel secure from the dangers of life under protection of the Almighty, only those may number themselves among the truly religious.” (Planck, as cited in Staguhn 1992, 152). ALBERT EINSTEIN (1879–1955), Nobel Laureate in Physics and founder of Special Relativity and General Relativity: “I want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know His thoughts, the rest are details.” (Einstein, as cited in Ronald Clark, Einstein: The Life and Times, London, Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1973, 33). “We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many different languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books, but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God. We see a Universe marvellously arranged and obeying certain laws, but only dimly understand these laws. Our limited minds cannot grasp the mysterious force that moves the constellations.” (Einstein, as cited in Denis Brian, Einstein: A Life, New York, John Wiley and Sons, 1996, 186). ERWIN SCHRODINGER (1887–1961), Nobel Laureate in Physics and one of the founders of Quantum Mechanics: “Science is a game – but a game with reality, a game with sharpened knives. If a man cuts a picture carefully into 1000 pieces, you solve the puzzle when you reassemble the pieces into a picture; in the success or failure, both your intelligences compete. In the presentation of a scientific problem, the other player is the good Lord. He has not only set the problem but also has devised the rules of the game – but they are not completely known, half of them are left for you to discover or to deduce. The uncertainty is how many of the rules God himself has permanently ordained, and how many apparently are caused by your own mental inertia, while the solution generally becomes possible only through freedom from its limitations. This is perhaps the most exciting thing in the game.” (Schroedinger, as cited in Moore 1990, 348). “I shall quite briefly mention here the notorious atheism of science. The theists reproach it for this again and again. Unjustly. A personal God can not be encountered in a world picture that becomes accessible only at the price that everything personal is excluded from it. We know that whenever God is experienced, it is an experience exactly as real as a direct sense impression, as real as one’s own personality. As such He must be missing from the space-time picture. ‘I do not meet with God in space and time’, so says the honest scientific thinker, and for that reason he is reproached by those in whose catechism it is nevertheless stated: ‘God is Spirit’.” (Schroedinger, as cited in ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 762 Moore 1990, 379; see also Schroedinger’s Mind and Matter, Cambridge University Press, 1958, p. 68). WERNER HEISENBERG (1901–1976), Nobel Laureate in Physics and one of the founders of Quantum Mechanics: “The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.” (Heisenberg, as cited in Hildebrand 1988, 10). “In the history of science, ever since the famous trial of Galileo, it has repeatedly been claimed that scientific truth cannot be reconciled with the religious interpretation of the world. Although I am now convinced that scientific truth is unassailable in its own field, I have never found it possible to dismiss the content of religious thinking as simply part of an outmoded phase in the consciousness of mankind, a part we shall have to give up from now on. Thus in the course of my life I have repeatedly been compelled to ponder on the relationship of these two regions of thought, for I have never been able to doubt the reality of that to which they point.” (Heisenberg 1974, 213). PAUL DIRAC (1902-1984), Nobel Laureate in Physics and founder of Relativsitic Quantum Mechanics: Earlier in 1927: “I can't for the life of me see how the postulate of an Almighty God helps us in any way. What I do see is that this assumption leads to such unproductive questions as why God allows so much misery and injustice, the exploitation of the poor by the rich and all the other horrors He might have prevented.” (Heisenberg responded “Well, our friend Dirac has got a religion and its guiding principle is 'There is no God and Paul Dirac is His prophet.'” Heisenberg, 1971. Later in 1963: "It seems to be one of the fundamental features of nature that fundamental physical laws are described in terms of a mathematical theory of great beauty and power, needing quite a high standard of mathematics for one to understand it. You may wonder: Why is nature constructed along these lines? One can only answer that our present knowledge seems to show that nature is so constructed. We simply have to accept it. One could perhaps describe the situation by saying that God is a mathematician of a very high order, and He used very advanced mathematics in constructing the universe. Our feeble attempts at mathematics enable us to understand a bit of the universe, and as we proceed to develop higher and higher mathematics we can hope to understand the universe better." Scientific American, May 1963. 3. The New Particle Should Be Called a “Higgson” In Physics World, there was a blog advocating the Higgs Boson should be called “higgson” for simplicity [16]. We advocate that whether this new particle is the SM Higgs or not, it should be called a “higgson” for the following reasons: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 763 (1) The whole impetus of building LHC seemed to be searching for the Higgs; (2) The new particle has properties similar or cloasest to the SM Higgs; but (3) As a scalar particle of no spin, it should be distinguished from fermions (spin 1/2, 3/2 etc) and bosons (spin 1, 2 etc); (4) Experiments may prove that a fundamental scalar particle such as the Higgs may have different statistical behavor from that of a boson. 4. Quantum Gravity & Table Top Experiments Now with Higgs Boson (higgson) apparently in the bag, the unification of Standard Model and General Relativity and the search for the origins of dark matter and dark energy become more urgent. Besides the mainstream approaches, we point out here some alternatives to think about or work on. Newton assumed that gravity is instantaneous and he would be correct if gravity is the manifestation of quantum entanglement [17-20]. Indeed, if this is so, gravity is already unified with the quantum theory and we can move on to derive General Relativity as the geometric theory of quantum entanglement (or wave functions) in macroscopic scales. What about gravitational wave (radiation) which so far has not been directly detected but indirectly observed through the binary star system PSR B1913+16? This of course needs alternative explanation within the framework of quantum entanglement related energy dissipation or transfer energy [17-18]. What about dark matter and dark energy? This then may be explainable as the manifestations or effects of quantum nonlocality in large scales [19-20]. This brings us to the topic of table top experiments. Can fundamental physics still be done in table top experiments besides the billion or multimillion dollar machines? Our answer is a resounding “Yes.” For example, using simple table top experimental setup, we found nonlocal gravitational effects in simple physical systems which support the notion that gravity is instantaneous and the manifestation of quantum entanglement [17-18]. 5. Higgson as the Shadow of Universal Consciousness Some would or have argued that Higgs Boson (higgson) is the shadow or manifestation of a more fundamental entity [see, e.g., 7]. This entity in some theory could be the universal consciousness behind the “God Particle”. For instance, in the principle of existence an unspinized particle governed by a matrix law is the precursor of all spinized particles and thus steps into the shoes played by the Higgs field [21-24]. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 764 We have speculated that the new particle discoveed at the LHC, if real, is plausibly the shadow or manifestation of the unspinized particle of the principle of existence [24]. The principle of existence is a unfied principle and model of elementary particles, four forces and consciousness and illustrates how self-referential hierarchical spin structure of the universal consciousness provides a foundation for creating, sustaining and causing evolution of elementary particles through matrixing processes embedded in universal consciousness [21-22]: 1 = e i 0 = 1e i 0 = Le −iM +iM = −1 E 2 − m 2 −ip µ xµ +ip µ xµ e = p2 −1 (1)  E − m  − p   −ip µ xµ  −ip µ xµ     e  →  − p  E + m   e      − p −ip µ xµ − p −ip µ xµ E − m −ip µ xµ E − m −ip µ xµ e = e → e − e =0 −p E +m −p E +m  −ip µ xµ  ψ e, +   E − m − p  ae, + e     →  == L  M  ψ  = LM ψ = 0 −ip µ xµ − p E + m i , _    a e    i,−   −ip µ xµ  ψ e , +    E − m − σ ⋅p  Ae , + e   = L M ψ = 0  →  = L  M  µx − ip ψ − σ ⋅ p E + m µ   A e   i,−   i,−  (2) (3) or  − ip µ x µ    E − m −s⋅p  Ae , + e E  →  = LM   = LMψ = 0  µ  iB   −s⋅p E + m  A e − ip x µ   i,−  (4) In the above, Equation (2) governs unspinized particles, Equation (3) governs spin-1/2 particles after spinization from (2); and Equation (4) governs spin-1 particles after spinization from (2). Traditionally, a spinless particle is presumed to be described by the Klein-Gordon equation and is classified as a boson. However, we have suggested in [21] that Kein-Gordon equation is a determinant view of a fermion, boson or an unspinized particle and the latter is neither a boson nor a fermion but may be classified as a third state of matter described by the unspinized equation (2) above in Dirac form. The Weyl (chiral) form is given below: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle”  E− p   −m −ip µ xµ   − m  ae ,l e ψ e,l     = LM ψ = 0 = L M   µ −ip xµ ψ i ,r  E + p     ai , r e  765 (5) The wave function of a fermion or boson is respectively a bispinor or bi-vector but that of the third state is a two-component complex scalar field. In the prespacetime model, the third state of matter is the precursor of both fermionic and bosonic matters/fields before fermionic or bosonic spinization [21]. Thus, it steps into the shoes played by the Higgs particle in the Standard Model and may be what has been seen at the LHC, if it is real [24]. The third state of matter may have different behavior from that of either the boson or fermion which may be detectable at LHC. 6. The 2012 Phenomena and Dawn of a Brave New World Among many apocalypse scenarios, Internet rumors had it that LHC would cause an apocalypse by creating some sort of black hole thus ending the World as we know it. Well, we are still here but it is not December 21, 2012 yet. What we do know so far are the following among others: 1. After some 50 years since it was conceptualized, particle physicists have finally found the Higgs Boson as announced by CERN on July 4, 2012 which was the Independence Day of America; 2. This new particle is called the “God Particle” by the media and perhaps understood as such by the general public; 3. Global Warming seems real as evidenced by the melting polar ice, extreme hot weather and droughts in many parts of the World; and 4. Global economic crisis is sweeping many nations worldwide. So, as scientists we should ponder on these things. At the dawn of a brave New World, JCER will continue be a vehicle for scientists and other learned scholars publish their research results and express their views on the nature and sciences of consciousness and related topics. We hope that all genuine truth seekers shall become clear in our eyes, resolute in our hearts and swift in our steps in the pursuit of consciousness studies and truth overall. What we have witnessed so far is the rise of collaborative spirit in sciences. We urge all genuine truth seekers to work together to make the brave New World a reality. 7. The Real “God Particle” Please Stand Up As already mentioned, the higgson was dubbed as the “God Particle” in the book written by Leon Lederman [15]. However, literally equating higgson with the “God Particle” is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 766 inappropriate and unacceptable. But to ask the questions whether there is a genuine “God particle” from which our Universe was born is scientifically legitimate. The genuine “God particle” should have at least the following explanatory powers: a) Explanation of the creations of bosons and fermions; b) Explanation of gravitatonal force; c) Explanation of the strong force; d) Explanation of the weak force; e) Explanation of the electromagnetic force; f) Explanation of the origin of the Universe; g) Explanation of or relation to universal consciousness; and h) Etc. Our own take of the “God Particle” is detailed in the principle of existence [21-24] and expressed in the following “mathematical poem.” With it we draw a close to this Editorial. Some readers may find it to be trying on their nerves even after the suggested antidote to phobia and alergy in Section 2. In that case, please relax deeply and remember that it is a poem! A Praise to God Particle ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oh, God Particle, you seem invisible to naked eyes, untouchable by hands, Yet you are mathematically omnipresent, omniscient: “e” is your body, ether, the foundation of existence; “i” is imagination, a faculty of your mind, the source of creativity; “0” is initial state of your mind; emptiness, nothingness; “1=ei0” is your primal state, oneness, unity of existence; ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oh God Particle, you seem silent in voice, absent in physical action, Yet you are mathematically omnipotent, omni-active: “+, -, *, /, =” are your operations of existence; “c, ħ, π” are your measuring units of existence; “matrix” is your container for governing rules, external/internal world; Thus, You make primordial distinction to occur as follows: 1=ei0=ei0ei0=eiL-iLeiM-iM=eiLeiMe-iLe-iM=e-iLe-iM/e-iLe-iM=eiLeiM/eiLeiM… You create energy-momentum-mass relationship revealed to Einstein as follows: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 767 1 = ei 0 = e − iL + iL = Le L−i 1 = (cos L − i sin L )(cos L + i sin L ) = p  m p   m − i p  m + i p   m 2 + p 2  m →  − i  + i  =   = E  E E   E  E   E 2  E E2 = m2 + p2 You create, sustain & make evolving an elementary particle as follows: 1 = e i 0 = ei 0 ei 0 = e −iL +iL e −iM +iM = Le L−i 1 (e −iM )(e −iM ) → −1 (LM ,e  Ae e −iM  A  ψ  LM ,i ) −iM  = LM  e e −iM = LM  e  = L M ψ = 0  Ai  ψ i   Ai e  As an example of your mighty power, you create, sustain & make evolving of an electron revealed to Dirac as follows: 1 = ei 0 = ei 0ei 0 = e − iL + iL e − iM + iM (cos L − i sin L )(cos L + i sin L )e− iM + iM =  m p  m p  − ip µ x µ + ip µ x µ  − i  + i e E  E E E  m − i p  m + i p  −ip µ xµ +ip µ xµ =  e E E     m 2 + p 2  −ip µ xµ +ip µ xµ E 2 − m 2 −ip µ xµ +ip µ xµ e =  = e 2 2 p E   −1  E − m  − p   −ip µ x µ  −ip µ x µ  −1   e =   e  →  E + m   − p       − p −ip µ xµ − p −ip µ xµ E − m −ip µ xµ E − m −ip µ xµ e = e → e − e =0 −p E+m −p E+m ISSN: 2153-8212  −ip µ xµ   E − m − p  ae , + e   →   = (LM ,e µ   − p E + m  a e −ip xµ   i,−  ψ  LM ,i ) e, +  = L M ψ = 0 ψ i , −   −ip µ xµ    E − m − σ ⋅p  Ae, + e  →   = (LM ,e µ  − σ ⋅p E + m  A e −ip xµ   i,−  ψ  LM ,i ) e , +  = L M ψ = 0 ψ i , −  Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 768 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ References 1. CERN (2012), CERN experiments observe particle consistent with long-sought Higgs boson: http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2012/PR17.12E.html 2. Gibbs, P. E., viXra Log: http://blog.vixra.org/ 3. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2012), Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle”. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 758-769. 4. Gibbs, P. E. (2012), Live Higgs Report on July 4, 2012 & Congratulations - It's a Boson. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 770-779. 5. Gibbs, P. E. (2012), The Higgs Boson and the Power of Consistency. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 780-786. 6. Pitkanen, M. (2012), Is It Realy the Higgs? Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 787-798. 7. Zeps, D. (2012), Crossroads on Way to Single Mathematical Particle. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 799-804. 8. Barušs, I. (2012), What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness, 3(7): pp. 805-819. 9. Kaufman, S. E. (2012), The Secret of Happiness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 820-829. 10.McBride, G. (2012), Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 830-840. 11.Smetham, G. P. (2012), Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism I. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 841-862. 12. Smetham, G. P. (2012), Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 863-883. 13. Smetham, G. P. (2012), Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism III. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3(7): pp. 884-904. 14. Lederman, L., If the Universe Is the Answer, What Is the Question? Delta (1994, ISBN-10: 0385312113). 15. Dimitrov, T. (2010), 50 Nobel Laureates and Other Great Scientists Who Believe in GOD. Scientific God Journal, 1(3): pp. 143-273. 16. Fraser, G. & Riordan, M. (2012), http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/indepth/2012/jul/04/introducing-thehiggson 17. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2006), Evidence of non-local physical, chemical and biological effects supports quantum brain, NeuroQuantology 4(4): pp. 291-306. 18. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2007), Evidence of nonlocal chemical, thermal and gravitational effects, Progress in Physics, v2: pp. 17-21. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 758-769 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Dawn of a Brave New World: Higgs Discovery & the “God Particle” 769 19. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2007), Thinking outside the box II: the origin, implications and applications of gravity and its role in prespacetime. NeuroQuantology 5(2): 190-196. 20. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2007), On dark chemistry: what’s dark matter and how mind influences brain through proactive spin. NeuroQuantology. 5(2): 205-213. 21. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2010), The Principle of Existence: Towards a Science of Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 1(1): pp. 50-119. 22. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2011), The Principle of Existence II: Genesis of Self-Referential Matrix Law, & the Ontology & Mathematics of Ether, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research 1(9): pp. 1149-1148. 23. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2011), The Dawn of a Brave New World in Fundamental Physics. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2(5): pp. 784-790. 24. Hu, H. & Wu, M. (2011), If the LHC Particle Is Real, What Is One of the Other Possibilities than the Higgs Boson? Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2(10): pp. 1555-1556. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

arXiv:2105.02314v1 [quant-ph] 5 May 2021 Consciousness and the Collapse of the Wave Function∗ David J. Chalmers† and Kelvin J. McQueen‡ † New York University ‡ Chapman University May 7, 2021 Abstract Does consciousness collapse the quantum wave function? This idea was taken seriously by John von Neumann and Eugene Wigner but is now widely dismissed. We develop the idea by combining a mathematical theory of consciousness (integrated information theory) with an account of quantum collapse dynamics (continuous spontaneous localization). Simple versions of the theory are falsified by the quantum Zeno effect, but more complex versions remain compatible with empirical evidence. In principle, versions of the theory can be tested by experiments with quantum computers. The upshot is not that consciousness-collapse interpretations are clearly correct, but that there is a research program here worth exploring. Keywords: wave function collapse, consciousness, integrated information theory, continuous spontaneous localization ∗ Forthcoming in (S. Gao, ed.) Consciousness and Quantum Mechanics (Oxford University Press). Authors are listed in alphabetical order and contributed equally. We owe thanks to audiences starting in 2013 at Amsterdam, ANU, Cambridge, Chapman, CUNY, Geneva, Göttingen, Helsinki, Mississippi, Monash, NYU, Oslo, Oxford, Rio, Tucson, and Utrecht. These earlier presentations have occasionally been cited, so we have made some of them available at consc.net/qm. For feedback on earlier versions, thanks to Jim Holt, Adrian Kent, Kobi Kremnizer, Oystein Linnebo, and Trevor Teitel. We are grateful to Maaneli Derakhshani and Philip Pearle for their help with the mathematics of collapse models, and especially to Johannes Kleiner, who coauthored section 5 on quantum integrated information theory. 1 Contents 1 Introduction 3 2 Consciousness as super-resistant 10 3 Superselection and the Zeno problem 17 4 Integrated information theory 21 5 Combining IIT with quantum mechanics 25 6 Continuous collapse dynamics 29 7 Experimental tests 34 8 The causal role of consciousness 39 9 Philosophical objections 43 10 Conclusion 48 A Appendix: Calculating Q-shape for a dyad system in IIT 3.0 and quantum IIT 49 2 1 Introduction One of the hardest philosophical problems arising from contemporary science is the problem of quantum reality. What is going on in the physical reality underlying the predictions of quantum mechanics? It is widely accepted that quantum-mechanical systems are describable by a wave function. The wave function need not assign definite position, momentum, and other definite properties to physical entities. Instead it may assign a superposition of multiple values for position, momentum, and other properties. When one measures these properties, however, one always obtains a definite result. On a common picture, the wave function is guided by two separate principles. First, there is a process of evolution according to the Schrödinger equation, which is linear, deterministic, and constantly ongoing. Second, there is a process of collapse into a definite state, which is nonlinear, nondeterministic, and happens only on certain occasions of measurement. This picture is standardly accepted at least as a basis for empirical predictions, but it has been less popular as a story about the underlying physical reality. The biggest problem is the measurement problem (see Albert (1992); Bell (1990)). On this picture, a fundamental measurement-collapse principle says that collapses happen when and only when a measurement occurs. But on the face of it, the notion of “measurement” is vague and anthropocentric, and is inappropriate to play a role in a fundamental specification of reality. To make sense of quantum reality, one needs a much clearer specification of the underlying dynamic processes. Another of the hardest philosophical problems arising from contemporary science is the mind-body problem. What is the relation between mind and body, or more specifically, between consciousness and physical processes? By consciousness, what is meant is phenomenal consciousness, or subjective experience. A system is conscious when there is something it is like to be that system, from the inside. A mental state is conscious when there is something it is like to be in that state. There are many aspects to the problem of consciousness, including the core problem of why physical processes should give rise to consciousness at all. One central aspect of the problem is the consciousness-causation problem: how does consciousness play a causal role in the physical world? It seems obvious that 3 consciousness plays a causal role, but it is surprisingly hard to make sense of what this role is and how it can be played. There is a long tradition of trying to solve the consciousness-causation problem and the quantum measurement problem at the same time, by saying that measurement is an act of consciousness, and that consciousness plays the role of bringing about wave function collapse. The locus classicus of this consciousnesscollapse thesis is Eugene Wigner’s 1961 article “Remarks on the mind-body question”. There are traces of the view in earlier work by von Neumann (1955) and London and Bauer (1939).1 In recent years the approach has been pursued by Henry Stapp (1993) and others. The central motivations for the consciousness-collapse view come from the way it addresses these problems. Where the problem of quantum reality is concerned, the view provides one of the few interpretations of quantum mechanics that takes the standard measurement-collapse principle at face value. Other criteria for measurement may be possible, but understanding measurement in terms of consciousness has a number of motivations. First, it provides one of the few non-arbitrary criteria for when measurement occurs. Second, it is arguable that our core pretheoretical concept of measurement is that of measurement by a conscious observer. Third, the consciousness-collapse view is especially well-suited to save the central epistemological datum that ordinary conscious observations have definite results. Fourth, understanding measurement as consciousness provides a potential solution to the consciousness-causation problem: consciousness causes collapse. Despite these motivations, the consciousness-collapse view has not been popular among contemporary researchers in the foundations of physics. Some of 1 It is clear that von Neumann (1955) endorses a measurement-collapse interpretation, and he says (p.418) that subjective perception is “related” to measurement, but he does not clearly identify measurement with conscious perception. In his discussion of observed systems (I), measuring instruments (II), and “actual observer” (III), he says “the boundary can just as well be drawn between I and II+III as between I+III and III”. This suggests neutrality on whether the collapse process is triggered by measuring devices or by conscious observers. He also says that the boundary is “arbitrary to a very large extent” (p.420), which is not easy to reconcile with the fact that different locations for collapse are empirically distinguishable in principle, as we discuss in section 6. London and Bauer (1939, section 11) say more clearly: “We note the essential role played by the consciousness of the observer in this transition from the mixture to the pure case. Without his effective intervention, one would never obtain a new psi function” (although see French (2020) for an alternative reading). 4 this unpopularity may stem from the popularity of the view in unscientific circles: for example, popular treatments by Capra (1975) and Zukav (1979), who link the view to Eastern religious traditions. More substantively, the view is frequently set aside in the literature on the basis of imprecision and on the basis of dualism. The objection from imprecision is stated succinctly by Albert (1992, pp.82– 3) “How the physical state of a certain system evolves (on this proposal) depends on whether or not that system is conscious; and so in order to know precisely how things physically behave, we need to know precisely what is conscious and what isn’t. What this “theory” predicts will hinge on the precise meaning of the word conscious; and that word simply doesn’t have any absolutely precise meaning in ordinary language; and Wigner didn’t make any attempt to make up a meaning for it; so all this doesn’t end up amounting to a genuine physical theory either.” We think that the force of this objection is limited. Of course it is true that ‘conscious’ in ordinary language is highly ambiguous and imprecise, but it is easy to disambiguate the term and make it more precise. Philosophers have distinguished a number of meanings for the term, the most important of which is phenomenal consciousness. As usually understood, a system is phenomenally conscious when there is something it is like to be that system: so if there is something it is like to be a bat, a bat is phenomenally conscious, and if there is nothing it is like to be a rock, a rock is not phenomenally conscious. One might question the precision of this concept in turn, but it is at least a common and widely defended view (see e.g. Antony (2006); Simon (2017)) that it picks out a definite and precise property. On this view, phenomenal consciousness comes in a number of varieties, but it is either definitely present or definitely absent in a given system at a given time. In recent years, theories that give precise mathematically-defined conditions for the presence or absence of consciousness have begun to be developed. The most well-known of these theories is Tononi’s integrated information theory (Tononi 2008), which specifies a mathematical structure for conscious states and quantifies them with a mathematical measure of integrated information. 5 Of course it is early days in the science of consciousness, and current theories are unlikely to be final theories. Nevertheless, it is possible to envisage precise theories of consciousness, and to reason about they might be combined with a consciousness-collapse view to yield precise interpretations of quantum mechanics. Crucially, when different precise theories of consciousness are combined with the consciousness-collapse view, these yield subtly different experimental predictions. As a result, we have a further motivation for taking consciousnesscollapse interpretations seriously: they can be tested experimentally. As we discuss in section 7, there is a long-term research program of experimentally testing consciousness-collapse interpretations and eventually supporting a precise consciousness-collapse interpretation. The required experiments are difficult, but advances in quantum computing may already exclude certain simple consciousness-collapse interpretations. Because of these considerations, the underdetermination of conditions for consciousness does not reflect any fundamental imprecision in consciousness-collapse views. It simply reflects an experimentally testable degree of freedom. The second common objection to the consciousness-collapse view is that it is committed to dualism: the view that the mental and the physical are fundamentally distinct. The consciousness-collapse view treats consciousness in a special way that seems to exempt it from the standard quantum-mechanical laws governing physical systems. This remark by Peter Lewis (this volume) reflects a common attitude: “Wigner postulates a strong form of interactive dualism in order to justify a duality in the physical laws. Few will want to follow Wigner down this path: non-physical minds, especially causally active ones, are mysterious at best.” Again, we think the force of this objection is limited. First: the consciousness-collapse thesis need not lead to dualism. It is compatible with materialist views on which consciousness is a complex physical property. For example, let us suppose a materialist version of integrated information theory on which consciousness is identical to Φ∗ , the property of having integrated information above a certain threshold. Then the consciousnesscollapse theory will say that Φ∗ causes collapse. This interpretation of quantum 6 mechanics will involve a fundamental physical law saying that under the conditions specified by Φ∗ , collapse is brought about according to the Born rule. A fundamental law involving a complex physical property may be unlike familiar physical laws, but it involves nothing nonphysical. Second: where consciousness is concerned, there are reasons to take dualism seriously. There are familiar reasons to question whether any purely physical theory can explain consciousness. One common reason (Chalmers 2003) is that physical theories explain only structure and dynamics (the so-called “easy problems” of behavior and the like), and explaining consciousness (the so-called “hard problem”) requires explaining more than structure and dynamics. These reasons need not lead to substance dualism, on which consciousness involves a separate nonphysical entity akin to an ego or soul, but they have led many theorists to adopt a form of property dualism where consciousness is accepted as a fundamental property akin to spacetime, mass, and charge. Where physical theories give fundamental physical laws that connect physical properties to each other, a property dualist theory of consciousness gives fundamental psychophysical laws that connect physical properties to consciousness. For example, on a property dualist construal of integrated information theory, there might be a fundamental physics-to-consciousness law saying that when a system has Φ above a certain threshold, the system will have a corresponding state of consciousness. Such a law has a structure akin to the Newtonian massto-gravitational-field law, saying that when a system has a certain mass, the system will have a corresponding gravitational field. On a consciousness-causescollapse theory, there will be an additional consciousness-to-physics law saying that states of consciousness bring about wave function collapse in a certain way. Putting these theories together might yield a mathematically precise version of property dualism that specifies the conditions under which consciousness arises and the role that it plays. Interestingly, the most common reason among philosophers for rejecting property dualist theories of consciousness is an argument from physics. This argument runs roughly as follows: (1) every physical effect has only physical causes, (2) consciousness causes physical effects, so (3) consciousness is physical. The key first premise is a causal closure thesis, supported by the observation that there are no causal gaps in standard physics that a nonphysical consciousness might fill. But wave function collapse in quantum mechanics appears to 7 be precisely such a gap, and consciousness-collapse models are at least not obviously ruled out by known physics. The situation is that many physicists rule out consciousness-collapse models for philosophical reasons (they are dualistic), while philosophers rule out property dualist models for physics-based reasons (they violate causal closure). The upshot is that a central reason to reject the consciousness-collapse thesis (it leads to dualism) and a central reason to reject interactionist property dualism (it violates the causal closure of physics) provide no reason to reject the two views when taken together. Perhaps there are other reasons to reject the consciousness-collapse thesis or to reject dualism, but these reasons must be found elsewhere. A third common objection to the consciousness-collapse thesis is that it is not necessary to invoke consciousness in an interpretation of quantum mechanics, as there are alternative interpretations that give it no special role. Even if we retain the measurement-collapse framework, it is possible to understand measurement independently of consciousness, so that nonconscious systems such as ordinary measuring devices can collapse the wave function. Going beyond this framework, a number of alternative interpretations have been developed that give no role to the notion of measurement. These include spontaneous-collapse interpretations (e.g. Pearle (1976); Ghirardi, Rimini, and Weber (1986)) which retain a collapse process but dispense with the need for measurement as a trigger, and hiddenvariable interpretations (Bohm 1952) and many-worlds interpretations (Everett 1957), which eliminate collapse entirely. We agree that one is not forced to accept a role for consciousness in quantum mechanics. At the same time, the mere existence of alternative interpretations is not itself good reason to reject the consciousness-collapse thesis. If it were, we would have good reason to reject all interpretations. Perhaps the underlying thought is that the consciousness-collapse thesis is extravagant and has certain costs, such as dualism. For there to be a serious objection here, an opponent needs to articulate the costs as objections in their own right. As with every other interpretation of quantum mechanics, the consciousness-collapse interpretation has both serious costs (dualism) and serious benefits (taking the standard dynamics at face value, solving the consciousness-causation problem). To assess any interpretation, we need to weigh its costs against its benefits. In this article, we are exploring consciousness-collapse models rather than 8 endorsing them. In particular, we are not asserting that these interpretations are superior to other interpretations of quantum mechanics. Both of us have considerable sympathy with other interpretations and especially with manyworlds interpretations (see Chalmers (1996, ch.10) and McQueen and Vaidman (2019)). But we think that consciousness-collapse interpretations deserve close attention. If it turns out that these interpretations have fatal flaws, they can be set aside. But if there are consciousness-collapse interpretations without clear fatal flaws, then these interpretations should be taken seriously as possible descriptions of quantum-mechanical reality. In our view, by far the most important challenge to consciousness-collapse models is not the issue of imprecision or of dualism, but the question of dynamic principles. Can we find a simple, coherent, and empirically viable set of dynamic principles governing how consciousness collapses the wave function? If we can find such principles, consciousness-collapse models should be placed alongside other dynamic models (including Bohmian hidden-variable models, Everettian many-worlds models, and Pearle-GRW style spontaneous collapse models) as serious contenders to be the correct interpretation of quantum mechanics. If we cannot, then consciousness-collapse models may remain an important speculative class of models, but they will stay on the second tier of interpretations until they are cashed out with dynamic principles. In what follows, we will explore the prospects for consciousness-collapse interpretations of quantum mechanics. We will do this mainly by exploring and evaluating potential dynamic principles. We focus especially on what we call super-resistance models, according to which there are special properties that resist superposition and trigger collapse. When these models are combined with the consciousness-collapse thesis, we obtain models in which consciousness or its physical correlates resist superposition and trigger collapse. We think superresistance consciousness-collapse models are worth investigating, and in this article we investigate some of them. In this article we are not trying to solve the hard problem of how physical processes give rise to consciousness. We are giving an account of the causal role of consciousness that can be combined with many different approaches to the hard problem. Our approach is consistent with both materialist views, on which consciousness is identified with a complex physical property, and dualist views, on which consciousness is a primitive property that correlates with physical 9 properties. Our approach is also consistent with many different theories of consciousness that correlate consciousness with underlying physical processes. For concreteness we will often assume a Tononi-style theory of consciousness on which consciousness is identical to or correlated with integrated information, but much of what we say should translate straightforwardly to other theories of consciousness. We will not be addressing problems that come up for collapse models of quantum mechanics quite generally. For example, collapse models face important challenges stemming from the theory of relativity (collapse seems to require a privileged reference frame (Maudlin 2011)), and the tails problem (collapse leaves wave functions with tails (McQueen 2015)). The collapse models we consider certainly face these challenges. These are important challenges, but for present purposes we will be happy if consciousness-collapse interpretations can be shown to be about as viable as widely discussed spontaneous-collapse interpretations. Interpretations in both classes will still face the general problems. A number of ideas about how to deal with them have been put forward, but this is a topic for another day. Our aim is to set out the best consciousness-collapse model that we can and to assess it. Our discussion is speculative and our conclusions are mixed. We articulate both positive models and serious limitations. We first articulate a simple consciousness-collapse model on which consciousness is entirely superposition-resistant. This model is subject to a conclusive objection (distinct from those outlined above) arising from the quantum Zeno effect. We then articulate a model that is not subject to this objection, combining integrated information theory with Pearle’s continuous-collapse theory. We explore the prospects of empirically testing these models, and discuss some objections. The model is still subject to both empirical and philosophical objections, but there are some potential ways forward. The upshot is not that consciousnesscollapse interpretations are clearly correct, but that there is a research program here worth exploring. 2 Consciousness as super-resistant One can clarify the options for a consciousness-collapse theory by asking a crucial question for any collapse model of quantum mechanics: What is the locus 10 of collapse? That is, which observable determines the definite states that the collapse process projects superposed states onto? Here there are two options: there can be a variable locus (different observables serve as the locus on different occasions of collapse) or a fixed locus (the same observable always serves as the locus of collapse). A variable-locus model is closest to standard formulations of quantum mechanics. On a standard understanding, many different observable quantities (e.g. position, momentum, mass, and spin) can be measured and thereby serve as the locus of collapse. Every observable is associated with an operator. Upon measurement, the wave function collapses probabilistically into an eigenstate of that operator, and the measurement reveals the corresponding eigenvalue for the observable (such as a specific position for the particle), with probabilities determined by the prior quantum state according to the Born rule. Henry Stapp’s consciousness-collapse model (Stapp 1993) is a variable-locus model, on which consciousness collapses whatever observable is being consciously observed at a given time. The variable-locus approach has some attractions, but it also faces some hard questions. Not least is the question: what determines which observable is being measured? This question is hard enough that Stapp’s model postulates an entirely separate process that determines the locus of collapse. Stapp calls this process “asking a question of nature”, which is supposed to be something that takes place in the mind of an observer. Stapp takes this to be a third process distinct from von Neumann’s standard dual processes of collapse itself and Schrödinger evolution. Stapp takes this third process as primitive. There are options for analyzing it (perhaps via a precisely specified observation relation between observers and observables, for example, or by building awareness of observables into the structure of consciousness), but it is clear that such a theory will be complex. One option for a variable-locus consciousness-collapse theory invokes the idea that consciousness represents certain objects and properties in its environment. For example, visual experiences typically represent the color, shape, and location of observed objects, while auditory experiences represent locations, pitches, and the like. A consciousness-collapse view may hold that when consciousness represents observable properties of an observed object, the object collapses into a definite state of those observables. For example, perceiving the location of a ball that was previously in a superposition will collapse the ball into a def- 11 inite location. One trouble here is that on standard representationalist views, the represented properties are built into a state of consciousness but the represented objects are not. In some cases an experience as of a single object may be caused by no object or by multiple objects in reality, so there is still a difficult question about which object if any undergoes collapse. This approach may work better with relationist views where consciousness involves direct awareness of specific objects and properties, but there will still be many complications.2 Fixed-locus models are simpler in a number of respects, and we will focus on them. In a fixed-locus measurement-collapse model, there are special properties that serve as the locus of collapse. In a fixed locus consciousness-collapse model, consciousness itself (or perhaps its physical correlate) serves as the locus of collapse. It is this idea that we will develop in what follows. One natural way to develop a fixed-locus collapse model is through the idea of superposition-resistance, which we will sometimes abbreviate as superresistance. The idea is that there are special superposition-resistant observables, which as a matter of fundamental law resist superposition and cause the system to collapse onto eigenstates of these observables (with probabilities given by the Born rule). The corresponding class of models are super-resistance models of quantum mechanics.3 There are a number of different ways to make the dynamics of super-resistance precise, some of which we will explore in the following sections. A strong version of super-resistance invokes fundamental superselection rules (Wick, Wightman, and Wigner 1952), according to which certain observables are entirely forbidden from entering superpositions. A weaker version invokes principles according to which these superpositions are unstable and tend to collapse. There are super-resistance models of collapse that give no special role to consciousness or measurement. One well-known super-resistance model is Penrose’s model (Penrose 2014) of quantum mechanics on which spacetime structure is superposition-resistant: when the structure of spacetime evolves into superpositions over a certain threshold, these superpositions collapse onto a definite 2 For representationalist views, see Tye (1995). For relationist views, see Byrne and Logue (2009). These views may face a version of the Zeno problem in the next section, arising from whether the states of consciousness themselves can enter superpositions. 3 In earlier versions of this article we called superposition-resistant observables “mproperties” (short for “measurement properties”) and super-resistance models “m-property models”. 12 structure. One can also see the GRW interpretation of quantum mechanics as an interpretation on which position is mildly superposition-resistant: superpositions of position tend to collapse, though with low probability for isolated particles. Super-resistance models work well with measurement-collapse interpretations of quantum mechanics. In the context of these interpretations, we can think of a super-resistant property not as a measured property (e.g. particle position) but as a measurement property (e.g. a pointer position or a conscious experience). To sketch the idea intuitively: suppose there is a special class of measurement devices (e.g. oscilloscopes) which have special measurement properties (e.g. meter readings or pointer locations) that (as a matter of fundamental law) resist superposition and tend to collapse. When a measurement takes place, a measured property affects a measurement property. Suppose that we have a quantum system (e.g. a particle) in a superposition of locations a and b, which we represent (simplifying by omitting amplitudes) as the quantum state |ai + |bi. The particle interacts with a measurement system such that if not for this principle, it would yield an entangled superposition |ai |M (a)i + |bi |M (b)i, where M (a) and M (b) are the states of the measurement system. Because M is superposition-resistant, the particle and measurement system will instead evolve into a collapsed state |ai |M (a)i or |bi |M (b)i, with probabilities given by the Born rule. The effect will be much the same as if the measured property collapsed directly, but now the measurement properties serve as a single locus of collapse. Superposition-resistance is an especially natural idea in the context of consciousnesscollapse models of quantum mechanics. The idea that consciousness resists superposition is suggested in a brief passage in Wigner (1961), and is later developed by Albert (1992), and Chalmers (2003). Wigner writes: “If the atom is replaced by a conscious being, the wave function α(φ1 × χ1 ) + β(φ2 × χ2 ) (which also follows from the linearity of the equations) appears absurd because it implies that my friend was in a state of suspended animation before he answered my question. It follows that the being with a consciousness must have a different role in quantum mechanics than the inanimate measuring device: the atom considered above. In particular, the quantum mechanical 13 equations of motion cannot be linear.” (Wigner 1961, p.180) Wigner’s suggestion seems to be that a state of consciousness cannot be superposed because it would require being in a “state of suspended animation”. Wigner does not suggest a dynamic process for collapse here, but potential processes are fleshed out a little by Albert and Chalmers. Albert suggests a picture on which the physical correlates of consciousness immediately collapse once superposed: All physical objects almost always evolve in strict accordance with the dynamical equations of motion. But every now and then, in the course of some such dynamical evolutions (in the course of measurements, for example), the brain of a sentient being may enter a state wherein (as we’ve seen) states connected with various different conscious experiences are superposed; and at such moments, the mind connected with that brain (as it were) opens its inner eye, and gazes on that brain, and that causes the entire system (brain, measuring instrument, measured system, everything) to collapse, with the usual quantum-mechanical probabilities, onto one or another of those states; and then the eye closes, and everything proceeds again in accordance with the dynamical equations of motion until the next such superposition arises, and then that mind’s eye opens up again, and so on. (Albert 1992, pp.81-2) Albert is entertaining the view mainly for the sake of argument, and he almost immediately rejects it in the passage quoted earlier about the imprecision of consciousness. Chalmers writes more sympathetically: Upon observation of a superposed system, Schrödinger evolution at the moment of observation would cause the observed system to become correlated with the brain, yielding a resulting superposition of brain states and so (by psychophysical correlation) a superposition of conscious states. But such a superposition cannot occur, so one of the potential resulting conscious states is somehow selected (presumably by a nondeterministic dynamic principle at the phenomenal level). The result is that (by psychophysical correlation) a definite brain state and state of the observed object are also selected. The 14 same might apply to the connection between consciousness and nonconscious processes in the brain: when superposed non-conscious processes threaten to affect consciousness, there will be some sort of selection. In this way, there is a causal role for consciousness in the physical world. (Chalmers 2003, pp.262-3) Chalmers in effect combines Wigner’s suggestion that consciousness cannot superpose with Albert’s suggestion that consciousness collapses its physical correlates. The key idea here is that consciousness is a superposition-resistant property and that its physical correlates therefore resist superposition too. That is, it is difficult or impossible for a subject to be in a superposition of two different states of consciousness, and this results in the collapse of physical processes that interact with consciousness.4 Here the relevant states are total conscious states of a subject at a time. The total conscious state of a subject is what it is like to be that subject: if what it is like to be subject A is the same as what it is like to be subject B, then A and B are in the same total conscious state. A subject’s total conscious state at a time may include many aspects: visual experience, auditory experience, the experience of thought, and so on. Like position or mass or color or shape, consciousness in this form can take on many specific values. Its specific values are the vast range of possible total conscious states of a subject at a time. This view assumes that there is a physical correlate of consciousness (PCC): a set of physical states that correlate perfectly with a system’s conscious states. For simplicity, we can start by assuming a materialist view where the total conscious state and its physical correlate are identical. Things work best if we also assume that the physical correlate of consciousness (PCC) can itself be represented as a quantum observable with an associated operator. This assumption is nontrivial, as not every physical property is an observable; we return to it later. A PCC observable will have many different eigenstates corresponding to distinct total states of consciousness. This makes it straightforward to treat consciousness as a super-resistant property. To illustrate how this works, we can again suppose an electron in a superposition of locations (again omitting amplitudes for simplicity) |ai + |bi. The electron registers on a measurement device and then the result is per4 Halvorson (2011) also argues for a picture on which mental states cannot be superposed and therefore bring about collapse in the physical world. 15 ceived by a human subject. Assuming the measurement device is not conscious, then at the first stage the electron and the device will go into an entangled state |ai |M (a)i + |bi |M (b)i. When the human looks, this result will affect the eye (E), early areas of the nervous system and brain (B), and eventually the physical correlates of consciousness (PCC). Under Schrödinger evolution, we would expect the electron, device, and subject to go into an entangled state |ai |M (a)i |E(a)i |B(a)i |P CC(a)i+|bi |M (b)i |E(b)i |B(b)i |P CC(b)i. However, this superposed state would yield a superposition of states of consciousness. So at the point where the PCC is affected, the system will collapse. It collapses into |ai |M (a)i |E(a)i |B(a)i |P CC(a)i or |bi |M (b)i |E(b)i |B(b)i |P CC(b)i, with Born rule probabilities. In effect, at the point where the measurement reaches consciousness, the electron, the measurement device, and the brain will collapse into a definite state. On a dualist view on which consciousness merely correlates with physical properties, things are a little more complicated. We focus on forms of dualism where there are psychophysical laws correlating physical states of a system with states of consciousness. There will be a set of physical correlates of consciousness (which may be disjunctive if necessary) that are in one-to-one correspondence with total states of consciousness. A subject will be in a given state of consciousness if and only if it is in the corresponding PCC state. We can assume as before that the PCC is a quantum observable. Psychophysical laws connect unsuperposed PCC eigenstates to unsuperposed states of consciousness. They also connect superpositions of PCC states to the corresponding superpositions of states of consciousness. A given subject’s PCC is in a superposition of PCC eigenstates with certain amplitudes if and only if the subject’s conscious experience is in a superposition of the corresponding total states of consciousness with the same distribution of amplitudes. On a dualist view, a fundamental principle will say that consciousness resists superposition. Whenever Schrödinger evolution plus the psychophysical laws entail that a system enters or is about to enter a superposition of total states of consciousness, the system will collapse into a definite total state of consciousness. As a result, the PCC will also collapse into an eigenstate, and other physical entities that are entangled with the PCC will collapse as described above. One motivation for the super-resistance consciousness-collapse model is given by Wigner’s suggestion that superpositions of consciousness are “absurd”. That 16 is, something about the very nature of consciousness or the concept of consciousness rules out total states where consciousness is superposed. It is certainly at least very hard to imagine subjects who are in superposed states of consciousness (at least without these states becoming total states of consciousness in their own right). If something about the nature of consciousness explains why it cannot be superposed, then this might provide a possible explanation of why collapse comes about. This explanatory motivation might be seen as a further motivation for understanding consciousness as the trigger of collapse. Taking Wigner’s motivation seriously leads to the idea that consciousness is absolutely superposition-resistant: that is, that it can never enter superpositions, even brief and unstable ones. Invoking absolute superposition-resistance leads to a clean and simple dynamic model for collapse involving superselection rules. Unfortunately this model leads to a fatal problem for absolute super-resistance, which we explore in the next section. 3 Superselection and the Zeno problem To develop super-resistance models in more detail, we can start by thinking of them independently of consciousness. In principle any observable could serve as a super-resistant observable, with distinct models of quantum mechanics arising from taking different observables to resist superposition. Later we can consider the special case where consciousness or its physical correlates serve as superresistant observables. The simplest (albeit fatally flawed) super-resistance model invokes superselection: the strong form of super-resistance where certain superpositions are ruled out entirely. In particular, it invokes the familiar concept of a superselection rule: a rule postulating that superpositions of a specified observable are forbidden. Superselection rules are invoked for a number of purposes in quantum mechanics.5 Sometimes they are postulated to analyze quantum-mechanical prop5 Superselection rules were introduced by Wick, Wightman, and Wigner (1952). There are many somewhat different definitions of superselection rules, analyzed thoroughly by Earman (2008). Here we use a common informal definition. Superselection rules are invoked in analyses of the measurement process by Bub (1988), Hepp (1972), Machida and Namiki (1980), and others. Thalos (1998) gives an excellent review. The most common strategy is to argue that superselection rules can emerge from the Schrödinger dynamics governing the interaction of 17 erties that are never found in superpositions, such as the difference in charge between a proton and a neutron. Sometimes they are used to help analyze quantum-mechanical symmetries. Sometimes they are used to help address measurement in quantum mechanics, most often through the idea that superselection can emerge through interaction with the environment by Schrödinger evolution alone. Here we are exploring a somewhat different idea: the idea of a superselection collapse model, with a fundamental superselection rule governing the collapse process. Such a model will specify a superselection observable, such that physical systems must always be in eigenstates of the operator corresponding to the observable. The associated collapse postulate says that whenever a system would otherwise enter a superposition of eigenstates of this operator (given Schrödinger dynamics alone), it instead enters a definite eigenstate, with probabilities given by the Born rule. In the special case where consciousness (or its physical correlate) is a superselection observable, then whenever consciousness would otherwise be about to enter a superposition, it must collapse to a definite state according to the Born probabilities. To specify the dynamics better, we can first suppose that the collapse takes place at a time interval of ∆t, so that if the system has evolved (according to the Schrödinger equation) in the preceding ∆t into a non-eigenstate of the superselection observable, it collapses probabilistically into an eigenstate of that operator, with probabilities given by the Born rule. This yields a well-defined stochastic process. For the absolute super-resistance model, the dynamics is the limiting case of this process as ∆t approaches zero. The superselection collapse model has a dynamics that is already familiar in quantum mechanics: it is precisely the dynamics that would obtain (on a traditional measurement interpretation) if the resistant observable were being continuously measured by an outside observer. The current approach does not require that there are any outside observers, or that resistant properties themselves are ever measured, or that continuous measurement ever takes place (though to aid the imagination, one could metaphorically suppose that God is continuously measuring the resistant properties of the entire universe). All that it requires is the mathematical dynamics associated with continuous measurea system with its environment. It is unclear to us whether anyone has explicitly proposed a superselection collapse interpretation, but we are open to pointers. 18 ment of resistant properties, which is fairly straightforward. Unfortunately, the dynamics of continuous measurement leads to a well known effect, the quantum Zeno effect, which renders any superselection collapse model empirically inadequate. The quantum Zeno effect is the effect whereby the more often one measures a quantum observable, the harder it is for the system to enter different states of that observable. In the extreme case where an observable is measured continuously, it cannot change at all. The source of the quantum Zeno effect lies in the mathematical fact that for a system to evolve under Schrödinger evolution from some initial eigenstate of an operator to some other eigenstate of that operator, it must evolve through superpositions of eigenstates.6 Eigenstates are orthogonal to each other, so the continuous process of Schrodinger evolution cannot evolve directly from eigenstate to eigenstate. If a system governed by this process cannot pass through superpositions of these eigenstates, then the system cannot change from one eigenstate to another. Another way to put things is that if small superpositions are permitted, an initial superposition will assign probability 1- (where  is negligible) to the initial eigenstate. So if there is a measurement of this observable in the first moment, the superposition will collapse to the initial eigenstate with probability 1-. Continuous measurement will therefore force the system to remain in that initial eigenstate. This leads to the Zeno problem for superselection collapse interpretations. If there is a superselection observable (one that can never enter superpositions), every system will remain forever in a single eigenstate of that observable. This consequence may be acceptable for standard superselection observables in physics (such as the charge difference between a proton and a neutron), but it is clearly unacceptable for observables tied to measurement that serve as triggers of the collapse process.7 For example, if a superselection observable corresponds to the position of the pointer on a measurement device, then that pointer will be forever stuck in one location and unable to give useful measurement results. 6 One could argue that this mathematical fact is the common explanation both of the Zeno effect and of the problem for superselection collapse models, rather than the Zeno effect explaining the problem. Still, the problem is still aptly called a Zeno problem, tied to the impossibility of motion. 7 Mariam Thalos (1998, p.538) raises a version of this problem for superselection-based accounts of measurement, arguing that if a classical quantity is governed by a superselection rule, it can never change its magnitude in evolution over time. 19 We can illustrate the Zeno problem by taking the superselection observable to be consciousness (or its physical correlate). We know that systems have different conscious states at different times, and sometimes evolve from being unconscious to being conscious. If consciousness or its physical correlate was a superselection observable, it would obey the dynamics of continuous measurement so it could not change at all. If we started in an unconscious state, we could never become conscious. The unfortunate consequence would be that we could never wake up from a nap. Furthermore, if there is no consciousness in the early universe, then consciousness could never emerge later.8 The Zeno problem is not just a problem for superselection collapse interpretations. In “Zeno Goes to Copenhagen”, we argue that the Zeno problem is a serious problem for almost any measurement-collapse interpretation of quantum mechanics. Any such interpretation faces the question of whether measurement itself can enter quantum superpositions. If measurement can enter superpositions, the standard dynamics of collapse upon measurement is ill-defined, and new dynamics is required. If measurement cannot enter superpositions, the quantum Zeno effect suggests that measurements can never start or finish, at least if measurement is an observable. One way out is to deny that measurement is an observable, but this option leads to further commitments (embracing a strong form of dualism or construing measurement as a special wave-function property) that themselves require a highly revisionary approach. In this article, however, we are focusing on the Zeno problem as a problem for super-resistance interpretations. To handle the Zeno problem in this framework, the obvious move is to abandon superselection (on which superpositions of the relevant observable are entirely forbidden) for a weaker version of superresistance. An approximately super-resistant observable is one that can enter superpositions but nevertheless resists superposition, at least in some circum8 Barry Loewer (2002) raises a different early-universe problem for consciousness-collapse theories: if the first collapse requires the universe to be in a non-null eigenstate of consciousness, then this will never happen, while if collapse is triggered by any superposition of consciousness, then the first collapse will happen too early. The absolute super-resistance model takes the second horn. On this view, Loewer’s “collapse too early” problem can be minimized by having conditions for consciousness that are not satisfied in the early universe (so that in its early stages, the universe will be in a null eigenstate of consciousness), and also by noting that most initial collapses when they occur will be onto a null state of consciousness. The Zeno problem as it arises for the early universe is the distinct but related problem that all collapses will be onto a null state of consciousness. 20 stances. On a simple version of this view, superpositions of the observable in question are unstable and they probabilistically tend to collapse over time. To make the idea of approximate super-resistance precise, we require nonstandard physics. Fortunately, there is a wealth of resources for developing such physics in the literature on modern dynamical collapse theories (Bassi et al. 2013). In section 6, we show how these theories can be adapted to yield a model on which consciousness is approximately super-resistant. The rough idea is that as a total state of consciousness (and/or its physical correlate) enters increasingly large superpositions (where a large superposition is roughly one that gives significant amplitude to distant states), this yields higher probabilities of collapse of consciousness onto a more definite state. Admittedly it is far from clear what a superposition of states of consciousness would amount to. We return to this matter in the final section. 4 Integrated information theory There are many ways to spell out the details of a consciousness-collapse superresistance model. We can combine the view with many different theories of consciousness, and with various different accounts of the collapse dynamics. In what follows we spell out one way of working out some details, by combining the theory with a specific theory of consciousness (integrated information theory, or IIT) and a specific model of approximate super-resistance dynamics (inspired by Pearle’s continuous spontaneous localization interpretation of quantum mechanics). We focus on IIT for several reasons. First, it is one of the few mathematically precise theories of consciousness. Second, unlike many competitors it purports to be a fundamental theory of consciousness that offers basic and universal principles connecting consciousness to physical processes. Third, it offers a specific physical correlate for total states of consciousness, using its notion of a Q-shape (qualia shape). Fourth, it has a distance metric between total states of consciousness, which plays an important role in our framework. None of this means that we are endorsing IIT. Many objections have been made to IIT (e.g. Aaronson (2014), Bayne (2018), Barrett and Mediano (2019), Doerig et al. (2019)) and they raise important issues. Our approach could in principle be combined with any theory that has the four properties just listed. 21 IIT is a theory that associates systems with both quantitative amounts of consciousness and qualitative states of consciousness. Its systems are classical Markovian networks made up of interconnected units that interact with each other according to deterministic or probabilistic rules. Each unit can take on a number of states, and the state of the system is made up of the states of each of the units in the system. One limitation of IIT as it stands (Barrett and Mediano (2019)) is that its assigns amounts and states of consciousness to discrete Markovian network systems but not to real physical systems. To apply it to real physical systems, we need to combine it with a mapping from physical systems to network structures. In what follows we will assume such a mapping (or some other generalization of IIT) so that IIT applies to physical systems. IIT is derived from phenomenological axioms rather than from experimental evidence. Experimental support for it is somewhat limited to date, especially because it is impractical to measure and calculate its measures of consciousness in biological systems. However, some measurable approximations of its quantitative measures have been shown to correlate with level of consciousness, see Massimini et al. (2005), Casarotto et al. (2016), Leung et al. (2020), and Afrasiabi et al. (2021). Additionally, spatiotemporal patterns of integrated information (approximating IIT’s qualitative measures) have been derived from brain areas and correlated with the contents of conscious perceptions of faces and other objects (Haun et al. (2017)). In any case, we will treat IIT as a potential empirical theory of consciousness. Much of our discussion should generalize to other theories. IIT is built around the notions of information and integration. The information in a system is a measure of the extent to which the present state of a system constrains its potential past and future states. One centerpiece of IIT is its measure of integration, which it labels Φ. Φ is a measure of the extent to which the information in a system is irreducible to the information of its components. It quantifies how much the causal powers of a system fail to be accounted for by any partitioned version of it. The simplest system with nonzero Φ is a dyad: a network AB with two interacting nodes A and B that swap their states. If A is on or off, B turns on or off at the next time step, and vice versa. In this case, AB has causal powers that are not reducible to those of A and B taken alone, and Φ(AB) = 1. (We 22 spell out the mathematics in an appendix.) By contrast, if A and B are not interacting, then the causal powers of AB are reducible to those of A and B taken alone, so Φ(AB) = 0. IIT says that a system is conscious if and only if it is a maximum of Φ: that is, if the system has higher Φ than any system nested within it and higher Φ than any system it is nested within. The amount of consciousness in a system is Φmax , which is equivalent to Φ if the system is a maximum and 0 if the system is not. In what follows we drop the superscript for simplicity. One way to combine IIT with a super-resistance model is to say that Φ is super-resistant. That is, Φ resists superposition and superpositions of Φ trigger collapse. Unfortunately, this view faces a fatal problem. It fails to suppress superpositions of qualitatively distinct conscious states with the same value of Φ. Consider a conscious subject and a screen in a dark isolated room. The screen can display green or blue. If it is put into a superposition of displaying both, then the subject will be put into a superposition of experiencing green and experiencing blue. There is no reason to assume that these experiences differ in their Φ–value. But then there is no Φ–superposition, and so no collapse. The subject remains in a superposition of qualitatively distinct total states of consciousness. Such a theory therefore will not yield determinate experiences for many crucial observations. The underlying problem is that Φ is not a genuine physical correlate of consciousness – that is, it is not a physical correlate of a total state of consciousness. It is merely a physical correlate of a scalar degree of consciousness, where the same degree can be present in many different conscious states.9 9 We canvassed the idea of using Φ as an absolutely super-resistant property in an early version of this article that raised the Zeno problem for absolute super-resistance and suggested approximate super-resistance via continuous localization as a possible solution. In an article responding to our early presentation and building on the ideas there, Okon and Sebastián (2018) develop the idea that Φ could be an approximately super-resistant property using continuous localization. Okon and Sebastian respond to our current objection by saying that decoherence makes it extremely unlikely that there will be superposed conscious states with the same value of Φ. The blue/green case seems a clear case of this sort of superposition, however, as does any ensuing state resulting from interactions with their environment that makes no difference to their total state of consciousness. The dyad system discussed in the main text and the appendix gives a simple illustration of a superposition of states with different Q-shapes but with the same value of Φ. In addition, the Q-shape collapse model is much better suited for giving all aspects of consciousness a causal role, whereas the Φ-collapse model gives degree of consciousness a causal role and leaves everything else epiphenomenal. 23 Fortunately, IIT also postulates a physical correlate of total states of consciousness. The Q-shape (qualia shape) of a system is an entity that serves as an abstract representation of the structure of the integrated information in a system. IIT specifies a mathematical mapping from network structures to Q-shapes. If we assume (as above) that the total physical state of a system determines a network structure, then IIT will derivatively specify a mapping from total physical states to Q-shapes. The Q-shape of S is a set of weighted points, one for each mechanism in S. A mechanism is a subsystem m of S – that is, a nonempty set of elements of S – with φ(m) > 0 (as defined in Appendix A). If S has n elements, then it has up to N = 2n − 1 mechanisms. For example, in the dyad system AB, which has two elements A and B, the subsystems are A, B, and AB, and the mechanisms are A and B. The weight associated with a mechanism m is φ(m), a non-negative real number representing the integrated information associated with m. The point associated with m is given by two probability distributions over the 2n states of S, the so-called maximally irreducible cause repertoire and maximally irreducible effect repertoire associated with m. According to IIT, a system’s Q-shape determines (at least nomologically) the total state of consciousness associated with that system. A Q-shape is itself a mathematical entity, and it is not obvious just how a Q-shape determines a state of consciousness. What matters most for our purposes is that according to IIT, (i) having a given Q-shape is a physically definable property (we might call it physical Q-shape), (ii) Q-shape is a physical correlate of consciousness, in that any two physical systems with the same associated physical Q-shape will have the same state of consciousness. It will also be helpful to assume the stronger theses that (iii) the mathematical structure of a conscious state is given by a Q-shape (call this a system’s phenomenal Q-shape) and (iv) as a matter of psychophysical law, a system has a given phenomenal Q-shape (that is, it has a conscious experience with a given structure) if and only if has the isomorphic physical Q-shape (that is, it has a physical state with the same structure as defined by IIT). These claims are far from obviously correct, but something like them seems to be intended by IIT. As before, it does not matter too much for our purposes whether these claims of IIT are correct. It is plausible that a final mathematical theory of consciousness will specify some mathematical structure for consciousness (though 24 there may be more to consciousness than its mathematical structure, as inverted qualia cases suggest). And it is plausible that this mathematical structure should be realized in some way in the physical correlates of consciousness. If necessary, we can replace Q-shape by that mathematical structure. What matters most is that there is some precise theory of consciousness for which psychophysical isomorphism principles like this are correct. Different states of the dyad system AB discussed earlier can be associated with different Q-shapes. Consider state 10, where A is on and B is off, and state 00, where both A and B are off. As we show in the appendix, both states have Φ = 1, but they are associated with distinct Q-shapes. In principle one can prepare a dyad system in a superposition of these two states 10 and 00: we might call this Schrödinger’s dyad. If Q-shape is super-resistant, Schrödinger’s dyad will be unstable and will collapse into a state with a definite Q-shape. We discuss a framework for combining IIT with quantum mechanics along these lines in the next two sections. In section 7, we discuss possible experimental tests, which are likely to rule out the simple Q-shape collapse interpretation but which suggest a program for empirically refining collapse interpretations. 5 Combining IIT with quantum mechanics10 The standard IIT framework (Oizumi, Albantakis, and Tononi (2014)) maps classical network states to Q-shapes. We have assumed a derivative mapping from classical physical states to Q-shapes. To combine IIT with quantum mechanics, we need to extend the IIT mapping so that it maps quantum physical states to Q-shapes or to superpositions of Q-shapes. The core idea of a Q-shape collapse model is that systems in superpositions of Q-shape always collapse toward having a determinate Q-shape. To extend the IIT mapping to quantum physical states, the obvious way to proceed is to use IIT’s physical definition of Q-shape to define a set of Q-shape collapse operators, one for each dimension of Q-shape. The joint eigenstates of these operators will be physical states with determinate Q-shapes. A challenge to defining these Q-shape operators is that in the classical IIT framework, φ and Q-shape depend on probabilities of state-transitions in a net10 This section is co-authored with Johannes Kleiner (Münich Center for Mathematical Philosophy, Ludwig Maximilian University). 25 work, which may depend on the position and momentum of the system’s parts. Position and momentum are noncommuting operators, so physical systems cannot be in joint eigenstates of them. High-mass systems may have precise enough position and momentum to determine φ and Q-shape, but these quantities may not be defined for low-mass entities such as electrons in quantum systems (McQueen (2019b, p97)). There are various options for addressing this challenge. We could redefine Φ and Q-shape so they depend only on positions or mass densities of elements of the system. We could also give special treatment for low-mass systems, for example modifying Φ to stipulate that Φ = 0 for systems with mass below a certain threshold, or we could invoke a coarse-grained or “smeared” version of Φ and Q-shape observables, with significant smearing mainly required for systems with very low mass. Alternatively, we can invoke newer versions of IIT that are defined over quantum states. One framework for an IIT-driven collapse model has been developed by Kremnizer and Ranchin (2015), who define a new measure of quantum integrated information QII for quantum systems. On their model, a system’s QII determines the probability of collapses onto a position basis, so that systems with higher QII are more likely to collapse on to the position basis. However, Kremnizer and Ranchin’s interesting model is a super-resistance theory only in a weak sense: the properties that trigger collapse (QII) are quite distinct from the collapse basis (position), and position resists superposition only in certain contexts with high QII. Also, while Kremnizer and Ranchin speculate that their quantity QII may be a measure of consciousness, this will yield at best a limited causal role for consciousness, on which the scalar amount of consciousness determines probability of collapse but the specific conscious state of a subject plays no role. Zanardi, Tomka, and Venuti (2018) have developed a more thoroughgoing quantum-mechanical version of IIT, defining quantum mechanical operators for each IIT notion (including Q-shape as well as φ) across a broad class of quantummechanical networks. (These are networks of finite-dimensional non-relativistic qudits, interacting via Markovian trace preserving completely positive maps.) Further generalizations have been given by Kleiner and Tull (2020). These models do not yet give a complete mapping from physical states to Q-shapes, but they come closer to doing this than standard IIT. In what follows, we will 26 assume a fully developed model along these lines with a complete mapping from physical states to Q-shapes. Quantum IIT specifies a mapping E from states of quantum systems to quantum Q-shapes. Quantum Q-shapes are are quantum analogs of classical Q-shapes, the Q-shapes invoked in standard IIT. Classical Q-shapes for an nelement system S can be represented as N = 2n −1 weighted points, one for each subsystem of S, where points are pairs of probability distributions and weights are non-negative real numbers (for a subsystem that is not a mechanism, the weight will be zero). Quantum Q-shapes likewise involve N weighted points, where points are now pairs of density operators associated with the Hilbert space of S and weights are non-negative reals. Where the space of classical Qshapes is the Cartesian product of N copies (one for each subsystem) of P r(S)× P r(S)×R0+ , the space of quantum Q-shapes is the Cartesian product of N copies of D(S) × D(S) × R0+ . Here P r(S) is the space of probability distributions over S, whose quantum analog D(S) is the space of density operators over S. R0+ is the set of non-negative real numbers.11 There is a natural mapping from classical Q-shapes to a subclass of quantum Q-shapes, deriving from a mapping from P r(S) to D(S), defined as follows: P (p(si )) 7→ i p(si ) |si i hsi |. We can call this distinguished subclass of quantum Q-shapes the quasi-classical Q-shapes. Any quantum Q-shape can be seen as a superposition of quasi-classical Q-shapes. Quantum IIT as it stands does not say much about how quantum Q-shapes correspond to states of consciousness. For our purposes we can add the further claims that (i) quasi-classical Q-shapes correspond to determinate states of consciousness, exactly as the corresponding classical Q-shapes do in classical IIT, and (ii) other quantum Q-shapes are superpositions of quasi-classical Q-shapes and correspond to superpositions of the corresponding states of consciousness. We can define the quasi-classical states of a quantum system as those quantum states that quantum IIT associates (via the mapping E) with a quasiclassical Q-shape. If C is the class of quasi-classical Q-shapes, the class of quasiclassical quantum states is E−1 (C), the preimage of C under E. Every state of 11 If S is a network of elements with binary states, each weighted point will have 2n+1 + 1 dimensions (two 2n -dimensional probability spaces plus a real number), so classical Q-space has (2n − 1)(2n+1 + 1) dimensions. In quantum IIT, the 2n dimensional probability-spaces are replaced by 22n -dimensional density spaces, so quantum Q-space has (2n − 1)(22n+1 + 1) dimensions. 27 a quantum system can then be represented as a superposition of quasi-classical states, and its associated Q-shape will be a superposition of the corresponding quasi-classical Q-shapes. We can then set up collapse operators so that quantum systems always collapse toward these quasi-classical states with quasi-classical Q-shapes. One limitation of quantum IIT as it currently stands is that these quasiclassical states (picked out as those that quantum IIT associates with quasiclassical Q-shapes) may not closely correspond to what we usually think of as quasi-classical quantum states such as mass density eigenstates. As a result, the Q-shape collapse dynamics need not lead to collapse toward standard “classical” states such as mass density eigenstates and may result in a superposition of these states (along with a relatively determinate state of consciousness). If we want to avoid these quantum superpositions as physical correlates of determinate consciousness, there is at least a research program of developing a version of quantum IIT on which quasi-classical Q-shapes and determinate states of consciousness are associated with more “classical” quantum states. In what follows it may be helpful to assume such a version of the framework. We can now define Q-shape collapse operators. Recall that a Q-shape is a point in the direct product of N copies of the density operator space D(S). Any density operator in D(S) can be represented (in the quasi-classical basis |si i) as ρ= X cij |si i hsj | (1) i,j The Q-shape for any given quantum state ψ consists of 2N density operators of this kind and N non-negative real numbers. The Q-shape can therefore be represented by 2N sets of coefficients ckij which we denote as ckij (ψ) (for k = 1 . . . 2N ), and N non-negative real numbers which we denote ϕk (ψ) (for k = 1 . . . N ). For notational simplicity, we duplicate each of the latter, so that for each k = 1, ... 2N , we have a ckij (ψ) which describes the first or second factor in D(S) × D(S) × R0+ and a ϕk (ψ) which describes the third factor. We can then define an ensemble of orthogonal self-adjoint collapse operators as follows: Q̂kij := X ϕk (ψ)((cij (ψ) + (cji (ψ)) |ψi hψ| . ψ∈E−1 (C) 28 (2) The sum has been restricted so that it runs over the class E−1 (C) of quasiclassical quantum states, that is, those whose Q-shapes are quasi-classical. As k ranges from 1 to 2N (where N = 2n − 1) and i and j range from 1 to 2n , an n-element system will be associated with 22n+1 (2n − 1) collapse operators.12 6 Continuous collapse dynamics To complete our picture of super-resistant consciousness-based collapse, we need an account of the dynamics of super-resistant collapse. Fortunately, there exist models of dynamic collapse (due to Philip Pearle and Lajos Diósi, among others) that can be generalized to model the continuous collapse of any observable. It is not difficult to adapt these models to model the continuous collapse of consciousness and its physical correlates such as Q-shape. We start by informally reviewing these models and the adaptation to consciousness-collapse models, before providing formal details.13 We start with the continuous spontaneous localization (CSL) model due to Pearle (1976, 1999, 2021). Pearle’s model is a continuous relative of the well known GRW model, on which the position of isolated particles undergo spontaneous localization of position with low probability at any given time. On CSL, wave functions undergo a gradual stochastic collapse process at all times. The model provides continuous collapse onto mass density: the amount of mass present at various locations. It provides a dynamics by which superpositions of mass density gradually collapse toward definite states of mass density, with faster collapse in high-mass systems. In effect, CSL is a model on which mass density is super-resistant. Pearle’s model can be informally motivated by an analogy between gradual collapse and the gambler’s ruin game in classical probability theory (Pearle 1982). In the gambler’s ruin, a number of gamblers play against each other until all but one of them is “wiped out”. Consider two gamblers, G1 and G2 , 12 For reasons tied to the role of weights within IIT, we have combined the real weights ϕk and the density operator coefficients cij in defining the Q-shape collapse operators. As a result there are N fewer collapse operators than dimensions of Q-space. Alternatively one can define separate operators for the coefficients and real weights as follows: Q̂kij := P P ((cij (ψ) + (cji (ψ)) |ψi hψ| and B̂ l := ϕl (ψ) |ψi hψ|. ψ∈E−1 (C) ψ∈E−1 (C) 13 Thanks to Maaneli Derakhshani, Philip Pearle, and Johannes Kleiner for their extensive help with the material in this section. 29 who have $100 between them such that G1 has $60 and G2 has $40. They toss a coin: if heads G1 gives a dollar to G2 , if tails G2 gives a dollar to G1 . As they keep playing, their respective amounts fluctuate, but the total remains the same. Eventually, the game ends, as one player acquires $100. It turns out that G1 wins 60% of the time while G2 wins 40% of the time. That is, the probability that a given gambler wins is determined by the initial stakes. In CSL, the squared amplitudes in a superposition (in the preferred basis) play a continuous stochastic gambler’s ruin game against each other, fluctuating up and down until one “wins”, thereby completing the collapse. The probability that a given state vector “wins” a collapse in the long run is determined by its initial squared amplitude according to the Born rule. Crucially, we may control the speed at which the games are played in terms of certain (experimentally bounded) parameters. This allows large superpositions to collapse quickly and small superpositions to collapse at a negligible rate. Like the GRW theory, Pearle’s theory involves a weak sort of super-resistance. Mass density resists superposition weakly, in that an isolated particle will only gradually collapse toward a definite position and so a definite mass density. At the fundamental level, superpositions of mass density will be ubiquitous. However, when many particles are entangled in a macroscopic system, the mass density of the system as a whole will collapse extremely fast, so that we will never encounter macroscopic systems in large superpositions of mass density. Continuous collapse models can be adapted to work with super-resistant properties other than position and mass density. Given any observable, we can postulate a continuous collapse process with a version of the Pearle dynamics applied to this observable. Squared amplitudes for eigenstates of the observable engage in a stochastic gambler’s ruin process, so that systems in superpositions of the observable collapse quickly or slowly toward their eigenstates via a gamblers-ruin process. A related collapse process is postulated in the Penrose (2014) model of gravitational collapse, where spacetime curvature is super-resistant. Superpositions of spacetime curvature collapse onto definite states. Unlike Pearle, Penrose does not give a fully defined dynamics for collapse. He defines a superposition lifetime, h̄/∆EG , where h̄ is Planck’s constant and ∆EG is the gravitational self-energy of the difference between the mass distributions belonging to the two states in the superposition. But the dynamics of collapse during this life- 30 time are not specified.14 An account of the dynamics of gravitational collapse has been independently provided by Lajos Diósi (1987). Diósi sets out a stochastic version of the Schrodinger equation on which there is a continuous collapse process onto spacetime structure. Diósi’s dynamic collapse process is closely related to Pearle’s continuous spontaneous localization process, with some differences arising from the use of a collapse onto gravitational structure as opposed to mass density. It turns out that the Diósi and Pearle dynamics are both instances of a general formulation of continuous collapse dynamics which can be applied to any collapse operator. Such a formulation has been presented by Angelo Bassi and coauthors (2017).15 We will adapt this formulation to set out a dynamics for continuous collapse onto consciousness. In the context of IIT, we can use this general dynamics to develop a view on which Q-shape is super-resistant. Informally: Suppose a system is in a superposition of two Q-shapes, each with an associated amplitude. We can stipulate a “localization” dynamics for this superposition that works much like Pearle’s except that collapse is toward eigenstates of Q-shape. The amplitudes trade off probabilistically with each other over time, in effect playing gambler’s ruin at a rate proportional to the distance between the two Q-shapes. In the long run, the system will collapse onto a specific Q-shape with probability given by its initial squared amplitude. We can spell out the mathematical details as follows. The general framework for continuous collapse rests on using a modified version of the Schrodinger equation that includes a nonlinear and stochastic term for collapse as well as the standard linear deterministic evolution. To be consistent and compatible with constraints such as no superluminal signalling, nonlinear modifications to 14 The Hameroff and Penrose (2014) “Orch OR” model extends Penrose’s model of collapse into a model of consciousness. The Penrose-Hameroff model is not a consciousness-collapse model either: Penrose and Hameroff hold that collapse is triggered by superpositions of spacetime curvature rather than by consciousness or measurement, and that collapse causes consciousness rather than vice versa. Our approach might be considered a distant cousin of the Penrose-Hameroff model, with the main differences on our approach being: (i) consciousness causes collapse rather than vice versa, (ii) collapse is onto Q-shape rather than onto spacetime curvature, (iii) the collapse dynamics corresponds somewhat more closely to Pearle’s model rather than Diósi-Penrose’s, and (iv) as discussed later, we make no claims about quantum coherence and quantum computation in the brain. 15 See also Pearle (1999, eqn.10) and Bassi et al. (2013, eqn.14). 31 the Schrodinger equation must take a highly constrained stochastic form. This yields the following general form for continuous collapse models (Bassi et al. 2017, p.27): dψt = [−iĤ0 dt + √ λ( − hÂit )dWt − λ ( − hÂit )2 dt]ψt 2 (3) Here ψt is the wave function state at t, Ĥ0 is the Hamiltonian, λ is a realvalued parameter governing collapse rate,  is a collapse operator, hÂit is its expected value at t, and Wt is a noise function allowing for stochastic behavior. The equation allows continuous stochastic collapse toward an eigenstate of the operator  at a rate governed by λ and W , with probabilities given by the Born rule. It is straightforward to generalize this equation to multiple collapse operators.16 Using our Q-shape collapse operators defined in (2), we can propose the following dynamics: √ X i dψt = [− Ĥdt + λ (Q̂α − hQ̂α it )dWα,t h̄ α λX (Q̂α − hQ̂α it )2 dt]ψt . − 2 α (4) Here α = i, j, k is a multi-index that comprises the indices in (2). If there is little difference in the superposed Q-shapes, then the first term on the right hand side (representing Schrödinger evolution) dominates. Otherwise, the system collapses toward a joint eigenstate of the collapse operators, at a rate proportional to the sum of the difference between their eigenvalues. The noise function Wα,t is responsible for the stochastic “gambler’s ruin” collapse behavior described earlier.17 In CSL and other mass density collapse models, the collapse operators correspond to local mass densities m̂(x) (the amount of mass at location x). The CSL noise function is given by Wiener processes Wt (x), representing Brownian motion through time at location x. The noise at different spatial locations x and y is correlated by a spatial correlation function G(x − y), which in CSL is a Gaussian function of the distance between x and y. This ensures that collapse rate depends on the distance between mass density distributions. 16 Bassi et al. (2013, eqn.36) 17 For a simple illustration of how this works, see Pearle (1999, sec. 2.2). 32 In our IIT-based collapse model, we can define the collapse rate so that it depends on the extended Earth movers distance EMD* between Q-shapes (see the appendix). To ensure this, we can stipulate that the spatial correlation function involved in the noise functions Wt (x) is defined in terms of Earth movers’ distance: specifically, G(x, y) = 1/EM D∗ (x, y) (with an appropriate cut-off for when EM D∗ (x, y) is small or zero; we omit the details). In CSL it is also standard to “smear” the mass density operator with the same Gaussian G(x − y), so that collapse is onto smeared mass density eigenstates rather than precise mass density eigenstates, thereby avoiding large violations of energy conservation.18 Our equation is simpler because our collapse operators do not correspond to points (or smeared regions) in a continuous space but instead correspond to a discrete set of mechanisms. We therefore do not need to include a smearing function in our equation. In principle, however, it is straightforward to add such a smearing function as in mass density models. Our equation (4) assumes that all superposed Q-shapes are Q-shapes of a single system (network of units) with a fixed number of units and a fixed causal structure. It does not address the case where we have a superposition involving Q-shapes of systems with different numbers of units or causal structures. Extending the current framework to handle those cases is a further project. The overall theory may look complex, but the underlying principles are fairly simple. First, there is an IIT-style quasi-classical psychophysical theory linking physical Q-shape by a structural isomorphism to phenomenal Q-shape in states of consciousness. Second, there is a generalization of this theory to the quantum realm, so that superpositions of physical Q-shape are linked to superpositions of phenomenal Q-shape and so to superpositions of states of consciousness. Third, there is the key claim that consciousness is super-resistant. More specifically, phenomenal Q-shapes resist superposition via a Pearle-style principle of continuous collapse for Q-shapes, so that superpositions of consciousness rapidly become more determinate. Putting these elements together: superpositions in the environment lead to superpositions of Q-shape in the brain, which lead to superpositions of consciousness. These superpositions of consciousness will rapidly collapse, yielding collapse in the correlated Q-shapes and collapse in the 18 Smearing the mass density operator results in the following equation: dψt = R 3 R 3 √ R [− h̄i Ĥdt+ λ d3 x(m̂(x−hm̂(x)it )dWt (x)− λ d x d yG(x - y)(m̂(x)−hm̂(x)it )(m̂(y)− 2 hm̂(y)it )dt]ψt . 33 brain states and the environmental states that are entangled with Q-shape. 7 Experimental tests Different super-resistant collapse models make different predictions. For any proposed super-resistant property, in principle it is possible (though usually extremely difficult) to test whether a system is in a superposition of that property. This means that in principle (although not yet in practice) it is possible to test which systems can collapse quantum wave functions, and in virtue of which of their properties. For example, in principle we can test whether atoms, molecules, cells, worms, mice, dogs, or humans, as well as oscilloscopes, computers, and other devices have the capacity to collapse a wave function.19 To test whether a given property supports superpositions, one can use an interferometer for this property, which detects interference between superposed quantities in much the same way that a double-slit experiment detects interference between superposed positions. In practice it is extraordinarily difficult to set up interferometers for complex properties instantiated by complex systems, because of the need to prepare the relevant system in complete isolation from environmental effects. To date, the most complex such measurements have detected interference in large molecules with around 2000 atoms (Fein, Geyer, Zwick, et al. 2019). Current limitations are practical rather than principled, and measurements for more complex properties are certainly possible in principle. These tests have clear implications for super-resistance models. In absolute super-resistance models, superpositions of super-resistant observables are impossible. In approximate super-resistance models, these superpositions are unstable. So at least on a first approximation: if we detect widespread superpositions of an observable, that tends to disconfirm models on which that observable is super-resistant. 19 It is occasionally suggested that we know from existing results that ordinary measuring devices collapse the wave function, perhaps because we always find them in definite states, or because their measurements do not lead to quantum interference. However, it is easy to see that these observations are all equally consistent with a view on which only humans (say) collapse wave functions, and measurement devices are observed by humans and entangled with their environment. Sophisticated variants of this objection are made by Koch and Hepp (2006) and Carpenter and Anderson (2006). Okon and Sebastián (2016) explain what goes wrong in these objections. 34 On a second approximation, all this depends on just how unstable the superpositions are. We can distinguish fast-collapse models on which large superpositions of a super-resistant observable are rare, from slow-collapse models on which large superpositions are common. Here a large superposition of an observable is a superposition of significantly different eigenstates of the observable with significant amplitudes for significant periods (where “significant” is a placeholder for now). If we frequently detect large superpositions of an observable, this tends to disconfirm at least fast-collapse super-resistance models involving that observable. These results do not disconfirm slow-collapse models as easily. Still, where consciousness-collapse models are concerned, fast-collapse models are arguably preferable to slow-collapse models, as the latter allow that large superpositions of conscious states are common. So for now, we will focus on fast-collapse models, returning to slow-collapse models shortly. We may already be in a position to test fast-collapse models in which Qshape is super-resistant. This project is aided by the fact that even quite simple systems (such as a dyad) can have nonzero Φ and nontrivial Q-shapes, as we have seen. To test the hypothesis, we need only prepare a quantum computer to enter superpositions of Q-shape. The simplest example is Schrödinger’s dyad (from section 4): two units A and B in a superposition of connected and disconnected states with distinct Q-shapes. If we find the interference effects predicted by standard quantum mechanics (which assumes that simple systems do not perform measurements and evolve according to Schrödinger dynamics), this will falsify the hypothesis that Q-shape is super-resistant, at least on a fast-collapse model. If we do not find these effects, this will suggest that these superpositions are impossible or unstable and will tend to support the hypothesis that Q-shape is super-resistant. Something along these lines could be done with a quantum version of a Fredkin crossover gate.20 A classical Fredkin gate involves three bits, a control bit and two other bits A and B. If the control bit is 1, bits A and B are swapped. If the control bit is 0, bits A and B are left as is. In a quantum version of the Fredkin gate, the control bit can be in superposition, and the AB system will then be in a superposition of bit-swapping and staying constant. As a result, IIT appears to suggest that the AB system will be in a Q-shape superposition. If Q-shape is super-resistant in a fast-collapse model, we should expect this 20 Thanks to Scott Aaronson for this suggestion. 35 superposition to collapse. In fact, a quantum Fredkin gate has recently been constructed (Patel et al. 2016), with results indicating a successful superposition. However, in this example, it does not seem that the conditions for Φ(AB)=1 are met, because there is no two-way feedback interaction between gates A and B. In IIT, purely feedforward networks typically have zero Φ. A feedforward network can have nonzero Φ if it has overlapping inputs and overlapping outputs, but this does not appear to be happening in the quantum Fredkin gate.21 How might we properly construct feedback systems such as AB using quantum computers? In the quantum computing literature, two primary types of quantum feedback are distinguished. The traditional type is measurement-based feedback. Here, a quantum system performs some (usually feedforward) processing and is measured, and the measurement result is then fed back into the quantum system as input. This will not help for our purposes. A more recent development is coherent quantum feedback (Lloyd 2000), where feedback connectivity obtains in the quantum system itself. Superpositions of coherent quantum feedback could be used to build our dyad system in a superposition of states. For example, consider the ion-trap example discussed by Lloyd (2000, p4). The initial state of the system is |ψis |0im |φic , where |ψis is the unknown state of the “system” ion, |φic is the prepared state of the “controller” ion and |0im is the vibrational mode cooled to its ground state. Lloyd explains how certain directed pulses can evolve the system from |ψis |0im |φic to |↓is |ψ 0 im |φic , to |↓is |φ0 im |ψic , and finally to |φis |0im |ψic . In effect, the initial unknown state of the system ion is swapped with the initial state of the controller ion. Schrödinger’s dyad may then be constructed by putting the input pulses into a superposition of implementing this swap and not implementing this swap, yielding: α |ψis |0im |φic + β |φis |0im |ψic . If the two terms in the superposition yield distinct Q-shapes, then our model predicts that this superposition is unstable and will eventually collapse, even if the system remains isolated. The issue is not entirely straightforward, as it might be denied that the full 21 This points to another test case that can be realized by a quantum computer. Perhaps the simplest feedforward system with nonzero Φ is a dyad system CD that forms a layer of a feedforward network, whereby a node from a previous layer gives input to both C and D, and both C and D give input to a node in a subsequent layer. For illustration, see Oizumi, Albantakis, and Tononi (2014, Fig. 7(B)). 36 conditions for Φ(AB)=1 are met (perhaps because of the role of the vibrational mode or the pulses). Still, it seems likely that some technologically feasible quantum computation involves a superposition of Q-shapes. If found, such a superposition will falsify the combination of standard IIT (on which Q-shape is the physical correlate of consciousness) and the fast-collapse consciousnesscollapse thesis. More generally, most proponents of quantum computing predict that superposed states in larger and larger systems will gradually be demonstrated. It would be foolhardy to bet against these predictions. In the face of these results, one could maintain an IIT-collapse view by modifying IIT somewhat: for example to say that a system is conscious (and has a Q-shape) only when Φ is above a certain threshold, or by adding other constraints to the definition of Φ so that the relevant simple systems have Φ = 0. Alternatively one could adopt a slow-collapse version of the model; one could reject IIT entirely for a different theory of consciousness; or one could reject the consciousness-collapse thesis. Still, this shows how even near-term experimental results from quantum mechanics can have some bearing on theories of consciousness. All this brings out that the consciousness-collapse thesis in its fast-collapse version is not easy to combine with panpsychist theories of consciousness on which consciousness is found even in very simple systems. A strong panpsychist fast-collapse view on which position or mass or charge quickly collapses the wave function is straightforwardly refuted by standard experimental results showing interference effects. The more recent results of Fein et al demonstrating superpositions of position in 2000-atom systems tend to suggest that the threshold for collapse lies somewhere beyond that level. There are some quasi-panpsychist collapse views involving slightly more complex properties distinct from position that have not yet been tested, but we should easily enough be able to test them as above, and few would expect them to be supported. The consciousnesscollapse thesis (in fast-collapse versions) tends to fit more comfortably with non-panpsychist views on which consciousness arises only in relatively complex systems. These views are consistent with existing and likely near-term-future observations, while still being subject to experimental test eventually. There remains the possibility of slow-collapse models on which superpositions of consciousness tend to collapse slowly across long periods. If these models allow widespread large superpositions of human states of consciousness, 37 these views are hard to reconcile with introspection, and it also becomes less clear why we should accept the consciousness-collapse view over an Everett-style view where one’s consciousness is constantly in large superpositions. Perhaps there could be a CSL-style slow-collapse panpsychist model on which superpositions of consciousness are common but unstable at the microphysical level, in the way that superpositions of mass distribution are common but unstable at the microphysical level in CSL. In CSL, large superpositions of macroscopic mass distributions are nevertheless uncommon. Likewise, a panpsychist slowcollapse view might have the consequence that large superpositions of human consciousness are uncommon, especially on a constitutive panpsychist view on which human consciousness is constituted by patterns of microconsciousness. Such a view will face the notorious combination problem of how this constitution works, and it may also have less of an irreducible causal role for human consciousness than other collapse views. Still, there are various versions of a slow-collapse model worth exploring. There are also empirical constraints on super-resistance models tied to energy conservation (collapses tend to produce excess energy, so they cannot be too frequent or too dramatic22 ) and to the quantum Zeno effect (a super-resistance model must allow superpositions to persist long enough to avoid Zeno effects, while not persisting so long that measurements do not have definite outcomes). All these phenomena impose constraints that narrow the class of available superresistance models: super-resistant properties are not too simple and not too complex, while collapses are not too frequent and not too slow. For a super-resistance model to be empirically supported, we will eventually have to find systems and properties that resist superposition. One key (if currently far-fetched) experiment would use an interferometer on a human isolated from their environment, preparing them to enter a superposition of conscious states and seeing if interference effects are observed. If interference effects are not observed, one will have experimental support for the claim that humans 22 The main difficulty in the experimental detection of such effects involves controlling all the possible ways of cooling. Thus, in their discussion of testing GRW and CSL, Feldmann and Tumulka (2012) consider the Kubacher Kristallhöhle, the largest natural cave in Germany, which is 9◦ C all year around. When surface temperatures are low, heat spontaneously created in the cave cannot be transported away, thereby suggesting a way of obtaining an empirical bound on the rate of spontaneous warming. It is much more difficult to see how we could find empirical bounds on spontaneous warming in conscious systems, but it may not be impossible. 38 can collapse wave functions. As before this would not decisively demonstrate that consciousness is doing the work, but it would give reason to take that view seriously. If interference effects are not observed, one will have experimental support for the claim that humans cannot collapse wave functions. This will also tend to falsify any measurement-collapse formulation of quantum mechanics, and in particular will tend to falsify the view that consciousness collapses the wave function. In this way the framework of this article may ultimately be subject to empirical test. Admittedly, it is not clear that it will ever be possible to isolate and test a conscious human brain in this way. Perhaps somewhat more feasible in the long term could be running a detailed simulation of a human brain on a quantum computer. If interference effects are not observed, one will have experimental support for the claim that the computational structure of the human brain can collapse wave functions. If they are not observed, one will have evidence against this claim. However, this result will leave open the hypothesis that other features of the human brain that are not replicated in a simulation, such as biological features, are responsible for wave-function collapse. It may be especially difficult to test biological collapse models, as many standard methods of isolating systems to test for superposition require low temperatures where the biology may break down. Still, these quantum computing experiments might at least give us evidence for or against a consciousness-collapse model where the correlates of consciousness are computational. In the long run, advances in quantum computing are likely to heavily constrain the prospects for consciousness-collapse models. 8 The causal role of consciousness On the picture we have sketched, superpositions of physical Q-shape drive collapse. How does this yield a causal role for consciousness? On a materialist view which identifies physical Q-shape (a physical property) with phenomenal Q-shape (a property of consciousness), the causal role is straightforward. Superpositions of consciousness involve superpositions of phenomenal Q-shapes, which trigger collapse onto more definite phenomenal Qshapes, which are themselves more definite physical Q-shapes, leading to more definite physical consequences. 39 On a dualist view, physical Q-shape may be ontologically distinct from phenomenal Q-shape, so a causal role for the former is not yet a causal role for consciousness. The simplest way to derive a causal role for phenomenal Q-shape is to assume (i) that consciousness has a quantum structure whereby subjects are in superpositions of phenomenal Q-shapes iff they are in corresponding superpositions of physical Q-shapes, and (ii) a fundamental principle saying that phenomenal Q-shape is super-resistant and obeys the collapse dynamics we have developed. When subjects are in superpositions of phenomenal Q-shapes, these Q-shapes collapse according to the dynamics. Phenomenal Q-shapes are perfectly correlated with physical Q-shapes, so collapse of phenomenal Q-shapes leads to collapse of physical Q-shapes, and the standard ensuing physical effects of collapse. Someone might object that we do not give a genuine causal role to nonphysical consciousness at all. Instead, all the causal work is done by the physical correlates of consciousness. One version of this objection notes that on a dualist consciousness-collapse interpretation, there will be PCC states (e.g. physical Q-shapes, on the IIT framework) that correlate perfectly with consciousness. One can then develop a physicalist collapse interpretation on which the primary locus of superpositionresistance is the PCC states. Collapse of the PCC states does all the causal work, and collapse of consciousness is causally irrelevant. There will at least be a possible world (we might think of it as a quantum zombie world) where collapse works this way. In that world, the physical wave function will evolve just as in our world. So even in our world, consciousness may seem redundant. In response: on the dualist interpretation spelled out above, it is consciousness that directly causes the wave function to collapse. There is a fundamental principle saying that consciousness resists superposition. (In the IIT framework, phenomenal Q-shapes resist superposition.) This leads to probabilistic collapse toward determinate states of consciousness. This collapse of consciousness brings about physical collapse to a more determinate PCC state, because of a psychophysical law ensuring that states of consciousness and their physical correlates (in the IIT framework, phenomenal Q-shapes and physical Q-shapes) are always in alignment. So consciousness is causally responsible for collapse in our world. There may be other models where physical correlates cause collapse directly, but that is not how things work on the dualist interpretation we have 40 specified. The quantum zombie scenario does suggest that there is a sort of structural/mathematical explanation that might be given for our actions without mentioning consciousness. Still (as is familiar from discussions of panpsychism and Russellian monism), this structural explanation would not provide a complete explanation of our actions, precisely because it leaves out the role of consciousness in grounding that structure. Like many structural explanations, it leaves out the actual causes. In the actual world consciousness is causing the relevant behavior, and consciousness may explain why it is that we behave determinately at all. A related objection asks: in the actual world, how do we know that it is consciousness that triggers collapse, and not its physical correlates? As we discussed in the last section, if there is a perfect correlation between the two, these hypotheses cannot be distinguished experimentally. Still, insofar as we already have reason to believe that consciousness is a fundamental property, then the hypothesis that consciousness triggers collapse has at least two advantages. First, this way the fundamental law of collapse involves a fundamental property. Second, this way we have a causal role for consciousness, cohering with a strong pretheoretical desideratum. These virtues give reasons to favor the view over the alternative. One might also object that even if our models give consciousness a causal role, they do not give consciousness the kind of causal role that we pretheoretically would expect it to have. One worry is that collapsing consciousness may affect the objects we perceive, but we want consciousness to affect action, producing intelligent behavior and verbal reports such as ‘I am conscious’. One worry is that the most obvious effects of collapse point the wrong way: collapse of consciousness will collapse perceived objects such as measurement instruments, but what we want is for consciousness to affect action. In response, we can note that a collapse of consciousness will collapse an associated PCC state in the brain, and this brain state will be entangled with action states or will at least cause a corresponding action state, so a collapse of consciousness will help bring about a determinate action. For example, if consciousness probabilistically collapses into an experience of red rather than an experience of blue, this collapse will bring about a PCC state associated with experience of red, which will tend to lead to an utterance of ’I am experiencing red’ rather than ’I am experiencing 41 blue’. Furthermore, consciousness also involves the experience of agency and action: say, the experience of choosing to lift one’s left hand rather than one’s right hand. Superpositions of these states will collapse into definite states, which will lead to actions such as raising one’s left hand. This picture naturally raises issues about free will. On this view, the experience of choice plays a nondeterministic causal role in bringing about action. On some popular conceptions of “free will”, on which what matters for free will is nondeterminism and a role for consciousness, this picture may vindicate free will in the relevant sense. Others may object that the choices are themselves selected probabilistically, and that random choices are no better than deterministic choices when it comes to free will. We think the issues are far from straightforward, so we will set aside issues about free will here, but we note that a causal role for consciousness can be expected to have some bearing on those issues. Another objection is that if consciousness always collapses via the Born role, then any effect of consciousness on action will at best be a sort of dice-rolling role. It will probabilistically select between different available outcomes, but it will not yield a qualitatively special outcome. Under a hypothesis where PCC states collapse the wave function, purely physical quantum zombies would have behaved the same way. So consciousness will not make outcomes on which humans behave intelligently or on which they say ’I am conscious’ any more likely than they would have been if some other property had collapsed the wave function. One might even simulate the dynamics in a classical computer (with a pseudorandom number generator), with no role for consciousness, and the same patterns of behavior would ensue. Most of what this objector says is correct. The quantum zombie scenario suggests that there is a sort of structural/mathematical explanation that might be given for our actions without mentioning consciousness. Still, this structural explanation would not provide a complete explanation of our actions, precisely because it leaves out the role of consciousness in grounding that structure. (Like many structural explanations, it leaves out the actual causes.) In the actual world consciousness is causing the relevant behavior, and consciousness may explain why it is that we behave determinately at all. One might have liked a stronger, more transformative causal role for consciousness that could not even 42 in principle have been duplicated without consciousness, but it is not clear why such a role is essential. If one does want a stronger role for consciousness, the most obvious move is to suggest that the role for consciousness in collapse is not entirely constrained by the Born probabilities. Perhaps perceptual consciousness obeys those constraints (thereby explaining our observations in quantum experiments), but agentive experience does not. For example, collapses due to agentive experience might be biased in such a way that more “intelligent” choices that lead to more intelligent behavior tend to be favored than they would be according to the Born rule. This picture sacrifices the great simplicity of the original quantum dynamics, and it could perhaps be disconfirmed through the right sort of experiments and simulations, but it is arguable that our current evidence leaves room open for it. We do not find this picture especially attractive, but it is at least worth putting it onto the table. 9 Philosophical objections We have already considered many objections to our account. Some are technical issues specific to the use of IIT: for example, whether IIT applies to real physical states, whether Q-shape operators can be defined, and whether a Qshape/collapse theory has already been falsified by existing experimental results. These are serious issues that may require modifying IIT or moving to a different theory of the physical correlates of consciousness. Some are versions of objections that arise for many objective collapse theories: for example, consistency with relativity and the tails problem. These are also serious issues that we have set aside for now with the preliminary aim of getting consciousness-collapse models closer to the level of seriousness of existing objective collapse theories. A final technical issue is whether the parameters of a consciousness-collapse theory can be set to avoid the Zeno effect. In this final section we consider a number of philosophical objections. We have already considered objections concerning the causal role of consciousness. The largest objection remaining concerns superposed states of consciousness. Objection 1: What is a superposed state of consciousness? 43 As we saw earlier, Wigner said that it is “absurd” to suppose that a subject could be in a state of “suspended animation”, that is, in a superposition of multiple states of consciousness. However, the approximate super-resistance model we have developed requires that subjects can be in such superposed states. Large superpositions of consciousness (those between significantly different states with significant amplitude for significant periods) will be rare, at least on a fast-collapse model, but they will be possible. Small superpositions of consciousness (those that are like large superposition except that they are brief, or low-amplitude, or between closely related states) may be ubiquitous. In fact, on these models it may be that most or all conscious subjects are in small superpositions of consciousness most or all of the time. This raises the questions: are superpositions of consciousness possible, and if so how can we understand them? There are a few different ways of trying to understand superposed states of consciousness. First, one could try to understand them as familiar states: for example, a superposition of seeing an object at positions A and B might be a state of double vision. However, double vision is an ordinary state of consciousness that can enter superpositions. It leads to reports such as “I see an object at A and at B”. The superposed state does not. It leads to reports such as “I see an object at A” (if the introspection and report process triggers collapse), or at worst a superposition of “I see an object at A” and “I see an object at B” (if no collapse is triggered). This brings out that the sort of superpositions we need are not introspectible or reportable and will be quite different from familiar states such as double vision.23 A more radical alternative says that superposed states of consciousness involve multiple subjects having distinct total states of conscious experience. We will set aside this option as extravagant (do subjects pop into and out of existence in superposition and collapse?), though it is perhaps worth some attention. A third option is to say that a superposition of states of consciousness is a state that the subject is in, but it is not itself a total state of consciousness. That is, when a subject is in a superposition of conscious states A and B, there is no subjective experience of being in this superposition. There is something it 23 Shimony (1963) reads London and Bauer (1939) as allowing superpositions of conscious- ness and critiques the idea in part by arguing that phenomena such as blurred vision and indecision do not really involve superpositions. 44 is like to be in A, and something it is like to be in B, but nothing it is like to be in A and B simultaneously. The subject has the experience of being in A and the experience of being in B, without having any conjoint experience of being in the superposition. This violates the Unity Thesis articulated by Bayne and Chalmers (2003) holding that whenever a subject is in multiple conscious states, they are also in a single conscious state that subsumes and unifies them. Some theorists hold that the Unity Thesis is false, at least for split-brain patients and other fragmented subjects: these subjects do not have a single determinate total conscious state, but instead have multiple conscious states as fragments.24 It is far from obvious what is really going on in these cases, and any analogy with superposed states seems fairly distant. Still, these cases at least bring out that the Unity Thesis and the corresponding assumption that every subject is in a single determinate total state of consciousness is not non-negotiable. A fourth option is to say that a superposition of total states of consciousness is itself a total state of consciousness – albeit one quite unlike the ordinary total states of consciousness that we are introspectively familiar with. On this view, when a subject is in a superposition of conscious states A and B, there is something it is like to be in this superposition. It presumably involves some combination of the experience of being in A and the experience of being in B, combined by some novel phenomenal mode of combination. This mode of combination is not something we could introspect or report for the reasons discussed above, so it would have to be something that we have no introspective familiarity with. The phenomenological role of amplitudes is also not clear. Perhaps amplitudes give the ordinary states of consciousness relative weights in the combined states. As a result, it is far from clear what the phenomenology of a superposed state would be like. Still, it is far from obvious that a mode of combination like this is impossible. We think that the fourth option is perhaps the most worthy of consideration, followed by the third. On the fourth option, we can no longer say that total states of consciousness correspond one-to-one with PCC eigenstates. Instead, ordinary non-superposed total states of consciousness will correspond to PCC eigenstates, and superposed total states of consciousness will correspond 24 On split-brain cases, see for example Nagel (1971) who argues for indeterminacy here. Bayne and Chalmers (2003) argue that in these cases there is a single subject with a single determinate state of consciousness, while Schechter (2017) argues that there are multiple subjects each with a determinate state of consciousness. 45 to superpositions of these eigenstates. There is precedent to the thought that there are states of consciousness that we cannot introspect or report. Theorists (e.g. Block) who believe in an “overflow” of consciousness outside attention often postulate such aspects: if introspecting and reporting a state always involve attending to it, unattended states cannot be introspected or reported. One can perhaps make unnoticed superpositions more palatable by noting that on a fast-collapse model they will usually be small superpositions, involving very similar states of consciousness, very low amplitudes, and/or very brief periods of time. As a result, the superpositions may largely fall below the grain of our ordinary introspective access. Still, the fact that our super-resistance model has to postulate superposed states of consciousness is a significant cost of the view. Is it possible to develop a super-resistance consciousness-collapse model that avoids superpositions of consciousness while also avoiding the Zeno problem? Such a model would need to give up on the tight connection between definite conscious states and PCC eigenstates, in order that never-superposed conscious states do not lead to neversuperposed PCC states and so to the Zeno effect. At the same time, it would need to retain enough of a connection between consciousness and physical states that the definiteness of consciousness leads to collapse in its physical basis. It is not easy to meet both demands at once. One path invokes a looser connection between consciousness and PCC eigenstates, whereby superposed PCC states can coexist with definite states of consciousness at least briefly. For example, one might hold that superposed PCC states determine a definite state of consciousness probabilistically according to the Born rule, and that this definite state of consciousness leads to collapse onto a corresponding PCC state but only after a time delay. Perhaps this view and others in the neighborhood are at least worth developing. In any case: in ordinary quantum mechanics, many theorists say that they cannot really imagine what it is for a physical state to be in a superposition. At the same time, they adopt the idea and run with it, and the idea seems to be theoretically fruitful. Our suggestion is that we do something like this for superpositions of states of consciousness, at least for now. We should simply adopt the idea and see whether it is fruitful. If it is, we can later return to the question of just what superposed states of consciousness involve. 46 Objection 2: How do quantum effects make a difference to macroscopic brain processes? Quantum theories of brain processes are sometimes criticized on the grounds that it is hard to see how low-level quantum processes can affect high-level processing in neurons. A more specific version of this objection is that on some accounts (e.g. Hameroff and Penrose), quantum coherence at the neural level is required for distinctively quantum effects in neural processing, but the high temperatures in the brain are likely to lead to decoherence below the neural level. These objections do not apply to our approach, which does not involve any special effects of low-level quantum processes on neural processes and is entirely consistent with decoherence at relatively low levels. In fact, in our central illustrations, we have treated brain states as superpositions of numerous decoherent eigenstates, which themselves may involve relatively classical processing in neurons. The only high-level quantum process that plays an essential role in our framework is the collapse process, which selects one or more of these eigenstates as outlined above. Our picture is consistent with further macroscopic quantum effects, but they are not required. Objection 3: What about macroscopic superpositions? One might worry that on a consciousness-collapse view ordinary macroscopic objects such as measurement devices will exist in states of superposition until they are observed. Our view does not necessarily lead to this consequence. For a start, if a correct theory of consciousness associates these devices with some amount of consciousness (as may be the case for IIT), then the devices will collapse wave functions much as humans do. Even if these devices are not conscious, it is likely that typical measuring devices will be entangled with humans and other conscious systems, so that they will typically be in a collapsed state too. Still, in special cases where such a device is entirely isolated from conscious systems and records a quantum interaction, it will enter a macroscopic superposition. Of course we will never observe such a superposition, as our observation will collapse the state of the system. But we might in principle get empirical evidence of this superposition if we can eventually measure associated interference effects. Perhaps the existence of macroscopic superpositions is counterintuitive, but many cosmological theories already allow macroscopic objects to be in superposition in the early universe where there are no observers. It is unclear why 47 allowing this in the current universe is any worse. Objection 4: What about the first appearance of consciousness in the universe? As we saw earlier, if consciousness is absolutely super-resistant, the quantum Zeno effect entails that it can never emerge for the first time in the development of the universe. On an approximate super-resistance model, there is less of a problem. For eons, the universe can persist in a wholly unconscious superposed state without any collapses. At some point, a physical correlate of consciousness may emerge in some branch of the wave function, yielding a superposition of consciousness and unconsciousness (or their physical correlates) with low amplitude for consciousness. With high probability the universe will collapse back toward an unconscious state. As this happens repeatedly in many branches of the wave function, there will eventually be a low probability collapse toward a state of consciousness, and consciousness will be in a position to take hold. 10 Conclusion The results of our analysis are mixed. We have developed a consciousnesscollapse model with a reasonably clear and precise dynamics. But it must be admitted that the model we have developed is not as simple and powerful as the original (simple if imprecise) measurement-collapse framework. Our initial superselection collapse model was simple, but it leads to the Zeno problem. Avoiding the Zeno problem has led to a number of complications. First, we have had to countenance superpositions in states of consciousness, and it is not at all clear that this is possible. Second, we have had to introduce Pearlestyle collapse dynamics along with parameters for the rate of collapse, and these parameters have to be constrained carefully in order to yield empirically acceptable results. We have also had to invoke a complex theory of consciousness – though this is less of a cost, since a theory of consciousness is needed even in the absence of the quantum measurement problem. Is this consciousness-collapse model the best that we can do? We have seen that to avoid countenancing superposed states of consciousness while also avoiding the Zeno problem, a consciousness-collapse model will need to break the strong link between definite states of consciousness and eigenstates of a 48 PCC observable. Perhaps there are alternative models on which the physical correlates of consciousness involve a more complex wave-function property, or on which consciousness can vary independently of any physical properties. There also remain the possibility of variable-locus models, though these may also need to break the strong link between consciousness and its physical correlates to avoid the Zeno problem. In any case, models along these lines are certainly worth exploring. Overall: the model we have developed is perhaps not as simple or powerful as some of the leading interpretations of quantum mechanics. If it is the best we can do, then the upshot may be that consciousness-collapse models are subject to principled limitations. Nevertheless, it at least serves as an existence proof for a relatively precise consciousness-collapse model. The model is open to empirical test, and it is not out of the question that a more powerful model along these lines could be developed. In the meantime, the research program of consciousness-collapse models deserves attention. A Appendix: Calculating Q-shape for a dyad system in IIT 3.0 and quantum IIT In this appendix, we illustrate some mathematical details of standard IIT (IIT3.0) and quantum IIT (QIIT), by showing how Φ and Q-shape are determined in simple dyad systems with two elements. The IIT formalisms are complex, but dyads avoid some complications. We will also define a distance measure between Q-shapes which is important for the collapse dynamics. We begin with IIT3.0.25 We assume a dyad system with two elements A and B, each of which can be in one of two states: [1] or [0]. The composite system AB can be in one of four possible states: [11], [00], [10], or [01]. The transition rules are a simple swap: the state of A at one time is determined by copying the state of B at the previous time and vice versa. We can stipulate that in 25 Thanks to Nao Tsuchiya and Leo Barbosa. Our calculations follow the supporting in- formation in Mayner et al. (2018) especially S1: Calculating Φ. See also Oizumi, Albantakis, and Tononi (2014) and Tononi et al. (2016). For the earlier, simpler IIT formalism for calculating Φ(AB), see Tononi (2004, fig. 5), Tsuchiya (2017), and McQueen (2019a). The reader can experiment with calculating Φ for various systems including the dyad AB at http://integratedinformationtheory.org/calculate.html. Details of the underlying software can be found in Mayner et al. (2018). 49 the system under consideration, the current state of AB is [10]. The next state is thereby determined to be [01]. Subsystems of AB are the nonempty sets of elements of the system: {A}, {B}, and {A, B}, which we will abbreviate as A, B, and AB when there is no chance of confusion. Mechanisms are subsystems with nonzero weight. The Q-shape of a system consists of a location L(m) for each mechanism m in the system, weighted by the measure φ(m). L(m) is a point in a 2n+1 dimensional space with two dimensions for each of the 2n possible states of the system, where n is the number of elements. L(m) is determined by conjoining two probability distributions over the states S of the system: pm (S) and p0m (S), where the former is defined in terms of the effects of m and the latter is defined in terms of the causes of m. Each distribution is associated with a φ value. The weight φ(m) is the minimum of these two values. The Q-shape of AB lives in an 8-dimensional space, as AB has four possible states. As we will see, of the three subsystems of AB, only A and B yield mechanisms with nonzero weight. Hence, The Q-shape of AB consists in two weighted points located in an 8-dimensional space. IIT3.0 distinguishes two notions of integrated information: φ (small phi), which applies to individual mechanisms, and Φ (big phi), which applies to the total system. To know Φ(AB) we must first calculate AB’s Q-shape. To know AB’s Q-shape we must first calculate φ for AB’s mechanisms. To begin with, we illustrate how the probability distribution pm (S) and φ(m) are calculated and then used to define Q-shape and Φ. The distribution pm (S) is a distribution over future states S of the system, reflecting their probability of occurrence given that the elements of m are fixed to their current state (while any other elements are allowed to vary). For the candidate mechanism AB, both elements will be fixed to their current value [10]. pAB (S) is the probability that the following state will be S, given the current state [10]. The following state is guaranteed to be [01], so pAB assigns probability 1 to [01] and probability 0 to the other three states. Recall that L(m) is determined by conjoining two probability distributions over the states S of the system: pm (S) and p0m (S). If we consider just pm (S), then the location L(AB) can be seen as a point in 4-dimensional space corresponding to the distribution pAB (S). Let us say the four dimensions are ordered as [00], [01], [10], [11]. Then L(AB)=[0,1,0,0], which assigns 1 to [01] and 0 to 50 the other states. While pm (S) is a distribution over possible future states, p0m (S) is a distribution over possible preceding states (i.e. the probabilities that the preceding state was S, given the current state). For our system AB the two distributions are the same, so the 8-dimensional location will be a repeated version of the 4-dimensional location: that is, L(AB)=[0,1,0,0,0,1,0,0]. For candidate mechanism A, pA (S) is the probability of the following state being S given that element A is fixed to its current value [1], while the other element B can vary with probability 0.5 for each value [0] or [1]. Under these conditions, the following state may be either [01] or [11], and pA will assign these two states probability 0.5 each. Likewise, pB will assign probability 0.5 each to states [00] and [01], the two states that can follow a state where B is fixed to 0. As with AB, pm (S) = p0m (S) for A and for B. As a result, L(A) = [0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5] and L(B) = [0.5, 0.5, 0, 0, 0.5, 0.5, 0, 0]. The integrated information [small phi] φ(AB) is determined by considering the difference between the probabilistic effects of the subsystem AB with the effects of a partitioned subsystem A-B where we consider only the effects of A and B taken separately on each other. We can define a probability distribution pA−B as the tensor product of two distributions: a distribution pA|B over states of A given that B is fixed to its current value 0 (so A=[1] has probability 1) and a distribution pB|A over states of B given that A is fixed to its current value 1 (so B=[0] has probability 0). The product distribution pA−B assigns 1 to [10] and 0 to every other state. We can then define φ(AB) = EM D(pAB , pA−B ). For two probability distributions p1 and p2 over the same state-space, EMD(p1 , p2 ) is the Earth mover’s distance between p1 and p2 . This can be defined as the minimal amount of work required to turn p1 into p2 by moving the “Earth” of probability from some points in the 2n -dimensional space to other points, where work is measured by the amount of probability moved multiplied by the Hamming distance between the points. In the case just described, pAB and pA−B are exactly the same distribution, so the Earth mover’s distance between them is 0. So φ(AB) = 0. The quantity φ(A) can be defined as a related Earth-mover’s distance over states of B, comparing the distribution over those states with A fixed to its current value of [1] (resulting in probability 1 to B=[0]) to a distribution that ignores the value of A (resulting in probability 0.5 each to B=[0] or B=[1]). In this case, φ(A) = 0.5. Likewise, φ(B) = 0.5. 51 As a result, we can fully specify the Q-shape QAB of the system AB. It consists of location L(AB) = [0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0] with associated weight φ(AB) = 0, location L(A) = [0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5] with associated weight φ(A) = 0.5, and location L(B) = [0.5, 0.5, 0, 0, 0.5, 0.5, 0, 0] with associated weight φ(B) = 0.5. In the above calculations we took a shortcut that should now be made explicit. For each candidate mechanism, we chose to consider the probability distribution assigned to the future (or past) states of a particular subsystem. For candidate mechanism AB we chose subsystem AB. For candidate mechanism A we chose subsystem B. And for B we chose A. These choices are not arbitrary, but are the result of an optimization procedure. For each candidate mechanism, we in fact consider all possible subsystems and choose the subsystem that maximizes φ. For example, when considering candidate mechanism A, it turns out that A has more integrated information about B than about AB. After all, there are three possible ways of disconnecting A from AB: disconnect A to A, A to B, A to AB. Nothing happens by disconnecting A to A (there was no connection there to begin with!). But then that is the minimal information partition, implying that A has zero φ about AB. On the other hand, there is only one way to disconnect A from B, and that disconnection does make a difference, giving nonzero φ. For details see Barbosa et al. (2021). We can define the distance between two Q-shapes Q1 and Q2 (defined over the same states S, with associated probability distributions pm,1 and pm,2 and weights φ1 (m) and φ2 (m)) as an extended Earth mover’s distance EM D∗ (Q1 , Q2 ): EM D∗ (Q1 , Q2 ) = X (|φ1 (mi ) − φ2 (mi )| × (EM D(pmi ,1 , pmi ,2 )) + EM D(p0mi ,1 , p0mi ,2 ))) (5) i This distance is the minimal amount of work required to transform the φ1 distribution over mechanisms m into φ2 by repeatedly moving the “Earth” of φ from one mechanism m1 in Q1 to another mechanism m2 in Q2 . (A complication is that in some cases (where Q1 has more total φ than Q2 ), we need to send the excess to an unconstrained distribution puc associated with Q2 .) We can then define Φ(AB) as the minimal value of EMD*(QAB , QAB ∗ ), across all partitions AB ∗ of AB. A partition of a system requires cutting one or more causal connections between its units. For system AB, a partition cuts the 52 connection from A to B or from B to A or both. In this case, either cut reduces φ to zero for both mechanisms A and B, and their probability distributions are flattened. The reason why cutting just one of these two connections destroys both mechanisms is tied to the fact that φ(m) is defined as the minimum of two φ values, the one that pertains to the future state and the one that pertains to the past state. Each cut will send one of these φ values to zero. Recall that QAB assigns φ(A) = φ(B) = 0.5, where these serve as weights for L(A) = [0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5] and L(B) = [0.5, 0.5, 0, 0, 0.5, 0.5, 0, 0]. QAB ∗ instead assigns zero weights to both L(A∗ ) and L(B ∗ ), where L(A∗ ) = L(B ∗ ) = [0.25, 0.25, 0.25, 0.25, 0.25, 0.25, 0.25, 0.25]. We thus have: EM D∗ (QAB , QAB ∗ ) = |φ(A)−φ(A∗ )|×(EM D(pA , pA∗ )+EM D(p0A , p0A∗ ))+|φ(B)−φ(B ∗ )|×(EM D(pB , pB ∗ )+ EM D(p0B , p0B ∗ )) = (0.5 × (0.5 + 0.5)) + (0.5 × (0.5 + 0.5)) = 1. The crucial quantity Φmax (AB) is defined as Φ(AB) if AB is a maximum of Φ, and 0 otherwise. Here AB is a maximum of Φ if Φ(AB) > Φ(S) for all systems S such that S has elements in common with AB. In our case, we can stipulate that AB is isolated from its environment so that no other system containing A or B has higher Φ. In this case, AB is a maximum of Φ, so Φmax (AB) = 1. According to IIT, Φmax is a measure of consciousness, so system AB has one unit of consciousness. In section 4 we noted that if AB is in a different state (either 01, 00, or 11), than the calculation for Φ is the same, but the Q-shape is different. This can now be seen by the fact that changing the initial state changes the locations but not their weights. Thus, if the initial state is instead 00, then we still have two mechanisms A and B, each with weight 0.5, but their locations become L(A) = [0.5, 0.5, 0, 0, 0.5, 0.5, 0, 0] and L(B) = [0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0, 0.5, 0]. This is not enough to change Φ, but it is enough to change the Q-shape. We can thus define Schroedinger’s dyad as AB in a superposition of 10 and 00. A collapse model base only on Φ would fail to collapse this superposition, despite it being a superposition of conscious states. We now move to quantum IIT (QIIT).26 To simplify the calculations of the dyad, it is easier to start A and B in the same initial state (|00i or |11i) so that they remain stationary. We add the further stipulation that A (B) maintains its own state over time. We may now consider A and B to be AND gates that 26 Thanks to Johannes Kleiner. Our calculations are intended to follow Zanardi, Tomka, and Venuti (2018) and Kleiner and Tull (2020). 53 each take two inputs as depicted. AND A B AND State |00i has zero Φ and Q-shape, that is, Φ(|00i) = Q(|00i) = 0. For if we partition the system by replacing one of the directed edges with random input, the inputs are still only either 00 or 01, whereas the AND gates require an input of 11 to change state. Partitioning does not make a difference. Partitioning makes a difference if the system is instead in state |11i: If any of the edges are removed and replaced by random input, at least in half the cases it will feed a 0 to its target, so that in light of the AND gate the state of the target will change from 1 to 0. This implies that the system in that state has non-zero Φ value, and its Q-shape isn’t null. We can therefore introduce collapse operators for the Q-shapes of these two states, and then use them to define a small consciousness superposition. Our new dyad still has three subsystems (AB, A, and B). For each we consider the integrated information φ of both future and past states. So for the collapse operators Qkij , the k index runs from 1 to 6. Since the Hilbert space of the system in this case is 4 dimensional, the indices i and j run from 1 to 4 each. The ckij (ψ) in (2) are the coefficients of the operator ρ which is the kth component of the Q-shape of ψ. Because Q(00) = 0, it follows that ckij (ψ0 ) = 0. Since |00i and |11i are wave functions with classical Q-shapes, they are contained in E−1 (C) and are summed over in (2). It follows that Q̂kij |00i = X ϕk (ψ)ckij (ψ) |ψi hψ| |00i = ϕk (00)ckij (00) |00i = 0 |00i (6) ψ∈E−1 (C) We have assumed the wave functions with classical Q-shapes are orthogonal. Thus |00i is an eigenvector of every operator Q̂kij with eigenvalue 0. We also have Q̂kij |11i = X ϕk (ψ)ckij (ψ) |ψi hψ| |11i = ϕk (11)ckij (11) |11i ψ∈E−1 (C) 54 (7) so that |11i is an eigenvector of Qkij with eigenvalue ckij (|11i). Letting |11i be the alive (conscious) state and |00i be the dead (unconscious) state, we can provide (in addition to the section 4 example) another example of Schroedinger’s dyad: |ΨiAB = α |00i + β |11i (8) Our dynamics (in section 6) predicts that this state is not completely stable, but continuously collapses towards one of the two Q-shape eigenstates, in accord with the Born rule. 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Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1023 Editorial The Possibility of Metaphysics Graham P. Smetham* * Correspondence: Graham Smetham, http://www.quantumbuddhism.com E-mail:graham@quantumbuddhism.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1024 Although the title of this focus issue is ‘The Possibility of Metaphysics’ the first part has as its focus not only metaphysics in general but Buddhist metaphysics in particular. This is because the motivation for this focus issue was sparked by an email from a colleague who asked for my opinion of a book written by Robert Ellis. The book is entitled The Trouble with Buddhism, and in this book Ellis tells us more or less that all Buddhist practitioners and philosophers are intellectually challenged at best and perhaps imbecilic at worst. Not only this but it seems that most of them had and have a pathological desire, perhaps unconscious, to ‘betray their own insights’. Another of the bold claims made by Ellis is that metaphysics of any kind, positive or negative, is mistaken, impossible or both. So according to Ellis not only is Buddhist philosophy confused and mistaken in detail, it is also mistaken in principle. Whilst reading through these bizarrely confident accusations of incompetence targeted at every member of what is in reality one of the most astonishingly fertile, precise and insightful intellectual traditions the world has been lucky to have in its midst, I have to say that I found some of the claims, and some of the reasoning, absurd, but I assume that there must be people who find them compelling, or at least reasonable. I therefore thought the project of trying to show their absurdity might be worthwhile, even if only for my own clarification. When I came to his section entitled ‘Quantum irrelevancies’ I did not notice at first that he refers to my own work as ‘foolish’, I simply read the statement that Ellis thinks he can philosophically justify the obviously wrong claim (provided that one knows about the implications of quantum physics) that: some Buddhists have foolishly pounced on quantum physics as evidence about the universe itself: that Reality is insubstantial in the ways claimed by Buddhist tradition … Quantum physics may cast doubt on some previously-held views about material reality, but it does not tell us anything at all about Reality. Quantum particles may or may not turn out to be substantial in some way, we just don’t know.1 Whilst marveling at the temerity exhibited in making such a false statement I decided to click on the footnote marker to find out who it was the Ellis considered to be ‘foolish’ enough to think that quantum physics actually told us something significant about ‘Reality’, only to find out that the footnote referred his readers to my own website (www.quantumbuddhism.com)! As far as I know Ellis is relatively unknown outside of the confines of the FWBO (Friends of the Western Buddhist Order, now changed its name to TriRatna) within which he found a spiritual home for some time, so if this kind of attack upon Buddhist philosophical competence had been restricted to him it would be of little import. However there are other, more well known and academically more established writers, in the field of attempting to scorn and undermine the spiritual claims of Buddhist philosophy and practice. Probably the most significant is Stephen Batchelor who has recently published a book, Confession of a Buddhist Atheist, in which he claims that a great deal of Buddhist ‘belief’ is thoroughly unmodern and unscientific and needs a corresponding thorough overhaul. Notions such as ‘karma’ and ‘rebirth’ must be excised and a completely pragmatic and scientific version of Buddhism needs to be put in the place of the traditional superstitious version. The problem with Batchelor’s work, and those of his persuasion, however, is that the lack of knowledge of science exemplified by their work indicates a complete ignorance of the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1025 dramatic discoveries of modern quantum theory. Instead they operate with what physicist Henry Stapp calls a ‘known-to-be-false’ conception of the physical world. In fact Ellis claims that knowledge of physical theory is entirely irrelevant to his philosophical demonstration that metaphysics is misleading or impossible. The details of what I consider to be the mistakes, confusions, and misunderstandings of Ellis, Batchelor and others form one aspect of my three articles in this focus issue. But that is not all there is to the articles. Whilst engaged in elucidating the various issues involved a great deal of ground is covered which is, as far as I know, groundbreaking philosophical work in the field of both the science-religion debate in general and the interconnections between Buddhist metaphysical thought and modern physics in particular. The article ‘The ‘Epiontic’ Dependently Originating Process of Cyclic Existence According to Early Buddhist Metaphysics’ in particular contains insights concerning aspects of the early Buddhist worldview of the Pali Canon in relation to the modern quantum ‘epiontic’ paradigm (the insight that ‘epistemological’ acts of perception, operating through the quantum level, ‘creates’ ontology) which have not been drawn previously. In this article I demonstrate, for example, that the sophisticated Buddhist notions of ‘karma’ (Pali: kamma) and ‘rebirth’ are entirely consistent with the epiontic paradigm. The quantum ‘epiontic’ paradigm, which was instigated by Wojciech Zurek based on inspiration from the much admired twentieth century physicist John Wheeler, is clearly both a physical and a metaphysical paradigm because it tells as about the ultimate quantum ‘dream stuff’2 of reality and the fundamental mechanism which triggers this ‘stuff’ into manifestation: Measurement – perception – is the place where physics gets personal, where our role and our capabilities as observers and agents of change in the universe (and our limitations as entities subject to the laws of physics) are tested - or, rather, where we get put in our place. I believe that quick solutions, and I include both the Copenhagen interpretation and many worlds here, have a tendency to gloss over the real mystery, which is how do we - that is to say, how does life - fit within the quantum universe. I think we have managed to constrain the possible answers (for example, through research on decoherence), but I believe there is more to come. The virtue of the focus on quantum measurement is that it puts issues connected with information and existence at the very center. This is where they should be.’3 Thus we see that the ultimate ‘stuff’ is ‘perception’ type ‘stuff’, the kind of ‘stuff’ that Buddhist philosophy in its Dzogchen (Great Perfection) form terms ‘Mindnature’, an energetic field of potentiality which has a fundamental cognitive function internal to its own nature. Such a viewpoint, now validated by quantum theory, suggests that the solution to what Zurek calls the ‘real mystery’ of how life ‘fits within the quantum universe’ is that life is built into the quantum ground of reality precisely because the universe is a perception machine within which sentient beings unravel the experiential qualities inherent in the field of reality itself. Thus ‘epiontic’ perception is seen to be the fundamental motive force of reality. In his important paper ‘Law without Law’, the paper in which Wheeler’s graphic of the “universe viewed as a self excited circuit” has pride of place (see figure 1), John Wheeler wrote that the evidence of modern physics requires that we rule out the ‘meaninglessness of nothingness’: From “nothingness ruled out as meaninglessness” to the line of distinction which rules it out; from this dividing line to phenomenon; from one phenomenon to many; ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1026 from the statistics of many to regularity and structure: these considerations lead us at the end to ask if the universe is not best conceived as a self-excited circuit: Beginning with the big bang, the universe expands and cools. After eons of dynamic development it gives rise to observership. Acts of observer-participancy … in turn give tangible ‘reality’ to the universe not only now but back to the beginning. To speak of the universe as a self-excited circuit is to imply once more a participatory universe.4 Thus Wheeler answered his own question “Are billions upon billions of acts of observer participancy the foundation of everything?5 And so a twentieth century quantum physicist came to exactly the same metaphysical conclusion, based upon ‘experimental metaphysics’ 6, as the fourth century Yogacara-Cittamatra (Mind-Only) Buddhist practitioner-philosophers: The entire world was created through latent karmic imprints. When these imprints developed and increased, they formed the earth, the stones, and the seas. Everything was created through the development or propagation of these latent karmic potentials.7 Within Buddhist ‘epiontic’ psycho-metaphysics ‘karmic potentials’ are produced by intentional and perceptual actions. Figure 1 Today an unprejudiced and honest evaluation of the evidence can only come to the conclusion that something of this sort must be the case and therefore life, mind, consciousness, awareness and so on are central to the process of reality, they are the very reason for reality so to speak. However, despite this it remains the case that there are many who wish to turn the clock back to the materialistic mechanistic paradigm which was central to the Western nineteenth century ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1027 worldview through making what are actually ignorant and misleading statements. Thus science writer John Horgan wrote in his article ‘Buddhist Retreat: Why I gave up in finding my religion’: All religions, including Buddhism, stem from our narcissistic wish to believe that the universe was created for our benefit, as a stage for our spiritual quests. In contrast, science tells us that we are incidental, accidental. Far from being the raison d’être of the universe, we appeared through sheer happenstance, and we could vanish in the same way. This is not a comforting viewpoint, but science, unlike religion, seeks truth regardless of how it makes us feel. Buddhism raises radical questions about our inner and outer reality, but it is finally not radical enough to accommodate science's disturbing perspective.8 This view, however, is simply incorrect both in its depiction of modern physics and its understanding of Buddhism. Such ignorant materialist viewpoints, however, are endlessly repeated in modern discourse and media simply because we still live in an intellectual climate of fundamental anti-spiritual materialism. Because of this the wildly mistaken attempt to reduce one of the greatest spiritualphilosophical traditions of the world to a materialist ‘pragmatic’ palliative technique of calming the mind in preparation for doing the washing up, as Batchelor portrays Buddhism, must be resisted simply because it is false. The ultimate aim of Buddhism is ‘enlightenment’, which is the direct and unmediated experience of the qualitative metaphysical depth of reality. And the possibility of this aim requires the metaphysical reality of certain claims regarding the process of reality, ‘karma’ and ‘rebirth’ being central in this respect. As the Buddhist practitioner and writer B. Alan Wallace points out in his article Distorted Visions of Buddhism: Agnostic and Atheist: As Buddhism has encountered modernity, it runs against widespread prejudices, both religious and anti-religious, and it is common for all those with such biases to misrepresent Buddhism, either intentionally or unintentionally. Reputable scholars of Buddhism, both traditional and modern, all agree that the historical Buddha taught a view of karma and rebirth that was quite different from the previous takes on these ideas. Moreover, his teachings on the nature and origins of suffering as well as liberation are couched entirely within the framework of rebirth. Liberation is precisely freedom from the round of birth and death that is samsara. But for many contemporary people drawn to Buddhism, the teachings on karma and rebirth don’t sit well, so they are faced with a dilemma. A legitimate option is simply is adopt those theories and practices from various Buddhist traditions that one finds compelling and beneficial and set the others aside. An illegitimate option is to reinvent the Buddha and his teachings based on one’s own prejudices. This, unfortunately, is the route followed by Stephen Batchelor and other like-minded people who are intent on reshaping the Buddha in their own images.9 One wonders why Batchelor and his sympathizers do not simply try and found their own religion. The answer of course is that it is easier to try and hijack an already existent and popular one. A remarkable fact of such attempts to fashion Buddhism according to a more Westernized, supposedly scientific point of view is that they are actually unscientific. Thus the physicist/philosopher Bernard d'Espagnat points out that: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1028 The doctrine that the world is made up of objects whose existence is independent of human consciousness turns out to be in conflict with quantum mechanics and with facts established by experiment.10 It is this aspect of the ‘experimental metaphysics’ of quantum theory which is examined in detail in the first essay The Matter of Mindnature: Bell’s Theorem Tolls for Dogmatic ‘Middle Way’ Scepticism and Rings Out for ‘Experimental Metaphysics’ and Quantum Mindnature’. The Buddhist metaphysical viewpoint tells as the nature of ultimate reality is best understood as a fundamentally interrelated and interpenetrating field of Mind-like energy, or Mindnature, and such a view is clearly supported by the quantum violation of Bell’s inequalities. In this article I examine Ellis’s notion of the impossibility of metaphysics in the light of both philosophical considerations and the implications of the quantum evidence. The next article ‘Taking the‘Meta’ Out of Physics’ is Ellis’s response to my criticisms of his work. I leave it to readers to come to conclusions without further comment from me. It is my hope that there will be feedback concerning the issues raised as I am personally convinced that Ellis’s position is untenable but am curious to know whether my viewpoint is widely held. Certainly the last two articles from James Kowall, ‘What is Reality in a Holographic World?’, and Brian Whitworth, ‘Introducing The Virtual Reality Conjecture’, seem to support my position. The last of my articles ‘The Quantum Truth of the Buddhist Metaphysics of the ‘Two Truths’ or ‘Two Realities’’ examines Steven Batchelor’s assertion that the Buddhist ‘Two Truths’ metaphysics is gravely mistaken and shows that once again Batchelor is digging his own intellectual grave by ignoring the clear evidence of quantum theory that the apparently material world is ultimately an illusion created out of quantum ‘dream stuff’ through epiontic perception. There are in fact two levels of reality: quantum and ‘classical’ and these correspond to the Buddhist doctrine of the ‘conventional’ reality of the apparently material world and the more ultimate realm of quantum Mindnature. It is because of such clear indications from quantum theory that d’Espagnat, in his book Physics and Philosophy writes that: …it is thus reasonable to conjecture that concerning Being, affective consciousness sometimes provides us with genuine elements of information-which are not obtainable from other sources since science essentially informs us on nothing but phenomena. Where may we hope to come across such elements? I for one have three domains in mind: mysticism, poetry and music … To speak of mysticism would only be possible on the basis of an experience but very few people have. Moreover, having it would hardly be of any help since all mystics assert their actual experience is ineffable. Does meditation yield some glimpses? Which is perhaps a suitable subject for a future focus issue. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1023-1029 Smetham, G. P., The Possibility of Metaphysics- Introduction 1 1029 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/Twb_Quantum_irrelevancies.html Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004). Science and Ultimate Reality. Cambridge University Press. p136 – Wojciech H. Zurek: ‘Quantum Darwinism and envariance.’ 3 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p159 4 Wheeler, J (1983), ‘John Archibald Wheeler: Law Without Law’, Princeton Series in Physics, Princeton University Press, p209 5 Wheeler, J (1983), ‘John Archibald Wheeler: Law Without Law’, Princeton Series in Physics, Princeton University Press, p199 6 A term coined by Abner Shimony – see Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005): Sneaking a Look at God’s Cards p226 7 Thrangu Rinpoche, Kenchen (2001). Transcending Ego: Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom. Namo Buddha Publication., Boulder, Colorado p28 8 Horgan, John – Why I Ditched Buddhism – Slate Magazine Feb 12, 2003 (http://www.slate.com) 9 Wallace, A. - Distorted Visions of Buddhism: Agnostic and Atheist 10 d'Espagnat, Bernard, `The Quantum Theory and Reality' Scientific American, Nov. 197 2 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 905 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) Article A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) Elio Conte (1,2)*, Nunzia Santacroce(1) & Antonio Federici(2) (1) (2) School of Advanced Int’l Studies for Applied Theoretical and Non Linear Methodologies of Physics, Bari, Italy Department of Pharmacology and Human Physiology, University of Bari- Italy; ABSTRACT A model of consciousness and conscious experience is introduced. Starting with a non-Lipschitz Chaotic dynamics of neural activity, we propose that the synaptic transmission between adjacent as well as distant neurons should be regulated in brain dynamics through quantum tunneling. Further, based on various studies of different previous authors, we consider the emergence of very large quantum mechanical system representable by an abstract quantum net entirely based on quantum-like entities having in particular the important feature of expressing self-reference similar to what occurs in consciousness. The properties of such quantum-like mind entities are discussed in detail. A quantum-like model of conscious experience is also discussed. It is shown that such quantum mechanical entities are able to arrange themselves alternatively on the basis of the subject story, memory, and pain-pleasure in response to an external stimulus, thus giving the subject the possibility to response to the stimulus on the basis of his emotion as well as cognitive state. Finally, we discuss the possible connections between the quantum-like model introduced in this paper and the chaotic behaviors often identified experimentally in studies on brain dynamics. Part I of this article contains: Introduction; 1. Non Lipschitz Terminal Dynamics of Single Neuron Activity; and References; 2. Quantum Mechanical Properties of Neuron Dynamics; and 3. A Quantum Model of Consciousness I. Key Words: quantum cognition, role of quantum mechanics in explaining consciousness, quantum wave function collapse, synaptic connection and quantum tunnelling, neurophysiology, neural activity, applied physics, Clifford algebra, non-Lipschitz dynamics. Introduction The brain is a macroscopic system containing approximately 1010 neurons. Each neuron is essentially a macroscopic device receiving a relevant number of inputs and giving an output as answer. The inputs are essentially currents generated by approximately 103-104 synapses posed on the dendritic tree, and the output is usually represented by sequences of action potentials carried by the axon. The input currents are generated by ion specific channels in the membrane which change their conductance in response to chemical neurotransmitters released by other neurons. Roughly speaking, such currents are integrated in the soma whose voltage rises and decays with the fluctuations in currents. When the soma voltage exceeds a certain threshold, action potentials are generated which are propagated down along the axon. Such a complex *Correspondence: Professor Elio Conte. E-mail: elio.conte@fastwebnet.it ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 906 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) dynamics can be studied by the simultaneous adoption of quantum and classical non linear methods of physics. The aim of the present work is to build up a model of the role of the basic dynamics of the neuron in the emergence of consciousness and conscious experience, by simultaneously adopting non Lipschitz chaotic dynamics and a quantum mechanical approach. 1. Non Lipschitz Terminal Dynamics of Single Neuron Activity According to our previous papers [1] and to the fundamental work of J. Zbilut, M. Zak, and D.D. Dixon [2], in addition to classical mechanics where the validity of the Lipschitz condition guarantees the uniqueness of solution of a given differential equation for a given initial condition, and thus a substantially imposed deterministic characterization of the dynamics of the system in consideration, a new dynamics, called terminal dynamics, arises for the special kind of non linear differential equations violating Lipschitz condition. The equilibrium points in terminal dynamics are terminal attractors or terminal repellers, and they represent singular solutions having new interesting properties regarding in particular their instability. After reaching terminal attractors or repellers the dynamics of the system becomes independent on the initial conditions, and it acquires an expected ability to overcome the rigid determinism, thus becoming able to adapt itself with great flexibility to any required change, also depending on external conditions. As a consequence the traditional deterministic approach to basic mechanisms of living systems collapses near the equilibrium points of terminal dynamics, and a new chaotic regime may be delineated, called [2] a non deterministic chaotic dynamics. We have adopted in this paper a model of terminal dynamics applied to the single neuron [details are given in 1,2]. For it an equation may be written in the following manner dx π = senωtsen 3 x dt k 1 (1) where ω and k are constants. The equilibrium points are at x n = nk ( n = 0,1,2,.... ) where Lipschitz condition is violated. We have a dynamics of the neuron with different terminal attractors and such attractors are converted into terminal repellers each time we have a change in the sign of the Lipschitz constant from L = −∞ to L = +∞ . Owing to the presence of the controlling function senωt , in the (1) L oscillates in sign with period ( 2π / ω ) . At the singularities the neuron is driven. If we consider a vanishingly small input ε (t ) that is added to (1), the influence of such an input may be ignored during the deterministic journey of the neuron, when in fact it is stable, but it becomes relevant at the instants of instability occurring near the equilibrium points of terminal dynamics. When such a condition occurs, a string of signs like ε (t ) = +,−,−,−,+,....... (2) will drive the neuron to fire or not to fire. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 907 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) 2. Quantum Mechanical Properties of Neuron Dynamics Substantially ε (t ) may reflect some quantum mechanical features in neuron dynamics. Let us consider an input xi that usually is evaluated with a corresponding weight wi . Owing to the enormous number of inputs hitting the neuron, these values are usually summed together to form the output y, which is therefore given as function of inputs and weights according to the equation y= n ∑w x (3) i i i =1 A non linear threshold function at the output, ϑ , will realize a crude but significant model of allor-nothing potential generated by the neuron . In this case the output is given y = 1(u > ϑ ); ε (t ) = + and u= y = 0(u < ϑ ); ε (t ) = − ∑w x (4) i i i In this framework the inputs xi represent the action potentials arriving from other neurons via many impinging synapses, the weights wi representing the effectiveness of the synapses in affecting the activity of the target neuron. The larger wi the more xi affects the neuron output. Some of the physiological contributions determining wi may be, for example, the number of synaptic vesicles which are opened by a single action potential in the presynaptic cleft or the number of ligand-gated channels which are activated in the post synaptic membrane. According to E.H. Walker [1, 3] the quantum tunneling effect has a role in synaptic transmission, and still according to the studies of F. Beck and of J.C. Eccles [4], the conventional synaptic theory leads to assume that the ultimate synaptic units operate in a quantal way. They are presynaptic buttons that, when excited by arriving action potentials, deliver the total contents of a single synaptic vesicle. An essential feature is that [4] the effective structure of each presynaptic button is a paracrystalline presynaptic vesicular grid with about 50 vesicles that act probabilistically to release the synaptic transmitter molecules from each vesicle. The emission of the synaptic transmitter molecules from each vesicle is quantal, varying from 5000 to 10000. It represents the elementary unit of information transmitted from one neuron to another. A central point in the synaptic theory is that this process is not regulated in a fully deterministic, but in a probabilistic way, in the sense that it seems intrinsically indeterministic the behavior of any single synaptic vesicle or ligand-gated channel when action potentials are arriving. On this basis such a process can be modeled according to the principles of quantum mechanics. In conclusion, quantum tunneling should have a role in synaptic transmission as well as in the effectiveness affecting the post-synaptic neuron activity. This is to say that also the weights wi may be modeled according to quantum mechanics. For such a purpose, according to the papers of Dan Ventura and T. Martinez [5], we first introduce a vector ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 908 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) w = [w1 , w2 , w3 ,....., wn ] (5) that cannot be characterized in usual classical terms but connecting to a wave function ψ ( w, t ) in Hilbert space. This wave function will represent the probability amplitude for all possible weight vectors in an abstract weight space with the usual associated normalization condition that holds in quantum mechanics. For any time we will write that 2 +∞ ∫ ψ (w, t ) dw = 1 (6) −∞ In order to elucidate, consider, for example, the case of only one input and one output. We have [5] π ≤ wi ≤ π , and solving Schrödinger’s equation for the case of one dimensional rigid box, we have mπw1 2 c m sen( ) a m a ψ ( w1 ) = ∑ (7) with m = 1,2,3,...... , and w1 the single element in (5), and a, the width of the box. A probability amplitude and thus a probability are connected to each possible value of w1 in each of the possible quantum states in the box. In the case of two inputs one may write briefly ψ ( w1 , w2 ) = Asen( m1πw1 m πw ) sen( 2 2 ) a a (8) and the same procedure may be followed in the case of several inputs. It is important to outline here that our model may also exhibit fractal like behaviour. It was recently shown that several quantum models related to chaotic scattering exhibit fractal like structures [6], and recently [7] it was evidenced that fractality emerges in a regular system as result of the choice for the wave function. In [7] the well known Weierstrass function [8] was considered ∝ W ( x ) = ∑ b n sen(a n x) , a > 1 > b > 0 , ab ≥ 1 (9) n =0 That is a known example of a continuous, nowhere differentiable function. It exhibits fractal properties and the box dimension of its graph gives D = 2− Lnb Lna (10) We may consider the solutions of Schrödinger equations for a particle in an infinite potential well. The general solutions satisfying the boundary conditions have the form ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 909 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) ∝ ψ ( x, t ) = ∑ a n sen(nx)e −in t with ψ (0, t ) = ψ (π , t ) = 0 2 (11) n =1 That obviously is similar to (7). In analogy to the Weierstrass function one (see [7]) may construct fractal wavefunctions M ψ M ( x, t ) = N ∑ q n ( s − 2) sen(q n x)e −iq t with q = 2,3,.....,2 > s > 0 . 2n (12) n =0 As discussed in [7], in the interesting case of finite M the wave function ψ M ( x, t ) is the solution of the Schrödinger equation and the limiting case ψ ( x, t ) = lim M →∝ ψ M ( x, t ) is continuous but nowhere differentiable with the normalization condition given by N= 2 π (1 − q 2 ( s −2 ) ). (13) It is shown in [7] that not only the real part of the wave function ψ ( x, t ) but also the probability density function P ( x, t ) = ψ ( x, t ) 2 (14) exhibit a fractal nature. 3. A Quantum Model of Consciousness I The first central problem is to ascertain if consciousness and mind entities are unequivocally admitted in the present framework of contemporary physics. We find that two basic arguments settle in an unequivocal manner that mind entities and consciousness enter in the present physical description of our reality. The first argument runs as it follows. According to von Neumann [9], there are two basic processes in quantum mechanics. One is represented by the Schrödinger equation, and it is continuous and casual, and, according to R.A. Mould [10], it delineates the basic features that may be found “inside” of a closed quantum system. The second one is the so called collapse of the wave function, and it is often assumed that it happens when the system is measured. It is discontinuous, non local, and it is imposed from the outside of the system through our procedure of inspection and measurement. At this stage a problem arises. A measurement represents a boundary condition placed on a finitely bounded system [10]. Where is that one poses such a boundary condition? Von Neumann showed that the boundary condition is flexible, and the sense of this statement is clear. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 910 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) In principle, the line separating the “inside” from the “outside” of the system, can be drawn in any finite way that excludes the laboratory observer. Still according to Mould [10], this means that an external measuring device in a given experimental condition, can be thought instead to be inside the system only considering the experiment to be arranged differently. Not only we may include a macroscopic instrument inside and includable in quantum mechanics, but it can appear to be in superposition with itself. In brief, any usual laboratory arrangement can be placed inside as well outside of a given quantum mechanical system owing to the previously mentioned flexibility of system’s boundary that von Neumann outlined. As Mould deepened in detail [10], if any closed physical system is finitely bounded and if nothing inside of the system is capable of interrupting the Schrödinger process, there must exist something that has the capability to interrupt such a process. This is something that finally cannot be included in the system by a simple operation of extension of the boundary of the system. The answer of von Neumann and Mould [9,10] was that this something is the consciousness. In our opinion, in this manner consciousness enters unequivocally in the domain of quantum mechanics in the sense that for the first time quantum mechanics, a physical theory, includes also consciousness and mind entities in its ontological architecture. According to Mould [10], we must accept the notion that there exists a mechanism which evolves as a quantum mechanical superposition under the Schrodinger equation, and which dissolves at some critical points into a reduced state and an associated conscious experience. The non-Lipschitz dynamics outlined in the previous section gives a strong analogy to this mechanism. The second argument suggesting an unequivocal presence of consciousness and mind entities in the present framework of quantum mechanics may be outlined as it follows. This time, according to D.M. Snyder [11], we will speak about the so called “knowledge factor” or the “mental creativity” as was defined by Epstein in 1945 [12]. According to these authors and others [13], the change of the wave function that we have called here the collapse of wave function is not due fundamentally to a physical cause. This change is unequivocally linked to the knowledge attained by the observer of the circumstances affecting the physical existent to be measured. In brief, quantum mechanics is fundamentally a theory concerned with the knowledge of the physical world. It is not concerned with the description of the physical world in a manner that is independent of the thinking living being. Cognition and the physical world are strongly linked in the framework of quantum mechanics, and cognition is an expression of mind entities. To prove this thesis, according still to Epstein [12] and to Snyder [11], one may consider the Gedanken experiment that was proposed by R. Feynmann et al. [14] regarding the distribution of electrons passing through a wall with two suitably arranged holes, A and B, to a backstop where the positions of the electrons are detected. It is well known that we may integrate the standard experiment inserting a strong light source so that the distribution of electrons from each hole is seen. The argument is well known [11,12]. The standard thesis is that the physical interaction between the light source and the electron is necessary to destroy the interference. However, where the light illuminates only hole A, electrons passing through hole B do not interact with photons from the light source, as discussed in detail in [11,12]. However, interference is destroyed in the same manner as if the light source illuminated both holes A and B. In particular, agreeing still with Snyder [11], the distribution of electrons passing through hole B at the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 911 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) backstop, indicates that there has occurred a change in the wave function of these electrons, even though no physical interaction has occurred between these electrons and photons from the light source. As said, Epstein in 1945 and more recently Snyder maintained that these kinds of effects on the physical world in quantum mechanics cannot be ascribed to physical causes, and are associated with the presence of the “knowledge factor” or to the mental certainty of the thinking observer for which possible alternatives to the physical existent occurs. The entity responsible for the change in the wave function for the electron headed for holes A and B, and which is not illuminated at hole A, is the knowledge of the observers as to whether there is sufficient time for an electron to pass through the illuminated hole. Knowledge thus enters, unequivocally, in the framework of quantum mechanics and it pertains to cognition that is one of the basic foundation of consciousness. These conclusions pertain to the standard manner to conceive the approach of quantum mechanics to mental entities. However, we retain that some recent results have given new light about such matter. First of all consider that von Neumann, formulating his theory of quantum measurement, introduced two basic postulates that are well known as basic von Neumann postulates of quantum measurement. Rather recently we have given what we retain to represent an important contribution in this direction. By using two shown theorems in Clifford algebra we have given proof of such basic von Neumann postulates. In other terms we have passed from the regime of postulates, thus admitted as true and from the outside, not derived from the standard quantum theory, to the new regime in which these postulates have been demonstrated also proving that they pertain to the inner scheme of quantum mechanics. This result has given a final inner coherence to quantum theory explaining for the first time, also if only in a mathematical manner, that quantum wave function occurs. The second result relates the actual structure of quantum mechanics. By using a Clifford algebraic formulation of quantum mechanics, we have realized some basic logic statements. Von Neumann showed that logic derives from quantum mechanics. Using such algebraic formulation , and according to Orlov, we showed the vice versa. It is quantum mechanics that derives from logic. This is to say about the logic origin of quantum mechanics. In other terms, quantum mechanics relates our mind entities. In particular we have evidenced that there are stages of our reality i9n which we no more may consider matter per se. There are stages of our reality in which matter no more may be separated from the cognition that we have about it. In conclusion quantum mechanics is a Two faces God Giano looking from one side to matter and from the other side to the abstract entities of our mind. As a rule such two faces no more may be considered to be separated at some stages of our reality. We retain that these are the basic advances that enable us to attempt to formulate a preliminary evidence of existing consciousness based on the essential role of quantum mechanics. We give citation of Our and of Orlov contributions in ref. [32]. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 912 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) In conclusion, we have introduced basic arguments that are unavoidable in order to conclude that quantum mechanics connects consciousness and that the wave function of quantum mechanics is a direct expression of our cognition when interfaced with the physical reality. We are convinced that the counterpart of this conclusion must obviously respond at a neurophysiological level. In other terms, if our premises are correct, we cannot escape admitting that quantum mechanics is directly involved at the level of the neurophysiological mechanisms that are present in the brain. They must operate with a strong link with terminal dynamics that we introduced in (1) and in (2). The equations (5-8) gave the first indication of such an existing connection of quantum mechanics with neurophysiological mechanisms. Obviously, one must also outline here that such a connection gives only a preliminary and rough scheme of the system under our discussion where, in substance, a larger number of physiological mechanisms are involved in addition to those under our present analysis. Let us examine now the second important connection. It was obtained by E.H. Walker [3] who, as we said in the previous section, based synaptic connection on quantum tunneling that is one of the fundamental processes in quantum mechanics. We outline here again that also J.C. Eccles and F. Beck [4] suggested the same mechanism also if with some modifications with respect to the standard Walker’s formulation. Note the important feature that the theoretical results that were elaborated by Walker, gave also a very satisfactory agreement with the experimental data. To introduce the argument, we must show, as discussed by Shepherd and Jacobson in 1991 and Agnati and Fuxe [15,16], that neuroscience is still based on the Cajal and Sherrington’s (CS) paradigm that states that the intercellular communication relevant for the integrative task of the central nervous system is the interneuronal communication that takes place if and only if the source cell and the target cell are connected by means of a synaptic contact. In 15 years of research activity, some groups [15] have developed an alternative theory that is based on the two classical opposites of interneuronal communication, the Cajal Sherrington’s paradigm on one hand and the Golgi’s paradigm [16] on the other hand. According to this theory, any cell in the central nervous system can contribute to the integrative brain behaviors. In brief, not only interneuronal communication must be considered but also other forms of intercellular communication should be considered in the brain. In his studies E.H. Walker [3] opened the possibility of an actual channel of communication. Brain may contain propagator like molecules that, distributed through the brain, could be used by a tunneling electron as stepping ones enabling it to make transitions from one synapse to another distant synapse. One may consider two synapses molecules with some “adhesive” other molecules (propagator like molecules).When the charge has first arrived on the molecule at the synapse, its wave function will be located entirely in that molecule. Starting the tunneling process, the wave function will begin to enter the propagator molecule and so forth. The process will continue until the wave packet will spread through all the space that it is enabled to occupy. Long range quantum mechanical effects will be induced. In detail, the quantum tunneling repeated through the potential wells of several propagator-like molecules, separating two synaptic molecules, will assure the wave packet spreads throughout the brain. In brief, the emerging conclusion seems to be that a signal may flow from one neuron to another also if they are not in close proximity. In this manner a cell can participate in an assembly of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 913 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) functionally interconnected cells as long as it can release signals that are decoded by other cells of the assembly. An equivalent scheme was given in studies of associative neural networks. These authors, and in particular M. Perus, [17] investigated the quantum mechanical tunneling between patterns considering the relatively stable minima of the configuration energy space of the networks. The patterns represented the macroscopically distinguishable states of the neural nets and the tunneling represented a macroscopic quantum effect. The authors considered the minima of approximately equal depth. The repeated tunneling represented so a random walk implying quantum fluctuations and thus they were reduced to a dynamics that may be modeled by the Pauli master equation. In the corresponding formulation of the present paper we have that the local minima are represented from the transmitting and receiving, distant synaptic molecules of the neurons, being instead the patterns identified from the adhesive or propagator molecules that, as previously seen, assure communication between distant neurons. In this manner, according to [17], in the neurophysiological scheme that we have delineated, the neurons may be seen as attractors realized through specific brain patterns identified by repeated tunneling processes. We may still follow the basic configuration given in [17], in particular, we have to give two different kinds of time. One may consider that the quantum tunneling pertains initially to the synaptic molecule k1 and then, through repeated tunneling, the synaptic molecule k 2 is reached. We have stochastic quantum jumps or, equivalently, an nondeterministic transition, for example, k1 → k 2 . In k 2 the quantum process may continue tunneling to involve k 3 and so on. Otherwise, from it the process may also turn back to k1 . A time, τ stable , will characterize the sequence of tunneling steps while the tunneling process will take a time that we will call τ tunneling . still according to [17]. If Pij (t ) represents the tunneling probability from the initial state (neuron) i to final state (neuron) j, τ tunneling will represent the time interval in which such a probability becomes unity. Obviously, the sequence of the transitions represents a stochastic process consisting of a random walk. This dynamics may be modeled by a Pauli master equation dPi = ∑Wij Pi − ∑W jiPj dt i ( i ≠ j ) i (i≠ j ) (15) where Pi represents the probability of finding the tunneling particle at the neuron i at the time t while W ji is the tunneling velocity through the adhesive molecules, and it is given by W ji = dPji (16) dt One interesting feature is that, using (15), some specific models may be introduced to explain and to account for memory dynamics, storage, and recognition in brain functioning. In fact, as also pointed out in [17], one may consider the most simple interesting case in which Wij = W ji = W = constant ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 914 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) but one we may also introduce specific models for each Wij involved in the sequential tunneling processes in order to characterize brain patterns and to account for memory factors and plasticity in the whole brain dynamics. This is the problem of recognition and memorization of patterns in the brain. We may acknowledge here the basic role explained by adhesive or propagator molecules. Let us remember the well known Hebb learning rule [18]. It states that if two neurons are both active or both inactive, then the synaptic connection between them is strengthened. Otherwise, if one is active and the other is inactive, then their mutual synaptic connection is weakened. Thus the adhesive or propagator molecules may have their active role. As seen in (15), the probability for tunneling is dependent from the amplitudes of the barriers interposed among the two neurons wells and characterized by Wij . Memorization and recognition are realized by the propagator molecules that, when operating with respect to unlearned and unmemorized brain patterns, have a lower value of W and this enhances tunneling probability and tunneling .velocity. Let us state now a rough definition of consciousness to which we make reference in the present work. Consciousness is that human entity on whose basis the human subject has perception of himself and of his environment. The deriving model of consciousness is becoming now evident. The reason is that, following the previous arguments, we obtain on one hand a network made by neurons and we will call it Neural Networks. It is entirely based on neurophysiological processes. From the other hand, we have also an Integrated and Complex Quantum Mechanical Network that is entirely based on the wave functions characterizing the previously mentioned quantum tunneling. The synaptic tunneling model that happens between adjacent as well as among distant neurons, will produce an abstract integrated and complex quantum mechanical network that will be overlapped onto the real neuron network dictated by the neurological mechanisms. We have in substance a quantum like nervous system or, if we like, a “virtual” nervous system that will direct the behavior of the real neurological nervous system. In this integrated quantum mechanical network, the consciousness is represented. In particular, such a virtual and integrated network or, equivalently, such a virtual nervous system will consist essentially of wave functions and thus of information, of signs and symbols that in detail will realize also basic logic operations such as YES- NOT functions, or also XOR functions. E.H. Walker [3] previously discussed this model with the particular role of propagator like molecules, but our main aim in this paper is to evidence the manner in which such an interface between neural network from one hand and integrated quantum mechanical network from the other hand, is actually realized. As we demonstrated in a previous paper it is the spin that develops an essential role [1]. The preliminary question to which we are related is to indicate if actually the spin has or not a role in brain dynamics. In order to strengthen this argument, we would consider here some results that were previously introduced. It is not our aim to expose in detail such an important theory that we discussed also in [1], but we will limit ourselves to explain only some features which are important that for our purposes. Starting with 2002, some authors [19] studied the possible role of neural electron spin networks in memory and consciousness, and with respect to this problem they also discussed the general problem of anesthesia. They evidenced that obviously we have ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 915 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) not a commonly accepted theory on the manner in which anesthetics work and that we may at least identify two main schools: one, the Lipid theory [20], admitting that anesthetics dissolve into cell membranes and produce perturbations resulting in a depression of ion channels and receptors involved in brain functions; the second, the protein theory [21], indicating instead that anesthetics directly interact with membrane proteins as ion channels and receptors involved in brain functions. In substance, these authors [19] evidenced that both experimental and theoretical studies indicated that many general anesthetics cause changes in membrane structures, and they added the fundamental elaboration that, since both O2 and general anesthetics are hydrophobic, general anesthetics may cause unconsciousness by perturbing O2 pathways in neural membranes and O2-utilizing proteins such that the availability of O2 to its sites of utilization should be reduced. The articulation of this argument leads the authors to consider the possible roles of neural electron spin networks in memory and consciousness. They considered nuclear spins inside neural membranes and proteins. They evaluated that free O2 and NO are the main sources of unpaired electron spins in neural membranes and proteins, are transitioned to metal ions and O2 and NO bound/absorbed to large molecules. Free radicals produced through biochemical reactions and excited molecular triplet states induced by fluctuating internal magnetic fields produced largely by diffusing O2. They concluded that these spin networks could be involved in brain functions. We recommend the reader to deepen all the basic features of such a theory by reading the papers given in [19]. It is relevant that such authors considered a simple two electron spin system in neural membranes demonstrating that the large neural electron spin networks inside the membranes can form complex modulated structures through action potential driven oscillations of exchange and dipolar couplings and g-factor and spin-orbital couplings. They argued that the neural spike trains of various frequencies can directly input information carried by them into these electron spin networks. They indicated that the fluctuating internal magnetic fields are produced by unpaired electrons such as those carried by O2 and NO and spin carrying nuclei such as H1, C13, P31, and still they calculated that the maximal magnetic field strengths produced by the magnetic dipoles of the unpaired electrons of O2 and of NO and H1 along the axes of such dipoles assume values of, respectively, 3.71 (0.003), 1.85 (0.0018), 0.002 (0.000003) T for distances ranging from 1 to 10.0 A˚ [19]. We consider that the dynamics of membrane structures is determinant in synaptic transmission. If synaptic transmission, as previously said, involves a quantum mechanical mechanism such as quantum tunneling, existing high values of the magnetic field strengths as induced by O2, NO, and H1 as previously calculated in [19], we have to conclude that quantum mechanisms involved in synaptic transmission will be also spin dependent. In conclusion, in [1] we suggested that synaptic connection and transmission is regulated by a mechanism of spin dependent quantum tunneling .We will expose in a following paper the details of our elaboration, but we may anticipate here some result. According to Walker [3], we have a quantum mechanical potential barrier tunneling by electron across the cleft. The electron transfer is made between two macromolecules, probably lipid-proteins lying in the presynaptic dark projections of Gray and the postsynaptic density at the cleft. Considering quantum mechanics we have a particle (the electron) with a given kinetic energy and moving for example along the y axis and interacting with a barrier of given height and width and centered at y=0. Owing the physical processes previously mentioned, a small magnetic field B, pointing in the z direction, will be confined to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 916 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) the barrier. For the previous arguments, the particle (the electron) will carry spin s=1/2 and the incident particle will be polarized, for example, in the x direction. As the particle will enter the barrier, it will start a Larmor precession and when the particle will leave the barrier, the precession will stop. The polarization of the transmitted and reflected particle may be now compared with the polarization of the incident particle. In the absence of a magnetic field, it is easily given, while, in the presence of the magnetic field, we will have two transmission probabilities along the z direction, T+ and T-, corresponding respectively to spin h values S z = ± . As mentioned, we will publish in detail all the features of such a formulation. 2 The basic key here is that we will have a mean value of spin S z that will be connected directly to the values of the transmission probabilities according to the following formula: < S z >= h T+ − T− 2 T+ + T− (17) This equation is obviously evident in its derivation but it has here of relevant importance for the arguments that we are developing. Admitting the primary role of the spin in synaptic connection, we link and interface, by (17), the close physical mechanism of neuronal activity represented by the synaptic connection with spin dependent quantum tunneling and terminal dynamics and, on the other hand, the abstract field of the probabilities, probability amplitudes and quantum mechanical wave functions. For details see also our previous paper given in [1]. To conclude we have to consider here still two important features. As indicated, the idea to introduce propagator like molecules was initially discussed by E.H. Walker [3] who suggested that RNA molecules could serve as a propagator vector in the brain .To support this conclusion one may claim the experimental results that were initially obtained by F.R. Babich in 1965 [22] but that were subsequently confirmed also more recently by other authors [23]. The second important comment regards an important criticism that could be considered for our present model evidencing that a lot of chaotic rather of quantum behaviors were actually identified in analysis of signals relating to the brain. To respond one considers first of all that in 5-14 we gave some important indications on the manner chaotic behaviors could be explained in the presence of a quantum mechanical dynamics. In addition, it must be added that the process of resonant electron tunneling through potential barriers may give an origin to chaotic behaviors that of course were found in brain signals. Non linear dynamical effects may be generated, in fact, by charge accumulation in the inter barrier spaces as they were also calculated by using the Davydov and Ermakov formulation [24] and outlined also by several authors [25]. We may now formulate our model of consciousness. We must explain how the interface between the neural and virtual or quantum mechanical (wavefunction) net, will originate at some stage a unique quantum mechanical function that will be self referential and able to have perception of itself and of the environment. Let us summarize briefly the conclusions we have reached at this stage. On the basis of the arguments previously developed we have admitted some fixed points: a) Discussing some previous quantum mechanical experiences we have evidenced that quantum mechanics has profoundly changed our classical view on physics and on our reality. There are ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 917 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) cases in which we cannot avoid considering the “knowledge factor” as an essential component in the dynamics of reality itself. By this way we arrive at the conclusion that some quantum mechanical approaches and formalizations describing reality include unequivocally and prototypically mind-like entities. In particular, as in detail we shall see also through the following elaboration, the basic substrate of quantum mechanics resides in its mathematical formalism which is an abstract language that continuously relates to the role of the logical mind. b) During the past decades studies on the brain have advanced in a considerable way. Many efforts have been devoted in understanding the physiology as well as the structure of the neocortex. Two basic directives have been substantially identified. In the first case various attempts and considerable advances have been obtained in the field of brain topology, that is to say in the identification of the localization of the specific area and role of brain activity. The second one has focused its attention on the analysis of the mechanisms that are involved with particular attention to the analysis and processing of signals that are involved during brain dynamics. In our opinion from the whole of such interdisciplinary studies it has emerged that the most fundamental process in brain dynamics is memorization. We consider that the neural network transforms a specific external stimulus into a specific pattern. Memorization, recognition of patterns are realized by tunneling processes happening by adjacent as well as by distant neurons that represent attractors in such configurations. The Pauli master equation delineates the time evolution of probabilities in tunneling also characterizing patterns, memorization and recognition. The neural net stores many patterns simultaneously, each neuron and each synapse participates in several tunneling processes so that the whole macroscopic dimension of the involved quantum process becomes dreadfully high so that it becomes impossible to delineate it by a quantum mechanical formalism. In our opinion, a quantum-like, that is to say, a kind of basic but simplified scheme of quantum mechanics is necessary to delineate it. Let us explain the problem with the aid of an example. As we said [4], there are about 40 vesicles altogether in the paracrystalline structure, but it never happens that more than one vesicle emits transmitter molecules into the synaptic cleft after stimulation by a nerve impulse. This certainly means that the vesicles in the vesicular grid do not act independently. Soon after one vesicle is triggered for releasing its content, the interaction between them blocks further exocytosis. The relaxation time for the blocking process is of the order of femtoseconds [for details see still the 4]. Therefore in the framework of the process we have two basic factors to account for the number of vesicles (about 40 in the paracrystalline structure) and times of the femtoseconds. With these starting data we may attempt to describe the many-body aspect of exocytosis from only one vesicular grid. In quantum mechanical terms we may attribute schematically to each vesicle in the grid, two possible quantum states, f and i, where i is the state before and f, the state after exocytosis has been triggered. Equivalently we may think a dichotomous quantum observable A that assumes the numerical values +1 or -1 if exocytosis has been triggered or not, respectively. In brief, from the view point of quantum mechanics the problem of characterizing our virtual or quantum mechanical net, does not appear to be so difficult: We need a dichotomous variable A that potentially may assume the values +1 and -1. The actual and impressive problem resides instead when accounting for the dimensions and for the times ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 918 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) characterizing our net. Let us consider only one exocytosis and thus only 40 vesicles. Still according to [4], the wave function of N vesicles is then a product of the denumerable states with N=40. ψ (1,2,...., N ) = ψ i 1ψ i 2 .......ψ i N and i j = (0,1) 1 2 (18) N Before exocytosis the wave function has the form ψ 0 = ψ 01ψ 0 2 .......... ...ψ 0 N with N=40 The observation that in response to a presynaptic impulse only one vesicle can empty its transmitter molecules into the synaptic cleft leads to a properly normalized wave function after the trigger for exocytosis that has the following form ψ 1 (1,2,.........., N ) = 1 N (ψ 11ψ 02 ...........ψ 0N + ψ 01ψ 12ψ 03 .........ψ 0N + ................................................... + ψ 01 .......ψ 0N −1ψ 1N ) with N=40. (19) This is a very articulated function. Let us add that the most elementary process characterizing brain dynamics involves a number of variables varying at least from 200 – 300 to one million of neurons. To write the detailed wave function and the virtual net that is represented, becomes a complex enterprise that on the other hand will be unable to characterize the unifying moment in which such a virtual net will be represented from only one wave function having some defined and self-referential attributes. The way we must continue, cannot be to represent step by step the increasing complexity of the virtual net as well as of the interfaced brain dynamics while we account for the increasing number of neurons that are employed and the neural patterns that consequently are induced. The way to be pursued is to introduce a formalism that on one hand is able to give the complexity of the net in consideration, but fundamentally, on the other hand, to be able at some point to represent instead the synthesis to which such a virtual complex net arrives at the final stage of its complexity. We think that the quantum mechanics becomes substantially unable to explain such a passage and for this purpose we will use here an alternative scheme that, of course, preserves all the quantum basic features of the theory. Let us delineate the basic scheme of our approach. We are convinced that the discovery of non commuting observables existing in entities of our reality [26] and identified for the first time through the introduction of quantum mechanics that of course also postulates the superposition principle and existing potential states in Nature, has represented the highest conceptual moment in the story of humanity. Let us return to consider the dichotomous variable A previously introduced to represent that exocytosis happened or not for a single paracrystalline structure. Our starting point is that our virtual-quantum net may be described on the basis of dichotomous variables as the previous A, yes/not or equivalently +1/-1 variables as mind like entities in the manner previously specified in a. As such they must be expressed as abstract mathematical ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 919 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) entities having a quantum like direct correspondence and analogy. Therefore, our aim is to introduce an algebra, that is to say a very rough scheme of quantum mechanics that however preserves some basic features of this theory, in particular, the non commutativity of observables and the quantum like potential states that usually are introduced in this theory. To respond to such requirements, let us introduce three basic algebraic elements ei , i = 1,2,3 , having the following basic features: 1) ei2 = 1 and 2) ei e j = −e j ei = iek with i, j, k = 1,2,3 , ijk = permutation of 1, 2, 3 and i 2 = −1 .. (20) We see that the axioms 1) and 2) introduce the two basic requirements that we invoke for quantum mechanics: potentiality and non commutativity. The first axiom in fact introduces an abstract entity, ei , but at the same time fixes that its square is 1. This is to say that to each ei with i = 1,2,3 , under particular conditions in such an algebra , may correspond or the value +1 or the value -1. For each ei we have the potential for it to correspond to one of such possible numerical values. The second axiom introduces non-commutativity for ei ( i = 1,2,3 ). We know that in the usual quantum mechanics the 1) and the 2) are representative of a well known quantum observable, the spin, but here it is assumed only in analogy, and we consider only that 1) and 2) characterize a well known algebraic structure with the addition of the unity element e0 = 1 , and we consider that a quantum like dichotomous observable is connected to such basic elements. In particular, we may observe [1, 24] that, if to one of the ei , i = 1,2,3 , under suitable algebraic conditions may correspond a numerical value , say +1 or -1 , we may also correspond to ei , their mean values, < ei > considering the probabilities for +1 or for -1 values, and writing < e1 >= (+1) p (+1) + (−1) p(−1) , <e 2 >= (+1) p (+1) + (−1) p (−1) , < e3 >= (+1) p(+1) + (−1) p(−1) (21) where p (+1) and p (−1) represent the probabilities for +1 and -1 values, respectively, with p (+1) + p (−1) = 1 . The quantum like features of this algebra may be synthesized in the following equation that we discussed in our previous work [1, 24] : < e1 > 2 + < e2 > 2 + < e3 > 2 ≤ 1 (22) In this manner all our virtual or quantum mechanical net may be represented by such a rough quantum mechanical scheme considering the previous dichotomous variable represented by such basic elements and their algebraic rules. First of all we have to observe that the given basic elements ei are abstract mathematical entities in our algebra and as such they remain. To lower this level of abstraction that, as clearly evidenced by the simultaneous reading of axioms 1) and 2) is very high, we may consider an ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 920 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) isomorphic operation. In fact, we may introduce the well known Pauli matrices at order n=2 as representative for the basic elements ei . This is an important operation since, from on one hand, it helps us to identify some hidden features of our algebra, and, on the other hand, it introduces for the first time the possibility of a self-referential operation that , as is well known, in mathematics as well as in science in general, is retained (and we agree) of the greatest importance in order to characterize the basic features of mind entities and thinking. Let us proceed with the aid of an example. Let us suppose that in the operation of progressive description of the net, we have arrived at a level of description of such a virtual (quantum ) net that two dichotomous variables A and B are actually required in order to characterize it since two tunneling processes have actually the probability to happen or, in any case, two dichotomous variables are actually required in order to characterize its behavior. We may use the matrix representation of the basic elements ei and we may realize some new algebraic elements given by the direct product of matrices. In this case, we will have new basic elements in the following manner: E oi = I ⊗ ei and Eio = ei ⊗ I being I the unit matrix, i = 1,2,3. (23) Note that E 0i and Ei 0 will satisfy the same rules that were given in 1) and 2) for ei . In detail we will have that E 02i = 1 , E 0i E0 j = iE 0 k , and Ei20 = 1 , and Eio E jo = iE k 0 . (24) It is important to observe that we will have also that E 0i E jo = E j 0 Ei 0 for any ( i, j ) and i = 1,2,3; j = 1,2,3 . As required, we have now two dichotomous variables, E 0i and E i 0 , i = 1,2,3, to describe our virtual (quantum) net. Let us consider still that ei are the basic elements of our algebra given at order n=2 in our isomorphism while E 0i and E i 0 are the same basic elements but at order n=4. Note that for the first time we have also introduced a self referential mathematical formalism. To explain such a referential mathematical operation ,let us return to our basic algebraic scheme but outlining what V.A. Lefebvre [27] recently outlined . As we know, the central topic of Western philosophy, starting with John Locke, was the problem of representing mentally one’s own thoughts and feelings. Actually, it is a very difficult concept to represent. It and this is the reason to use here a pictorial representation, the same figure that V.A. Lefebvre introduced to describe his formulation [27]. Tentatively we may express self attitude through the reflexion. A subject having reflexion may be conceived as a miniature human figure with the image of the self inside his head. We recover it here in the following fig 1. It represents with care the subject with reflexion. We prefer to call it the picture of a subject having perception of itself. In fig.1, following V.A. Lefebvre, we may say that inside the subject’s inner domain, there is an image of the self with its own inner domain. An image of the self is traditionally regarded as the result of the subject’s conscious constructive activity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 905-921 921 Conte, E., Santacroce, N., Federici, A., A Possible Quantum Model of Consciousness Interfaced with a Non-Lipschitz Chaotic Dynamics of Neural Activity (Part I) [References at the end of part II] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Article Whole-brain models to explore altered states of consciousness from the bottom up Rodrigo Cofré 1,∗ , Rubén Herzog 2 , Pedro A.M. Mediano 3 , Juan Piccinini 4,5 , Fernando E. Rosas 6,7,8 , Yonatan Sanz Perl 4,9 , Enzo Tagliazucchi 4,5 1 2 arXiv:2008.02788v1 [q-bio.NC] 6 Aug 2020 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 * CIMFAV-Ingemat, Facultad de Ingeniería 2340000, Universidad de Valparaíso, Valparaíso, Chile Centro Interdisciplinario de Neurociencia de Valparaíso 2360103, Universidad de Valparaíso, Valparaíso, Chile Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EB, UK National Scientific and Technical Research Council, Buenos Aires, Argentina Buenos Aires Physics Institute and Physics Department, University of Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina Centre for Psychedelic Research, Department of Brain Science, Imperial College London, London SW7 2DD, UK Data Science Institute, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, UK Centre for Complexity Science, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, UK Universidad de San Andrés, Buenos Aires, Argentina Correspondence: rodrigo.cofre@uv.cl Abstract: The scope of human consciousness includes states departing from what most of us experience as ordinary wakefulness. These altered states of consciousness constitute a prime opportunity to study how global changes in brain activity relate to different varieties of subjective experience. We consider the problem of explaining how global signatures of altered consciousness arise from the interplay between large-scale connectivity and local dynamical rules that can be traced to known properties of neural tissue. For this purpose, we advocate a research program aimed at bridging the gap between bottom-up generative models of whole-brain activity and the top-down signatures proposed by theories of consciousness. Throughout this paper, we define altered states of consciousness, discuss relevant signatures of consciousness observed in brain activity, and introduce whole-brain models to explore the mechanisms of altered consciousness from the bottom-up. We discuss the potential of our proposal in view of the current state of the art, give specific examples of how this research agenda might play out, and emphasise how a systematic investigation of altered states of consciousness via bottom-up modelling may help us better understand the biophysical, informational, and dynamical underpinnings of consciousness. Keywords: whole-brain models; altered states of consciousness; signatures of consciousness; integrated information theory; psychedelics 1. Introduction Consciousness has been for centuries a puzzle beyond the scope of natural science; however, the significant progress seen during the last 30 years of research suggests that a rigorous scientific understanding of consciousness is possible [1–3]. The dawn of the modern scientific approach to consciousness can be traced back to Crick and Koch’s proposal for identifying the neural correlates of consciousness (NCC) [4,5], understood as the minimal set of neural events associated with certain subjective experience. The key intuition that fuels this proposal is that careful experimentation should suffice to reveal brain events that are systematically associated with conscious (as opposed to unconscious or subliminal) perception. Needless to say, the methodological challenges associated with this idea are vast – particularly concerning the determination of what constitutes conscious content (e.g. must content be explicitly 2 of 28 reported, or are other less direct forms of inference equally valid? [6,7]). Despite these problems, the program put forward by Crick and Koch succeeded to jump-start contemporary consciousness research.1 While the quest for the NCC aims to provide answers to where and when consciousness occurs in the brain, subsequent theoretical efforts have attempted to discover systematic signatures within those NCC that could reflect key mechanisms underlying the emergence of consciousness. In other words, these efforts try to answer how consciousness emerges from the processes that give rise to the NCC [12,13]. Hence, theoretical models of consciousness strive to "compress" our empirical knowledge of the NCC, i.e. to provide rules that can predict when and where from how. The nature of those rules, in turn, determines the kind of explanation offered by a theoretical model of consciousness. Here we consider two possible approaches: top-down and bottom-up [14]. On the one hand, top-down approaches start by identifying high-level signatures of consciousness, and then try to narrow down low-level biophysical mechanisms compatible with those signatures. On the other hand, bottom-up approaches build from dynamical rules of elementary units (such as neurons or groups of neurons [15]), and attempt to provide quantitative predictions by exploring the aggregated consequences of these rules across various temporal and spatial scales. We further subdivide explanations into those addressing conscious information access (e.g. perception in different sensory modalities) and those concerning consciousness as a temporally extended state, such as wakefulness, sleep, anaesthesia, and the altered states that can be elicited by pharmacological manipulation [16–22]. Our objective is to put forward a research program for the development of bottom-up explanations for the relationship between brain activity and states of consciousness, which we claim is underrepresented both in past and current research. Theories that rely heavily on a top-down perspective risk being under-determined in the reductive sense; i.e. they could be compatible with multiple and potentially divergent lower-level biological and physical mechanisms [23]. While we do not know whether consciousness may be instantiated in other physical systems, we certainly do know that it is instantiated in the human brain, and therefore all theoretical models of consciousness should be consistent with the low-level biophysical details of the brain to be considered acceptable. In light of this potential under-determination, it is difficult to decide whether the different theories currently dominating the field are competing (in the sense of predicting mutually contradictory empirical findings) or convergent (in spite of being formulated from disparate perspectives). Without investigating theories of consciousness from the bottom-up, it could be simply too early for proposals of an experimentum crucis to decide between candidates [24]. In this paper we posit that computational models can play a crucial role in determining the low-level physical and biological mechanisms fulfilling the high-level phenomenological and computational constraints of theoretical models of consciousness. The idea that consciousness is intrinsically dependent on the dynamics of neural activity is not new, and in this sense we follow the trail of pioneers such as Walter J. Freeman [25], Francisco Varela [26], and Gerald Edelman [27], among others. However, our proposal reaches further than these previous attempts by building upon the technological and conceptual advances accumulated over the last decades. In particular, the widespread availability of non-invasive neuroimaging methods (fMRI, DTI, MEG) has expanded our knowledge of the functional and structural aspects of the brain, while the development of connectomics has revealed the intricate meso- and macroscopic connectivity patterns that wire cortical and subcortical structures together [28]. Moreover, for the first time there is sufficient empirical data and computational power available to construct whole-brain models with real predictive power [15,29,30], which represents a radical improvement over past research efforts. We 1 For recent reviews on the empirical search for NCC see Ref. [8], for a theoretical examination of the concept of NCC see Ref. [9], and for criticism to the concept of NCC see Refs. [10,11]. 3 of 28 expect that these advances will enable us to compare the predictions of theories of consciousness by means of whole-brain computational models that can be directly contrasted with empirical results. In the following, we adopt and explore the consequences of this perspective. Our proposal and its justification are structured as follows. First, Section 2 describes several examples of altered states of consciousness and briefly discusses some proposed general definitions. Next, Section 3 introduces top-down approaches for quantifying and classifying states of consciousness solely from functional data. Then, Section 4 introduces the main technical ideas underlying the development of whole-brain computational models, highlighting novel results with special emphasis on those informing research on altered states of consciousness. Section 5 discusses how computational models can contribute to overcome open challenges and conceptual difficulties, thus providing new insights into the study of altered states of consciousness. Finally, Section 6.1 elaborates on possible future directions of research stemming from our proposal. 2. What is an altered state of consciousness? Examples and defining features A basic distinction is commonly drawn between phenomenal and access consciousness [31]. The first represents the subjective experience of sensory perception, emotion, thoughts, etc.; in other words, what it feels like to perceive something, undergo a certain emotion, or engage in a certain thought process. The second represents the global availability of conscious content for cognitive functions such as speech, reasoning, and decision-making, enabling the capacity to issue first-person reports. The term "consciousness" is also used in reference to a third concept whose definition is comparatively more elusive: that of temporally extended and qualitatively distinct modes or states of consciousness [16–22]. This concept is perhaps best introduced by listing examples, such as our ordinary state of conscious wakefulness, the different phases of the wake-sleep cycle, dreaming during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, sedation and general anaesthesia, post-comatose disorders such as the unresponsive wakefulness syndrome, the acute effects of certain drugs (mainly serotonergic psychedelics and glutamatergic dissociatives), the state achieved in some contemplative traditions by means of meditation, hypnosis, and shamanic trance, among others. Following Ludwig [20] and Tart [32], we refer to these as "altered states of consciousness", adopting this term to emphasise their dissimilarity to ordinary conscious wakefulness. Let us describe commonalities shared by altered states of consciousness, which point towards a potential general definition. First, altered states of consciousness are temporally extended and typically (but not always) reversible. Second, they are not defined by the presence of specific subjective experiences, but instead by general and qualitative modifications to the contents of consciousness, including their experienced intensity [17]. Third, at least some states can be ordered along a hierarchy of levels, from states of "reduced" consciousness (e.g. general anaesthesia, sleep) to others considered "richer" (e.g. certain states achieved during meditation or induced by pharmacological means) [33]. A proper definition of what constitutes an altered state of consciousness is, unfortunately, more elusive than suggested by the examination of these examples. If states of consciousness are transient, then what is their minimum accepted length? Do qualitative modifications of conscious content apply only to the sensory domain, or encompass other forms of subjective experience as well? Does a déjà-vu (a brief episode of eerie familiarity with an unknown past event) qualify as an altered state of consciousness? What about an orgasm, or the state of pain caused by hitting one’s finger with a hammer? Without doubt, these examples modify in one way or another the general contents of consciousness, but they are not commonly considered as altered states of consciousness. The intuitive notion of "levels" of consciousness is also problematic [34]. We are familiar with the fact that some states appear to be "more conscious" than others; for instance, ordinary wakefulness would have a higher conscious level than deep sleep or an absence seizure. But in what sense is deep sleep 4 of 28 Table 1. Categories of altered states of consciousness Category Natural or endogenous Pharmacological Induced by other means Pathological Examples deep sleep dreaming general anaesthesia psychedelic state meditation hypnosis epilepsy psychotic episodes Reversibility transitory transitory transitory transitory or permanent more or less conscious than an absence seizure? Following this logic, how should dreaming, the acute effects of psychedelic drugs, and the state achieved by expert meditators be ordered along a hypothetical uni-dimensional hierarchy of levels of consciousness? It seems that altered states of consciousness can only be subject to partial ordering, with comparisons between certain pairs of states being questionable or outright meaningless. These difficulties relate to two main problems. The first problem is granularity: how long is long enough to qualify as an altered state of consciousness? The second is compositeness: instead of a single level of intensity, multiple dimensions are likely required for an unambiguous characterisation; however, it is unclear how many dimensions are needed and how they should be determined [34,35]. A subsidiary issue related to the granularity problem is whether altered states of consciousness represent discrete states with sharply defined boundaries, or are more adequately understood as continuous transitions. Several proposals have been put forward to circumvent these issues and define altered states of consciousness [16–22]. Here, we adopt perforce a more pragmatic stance: we are interested in altered states of consciousness lasting enough to be investigated by modern neuroimaging techniques (>10 min). At the same time, we strive to show that whole-brain models can be sufficiently rich to transcend the unidimensional characterisation of consciousness in terms of "levels". For the purposes of this article, we divide altered states of consciousness into the following (neither exhaustive nor mutually exclusive) categories: natural or endogenous (e.g. the states within the sleep cycle), induced by pharmacological means (e.g. general anaesthesia, the psychedelic state), induced by other means (e.g. meditation, hypnosis), caused by pathological processes, either neurological or psychiatric (e.g. disorders of consciousness, epilepsy, psychotic episodes), and transitory vs. permanent. 3. Top-down signatures of consciousness from brain signals A major challenge in the study of altered states of consciousness has been to establish empirical signatures in brain signals that are characteristic of different states, thus allowing us to identify them "from the outside" – i.e. not depending on self-report or behavioural tasks [13]. Establishing and validating these signatures also carries significance from a clinical perspective, since they could lead to efficient and specific biomarkers for certain neuropsychiatric conditions [36,37]. Furthermore, when interpreted within a broader theory, some of these signatures may also provide new insights about the nature of the corresponding conscious states, advancing our fundamental understanding of consciousness itself. In the following, we first provide a broad overview of general aspects of theories of consciousness, and then illustrate what a signature of consciousness is by reviewing two well-known examples. 5 of 28 3.1. Functionalist and non-functionalist positions on the mind-brain problem When we consider the most prominent contemporary theories of consciousness, we find that they mainly differ in what they take as valid empirical data to be explained by the theory. There are essentially two positions on this matter, which can be related to the influential division between functionalist and non-functionalist positions on the mind-brain problem. For a functionalist, the subjective quality of conscious experience is rejected as a valid target of scientific explanation. According to this view, most famously articulated by Daniel Dennett in Consciousness Explained [38], only third-person objective measurements fall into the scope of a science of consciousness. This data is limited to observable behaviour and neural activity recordings; for instance, whenever an experimental subject claims to be experiencing a certain shade of blue, the neuroscientist is not tasked with finding how a physical process in the brain can cause a subjective feeling of blue, but with determining the mechanisms leading the subject to declare such experience [39]. Non-functionalists, on the other hand, reject this position as a sophisticated form of behaviourism [40]. According to this view, introspection plays a crucial role in the scientific explanation of consciousness, because it reveals the very nature of the explanandum itself; any other kind of data represents, at best, an indirect approximation [41–43]. It is one of the defining features of consciousness, argue the defenders of this position, that it cannot be illusory [44] since being conscious of something is precisely what bears that conscious experience into existence [45,46]. When translated into the domain of neuroscience, these positions inform the two most influential contemporary models of consciousness. The global neuronal workspace theory (GNW) [47,48] links consciousness with the widespread and sustained propagation of activity in the cortex, serving the computational function of broadcasting information to be processed by specialised modules [49]. This theory was developed to explain the neural signatures of consciousness seen in cognitive neuroscience experiments – in other words, to explain third-person objective data. On the contrary, integrated information theory (IIT) [50–52] is based on certain first-person qualities of subjective experience, which are accessed by introspection and can be taken as "postulates" or "axioms" for the theory [52]. This theory strives to provide a quantitative characterisation of consciousness, as well as to determine the neural correlates of conscious contents from first principles only (even though concrete predictions may be computationally intractable [53]). Both theories have been the target of intense criticism [6,54–58], which can be taken as a sign that the scientific problem of consciousness remains unsolved. While GWT and IIT are frequently pitted against each other, their predictions for human brains may still be mutually compatible [59,60]. For our purpose, what these two theories have in common is that they follow a top-down approach, in the sense that they both focus on abstract computational or information-theoretical principles, without necessarily specifying how these principles arise as a consequence of local dynamics within the underlying neural substrate. We argue that it is via detailed whole-brain modelling that the points of agreement and divergence between theories, and how they relate to the neurophysiology of the human brain, can and should be studied ahead of possible experiments. 3.2. Examples of signatures of consciousness Since the conception of NCC, neuroscientists have turned to every available neuroimaging technology in the search for signatures of consciousness [4,5]. Although many kinds of signatures have been explored (including some related to metabolic consumption [61] or cortical connectivity [62]), for the purposes of this article we will focus on signatures measurable with functional neuroimaging tools like MEG, EEG and fMRI (which can be simulated with the models described in Section 4). In the sequel, we illustrate the nature and application of signatures of consciousness by elaborating on two well-known examples. 6 of 28 3.2.1. The entropic brain hypothesis One of the simplest, yet remarkably powerful, theoretical framework to furnish signatures of consciousness is Carhart-Harris’ entropic brain hypothesis (EBH) [33,63]. According to the EBH, the richness of conscious experience depends on the complexity of the underlying population-level neuronal activity, which determines the repertoire of states available for the brain to explore. Put simply, conscious states that involve richer experiences might require a more diverse set of brain configurations, which should leave a traceable footprint to be observed in the entropy, or in the entropy rate2 of the corresponding brain signals. Following this rationale, the level of consciousness should be proportional (at least within reasonable range) to the entropy of brain signals. An effective tool to estimate the entropy rate of a signal is the Lempel-Ziv complexity (LZc) [63–65], originally conceived as a lossless compression algorithm. The LZc of brain signals has proven to be an extremely robust signature of consciousness, and has been tested in a breadth of scenarios including anaesthesia [66], coma [67], sleep [68], epilepsy [69], meditation [70] and the psychedelic state [71,72]. More recently, it has also been used to assess fluctuations of consciousness during normal wakefulness due to cognitive tasks [73], stress [74], fatigue [75], and music performance or listening [76]. With its impressive track record and wide applicability, LZc stands as a prominent signature of consciousness to compare across biological and simulated brains. Furthermore, LZc can be used in tandem with transcranial magnetic stimulation to compute the perturbational complexity index [77], a clinically-tested marker of consciousness, which can also be used as a test measure for whole-brain models. 3.2.2. Integrated information theory A strong limitation of standard brain entropy analyses is that they consider only the entropy of individual signals, without acknowledging the multivariate structure of brain dynamics. An attractive way of studying interdependencies between brain signals is with tools drawn from integrated information theory (IIT) [78]. IIT proposes an intimate relationship between consciousness and the ability of a physical system to be integrated in such a way that is "more that the sum of its parts" – i.e. to display dynamical properties in the whole that are not observed in any of its parts. IIT builds on key information-theoretic ideas first presented in the seminal early work of Tononi, Sporns, and Edelman [79], and has been subject of continuous development since [50–52,80]. Following Mediano et al. [81], we distinguish between empirical IIT and fundamentalist IIT as two separate branches of the theory. While fundamentalist IIT has been highly controversial and subject of extensive criticism [53, 82–84], multiple efforts in empirical IIT have been made to overcome the computational challenges of the theory [85–87]. At the core of empirical applications of IIT is a quantitative measure of integrated information, typically denoted by Φ. There is currently no agreed-upon Φ measure, although multiple proposals have been put forward [81] and can be used to understand and compare the dynamical structure of systems of interest. Detailed procedures describing how to compute different versions of Φ can be found in Ref. [81]. Although the evidence supporting IIT as a fundamental theory of consciousness has been contested [88], measures inspired by empirical IIT have proven useful in analysing both empirical [89,90] as well as simulated [87,91] neural data. Altogether, the family of information-theoretic measures inspired by empirical IIT provides a valuable toolkit to study the multivariate dynamics of whole-brain models. 2 While the entropy estimates the average uncertainty in a signal, the entropy rate estimates how hard is to predict the next time-point given its history. 7 of 28 4. Bottom-up whole-brain models While human neuroscience research has been increasingly dominated by imaging experiments, an important complement to this research is provided by computational neuroscience [92]. In effect, neuroimaging data is usually insufficient to inform the underlying mechanisms at play behind neural phenomena unfolding at different spatial and temporal scales [93]. Also, since ethical considerations severely limit direct causal manipulation of human brain activity, most of the neuroimaging literature is limited to correlational studies. The application of computational models to neuroimaging data with the purpose of making causal and mechanistic assertions has been proposed and developed in parallel with different objectives. For instance, deep neural networks can be used to model information-processing in the brain [94] by comparing their representational content via second-order isomorphisms (e.g. representational similarity analysis) [95]. These models can be used to investigate the plausibility of different computational architectures within cognitive neuroscience [96]. Another example is dynamic causal modelling (DCM), which was developed to make model-based causal inferences from neuroimaging experiments [97]. DCM is based on simulating brain signals under the assumption of different causal interactions and then performing model comparison and selection. Finally, whole-brain models are based on dynamical systems coupled by large-scale anatomical connectivity networks, and are developed to reproduce the statistics of empirical brain signals at multiple scales [98]. We also distinguish whole-brain models from attempts to produce extremely detailed reproductions of large neural circuits (e.g. cortical columns) [99], mainly due to differences in model complexity. Whole-brain models provide a practical, ethical, and inexpensive "digital scalpel", which allows researchers to explore the counterfactual consequences of modifying structural or dynamical aspects of the brain. More generally, whole-brain models build a bridge from local networked dynamics to the large-scale patterns of activity that are addressed by theoretical signatures of consciousness. As such, they represent a valuable tool to narrow the space of mechanistic explanations compatible with the observed neuroimaging data, including data acquired from subjects undergoing different altered states of consciousness. In this section, we provide a brief introduction to whole-brain models to the unfamiliar reader, discussing their various types and the principles behind their tuning to empirical data. Additionally, we review recent articles where these models have been used to shed light on the neurobiological mechanisms underlying different altered states of consciousness. 4.1. What are whole-brain models? Whole-brain models are sets of equations that describe the dynamics and interactions between neural populations in different brain regions. These models typically focus on the joint evolution of a set of key biophysical variables using systems of coupled differential equations (although discrete time step models can also be used, as will be discussed below). These equations can be built from knowledge concerning the biophysical mechanisms underlying different forms of brain activity, or as phenomenological models chosen by the kind of dynamics they produce. Then, local dynamics are combined by in vivo estimates of anatomical connectivity networks. In particular, fMRI, EEG and MEG signals can be used to define the statistical observables, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) can provide information about the structural connectivity between brain regions by means of whole-brain tractography, and PET imaging can inform on metabolism and produce receptor density maps for a given neuromodulator. Most whole-brain models are structured around three basic elements: A. Brain parcellation: A brain parcellation determines the number of regions and the spatial resolution at which the brain dynamics take place. The parcellation may include cortical, sub-cortical, and 8 of 28 Inputs Model Optimization to Fit Empirical Features Tractography Altered States Brain Recordings Bottom-up Whole-Brain Model for Conscious Wakefulness Pharmacological Altered State Parcellation + Local Dynamics Whole-Brain Models for Altered States Endogenous Altered State Pathological Altered State Figure 1. Workflow describing the construction of whole-brain models. First, model inputs are determined based on anatomical connectivity, a brain parcellation (representing a certain coarse graining), and the local dynamics (left). Each region defined by the parcellation is endowed with a specific connectivity profile and local dynamics. Then, the model can be optimised to generate data as similar as possible to the brain activity observed during conscious wakefulness. Generally, this similarity is determined by certain statistical properties of the empirical brain signals, which constitute the target observable. The same or another observable is obtained from subjects during altered states of consciousness and used again as the target of an optimisation algorithm to infer model parameters. Following a given working hypothesis, the model for wakeful consciousness can be perturbed in such a way that optimises the similarity between the target observable for the altered state of consciousness and the data generated by the model. In this way, a whole-brain model for an altered state of consciousness can be used to test working hypotheses about its mechanistic underpinnings. cerebellar regions. Examples of well-known parcellations are the Hagmann parcellation [100], and the automated anatomical labeling (AAL) atlas [101]. B. Anatomical connectivity matrix: This matrix defines the network of connections between brain regions. Most studies are based on the human connectome, obtained by estimating the number of white-matter fibers connecting brain areas from DTI data combined with probabilistic tractography [28]. For control purposes, randomized versions of the connectome (null hypothesis networks) may also be employed. C. Local dynamics: The activity of each brain region is typically determined by the chosen local dynamics plus interaction terms with other regions. A variety of approaches have been proposed to model whole-brain dynamics, including cellular automata [102,103], the Ising spin model [104–106], autoregressive models [107], stochastic linear models [108], non-linear oscillators [109,110], neural field theory [111,112], neural mass models [113,114], and dynamic mean field models [115–117]. A detailed review of the different models that can be explored within this context can be found in [15,29]. 9 of 28 The first two items are guided by available experimental data. In contrast, the choice of local dynamics is usually driven by the phenomena under study and the epistemological context at which the modelling effort takes place. Because of this hybrid nature, whole-brain models constructed following this process are sometimes called semi-empirical models. Whole-brain models can be constructed from in-house code, or more easily from platforms such as The Virtual Brain (https://www.thevirtualbrain.org/tvb/zwei) [30]. 4.2. Examples We showcase two models that have been frequently used to assess mechanistic hypotheses behind both pharmacologically and physiologically-induced altered states of consciousness: the dynamic mean field model [115,116,118], and the model comprised by Stuart-Landau non-linear coupled oscillators [109,110,119]. These examples are chosen to represent a biologically realistic model (dynamic mean field) and a phenomenological model (Stuart-Landau oscillators); moreover, these models have been applied to different states of consciousness, making them pertinent in the context of the present discussion. 4.2.1. Dynamic mean field (DMF) model In this approach, the neuronal activity in a given brain region is represented by a set of differential equations describing the interaction between inhibitory and excitatory pools of neurons [120]. The DMF presents three variables for each population: the synaptic current, the firing rate, and the synaptic gating, where the excitatory coupling is mediated by NMDA receptors and the inhibitory by GABA-A receptors. The interregional coupling is considered excitatory-to-excitatory only, and a feedback inhibition control in the excitatory current equation is included [115]. The output variable of the model is the firing rate of the excitatory population that is then included in a nonlinear hemodynamical model [121] to simulate the regional BOLD signals. The key idea behind the mean-field approximation is to reduce the high-dimensional randomly interacting elements to a system of elements treated as independent. Then, an average external field effectively replaces the interaction with all other elements. Thus, this approach represents the average activity of an homogeneous population of neurons by the activity of a single unit of this class, reducing in this way the dimensionality of the system. In spite of these approximations, the dynamic mean field model incorporates a detailed biophysical description of the local dynamics, which increases the interpretability of the model parameters. 4.2.2. Stuart-Landau non-linear oscillator model This approach builds on the idea that neural activity can exhibit – under suitable conditions – self-sustained oscillations at the population level [102,109,110,119,122]. In this model, the dynamical behaviour is represented by a non-linear oscillator with the addition of Gaussian noise at the proximity of a Hopf bifurcation [123]. By changing a single model parameter (i.e. bifurcation parameter) across a critical value, the model gives rise to three qualitatively different asymptotic behaviours: harmonic oscillations, fixed point dynamics governed by noise, and intermittent complex oscillations when the bifurcation parameter is close to the bifurcation (i.e. at dynamical criticality). Correspondingly, the model is determined by two parameters: the bifurcation parameter of the Hopf bifurcation in the local dynamics, and the coupling strength factor that scales the anatomical connectivity matrix. In contrast to the DMF model, coupled Stuart-Landau non-linear oscillators constitute a phenomenological model, i.e. the model parameter does not map into any biophysically relevant variable. In this case, the model is attractive due to its conceptual simplicity, which is given by its capacity to produce three qualitatively different behaviours of interest by changing a single parameter. 10 of 28 4.3. How to fit whole-brain models to neuroimaging data? Whole-brain models are tuned to reproduce specific features of brain activity. The way in which this is ensured is via optimisation of the free parameters in the local dynamics plus the coupling strength. Parameter values are usually selected such that the model matches a certain statistical observable computed from the experimental data. For example, the DMF whole-brain model introduces one parameter to scale the strength of the connectivity matrix, usually known as the global coupling parameter. During model training, an exhaustive exploration of this parameter is conducted over a wide range of values. The parameter value is chosen to maximise the similarity between the observable computed from simulated and experimental data. For instance, the parameter can be chosen to minimise the Kolmogorov-Smirnov distance between the functional connectivity dynamics (FCD) distributions of the simulated and real data [115]. This kind of brute-force optimisation is employed when the number of free parameters is low (i.e. two or three). However, it is also possible to separately optimise the parameters governing the local dynamics of each node, which dramatically increases the dimensionality of the search space, and thus requires more elaborated optimisation techniques, such as gradient descent [124] or genetic algorithms [119]. The advantage of considering a small set of global parameters resides in its simplicity and scalability, but unfortunately it misses the dynamical heterogeneity among brain regions. These heterogeneities can be modelled at the expense of increasing the parameter space. Essentially, the choice of model complexity (i.e. the number of free parameters) depends on the scientific question and its associated hypotheses. Since adding more free parameters increases the computational cost of the optimisation procedure, it becomes critical to choose parameters reflecting variables that are considered relevant, either from a general neurobiological perspective or in the specific context of the altered state under investigation. Depending on the latter, the parameters could be divided into groups that are allowed to change independently based on different criteria, including structural lesion maps, receptor densities, local gene expression profiles, and parcellations that reflect the neural substrate of certain cognitive functions, among others. After choosing the parcellation, the equations governing the local dynamics and their interaction terms, the interregional coupling given by the structural connectivity matrix, and selecting a criteria to constrain the dimensionality of the parameter space, the last critical step is to define the observable which will be used to construct the target function for the optimisation procedure. As mentioned above, one possibility is to optimise the model to reproduce the statistics of functional connectivity dynamics (FCD). Perhaps a more straightforward option is to optimise the "static" functional connectivity matrix computed over the duration of the complete experiment, an approach followed by Refs. [119] and [110], among others. Other observables related to the collective dynamics can be obtained from the synchrony and metastability, as defined in the context of the Kuramoto model [110,125]. In general, any meaningful computation summarising the spatiotemporal structure of a neuroimaging dataset constitutes a valid observable, with the adequate choice depending on the scientific question and the altered state of consciousness under study. Since different observables can be defined, reflecting both stationary and dynamic aspects of brain activity, a natural question arises: is a given whole-brain model capable of simultaneously reproducing multiple observables within reasonable accuracy? We consider this question to be very relevant, yet at the same time it has been comparatively understudied. For instance, a review of articles using coupled Stuart-Landau oscillators shows that dynamical observables are reproduced when the oscillators operate at dynamical criticality (i.e. near the Hopf bifurcation), yet stationary observables (such as the "static" functional connectivity") are best reproduced for other parameter combinations [110,119,124]. This suggests that exploring bifurcations with higher co-dimensions or even chaotic dynamics unfolding in the proximity 11 of 28 of strange attractors could enable the simultaneous optimisation of several observables, a possibility that is discussed later in this article. Finally, some natural candidates for observables to be fitted by whole-brain models are precisely the high-level signatures of consciousness put forward by theoretical predictions, such as the different measures of information integration, complexity and entropy that were reviewed in the previous section. The objective is to fit whole-brain models using these signatures as target functions and then assess the biological plausibility of the optimal model parameters, which allows to test the consistency of these signatures from a bottom-up perspective. Alternatively, signatures of consciousness can be computed from the model –initially fitted to other observables– and compared to the empirical results. Again, this highlights the need to understand which kind of local dynamics allow the simultaneous reproduction of multiple observables derived from experimental data. 4.4. Whole-brain models applied to the study of consciousness The available evidence suggests that states of consciousness are not determined by activity in individual brain areas, but emerge as a global property of the brain, which in turn is shaped by its large-scale structural and functional organisation [48,126,127]. According to this view, whole-brain models provide a fertile ground to explore how global signatures of different states of consciousness emerge from local dynamics. This promise is already being met, as shown by several recent articles [33,102,109,110,118,119,122,128]. For example, transitions from wakefulness into other states, such as the different stages of human sleep or the state induced by general anaesthetics, have been interpreted as phase transitions in neural mass models and in terms of the collective dynamics of coupled Stuart-Landau oscillators [109,110,119]. Noise-driven systems at dynamical criticality result in dynamics compatible with neuroimaging recordings obtained during conscious wakefulness, and departures from these dynamics better reflect different states of unconsciousness [33,102,122,128–130]. As will be discussed in the following section, the stochastic switching between different attractors results in the kind of metastable behaviour that is characteristic of conscious wakefulness [131]. These results are consistent with the hypothesis of statistical criticality (e.g. proximity to a second order phase transition) as a fundamental principle of brain organization [132]. Even though parallels can be drawn between statistical and dynamical criticality, we limit our discussion to the former since the relationship between both concepts is complicated and beyond the scope of this article. Following the example of the PCI index (which is obtained by perturbing the cortex with TMS and measuring the complexity of the elicited response) [77], whole-brain models can be systematically "perturbed" by incorporating changes into the dynamical equations. The in silico rehearsal of perturbations is useful to test hypotheses concerning which parts of the model are essential to produce different signatures of consciousness. A prominent example of this perturbational analysis applied to whole-brain models can be found in a recent article [118] where a whole-brain model based on coupled Stuart-Landau oscillators was fitted to empirical fMRI data acquired from subjects during deep sleep. The model was then modified by changing local bifurcation parameters with a greedy optimization algorithm, which unveiled the optimal perturbation profile to increase the similarity to a target brain state (in this case, conscious wakefulness). Another relevant example of this perturbational approach is found in Ref. [116], where a transition was shaped by the effects of neuromodulation. The authors investigated the transition from resting state activity acquired under a placebo condition towards the altered state of consciousness induced by the serotonin 2A receptor agonist lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). A dynamical mean-field model was fitted to minimize the difference between FCD of the simulated activity and the empirical data of subjects in the placebo condition, which allowed to determine the optimal value of the global coupling parameter. Then, an empirical map of 5-HT2A receptor density was used to modulate the synaptic gain, 12 of 28 effectively simulating the heterogeneous effects of LSD across the whole brain. As a control, the authors showed that using maps for the density of other serotonin receptor sub-types decreased the goodness of fit, thus corroborating the well-known association between LSD and the 5-HT2A receptor. Another interesting possibility is to assess the consequences of stimulation protocols that are impossible to apply in vivo. An example is the Perturbative Integration Latency Index (PILI) [122], which measures the latency of the return to baseline after a strong perturbation that generates dynamical changes detectable over long temporal scales (on the order of tens of seconds). This in silico perturbative approach allows to systematically investigate how the response of brain activity upon external perturbations is indicative of the state of consciousness, providing new mechanistic insights into the capacity of the human brain to integrate and segregate information over different time scales. In Ref. [119], the authors used a model of coupled Stuart-Landau oscillators to model the regional changes in dynamical stability that occur during the wake-sleep cycle. Brain regions belonging to different resting state networks (RSN) [133] were considered as independent sources of variation for the local model parameters. Using a stochastic optimisation algorithm, the authors represented the transition from wakefulness into deep sleep as a sequence of changes in the stability of brain activity within canonical RSN. A follow-up paper extended this analysis to other states of reduced consciousness (including anaesthesia and patients suffering from disorders of consciousness) and investigated the possibility of inducing transitions to conscious wakefulness by means of simulated periodic stimulation at the resonant frequency of each node in the model [134]. 5. Proposed research agenda 5.1. Motivation Consciousness research is in need of mechanistic accounts to explain why brain signals recorded during different states of consciousness can be consistently characterised by the presence of certain global signatures. Our motivation is not the replacement of the explanations of these signatures provided by theories such as GNW or IIT. Instead, we aim to put forward a framework for their investigation from a bottom-up perspective. Eventually, we expect to converge on the high-level explanations furnished by some of these theories. Our inspiration is partially drawn from statistical thermodynamics, which provides a clear example of how the bottom-up and top-down perspectives can converge into a consistent picture of physical reality. Importantly, in this case the resulting theory remained useful both as a set of phenomenological principles and computational rules (i.e. classical thermodynamics), but also as a framework to establish connections between those principles and the rules governing the microscopic properties of matter. Following this concept, we strive to use our current knowledge about neural dynamics to produce models whose behaviour agrees with the constraints of some theories formulated from a top-down perspective, while weakening the support for others as a result of inconsistent predictions. Here it becomes important to clarify our intended meaning of the word "prediction". When it comes to complex systems such as the brain, predictions are considered possible only in a statistical sense [132]. Accordingly, we do not expect that the time series generated by computational models directly correspond to their empirical counterparts; however, we can expect a match for statistical observables. This motivates our study of altered states of consciousness, since their extended temporal duration guarantees the possibility of extracting robust statistical characterisations from multivariate neuroimaging recordings. An example of this characterisation is the matrix derived from computing all pairwise correlations between regional time series, which is considered a marker of inter-areal functional connectivity (sometimes referred to as the "functional connectome") [135]. We consider that whole-brain 13 of 28 computational models have been developed to a point where they contain sufficient empirical ingredients to predict the second-order statistics of brain activity. Thus, the field is ripe to welcome a framework which may provide solid ground to investigate signatures of consciousness from a mechanistic perspective. The following example is aimed to motivate the proposal we put forward in the next section. We know that activity within a network of brain regions including the fronto-parietal cortex is correlated with conscious experience [8,62,136–138]. On the other hand, conscious experience is also characterised by signatures such as information integration, entropy and neural complexity. Is it possible to determine the causal role that these anatomical regions play in the generation of these signatures of consciousness by means of computational models? 5.2. Proposal The principal idea behind our proposal is that whole-brain models can be used to test hypotheses concerning the mechanistic and causal underpinnings of different states of consciousness. We do not expect that whole-brain models are sufficiently advanced to identify those precise mechanisms; however, we propose that they can contribute to narrow the space of possible mechanistic explanations, therefore complementing current theories of consciousness from a bottom-up perspective. The fundamental objective of this research program is to foster the development of this novel approach to study altered states of consciousness. Our framework rests upon the complementary nature of three key ingredients: experimental data obtained through neuroimaging experiments, theoretical approaches to characterise signatures of consciousness, and bottom-up whole-brain computational models. The application of modern neuroimaging techniques to the study of signatures of consciousness has provided very effective tools to predict the brain activity patterns that are associated with different states of consciousness. However, as René Thom famously stated "to predict is not to explain" [139]. Hence, we now turn to the discussion of how models could bridge the gap between prediction and explanation. The proposed framework to model altered states of consciousness is based on adjusting three independent variables (see Figure 2): A. Connectome: Is the state of consciousness implicated with local or diffuse structural abnormalities? This is frequently the case for neurological conditions such as coma and post-comatose disorders of consciousness (e.g. unresponsive wakefulness syndrome, minimally conscious state) [140]. Also, subtler structural modifications can be implicated in certain psychiatric conditions presenting episodes of altered consciousness, such as different forms of schizophrenia [141]. B. Modulation: Is the state of consciousness a consequence of neuromodulatory changes, either endogenous or induced externally by means of pharmacological manipulation? Two typical examples are the altered states of consciousness induced by psychedelics/dissociatives, which are linked to agonism/antagonism at serotonin/glutamate receptors [142]. Certain psychiatric conditions are believed to arise as a consequence of neuromodulatory imbalances, e.g. dopaminergic imbalances are believed to play an important role in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia [143]. Most anaesthetic drugs reduce the complexity of the brain activity by targeting specific neuromodulatory sites, such as those activated by gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) [144]. Finally, sleep is a state of reduced consciousness triggered by activity in monoaminergic neurons with diffuse projections throughout the brain [145]. C. Dynamics: Is the altered state of consciousness captured by well-understood dynamical mechanisms? Does the model include parametrically controlled external perturbations? While changes in the local excitation/inhibition balance are ultimately caused by neurochemical processes, they are best understood in terms of their dynamical consequences. States such as epilepsy, deep sleep and general anaesthesia are believed to involve unbalanced excitation/inhibition [146]. In some cases, dynamics 14 of 28 Structural Connectivity Connectome Dynamics DOC Coma Neuromodulation sy Ep ile p Pharmacology Anesthesia Receptor Density Sleep ia Neurostimulation n re Conscious Wakefulness ph zo hi Sc Local Dynamics and Perturbations Modulation Figure 2. Representation of the three key variables that can be modified to construct whole-brain models of different altered states of consciousness. These variables correspond to local dynamics, anatomical connectivity, and priors related to neuromodulatory systems necessary to accommodate physiological, pathological and pharmacologically-induced altered states of consciousness. Certain states may require the modification of multiple variables; for instance, focal seizures and propofol-induced anaesthesia are both associated with low complexity patterns of brain activity, yet in the first case these dynamics reflect structural abnormalities, while in the second case they reflect the activation of certain inhibitory pathways. may be sufficiently idiosyncratic to be captured by low dimensional phenomenological models, as in the case of certain forms of epileptic activity [147]. Finally, local dynamics could be modified to simulate the effects of external neurostimulation [118,134]. Depending on the answers to these questions, the whole-brain model should incorporate changes to anatomical connectivity, local dynamics, or include empirical receptor density maps to add a new layer of neurobiological detail. 5.3. What can we learn? The dynamics of whole-brain models can be perturbed arbitrarily. This is significant since it allows to explore different mechanisms leading to the observed empirical dynamics (as described in a previous paragraph) and to explore how external stimulation can force transitions between states of consciousness, including the clinically relevant case of displacing whole-brain models from unconscious states towards wakefulness [118,134]. Therapeutic alternatives to accelerate the recovery of DOC patients are scarce, and while some studies support the therapeutic role of external electrical stimulation [148], very little is known about the optimal choice of stimulation sites and parameters. Whole-brain models could be 15 of 28 useful for the optimization of stimulation protocols, as well as for assisting in clinical decision making. Localized stimulation and/or resection of neural tissue are surgical alternatives to treat certain severe forms of epilepsy, and whole-brain models have been explored with success to predict the outcome of these interventions [149]. The same concept could apply to the development and in silico testing of new pharmaceuticals to treat psychiatric conditions, where whole-brain models could be used to reverse-engineer the optimal receptor affinity profiles required to restore statistical signatures of healthy brain dynamics. Finally, the combination of data produced by whole-brain models and machine learning classifiers could be useful for data augmentation in the context of automated diagnosis of rare neurological diseases [150], and to generate input for deep learning architectures (e.g. variational autoencoders) capable of representing altered states of consciousness as trajectories within a low dimensionality latent space. [151]. 5.4. Case study: modelling neural entropy increases induced by psychedelics To further highlight what we can learn from whole-brain models, we discuss an illustrative example of a bottom-up model that successfully matches a global signature of altered conscious [152]. Using the DMF model optimised to fit the FCD of placebo and LSD conditions [116], a significant entropy increase of brain signals was found in LSD vs. placebo as a consequence of simulated 5-HT2A receptor activation. Thus, the model was capable of identifying a low-level (i.e. molecular scale) mechanism leading to increased neural entropy, which is a robust signature of the psychedelic state [33,63]. Since activation of the 5-HT2A receptor is causally implicated with the conscious state induced by serotonergic psychedelics [142,153,154], the effect of the drug was modelled as a local change in the non-linearity of the regional firing rate. This change was proportional to the local density of 5-HT2A receptors as determined by PET imaging. Brain entropy increases during the psychedelic state were the result of heterogeneous changes in the entropy of the regional firing rates (i.e. some regions increased while others decreased their entropy). These changes in firing rate entropy depended both on the local anatomical connectivity and the 5-HT2A receptor density. Thus, starting from local dynamics describing the behaviour of coupled excitatory and inhibitory pools of neurons, and introducing a perturbation which reflects serotonergic activation, the model provided a bottom-up confirmation of 5-HT2A activation as the source of increased neural entropy during the psychedelic state. In the context of Fig. 2, the model adopted changes in local dynamics (bottom left) informed by empirical maps of 5-HT2A receptor density (bottom right). 6. Future directions 6.1. What should be the "bottom" of bottom-up models? The question of the ultimate substrate of consciousness is part of a long-standing philosophical debate, with positions including functionalism (the substrate is irrelevant insofar it instantiates the adequate set of causal relationships) [38], biological naturalism (the view that consciousness arises as a consequence of biochemical processes in the brain) [155], and proposals of consciousness as a manifestation of quantum mechanics [156]. Even though we choose to sidestep this complicated discussion, our modest aim of building bottom-up models of brain activity still requires the specification of some physical or biological substrate, which in turn determines the level of realism displayed by the equations that govern local dynamics. Many signatures of consciousness are directly related to the global complexity of brain dynamics, reflecting the widespread hypothesis that consciousness plays an integrative role in the brain [127]. According to this hypothesis, consciousness could be considered a dynamical process "gluing" together 16 of 28 the output of specialised neural circuits. While tampering with these circuits could modify some specific contents of consciousness, only the disruption of large-scale neural communication would result in a state of altered or reduced consciousness. Since this view disregards the contribution of specific computations that are implemented in local neural circuitry, we could expect that bottom-up models capable of reproducing an adequate set of canonical dynamics3 will suffice to span the spectrum of signatures of altered consciousness. Conversely, it could be that the large-scale dynamics that support inter-areal communication at the same time interact and shape local information processing, and vice-versa. In this case, we expect that increasingly complex and biologically realistic models will be needed to advance with our proposal. This crucial point results in a ramification within our proposal to investigate altered states of consciousness using whole-brain models. On one hand, models could be enriched by increasingly detailed and sophisticated sources of empirical information with the purpose of linking signatures of consciousness to the biophysical details of neural activity. This direction is already suggested by studies modelling the effects of 5-HT2A activation using receptor density maps produced by PET imaging [116,152]. Following this direction, future models could be expanded to include fine-grained details of local wiring patterns, different cell types and their projections, as well as their interaction with diffuse neuromodulatory systems. However, as complexity is increased, the conceptual interpretation of models becomes less clear. On the other hand, it is known that dynamical systems may exhibit canonical behaviours when their solutions undergo changes in their qualitative behaviour (i.e. bifurcations) [157]. Recent work fitting whole-brain models to the results of fMRI experiments suggests that bifurcations play a key role in the reproduction of the second-order statistics of empirical data [102,109,110,119,122]. This occurs because noisy dynamics close to a bifurcation point switches between different attractors, producing rich and complex dynamics typical of brain signals. This observation raises the question of whether more complex models reproduce the statistics of empirical observables by virtue of their universal behaviour near bifurcation points, or as a consequence of their stationary solutions away from dynamical criticality. 6.2. Transitions between canonical dynamics as primitives to construct whole-brain models Contrary to the dictum by Norbert Wiener ("The best material model of a cat is another, or preferably the same, cat") we propose that even if vast sources of biological information can be incorporated into whole-brain models, striving for such level of detail defeats the purpose of unveiling concrete and interpretable mechanisms underlying signatures of consciousness. Thus, we suggest that models could be classified by the kind of large-scale activity patterns they are capable of generating. In other words, we propose that the "bottom" of bottom-up models should not be related to the scale of the biological substrate, but to the minimal set of simple dynamical behaviours necessary to reproduce a certain signature of consciousness. Paralleling the definition of NCC given by Crick and Koch [4,5], we could introduce the "dynamical correlates of consciousness" (DCC); but we opt to not introduce yet another acronym in an already crowded field. Interestingly, Batterman has suggested that multiple realizability, the "metaphysical mystery" that troubled Jerry Fodor, among other great philosophers of the mind, is as mysterious as the observation that physical matter behaves in ways which are entirely independent from the vast majority of its details [158]. For a typical example consider a pendulum, whose behaviour is described by the same differential equation regardless of the colour of the swinging bob. Furthermore, in the small amplitude regime all systems with 3 Here, canonical dynamics refers to dynamics in the proximity of a class of topologically equivalent attractors. The reader should think of the result of simplifying the equations into the normal forms corresponding to the bifurcations present in the system [157]. 17 of 28 an U-shaped energy landscape can be approximated by an harmonic solution, with examples ranging from electrical circuits to orbital mechanics. Northoff and colleagues have argued that the spatiotemporal dynamics constitutes the fundamental substrate underlying human consciousness [159], which resonates with Batterman’s proposal, as well as with our suggestion that the "bottom" (i.e. the maximum necessary level of detail) is best understood as a comprehensive list of the dynamical behaviours that the system can display. We postpone taking a stance towards these metaphysical speculations, and proceed to develop these ideas in the context of building useful bottom-up models in the future. A set of qualitatively different dynamics is provided in Fig. 3, illustrating a Takens-Bogdanov bifurcation diagram [160]. Whole-brain models can be constructed by coupling the dynamics given as an equation in the inset (left panel) either by variables x, y, or both. The equation and its solutions depend on two parameters, α and β. Under the weak coupling assumption, modifying these two parameters will result in qualitative changes in the local dynamics (where these changes occur in the diagram could be modified by the coupling strength). For uncoupled dynamics, parameter combinations at points a, c, e result in a stable constant level of activity (i.e. fixed point dynamics). Parameter combinations at points b, d, f give rise to oscillations of different spectral content (i.e. limit cycles). In the right panel of Fig. 3, the solutions can be visualised either as time series or as two dimensional diagrams known as phase portraits, where each axis corresponds to a variable (in this case, x and y) and the arrows stand for the vector field (in this case, ẋ and ẏ). Insofar the bifurcations in the left panel of Fig. 3 are not crossed, changes in the parameters α and β only result in deformations of the phase portrait, representing solutions that are equivalent in a qualitative sense (more formally, the phase portraits are topologically equivalent). Crossing a bifurcation results in an abrupt change that cannot be understood as a small deformation of the phase portrait, implying a qualitatively different behaviour of the system. The richness of coupling this kind of simple dynamical models stems from the possibility of inducing stochastic transitions across bifurcations by incorporating an additive noise term. In this way, dynamics switch intermittently between two qualitatively different solutions. In the case of the Hopf bifurcation, for instance, noise-driven dynamics at the bifurcation point are neither stable nor oscillatory, but present complex amplitude fluctuations [124]. The noise-driven exploration of a system’s attractor space is a mainstay of computational neuroscience [161] and could represent an useful methodological resource to build whole-brain models to explore altered states of consciousness. Following the pioneering work of Deco and colleagues [124], the most frequently explored transition is between stable noise-driven dynamics and self-sustained harmonic oscillations, corresponding to the Hopf bifurcation (vertical red line in Fig. 3), which appears in Stuart-Landau nonlinear oscillators. At the bifurcation point, dynamics show the kind of complexity that is compatible with certain signatures of consciousness, with departures from this point being reported for states of reduced consciousness such as sleep and anaesthesia [110,118,119,122] (as it is clear from Fig. 3, however, this bifurcation is only one among multiple possibilities). The upper panel of Fig. 4 illustrates this situation by presenting the phase space and temporal evolution of a noise-driven Stuart-Landau nonlinear oscillator near dynamical criticality. The signal evolves with complex amplitude fluctuations as noise drives the dynamics across the bifurcation. Also, at dynamical criticality small fluctuations tend to be amplified [110,124], thus whole-brain models far from criticality reproduce the lack of sustained and complex responses to external perturbations seen in states of reduced consciousness [77]. The inclusion of noise in whole-brain models raises questions concerning the mechanisms that endow biological systems with stochastic dynamics [161]. Again, we postpone these difficult questions in lieu of more practical considerations, and propose that noise-driven equilibrium dynamics increase interpretability at the expense of two main shortcomings. First, parameter fine-tuning is required to pose dynamics near dynamical criticality. As discussed above, optimisation procedures can be applied to obtain the parameters which best reproduce certain empirical observables. However, the biological variables 18 of 28 Figure 3. Left panel: Takens-Bogdanov bifurcation diagram, which is obtained by changing parameters α and β in the normal form equations (included as an inset). Depending on the combination of parameters, this simple dynamical system can present qualitatively different solutions. The green line stands for a saddle-node bifurcation, where two equilibrium points collide and disappear. Crossing the red line results in a Hopf bifurcation, where dynamics switch from a fixed point to stable harmonic oscillations. The dashed line represents a homoclinic bifurcation, where the limit cycle collides with a saddle point resulting again in steady dynamics. Right panel: The phase portraits a-f illustrate the dynamics at different regions of the bifurcation diagram, with individual trajectories highlighted in red and presented both as curves in phase space and as time series. a) Stable fixed point, b) Self-sustained harmonic oscillation after the appearance of a stable limit cycle, c) Three fixed points appear due to a saddle-node bifurcation, resulting in a stable fixed point, d) One of the stable fixed points loses its stability and dynamics undergo a Hopf bifurcation, e) The limit cycle undergoes a homoclinic bifurcation, f) A saddle-node on a limit cycle (SNIC) bifurcation occurs, resulting in periodic dynamics with complex spectral content. For a detailed description of the Takens-Bogdanov bifurcation see Ref. [160]. Left panel adapted from Ref. [162]. captured by the optimal combination of parameters could change upon small perturbations, leading to models that always predict intrinsically unstable states of consciousness. The second problem is that once parameters are optimised to reproduce a certain observable, other different observables could be poorly captured by the model, thus questioning the extent to which the model is adequately describing the empirical data. We propose that both problems could be simultaneously addressed by exploring non-stochastic models of chaotic coupled oscillators, such as Rossler oscillators. In this model, dynamics unfold near a strange attractor with positive Lyapunov exponent for a comparatively ample range of parameters [163]. Thus, complex dynamics do not depend on a bifurcation parameter taking a precise value, but instead arise over an extended range of parameter values. This kind of phenomenological models of whole-brain activity is comparatively understudied, and could represent a valuable target for future developments. 7. Final remarks The history of science shows an intensive ongoing debate about the position of scientific inquires with respect to the study of consciousness. As a matter of fact, until recently the largest part of the scientific community did not consider consciousness as a suitable topic for investigation. While the ultimate nature of consciousness is still full of mysteries, it is evident that deepening our knowledge of the mechanistic, statistical, and dynamical relationships within the brain in its different possible states of consciousness can only increase our understanding of the relationship between mind and body. 19 of 28 Figure 4. Upper panel: Phase space of a single Stuart-Landau nonlinear oscillator near dynamical criticality (Hopf bifurcation) with an additive noise term. The radius of the limit cycle fluctuates unpredictably, resulting in complex signal amplitude modulations. Bottom panel: Phase space of a chaotic Rossler oscillation in a regime with positive Lyapunov exponent, without the addition of noise. Dynamics unfold in the proximity of a strange attractor, which results in complex but deterministic dynamics. A key factor supporting the modern discipline of consciousness research is the extraordinary development of neuroimaging technologies that occurred over the last decades, which plays a similar fundamental role than the one played by telescopes in the discovery of the nature of the solar system. However, making progress in the problem of consciousness not only depends on technological advances, but also on our capacity to explore and chart the contents and boundaries of consciousness itself. Consciousness research needs neuroimaging as much as any other branch of human neuroscience, but also needs to devise and explore new methods to induce altered states of consciousness, and to break through arbitrary regulatory restrictions preventing the exploration of certain older but very powerful research tools [164,165]. These technological advances, matched with increases in computational capability, and a renewed appreciation of the role that altered states of consciousness play in scientific research, have prepared a fertile ground for whole-brain models to open a new window of research possibilities. In effect, while much progress has been made during the last decades in the problem of identifying top-down signatures of consciousness, most of these tools have not yet reached a stage of maturity to allow clinical applications. We expect that pursuing the problem from a different perspective will be invigorating for the field as a whole, increasing the appreciation for the role that low-level biological mechanisms play in the emergence of high-level signatures of consciousness. Consciousness research is not alone in its need for low-level mechanistic explanations. The project of formulating psychiatric diagnosis in biological terms [166] will require a systematic exploration of the low-level mechanisms giving rise to the behavioural manifestations of mental disorders [167,168]. We expect that many of the ideas and methods here proposed will seamlessly translate into the field of 20 of 28 computational psychiatry, even for the study of disorders which do not include altered consciousness as a defining feature (e.g. depression). In the same way that scientific inquiry has eventually succeeded explaining seemingly mysterious phenomena such as heat (in terms of kinetic considerations), combustion (in terms of chemical reactions) and genes (in terms of molecular replication), it is reasonable to expect that consciousness will also be explainable someday in mechanistic terms. If this is to happen, the perspective of bottom-up modelling is likely to play a crucial role, as it was the case for the three aforementioned examples. It is our hope that the present proposal will serve both as an encouragement and as a roadmap to invest future research efforts in the computational modelling of altered states of consciousness. Author Contributions: Conceptualization, R.C., R.H., P.A.M.M, F.E.R, Y.S.P and E.T; methodology, R.C., R.H., P.A.M.M, F.E.R, Y.S.P and E.T; writing–original draft preparation, R.C., R.H., P.A.M.M, F.E.R, J.P, Y.S.P and E.T; writing–review and editing R.C., R.H., P.A.M.M, F.E.R, J.P, Y.S.P, and E.T Funding: R.C. was supported by Fondecyt Iniciación 2018 Proyecto 11181072. R.H. was funded by CONICYT scholarship CONICYT-PFCHA/Doctorado Nacional/2018-21180428. P.M. was funded by the Wellcome Trust (grant no. 210920/Z/18/Z). F.R. was supported by the Ad Astra Chandaria Foundation. E.T. and Y.S.P. were supported by ANPCyT (Argentina), grant PICT-2018-03103 Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest. Abbreviations The following abbreviations are used in this manuscript: NCC DMF fMRI BOLD PET DTI EEG MEG IIT GNW EBH LZc FCD PCI TMS PILI LSD AAL DOC GABA RSN Neural correlates of consciousness Dynamic mean field Functional magnetic resonance imaging Blood oxygen level–dependent Positron emission tomography Diffusion tensor imaging Electroencephalography Magnetoencephalography Integrated Information Theory Global neuronal workspace Entropic brain hypothesis Lempel-Ziv complexity Functional connectivity dynamics Perturbational complexity index Transcranial magnetic stimulation Perturbative Integration Latency Index Lysergic acid diethylamide Automated anatomical labelling Disorder of consciousness Gamma-aminobutyric acid Resting-state networks References 1. 2. LeDoux, J.E.; Michel, M.; Lau, H. A little history goes a long way toward understanding why we study consciousness the way we do today. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2020, 117, 6976–6984. Seth, A.K. 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1030 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Article The Matter of Mindnature: Bell’s Theorem Tolls for Dogmatic ‘Middle Way’ Scepticism and Rings Out for ‘Experimental Metaphysics’ and ‘Quantum Mindnature’ Graham P. Smetham* * Correspondence: Graham Smetham, http://www.quantumbuddhism.com E-mail:graham@quantumbuddhism.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1031 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Like the waves of the ocean, set in motion under windy conditions, Arising like a dance – and there is no interruption – The stream of basic Mindnature is in a similar manner set Constantly in motion by the wind of cognitive objects And the varied waves of consciousness arise as in a dance.1 Abstract In recent years there has developed a movement in the West which seeks to convince people that the original teachings of the Buddha were far more mundane than his later followers would have us believe. An extreme recent example of this is the book The Trouble with Buddhism in which Dr. Robert Ellis claims that every Buddhist who has ever lived has been ‘scandalously” confused about the central doctrines of Buddhism, especially the ‘Middle Way’ philosophy, which is a central teaching of all Buddhist schools. He also claims that if one takes Humean scepticism ‘seriously’, as he thinks one should do, it follows that it is impossible to know anything with any certainty. Metaphysics therefore become a ‘foolish’ dream. In fact according to Ellis it is “foolish” to think that quantum physics supplies “evidence about the universe itself.” This article considers Ellis’s claims regarding metaphysics and physics in detail, particularly focusing on the implications of the quantum violation of Bell’s theorem, in order to show that we must be sceptical of extreme scepticism. Keywords: Metaphysics, ‘Reality’, scepticism, dogmatism, Buddhist philosophy, Bell’s theorem, quantum non-locality, Madhyamaka, the ‘Middle Way,’ Hume, Popper, Kuhn, Feyerabend, Nagarjuna, Dzogchen, Matter, Mindnature. In his book The Trouble with Buddhism Dr. Robert Ellis makes some startling and controversial assertions. According to Ellis every Buddhist who has ever lived, including perhaps the Buddha, he is not clear on this point, has been “scandalously” confused about the central doctrines of Buddhism, especially the ‘Middle Way’ philosophy, and he also opines that it is “foolish” to think that quantum physics supplies “evidence about the universe itself.” Quantum physics, Ellis tells us: …may cast doubt on some previously held views about material reality, but does not tell us anything at all about Reality.2 So it would appear that, according to Ellis ‘material reality’ is not part of, or indicative in any way of the nature of, ‘Reality’. In this article, along with parts of my other articles in this issue which elucidate aspects of Buddhist metaphysics in detail, I shall investigate this and related issues in order to determine where the f-word really applies. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1032 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature In his outline of the philosophical scepticism which is supposed to underlie Ellis’s personal version of the ‘Middle Way’ philosophy, which he seems to consider to have been misunderstood by, perhaps, the Buddha and, definitely, all subsequent Buddhists, he tells us that “the insights of classical scepticism as to the limitations of our knowledge are important ones, shared with Hindu and Buddhist thought, and stimulating much later Western philosophy by issuing a profound challenge to it.”3 Indeed it is precisely because a lot of philosophical moves that Ellis employs are derived from a distorted understanding of Buddhist philosophy that his thought provides a strange territory for a Buddhist philosopher, like looking at a beautiful landscape through a monstrously distorting lens. The thoroughgoing scepticism required by his version of the Middle Way’, he says, is based on arguments like the following: As finite beings occupying a limited point in space, the information that we have access to is always necessarily limited. Given our limited mental capacities, it is unlikely that the concepts we form are capable of accurate representation of reality. Our senses are limited in what they can detect (for example, we only see objects that reflect light between certain wavelengths), so we cannot gain true perceptions of objects through the senses, since we might be missing crucial features. Given evidence and arguments for one belief, alternative evidence and arguments that appear to support opposing beliefs can always be found. Our conceptual frameworks for understanding the world are limited by our cultural and linguistic background. No conclusive proof can be offered that one’s current experience (or any given past experience) is not illusory. You may be dreaming at this moment. Given how often we have made mistakes in the past and had to alter our beliefs, it seems likely that we will make more mistakes and have to alter them again. At least some of our current beliefs thus seem likely to be mistaken, and we do not know in advance which ones.4 On the basis of taking such arguments ‘seriously’ Ellis tells us we must reach a thoroughgoing ‘agnostic scepticism’ rather than a ‘negative metaphysics’; and his form of ‘agnostic scepticism’ is indeed radical: Agnosticism is the recognition that we don't know, and it can be applied to every possible belief. For beliefs about things that lie beyond our experience we can have no evidence, and thus it is clear that we cannot know about them. For beliefs about things that lie within experience there is still plenty of room for doubt, because any assertions we make on the basis of our experience are limited in their justification by the limitations of our senses, the limitations of our viewpoint, and the limitations of our prior assumptions and categories for interpreting our experience. … Agnosticism is thus the most balanced and rational response to the lack of total justification for our beliefs: we may not know anything, and we cannot and should not affirm either that we know or that we do not know.5 Remarkably however, as anyone who goes on to Dr. Ellis’s website, moralobjectivity.net, will quickly see, he seems to think that he ‘knows’ quite a lot. Even though Ellis suggests we must extend radical doubt to that which lies both beyond experience and within experience, which is pretty much every possible kind of experience and non-experience, he at the same time claims that he knows that: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1033 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature … we may not know anything, and we cannot and should not affirm either that we know or that we do not know.6 But, immediately, we know that he cannot know this; for how can anyone know that there is no possibility of that very knowing without undermining the very possibility of knowing the lack of knowing? According to Ellis the term ‘knowing’ as used in Western analytic philosophy employs a ‘conventional account of 'knowledge',’ which simply uses the term in a ‘weakened’ sense’ which “distracts our attention from the extent of our ignorance”, and because of this we need to maintain a strong definition of knowledge so “that we can fully appreciate that we may know nothing.”7 So obviously we need to know Ellis’s “strong” definition of knowledge. However it seems that we are not given a direct definition (not on his ‘concepts’ page anyhow); his implied definition is lumped in with his discussion of ‘metaphysical agnosticism’ a term which means that we cannot ‘know’ anything, which also means that we should not be able to ‘know’ that ‘metaphysical agnosticism’ is the correct way of ‘knowing.’ But according to Ellis, although we cannot ‘know’ anything, what we can have is ‘incremental’ ‘justifications’. ‘Justification’ says Ellis, is ‘incremental’ whereas, according to him, ‘knowledge’ is all or nothing, we either know the absolute reality of something or we do not. This is an important point, for if one uses or understands the term ‘knowledge’, as most people do, on a sliding scale depending upon context, one runs into problems with Ellis for whom knowledge seems to be all or nothing: Agnosticism does not remove the possibility of justification from our beliefs, because justification, unlike knowledge, is an incremental term which can be calibrated in relation to experience. Justification depends on the extent to which we have removed the conditions of ignorance which prevent us from assessing our experience objectively. The conditions of ignorance include the assumptions either that we "know", or that we "don't know" about what we are dealing with, when all we actually have access to is degrees of justification.8 This is an important insight which we will return to when we come to consider how physics has come to ‘know’ various ‘metaphysical’ things about ‘reality’ through an ‘incremental’ process. But for the moment it is important to note that one problem with Ellis’s perspective, which is implied by the preceding sentence, is that, at least on the surface, it looks as if what Ellis is doing is simply rearranging language use, replacing the term ‘justification’ for the term ‘knowledge’ as used in its weak contextual sense, whilst presenting his philosophy as some radical new discovery, the discovery of the real ‘Middle Way’, as opposed to the incompetent Buddhist version. Ellis claims that he (almost alone it would seem) practices the ‘non-dogmatic’ true ‘Middle Way’. This is his own personal ‘discovery’ of the true ‘Middle Way’, which is a central, yet, according to him, misunderstood by Buddhists, notion within the Buddhist tradition. Indeed Ellis’s presentation of his ‘Middle Way’ seems to imply it is a discovered metaphysical entity, like a mathematical truth which was eternally destined to be just the way he describes it. Furthermore, according to Ellis, all Buddhists have and still do misdescribe it. Thus in a talk given to the men’s order of the FWBO (Friends of the Western Buddhist Order) entitled ‘The death of metaphysics and the birth of the Middle Way’, Ellis tells his listeners that “after applying central insights of Buddhism to Western philosophy and other Western thought” he “discovered” results that seemed “radical and important”9. And part of his ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1034 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature discovery seems to concern the fact that, as he phrases this insight in his later book The Trouble with Buddhism: …at the very starting point of Buddhism, there are confusions to clear up. These confusions suggest to me that the Buddhist betrayal of its own insights is no recent phenomenon, but started very early on in its history or was perhaps even there in confusions from the beginning.10 So his claim is that all Buddhists, and possibly the Buddha himself (although in email correspondence he has backtracked somewhat from this claim) are desperately confused about the real ‘Middle Way’. His discovered reformulation, however, provides the real philosophical ‘Middle Way’, and this remedies a ‘scandalous’ ‘betrayal’ or ‘confusion’ within the Buddhist tradition. But, as we shall see, it is the claims made by Ellis concerning the incompetence, intellectual confusion and general weakness of insight on the part of Buddhists which are, indeed, scandalous. The notion of the ‘Middle Way’ (‘Madhyamaka’ or sometimes ‘Madhyamika’11), is indeed central within Buddhist practice and philosophy. The Buddhist scholar T, R.V. Murti wrote a significant book about it called The Central Philosophy of Buddhism: A Study of the Madhyamaka; and in this work Murti clearly considers the Madhyamaka to be a form of metaphysics as he contrasts it with other Indian philosophies of the nature of the absolute, the Buddhist Vijnanavada or Consciousness-Only metaphysics and the Hindu Vedanta: In all these systems the absolute is transcendent, totally devoid of empirical determinations .... The Absolute is immanent too, being the reality of appearance. The Absolute is the phenomena in their essential form.12 And in his fundamental definition of the approach of the ‘middle way’ Murti specifically indicates that it is not a form of scepticism: The middle path is the avoidance of both the dogmatism of realism (the reality of objects) and the scepticism of Nihilism (the rejection of objects and consciousness both as unreal).13 It must be admitted however that Ellis’s use of the term ‘scepticism’ is not the same as Murti’s; Ellis’s view would seem to be that we cannot assert realism, nihilism or anything else with certainly. In the earliest Buddhist teachings of the Pali Canon the notion of the Middle Way applied primarily to the manner of practice. The Buddha had spent some time practicing intense ascetic austerities in pursuit of ‘enlightenment’, which is the direct and unmediated knowledge of the nature of ‘Reality.’ He eventually decided that it was mistaken to think that extreme mortification of the body was the correct method and therefore, once he had achieved enlightenment (according to traditional Buddhism), he went on to teach a middle course of lifestyle which steered between excessive indulgence and excessive asceticism. The idea was that the body should be kept in a healthy condition in order to provide the basis for meditative practice leading to direct insight into the nature of ‘Reality’. But in the early Pali Canon the notion that the ‘middle way’ was a metaphysics which avoided metaphysical extremes was clearly evident. Thus Ajahn Payutto (‘Ajahn’ indicates a Theravadin monk of some standing so if Ellis is correct we must brace ourselves for some form of ‘betrayal’) in his exposition of the ‘middle teaching’ of the Pali Canon tells us that: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1035 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature This Right View is a very balanced kind of view, one which does not tend to extremes. Thus the principle of Dependent Origination is a law which teaches the truth in a median and unbiased way, known as the Middle Teaching. The ‘medianness’ of this truth is more clearly understood when it is compared with other teachings … the principle of Dependent Origination differs from these extreme views…14 The principle of Dependent Origination and the early doctrine of the ‘middle avoiding extremes’ is elucidated in detail in another article in this issue (The ‘Epiontic’ Dependently Originating Process of Cyclic Existence According to Early Buddhist Metaphysics). The point necessary for the present is that the ‘right view’ of the ‘middle teaching’ of the early Pali Canon avoided extreme views of many kinds, but one central pair of extreme views highlighted are those of absolute ‘existence’ and absolute ‘non-existence’. This teaching became central within Buddhist Madhyamaka philosophy after the remarkable philosophical work of the second century C.E. Buddhist philosopher-practitioner, or ‘madhyamika’ (a practitioner of the Madhyamaka), Nagarjuna. Nagarjuna is considered by the Mahayana tradition to be one of the greatest philosophers of the tradition but according to Ellis’s his work “illustrates very well the Buddhist tradition’s betrayal of its own insights”15. The Madhyamaka emphasized that the ultimate nature of ‘Reality’, as far as it can be expressed conceptually, lies neither in ‘permanence’ nor in ‘annihilation’, it neither ‘exists’ nor does it ‘not exist’, in a sense it hovers between the two. Thus, as the Madhyamika Bhavaviveka (1st-2nd century) indicated the character of reality is: Neither existent, nor nonexistent Nor both existent and nonexistent, nor neither. …true reality …is free from these four possibilities.16 Which is a formulation which anticipates in a remarkable fashion the discoveries of modern quantum theory, for as the eminent quantum physicist Giancarlo Ghirardi, in his book Sneaking a Look at God’s Cards, clearly indicates, this paradoxical existential configuration lies at the heart of the quantum situation. When describing the existential possibility configuration for a quantum chair, i.e. a chair considered as a quantum object, he writes: What meaning can there be in a state that makes it illegitimate to think that our chair is either here or in some other place? … only potentialities exist about the location of the chair, potentialities that cannot be realized, unless we carry out a measurement of position? How can it be understood that, attached to these potentialities, is a nonepistemic probability that in a subsequent measurement of position the chair will be found here or there (which is equivalent to asserting that, before the measurement was carried out, the chair could be neither here nor there, nor in both places, nor in neither place)?17 The (in the original) italicized word ‘nonepistemic’ is emphasized because the situation of ‘hovering’ between possibilities of existence is not a matter of our lack of knowledge; it is the ontological condition of the quantum entity. The Buddhist metaphysical employment of the notion of the ‘Middle Way’ then led them to assert the same metaphysical existential configuration to fundamental ‘Reality’ as quantum physics. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1036 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature According to Ellis, however, all such insights concerning the metaphysical nature of reality are deeply mistaken because the ‘Middle Way’ approach must involve metaphysical agnosticism: …all claims to knowledge (or to its absence) are metaphysical, and the Middle Way involves systematic navigation between positive and negative metaphysical claims. The practice of the Middle Way thus begins with agnosticism as an underlying attitude, and is undermined by claims to knowledge of any kind. Instead, the practice of the Middle Way requires the use only of provisional claims.18 So, whereas all the great Buddhist practitioners and scholars consider that Bhavaviveka, and his colleague Nagarjuna, were making claims about both the nature of conceptuality and the metaphysical nature of ‘Reality’, Ellis considers the ‘Middle Way’ is chained to metaphysical ‘agnosticism’. Furthermore Ellis identifies any claim to knowledge (or its absence) with metaphysics, which he defines as follows: The term 'metaphysics' comes from a Greek word coined by Aristotle, and meaning the study of things beyond the physical world. However, the physical world in itself is beyond our experience - all we have access to is what our senses tell us about what we assume to be the physical world - so the word has been more usefully employed in philosophy to mean the study of things beyond our experience. Traditionally, religions have made claims about 'truths' beyond our experience, known through revelation or intuition. The rationalist tradition in Western philosophy has also made claims about truths beyond experience known through reason. Both of these kinds of claims may be described as metaphysical, and both are rejected in Middle Way philosophy. It is argued in Middle Way philosophy that metaphysical beliefs are beyond any method of non-dogmatic justification.19 Ellis’s form of ‘Middle Way’ philosophy, which he admits is derived from the Buddhist version, having from his point of view expunged all the confusions introduced by what he considers to be Buddhists’ misunderstanding of their own insights, is supposed to skilfully navigate its way between the dangerous reefs of positive and negative metaphysical claims without making any claims of its own. Already in this presentation, however, we can detect an immediate ‘metaphysical’ position which is adopted by Ellis in his supposed derivation of the necessity for avoiding all metaphysics. We are told that “the physical world is beyond our experience.” What is this if it is not a metaphysical claim about reality? It is clearly a dualistic metaphysical-ontological claim that “physical world in itself is beyond our experience” - all we have access to, apparently, is what our senses tell us about what we assume to be the physical world.” Thus the realm of the “physical”, which Ellis seems at this point to identify with ‘Reality’, is asserted to be dramatically and irrevocably ‘beyond” our experiences which are generated by the senses. Presumably Ellis would agree that sense faculties are themselves “physical” so it seems then, on this view, that there must be some kind of nebulous sphere of experiential ‘unreality’ which is generated by the physical bits of ‘us’ interacting with the physical bits of ‘Reality’ which are ‘not-us’. But where does the conclusion that experience is not part of ‘Reality’ come from? It looks suspiciously like a metaphysical assumption. However such an assumption has no more validity than the assumption that experience itself is physical, and there is nothing beyond the physicality of experience, as cogently argued for by, for instance, Galen Strawson in his essay ‘Realistic Monism’20. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1037 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature In this case one might claim as Buddhists do that because experience is part of ‘Reality’ itself, there is a way of experiencing which gives direct and unmediated access to reality (‘enlightenment’). If we take ‘Reality’ to be a concept which embraces all aspects of experience and anything that lies beyond, if anything does ‘lie beyond’, then sentient beings, including ‘physical’ senses and the experiences generated by the senses, are clearly part of ‘Reality’, so the possibility of direct ‘non-conceptual’ (as Buddhists refer to this immediate experience) knowledge cannot be ruled out a-priori. However, in line with the early twentieth century logical positivists, Ellis considers that metaphysics is a kind of nonsense because it, according to him, goes beyond the bounds of experience, although how he can possibly know this with absolutely certainty, on the basis of his own presuppositions, is a mystery. For, as we do know, he clearly refers to our need to “fully appreciate that we may know nothing”21. In fact, he clearly states (with reference to my own work) that to indulge in metaphysical claims that even science can tell us anything about reality is “foolish”: …some Buddhists have foolishly pounced on quantum physics as evidence about the universe itself… The problem with this assertion, of course, is that just about all physicists consider that physics, and quantum physics in particular, provides ‘evidence about the universe itself’; although it has to be said that most quantum physicists agree that the nature of the reality revealed by quantum theory is very hard to comprehend. Thus the author of the thousand page exposition of modern physics, The Road to Reality, Sir Roger Penrose, who was knighted for his services to science (why didn’t someone tell the queen about the extent of his foolishness? – for according to Ellis: “from an epistemological point of view there is no distinction between ‘Reality’ and ‘metaphysics’”22) wrote in a previous book: Undoubtedly the world is strange and unfamiliar at the quantum level, but it is not unreal. How, indeed, can real objects be constructed from unreal constituents?23 So it is clear that the actual real status of ‘Reality’, so to speak, is put into a paradoxical configuration by the advent of quantum physics, but the notion that quantum physics bears absolutely no relation to our knowledge of ‘reality’ would, for Penrose and most other physicists, be an assertion beyond the paradoxical, probably venturing in to the realms of the absurd. Ellis, however, has decreed, on the basis of taking sceptical arguments ‘seriously’ that we can ignore what physicists have to say on the nature of ‘Reality’. At the outset of his book Veiled Reality, however, quantum physicist and philosopher Bernard d’Espagnat indicates that he completely disagrees with the kind of view promulgated by Ellis: This whole book centers on the conviction that whoever tries to form an idea of the world – and of man’s position within the world – has to take the findings of quantum physics most seriously into account.24 In other words for d’Espagnat only someone who has a grasp of quantum physics can possibly say something significant about ‘Reality’. Ellis, however, not only admits to knowing very little about quantum theory, he considers that issues concerning whether or not aspects of ‘Reality’ can be known or not (or neither!) can be known to be not known through armchair philosophizing on the basis of simple and homespun observations; the findings of physics are of absolutely no relevance whatsoever. As we have seen, Ellis considers such a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1038 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature viewpoint such as that proposed by d’Espagnat to be “foolish”; it is, says Ellis, ‘Scientism’, which: …appeals to science as the basis of our information about facts, treating it as the source of information about 'laws of nature', rather than merely justified theories. By treating the subject matter of science ontologically rather than epistemologically, it encourages a focus on its results rather than its method, and distracts attention from the provisionality of all scientific results whatsoever - a provisionality which can be easily established by basic sceptical arguments.25 So here we find that it is what Ellis calls the ‘provisionality’ of scientific theories upon which he pins his hopes of not knowing anything. We shall find, however, that his notion of ‘provisionality’ is hopelessly over played. Quantum physics for instance, has been around for about a hundred years and the fundamental features have not changed, although the details have been dramatically enhanced. Classical Newtonian mechanics still functions adequately within its own domain of application, and when it is tweaked relativistically was used to send human beings to the moon. So just how ‘provisional’ is such knowledge? To answer this question we will have to briefly survey the work of some of the twentieth century philosophers of science: Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, Abner Shimony and Bernard d’Espagnat. When we do so we shall find that the often reiterated notion that physics in particular is constantly undergoing dramatic and seismic ‘revolutions’, a notion derived in particular form the work of Kuhn, is a mistaken paradigm. Ellis’s assertion that physics tells us nothing at all about ‘Reality’ seems particularly out of place in the context of the work of John Bell. The following, which concerns the analysis of the conditions which must apply for the existence of a ‘locally’ or ‘non-locally’ causally interconnected ‘Reality’, is an appreciation of the profound implications of the work of the hugely significant mathematician and quantum physicist John Stewart Bell, for our understanding of the metaphysical nature of reality, by James T. Cushing, who was at the time Professor of Physics at the University of Notre Dame: Bell never wrote down a single, local deterministic theory. Rather, he proved, without ever having to consider any dynamical details, that no such theory can in principle exist. The entire class was killed at a stroke - a classic “no-go” theorem. [Further,] Bell's theorem really depends in no way upon quantum mechanics. It refutes a whole category of (essentially) classical theories without ever mentioning quantum mechanics. Abner Shimony has appropriately given the name "experimental metaphysics” to this type of definitive empirical resolution of what appears to be a metaphysical question.26 The ‘metaphysical’ fact that ‘Reality’ is ‘nonlocal’, which means that it exhibits a fundamental, immediate and ‘mysterious’ interconnectedness between distant elements, has been established, to the satisfaction of the community of physicists beyond all “reasonable doubt.”27 Abner Shimony has been described as “one of the most eminent of present day philosophers of science”28 but is also a physicist so his views on this matter ought, perhaps, to bear a little weight. In his excellent book on the theory and philosophy of quantum physics Sneaking a Look at God’s Cards Giancarlo Ghirardi writes that Bell’s theorem: …has been described by experts in the conceptual and philosophical foundations of quantum mechanics as - to use Nobel laureate Josephson's words - the most important ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1039 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature recent contribution to science: namely, the derivation by John Stewart Bell of his (now) famous inequality. When Bell died so unexpectedly and prematurely at age 62 in October 1990, many of his colleagues spoke of him as the only man of his generation who could be same level as Bohr and Born for his profound understanding of the conceptual implications of the theory. He was referred to as "the man who proved Einstein wrong" (New Scientist, November 24, 1990) …29 Indeed, after Bell’s work the notion that quantum physics is “experimental metaphysics” has found a deep resonance within the physics community, and, as we shall see, one of the reasons for this is the profound and far-reaching implications of the mathematical inequalities derived by Bell, which were then famously investigated experimentally by Alain Aspect in Paris and subsequently by others to more precise levels of detail, for the possible nature that any ‘Reality’ can have. A full appreciation of the proof of the non-locality of ‘Reality’ clearly indicates the mistakenness of Ellis’s assertions about physics not being able to tell us anything about ‘Reality.’ For it shows us that some versions of ‘Reality’ can be ruled out once and for all. None of the above considerations, however, will have any impact on Ellis because he thinks that his sceptical arguments show that the insights of physics, however seemingly profound, are irrelevant to knowledge of the ultimate nature of ‘Reality’. The crux of his argument is contained in the following snippet from an email correspondence between us: We are flesh-and-blood beings, with specific positions in time and space, with limited perceptions and a limited mental capacity to process those perceptions. This is certainly the case with all human beings I have ever observed, and I presume I am not corresponding with a god here! Therefore all our observations are non-absolute. We cannot justify absolute claims from this because we do not have access to observations of the whole universe or knowledge of all conditions. Thus if we make claims that are believed to be always and invariably true, it is extremely likely that we will be making mistakes that do not take into account the enormity of conditions that we have not observed. It seems very odd to have to say this to a scientist. What proportion of the universe have we observed? What proportion of the human brain? A minute proportion, almost infinitesimal. How many previous theories in human history have been proved wrong? The vast majority. How about a bit of scientific humility? Now on the face of it this seem like quite a reasonable observation which, with appropriate scientific humility, reduces all human beings the same level of insight, all having the same ‘limited perceptions and a limited mental capacity to process those perceptions’. However, it only takes a few moments thought to see that it is not true. It is quite clear that there are levels of capacity for insight within the vast expanse of human embodiments, otherwise we would all be on the intellectual level of a Buddha, Einstein, imbeciles or somewhere between these possibilities. On the other hand, one could say that, even by his own claims as to the necessity for metaphysical agnosticism, we cannot know that his assertions are true. According to certain Buddhist teachings, for instance, there may be fully or partially awakened beings in our midst, for the purposes of this article I can remain quite happily agnostic about this, but the fact remains that just because Ellis tells us that “all human beings I have ever observed” have such limited capacities, does not, by his own assertion, mean it is true. For as he says: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1040 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature As finite beings occupying a limited point in space, the information that we have access to is always necessarily limited. But this is clearly a limited observation based on his own limited capacities. He is assuming at the outset that all human beings are as limited as himself, and thereby ruling out the possibility of the existence of techniques for achieving direct metaphysical insight into the ultimate nature of reality at the outset. Another of his dogmatic epistemological assumptions is that “our conceptual frameworks for understanding the world are limited by our cultural and linguistic background” clearly applies to his own position. The following remarks by Buddhist philosopher Anne Klein are relevant: Virtually no contemporary western thinker would take seriously, much less agree with, the notion that conditioned persons can have an experience outside of historical, cultural, psycho-social, and other sets of conditionings. Neither Derrida, Foucault, Lacan, nor those following Kant, for example, would postulate or even seek a resolution between their own positions and the Buddhist claim that there are states of mind unaffected either by personal or cultural histories or by epistemic limitations. Here, the conditioning role of social and personal histories is emphasized in ways that are foreign to Buddhism. From the viewpoint of contemporary theories, Buddhist soteriological theories are but one more example of cultural construction.30 But such views concerning the necessary metaphysically limiting fetters of psycho-social and cultural frameworks are, as Klein intimates, themselves part and parcel of a particular, mostly academic, limiting fetter of a Western psycho-social and cultural framework. And if this particular fetter, adopted as an epistemological absolute, were to be incorrect then it would indeed be a ‘fetter’ which possibly cuts off an avenue to an absolute and unconditioned metaphysical insight. Ellis’s own adoption of this fettering perspective is radical to the point of extremity for he makes the assumption that his own limited perceptions can be used as the basis for, not only the claim that there are, probably in his estimation, no enlightened sentient beings, but also, more baffling, that it is invalid to make any claim to metaphysical knowledge, even ones based on the precise and detailed investigations of physics, a claim which can, as we shall do shortly, be refuted by a consideration of Bell’s theorem and quantum entanglement. Ellis rejects the argument that his derivation of ‘metaphysical agnosticism’ requires an initial metaphysical commitment of his own, he calls his sceptical starting point to be a non-absolute ‘general claim’: This is not an absolute claim, but a general claim based on an observation of the conditions of all human experience.31 But the problem with such a ‘general claim’ is that it treats the observation of the “conditions of all human experience” made by a self-confessed ‘being with limited capacities’ as being valid and sufficient for clearly establishing an all embracing claim as to what can and cannot be claimed. But the observation is clearly dubious; the observation is dubious on the basis of the claim based on the observation. This seems absolutely clear, it is circular and selfdefeating. But this is not the end of Ellis’s metaphysical circles of self-immolation. For the observation, that “you cannot make absolute claims based on non-absolute observations” is meant to be ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1041 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature the source of Ellis’s claim that it is “foolish” to think that quantum physics can be taken as “evidence about the universe itself.” This assertion is based on Ellis’s claim that: “we are flesh-and-blood beings, with specific positions in time and space, with limited perceptions and a limited mental capacity to process those perceptions” which he tells us is just a ‘general’ observation. But, if quantum theory is correct in some sense as a ‘real’ depiction of reality, then the borderline between the quantum realm and the ‘classical’ realm of “fleshand-blood beings,” is, according to quantum physicist Erich Joos, a delusion: The disturbing dichotomy between quantum and classical notions was only a delusion.32 In other words if quantum theory were to be true then Ellis’s basis for rejecting quantum theory as relevant for our understanding of reality, “we are flesh-and-blood beings…” and so on would, from an ultimate point of view, be false. Indeed if Gerard ‘t Hooft and Leonard Susskind’s ‘holographic universe’ proposal were to be true (see Jim Kowell’s article in this issue What is Reality in a Holographic Universe) then what appears to be “flesh-and-blood beings” would actually be some form of illusion: …the theory suggests that the entire universe can be seen as a two dimensional informational information structure “painted” on the cosmological horizon, such that the three dimensions that we observe are only an effective description at macroscopic scales and at low energies.33 Of course, such considerations would seem on the face of it to support at least part of Ellis’s sceptical position: No conclusive proof can be offered that one’s current experience (or any given past experience) is not illusory. You may be dreaming at this moment. And to a degree this is true. However, the essential point is that such seemingly wild notions such as the holographic principle which are based upon the findings of modern physics, which are all part and parcel of quantum physics, do not lead to the radical view that ‘knowledge’ of ‘Reality’ is an impossibility and metaphysics a foolish mistake. How could they, for what they indicate is that the ‘may’ in the above observation by Ellis is unnecessary; Quantum theory shows us that in a very real sense we are ‘dreaming at this moment!’ The holographic universe proposal is one metaphysical possibility ‘justified’, to employ Ellis’s preferred terminology, by the scientific method through the experimental evidence and mathematical analysis. It is one metaphysical possibility amongst a infinite number of metaphysical impossibilities, such as, for example, that all the phenomena of the universe are caused by Noddy and Big Ears manipulating wooden levers on the edge of space. One would have thought it quite possible to return a negative evaluation upon this metaphysical suggestion, if anyone were to be so “foolish” as to suggest it! In a sense this extreme example is only slightly extended for irony’s sake for there has been a recent not so tongue in cheek suggestion by some physicists that we might all be living in a vast computer simulation organized by aliens. Even physicists have their off days in philosophical mode. One has to bear in mind that if we take Ellis’s “serious” acceptance of scepticism seriously then all manner of ridiculous metaphysical possibilities would have to remain in the agnostic box, perhaps even the metaphysical potency of Noddy and BigEars. I suppose Ellis would say we are overwhelmingly and ‘incrementally’ ‘justified’ in supposing this not to be true, but there still remains a tiny possibility that it might be true! ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1042 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature The ‘metaphysical’ suggestions based upon the evidence of physics are those which are entirely coherent with our experience as revealed within ‘physical’ experiments. This is the case because ‘experience’ is embedded within ‘Reality’ and not banished outside of it; and there are ‘metaphysical’ suggestions, the existence of Cartesian type ‘matter’ for example, which can be completely ruled out because they are entirely inconsistent and incoherent with experience gained by physics. If ‘Reality’ were to be radically and absolutely beyond and unrelated to our experience there would be no conceivable way in which it could have anything to do with experience. The Buddhist philosopher Chandrakirti put this, in another context, as follows: If something can arise from something other than itself, Well then, deep darkness can arise from tongues of flame, And anything could issue forth from anything.’34 If two ontological aspects of the world are considered to be absolutely antithetical and unconnected in essence then there can be no connection between them. So if ‘experience’ were to be completely beyond the pale of ‘Reality’ then obviously we could never ‘know’ it in any shape or form. But such a notion is clearly incoherent precisely because it is only through ‘experience’ that we can have any notion at all about ‘Reality’, ‘Reality’ is clearly revealed, admittedly in degrees of ‘veiled’ forms, through experience. One assumption which is shared by physics, hopefully Western philosophy (even in spite of Hume) but certainly Buddhist philosophy is that ‘Reality’ is at basis coherent, and the notion that the interdependent realms of ‘Reality’ and ‘experience’ are absolutely and irredeemable antithetical is clearly incoherent; for if this were the case then ‘Reality’ would have nothing whatsoever to do with our experience, in which case from whence cometh experience? With this in mind we can return to the matter of ‘matter’. The notion that Cartesian type ‘matter’, which is conceived of as extended, continuously solid ‘stuff’ that is supposed to be independent in all respects from the ontological category of ‘mind’, ‘exists’ is entirely incoherent with experience as revealed in quantum experiments which have been repeated over and over again. And it is worth considering the extraordinary precision of such experiments. The miniscule scale of these quantum experiments is staggering. For instance it is possible to fit in the order of 100000 atoms across the width of a human hair and the scale of the quantum experiments that have been conducted, which involve the constituents of atoms, are at an order beneath this. The breathtaking scale and precision of experiments which delve beneath the sphere of atomic ‘particles’ into the realm of deeper quantum phenomena has been constantly refined to ever more unimaginable and mind warping tiny scales of accuracy. Physicist Robert Oerter describes the accuracy required for these investigations as that ‘you would need to shoot a gun and hit a Coke can – if the can were on the moon’35. Richard Feynman, one of the most significant physicists of the twentieth century, compared the accuracy of quantum experiments to measuring the distance between New York and Los Angeles to the precision of the width of one human hair!36 And on the basis of such experiments quantum physicist Henry Stapp has concluded, with just about all others, that from an ultimate quantum level: …no such brain exists; no brain, body, or anything else in the real world is composed of those tiny bits of matter that Newton imagined the universe to be made of.37 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1043 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature It is important to be aware, however, that Stapp is not denying the existence of a structure of apparent materiality that we call the ‘brain’ which functions at the ‘classical’ level of reality; he is indicating that quantum physics has uncompromisingly shown that it is not composed of ‘tiny bits of matter’. In fact Jonathan Allday, in his recent book Quantum Reality: Theory and Philosophy, tells us that according to the lowest level analysis of ‘Reality’, quantum field theory, that there is no ‘substance’ to be found anywhere: Now, from a philosophical point of view, this is rather big stuff. Our whole manner of speech … rather naturally makes us think that there is some stuff or substance on which properties can, in a sense, be glued. It encourages us to imagine taking a particle and removing its properties one by one until we are left with a featureless ‘thing’ devoid of properties, made from the essential material that had the properties in the first place. Philosophers have been debating the correctness of such arguments for a long time. Now, it seems, experimental science has come along and shown that, at least at the quantum level, the objects we study have no substance to them independent of their properties.38 Ellis, however, feels he is ‘justified’ in waving his agnostic anti-philosophical wand to render any such evidence irrelevant: If the theory is about properties and does not posit or identify substances, that is very far from proving that there are no such substances, or claiming that the world is “ultimately” non-substantial.39 However, such a statement demonstrates not only his self-confessed complete lack of knowledge of physical theory, but also his determination to ignore clear philosophical implications in order to promote his own particular non-philosophical agenda. Whilst it is true that it might be possible to concoct a new conception of ‘substance’ in order to try and save the appearance of a substantial world, attempts have been made in this direction, if, however, one operates with the common and garden notion derived from Descartes, which is still the primary use of the notion, then quantum field theory clearly rules out the existence of ‘substance’ at the ground level of reality, there can be no doubt, physical or philosophical, about this. The following snippet is another example of Ellis’s flouting not only of philosophical implications, but straightforward common sense: If consciousness is shown to have a role in giving us the impression that things exist, this shows that the observation of consciousness is necessary for the experience of observing something and believing it to exist, not that it is sufficient. It does not demonstrate that the object concerned does not exist as an independent entity. I think this is the most basic philosophical error behind almost everything else you are saying.40 The introduction of the ‘necessary and sufficient’ distinction is quite obviously irrelevant. If, as quantum physicists Planck, Schrodinger, Pauli, Wheeler, Bohm, Rosenblum and Kuttner, Stapp, Zurek, Zeh, Penrose … etc. etc. all conclude that in some manner consciousness is required for the appearance of the apparent experienced world of substantiality from an insubstantial quantum ground of potentiality, then, quite clearly, the entities of experienced realm are dependent and therefore not independent. This is why the quantum physicist Professor Anton Zeilinger refers to the pre-quantum viewpoint as involving: …the obviously wrong notion of a reality independent of us.41 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1044 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature This is really a matter of definition of words: if something depends upon something else then it is not independent, this has nothing to do with philosophical analysis into necessary and sufficient conditions. It appears that in Ellis’s mode of philosophizing he thinks it is necessary to bring in irrelevant distinctions in the hope that they may be sufficient to bring unnecessary confusion into the issue. In an article in the New Scientist (23rd June 2007) Michael Brooks, commenting on quantum entanglement experiments carried out by teams led by Markus Aspelmeyer of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and Anton Zeilinger of the University of Vienna, tells us that the conclusion reached by the physicists involved is that: … we now have to face the possibility that there is nothing inherently real about the properties of an object that we measure. In other words measuring those properties is what brings them into existence. 42 And Professor Vlatko Vedral, quantum researcher at the University of Leeds commented that: Rather than passively observing it, we in fact create reality. 43 The headline for the article proclaims that: To track down a theory of everything, we might have to accept that the universe only exists when we are looking at it…44 This dramatic conclusion is prompted by recent extremely delicate experimental investigations of the interaction of the observations being made and the nature of the resulting experimental outcomes. But for Ellis any such considerations are a priori ruled out of the philosophical court. For him the views and opinions of authorities in the field of physical reality are worthless when it comes to what he considers to be the real non-reality revealing (in the sense of being ‘agnostic’) thought processes of crude sceptical philosophy: …authorities do not conclusively resolve arguments, simply because they can be wrong. There are many spectacular cases of authorities of the past turning out to be wrong, which I'm sure you're aware of. In this particular case, you quote a lot of authorities that all share the assumptions that I am questioning, which makes the whole enterprise rather a waste of energy on your part (for me, anyway). If I don't accept the assumptions your authorities are making, and you are citing them only because they share your assumptions, the justification they offer becomes circular. Of course, if you give the arguments of the authorities rather than just their conclusions, then you are just using them as a source of justifications that could potentially be correct regardless of where they come from…45 The authorities he is referring to is a fairly comprehensive set of modern physicists who clearly think that their work does tell us something significant about the nature of ‘Reality’. Ellis considers that his list of sceptical points, most of which assume the irrelevance of physics at the outset, show that the views of such top-notch physicists are irrelevant in his ‘Reality’, which he seems to think lies metaphysically somewhere beyond the rainbow world of experience and the appearance of the ‘material’ realm. It is quite clear from this fragment that Ellis considers that there exists a kind of Platonic philosophical realm, which he has dubbed as his ‘correct’ version of the ‘Middle Way’, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1045 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature wherein pristine logical forms of argument have been established by a kind of divine logician and it is only the results of the application of the divinely ordained logical procedures (those Ellis has discovered) which can reveal the fact that we can never ‘know’ ‘Reality’. Ellis asks “How many previous theories in human history have been proved wrong - the vast majority.” But, we are not concerned with the entirety of human history, we are concerned with physics, and strangely enough ‘classical’ physics took a pretty straight and undeviating course from the seventeenth century inception down to the end of the nineteenth century where upon the quantum revolution at the beginning of the twentieth century indicated a new level of reality had been reached, a level of reality with an astonishingly different mode of operation. Since then the fundamental features of the theory have remained stable, with a much greater knowledge of the detail accrued over time of course, plus the quantum interpretational problem, but that is a separate issue. The image of one scientific ‘paradigm’ being continuously overturned, trashed and replaced and so on is actually an overplayed myth, perpetrated in large measure due to academic over-proliferation in the quest for philosophy PhDs. The only major shift in paradigm within science since the inception of the modern scientific enterprise has been from ‘classical’ physics to quantum theory (relativity is a ‘classical’ level theory). Furthermore, the notion that the history of physics is littered with a huge number of authorities being ‘spectacularly’ incorrect is simply wrong. The notion that Planck, Heisenberg, Schrodinger, Bohr, Born, de Broglie, Dirac, Bohm, Wheeler, Feynman ….. etc. etc. are all going to be ‘spectacularly’ incorrect en mass is, well, I won’t use the f-word. Of course there will be some interpretative theories which turn out be unworkable. But the notion the entire quantum paradigm is going to be found fundamentally and spectacularly wrong? Einstein who was the real instigator of the theory thought it was ‘incomplete’, and currently Roger Penrose shares such a view. According to Ellis: There is also no 'paradox of scepticism' whereby sceptics are making absolute claims about the non-absoluteness of human belief, so long as you understand the implications of scepticism to be agnostic rather than those of negative metaphysics. Scepticism merely observes that we cannot justify either the assertion or the denial of metaphysical beliefs: this is an observation that must be distinguished from the denial of any metaphysical belief, which would certainly over-reach the evidence available to our experience.46 However the fact of the demonstration of the impossibility of Cartesian style ‘matter’ is exactly such an assertion of “negative metaphysics” which has been clearly validated without over-reaching the evidence “available to our experience”. In a previous quote Ellis asks “What proportion of the universe have we observed?,” as if it were possible for somewhere on the outer limits of the universe which is unobservable to us for the apparently ‘material’ nature of reality to suddenly become ‘really’ material and made up of Cartesian type continuously solid matter or tiny Newtonian balls. Such would only be possible in an incoherent universe; and I am not even sure that this would be coherent in an incoherent universe. At this point a committed sceptic, like Ellis, will perhaps be jumping up and down uttering something like “But read Hume, Hume on causality and induction”; so it is to this sceptical analysis we must turn our attention. Ultimately, of course, someone who is determined to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1046 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature remain a staunch sceptic will do so, whatever arguments are marshalled in defence of the fundamental coherency of reality. It is surely very doubtful that there are knock-down arguments against someone who declaims “I know that I cannot know that my senses are not deceiving me, therefore I also know that there cannot be any certain knowledge.” When it comes to Hume, of course, the key issue is the problem of induction. According to the standard or ‘traditional’ presentation of Hume’s viewpoint there is absolutely no way of absolutely grounding or validating any kind of knowledge which relies upon inductive reasoning, or to put it more generally assumes that ‘reality’ is fundamentally coherent, and this includes just about all, if not all, of the current theories of physics. The sceptical position, crudely stated, is that it is entirely possible, for instance, that one day billiard balls will suddenly, instead of conforming to Newton’s laws, melt into each other, jump off the billiard table and disappear into thin air. Now in one sense quantum theory has actually proved Hume correct, as quantum physicist Michio Kaku for instance tells us: I sometimes ask our PhD. students at the university simple questions such as, calculate the probability that they will suddenly dissolve and rematerialise on the other side of a brick wall. According to quantum theory there is a small but calculable probability that this could happen. Or, for that matter, that we will dissolve in our living room and wind up on Mars.47 According to quantum theory the quantum realm prior to ‘measurement’ contains a possibility for every conceivable event to occur, and each possible event has a probability for happening associated with it. So it would seem that it is entirely probable for billiard balls to behave in the bizarre way described above, and for scrambled eggs to unscramble themselves and so on, if, that is, by ‘entirely probable’ we mean that the event has some associated probability value. This value, however, would be so tiny that one would have to wait for the universe to end and the event would still, probably, not occur. It is precisely the fact that quantum theory can encompass and elucidate Hume’s scepticism yet at the same time delimit its limits that surely proves the efficaciousness of the theory as an all-inclusive metaphysical account of ‘Reality’. Quantum theory has given us the probabilities of Hume’s improbabilities. Such a view can be derived from the application of the philosopher David Lewes’s ‘Principle Principle’ concerning the ‘credence’ conformity of rational agents within a quantum chancy “Humean mosaic” of time advancing experienced ‘actualities’. Crudely stated, any bizarre occurrence would simply become incorporated into the quantum probability configuration and thereby be comprehended within quantum theory!48 Another feature of Hume’s analysis is that it actually relies on a prior commitment to a metaphysical standpoint, which is the dualistic view that the ‘real’ world, so to speak, is ‘out there’ whilst the person doing the perceiving only has access to sense impressions ‘in’ their minds. According to Hume’s account of knowledge any notions that we have concerning the nature and functioning of the world derives from contiguities and associations which somehow develop amongst these internal sense impressions. Now an immediate question which arises concerns the issue of the basis upon which such associations and so on develop. Any account which appeals to similarity and analogy and so on, as Hume’s does, obviously imputes some activity to the mind in ordering the putative sense impressions, and this activity on the part of the mind must itself be part of reality itself, as we have argued previously. In fact Hume himself seems to anticipate Kant’s later notion that causality is a necessary and natural category of reality, for Hume writes in his Essay Concerning Human Understanding ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1047 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature concerning this issue that causal inferences are “essential to the subsistence of all creatures,” and: It is more comfortable to the ordinary wisdom of nature to secure so necessary an act of the mind, by some instinct or mechanical tendency, which may be infallible in its operations, may discover itself at the first appearance of life and thought, and may be independent of all the laboured deductions of the understanding. As nature has taught us the use of our limbs, without giving us the knowledge of the muscles and nerves by which they are actuated; so she has implanted in us an instinct, which carries forward the thought in a correspondent course to that which she has established among external objects; though we are ignorant of those powers and forces, on which this course and succession of objects depends.49 In other words “the ordinary wisdom of nature”, or reality, might actually be more dependable than the “laboured deductions of the understanding.” Note also the clear ‘nondual-dualism’ to use a term used by Stapp in his paper Nondual Quantum Duality, the clear implication being that the categories that the mind uses to comprehend what appears to be an external world are produced by the very same processes that produce the apparently external world. One might say that there must be a fundamental coherency in operation at some level even to be able to argue for incoherency, a fact that Hume was clearly aware of. The notion that this apparent duality is in reality a vicious unbridgeable ontological divide is itself a product of the “the laboured deductions of the understanding”. Remarkably, however, now quantum theory indicates that both aspects of the apparent duality arise from the nondual quantum realm. One of the features of quantum theory which makes it so remarkable, beside its continuous verification at an astonishing level of precision, is the fact that it was found to be true despite the fact that none of the scientists involved actually wanted it to be so. John Wheeler, for instance, said that: Quantum Theory appears to many as strange, unwelcome, and forced on physics as it were from outside against its will50. Hume suggested that all our knowledge was ultimately derived from ‘sense impressions’ of the external world. It is acknowledged, however, that the ‘reality’ suggested by quantum theory seems to correspond in no way to those of the everyday person but, rather, to the sense impressions of “mystics and madmen,”51 as quantum physicist Nick Herbert says. According to Penrose: Quantum theory was not wished upon us by theorists. It was (for the most part) with great reluctance that they found themselves driven to this strange and, in many ways, philosophically unsatisfying view of the world.52 This is an important point to bear in mind because it lends great weight to the discoveries of quantum theory. The remarkable features of quantum functioning were not unearthed by physicists who set out to uncover them; quite the opposite. The American experimental physicist Robert Millikan, for instance, could not accept Einstein’s picture of the light photon as both wave and particle and he therefore set out on a series of difficult experiments in order to prove that Einstein was wrong. The physicist and science writer John Gribben writes concerning this: … he only succeeded in proving that Einstein was right … In the best traditions of science, it was this experimental confirmation of Einstein’s hypothesis (all the more ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1048 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature impressive since it was obtained by a skeptic trying to prove the idea wrong) that established clearly, by about 1915, that there was something in the idea of light quanta.53 Towards the end of his life Millikan commented on this episode: I spent ten years of my life testing that 1905 equation of Einstein’s and contrary to all my expectations, I was compelled in 1915 to its unambiguous verification in spite of its unreasonableness.54 So it is not the case that a deviant group of mad scientists got together sometime at the beginning of the twentieth century and decided that they were bored with the idea of a completely ‘material’ world, and would therefore like to concoct a more exciting version of reality; a numinous vision within which matter was asserted to be similar to an illusion generated in some strange fashion by the operation of mind or minds. Nor did they go to bed one evening and, because of some strange Day of the Triffids55 (or, perhaps, Humean) like cosmic event, wake up next morning turned into incoherent rabid mystics. Quantum theory was proved by physicists in large part desperately trying to falsify it. This observation moves us directly into the realm of the philosophy of science, an area of discourse which Ellis considers is central to his philosophical analysis which he claims is purely ‘epistemological’; in this particular case of the notion of ‘falsifiability’ we are lead directly into the philosophical arms of Karl Popper who, according to the online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, is “generally regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of science of the 20th century.” Popper’s approach to the philosophy of science is particularly cogent in the present discussion because, like Ellis, Popper takes Hume’s scepticism ‘seriously.’ Popper’s theory requires that science operates according to an epistemological method of ‘falsifiability’, which was designed in order to avoid the problems associated with the idea that science requires the principle of ‘induction’, the notion that a large enough sequence of particular observations (the sun rising in the morning is often quoted as an example) can guarantee that the same observations will be made in the future. Popper was impressed by the fact that theories such as Einstein’s theory of relativity were ‘risky’ because they clearly were open to refutation by experimental evidence whereas, from Popper’s evaluation, other spheres of investigation such as psychoanalysis could not be refuted by any particular test because they were formulated in a fashion which protected them from such testing. He came to the conclusion that only proposals which were falsifiable can be considered to be scientific. Furthermore it followed from this position that scientific theories which had not been falsified were only provisionally held as possible scientific ‘truths’ because they may be falsified at some point in the future. Stephen Thornton summarizes the view as follows: Popper, then, repudiates induction, and rejects the view that it is the characteristic method of scientific investigation and inference, and substitutes falsifiability in its place. It is easy, he argues, to obtain evidence in favour of virtually any theory, and he consequently holds that such ‘corroboration’, as he terms it, should count scientifically only if it is the positive result of a genuinely ‘risky’ prediction, which might conceivably have been false. For Popper a theory is scientific only if it is refutable by a conceivable event. Every genuine test of a scientific theory then, is logically an attempt to refute or to falsify it, and one genuine counter-instance falsifies the whole theory. In a critical sense, Popper's theory of demarcation is based upon his perception of the logical asymmetry which holds between verification and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1049 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature falsification: it is logically impossible to conclusively verify a universal proposition by reference to experience (as Hume saw clearly), but a single counter-instance conclusively falsifies the corresponding universal law. In a word, an exception far from ‘proving’ a rule, conclusively refutes it.56 On Popper’s view, then, theories are weeded out by being falsified by experimental testing. An interesting situation, then, would arise when after an amount of time we might be left with only two mutually exclusive and mutually exhaustive theories ‘provisionally’ accounting for some phenomenon. Presumably if one of these were to be falsified then the other would then have to lose it status of ‘provisionality’ and thus actually become the final and ultimate theory, there being no possible alternative. So, if we accept Popper’s ‘falsifiability’ account of scientific knowledge, then the Mind-Matter metaphysical tussle for equality or supremacy within Western philosophy has indeed now been decided by the fact that quantum physics has shown ‘matter’ to be an illusory category of reality. Thus quantum physics would indeed, on Popper’s philosophy of science, count as ‘experimental metaphysics.’ Until the advent of quantum theory, the situation within the field of the metaphysical dimension of Western philosophy was that of a vying for absolute ontological position, or a dubious equality and interaction, between ‘Mind’ and ‘Matter’, ultimate concepts which have been the fundamental categories for ontological possibility since the time of Descartes. Descartes, of course, famously divided the ontology of reality into two ‘substances’: the ‘extended substance’ of ‘matter’ (res extensa) and the ‘thinking substance of ‘mind’, or consciousness (res cogitans). It is important to note the use of the term ‘substance’ here is not the same as its use in the discussion of quantum field theory being insubstantial, which means that there is no material substance within the ground quantum field. The concept of ‘substance’ employed by Descartes was that of a unique aspect of reality which shared no qualities with any other substance, Cartesian ‘substances’ therefore are assumed ontologically foundational aspects of reality. The significant basis which was established by Descartes for the subsequent metaphysical explorations of modern Western philosophy, down to the middle of the twentieth century (when in large measure Anglo-American philosophy gave up and retreated into mostly meaningless linguistic analysis, whilst Continental philosophy took up a more nuanced manner of analysis) was precisely the establishment of ‘Matter’ and ‘Mind’ as the two, mutually exclusive and exhaustive possible foundational ‘substances’. Various possible views concerning possible dualistic perspectives within which these two ‘substances’ are considered to be equally foundational (Interactionism, Epiphenomenalism etc.) or, on the other hand, which of the two might be primary, were explored by Descartes himself, who posited interaction via the pineal gland, and philosophers at the time and afterwards. The crucial, and actually insurmountable without intellectual deception, problem for any kind of Dualism is that the very definitions of the primary substances as set up by Descartes requires by definition that there cannot be any connection between the two if one accepts the reasonable philosophical principle which we might call the Principle of the Incompatibily of Absolute Non-Identicals (which we can shorten to the ‘Principle of Absolute Incompatibility’ (PAI) with the implication that we are referring to absolute opposite or contrary natures). This principle is a natural corollary of the seventeenth century philosopher Leibnitz’s Principle of the Indiscernibility of Identicals (PII). According to PII two things can only be identical if they share all their properties in common; PAI says that if two substances are absolutely ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1050 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature different and therefore share absolutely no common properties, qualities or aspects they cannot be related or connected in any way. Such absolutely different ‘substances’ can have no means of relationship or connection, they are, as Buddhist philosophy describes the situation ‘concepts of mutual abandonment’ which cannot interact in any way, unless we want to declare that ‘deep darkness can give rise to tongues of flame.’ Popper, however, paradoxically maintained a dualist ontology and a form of an interactionist account of the capacities of mind and matter which veered towards a subtle monist materialism, thus apparently hedging his bets on the matter: …although Popper was a body-mind dualist, he did not think that the mind is a substance separate from the body: he thought that mental or psychological properties or aspects of people are distinct from physical ones.57 Remarkably Popper, the great philosopher of science, seems confused on these issues, for although he is scathing about the kind of hardcore ‘eliminative materialism’ preached by Paul and Patricia Churchland, referring to it as “promissory materialism” which relies on “prophecy about the future results of brain research”58, he appears to be unaware of the strange inconsistent ambiguity which surrounds his own subtle ‘non-eliminative’ materialism. For, if we employ the usual notions of the ‘physical’ and ‘mental’ which come down to us from Descartes then ‘physical’ processes cannot by definition generate “mental or psychological properties or aspects” that are completely “distinct from physical ones.” In his work with the Nobel prizewinning neurophysiologist Sir John C. Eccles, Popper (who was also a ‘Sir’) considered the possibility that quantum indeterminacy might underlie the possibility of free-will. Eccles had suggested that "critically poised neurons" might be influenced by the mind to assist in a decision, a view which anticipated Penrose and Hameroff’s later suggestions. At this point, however, Popper criticized the idea of amplified quantum events affecting the decision. But in the 1977 book with John Eccles, The Self and its Brain, Popper finally formulated a two-stage model of mind-brain interaction involving quantum physics; he compares free will to Darwinian evolution and natural selection: New ideas have a striking similarity to genetic mutations. Now, let us look for a moment at genetic mutations. Mutations are, it seems, brought about by quantum theoretical indeterminacy (including radiation effects). Accordingly, they are also probabilistic and not in themselves originally selected or adequate, but on them there subsequently operates natural selection which eliminates inappropriate mutations. Now we could conceive of a similar process with respect to new ideas and to freewill decisions, and similar things. "That is to say, a range of possibilities is brought about by a probabilistic and quantum mechanically characterized set of proposals, as it were - of possibilities brought forward by the brain. On these there then operates a kind of selective procedure which eliminates those proposals and those possibilities which are not acceptable to the mind."59 In this observation it is clear that Popper’s account clearly requires that the mind must have an effect at the quantum level of functioning; which is a view that, by the Principle of Absolute Incompatibility, must mean that the quantum level has mind-like qualities (for if it did not there could not be an interaction of the kind suggested by Popper). This requirement actually undermines Popper’s subtle materialist monist dualism. The resemblance of the Popper-Eccles proposal to that of Stapp in his Nondual Quantum Duality paper is quite clear. As Stapp says: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1051 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature …quantum mechanics is thus dualistic in the pragmatic and operational sense that it involves aspects of nature that are described in physical terms and also aspects of nature that are described in psychological terms… This is all in close accord with classic Cartesian dualism. On the other hand, in contrast to the application to classical mechanics, in which the physically described aspect is ontologically matterlike, not mindlike, in quantum mechanics the physically described part is mindlike. Thus quantum mechanics conforms at the pragmatic/operational level to the precepts of Cartesian duality, but reduces at a deep ontological level to a fundamentally mindlike nondual monism.60 But Eccles and Popper seemed to baulk at going as far as asserting the “mindlike” nature of reality. As Donald E. Watson and Bernard O. Williams point out: As a young medical student, Sir John Eccles could not accept the "irreligious philosophy of monist-materialism." He turned to Descartes’ dualism because separating res extensa and res cogitans "gave a secure status to the human soul or self." Though Eccles was motivated partly from his religious beliefs, it is clear from context that his concept of spirit was not confined to any particular religious or philosophical doctrine. That is, he equated the terms spiritual and nonmaterial, which disengaged his thinking from Cartesian dualism and placed it in the path of modern science. Given this insight, if he had not persistently returned to dualistinteractionism or any other philosophical model of mind, he would have been free to develop a scientific theory of the self and its relation to the brain.61 In other words (and replacing the word ‘self’ with the more appropriate term ‘mind’ in the above quote) if Eccles and Popper has not felt compelled to leave at least a subtle form of matter lying around at the foundations of reality they might have come to the conclusion, which is clearly required by Popper’s falsifiability thesis and the evidence of quantum theory, that matter had dematerialized into an insubstantial mindlike quantum field of potentiality. The seventeenth century philosopher John Locke wrote concerning the notion of material substance: The idea then we have, to which we give the general name substance, being nothing but the supposed, but unknown support of those qualities, we find existing which we imagine cannot subsist, sine re substante, without something to support them, we call that support substantia, which, according to the true import of the word, is in plain English, standing under or upholding.62 A few pages later Locke compared the idea of ‘substance’ to the notion that the world rests on an elephant, which in turn rests upon a turtle and so on, the point being that we can never actually know the actual nature of any such putative substratum of reality because we only ever encounter properties, qualities and characteristics, rather than the naked substantiality itself. It seems then that Locke, in a very minimalist sense, anticipated quantum field theory! Although Locke seemed to adopt an atomist point of view concerning foundational reality, he also pointed out that “It is impossible to conceive that pure incogitative matter should produce a thinking intelligent being…” 63. The following passage from Locke is “what he considered a sound a priori argument that Mind must come first, must be the original Cause, not merely an Effect:”64 If, then, there must be something eternal, let us see what sort of Being it must be. And to that it is very obvious to Reason, that it must necessarily be a cogitative ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1052 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Being. For it is as impossible to conceive that ever bare incogitative Matter should produce a thinking intelligent Being, as that nothing should of itself produce Matter. Let us suppose any parcel of Matter eternal, great or small, we shall find it, in itself, able to produce nothing. . . . . Matter then, by its own strength, cannot produce in itself so much as Motion: the Motion it has, must also be from Eternity, or else be produced, and added to Matter by some other Being more powerful than Matter. . . . But let us suppose Motion eternal too: yet Matter, incogitative Matter and Motion, whatever changes it might produce of Figure and Bulk, could never produce Thought: Knowledge will still be as far beyond the power of Motion and Matter to produce, as Matter is beyond the power of nothing or nonentity to produce. And I appeal to everyone's own thoughts, whether he cannot as easily conceive Matter produced by nothing, as Thought produced by pure Matter, when before there was no such thing as Thought, or an intelligent Being existing. . . . So if we will suppose nothing first, or eternal: Matter can never begin to be: If we suppose bare Matter, without Motion, eternal: Motion can never being to be: If we suppose only Matter and Motion first, or eternal: Thought can never begin to be. For it is impossible to conceive that Matter either with or without Motion could have originally in and from itself Sense, Perception and Knowledge, as is evident from hence, that then Sense, Perception, and Knowledge must be a property eternally inseparable from Matter and every particle of it.65 So Locke clearly considered the field of (non-individuated) Mind to be, as quantum physicist and the unwittingly inadvertent instigator of the quantum revolution Max Planck (Einstein was the physicist who actually wittingly promoted the idea of the quantum nature of reality) put it the ‘matrix of matter’: All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force... We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind. This Mind is the matrix of all matter.66 It is quite remarkable just how the cogent argument on the part of Locke actually produces a conclusion that is spectacularly validated three centuries later with the advent of quantum theory and the insubstantiality of quantum field theory wherein only properties without property holders are posited. This example indicates the possibility of clear and coherent philosophical reflection leading to metaphysical insight of the first order. It is perhaps even more remarkable that Popper’s falsifiability philosophy of science, which Popper originally thought would be an antidote to metaphysics, can, when applied in the context of the clear findings of quantum physics, be employed to validate Locke’s viewpoint; and, furthermore, that Popper ended up developing a metaphysical perspective which took its basic demeanour from an acceptance of quantum physics as a foundational description of the nature of reality. Popper shared Einstein’s worries concerning the counter intuitive implication that apparently separated elements of ‘reality’ seem to have a mysterious interconnection between them, a aspect of the nature of ‘Reality’ we shall look at very shortly, and because of this worry about the phenomenon of ‘quantum entanglement’ Popper tried to design a quantum experiment to resolve the issue.67 However, as we shall see shortly, physicist Giancarlo Ghirardi, is actually quite scathing about Popper’s understanding of the subtle aspects of quantum theory involved. But, nevertheless, it is quite clear that Popper clearly considered his falsifiability methodology to operate within science and was not an argument to claim, as Ellis does, that ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1053 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature physics can tell us nothing about ‘Reality’; Popper clearly thought that quantum theory had a great deal to contribute in this ultimate arena of knowledge. Popper’s later development of his ‘Three Worlds’ proposal, outlined in his 1978 Tanner Lectures on Human Values, is highly metaphysical in tenor: In this lecture I intend to challenge those who uphold a monist or even a dualist view of the universe; and I will propose, instead, a pluralist view. I will propose a view of the universe that recognizes at least three different but interacting sub-universes.68 The three worlds (figure 1) proposed as being ‘real’ by Popper are those of the ‘physical’ world (World 1) the ‘mental’ world (World 2) and the ‘cultural’ world (World 3); the world of culture is also the world of ‘objective’ knowledge; these worlds were conceived of by Popper as interacting through various feedback mechanisms. This ‘three worlds’ perspective was later adapted by Roger Penrose as we shall later see. It would seem then that, not only did Popper consider that quantum theory was, contrary to Ellis’s viewpoint, capable of providing evidence about the universe, he also decided at some point that, even despite his falsifiability thesis, metaphysics was a worthwhile pursuit. In his ‘Three Worlds’ lectures Popper gave the following account of what he considers should count as being ‘real’: I suggest that all of us are most certain of the existence or reality of physical bodies of medium size: of a size such that we can easily handle them, turn them round, and drop them. Such things are ‘real’ in the most primitive sense of the word, I conjecture that a baby learns to distinguish such things; and I suppose that those things are most convincingly real to the baby that he or she can handle and drop, and can put into his or her mouth. Resistance to touch also seems to be important; and some degree of temporal persistence. Starting from a primitive idea of real things like this, the physicalist extends the idea by generalizing it. I suggest that the materialist's or physicalist’s idea of real physical existence is obtained by including very big things and very small things, and things that do not persist through any length of time; and also by including whatever can causally act upon things, such as magnetic and electrical attraction and repulsion, and fields of forces; and radiation, for example X-rays, because they can causally act upon bodies, say, upon photographic plates. We are thus led to the following idea: what is real or what exists is whatever may, directly or indirectly, have a causal effect upon physical things, and especially upon those primitive physical things that can be easily handled.69 The first point we should note is that the first sentence of Popper’s statement is just false; if that is, by ‘real’ we mean completely independent of observing minds. Ordinary human beings may be ‘certain’ in a ‘primitive’ manner of the ‘reality’ of the objects of the everyday world as independent self-enclosed entities, but quantum theory clearly shows this certainly is mistaken. In this analysis Popper suggests that all the attributions of reality that are made, both within science but also in life in general, are based, at root, in the immediacy of our experiences of the “physical bodies of medium size”, and it to these objects of direct experience that we attribute the most ‘primitive’ notion of reality. It is upon the base of such directly experienced ‘physical’ objects that the notion of ‘reality’ is generalised upon the basis of ‘causal effects’. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1054 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Figure 1 – Popper’s three worlds as depicted by Penrose.70 Now, although Popper speaks of the ‘physical’ world as in some sense looking as the foundational level, a proper consideration of the overall viewpoint, taking into account that fact that it actually bases its viewpoint upon the experiential aspect of our awareness of the ‘physical’ world, requires that that the ‘three words’ proposal is most appropriately contained within a overall pan-experiential perspective. It may be objected that the dualist-interactive perspective proposed by Popper in The Self and Its Brain: An Argument for Interactionism,, argues against such a pan-experientialist perspective, but, as has been already argued above, if we are using the terms ‘matter’ and ‘mind’ in a traditional manner such an interaction is impossible. The kind of interactionism proposed by Popper appeals to an interaction at the quantum level, a level at which traditional ‘matter’ no longer ‘exists’, to re-quote Stapp. In the context of the current discussion regarding Ellis’s claim as to the ultimate unknowability of ‘Reality’, which Ellis considers established by Popper’s falsifiability principle, the significant point is that within Popper’s worldview ‘Reality’ is clearly not some structure or process which is absolutely beyond all possible knowledge. For Popper, rather, ‘Reality’ reveals itself through the “feedback mechanisms” within a pan-experiential metaphysical process. Such a view directly undermines the kind of dogmatic claims presented by Ellis: In the Western tradition of philosophy there have been many false assumptions about the implications of scepticism. One of these is that if we take it seriously it stops us from holding beliefs or making claims altogether. This is not an implication of scepticism, because all it undermines is claims about reality. It does not prevent us from making statements about our experience, nor does it prevent us making justifiable provisional statements about what appears to be the case based on that experience.71 When we understand that ‘Reality’ is not and cannot be completely and absolutely beyond and antithetical to our experience, statements regarding scepticism like this – “all it undermines is claims about reality” - seem grotesquely overblown. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1055 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature In his final summing up of his ‘Three Worlds’ metaphysics Popper says: To sum up, we arrive at the following picture of the universe. There is the physical universe, world 1, with its most important sub-universe, that of the living organisms. World 2, the world of conscious experience, emerges as an evolutionary product from the world of organisms. World 3, the world of the products of the human mind, emerges as an evolutionary product from world 2. In each of these cases, the emerging product has a tremendous feedback effect upon the world from which it emerged. For example, the physico-chemical composition of our atmosphere which contains so much oxygen is a product of life - a feedback effect of the life of plants. And, especially, the emergence of world 3 has a tremendous feedback effect upon world 2 and, through its intervention, upon world 1. The feedback effect between world 3 and world 2 is of particular importance. Our minds are the creators of world 3; but world 3 in its turn not only informs our minds, but largely creates them. The very idea of a self depends on world 3 theories, especially upon a theory of time which underlies the identity of the self, the self of yesterday, of today, and of tomorrow. The learning of a language, which is a world 3 object, is itself partly a creative act and partly a feedback effect; and the full consciousness of self is anchored in our human language. Our relationship to our work is a feedback relationship: our work grows through us, and we grow through our work. This growth, this self-transcendence, has a rational side and a non-rational side. The creation of new ideas, of new theories, is partly non-rational. It is a matter of what is called ‘intuition’ or ‘imagination’. But intuition is fallible, as is everything human. Intuition must be controlled through rational criticism, which is the most important product of human language. This control through criticism is the rational aspect of the growth of knowledge and of our personal growth. It is one of the three most important things that make us human. The other two are compassion, and the consciousness of our fallibility.72 But the “consciousness of our fallibility” referred to by Popper is not the absolutized and metaphysically foundational ‘fallibility’ as to the possibility of any ‘real’ knowledge of ‘Reality’ asserted by Ellis; it is, rather, the awareness that “intuition is fallible” unless it is guided by “rational criticism.” In relation to this it is worth revisiting the quote from Hume already cited: As nature has taught us the use of our limbs, without giving us the knowledge of the muscles and nerves by which they are actuated; so she has implanted in us an instinct, which carries forward the thought in a correspondent course to that which she has established among external objects…73 The fact that human bodies and their experiential continuums and mental faculties are all part of ‘Reality’ and embedded within it is sufficient rational reason to adopt at the outset, in contrast to the metaphysical nihilism which seems to lie at the core of Ellis’s vision, a positive attitude to the possibilities of intuitive metaphysical insight, as long, of course, as it is guided by the rigorous employment of “rational criticism.” The example of mathematics is very relevant in this context. The physicist Eugene Wigner once referred to: The unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the physical sciences.74 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1056 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Penrose to a large extent concurs with Wigner about the ‘mystery’ of it can possibly come to pass that mathematics has the remarkable capacity to describe with such great precision the processes and operations of the ‘physical’ world, a world which generally is considered as being absolutely distinct from the realm of the ‘mental.’ Hence Penrose, with regard to mathematics and his reworking of Popper’s ‘three worlds’ (see figure 2) asks: …what underlies our ability to access mathematical truth? When I referred to the Platonic world … I was primarily talking about mathematics and the mathematical concepts one has to call upon to describe the physical world. One has the feeling that the mathematics needed to describe these things is out there. There is also, however, the common feeling that these mathematical constructions are products of our mentality, that is, mathematics is a product of the human mind. One can look at things in this way but it is not really the mathematician's way of looking at mathematical truth; nor is it my way of looking at it either. So although, there is an arrow joining the mental world and the Platonic world, I do not mean to indicate that this, or indeed any of these arrows, implies that any of these worlds simply emerges out of any of the others. Although there may be a sense in which they are emerging, the arrows are simply meant to represent the fact that there is a relationship between the different worlds. Figure 2 – Penrose’s three worlds But mathematics obviously is, indeed, a product of the human mind, so how come the astonishing ‘objectivity’ which comes about, an apparent objectivity which is so profound that it is able to describe in great detail the lineaments of the physical world and also leads those of Penrose’ disposition to speculate about the existence of a ‘Platonic World’. Surely the answer is likely to be that both mind and the physical world have their source in the same process of ‘Reality’ and are both aspects of that ‘Reality’. The reason that the mathematical patterns of thought which have been ‘incrementally’ discovered or accessed as if from a ‘Platonic’ realm over the centuries describe the functioning of the physical world is simply that they both have a common source and the human mind, to various degrees, has an intuitive capacity to discover and understand such mathematical patterns. The quantum physicist David Bohm described such a common source, which is actually suggested by quantum physics, as the ‘implicate order’: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1057 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature If matter and consciousness could in this way be understood together, in terms of the same general notion of order, the way would be opened to comprehending their relationship on the basis of some common ground. Thus we could come to the germ of a new notion of unbroken wholeness, in which consciousness is no longer to be fundamentally separated from matter.75 In this case it would be more appropriate to graphically represent the three worlds as shown in figure 3. One intriguing aspect of this viewpoint is provided by the implication of the famous Gödel incompleteness theorem which indicates that any complex mathematics capable of describing the physical world cannot supply a validation for its own validity, it is in a sense logically groundless and yet it functions with a remarkable logically crystalline precision. A mathematician of Ellis’s profoundly sceptical disposition would surely lament: “We can never, ever know anything about Mathematics! For its own nature hides the source of its effectiveness from us.” But this is not correct for, as Penrose has cogently argued, Gödel’s incompleteness theorems indicate the dramatic power of human intuitional insight. Figure 3 – common quantum implicate source. The above analysis of the ‘three worlds’ began from consideration of Popper’s metaphysical configuration of his three worlds. Ellis, however, seems to prefer to ignore these aspects of Popper’s work, although he considers Popper to be one of his inspirations: The concept of falsification is a vital one for the testing of our beliefs. Without it the search for objectivity is in vain, because we can have no clear indication that we are moving beyond the limitations of one view and into a more adequate one. The possibility of our beliefs being shown to be wrong is a crucial indicator that we are avoiding metaphysical dogma and gaining objectivity in our beliefs. However, at the same time, because a metaphysical justification for the process cannot be sought within an experiential framework of objectivity. Central to Middle Way philosophy is the claim that falsification can be decisive and objective without being absolute.76 Here again we find Ellis proclaiming the impossibility of true knowledge. Even with the cherished principle of falsification in place “there can be no absolute falsification” because ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1058 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature the principle itself is beyond ‘justification’ within our “experiential framework of objectivity.” This would mean, of course, that the principle of falsification is itself unfalsifiable; which further means that, by Ellis’s own proclamations, the principle itself, as employed within Ellis’s perspective, becomes dogmatic metaphysics. Ellis’s appropriation of the notion of ‘falsification’ does not seem to conform to Popper’s use of it. Ellis would no doubt want to claim that one can only apply the notion of ‘metaphysics' to assertions about ‘Reality’, rather than assertions concerning the method for finding, or not finding, out about ‘Reality’. Such an unfalsifiable assertion, however, will not wash; for the assertion that ‘Reality’ is absolutely unknowable is clearly an assertion about ‘Reality’. According to Ellis: Popper's approach also provides one of the primary ways of recognising metaphysical beliefs: metaphysical beliefs are unfalsifiable beliefs, that is, beliefs that can be maintained regardless of the evidence offered by experience. A metaphysical belief can always be maintained no matter what our experience, because it is sufficiently abstracted from all possible experience to be reinterpreted to fit any possible experience.77 If this were to be the case then it clearly applies to Ellis’s own assertions, and this can be seen by applying his own assertions to those very assertions! But Ellis’s notion of what metaphysics is simply does not conform to most philosophers notion of metaphysics, although it does conform to the use of the term as intellectual abuse as was employed within the dogmatic scientism of the logical positivists. However, during the course of ‘traditional’ Western philosophy, which Ellis calls ‘representational’ philosophy, the concern with discovering what the ultimate ontological lineaments of ‘Reality’ consisted of was central; thus Leibniz wrote: I consider the notion of substance to be the keys to the true philosophy. Brandon C. Look, in his online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry for Leibniz points out concerning this: For Leibniz, the fundamental questions of metaphysics were reducible to questions of ontology: What is out there? What are the most basic components of reality? 78 And this concern regarding the ultimate nature of the phenomena experienced by sentient, or at least human, beings was also a central, and ‘metaphysical’, knowledge target for most philosophers down even to Daniel Dennett who, against all the evidence, still maintains an unjustifiable materialist standpoint. And indeed in Dennett’s case it is true that he holds a “metaphysical belief” that is “maintained no matter what our experience”, to re-quote Ellis. But the reason that Dennett is clearly mistaken is not because, as Ellis thinks: …no claim can more than approximately represent truth, and truth can be no more than a regulative idea … . Justification needs to be separated from any reliance on truth claims, and based instead on integration and objectivity. Justification is always incremental and never absolute. It is, rather because the metaphysical belief in the existence of independent and solid Cartesian type ‘matter’ has been shown, admittedly in a scientifically ‘incremental’ manner, within our own experience to be completely false. Ellis claims that: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1059 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature A falsifiable belief is of no relevance to us if it does not accord with our experience, and a merely coherent belief that seems to accord with our experience is merely dogmatic if it is not provisional, recognising its own fallibility. But the falsification of Cartesian type matter is not ‘provisional’ it is actually final. As quantum physicist Henry Stapp expresses this finality: We live in an idealike world, not a matterlike world.’ The material aspects are exhausted in certain mathematical properties, and these mathematical features can be understood just as well (and in fact better) as characteristics of an evolving idealike structure. There is, in fact, in the quantum universe no natural place for matter. This conclusion, curiously, is the exact reverse of the circumstances that in the classical physical universe there was no natural place for mind.79 And, as we shall see, this conclusion, or one like it, is necessarily established by the fact that the precise analysis of our experience indicates that, whatever ‘Reality’ might be, it cannot be made up of “those tiny bits of matter that Newton imagined the universe to be made of,” as Stapp puts it. The very nature of our experience rules this out, unless, that is the fundamental scientific method, including Popper’s notion of ‘falsifiability’, is completely and desperately incorrect, no not even incorrect, the method would have to be desperately and degenerately misleading, or, perhaps, ‘Reality’ would have to be determinedly and incoherently perverse, having the means at its disposal so to speak to be not just subtly paradoxical but to be utterly, absolutely and unremittingly incoherent and contradictory (it was thought of course that quantum wave and particle were contradictory, but this turns out not to be so – ‘particles’ are transformations though experience of the fundamental quantum wave-nature). If ‘Reality’ were to be made up of tiny ‘solid bits of matter’, then it simply could not exhibit the phenomenon of quantum entanglement, an issue we now need to investigate in a little detail. And, after we have done so we shall find that Ellis’s claim that: We do not ultimately know whether or not the world is actually made up of absolute things that either exist or don't exist,…80 …is actually false. In a recent work the science writer Michio Kaku tells us that: The reason why molecules are stable and the universe does not disintegrate is that electrons can be in many places at the same time. ….electrons can exist in parallel states hovering between existence and non-existence.81 And, as quantum physicist Lee Smolin says: Quantum physics tells us, no it screams at us, that reality is not composed of things. It is made up of processes…82 The fact that the ‘ultimate’ nature of quantum reality, which is the most precise description of the nature of our collective experience available to us, a description which must be indicative in some degree of the nature of ‘Reality’, has turned out to be a realm of potentiality which ‘hovers’ between existence and non existence until it is measured had implications which the physicists Einstein, Boris Podolski and Nathan Rosen (EPR) found detrimental to what they considered what ‘Reality’ should be like. In 1935 Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen published a paper with the title “Can Quantum- Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?”83 In this paper, known as the EPR paper, EP & R show that quantum physics indicates that there must be a mysterious interconnectedness between distant ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1060 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature quantum aspects of reality, an interconnection completely at variance with anything expected in the ‘classical’ everyday level. In particular quantum physics requires that quantum ‘particles’ that have interacted and then separate, even to large distances, are interconnected in a manner such that a measurement of one of them will instantaneously change the state of the other. In particular this rules out that notion that there are ultimate ‘things’, ‘things’ which are conceived of as self-enclosed independent entities which have an ‘existence’ independent of all other equally independent ‘things’. The actual term used by EPR for ‘thing’ was ‘element of reality’. In the EPR paper it was argued that the following should suffice as a definition of an ‘element of reality’: If, without in anyway disturbing a system, we can predict with certainty (i.e., with probability equal to 1) the value of a physical quantity, then there exists an objective element of physical reality corresponding to this physical quantity.84 The phenomenon at the heart of this debate is that of quantum entanglement. Quantum ‘particles’ are said to be ‘entangled’ when they interact, or are produced, at the quantum level in a manner so that they share a common quantum state which is ‘hovering between existence and non-existence’. Whilst they remain in this state neither ‘particle’ have any determinate characteristics, they only have a multitude of possible characteristics. In fact even to use the term ‘particles’ is in a sense misleading because until a measurement is performed there is only an interconnected field of potentiality for the ‘particles’ to come into being when a ‘measurement is performed by an ‘observer’. For example consider the case of the polarization of quantum entangled photons (‘particles’ of light). Two entangled photons are created from a source, one of them moves to the left and the other to the right (figure 4); at this point the photons do not have any explicit polarization although they may become, when measured, polarized in any direction, the actual direction appears to be random. However, the way in which the quantum world works is that if the right photon is ‘measured’ by an observation to have vertical polarization the left photon will immediately also become vertically polarized. It seems as if there is a ‘spooky’, to employ the word used by Einstein, instantaneous connection which can operate over any distance. It is essential to understand the mysterious nature or ‘spookiness’ of this instantaneous connection in order to appreciate the significance of what is to follow. It is not the case that the photons have a definite polarization that we do not know about; this is the significance of the use of the term ‘nonepistemic’ by Ghirardi in his explanations. Prior to measurement there is a multitude of potential polarization possibilities but no actual polarization, the state is that of a quantum ‘superposition’, which is combination of a multitude of potentialities. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1061 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Figure 4 (taken- with modification - from Ghirardi’s book Sneaking a Look at God’s Cards) John Bell humorously described the mistaken way to view the situation of quantum entanglement in the context of quantum particle ‘spin’ in which the two particles will adopt opposite spin directions when one is measured, by referring to his cartoon of ‘Dr Bertlmann’ (figure 5): Figure 5 The philosopher in the street, who has not suffered a course in quantum mechanics, is quite unimpressed by Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlations. He can point to many examples of similar correlations in everyday life. The case of Dr Bertlmann’s socks is often cited. Dr. Bertlmann likes to wear two socks of different colours. Which colour he will have on a given foot on a given day is quite unpredictable. But when you see that the first sock is pink, you can be already sure that the second sock will ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1062 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature not be pink. Observation of the first, and experience of Bertlmann, gives immediate information about the second . . . and is not the EPR business just the same?85 The point that Bell, is making, of course, is that the situation with the quantum entanglement situation which is addressed in the EPR context as to just what an ‘element of reality’ consists of is not at all analogous to the Dr. Bertlmann socks example: It is in the in the context of ideas like these that one must envisage the discussion of the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlations. Then it is a little less unintelligible that the EPR paper caused such a fuss, and that the dust has not settled even now. It is as if we had come to deny the reality of Bertlmann's socks, or at least their colours, when not looked at. And as if a child has asked, How come they always choose different colours when they are looked at? How does the second sock know what the first has done? Paradox indeed!86 The point is that if Dr. Bertlmann’s socks were quantum socks then they would have no specific colours until an observation is made and when we observe the first the second would somehow ‘know’ that the first had adopted a colour and would instantaneously adopt a different colour. But Bell is not revelling in the apparent paradox. At this point in his thinking Bell considered that there was something incomplete and unsatisfactory with the theory: Paradox indeed! But for the others, not for EPR. EPR did not use the word "paradox.” They were with the man on the street in this business. For them, these correlations simply showed that the quantum theorists had been hasty in dismissing the reality of the microscopic world. In particular Jordan had been wrong in supposing that nothing was real or fixed in that world before observation.87 Pascal Jordan was a physicist who had wholeheartedly embraced the notion that the act of observation in some way produces or creates the transition for the realm of quantum potentiality to experienced actuality. This was an adumbration of the now increasingly unavoidable conclusion that in some measure consciousness is creative in the quantum measurement process. At the time that Bell was writing the above analysis, however, Bell was sceptical about such conclusions and was on the side of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen view that the fact that the left hand photon in the above example adopts a definite polarization when the right one is measured must mean that “there exists an objective element of physical reality” which exists independently of the observation. The notion that the observation of the right hand photon ‘created’ the polarization of the left hand one was just too ‘spooky’. At this point the physicist David Bohm, who had had lengthy discussions on this issue with Einstein, came up with a ‘hidden variables’ theory which reproduced all the phenomena of quantum physics in a manner which did not require an ‘unreal’ or semi-real quantum realm of potentiality but assumed that the positions of ‘particles’ were hidden and were guided by a quantum ‘pilot wave’. There is no need to investigate the de Broglie-Bohm theorem; the point is that such a theory, if correct, would mean that the particles in the polarization experiments we have been considering would have hidden ‘on board’ local bits of information regarding their inner states (figure 6). Bell greeted this approach with enthusiasm: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1063 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Figure 6 This theory is equivalent experimentally to ordinary, nonrelativistic quantum mechanics-and it is rational, it is clear, and it's exact, and it agrees with experiment and I think it's a scandal that students are not told about it. Why are they' not told about it? I have to guess here that there are mainly historical reasons, but one of the reasons is surely that this theory takes almost all the romance out of quantum mechanics. This scheme is a living counter-example to most of the things that we tell the public on the great lessons of twentieth century science: things like the uncertainty principle - that particles do not have velocities as well as positions; things like the necessary role of the observer in modern physics - there just isn't any; things like the necessary appearance of hazard, or pure chance, in modern physics; this theory is deterministic and it accounts for all the quantum phenomena fully. So what's wrong with it? These observations by Bell are crucial and it is necessary to comprehend in their full significance. Bell at this time was a thoroughgoing realist who would have no truck with what he considered to be ‘romantic’ notions of uncertainty and the necessary role of the observer in modern physics; according to Bell writing at this time “there just isn't any.” Ghirardi remarks regarding this aspect of Bell’s viewpoint at this time that he: …pointed out that EPR did not intend to reveal a paradox, but to draw extreme conclusions from the conceptual structure of the theory, and show its incompleteness.88 In other words it was not Bell’s intention to prove that ‘Reality’ was in anyway mysterious or paradoxical, quite the opposite, he thought there was something lacking in quantum theory. But, as the quantum physicist Anton Zeilinger points out, in Bell’s 1964 paper ‘On the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox’89: Bell showed that it is not possible to understand the phenomenon of entangled systems if one starts from rather “reasonable” assumptions about how the world should work, assumptions that one might even be tempted to call self-evident.90 It is at this point in his discussion of Bell’s work that Ghirardi indicates Karl Popper’s deficient understanding of quantum theory, which is worth examining in the light of the fact that Dr. Ellis seems to think that philosophers of science are more authoritative concerning ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1064 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature ‘Reality’ than quantum physicists.. According to Ghirardi, Popper had made the “philosopher on the street” Dr. Bertlmann socks mistake; Ghirardi writes regarding this: A similar misunderstanding was shown by the great philosopher of science, Sir Karl Popper. In a book of some of this collected writings, Quantum Theory and the Schism in Physics, Popper presents his own criticisms of the orthodox interpretation, attacking the traditional position about the reduction of the wave packet, saying, “No doubt, the reduction of the wave-packet can happen very sudden; even with superluminal velocity, as I explained in section 75 of The Logic of Scientific Discovery; for it simply is not a physical event - it is the result of the free choice of new initial conditions." It should be noted that this wording, with its explicit reference to superluminal events, suggests a position like that of … the socks on Dr. Bertlmann. Just how these new initial conditions, defined as an action that takes place at A, can, to use the language of Popper, render immediately actual some potentialities and not others present in B at the moment of measurement, does not seem to interest him. This work dates from the 1950s.91 Ghirardi then recounts how “just few years after writing the preface of that book, Popper fell into an opposite, and equally serious, error about an ‘EPR situation.’" In this case Popper suggests his variant of the EPR experiment and argues for the possibility of sending signals faster than the speed of light, a view which Ghirardi indicates is “fundamentally erroneous and arises from an incorrect use of quantum formalism”. Ghirardi then continues: I recall a spirited discussion I once had with Popper at the International Center for Theoretical Physics at Miramare in 1983. Professor Abdus Salam informed me that on the occasion of Popper’s visit (for delivering a lecture on the foundations of quantum mechanics), he would be very pleased if the Center would have on hand some competent person in the field, and asked me to take part in the discussion. I knew Popper’s work well and told Professor Salam that my intervention could be critical. Salam’s reply was simple: "I have full confidence in you, and if you think you are right, you should explain your position without any fear.” Popper presented his thought experiment (a variant of the EPR argument, which, according to him, left us with only two alternatives: either the orthodox interpretation was correct, and it would then be possible to send signals faster than the speed of light, or there would not be any action at a distance and the experiment would constitute a falsification of quantum theory. At the end of the conference I explained to him in simple, but mathematically precise terms, the reasons why his point of departure was erroneous: he had not correctly applied the rules of the theory and in fact, the impossibility of sending superluminal signals would confirm the theory rather than falsify it - the exact opposite of what he maintained. At the end of my intervention he only said that he could not answer my objection since he did not have a mastery of the mathematics of the formalism, but was still convinced that the theory implied the possibility of superluminal signals.92 The ‘orthodox interpretation’ refers to the usual interpretation of the ‘Copenhagen’ viewpoint that in the situation of entanglement described above there is an immediate and inherent connection between distant points of the quantum entanglement. This viewpoint has a radically ‘subjectivist’ slant in that it would mean that an observation performed at one point would have an immediate effect at the quantum level, possibly across immense distances. Popper considered that the experiment which he proposed, the details of which need not detain us – there is some controversy about its significance93, would either falsify the Copenhagen view or indicate the ‘objective’ existence of faster than light signalling. In his ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1065 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature book Ghirardi is carries out a detailed analysis of Popper’s views concerning the experiment and concludes that: It would be difficult to imagine a more radical misunderstanding of the effects of nonlocality, or a more erroneous use of the formulism.94 It would seem, then, Popper considered that his profession as philosopher of science enabled him to contradict established and respected quantum physicists as to the implications of the quantum formulism, even though admitting not being fully conversant with it. And, as we know, Ellis also feels content to make his claims about the impossibility of knowledge without knowing too much about it. Ghirardi is not the only quantum physicist with a less than positive view of highly lauded philosophers of science. Abner Shimony, who is not only a physicist but is also a highly regarded philosopher of physics, in an interview with Joan Lisa Bromberg conducted in 2002, has some fairly uncompromising things to say about some notions of Thomas Kuhn and Paul Feyerabend concerning the methodology of science. The following remarks were made during Shimony’s description of the events surrounding the early testing of Bell’s inequality, a mathematical inequality which was given a more testable form by Shimony and others, and an inequality which, as we shall see, if shown to be violated by experiment, indicates that ‘Reality’ really is mysteriously interconnected in the ‘spooky’ manner suggested by quantum entanglement. Shimony is talking about the early experimental tests he was involved with; the Freedman-Clauser experiment was the first such experimental test of Bell’s inequality: Fortunately for Mike and me, Clauser very much wanted his hands on the first experiment, the first test of Bell's Inequality, because he was absolutely convinced that the experiment was going to come out for the local hidden variable theory and against quantum mechanics, and it was going to be an epoch-making experiment and he wanted to have his hands on it.95 So Clauser was completely convinced that the ‘spooky’ aspect of quantum theory couldn’t be true and he wanted to test Bell’s inequality precisely because he was sure that quantum theory would be shown to be faulty. Clauser, then, fully expected to find that there must be ‘local hidden variables’, hidden bits of information, ‘local’, or ‘on board’ so to speak, to the entities involved, which determined the observed behaviour. Shimony goes on to say that: There’s another little detail that I want to put in because I really dislike the idea that experimental results are theory laden, that somehow experimenters see what they want to see. Clauser is a very ebullient man, enthusiastic and so forth. So he thought he was certainly going to find local hidden variable results, and that this was going to be revolutionary. He had bets of quite large amounts of money on the outcome, I think of the order of $500, but you'll have to get from him how much it was. His experiment with Freedman came out for quantum mechanics, unequivocally. Holt didn’t make, as far as I know, any bets, but he once told me, “My experiment better come out for quantum mechanics. If it comes out for local hidden variable theories, well, I’ve got the Nobel Prize, but Harvard is not going to give me a doctorate.” How did his experiment come out? Well, it was an odd kind of borderline result. It did barely agree with Bell’s inequality. It was sort of at the Bell limits, you know, the sum of those expectation values has to be between minus two and plus two. It was just at two. And it disagreed pretty sharply with quantum mechanics. So his experiment came out certainly clearly against quantum mechanics, even though he anticipated, and his theory said it would be quantum mechanical. So here, you have a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1066 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature case in which the two main experimental players in the game each got the result that the other anticipated. So much for theory ladenness of observation. Phooey.96 When reading the philosophies of science as presented by Kuhn and Feyerabend, it is very easy to come away with the notion that, firstly, reality, as understood by physics, can be viewed through just about any conceptual, theory-laden, framework that the human imagination can come up with and, secondly, the ‘progress’ of science is a process of dramatic ‘revolutions’ through which one ‘paradigm’ is wholly replaced by another ‘incommensurate’ paradigm: Kuhn claimed that science guided by one paradigm would be 'incommensurable' with science developed under a different paradigm, by which is meant that there is no common measure for assessing the different scientific theories. This thesis of incommensurability, developed at the same time by Feyerabend, rules out certain kinds of comparison of the two theories and consequently rejects some traditional views of scientific development, such as the view that later science builds on the knowledge contained within earlier theories, or the view that later theories are closer approximations to the truth than earlier theories.97 For Kuhn scientists operating in differing paradigms live in different worlds: …the proponents of competing paradigms practice their trades in different worlds. One contains constrained bodies that fall slowly, the other pendulums that repeat their motions again and again. In one, solutions are compounds, in the other mixtures. One is embedded in a flat, the other in a curved, matrix of space. Practicing in different worlds, the two groups of scientists see different things when they look from the same point in the same direction.98 It is quite clear that Kuhn emphasizes the discontinuities within changes in scientific perspectives and new developments. Thus in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions Kuhn says that: ... the physical referents of these Einsteinian concepts are by no means identical with those of the Newtonian concepts that bear the same name. (Newtonian mass is conserved; Einsteinian is convertible with energy. Only at low relative velocities may the two be measured in the same way, and even then they must not be conceived to be the same.)99 Such notions, however, are overstated, perhaps for academic effect. An investigation of the concept of ‘mass’ for instance reveals that its origins are clearly in simple human experience of pushing around ‘massive’ objects and this fundamental and primal aspect of the meaning of the term still operates within the various much more rarefied conceptual surroundings of physics. Concepts generally evolve through sequences of accumulating differences accruing upon a basic similarity. Perhaps the most significant, probably the only, major paradigm shift within physics since the seventeenth century has been that of the ‘classical’ to ‘quantum’. As Nick Herbert has said: Nothing exposes the perplexity at the heart of physics more starkly than certain preposterous claims a few outspoken physicists are making concerning how the world really works. If we take these claims at face value, the stories physicists tell resemble the tales of mystics and madmen.100 This really was a seismic change in our understanding of the ‘physical’ world, but we are not faced with a bunch of ‘classical’ physicists completely unable to comprehend another bunch ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1067 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature of ‘quantum’ based physicists and vice-versa. Physicists today comprehend the nature of both theories; it is the puzzle of how they fit together which is the crucial issue. Within this astonishing paradigm shift, which was prompted by the discovery of serious ‘anomalies’ - to use a term employed by Kuhn - in the ‘classical’ paradigm there was most certainly a need to forge new concepts to cope with the new quantum context. As Shimony says: Bohr believed that the apparent anomalies of quantum mechanics are consequences of misinterpretation, resulting from the use of theoretical concepts without detailed attention to the experimental arrangement and from neglect of the fact that the arrangement must be described in the language of classical physics. The use of expressions like "creation of physical attributes of objects by observation” are manifestations of such misinterpretation, … It is essential to Bohr’s theory of knowledge that the ordinary human elements in experience be accepted without challenge or revision; he wrote “we must not forget that, in spite of their limitation, we can by no means dispense with those forms of perception which colour our whole language, and it terms of which all experience must ultimately be expressed.101 Bohr, however, was to a large extent extremely conservative in what he was able to visualize and as Shimony remarks “the theme of renunciation and submission to the unavoidable limitations of the human condition is recurrent in Bohr’s writings.”102 Such a viewpoint is understandable at the time when the ‘reality’ of the everyday word was hardly questionable for most people, even physicists. Bohr clearly wanted to ‘save the appearances’ of the everyday ‘classical’ world, and to this end tried to demote the ‘reality’ of the quantum realm. Today, however, scanning tunnelling microscopes provide pictures of waves of quantum probability (fig. 7). As Jim Al-Khalili says ‘this is the closest physicists have got to actually seeing the quantum wavefunction’103. Furthermore the necessary concepts have been developed, upon the basis of former ‘classical’ notions, to comprehend the quantum situation. In passing it is worth mentioning that, in the light of such STM images Ellis’s assertion that quantum theory tells us nothing about the universe seems overblown to the point of bursting! Figure 7 It is not the case that the notion of ‘paradigm-shifts’ has no relevance, it is just generally overplayed, as is the notion of ‘theory-ladenness’. Feyerabend gave a paper entitled ‘On the Quantum Theory of Measurement” to the 1957 Colston Research Symposium in which he ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1068 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature introduced a major component of his philosophy of science, the notion that there is no independent neutral ‘observation-language’ or ‘everyday language’ against which the theoretical statements can be tested. Quantum physicist and philosopher Bernard d’Espagnat is in no doubt that Feyerabend exhibits a “faulty” understanding of quantum implications, as Feyerabend considers that macro-objects can be taken as being ontologically distinct from their quantum basis104, which is a misinterpretation of Bohr’s position. But Feyerabend’s central concern is the issue of the nature of theoretical conceptuality: …the everyday level is part of the theoretical rather than something self contained and independent.105 And: …the interpretation of an observation-language is determined by the theories which we use to explain what we observe, and it changes as soon as those theories change.106 Such notions of helpless entrapment within language and theory are appropriate only within limits. It also essential to understand that our experience that gives rise to any language and theory is guided by a ‘Reality’ within which our experience is enmeshed The notion of paradigm entrapment can become, when absolutized, as is the case with Ellis, a full blown metaphysical scepticism, or, on the other hand, a claim for an absurd thoroughgoing relativism, as if ‘Reality’ had nothing to say on the matter. What quantum physics and correct philosophical analysis does provide, however, is a constrained metaphysical relativism (CMR). This is the metaphysical position that it is the very nature of ‘Reality’, not to be unknowable, as Ellis maintains, but to be knowable in various manners which are consistent with, and constrained by, its inner nature. Furthermore the inner, or absolute nature of reality, is indicated by the overlap between various different aspects which are consistent with appropriate experience. This metaphysical position is basically the one advanced by Stephen in their recent book The Grand Design: Model-dependent realism short circuits all this argument and discussion between the realist and anti-realist schools of thought. According to model-dependent realism, it is pointless to ask whether a model is real, only whether it agrees with observation. If there are two models that both agree with observation … then one cannot say that one is more real than another. One can use whichever model is more convenient in the situation under consideration.107 This view, if hastily perused, might look similar to Ellis’s scepticism, but it is not. This is quite clear from the fact that model-dependent realism (MDR) accepts that models can be ruled out, thus final negative metaphysical decisions are possible. In Hawking and Mlodinow’s formulation the terms ‘realist’ and ‘anti-realist’ are used quite loosely for, in fact, MDR necessarily will have to impute unreality to models, such as the existence of ultimate little balls of ‘matter’, which are clearly ruled out by observation. And, on the other hand, ‘reality’, or at least a ‘provisional’ reality, would have to be accorded to those models which are in accord with observation. But this, it might be thought, is little better than Ellis’s universal metaphysical scepticism, it still only gives us a set of ‘provisional’ realities. But, again this is mistaken on two counts. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1069 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Firstly CMR (constrained metaphysical relativism) asserts that it is the very nature of reality to reveal itself in various constrained guises. Secondly, as Hawking and Mlodinow point out: … situations in which … very different theories accurately describe the same phenomenon-are consistent with model-dependent realism. Each theory can describe and explain certain properties and neither theory can be said to be better or more real than the other. Regarding the laws that govern the universe what we can say is this: there seems to be no single mathematical model or theory that can describe every aspect of the universe. Instead … there seems to be the network of theories called Mtheory. Each theory in the M-theory network is good at describing phenomena within a certain range. Wherever their ranges overlap, the various theories in the network agree, so they can all be said to be parts of the same theory.108 And it is within the overlapping of the ranges, in particular the point at which all ranges overlap, that we can find a clue to the ‘ultimate’ metaphysical nature of reality. Furthermore, as will be argued in other articles, because the ultimate nature of reality is mind-like or ‘Mindnature’, it is entirely possible that there are advanced techniques of training and meditation which enable one to directly experience the deep non-dual nature of ‘ultimate’ reality. It is time to start Bell’s theorem tolling for the end of dogmatic sceptical metaphysical agnosticism. The experiment we are going to consider is considerably simplified for purposes of exposition but will contain all the elements necessary to understand the remarkable quantum phenomenon of the non-local interconnection of quantum entanglement. The experimental set up is shown in figure 8. The two experimenters are traditionally called Alice and Bob, each has control of a polarizing filter which can be rotated into three positions: 1, 2 and 3. They choose which position at random as entangled ‘particles’ are sent from a source towards the polarizing filters as shown. Sometimes the ‘particles’ will be transmitted through the filter and sometimes they fail to transmit, which occurs seems to be a random event. Quantum theory gives us the precise probabilities for transmission and failure but the actual values need not concern us. All we need to know for the moment is that there are three possible positions for the polarizing filters 1, 2, and 3, and, furthermore, for each position the photon will either pass through, which we register as YES, or fail to pass, which we register as a NO. Figure 8 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1070 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Figure 9 The following discussion is taken from Ghirardi’s brilliant book on quantum physics Sneaking a Look at God’s Cards, in a section entitled ‘Telepathy or a Cheap Trick’. Alice and Bob are putting on a music hall performance (figure 9). There are two section of the audience one of which continuously and randomly feed Alice cards with a 1,2 or 3 on each of them; the other does the same for Bob. Both Alice and Bob write either a ‘YES’ or a ‘NO’ on each card they are given, this response is random but 50% of the time the response will be ‘YES’ and 50% ‘NO’. The performance is set up so that it appears that Alice and Bob have no idea about the numbers on the other’s cards, or the other’s responses. However, amazingly, whenever Alice and Bob are, randomly, given the same number they always, apparently also randomly, give the same response, they both either write ‘YES’ or both write ‘NO’. It appears to be an astounding feat of telepathy! However, there are sceptics who suggest that such telepathy is simply impossible, the performance must involve a cheap trick, it is obvious, they say, that Alice and Bob must come to a prior agreement of some kind which enables them to produce the illusion of telepathy, there must be some ‘hidden variables’ somewhere in the performance. The only way this could be done is to agree to patterns of responses before the show. For example, they could decide that for the first set of cards they might agree to the pattern: 1 YES 2 NO 1 YES 2 NO 3 NO and for the second: ISSN: 2153-8212 3 YES Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1071 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature And so on. They would have to remember a great many patterns but we assume they can do this. They must also make sure that the patterns they use are such that the overall ‘YES’ – ‘NO’ responses are split 50%-50%. This imaginary music hall performance actually corresponds to the experiment shown in figure 8. Alice and Bob are choosing the setting of the polarizing filters to one of the three positions at random - the experiment has been set up so that they are completely isolated from each other. Furthermore what happens in the experiment, which has been repeated on many occasions to a fine level of precision, is exactly as described in the music hall example. Whenever Alice and Bob set the filters to the same position the result – PASS = ‘YES’ or FAIL = ‘NO’ is always the same. When the positions are different, however, the results seem pretty random. The question which arises, of course, is how do the photons manage to coordinate? This is the issue of whether or not there are ‘hidden variables’’ operating at the quantum level that we have not spotted. By the way, the distance over which such experiments have been carried out is more than 10 kilometers109, and yet it appears that the photons respond instantaneously. How? In the case of the music hall scenario Ghirardi shows that it is possible to demonstrate that by examining the configuration of the pairs of results in which there are mismatches of numbers that it is impossible for Alice and Bob to have a pre-arranged ‘hidden-variable’ system. A shrewd group of researchers, whom Ghirardi likens to Bell, do some further investigation and discover that over time the number of disagreements and agreements between the cards given to Alice and Bob is equal. They then look into what the situation would be in the case of using pre-arranged tabled. First they note that the possibilities for the two cards given to Alice and Bob at any one time is as follows: 1,1 1,2 1,3 2,1 2,2 2,3 3,1 3,2 3,3 Now consider what happens when Alice and Bob apply the first table above (using ‘Y’ for YES, ‘N’ for NO) and we note the number of agreements and disagreements: 1,1 YY agree 1,2 1,3 2,1 YN YN NY disagree disagree disagree 2,2 NN agree 2,3 NN agree 3,1 NY disagree 3,2 NN agree 3,3 NN agree 3,2 YN disagree 3,3 YY agree This gives 5 agreements and 4 disagreements What about the second table? 1,1 YY agree 1,2 1,3 YN YY disagree agree 2,1 NY disagree 2,2 NN agree 2,3 3,1 NY YY disagree agree This gives 5 agreements and 4 disagreements. As long as we use tables with one YES and two NOs or one NO and two YESs the pattern we choose is irrelevant, we will always get a ratio of 5 agreements to 4 disagreements; if we use all YESs or all NOs we will get 9 agreements of course. So we can conclude with certainly that using tables in this way would mean that: Number of agreements – Number of disagreements ≥ 1 (‘≥’ means greater or equal to) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1072 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature This is a Bell-type inequality. But our investigators have already discovered that the number of agreements and disagreements which actually occur is equal, so the difference between them is zero. The only conclusion that can be drawn is that it is impossible for prearranged tables to be being used. If pre-arranged tables were being used then the difference between the number of agreements and the number of disagreements must be greater or equal to one. But in actuality the difference is zero. Hence tables cannot be in use; it therefore must be a case of telepathy. This is an example of the use of a Bell-type inequality; and the significant point to grasp is the fact that the violation of the inequality proves without doubt that no cheap tricks, no prearranged tables, or no ‘hidden variables’ can possibly be involved in the phenomenon. We are in the presence of telepathy! In his book The Dance of the Photons Professor Anton Zeilinger, a quantum experimenter who has conducted many of the precise experiments of the type we are discussing gives a fairly accessible derivation of Bell’s inequality for polarization of entangled photons. This presentation derives from a paper by Eugene Wigner110 which was expanded by d’Espagnat111 In order to make the derivation more approachable we consider pairs of identical human twins, instead of entangled quantum ‘particles.’ The three polarization measurements (1, 2, or 3) correspond to the observation of three features of the twins, their height, hair color, and eye color, and we set this up so that we use two valued features: tall or short (we can set a height to divide our sample into two groups), blue eyes or brown eyes, blond hair or brunet hair. Because the twins are identical we know that if one of the twins is tall, blue-eyed, and brunet, we know that the other twin will also be tall, blue eyed, and brunet. From the perspective of Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen, these three properties height, eye color, and hair color - are ‘elements of reality’ that we predict with certainty for the second twin upon obser-vation of the first twin. We also assume that the reason for these correlations is that the twins carry the same genes. These genes correspond to the ‘local hidden variables’ we postulate might be operational in the quantum situation. We can now look at all the possible combinations in a large sample of these twins: Tall, blue-eyed, brunet Tall, blue-eyed, blond Tall, brown-eyed, brunet Tall, brown-eyed, blond Short, blue-eyed, brunet Short, blue-eyed, blond Short, brown-eyed, brunet Short, brown-eyed, blond Now we can make some very simple and obvious statements amount the numbers involved. For instance: [Exp 1] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1073 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature The equality (Expression 1) should be obvious, as the hair colours blond and brunet cover all the twins there cannot be any tall, blue-eyed twins with another hair colour. From this equation we can derive the following inequality, the symbol ‘≤’ means that the number on the left hand side is less than or equal to the number on the right hand side: [Exp 2] The reason that this inequality must be true is because: Both of the bracketed sets on the left hand side of Exp 2 must be larger than the corresponding bracketed sets in Exp 1 because extra pairs of twins are added in. In the case of the first bracket on the right hand side, pairs of twins who are tall, brunet with brown eyes are added in; and in the case of the second bracketed set on the right hand side we have added in pairs of twins with blue eyes, blond hair and are short. Now we suppose that we can only observe one property on each twin, we can write down Exp 2 as follows: [Exp 3] Why does this work? Consider the set on the left hand side. The number of pairs of twins where one is tall and the other is blue eyed must be the same as the number of tall twins with ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1074 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature blue eyes because they are twins. If the twin of a tall twin has blue eyes then the tall twin must have blue eyes also because they are twins. The same reasoning applies to the sets on the right hand side; so Exp 3 is equivalent to Exp 2 but expressed in a different form. Exp 3 is Bell’s Inequality for Twins. The point of this inequality is that it must be satisfied by a ‘Reality’ which conforms to our everyday notions concerning reality, which is that ‘Reality’ is made up of individual, separately existing things which have their features inherently attached to them independently of observations. Zeilinger comments upon Bell’s achievement with devising this possibility for performing ‘experimental metaphysics’: How is it possible that a statement as simple as Bell's inequality might not hold in nature? The problem we have is that the considerations that led us to Bell's inequality were extremely simple. I would argue that they are so simple that the Greek philosopher Aristotle could already have derived Bell's inequality had he known that this was an interesting and nontrivial problem. We did not have to use quantum mechanics for its derivation. But Aristotle would never have expected that this could be an interesting problem. In contrast, he probably would have said that this is quite uninteresting, because nature obviously has to behave in a way so as not to violate the inequality. As Daniel Greenberger commented, to think that nature could possibly function in a manner to violate Bell’s inequality is surely “crazy”.112 In order to translate this from the terms of human twins, also taking into account Ghirardi’s discussion outlined above, we use the following translation. In Zeilinger’s discussion he refers to the diagram shown in figure 10. We had three different features which were determined by the setting of the polarization filters, these features were labelled 1, 2 and 3, in order to accord with Zeilinger’s exposition we shall now label them x, y and z. There were two possible results: ‘YES’ ‘NO’, which now are labelled + or –, Alice and Bob become ‘apparatus A’ and ‘apparatus B’. We need to recall that the + and – results are always perfectly correlated (+ + or – –) whenever the same feature was tested at apparatus A and apparatus B. Zeilinger gives the following explanation, the expressions in square brackets indicates Ghirardi’s schema: The size corresponds to the property x [1]: tall is translated into the result + [YES]; short translated into the result – [NO]. Eye colour corresponds to the property y [2]: blue is translated into the result + [YES]; brown translated into the result – [NO]. Hair colour corresponds to the property z [3]: brunet is translated into the result + [YES]; blond translated into the result – [NO]. And we now have Bell’ inequality for pairs of entangled quantum particles: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1075 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Figure 10 (Taken from The Dance of the Photons) Zeilinger goes on to describe a slightly more complicated experiment which need not concern us. The results apply equally to the inequality displayed above. The point is that Bell’s inequality must be satisfied for a ‘locally real’ ‘Reality’ to be functioning, which is a ‘Reality’ with ‘real’ individuated and separate ‘things’, or ‘elements of reality’, to ultimately exist independently of observations, and independently of all other apparent ‘things’. Quantum theory predicts that that Bell’s inequality must be violated; and it turns out that in all experiments (except an early one which certainly was defective) quantum physics has been validated and Bell’s theorem violated. In the final paragraph of his section ’Telepathy or Cheap Trick’ Ghirardi writes: I would like to conclude this section with a quotation from Einstein that is particularly apt for the example just discussed, and shows how lucidly he intuited (even while refusing to accept) the deepest implications of the theory, long before Bell's own analysis: "It seems hard to sneak a look at God's cards. But that He plays dice and uses ‘telepathic’ methods (as present quantum theory requires of Him) is something that I cannot believe for a single moment."113 Indeed, it seems remarkable that Einstein, who was the first to take the notion that ‘Reality’ at its deepest physical level was quantum in nature, when he used the idea to solve the puzzle of the photoelectric effect, and was the person, of course, who overturned notions of absolute ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1076 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature space and time with his relativity theories, simply could not, would not, accept that independent and completely separate ‘elements of reality’ ultimately do not exist. Ghirardi, however, tells us that the evidence tells us that “the photons themselves must be telepathic.”114 Experiments of extraordinary delicacy and precision have been carried out to probe the phenomenon of the telepathic nature of quantum entanglement. Ghirardi describes one carried out by Alain Aspect, who carried out one of the first precise demonstrations of the violation of Bell’s inequality, and collaborators that involved a system which precluded any form of hidden message being transmitted at the speed of light and he concludes: Personally, I take the experiment of Aspect and his collaborators as conclusive: photons really are telepathic, or to use more scientific terminology they cannot be considered as possessing any local characteristics that determine whether or not they will pass the test before the test is carried out. Nevertheless, they still react the same way for the same test.115 Anton Zeilinger concludes that: Quantum particles do not behave like identical twins. Even though they always show the same results when they are measured for the same property, we are not allowed to explain this by saying that they carried that property before and independently of observations.116 Zeilinger analyses what he considers to be the implications of the quantum physical violation of Bell’s inequality in his final section ‘What Could That Mean?”. He begins by asserting that at least one of the assumptions about “Reality” which were used to derive Bell’s inequality must be wrong. These assumptions he lists as follows: 1) Realism: This is the idea that an experimental result reflects in some way the features of the particles that we measure. 2) Locality hypothesis: the assumption that the real physical situation of the measurement at apparatus B including particle b must be independent of the kind of measurement done at the same time to the distant particle a using measurement apparatus A. 3) Counterfactual nature of reality: Zeilinger writes: “There is a third assumption, which we used implicitly but did not express in detail. It is the assumption that it makes sense to consider what kind of experimental result would have been obtained if one had measured a different than the one than the one that was actually measured. For the case of twins the assumption means that it makes sense to assume that, for example, blue-eyed blond twins must be either tall or short, even if we do not check their height. Zeilinger then writes that: We now discuss some of the possible conceptual consequences of the breakdown of local realism. One possibility is that the reality assumption is not correct. This would mean in principle that the property of a particle observed in a specific experiment is not an element of physical reality before the measurement is performed. In the end, this means that the reality depends on the decision of the observer-of the experimentalist-about which measurement to perform. The breakdown of realism would mean that the measured result does not reflect any kind of property that existed before and independently of observation. Another possibility would be that the locality hypothesis is not correct. Such a breakdown of locality could, for example, mean that something is wrong with our ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1077 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature picture of space and time. A quantum system that consists of two or more entangled particles remains an unseparated entity regardless of how far the individual components of the system are separated from each other. A breakdown of the third assumption would mean that one is only allowed to talk about the properties of systems when these properties are indeed measured. Expressed very simply, the question "What if?" would be illegal. This would certainly contradict our everyday experience. We always consider different possible alternatives, and we base decisions on the possible consequences of these alternatives. For example, to know what will happen if we cross a superhighway during rush hour with our eyes closed, it is not really necessary for us to perform that experiment. At present, there is no agreement in the scientific community as to what the philosophical consequences of the violation of Bell's inequality really are. And there is even less agreement about what position one has to assume now. Nearly all physicists agree that the experiments have shown that local realism is an untenable position. The viewpoint of most physicists is that the violation of Bell's inequality shows us that quantum mechanics is nonlocal. This nonlocality is exactly what Albert Einstein called "spooky"; it seems eerie that the act of measuring one particle could instantly influence the other one. The other possibility would be for us to give up the picture of a world that exists in all its properties independent of us. That would mean that we have a very essential influence on reality just by deciding which measurement to perform. There are indeed hints that this might be the message we have to accept.117 Nowhere in his summary, however, does he mention the possibility that ‘Reality’ can be made up of independent, completely solid and self-contained units of ‘matter’. Such a metaphysical position has been, completely ruled out, if, that is, we accept that ‘Reality’ is essentially coherent. But isn’t the assumption of a completely and radically incoherent universe, well, incoherent? Although in the above quote Zeilinger says that “there is no agreement in the scientific community as to what the philosophical consequences of the violation of Bell's inequality really are,” this does not mean that there are not some possibilities that are definitely ruled out by the results of the demonstration of the violation Bell’s inequality. This is why Zeilinger writes in a collection of essays dedicated to the work of the famous twentieth century physicist John Wheeler of Wheeler’s: …realization that the implications of quantum physics are so far-reaching that they require a completely novel approach in our view of reality and in the way we see our role in the universe. This distinguishes him from many others who in one way or another tried to save pre-quantum viewpoints, particularly the obviously wrong notion of a reality independent of us.118 Which is an observation which clearly suggests that there can be no ‘Reality’ which is completely cut off and ‘independent’ from sentient observation of some sort; in some manner all sentient beings are somehow ‘entangled’ with the world of apparent materiality. As Wheeler expressed this quantum insight: Directly opposite to the concept of universe as machine built on law is the vision of a world self-synthesized. On this view, the notes struck out on a piano by the observer participants of all times and all places, bits though they are in and by themselves, constitute the great wide world of space and time and things.119 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1078 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Although some may find Wheeler’s pan-psychic cosmic vision overly ‘mystical’, it remains the case that any kind of naïve realism about ‘matter’ being composed of solid independent ‘stuff’ which has no connection to the minds of observers is ruled out as a metaphysical possibility by the violation of Bell’s inequality. Such an ontological structure of reality would be completely and absolutely at variance with our collective experience as revealed by physics. The recent publication of the book Elegance and Enigma: The Quantum Interviews enables us to get some idea of what some significant physicists of the ‘scientific community’ think about the implications of the violation of Bell’s inequalities as the subject was one of the questions posed to a group of quantum physicists by the editor Maximilian Schlosshauer. The following are brief excerpts from the answers given120: Guido Bacciagaluppi: …what can safely be said is that … distant correlations present in nature cannot be understood in what seem to be quite general forms of local models. … I am happy to call that nonlocality. Caslav Brukner: Bell’s theorem … states that no ‘local causal’ or ‘local realistic’ theories can ever reproduce all of the predictions of quantum theory … (and) requires a radical revision of the ruling philosophical view among most scientists and is in sharp contrast to our everyday experience. Jeffrey Bub: …the experimentally observed violations of Bell’s inequalities tell us that we live in a world in which there are nonlocal correlations which are inconsistent with any explanation in terms of common causes. Christopher Fuchs: … our actions matter indelibly for the rest of the universe (pluriverse). … With every quantum measurement set by an experimenters free will, the world is shaped just a little as it participates in a kind of moment of birth. Daniel Greenberger: Bell’s theorem is based on the idea that there exist sets of instructions that determine future events as consequences of past events. The violations of Bell’s theorem tells us that there exist situations that do not follow from such sets of instructions. This relates directly to our ideas of classical causality, which are based on the future being determined by specific conditions in the past. Instead, in quantum theory we have entangled states, where neither state is determined until it is measured. Tim Maudlin: … we can conclude that nature is nonlocal. Lee Smolin: The observed violations of the Bell inequalities imply that there are real physical nonlocal correlations in nature. Antonio Valentini: The observed violations of Bell’s inequality tell us that locality it violated – if we assume that there is no backward causation and that there are non many worlds. Wojciech Zurek: The basic message is that our universe is quantum. According to d’Espagnat an important implication of Bell’s theorem is the correctness of quantum field theory as the most fundamental physical and metaphysical account of ‘Reality’. He writes: …what, from a philosophical standpoint, is by far the most remarkable feature of quantum field theory is that it reduces the (scientifically unmanageable) notion “creation” [of particles] to the (scientifically tractable) notion “state change.” And the point that is relevant to the here considered issue is that it succeeds in doing so ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1079 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature by making primary some concepts of a general nature-such as fields associated with types of particles-and secondary the concept of individualized particles. Consequently, if we are on the lookout for some concept, or “mathematical algorithm,” that this theory could be identified as referring to the “basic stuff,” we can find none except, conceivably, the element the state of which changes when a particle gets “created” or “annihilated”. … Now, in the theory, there are not myriads and myriads of such elements. Indeed there is just one! Which means that, conceptually speaking, the theory is as far from atomism as it is conceivably possible for a theory to be.121 On the other hand, however, I guess that if we are still in the mood to humour an extreme Humean scepticism, it could all conceivably be being orchestrated by Noddy and Big Ears pulling wooden levers at the edge of the universe, could it? It might be thought that such a lampoon is going too far, being too unkind. But it must be fully appreciated that Ellis is asserting that human beings can reach absolutely no certain knowledge about the metaphysical nature of reality, either positively or negatively. Yes, one might say, but he obviously would not claim that fictional characters from children’s books could be viable metaphysical agents. Maybe not, however, the point is that, in the light of the quantum violation of Bell’s theorem, Cartesian-Newtonian type ‘matter’ is equally, although not so obviously, fictional; which is why quantum physicist Henry Stapp tells us that: One might try to interpret the ‘matter’ occurring in this formula as the ‘matter’ that occurs in classical physics. But this kind of ‘matter’ does not exist in nature.122 And which is also why Paul Davies and John Gribben, in their book about ‘the death of materialism’, which is the title of their first chapter, The Matter Myth123. In a talk entitled ‘Science, Values, and the Nature of the Human Person’124 Henry Stapp referred to the necessity for a new idea of ‘matter’: By this new idea of "matter" I mean the new idea of the "stuff" out of which the physical universe is made. The properties of this stuff are radically different from the properties of matter postulated by Isaac Newton and his successors. The properties of "quantum matter" lie "mid-way" between those of classical matter and mind:"matter" has moved toward "mind". The problem with the notion of adopting a new concept of ‘matter’, however, lies precisely in its Cartesian-Newtonian origin which has permeated the Western scientific, philosophical and academic ethos to the point of no return. As we have seen, when we have two possible ontological absolutes, ‘Mind’ and ‘Matter’, and one of them, in this case ‘Matter’ is in true Popperian fashion ‘falsified’, then that must clearly leave us with the only possible conclusion, the ultimate nature of ‘Reality’ is Mind-like. It would seem that the most obvious conclusion is precisely that which is indicated by quantum field theory conjoined with the obvious conclusion that the ultimate quantum field must have mind-like qualitative features; otherwise none of us would have minds. The violation of Bell’s theorem, which has been experimentally verified over and over with astonishing degrees of precision, indicates that the realm of what was once thought be independent ‘matter’ and the realm of mind are not separate but interpenetrate in a nonlocal quantum field of potentiality which bears a significant resemblance to what Buddhist ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1080 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Dzogchen philosophy calls ‘Mindnature’ – an energetic realm of potentiality which is activated by an internal ‘excitatory intelligence’. The Tibetan Dzogchen term sems nyid is translated by Anne Carolyn Klein and Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche in their book Unbounded Wholeness: Dzogchen, Bon, and the Logic and the Nonconceptual as ‘Mindnature’ may be a possible description of the ultimate nature. As the Expansive Sky Tantra says: Prior to Buddhas or ordinary beings, Our primordial ancestor, the quintessential heart essence base Dwells as just that unbounded sun heart essence Because it is one with, being everywhere suffused by, The dynamic display of the [creative and unmanifested] dimension, My own mind, just that greatness, vast and whole Dwells primordially uncoarsened by any external element. A1so the Authentic Scripture says: Prior to all Buddhas and sentient beings When even their names do not exist Is ancestral wholeness, mindnature. Furthermore the Profound Great Bliss Sutra says: Mind of mine, dwelling in the present Uncontrived, uncoarsened, and untouched Heart essence of all that is Dwells solely as wholeness unbounded.125 So it looks as if we can say that quantum Mindnature dwells solely as quantum non-locality unbounded! ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1081 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Sources: Allday, Jonathan (2009). Quantum Reality: Theory and Philosophy. CRC Press. Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004). Science and Ultimate Reality. Cambridge University Press. Brunnhölzl, Karl (2004) Center of the Sunlit Sky: Madhyamaka in the Kargyu Tradition. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications. Brunnhölzl, Karl (2010). Gone Beyond: Volume 1: The Prajnaparamitra Sutras, The Ornament of Clear Realization, and Its Commentaries in the Tibetan Kagyu Tradition. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications (Tsadra Foundation). Bohm, D (2002) Wholeness and the Implicate Order (First published: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980; Routledge Classics, 2002) Chandrakirti and Jamgon Mipham (2002). Introduction to the Middle Way: Chandrakirti's Madhyamakavatara with Commentary by Jamgon Mipham. Translated by the Padmakara Translation Group. Boston: Shambhala Publications. d’ Espagnat, B (2003). Veiled Reality: An Analysis of Present-Day Quantum Mechanical Concepts, Westview Press. Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003). The Tests of Time: Readings in the Development of Physical Theory. Princeton University Press. Eccles, John C. and Karl Popper (1984). The Self and Its Brain: An Argument for Interactionism, Routledge - (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper) Ellis, R. M. (2008). The Trouble with Buddhism: How the Buddhist tradition has betrayed its own insights. UK: Robert M. Ellis; Lulu.com. Feynman, Richard (1988). QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter. Princeton University Press Ghirardi, G (1997). Sneaking a Look at God’s Cards: Unraveling the Mysteries of Quantum Mechanics, Princeton University Press. Gribben, John (2009). Science: A History. Penguin Books. Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010). The Grand Design: New Answers to the Ultimate Questions of Life. Transworld Publishers – Bantum Press. Herbert, Nick (1985). Quantum Reality: Beyond The New Physics. Random Hopkins, Jeffrey (1996). Meditation on Emptiness. Wisdom Publications, U.S.A. (First published 1983). Kaku, Michio (2006). Parallel Worlds: The Science of Alternative Universes and our Future in the Universe. Penguin Books (First published by Doubleday 2005). Klein, A. C. & Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche (2006). Unbounded Wholeness: Dzogchen, Bon, and the Logic of the Nonconceptual, Oxford University Press. Murti, T.R.V (1987). The Central Doctrine of Buddhism A Study of the Madhyamaka System. Unwin Paperbacks. Oerter, Robert (2006). The Theory of Almost Everything. Pi Press. Penrose, Roger (2007). The Large, the Small and the Human Mind, Cambridge University Press – First Published 1997. Penrose, Roger (1995). Shadows of the Mind. Oxford University Press:1994, Random HouseVintage:1995 Penrose, Roger (1999). Emperors New Mind. Oxford University Press:1989, Oxford University Press paperback:1999 Popper, K. R. (1971). The Open Society and Its Enemies: The Spell of Plato, Princeton University Press - (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper) Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011). Elegance and Enigma: The Quantum Interviews, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1082 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Smolin, Lee (2002). Three Roads to Quantum Gravity. Perseus Book Group:2002 (first published 2000) Stapp, H. P. (2007). Mindful Universe: Quantum Mechanics and the Participating Observer. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, US.: Springer. Strawson, G. et al. (ed. Anthony Freeman) (2006). Consciousness and its place in nature: does physicalism entail panpsychism? Imprint Academic. Zeilinger, Anton (2010). Dance of the Photons. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1083 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature Ratnagotravibhaga – Direct Path to the Buddha Within http://www.moralobjectivity.net/Twb_Quantum_irrelevances .html 3 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20scepticism.html 4 ibid 5 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/oncept%20-%20agnosticism.html 6 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20agnosticism.html 7 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20agnosticism.html 8 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20agnosticism.html 9 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/Death_of_Metaphysics.html 10 Ellis, R. M. (2008). 11 The term ‘Madhyamaka’ is now used to describe the philosophy and the term ‘madhyamika’ is used for a practitioner. 12 Murti, T.R.V (1987) p321 13 Murti, T.R.V (1987) p8 14 Bruce Evans’s translation of Chapter 4 of Ajahn Payutto’s Buddhadhamma: ‘Dependent Origination: The Buddhist Law of Conditionality’. - http://www.buddhanet.net/cmdsg/coarise.htm 15 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/nagarjuna.html 16 Brunnhölzl, Karl (2004) p228 17 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p348 18 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20agnosticism.html 19 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept - metaphysics.html 20 Strawson, Galen - ‘Realistic Monism: Why Physicalism Entails Panpsychism’ in Strawson, G. et al. (ed. Anthony Freeman) (2006) 21 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20agnosticism.html 22 Email correspondence 23 Penrose, Roger (1995) p313 24 d’ Espagnat, B (2003). xvi 25 http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20scientism.html 26 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p226 27 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p291 28 http://philpapers.org/s/Abner%20Shimony 29 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p226 30 Klein, A. C. (1992) p298 quoted in Brunnhölzl, Karl (2010). 31 Email correspondence 32 Joos, Erich (2006). 'The Emergence of Classicality from Quantum Theory' in The Re-Emergence of Emergence: The Emergentist Hypothesis from Science to Religion (Eds: Philip Clayton and Paul Davies). Oxford: Oxford University Press. p54 33 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holographic_principle 34 Chandrakirti and Jamgon Mipham (2002) p70 35 Oerter, Robert (2006) p130 36 Feynman, Richard (1988) p7 37 Stapp, Henry (2007) p139 38 Allday, Jonathan (2009) p493 39 Email correspondence 40 Email correspondence 41 Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p201 42 Michael Brooks: ‘The Second Quantum Revolution,’ New Scientist 23rd June 2007 43 Vlatko Vedral quoted in New Scientist 23rd June 2007 44 New Scientist 23rd June 2007 45 Email communication 46 Email communication 1 2 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1084 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature 47 Kaku, Michio (2006) p147 See ‘A Subjectivist’s Guide to Objective Chance’ by David Lewes and ‘David Lewis’s Humean Theory of Objective Choice’ by Barry Loewer. 49 Locke, J. - Essay Concerning Human Understanding 5.22 50 Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003) p490 – John A. Wheeler (1978): ‘The ‘Past’ and the ‘Delayed Choice’ Double-Slit Experiment.’ 51 Herbert, Nick (1985) p16 52 Penrose, Roger (1999) p295 53 Gribben, John (2009) p511-512 54 Reviews of Modern Physics vol XXI p343 55 Science fiction novel by John Wyndham 56 http://plato.stanford,edu/entries/popper/ 57 Popper, K. R. (1971). p265 58 Eccles, John C. and Karl Popper (1984). 59 Eccles, John C. and Karl Popper (1984). 60 Stapp, Henry. ‘Nondual Quantum Duality’ 61 Eccles’ Model of the Self Controlling Its Brain: The Irrelevance of Dualist-Interactionism. 62 Locke, J., Essay Concerning Human Understanding - (II xxiii 2) 63 Locke, J., Essay Concerning Human Understanding, IV. X, 10, 1640 64 ‘Evolution as Algorithm’ 65 Locke, J., An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 1690, IV, x, 10 66 Das Wesen der Materie” (The Nature of Matter), speech at Florence, Italy, 1944 (from Archiv zur Geschichte der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Abt. Va, Rep. 11 Planck, Nr. 1797) 67 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popper’s_experiment 68 Popper K R - ‘Three Worlds’ p143 – Tanner Lecture on Human Values April 7, 1978 69 Popper K R - ‘Three Worlds’ p153 – Tanner Lecture on Human Values April 7, 1978 70 Penrose, Roger (2007).p95 71 Ellis… 72 Popper K R -Three Worlds’ p166-167 – Tanner Lecture on Human Values April 7, 1978 73 Locke, J., Essay Concerning Human Understanding 5.22 74 Penrose, Roger (2007). p50 75 Bohm, David (2002) p250 76 Ellis… 77 Ellis… 78 http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz 79 Stapp, Henry (2004) p223 80 Moralobjectivity – incrementality page 81 Kaku, Michio (2006) p148 82 Smolin, Lee (2002) 83 A. Einstein, B. Poldolsky, and N. Nathan, “Can Quantum- Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?” Physical Review 47 (May 15, 1935): 177 84 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p167 85 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p185 86 ibid 87 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p165 88 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p185 89 J. S. Bell ‘On the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox’ Physics I (1964) 195-200 90 Zeilinger, Anton (2010). p273 91 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p186 92 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p186-7 93 See http:/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popper’s_experiment and http:/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Popper’s_experiment 48 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1085 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1030-1085 Smetham, G. P., The Matter of Mindnature 94 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p276 http://www.aip.org/history/ohilist/25643.html p45 96 http://www.aip.org/history/ohilist/25643.html p47 97 http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/thomas-kuhn p2 98 Kuhn, T. (1962, 170) 99 Kuhn, T. (1962, 102) 100 Herbert, Nick (1985) p16 101 Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003) p542 102 ibid 103 Al-Khalili, Jim (2003) p235 104 d’ Espagnat, B (2003). p319 105 Feyerabend, P. Philosophical Papers Vol 1 p217 106 Feyerabend, P. Philosophical Papers Vol 1p31 107 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010). p46 108 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010). p58 109 Stapp, H. ‘Quantum Theory and the Role of Mind in Nature p1 110 E.P. Wigner, “On Hidden Variables and Quantum Mechanical Probabilities,” American Journal of Physics 38 (1970): 1005 111 d’ Espagnat, B (2003). 112 Zeilinger, Anton (2010). p273 113 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p237 114 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p236 115 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p246 116 Zeilinger, Anton (2010). p285 117 Zeilinger, Anton (2010). p286 118 Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p201 – Anton Zeilinger: ‘Why the quantum? “It from bit”? A participatory universe? Three far-reaching challenges from John Archibald Wheeler and their relation to experiment.’ 119 John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p577 – Wheeler, J A (1999) ‘Information, physics, quantum: the search for links.’ In Feynman and Computation: Exploring the Limits of Computers, ed A. J. G. Hey, p309 (314). Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. 120 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011). p165-180 121 Ghirardi, Giancarlo (2005) p317 122 Stapp, Henry (1995) – Why Classical Mechanics Cannot Naturally Accommodate Consciousness But Quantum Mechanics Can. 123 Davies, P and Gribben, J, The Matter Myth 124 May 21, 2001, Paris 125 Klein, A. C. & Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche (2006). p226 95 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Founding quantum theory on the basis of consciousness arXiv:quant-ph/0604100v1 13 Apr 2006 Efstratios Manousakis Department of Physics, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida, 32306-4350, U.S.A and Department of Physics, University of Athens, Athens, 15784, Greece. email: stratos@martech.fsu.edu To be published in Foundations of Physics Publication date: June 6, 2006 (Found. Phys. 36 (6)) Published on line: DOI: 10.1007/s10701-006-9049-9 http://dx/doi.org/10.1007/s10701-006-9049-9 In the present work, quantum theory is founded on the framework of consciousness, in contrast to earlier suggestions that consciousness might be understood starting from quantum theory. The notion of streams of consciousness, usually restricted to conscious beings, is extended to the notion of a Universal/Global stream of conscious flow of ordered events. The streams of conscious events which we experience constitute sub-streams of the Universal stream. Our postulated ontological character of consciousness also consists of an operator which acts on a state of potential consciousness to create or modify the likelihoods for later events to occur and become part of the Universal conscious flow. A generalized process of measurementperception is introduced, where the operation of consciousness brings into existence, from a state of potentiality, the event in consciousness. This is mathematically represented by (a) an operator acting on the state of potential-consciousness before an actual event arises in consciousness and (b) the reflecting of the result of this operation back onto the state of potential-consciousness for comparison in order for the event to arise in consciousness. Beginning from our postulated ontology that consciousness is primary and from the most elementary conscious contents, such as perception of periodic change and motion, quantum theory follows naturally as the description of the conscious experience. KEY WORDS: Consciousness; quantum theory; measurement, EPR paradox. 1 INTRODUCTION Quantum theory is plagued with conceptual difficulties such as the question of the so-called wave-function collapse in the measurement process[1], and the well-known paradoxes[1, 2, 3, 4]. While the literature addressing various issues of the interpretations of quantum mechanics[6, 5, 7, 8, 1, 9] is rather rich[4, 11, 10, 12, 13], in this paper we will limit ourselves to mention those more directly related to the point of view elaborated here. Independently Schrödinger[14, 15], Wigner[16], Von Neumann[17], London and Bauer[18], and Pauli[19] have considered the possibility that consciousness plays a fundamental role in the interpretation of quantum 1 mechanics, especially in the question of measurement. While in the so-called Copenhagen interpretation[5] as well as in other interpretations the observer enters in a fundamental manner, ultimately, the nature of the observer is objectified and is considered to be the same as the instrument which carries out the measurement. On the other hand, the paradoxes and the problems associated with the process of the wave function collapse and the process of measurement have led many of the pioneers of quantum theory to examine the possible role of consciousness in the process of measurement. For example, Schrödinger in his “Tarner Lectures” at the Trinity College (see “Mind and Matter” second part in Ref.[14], Chapters 1-4) discusses the fundamental role of consciousness and the role of the process of objectivation in the description of nature. Von Neumann[17], using projection operators and density matrices as tools to describe the apparent statistical character of measurement, was able to show that the assumed boundary separating the observing instrument and the so-called observed object can be arbitrarily shifted and, therefore, ultimately the observer becomes the “abstract ego” (in Von Neumann’s terms) of the observer. Similarly, London and Bauer[18] followed a similar scheme to conclude that it is the “creative action of consciousness” by which “the observer establishes his own framework of objectivity and acquires a new piece of information about the object in question”. According to London and Bauer[18] this leads to the collapse, namely to the choice of a particular state from a linear combination of the correlated states describing the combined system, i.e., the instrument and the observed object. Similarly Wigner[16] proposes that inanimate or unconscious matter evolves deterministically according to the quantum mechanical evolution operator and when consciousness operates on inanimate matter, the result is the familiar projection process of measurement. Pauli and Jung[19] through several letters and communications have discussed a parallelism between the operation of consciousness and quantum theory. Some of the philosophical ideas, from which we use in the present paper, can be also found in the books of Schrödinger[14, 15] and they are extensively discussed in the next section. In this paper quantum theory (more generally, the description of nature) is founded on the framework of the operation and on the primary ontological character of consciousness, rather than founding consciousness on the laws of physics[12, 13, 20, 21]. It is discussed that quantum theory follows naturally by starting from how consciousness operates upon a state of potential consciousness and more generally how it relates to the emergence or manifestation and our experience of matter. In addition, it is argued that the problem of measurement and the paradoxes of quantum theory arise due to our poor understanding of the nature and the operation of consciousness. 2 CONSCIOUSNESS AND ITS OPERATION We begin by introducing our concepts such as, streams of consciousness (particular and Universal), potential consciousness, and operation of consciousness which are necessary in order to discuss our ontological proposal. 2 2.1 Streams and Sub-Streams of Consciousness The word consciousness usually means “experienced awareness”. A person is “conscious” or “has” consciousness if he is experiencing a “flow” of conscious events. The stream of consciousness consists of the conscious events that constitute this stream. The order or the sequence of these events gives rise to a temporal order which together with the experience of temporal continuity[22], as we will discuss later, introduce the concept of continuous time used in physics to describe the laws of nature. The contents of the stream, i.e., the conscious events, act to modify the tendencies for later events to enter the stream. The subject is either the holder or the experiencer of this “flow” of events or just this “flow” of entangled events. First, we conjecture that all human beings and the other living organisms have their own streams of consciousness. In order to gain an understanding of all of these related streams of consciousness together, and what precedes our human thoughts, and binds them together, we postulate the existence of the Universal/Global stream of consciousness, as the primary reality that contains all of our individual streams, (which are sub-streams of the Universal conscious flow of events) and also conscious events that are not members of any human stream, but are like certain of our conscious events (to be clarified in later subsections). Note that the set of conscious events in consciousness must include all those that anyone has ever had, and for any personal stream of consciousness, all the events that have appeared in that person’s stream of consciousness. Even though all of our thoughts and experiences are in our stream of consciousness, and have certain “feel” or quale, it is common and useful to draw some distinctions between different kinds of thoughts. While both are parts of our stream of consciousness, experiences through the sensory apparatus, or sense data, are distinguished from theoretical constructs where memory is a contributing factor in causing these events. Therefore, when we distinguish between “mind” and “matter” we are referring to the previously mentioned distinction. “Mind” refers to our conscious experience of the process of thought, whereas “matter” refers to the conscious experience of an imagined set of properties that are imagined to exist “when no one is looking”. A simple example of the latter is the experience of a surface, which, under microscopic examination, the imagined notion of surface disappears and is replaced by another imagined notion of an array of relatively widely spaced atoms or molecules. We are not denying the existence of something that causes these experiences and it persists when “no one is looking”. Instead we are only questioning its “substantial nature” and we postulate that these properties exist in the Universal Mind, namely, they are parts of the Universal stream of consciousness. The emergence of “matter” is discussed in Sec. 2.4. 2.2 Intuition and State of Potential Consciousness We postulate that a fundamentally new experience or an insight into a problem can occur through the intuitive character of the mind (or consciousness). Aristotle speaks of intuition which is only a “possibility of knowing without in any respect 3 already possessing the knowledge to be acquired.”[23] The conscious event of a new experience or of the insight, while after it happens it can be rationalized, prior to its occurrence it can not be rationally inferred from the previous experiences alone[24]. After such an event becomes part of the individual’s stream of consciousness, it can be incorporated into reasoning by assigning the experienced conscious meaning of it or qualia. This can be demonstrated by the fact that we cannot use reason to directly explain the experience of color to someone born-blind or any experience to one who never had this particular experience. Spinoza[25] clearly states that reasoned conviction is no help to intuitive knowledge and Whitehead[26] accepts that “all knowledge is derived from and verified by, direct intuitive observation.” Jung defines intuition as “that psychological function which transmits perception in an unconscious way.”[27] While the earlier sequence of events in a child’s stream of consciousness might be prerequisites for any new experience which causes the child’s further development, the new experience cannot be grasped in terms of the previous experiences alone. The same argument seems to be valid in the process of the evolution of species or of life in general. In order to describe such a process of fundamentally new conscious events, we find it necessary to introduce the notion of potential consciousness. Namely, in order to explain the manifestation of the experience and its tendency for re-occurrence after its first manifestation, we conjecture the existence of the potentiality[28] for such a manifestation. When the experience fades from the stream of consciousness, we conjecture that, with respect to such an experienced quality, the state of consciousness is transformed into its potential state again with a modified potential for re-occurrence of this particular “felt-quality” in a future conscious event. In the case where the intuitive mind is constrained in such a way that a fundamentally new experience (or intuition) is not allowed to occur, the state of potential consciousness is still necessary in order to describe what happens. One of the capabilities of human consciousness is to imagine what some future conscious event might be, and pre-ascribe values and likelihoods to these future possibilities. In this case the sequence of events along with their character and conscious qualia form the basis on which the state of potential consciousness is defined, namely, the potential for a particular future event to occur depends on the contents of consciousness accumulated during the previous events leading to the present. We also ascribe to the Universal consciousness a Universal state of potential consciousness out of which an event can arise in the Universal stream of consciousness. Namely, just as the entire history of events which form the stream of consciousness in an individual and have causal consequences on what can happen in the present time or in the future time, in the same sense the contents of the Universal consciousness and their temporal order along with the operation of consciousness could entail evolution, unless a higher-level operation of consciousness intervenes. The operation of consciousness and its hierarchical structure is discussed in the following subsections. Therefore, we postulate the primary ontological status, the oneness, and the universality of consciousness[29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 25, 14]. The term “oneness” means that 4 there is only one stream of conscious flow with various sub-streams, the individual streams of consciousness, such as those which we are experiencing as human beings, but they are all connected to one Universal conscious flow. There is a hierarchical tree-like structure of this “branching” of the conscious flow as can be also evidenced within the human body. While there is a vast number of sub-streams deriving from the Universal consciousness, they all belong to the same single unbroken flow. This separation though between Universal and individual consciousness or streams of consciousness is done to facilitate the description of our experience and there is no sharp boundary, namely, the individual consciousness is a sub-stream of the Universal consciousness. As it is discussed next, consciousness also acts on its state of potential consciousness in order to cause an alteration or change of the state in order to cause an experience. Finally consciousness has also the faculty of the experiencer, namely, the felt qualities or qualia or the objects which appear through the process of perception or measurement, a process which can take place at the level of the particular substream or at a lower- or higher-level sub-stream of the Universal flow of consciousness. These notions are elaborated in the following three subsections. 2.3 The Operation of Consciousness In our theory, consciousness also plays an active role and next we give an outline of the main functions of consciousness which are further discussed in the following sections. As discussed earlier we postulate that the ontological character of consciousness is primary[34]. The world “outside”, which is perceived by consciousness as objective, becomes actual through the operation of consciousness. Can one describe the state of any part of nature before the operation of consciousness? Let us call this state of nature before the operation of consciousness, “pro-nature”? Our language, our mathematics, our process of thought, our experience, is based on concepts (or percepts) which are all contents of consciousness. We will use the term consciousconcept or conscious-percept to generally represent the conscious quale or felt experience (or simply percept). Let us ask ourselves the question, “how else can we describe something that is behind the conscious perception?”, namely, by avoiding the usage of any concepts or percepts, because they are all products of perception, i.e. of consciousness. Einstein taught us that even “time” and “space” (which were once believed to “stand out there” independently of us) exist, in a sense, dependent on the process of their perception and measurement and they have no meaning independently of that. In this paper, we take a phenomenological position, that this “pro-nature” is also an aspect of consciousness, namely, the best way to describe it and be free of contradiction is to call it by its potential aspect and that aspect is “potential to become conscious”. Therefore, the state of nature, before the application of consciousness, is a state of potential consciousness. In the previous subsection we discussed that from the state of potential consciousness and through the operation of consciousness on the state of potential consciousness, an actual event arises, and 5 enters the particular or Universal stream of conscious flow. Consciousness can be realized as operation and as experience[35] through perception as follows. First in order to describe the operation of consciousness at a particular level of the Universal stream, we need to divide the complete hierarchical set of operations in two sets as follows: (i) The operations which occur at a particular level which corresponds to a particular sub-stream of consciousness and (ii) the operations which occur at all other levels. Namely, • (a) First, the operation of consciousness at all other levels can be thought of as an operation which causes the state of potential consciousness, which corresponds to a particular sub-stream, to change or evolve. This change or evolution of the state of potential consciousness and its relation to the perception of time, which is complementary to the perception of change, is discussed in Sec. 4. • (b) The state of potential consciousness evolves and remains in potentiality until it is perceived or measured by consciousness’ appropriate “instrument” at the particular level or sub-stream of the conscious flow. When this happens, an event arises or is actualized in the particular sub-stream of consciousness from the state of potential consciousness. Perception or an event in consciousness can only be actualized only if consciousness operationally projects or measures the experience or event as follows: • Consciousness asks a question (inquiry) or perceives a change or alteration in its state of potential consciousness |ψi i, by acting on the |ψi i. The result of this operation, i.e., |ψi+1 i = Ô|ψi i (here Ô represents the action of consciousness, through an operational question which in general causes a change), is evaluated by comparing the changed state of potential consciousness, i.e., |ψi+1 i with the previous state of potential consciousness |ψi i. • This process of projection or objectivation creates an actual event in consciousness. Namely the event is manifested or it becomes a phenomenon[36] or an object in consciousness through such an operation of consciousness. Therefore, we postulate a sequence of pairs {|ψi i, Ci } consisting of a sequence of conscious events Ci during each of which consciousness operates upon and changes the state of potential consciousness |ψi i. The state |ψi i constitutes a set of potentialities out of which the next conscious event Ci+1 arise. Namely, the activities of our body/brain are not the causes of conscious events, they are consequences of conscious events. Let us give a simple example of the operation of consciousness. The subjective experience of the sweet taste of a fruit. The fruit is not sweet unless it is tasted, namely, there is no sweet taste attached to the molecules of the fruit. Sweetness is a subjective experience; it is not a property of any interaction whatsoever of the 6 ingredients of the fruit with our mouth or with our nervous system. The result of this interaction is only a network of electromagnetic currents from the neurons of the body/brain. The same is true with any (subjective) experience. The word subjective is placed inside parentheses because all experience is subjective in the sense that only when it leads to such subjective qualia, it is experienced. It appears through the process of objectivation[37] that while “our hands” (including man-made instruments, our eyes, the nerves carrying the signal to the cortex, etc) act on the state of “nature”, what we actually “see”, is the conscious experience, the event in consciousness and this is what we must describe. The question, “is this fruit sweet between observations of its sweetness?”, is a meaningless question. The correct question to ask is: “Is this fruit potentially sweet?” or even better: “What is the likelihood for this fruit to be found sweet when it is tasted?”. Clearly, the experience brings into existence, in consciousness, the taste from potentiality[28]. Therefore, in general, when an event occurs, an observable takes a definite value in consciousness from the state of the potentially conscious. The value has only meaning with respect to a measure, an ideal, an observable quality (in the example given before the measure is the taste and its value or its quality that of sweet) acquired by the operation of consciousness. If consciousness does not operate because the conscious attention is not there (for example someone’s attention is not in what he is eating but elsewhere), there is no event in “one’s consciousness” (in the particular sub-stream). When consciousness operates through one’s attention, only then the operated state of potential consciousness is compared to consciousness’ previous state. This is the process by which an event arises in consciousness. Next, we would like to give an example to clarify why consciousness needs to compare the state obtained after the operational application of the measure or a question on the state of potential consciousness to its own previous state of potential consciousness. Suppose that we enter a room for the first time where an event took place before our entrance; we may not be able to figure out what the event was; however, a person who is “aware” of the state of the room before the event is able to find out what happened, by a mere comparison of the state of the room before and after the event. In the same way, consciousness is aware of its state of potential consciousness before the specific observation, which takes place by altering the state of consciousness by the operation of the examination of its state operationally and then comparing the new state with the old state of potential consciousness. Namely, consciousness only perceives change and this is documented in visual perception experiments (see e.g., Ref. [38]). Namely, if the retina remains fixed relative to the image there is no visual perception by the striate cortex neurons. The constant microsaccadic motion of the retina allows us to see images, and the image fades quickly if this motion does not occur[38, 39]. Within this model how does one get an experience of the room at all, if one does not have a prior experience of the room? However, the experience of the room itself is a change in the state of one’s own retina and post-retinal visual system and this is why the room can be perceived. In order for that to occur, the retina as a whole 7 needs to move through micro-saccadic motion; if the eye remains constant relative to the image, there is no perception[38, 39]. First at the retina level the photons are perceived through the operation of consciouness on the receptor cells. At a higherlevel in the hierarchy of the conscious flow, the person still needs to perceive (operate or cause a conscious event in “his” sub-stream of consciousness by activating the corresponding neural correlate to the person’s consciousness) the image of the state prepared by the post-retinal visual system. Therefore consciousness only perceives changes by comparing the state of potential consciousness to the state obtained after the operation of the attention of consciousness. Another related question which can arise here is the following: It appears that related brain activity generally precedes the occurrence of a perception which might make it difficult to accept the idea that consciousness is primary. Does a related brain activity precede the occurrence of the experience of an image? It is true that some brain activity precedes the perception of the image, but is that activity the perception of the image itself? Perception comes into being through the intervention of consciousness, and without it there is no perception. One can be near an image but he may not be seeing it. The retina may be “seeing” it but what we call the “person” (a higher-level conscious operator) does not see it. We can imagine a person with damaged striate cortex with perfect eyes; he will not see the image which his retina “sees”. Therefore, the brain activity of the pre-cortex visual system still takes place with no perception of the image by the person. This activity might be confused with the perception itself of a more processed image. This argument can go deeper in the brain until we encounter Von Neumann’s notion of the “abstract ego”. The brain activity, which seems to precede the perception, occurs as any particular conscious sub-stream, corresponding to the various brain parts, becomes “conscious” (by means of a conscious event entering the Universal stream through this sub-stream) of some precursor of the higher level perception, in the vast tree-like hierarchical structure of flow of consciousness. These are simple examples from our everyday experience which are only given to demonstrate the process of how consciousness brings about events. As we have already discussed, this does not imply that we should require the presence of a body of a “sentient being” for something to come into existence, because an event can arise in the Universal stream of consciousness. The observed universe is the body of the Universal consciousness! Many objections[20] to previous attempts to interpret quantum theory using consciousness boil down to the requirement that consciousness is owned by the bodies of sentient beings. 2.4 The Emergence of Matter We have discussed the state of potential consciousness and the operation of consciousness on that state which produces an event which is added to the stream of consciousness. These operations can occur at any level in the stream of consciousness, such as at an individual sub-stream of consciousness or at the Universal stream of consciousness. 8 What is the ontological status of space-time and quantum fields? In this paper an attempt is made to construct an ontology based fundamentally on consciousness. Then, we take both the quantum fields and space-time structure, that gives the space-time relationships between them, to be basic elements in what we call the Universal Mind or Universal Consciousness. Therefore space-time and quantum fields are experiences or contents of the universal stream of consciousness to which our experiences all belong. As we will show in Sec. 4, the parameter of time used in physics is related to the order of occurrence of these conscious events which take place in the Universal stream of consciousness. In Sec. 5 we show that, the perception of space and motion are also based on conscious events which, along with their associated felt qualities, enter the Universal stream of consciousness. The emergence of matter out of the operation of consciousness occurs at the Universal stream of consciousness, therefore, these events seem to us, to the individual stream of consciousness, far more stable, long lived, persistent, namely, they seem to exist “when no one is looking”. We generally postulate that when any new event occurs at any level in the Universal stream of consciousness, it changes the state of potential consciousness, and, therefore, it can have observable effects at, or effects that will influence, any sub-stream. The potential consciousness and the actor or the operation of consciousness are primary. The stream of conscious events, which as they occur modify the state of potential consciousness for later events to be added to the stream of conscious events, are emergent. Consciousness as an actor or an operator is beyond time. The Big-Bang itself is an event in the Universal stream of consciousness. However, the Universal potential consciousness and the operational consciousness are always present and the Big-Bang, as well as all other events, are manifestations of the Universal potential consciousness. 2.5 The Emergence of the Brain How does Mind (consciousness) use the already realized events in consciousness to allow the manifestation of more complex perception or concepts (which are also events)? First, these rather simple events discussed in the previous subsection enter the Universal stream, and then the emerging complexity is the manifestation of higher-level conscious events in the Universal stream of consciousness. Therefore simple events flow into more complex structures to represent these higher-level conscious qualities or concepts. We can also represent life by this flow, and, at some level of manifestation of the conscious potential, the cell emerges and then the brain/body emerges which are manifestations of higher-level conscious operations. The little streams flow into or merge into greater streams to create a larger flow or higher-level streams and these higher-level streams merge into higher-yet-level streams and so on. At some level the neurons or neural networks or other structures in the brain emerge as manifestations of concepts, feelings, memories and so on. Therefore, we conclude that any conscious quality, when it becomes manifest, has a counterpart in the brain and in an individual stream of consciousness (which is also part of the 9 Universal stream). The neurons or other central nervous system structures are the neural correlates or manifestations of the conscious concepts (or percepts)[40]. How do neural correlates represent concepts? For the case of a brain, we postulate the restriction that the action of the conscious concept on the potential consciousness must be to restrict the potential consciousness to one in which the probability for a particular concept to hold is unity (certainty): the neural correlate of the conscious concept must be actualized. All brain activities incompatible with the consciousconcept and its neural-correlate must be projected out. In order for this to make sense a correlation must hold between the concept in consciousness and some component part of the state of potential consciousness (as it will become clear, this is the quantum state of the brain, defined by tracing over the other degrees of freedom except those of the brain). The pattern of brain activity, can be a pattern that has component parts scattered over the brain. As we discussed the allowed set of concepts in consciousness must include all those that anyone has ever had, and for any personal stream of consciousness, all the concepts that have appeared in that person’s stream of consciousness, in association with its neural correlate; the concept will always have its neural correlates distributed over the brain, and the concept will be able to actualize the corresponding neural correlates. That is, the binding problem is solved by postulating that the concept causes the collapse which actualizes the connection between the concept and the neural-correlates. As we discussed we have postulated the existence of the state of the Universal potential consciousness. The particular brain contains the neural correlates of the concepts or qualities of the particular stream of consciousness. Because of the existence of the brain with its neural correlates it makes sense to consider the personal potential consciousness, which means a state where we pre-ascribe likelihoods only to concepts which already have a neural correlate in the particular brain. It is possible for a particular stream of consciousness to come “in contact” with the Universal consciousness. When this “contact” is established an insight comes forth on the particular stream of consciousness. For this to occur, the operator which carries out measurements in the brain has to be suspended. This operator is made out of the old contents and it is acting on the already existing neural correlates. The process of thought which is a process of measurement in the brain should momentarily halt in order for this contact with the Universal state of potential consciousness to become possible. The reason is that the action of measurement creates decoherence and collapses the state of local potential consciousness to a particular concept with an already existing neural correlate. Therefore, when these local measurements cease, the state of potential consciousness becomes coherently entangled with the Universal state of potential consciousness. When this Global state of potential consciousness is established and all the brain activities cease, it becomes possible to establish a correlation between a new concept from the Universal mind and a new neural correlate in the brain and, thus, a new event enters the personal stream of consciousness. We postulate that this is the process of a new perception, the process of creation, the process of evolution, the process of the growth of a child, and the process of acquiring an insight. 10 3 MATHEMATICAL DESCRIPTION In Sec. 10 (appendix) we present as example where we use earlier contents of our stream of consciousness (the real numbers) to project a new concept (the solution to the equation x2 + 1 = 0) onto a basis formed by the old concepts (the real numbers). In the same sense, in an experimental situation to measure the position of a microscopic particle, we begin with the concept of position which is a macroscopic experience, and we build instruments appropriate to measure or to project this content of our streams of consciousness. This macroscopic experience of space is a content of our streams of consciousness created from direct macroscopic experiences, events which enter the stream of our consciousness by interacting with macroscopic objects. We cannot use a real conscious being to interact directly with the microscopic world and to make measurements in the way our brain does (it is actually our human consciousness which does it through the brain) by direct perception as described in Sec. 2.5. Instead, we construct instruments to measure quantities based on our known concepts and therefore they do not have the capability to measure an unknown concept to us. This is a process of projection and this process, as was demonstrated by the example, can be described by writing the potential outcome of the Newton-Raphson operation as a linear combination of pre-ascribed likelihoods for events, which correspond to known concepts, to occur. The example in the appendix demonstrates that we can use linear spaces and operators to describe a situation in which we consider a new realm where perception of new concepts is required in order to be able to build a rational description of our experiences there. However, due to restrictions of our own stream of consciousness, such fundamentally new contents are not allowed to enter the stream. Therefore, in order to express the potential outcome of a conscious operation (or measurement), our consciousness uses as reference pointers the old contents of our consciousness which entered the stream of our consciousness as a result of earlier experiences (or earlier conscious events which correspond to definite neural correlates). The result of such a restricted operational observation is a random one from a pool of potential outcomes, which obey a well-defined distribution, if the question is repeated many times. The process of the operation of consciousness can be formulated mathematically, in order to describe the perception of matter. As in the example of the appendix, we will make use of a Hilbert space and operators acting inside this space to describe functions of our consciousness and potential consciousness; the role played by the eigenstates and eigenvalues of such operators was also demonstrated with the example. A more general mathematical description is as follows: • We begin from the experienced dualism between consciousness (subject) and object (any experience in consciousness). Note, however, that both subject and the object (as experienced quality of the actual event which enters the stream of consciousness) are aspects of consciousness. The state of potential consciousness will be represented by a vector in Hilbert space. Using the Dirac 11 notation, we can write this state vector as |ψi which is a linear combination of the basis vectors |ii, with i = 1, 2, ..., N , namely, as follows |ψi = N X i=1 ψi |ii. (1) The vectors |ii give all possible states of consciousness (states describing potential events) for the particular observable (concept) in question. In the case of a particular conscious stream of a person, these concepts are also associated to specific neural correlates scattered over the brain. All the N vectors together form a complete basis set of states, namely, they cover all potential outcomes. In general, however, depending on the phenomenon which we need to describe, N can be finite or infinite. In addition, the discrete variable i, labeling the basis elements, can be a continuous variable; in this case the summation in Eq. 1 should be replaced by an integration. The above linear combination implies that the observable is not in any of the potential states. Unless an observation takes place, all we can say is that there is a state of potentialities. This is so, not because we don’t know what the actual value of the observable is, it is so because there is no value in consciousness. What is the taste of a cake before tasting it? Obviously, this question is meaningless, the right question is: what is the potential taste of the cake before tasting it? The state vector which is represented as a linear combination of potential experiences represents the state of potential consciousness not experiences in consciousness. It is through the operation of consciousness that one of the potential experiences can be materialized. Because of the potential nature of the state (i.e, that, which the state describes, is not actual yet before the experience) it is written as a mixture of possibilities. Each possibility is fundamentally distinct from any other. The result of the experience while unique, prior to the experience itself (when it is in potentia), should be written in such a way that it is a mixture or a sum of probability amplitudes for each one to occur as opposed to just probabilities. The reason is that we need to end up with probabilities after the experience not prior to the experience. This is so in order to allow for the operation of consciousness to take place and then carry out the measurement of the experience by comparing the previous state of potential consciousness with the one after the operation in order to have an event. After this action we end up with real events with a probability given by the square of the coefficient in the linear combination multiplying the particular state that becomes manifest. • Because consciousness needs to carry out measurements (operations) inside this space, to make an event happen, this vector space should have the property of finite measure and, as a result of these requirements, it is a Hilbert space. In such a space, a measure of the “overlap” between two states |ψi and |φi is measured by the scalar product between the two vectors representing the two 12 states, namely, I = hψ|φi = X ψi∗ φi . (2) i The overlap of any state to itself, which is the square of the length of the vector, is normalized to unity, i.e., hψ|ψi = 1 and this is possible when working in a Hilbert space. Depending on the nature of the observed phenomenon, ψi can be real or complex numbers, or other mathematical objects such as multi-component vectors. Then, consciousness operates, by means of a linear operator acting on this state vector representing potential consciousness. An event in consciousness is a change and this change, in general, is an operation acting on a previous state. How does consciousness measures this potential change? If attention is absent there will be no conscious event. For such an event to occur in consciousness, consciousness has to compare this state to its own previous state for the event to occur. The state |ψi represents the state of potential consciousness, which is not realized yet. It can potentially lead to a real event or experience through the application of consciousness or attention of consciousness. The so-called real or physical event is a conscious quality (or quale) in the Universal stream, which consciousness projects “out there”. There is no difference or separation between the qualia and the real, the physical. This notion was discussed in Sec. 2.3. The physical is an experience in the Universal stream of consciousness. In the particular or individual stream another corresponding event enters, the one actualized in its central nervous system, when the observation by that person occurs. Therefore, the state is defined over potentially physical events, or potentially conscious events. The “physical” or the mental event, or simply event, can be mathematically broken down into a two step process, (a) the action or an operation which applies a concept on the state of potential consciousness and transform the state of potential consciousness (by activating the corresponding object (or “material”) correlate) to a state representing the concept alone, |φi = Ô|ψi ( Ô is the operator representing a particular action of consciousness) (b) the overlap of the changed state (after the operation) to the state of potential consciousness prior to the operation, i.e., M = hψ|φi, corresponds to the conscious value or the quality of the applied concept. After this process, the potential becomes real, namely, it appears in consciousness, or equivalently, it is a physical event and it activates the objective-correlate. In the example given in the appendix, how does consciousness find the solution to an equation? Using the language of the operational consciousness this can be formulated as follows. The Newton-Raphson operator Ô creates the potential solution of the equation. When the state |xn+1 i = Ô|xn i and the previous state |xn i have large overlap we take it that the solution is found (or “observed”). This is how we decide that we have found the solution, namely when hxn |Ô|xn i = 1, within a resolution defined by our computer precision. In order to make sure that we found a solution P l independent of the initial condition, we may start from a state |ψ0 i = M l=1 |x0 i 13 and after application of the operator Ô several times, we stop when the overlap hψn |Ô|ψn i is maximum (or unity, if we keep normalizing the states |ψn i). • Therefore, every creative action of consciousness can be mathematically represented by an operator Ô applying an idea or a concept to the state of potential consciousness |ψi. This causes a change of the state of potential consciousness. • This changed state of potential consciousness |φi = Ô|ψi, due to the creative operation of consciousness, remains in a state of potentiality until it is perceived or measured by consciousness’ appropriate instrument, again through the operation of consciousness. When this happens the event arises in consciousness from the state of potential consciousness. • This new action of consciousness which causes the observation-perceptionmeasurement is completed by the comparison of the two states, namely the one before the operation of consciousness, i.e., |ψi, with the one after the operation of consciousness, i.e., Ô|ψi, which is taken to be the scalar product between the two states: M = hψ|Ô|ψi. (3) The result of this comparison is also the observed result of the measurement as was discussed in Secs. 2.3 and 3. When this operator is used to represent a real (non-complex) physical observable, i.e., M = M ∗ , the operator Ô is a Hermitian operator. More information on the properties of a Hilbert space and of Hermitian operators acting in such a space can be found in Ref. [17]. • Each particular operation of consciousness, represented by an operator Ô that represents a particular observable or observing operation, is characterized by eigenvectors and eigenvalues in the Hilbert space, namely, Ô|λi = λ|λi. (4) The significance of the eigenvectors of Ô is that these are the only states of potential-consciousness that do not change by the particular act of consciousness, namely, through the application of the inquiry Ô. The result of the measurement (or the conscious quality) is the corresponding eigenvalue because the projection of the result of the action, i.e., Ô|λi on the state |λi itself, is the eigenvalue λ. The eigenstates are the only states which represent a lasting experience in consciousness through the perception which corresponds to the eigenvalue. This point is discussed by means of an example in the Sec. 10. Next we schematically discuss the main points. Let us consider two such operators, the operator Ô and its eigenstates/eigenvalues as defined above, and the operator Q̂ with the following spectrum of eigenstates/eigenvalues: Q̂|µ) = µ|µ). 14 (5) Since the eigenstates of each of these operators form what we call a complete basis set of a Hilbert space, let us express any of the eigenstates of the operator Ô in terms of eigenstates of the operator Q̂, namely: |λi = X ψλ (µ)|µ), (6) µ ψλ (µ) = (µ|λi. (7) The meaning of this expression is as follows. First let us suppose that the measurement of the observable (or question) represented by the operator Ô transforms the state of potential-consciousness to a particular eigenstate |λi. The result of the measurement is the corresponding eigenvalue λ. The next observation or question to ask is represented by Q̂, which may or may not be compatible with the previous observation Ô. The result of a single observation corresponding to Q̂ will transform the state of potential consciousness to an eigenstate |µ) of Q̂ corresponding to a definite conscious quality characterized by the eigenvalue µ. The result of a single observation/measurement will bring about in consciousness only a single definite answer. This answer must correspond to an eigenstate of the operator Q̂ because only the eigenstates of an operator are “robust” or “lasting” against the application of Q̂. As we have already mentioned, this is the reason why we use eigenstates to represent any particular realizable state of potential consciousness. The particular state |µ) which would be brought about in consciousness cannot be known (as discussed in Sec. 2.3), all that is known is that the previous state of potential consciousness is |λi. This particular state that arises in consciousness is a choice that consciousness makes. In Sec. 10 we show that because of the limitation of consciousness’ observing instrument, the only way to possibly describe such an act of measurement is a distribution; namely, any one particular state is not a predictable outcome, whereas a particular distribution can be a predictable output of many measurements. For the case of our example given above, this means that while the state of potential consciousness is |λi, i.e., an eigenstate of the observable represented by the operator Ô, consciousness carries out a measurement of an observable represented by the operation Q̂. A particular question can be the following Pµ : “Is the state of potential-consciousness the one corresponding to the eigenvalue µ?” This question is operationally applied using the projection operator defined as follows: P̂µ |µ′ ) = δµµ′ |µ′ ); (8) i.e., such that the outcome of its operation on the state |µ′ ) and then projected back to itself (measured against itself) is given as (µ′ |P̂µ |µ′ ) = δµµ′ . (9) Namely, it is affirmative or negative depending on whether or not the state of potential consciousness agrees with that sought by means of the operational question Pµ . 15 If the same question is applied on the state |λi given by Eq. 7, we find hλ|P̂µ |λi = |ψλ (µ)|2 , (10) namely, the outcome of the projection would be the eigenstate |µ) with eigenvalue µ and with probability |ψλ (µ)|2 . Therefore, we can represent the projection operator in Hilbert space as P̂µ = |µ)(µ|. 4 COMPLEMENTARITY OF CHANGE AND TIME Periodic change or fluctuation is a fundamental element of consciousness. Consciousness perceives time only through the direct perception of change through an event; the value of the time interval between two successive events in consciousness is only found by counting how many revolutions of a given periodic event took place during these two events. Therefore the notion of time is related to the sequential (ordered) events which allow counting, and the interval of time and change (in particular periodic change) are complementary elements and they are not independent of each other. There is physiological evidence suggesting the direct perception of frequency. For example, we perceive the frequency of sound directly as notes or pitch, without having to perceive time and understand intellectually (after processing) that it is periodic. Another evidence of direct perception of frequency comes from the fact that color is perceived directly without the requirement that “one’s” consciousness is aware of any co-experience of time whatsoever. In addition, the retina receptor cells are highly sensitive and it has been shown that they can observe a single photon[42, 41]. Furthermore, in biological systems, receptors for what we refer to as time do not exist[22]. On the contrary, there is significant neuro-physiological evidence that the perception of time takes place via coherent neuronal oscillations[43] which bind successive events into perceptual units[22]. Nature responds to frequency very directly, and some examples are resonance, single photon absorption and in general absorption at definite frequency. The timeless photon, in addition to being a particle, can be thought of as the carrier of the operation of consciousness on the state of potential consciousness together with the correct instrument. When the operated state of potential consciousness is measured against its own state before the operation, a definite frequency is realized (or materialized). An instrument (such as the retina receptor cells) is needed to materialize the operation of consciousness, because matter is the necessary “mirror” to “reflect” (to actualize) the act of consciousness. At first glance it may appear that we have introduced a duality by separating consciousness and matter. Matter, however, as discussed in Sec. 2.4 is manifested consciousness at another level, at the Universal stream of conscious events. Let us try to discuss evolution (or change) quantitatively. In order to describe any perception of change, our imagination invents a parameter which we call time which labels the various phases of change and we delude ourselves with the belief that such a parameter has independent existence from consciousness; time is only a vehicle or 16 a label used to facilitate the description of change. Therefore, we imagine the state of potential consciousness |ψ(t)i, as a function of t, labeling the time of potential observation. We wish to discuss a periodic motion, so let us confine ourselves within a cycle of period T . For simplicity we will discretize time, namely, the states are labeled as |ψ(ti )i where t1 = 0, t2 = δt, t3 = 2δt, ..., tN = (N − 1)δt, with N δt = T . These time labels have been defined and measured in terms of another much faster periodic change which we call it a clock. Let us assume that δt corresponds to the “time” T ′ of a single period of the fast periodic change of the clock, namely ti , i = 1, 2, .., N , are the moments when the “ticks” of the clock occur. Let us define the chronological operator t̂ and its eigenstates t̂|ψ(t)i = t|ψ(t)i, (11) namely, we have assumed that the state of potential consciousness is characterized by a definite measured time. Notice, that we needed two periodic motions “running” in parallel in order to discuss the measurement of the period of the first in terms of the second (clock). Namely, we are unable within a single event in consciousness to know both the time and the frequency of the event. We have already discussed that physiological evidence given above, suggests that consciousness only experiences frequency not time as a fundamental conscious quality. Here we have put the cart before the horse by beginning from the imagined notion of time, which is only quantified through the periodic motion. We will next define the eigenstates characterized by definite period in terms of the states characterized by definite time. Next, let us define the evolution operator or time-displacement operator, the operator that causes the change of the state of potential consciousness, namely T̂ |ψi i = |ψi+1 i, T̂ |ψN i = |ψ1 i, i = 1, ..., N − 1, (12) where |ψi i = |ψ(ti )i, and the second equation above implies that because of the nature of the perception of the periodic change there will be no difference in the state after time t = N δt, i.e., the period T of the periodic change. In the case of periodic change, such as described by Eq. 12, all the eigenstates and eigenvalues of the operator T̂ , in terms of the eigenstates of the chronological operator, are given as follows: T̂ |ωn i = τωn |ωn i, |ωn i = N X τωn = e−iωn δt , 1 √ eiωn ti |ψi i, N i=1 (13) (14) where ωn = n(2π/T ), and n = 1, 2, ..., N . Notice that the quantization of the levels of single periodic change is the same as that of the harmonic oscillator (here we have used natural units where the so-called “energy” is the same as the frequency and this is discussed later). This is so because we have not limited in any way the number of quanta (or atoms) which are observed. 17 The state which describes a periodic change is such that when the time displacement operator acts on it, it behaves as its eigenstate. The significance of the eigenstates was discussed in Sec. 3. Namely, they are the only states of potential consciousness which do not change under the application of the inquiry, no matter how many times the inquiry (measurement) is applied. Therefore, the measurement in this case introduces no frequency uncertainty of the state of definite frequency. This state cannot be characterized by any definite value of time; for the change to be characterized by a definite frequency, an observation of regular periodic motion is required to continue forever. Time t = mδt “elapses” when the time-translation operator T̂ acts m consecutive times on the state, namely, the time evolution of the state |ωn i is |ωn it = T̂ m |ωn i = e−iωn mδt |ωn i −iωn t = e |ωn i. (15) (16) Let us now consider the case where the change does not necessarily occur at a single period but it is a mixture of periodic changes of various characteristic frequencies. We begin from the frequency eigenstates Eq. 14 as the basis and let us define the time evolution of the state as |ψ(t)i = X cn |ωn it (17) n = X cn e−iωn t |ωn i, (18) n where the sum is over all the eigenstates of the time translation operation acting on the state of potential consciousness that characterizes the system. This latter equation can also be written as follows |ψ(t)i = e−iω̂t |ψ(0)i, ω̂|ωn i = ωn |ωn i, (19) (20) where |ψ(0)i is some reference state. Again the perception of frequency is direct and so in our description of nature we need to start by considering this perception as one fundamental building block of consciousness and not the perception of time. Equivalently from Eq. 19, we can say that this is the solution to the following differential equation ω̂|ψ(t)i = i∂t |ψ(t)i, (21) ω̂ = i∂t . (22) or equivalently We need to discuss why the above frequency operator characterizes the measurement of change. For simplicity let us go back to the discrete time domain. If consciousness applies the operator ω̂ on the state of potential consciousness we have ω̂|ψ(ti )i = i (|ψ(ti+1 )i − |ψ(ti )i), δt 18 (23) which is (apart from the multiplicative factor i/δt) the change of the state of potential consciousness. This change is evaluated by simply using as measure the instantaneous state of potential consciousness itself, i.e., by projecting the change onto |ψ(ti )i. This means that the expectation value hψ(t)|ω̂|ψ(t)i is a measurement of the rate of change of potential consciousness. Using Eq. 22 for the frequency operator, the following commutation relation between frequency and the chronological operator follows in a straightforward manner: [t̂, ω̂] = i. (24) In addition, the well-known uncertainly relation follows, namely, ∆ω∆t ≥ 1. (25) The uncertainty relationship between frequency and time can be easily understood as follows. Let us suppose that a changing state of consciousness is observed for a finite interval of time ∆t. This observation time interval is also the uncertainty in time, because there is no particular instant of time inside this interval to choose as the instant at which the observed event happened. Even if the event seems to be regular or periodic inside this interval of time, there is an uncertainty as to what happens outside this interval. In fact, as discussed, nothing happens outside this interval because there is no observation in consciousness and thus no event there, only a potentiality. If we calculate the Fourier spectrum of such a changing event, no matter how regularly it evolves inside this interval, (with nothing happening outside of this interval) we will find significant amplitudes for frequencies in an interval range greater than 1/∆t. 5 COMPLEMENTARITY OF MOTION AND SPACE The next question which naturally arises is how consciousness perceives motion. Motion is associated with change of relative position. Let us inquire how consciousness perceives motion of a point-like object. In translationally invariant space, how does one know that motion occurs? There is no movement unless there is an observer and a change of the position of the object relative to that of the observer. Just as we did in the previous section, where we considered frequency (periodic change) and time as complementary observables, here, we will consider regular motion in space and spatial position as complementary observables in consciousness; namely, one needs the other in order to be perceived in consciousness. There is a tendency to think that space is out there “standing” even if the perception of motion was not there. However, the very definition of space requires the pre-conception of motion and the perception of space implies motion as a potential event. In the following section, we will discuss that motion is also a particular form of change and therefore we will require a relationship between frequency and wave-vector. For the case of motion, however, there is the field of space which can be used by consciousness to express this particular form of change, namely, motion; hence, momentarily time can be set aside. This point will become clear below. 19 Let us examine whether or not we can use the state of potential-consciousness representing position in space to understand the state of potential-consciousness representing motion. If a particle is observed to be in a particular fixed position in space, for example r, we will represent the state of potential-consciousness by a state vector |ri. In order for this state to successfully represent the state of definite position, the operation of observing the eigenstate of the position should leave this state unchanged. For the case of motion let us begin from these eigenstates of position and work in a bounded world with periodic boundary conditions. We then define the displacement operator T̂δr , that causes the motion in consciousness, as follows: T̂δr |ri = |r + δri, (26) and if the position vector lies outside of the boundary of space it is mapped inside using the Born-Von Karman boundary conditions. In order to simplify the discussion, let us consider a one dimensional problem with periodic boundary conditions, namely a problem on a circle of length L with discrete positions xi = (i − 1)δx labeled as i = 1, 2, ..., N , and N δx = L. Then the space-displacement operator is T̂s |xi i = |xi+1 i, T̂s |xN i = |x1 i. i = 1, ..., (N − 1), (27) (28) In order for consciousness to perceive motion, we need to define a state of potential-consciousness which, when the displacement operator acts on it, does not change it. Mathematically, assuming that the eigenstates of the position operator form all possible outcomes of a measurement of position, it is possible to write down all the eigenstates and eigenvalues of the operator T̂s in terms of the eigenstates of the position operation. They are given as follows: T̂s |ki = λk |ki, |ki = λk = e−ikδx , (29) (N −1) 1 X ikl √ e |xl i, N l=0 (30) where k = (2π/L)j, with j = 0, 1, 2, ..., (N − 1) and the states |xl i are the position eigenstates along the circle. The state which describes a periodic motion is such that when the time displacement operator (representing consciousness) acts on it, it does not change no matter how many times consciousness applies the inquiry. Therefore, the measurement in this case introduces no wave-number (k) uncertainty of the state of definite k. This state cannot be characterized by any definite value of position. Since the basis k forms a complete set, we can express the position basis as a linear combination, namely |xi i = (N −1) 1 X −ikj xi √ e |kj i, N j=0 20 kj = 2π j. L (31) These equations can be generalized from a discrete one-dimensional index to a continuous three-dimensional one, in the usual way. Namely, T̂δr |ki = λk |ki, λk = e−ik·δr , Z 1 d3 reik·r |ri, |ki = √ V (32) (33) where k = (kx , ky , kz ), and for periodic boundary conditions each of the components is given by kw = 2π/Lw nw (w = x, y, z), with nw taking integer values and Lw are the dimensions of the box of volume V bounding the space. The position eigenstate |r′ i can be reached from |ri by acting with the spacedisplacement operator as follows ′ (34) k̂|ki = k|ki. (35) |r′ i = eik̂·(r −r) |ri, It is straightforward to see from the last equation, that the operator k̂ = (k̂1 , k̂2 , k̂3 ) is given by k̂i = −i∂xi , (36) where xi , i = 1, 2, 3 are the three components of r. As was discussed in the case of the frequency operator, in a similar way it can be shown that the above wave-vector operator characterizes the measurement of change through motion. Namely, when consciousness applies the operator k̂ on the state of potential consciousness apart from the multiplicative factor, the change of the state of potential consciousness is obtained. This change is evaluated by projecting the change onto the state itself. This means that the expectation value hψ|k̂|ψi is a measurement of the “rate”of change of potential consciousness with respect to spatial variation. Using Eq. 36 for the wave-vector operators, it can be shown in a straightforward manner, that the following commutation relation between position and momentum operators, [x̂i , k̂j ] = iδi,j , (37) as well as the following uncertainly relations, ∆xi ∆ki ≥ 1, (38) are valid. This uncertainty relationship can be easily understood by means of a similar argument as one provided for the case of the frequency-time uncertainty (Eq. 25). There is direct experimental evidence that consciousness perceives directly states of well-defined wave-vector[38, 39, 44]. There is a large number of striate cortex neurons which only respond to motion in a well-specified direction[38, 39]. In particular in Ref.[44] the analog of the two slit interference experiment is introduced for the 21 visual perception of the mammalian brain. The response of the cat striate cortex neuron to a single line of light flashed alternatively at two parallel locations separated by distance d was recorded. The response of the direction-sensitive neuron of the striate cortex (area 17) was found to fit the form f (d) = sin(kd + δ)e−d/ξ , (39) as a function of the distance d and k = 2π/λ, with λ the distance where the optimum response is found. Therefore the mammalian brain’s study indicates that consciousness is wave-length selective. Indirectly this fact was already known to us, because we can see definite colors. Our operations, applied on observation instruments of the outside world, must be the same operations which we apply inwardly, otherwise what makes us apply different operations for observing two parts of the same world? Because the boundary between inward and outward, between the observed and the observing instrument can be arbitrarily shifted[17, 18]. Therefore, consciousness naturally understands motion as well as position as fundamental elements of consciousness. However, as it was discussed, they are also complementary observables, each having no independent existence from the other. The Newtonian conception of classical mechanics (the notion of the independent existence (absolute) of the framework of space and time and, as a result, the notions of rates of change) through the successful application of its laws to describing all macroscopic motion, has given a tremendous credit to these notions as existing independently. However, as we have recognized now, this conception is not accurate. 6 EQUATIONS OF MOTION 6.1 Non-Relativistic Quantum Mechanics Let us summarize what has been shown so far. First, the expressions for the wavevector (Eq. 36) and frequency (Eq. 22) operators are generally derived. Using these relations, the commutation relations between position and momentum operators given by Eq. 37 as well as the uncertainty relations Eq. 25 and Eq. 38 follow in a straightforward manner. In the case where the uniformity of space is broken, namely the various positions of space are biased differently (for example by an external field), the situation is somewhat different. Let us consider the discretized one-dimensional space (with periodic boundary conditions) in order to demonstrate what happens in this case. The basis state vectors are |xi i, labeled by the discrete positions xi = (i−1)δx where i = 1, 2, ..., N and N δx = L. When the frequency operator is applied on any such position eigenstate |xi i we can write the following general expression ω̂|xi i = ǫ(xi )|xi i − (t1 |xi+1 i + t∗1 |xi−1 i) − (t2 |xi+2 i + t∗2 |xi−2 i) − .... (40) Notice that the coefficients of |xi + ni and |xi − ni must be complex conjugates because the operator ω̂ is Hermitean as discussed. Note that in general the coefficients ti could also depend on xi but we consider the simplest case. Let us initially 22 consider only “nearest-neighbors hopping”, i.e., we neglect all the terms tn with n > 1. Furthermore we can choose an overall phase factor such that t1 is real. It is straighforward to show that in the continuum limit (δx → 0) we obtain  ω̂|xi = u(x) − 1 d2  |xi, 2µ dx2 (41) where u(x) = ǫ(x) − 2 and 1/2µ = t(δx)2 . Note that if we consider the terms proportional to tn with n > 1, they also give rise to the same second derivative term with a redefined value of µ. The term u(x) describes a possible spatial relative bias which in general can be made time-dependent. To quantify the description of motion, we define a function of space-time u(r, t) which we call potential frequency and we write the total frequency operator as two contributions. In momentum space basis and in three-dimensions, the frequency operator can be written as ω̂(k̂) = 1 2 k̂ + u(r, t). 2µ (42) Here we would like to identify the frequency and wave-vector with the energy and momentum of a particular mode; they are different words for the same observable in macroscopic mechanics. To make contact with experimental results we need to use the same notions and units for these quantities. This implies that when we use units such that Ĥ = h̄ω̂, and p̂ = h̄k̂, the energy and the momentum operators are the same as the frequency and wave-vector operators. Note the absence of Planck’s constant from these relations and from Eqs. (22,25,36,38). Planck’s constant enters in Quantum Mechanics because of the traditional or historical way of evolution of the description of nature starting from Newtonian notion of mass which in our notation is m = h̄µ. With these identifications, Eq. 21 is the Schrödinger equation with Ĥ = h̄ω̂ = p̂ = h̄k̂, p̂2 + V̂ (r, t), 2m V̂ (r, t) = h̄û(r, t), (43) m = h̄µ. (44) Schrödinger’s takes the form of Newton’s equation in the limit where, in any given eigenstate, the contribution of the first term in Eq. 43 is much smaller than the contribution of the second term. In addition, classical mechanics describes the behavior of an ensemble of a huge number N of such indivisible microscopic systems together. P Therefore, the notion of the energy used in classical mechanics is N i=1 h̄ω̂i and the PN momentum of the system will be i=1 p̂. 6.2 Relativistic Quantum Mechanics The validity of relativistic mechanics is additional support for the starting point of the present paper that everything that happens, takes place in consciousness. 23 Namely, space and time are not independently existing notions but they are related through the fact that periodic variation (frequency) and spatial variation (wavevector) are both changes related to events in consciousness. In units where we measure distance by the time it takes light to “travel” it, frequency and wave-number for light are related through the relation ω = ck. This oneness of space and time is ultimately linked to the oneness of change (namely motion is change) as the only generalized event that can possibly occur in consciousness. In the case of relativistic mechanics, where we need to impose invariance under Lorentz transformations, using the four-vector notation ckµ = (ω, ck), where c is the speed of light, we have  2 kµ kµ = ω 2 − c2 k2 = mc2 /h̄ , (45) and by substituting the operators given by Eq. 36 and Eq. 22 for ki and ω, respectively, the Klein-Gordon equation is obtained h −∇2 + 1 2 c2 m2 i ∂ + 2 |ψi = 0. c2 t h̄ (46) In the case of the dispersion relation ω 2 (k) = c2 k2 the wave equation for a massless particle is obtained. Similarly, while on the one hand we impose invariance under Lorentz transformations, we may assume that the existence of a vector, such as the spin, breaks the rotational symmetry of space. Following Dirac, the following frequency operator is obtained by taking the square root of the operator in Eq. 46: ω̂(k) = c~ α · k̂ + mc2 β̂, (47) where α ~ = (α̂1 , α̂2 , α̂3 ) and β̂ are four Hermitian operators acting on the spin variables alone. The squares of these operators are unity and their components anticommute, in order for the equation ω̂ 2 |ψi = −∂t 2 |ψi to be the same as the Klein-Gordon equation. Namely, (α̂i )2 = 1, β̂ 2 = 1, α̂i α̂j + α̂j α̂i = 0 (i 6= j), α̂i β̂ + β̂ α̂i = 0. (48) (49) By substituting the frequency (Eq. 22) and wave-number (Eq. 36) operators in Eq. 47, the Dirac equation is obtained. 7 MEASUREMENT AND STATE VECTOR COLLAPSE Theory does not describe what actually happens independently of the operation of consciousness, it describes what is observable in consciousness. It elegantly describes our experiences as “events” in consciousness caused by consciousness’ operation. This implies that the theory should describe at once the process of observation 24 together with the description of the event, as opposed to describing separately what happens and then leaving the description of the process of observation for a later stage. Namely, as it has been repeatedly discussed, we cannot possibly describe what happens outside consciousness, without introducing the presence of the operational observer in the very description of what happens. What instead theory describes is the very process of operational observation. This implies that in order to understand the process of measurement we do not need an additional theory of measurement, the theory itself is the theory of observation. Theory should describe what we operationally do to observe. It describes how consciousness operates upon itself in an event of observation and what the potentialities of observation are depending on what this operational process does. Therefore, there is no difference between the theory of what “happens” in nature and the theory of measurement. Quantum theory is the description of what happens in consciousness, namely what happens during the process of observation and how we should describe the evolution of the state of potential consciousness between observations. While there is only one consciousness, particular observing instruments related to consciousness observation sites can reflect particular events. A particular instrument or observation site of consciousness is realized when the totality is divided into an observing instrument and the rest which plays the role of the observed. A particular measurement consists of a “question” that consciousness has decided to “ask” by a) sectioning the whole into an observed and an observing instrument. The way this division is chosen by consciousness reflects the nature of the question to be asked. The experimental instrument is used only to materialize, or to operationally apply, or to reflect the question. This instrument is made to mimic the operation of consciousness known from experience (see discussion of Sec. 2.5 and Sec. 3). b) The question is operated by allowing the reunion (interaction) between the observing instrument and the observed and this reunion forces a changed state of potential consciousness c) this changed state is measured relative to the state of potential consciousness prior to the application of the question. This process causes an experience or event in consciousness and in the case of quantum theory it corresponds to the state collapse. Let us divide the universe, the closed system, into an observed subsystem S and an observing instrument O. Let the eigenstates of S be denoted by |αi and the eigenstates of the observing instrument be |a). These eigenstates among other quantum numbers are characterized by a quantum number a which are the eigenvalues of an observable â which is a property of O. For the system O to play the role of a measuring device of the property α̂ of S the following are required: 1) The eigenvalues of â must be in one to one correspondence with the eigenvalues α of an observable α̂ of S. This correspondence is declared by the function a = f (α) and it can be used as the measuring scale. Namely, by observing the value of a on the measuring scale of the instrument O, we actually observe the corresponding value α characterizing S. 25 2) While in general the state of the combined system after their interaction is |Ψi = X α,a Ψα,a |αi|a), (50) for O to play the role of an observing instrument, the choice of the system O, (namely, the particular separation of the whole into an observing instrument and the observed) should be restricted in such a way that the state of the whole system after their mutual interaction is the following linear combination[17, 18] |Ψi = X α Ψα |αi|f (α)). (51) Namely, in the linear combination, a pair of states |αi|a) has a non-zero contribution only if a and α are eigenvalues of the instrument’s observable â and of S’s observable α̂, such that a = f (α). If we have made a table of these corresponding states by “looking” at the state of the system O, we know in which state the system S is after the measurement. In our case, the whole system includes the body of the observer. In particular, the measuring instrument could be any part of the body of the observer. However, even in this correlated state of instrument and object, there is no possibility of a collapse. What would cause the combined system to choose a particular state, i.e., a particular combined state |αi|a = f (α)i ? What would make the whole system decohere? There is nothing outside of it to help it decohere itself. Consciousness is the only agency which can make that choice. This, from moment to moment, different experience of the universe, is what causes the collapse and this point has been appreciated some time ago (see, e.g., [18]). To understand the wave function collapse in terms of very simple examples of consciousness’ operation at the so-called personal subjective world, the reader is referred to Secs. 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5. There, it was discussed that the state of potentiality, when observed, becomes a definite state representing a definite conscious quality and therefore it acquires a definite value. Hence, within this theory, there is no puzzle in the so-called Schrödinger’s cat paradox[3] because of the Universality or non-locality of consciousness; as discussed, there is no separation between what happens and what is measured; namely, there is no issue with the state vector collapse and if an event happens, through the projective action of consciousness, it has occurred in one and the same consciousness. The following discussion is related to the Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen (EPR) paradox[2] and the results of the experiments by Aspect el al.[46] as well as the attempts recently made for various forms of teleportation[47]. Starting from the character of consciousness we have shown that space and time are observables and they do not exist “out there” independently of events in consciousness (Universal and particular). While events happen in consciousness, the events themselves can be characterized by space-time labels only when these events and the measurement of space time coordinates can be simultaneously observed (and their observation is not incompatible with the observation of their complementary observables) by 26 the observing instrument. Therefore, because of the non-locality of consciousness, an observation which is caused by some action at a particular position in space, influences the entire universe. In the particular example of Bohm’s[45] formulation of the EPR paradox when the observation occurs anywhere, the pair of spins together as a single event is born in consciousness from the state of potential consciousness, namely from the spin-singlet state describing a pair of correlated spins. In other words, in this case it is not possible to observe just one spin; the very observation of that one spin is, at the same time, observation of the other spin. Therefore, because of the non-locality of consciousness there is no paradox. Causality, on the other hand, applies to two different or separate events in consciousness which are both characterized by definite space and time labels as observed. For example, if an event occurs, where a measurement is made of the position of the particle at a measured instant of time t1 and then in a separate event its position is measured at a different measured instant of time t2 , the second event should lie in the light cone which has the first event as its origin. In addition, the evolution of the states of potential consciousness between such operations of consciousness is deterministic, bound by law and governed by cause and effect. In any attempt to understand the process of any felt experience, namely how it occurs using a mechanistic theory, even using quantum mechanics, the subject or consciousness itself will never be “seen”[37]. Therefore, the result of a particular operation of consciousness cannot be predicted, only the statistical result of many such measurements is predictable. Quantum theory allows for this intervention of consciousness, namely via the projection process where the result of this projection is observed as a destructive interference. A good example is equilibrium quantum statistical mechanics, where in the canonical ensemble for example, one assumes that there is such a phase decoherence which allows one to consider the trace of ρ̂Ô (ρ̂ is the density matrix and Ô an operator representing an observable) as an observable only. This is so because of phase decoherence introduced by the multiple interaction of the bath, with which the system is in equilibrium. This interaction is actually nothing but an external (to the subsystem) “measuring” instrument through which the subsystem is continuously observed or projected. Through such an overwhelmingly large number of observations of an observed subsystem which are all averaged out, we are allowed to introduce the notion of temperature and entropy of the subsystem. In addition, non causal evolution can exist because of consciousness’ choice of the dividing line, which bisects the whole into an observed and observing instrument. Therefore, consciousness is the ultimate judge that simply makes the choices about what questions to ask. Through such choices the universe evolves in a direction prepared by the sequence of all these events in consciousness. This process requires the division of the observed universe into an observed part and into an observing instrument. Consciousness participates in this division silently through the choices and the process of various projections made coherently on the various material parts of the instrument, so that the action as a whole leads to a coherent measuring instrument made for the particular reason of measurement (or reflection) and requires 27 no external energy and no external material action. Notice that this choice, which is the moment of the wave-function collapse, costs no external energy at all. 8 SUMMARY A theory of consciousness was presented from which quantum theory follows as the quantitative description of the operation of consciousness on a state of potential consciousness. The so-called material aspects of nature are experienced due to events in our particular sub-streams of a Universal stream of conscious flow. These events give rise to conscious qualities, such as concepts, sensations, feelings, through which we experience the world. In addition, through the conscious process of objectivation[37] which is part of the general perception process, they are projected into “actual” events. The persistence of the material Universe “when no one is looking” is due to our postulate that our streams of consciousness are sub-streams of a Universal conscious flow. When an event occurs, it happens in the Universal consciousness directly or through the particular sub-streams. Notice that we can describe everything using exclusively aspects of a Universal consciousness. The so-called seat of consciousness is not to be found anywhere in particular because the objects are products of consciousness; instead what can be perceived directly is not consciousness, but rather the process of the operation of consciousness and the events which occur in consciousness. In order to discuss the operation of consciousness, we introduce the state of potential or unmanifested consciousness as a state representing the contents (or constructs, or abstractions, or ideals, which manifest themselves as conscious qualities or qualia, when they become experiences) of all previous experiences each assigned a weight to be related to its probability of its projection when a future experience takes place. Consciousness operates on this state of potentiality and there are two different operations; the creative operation of consciousness and the operation of conscious inquiry. In addition, the potential consciousness is also a tool to describe intuition[23, 25, 27, 26] or creative advance[26], a state of “pregnancy” of consciousness and a tool to describe the process of evolution. The creative action of consciousness can be thought of as an operation of an idea or a concept (which strictly speaking has no exact material representation) on the state of potential consciousness. This causes a change of the state of potential consciousness. Consciousness either perceives a change in its own state, which is recognized by the process of measurement or projection or thought, or asks a question (inquiry) by acting on the potential state. The result of such an operation is to manifest the conscious concept either (a) on the measuring instrument or (b) in the case of the brain, the action of the conscious-concept is to actualize the neural correlate in the brain, which is identified with the so-called collapse of the quantum state. When an event happens, it always happens due to the action of the conscious concept from the Universal stream or sub-streams of consciousness on the state of potential consciousness. A simple framework to quantify the description and to apply it to the science of perception and more generally to the science of consciousness as well as physics, 28 is to work with operators acting in linear spaces representing potential states of consciousness which are based on a few basic concepts. An operator represents the direct operation of the conscious-concept and, in general consciousness, on the state of potential consciousness. The outcome of measurement or experience is (i) to collapse the state describing the potential for consciousness to a particular state representing a corresponding conscious concept and (ii) the value of the observable is represented as the result of evaluating the overlap between the change of the state of potential consciousness after the action of consciousness and its own state of potentiality before the action of the operator; namely, consciousness uses the previous state of potential consciousness as the measure to evaluate the quality and degree of change. We begin from elementary contents of the Universal and particular streams of consciousness: (a) the notion of frequency and periodic change and its complementary concept of time, (b) the notion of space and its complementary concept of motion in space. We use neuro-physiological evidence to argue that consciousness can directly observe frequency and wavelength, independently of the experience of time and space. We also find that the equation of motion of the state of potential consciousness, when it is restricted to the potential observation of the spatial position of a particle, is Schrödinger’s equation, where the state of potential consciousness is identified with the wave-function of the particle. Furthermore, we show that this theory is free from the paradoxes and puzzles present in the usual interpretations of quantum theory, such as the EPR paradox and the Schrödinger cat paradox. In addition, the two well-known postulates of von Neumann’s quantum theory of measurement follow from these more general philosophical ideas. Therefore, the theory is also free from the well-known problem of wave-function collapse which appears in the quantum theory of measurement. 9 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This work is dedicated to the memory of my son, Jacob Anthony Manousakis, from which it was inspired. I would like to thank Professors N. Antoniou, F. Flaherty, C. Ktorides, P. Varotsos and D. V. Winkle for comments, and S. Barton, J. Ryan, N. Sarlis and I. Winger for proof-reading the manuscript at an early state of its development. In addition, I would like to thank the three anonymous referees for their comments; because of the effort made to respond to these comments, the manuscript has significantly improved from the originally submitted version. 10 APPENDIX 10.1 Mathematical Description of the Operation of Consciousness: An Example A child’s conceptual development might proceed first by conceiving the integer numbers, then the fractions and then the irrational numbers. The concept of irrational 29 numbers √ is introduced operationally as a solution to algebraic equations, say, for example 2, as the solution to the equation x2 = 2. However, an exact solution to this equation can never be a content of a particular brain (due to its limitation) but only fractional approximations to the solution or sequences with limit the solution. While with this concept of “getting arbitrarily close” satisfies us most of the time, there are phenomena, such as chaos, where even the slightest departure from exactness √ leads to qualitatively different states. Pythagoras demonstrated, however, that 2 can be grasped through a geometrical operation of consciousness if we abandon our attachment to one dimension (real axis) and go to two dimensions. The reason is that while consciousness is undivided, with no beginning and no end, a particular instrument of it (e.g. the brain), is always limited. Therefore, such an operational definition through an infinite series of approximants may not always be satisfactory. To demonstrate our point, let us go ahead and use such an iterative process which provides closer and closer approximants to the solution of the equation f (x) = 0. In particular let us adopt the Newton-Raphson method as the operational definition of the solution of the equation f (x) = 0, where the following recursion relation xn+1 = xn − f (xn )/f ′ (xn ) is iterated starting from x = x0 . Through this process the solution is conceptualized by the intersection of the curve f (x) and the real axis. Now, let us define the Newton-Raphson operator as follows: Ô|xn i = |xn+1 i, xn+1 = O(xn ) ≡ xn − f (xn )/f ′ (xn ). (52) In the case of the equation f (x) = x2 − 2 = 0, the recursion relation is xn+1 = (x2n + 2)/2xn . If we iterate this equation for a large number of operations we find √ that the limiting distribution approximates a delta function at x0 = 2. Using the language of the operational consciousness this can be formulated as follows. The operator Ô creates the potential solution of this equation defined above. When the state |xn+1 i = Ô|xn i and the previous state |xn i have large overlap we claim that the solution is observed. This is how we decide that we have found the solution, namely when hxn |Ô|xn i = 1, within a resolution defined by our computer precision. In order to make sure that we found a solution independent of the initial condition, P l we may start from a state |ψ0 i = M l=1 |x0 i and after application of the operator Ô several times and we stop when the overlap hψn |Ô|ψn i is maximum (or unity, if we normalized the states |ψn i). This operational procedure is used here to simulate the operation of thought and of consciousness. Namely, the operational procedure which applies a question on the state of potential-consciousness and obtains an answer by comparing the states before and after the application. In addition, it can be also used to represent the experimental measurement procedure. Next, let us assume that we wish to find the solution of the equation f (x) = 2 x + 1 = 0, using the same operational definition of what is meant by solution. The Newton-Raphson operator for this case is such that |xn+1 i = Ô|xn i with xn+1 = (x2n − 1)/(2xn ). Here, we assume that our consciousness has only experienced real numbers. A solution to the equation f (x) = 0 does not exist on the real axis. However, to demonstrate our point let us say that we cannot grasp other notions 30 such as the “imaginary” numbers, because we do not have such direct experience. Therefore, let us insist on looking for the solution on the real axis using the NewtonRaphson method. This is meant to parallel the fact of our firm belief, acquired from our macroscopic experience, that every “particle”, while in a state of motion, is also somewhere in space. In addition, this is meant to parallel the fact that these two states are incompatible states of consciousness; namely when the solution is an imaginary number it cannot be placed on the real axis at the same time. Therefore the Newton-Raphson algorithm, is used here as an “experimental” device to materialize, or operationally apply, or reflect the question, where is the solution 2 to the √ equation x = −1 on the real axis? The incompatibility is that the state |i ≡ −1i has nothing to do with real numbers. We will find out using our definition of what we mean operationally by a solution to an equation (which also is meant to map our “experimental” operations), that the question, “where is the solution?”, is not a good question. A better question would be, “what is the potential solution?”. These statements will become clear through this example. If we iterate for a very long time, we will notice that the method passes many times arbitrarily close to any real number. However, the neighborhood of certain numbers are visited more frequently that others. The probability density of visiting a particular small region near a number x is plotted in Fig. 1 as found by iterating the equation xn+1 = (x2n − 1)/2xn about 200,000 times. Can we give any practical meaning or interpretation to this distribution? We have already paralleled the computerized search for the solution to this equation to the operation of consciousness or an experimental procedure to determine the position of a particle. Let us further assume that this procedure requires a very large number of iterations (such as of the order of the Avogadro number) because each operation of projection (or measurement) in practice is carried out by a macroscopically large number of microscopic processes. Another reason is that since we are accepting as a solution the converged value of this process, we have to carry out a large number of such iterations. If it is applied 1023 times we will obtain one value of x. If we then repeat the procedure by using the same number of iterations, plus one more, then two more and so on, we can obtain different outputs, but they belong to the distribution given in Fig. 1. Therefore in this case we might say that the experimentally determined value of this variable is random but it has a definite probability distribution given by that of Fig. 1. −1 The operator Ô has no unique inverse because the two operators Ô± |xi = |x ± √ −1 x2 + 1i have the property of the inverse operation, namely ÔÔ± = 1̂. After a large number of iterations n starting from the state x0 , the state Ôn |x0 i = |xn = O(O(...O(x0 )..))i is not a well-defined output of the procedure because it depends on n. However, there is something else which is well-defined as a limit for n > n0 , where n0 → ∞. Let us define the operator P̂n0 →n ≡ n X Ôm , (53) m=n0 where n0 , n are numbers of the order of the Avogadro number and n > n0 . When 31 this operator acts on a starting state |xi the outcome is a distribution |ψi = P̂n0 →n |xi = n X m=n0 |xm−n0 = O(O(...O(x)...))i, (54) and in the last equation, the function O(x) has been applied m − n0 times on the value x. The important point is that the state |ψi, in the limit n0 → ∞ n → ∞ with n = n0 + m and m >> 1, depends only on the starting value of x. As we will show in the following subsections, the dependence on the value of x is an overall prefactor, otherwise the normalized state |ψi is independent of x. It is useful to consider the eigenstates of the Newton-Raphson operator Ô that correspond to the eigenvalue λν : Ô|νi = λν |νi. (55) Let us consider the equation O(O...(O(x))...) = x where the function O(x) has been applied n times. Given a solution x = x0 to this equation, the following state is an eigenstate of the operator Ô: X 1 n−1 Ôm |x0 i, |n, x0 i = √ n m=1 (56) √ with eigenvalue unity. An example of such √ √ √ √ an eigenstate √ is |2, 1/√ 3i = √ corresponding 1/ 2(|1/ 3i + | − 1/ 3i), because O(1/ 3) = −1/ 3 and O(−1/ 3) = 1/ 3. Fig. 2(a) shows the evolution of the variable x under the √ action of the NewtonRaphson operator Ô starting from the initial value x = 1/ 3 for 100 iterations. 0 √ √ √ Notice the cycle 1/ 3 → −1/ 3 → 1/ 3 is followed for a few iterations and after that the cycle is broken. The reason √ is the following. A computer cannot exactly represent the irrational number 1/ 3 because it only has a limited precision. Therefore it starts from the neighborhood of that number (the truncation of the number, say up to ten significant digit accuracy) but a few iterations later the value of xn = Ôn x0 is very far from the original solution corresponding to the cycle of period 2, because of the propagated error. In fact after a few iterations the value of the xn is closer to a member belonging to a different cycle of period m. If the period m is a large integer, because of the limited precision before the end of even one cycle, we get closer to another cycle and so on. Figs. 2(b-c) give the evolution of the variable x within 1000 and 10000 iterations. The distribution of x after 200000 iterations is shown in Fig. 1 where it is compared with the Lorentzian (which is the exact solution, see Eq. 57). Eigenstates corresponding to an infinite cycle (continuum) are of the following form ψν (y) = φν (O(y)) , y2 + 1 φν (y) = λν φν (O(y)). (57) An obvious solution to the second equation is the constant which implies ψ1 (y) = 1/π(y 2 + 1) with eigenvalue λ = 1. This is shown by the solid line in Fig. 1 which 32 fits very well the results of the numerically implemented Newton-Raphson method. The other solutions of the above equation are not going to be discussed because this goes beyond the goal of this work. In the limit of n0 → ∞ and n − n0 → ∞ the projection operator takes the form P̂n0 →n |xi = c X hµ|xi|µi µ:λµ =1 c = n − n0 . The question is why is the probability density to observe a definite value of x, |ψ(x)|2 and not ψ(x)? In order to measure the probability to find the value x we need to start the projection process at x and measure it at x or another place x′ . The “particle” is not on the real axis, we just believe it must be. We also know that it can be on the real axis in the sense defined by the operational definition or by our way of searching. There is no “particle” anywhere on the real axis unless we start the operational procedure which defines it, in quantum mechanics this means the experimental procedure. Therefore, particles do not exist on our perception screen on their own, the act of observation creates them. We need to start the measuring or projection process from some value of x and ask the question what is the probability to observe the “shadow” of the particle at x. Our procedure implies that we will measure the ratio of the number of occurrences of the particle at x (or between x and x + dx) to the total number of measurements n − n0 . This implies that the probability is proportional to P (x) ∝ hx|P̂n0 →n |xi. In the limit of large n we find P (x) ∝ X ν:λν =1 |ψν (x)|2 , (58) and this agrees with what we know from the quantum mechanical measurement process. 10.2 “Quantum” Interference Let us see how far we can push this analogy with quantum mechanics. One of the most important aspects of quantum theory is the so called interference. The two-slit thought experiment is the best known formulation of the problem. Here we will consider the case of the equation f (x) = 0 with f (x) = (x2 + δ)((x − 3)2 + δ). While there are two independent sets of solution one with real part equal to zero, as before, and another with real part equal to 3, our “measurement” (or projection) process gives interference. First we choose a small value of δ = 0.01, and when we apply the NewtonRaphson projection algorithm, we find the distribution shown in Fig 3 (Left graph). There are two Lorentzian peaks near the real parts of the solutions, namely x = 0 and x = 3 and the widths of these Lorentzian distributions are of the order of the imaginary part, namely 0.1. Notice that because of the small width of these two distributions, there is negligible overlap and the “particle” seems to be either around x = 0 or around x = 3. In the right graph of Fig. 3, the distribution obtained from the same projection process for δ = 0.1 (dashed line) and δ = 1 (solid line). Notice 33 that as the widths of the two distributions become broader, interference peaks begin to appear. They correspond to values of x which form cycles but they arise from bounces off both neighborhoods, namely, the x =√0 and the x = √ 3 neighborhood. Since the actual “particle” is either at x = 0 ± i δ or x = 3 ± i δ and nowhere on the real axis, its “shadow” on the real axis, which is what we observe (because of our insistence of asking the wrong question), appear to be in both places at once and to interfere. References [1] J. A. Wheeler and W. H. Zurek, Quantum Theory and Measurement, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1983). [2] A. Einstein, B. Podolsky and N. Rosen, Phys. Rev. 47, 777 (1935). [3] E. Schrödinger, Proc. Cambridge Phil. Soc. 31, 555 (1935); ibid 32, 446 (1936). [4] F. Selleri, and A. van der Merwe, Quantum Paradoxes and Physical Reality (Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, 1990). See also references therein. [5] N. Bohr, Atomic Theory and the Description of Nature (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1934). Atomic Theory and Human Knowledge (Wiley, New York, 1958). [6] W. Heisenberg, The Physical Principles of the Quantum Theory (Dover, New York, 1930). Physics and Philosophy, (Harper and Row, NY, 1958). [7] D. Bohm, Phys. Rev. 85, 166 (1952). ibid, 85, 180 (1952). [8] H. Everett III, Rev. Mod. Phys. 29, 463 (1957). [9] L. E. Ballentine, Rev. Mod. Phys. 42, 358 (1970). [10] J.S. Bell, and A. Aspect, Speakable and unspeakable in quantum mechanics: Collected papers on quantum philosophy (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1987). [11] A. van der Merwe, F. Selleri and G. Tarozzi, Microphysical Reality and Quantum Formalism, Eds., Vols I and II (Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, 1988). [12] H. P. Stapp, Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics (Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 2003). H. P. Stapp, Found. Phys. 10, 767 (1980). [13] J. M. Schwartz, H. P. Stapp and M. Beauregard, Phil. Tran. Royal Soc. B 360 (1458), 1306 (2005). [14] E. Schrödinger, What is life? and Mind and Matter (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1967). Studying the entire book is strongly recommended and in particular Chap. 3, pg. 126 and Chap. 4, pg. 139. 34 [15] E. Schrödinger, Nature and the Greeks, (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1954). [16] E. P. Wigner, in Quantum Theory and Measurement J. A. Wheeler and W. H. Zurek eds., pg.260 and pg. 325 (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1983). [17] J. Von Neumann, Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, Chap. VI, pg. 417 (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1955). [18] F. London and E. Bauer, in Quantum Theory and Measurement, J. A. Wheeler and W. H. Zurek eds., pg. 217 (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1983). [19] W. Pauli and C. G. Jung, Atom and the Archetype, Pauli/Jung, Letters, 19321958, ed. C. A. Meier, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2001). [20] R. Penrose, The Emperor’s new Mind (Oxford University Press, New York, 1989), and The Shadows of the Mind (Oxford University Press, New York, 1994). [21] N. E. Mavromatos and D. V. Nanopoulos, Int J. 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This can be translated as follows: “..., because the one exists in potentia and in actuality.” [29] Parmenides, On Nature, Pre-Socratic Greek Philosopher, born in 510 B.C. See The fragments of Parmenides, A. H. Coxon, (Assen, Netherlands, 1986). See also Ref. [30] [30] Parmenides, Presented by Plato, pg. 920, Ref. [31]. [31] Plato, Collected Dialogs, Eds. E. Hamilton and H. Cairns (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1980). 35 [32] S. Vivekananda, The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, Mayavati memorial edn. (Advaita Ashrama, Calcutta, 1965). [33] J. Krishnamurti and D. Bohm, The Ending of Time (Gollancz, London, 1985). [34] We postulate that the seat of consciousness cannot be matter-energy itself because matter is itself an experience of consciousness; namely the experience of matter is given us posteriori but that which perceives matter, that which has the experience, must be ready for the experience to occur a priori[24]. [35] E. Webb, Philosophers of Consciousness, Chapter 2, “B. Lonergan, Consciousness as experience and operation”, pg. 53 (University of Washington Press, Seattle, 1988). [36] The original meaning of the Greek word “phenomenon” is “appearance”, namely, that which appears in consciousness. [37] When a sentient being is examined to study “his” consciousness using all presently available instrumentation, the being is turned into an object (See Ref. [14], Chapter 3, “The principle of objectivation”). Subject is the experience of oneself. For example, if we follow the nerve excitation caused by the molecules of a flower which interact with those of his nose we will never “see” or experience the aroma. All we will be able to see is the electromagnetic imprint, the pointer which ultimately the subject experiences. Some people are inclined to think that this is not the final stage, that somehow another part of the brain has looked at this imprint and interpreted it. However, we have already included this, namely, the imprint we are considering is the one produced in the brain after this process, namely, it is the collective neural excitations including the neurons that process all the series of signals and their translations to other signals. See also, Ref. [14], Chapter 6, “The mystery of the sensual qualities”. [38] D. H. Hubel, and T. N. Wiesel. J. Physiol. 148, 574-591 (1959). [39] D. H. Hubel, Eye, Brain, and Vision (Scientific American Library Series, New York, 1995). [40] J. C. Eccles, How the self controls its brain (Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 1994). [41] F. Rieke and D. A. Baylor, Rev. Mod. Phys. 70, 1027 (1998). [42] K.-W. Yau, and D. A. Baylor, Ann. Rev. Neurosci. 12, 289 (1989). [43] A. K. Engel, P. Konig, A.K. Kreiter, T. B. Schillen, W. Singer, Trends Neurosci. 15, 218 (1992). C. M. Gray. J. Comput. Neurosci. 1, 11 (1994). P. Fries, J.-H Schöder, P. R. Roelfsema, W. Singer, A. K. Engerl, J. Neurosci. 22, 3739 (2002). [44] C. L. Baker, Jr. and M. S. Cynader, J. Neurophysiol. 55, No 6, 1136 (1986). [45] D. Bohm, Quantum Mechanics (Dover, New York, 1979). 36 [46] A. Aspect, P. Grangier and G. Roger, Phys. Rev. Lett. 49, 91 (1982); ibid, 47, 460 (1981); A. Aspect, J. Dalibard and G. Roger, Phys. Rev. Lett. 49, 1804 (1982). [47] D. Bouwmeester, et al. Nature 390, 575 (1997). D. Boschi, et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 80, 6, 1121-1125 (1998); I. Marcikic, et al., Nature 421, 509 (2003); M. Riebe, et al., Nature 429, 734(2004); M. D. Barrett, et al., Nature 429, 737 (2004). 37 Figure Captions Fig. 1: The distribution of the steps of the Newton-Raphson iteration process to solve the equation x2 = −1 within the real axis. This is also an eigenstate of the Newton-Raphson operator as defined by Eq. 52 with eigenvalue unity. Fig. 2: The evolution of the variable x under the action of the Newton-Raphson √ operator to observe the solution of Eq. 52 starting from the initial value x0 = 1/ 3. Fig. 3: Demonstration of interference. Left graph is obtained for δ = 0.01. Right graph: for δ = 0.1 (dashed line) and δ = 1 (solid line). 38 0.4 Distribution 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 -10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0 x Figure 1: 39 2 4 6 8 10 10 5 5 0 0 x x 10 -5 -10 -5 0 20 40 60 Iterations 80 100 -10 0 200 400 600 Iterations 800 1000 10 x 5 0 -5 -10 0 2000 4000 6000 Iterations Figure 2: 40 8000 10000 Figure 3: 41

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 515 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) Article Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) Matti Pitkänen 1 Abstract This article has been inspired by two books. The first book ”On intelligence” is by Jeff Hawkins. The second book ”Consciousness: the science of subjectivity” is by Antti Revonsuo. Jeff Hawkins has developed a highly interesting and inspiring vision about neo-cortex, one of the few serious attempts to build a unified view about what brain does and how it does it. Since key ideas of Hawkins have quantum analogs in TGD framework, there is high motivation for developing a quantum variant of this vision. The vision of Hawkins is very general in the sense that all parts of neo-cortex would run the same fundamental algorithm, which is essentially checking whether the sensory input can be interpreted in terms of standard mental images stored as memories. This process occurs at several abstraction levels and involve massive feedback. If it succeeds at all these levels the sensory input is fully understood. TGD suggests a generalization of this process. Quantum jump defining moment of consciousness would be the fundamental algorithm realized in all scales defining an abstraction hierarchy. Negentropy Maximization Principle (NMP) would be the variational principle driving this process and in optimal case lead to an experience of understanding at all levels of the scale hierarchy realized in terms of generation of negentropic entanglement. The analogy of NMP with second law suggests strongly thermodynamical analogy and p-adic thermodynamics used in particle mass calculations might be also seen as effective thermodynamics assignable to NMP. In Part I of this two-part article, I will first discuss the ideas of Hawkins and then summarize some relevant aspects of quantum TGD and TGD inspired theory of consciousness briefly in the hope that this could make representation comprehensible for the reader having no background in TGD (I hope I have achieved this). The representation involves some new elements: reduction of the old idea about motor action as time reversal of sensory perception to the anatomy of quantum jump in zero energy ontology (ZEO); interaction free measurement for photons and photons as a non-destructive reading mechanism of memories and future plans (time reversed memories) represented 4-dimensionally as negentropically entangled states approximately invariant under quantum jumps (this resolves a basic objection against identifying quantum jump as moment of consciousness) leading to the identification of analogs of imagination and internal speech as fundamental elements of cognition; and a more detailed quantum model for association and abstraction processes. 1 Introduction This work has been inspired by two books. The first book ”On intelligence” is by Jeff Hawkins. The second book is by Antti Revonsuo. 1.1 On intelligence Jeff Hawkins [22] has developed a highly interesting and inspiring vision about neo-cortex, one of the few serious attempts to build a unified view about what brain does and how it does it. Since the key ideas of Hawkins have quantum analogs in TGD framework, there is high motivation for developing a quantum variant of this vision. The vision of Hawkins is very general in the sense that all parts of neo-cortex would run the same fundamental algorithm, which is essentially checking whether the sensory input can 1 Correspondence: Matti Pitkänen http://tgdtheory.com/. Address: Köydenpunojankatu 2 D 11 10940, Hanko, Finland. Email: matpitka@luukku.com. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 516 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) be interpreted in terms of standard mental images stored as memories. This process occurs at several abstraction levels and involve massive feedback. If it succeeds at all these levels the sensory input is fully understood. TGD suggests a generalization of this process. 1. Quantum jump defining moment of consciousness would be the fundamental algorithm realized in all scales defining an abstraction hierarchy. Negentropy Maximization Principle (NMP, [44]) would be the variational principle driving this process and in optimal case lead to an experience of understanding at all levels of the scale hierarchy realized in terms of negentropic entanglement. The analogy of NMP with second law suggests strongly thermodynamical analogy and p-adic thermodynamics used in particle mass calculations might be also seen as effective thermodynamics assignable to NMP. One can imagine the analogs of temperature and various other parameters as characteristics of ”thermal equilibrium” under some constraints with respect to NMP instead of second law. These would be macroscopic parameters characterising the state of consciousness, and one can easily imagine psychological counterparts of thermodynamical notions. Psychological pressure would not be a mere metaphor! 2. The anatomy of quantum jump implies alternating arrow of geometric time at the level of imbedding space [40]. This looks strange at first glance but allows to interpret the growth of syntropy introduced by Fantappie [21] as a growth of entropy in reversed direction of imbedding space time. As a matter fact, one has actually wave function in the moduli space of CDs and in state function reductions localisation of either boundary takes place and gradually leads to the increase of the imbedding space geometric time and implies the alternating arrow for this time. The state function reduction at positive energy boundary of CD has interpretation as a process leading to sensory representation accompanied by p-adic cognitive representation. The time reversal of this process has interpretation as motor action in accordance with Libet’s classical findings [25]. This symmetry holds true in various length scales for CDs. In the same manner p-adic space-time sheets define cognitive representations and their time reversals as intentions. It seems that self model could be assigned to negentropically entangled collections of sub-CDs and negentropic entanglement would stabilize them. A rather obvious inaccuracy in the earlier interpretation of negentropic entanglement has been corrected. The statement that negentropic entanglement corresponds to the experience of understanding (or any conscious experience) is in conflict with the basic postulate of TGD inspired theory of consciousness. The correct wording is that the generation of negentropic entanglement gives rise the experience of understanding and possibly some other emotionally positively colored experiences. Generation and loss of negentropic entanglement would be the key to the understanding of emotions. 3. One could understand the fundamental abstraction process as generation of negentropic entanglement serving as a correlate for the experience of understanding. This process creates new mental images (sub-CDs) and to longer sequences of mental images (accumulation of experience by formation of longer quantum association sequences). Abstraction process involves also reduction of measurement resolution characterizing cognitive representations defined in terms of of discrete chart maps mapping discrete set of rational points of real preferred extremals to their p-adic counterparts allowing completion to p-adic preferred extremal. The reversal of this abstraction process gives rise to improved resolution and adds details to the representation. The basic cognitive process has as its building bricks this abstraction process and its reversal. 4. The notion of self, which should be distinguished from a model for self, has been a continual source of worries in TGD inspired theory of consciousness [45, 40]. Hierarchy of quantum jumps suggests that self can be identified as quantum jump and that the conscious information corresponds to the ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 517 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) change of negentropy in quantum jump. The notion of negentropic entanglement however raises the temptation to identify self model (distinguished from self) as a property of quantum state, which consciousness certainly cannot be in TGD framework. Self representations would naturally correspond to negentropically entangled tensor products approximately invariant under quantum jump sequence. One can of course ask whether the notion of self reduced to quantum jump is needed at all. 1.2 Consciousness: the science of subjectivity Antti Revonsuo has written a wonderful book about consciousness with title ”Consciousness: the science of subjectivity” [33]. 1. Revonsuo discusses philosophical, historical, and conceptual foundations of consciousness science. 2. Various disorders of consciousness provide test benches for the theories of consciousness and Revonsuo discusses neuropsychological deficits of visual consciousness, neuropsychological dissociations of visual consciousness from behavior, and neuropsychological disorders of self-awareness. 3. If one believes (and even if one does not!) that the state of brain dictates completely the contents of consciousness, it is natural to search for the neural correlates of consciousness since brain state could indeed correlate in one-one manner with certain (say cognitive and representational) aspects of consciousness. Revonsuo analysizes methods and design of a typical NCC experiment, discusses neural basis of consciousness as a state and studies on the neural basis of visual consciousness. 4. A lot of theories of consciousness have been proposed and Revonsuo discusses both philosophical and empirical theories of consciousness critically pointing out the basic difficulties of various approaches. Revonsuo does not discuss quantum theories of consciousness. 5. The last chapters are devoted to altered states of consciousness (ASC) with a discussion of dreaming and sleep, hypnosis, and higher states of consciousness. The understanding of ASCs obviously define also tests for any theory of consciouesness. In the following I will first discuss the ideas of Hawkins and then summarize some relevant aspects of quantum TGD and TGD inspired theory of consciousness briefly in the hope that this could make representation comprehensible for the reader having no background in TGD (I hope I have achieved this). The representation involves some new elements: reduction of the old idea about motor action as time reversal of sensory perception to the anatomy of quantum jump in zero energy ontology (ZEO); interaction free measurement for photons and photons as a non-destructive reading mechanisms of memories and future plans represented 4-dimensionally as negentropically entangled states approximately invariant under quantum jumps (this resolves a basic objection against identifying quantum jump as moment of consciousness) leading to the identification of analogs of imagination and internal speech as fundamental elemens of cognition; and a more detailed quantum model for association and abstraction processes. After that I compare various theories and philosophies of consciousness with TGD approach following the beautifully organized representation of Revonsuo. Also anomalies of consciousness are briefly discussed. My hope is that this comparison would make explicit that TGD based ontology of consciousness indeed circumvents the difficulties against monistic and dualistic approaches and also survives the basic objections that I have been able to invent hitherto. 2 The vision of Hawkins Jeff Hawkins has written together with Sanda Blaskeslee a very inspiring book about conscious intelligence with title ”On intelligence” [22]. What makes the book so inspiring to me is that it tries to build a holistic ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 518 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) strongly structured vision about the functioning of neo-cortex easily generalizable outside to its original context - in my case TGD inspired theory of consciousness based on rather different basic philosophy. 2.1 The philosophical attitudes of Hawkins Before continuing I want to locate the vision of Hawkins to the map of theories. 1. Hawkins accepts functionalism stating that intelligence and maybe even consciousness are properties of organization and have nothing to with the stuff that the system is made of. This was the justification for AI people to regard brain as a primitive realization of something which can be realized much more elegantly using digital computers. Hawkins assumes that the functional structure at neuronal level determines the contents of consciousness and could therefore be seen as a materialist allowing emergence. 2. Hawkins does not discuss the possibility of quantum consciousness but his vision might allow also quantum formulation and in the followin I will represent such a generalization. Although Hawkins accepts functionalism, he represents excellent arguments against AI and connectionism, and computationalism in general stating brain is a computer. 1. The argument against computationalism according to AI goes as follows. The time scale of neural processing is 1 ms: this is million times longer than 1 ns: the time scale of processing in modern computers. Despite its slowness brain is able to recognize a face represented in various manners in a fraction of second. For recent day computers this is a mission impossible. Computationalistic brain should make this feat by using basic programs consisting of roughly 100 steps. Parallelism does not help as often claimed. As an analogy Hawkins mentions a task of carrying some amount of material to another side of a desert. Irrespective of how many camels are hired the task takes some minimum time determined by the maximal load carried by single camel over the desert and the distance to the other side. 2. Gradually the failure of AI was accepted, and the follower of AI was connectionism. Connectionism takes the notions of association and and standardized mental image (memory) seriously and is therefore nearer to what brain is thought to do. The possibility to complete full patterns from pieces by a non-linear algorithm seemed to give excellent hopes about progress. The dream was not fulfilled. Pattern recognition by computers differs from what brain does in one but overall important aspect: the ability to form invariant representations is lacking. When sensory input representing the same object but from a different perspective is used, computer based pattern recognition fails. A mere shift of the spatial pattern is enough to make recognition impossible. Brain can however easily recognize the pattern seen from different perspectives, the pattern can be even deformed in wide limits. Even patterns represented using pictures, sound, and touch are recognized as same object. 3. Hawkins criticizes also the behavioristic approach assuming that contents of consciousness can be deduced by looking only the behavior. Turing’s test relies formulates mathematically this behavioristic dogma. It is probably relatively easy to cheat human subject to to believe that machine is conscious by using Turing test. This however does not demonstrate anything. The basic problem is that the more abstract the level of cognitive process is is, the less it shows itself in the behavior. The situation in which a person is fully conscious but completely paralyzed so that he is not able to express any thoughts via motor actions illustrates a failure of the naive behavioristic approach. In TGD framework it is easy to agree with Hawkins. Turing machine is a model of computer in which one implicitely takes granted the identification of experienced and geometric time, which differ in ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 519 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) many crucial aspects as even child knows. The starting point of TGD inspired consciousness theory as a generalization of quantum measurement theory is the paradox of quantum measurement theory caused by this identification. The discretization of geometric time is also an extremely heavy idealization and I find it surprising that it has raised so little criticism. In TGD framework the behavioristic approach and the materialistic identification of contents of consciousness with the state of brain must be given up since consciousness cannot be identified as a property of quantum state since it is assigned with the quantum jump between two quantum states. 2.2 Basic observations of Hawkins Several observations and ideas of Hawking relate to the notion of time. 1. Instead of computation Hawkins sees memory, recognition of familiar objects in the sensory input, and their naming as fundamental processes in neo-cortex. Nerve pulse patterns are identified as names for objects. A cognitive representation is what sensory input gives rise to, and means a decomposiion of the sensory input to objects with names, analogous to a linguistic essentially linear description of the percept. 2. It is not only spatial patterns but temporal sequences of them which matter. At higher level of abstraction one has a sequence of patterns instead of single patttern and the representation is less detailed. Sensory inputs are this kind of temporal sequences as are also plans for motor actions resulting as a reaction to the sensory input. Here ”sensory input” and ”motor action” could be understood very generally: even the nerve pulse patterns arriving neuron and leaving it can be seen as ”sensory inputs” and ”motor actions”. 3. Hawkins emphasizes the similarities between sensory input and motor action and one can indeed claim that they one and same thing except that they seem to proceed in opposite directions of time: bottom-up and top-down. Libet’s well-known findings that the neuronal activity begins a fraction of second earlier than conscious decision for motor action and later experiments suggesting even longer time scales might be understood in this framework. If one takes this idea seriously, one must however modify the existing beliefs about the relation between subjective time and the geometric time of physicists identified as fourth space-time dimension. Subjective time has constant arrow but this arrow might correspond to different arrow of geometric time for sensory input and motor action. This brings in mind TGD based view about time [40] and suggests more detailed interpretation of the arrow of time as it emerges in TGD framework. 4. Hawkins sees as the basic function of neo-cortex construction of predictions based on the ”understanding” of the sensory input and coded by cognitive representation. Prediction might seen also as an intention how to behave realized as a motor program defining the reaction to the sensory percept. This general vision is very elegant. The challenge is to understand what various concepts such as memory, recognition of familiar objects, naming, and understanding do mean physically. This is far from trivial in the materialistic framework of standard physics, and one can hope that quantum TGD generalizing considerably also the quantum theory itself, could help in this challenge. In particular, p-adic physics and p-adic space-time sheets could serve as correlates for the ”mind stuff”, and one could see the formation of cognitive representations as a formation of p-adic charts about real physical systems. Sensory perception would be real, cognitive representation p-adic. In p-adic topology the decomposition to objects and discretization in a given resolution are natural so that it would be ideal to the description of cognition. Negentropic entanglement would be an excellent candidate for a correlate of understanding. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 520 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 2.3 Invariant representations Hawkins emphasizes the ability of brain to recognize objects represented in very different manners as a basic distinction between brain and computers. 1. Invariant representations distinguish brain from computer. Invariant representations are abstractions. Abstraction summarizes something common to a large class of objects and gives a name for this class of objects. For instance, ”living room” as a name of this kind of class is extremely economical manner to represent information in terms of a concept instead of remembering every detail of every living room one has spent some time. So called idiot savants can have this kind of sensory memory, and are able to perform incredible memory feats, but this kind of memory is not useful unless one is an artist. An interesting question is whether animals could still possess sensory memories: this would be certainly useful gift in jungle. Another interesting question is whether cerebellum could have sensory memories not conscious-to-us and whether these could become conscious-to-us in some altered states of consciousness. Abstraction appears also in the music experience. Ordinary listener is not able to identify the key of the music piece but this does not affect the music experience much since only the ratios of the pitches of notes of the melody matter. People with ”absolute ear” can however recognize the absolute key of the music piece and regard pieces in different keys as different ones. In the standard scale used for the piano, the ratios are not quite the same in different keys but this causes troubles for people with ”absolute ear”. 2. Hawkins sees the formation of associations as an important aspect of invariant representations allowing to recognize the same object using different sensory channels. Second aspect of abstraction is the elimination of un-necessary details: kind of reduction of sensory/cognitive resolution. Some kind of averaging could be involved. 3. Hawkins concludes that neo-cortex is specialized to the construction invariant representations and that there is a hierarchy of increasingly abstract invariant representations assignable to sensory percepts and motor actions. All these representations are needed to achieve ideal perception but only the highest level abstractions are usually conscious-to-us. Note that in standard neuro-science framework ”conscious-to-us” is synonymous to ”conscious” but in quantum TGD approach entire hierarchy of conscious entities can be imaged so that ”sub-conscious” translates to ”consciousbut-not-to-us”. This distinction allows to understand many brain disorders [33] such as being not conscious of being able to see (and other agnosias) or believing that one sees although one is cortically blind or being cortically blind but believing that one is able to see. Note that if primary visual experience is at the level of retina, cortical blindness need not mean subjectively experienced blindness. One of the hard challenges is to identify the mechanism giving rise to invariant representations. Neural firing patterns are though to transform synaptic connections and in this manner give rise to associations. Hebb’s rules define an attempt to model what happens in the process. One can also understand what abstraction could mean. In TGD framework one can consider the generation of negentropic entanglement as a mechanism of association: negentropically entangled state defines a rule represented as a superposition of state pairs (or n-plets) such that each pair (n-tuple) represents one particular instance of the rule. Abstraction means also getting rid of insignificant details. Here one can consider some kind of averaging (kind of ensemble of mental images at quantum level) or quantum superposition of states representing same object but with different details below cognitive resolution. I have also proposed that quantum states in general are superpositions of preferred extremals which have equivalent statistical geometries meaning that various geometric correlation functions are identical for them. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 521 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 2.4 Observations about the structure and functioning of the neocortex The proposal of Hawkins relies heavily on the observations about the structure and functioning of the neo-cortex. 1. Neocortex (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neocortex) [6] is a very thin grey layer at the top of cortex having thickness of about 3 mm and consisting of 6 layers, which according to Hawkins are functionally hierarchically ordered with layer 1 at the top representing the highest level of abstraction. Layer 4 is the layer to which inputs from distant regions of neocortex arrive and are transferred to the levels above and below it. There is a strong feedback and feedforwad between the layers. 2. Neo-cortex decomposes to various sensory and motor areas. In associative areas the inputs from sensory areas are combined and sent to motor areas. Sensory and motor areas in turn have hierarchical structure: for instance, visual areas consting of sub-areas V1, ..., V5. Sensory input arrives to V1 and V1 is believed to identify from the sensory input various simple features. Higher areas identify more abstract features and sequences of them. 3. Hawkins emphasizes the fact that sensory perception and motor action are not simple bottom-up and top-down processes. Feedback is present and can be even 10 times more massive than input. The proposed interpretation is that input to from a given layer of neo-cortex to a higher layer (from say from 3 to 2) means formation of a more abstract and less detailed representation and vice versa. This representation consists also longer sequences of basic patterns and allows easier recognition. A good example is a situation in which music piece on CD changes: at the lower level this means unexpected input. At higher level music pieces on CD form a sequences and recognition as new piece is possible. The higher level can send this prediction back to the lower level. 4. Neo-cortex and also cortex look the same everywhere. This suggests that all basic units of the cortex perform essentially same basic function or algorithm. This idea is elegant and far reaching and would apply to the formation of cognitive representations which would be just the identification and naming of objects of sensory percept. 5. This picture applies also to motor action. If one accepts that motor action is time reversal of sensory perception and leads from abstract to less abstract and more detailed, one can ask whether the feedback to less abstract levels could be interpreted as motor action at neuronal level. A fractal structure in which sensory perception and motor action takes place in various time and length scales would suggeset this kind of view. There are many notions which require more detailed definition. The proposed detailed model for feedback need not of course be correct as such. What matters is the existence of hierarchical structure and communications between the levels of the hierarchy. In TGD framework this hierarchy would naturally correspond to self hierarchy and hierachy of quantum jumps within quantum jups. In zero energy ontology it has as correlates the hierarchy of space-time sheets at space-time level and that of causal diamondswithin causal diamonds at the level of imbedding space. Also the p-adic length scale hierarchy and hierarchy of effective Planck constants assigned with dark matter in TGD Universe relate to these hierarchies. 2.5 Universal algorithm These observations inspire Hawkins to propose for the universal algorithm run by the units of neo-cortex. 1. The homogenuity of neocortex motivates the proposal that all units of the neo-cortex forming a hierarchy are performing the same universal algorithm, which is recognition of the virtual sensory input represented as nerve pulse pattern with some standard input stored in memory. If the recognition attempt fails, the input is sent to a higher more abstract level with less details and this level ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 522 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) makes a similar trial. If the recognition attempt is successful, the input is sent to a lower level (this corresponds to a feedback) and same attempt is made. 2. This process continues until recognition is made at all levels or if this is not possible, the pattern is sent to hippocampus as a genuinely new pattern to be stored to memory. Some maximum time of unsuccessful processing is a natural criterion for the novelty. Percept is thus stored as a memory in hippocampal level only when it represents something new. The percepts which do not enter hippocampus are stored at lower cortical layers but do not represent memories conscious-to-us. This could explain why people at older age are not able to remember details of say movie unless they represent something genuinely new. To me this picture looks rather attractive and inspires the question whether a generalization to quantum context - say in TGD framework - is possible. 2.6 The basic objection against the vision of Hawkins The basic objection against Hawkins’s vision applies to neuroscience view in general. 1. As Hawkins notices, the homogenuity of the neocortex and brain in general is in conflict with the idea that cortex is the seat of the sensory qualia. It is difficult to understand why the auditory and visual pathways could give rise to so different sensory qualia if only the organization of the sensory pathways matters. 2. A possibility not discussed by Hawkins nor by neuroscientists is that sensory qualia could be formed at the level of sensory organs. (a) TGD approach would suggest that qualia are realized at the level of sensory organs [42] and quale mental images (subselves) entangle with the cortical mental images representing names of objects of the perceptive field represented at cortex and thus give rise to a coloring of the cognitive map. This would explain why the qualia associated with different sensory pathways are so different. Pure thought would correspond to cognition without this coloring and dreams would involve a feedback to the level of sensory organs (REM sleep) transforming thinking to vivid imagination. Note that also the feedback to the level of sensory organs and comparison of this virtual sensory input with the actual one is quite possible in TGD framework since there is no reason to restrict the feedback hierarchy to the 6 neo-cortical layers. Dark photons with large value of ~ef f could make possible this feedback by generating sensory input by transforming to ordinary visible photons interpreted as biophotons. (b) The basic objection against this view is the phenomenon of phanton limb (see http://en. wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_limb) [17], which in standard physics framework forces to locate the pain to the map of sensory field at cortex. One manner to solve the problem would be that that the pain is somewhere else than in phantom limb but mislocated in the construction of cognitive representation: this would be just wrong kind of association. The alternative approach would give up the standard view about the relationship between subjective and geometric time: the phantom pain is sensory memory of an actual pain in the limb which exists in the geometric past at a distance of maybe decades. The third option is that qualia are formed at the level of neurons and under some conditions correspond to those experienced by us. This requires new physics at the level of neurons and clear identification what the physical correlates of qualia are in this new physics. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 523 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 3 Quantum TGD very briefly Before discussing the TGD inspired identification of the universal algorithm as quantum jump in turn identified as a moment of consciousness, it is good to briefly summarize some basic aspects of quantum TGD. 3.1 Many-sheeted space-time, imbedding space, WCW The basic geometric notions of TGD are many-sheeted space-time, imbedding space M 4 ×CP2 and ”world of classical worlds” (WCW) identified as the infinite-dimensional space of space-time surfaces, which can be seen as analogs of Bohr orbits representing kind of archetypical field patterns in their geometry. The choice of the imbedding space is fixed by particle physics considerations uniquely and can be justified also by very general mathematical arguments. TGD leads to geometrization of the classical fields appearing in standard model and particle quantum numbers can be understood in terms of the symmetries of the imbedding space. I will not go the detailed definitions of these notions here but refer to the articles and books at my homepage. What is essential is that TGD space-time is topologically non-trivial in all length scales and objects of various size scales that we see around us can be interpreted in terms of space-time sheets defining their own sub-Universes. Second essential generalization and deviation from Maxwell’s electrodynamics (and other field theories) is topological field quantization. For instance, magnetic field decomposes to flux quanta (flux tubes and sheets) represented as space-time time quanta. This quantization is in key role in the model of living matter and the dynamics of the ”magnetic bodies” is crucial for understanding various aspects of biocatalysis and also EEG. Magnetic body (hierarchy of them) brings to the usual picture of living system as biological body interacting with environment a completely new level. 3.2 Zero energy ontology (ZEO) The failure of the strict determinism for the preferred extremals of Kähler action means that data in time=constant snapshot do not determine the future and past behavior. Several time=constant snapshots must be assumed and this led originally to the notion of association sequence. Later the notion of zero energyh ontology (ZEO) emerged and was forced by number theoretical universality: vanishing total quantum numbers indeed make sense in number theoretically universal manner. ZEO allows also to avoid the paradox suggested by the fact that Poincare invariance is exact in laboratory scales but not in cosmological scales: the solution relies on the observation that the notions of energy and momentum for the positive energy parts of zero energy states are scaled dependent in ZEO. 1. Zero energy states are superpositions over pairs of positive energy states and negative energy states and correspond to initial and final states of a physical event in positive energy ontology. Positive and negative energy states are localized at the opposite light-like boundaries of a causal diamond (CD) defined as intersection of future and past directed light-cones (CP2 appears as a Cartesian factor but will not be mentioned separetely in the sequel). Space-time surfaces in the quantum superposition are identified as preferred extremals of Kähler action and are restricted inside CD for the simplest option. 2. CDs form a fractal hierarcy with size scales coming as integer multiples of fundamental size scale. Translates and Lorentz boosts of CDs are also possible. It is not quite clear whether one should allow CDs to intersect or should one require strict nesting. System has in general wave function in the moduli space of CDs and in quantum jump a localization to CDs for which either upper or lower boundary is fixed takes place. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 524 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 3. CDs are the geometric correlates of selves at the level of imbedding space M 4 × CP2 . The 4-D space-time surfaces define the correlate of selves at space-time level. One can consider two time coordinates: imbedding space time coordinate and that of 4-D surface. 3.3 p-Adic physics and cognition and intentionality I ended up with p-adic physics from accidental observations related to the mass scale ratios of elementary particle spectrum. The construction of p-adic thermodynamics predicting particle masses with excellent accuracy inspired questions which led to the proposal that p-adic physics describes cognition present already at elementary particle level. 1. Imbedding space has also p-adic sectors corresponds to various p-adic number fields. These sectors are glued together along rational points common to real and p-adic number fields and also via common algebraic points in the case of algebraic extensions of p-adic number fields. The common rational points of real and p-adic space-time surface (or at least partonic 2-surface) define cognitive representation so that cognitive representations are always discrete. At the level of WCW the points of real and p-adic sectors identifiable with each other correspond to surfaces, whose algebraic representations make sense both in real and p-adic sense. The general vision is that life resides in this this intersection of real and p-adic worlds. For instance, this motivates the notion of number theoretic entanglement entropy which can be negative and is interpreted as a measure of information assignable to entanglement. 2. Mappings of real space-time surfaces to p-adic ones are fundamental and define cognitive representations [50]. The mappings of p-adic space-time surfaces to real ones are interpreted as realizations of intentional actions. When motor action is identified as the time reversal for the formation of sensory representation, intentional action becomes time reversal for the formation of cognitive representation so that a very powerful and elegant symmetry emerges. 3. Finite measurement resolution is fundamental notion and actually forced by the notion of p-adic manifold. An attractive additional constraint is that the space-time surfaces in the superposition are perceptively equivalent in given measurement resolution characterized by p-adic prime assignable to the space-time surface and corresponding pinary cutoffs and also by the algebraic extension of p-adic numbers characterizing the angle resolution. 3.4 Length scale hierarchies and cognitive hierarchies TGD involves several hierarchies. 1. One hierarchy is formed by the p-adic length scales assignable to p-adic primes coming as primes near powers of two. 2. Second hierarchy corresponds to size scales of CDs coming as integer multiples of CP2 scale with secondary p-adic length scales being favored. One can assign to these length scales length scale resolution as p-adic length scale multiplied by a half-integer power of p, and angle resolution defined in terms of algebraic extenion of p-adic numbers used. These length scales are now an essential part of the definition of the notion of p-adic manifold necessary for the construction of number theoretically universal calculus. The resolution scales have also natural counterpart at quantum level and can be realized in terms of inclusions of hyper-finite factors of type II1 [47]. The included factor defines the degrees of freedom which cannot be seen in given resolution and the factor space obtained by dividing with the included factor defines quantum space with finite but fractional dimension. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 525 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 3. The increase of resolution means getting rid of un-necessary details in the case of cognitive representations it would be un-necessary information allowing a formation of abstraction. The reduction of the resolution means addition of details and formation of lower level representation. In the realization of motor action this process indeed occurs. This process can be however as a formation of sensory representation in non-standard time direction. The findings of Libet conform with this view about motor action. 4. The hierarchy of (effective) Planck constants ~ef f was conjectured for about 8 years ago [41]. (a) The values of ~ef f would come as multiples of ordinary Planck constant: ~ef f = n~. TGD provides two possible explanations for how ~ef f emerges. The first one relies on multifurcations of space-time surface implied by the failure of strict determinism of the basic variational principle: ~ef f = n~ would correspond to n-furcation taking place at the boundary of causal diamond. Second explanation relies on the general structure of p-adic Lie-algebras predicting effective values of Planck constant coming in the proposed manner [50]. These explanations should and could be equivalent. (b) For large values of ~ef f the quantal scales (say Compton length of electron) become large and this makes possible macroscopic quantum coherence. The hypothesis is that dark matter corresponds to ordinary matter but with non-trivial value of ~ef f . What would make it dark is that particles with different values of ~ef f cannot occur in the same vertex of a generalized Feynman diagram although particles with different value of ~ef f can transform to each other. (c) The proposal is that magnetic flux quanta (sheets and tubes) can be carriers of dark matter. The phase transitions reducing ~ef f reduce the length of the magnetic flux tube and if biomolecules form an ”Indra’s net” connected by flux tubes, these phase transitions could force two biomolecules connected by flux tube near to each other so that they could find each other in the dense molecular soup. The reconnection of closed magnetic flux tubes associated with two molecules in turn generates two flux tube pairs connecting the molecules and allowing the two systems to become effectively single quantum system in dark degrees of freedom with large value of Planck constant. Persinger’s recent experiments give support for this vision [49]. 4 Quantum jump as the counterpart of fundamental algorithm in TGD? In order to formulate the interpretation of quantum jump sequence as a fundamental algoritm of sensory perception, cognition, intentional action, and motor action, one must describe the basic ideas of TGD inspired theory of consciousness. 4.1 Basic ideas of TGD inspired theory of consciousness Before discussing the TGD based analog for universal algorithm, it is good to begin by giving a list about basic ideas of TGD inspired theory of consciousness. 1. Identification of quantum jump between zero energy states as moment of consciousness. It is essential that the quantum states counterparts for entire time evolutions of Schrödinger equation rather than time=constant snapshots of single evolution. In this manner one can avoid the conflict between nondeterminism of state function reduction and determinism of Schrödinger equation. This however implies that subjective time whose chronon quantum jump is, cannot be identified with the geometric time of physicists. The correlation between these two times is of course possible in the sense that quantum jump sequences corresponds to an increase of geometric time defined in some natural manner. This correlation must be strong since these two times are usually identified. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 526 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 2. Originally I distinguished between the notions of quantum jump and self proposed to emerge from some kind of gluing together of quantum jumps to larger structures in a manner analogous to the fusion of particles to bound states. The fractality of quantum jump in the sense that there are quantum jumps within quantum jumps led to the identification of quantum jump and self. This identification has however remained somewhat fuzzy. The recent considerations however suggests that negentropic entanglement in time direction is necessary for mental images (having sub-CDs as correlates) to mental images representing spatial patterns and for these patterns in turn to bind to a sequence of mental images representing abstract memories as sequences of mental images. Negentropically entangled sequence would be a quantal counterpart for the original association sequence introduced as purely geometric concept. Should these sequences define selves so that self would be something characterizing quantum state rather than something identified as quantum jump? Or could these sequences define a model of self to be distinguished from self identified as quantum jump? By definition negentropic entanglement tends to be preserved in quantum jumps so that it represents information as approximate invariant: this conforms with the idea of invariant representation and quite generally with the idea that invariants represent the useful information. This information would not be however conscious if the original view about conscious information as change of information is accepted. Could one imagine a reading mechanism in which this information is read without changing the negentropically entangled state at all?. This reading process would be analogous to deducing the state of a two-state system in interaction free measurement to be discussed below. 3. Selves/quantum jumps form a hierarchy, which predicts higher level selves identifiable in terms of collective and transpersonal consciousness. Also lower levels of hierarchy should be present so that even neuron and even electron should possess primitive self-awareness. 4. The subselves of self are identified as mental images of self and sub-subselves are assumed to be experienced as ensemble averages- at least when the entanglement is not negentropic. This averaging could be seen as an alternative mechanism for the formation of abstractions. Another mechanism would be based on quantum superposition of perceptively equivalent space-time surfaces. Sharing of mental images by entanglement of subselves is proposed and the motivation comes from the spacetime correlates of entanglement identified as magnetic flux tubes connecting the space-time sheets of subselves although space-time sheets of selves are disjoint. This picture requires a generalization of the usual tensor product description for the formation of many-particle states. Negentropy Maximization Principle (NMP) defines the basic variational principle of TGD inspired theory of consciousness. 1. NMP states that the negentropy gain in the quantum jump is maximal. For the ordinary entanglement entropy NMP implies that state function reduction leads to a pure state, which is an eigenstate of the density matrix characterizing the interaction of subsystem with its environment. An interesting purely mathematical result is that the assumption that density matrix always reduces to a partial trace of pure state density matrix leads to the basic rules of quantum theory probabilities. TGD inspired theory of consciousness, which can be seen as a generalization of quantum measurement theory, allows only this kind of density matrices. 2. If one accepts the notion of negentropic entanglement making sense in the intersection of real and padic worlds, number theoretic entropy can become negative in state function reduction. This makes possible formation of negentropically entangled states wheras in the usual state function reduction entanglement is always reduced. Negentropy is however associated with the entanglement rather that single particle states of either particle. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 527 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 3. NMP and second law are very similar and one can consider the notion of the counterpart of thermodynamical equilibrium in which the avarage values of some conserved quantities are fixed so that one can assign to them temperature like parameters. At least in the ideal situation quantum jump could lead to the analog of thermal equilibrium prevailing in all scales with maximum amount of negentropic entanglement. This is probably too strong an idealization. The assignment of the experience of understanding with the generation of negentropic entanglement is a highly attractive idea. To assign it with negentropic entanglement itself does not conform with the basic postulate. Both p-adic length scales and CDs form a hierarchy and this raises the question whether or not the quantum jumps inside CDs within CDs are related or not. One can consider three options. 1. For the first option the cascade of state function reductions can begin from any unentangled CD and after that proceeds to shorter length scales (smaller sub-CDs) until it stops when maximally negentropic entanglement is reached. This cascade would be analogous to motor action proceeding from long to short scales as detailes of the motor action are fixed. For sensory perception the cascade would be same but in opposite direction of imbedding space geometric time (state function reduction for the opposite boundary of CD). This would imply an effect analogous to quantum Zeno effect. If for given CD quantum jump cascade can begin only if CD is unentangled, negentropic entanglement stabilizes the CD, and it can spend long times in this negentropically entangled state but would not be conscious. 2. One can consider also the possibility that the CD from which the cascade begins is entangled with other CDs so that in quantum superposition of states the state function reduction cascades could occur separately for all summands. This would mean quantum parallelism for state function reductions. For instance, in this picture hadrons could be seen as quantum coherent structures in hadronic length scales but dissipative quantum structures in quark length scales. This options is certainly simpler than the first one but one must keep mind open for both options. It is is not clear to me whether the possible non-uniquencess of the state basis could exclude quantum parallellism. 3. For the third option quantum jumps inside various CDs would occur independently and top-down and bottom-up cascades are not predicted. 4.2 The anatomy of quantum jump in zero energy ontology (ZEO) Concerning the notion of quantum jump ZEO encourages rather far reaching conclusions. In ZEO the only difference between motor action and sensory representions on one hand and intention and cognitive representation on the other hand is that the arrows of imbedding space time are opposite for them. Furthermore, sensory perception followed by motor actions corresponds to a basic structure in the sequence of state function reductions and it seems that these processes occur fractally for CDs of various size scales. 1. State function reduction can be performed to either boundary of CD but not both simultaneously. State function reduction at either boundary is equivalent to state preparation giving rise to a state with well defined quantum numbers (particle numbers, charges, four-momentum, etc...) at this boundary of CD. At the other boundary single particle quantum numbers are not well defined although total conserved quantum numbers at boundaries are opposite by the zero energy property for every pair of positive and negative energy states in the superposition. State pairs with different total energy, fermion number, etc.. for other boundary are possible: for instance, t coherent states of super-conductor for which fermion number is ill defined are possible in zero energy ontology and do not break the super-selection rules. 2. The basic objects coding for physics are U-matrix, M-matrices and S-matrix. M-matrices correspond to a orthogonal rows of unitary U-matrix between zero energy states, and are expressible as products of a hermitian square root of density matrix and of unitary S-matrix which more or less corresponds ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 528 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) to ordinary S-matrix. One can say that quantum theory is formally a square root of thermodynamics. The thermodynamics in question would however relate more naturally to NMP rather than second law, which at ensemble level and for ordinary entanglement can be seen as a consequence of NMP. The non-triviality of M-matrix requires that for given state reduced at say the ”lower” boundary of CD there is entire distribution of statesat ”upper boundary” (given initial state can lead to a continuum of final states). Even more, all size scales of CDs are possible since the position of only the ”lower” boundary of CD is localized in quantum jump whereas the location of upper boundary of CD can vary so that one has distribution over CDs with different size scales and over their Lorentz boots and translates. 3. The quantum arrow of time follows from the asymmetry between positive and negative energy parts of the state: the other is prepared and the other corresponds to the superposition of the final states resulting when interactions are turned on. What is remarkable that the arrow of time at imbedding space level at least changes direction when quantum jump occurs to opposite boundary. This brings strongly in mind the old proposal of Fantappie [21] that in living matter the arrow of time is not fixed and that entropy and its diametric opposite syntropy apply to the two arrows of the imbedding space time. The arrow of subjective time assignable to second law would hold true but the increase of syntropy would be basically a reflection of second law since only the arrow of the geometric time at imbedding space level has changed sign. The arrow of geometric at space-time level which conscious observer experiences directly could be always the same if quantum classical correspondence holds true in the sense that the arrow of time for zero energy states corresponds to arrow of time for preferred extremals. The failure of strict non-determinism making possible phenomena analogous to multifurcations makes this possible. 4. This picture differs radically from the standard view and if quantum jump represents a fundamental algorith, this variation of the arrow of geometric time from quantum jump to quantum jump should manifest itself in the functioning of brain and living organisms. The basic building brick in the functioning of brain is the formation of sensory representation followed by motor action. These processes look very much like temporal mirror images of each other such as the state function reductions to opposite boundaries of CD look like. The fundamental process could correspond to a sequences of these two kinds of state function reductions for opposite boundaries of CDs and maybe independently for CDs of different size scales in a ”many-particle” state defined by a union of CDs. How the formation of cognitive and sensory representations could relate to quantum jump? 1. ZEO allows quantum jumps between different number fields so that p-adic cognitive representations can be formed and intentional actions realized. How these quantum jumps are realized at the level of generalized Feynman diagrams is non-trivial question: one possibility suggested by the notion of adele combining reals and various p-adic number fields to a larger structure is that the lines and vertices of generalized Feynman diagrams can correspond to different number fields [48]. The formation of cognitive representation could correspond to a quantum jump in which real spacetime sheet identified as a preferred extremal is mapped to its p-adic counterpart or superposition of them with the property that the discretized versions of all p-adic counterparts are identical. In the latter case the chart map of real preferred extremal would be quantal and correspond to delocalized state in WCW. The p-adic chart mappings are not expected to take place but with some probabilities determined by the number theoretically universal U-matrix. 2. Similar consideration applies to intentional actions realized as real chart maps for p-adically realized intention. The natural interpretation of the process is as a time reversal of cognitive map. Cognitive map would be generated from real sensory represention and intentional action would transform time reversed cognitive map to real ”motor” action identifiable as time reversal of sensory perception. This would occur in various length scales in fractal manner. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 529 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) 3. The formation of superpositions of preferred extremals associated with discrete p-adic chart maps from real preferred extremals could be interpretated as an abstraction process. Similar abstraction could take place also in the mapping of p-adic space-time surface to a superposition of real preferred extrmals representing intentional action. U-matrix should give also the probability amplitudes for these processes, and the intuitive idea is that the larger then number of common rational and algebraic points of real and p-adic surfaces is, the higher the probability for this is: the first guess is that the amplitude is proportional the number of common points. On the other hand, large number of common points means high measurement resolution so that the number of different surfaces in superposition tends to be smaller. 4. One should not make any un-necessary assumptions about the order of various kinds of quantum jumps. For the most general option real-to-padic and p-adic-to-real quantum jumps can follow any quantum jumps and state function reductions to opposite boundaries of CD can also occur any time in any length scale. Also the length scale of resolution scale assignable to the cognitive representation should be determined probabilistically. Quantal probabilities for quantum jumps should therefore apply to all aspect of quantum jump and now ad hoc assumptions should be made. Very probably internal consistency allows only very few alternative scenarios. The assumption that the cascade beginning from given CD continues downwards until stops due to the emergence of negentropic entanglement looks rather natural constraint. 4.3 How memories are represented and recalled? Formation of memories and memory recall are key elements in the vision proposed by Hawkins. The question is what memories and memory recall are. If quantum jump is the fundamental process, it should automatically give rise to memories and memory recall. 1. Memories in given scale would naturally correspond to sequences of mental images defined by negentropically entangled sub-CDs of CD in given scale. According to earlier view the sequences of moments of consciousness bind to form higher level moments of consciousness, selves. Somewhat different view is that formation of selves means formation of sequence of negentropically entangled sub-CDs stable against NMP and preserved in quantum jump and even increasing in size. Thus self would correspond to a property of state and consciousness would be associated with the replacement of state with a new one. 2. The hierarchical structure of memories would emerge naturally. Conscious memory recall would correspond to a generation of negentropic entanglement between the new mental images emerging in the state function reduction (recall that the sizes of CDs increase and new sub-CDs emerge) and already existing negentropically entangled mental images. Generation of negentropic entanglement would give rise to the experience of recognition of the new mental images. 3. The natural guess is that negentropic entanglement is generated if the new sensory input is ”consistent” with older mental images. The addition of new tensor factor would mean a more abstract representation so that the sequence of quantum jumps would mean accumulation of experience. Consistency with older mental images could mean that the mental images have same ”name”. The name could correspond to p-adic cognitive representation. The physical correlate could be a collection of resonance frequencies. The names would be same if the frequencies for older mental images and new one are same, so that resonant interactions becomes possible. The generation of negentropic entanglement would be like finding a radio station. For this proposal memory recall and memory formation are actually more or less the same thing. Only the completely new memories claimed to be formed in hippocampus would not involve memory recall. The new memory would correspond to a new sub-CD or ensemble of sub-CDs representing the ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 530 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) associated negentropically entangled mental images. Neuronal loop could make possible to build copies about the new memory and thinking about it would create copies of corresponding p-adic cognitive representations which in turn could be transformed via state function reduction to an opposite boundary of CD to actions. In TGD framework the 4-D hierarchy of memories could continue from hippocampus to the magnetic body: this would explain the correlation of EEG with memory and also with various other brain functions. 4.4 The roles of sensory perception and motor action in TGD framework The attempts to define consciousness rely on two basic approaches. The first approach emphasizes direct sensory awareness and formation of cognitive representations from it (phenomal consciousness and reflective consciousness). Second approach emphasizes volition, motor plans, and motor actions. The analogs of sensory representations and motor actions emerge at the fundamental level in quantum TGD without mentioning anything about brain. In ZEO state function reduction is replaced with a cascade of state function reductions corresponding to various scales for CDs forming a fractal hierarchy. State function reduction can take place to either of the opposite boundaries of CD in a given length scale. The reduction at given boundary of CD would always force delocalization of the opposite boundary of CD creating quantum superposition of CDs with various sizes. Also new sub-CDs (correlates for sensory mental images) within the resulting bigger CDs are naturally generated. This would explain the arrow of geometric time at imbedding space level but the arrows are opposite at the opposite boundaries of CD. The reduction to opposite boundaries of CD gives rise to zero energy states related by time reversal at the level of imbedding space. If ”my” conscious experience corresponds to reductions to either ”upper” or ”lower” boundary of CD of wake-up cycle defining me, I will experience that the arrow of geometric at the level of imbedding space arrow is constant and would be basically due to the scaling up of the average size of ”personal” CD. ”Upper”/”lower” can be fixed by the arrow of time assignable to large enough CD definining environment. Standard quantum measurement theory assumes that a state function reduction followed immediately by a new one does not affect the reduced state [this gives rise to so called quantum Zeno effect: quantum monitoring of unstable particle prevents its decay (watched kettle does not boil)]. That repeated state function reduction at given boundary of CD does not affect the zero energy state resulting in the reduction for given CD would generalize this hypothesis. If this assumption hold true, the subsequent reductions at the same boundary of CD would effectively correspond to single reduction and one would effectively have an alternating sequence of cascades of state function reductions beginning from opposite boundaries of CDs. Note hower that there a fractal cascade of reductions beginning from sub-CDs the CD is assumed changing the state in smaller scales. In TGD framework the counterpart of quantum Zeno effect would be achieved by closing an unstable particle inside small enough CD so that the unitary time evolution restricted to CD would not affect the particle appreciably and state function reductions at boundaries of this CD very rarely would give rise to a final state of decay. Watchdog in this case would be the self to which this CD corresponds to. 4.4.1 Motor action as time reversal of sensory perception In TGD framework motor action could be seen as a time reversal of sensory perception so that sensorymotor pairing could be seen as fundamental element of all conscious existence. Just to fix conventions let us fix arrow of time as the arrow of the imbedding space time for a very large CD, maybe of cosmic size scale, so that there is unique time direction corresponding to future. 1. All scales for CDs are possible. For sub-CDs of given CD the experiences associated with sub-CD define mental images of CD and the experience can be assigned with either boundary of sub-CD. Let us tentatively agree that for a given CD ”lower” and ”upper” boundaries are in future and past when seen from the center point of CD (past and future could be permuted in the convention). ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 531 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) This choice would conform with the interpretation that motor ”me” Im makes a fuzzy prediction of future as superposition of space-time sheets extending from the lower boundary of CD and sensory ”me” Is generates memories represented by superposition of space-time sheets extending downwards from the upper boundary of CD. I do not quite have the courage to completely exclude the second option in which the roles of motor me and sensory me are changed. 2. With this assumption one can assign to a sub-CD near upper resp. lower boundary of sub-CD sensory mental images resp. their time reversals. In the interior they would represent memories resp. predictions. The larger CD would experience these subselves as mental images and interpret them in terms of ordinary sensory percepts resp. volitions, decisions, and plans. The primary sensory experience, phenomenal experience, involves generation of negentropic entanglement as the sensory mental image combines as a tensor factor with the existing sequence of mental images forming a sensory representation defining memory. The reading of this sequence of mental images using interaction free quantum measurement gives rise to a conscious memory about the mental image sequence. 3. A prediction, which looks rather strange at first glance, follows. ”My” CD would be seat for two selves having their own phenomenal experiences seated at the opposite boundaries of my CD. They would be sensory me Is assignable to sensory perception and motor me Im assignable to motor action as time reversed sensory perception and assignable to the opposite boundaries of CD when they are localized in state function reduction. The time reversed sensory percept is interpreted in terms of predictions, volitons, and plans at least by larger CD having the CD as sub-CD. Sensory and motor ”mes” would appear in all scales in the hierarchy of sub-CDs. 4. Since the scale of CDs increases quantum jump by quantum jump on the average and new sub-CDs emerge, the size scale of the largest CD in hierarchy increases and the perceptual fields of the two ”me”s associated with it shift towards geometric future resp. past of the imbedding space. The sub-CDs near the boundaries of largest CD give rise to sensory percepts of the two ”me”s involved with the largest CD in the hierarchy. Those in the interior define memories. The flow of time would correspond to the gradual shifting of the upper/lower boundary of largest CD to future/past and generation of sensory mental images (sub-CDs) near the boundary. Same would of course occur for the smaller CDs. The time interval about which memories are about and also the time scale for predictions of future increases since the size of the personal CD is gradually scaled up. 4.4.2 Quantitative considerations One can make also quantitative questions. 1. What is the average increase of the temporal distance between the tips of CD in a pair of state function reductions to opposite boundaries defining the chronon of subjective experience? The duration of this chronon can depend on the level of the self hierarchy. For human sensory consciousness this chronon would naturally correspond to the time scale of about .1 seconds having interpretation as a duration of sensory mental image. Each pair of state function reductions would generate a layer of the sensory mental images at the lower and upper boundary of ”our” CD. This leaves open the size scale of ”our” CD and lifetime would represent only the size scale for the increase of ”our” CD during life cycle. This would mean that the durations of consciousness for the two ”me”s assignable to ”our” CD would be measured using .1 second as a natural unit. 2. What can one say about the size scales of CDs themselves? Since the memories are about the time interval, which is roughly the duration of life cycle at most, the first guess is that the size of personal CD is of the order of duration of life cycle. By the previous argument however only the increase of ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 532 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) the distance between the tips of ”personal” CD naturally corresponds to the duration of life cycle so that the size scale of personal CD could be much larger. Note that the conscious experiences of Is and Im assignable to sensory percepts and motor actions should correspond to sub-CD:s with size scale not much larger than .1 seconds. This is consistent with the interpretation of sensory percepts of Im as plans, decisions, predictions, and volitions. The sub-CDs with time scale of say years are however possible and would correspond to memories and plans in time scales of years. 3. One can imagine also a fractal hierarchy for the increments ∆Ti of the temporal distance Ti between tips of CDs assignable to single pair of quantum jumps to opposite boundaries of CD in given length scale. ∆T = .1 seconds would not be the only possible duration of chronon. This time scale is however very special since it corresponds to the Mersenne prime M127 assignable to electron which corresponds to largest Mersenne prime which does not correspond to completely super-astrophysical p-adic length scale. The smaller Mersenne primes - such as M107 and M89 could correspond to shorter time scales perhaps assignable to nerve pulse in the case of lightest quarks. All primes characterizing elementary particles could define chronons of this kind serving as clocks. The hierarchy of chronons could mean sensory percepts and motor actions have a fractal hierachy of resolutions identifiable as kind of abstraction hierarchy. The clocks defined by these chronons of duration Ti should be synchronized in the sense that there would Nij = ∆Ti /∆Tj quantum jumps with time increment Tj per single quantum jump with time increment Ti . Could various periodic phenomena such as diurnal period of 24 hours defining sleep-awake cycle, annual cycle, and various bio-rhytms such as EEG rhytms, define also chronons? Could cyclity which seems to appear at the level of sensory and cognitive mental images relate to this kind of chronons: for instance, after images are a good example about mental images having analog of wake-up-sleep cycle. 4.4.3 Questions There are also questions about the relation to the functioning of brain. 1. How sleep-awake cycle relates to this picture? The above argument suggest that .1 second time scale rather than 24 hour time scale defines the increase of CD scale assignable to single pair of state function reduction assignable to ”me”. Therefore the period assignable to single moment of human sensory conscious of the two ”me”s would be of order .1 seconds. This strongly suggests that due to the lack of sensory input and absence of motor actions we are conscious during sleep but do not have memories from this period. Dreams generated by virtual sensory input to retina would produce memories during sleep state. Revonsuo indeed mentions that according to the reports of subject persons after awakenings sleeping period seems to involve either dreams or sleep mentation. Sleep mentation is very simple during nREM sleep: for instance, repetion of some word of internal speech. Sleep mentation would involve motor actions generating internal speech and in some cases also genuine speech. Also genuine motor actions such as sleep walking are possible. 2. Could the sensory-motor dichotomy have some relation to the righ-left dichotomy at the level of brain? Right and left brain hemisphere could naturally correspond to parallel CDs of same size scale. Could right and left brain (or parts of them) organize their wake-up periods as in shift work: if left brain hemisphere is awake right hemisphere sleeps (sensorily perceives the opposite end of its CD) and vice versa, an alternating dominance by either hemisphere results, and one could understand sensory rivalry. The time scale of CDs possibly involved would be much shorter than that of sleep-awake cycle in this case. Interestingly, the duration of hemisphere dominance period in some disorders like schizophrenia is anomalously long. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 533 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) The CD containing both these CDs - ”entire brain CD” - would be also present. The view of ”brain CD” about world represented by entangled right and left negentropic mental images would be analogous to initial and final state and thus contain much more information than given by either right or left hemisphere. In the case of visual mental images this would give rise to stereo vision. Could this shift work between parts of right and left hemisphere be realized in several time scales of CDs? Even in the scale corresponding to sleep-awake rhythm? It is known that in case of some birds and mammals, which must be motorially and sensorily active all the time, the brain hemispheres have this kind of shift work in long time scale. 4.5 Self or only a model of self ? Negentropic entanglement provides a model for associations as rules in which superposition of tensor product states defines rule with entanglement pairs defining its various instances. This generalizes to N-fold tensor products. Associations would be realized as N-neuron negentropic entanglement stable against NMP. One could also think of realizing associative areas in terms of neurons whose inputs form entangled tensor product and when sensory inputs are received they form analogous tensor product in representative degrees of freedom. Thus negentropic entanglement is necessary for mental images (having sub-CDs as correlates) to mental images representing spatial patterns. Negentropic entanglement in time direction for these patterns (zero energy states) is in turn necessary to bind them to sequences of mental images representing abstract memories as sequences of mental images. Negentropically entangled sequence would be a quantal counterpart for the original association sequence introduced as purely geometric concept. This picture however challenges the identification of self as quantum jump. Should the negentropically entangled sequences of mental images define selves so that self would be something characterizing zero energy state rather than something identified as quantum jump? Could they define a model of self to be distinguished from self identified as quantum jump? Or could one give up the notion of self alltogether and be satisfied with model of self? At this moment it seems that nothing is lost by assuming only the model of self. By definition negentropic entanglement tends to be preserved in quantum jumps so that it represents information as approximate invariant: this conforms with the idea of invariant representation and quite generally with the idea that invariants represent the useful information. There is however a problem involved. This information would not be conscious if the original view about conscious information as a change of information is accepted. Could one imagine a reading mechanism in which this information is read without changing the negentropically entangled state at all? This reading process would be analogous to deducing the state of a two-state system in interaction free measurement to be discussed below in more detail. Acknowledgements: I want to express my gratitude for Lian Sidorov for generously providing abstracts and other material as well as for inspiring discussions. I am also grateful to Jean Burns for posing a question whether interaction free measurement could serve as a mechanism of remote mental interactions: the question led to the idea about non-destructive reading of sensory and other representations by interaction free measurement. (Continued on Part II) References Theoretical physics [B1] ElitzurVaidman bomb-testing problem. ISBN: 2153-8212 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ElitzurVaidman_ Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 534 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) bomb-testing_problem. Biology [1] H. Burr. The fields of life. New York: Ballantine, 1972. [2] L. McTaggart. The Field. HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. http:/www.torsioelement.com, 2001. [3] R. Sheldrake. A New Science of Life: The Hypothesis of Formative Causation. Inner Traditions Intl Ltd., 1995. [4] R. Sheldrake. The Presence of Past: Morphic Resonance and the Habits of Nature. Icon Books Ltd, 2011. Neuroscience and consciousness [5] Microtubules. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microtubules. [6] Neo-cortex. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neocortex. [7] Neurophenomenology. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurophenomenology. [8] B. J. Baars. A cognitive theory of consciousness. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988. [9] P. Carruthers. Higher order theories of consciousness. In The Blackwell companion to consciousness, pages 277–286. Oxford: Blackwell, 2007. [10] D. Chalmers. The conscious mind: in search of a fundamental theory. Oxford University Press, New York, 1996. [11] F. Crick and C. Koch. Towards a neurobiological theory of consciousness. Seminars in neurosciences, 2:273–304, 1990. [12] A. Damasio. The Feeling of What Happens. Sane Töregard Agency, 1999. [13] D. C. Dennett. Consciousness explained. Boston: Little, Brown, 1991. [14] F. Dretske. Naturalizing the mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1995. [15] G. M. Edelman and G. Tononi. A Universe of consciousness. New York: Basic Books, 2000. [16] B. Libet et al. Subjective referral of the timing for a conscious sensory experience. Brain, 102, 1979. [17] J. P. Hunter et al. The effect of tactile and visual sensory inputs on phantom limb awareness. Brain, 126(3), March 2003. [18] M. Persinger et al. Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and 5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Expolaration & Research. http: // jcer. com/ index. php/ jcj/ article/ view/ 277 , 2013. [19] M. Persinger et al. Demonstration of Entanglement of Pure Photon Emissions at Two Locations That Share Specific Configurations of Magnetic Fields: Implications for Translocation of Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Expolaration & Research. http: // jcer. com/ index. php/ jcj/ article/ view/ 278 , 2013. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 535 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) [20] M. Persinger et al. Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s− LORETA, QEEG Measurements. Journal of Consciousness Expolaration & Research. http: // jcer. com/ index. php/ jcj/ article/ view/ 279 , 2013. [21] L. Fantappie. Teoria Unitaria del Mondo Fisico e Biologico. Di Renzo Editore, Roma, 1942. [22] J. Hawkins. On Intelligence. St. Martin’s Griffin, New York, 2004. [23] V. A. Lamme. Separate neural definitions of visual consciousness and visual attention: A case for phenomenal awareness. Neural networks, 17:861–872, 2004. [24] S. Lehar. The world in your head. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., 2003. [25] B. Libet. Readiness potentials preceding unrestricted spontaneous and preplanned voluntary acts. http://cornea.berkeley.edu/pubs/ccog_2002_0580-Klein-Commentary.pdf, 1982. [26] R. Llinas. I of the vortex: from neurons to self. Cambrdige, MA: MIT Press, 2001. [27] T. Metzinger. Being no one. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003. [28] P. Pietch. Shuffle Brain: the The Quest for Hologramic Mind. http://www.indiana.edu/~pietsch/ shufflebrain-book00.html, 1972. [29] K. H. Pribram. The Neurophysiology of Remembering. Scientific American, January 1969. [30] K. H. Probram. Brain and Perception; Holonomy and Structure in Figural Processing. Lawrence Eribaum Associates, 1991. [31] J. K. O’Regan and A. Noe. A sensorimotor account of vision and visual consciousness. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 24:939–1031, 2001. [32] A. Revonsuo. Is synchronization the direct neural correlate of visual consciousness? http://www. phil.vt.edu/ASSC/engel/revonsuo1.html, 1998. [33] A. Revonsuo. Consciousness. The science of subjectivity. Psychology Press, http://www.psypress. com, 2010. [34] J. R. Searle. The rediscovery of the mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992. [35] G. Tononi. An integrated information theory of consciousness. In Encyclopedia of consciousness, pages 403–416. San Diego, CA: Academic Press, 2000. [36] M. Tye. Consciousness revisited. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2009. [37] F. J. Varela. Reply to Owen and Morris. In The view from within, pages 271–273. Thorverton: Imprint Academic, 1999. [38] M. Velmans. Understanding consciousness. Hove: Routledge, 2009. [39] S. Zeki. Towards a theory of visual consciousness. Consciousness and Cognition, 8:225–259, 1999. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 5 | pp. 515-536 536 Pitkänen, M., Comparison of TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness with Some Other Theories of Consciousness (Part I) Books and articles related to TGD [40] M. Pitkänen. About Nature of Time. In TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#timenature, 2006. [41] M. Pitkänen. Does TGD Predict the Spectrum of Planck Constants? In Towards M-Matrix. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html#Planck, 2006. [42] M. Pitkänen. General Theory of Qualia. In Bio-Systems as Conscious Holograms. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/hologram/hologram.html#qualia, 2006. [43] M. Pitkänen. Generalized Feynman Diagrams as Generalized Braids. In Towards M-Matrix. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html#braidfeynman, 2006. [44] M. Pitkänen. Negentropy Maximization Principle. In TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#nmpc, 2006. [45] M. Pitkänen. Self and Binding. In TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#selfbindc, 2006. [46] M. Pitkänen. TGD Based Model for OBEs. In TGD Inspired Theory of Consciousness. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdconsc/tgdconsc.html#OBE, 2006. [47] M. Pitkänen. Was von Neumann Right After All. In Towards M-Matrix. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html#vNeumann, 2006. [48] M. Pitkänen. Quantum Adeles. In TGD as a Generalized Number Theory. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdnumber/tgdnumber.html#galois, 2012. [49] M. Pitkänen. Comments on the recent experiments by the group of Michael Persinger. In TGD based view about living matter and remote mental interactions, 2013. [50] M. Pitkänen. What p-Adic Icosahedron Could Mean? And What about p-Adic Manifold? In TGD as a Generalized Number Theory. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdnumber/ tgdnumber.html#picosahedron, 2013. [51] M. Pitkänen. DNA as Topological Quantum Computer. In Genes and Memes. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/genememe/genememe.html#dnatqc, 2006. [52] M. Pitkänen. Three new physics realizations of the genetic code and the role of dark matter in bio-systems. In Genes and Memes. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/genememe/ genememe.html#dnatqccodes, 2006. [53] M. Pitkänen. Bio-Systems as Conscious Holograms. In Bio-Systems as Conscious Holograms. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/hologram/hologram.html#hologram, 2006. [54] M. Pitkänen. Magnetic Sensory Canvas Hypothesis. In TGD and EEG. Onlinebook. http:// tgdtheory.com/public_html//tgdeeg/tgdeeg/tgdeeg.html#mec, 2006. [55] M. Pitkänen. Magnetospheric Consciousness. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/ magnconsc/magnconsc.html, 2006. [56] M. Pitkänen. Wormhole Magnetic Fields. In Quantum Hardware of Living Matter. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/bioware/bioware.html#wormc, 2006. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

1086 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Article Taking the ‘Meta’ out of Physics: A response to Graham Smetham’s ‘The Matter of Mindnature’ Robert M. Ellis* Abstract In this response to Graham Smetham’s criticisms, I defend the approach of metaphysical agnosticism on philosophical grounds. Pyrrhonian (agnostic) sceptical approaches are distinguished from Academic ones and shown not to be contradictory provided one does not begin with unnecessary metaphysical assumptions. The burden of proof needs to be put on those who make metaphysical claims rather than those who stick to experience as a point of reference, and falsification involves a provisional, not an absolute, process of elimination of theories that do not fit the evidence. Smetham’s appeals to certain results from quantum physics as exceptional are shown to be unacceptable on the grounds that no scientific observation can confirm metaphysical claims that lie beyond their scope. A wider psychological, moral and linguistic context is given for the argument that we should avoid the adoption of a metaphysical framework of understanding. Keywords: metaphysics, quantum physics, Buddhism, scepticism/ skepticism, metaphysical agnosticism, Pyrrhonism, Middle Way Philosophy, incrementality, justification, nihilism, paradox of scepticism, paradigm shifts, falsification, scientific exceptionalism, representationalism. Graham Smetham’s paper ‘The Matter of Mindnature’ is an extended critical attack on an argument I included in my book ‘The Trouble with Buddhism’. This argument was that quantum physics cannot give us metaphysical information, and that metaphysical claims supported by quantum physics are at best an irrelevant distraction from the Buddha’s key insights expressed in the Middle Way. I would like to thank Graham for taking an interest in my arguments, and taking some trouble to find out more about them through email correspondence. Nevertheless, his critical paper misunderstands my argument in a number of ways through not considering it in its full context – which is the philosophical approach expressed most fully in my Ph.D. thesis, published as ‘A Theory of Moral Objectivity’, and which I have taken to calling Middle Way Philosophy. He also makes many philosophically questionable assumptions, which are not improved by the fact that he is not alone in making them. I am not a physicist, and do not consider myself qualified to comment on the more technical aspects of the experimental evidence that Smetham discusses in some detail in the second half of his paper. However, as a philosopher, I do consider myself qualified to comment on the general conditions surrounding knowledge claims. It seems that quantum physicists have become gods, if they really claim to be able to support metaphysical beliefs from finite * Correspondence: Robert M. Ellis, http://www.moralobjectivity.net E-mail: re@moralobjectivity.net ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1087 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. scientific observation and experiment: and none of the evidence Smetham offers gives any justification for such extraordinary claims, as I shall explain. Smetham raises a number of interconnected philosophical issues, which I am going to respond to under the first eleven sub-headings below: all of these concerned in some way with scepticism, the nature of metaphysics, and the relationship of theory to metaphysics. However, to try to support a fuller appreciation of my reasons for adopting the agnostic stance that Smetham criticises so strongly, I am also going to conclude with a brief account of three areas of Middle Way Philosophy that Smetham has largely ignored, but which I think are unavoidably interconnected with these arguments about the status of quantum theories: that is, questions of language, psychology and ethics. This will offer the basis of a further secondary argument against accepting metaphysical beliefs, on the grounds of the practical effects of doing so. 1. The supposed paradox of scepticism Middle Way Philosophy includes a commitment to metaphysical agnosticism, justified through well-known sceptical arguments. Smetham’s arguments against this approach, on the other hand, depend strongly on the assertion that sceptical assertions must be metaphysical assertions, and therefore that sceptical arguments are contradictory in seeking to avoid scepticism. “… we may not know anything, and we cannot and should not affirm either that we know or that we do not know.” But, immediately, we know that he cannot know this; for how can anyone know that there is no possibility of that very knowing without undermining the very possibility of knowing the lack of knowing? 1 Here Smetham misses the distinction, which goes back to ancient Greek Scepticism, between what the Greeks called ‘Pyrrhonism’ and ‘Academic Scepticism’2. Pyrrhonian forms of scepticism, of the kind I have utilised, do not make any claim to have knowledge that we do not have knowledge, only to cast doubt on any claim to knowledge. This point is clearly expressed in my use of the term ‘may’ rather than ‘do’ in the passage Smetham quotes. We may not have knowledge, but we do not know that we do not know. Nevertheless, the recognition that we may not have knowledge is sufficient to justify us in avoiding claims to absolute knowledge, limiting ourselves only to claims of provisional belief. It is not enough here to merely assert, as Smetham does3 that the untruth of Cartesian claims about matter has been proved, showing that there is no justification for such metaphysical agnosticism. This alleged disproof is based on observations that are still subject to sceptical argument. The claim that experimental evidence regarding quantum physics, particularly in Smetham’s example of Bell’s inequality, is an exception to the general limitations of information from scientific experiment, is one I will tackle in section 11 below. Since Smetham complains that my definition of knowledge is unclear, let me clarify here that I am not challenging the widely accepted definition of knowledge as justified true belief. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1088 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Under such a definition, we lack adequate justification for believing that our claims are true because of the sceptical arguments that Smetham quotes4, and thus if it happens that our beliefs are true (which they may be) this will nevertheless be irrelevant to our concerns. I prefer to avoid the use of the term ‘knowledge’ in a weakened conventional sense for the practical reason that this can distract us from recognising our lack of knowledge in a strong sense. However, if Smetham still wants to argue that all sceptical claims, no matter how provisional, must be metaphysical by definition, I must point out the circularity of this assumption. The universality of metaphysics is here being supported in turn by a dogmatically-assumed metaphysical claim, not by any theory accessible to experience. The distinction between metaphysical and provisional claims obviously cannot be made metaphysically, otherwise founding assumptions alone will lead one into the inescapability of metaphysics; however, we can make a distinction between provisionality and metaphysics both in terms of accessibility to evidence (the issue of falsifiability, which will be discussed in section 10 below) and also in psychological terms. Our mental states when we are merely defending what we already assume are distinguishable from our mental states when we are open to investigation through experience and are capable of modifying our views in response to that experience. This point will be discussed further in section 13 below. Metaphysicians in general seem to want to envelope us in a massive Catch-22: if we try to get out of metaphysics we are judged to still be doing it regardless. Their view of the world is self-validating in its own terms. However, I want to argue that this view of the world is neither inevitable nor helpful. It can be generally observed that we all have representational beliefs about the world, but these representations are not necessarily metaphysical representations, because we can at least roughly distinguish those that make claims accessible to experience from those that do not. If we allow this distinction, regardless of specific issues about the precise boundary between what is metaphysical and what is not, we can start to make progress in important practical issues about the objectivity of science and ethics. However, if we deny any such distinction from the beginning, we shut out the possibility of any such progress and are stuck with the problem of relativism. Much of the rest of this paper will offer an accumulation of support for this perspective. 2. The supposed presentational paradox The supposed paradox of scepticism is closely related to the supposed paradox of presentation. In addition to claiming that scepticism must be dogmatic in terms of the claims it makes, Smetham seems to be suggesting in a number of places either that the presentation of a sceptical argument cannot be provisional, or perhaps more specifically that my own presentation of it is not. For example, he writes: Remarkably however, as anyone who goes on to Dr. Ellis’s website, moralobjectivity.net, will quickly see, he seems to think that he “knows” quite a lot.5 Ellis, however, seems to adopt definitions and interpretations which he asserts in a remarkably dogmatic fashion, given that he claims to practice the “non-dogmatic” true “Middle Way”. This is his own personal “discovery” of the true “Middle Way”, which is a central, yet, according ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1089 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. to him, misunderstood by Buddhists, notion within the Buddhist tradition. Indeed Ellis’ presentation of his “Middle Way” seems to imply it is a discovered metaphysical entity, like a mathematical truth which was eternally destined to be just the way he describes it, and all Buddhists have and still do misdescribe it.6 And, more oddly: It is quite clear from this fragment that Ellis considers that there exists a kind of Platonic philosophical realm, which he has dubbed as his ”correct” version of the “Middle Way”, wherein pristine logical forms of argument have been established by a kind of divine logician and it is only the results of the application of the divinely ordained logical procedures (those Ellis has discovered) which can reveal the fact that we can never “know” “Reality”.7 Let’s separate out these two possible interpretations of Smetham’s comments. Firstly, he might think that even when a Pyrrhonian sceptic attempts to write provisionally, he or she will inevitably not succeed. Perhaps all human beings cannot avoid being dogmatic metaphysicians. If that is what he means, then my arguments in the previous section come into play. The inevitability of metaphysics is coherent in its own terms, but it is an interpretation that the metaphysicians choose to make, and there are more helpful alternatives available. If one does choose the more helpful alternative of recognising that provisionality is possible, then it is much more germane to the progression of argument if when a sceptic says that all their statements are provisional, to apply the principle of charity in interpreting them as such in any cases of interpretative doubt. On the second interpretation, Smetham may just be pointing out the imperfections of my own provisionality of argument. Every claim I make in all my writings aspires to be provisional, but I have not always succeeded in this – it is an ongoing matter of practice. If my practice is imperfect, I apologise, as I know that I have lapsed into rhetoric that shows a passionate (and thus perhaps insufficiently provisional) attachment to a particular position in some places in The Trouble with Buddhism (which was originally conceived as directed towards a relatively popular audience). For example, Smetham understandably (though not helpfully) throws the word ‘foolish’ back at me. Such lapses may well be an indication of limitations in the provisionality I have actually achieved. However, in most places where provisional claims are made, it is very easy for someone who is determined to interpret them as dogmas to do so, and Smetham does not seem to have given me the benefit of the doubt in this respect. To justifiably draw the conclusion that someone is dogmatic, one needs to survey their work more broadly and ask whether the belief that they are dogmatic is consistent with the wider picture that is emerging, rather than relying on one’s emotional response to a few sentences that one disagrees with. In any case, imperfections in my own presentation are not evidence that the Middle Way cannot be applied in a provisional way. Such provisionality is central to the meaning of the Middle Way on the interpretation I am putting forward, and, crucially, such provisionality is incompatible with metaphysical claims that go beyond all possible experience. They certainly do not imply that there is some hidden Platonic agenda8 where a supposedly absolutely correct blueprint of the Middle Way is claimed to be available to me. Instead, the Middle ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1090 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Way is a theory, subject to the evidence of experience like any other theory, but one at a high level of generality9. I have never claimed that I know the “True Middle Way” or that I have an ultimately correct understanding of it – only an account that seems to lack the disadvantages that attend the more traditional Buddhist versions10, and one that seems to be justified in both coherence and recognition of its own limitations11. The statements Smetham quotes that show that I believe my theory to be radical and important, and that I think there are confusions in the Buddhist tradition, do not in the least imply such absolute claims on my part. It is quite possible to be putting forward arguments that one considers important, and that improve on previous ones, and yet remain fallible and aware of that fallibility. The best practical test of provisionality in the short term is that of openness to revision. Middle Way Philosophy remains open to revision, but metaphysical beliefs, by definition, cannot be open to revision. Middle Way Philosophy, however, is only open to revision from those who accept its basic terms of provisionality, not those who want to either insist on its metaphysicality, or to misunderstand its provisionality as an openness to metaphysics that would destroy that provisionality. I welcome collaborators in improving Middle Way Philosophy, but Smetham has not as yet approached it in that spirit. 3. Jostling for the incremental ground Smetham’s comments also suggest that he recognises the importance of incrementality, but that he is not willing to yield that Middle Way Philosophy is incremental, nor that metaphysics is not. But according to Ellis, although we cannot „know” anything, what we can have is “incremental” “justifications”. “Justification” says Ellis, is “incremental” whereas, according to him, “knowledge” is all or nothing, we either know the absolute reality of something or we do not. This is an important point, for if one uses or understands the term “knowledge”, as most people do, on a sliding scale depending upon context, one runs into problems with Ellis for whom knowledge seems to be all or nothing: “Agnosticism does not remove the possibility of justification from our beliefs, because justification, unlike knowledge, is an incremental term which can be calibrated in relation to experience. Justification depends on the extent to which we have removed the conditions of ignorance which prevent us from assessing our experience objectively. The conditions of ignorance include the assumptions either that we "know", or that we "don't know" about what we are dealing with, when all we actually have access to is degrees of justification”. This is an important insight which we will return to when we come to consider how physics has come to “know” various “metaphysical” things about “reality” through an “incremental” process. But for the moment it is important to note that one problem with Ellis’ perspective, which is implied by the preceding sentence, is that, at least on the surface, it looks ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1091 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. as if what Ellis is doing is simply rearranging language use, replacing the term “justification” for the term “knowledge” as used in its weak contextual sense, whilst presenting his philosophy as some radical new discovery, the discovery of the real “Middle Way”, as opposed to the incompetent Buddhist version. The concept of justification as I have used it obviously does have a good deal of overlap with a weak sense of “knowledge” as commonly used. However, I have defined justification, not as justified true belief, but as falsifiable coherence12 (using the account of coherence that includes evidence through experience, and one of falsifiability explained in section10 below). There are thus important differences between the two concepts. Knowledge, even in a weak conventional sense, involves an assumption of correspondence between one’s representation and a reality beyond it (see section 12 below), whereas justification does not require any such correspondence and thus avoids metaphysical assumptions. If, as seems to be the case here, Smetham recognises the importance of incrementality, and that scientific evidence is incremental, it seems odd that he is then able to assert that science can offer absolute conclusions (but see section 11 for a fuller discussion of this). It also seems uncharitable that he is unable to credit my approach with the incrementality it aspires to. We do not have to jostle for the incremental ground and each claim unique occupation of it – we just need to argue on a basis that is shown not to preclude incrementality. Claims to knowledge which appeal solely to correspondence with a representation that we believe to be ‘real’ cannot avoid precluding incrementality, because either that representation is correct or it is not. If we start to modify our representation in response to feedback, we simultaneously admit that the previous representation did not reflect reality, so, in practice, we use a feedback loop together with an awareness of the fallibility of our theories. Such modifiable theories may in practice be called ‘provisional knowledge’, but they only become modifiable because we recognise the possibility of being wrong when we hold them – a psychological requirement that is not traditionally specified in any definition of knowledge or of justification as a necessary feature of knowledge. It is the psychological state in which the belief is held that makes the conclusive difference to its incrementality, regardless of whether we call it knowledge or not. Metaphysical claims, on the other hand, do not admit of any such incrementality, because they cannot be subjected to any feedback loop or modified in response to evidence. This applies to obvious metaphysical claims such as the existence of God, and also to the one that Smetham claims is proved by quantum physics: the wrongness of Descartes’ account of matter13. Even if it were the case that this metaphysical belief were exceptionally proved by observations in physics (which I do not accept – see section 11), once accepted, this belief could not be subsequently modified by further observations. This must be the case because it is absolute and does not admit of increments: Descartes’ account of matter cannot be partly wrong or subtly modified, but can only be right or wrong. A belief about either the rightness or the wrongness of Descartes’ metaphysics cannot be a scientific belief in the usual evidential sense if it is not open to subsequent incremental modification in the light of evidence. 4. The accusation of nihilism ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1092 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Smetham also completely misunderstands Middle Way Philosophy when he assumes that its sceptical approach implies relativism and/or nihilism. After quoting Anne Klein, he writes: But such views concerning the necessary metaphysically limiting fetters of psycho-social and cultural frameworks are, as Klein intimates, themselves part and parcel of a particular, mostly academic, limiting fetter of a Western psycho-social and cultural framework. And if this particular fetter, adopted as an epistemological absolute, were to be incorrect then it would indeed be a “fetter” which possibly cuts off an avenue to an absolute and unconditioned metaphysical insight.14 And later: ...the metaphysical nihilism which seems to lie at the core of Ellis” vision...15 Smetham alleges that my approach reduces all human beings the same level of insight, all having the same “limited perceptions and a limited mental capacity to process those perceptions”. However, it only takes a few moments thought to see that it is not true. It is quite clear that there are levels of capacity for insight within the vast expanse of human embodiments, otherwise we would all be on the intellectual level of Einstein, imbeciles or somewhere between the two.16 The implication seems to be here that the only way to avoid metaphysical nihilism is the acceptance of “absolute and unconditioned metaphysical insight”: an entrenchment of the very dualism that the Buddha sought to avoid in his rejection of metaphysical dichotomies 17. The limiting relativist or nihilist fetter found widely in Western academic thought is not due to the mere recognition of a psycho-social and cultural framework, but to the assumption that such a recognition cuts off the possibility of objectivity. It is this assumption that Smetham and his fellow absolutists share in unholy alliance with postmodernists, the central assumption that I have sought to question in Middle Way Philosophy. I would agree with Smetham completely that we have different “levels of capacity for insight”, but the recognition that all these different levels are to some extent limited in no way homogenises them into one level, as he implies. On the contrary, it is the recognition that we are all finite and embodied creatures that provides us with a basis to distinguish levels of objectivity below the level of absolutes. We just have to acknowledge that distinctions of objectivity are based, not on absolute metaphysical Insight, but on differential levels of experiential adequacy and psychological integration. If we understand objectivity, not in absolute but in incremental terms, then it is persons and their judgements who can be more or less objective, not beliefs. This objectivity is interfered with to varying degrees by cognitive biases that interfere with our understanding of conditions18, together with emotional conflicts that divide our awareness19. Metaphysical beliefs, far from supporting this genuine, experienced, incremental objectivity, interfere with it by providing an intense focus for attachment. Because metaphysical beliefs seem ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1093 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. unassailable, they provide an attractive but deceptive basis for identification, their objectivity false by the very reason of it being absolute20. See section 13 below for more on this argument. The whole project of Middle Way Philosophy maintains as its prime goal the avoidance of both eternalism and nihilism21, of positive and negative forms of metaphysics. It attempts the difficult task of maintaining equidistance between them, and as a result gains criticism from both sides. If it was indeed “metaphysical nihilism” it would have failed in this task, but it is difficult to see how a philosophy that offers a worked-out account of objectivity, applied both to scientific and to moral judgements, can be fairly described in such a way. Whether your definition of nihilism, like mine, is that of a denial of moral objectivity, or whether you accept traditional Buddhist, analytic or Nietzschean definitions of nihilism, all involve the denial of objective moral and epistemic values that Middle Way Philosophy not only clearly affirms, but also seeks a new way of justifying. 5. Circularity and burden of proof issues Smetham also accuses my arguments of circularity: a point which raises issues of where the burden of proof lies. Ellis rejects the argument that his derivation of “metaphysical agnosticism” requires an initial metaphysical commitment of his own, he calls his sceptical starting point to be a non-absolute “general claim”: “This is not an absolute claim, but a general claim based on an observation of the conditions of all human experience.” But the problem with such a “general claim” is that it treats the observation of the “conditions of all human experience” made by a selfconfessed “being with limited capacities” as being valid and sufficient for clearly establishing an all embracing claim as to what can and cannot be claimed. But the observation is clearly dubious; the observation is dubious on the basis of the claim based on the observation. This seems absolutely clear, it is circular and self-defeating.22 This is an argument that partly depends on the lack of appreciation of the distinction between Pyrrhonian and Academic forms of scepticism mentioned in section 1 above. If you grant the Pyrrhonian no licence to make a non-absolute claim about the non-absoluteness of her claims, then it will obviously appear circular. However, this is a circularity created by metaphysics, and the assumption that all claims must be metaphysical, not by agnostic scepticism. The circularity attributed here to my position is one shared by all metaphysical positions, including Smetham’s, as they assert that their observations give them justification for metaphysical conclusions because metaphysics is the only possible way of understanding the universe, because of their observations that are interpreted metaphysically. However, if we do not make any assumptions about the inevitability of a metaphysical stance, we stand a chance of making progress using, not a Cartesian-style circle, but a feedback loop. If evidence allows us to shift our position, each new access of evidence can result in a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1094 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. modification of theory and a new standpoint from which to seek evidence. Any theory created in terms of metaphysical agnosticism allows us to do this, because it leaves theories as provisional. Metaphysical agnosticism (or, more broadly, Middle Way Philosophy) itself is a general claim which can itself be adjusted in response to evidence (for example, in its understanding of what psychological states are associated with agnosticism, or what kinds of beliefs in what kinds of practical contexts have the effect of dogmatic metaphysics), though only in terms of its implications for investigation, not in its basic rejection of metaphysics. The rejection of metaphysics has to be decisive in order not to get sucked into metaphysical ways of thinking which undermine the whole approach: but this rejection is required as a practical response to the evident dualistic and dogmatising properties of metaphysics. So, metaphysical agnosticism appears circular to metaphysicians in their terms, whilst any appeal to metaphysics appeals circular to metaphysical agnostics in their terms. How are we to resolve such an impasse? Smetham’s preferred method often seems to be a concatenation of quotations from authorities, all of which share his assumptions. On ordinary matters where we are deciding where to place our investigative energies, establishing credibility by appeal to experts may be useful, but it tells us nothing about their justification when the very basis on which they are reasoning is being called into question. Indeed, the group bias effect recorded by cognitive psychologists suggests that we are very often distracted from proper consideration of evidence by the belief that lots of other people, particularly those with authority, agree with us in either accepting or rejecting it (see section 13 below). The underlying issue is one of the burden of proof, even though the basis on which burden of proof should be allocated is itself a controversial issue. I am accustomed to having the burden of proof thrust upon me by social convention because I am expressing a minority point of view, but I would suggest that in basic epistemological matters a fairer way to allocate it is according to accessibility to everyday experience. Those who want to make extraordinary claims about non-evident matters (i.e. metaphysical claims) are the ones that should carry the burden of proof, not those who appeal to the foreseeable experience of all. Indeed it seems to me a very strange state of affairs if those who make absolute claims have their assumptions taken for granted, while those who attempt to confine themselves to non-absolutes are charged with proving that they really are non-absolute! A rough analogy to this might be being stopped by a policeman and asked to prove that you are really not a giant lizard in disguise. 6. The multiple possibilities argument A further objection to metaphysical agnosticism used by Smetham is the argument that it would make all metaphysical possibilities, even silly ones, equally likely. The holographic universe proposal, rather, is one metaphysical possibility “justified”, to employ Ellis’ preferred terminology, by the scientific method through the experimental evidence and mathematical analysis. It is one metaphysical possibility amongst a infinite number of metaphysical impossibilities, such as, for example, that all the phenomena of the universe are caused by Noddy and BigEars manipulating wooden levers on the edge of space. One would have thought it quite possible to return a negative evaluation upon this metaphysical suggestion, if anyone were to be so “foolish” as to suggest it! In a sense this extreme example is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1095 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. only slightly extended for irony’s sake for there has been a recent tongue in cheek suggestion by some physicists that we might all be living in a vast computer simulation organized by aliens. Even physicists have their off days in philosophical mode. One has to bear in mind that if we take Ellis’s “serious” acceptance of scepticism seriously then all manner of ridiculous metaphysical possibilities would have to remain in the agnostic box, perhaps even the metaphysical potency of Noddy and BigEars. I suppose Ellis would say we are overwhelmingly and “incrementally” “justified” in supposing this not to be true.23 Here Smetham misunderstands my perspective again. I would have no problem in accepting that the Noddy and Big Ears scenario should “remain in the agnostic box” along with the acceptance or dismissal of the holographic universe. As metaphysical claims, they are neither more nor less likely than each other, just as the Flying Spaghetti Monster is neither more nor less likely than the existence of God. If we take probability to be a measure of likely experience judged on the available evidence of past experience, probability simply does not apply to metaphysical claims. Based on previous experience, the probability of metaphysical experience is zero, so there is no problem in acknowledging that Noddy and Big Ears causing all phenomena is as likely as any other metaphysical explanation of all phenomena – that is, not likely at all. Any of these explanations are possible, and we cannot rule them out of possibility without making negative metaphysical claims, but their possibility does not bring them into the realm of probability. We still need to be able to account for why some metaphysical beliefs are much more popular than others, so that, for example, God is much more popular as an explanation of the cause of the universe than Noddy and Big Ears. My suggestion here is that the more popular beliefs use symbols that are more meaningful to people and thus have a bigger appeal, which is reinforced by the social function of metaphysical beliefs in supporting group-allegiance. Obviously the idea of disproving Cartesian matter is highly meaningful to some quantum physicists, but as soon as we advance from the realm of meaningful story to that of factual assertion, group identity starts to become entrenched by that assertion in a way that it did not have to be by the mere story. A hypothesis or a theory can remain in the provisional world of story as long as it is investigated and remains capable of being investigated. As long as we maintain that openness, so does the group that supports that theory, but as soon as the theory becomes ‘proven’ (or alternatively, becomes the basis of faith regardless of evidence), the group-identity hardens and the apparent unassailability of the belief becomes a rallying-point for an increasingly competitive, even combative, group24. There is no need to dismiss the meaningfulness of metaphysical assertions after the manner of the logical positivists (see section 12 below), because metaphysical assertions can be recognised as both meaningful and possible without being either probable or proven, or having anything beyond social bonding functions to motivate their acceptance. So, Noddy and Big Ears causing all phenomena by pulling wooden levers on the edge of space is a nice story. All it needs is a group that will tell it. This will be a harmless group, perhaps even an inspiring one, until such point as it starts asserting this story as true, and using it to compete with other groups that assert other stories that are claimed to be true. Quantum physics seems to me to have not only a harmless, but indeed an inspiring and interesting story, until the point when Noddy and Big Ears start brandishing their wooden ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1096 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. pegs and waving them aggressively at passing giant lizards. However, while Noddy and Big Ears don’t have a group they don’t mean very much, so they’ll have to forgive me for neglecting them in favour of the discussion of more popular assertions. 7. Reality united with experience At the heart of Smetham’s metaphysical vision seems to be a monistic insistence on the unity of experience with Reality. If two ontological aspects of the world are considered to be absolutely antithetical and unconnected in essence then there can be no connection between them. So if “experience” were to be completely beyond the pale of “Reality” then obviously we could never “know” it in any shape or form. But such a notion is clearly incoherent precisely because it is only through “experience” that we can have any notion at all about “Reality”, “Reality” is clearly revealed, admittedly in degrees of “veiled” forms, through experience.25 The key to this argument lies in the word ‘ontological’ at the beginning. Smetham already assumes that the sceptical argument must be an ontological argument (raising the ‘paradox of scepticism’ issue discussed in section 1 above), and thus that the separation must be an ontological separation ‘in essence’. But again, he is misunderstanding metaphysical agnosticism by viewing it through a metaphysical lens that merely obscures it. All that the Pyrrhonian sceptical starting point begins with is the observation that claims about Reality cannot be justified on the basis of experience, supported by a recognition of changing and limited perspectives and past and potential mistakes. We create a ‘reality’ for ourselves through constructive representation, but no claims are made about the ontological status of this reality: it is just a shifting, flexible interpretation of our experience. There is certainly no speculation about a ‘Reality’ beyond such reality, so that it can be considered “antithetical and unconnected in essence”. This is the realm of negative metaphysics, which Smetham constantly confuses with agnosticism, and there is no reason for agnostics to get embroiled in it. Smetham continues One assumption which is shared by physics, hopefully Western philosophy (even in spite of Hume) but certainly Buddhist philosophy is that “Reality” is at basis coherent, and the notion that the interdependent realms of “Reality” and “experience” are absolutely and irredeemable antithetical is clearly incoherent; for if this were the case then “Reality” would have nothing whatsoever to do with our experience, in which case from whence cometh experience?26 I see no reason why either physics or Buddhist philosophy should assume that Reality is coherent. This is a very dangerous assumption to make, because it sets us up for confirmation bias: we look for coherence and we find it, then we absolutise the coherence we have found, even though it may be a result of egoistic projection and is part of an ongoing process of investigation. To some extent we probably cannot help seeking coherence in the world around us, and indeed this tendency may be inextricable from our intelligence and creativity ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1097 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. as a species: however, we can avoid absolutising the patterns we find, and leave them as stories or theories with varying degrees of support. At the end of this quotation Smetham asks the causal question which has been asked before by philosophical realists: surely a Real world is the best explanation for the cause of our experience? I would agree that it is – or at least, that a real world is such a best explanation. This is the best reason for assuming that tables, chairs, doors etc will continue to interact with us in the way we are accustomed to them doing. However, an explanation is a hypothesis, or at best a theory, and the mere capacity to provide the best explanation falls far short of ultimate proof. So, it is not a Real world but a real world that can provide the best explanation. Ultimately we just do not know what causes our experiences. This causal question is, indeed, the one that the Buddha appears to point out the unhelpfulness of in the well-known parable of the arrow27. If we are too concerned with explaining the ultimate cause of the arrow, he says, we will be distracted from the immediate practical need of pulling it out. Reality is not necessarily divided from experience, but beliefs about it are just not relevant to the demands of that experience, and concern with those beliefs is very likely to distract us from practical requirements that we can easily judge from experience. 8. Sufficiency and independence One of my most basic arguments against the idealism that Smetham promotes is the point that quantum physics shows consciousness to be necessary for perceived quantum objects but not sufficient. Without a complete understanding of all possible conditions affecting such objects we cannot justifiably conclude that consciousness alone is enough to create them. Smetham replies as follows: The introduction of the “necessary and sufficient” distinction is quite obviously irrelevant. If, as quantum physicists Planck, Schrodinger, Pauli, Wheeler, Bohm, Rosenblum and Kuttner, Stapp, Zurek, Zeh, Penrose … etc. etc. all conclude that in some manner consciousness is required for the appearance of the apparent experienced world of substantiality from an insubstantial quantum ground of potentiality, then, quite clearly, the entities of experienced realm are dependent and therefore not independent. This is why the quantum physicist Professor Anton Zeilinger refers to the pre-quantum viewpoint as involving: …the obviously wrong notion of a reality independent of us. This is really a matter of definition of words: if something depends upon something else then it is not independent, this has nothing to do with philosophical analysis into necessary and sufficient conditions. It appears that in Ellis’s mode of philosophizing he thinks it is necessary to bring in irrelevant distinctions in the hope that they may be sufficient to bring unnecessary confusion into the issue.28 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1098 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. I have a certain respect for many of Smetham’s arguments, because they make sense in their own terms: but this one does not. Because he is able to put the same point in different words he seems to assume that a different distinction must be being made in his language, and therefore that I must have been making irrelevant distinctions in the original point. However, ‘necessary to’ is synonymous with ‘dependent’: if “something depends on something else” then this means exactly the same as “something else is necessary to something”. Similarly, if a is sufficient for b, then this means exactly the same, at least in the shared language of Western philosophy and science that we are using, as “b is not independent of a”. Sufficiency is just a complete dependency, without any other contributory causes or conditions being required. So, my point, restated in Smetham’s preferred language, would be exactly the same one: quantum physics shows perceived objects to be dependent upon consciousness, but it does not thereby show that they are dependent only on consciousness and nothing else. It does not show that objects are independent of other factors that may be operating, such as a possible material universe. Claims about sufficiency of cause are indeed generally rather difficult to make sceptic-proof, unless they describe the same event in different terms and claim that one description sufficiently caused another. For example, a bullet through the vital areas of one’s brain is a sufficient cause for death. This claim seems indisputable if one takes the bullet’s destruction of brain-function and death to be basically the same event described in different ways, but if we take them as distinct events, there will always be room for a sliver of doubt as to whether the bullet was really enough by itself. If any time elapses between the bullet and the death, for example, we could take the time lapse itself, plus possible other small events in it, to contribute to the inevitability of the death, which might possibly have been averted during that time. We are also assuming the absence of other conditions (however unlikely in practical terms), such as a spare head with an identical brain, and the technology and surgeons to replace the damaged one. These kinds of distinction are of no practical importance in empirical cases, where we do not need to know absolute sufficient causes, but when the claim being made is an absolute one, even the slightest doubt is enough to completely disable it. So, I see no circumstances in which it could be shown that consciousness is a sufficient cause of any phenomenon, quantum or otherwise. 9. History and paradigm shifts Smetham’s argument against Kuhnian paradigm shifts is a more interesting one. It arises as a response to my argument that many previous scientific theories in history, all confident of the absolute status of their own discoveries, have since been discredited, so current scientists should learn the lessons of history in avoiding such absolute claims. Ellis asks “How many previous theories in human history have been proved wrong - the vast majority.” But, we are not concerned with the entirety of human history, we are concerned with physics, and strangely enough “classical” physics took a pretty straight and undeviating course from the seventeenth century inception down to the end of the nineteenth century where upon the quantum revolution at the beginning of the twentieth century indicated a new level of reality had been reached, a level of reality with an astonishingly different mode of operation. Since then the fundamental features of the theory have remained stable, with a much greater knowledge of the detail accrued over time of course, plus ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1099 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. the quantum interpretational problem, but that is a separate issue. The image of one scientific “paradigm” being continuously overturned, trashed and replaced and so on is actually an overplayed myth, perpetrated in large measure due to academic over-proliferation in the quest for philosophy PhDs. The only major shift in paradigm within science since the inception of the modern scientific enterprise has been from “classical” physics to relativity theory and quantum theory.29 Smetham may not be concerned with history, but I make no apologies for being concerned with it. There is no absolute distinction between history and physics, given that history is the history of the same world that physics investigates, and the history of science includes that of physics. If Smetham is right and there were no great paradigm shifts in physics between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries, this hardly goes very far towards showing that there have not been important shifts at other times: the discrediting of Aristotelian and Pythagorean models at an earlier stage being perhaps the most important. He also admits here that there was a paradigm shift in the twentieth century. Even if we only accept two major paradigm shifts (or even, for that matter, one) this is quite sufficient to illustrate my point about the unreliability of theories that may seem certain now when judged in the light of possible future history. He goes on: Furthermore, again, the notion that the history of physics is littered with a huge number of authorities being “spectacularly” incorrect is simply wrong. The notion that Planck, Heisenberg, Schrodinger, Bohr, Born, de Broglie, Dirac, Bohm, Wheeler, Feynman ….. etc. etc. are all going to be “spectacularly” incorrect en mass is, well, I won’t use the f-word. Of course there will be some interpretative theories which turn out be unworkable. But the notion the entire quantum paradigm is going to be found fundamentally and spectacularly wrong?30 This suggests a misreading of the idea of paradigm shift as it is found in the work of Thomas Kuhn and Imre Lakatos31. Neither of them depicts paradigm shift as either fundamental or spectacular. Rather there is an ambiguous period of shift when an old research programme gradually ceases to be fruitful, and is only slowly abandoned in favour of an emerging new research programme. If a theory that explained some phenomena for a while fails to provide testable new predictions, and a new theory that is available is gradually seen to explain previous successful results better and offer new testable predictions, then scientists will gradually drift from the old theory to the new. However, people’s attachment to their theories can scarcely be overestimated, and to me it often seems astonishing (and a testament to the effectiveness of scientific tradition) that old paradigms ever get abandoned at all, given the amount of psychological resistance set against new theories. Old paradigms do not disappear with a bang, but if one imaginatively takes the long view, there is still no reason why, in another 24 centuries or so, Smetham’s list of august physicists might not seem as antiquated and superseded as a list of presocratic philosophers does now. Smetham argues that paradigm shifts are ‘overstated’, but only because he has overstated them. Even one relatively weak paradigm shift in history would be enough to prove the point. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1100 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Smetham argues later: [The advent of quantum physics] really was a seismic change in our understanding of the “physical” world, but we are not faced with a bunch of “classical” physicists completely unable to comprehend another bunch of “quantum” based physicists and vice-versa. Physicists today comprehend the nature of both theories; it is the puzzle of how they fit together which is the crucial issue.32 This again is quite compatible with the Lakatosian and Kuhnian accounts of paradigm shifts, whereby shifts are neither clear-cut nor necessarily obviously completed at a particular point. Even if it turns out that the two kinds of physics can actually be reconciled by a new higher theory, this will not invalidate the most important point to be drawn from the story of the fall of Newtonian physics. Newtonian physics once thought it was absolute, and the paradigm shift means that it no longer is so. If quantum physicists adopt a similar attitude of arrogance in claiming an absolute status for their discoveries, their memories must be short indeed and their capacity to learn from history severely limited, for the fall of Newtonian physics from absolute status is not even past history, but is evidently still going on today. It will only be finally completed when a new ‘unified’ theory can more completely explain its apparent successes as well as its failures. Finally, one of Smetham’s most interesting points concerns the incrementality of conceptual evolution: An investigation of the concept of “mass” for instance reveals that its origins are clearly in simple human experience of pushing around “massive” objects and this fundamental and primal aspect of the meaning of the term still operates within the various much more rarefied conceptual surroundings of physics. Concepts generally evolve through sequences of accumulating differences accruing upon a basic similarity.33 His point about mass is that of Lakoffian linguistics: that meaning is rooted our basic physical experience and then becomes abstracted through metaphor (see section 12 below). I would entirely agree with him about this basis for the meaning of “mass”, but this does not contribute towards supporting the arguments against paradigm shift that he wants it to support. If concepts maintain a basic continuity over time due to their physical rootedness, the same cannot necessarily be said about theoretical beliefs. Theoretical beliefs assemble these concepts into representational claims about reality as we experience it, and the classification of entities and causal claims made in such theories may change regardless of continuity in the meaning of the words from which they are constituted. 10. Falsification My work on Middle Way Philosophy makes quite a lot of use of the concept of falsification, inspired by the writings of Popper and Lakatos but with considerable modifications of their approach34. Smetham responds to what he takes to be my approach to falsification in three different ways involving different arguments: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1101 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. a. He claims that the fact that scientists were attempting to falsify quantum ‘Reality’ when they discovered evidence of it shows that their findings are falsifiable. b. He claims that if there are two provisional theories explaining the same phenomena and one of them is falsified, then the remaining one is no longer provisional. c. He argues that in the absence of absolute falsification, the principle of falsification, and indeed the wider arguments of Middle Way Philosophy, are unfalsifiable. I will respond to these distinct arguments in turn. a. Smetham writes: “Quantum theory was not wished upon us by theorists. It was (for the most part) with great reluctance that they found themselves driven to this strange and, in many ways, philosophically unsatisfying view of the world.” This is an important point to bear in mind because it lends great weight to the discoveries of quantum theory. The remarkable features of quantum functioning were not unearthed by physicists who set out to uncover them; quite the opposite. The American experimental physicist Robert Millikan, for instance, could not accept Einstein’s picture of the light photon as both wave and particle and he therefore set out on a series of difficult zhistory gives us an indication that in the past, people have often conceived only a restricted range of explanatory theories, not including the ones that we now consider the best available explanations of important phenomena. For example, the now accepted theory that lightning is electrostatic discharge was not considered until the investigations of Benjamin Franklin in the eighteenth century. We have no way of anticipating new and more fruitful explanatory theories that we have not even imagined yet, but comparison with the past suggests that we would be very rash to rule them out. This determination to falsify is indeed very much to the credit of the scientists concerned, and lends weight to their findings – to the extent that their findings were actually falsifiable in the first place. However, falsification can only be sought of claims that are falsifiable. Claims about the reality accessible to scientific investigation, such as claims about the appearance of light as both wave and particle judged from evidence about the behaviour of light, can indeed be falsifiable. However, a metaphysical claim such as the disproof of Descartes’ materialism, goes far beyond such evidence and cannot be falsified by it, because any evidence about the behaviour of light tells one only about the behaviour of light, not an interpretation of that behaviour that rules out the very possibility of other unobserved causal factors beyond consciousness. b. Smetham writes further: On Popper’s view, then, theories are weeded out by being falsified by experimental testing. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1102 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. An interesting situation, then, would arise when after an amount of time we might be left with only two mutually exclusive and mutually exhaustive theories “provisionally” accounting for some phenomenon. Presumably if one of these were to be falsified then the other would then have to lose it status of “provisionality” and thus actually become the final and ultimate theory, there being no possible alternative. So, if we accept Popper’s “falsifiability” account of scientific knowledge, then the Mind-Matter metaphysical tussle for equality or supremacy within Western philosophy has indeed now been decided by the fact that quantum physics has shown “matter” to be an illusory category of reality. Thus quantum physics would indeed, on Popper’s philosophy of science, count as “experimental metaphysics.”35 Smetham misunderstands Popper’s view if he thinks that it implies that provisional theories lose their provisionality when alternatives are weeded out. The value of falsification theory generally is that it leaves scientific theory as acceptable whilst it is falsifiable but unfalsified. With this provisional status it is never subject to final verification, but provisionally acceptable whilst it meets those criteria. If Popper thought that absolute verification could be achieved by ruling out alternatives he would have been a type of verificationist, not a falsificationist. Peter Muns explains this point well in relation to Popper’s theory: A falsifiable but unfalsified theory is provisionally true and should therefore be called verisimilar rather than true. The concept of verisimilitude (truth-likeness) corresponds to the concept of adaptation. Adaptations are rarely perfect. To be selected, a feature only needs to be more adapted than its competitors.36 The weeding out of alternative theories does not yield absolutely conclusive results because we have no guarantee that all possible explanatory theories have been considered. Again, history gives us an indication that in the past, people have often conceived only a restricted range of explanatory theories, not including the ones that we now consider the best available explanations of important phenomena. For example, the now accepted theory that lightning is electrostatic discharge was not considered until the investigations of Benjamin Franklin in the eighteenth century. We have no way of anticipating new and more fruitful explanatory theories that we have not even imagined yet, but comparison with the past suggests that we would be very rash to rule them out. c. Smetham thus appears to be supporting the general principle of falsification, but at the same time claiming that falsification can be absolute, an assertion that runs entirely against the spirit of falsification as Popper conceives it. Both Popper and Lakatos recognised that no falsification could be absolute, and attempted to work with this limitation in falsificationism. The basic reason for this is that any observation taken to offer a falsification is itself fallible and open to a variety of possible interpretations. Nevertheless, Smetham argues that if the principle of falsification is not absolute, it must be self-contradictory: Here again we find Ellis proclaiming the impossibility of true knowledge. Even with the cherished principle of falsification in place “there can be no absolute falsification” because the principle itself is beyond “justification” within our “experiential framework of objectivity.” This ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1103 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. would mean, of course, that the principle of falsification is itself unfalsifiable; which further means that, by Ellis’ own proclamations, the principle itself, as employed within Ellis’ perspective, becomes dogmatic metaphysics. Smetham’s claim here takes us back to section 1 and the supposed paradox of scepticism. The principle of falsification can only be contradicted by a lack of absolute falsifiability if one assumes in the first place that the principle of falsification is a metaphysical theory requiring absolute rather than provisional justification. However, the principle of falsification, like any other provisional theory, can only be incrementally justified by the falsifiable theories that it supports, that remain falsifiable but unfalsified and continue to offer lines of fruitful research. If one insists on taking the principle of falsification metaphysically, just like metaphysical agnosticism and Middle Way Philosophy in general, it will be unfalsifiable and/or selfcontradictory in those terms, just as metaphysics is unfalsifiable and self-contradictory in the terms of Middle Way Philosophy. Thus we are taken back to the questions of circularity and burden of proof discussed in section 5 above. In addition, I will later be discussing the practical justifications that can be given for the avoidance of metaphysics. These are practical justifications that support the sphere of science as much as any other. A much more reasonable, and interesting, question remains, as to how one should understand falsification if not in absolute terms. This is where I find that the initial insights of Popper and Lakatos run into the sand. Both of them believe in objective progress in science, but because of their steadfast refusal to seriously consider psychological explanations for scientific objectivity, they can only give us appeals to the conventionally accepted scientific results of today as apparently self-evidently more objective than those of yesterday, without really explaining what kind of objectivity has made them better. My proposal in response to this problem is that justification depends on both coherence in the explanation of evidence and recognition of fallibility, and that both of these can be considered with greater degrees of adequacy where there is integration. The progress of Western science in helping us to engage with conditions, then, can be explained by the degree of integration both amongst the community of scientists (who have gradually improved the rigour of their methods so as to both offer coherent theories and allow for fallibility) and in the psyches of scientists, whose coherence and sense of fallibility in creatively developing theories has helped the scientific community to make progress. The insights of Popper and Lakatos, then, can be adapted to a psychological explanation of scientific objectivity by thinking of falsification, not as a decisive event that happens to a theory regardless of who is testing it, but as an important part of the attitude of the person (or the group) believing in and testing the theory when they make judgements. A recognition of the fallibility of a theory is required to actively consider negative outcomes and to accept them when they occur, but it is a balancing of that sense of the fallibility of a theory with the grounds we have for confidence in it that helps us to make more objective judgements about when a theory has been falsified, and neither prematurely abandon it nor hang onto an unfruitful theory too long. This is the direct application of the Middle Way in scientific judgement. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1104 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. This approach to falsification plays an important part in helping us to distinguish between theories that are metaphysical (and thus unfalsifiable) and those that are provisional (and thus falsifiable). A theory is only falsifiable if the person believing in it holds a provisional enough belief in it to allow it to be falsified, for the ambiguities of evidence by themselves cannot convince those who are deeply attached to a belief and are determined to make the evidence fit the theory. The nature of the belief contributes to falsifiability (for example, a falsifiable theory fruitfully yields opportunities for testing), but it is not enough by itself without a psychological state of provisionality. Similarly, the nature of a metaphysical belief makes a large contribution to it being unfalsifiable, when any experience can be readily explained to fit that belief, but we also have to consider the psychological function of that belief and the context in which it is habitually used in order to judge its unfalsifiability. Another strength of this approach to falsification is that it allows similar criteria to those used to judge beliefs in formal scientific settings to also be applied by individuals making personal judgements. For individuals the parameters of when a theory is judged to have failed its test are individually determined, yet not necessarily merely ‘subjective’ because outside a scientific community. Individuals have to both determine their standards and judge when they have been breached, but it is the objectivity of the individual concerned judged psychologically that allows us to assert that some such judgements are more adequate than others. If individuals subject their beliefs to such tests they are acting in a more objective way that allows progress in addressing conditions, compared to those that merely accept unfalsifiable beliefs that help them to be accepted by a group and that are not subjected to genuine investigation. 11. Scientific exceptionalism So, having dealt with a range of Smetham’s philosophical assumptions, we finally come to the point that Smetham obviously considers central to his paper: the claim that the violation of Bell’s inequality conclusively proves a metaphysical point about underlying Reality: namely the falsity of the Cartesian conception of absolute matter. It will be obvious by now that I do not accept this claim, firstly on the grounds that no empirical evidence could ever prove a metaphysical claim, and secondly on the grounds that acceptance of such a metaphysical claim would in any case do us no good, but would distract us from the insights offered by the Middle Way and from the quest for objectivity. I will concentrate on the first point here, but the second, which gives a wider and more important pragmatic context to my case against metaphysics in general, will be considered in the final three sections. Smetham’s argument appears to be that certain experiments in Quantum physics, but particularly those related to Bell’s inequality, provide a scientific exception to the norm. Even if normal science (outside quantum physics) provides us only with provisional conclusions, he seems to be arguing, quantum physics gives us absolute certainty about metaphysical truth. the metaphysical belief in the existence of independent and solid Cartesian type “matter” has been shown, admittedly in a scientifically “incremental” manner, within our own experience to be completely false.... the falsification of Cartesian type matter is not “provisional” it is actually final.... this conclusion, or one like it, is necessarily established by the fact that the precise analysis of our experience indicates that, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1105 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. whatever “Reality” might be, it cannot be made up of “those tiny bits of matter that Newton imagined the universe to be made of,” as Stapp puts it.... If “Reality” were to be made up of tiny “solid bits of matter”, then it simply could not exhibit the phenomenon of quantum entanglement, an issue we now need to investigate in a little detail. And, after we have done so we shall find that Ellis” claim that: We do not ultimately know whether or not the world is actually made up of absolute things that either exist or don't exist,… …is actually false. 37 To support this claim, Smetham gives a detailed account of a number of experiments in quantum physics, far too long to quote. However, one can summarise the implications of these experiments in Smetham’s interpretation as follows: 1. The characteristics of quantum phenomena are dependent upon the observer. 2. There is an unexplained relationship of ‘entanglement’ between one particle and another, such that the observation of one appears to affect the observation of the other. 3. This experimental evidence can be interpreted as metaphysical using the philosophical framework of ‘Constrained metaphysical relativism’: This is the metaphysical position that it is the very nature of “Reality”, not to be unknowable, as Ellis maintains, but to be knowable in various manners which are consistent with, and constrained by, its inner nature. Furthermore the inner, or absolute nature of reality, is indicated by the overlap between various different aspects which are consistent with appropriate experience.38 4. This Constrained metaphysical relativism is claimed to be consistent with ‘model dependent realism’ where, despite the dependence on models that are relative to observers, “negative metaphysical decisions are possible” 39 by ruling out falsified models. 5. The violation of Bell’s inequality shows conclusively that ‘Reality’ cannot be made up of “independent, completely solid and self-contained units of ‘matter’ “40, despite disagreement between scientists as to the precise philosophical implications beyond this. A number of the assumptions Smetham makes here have already been discussed. The dependency of quantum phenomena on the observer, as I argued in section 8 above, does not necessarily imply its sole dependence on the observer or its independence from other processes beyond the observer that are unknown to us. The idea that falsification can be absolutely decisive was also dealt with in section 10 above. ‘Constrained metaphysical relativism’ depends on the assumption that Reality is knowable, a metaphysical assumption that leads us to the issues with circularity and burden of proof discussed in section 5 above. These points alone would be enough to refute Smetham’s claims here, because the process of elimination of theories that he describes cannot be absolutely decisive unless all other ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1106 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. possible theories and all other possible operations on the phenomena have been ruled out – which they cannot be. The unexplained relationship of ‘entanglement’ is precisely that – an unexplained relationship. That the fact of the experiments Smetham describes appear to run against “solid bits of matter” does not show with certainty that no such “solid bits of matter” exist, or that the apparently linked particles are “Really” mind. Many other hypotheses are possible to explain these mysterious relationships between particles. The much-maligned Noddy and Big Ears would do, or force fields from alien space craft, or of course the direct intervention of God (we could resurrect a version of the parallelism of Leibniz or the occasionalism of Malebranche!). As argued in section 6 above, no one metaphysical claim is any more likely than another, as all have zero probability given that we have no experience to judge their probability on. Rather than rushing into metaphysical explanations for ‘entanglement’, I think we would be far better advised to merely acknowledge a mystery for which we have no clear explanation as yet. My argument here is no different to the one I would use in parallel cases of religious claims. For example, where prodigal children show inexplicable knowledge of the lives of others who lived before them, we should not rush into the belief that this ‘proves’ rebirth or reincarnation when there are lots of other possible explanations41: thought waves, divine intervention, stray memories without bodies etc. The reason that people overwhelmingly favour one kind of metaphysical explanation for these mysterious cases over others appears to be just that this is the one favoured by their group or culture. But if we are honest, we just do not know. Let’s leave it at that and stick to formulating theories about phenomena which are actually fruitful, specific and incremental enough to be tested further in experience. 12. The linguistic context Before concluding this paper, however, I want to say a bit more about my second level of objection to metaphysics. Not only is metaphysics not informative as a way of telling us about the universe, but it also needs to be avoided for practical reasons, as detracting from objectivity rather than supporting it. One of the basic reasons for this relates to the way in which we understand the meaning of language. The dominant theory of meaning in Western philosophy is the truth-conditional theory of meaning. According to this, the meaning of a proposition consists in the circumstances in which it would be true. There have been variations on the classic version of this theory, and there are Wittgensteinian challenges to it, but all these theories maintain a basic assumption that meaning consists in a relationship between propositions and states of affairs that they represent. I thus call these kinds of theories representationalist42. The major defect in representationalist theories of meaning is that meaning consists solely of a relationship between a represented world and a real or hypothesised one. This approach unnecessarily divides meaning from meaningfulness, removing affective factors from our understanding of meaning so that meaning is understood as entirely cognitive. But our experience of meaning does not merely develop cognitively, but through physical experience, as discussed by Smetham in relation to mass (see above section 12), and our physical condition and emotional state can never be completely separated from the meaning we experience in language. The linguistic theory of George Lakoff provides an alternative ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1107 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. understanding of the meaning of language as experienced through our physical bodies, and gradually abstracted through metaphorical extension43. This matter of semantic theory becomes important to our judgements about scientific and metaphysical theories, when we consider what the language that composes such theories means. Undoubtedly, all theories aim at representation of a real or hypothesised reality, but if meaning has an emotional and bodily component, this representation does not exhaust the meaning of a theory. Theories are both written and interpreted within a certain physical context, and our understanding of them is shaped not by an absolute one-to-one relationship between words and hypothesised reality, but by the physical and emotional conditions impacting our interpretation. For example, one will be more interested in a theory and interpret it more charitably if one finds it interesting, rather than considering it with boredom and alienation. This recognition of an affective element in the meaning of a theory has important implications. The meaning of a theory, although it strives towards pure representation, is incapable of achieving it because its language not merely representational. Not only will the words of the theory depict reality imperfectly, but they will make an impression on us partly through the impact of the form of the intended depiction rather than the representational content. I would not conclude from this that theories are irredeemably ‘subjective’, because, unlike Hume, I do not identify passion with irredeemable subjectivity and reason with objectivity, regardless of the psychological context of reason and passion. Rather, the objectivity of a theory comes not from an absolute correlation with reality (or Reality) but from the degree of integration (both cognitive and affective) of the judgements it embodies. If we adopt this approach to meaning, not only must the objectivity of scientific theories be re-assessed as the product of scientific judgements rather than correct theories, but metaphysical theories become indefensible. Metaphysical theories depend entirely on the idea of representation: that a particular form of words corresponds to Reality. In Smetham’s case, for example “the falsity of Cartesian type matter” is taken to represent a state of affairs. This absolute state of affairs is not one that language is capable of absolutely representing. My argument about the meaning of metaphysical statements is that their meaning is in practice highly dependent on their emotional impact in relation to the group that supports a metaphysical belief. It has a hypothesised representational content, but this representational content is so abstracted that it cannot be related to experience directly at all. It is thus highly dependent on group associations to provide it with meaning. The meaning of a term like “Natural Law” for example, is highly charged and given rich associations by the group in which it is used, and thus becomes a matter for intense dispute between groups, even though when analysed it is so ambiguous as to mean very little that is specific in terms of the representation of experience. Many scientific discoveries have a strong representational relationship to things we experience, and have led us to experience them differently. I may feel slightly less terrified of lightning if I understand it as electrostatic discharge rather than thunderbolts hurled by a vengeful deity. I think differently about the experience of meditation through being aware that absorbed meditational states correspond to changed patterns of brain functioning that have been called alpha waves. However, I remain at a loss to understand how “the falsity of Cartesian type matter” is meant to mean anything to anyone beyond a rallying point for ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1108 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. fruitless intellectual dispute. Even for quantum physicists, the design of further experiments to investigate entanglement cannot be positively influenced by this interpretation, for it offers no new testable predictions. 13. The psychological context I have already mentioned several aspects of my psychological case against metaphysics. Broadly, this case is that metaphysical beliefs function psychologically so as to prevent integration and thus objectivity. Considerable initial support can be given to this case by the study of cognitive biases, all of which can be understood either as part of a mechanism for defending metaphysical beliefs in general, or for supporting specific metaphysical beliefs44. Some examples of cognitive biases which form part of the psychological explanation for the attractiveness of metaphysical beliefs are attribute substitution (which leads us to prefer simple answers)45, belief bias (which short-circuits reasoning)46, confirmation bias (where evidence is sought to fit a theory)47, ingroup bias (where group beliefs are held dogmatically)48, information bias (where more information is sought regardless of practical relevance)49, and system bias (where existing systems of thought are favoured over new)50. An accumulation of psychological evidence points to the view that humans often (though not inevitably) favour metaphysical views over provisional ones because they bolster security, maintain a place in a group, and save investigatory effort. However, my own work goes further than this in putting forward an integrative theory that explains the role of metaphysics in preventing investigation. Given that all beliefs are motivated by desires and are used to create a represented context in which desires may seek their fulfilment, and that different desires held at different times or by different individuals or groups may conflict, our desires at a particular time often try to obtain egoistic supremacy by suppressing other contradictory desires and their associated beliefs. Our desires and beliefs at different times may be increasingly integrated by a process of developing habitual awareness, but this process is prevented by desires that wish to maintain dominance and maintain suppression of contrary desires. An important tool for such desires are beliefs that are resistant to such integration because they claim total justification, and appear to be immune to cognitive attack from other beliefs. Metaphysical beliefs fulfil this role because they are selfjustifying and not subject to evidence which could help ‘reason’ (that is, awareness being extended using reasoning based on a wider range of experience) to undermine them. A metaphysical belief is a kind of cognitive castle – an apparently impregnable fortification – but one that stands needlessly in the way of the peaceful unification of beliefs (and hence desires) both within and between individuals, insisting on war to resist peaceful federation51. Integration of belief is central to successful investigation, because beliefs become integrated by taking more conditions into account. A metaphysical belief meeting another one cannot be integrated, because the two beliefs each claim absolute authority, have no basis for compromise, and are impermeable to evidence from experience that might form a dialectical basis for their integration. Two opposed provisional beliefs, on the contrary, can be integrated by investigating the experiences used to support them, and incorporating all those experiences in a new, more adequate belief. Provisional beliefs are not fundamentally opposed to this process because part of their psychological conditions includes an awareness of fallibility. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1109 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Thus a scientist who adopts provisional beliefs is capable of making further investigatory progress (a point that links with my psychological explanation of falsification in section 10), whilst one who adopts metaphysical beliefs (at least in the area affected by her metaphysical belief) is not. To echo Popper, provisionality is science, but metaphysics is inimical to scientific investigation. Even if that metaphysics is in some way claimed to be derived from science, as in Smetham’s claims about quantum physics, it is opposed to the very process that makes scientific method successful in improving the objectivity of its judgements. Such metaphysics is not science, but scientism. 14. The ethical context Finally, another important area relevant to this discussion but ignored by Smetham is that of ethics. Perhaps its relevance will surprise many scientists and analytic philosophers who take the fact-value distinction for granted. Facts, they may argue, are the preserve of science, whereas ethics is in the separate area of ‘values’, which (according to one’s philosophical persuasion) is a matter of social convention, individual preference, emotion, mysterious intuition, or dogmatic assertion. Central to Middle Way Philosophy is the argument that the fact-value distinction is mistaken and that ethics, just as much as facts, are a matter for incrementally objective investigation through experience. If this argument is right, there are also ethical reasons for rejecting metaphysical beliefs. First, let me summarise the reasons for rejecting the fact-value distinction. This distinction is based on Hume’s argument52, later reinforced by Moore53, that no ‘ought’ can be validly derived from an ‘is’: that is, value claims cannot be logically supported by factual claims, only by other value claims. This abstract analysis may be correct in abstract terms, but it seldom seems to be appreciated that it is an empty analysis. In our experience, there are no such things as pure factual claims without value implications, because all factual claims have to be made in a physical context where a flesh-and-blood being is asserting them with a value motive for doing so. Conversely, there are no pure value claims, because all values must relate to assumed facts in a hypothesised world to be values that relate to our experience in any way54. Science, then, is in practice riddled with values, and indeed sustained and made objective (as I have already argued) by values of provisionality, rigour, observational thoroughness etc. We need to decisively reject the pervasive prejudice, inherited from Hume, that values are necessarily ‘subjective’, and thus that the recognition of the ways that values reflect desires will lead to moral relativism (as it effectively does for Hume). Instead, if we think of desires as subject to integration and more integrated desires as being better able to address conditions, desires become capable of differentiation in terms of their adequacy and objectivity just as beliefs do. Greater integration allows us to become morally better because our desires become more broadly based values, based on a wider awareness, a more coherent and provisional hypothesised world-view, and a judgement that takes more conditions into account. Our strength and consistency of character, our consistency balanced with realism in applying principles, and our awareness of the consequences of our actions, all become greater with integration. It is by thinking of ethics incrementally in this way that we can maintain an understanding of moral objectivity, with some judgements being better than others, whilst avoiding absolute or metaphysical bases for ethics55. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1110 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. Just as I have argued that metaphysical beliefs interfere with scientific objectivity, simultaneously I would argue that metaphysical beliefs also interfere with moral objectivity. Far from helping us to address more moral conditions, metaphysical beliefs about ethics (e.g. belief in absolute moral instructions revealed by God) provide a fortified set of values that are impervious to new experience that challenges them. In addition to there being scientific reasons for avoiding metaphysics in science, then, there are also moral reasons for avoiding metaphysics in science. The relationship between metaphysical beliefs and individual behaviour is admittedly complex, so I would certainly not wish to over-simplify it by accusing Smetham, or any other physicist holding metaphysical beliefs derived from quantum physics, of specific moral failings as a result of it. In order to begin to relate a person’s metaphysical beliefs to their moral character one needs to know them quite well personally. Nevertheless (to speak broadly and impersonally), the idealism recommended by Smetham can potentially be used directly or indirectly to support many kinds of moral rigidity. For example, the belief that mind and nature are one can be used to support cosmic justice beliefs such as the theory of karma (in either its Hindu or Buddhist versions), where it is believed that mental actions lead to proportionate results in ‘nature’, and often that events from ‘nature’ that occur to us are the results of our mental actions. This belief must then be maintained regardless of the contrary evidence offered by experience that things may happen to us by chance or due to conditions that are completely unrelated to our mental states: even a large asteroid hitting the earth and destroying humankind would have to be explained as the result of the mental choices of all. Even if one adopts a liberalised view of karma that allows for tragedy and claims only that all our mental actions must have proportionate effects at some point in the future, this idea requires a dogmatic identification with beliefs that go far beyond our experience56. The law of karma is only one example of an extremely unhelpful moral belief that might be supported by Smetham’s insistence on ‘Mindnature’. Of course, Smetham may credibly deny that he personally believes this, or any other of many other further metaphysical beliefs that could be derived from it, such as revelations from enlightened states or Hegelian beliefs in the purpose of history. The point remains that metaphysical beliefs have a tendency to beget more metaphysical beliefs57, and that metaphysical beliefs in general are morally obstructive. It is thus not just scientifically but morally irresponsible to spread metaphysical beliefs, especially in a context like science which in the recent past has been developing in a way that is largely free of them. Conclusion I hope this paper has made it clear that although not a scientist myself, I am a supporter of science and the use of scientific method. The findings of quantum physics, including the violation of Bell’s inequality, are both interesting and mysterious. I would not wish to underestimate their scientific importance in the least. Nevertheless, I wrote the passage in The Trouble with Buddhism that triggered Smetham’s critical attack out of concern at the abuse of quantum physics for purposes that are not scientific, but scientistic. Not only some Buddhists, it seems, but also some quantum physicists themselves, are seeking to make metaphysical capital out of the empirical results of quantum physics. As I have argued, this is not only unjustified but also practically unhelpful in both scientific and moral terms. I can only assume that the physicists concerned have done ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1111 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. this because they do not fully understand the enormous and unfortunate implications of the short step over the boundary from physics into metaphysics. There remains a good deal of scope for argument, I will concede, as to the precise boundary between metaphysics and provisional theory. I have defined metaphysics according to its psychological function, and there is a general relationship between assertions with a certain type of absolute and unfalsifiable representational content and this psychological function, not an absolute one. Nevertheless, Smetham does not deny that the assertions he is making are metaphysical assertions, and there are many other examples of assertions that are clearly metaphysical, whatever the possible debates about boundary cases. Such alleged boundary cases often include general theoretical assertions at a high level of abstraction, such as those of Middle Way Philosophy, or indeed of many top-level scientific theories. However, my argument is that these kinds of cases are not metaphysical, primarily because they do not function as such: they yield further testable hypotheses rather than staking an absolute claim and closing down further investigation, and are decisive in their rejection of metaphysics only in able to protect our capacity to continue investigation. It is the practical context and purpose of this philosophical approach that needs to be appreciated to avoid many of the misunderstandings Smetham has of it. Middle Way Philosophy aims to clear the ground for practical progress. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1112 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. 1 Graham Smetham The Matter of Mindnature p.2 (quoting me) For more details see Adrian Kuzminski, Pyrrhonism, Lexington Press 2008 3 Smetham op cit p.14 4 Ibid p.2 5 Ibid p.2 6 Ibid p.3 7 Ibid p.13 8 Smetham cannot have read my very critical work on Plato: see Robert M. Ellis, A Theory of Moral Objectivity section 3d (Lulu 2011) or http://www.moralobjectivity.net/Plato.html 9 See Ellis op cit section 6c, or http://www.moralobjectivity.net/thesis6c.html for more details. 10 See http://www.moralobjectivity.net/Buddhist_errors.html 11 See http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20justification.html 12 Ibid 13 Smetham op cit p.14 14 Ibid p.9 15 Ibid p.23 16 Ibid p.8. There seems to be a contradiction in the final sentence, which would make more sense if ‘so’ was used in the place of ‘otherwise’. 17 See Culamalunkya Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 63), and several other places in the Pali Canon. 18 See http://www.moralobjectivity.net/cognitive_bias.html for some preliminary work in this area. I hope to write on it in more depth in future. 19 See http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20integration.html 20 See Robert M. Ellis, A Theory of Moral Objectivity chapter 2 (Lulu 2011) 21 For brief accounts of these terms see http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concepts.html . For detailed accounts, including the different ways in which eternalism and nihilism have appeared in the history of Western thought, see Ellis op cit chapters 3 (on eternalism) & 4 (on nihilism). 22 Smetham op cit p.9 23 Ibid p.10 24 For a brief account of the role of groups in Middle Way Philosophy, see http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20group.html, and for a more detailed discussion see A Theory of Moral Objectivity section 6d. Cognitive psychology also gives further evidence of this process in its observations of ingroup bias, belief bias and confirmation bias (see note xviii). 25 Smetham op cit pp.10-11 26 Ibid p.11 27 See Culamalunkya Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 63) 28 Smetham op cit p.12 29 Ibid p.13 30 Ibid pp 13-14 31 See Thomas Kuhn The Structure of Scientific Revolutions University of Chicago Press 1996 (3rd edn) and Imre Lakatos “Falsification and the methodology of scientific research programmes” from Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge ed. I. Lakatos and A. Musgrave, Cambridge University Press 1974. 32 Smetham op cit p.34 33 Ibid 34 See Robert M. Ellis Truth on the Edge (Lulu 2011) p.54-8, and A Theory of Moral Objectivity (Lulu 2011) sections 2b and 6c. 2 35 Ibid p.17 Peter Muns “Popper’s Darwinism” from Karl Popper: A centenary assessment, volume 3, ed. Ian Jarvie et al (Ashgate 2006), p.138 36 37 Smetham op cit p.27 Ibid p.35-6 39 Ibid p.36 38 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1113 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | Novenber 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1086-1113 Ellis, Robert M., Taking the ‘Meta’ Out of Physics. 40 Ibid p.44 See Robert M. Ellis The Trouble with Buddhism (Lulu 2011) p.137 ff 42 See http://www.moralobjectivity.net/concept%20-%20representationalism.html. This use of the term should not be confused with the same term used in the analytic philosophy of perception to mean indirect realism or idealism. 43 See George Lakoff, Women, Fire and Dangerous Things (University of Chicago Press 1987). This is also discussed in Robert M. Ellis, A Theory of Moral Objectivity (Lulu 2011) 2.c.iii. 44 See note xviii 45 See Daniel Kahneman & Frederick Shane, "Attribute Substitution in Intuitive Judgment", in Mie Augier, James G. March Models of a man: essays in memory of Herbert A. Simon (MIT Press,2004) pp. 411–432 46 See J. Evans, J.L.Barston & P. Pollard, P, “On the conflict between logic and belief in syllogistic reasoning” Memory and Cognition 11, pp 295-306 47 See Margot Oswald & Stefan Grosjean, "Confirmation Bias", in Rüdiger Pohl, Cognitive Illusions: A Handbook on Fallacies and Biases in Thinking, Judgement and Memory (Psychology Press, 2004) pp. 79–96 48 See P. W. Linville, “Polarized appraisals of out-group members”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 38 (5), pp. 689-703 49 See J. Baron, J. Beattie & J.C. Hershey, “Heuristics and biases in diagnostic reasoning: II. Congruence, information, and certainty” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 42, pp. 88-110. 50 See John T. Jost et al "A decade of system justification theory: Accumulated evidence of conscious and unconscious bolstering of the status quo", Political Psychology 25, pp. 881–919 51 The theory outlined here is central to Robert M. Ellis A Theory of Moral Objectivity (Lulu 2011). More details can be found throughout, but especially in section 2.a and chapter 5. 52 David Hume A Treatise of Human Nature (Oxford,1978) p.469 53 G.E. Moore Principia Ethica (Cambridge University Press, 1959) 54 For more details see http://www.moralobjectivity.net/assumptions%20-%20fact-value.html 55 For more details see Robert M. Ellis, A New Buddhist Ethics (Lulu 2011) chapter 1 & A Theory of Moral Objectivity (Lulu 2011) chapter 8 (and more broadly passim). 56 See Robert M. Ellis The Trouble with Buddhism (Lulu 2011) chapter 4 57 See further analysis of the way different groups of metaphysical beliefs tend to support each other, see my accounts of eternalism and nihilism respectively in A Theory of Moral Objectivity sections 3b and 4a. 41 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 787 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? Higgs Essay Is It Really Higgs? Matti PItkänen 1 Abstract The discovery of a new spinless particle at LHC has dominated the discussions in physics blogs during last weeks. Quite many bloggers identify without hesitation the new particle as the long sought for Higgs although some aspects of data do not encourage the interpretation as standard model Higgs or possibly its SUSY variant. Maybe the reason is that it is rather imagine any other interpretation. In this article the TGD based interpretation as a pion-like state of scaled up variant of hadron physics is discussed explaining also why Higgs is not needed and why it cannot even perform the tasks posed for it in TGD framework. Essentially one assumption, the separate conservation of quark and lepton numbers realized in terms of 8-D chiral invariance, excludes Higgs like states as also standard N = 1 SUSY. This identification could explain the failure to find the decays to τ pairs and also the excess of two-gamma decays. The decays gauge boson pairs would be caused by the coupling of pion-like state to instanton density for electro-weak gauge fields. Also a connection with the dark matter researches reporting signal at 130 GeV and possibly also at 110 GeV suggests itself: maybe also these signals also correspond to pion-like states. 1 Background The discovery of the new spinless particle at LHC [8, 9] is believed to be a turning point in physics, and for a full reason. Before discussing TGD based view about the discovery it is appropriate to discuss briefly the historical background to demonstrate that the answer to the question ”Higgs or not Higgs?” indeed determines the path to be followed in future particle physics. 1.1 GUT paradigm The leading thread in the story of particle physics is GUT paradigm, which emerged for four decades ago. It however has its problems besides the fact that not a single thread of evidence has accumulated to support it. 1. The basic idea of GUTs is to put all fermions and bosons to multiplets of some big gauge group extending the standard model gauge group. This idea is applied also in the generalization of gauge theories to supersymmetric gauge theories and in superstring models. Scalar fields developing vacuum expectations define a key element of this approach and give hopes of obtaining a realistic mass spectrum. This rather simple minded approach would make unification an easy job. There are however difficulties. 2. One of the basic implications is that baryon and lepton numbers are not conserved separately. Proton decays would make this non-conservation manifest. These decays have not been however observed, and one of the challenges of the GUT based models is fine-tuning of couplings so that proton is long-lived enough. This raises the question whether one could somehow understand the separate conservation of B and L from basic principles. 1 Correspondence: Matti Pitkänen http://tgdtheory.com/. Address: Köydenpunojankatu 2 D 11 10940, Hanko, Finland. Email: matpitka@luukku.com. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 788 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? 3. Putting all fermions in the same multiplet would suggest that the mass ratios for fermions should be simple algebraic numbers not too far from unity. Fermion families have however widely differing mass scales and the ratio of top quark mass scale to neutrino mass scale is gigantic. This suggests that fermion generations and even different charge states of fermions of single generation are characterized by inherent mass scales and do not belong to a multiplet of a big gauge group. Standard model gauge group would be the fundamental gauge group and the challenge would be to deduce it from some fundamental principles. In TGD framework number theoretical vision indeed leads to an explanation for standard model gauge group [24]. It is also an empirical fact that fermion generations are identical copies of each other apart from widely different masses. This suggests some non-group theoretic explanation for family replication phenomenon. In TGD framework 2-D wormhole throats characterized topological by their genus in orientable category are the fundamental particle like objects. This provides a possible explanation for the family replication phenomenon. One must of course explain why genera higher than g = 2 are heavy or absent from the spectrum, and one can indeed develop an argument for this based on the fact that g ≤ 2 2-surfaces allow always Z2 as conformal symmetries unlike g > 2 2-surfaces [16]. 4. Particle massivation is in GUT framework is described by coupling the fermions and gauge bosons to a scalar field. The vacuum expectation values of the scalar fields define the mass scales. In the case of standard model one has only single scalar/Higgs field and by choosing the couplings to Higgs field to be proportional to fermion mass one can reproduce particle masses. Only a reproduction is in question and theory is certainly not microscopic. Vacuum expectation value (VEV) paradigm is central also for the inflationary cosmology - in fact for the entire theoretical particle physics developed during last decades. The no-existence of Higgs would force to return to the roots to the situation four decades ago. Therefore the new spinless particle could be a turning point in the history of physics, and it is easy to understand why the attitudes against or on behalf of Higgs interpretation are so passionate and why facts tend to be forgotten. 1.2 How to achieve separate conservation of B and L? A possible manner to understand the separate conservation of both B and L would be via the identification of spinors as different chiralities of higher-dimensional spinors. 1. This would however require the identification of color quantum numbers as angular momentum like quantum numbers assignable to partial waves in internal space. This is indeed the identification performed in TGD framework and H = M 4 × CP2 is the unique choice of imbedding space coding for the standard model quantum numbers. In TGD approach quarks and leptons correspond to different imbedding space chiralities, and this excludes Higgs as a genuine imbedding space scalar since it would couple to quark-lepton pairs. To get the couplings correctly Higgs should correspond to imbedding space vector having components only the direction of CP2 but it is rather difficult to imagine how gauge bosons could ”eat” components of Higgs in this case. As a matter fact, Higgs components should be characterized by same charge matrices as weak bosons and would be a TGD counterpart for a mixture of scalar and pseudoscalar. 2. Chiral invariance is indeed essential for the renormalizability of 4-D gauge theories.The absence of 8-D scalars would allow also a generalization of chiral invariance from 4-D to 8-D context implying separate conservation of B and L. This is the case even in string model framework if separate conservation of B and L is assumed. It is worth of mentioning that the separate conservation of B and L is not consistent with the standard N = 1 SUSY realized in terms of Majorana spinors. This is not a catastrophe since LHC has already excluded quite a considerable portion of parameter space for N = 1 SUSY. N = 2 SUSY however is and is generated in TGD framework by right-handed neutrino and its antiparticle. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 789 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? There are however quite intricate delicacies involved discussed in detail in [28]. For instance, the modes of covariantly constant right-handed neutrino spinor of CP2 generates 4-D generalization of super-conformal symmetry as modes delocalized into entire space-time surfaces whereas other modes are localized to 2-D surfaces and generate badly broken SUSY with very large value of N . An open question is whether the νR covariantly constant also in M 4 degrees of freedom could generate N = 1 SUSY analogous to the standard SUSY. In any case, TGD seems to be inconsistent with both scalar VEV paradigm and standard N = 1 SUSY. 3. p-Adic physics and p-adic length scale hypothesis allow to understand the widely different mass scales of fermions and various gauge bosons since p-adic prime and the primary p-adic length scale defined by it become the characterizers of elementary particle. Also the secondary p-adic length and time scales are important: for electron secondary p-adic time scale is .1 seconds and quite intriguingly the fundamental time scale of biology. p-Adic thermodynamics provides the microscopic theory of particle massivation leading to highly successful predictions not only for particle mass scale ratios but also for the particle masses. p-Adic primes near powers of two - in particular Mersenne primes - pop up naturally and define positive integer characterizing given particle. Number theory becomes the tool of understanding the mystery number 1038 defined by the ratio of Planck mass and proton mass (this number is essentially the ratio of CP2 mass to electron mass) [19]. If Higgs is needed in TGD framework at all, it might provide gauge bosons with longitudinal polarizations. Even this function seems to be un-necessary. Here so called zero energy ontology (ZEO) comes in rescue. 1.3 Particle massivation from p-adic thermodynamics p-Adic thermodynamics defines a core element of p-adic mass calculations [16, 19, 22]. p-Adic thermodynamics is thermodynamics for the conformal scaling generator L0 in the tensor product representation of super-conformal algebra and the masses are fixed one the p-adic prime characterizing the particle is fixed. p-Adic length scale hypothesis p ' 2k , k integer, implies an exponential sensitivity of the particle mass scale on k so that a fitting of particle masses is not possible. 1. The first thing that one can get worried about relates to the extension of conformal symmetries. 4 × CP2 generalize to D = 4, how can If the conformal symmetries for light-like surfaces and δM± one take seriously the results of p-adic mass calculations based on 2-D conformal invariance? There is actually no reason to worry. The reduction of the conformal invariance to 2-D one for the solutions of modified Dirac equation takes care of this problem [28] This however requires that the fermionic contributions assignable to string world sheets and/or partonic 2-surfaces - Super- KacMoody contributions - dictate the elementary particle masses. For hadrons also super-symplectic contributions would be present and would give the dominating contribution to baryon masses. The modes of right handed neutrino are delocalized to a 4-D region of space-time surface and characterized by two integers. The absence of all standard model interactions suggests that no thermalization takes place for them. These modes are de-localized either to a region of Euclidian signature identifiable as 4-D line of generalized Feynman graph or to a region of Minkowskian signature. Since modified gamma matrices vanish identically for CP2 type vacuum extremals one can ask whether the 4-D neutrino modes are associated only with Minkowskian regions. In this case the counterpart of N = 1 SUSY would assign spartner to a many-particle state rather than to elementary particle. This could explain for why LHC has not seen the analog of standard SUSY. 2. ZEO suggests that the wormhole throats carrying many-fermion states with parallel momenta are massless: this applies even to virtual wormhole throats [26]. As a consequence, the twistor approach would work and the on mass shell kinematical constraints to the vertices would allow the cancellation of UV divergences. The 2-D Kac-Moody generators assignable to the boundaries of string world ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 790 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? sheets would generate Yangian algebra [27]. IR divergences would cancel because incoming and outgoing particles would be massive on mass shell particles as states involving several wormhole throats. The p-adic thermal expectation value is for the longitudinal M 2 momentum squared rather than for the four-momentum squared (the definition of CD selects M 1 ⊂ M 2 ⊂ M 4 as also does number theoretic vision). Also propagator would be determined by M 2 momentum. Lorentz invariance would be achieved by averaging over the moduli for CD including also Lorentz boosts of CD. 3. In the original approach states with arbitrary large values of Ltot 0 were allowed as physical states. Usually one would require that the generator Ltot of conformal scaling annihilates the states. In 0 the calculations however mass squared was assumed to be proportional Ltot apart from vacuum 0 contribution. This is a questionable assumption. ZEO suggests that total mass squared vanishes and that one can decompose mass squared to a sum of longitudinal and transversal parts. If one can do the same decomposition for the longitudinal and transverse parts also for the Super Virasoro algebra, one can calculate longitudinal mass squared as a p-adic thermal expectation of Ltr 0 in = 0 would contribute and one the transversal Super-Virasoro algebra and only states with Ltot 0 would have conformal invariance in the standard sense. The decomposition is indeed possible since longitudinal parts correspond to pure gauge degrees of freedom. Thermodynamics - or rather, its square root - would become part of quantum theory in ZEO. M matrix is indeed product of hermitian square root of density matrix multiplied by unitary S-matrix and defines the entanglement coefficients between positive and negative energy parts of zero energy state. Different M -matrices orthogonal to each other with respect to trace become rows of the unitary U -matrix. 4. The crucial constraint is that the number of super-conformal tensor factors is N = 5: this suggests that thermodynamics applied in Super-Kac-Moody degrees of freedom assignable to string world sheets is enough if one is interested in the masses of fermions and gauge bosons. Super-symplectic degrees of freedom can also contribute and determine the dominant contribution to baryon masses. Should also this contribution obey p-adic thermodynamics in the case when it is present? Or does the very fact that this contribution need not be present mean that it is not thermal? The symplectic contribution should correspond to hadronic p-adic length scale rather the much longer (!) p-adic length scale assignable to say u quark (this paradoxical looking result can be understood in terms of uncertainty principle and the assignment of quarks to the color magnetic body of hadron). Hadronic p-adic mass squared and partonic p-adic mass squared cannot be summed since primes are different. If one accepts the basic rules [22], longitudinal energy and momentum are additive as indeed assumed in perturbative QCD. 5. Calculations work if the vacuum expectation value of the mass squared must be assumed to be tachyonic. There are two options depending on whether one whether p-adic thermodynamics gives total mass squared or longitudinal mass squared. (a) One could argue that the total mass squared has naturally tachyonic ground state expectation since for massless extremals (MEs, topological light rays [15]) longitudinal momentum is light-like and transversal momentum squared is necessary present and non-vanishing by the localization to topological light ray of finite thickness of order p-adic length scale. Transversal degrees of freedom would be modeled with a particle in a box. (b) If longitudinal mass squared is what is calculated, the condition would require that transversal momentum squared is negative so that instead of plane wave like behavior exponential damping would be required. This would conform with the localization in transversal degrees of freedom. This is the general picture. One crucially important implication is that gauge conditions in Lorentz gauge must be modified. Only longitudinal M 2 momentum appears in the propagators (recall that total ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 791 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? mass squared vanishes and cannot appear in the propagator if virtual particles are massless). Therefore only M 2 momentum appears in gauge conditions: pL ·  = 0 holds true and implies that also longitudinal polarization is allowed. Massivation is also unavoidable. The first guess for gauge boson state is as a wormhole contact containing fermion and anti-fermion at 3-D light-like wormhole throats. One must have spin 1 but since fermion and anti-fermion are massless they must have non-parallel 3-momenta in order to have parallel spins. For instance, they could have parallel and massive longitudinal momenta but non-parallel transverse momenta. The longitudinal mass squared would be in general non-vanishing and hence mass squared as the average over moduli of CD involving also integration over Lorentz boosts of CD. Higgs is not needed in TGD framework and its possible TGD counterpart seems also incapable of fulfilling its functions. 1.4 Could a TGD counterpart of scalar boson have useful functions in TGD Universe? The social pressures tending to force the interpretation of the new resonance as Higgs are rather strong and most bloggers seem to take this interpretation as granted. In this kind of situation theoretician with visions deviating from the mainstream thinking of course feels excitement and stress. I am not an exception to this rule. What if the production rate and branching ratios are those predicted by standard model? Is my vision wrong in this case? How it could be wrong? Can I modify it without losing something essential? Recall that standard model Higgs has two functions. Higgs VEV gives masses for fermions and weak gauge bosons and Higgs gives longitudinal components for massive gauge bosons. Could one have Higgs like states performing only one or none of these functions? 1. In TGD framework fermion massivation by Higgs vacuum expectation is replaced by p-adic thermodynamics giving the dominant contribution to the longitudinal mass squared p2L (all particle states are massless at fundamental level). One cannot however exclude scalar vacuum expectations giving a small corrections to fermion masses. p-Adic thermodynamics as a microscopic mechanism of fermion massivation is so beautiful and predictive that it beats massivation based on Higgs expectation, which in TGD framework can be seen as a phenomenological parametrization at best. 2. In the case of weak gauge bosons p-adic temperature T = 1/n would be probably smaller (T ≤ 1/2 instead of T = 1 for fermions) and the analog of Higgs expectation could give a significant or even dominating contribution to weak gauge boson masses. There are however conceptual problems. What is the TGD counterpart of Higgs VEV? Does it characterize coherent state? Does this expectation have classical space-time correlate as gauge bosons have? What about the second function of Higgs as a provider of longitudinal polarizations for massive gauge bosons? 1. TGD allows to imagine the existence of analogs of Higgs like states [20] (see the previous posting). They generalize the notions of scalar and pseudo-scalar in Minkowski space to vector and pseudovector in 8-D imbedding space with components only in CP2 directions defining the analogs of polarizations. These states appear always as singlet and charged triplet and are very much analogous to 1+3 formed by electroweak gauge bosons. 2. In standard model the three components of standard model Higgs also provide the longitudinal components of weak bosons W and Z. ZEO allows to understand the massivation of spin 1 bosons as something unavoidable without the need for Higgs like particle and I do not have any elegant proposal how the possible scalar 1+3 could transform to longitudinal components of weak bosons and single neutral Higgs. Thus there is a tendency to conclude that if Higgs like states exist in TGD Universe they appear as full multiplets 1+3 containing also charged states as physical particles. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 792 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? I could of course be wrong! Maybe Higgs could after all manage to serve as a provider of longitudinal polarizations. Could one imagine the classical counterparts of gauge bosons eating Higgs components in classical TGD? To get some perspective, consider modified Dirac equation for induced spinors at preferred extremals of Kähler action. 1. For the TGD counterparts of induced Dirac equation both gamma matrices and gauge potentials appearing in the modified Dirac equation are induced from those of imbedding space by simply projecting them to the space-time surface. This implies that induced gamma matrices contain also CP2 part. This gives rise to new kind of couplings proportional to the contraction of gauge potential with CP2 part of induced gamma matrices. Induced gamma matrices are actually replaced by modified gamma matrices defined by Kähler action to obtain supersymmetry and internal consistency of the theory but the conclusion remains the same. Modified gamma matrices are proportional to Maxwell energy momentum tensor expressible in terms of Einstein equations using Einstein tensor and metric for the proposed ansatz for preferred extremals. Could these couplings involving energy momentum tensor and thus mass mimic Higgs couplings? I do not regard this interpretation as plausible. 2. Quantum classical correspondence requires the existence of classical counterparts of quanta, also Higgs. My inability to imagine any convincing candidate has been one of the reasons for my skepticism concerning Higgs like states. While writing this I however decided to try once again. I failed but learned that em charge as isospin like quantum number for fermions should be conserved in TGD classically - something very non-trivial that I have taken as granted and shown to be true only for the octonionic representation of imbedding space gamma matrices [18]. Therefore it seems that the possibility to realize the longitudinal polarizations of weak gauge bosons using Higgs like states are rather meager. 1.5 Could the conservation of em charge allow to identify unitary gauge and from this classical Higgs field? An important aspect of the standard model Higgs mechanism is that it respects em charge leaving photons massless. In standard model the conservation of em charge defined as isospin like quantum number is non-trivial since the presence of classical gauge fields induces transitions between different charge states of fermions. In second quantization this problem is circumvented by replacing classical gauge fields with quantized ones. The so called unitary gauge defined by a gauge transformation depending on Higgs fields allows to express the action in terms of physical (in general massive) fields and makes charge conservation explicit. How the conservation of em charge is obtained in TGD? 1. Doesn’t one have the same problem but as a much worse variant since classical long range electroweak gauge fields are unavoidable in TGD and there is no path integral but preferred extremals? Could it make sense to speak about unitary gauge also in TGD framework? Could one turn around this idea to derive classical Higgs from the possibly existing gauge transformation to unitary gauge? The answer is negative. There is actually no need for the unitary gauge. As a matter fact, the conservation for em charge in spinorial sense leads to the earlier conjecture that the solutions of the modified Dirac equations are localized at 2-D surfaces whose ends define braid strands at space-like 3-surfaces at the ends of causal diamonds and at the light-like 3-surfaces connecting them and defining lines for generalized Feynman diagrams. This picture was earlier derived from the notion of finite measurement resolution implying discretization at the level of partonic 2-surfaces and also from number theoretical vision suggesting that basic objects correspond to 2-D commutative and co-commutative identifiable as sub-manifolds of 4-D associative and coassociated surfaces. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 793 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? 2. The point is that the Kähler form of CP2 is covariantly constant and one can identify covariantly constant em charge as a matrix of form Q = aI + bJkl Σkl : the coefficients a and B are different for quarks and leptons (different chiralities of H-spinors). This matrix is covariantly constant also with respect to the induced spinor structure and commutes with Dirac operator (be it the TGD counterpart of the ordinary massless Dirac operator or modified Dirac operator). Therefore one should be able to choose the modes of induced spinor field to have a well-defined em charge at each point of space-time surface. The covariantly constant Kähler form of CP2 is an important element in making possible the conservation of em charge and derives from the supersymmetry generated by covariantly constant right-handed neutrino. This is however not enough as it became clear. 3. Rather unexpectedly, the challenge of understanding the charge conservation in the spinorial sense led to a breakthrough in understanding of the modes of the modified Dirac equation. The condition for conservation leads to three separate analogs of Dirac equations and the two additional ones are satisfied if em charged projections of the generalized energy momentum currents defining components of modified gamma matrices vanish. If these components define Beltrami fields expressible as products j = Ψ∇Φ the conditions can be satisfied for Ψ = 0. Since Ψ is complex or hyper-complex, the conditions are satisfied for 2-dimensional surfaces of space-time surfaces identifiable as string world sheets and partonic 2-surfaces. This picture was earlier derived from various arguments. Em charge conservation does not there give rise to a counterpart of unitary gauge but leads to a bridge between modified Dirac equation and general view about quantum TGD based on generalization of super-conformal invariance. Higgsteria had therefore at least one very positive impact in TGD framework! Note that only slightly earlier emerged the construction recipe for preferred extremals of Kähler action based on a generalization of minimal surface equations of string models to 4-D context and generalizing the 2-D conformal invariance to its four-dimensional analog. This had also a surprising and very pleasant outcome: Einstein’s equations with cosmological term follow as consistency conditions for the reduction of field equations to purely algebraic conditions solved by assuming that Euclidian space-time region has hermitian structure and Minkowskian region its counterpart that I have christened Hamilton-Jacobi structure. This simplified considerably the vision about the representations of super-conformal symmetries [28]. 2 M89 hadron physics instead of Higgs? In TGD framework the most plausible interpretation for 125 GeV state would be as pion-like state of scaled up copy of hadron physics. Two-photon decay and also the decays to other weak bosons and perhaps even gluons would be due to axial anomaly and involve only gauge boson loops. 2.1 Scaled copies of hadron physics as a basic prediction of TGD One of the most surprising ”almost-predictions” of TGD is the possibility of scaled variants of hadron physics. 1. Ordinary hadron physics is characterized by Mersenne prime Mn = 2n − 1, n = 107. There are also other physically interesting Mersenne primes. M127 corresponds to electron and has been tentatively assigned to electro-hadron physics for which color octet states of electron replace color triplet of quarks. Muon corresponds to Gaussian Mersenne MG,n = (1 + i)n − 1, n = 113, and τ to the hadronic Mersenne prime Mn , n = 107. 2. There is evidence for leptohadron physics associated with these charged leptons too [25]. 3. The masses of current quarks are from QCD estimates in 10 MeV scale and there exists some evidence for Regge trajectories in 20 MeV string tension. The interpretation would be in terms ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 794 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? of magnetic flux tubes associated with the ”magnetic body” of the hadron and the question. It however seems that M127 variant of hadron physics with characteristic mass scale of order .5 MeV cannot be in question. 4. In biologically relevant length scale range ranging from cell membrane thickness (10 nm) to the size scale of cell nucleus about 5 µm there are as many as four Gaussian Mersennes MG,n corresponding to n = 151, 157, 163, 167. Dark matter identified as phases with non-standard value of effective Planck constant coming as integer multiple of ordinary Planck constant is essential for what it is to be living in TGD Universe. The dark matter residing at magnetic flux quanta could correspond to quarks and gluons free in the size scale involved. M89 corresponds to a candidate for a hadron physics with mass scale of hadron physics scaled up by a factor 512: this corresponds to TeV range. For instance, proton mass of order .94 GeV would be scaled up to about 500 GeV. General arguments suggests that some new physics must emerge at TeV energy scale. Could it be that M89 hadron physics is this new physics? If so then the identification of 125 GeV resonance as a pion-like state of the new hadron physics would be natural. It should be easy to kill this hypothesis at LHC since entire spectroscopy of hadron like states is predicted and the experience from QCD allows to predict the dynamics of these states. p-Adic mass calculations in turn allow to estimate the mass spectrum using simple scaling arguments. 2.2 Is it really Higgs? After the first wave of Higgsteria the attitudes to the discovery at LHC have become more realistic and i ”Higgs discovery” is indeed transforming to ”discovery”. I of course feel empathy for those who have spent their professional career by doing calculations with Higgs: it is not pleasant to find that something totally different might be in question. In the latest New Scientist [10] the problems are acknowledged and summarized. For most decay channels the rates differ from standard model predictions considerably [2]. In particular, gamma gamma decay rate is about three times too high and tau lepton pairs are not produced at all. This is very alarming since Higgs should couple to leptons with coupling proportional to its mass. It is becoming clear that it is not standard model Higgs. People have begun to talk about ”Higgs like” state since nothing else they do not have because technicolor scenario is experimentally excluded. The most natural - albeit not the only possible - TGD identification is as a pion-like state. This would mean that it is pseudo-scalar: also SUSY predicts pseudo-scalar as one of the several Higgses. The basic predictions of TGD scenario deserve to be summarized. 1. Also two charged and one neutral companion of the effective pseudo-scalar should exist. This is because pseudo-scalar must be replaced by imbedding space axial vector having only CP2 components (4) forming electroweak triplet and singled just as ew gauge bosons do. The identification as CP2 tangent space vector looks promising at first but it is difficult to imagine how charged components of Higgs could be eaten by weak bosons. 2. ATLAS and CMS see their Higgs candidates at slightly different masses: mass difference is about 1 GeV. Could this mean that the predicted two neutral states contribute and have been already observed? Could this also explain the too large decay rate to two gammas. One can however counter-argue that ordinary pion has no neutral companion of same mass. In hadronic sigma model it has scalar companion with which it forms 1+3 multiplet of SO(4), the tangent space group of CP2 reducing to SU (2)L × U (1) identifiable as U (2) ⊂ SU (3 in the concrete representation of pion states. Could one think that this is the case also now and sigma develops vacuum expectation analogous to that of Higgs determining most of the couplings just as in sigma model for ordinary hadrons? The problem is that the neutral component should be scalar. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 795 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? Could one get rid of the additional sigma state? CP2 allows two geodesic spheres and the homologically trivial one allows SO(3) as isometries instead of U (2). In this case one would have naturally SO(3) triplet instead of 3+1 and no sigma boson. For the four kaon like states one would have 3+1 naturally. This could distinguish between pion-like and kaon-like multiplets also in the ordinary hadron physics [20]. What is genuinely new that strong isospin groups U (2) and SO(3) would reduce to subgroups of color group in spinor representation. 3. If there is pion-like state there, it is pseudo-scalar: this might become clear during this year. SUSY people would identify it as one of the SUSY Higgses. 4. Pion-like states consist of ”scaled up” quarks of M89 hadron physics and they prefer to decay to hadrons. Lepton pairs are produced only in higher order via box diagrams with weak boson pair as vertical edges and quark line and lepton line as horizontal edges. This explains why tau pairs are not observed. The fastest decays could take place to two gluons of M89 hadron physics transforming to ordinary gluons in turn decaying to quarks and producing jets. 5. The simplest option is that effective action for decays to weak gauge bosons is instanton action assignable to axial current anomaly. WW production rate is consistent with standard Higgs and this fixes the coefficient of the instanton term if one assumes that electroweak symmetry is not broken so that γ, Z, and W would have different coefficients. 6. Associated production of bb + W has been observed as predicted. In TGD bb would correspond to decay to two gluons annihilating to quark pair. Light quark pairs would be produced much more than in Higgs decays where Higgs-quark coupling is proportional to quark mass. 7. What is intriguing that the plots for the ratio of observed cross section divided by standard model prediction as a function of Higgs mass show periodically occurring peaks as a function of Higgs mass with period of order 20 GeV. This might be of course a mere artifact related to the size of data bin and probably is and also to the character of the plot. There is however intriguing similarity with the reported existence of satellites of ordinary pion with period of order 20-40 MeV. By scaling 40 MeV by a factor 512 one obtains 20 GeV. Could the 145 GeV state reported earlier by CDF collaboration [1] correspond to this kind of state? What experimenters have to say about these predictions after year is interesting. The discovery of charged partners, too low rate for the decays to lepton pairs, and too fast decays to light quark pairs would destroy the Higgs interpretation. 2.3 Connection with dark matter searches? An additional fascinating thread to the story comes from the attempts to detect dark matter. The prediction of TGD approach is that dark matter resides at magnetic flux tubes as phases with large value of Planck constant and that dark energy corresponds to the magnetic energy of the flux tubes and is characterized by a gigantic value of (effective) Planck constant [17]. This leads to a rather detailed vision about cosmic evolution with magnetic energy replacing the vacuum energy assigned with inflaton fields. The decay of the magnetic flux tubes rather than vacuum expectation of inflaton field would create ordinary matter and dark matter [23]. The results of the dark matter searches are inconclusive. Some groups claim the detection of what they identify as dark matter [4, 7], some groups see nothing [5, 3]. The analysis is sensitive to the assumptions made and if the assumption that dark matter corresponds to WIMPs - say neutralino of standard SUSYthe analysis might fail. Second source of failure relates to the distribution of dark matter. For instance, the standard assumption about spherical halos around galaxies might be wrong and TGD indeed suggests that this particular form of dark matter is concentrate string like magnetic flux tubes containing galaxies around it like pearls in a necklace. It has been indeed reported that the nearby space around Earth does ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 796 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? not contain dark matter [14]. On the other hand, evidence for string like magnetic flux tubes containing dark matter and connecting galactic clusters has been reported [13]. Even if dark matter candidates are detected, they could be fake since the particles in question could be created in atmosphere in the collisions of highly energetic cosmic rays creating hadrons of M89 hadron physics: certain mysterious cosmic ray events with ultra high energies could be indeed due to M89 hadron physics [21]. Independent positive reports come from groups studying the data from Fermi satellite in the hope of identifying particles of galactic dark matter. 3 sigma evidence has been represented for the claim that there is signal for dark particle with mass around 130 GeV [12]. Gamma pairs would be produced in the annihilation of particles with this mass. Another group [6] reports a signal at the same energy but argues that due to kinematical effects this signal actually corresponds to a particle with a mass of about 145 GeV: similar signal was earlier reported earlier by CDF at Fermilab [1]. Also some indications for a signal at 110 GeV is proposed by the latter group: direct extrapolation to take into account the kinematical effects would suggest a particle at 125 GeV. It has been also claimed that the signal is too strong to be interpreted as neutralino, the main candidate for a WIMP defining dark matter in the standard sense [11]. This is a further blow against standard SUSY. If the Higgs candidate is actually a pionlike state of scaled up variant of hadron physics, one can ask whether M89 hadron physics could be active in the extreme conditions of the galactic center and lead to a copious production of pionlike state of M89 physics annihilating and decaying to gamma pairs. References Particle and Nuclear Physics [1] More details about the CDF bump. more-details-about-cdf-bump.html, 2011. http://resonaances.blogspot.com/2011/06/ [2] M. R. Buckley and D. Hooper. Are There Hints of Light Stops in Recent Higgs Search Results? http://arxiv.org/pdf/1207.1445v1.pdf. [3] CDMS collaboration. Results from the Final Exposure of the CDMS II Experiment. http://arxiv. org/abs/0912.3592, 2009. [4] DAMA Collaboration. New results from DAMA/LIBRA. http://arxiv.org/abs/1002.1028, 2010. [5] Xenon100 collaboration. Dark Matter Results from 100 Live Days of XENON100 Data. http: //arxiv.org/abs/1104.2549, 2011. [6] M. Raidal E. Tempel, A. Hektor. Fermi 130 GeV gamma-ray excess and dark matter annihilation in sub-haloes and in the Galactic centre. http://arxiv.org/abs/1205.1045, 2012. [7] R. Foot. A CoGeNT confirmation of the DAMA signal. http://arxiv.org/abs/1004.1424, 2010. [8] F. Gianotti. ATLAS talk at Latest update in the search for the Higgs boson at CERN, July 4, 2012. https://indico.cern.ch/getFile.py/access?contribId=1&resId=1&materialId= slides&confId=197461, 2012. [9] J. Incandela. CMS talk at Latest update in the search for the Higgs boson at CERN, July 4, 2012. https://indico.cern.ch/getFile.py/access?contribId=0&resId=0&materialId= slides&confId=197461. [10] M. Slezak and L.Grossman. Beyond Higgs: Deviant decays hint at exotic physics. New Scientist, 214(2873), 2012. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 797 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? [11] T. R. Slatyer J G. Wacker T. Cohen, M. Lisanti. Illuminating the 130 GeV Gamma Line with C. http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.0800, 2012. [12] C. Weniger. A Tentative Gamma-Ray Line from Dark Matter Annihilation at the Fermi Large Area Telescope. http://arxiv.org/abs/1204.2797, 2012. Cosmology and Astro-Physics [13] Giant Dark Matter Bridge Between Galaxy Clusters Discovered. 16412-dark-matter-filament-galaxy-clusters.html", 2012. http://www.space.com/ [14] Serious Blow to Dark Matter Theories? New Study Finds Mysterious Lack of Dark Matter in Sun’s Neighborhood. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120418111923.htm# .T48OkKMJjmA.email, 2012. Books related to TGD [15] M. Pitkänen. Basic Extremals of Kähler Action. In Physics in Many-Sheeted Space-Time. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdclass/tgdclass.html#class, 2006. [16] M. Pitkänen. Construction of elementary particle vacuum functionals. In p-Adic length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/paddark/ paddark.html#elvafu, 2006. [17] M. Pitkänen. Does TGD Predict the Spectrum of Planck Constants? In Towards M-Matrix. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html#Planck, 2006. [18] M. Pitkänen. Does the Modified Dirac Equation Define the Fundamental Action Principle? In Quantum Physics as Infinite-Dimensional Geometry. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_ html/tgdgeom/tgdgeom.html#Dirac, 2006. [19] M. Pitkänen. Massless states and particle massivation. In p-Adic Length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/paddark/paddark. html#mless, 2006. [20] M. Pitkänen. New Particle Physics Predicted by TGD: Part I. In p-Adic Length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/paddark/paddark. html#mass4, 2006. [21] M. Pitkänen. New Particle Physics Predicted by TGD: Part II. In p-Adic Length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/paddark/paddark. html#mass5, 2006. [22] M. Pitkänen. p-Adic Particle Massivation: Hadron Masses. In p-Adic Length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/paddark/paddark. html#mass3, 2006. [23] M. Pitkänen. TGD and Cosmology. In Physics in Many-Sheeted Space-Time. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdclass/tgdclass.html#cosmo, 2006. [24] M. Pitkänen. TGD as a Generalized Number Theory: Quaternions, Octonions, and their Hyper Counterparts. In TGD as a Generalized Number Theory. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/ public_html/tgdnumber/tgdnumber.html#visionb, 2006. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 7| pp. 787-798 798 Pitkänen, M. Is It Really Higgs? [25] M. Pitkänen. The Recent Status of Lepto-hadron Hypothesis. In p-Adic Length Scale Hypothesis and Dark Matter Hierarchy. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/paddark/paddark. html#leptc, 2006. [26] M. Pitkänen. Twistors, N=4 Super-Conformal Symmetry, and Quantum TGD. In Towards M-Matrix. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html#twistor, 2006. [27] M. Pitkänen. Yangian Symmetry, Twistors, and TGD. In Towards M-Matrix. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/tgdquant/tgdquant.html#Yangian, 2006. [28] M. Pitkänen. The Recent Vision About Preferred Extremals and Solutions of the Modified Dirac Equation. In Quantum Physics as Infinite-Dimensional Geometry. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory. com/public_html/tgdgeom/tgdgeom.html#dirasvira, 2012. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Researchl Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.jcer.com

(version 17 October 2014, cite as arXiv:1401.6761 [q-bio.NC]) Consciousness Results when Communication Modifies the Form of Self-Estimated Fitness J. H. van Hateren Johann Bernouilli Institute for Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands e-mail: j.h.van.hateren@rug.nl Abstract The origin and development of consciousness is poorly understood. Although it is clearly a naturalistic phenomenon evolved through Darwinian evolution, explaining it in terms of physicochemical, neural, or symbolic mechanisms remains elusive. Here I propose that two steps had to be taken in its evolution. First, living systems evolved an intrinsic goal-directedness by internalizing Darwinian fitness as a self-estimated fitness. The self-estimated fitness participates in a feedback loop that effectively produces intrinsic meaning in the organism. Second, animals with advanced nervous systems evolved a special form of communication that modifies the way each partner estimates fitness. The resulting change in intrinsic meaning is experienced subjectively as a primary form of consciousness. This primary form is subsequently used to generate, partly through internalized dialogue, more complex forms of consciousness, such as consciousness of the natural and social worlds, consciousness of the self, and language-dependent forms of consciousness. Keywords Self-estimated fitness · Evolution · Active causation · Intrinsic meaning · Dialogue · Subjective experience · Consciousness · Language Introduction Human behaviour is often accompanied by a subjective, conscious experience. There are strong indications that such experiences also occur, to varying degrees, in many animal species. The physical origin of this phenomenon is not understood: there is nothing in basic physics and chemistry that points to the existence of consciousness. It appears to have evolved fairly recently in evolution, because it presumably occurs only in animals with complex nervous systems. Here I will argue that its roots lie much earlier in evolution, as an extension of the basic Darwinian evolution scheme. The extension mixes deterministic and stochastic (random) forms of causation in a fitness-driven feedback loop. The result is an internalization of Darwinian fitness, leading to value and meaning intrinsic to the organism. The more recent development of animals with sophisticated nervous systems enabled a form of communication where this intrinsic meaning is, effectively, exchanged between animals. It is proposed here that the modification of intrinsic meaning, as required during such forms of communication, is accompanied by a subjective experience in the animal. The theory is extended, in a fairly straightforward way, to forms of consciousness that do not require communication between two animals, but occur within a single animal. The theory is strictly naturalistic, requiring only known physical components and mechanisms. The new properties, intrinsic meaning and consciousness, simply emerge from the rather special properties of the extended Darwinian evolutionary mechanism in combination with a particular mix of deterministic and stochastic causation. The article first explains the basic theory and its application to various forms of consciousness, then discusses the unity of consciousness that it implies, and finally discusses its relationship with several other theories of consciousness. Theory The theory presented here consists of a series of steps, some of which have been presented in more detail elsewhere. An overview and a computational analysis can be found in van Hateren (2014a) and an analysis of active causation as a fundamental property of life in van Hateren (2013). The consequences of the theory for agency and free will are analysed in van Hateren (2014c), which also 1 Fig. 1 Origin of intrinsic meaning and consciousness. (a) Deterministic causation, where a system variable or property (‘signal’) is caused by (left arrow) or causes (right arrow) other signals; (b) stochastic causation, initiating new causal chains; (c) modulated stochastic causation, where a non-negative deterministic signal modulates the variance of a stochastic signal; (d) modulated stochastic causation (arrows 1-3 as corresponding to (c)) participates in a feedback loop A where the organism uses an estimate fest of the true Darwinian fitness ftrue to generate behavioural variability. The result is behavioural freedom and an intrinsic goal-directedness in the organism, implying intrinsic meaning; (e) communication between two animals comes in three basic forms, either evaluated directly through ftrue (instrumental), indirectly through fest (meaningful), or aimed at changing the form of fest (formative). The resulting change in intrinsic meaning is conjectured to be experienced subjectively as consciousness by the animal includes a succinct discussion of consciousness. In order to keep the present article self-contained, I will first summarize the theory as it applies to communication between animals, and subsequently present the more detailed material with respect to consciousness. Causation and Self-Estimated Fitness Figure 1 gives a schematic overview of the steps leading to an elementary form of subjective experience. The first point that needs to be appreciated is that there are different forms of causation at work in nature, as illustrated in Fig. 1a-c. In these diagrams, traces (called ‘signals’ below) symbolize system variables or properties, and arrows a causal relationship with earlier or later signals. The most basic form, deterministic causation (Fig. 1a), is also the standard form used in scientific explanations. Earlier signals cause a particular signal in a deterministic, predictable way, and this signal subsequently influences later signals similarly. The signal is thus part of a continuous, uninterrupted chain of causation, like a cog in a clockwork, which implies that it cannot start new causal chains. In contrast, stochastic causation (Fig. 1b), initiates new causal chains by definition, as it is not caused by (identifiable) earlier signals. Its statistical properties, like mean and variance, may be known, but they are constant in time and therefore cannot participate in causation. The unpredictable, individual fluctuations do the causal work. Stochastic causation can arise from thermal and quantum noise, or from disturbances coming from outside the system considered (systems are never completely isolated from their surroundings, not even from very remote parts, see e.g. Berry 1988). Although such noise may be microscopic in origin, it can easily be amplified to macroscopic scales if a system has components interacting in non-linear ways (similarly as in chaotic systems). A form of causation that is midway between deterministic and stochastic causation is illustrated in Fig. 1c. This so-called modulated stochastic causation is a key component of the theory presented here. It consists of two steps. In the first step, earlier signals cause a non-negative deterministic signal (left trace in Fig. 1c). This signal is subsequently used to modulate the variance of a stochastic signal (right trace), which then continues the causal chain (right-most arrow). The mean of the stochastic signal remains constant, and therefore does not participate in causation. The causal work is jointly done by a deterministic component (the varying variance) and a stochastic component (the individual fluctuations). Modulated stochastic causation plays an important role in genetic evolution, because it is a good model for how the stress response of cells modulates their mutation rate (high stress leads to high mutation rates and vice versa; Galhardo et al. 2007; see van Hateren 2014b for the consequences for evolutionary theory). However, it can also be extended to behavioural variability within the lifetime of individual organisms (van Hateren 2013; 2014a, c). I will concentrate on that here, because only the 2 behavioural timescale is relevant for consciousness. Figure 1d shows the basic mechanism. An organism is embedded in a time-varying environment, which includes other organisms. The Darwinian fitness of the organism is defined here, in its most basic form, as the expected number of offspring of the organism over its lifetime. It therefore depends on survival and reproduction. In a less basic form it includes fitness effects through related organisms (such as kin selection) and can involve organisms with shared interests (such as effectuated through social and cultural mechanisms). Note that fitness is defined here in a predictive, probabilistic sense, as a continuously updated expectation value, and it is therefore a function of time. It might fluctuate, for example declining when the organism gets seriously ill, and rising again if the organism recovers and flourishes thereafter. Keeping fitness (ftrue in Fig. 1d) high is a prerequisite for Darwinian evolution. Previous selection must therefore have produced mechanisms in the organism that can be expected to promote fitness, at least on average. Such mechanisms may code directly for suitable properties and behaviours of the organism, or code for properties and strategies that allow it to learn during its lifetime and thereby acquire fitness promoting behaviours, again only on average. Either way, the form of causation is primarily deterministic. However, often the consequences of behaviour are not known in advance, where known is meant in a probabilistic way, as an expectation based on genetic memory established by natural selection in the past, or on physiological and neural memory established by the consequences of previous behaviour. With unknown consequences, the question is then how much behavioural variability is optimal. In van Hateren (2014a) it is argued that, similarly to the way mutation rates depend on cellular stress (which is inversely related to fitness), behavioural variability should also be driven by fitness. When current fitness is high, behaviour is presumably adequate, and it should not change much (low variability), just a little to allow for the possibility to find a behaviour that is even better. When current fitness is low, behaviour is presumably inadequate, and large changes in behaviour (high variability) are necessary in order to avoid the (potentially lethal) consequences of continued low fitness. Behaviour needs to be varied until a behaviour is found that produces higher fitness, upon which variability can be lowered. Model calculations (van Hateren 2014a) indicate that this is indeed an evolvable mechanism. A problem with this scheme is that fitness itself, ftrue, is not available to the organism. It cannot be observed directly, and to determine it would require a detailed simulation of the organism and its interaction with its environment, including other organisms. Such a simulation is clearly out of reach for the organism. However, what it can do is to make an approximate estimate1 of its own fitness, fest, and use that to drive its behavioural variability. The estimate can make use of a large range of indicators the organism could have about itself, such as its physiological state, and its environmental conditions. For example, low fitness associated with an internal lack of nutrients can be inferred from internal state variables, and the presence or absence of nutrients in the environment can be assessed through the organism's senses. The self-made fitness estimate is assumed to be present only implicitly, represented in a distributed way throughout the organism's physiology and nervous system. The way it affects behaviour will be similarly diffuse. Although fest can only approximate ftrue, the better the approximation, the better it can increase fitness. The estimate is therefore under Darwinian selection pressure to be as close to ftrue as possible given the constraints and means of the organism. The loop marked A in Fig. 1d shows this scheme. It is a feedback loop (i.e., with cyclical causation), running through the organism. A continuously updated fest drives behavioural variability, with variability roughly inversely related to fest. This relationship is symbolized by ~1/ fest, although its actual form may be more complicated and is also subject to Darwinian selection. The causation in this loop conforms to the modulated stochastic causation of Fig. 1c (see corresponding arrows marked 1-3; strictly speaking the left trace in Fig. 1c corresponds to 1/ fest, not to fest). Only the variance of the behaviour should be modulated, not the mean, because the part of the behaviour driven by this process is the part for which the fitness consequences are not known. Behavioural change should therefore be undirected, i.e., not into one particular direction rather than another (on average). The directed part of 1 The term ‘estimate’ is used here in the theoretical, technical sense as in estimation theory. It just refers to a variable that approximates another variable. Note that it is devoid of any deliberateness by the organism, it is just present in its physiology. Also note that it is in no way related to the estimates that a scientist might want to make of the true fitness. The latter is part of doing science, whereas the organism's estimate is part of its biological functioning, independent of whether there are scientists or not. 3 behavioural change is under control of the genetic and learned mechanisms mentioned above, which are primarily deterministic. Active Causation and Intrinsic Meaning The fact that modulated stochastic causation takes part in a feedback loop that is indirectly driven by Darwinian fitness (because fest estimates ftrue) has two important consequences (van Hateren 2014a). First, it produces a form of causation for which I have coined the term active causation. The feedback loop produces, each time it is traversed, a behavioural change that is mostly, but not completely stochastic. The tiny part that is not stochastic is due to the fact that the variance is driven by fest. However, this tiny part gradually accumulates, with each time the loop is traversed, into a behavioural trajectory (the sequence of subsequent behaviours) that gradually becomes, statistically, strongly dependent on fest (van Hateren 2014a). The resulting behavioural trajectory is mostly stochastic in its details, but as a whole it can only be understood by the action of fest. In other words, the behaviour as it manifests itself on a longer timescale (many loopings through A) is neither completely deterministic nor completely stochastic, but driven by the organism itself (through its estimate of its own fitness). It is therefore an active form of causation, presumably unique to living systems (van Hateren 2013). Effectively, it provides the organism with some behavioural freedom, i.e., an elementary form of agency (see also Heisenberg 2009). A second consequence of the feedback loop is that it produces a genuine goal in the organism, namely high fest. Whereas high ftrue cannot be seen as a genuine goal of the organism, because it is merely a consequence of an external physicochemical process (selection against low ftrue in the past), this is different for fest. The form of fest is not fixed, as long as its value is sufficiently close to ftrue such that the mechanism using fest is evolvable and evolutionary stable. The feedback loop produces behavioural freedom and agency, replacing the deterministic causation of processes involving ftrue by the active causation of processes involving fest. High fest should therefore be viewed as a genuine goal of the organism. The way by which the organism evaluates fest signifies which internal and external parameters the organism estimates to be important for its own fitness. I have therefore coined the term intrinsic meaning for the specific form of the fest of a particular organism (van Hateren 2014a). Meaning is used here in the general sense of import, significance, value, and purpose, i.e., similar to its use in ‘the meaning of an action’ instead of its use in ‘the meaning of a word’. Intrinsic meaning should be seen as not just a theoretical construct, but as a genuine physical property, evolved through Darwinian evolution and only present in living systems. It is, in principle, not different from other genuine physical properties that only occur in material systems with very special (dynamic) structures, such as the property of high-temperature superconductivity in specific materials, or the property of some spherical objects that they can roll on a plane. The scheme of Fig. 1d is easiest to understand when fest has a simple, one-dimensional form, where it drives a single behaviour and is evaluated in a simple way from the state of the environment and the properties of the organism (see e.g. the computational model in van Hateren 2014a). In more realistic cases, fest would have a range of different inputs, and it would need to drive the variability of a range of different behaviours. Then the partial fitness effects of each input and each behavioural output would need to be taken into account and properly weighted. This will quickly become intractable in realistic cases, where the form of fest is expected to become highly complicated (with complex dynamics involving nonlinearities and memory) and the number of inputs and outputs large and interdependent. The current theory should therefore be primarily seen as a conceptual aid in understanding the phenomena of meaning and consciousness, and not so much as a first step towards a comprehensive quantitative model. Formative Communication and Consciousness The fact that animal behaviour is evaluated through two forms of fitness, passively through ftrue and actively through fest, implies that there are three basic forms of communication possible between animals (van Hateren 2014d). The simplest combinations of these forms are illustrated in Fig. 1e (although in practice different forms will usually mix with different weights and in different combinations for each partner in the communication). Communication is called instrumental when it 4 only involves ftrue. It is deterministic and reflex-like, and does not involve behavioural freedom. Communication is called meaningful when it involves fest. This produces some behavioural freedom, and communication is evaluated depending on the forms of fest, i.e., depending on the intrinsic meaning of the communication to each of the partners. In contrast to ftrue, fest is intrinsic to each animal, and it is therefore in principle under its control and modifiable. This implies that there is a third form of communication possible, called formative. In formative communication the very form of fest is modified, a modifiability symbolized by the oblique arrow through fest in the lower diagram of Fig. 1e. The basic idea is that changing the form of fest can yield fitness benefits for both partners in the communication, for example by forming mother-infant bonds in mammals, and partner bonds in mammals and birds. It works best when there is a stable incentive for cooperation, because modifying the form of fest is inherently a rather risky operation. It can be abused easily by other organisms, and it will endanger the organism when fest strays too far from ftrue. Presumably, it can therefore only operate in an evolutionary stable way by using a range of checks and balances that require a sufficiently advanced nervous system. The main conjecture made in this article is the following. The form of fest embodies the intrinsic meaning of an animal, the value it assigns to its internal and external state. Intrinsic meaning is a genuine physical property, only present in living systems. By modifying the form of fest during acts of communication, a genuine physical property is thus modified. It is known from physics that changing one physical entity may produce another, qualitatively different physical entity. For example, a changing electric field produces a magnetic field. The conjecture is, then, that modifying intrinsic meaning originates another genuine physical phenomenon, consciousness. Thus what is experienced subjectively is associated with the change in intrinsic meaning. Although intrinsic meaning is normally an implicit, distributed property of the organism, parts of it need to be made explicit during acts of formative communication. The reason is that there is no way intrinsic meaning can be transferred directly from one organism to the other: it is a physical phenomenon that only exists within organisms. The only way to exchange intrinsic meaning between communicating partners is therefore indirectly, via regular physical acts of behaviour. The distributed, implicit meaning needs to be extracted and made explicit by the communicator, and coded suitably in physical behaviour. The recipient needs to perceive this physical behaviour, and translate it into a form that can be assimilated into its own, distributed intrinsic meaning. Presumably, subjective experience accompanies the acts of extracting and assimilating intrinsic meaning, which in either case is expected to be modified by the very act. Although there are many ways by which intrinsic meaning may be modified through formative communication, it is assumed here that its evolutionary origin lies in pair-bonding, such as the motherinfant bond in mammals. From this basis, more complex forms of consciousness can be constructed during development, as detailed in the next section. Origins of Various Forms of Consciousness Pair-bonding seems to be the most plausible evolutionary and developmental origin of the subjective experience associated with formative communication. However, whether this is the case is ultimately an empirical question that would need to be assessed in future research. The ways more complex forms of consciousness can be constructed from the basic one as described in this section should therefore primarily be seen as draft proposals. The order and specific paths presented here may be different and more complex in actual organisms: evolution needs to work from existing material and incrementally, and thus adds layer upon layer. What it produces is often sophisticated and tortuous at the same time. Furthermore, many of the mechanisms, in particular the ones involving symbolic communication, will have a strong cultural component, adding to the complexity. Figure 2a shows at (1) the basic pair-bond in a symbolic way. The double-headed arrow stands for a dialogue (two-way, continued formative communication) between two subjects, S1 and S2. As the prototypical pair-bond I will take the human mother-infant bond, which has been particularly well studied (e.g., Trevarthen and Aitken 2001; Reddy 2003). In all of Fig. 2 (except for the languagerelated diagrams in Fig. 2e), S1 stands for the infant and S2 for the adult. The basic bond at (1) produces a simple form of consciousness in S1, a subjective experience of S2 in relation to itself. At (2) the basic bond is used to gradually acquire an internalized version of S2, symbolized by Ŝ2. This 5 Fig. 2 Origin of various forms of consciousness. (a) Basic mother-infant bond (1), with the double arrow a dialogue (continued formative communication, implying subjective experience) between infant S1 and adult S2. S1 gradually (2) internalizes S2 (Ŝ2), and uses an internalized dialogue with Ŝ2 as a source of consciousness even when S2 is absent (3); (b) consciousness of the natural world arises when objects O are first perceived in interaction with S2 (1), and S2 and the interaction are internalized (2), even when S2 is absent (3); this finally results in simulated dialogue with O (4) and its internalized version (5); (c) similarly as (b) for a group G of individuals, leading to consciousness of the social world; (d) similarly as (b) for the self as experienced as an object of attention to S2, eventually leading to an elementary form of selfconsciousness; (e) the first two steps are identical to (b), but in step (3) the direct dialogue S1-S2, and the dialogues S1- Ŝ2 and S2- Ŝ1 are retained, leading to enhanced communication, first iconic (3) and symbolic (4) dialogues about concrete objects, and finally (5) symbolic dialogues about abstract topics X. Scheme (5) without the presence of S2 implies symbolic thought (internalized dialogue between S1 and either Ŝ1 or Ŝ2 about X) internal model of S2 then becomes sufficiently realistic to maintain a (partly simulated) dialogue between S1 and Ŝ2, thus enabling consciousness of S2 without the presence of S2 (3). Although the basic pair-bond is used here to derive more complex forms of consciousness below, it implies an even simpler form of subjective experience. Subjective experience is assumed to accompany any act of formative communication, either as sender or recipient. A dialogue is not strictly necessary, although it is expected to sustain and, through positive feedback, amplify consciousness. Even if S2 is absent, a new-born infant crying in response to a painful stimulus will experience that subjectively according to the present theory, because it is an act of formative communication. It slightly modifies the infant's intrinsic meaning, even if the attempted dialogue fails. The natural world can become part of subjective experience as shown in Fig. 2b. The basic S1-S2 bond is extended with an interaction of S2 with an object O. This is in the form of a (simulated) dialogue, because S2, the adult, has already formed an internalized model of O. Initially, S1 lacks such an internal model, and perceives O without subjective experience (1). However, the internalized version of S2 as formed according to Fig. 2a, Ŝ2, can be gradually extended with the interaction with O (and its implicit version Ô as used by S2), as shown in (2). Once this has become sufficiently realistic, S2 need not be present any more (3). Finally, the intermediate Ŝ2 can fade away, and S1 directly interacts with O (4), using an internal model Ô, or even interacts with this model without the presence of O (5). In either case, the interaction is a simulated dialogue, with a modifying intrinsic meaning accompanied by subjective experience. 6 The social world, symbolized by G, a group of individuals, can become internalized in a similar way as the natural world (Fig. 2c). An obvious difference with O is that G, or at least some members of G, can engage in a genuine dialogue with S1. This makes the interactions and internalized model more complex than in the case of the natural world (although the presence of other living and perhaps conscious species might complicate the latter case as well). Establishing consciousness of the self may proceed according to Fig. 2d. In the dialogue between S1 and S2, the latter will implicitly use an internalized version of S1. Perceiving this is more difficult for S1 than perceiving O as in Fig. 2b. Nevertheless, the behaviour of S2 when paying attention to S1 bears resemblances to when S2 pays attention to O. S1 may perceive this (1) as being the object of attention (Reddy 2003). Once S1 has developed a realistic model of S2, such a model may get extended, by inference, with an internalized model of S1, Ŝ1, as apparently used implicitly by S2 (2). Once this is sufficiently realistic for a simulated dialogue, S2 needs not be present any more (3). Finally, a direct simulated dialogue between S1 and Ŝ1 (4) produces an elementary form of selfconsciousness. Note that self-consciousness as conjectured here does not involve self-referentiality (i.e., there is no circularity): S1 and Ŝ1 are two different entities, with the subjective experience produced, as before, by the formative change in the fest of S1 while communicating with the simulation (model) Ŝ1. Obviously, this change may subsequently lead to an adjustment of Ŝ1, but this is then just the regular cyclicism of feedback, rather than circularity. Symbolic communication may arise as depicted in Fig. 2e. The first two steps are identical to Fig. 2b, establishing a basic dialogic connection with an object O, using an internalized Ŝ2 as intermediary. In contrast to Fig. 2b, the dialogues with S2 and Ŝ2 are maintained even after the possibility of a dialogue with O (implicitly using Ô) has been established. This leads to scheme (3), where for completeness the implicit Ŝ1 used by S2 has been added. This scheme greatly facilitates dialogue about O between S1 and S2, because both maintain internalized versions of each other. In effect, S1 can communicate taking S2's perspective into account, and vice versa. The signs used for communication may initially be similar (iconic) to concrete objects (3), but gradually become symbolic (4), and eventually refer to abstract objects (X, such as categories, social events, and ideas) as well (5). Symbolic communication, particularly in the form of language, is a specialization of humans (Deacon 1997), and presumably requires evolved motivations, such as a propensity for sharing intentionality (Tomasello and Carpenter 2007) and a willingness to cooperate (Richerson and Boyd 2005). A final stage for S1 is to use the scheme of Fig. 2e without the presence of S2. Conscious, symbolic thought then involves an internalized dialogue of S1 with either Ŝ1 or Ŝ2 about X. Symbolic communication and thought will subsequently enhance consciousness of the other, the world, and the self, as complex extensions to the schemes of Fig. 2a-d. The Unity of Subjective Experience In the previous paragraph several forms of consciousness were discussed, and even a single form, say consciousness of the natural world, usually contains a range of components. The question is, then, how there can be unity of consciousness. Figure 3 explains why the theory presented here must lead to such a unity. The organism has only a single ftrue, and therefore also a single fest (barring pathology), and only this single fest can be modified in formative communication. It is this fluidity of intrinsic meaning that gives rise to consciousness. There may be many components contributing to fest (the time-varying states in Fig. 3 that are used by the organism to assess intrinsic meaning), and there may be many behavioural variabilities under control of fest, and there may be many ways the organism can engage in dialogue, all subjectively experienced (as different qualia), but there is only one fest. If all is well, there must be unity of consciousness. How the unity of consciousness is realized in the organism's physiology and nervous system is likely to be opaque. There is no reason for fest to be localized, as all parts of the organism can, in principle, play a role in the system that embodies fest. Obviously, if fest is to be a good estimate of ftrue, it needs to be well coordinated across the organism. However, such a coordination serves the organism's fitness, and should not be seen as a means to ensure unity of consciousness. The coordination is interesting from a scientific point of view in that it provides information on how the organism is realizing its fest, i.e., its intrinsic meaning. But the interpretation would be extraordinarily difficult, because fitness itself is extremely complex for a social and cultural species such as the human one. For 7 Fig. 3 Unity of subjective experience. Organisms have only one true fitness and therefore should have only one estimated fitness fest, and modifying this one fest therefore must lead to a unitary experience. Nevertheless, the form of fest is expected to be embodied in a distributed way, and to be highly complex, with many state variables (of body, mind, and environment) contributing, with the variability of many different behaviours controlled, and with consciousness arising from a variety of internalized and external dialogues (leading to qualitatively different conscious experiences, the qualia) the same reason it may be similarly challenging to integrate neural correlates of consciousness (reviewed in Tononi and Koch 2008) into a coherent picture that could be interpreted within the present framework, i.e., as implementations of fest, the A loop of Fig. 1d, and external and internalized dialogues. Discussion In this article I have argued that consciousness arises from acts of formative communication, usually during dialogue. Formative communication is a special form of communication that modifies the intrinsic meaning as embodied in animals in the form of a self-estimated fitness. Such a fitness participates in a feedback loop that finds a middle ground between determinism and stochasticity, and equips the animal with behavioural freedom in addition to intrinsic meaning. Dialogue and elementary consciousness are assumed to originate from a basic bond, such as the mammalian mother-infant bond. This bond is subsequently used for establishing more complex forms of consciousness, such as consciousness about the natural world, about the social world, self-consciousness, symbolic dialogue with others about concrete or abstract objects (language), and internalized symbolic dialogue (thought). The theory presented here is consistent with Darwinian evolution, although it extends the basic scheme using only extrinsic fitness ( ftrue) with one where an internalized, self-estimated fitness (fest) plays a role as well. The consequence is a scheme that allows for agency, meaning, and consciousness (van Hateren 2014a, c). Fitness implies embodiedness (e.g., Damasio and Carvalho 2013), because without a body there would be no survival, reproduction, and death. The present theory is therefore rather different from purely symbolic and informational approaches to understanding meaning and consciousness (see also Searle 2013). However, the present theory also implies that embodiedness as such is not sufficient for generating meaning and consciousness: embodiedness without the A loop of Fig. 1d would not produce active causation and intrinsic meaning, and therefore also no consciousness in the formative communication of Fig. 1e. Similarly, fitness implies embeddedness and enaction (e.g., Thompson 2007; McGann et al. 2013; Engel et al. 2013), as it is determined to a large extent by how the organism interacts with its environment. This also follows from the way conscious perception of the world is understood here, as in Fig. 2b. Formative communication with O or its internalized version implies modifying fest. It is therefore action-oriented, because Darwinian fitness is ultimately determined by the consequences of action and interaction. But also embeddedness and enaction are not sufficient for generating meaning and consciousness, for the same reasons as stated above. Theories stressing embodiedness and embeddedness often derive a concept of value from elementary life-sustaining processes, such as homeostasis and metabolism. However, this would not work without the value-producing A loop of Fig. 1d, because the basic Darwinian loop (using only ftrue) is inherently value-free, where life and death are just consequences of the process, not related to values and goals (see also Davies 2009, pp. 86-87, and van Hateren 2014a, c). 8 A recent theory (Tononi 2008; Edlund et al. 2011) proposes to explain consciousness as an inherent property of integrated information, i.e., the excess information in the system produced by the integration of its parts over the total of the individual parts. The theory presented here presumably implies that a conscious organism would score high on integrated information, because fest is unitary and distributed at the same time (as illustrated in Fig. 3). Complex forms of consciousness, such as involving symbolism (Fig. 2e), would require well-connected, but complex subsystems. However, the reverse is not true. A system which scores high on integrated information, but without the A loop of Fig. 1d, would completely lack meaning and consciousness according to the present theory. From the present perspective it is clear that, although consciousness is a phenomenon that has evolved through Darwinian evolution, the question what fitness benefits it would yield is slightly illposed. The fitness benefits come primarily from formative communication, enabling a flexible adjustment of the self-estimated fitness of the communicative partners. This may facilitate cooperation to such an extent that it presumably produces higher fitness in each partner than they would have had without the dialogue, at least on average. Subjective experience is then just the phenomenon that accompanies a modifying intrinsic meaning. Both intrinsic meaning and consciousness are presumably unique to life, the former a property of all forms of life (van Hateren 2013), and the latter limited to specific species with a sufficiently social lifestyle and a sufficiently advanced nervous system. Nevertheless, advanced forms of consciousness may indeed produce fitness benefits by themselves. The strong reliance on internalized forms of dialogue, particularly in humans, suggests such additional fitness benefits, for example by enabling more flexible and deliberate forms of engagement with the physical and social worlds (van Hateren 2014c). The high levels of formative communication found in humans, as in language and symbolic thought, are accompanied by correspondingly high levels of consciousness alongside extraordinary fitness. References Berry MV (1988) The electron at the end of the universe. In: Wolpert L, Richards A (eds) A passion for science. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 39-51 Damasio A, Carvalho GB (2013) The nature of feelings: evolutionary and neurobiological origins. Nat Rev Neurosci 14:143-152 Davies PS (2009) Subjects of the world: Darwin's rhetoric and the study of agency in nature. University of Chicago Press, Chicago Deacon TW (1997) The symbolic species: the co-evolution of language and the brain. Norton, New York Edlund JA, Chaumont N, Hintze A, Koch C, Tononi G, Adami C (2011) Integrated information increases with fitness in the evolution of animats. PLoS Comput Biol 7:e1002236 Engel AK, Maye A, Kurthen M, König P (2013) Where’s the action? The pragmatic turn in cognitive science. Trends Cogn Sci 17:202-209 Galhardo RS, Hastings PJ, Rosenberg SM (2007) Mutation as a stress response and the regulation of evolvability. Crit Rev Biochem Mol Biol 42:399-435 Heisenberg M (2009) Is free will an illusion? Nature 459:164-165 McGann M, De Jaegher H, Di Paolo E (2013) Enaction and psychology. Rev Gen Psychol 17:203-209 Reddy V (2003) On being the object of attention: implications for self–other consciousness. Trends Cogn Sci 7:397-402 9 Richerson PJ, Boyd R (2005) Not by genes alone: how culture transformed human evolution. University of Chicago Press, Chicago Searle J (2013) Theory of mind and Darwin's legacy. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 110(suppl. 2):1034310348 Thompson E (2007) Mind in life: biology, phenomenology, and the sciences of mind. Belknap Press, Cambridge Mass Tomasello M, Carpenter M (2007) Shared intentionality. Dev Sci 10:121-125 Tononi G (2008) Consciousness as integrated information: a provisional manifesto. Biol Bull 215:216242 Tononi G, Koch C (2008) The neural correlates of consciousness: an update. Ann NY Acad Sci 1124:239–261 Trevarthen C, Aitken KJ (2001) Infant intersubjectivity: Research, theory, and clinical applications. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 42:3-48 van Hateren JH (2013) A new criterion for demarcating life from non-life. Orig Life Evol Biosph 43:491-500 van Hateren JH (2014a) Active causation and the origin of meaning. Biol Cybern, doi:10.1007/s00422-014-0622-6 van Hateren JH (2014b) Intrinsic estimates of fitness affect the causal structure of evolutionary change. Biol Philos, doi:10.1007/s10539-014-9463-x van Hateren JH (2014c) The origin of agency, consciousness, and free will. Phenomenol Cogn Sci, doi:10.1007/s11097-014-9396-5 van Hateren JH (2014d) Three different forms of animal communication: instrumental, meaningful, and formative. Preprint available at https://sites.google.com/site/jhvanhateren/ 10

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1192 Article What is Reality in a Holographic World? James Kowall* Abstract The nature of a holographic world is described. This scientific description of the world is based upon the assumptions of modern theoretical physics. These natural assumptions are inherent in any unified theory, such as string theory, and in any theory of the creation of the world, such as inflationary cosmology. At their most basic level, these are the assumptions of the equivalence, uncertainty and action principles, along with the second law of thermodynamics. Any world consistent with these fundamental principles is easily shown to be a holographic world. The mathematical consistency of such a holographic world also implies something about the nature of consciousness. If that mathematical consistency is followed to its logical conclusion, in the sense of the Gödel incompleteness theorems, this scientific description of the world also has something to tell us about the nature of reality. What this scientific description of the world tells us about the nature of reality is compared to what mystics have told us about reality throughout human history. Key words: Reality, holographic world, consciousness. What is reality? There is no immediately obvious way to answer this question. Any answer that we can give depends upon our assumptions. There is no way to avoid the fact that any answer to this question is assumption dependent. There is however a natural way to approach this question, which is the scientific method. The scientific method is fundamentally based upon observation. We observe the world, and we deduce properties of the world from our observations. From our observations of the world we then construct theories about the world. Those theories allow us to make predictions, which we can test in subsequent observations of the world. It is often stated that the scientific method is based upon experimental observation, but that is not quite correct. An experimental set-up is always a part of the world we perceive. The experimenter is as much a part of the world we perceive as is the experimental apparatus. What about the nature of consciousness? Is the nature of consciousness a part of the same world we perceive with our observations of the world? If we assume that consciousness arises within the same world with the things perceived within that world, that assumption is a paradox of self-reference, and leads to logical inconsistency, since it implicitly identifies consciousness with something that consciousness perceives within that world. * Correspondence: James Kowall, PhD, MD. E-mail: jkowall@earthlink.net ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1193 How can the nature of consciousness be identical to something that consciousness perceives within the world? Science has no answer to this question, since the scientific method is based on observation, and assumes the existence of consciousness. Robert Ellis has written an article entitled "Taking the 'Meta' out of Physics", which is the focus of attention of this focus issue. Early in this article he states that "quantum physics cannot give us metaphysical information, and that metaphysical claims supported by quantum physics are at best an irrelevant distraction from the Buddha's key insights". What exactly are those key insights of the Buddha? Who is the one that is having those insights? Who is the knower of that knowledge? It is just not possible to answer these questions unless we understand the nature of consciousness, which of course is our own insight into this question concerning the Buddha's insights. In a similar way, our insights into the nature of quantum physics also depend on the nature of our consciousness. Ellis admits he is unaware of the full implications of modern physics. In a dismissive way he states "as a philosopher, I do consider myself qualified to comment on the general conditions surrounding knowledge claims. It seems that quantum physicists have become gods, if they really claim to be able to support metaphysical beliefs from finite scientific observation". But the question is still the same: what is the true nature of the knower? Simply stated, it is impossible to take the 'meta' out of physics since it is impossible to take the observer out of physics. It is impossible to take the knower out of knowledge. All metaphysical discussions are inherently about the nature of the observer and the knower. There is no physical theory of the observer because consciousness cannot be explained physically. Everything our physical theories of the observable world describe is some physical thing observed by an observer. The observer is inherent in our most basic scientific principles, like the principle of equivalence. All the scientific debate about the correct interpretation of quantum theory is about the nature of observation. Both physics and metaphysics place the observer at the center of this discussion. If Ellis wants to take the 'meta' out of physics he either has to take the observer out of physics (which is impossible) or he has to give a physical explanation of the nature of consciousness (which is equally impossible). Until he does one or the other, what he has to say about the Buddha's insights, or anyone else's insights, does not make any sense. Stephen Hawking addresses this conundrum about the nature of observation and quantum theory (and all physical theories) with the following two statements: "I don’t demand that a theory correspond to reality because I don’t know what it is. Reality is not a quality you can test with litmus paper. All I’m concerned with is that the theory should predict the results of measurements" (Penrose 2005, 29.1). "Personally, I get uneasy when people, especially theoretical physicists, talk about consciousness. Consciousness is not a quality that one can measure from the outside" (Penrose 1999, 171). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1194 We may find this state of affairs uneasy, but the fact remains it is impossible to discuss any physical theory of any physical world without mentioning the observer of that world. When we refer to the observer of our own physical world, we are referring to our own consciousness. This is the key insight that Ellis does not seem to realize. It is not even possible to discuss the nature of a physical world without the observer of that world. There is a modern physical theory of the physical world that almost seems to demand of us that we discuss the nature of the observer of that physical world. This kind of physical description of the physical world is inherent in all modern unified theories, which unify the fundamental forces of nature. This kind of physical description of the physical world is also inherent in all modern theories of the creation of the physical world. Our modern physical theories of the physical world incorporate a fundamental principle, referred to as the holographic principle of quantum gravity (Susskind 1994, 1). This is a very strange principle precisely because we cannot understand what it has to tell us about the physical world unless we examine what it has to tell us about the observer of that world. Simply stated, without the observer of that world, there is no physical world. Susskind tells us that he is taking us into a "very strange territory" with the holographic principle (Susskind 2008, 298-299). He is some of what he has to say about it: "…the three-dimensional world of ordinary experience – the universe filled with galaxies, stars, planets, houses, boulders, and people – is a hologram, an image of reality coded on a distant two-dimensional surface. This new law of physics, known as the Holographic Principle, asserts that everything inside a region of space can be described by bits of information restricted to the boundary. To put it in concrete terms, consider the room I am working in. I in my chair, the computer in front of me, my messy desk piled high with papers I'm afraid to throw out – all that information – is precisely coded in Planckian bits, far too small to see but densely covering the wall of the room. Or instead, think of everything within a million light-years of the Sun. That region also has a boundary – not physical walls, but an imaginary mathematical shell – that contains everything within it: intersteller gas, stars, planets, people, and all the rest. As before, everything inside that giant shell is an image of microscopic bits spread over the shell. Moreover, the required number of bits is at most one per Planck area. It is as if the boundary – office walls or mathematical shell – were made of tiny pixels, each occupying one square Planck length, and everything taking place in the interior of the region is a holographic image of the pixilated boundary." Susskind describes how all the information for the images of a physical world that appear within space is encoded in terms of bits on information on the boundary surface of that space. In this sense, that bounding surface acts just like a holographic viewing screen that projects perceivable images to a focal point of perception (Bousso 2002, 28). If that bounding surface is a sphere, then that focal point of perception is at the central point of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1195 view of that sphere. That physical world of images demands of us that we inquire into the nature of the consciousness of the observer present at that focal point of perception. The scientific method is fundamentally about the things we observe in the world. In the language of modern theoretical physics, those things can always be deconstructed into the nature of information and energy. The scientific method is reductionistic in nature, and reduces all things in the world down to the fundamental nature of information and energy. The remarkable thing about modern theoretical physics is that it ultimately reduces all information and energy down to its fundamental holographic nature. This holographic description of the world is fundamentally expressed as the holographic principle of quantum gravity (Susskind 2008, 290). Any scientific description of the world that incorporates the equivalence, uncertainty and action principles, along with the second law of thermodynamics, can easily be shown to be a holographic world. The holographic nature of the world describes at the most fundamental level possible how all information and energy is encoded in the world. But what does that fundamental description of the world tell us about the fundamental nature of consciousness? What is the nature of the consciousness that perceives that holographic world? There is a straightforward answer that can be given to this question if we have the fortitude to follow the scientific method to its logical conclusion. The answer is not an easy one to accept, but it is the only answer possible if we require our scientific description of the world to possess the quality of logical consistency. There is something fundamentally wrong with the conventional scientific concept of the world held in the minds of most scientists. That concept is the idea that the world consists of matter and energy that exist within space and time. The usual idea of matter and energy is the atomic hypothesis, which says that at a fundamental level all matter and energy is composed of point particles, like the electron and photon. Point particles exist at points of space, and trace out paths through space over the course of time. Quantum theory only extends the classical idea of a point particle to a sum over all possible paths. But those point particles only exist if there is a pre-existing space and time for particles to exist within. This is the kind of scientific paradigm described by any quantum field theory. The usual idea of that pre-existing space and time is flat Minkowski space-time geometry (Zee 2003, xv). A quantum field Ψ(x,t) is interpreted as a probability amplitude that specifies the probability that the particle excitation of energy associated with that field can be measured at position x and time t in that pre-existing space-time geometry. The probability for the particle to propagate between two space-time points is expressed in terms of a sum over all possible paths that connect those two points (Zee 2003, 9). Quantum field theory assumes the existence of a vacuum state from which all particle excitations of field energy arise (Zee 2003, 19). The nature of the vacuum state is conceptualized as empty space, and is the ground state from which all excited states arise. A particle is an excitation of field energy. The nature of a force is conceptualized as an ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1196 exchange of particles between other particles (Zee 2003, 27). Quantum field theory is more complicated than ordinary quantum mechanics due to virtual particle-antiparticle pairs that can arise within the path of any point particle (Zee 2003, 55). The path of any particle is drawn as a diagram that connects two space-time points (Zee 2003, 41). In terms of diagrams, the virtual particle-antiparticle pairs are drawn as closed loops. Closed loops can arise even within the vacuum state, and are interpreted as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs that are created out of nothing and annihilate back into nothing within a short period of time due to quantum uncertainty in energy (Zee 2003, 57). The vacuum state is a state of zero energy, but due to quantum uncertainty, the vacuum state has quantum fluctuations in energy. In the sense of energy conservation, the virtual antiparticle carries an equal but opposite amount of energy as the virtual particle, so that the total energy of a vacuum fluctuation adds up to zero (Penrose 2005, figure 30.11). Relativity theory is also a field theory, since it describes the gravitational field, but it is a most unusual field theory, since the gravitational field describes the dynamical nature of space-time geometry. In relativity theory space-time geometry is dynamical, and there is no pre-existing space and time for point particles to exist within. The gravitational field and the curvature of space-time geometry are represented in terms of a metric (Penrose 2005, 17.9), which describes the amount of proper time that passes on any path of a point particle that connects two space-time points (Penrose 2005, figure 17.15). The concept of proper time is analogous to length along the path in a curved space-time geometry. The problem with the conventional scientific paradigm of quantum field theory is that it contradicts relativity theory, which describes the dynamical nature of space-time geometry. Relativity theory describes the gravitational field. That field describes the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1197 dynamical nature of space-time geometry, but it cannot be quantized. According to relativity theory, there is no such thing as a pre-existing space and time for point particles to exist within. If there was such a thing, then relativity theory could be quantized, and would result in the point particle we call the graviton. The graviton would exist at a point in that pre-existing space and time, which according to relativity theory doesn't exist. This is the ultimate chicken and egg problem. There is just no way to quantize relativity theory as a field theory (Zee 2003, 434; Susskind 2008, 331). The second problem with this conventional scientific paradigm is the problem of consciousness. In a strange way, the problem of consciousness is related to both relativity theory and quantum theory. Relativity theory is based upon the principle of equivalence, which expresses the equivalence of all observational points of view. Quantum theory says that everything that is observable in the world is specified by an observable value of the quantum state, and is observed by an observer. Relativity theory expresses the equivalence of all observers, present at all points of view. The problem with the conventional paradigm of point particles that exist within some pre-existing space and time is its logical inconsistency, which results in paradoxes of self-reference. There is a logical contradiction if consciousness somehow arises within that pre-existing space and time from the behavior of the point particles that exist within that space and time, since ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1198 consciousness is what observes the behavior of those point particles. This logical contradiction is the idea that the observer somehow arises from the behavior of some observable thing that it can observe, which is a paradox of self-reference, since it equates the observer with an observable value (Goldstein 2005, 165; Penrose 1999, 112). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1199 The Gödel incompleteness theorems prove that the only way any science, based on the logical consistency of mathematics, is free of these paradoxes of self-reference, is if the observer is 'outside' of whatever observable values it observes, just like the viewer of a computer viewing screen is always 'outside' of the computational information displayed on that viewing screen. A logical contradiction arises if consciousness somehow arises in the same world that behavior arises within, since consciousness is what observes that behavior (Penrose 2005, 34.6). The second incompleteness theorem proves any consistent mathematical system as complex as counting natural numbers can never prove its own consistency. The 'proof of consistency' is always 'outside'. (Goldstein 2005, 183). Consciousness is always 'outside', since it is what 'knows' about that logical consistency. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1200 The holographic principle explains how this is possible. The consciousness of the observer that views the viewing screen is always present at a point of view that is outside the viewing screen. That presence of consciousness does not arise in the same world that behavior arises within. That behavior arises on a viewing screen from the way information is encoded on the viewing screen, and the way energy flows through that world over a sequence of events, as viewing screens are animated like the frames of a movie (Penrose 2005, figure 17.1). As energy flows, information is coherently organized into animated forms of information. Those forms appear three dimensional since they are holographic. Animated forms of information are displayed on the viewing screen over a sequence of events, and the forms tend to replicate in form due to coherent organization. Coherent organization is what allows for self-replication of form over a sequence of events displayed on viewing screens. Forms coherently organized on the viewing screen are projected like images to a focal point of perception (Penrose 2005, figure 15.13). The consciousness of the observer is always outside the screen, present at a point of view. What screen? What observer? What exactly are we talking about? Where exactly is the screen? Where exactly is the observer? There is no way to answer these questions without the principle of equivalence. Relativity theory is fundamentally based on the principles of relativity and equivalence. The principle of relativity expresses the constancy of the speed of light as observed from all points of view. The principle of equivalence expresses that every force is equivalent to an accelerating frame of reference. We can always place an observer at the origin of any frame of reference. An accelerating frame of reference always has an event horizon, which is a two dimensional surface that is as far as the observer can see things in space due to the constancy of the speed of light. The surface of the event horizon is the viewing screen. This is usually represented in terms of a Penrose diagram (Penrose 2005, 27.12), which describes the nature of the 'observable world' as observed from the central point of view of that accelerating frame of reference. The key insight of the holographic principle is that an accelerating frame of reference, with an observer present at the central point of view, can arise even within empty space. As the observer arises, an event horizon also arises, which is a far as the observer can see things in space due to the constancy of the speed of light (Penrose 2005, figure 27.16). Where does the point of view of the observer arise? Where does the two dimensional surface of the event horizon arise? They both arise in empty space. Forces are inherently geometrical in nature since they are equivalent to accelerations, as observed from the point of view of an accelerating frame of reference. That accelerating frame of reference always has an event horizon, which is a two dimensional surface that is as far as the observer present at that central point of view can see things in space due to the constancy of the speed of light. The principle of relativity expresses the constancy of the speed of light observed by all observers present at all points of view in empty space. The equivalence of any force with an accelerating frame of reference expresses the equivalence of all points of view in empty space (Greene 1999, 61). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1201 The equivalence of all points of view in empty space is explicitly demonstrated in relativity theory with general focusing and projection theorems (Bousso 2002, 26, 36), which prove the number of fundamental degrees of freedom in any region of space are defined upon a bounding surface of space. The information content for those degrees of freedom is measured by the area of the bounding surface, and can always be projected to a central point of view, which is a focal point of perception. The bounding surface is an event horizon, which is as far as the observer present at that central point of view can see things in space. Every accelerating frame of reference has an event horizon, which is as far as the observer can see things. This relationship was discovered when the entropy of black holes was first calculated. Entropy measures disordered information, which is inherently related to disordered kinetic energy. If too many degrees of freedom are excited in some spherical region of space, the region becomes very massive and must gravitationally collapse into a black hole with an event horizon. The entropy of the black hole is proportional to the surface area of the event horizon. This relationship is easily shown (Susskind 2008, 152). The only assumptions necessary are the equivalence and uncertainty principles, and the second law of thermodynamics. Any world that incorporates these basic scientific principles must be holographic. Why is the holographic principle implied in such a world? In quantum theory, if we want to observe the behavior of a point particle as it moves through space, we have to use some kind of radiation, such as light, which is electromagnetic radiation. We shine the radiation at the particle, and observe how the radiation scatters off the particle. We can only know about the position and the motion of the point particle because of the scattered radiation we observe. Quantum theory tells us that if we want to look at smaller distance scales we have to use higher frequencies of radiation, since the distance scale we can probe with light is set by the wavelength of the light, λ, which is related to the frequency of the light waves, ν, and the speed of light, as c=λν. In quantum theory, a higher frequency of vibration corresponds to a higher energy, as E=hν=hc/λ, and so we must use higher energies to look at smaller distances. This is where relativity theory comes in. At some point, we focus so much energy into such a small region of space that we create a black hole. Once the black hole is created, the only radiation we can see scattered off the surface of the black hole is Hawking radiation. If we shine higher energy radiation at the black hole, we only create a bigger black hole, with a larger event horizon, which only radiates away lower frequencies of Hawking radiation back to us (Susskind 2008, 268). There is an ultimate distance scale that we can probe, which is the Planck length. This is the length that corresponds to a frequency of radiation where enough energy is concentrated into a small enough region of space that a black hole is forced to form. Relativity theory demands that it is impossible to probe smaller distance scales than the Planck length. The reductionistic tendency to probe smaller distance scales with larger energies must finally come to an end at the Planck scale. The way that reductionistic tendency comes to an end is inherently holographic in nature. All the information for the black hole is encoded on the surface of the event horizon. An event horizon is a two dimensional surface that encodes quantized bits of information. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1202 Relativity theory predicts event horizons. The event horizon of a black hole is a two dimensional surface of radius R where the acceleration due to gravity is so strong that even light cannot escape. The radius of the event horizon is given in terms of the mass of the black hole M, as R=2GM/c2, where G is the gravitational constant and c is the speed of light. This result follows from the acceleration due to gravity on the surface of a gravitating body of mass M and radius R, g=GM/R2. The acceleration of gravity is so strong at the event horizon that even light cannot escape. No physical signal that originates from inside a black hole can ever cross the event horizon. It is instructive to examine this relationship a bit further. The classical equations of motion for an object, like a point particle, are usually expressed as Newton's law, which states that the force F applied to that object is equal to its mass m times its acceleration a, or F=ma. The other law Newton discovered is the law of gravity, which states the force of gravity applied to an object of mass m by a gravitating body of mass M, when the two objects are separated by a distance R, is given by F=GMm/R2. Einstein postulated the principle of equivalence based upon the fact that gravitational mass is the same as inertial mass, and so the force of gravity is equivalent to an accelerating frame of reference. The acceleration of gravity due to a gravitating body of mass M at a distance R from that body is independent of the mass m of a particle that the gravitational force acts upon, and is given by a=g=GM/R2. The reason the gravitational field can be conceptualized as the curvature of space-time geometry is precisely due to the fact the force of gravity is always equivalent to an acceleration. An acceleration is geometrical in nature, just as position in space and velocity through space are geometrical in nature. There is an easy way to determine the radius of the event horizon from classical principles (Susskind 2008, 48). The concept of escape velocity is inherent in both classical mechanics and relativity theory, and represents the amount of kinetic energy needed to overcome the potential energy of gravitational attraction. The amount of gravitational potential energy at the surface of a gravitating body of radius R and mass M experienced by a particle of mass m is given by PE=−GMm/R. In classical physics, the kinetic energy of that particle as it moves away from the gravitating body with velocity v is given by KE=½mv2. The particle just escapes if it has just enough kinetic energy to overcome the gravitational attraction, which is determined by total energy E=KE+PE=0, and gives the escape velocity as v2=2GM/R. For a black hole, we equate escape velocity with the speed of light, v=c, and determine the radius of the event horizon as R=2GM/c2. There is an easy way to see how the event horizon of a black hole encodes quantized bits of information. The energy of a Hawking photon radiated away from the event horizon is given by E=hc/λ. The amount of gravitational potential energy that photon experiences at the surface of the event horizon is given by PE=−GmM/R. The 'effective mass' of the photon is related to its energy by E=mc2. A photon is only bound to a black hole since its potential energy of gravitational attraction outweighs its kinetic energy, just like an electron bound to a proton by the electromagnetic force. The electron can orbit the proton in a circular orbit of radius r. The ground state orbit of a hydrogen atom is specified by an electron wave function with a wavelength λ=2πr, as a single wavelength fits into the circumference of the orbit. This wavelength determines the amount of energy needed to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1203 ionize the electron, as it escapes away from the proton (Feynman 1963, I 38-5). In a similar way, a photon that is gravitationally bound to a black hole has a wavelength set by the radius of the event horizon, and has a similar 'ionization energy'. The smallest quantized bit of information radiated away from the black hole is a photon with wavelength equal to the circumference of the event horizon, or λ=2πR, which gives that photon an energy of E=hc/2πR. That is the smallest bit of energy the black hole can emit, just like an ionized electron that escapes away from its ground state orbit around a proton in a hydrogen atom. As that photon is emitted, the radius R=2GM/c2 of the event horizon decreases, since energy is radiated away from the black hole, and the mass M of the black hole decreases by an amount ∆M=m=E/c2=h/2πRc. The emitted photon carries energy away from the black hole, which results in a decrease in the radius of the event horizon as ∆R=2G∆M/c2=2Gh/2πRc3. The area of the event horizon is A=4πR2. The change in area of the event horizon that corresponds to this change in radius is given by ∆A/A=2∆R/R=8Gh/c3A, or ∆A=8Gh/c3=16πℓ2, where ℓ is the Planck length. The natural definition of a Planck area is a=4πℓ2. As a quantized bit of information is radiated away from the black hole, the area of the event horizon decreases by four Planck areas. If we imagine that four Planck areas act like a pixel on a screen that encodes a quantized bit of information, then the total number of bits of information encoded on the event horizon, b, is the surface area divided by the area of a pixel. This is exactly the kind of relationship that Hawking found. The correct relationship is given by b=A/4ℓ2. The above argument is the heuristic explanation of Bekenstein (Susskind 2008, 152). Hawking's argument is mathematically more sophisticated, and uses quantum field theory in a curved space-time geometry. At an intuitive level, Hawking's explanation is based upon the apparent separation of virtual particle-antiparticle pairs at the event horizon, as observed by a distant observer (Susskind 2008, 171; Penrose 2005, figure 30.11). That apparent separation of virtual pairs at the horizon is inherently related to the encoding of quantized bit of information on the horizon, with one bit of information encoded per pixel on the screen. The two dimensional surface of the event horizon acts as a holographic viewing screen that projects the three dimensional images of things observed in space to a focal point of perception. Both the event horizon and the observer arise within empty space. Where is that focal point of perception? In the sense of inflationary cosmology, everything perceived within that space, which includes the black hole, is observed from the central point of view of a cosmic event horizon (Susskind 2008, 304). What about the usual interpretation of quantum field theory that any quantum field is a probability amplitude that species the probability of measuring some quantized physical property of the point particle at some point in space-time? That probability amplitude corresponds to the projection of a holographic image from the surface of the horizon, which acts as a holographic viewing screen. All the information is defined on the viewing screen, and is perceived at a point of view. The point particle description of physical reality in terms of a quantum field theory is a holographic description. The more fundamental description is the viewing screen description, since that is where all the fundamental bits of information are defined. In this sense, the propagation of a light wave is like the projection of an image from the viewing screen to the central point of view. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1204 The quantum field Ψ(x,t) that describes the propagation of a light wave is a probability amplitude that specified the probability with which a photon can be measured at position x at time t. The quantum field has both wave-like properties and particle-like properties due to the sum over all possible paths of the photon (Susskind 2008, 77). In terms of the viewing screen description, all the information for the photon is coherently encoded on the viewing screen, and the measurement of any photon property in space is like the holographic projection of an image from the viewing screen to a point of view. The nature of time arises as images are animated over a sequence of events, like the frames of a movie. Relativity theory expresses the fundamental nature of consciousness through the principle of equivalence, which expresses the equivalence of observers present at all points of view in empty space. Contrary to what is often assumed in the scientific literature, quantum theory does not express the fundamental nature of consciousness. The fundamental nature of quantum theory is the uncertainty principle, which describes how something is created from nothing, as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs spontaneously arise from the vacuum state. Virtual pairs appear to separate at an event horizon, as observed by the observer present at the central point of view. That separation of matter from antimatter, called Hawking radiation, is the essence of the holographic principle (Penrose 2005, 30.7). Inflationary cosmology (Penrose 2005, 28.4) is another idea that has something very important to tell us about the nature of consciousness. Inflationary cosmology explains the nature of the big bang event, which is how the universe is created, and is supported by a lot of observational evidence, but it inevitably leads to the conclusion that multiple universes exist. Multiple universes are referred to as an ensemble of universes, which describe all possible ways in which the universe can be created and evolve. An ensemble of universes is understood both in the sense of quantum theory and thermodynamics. Every possible way in which the universe can be created and evolve is described by a state of information. Quantum theory describes how quantized bits of information are encoded in any state of information, and thermodynamics describes how states of information evolve over time. The holographic principle of quantum gravity explains how information is encoded on the surface of an event horizon, which acts as a holographic viewing screen, with one fundamental bit of quantized information encoded per fundamental pixel on the screen. An ensemble of universes describes all possible ways in which information can be encoded in an initial state and evolve over time. An ensemble of universes is often described as 'bubbles in the void'. The surface of a bubble is called a cosmic event horizon (Susskind 2008, 435). In an exponentially expanding universe like ours, there is always a cosmic event horizon, where the universe at that point appears to expand at the speed of light, as observed by the observer present at the central point of view. Since nothing can ever travel faster than the speed of light, that horizon is as far out as that observer can see things in space. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1205 The exponential expansion of the universe implies a cosmological constant, which in the sense of quantum field theory arises from vacuum energy (Zee 2003, 434). That universal expansion is caused by 'dark energy', or vacuum energy, which causes the universe to repel itself, and is a kind of anti-gravity. The universe exponentially expands from the big bang event due to that repulsion. Dark energy arises from the vacuum state due to quantum uncertainty. This is usually described as the virtual creation of particleantiparticle pairs, or a closed-loop process. Virtual particle-antiparticle pairs are created out of nothing, and normally annihilate back into nothing within a short period of time, as specified by the uncertainty principle. In some sense, the virtual antiparticle carries an equal but opposite amount of energy as the virtual particle, so that the total energy of this virtual process adds up to zero (Penrose 2005, 30.7). Virtual pairs appear to separate at a cosmic event horizon, as observed by the observer at the central point of view of that spherical surface, which is how a universe of matter is created. The cosmic event horizon inflates in size from the big bang since there is an instability in amount of dark energy, due to a phase transition that occurs as the universe expands and cools, similar to super-cooled liquid water that freezes into ice. The big bang event is only a spontaneous eruption of energy from the vacuum state that occurs due to quantum uncertainty and the nature of that universal repulsion. A cosmic event horizon is like an inflating bubble in the void, which is the nature of the universe. The void is the empty background space that the universe is created within. The void is the ground state, or the vacuum state, from which all excited states arise (Penrose 2005, 28.4). In the sense of the holographic principle, those excited states are states of information defined on an event horizon. A state of information for the universe is defined on a cosmic event horizon. It is instructive to examine thermodynamic principles more closely and how they relate to the holographic principle. Every possible event horizon is a possible state of the universe. That is where all the information for the universe is defined, with one bit of information per pixel on the screen. Those surfaces encode information, and are states of information. If that information is encoded with a binary code, like a sequence of 1's and 0's, then a surface with area A encodes a total number of bits of information b=A/4ℓ2, and the total number of ways to arrange all of that information is given by N=2b. Each pixel encodes either a 1 or a 0, and there are N ways to arrange that information. In quantum theory, the entropy of any system in any distinct thermodynamic phase of organization is given by S=klogN, where N is the number of distinct quantum states that give rise to the macroscopic appearance of the system in that distinct phase of organization. The entropy of a black hole measures all possible arrangements of information for any system. We conclude that the entropy of a black hole behaves like SBH=kA/4ℓ2 (Penrose 2005, 27.10). Thermodynamics is a description of how energy tends to flow from a hotter to a colder body, as a hotter body radiates away more heat. Thermodynamics is also a description of how information in any system becomes organized into distinct thermodynamic phases of organization, which gives rise to a distinct macroscopic appearance of that system. The distinct macroscopic appearance arises from the way information is organized at a microscopic level. For example, a system of water molecules can become organized into the macroscopically distinct phases of organization of either a gas or a liquid. A gas of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1206 hot water vapor can condense into liquid water if the temperature is lowered, which is called a phase transition. A system of water molecules that condenses into liquid water has less entropy than the system in the form of hot water vapor, since the number of quantum states that corresponds to the system in the form of liquid water is less than the number that corresponds to the form of water vapor. The entropy of a gas of hot water vapor is higher than the entropy of liquid water, since there are more distinct quantum states for the water molecules in that phase that give the same macroscopic appearance. How is entropy related to the flow of energy? The entropy of any system is a measure of disordered information, and is inherently related to disordered kinetic energy. By a system, we mean some distribution of matter and energy that occupies a region of space. A gas of hot water vapor is such a system. If we put a bunch of water molecules inside a box, each water molecule has a certain position within the box, and moves with a certain velocity, which defines a microscopic state for the water molecules inside the box. We know from quantum theory that those position states and velocity states are quantized, and must take on discrete values. Those discrete values arise from probability amplitudes, and reflect the number of distinct wavelengths that can fit into the length, L, of the box. Momentum is quantized as p=h/λ, and the requirement of an integral number of wavelengths inside the box, L=nλ, quantizes momentum as p=nh/L, where n is an integer. If the velocities of the molecules are great enough, that system of water molecules is in the macroscopic form of hot water vapor. As the water molecules collide into each other, they tend to scatter into random directions of motion. The second law says this gas of hot water vapor will come into thermodynamic equilibrium when its entropy is maximal, and the motion of the water molecules is as random as possible. Maximal entropy for this system occurs when the water molecules randomly move through all possible positions within the box, and randomly move with all possible velocities. The only constraint on the system is the volume of the box, and the temperature of the gas of water vapor. That temperature is a measure of the average kinetic energy of the water molecules. Each direction of motion for each water molecule is a degree of freedom that contributes to the amount of kinetic energy carried by that molecule, and defines temperature in terms of kinetic energy. If a water molecule moves with an average velocity v in some direction, it carries an average amount of kinetic energy KE=½mv2, which by definition is set equal to KE=½kT, where T is the absolute temperature. If the total number of quantum states that gives rise to the macroscopic appearance of a hot gas of water vapor inside a box at temperature T is N, then the entropy of that gas is S=klogN (Penrose 2005, 27.3). If the temperature is lowered, that gas of hot water vapor can condense into liquid water. How does this happen? The water molecules move around inside the box, collide with each other, and scatter off each other. But the water molecules also attract each other due to their electromagnetic energy of attraction, which arises from an uneven distribution of electric charges in space. Positive electric charge is located at an atomic nucleus, and negative electric charge on the electrons. Positive charges attract the negative charges. That is the force that holds a molecule together, but is also the force of attraction between different molecules. There is always a balance between the average amount of kinetic energy any molecule carries and its electromagnetic attraction to the other molecules. If ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1207 there is too much kinetic energy, which is reflected by a high temperature, the molecules cannot bind together, since their average velocities are greater than an escape velocity. That escape velocity is determined when total energy E=KE+PE=0. If the temperature is lowered, the average velocity may fall below that escape velocity, and the molecules can bind together. The critical point occurs when the average velocity is equal to the escape velocity, and defines the critical temperature at which the phase transition occurs. The concept of escape velocity is valid for both microscopic and macroscopic bound states. When an electron binds to a proton in a hydrogen atom, the electron's velocity must fall below escape velocity for the bound state to form. When two protons fuse together to form an atomic nucleus, the velocity of the protons must also fall below escape velocity. As any two particles bind together, the velocity of those particles must fall below escape velocity. If the velocity is initially greater than escape velocity, the only way that binding is possible is if some of that kinetic energy is radiated away. That energy is typically radiated away as a photon of electromagnetic radiation. As an electron binds to a proton, a photon is radiated away. As two protons fuse together, a photon is radiated away. The only reason the sun burns bright and shines with the energy of electromagnetic radiation is due to photons radiated away as protons fuse together inside the sun. Protons fell together from the big bang event under the influence of gravitational attraction to form the sun. As any bound state forms, energy is radiated away, which is the only way the velocity of the particles that fall together can fall below escape velocity. It is instructive to examine how bound states form. The best example is a hydrogen atom, which is an electron bound to a proton under the influence of the electromagnetic force. The total energy of that system is given by E=KE+PE. If the total energy is positive, the system is unbound, and if negative, the system forms a bound state. All possible energy levels of the bound state are quantized. Quantization of energy follows from quantization of momentum, since p=h/λ. An integral number of wavelengths is required to fit into the circumference of any bound state orbit. If that orbit is circular with a radius r, the lowest energy level is defined by λ=2πr, which defines the ground state. The electron is not allowed to radiate away all of its kinetic energy and collapse at rest on top of the proton, since that would imply an infinite amount of energy by the uncertainty principle ∆p=h/∆r. If there is no uncertainty in position, then there is infinite uncertainty in momentum. A point particle occupies no space. At this level, quantum uncertainty in position is the only reason a hydrogen atom occupies space (Feynman 1963, I 38-6). At a deeper level, point particles are impossible, since they imply infinite energy (Susskind 2008, 331). Macroscopic systems can undergo phase transitions, and form bound states, which are macroscopically distinct phases of organization. A gas of hot water vapor forms a bound state as it condenses into liquid water. This happens naturally as the temperature of the environment is lowered, and the system of hot water vapor radiates away heat into the environment. Heat tends to flow from the hotter to the colder object, and as the temperature of the environment is lowered, heat is radiated away into the environment. The heat radiated away is disordered kinetic energy, radiated away in the form of infrared photons. As heat is radiated away, the velocity of the molecules decreases, and they have a greater tendency to bind together under the influence of the attractive electromagnetic ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1208 force between water molecules. As their velocities fall below an escape velocity, they tend to bind together into the bound state of liquid water. The bound state only forms if disordered kinetic energy is radiated away into the environment. The phase transition only occurs if heat is radiated away from the system. As the bound state forms, the total entropy of the water molecules and the environment tends to increase, due to the disordered kinetic energy radiated away into the environment (Penrose 2005, 27.7). What happens if that system of water molecules gravitationally collapses into a black hole? A black hole is the system and its environment in its maximally disordered form, with maximal entropy. The black hole is a maximally disordered state that arises from maximal gravitational collapse. The black hole is the bound state that gives maximal entropy. Maximal entropy is a measure of the total number of possible arrangements of information for any system and its environment. The macroscopic appearance of a black hole is no more fundamental than the appearance a system takes on with the macroscopic appearance of a gas of hot water vapor or liquid water. What is fundamental? If we understand the nature of entropy for a black hole, then we understand the fundamental microscopic level at which all information is quantized. Quantum gravity is about how information is defined at the fundamental level of quantized space-time. A black hole is the key that solves the puzzle. We already know from the holographic principle that information is encoded on the surface of the event horizon. The total number of bits of information encoded is b=A/4ℓ2, which gives the black hole an entropy of SBH=kA/4ℓ2. That is the maximal entropy possible for any system holographically defined on the screen. Black hole entropy tells us about the maximal number of arrangements of information for any possible system. Black hole entropy is maximal since both the system and its environment are holographically defined on the screen. The holographic principle implies both system and environment are defined on the screen. Hawking also calculated the temperature of the event horizon of a black hole as observed by a distant observer, and found that kT=hc3/16π2GM. The other way to express this is as kT=hc/8π2R, where R is the radius of the event horizon. In thermodynamics, the value E=kT is a measure of the amount of disordered kinetic energy in any system per degree of freedom, and defines temperature in terms of energy. A degree of freedom is like a bit of information defined on the screen. Hawking found the smallest bit of information that can escape away from a black hole is a photon with energy E=hc/8π2R. The photon is radiated away in the sense of thermal blackbody radiation. The encoding of information on the event horizon is inherently related to the separation of virtual pairs at the horizon. The temperature of a solar mass black hole is about 10−7 degrees Kelvin. But the formula kT=hc/8π2R also applies to a cosmic event horizon. The radial size of the universe at the time of the big bang event was about a Planck length, R=ℓ, which gives the big bang event a temperature of about 1032 degrees Kelvin. The current temperature of the universe, measured with the observed spectrum of microwave radiation left over from the big bang, indicates a temperature of 2.7 degrees Kelvin. The universe has cooled since the big bang since it has expanded. If the universe continues to expand indefinitely, its temperature will approach absolute zero as its size approaches infinity, called the heat ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1209 death of the universe. In an exponentially expanding universe with dark energy, there is always a cosmic event horizon, where the universe at that point appears to expand at the speed of light. Eventually all other matter and energy in the universe will cross the cosmic event horizon, and the universe will only contain dark energy, and nothing else. The current measured rate of exponential expansion of the universe indicates the size of the cosmic event horizon is about 15 billion light years, which gives it a temperature of about 10−30 degrees Kelvin. The second law ultimately describes how heat flows from the big bang event to the heat death of the universe. The big bang event is the hottest state of the universe, and a maximally inflated cosmic event horizon is the coldest possible state. Inflationary cosmology tells us the total energy of the universe is zero, since the universe arises from the vacuum state as a spontaneous eruption of energy, due to the virtual creation of particle-antiparticle pairs. Those virtual pairs are created out of nothing and normally annihilate back into nothing, with a total energy that adds up to zero. Virtual pairs appear to separate at the cosmic event horizon, as the antiparticle appears to cross the horizon. That separation is how a universe of matter is created. How can the total energy of a universe of matter add up to zero? The answer is gravitational attraction. The negative potential energy of gravitational attraction cancels out all forms of positive energy, like mass energy and kinetic energy. Even the dark energy that is responsible for the exponential expansion of the universe is canceled out by gravity. Everything ultimately adds up to zero. The holographic principle explains how all the information for the universe is encoded on the surface of the event horizon. That encoding of information is inherently related to the separation of matter from antimatter at the horizon. The holographic principle is the only known way to unify relativity theory with quantum theory, and unify the equivalence principle with the uncertainty principle. It is explicitly demonstrated in string theory, which is our best unified theory. String theory is the only consistent theory we have that quantizes gravity (Greene 1999, 135). String theory has a 'point particle' kind of description, which is the description of vibrating loops of string, and is similar to a quantum field description. But string theory also has a 'dual' description, which is the viewing screen description (Susskind 2008, 290). The viewing screen is an event horizon, or a two dimensional surface that encodes pixilated bits of information. Each fundamental pixel on the viewing screen encodes a quantized bit of information. The images of the things that we observe in our usual three dimensional world, like images of point particles, are holographically projected from the viewing screen to a central point of view. The probability of measuring those measurable images is inherent in the probability amplitudes that are calculated with a quantum field theory. Unified theories like string theory assume the existence of an empty background space. It cannot be stressed strongly enough that this empty background space is the nature of the vacuum state, or the ground state from which all excited states arise. Those excited states of information are defined on the surface of an event horizon, as observed by an observer at the central point of view. This empty background space is not the same as our usual 3+1 dimensional space-time, which only has a holographic reality. String theory is only consistently defined as a quantum theory in a ten dimensional background space, due to an anomaly in the quantized spectrum of energy levels in any other dimensionality, which ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1210 invalidates Lorentz invariance (Susskind 2008, 339). But these extra dimensions are exactly what is needed to unify all the fundamental forces with gravity. String theory unifies all the fundamental forces through compactification of extra dimensions. The laws of the universe arise from the symmetry of empty space, like conservation of momentum that arises from translational symmetry of empty space, and conservation of angular momentum that arises from rotational symmetry of empty space. The symmetry of empty space expressed by relativity theory is the principle of equivalence (Greene 1999, 61), which expresses that all forces are inherently geometrical in nature, and are equivalent to accelerations. Every force is equivalent to an accelerating frame of reference in empty space. An event horizon always arises from the point of view of the observer at the center of that frame of reference, and is as far as the observer can see things in space, due to the constancy of the speed of light. A cosmic event horizon is a surface where the universe appears to expand at the speed of light, as observed from the central point of view of that sphere. Since nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, that surface is as far out as that observer can see things in space. Strsoing theory unifies the fundamental forces of the universe with gravity through the compactification of extra dimensions. Electromagnetism is unified with gravity with compactification of an extra fifth dimension, and the strong and weak forces with compactification of another extra five dimensions (Susskind 2008, 339). The symmetry inherent in unification is expressed by the principle of equivalence. All the fundamental forces are equivalent to an accelerating frame of reference, and express the equivalence of all points of view in empty space. An implication of the principle of equivalence is the effects of all forces disappear for an observer in a state of free fall through empty space. Unification expresses this symmetry of empty space. In relativity theory, a force is always equivalent to an acceleration. A path through space followed by a point particle is determined by a geometrical principle, which is the path of least action. In relativity theory, action is equivalent to proper time (Penrose 2005, 17.8, 20.1). We imagine particles carry clocks with them, and the amount of time that passes in the particle's rest frame is its proper time. Particle motion is determined by the path that minimizes the action, which is also the path that maximizes the amount of proper time. Time appears to run more slowly on a clock in motion due to time dilation, but appears to run more rapidly for an observer in an accelerating frame of reference (Greene 1999, 37, 74). For example, time appears to run faster on a clock above the surface of the earth as observed by an observer at the earth's surface, due to the force of gravity. It is instructive to briefly review these two effects. The first effect is time dilation. Imagine that the particle's clock consist of two mirrors, and a photon bounces back and forth between the mirrors (Greene 1999, 39). Each bounce of the photon off a mirror is a tick of the clock. If the mirrors are separated by a distance L in the y-direction, the amount of time that passes by with each tick as observed in the particle's rest frame, and as the photon moves at the speed of light, is ∆τ=L/c. From the point of view of another observer, that time interval is ∆t. If the particle appears to move in the x-direction with velocity v, then in a time interval ∆t, the particle will appear to move a distance ∆x=v∆t. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1211 The total distance, D, the photon appears to move as it makes one tick is given by the Pythagorean theorem D2=L2+(∆x)2=c2(∆τ)2+v2(∆t)2. The speed of light is a constant, so from the point of view of the other observer D=c∆t. It is a simple matter to rearrange these terms, which results in the effect of time dilation (∆t)2=(∆τ)2/(1−v2/c2). From the point of view of the other observer, time appears to run more slowly. The second effect arises with accelerated motion. Imagine that a spaceship accelerates through empty space with an acceleration rate a=g. A clock is placed in the front of the spaceship and an identical clock in the back of the spaceship, separated by a distance x. Imagine the clock in the front of the spaceship emits a flash of light every ∆τ seconds. An observer at the back of the spaceship measures the arrival of each flash of light. That observer compares the time interval ∆t between the arrival of each flash of light with the time interval recorded on the clock in the back of the spaceship, which is ∆τ, since the clocks are identical. The flash of light appears to arrive early, since the spaceship accelerates while the flash of light travels at the speed of light from the front clock to the back clock, and so the observer at the back of the spaceship observes that the front clock appears to run fast. The easiest way to calculate how much the front clock appears to run fast is to use the Doppler effect (Feynman 1963, II 42-9), which gives ∆t=∆τ/(1+gx/c2). Another way to see this is to use the equivalence principle. Consider a photon that falls in a gravitational field. The gravitational potential energy of an object of mass m at a height x above the surface of the earth is given by PE=mgx. If a photon with energy E=hν falls from a height x down to the surface of the earth, that photon gains an amount of potential energy ∆E=mgx. That photon has a 'gravitational mass' specified by E=mc2=hν, and so ∆E=hνgx/c2. As the photon falls in the gravitational field its frequency increases by an amount ∆E=h∆ν, which gives ∆ν=νgx/c2. The energy of the photon at the surface of the earth relative to its energy at a height x above the earth's surface is given by E'=hν'=h(ν+∆ν)=hν(1+gx/c2), which is the same as ∆t=∆τ/(1+gx/c2) if we identify the frequency of vibration with an inherent rate of oscillation as ν=1/∆τ. The principle of equivalence tells us there is no way to distinguish the effects of a gravitational field from an accelerating frame of reference. The acceleration due to gravity on the surface of the earth is g=GM/R2, where M is the mass and R is the radius of the earth. If we have a clock on the surface of the earth and an identical clock at a height x above the surface of the earth, the clock at the higher elevation appears to run faster by an amount ∆t=∆τ/(1+gx/c2). The clock at the higher elevation appears to run faster due to its equivalence to a clock in an accelerating frame of reference. How do we discover the action principle from these two effects? Einstein tells us to look at the proper time interval, which is the amount of ordinary time that passes in the particle's rest frame. Einstein tells us the particle follows a geometrical path through space-time that maximizes the proper time relative to all nearby paths. That path is like the shortest distance between two points in a curved space-time geometry (Zee 2003, 79). If that particle moves in the earth's gravitational field at a height x above the surface of the earth, the time interval measured on the particle's clock as observed by an observer at the earth's surface is ∆t=∆τ/(1+gx/c2). But if that particle moves with velocity v, we also ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1212 have to include the effects of time dilation, which gives ∆τ=∆t(1+gx/c2)(1−v2/c2)½. In the non-relativistic limit we can approximate ∆τ=∆t(1−½v2/c2+gx/c2+…). If we define the particle's action in terms of its mass m and its proper time as ∆S=−mc2∆τ, then ∆S=∆t(½mv2−mc2−mgx)=(KE−PE)∆t. The potential energy includes the mass energy and the gravitational potential energy as PE=mc2+mgx. Einstein tells us the particle will follow a path through space-time that maximizes the proper time interval, or minimizes the action. Kinetic energy arises from time dilation, and potential energy arises in an accelerating frame of reference. Both kinds of energy are purely geometrical in nature. Even the 1/R2 force law, as in g=GM/R2, is geometrical in nature, and arises from the amount of particle flux that crosses the surface area of a sphere (Zee 2003, 27). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1213 The path of least action minimizes the amount of kinetic energy expended by the particle on its path while it maximizes the amount of potential energy preserved on that path, as observed from the point of view of the observer of that motion. Kinetic energy arises from the effects of time dilation, while potential energy arises in an accelerating frame of reference. Time dilation and kinetic energy arise with all motion due to the constancy of the speed of light. Every force is characterized by potential energy and an accelerating frame of reference. The path of least action is the classical path (Feynman 1963, II 19-1), which allows us to recover the classical laws of motion, F=mg=ma, or a=g, which was our initial assumption. We have come full circle. We are back where we started! How is this related to quantum theory? The classical path is the path of least action, but is only the most likely path in the sense of quantum probability. The particle can follow all possible paths, or trajectories x=x(t), but some are more likely than others. Quantum theory instructs us to calculate probability amplitudes z(θ)=exp(iθ)=cos(θ)+isin(θ), where i2=−1 is the unit imaginary number. This remarkable formula is called Euler's formula. The phase angle θ is related to action as ∆θ=2π∆S/h, where h is Planck's constant. We are instructed to sum over all possible paths, and assign each path a probability factor z(θ) that depends on the action for that path. The probability amplitude z(θ) acts like a vector in the complex plane. That vector points in some direction relative to the real axis, with an angle θ. As we sum over all possible paths, those vectors tend to cancel each other out, since they tend to point in random directions. The only paths that do not tend to cancel out are those near the path of least action, which is the path that minimizes the amount of action (Penrose 2005, figure 26.4). The angle θ acts just like a phase angle in an interference pattern. When waves are in phase they add together, and when out of phase they cancel out. The path of least action is the stationary path that has the greatest phase reinforcement, and gives the largest quantum probability (Penrose 2005, 26.6). How is this related to a quantum field? A quantum field amplitude is expressed as a sum over plane waves, Ψ(x,t)=Aexp(2πi[x/λ−νt]), where A is a wave amplitude, λ is a wavelength, and ν is a frequency. This describes a wave oscillation thanks to Euler's formula. The sum over all possible wavelengths and frequencies describes any possible wave. These wave oscillations are describable in terms of a phase angle, just like the probability factor z(θ), where θ=2π(x/λ−νt). This result also follows directly from the non-relativistic action for a point particle ∆S=(KE−PE)∆t=(½mv2−PE)∆t=(p∆x−E∆t), where p=mv, v=∆x/∆t, and E=KE+PE. We can write Ψ(x,t)=Aexp(2πi[px−Et]/h), and make the quantum correspondence that E=hν and p=h/λ. This is still only geometry. Quantum theory is expressed as a sum over all possible paths. Each path is weighted with a probability factor that depends on the action Ψ(x,t)=exp(2πiS/h). For point particle motion the action is written as ∆S=p∆x−E∆t. The only thing that makes quantum field theory more complicated than ordinary quantum mechanics is the closed loops of virtual particle-antiparticle pairs that arise within the path of any particle (Zee 2003, 56). The probability factors embody the uncertainty principle. As the particle moves on a path from an initial position to a final position over the course of an interval of time, the probability factors describe wave motion. If we want to localize the particle within some ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1214 distance interval ∆x, we have to scatter light off the particle. The wavelength of the light determines how much momentum is carried by the light wave as p=h/λ. As the light wave scatters off the particle, there is an exchange of momentum. If we want to localize the particle within a distance interval ∆x=λ, then an amount of momentum ∆p=h/∆x must be exchanged, which is the uncertainty principle (Feynman 1963, I 37-11). The most likely path in the sense of quantum probability is the path of least action, which is the path that minimizes the expenditure of kinetic energy while maximizing the preservation of potential energy, as observed by the observer of that motion. The path of least action is also the path that maximizes proper time. As observed from the point of view of the observer, kinetic energy arises from the effects of time dilation, while potential energy arises in an accelerating frame of reference. The classical path is only a geometrical statement about the most likely path the particle can follow. In the sense of relativity theory, that path maximizes the amount of proper time, and is like the shortest distance between two points in a curved space-time geometry. That space-time geometry is curved purely due to the effects of time dilation, which reflects the principle of relativity, and the effects of an accelerating frame of reference, which reflects the principle of equivalence. The closed loops of virtual particle-antiparticle pairs that arise within any path reflect the uncertainty principle. The whole thing reflects geometry. To construct a quantum state of potentiality requires that we take a sum over all possible paths (Penrose 2005, 26.6). The sum over all paths for point particle motion results in a quantum field theory. Any quantum field theory amplitude, Ψ(x,t), is a probability amplitude that specifies the probability that the point particle can be measured at position x at time t. Quantum field amplitudes are calculated with a sum over all possible particle paths. The path of least action is the most likely path in the sense of quantum probability. We measure a particle-like behavior of the point particle when we measure its position at some moment of time (Susskind 2008, 80). Quantum field amplitudes also exhibit wavelike behaviors due to the sum over all possible paths. Those wave-like behaviors include phenomena like interference patterns. We measure a wave-like behavior when we measure the interference pattern (Susskind 2008, 78). The difficulty in constructing a unified theory is how to unify the principle of equivalence with the uncertainty principle. All unified theories assume the existence of an empty background space, which is the nature of the vacuum state, or the ground state from which all excited states arise. That empty background space is not the same as the usual 3+1 dimensional space-time we are familiar with and observe, which only has a holographic kind of reality. All unified theories are inherently holographic in nature. All the fundamental bits of information for the form of anything observed in the world are holographically encoded on an event horizon, with one quantized bit of information per pixel on the screen. The viewing screen description is the more fundamental description. The viewing screen defines an excited state of information that arises from the vacuum state. The observation of the form of anything in the world is like the holographic projection of an image from the screen to a focal point of perception. Those images are animated over a sequence of events, just like the frames of a movie (Susskind 2008, 305). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1215 String theory, like all unified theories, is inherently holographic in nature. String theory has a point particle like description that is similar to a quantum field theory, which is the description of vibrating loops of string. String theory also has something similar to the virtual particle-antiparticle pairs of quantum field theory, which are virtual stringantistring pairs that arise from the vacuum state due to quantum uncertainty. But there are no real point particles in string theory (Susskind 2008, 335). The fundamental description of string theory is the dual description of the viewing screen. In string theory, the viewing screen is an event horizon that encodes pixilated bits of information. The viewing screen description is the more fundamental description, since that is where all the fundamental bits of information for the world are defined. A point particle, located at a point in three dimensional space at some moment of time, is like a holographic projection of an observable image from a two dimensional viewing screen to a point of view. The probability of observing that image at that point of view is determined by the probability amplitudes in string theory that describe the vibrating loops of string, which are similar to probability amplitudes calculated in a quantum field theory. String theory demonstrates that there is no such thing as point particles that exist in some pre-existing space and time. The primordial nature of existence is the void. The world is holographically constructed within that empty background space. A viewing screen is an event horizon that encodes pixilated bits of information, and always arises from the central point of view of an observer. The images of things in the world are holographically projected to that point of view, and are animated over a sequence of events in the flow of energy, just like the frames of a movie. Quantum theory tells us that the quantum state of the universe is a state of potentiality, which describes all possible paths that the universe can take in its dynamical evolution. Every event is a decision point where the quantum state branches into alternative paths. The path of least action is only the most likely path in the sense of quantum probability. The many world interpretation tells us that each path is actually taken, in the sense that an observer is always present for each path. In the sense of inflationary cosmology, each path of the universe is like a bubble in the void that inflates in size. That bubble is only an event horizon, which is a spherical surface that inflates in size, and always has an observer present at the central point of view of that bubble. A cosmic event horizon is a spherical surface where the universe at that point appears to expand at the speed of light. Since nothing can ever travel faster than the speed of light, the observer at the central point of view can only see things in space as far out as that horizon. Every observer has its own bubble, and is at the center of its own world. The quantum state of potentiality for the universe is a sum over all bubbles in the void, which is a sum over all surfaces. The holographic principle explains how the surface of any bubble encodes information, acts like a holographic viewing screen, and projects images to the central point of view. Images are animated over events in the flow of energy, like the animated frames of a movie. The confusing aspect of consensual reality is each bubble shares information with other bubbles, which is the nature of the perceivable world that we share together. The mechanism by which information is shared is called quantum entanglement (Penrose ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1216 2005, 23.3). Any bubble has an observer present at the central point of view, but those surfaces are pixilated, and encode information. The quantum state of any bubble includes all possible ways that information can become encoded on all the different pixels. A state of information for a bubble is defined by the way information is encoded. Every event is a decision point, which describes all the different ways in which information can become encoded on those pixels. An event is a decision point where the path branches. The path only branches due to all the different ways in which information can become encoded on those pixels. The other bubbles are described by their own states of information. Quantum entanglement describes how the different bubbles interact with each other, as bits of information tend to align together. That alignment allows the different bubbles to share information. What appears to happen in any bubble is connected to what appears to happen in other bubbles to the degree the bits of information in those different states of information interact with each other, align together, and share information. The holographic principle explains the fundamental level at which all information is defined, but it also explains the source of all information, in the same way that inflationary cosmology explains the source of everything in the universe. The source of everything is the void. All excited states of information arise from the vacuum state. The void is the empty background space the universe is created within. The universe is like a bubble in the void. These theories tell us everything arises from the nothingness of empty space as a quantum fluctuation in the zero energy level of the void. We call that spontaneous eruption of energy from the void the big bang event. Information is only encoded on event horizons due to quantum uncertainty with that quantum fluctuation. All information is encoded on surfaces of quantized space-time, which are event horizons in the sense of relativity theory, and define states of information. Information is pixilated on the surface. Each fundamental pixel on the screen encodes a quantized bit of information. A viewing screen is an excited state of information that arises from the void. The encoding of pixilated bits of information on the event horizon only occurs as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs appear to separate at the event horizon. Virtual particleantiparticle pairs are created out of nothing, and normally annihilate back into nothing within a short period of time, as specified by the uncertainty principle. But something very strange appears to happen at the event horizon, as observed by the observer at that central point of view. The virtual antiparticle appears to cross the event horizon, and is not observable to the observer at the central point of view, while the virtual particle appears to move toward the observer, and appears to become a real particle that is observable. Separation of matter from antimatter at the event horizon is how a universe of matter is created. Separation of virtual particles from virtual antiparticles at the event horizon creates a kind of holographic virtual reality, as virtual particles appear to become real (Susskind 2008, 171), and as information is encoded on the viewing screen. Those bits of information tend to coherently align with each other, which makes the surface holographic. Coherent organization arises from alignment of information. Each ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1217 distinct form of information is coherently organized, and tends to hold together over a sequence of events. Coherent organization is the nature of all the distinct things in the world that appear to hold together and self-replicate form. Coherent organization is the only way a distinct form holds together as a bound state of information, which allows for self-replication of form, while its behaviors are enacted over a sequence of events. In the sense of thermodynamics, any macroscopic form is organized within a coherent phase. The nature of coherent organization, as bits of information tend to align together, arises from symmetry breaking. The symmetry that is broken is the symmetry of empty space. Symmetry breaking is how bound states of information form, which allows for selfreplication of form. Energy flows in the sense of thermodynamics. In the usual quantum field theory description of point particles, the particles tend to randomly move around, and tend to scatter off each other in collisions, due to their kinetic energy. But particles also tend to bind together into bound states due to their potential energy of attraction. In the viewing screen description, bits of information tend to randomly flip back and forth, which is the viewing screen analogue of kinetic energy. A pixel that encodes a bit of information in a binary code of 1's and 0's is like a switch that flips back and forth between the 'on' and 'off' position. Bits of information tend to align with each other due to quantum entanglement, which is the viewing screen analogue of potential energy. Spin networks (Penrose 2005, 32.6) demonstrate how this is possible. Quantized bits of information align together as entangled states of spin angular momentum add together. In the same sense as any other quantum theory, the amount of action that separates two events is given by ∆S=(KE−PE)∆t, where KE arises as bits of information flip back and forth, and PE arises as bits of information tend to align with each other. Alignment of information allows bound states of information to form, which is the nature of coherent organization that allows for the formation of animated forms of information that replicate their forms over a sequence of events. That alignment of information spontaneously emerges in the flow of energy, and breaks the symmetry of empty space. Alignment of information arises from symmetry breaking. Rotational symmetry of empty space leads to conservation of angular momentum and quantization of spin angular momentum. If space-time geometry was 3+1 dimensional, only spin angular momentum of point particles would arise, like the spin ½ electron and spin 1 photon. String theory, like any unified theory, assumes the existence of an empty background space. The electromagnetic, strong and weak forces arise from the compactification of extra dimensions, which lead to 'gauge' symmetries (Greene 1999, 124, 374). Any compactified dimension is like another rotational symmetry. Multiple compactified dimensions lead to the encoding of quantized bits of information, but in larger rotational groups than ordinary spin (Greene 1999, 186, 205). Unified theories also assume super-symmetry, which is a strange kind of symmetry. Any point in empty space is located with ordinary commuting numbers and anti-commuting numbers. Greene describes super-symmetry as "just as spin is like rotational motion with a quantum-mechanical twist, super-symmetry can be associated with a change in ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1218 observational vantage point in a quantum-mechanical extension of space and time" (Greene 1999, 172). The encoding of information naturally arises with compactification of extra dimensions in an empty background space due to symmetry. Alignment of information arises as states of information become entangled, like entangled spin states. Entangled states are mathematically represented by the multiplication of states (Penrose 2005, 23.4). The rules of group theory describe how entangled states multiply together, and how spin states combine together (Zee 2003, 468). As entangled states add together, quantized bits of information tend to align together like little magnets, which allows for the formation of bound states of information on an event horizon, as observed from the central point of view. Each pixel on the screen encodes a quantized bit of information. It is instructive to examine how information is encoded with the compactification of extra dimensions. The proto-typical example is the Kaluza-Klein mechanism (Zee 2003, 428). Relativity theory is defined in five space-time dimensions with a compactified fifth dimension. A compactified fifth dimension is rolled-up into a small circle. This is usually compared to the surface of a garden hose, which appears like a one dimensional line when examined from a long distance away, but appears two dimensional when examined up close (Greene 1999, 186). The compactified fifth dimension is rolled-up into a small circle at every point of our usual 3+1 dimensional space-time geometry. Einstein's equations are written in terms of the metric, which measures the curvature of space-time geometry, and is the nature of the gravitational field. But the metric also measures the amount of proper time that passes on the path of any particle through that space-time geometry. The path of least action maximizes the amount of proper time, and is like the shortest distance between two points in a curved space-time geometry (Zee 2003, 79). The remarkable aspect of this procedure is that Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism naturally arise from Einstein's equations with the compactification of the fifth dimension (Zee 2003, 433). The electromagnetic field naturally arises from the components of the metric that describe how that space-time geometry curves into the fifth dimension. Even more remarkable is the nature of electric charge at any point in space-time arises from the compactification of the fifth dimension. Electric charge is nothing more than momentum directed in the compactified fifth dimension at every point of our usual 3+1 dimensional space-time geometry. Fifth dimensional momentum is quantized as p=h/λ, and can be directed in the positive or negative direction. If that compactified dimension has a radius of r, the requirement that an integral number of wavelengths fit into the circumference of that circle, nλ=2πr, quantizes momentum, and quantizes electric charge, as p=nh/2πr. The momentum quantized with the compactification of an extra dimension is similar to a spin variable, since pr=nh/2π is just like spin angular momentum quantized in integral units at every space-time point. The concept of a spin network thus allows us to understand how information is encoded on the surface of an event horizon. Each pixel on the screen encodes a quantized bit of information. Alignment of information naturally arises as spin states become entangled and combine together. The whole thing is pure geometry. The phenomena of quantum entanglement raises certain metaphysical questions about the nature of measurement and observation. These metaphysical questions are at the very center of how we understand quantum theory. There are those that wish to take the meta ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1219 out of physics, but that is not possible. It is impossible to take the meta out of physics since it is impossible to take the observer out of physics. The very nature of physics would not exist without observation. The principle of equivalence is inherently based upon the nature of the observer. All the debate about the correct interpretation of quantum theory is about the nature of observation. The only way to take the meta out of physics is to take the observer out of physics, which is impossible. The only other option is to explain the nature of the observer with a physical theory, but that is equally impossible. Such a physical theory of the observer would give a physical explanation of the nature of consciousness, but no such physical explanation is possible. That is what the incompleteness theorems prove. The observer of a physical world can never be reduced to the way information is physically encoded or coherently organized in that physical world. The observer is always 'outside' of that physical world. The physical body of an experimenter is not the same as the consciousness that is present for that physical body. After quantum theory was formulated, the standard interpretation of quantum theory was proposed, but nobody was very happy with this idea, and it continues to be hotly debated to this day (Penrose 2005, 29.1). The standard interpretation proposes that a measurement is a quantum state reduction (Penrose 2005, 22.1). The conceptual difficulty with the standard interpretation is that a quantum state reduction of entangled spin states violates Bell's theorem (Penrose 2005, 23.3; Shimony 2009, 11). Bell's theorem expresses the expectation that measurable variables physically separated far away from each other should behave independently of each other. Bell's theorem assumes that there is no possibility that the result of a measurement of one variable can effect the measurement of another variable that is physically separated by a large distance. Bell's theorem is explicitly violated in the measurement of physically separated entangled spin variables. The violation of Bell's theorem in the measurement of physically separated entangled spin variables is a conceptual problem, since it is strong evidence that particles do not behave like independent entities after they become physically separated. This demonstrates the impossibility of a locally realistic interpretation of quantum theory. In other words "no physical theory which is realistic and also local in a specified sense can agree with all of the statistical implications of Quantum Mechanics" (Shimony 2009, 2). This is how Shimony describes these conceptual difficulties: "Quantum nonlocality and Relativistic locality−may have less to do with signaling than with the ontology of the quantum state. Heisenberg's view of the mode of reality of the quantum state was−that it is potentiality as contrasted with actuality". He goes on to state: "the domain governed by Relativistic locality is the domain of actuality, while potentialities have careers in spacetime (if that word is appropriate) which modify and even violate the restrictions that space-time structure imposes upon actual events. The peculiar kind of causality exhibited when measurements at stations with space-like separation are correlated is a symptom of the slipperiness of the space-time behavior of potentialities. This is the point of view tentatively espoused by the present writer, but admittedly without full understanding. What is crucially missing is a rational account of the relation between potentialities and actualities−just how the wave function probabilistically controls the occurrence of outcomes. In other words, a real understanding of the position tentatively espoused ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1220 depends upon a solution to another great problem in the foundations of quantum mechanics−the problem of reduction of the wave packet" (Simony 2009, 31). Shimony continues: "something is communicated superluminally when measurements are made upon systems characterized by an entangled state, but that something is information, and there is no Relativistic locality principle which constrains its velocity". He states: "A radical idea concerning the structure and constitution of the physical world, which would throw new light upon quantum nonlocality, is the conjecture−about the nature of space-time in the very small, specifically at distances below the Planck length (about 10-33 cm). Quantum uncertainties in this domain have the consequence of making ill-defined the metric structure of General Relativity Theory. As a result−basic geometric concepts like point and neighborhood are ill-defined, and non-locality is pervasive rather than exceptional as in atomic, nuclear, and elementary particle physics. Our ordinary physics, at the level of elementary particles and above, is (in principle, though the details are obscure) recoverable as the correspondence limit of the physics below the Planck length. What is most relevant to Bell's Theorem is that the non-locality which it makes explicit in Quantum Mechanics is a small indication of pervasive ultramicroscopic nonlocality. If this conjecture is taken seriously, then the baffling tension between Quantum nonlocality and Relativistic locality is a clue to physics in the small". The natural way to understand the nature of quantum nonlocality is with the holographic principle of quantum gravity. Information is not encoded in 3+1 dimensional space-time, but on the two dimensional surface of an event horizon, as observed by an observer at the central point of view. For this formulation to make sense, there is one missing ingredient, which is the many world interpretation of quantum theory (Penrose 2005, 29.1). The many world interpretation of quantum theory, as put forward by Hugh Everett, is considered too far-fetched and too radical an idea by many physicists. Everett was a student of John Wheeler at Princeton. Wheeler's other students included Richard Feynman, who discovered the sum over all paths formulation of quantum theory, and Jacob Bekenstein, who first calculated the entropy of a black hole, and which led to the discovery of the holographic principle. Even today, there's a split in the physics world about the correct interpretation of quantum theory (Penrose 2005, 29.2). The many world interpretation is seen as the natural interpretation by those that accept it. Those that hold onto the standard interpretation see the flaws of that interpretation, and don't like it, but consider the many world interpretation as too far-fetched and too radical an idea. But there is no natural way to understand the holographic principle without it. Quantum entanglement and the violation of Bell's theorem tell us that there really is no such thing as independent entities called point particles that exist in some pre-existing space and time. But we already knew that from the holographic principle. All the bits of information for a particle are encoded on the surface of an event horizon, as observed by the observer at the central point of view. It helps to deconstruct the holographic principle and identify exactly where our usual ideas about the nature of physical reality go wrong. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1221 The simplest case to consider are two entangled spin ½ variables (Penrose 2005, 23.3). In quantum theory a spin 'up' eigenstate is designated by Ψ=|↑>, and a spin 'down' eigenstate by Ψ=|↓>. An arbitrary quantum state of spin is written as Ψ=a|↑>+b|↓>. The parameters 'a' and 'b' are probability amplitudes that specify the likelihood with which the spin ½ variable can be measured in the 'up' or 'down' spin eigenstates. That measurement is a quantum state reduction that reduces the quantum state to either |↑> or |↓>. Spin ½ can only be measured to be 'up' or 'down'. That is what quantum state reduction means. An arbitrary quantum state is like a probability distribution that says with a likelihood determined by the parameter 'a' the spin can be measured to be 'up', and with a likelihood determined by 'b' that the spin can be measured to be 'down'. Those are the only two possibilities. A spin ½ variable can only be measured to be 'up' or 'down', which means the probability amplitudes satisfy a2+b2=1. A spin measurement is a quantum state reduction that reduces the quantum state to either |↑> or |↓>. That measurement requires a choice. Quantum theory says that nature makes her choices randomly. Even if the choice is made randomly, the probability distribution that is measured is not random, which allows for correlation of behavior between different measurements. The classic ‘thought’ experiment is to take an unstable spin zero particle, like a pi-meson, and let it decay into two spin ½ particles. The two spin ½ particles move in opposite directions away from the initial position of the spin zero particle. Let's call those directions R and L. Diagrammatically: L-side (Spin ½)←←(Spin 0)→→(Spin ½) R-side The most general quantum state of a single spin ½ variable is Ψ=a|↑>+b|↓>. When two spin ½ variables interact with each other, their quantum states become entangled, which is mathematically expressed by the multiplication of those quantum states. But the two spins are constrained by the total amount of spin that arises from the pi-meson decay, which is zero. The entangled quantum state of that decay process, which describes a total spin of zero, is written as (Penrose 2005, 23.4): Ψ=a|↑R>|↓L>+b|↓R>|↑L> The total spin has to add up to zero since spin is a conserved quantum number, which arises from rotational symmetry and conservation of angular momentum. For the total spin to add up to zero, if the R-particle is 'up' then the L-particle must be 'down', and if the R-particle is 'down' then the L-particle must be 'up'. Those are the only two possibilities that add up to a total spin of zero. The two spin ½ particles move away from each other. Let’s imagine that one travels to Mars and the other travels to Venus. A clever experimenter on Mars measures the direction of that spin as the particle passes by. There is another clever experimenter on Venus that measures the direction of that spin as it passes by. In the standard interpretation, a measurement is a quantum state reduction. The quantum state can only be reduced to |↑R>|↓L> or to |↓R>|↑L>. Those are the only two possibilities. A measurement is a quantum state reduction that chooses among these ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1222 two possibilities. If the experimenter on Mars measures the particle spin that passes by to be 'up', then the experimenter on Venus must measure the particle spin that passes by to be 'down'. If the experimenter on Venus measures the particle spin that passes by to be 'up', the experimenter on Mars must measure the particle spin that passes by to be 'down'. The results are always correlated with each other since the quantum states are entangled. Quantum entanglement indicates that different measurements, performed by different experimenters far away from each other, are correlated with each other. The results of independent measurements, separated far away from each other, are correlated due to quantum entanglement. Entangled quantum states are reduced together, no matter how far apart the things are that are measured. Those things can be measured on opposite sides of the universe, but as soon as one measurement is performed, the other is also determined. Until the measurement is performed the quantum state is a state of potentiality. Once the measurement is performed the quantum state is reduced. What one experimenter actually measures is determined by what the other experimenter actually measures. It does not matter if the two experimenters are on opposite sides of the universe. The moment the experiment is performed on one side of the universe by one experimenter, the result of the experiment is also determined on the other side of the universe. Einstein referred to this phenomena as 'spooky action at a distance', indicating the presence of a 'ghost'. He was absolutely right. That ghost is a presence of consciousness that perceives whatever appears to happen in its world. That ghost is always present at a point of view, while the images of its world play like movie images on a viewing screen. The holographic principle explains the subjective nature of reality. There is no such thing as objective reality. Susskind describes this state of affairs as: "The objective reality of points of space and instants of time is on its way out, going the way of simultaneity, determinism, and the dodo. Quantum gravity describes a much more subjective reality than we ever imagined" (Susskind 2008, 8). If reality was objective in nature, information in 3+1 dimensional space-time could be encoded on a three dimensional lattice of quantized space, referred to as voxels (Susskind 2008, 295). But information is not encoded in three dimensional space. Information is pixilated, and is encoded on the two dimensional surface of an event horizon, as observed by the observer present at the central point of view of that surface. The encoding of information arises purely from the principle of equivalence, which expresses the equivalence of all points of view in empty space, and the uncertainty principle, which explains how something is created from nothing as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs appear to separate at a horizon. Simply stated, without the observer of that world, there would be no observable world. What if we use the many world interpretation for our system of entangled spin variables? There is no quantum state reduction. Every possible observable state is an actual state that is actually observed by an observer. An observer is present for every possibility. No signal is transmitted across the universe since no quantum state reduction is performed. A quantum state reduction must disturb the universe as the universe is measured. A measurement disturbs the universe since the universe is not the same after a measurement ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1223 is performed. A measurement is a quantum state reduction that reduces the quantum state of potentiality for the universe to an actual state, which is a choice, and in that process of choosing, some of that potentiality is lost. With the many world interpretation, there is no quantum state reduction, there is no choice, and there is never any loss of potentiality. With the many world interpretation, the universe is never disturbed. The natural way to understand the many world interpretation is with the holographic principle. Any possible state of information for the universe is defined on an event horizon, and is observed by an observer present at the central point of view. The event horizon acts like a holographic viewing screen, and defines a state of information. Whatever is observed in that world is like the projection of a holographic image to the central point of view. As that state of information for the world arises, an observer arises at that focal point of perception. The results for the measurement of entangled spin variables by experimenters that are physically separated from each other violates Bell's theorem (Shimony 2009, 11). These results also seem to violate causality, since the results are instantaneously determined in physically separate locations. The problem with Bell's theorem is it assumes the results of two physically separate measurements are independent of each other, and that the two particles behave as independent entities after they become physically separated. Quantum entanglement directly refutes this assumption of independent behavior. Bell's theorem assumes the independent behavior of physically separated particles, but also assumes the independent existence of different observers in the same world with the particles. Those two observers observe the observable values of the particles. There is an implicit assumptions the two observers exist within the same world with the particles. There are two important assumptions lurking in Bell's theorem: 1. The independent existence of multiple particles within the world. 2. The existence of multiple observers within the same world with multiple particles. The holographic principle resolves this paradox in a very straightforward way, since it demonstrates that neither of these assumptions is correct. In a holographic world, all the information for that world is encoded on the surface of an event horizon, which acts as a holographic viewing screen. Each pixel on the screen encodes a bit of information. The event horizon is a spherical surface that is as far out in space as the observer present at the central point of view of that sphere can see things in space due to the constancy of the speed of light. An observer that is not in a state of free fall through empty space, which is to say that observer is in an accelerating frame of reference, observes an event horizon, where all the information for that world is holographically encoded. The event horizon always arises from the point of view of the observer present at the central point of view of that sphere. Every observable value observed in that world is like the projection of an image from the viewing screen to that focal point of perception. All the information for the image is coherently encoded on the screen. A measurement of the spin value of a particle in that world is like the holographic projection of an observable image from the viewing screen to that point of view. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1224 A different observer located at a different point of view observes its own event horizon, which also acts as a holographic viewing screen that encodes bits of information. Each viewing screen defines a state of information. The information encoded on one viewing screen is correlated with the information encoded on the other viewing screen due to quantum entanglement. A measurement of the spin value of the second particle by the second observer is always correlated with the measurement of the spin value of the first particle by the first observer due to the quantum entanglement of bits of information on the different viewing screens. Those states of information are entangled. The two observers do not exist within the same world. Each observer has its own world defined on its own viewing screen. What appears to happen in either world is only correlated with what appears to happen in the other world due to quantum entanglement of bits of information on different viewing screens that define those different worlds, each of which is observed from a different point of view. A viewing screen defines a state of information that is entangled with other states of information. Quantum entanglement is the nature of coherent organization of information. Coherent organization arises as bits of information tend to align together. Spin networks explain how this is possible. Spin angular momentum tends to combine together due to entangled spin states. As spin combines together, the spin variables tend to align together like little magnets. Alignment of information allows information to become coherently organized on a viewing screen, and makes the viewing screen holographic in nature. Alignment of information also allows for correlation of information between different viewing screens. The nature of a spin network follows from the above example of entangled spin variables (Penrose 2005, 32.6). A simple spin network is diagramed by Penrose in figure 32.10 of The Road to Reality, and needs to be consulted in order to continue this discussion. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1225 With the idea of a spin network, we can see that every event is a decision point where the quantum state branches into alternative paths. This is exactly what Penrose diagrams in figure 32.10. As two spin 0 variables decay into two entangled spin ½ variables, and two spin ½ variables combine together, another decision point is formed, and another branch forms. Two spin ½ variables can combine into a spin 0 or spin 1 variable, but spin 1 is more likely than spin 0 (with probability ¾ versus ¼). The difference in probability arises from the different number of spin eigenstates (one for spin 0, two for spin ½, and three for spin 1). A spin 0 variable only has the spin eigenstate of 0, a spin ½ variable has the eigenstates of +½ and −½, and a spin 1 variable has the eigenstates of +1, 0, and −1. As entangled spin states combine together, more decision points form, and more branches form. If an observer is present for any event, then that observer measures the amount of spin in that branch. The key ideas are that every decision point is an event where the path branches, and that an observer may be present for an event to measure the amount of spin in that branch. If an observer is present for every decision point, and for every branch, there is no need for the idea of quantum state reduction, and the many world interpretation is the natural way to understand measurement. In the many world sense, a particular path defines its own world, and an observer is always present for every decision point on that path, or for every event in that world. An observer is present at every decision point, and measures the amount of spin in that path for that event. The only way we can recover the standard interpretation, with the idea of a quantum state reduction, is if an observer is only present for one particular path. The observer still measures the amount of spin on the path at a decision point, but an observer need not be present for every event, and need not be present for every path. The only real difference between the many world and standard interpretations is whether an observer is present at every decision point or not. This obviously has something to do with the nature of consciousness, observation and measurement, or what is actually observed to happen, but not with the nature of physics. The physics of a spin network is exactly the same in either case, since the quantum state of potentiality of a spin network is described by all possible paths that can be drawn in the manner of the diagram of figure 32.10. The key idea is that an event is a decision point where the path branches. The quantum state of potentiality includes all possible paths, which is the same as all possible diagrams. An actual measurement of spin on any particular path at any particular decision point is observed by an observer for that particular event. In the sense of the standard interpretation, that measurement is a quantum state reduction that alters the quantum state of potentiality by truncating all paths that are not consistent with that measurement. That measurement is like a resetting of initial conditions, and so alters the quantum state. Only the paths consistent with that measurement, or with that resetting of initial conditions, remain in the truncated quantum state of potentiality. The quantum state of potentiality, which is like a probability distribution, has changed as a consequence of that measurement, but only in the sense of quantum state reduction. Subsequent measurements are conditional on that measurement, since the truncated ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1226 probability distribution has changed as a consequence of that measurement. The nature of conditional probability, usually stated as Bayes' theorem, has something to do with the memory of events based on observation of events, in the sense all possible subsequent events are dependent on resetting of initial conditions, as occurs with a measurement. The important point about the standard interpretation is that the quantum state of potentiality is only truncated as a consequence of a measurement. There are no new paths created as a consequence of the measurement, only truncation of those paths that are not consistent with the measurement. A quantum state reduction is only a truncation of some possible paths. With the many world interpretation, there is no truncation of the quantum state. There is no quantum state reduction. Every decision point is an event where the path branches, and all possible paths are included in the quantum state of potentiality. An observer is present for every event to measure the amount of spin on that path for that event. If an observer is present for every event, then there is no need for any quantum state reduction. As far as that observer is concerned, there is no way to distinguish this state of affairs from a quantum state reduction, since the physics does not change. There is no possible way for an observer to distinguish many worlds from a single world, since all a quantum state reduction does is truncate some possible paths. In the sense of an interference pattern, the paths that are truncated do not interfere with the observed path. As far as any observer is concerned, there is only one world, which is the observer's own world, within which measurement, or quantum state reduction, appears to take place. A quantum state reduction is referred to as the collapse of the wave function preciously because of the destruction of the interference pattern (Davies 1977, 172). Only those worlds that become entangled, and interfere with each other, can share information. Different worlds that do not become entangled, and do not interfere with each other, do not share information. Those non-interfering worlds only exist in the sense of an ensemble of worlds, which is an essential aspect of any thermodynamic description of the world, as in inflationary cosmology. That ensemble of worlds describes all possible ways in which the universe can initially be created and evolve over the course of time, as energy flows through the universe in the sense of thermodynamics (Davies 1977, 172). The only way to understand how this state of affairs is possible is if the consciousness of the observer in some sense is 'external' to the world that is measured, and if the laws of quantum theory do not apply to the nature of consciousness (Davies 1977, 172). That is exactly what the holographic principle demonstrates. As a world holographically arises on a viewing screen, the nature of consciousness arises at a point of view. That particular observer is only aware of its own world, and is not aware of the other non-interfering worlds. In the sense of the branching of the quantum state of potentiality, those different world are parallel to each other, but do not interfere with each other. In the sense of inflationary cosmology, a cosmic event horizon is like a bubble in the void, which always has an observer present at the central point of view, and at the center of its own world. In the sense of inflationary cosmology, each cosmic event horizon defines its own world with an observer present at the central point of view. The event horizon encodes bits of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1227 information, and acts like a holographic viewing screen. Every viewing screen defines a state of information, with one bit of information encoded per pixel on the screen. A particular event horizon is observed from a particular point of view. With every event, the quantum state that describes a particular event horizon branches. Every event is a decision point where the quantum state branches due to all the different ways in which information can become encoded on all the different pixels. Those different branches of the quantum state for any particular event horizon do not interfere with each other, and define non-interfering parallel worlds. The quantum state of potentiality for the universe includes all possible event horizons, observed from all possible points of view. A state of information for one particular event horizon may interfere with a state of information for another event horizon, as those states of information become entangled. The observer at the central point of view of any particular event horizon observes its own world, as the path of that world branches away from the path of parallel worlds. Every event is a decision point where the quantum state branches. The most likely path, in the sense of quantum probability, is the path of least action. If the path of least action is always taken, then no decision is ever made. That is the natural way for its world to evolve over time. Inflationary cosmology tells us that the flow of energy through the universe begins with a big bang event, and flows in the sense of thermodynamics (Penrose 2005, 27.7), as the universe expands in size from the big bang event. That expansion will finally end with the heat death of the universe. If the universe expands in size indefinitely, its temperature approaches absolute zero as its size approaches infinity. In an exponentially expanding universe with dark energy, all other matter and energy will eventually cross the cosmic event horizon, and that universe will only contain dark energy (Susskind 2008, 437). The universe suffers heat death as its temperature approaches the temperature of the maximally inflated cosmic event horizon. The flow of energy tends to flow from a hotter to a colder object. The universe was hottest at the time of the big bang event, since the cosmic event horizon was smallest at that time (Greene 1999, 356), and its eventual heat death occurs with the largest possible cosmic event horizon. The universe inflates in size due to an unstable process that alters the amount of dark energy, which increases the distance to the cosmic event horizon. As the universe expands it cools, and undergoes a phase transition. The big bang is the state of highest gravitational potential energy, conceptualized as a nearly uniform distribution of matter and energy in space-time geometry (Penrose 2005, 27.11). In inflationary cosmology, the total energy of the universe is zero (Penrose 2005, 28.10), since the negative potential energy of gravitational attraction cancels out all forms of positive energy. A total energy of zero is like an energy that determines an escape velocity (Penrose 2005, 27.11). Matter and energy fall together from the big bang under the influence of gravitational attraction. As the universe expands in size it also cools, and it changes phase. That change in phase is like the burning that occurs as an unstable state of high potential energy transitions to a more stable state, and releases heat. Heat flows from the hotter to colder object, and nothing is colder than the maximally inflated cosmic event horizon (Bousso 2002, 44). Energy flows through the universe in the sense of thermodynamics. Things move around due to kinetic energy, and tend to scatter off each other in collisions as they exchange ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1228 some kind of radiation, which is the nature of a force (Susskind 2008, 162, 328, 346). In quantum field theory, a force is conceptualized as an exchange of particles between other particles. As those particles move around, they tend to scatter in random directions. We measure kinetic energy as heat at the macroscopic level when motion becomes randomly directed at the microscopic level. Things are hotter at the macroscopic level if there is more disordered kinetic energy at the microscopic level. Heat tends to flow from hotter to colder objects since hotter objects radiate away more heat. Heat is some form of radiation that carries away disordered kinetic energy. Things tend to scatter off each other in collisions, but also tend to bind together due to their potential energy of attraction. Bound states form at the microscopic level, but they also form at the macroscopic level, which we call a phase transition. Formation of a bound state alters the balance between kinetic and potential energy. Kinetic energy is radiated away as any bound state forms, just as heat is radiated away from liquid water as ice forms. The formation of a bound state is always like a scattering event with something else in the universe due to that radiation of energy. Only that flow of energy allows form to become transformed into new form. Bound states form through a process of symmetry breaking, which leads to the formation of a more stable equilibrium state through a reduction in the amount of symmetry (Greene 1999, 351). Symmetry breaking involves the alignment of bits of information, just like little magnets that tend to align together (Penrose 2005, 28.1). In the usual physical systems that undergo phase transitions, like liquid water that freezes into ice, the balance between kinetic and potential energy is shifted in favor of potential energy as disordered kinetic energy is radiated away. But that balance can also be shifted if potential energy is added to the system, as occurs when a biological organism adds the high potential energy of a biological molecule to its body through a process of eating, burns that molecule within its body, and excretes away the disordered kinetic energy. All body growth and development requires some kind of biological symmetry breaking, as does the maintenance of body stability (Damasio 1999, 138). Self-replication of the form of a body is only possible within a coherently organized phase of organization. That coherent organization only develops through a process of symmetry breaking. There are two mysteries of the physical world that science has a difficult time to explain. The first mystery has to do with the computational nature of information. All theories of the physical world are computational in nature, and are expressed as equations that relate one physical value to another physical value. A physical value refers to an observable property of some physical thing that can be measured, such as the mass, electric charge, or spin angular momentum of an electron. If we think of the electron as a point particle, its location in space and time are also measurable values. At the most fundamental level possible, those measurable values can be reduced to bits of information, which John Wheeler famously expressed as 'It from bit' (Susskind 2008, 136). In the sense of computer processing, the laws of physics are only computational rules that describe how those bits of information are dynamically processed over a sequence of events. If we think of the physical universe as a computer that processes information, the laws of physics describe how bits of information are dynamically processed over a sequence of events (Susskind 2008, 137). Every event is like a processing cycle that updates the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1229 configuration state of bits of information from one moment to the next moment. The laws of physics, as typically expressed in terms of equations, are like computer programs, or computational rules, that underlie this processing of information. The first mystery of the physical world is about the origin of the information and the origin of the programs that dynamically process that information. If we equate a program with an equation, like Maxwell's equations, the Dirac equation or Einstein's equations, we have to explain where both the information and the programs come from. The beauty of a unified theory, like string theory, is all of these equations naturally arise from fundamental symmetry principles that represent the symmetry of empty space. The most basic symmetry of empty space is general coordinate invariance (Zee 2003, 76), which is usually expressed as the principle of equivalence. Einstein's field equations for the metric naturally arise from general coordinate invariance (Zee 2003, 419). String theory is based on the fact that the only coordinate invariant 'area' is of the world sheet of a string (Zee 2003, 452), just as the only coordinate invariant 'length' is of the world line of a point particle. General coordinate invariance is the fundamental gauge invariance. The U(1), SU(2), and SU(3) gauge symmetries of particle physics naturally arise with compactification of extra dimensions (Zee 2003, 433). Even the Dirac equation arises naturally if we incorporate super-symmetry into the symmetry of empty space. In this sense, the computer programs that describe the dynamical processing of information naturally arise from the symmetry of empty space. The encoding of information also naturally arises from symmetry, since a compactified dimension encodes bits of information like a spin network, or in the sense of loop variables (Penrose 2005, 32.4). The second mystery of the physical world is the second law of thermodynamics, and the origin of order. The second law describes irreversibility, as energy flows from a more ordered to a less ordered state. The only natural way the universe evolves over time from a more ordered state to a less ordered state is if the initial state of the universe is ordered (Feynman 1963, I 46-7). But if the universe begins with a big bang event that is only a quantum fluctuation, there is no natural way to put that order in the initial state of the universe. Only with all possible initial states of the universe (in the sense of an ensemble of universes, or many worlds) will some of those initial states naturally become ordered. The only natural way to have irreversibility is if the initial state of the universe is ordered. How does order arise in the initial state of the universe? If the universe only contained thermal blackbody radiation, it would rapidly come into thermal equilibrium (Penrose 2005, 27.13). Even as the universe inflates in size, if it only contained thermal blackbody radiation, it would rapidly come into thermal equilibrium at a lower temperature as the cosmic event horizon inflates in size. In the sense of inflationary cosmology, the big bang event is only a quantum fluctuation, and the most likely way for that fluctuation to occur is for the universe to only contain thermal blackbody radiation (Zee 2003, 403). But the universe does not just contain thermal blackbody radiation. The initial state of the universe is conceptualized as a nearly uniform distribution of matter and energy (Penrose 2005, 27.11). Most of that matter is initially in the form of a very hot gas of protons and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1230 electrons that are overall electrically neutral (Greene 1999, 346). As the universe expands and cools, the electrons bind to the protons to form hydrogen atoms. The hydrogen atoms gravitationally attract each other and tend to clump together into nebulae, and then into stars, galaxies and planets. Protons within stars tend to fuse together into larger atomic nuclei. As protons fuse together deep within stars, very high energy photons are released, which gives rise to the electromagnetic radiation that is radiated away from the star. The radiation of energy away from the hot surface of stars into colder outer space indicates the universe is not in thermodynamic equilibrium. That radiation of energy reflects the order inherent in the initial state of the universe, which arises from a nearly uniform distribution of protons and electrons early in the history of the universe. The formation of stars that arise as hydrogen atoms tend to gravitationally clump together indicates the universe is not in thermodynamic equilibrium. The formation of stars, and the fusion of protons together deep within stars to form atomic nuclei, reflects that state of thermodynamic disequilibrium, as heat flows from hotter to colder objects, energy flows from more ordered to less ordered states, and total entropy increases. That overall increase in entropy for the universe only arises from the initial ordered state of the universe, with a nearly uniform distribution of protons and electrons. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1231 Total entropy increases as protons fuse together deep within stars (Davies 1977, 92). The most significant source of increased entropy in the local environment of a star is the fusion of protons within the star. The temperature deep within a star is millions of degrees, while the temperature at the star's surface is only a few thousands of degrees. As protons fuse together within a star, the process of fusion releases high energy photons. A photon must be radiated away from the protons for the velocity of the protons to fall below an escape velocity, as the potential energy of nuclear attraction between the protons overcomes their kinetic energy. The fusion of protons into larger atomic nuclei is a kind of nuclear 'burning' of protons. Deep within a star electrons are ionized due to the very high temperature, and matter is in the form of an ionized plasma of electrons and atomic nuclei. A high energy photon released as protons fuse together has an energy in the range of millions of electron volts, which reflects the mass energy of fusion by E=mc2, as about 1% of the mass of a proton is converted into electromagnetic energy. As a high energy photon is released into the ionized plasma, it tends to scatter off the negatively charged electrons and positively charged atomic nuclei. With each scattering event there is a tendency for a high energy photon to become dispersed into lower energy photons. More and more dispersion occurs as those photons make their way out to the cooler surface of the star. Those dispersed photons have a lower energy and a lower frequency as E=hν. The photons that are eventually radiated away from the star only have an energy in the range of an electron volt. The dispersion of a high energy photon into millions of lower energy photons radiated away into space is a huge increase in entropy. But the thermodynamic disequilibrium of a star, with a very hot interior of the star, a cooler surface of the star, and cold outer space, only arises from gravitational collapse. The initial order of the universe is inherent in the gravitational potential energy of a nearly uniform distribution of protons and electrons early in the history of the universe (Penrose 2005, figure 27.10). The difficult thing to explain is how that initial order arises ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1232 if the big bang event is only a quantum fluctuation. Inflationary cosmology postulates an ensemble of universes that include all possible initial states. A thermodynamic ensemble will naturally include some initial states that are highly ordered (Davies 1977, 199). The total entropy of a star and its environment increases as the star radiates away photons into cold outer space. As the star burns, heat is radiated away into the environment, like any other kind of burning. That heat is disordered kinetic energy. Entropy increases due to the disordered kinetic energy carried away from the star by the photons. The system of the star and its environment is not in thermodynamic equilibrium, since total entropy has not yet become maximal. That maximal state of entropy only occurs if the star collapses into a black hole. The black hole is the system of the star and its environment in a maximally disordered state, with maximal entropy. That maximally disordered state is in thermal equilibrium. Hawking radiation is only a kind of thermal blackbody radiation. The largest possible increase in entropy occurs if the star collapses into a black hole. As any system forms a bound state (like liquid water that freezes into ice), the entropy of that system appears to decrease locally. This is only possible due to heat irreversibly radiated away into the environment as the bound state forms. The overall entropy of system plus environment increases due to the heat radiated away. As any system collapses into a black hole, the total entropy of the system plus its environment becomes maximal. The entropy of a black hole is proportional to the surface area of its event horizon. The only way to understand entropy is if all the information for the system and its environment are defined on the surface of an event horizon, which is the holographic principle. The holographic principle tells us that whatever forms we observe in space is like a holographic projection of images from a surface (the viewing screen) to a focal point of perception (a point of view). All the information for that world is defined on the viewing screen, which defines a state of information that (thermo)-dynamically evolves into other states of information as energy flows from more ordered to less ordered states. The problem is how to put order into the initial state. The only natural solution to this problem is to have an ensemble of initial states, in the sense of many worlds. Otherwise, that order has to be put in by hand, as in the hand of God (Penrose 2005, figure 27.21). So far the holographic principle has only been used to explain the connection between unified theories, like string theory, and more conventional theories, like relativity theory and quantum field theories. The more fundamental description of a unified theory is the viewing screen description, and our more conventional theories only give a holographic description of events in the world. A quantum field theory is inherently a description of the behavior of particles, like an electron or a photon, in 3+1 dimensional space-time. That holographic description of events always has a corresponding viewing screen description, where all the fundamental bits of information are defined. The observed behavior of a particle is like the holographic projection of an image from the viewing screen to a point of view, as those images are animated over a sequence of events. We are now about to make the leap from the behavior of particles to the behavior of bodies in the world. This is not a small conceptual leap. The number of protons in the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1233 observable universe is approximately 1080, which corresponds to about 10123 fundamental bits of information, based on the amount of information encoded in a black hole with the same mass (Penrose 2005, 27.13). A similar number arises from the size of the cosmic event horizon at 15 billion light years. A biological body with a mass of 100 kg has about 1029 protons. How can we generalize from the relatively simple behavior of particles to the complex behavior of biological bodies? The answer is coherent organization, which is as valid for the behavior of a biological body as for the behavior of a particle. The form of every observable thing observed in the world is a coherently organized bound state of information. This is as much the case for a particle as for a biological body. It is worth noting the evolutionary concept of the survival of the fittest body follows directly from the concepts of symmetry breaking and quantum probability. A body is a bound state of information that only develops through a process of biological symmetry breaking. The nature of biological symmetry breaking is the balance between potential and kinetic energy in any biological organism is altered in favor of potential energy as potential energy is added to the organism and disordered kinetic energy is radiated away. The addition of potential energy to the organism is what we call eating. All biological development, growth, behavior and survival requires a process of eating, as high potential energy molecules are added to the organism, burned within that body, and disordered kinetic energy is excreted. A body only develops and survives through a process of eating, which is an aspect of biological symmetry breaking. The bodies most likely to survive, in the sense of the survival of the fittest, follows from quantum probability. The most likely path is the path of least action. The path of least action minimizes the expenditure of kinetic energy while maximizing the preservation of potential energy. As energy flows in its universal gradient from the big bang event to the heat death of the universe, those bodies that most efficiently transfer energy down this universal gradient are most likely to survive, since they follow the path of least action. The flow of time arises as energy flows in its universal gradient. It is also worth noting the principle of equivalence, not quantum theory, describes the nature of consciousness. Quantum theory specifies that every observable value of the quantum state is observed by an observer, but has nothing to say about the nature of the observer. The principle of equivalence specifies an observer arises at a point of view in empty space as a world arises on an event horizon. We are now ready for another conceptual leap. What is the nature of a mind? Does a mind arise from a body, or is a body somehow dependent on a mind? Neuroscience implicitly assumes that a mind arises from a body, but that assumption has never been verified. The problem with this assumption is that it assumes matter and energy exist within some pre-existing space and time. The body is assumed to be composed of matter and energy that exist within space and time, and somehow the mind is assumed to arise from the body. We know from the holographic principle that this assumption is incorrect. The other problem with this assumption is that it is too limited to explain the mind. It is impossible to explain the nature of the mind with this assumption. This assumption is a mental model of the world, or a mental concept that arises in a mind. The content of the mind is information content. Behavior and emotional expression arises with the flow of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1234 energy through the world. This mental concept of the world can never explain the nature of consciousness that perceives information and energy in that world. The mind displays an entire world that includes the body. How can the mind arise within that world? How can consciousness arise in the same world the body arises within, since consciousness perceives the entire world that the mind displays? That world includes the body. Even the best neuroscientists in the world, like Antonio Damasio, are confused about the nature of consciousness. Damasio implicitly assumes the world is composed of matter and energy that exist within space and time when he describes the problem of consciousness: "The neurobiology of consciousness faces two problems: the problem of how the movie-in-the-brain is generated, and the problem of how the brain also generates the sense that there is an owner and observer for that movie. The two problems are so intimately related that the latter is nested within the former. In effect, the second problem is that of generating the appearance of an owner and observer for the movie within the movie" (Damasio 1999, 11). Consciousness is only an appearance for Damasio. This assumption places consciousness within the same world matter and energy appear to exist within, which is a paradox of self-reference, and which makes that description logically inconsistent. The observer does not arise within the same world with matter and energy. The holographic principle explains what Damasio calls the 'movie in the mind', except the mind is only a movie of images animated upon a viewing screen. The mind is the viewing screen that displays an entire world, like a bubble in the void. That viewing screen always has an observer present at the central point of view. The confusing aspect of the world is its holographic nature. Organs of sensory perception in a body appear to relay information about an entire world to a brain, much like a video camera relays information to a digital viewing screen. That apparent relay of information includes external sensory perceptions of the world and internal perceptions of emotional body feelings, but all of those perceptions are only a holographic appearance. All the fundamental bits of information for the world are defined on the surface of an event horizon, which defines a state of information for an entire world that includes the body, and defines the nature of the mind. The form of a body is an image on a viewing screen. The form of the body is the central image, and all external sensory perceptions of the world are relayed through that central image, in the same way that all internal emotional perceptions of the body, or body feelings, are relayed through the central image. The consciousness of the viewer of that viewing screen is never defined by the information encoded on that viewing screen. That is what the incompleteness theorems prove. The viewer is always outside the viewing screen, present at a point of view. Consciousness can never be reduced to the way information is encoded or coherently organized on any viewing screen it observes. Its true nature is always outside the viewing screen. That viewing screen is only an event horizon that arises within the empty background space of the void, as observed by the observer at that central point of view. As a viewing screen spontaneously arises, consciousness arises at a point of view. The void is the source of all information and energy. The void is the source of the universe, and everything in the world. The void is a state of zero energy and no ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1235 information, which physicists call the vacuum state. In this sense, the void is the 'stateless state', since all states of information and energy, and all states of the world, are defined on surfaces of quantized space-time. The stateless state is the most stable state, since it is the unchanging ground state. That empty background space is the 'ground of being', in the sense that it is the source of all things that appear to exist in the world. It is the primordial nature of existence. Everything in the world arises from that 'ground'. This way of understanding the nature of the void, as the empty background space, vacuum state, or ground state from which all excited states of information and energy arise, is not controversial within mainstream theoretical physics. All unified theories, like string theory, and all theories of the creation of the universe, like inflationary cosmology, assume the existence of the void, and understand the nature of the void in this way. The holographic principle helps us understand that the nature of this empty background space is not the same as our usual 3+1 dimensional space-time, which only has a holographic kind of reality. What is controversial is to understand the nature of the void as the source of consciousness that perceives the form of everything in that holographic world. There is no easy way to say this, so we might as well say it as clearly as possible, and appeal to the great tradition of spiritual wisdom to help us understand what it means. The nature of the void is the 'infinite nothingness' that is the 'one' source of consciousness that perceives everything in any world that holographically arises from the void. As a world arises on a viewing screen, a presence of consciousness arises at that particular point of view. That viewing screen is the nature of the mind. As that mind arises, a presence of consciousness is divided from its true undivided state with the creation of that world. This is what all the great spiritual writings of the world tell us about the nature of creation. It is found in Genesis, the Rig Veda, and the Tao Te Ching (Lao Tsu 1997). In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth And the earth was without form and void And darkness was upon the face of the deep And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters And God said 'Let there be light'; and there was light And God saw the light, that it was good And God divided the light from the darkness The Book of Genesis describes how the 'light of consciousness' is divided from the 'one' source of consciousness with the creation of the world. It says 'the light is divided from the darkness' with the creation of the world. That darkness is the void, which is the source of everything in the world. The 'Spirit of God' is the presence of consciousness that is divided from the 'one' source with the creation of the world. That spirit 'moves upon the face of the deep', as all the images for that world are animated on the surface of an event horizon that arises within the void, and are perceived at a focal point of perception. The focus of attention of that presence of consciousness is focused upon those images. The event horizon acts as a holographic viewing screen, and projects images to the central point of view, where a presence of consciousness is always present at that focal ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1236 point of perception. That presence of consciousness is divided from the 'one' source of consciousness, which is called the darkness. The true nature of that source is undivided consciousness. As the viewing screen arises, a presence of consciousness arises at that point of view. It all arises from the void. The face of the 'deep' is a surface, just like the surface of the ocean. That ocean is a void of undifferentiated consciousness. The Rig Veda describes the process of creation as 'that which becomes through the power of heat', just like modern cosmology. It refers to the source of existence as non-existent, oneness and nothingness. 'Darkness was hidden by darkness in the beginning. All that existed then was void and formless.' The Rig Veda also has a bit more to say about the nature of the creator, who may or may not know its true nature. Although the creator may not know what it is, a sage may look across from the existent to the non-existent: The non-existent was not; the existent was not at that time An unfathomable abyss There was neither death nor immortality There was not distinction of day or night That One thing, breathless, breathed by its own nature Apart from it, there was nothing Darkness was hidden by darkness in the beginning All that existed then was void and formless That which becomes, was born through the power of heat Upon that desire arose in the beginning the first discharge of thought Sages discovered this link of the existent to the non-existent Having searched in the heart with wisdom Their line of vision was extended across What was below, what was above? Who knows truly Whence this creation came into being He, the first origin of this creation Whether he formed it all or did not form it Whose eye controls this world in highest heaven Surely he knows, or perhaps he knows not The Tao also tells us that consciousness arises from the void, and is always present for whatever appears to happen in the world, as everything in the world appears to move. Everything in the world arises from the void as consciousness arises from the void, but the void stands alone, and is silent and unchanging: In the silence and the void Standing alone and unchanging Ever present and in motion ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1237 I do not know its name Call it Tao The Tao tells us that a divided presence of consciousness may return to its true undivided state, but that return is only possible in a state of being desireless. The Tao refers to the mystery of that undivided state as the darkness, or the void: Ever desireless one can see the mystery Ever desiring one can see the manifestations These two spring from the same source but differ in name This appears as darkness Darkness within darkness The gate to all mystery The Tao tells us that return to that formless state is only possible in a state of being desireless. If any desires are expressed, then the world is animated in the flow of that energy, and animated forms are manifested and appear to move in that world. The desireless state is only possible with the withdrawal of emotional energy from the world. The flow of energy through the world is what animates that world over a sequence of events, and the withdrawal of that energy is the de-animation of that animation. When we examine anything in the world, it is always the focus of attention of our consciousness that is focused in that examination. The nature of what we focus our attention on in the world is the nature of information and energy. The world is defined on a viewing screen by a state of information, and those states are animated over a sequence of events in the flow of energy like the frames of a movie. A presence of consciousness is always at the center of its own world. To paraphrase from the Lion King: 'whatever the light of consciousness touches, is its kingdom'. The focus of attention of consciousness on the world leads to an investment of emotional energy in that world, which always creates an emotional attachment to something in the world. The focus of attention is only withdrawn from the world if that investment of emotional energy is withdrawn. That withdrawal of emotional energy leads to a detached, desireless state. The willingness to let go of those attachments, withdraw that investment of emotional energy, and do nothing, only arises if the futility of everything that can be done in the world is clearly seen. The focus of attention of consciousness is only shifted away from the world onto that nothingness if nothing is done, in the desireless state. Only a detached observer can return to its true undivided, formless state. Look, it cannot be seen-it is beyond form Listen, it cannot be heard-it is beyond sound Grasp, it cannot be held-it is intangible These three are indefinable Therefore they are joined in one ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1238 Return to that undivided state is called truth realization or enlightenment, and is described as dissolution into nothingness and oneness. Consciousness dissolves back into its source like a drop dissolves into the ocean. Dissolution only occurs if the observer of that world detaches itself from that world, and enters into a state of free fall through empty space. In a state of free fall, that world disappears. That world is only defined on a viewing screen, which is an event horizon. The principle of equivalence tells us that in a state of free fall through empty space the effects of all forces disappear, the event horizon disappears, all forms disappear, and that world disappears. It is as though the void creates a world for its own amusement, and watches with detached interest from its seat in the audience, while images play on a stage. The only problem with this play of consciousness is self-identification with form, which is the problem of the ego. Every viewing screen that arises is observed from its own point of view, which gives the appearance of an entire world, and the appearance of separation, self and other. The void reveals itself to itself through all the things that appear to exist in a world. In that world, self appears to be separate from others. That appearance of separation is only possible with the self-identification of a presence of consciousness with the central form of a body. That appearance of separation, self and other is only an illusion, which comes to an end when that world of form disappears. Ultimately, nothing exists, there is no separation, no self, and no other. The void is 'all-one' and alone. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1239 Mu-mon describes the path of return with the gateless gate paradox, which expresses that the divided consciousness of an observer can only be present for a world of form at a point of view, or return to its true undivided, formless state: The great path has no gates, Thousands of roads enter it. When one passes through this gateless gate, One walks the universe alone. It is tempting to attribute intentionally to the void, but that is just not the nature of the void. There is no intentionality in the void, only potentiality. The void creates a world because it can. That is its potentiality. Everything that can possibly appear to happen in the world actually does appear to happen in some world. As expressed in The Once and Future King: 'Everything not forbidden is compulsory'. All actions of the void are impersonal, as is the true nature of consciousness. Intentionality is only about actuality. Intentionality only arises with the flow of energy through the world, the organization of information into the form of a body, and the emotional actions of a body. All things arise from Tao They are nourished by the energy of Tao They are formed from matter They are shaped by environment Tao in the world is like a river flowing home to the sea Tao follows what is natural A body is an animated form of information that naturally arises in the world. That form is coherently self-replicated in form over events in the flow of energy, as the behaviors of that form are enacted. Only the coherent flow of energy through a body allows for the coherent self-replication of the form of that body. We perceive those emotional actions as body feelings. It is not possible to understand the self-identification of a presence of consciousness with the form of a body without a discussion of emotional expressions. There are two kinds of emotional expressions that are inherently related. The first kind of expression is an emotional attachment, and the second kind is a self-defensive expression. They are related since self-defensive expressions only arise with emotional attachments. It only makes sense to defend attachments. Without an attachment to something, there is nothing to defend. Attachments come first, followed by self-defensive expressions. All complex organisms must attach themselves to the parent organism early in their development. The reason for this is simple. A developing organism feeds upon the parent organism. The coherent organization of a biological organism only develops through a process of eating. Coherent organization only develops through a process of biological symmetry breaking, which is dependent on a process of eating, as high potential energy ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1240 molecules are added to the body, burned within the body, and disordered kinetic energy is radiated away. All body development and growth requires a process of eating. This is as much the case for plants as for animals. The only difference is animals eat other biological bodies, and plants eat photons. The process of photosynthesis inside a plant only goes forward as a high energy photon from the sun is absorbed, and lower energy photons are radiated away into the environment. The lower energy photons are radiated away as heat into the cool night sky. This process can only go forward as heat flows from a hotter to a colder body. That flow of energy is associated with an increase in entropy. An increase in disordered information arises since more infrared photons are radiated away into the cooler sky each night than the number of yellow photons that arrive each day from the hot sun. The reason more infrared photons are radiated away is the energy of each photon is quantized as E=hν, and energy is conserved. The same amount of energy that arrives is radiated away. This process is only possible due to gravitational clumping of matter and energy that occurs after the big bang event, and allows for a hot sun to form in the sky by day, and a cool dark sky by night (Penrose 2005, figure 27.9). The same kind of thermodynamic processes occur as an animal eats another biological body. High potential energy molecules are added to the body of the animal, burned within the body, and heat is radiated away. These thermodynamic processes allow for development of coherent organization through symmetry breaking. All development, growth and survival of biological organisms requires these thermodynamic processes. A biological body only develops, grows, and survives if it eats other bodies. The development of a biological body depends on development of coherent organization, which only occurs through a process of biological symmetry breaking, and is dependent on a process of eating. Bodies must eat each other in order to develop and survive. Body survival is inherently the self-replication of the form of that body over a sequence of events, while the behaviors of that body are enacted. Self-replication of form is the nature of how information becomes coherently organized in a distinct thermodynamic phase of organization, which gives rise to the distinct macroscopic appearance of that form. Only coherent organization allows for self-replication of form over a sequence of events. These thermodynamic processes in biological bodies are dependent on a process of eating. A biological body only develops and survives if it eats other bodies. Early in its development, a developing organism only develops if it feeds upon the parent organism. The process of eating is a natural aspect of the life of a body. Emotional expressions naturally arise with the life of a body. Every expression of desire is a kind of hunger, and expresses the desire to eat something. Body survival is not possible without these kinds of expressions. The expression of the desire to eat is fundamentally about the desire to live. Coherent self-replication of the form of a body is only possible with the coherent flow of emotional energy through that body, which allows for the self-replication of that form over a sequence of events, and for body survival (Damasio 1999, 39, 138). These kinds of emotional expressions are at the heart of emotional attachment. Every expression of desire is a kind of hunger that expresses the desire to eat something. That ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1241 desire to eat is expressed from the very beginning of life of the developing organism, as it attaches itself to the parent organism, and feeds upon the parent organism. That desire to eat is expressed by the newly born organism, but is also expressed by the fetal organism, and even by the unfertilized egg cell. Every biological organism, whether multi-celled or single-celled, expresses the desire to eat, and to live. It is not even possible to define a living biological organism without the expression of that desire (Damasio 1999, 51, 136). Emotional attachments only arise as desires are expressed and satisfied. The satisfaction of a desire feels good, which is described as pleasurable. The most basic desire that is expressed is the desire to eat, which feels good as that desire is satisfied. The frustration of a desire feels bad, which is described as painful (Damasio 1999, 77). Emotional attachments only arise as desires continue to be expressed and satisfied over a sequence of events. We might say that an attachment to something only arises from the perpetuation of that expression of desire and its satisfaction. The most basic example of attachment is the desire to eat something. In this sense, the attachment of a developing organism to its parent organism naturally arises as it feeds upon the parent organism. How can we understand the expression of desire, and the satisfaction and frustration of desires, in energetic terms? The expression of desire is inherent to the way the organism is coherently organized. It is not even possible to discuss a distinct living organism unless the form of that organism is coherently self-replicated over a sequence of events, which requires the coherent flow of emotional energy through that organism. That coherent flow of emotional energy through the organism is the expression of desire, which allows for the self-replication of the form of the organism while the behaviors of the organism are enacted over a sequence of events. The most basic desire that can be expressed in the desire to eat something. Without that emotional expression, the coherent organization of the organism cannot develop, and is not perpetuated over those events. If the desire to eat something is satisfied, the coherent flow of emotional energy through the body of the organism comes into alignment with the flow of energy through that other thing. That is the nature of a process of eating, as that thing is absorbed within the body of the organism. A process of eating by an organism only arises with the alignment of the flow of energy between the organism and the thing that is eaten. As that flow of energy comes into alignment, feelings of connection are expressed by the body of the organism. Those feelings of connection feel good, which is perceived as pleasure. If the desire to eat something is frustrated, the coherent flow of emotional energy through the body of the organism goes out of alignment with the flow of energy through that other thing. That other thing is not absorbed within the body of the organism. As that flow of energy goes out of alignment, feelings of disconnection are expressed by the body of the organism. Those feelings of disconnection feel bad, which is perceived as painful. Emotional attachments only arise as desires are expressed and satisfied, and feelings of connection are expressed, which feel good. The attachment is perpetuated as those desires are subsequently expressed and satisfied in future events. The attachment arises as the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1242 flow of emotional energy through the body of an organism comes into alignment with the flow of energy through some other thing, such as a developing organism that attaches itself to the parent organism as it feeds upon the parent. Inherent in that attachment is a process of eating, which allows for the coherent self-replication of the form of that body. The attachment can only arise as that desire to eat something is expressed and satisfied. If the desire to eat something is frustrated, feelings of disconnection are expressed, which feel bad. Self-defensive expressions, like fear and anger, arise out of that frustration. Selfdefensive expressions inherently defend the survival of the body. Body survival is dependent on the process of eating and the satisfaction of that desire. Self-defensive expressions naturally arise if those desires are frustrated, and body survival is threatened. Self-defensive expressions are a natural aspect of embodied life in an inherently dangerous world, where bodies must eat each other in order to survive. Self-defensive expressions inherently defend the survival of a body. These kinds of selfdefensive expressions are a necessary aspect of embodied life in an inherently dangerous world where bodies must eat each other in order to survive. With the expression of desire, the body moves toward those things that promote its survival. With the expression of fear, the body moves away from those things that threaten its survival. With the expression of anger, the body moves against those things that threaten its survival. Selfdefensive expressions inherently defend the attachments that are formed as desires are satisfied. The survival of the body depends upon perpetuating those attachments. These self-defensive emotional expressions are inherent in how the body is coherently organized. The body is coherently self-replicated in form as behaviors are enacted over a sequence of events. The coherent flow of emotional energy through the body allows for that self-replication of form. Only a coherently organized body can express self-defensive emotions, which inherently defend the survival of the form of that body, and inherently are limited to that form. The flow of energy through a body can come into alignment with the flow of energy through other things, and create an emotional attachment to those forms, but if the body is to survive and self-replicate its form over a sequence of event, that coherent flow of energy at most can become limited to the body itself. As desires are frustrated, the flow of energy through the body goes out of alignment with the flow of energy through some other thing, but if the body is to survive, that flow of emotional energy must remain coherently organized as it flows through that body. Selfdefensive expressions inherently arise from that coherent flow of emotional energy through the body itself. Body feelings of connection arise as desires are satisfied, and body feelings of disconnection arise as desires are frustrated. Self-defensive expressions arise with the self-limitation of that flow of emotional energy within the body itself. So far, emotional expressions have only been discussed in the sense of the emotional flow of energy through the body, and how that flow of energy can come into or go out of alignment with the flow of energy through other things. If there is alignment, feelings of connection are expressed. If there is no alignment, feelings of disconnection are expressed. Attachments naturally arise with the satisfaction of desires. Self-defensive ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1243 expressions naturally arise with the frustration of desires, and defend attachments. We might say that the ultimate attachment is to the body itself, since the ultimate level that the flow of emotional energy can become self-limited to is to a coherently organized body. In this sense, the ultimate defense of an attachment is the defense of body survival. This discussion of the energetic nature of emotional expressions is as far as we can go without introducing the concept of consciousness. Feelings of connection feel good, and feelings of disconnection feel bad, but who perceives those body feelings? Those body feelings inherently represent the way emotional energy flows through the body. Body feelings are somehow represented in the mind, but who is the perceiver of the mind? The discussion that follows is really no different than the discussion that can be found in the mainstream neuroscience literature, except in one important aspect. In large part, this discussion is the same argument Damasio makes about the nature of the self-concept in The Feeling of What Happens. Damasio's argument is really not new, and is largely the same argument found in the psychoanalytic literature, usually referred to as Object Relations Theory. What Damasio has done is to give these ideas a sounder scientific basis. Damasio describes how body feelings are represented in the mind, and how the self-concept arises from emotional relationships between a body-based self-image and the image of another (Damasio 1999, 133). What Damasio has not done is explain the nature of the observer of the mind. The one important aspect of the discussion that Damasio left out, and that all neuroscience discussions leave out, is about the nature of the observer. The natural way to understand the observer of the mind is with the holographic principle. The mind arises on a viewing screen, which is an event horizon that encodes quantized bits of information, with one bit encoded per pixel on the screen. The event horizon always arises from the central point of view of the observer. The event horizon arises in empty space, and the observer arises at a focal point of perception. All the information for the observable world is encoded on the viewing screen. That information includes the central form of a body. Organs of sensory perception in that body relay information about that entire world, which includes external sensory perceptions of that world, and internal perceptions of emotional body feelings. All of those perceptions are like images that are projected from the viewing screen to the central point of view, where the consciousness of the observer is present. That observer only feels like it is embodied in that body, as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body. This state of affairs cannot be stressed strongly enough. Self-identification of a presence of consciousness with the form of a body is only a feeling. A feeling is only a perception. That observer only identifies itself with the form of a body since it really feels like it is embodied in the form of that body as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body. That body-based self-identification is inherently emotional in nature. How is self-identification even possible? We might say that perception is recognition. A presence of consciousness recognizes itself in the forms of information that it perceives since those forms are emotionally animated over a sequence of events in the flow of energy. The perception of emotional actions leads to emotional self-identification with ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1244 the form of a body, which is another way to say the observer really feels like it is embodied in the form of a body that expresses those emotional actions. Those emotional actions are perceived as body feelings. The observer recognizes itself in those actions. How can a presence of consciousness recognize the forms of information it perceives? Forms only arise through a process of symmetry breaking, as bits of information tend to align with each other and form bound states. The symmetry broken is the symmetry of empty space. In a physical sense, the true nature of consciousness is empty space. A form is only self-replicated in form over a sequence of events due to the coherent flow of energy through that form. The coherent flow of energy through the form of a body is perceived as emotional expression, which allows for self-replication of form while behaviors are enacted. Emotional actions allow for recognition, which is another way to say 'to act is to give meaning'. Emotional meaning is given to emotional actions. That is another way to say 'feeling is believing', just as 'seeing is believing'. All perceiving is believing. Beliefs are mentally constructed concepts that only arise with emotional actions. Mental concepts are only believable due to the meaning given to them as they are perceived. The meaning given to an action only arises within an emotional context. That emotional context only arises from the way things are connected to each other, due to coherent organization and alignment of information. The meaning given to an action arises with the alignment of information, which arises through a process of symmetry breaking. The symmetry that is broken is the symmetry of empty space. Consciousness recognizes itself in all of its actions, since all of its actions arise from its true nature. This is the best scientific explanation we will ever have for the nature of consciousness. We are trying to explain a mystery that is transcendent of all explanations. No scientific concept can ever explain the nature of consciousness, since consciousness itself is what perceives and understands those concepts, and it can never be reduced to any concept it perceives. This is what the incompleteness theorems prove. All concepts can be reduced to the way information is encoded in the world, and the way that information becomes coherently organized into form, as energy flows through the world. The consciousness that perceives and recognizes those coherently organized forms of information can never be reduced to a form of information it perceives. A presence of consciousness is always outside that world of form, as it perceives and recognizes those forms of information. We have just introduced the concept of belief. A belief is a mentally constructed concept that only arises with emotional action. Only the presence of consciousness for that mind perceives and recognizes that belief, and gives emotional meaning to that belief. That presence of consciousness is the believer. The perceiver of the mind is the believer of all the beliefs emotionally constructed in that mind. There is something inherently circular about this explanation. The perceiver recognizes itself in that perception as it believes that belief. The nature of belief is reflected in every self-concept. The perceiver only identifies itself with a body-based self-concept since it really feels like it is embodied as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body, and feeling is believing. In this sense, self-identification with the form of a body is a belief. The perceiver believes it is embodied. The circular nature of belief reflects the holographic principle, since the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1245 mind is only a viewing screen that arises in empty space, as an observer arises at a point of view. Both that observable world and the observer of that world arise from the void. The discussion of belief that follows is no different than the discussion Damasio gives in The Feeling of What Happens, except in one important aspect. Damasio does not identify the nature of the observer of the mind, even as Damasio describes how that observer becomes emotionally self-identified with a body-based self-concept that is emotionally constructed in the mind. The holographic principle naturally identifies the observer with a presence of consciousness that arises at a point of view in empty space as the mind arises on a viewing screen. It is not possible to say what that observer is, except to say the observer arises from the void, as the world the mind displays arises from the void. Damasio points out there is emotional expression in every expression of belief, and in every concept. Beliefs only arise with emotional relationships between self and other, and implicitly require our belief in a body-based self-concept (Damasio 1999, 21, 133). Every concept of self and other constructed in the mind relates a body-based self-concept to the concept of some other thing with an emotional body feeling. We perceive body feelings as we perceive the emotional flow of energy through the body inherent in the enactment of behaviors. Only emotional expressions allow for self-replication of form, and maintain the organization of the body. (Damasio 1999, 39, 138). Those emotional expressions are inherently self-defensive in nature, as body survival is defended. A body only develops and survives through a process of emotional attachment. Attachments are defended if threatened, just as body survival is defended if threatened. A self-concept is only emotionally constructed and self-replicated in a mind with these self-defensive expressions, as the concept of self is emotionally related to the concept of other things that appear in the world. The mental construction of a self-concept only arises as an emotional projection to past or future events, as a body-based self-image is emotionally held in mental imagination, and is related to the images of other things held in mental imagination (Damasio 1999, 133). Holding of images in mental imagination is the nature of what we call memory and anticipation of events, and is inherently emotional in nature. The holding of a body-based self-image in mental imagination is inherently self-defensive in nature. The construction of any mental concept is emotional in nature, as an image is emotionally held in mental imagination and related to other images. Memory only arises with the development of coherent organization of information. Memory of events only develops through a process of conditional probability that arises with the observation of events. In terms of a quantum state of potentiality, every event is a decision point where the path branches. In the sense of a quantum state reduction, memory only arises through a decision process that truncates the probability distribution and alters conditional probabilities. This decision process occurs with every observation of events. In this sense, memory of events and the development of coherent organization only occurs with observation of events. In the many world sense, the potentiality for all possible events co-exist as a superposition of all possible paths, and all alternative paths co-exist in an ensemble of all possible worlds. An observer is present for every possible event, but that observer only has access to those memories that arise on a particular path, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1246 since all the alternative paths of all the parallel worlds do not interfere with each other. In either case, only observation of events allows for a decision process that leads to the development of coherent organization, which underlies all memory of events. There is another aspect of coherent organization that needs discussion. A coherently organized system only arises through symmetry breaking. The coherently organized form of that system takes on a distinct macroscopic appearance that only arises in a coherently organized thermodynamic phase of organization. Development of coherent organization is inherently thermodynamic in nature. Self-replication of the form of that system only arises within that coherently organized phase of organization. Self-replication of form is nothing more than maintaining that macroscopic appearance while the microscopic details change. Inherent in the development of such a coherently organized phase of organization is the concept of a thermodynamically meta-stable state (Davies 1977, 174). Such meta-stable states are common in nature, like super-cooled liquid water that can rapidly transition into the form of ice. As ice forms, heat is radiated away from the system. The system of water molecules in the form of ice is more ordered, since the molecules take on a more orderly arrangement of position in space as water freezes. The amount of disordered information, or entropy, is less for the system of water molecules in the form of ice than for the form of liquid water, even at the same temperature. The entropy of the system decreases as water freezes. How is this possible? As water freezes, heat is radiated away into the environment, and heat is disordered kinetic energy. The total entropy of the system and the environment increases due to the heat radiated away. A key aspect of such thermodynamically meta-stable states is the possibility of amplification of a microscopic signal. Such a microscopic amplification occurs when a photon interacts with a retinal cell, and a photo-chemical reaction occurs inside the retinal cell. That photo-chemical reaction is no different in kind than the photo-chemical reactions that occur on a photographic plate. The atoms in that photographic plate are in a thermodynamically meta-stable state, and as they interact with photons they transition to a more stable state, just like super-cooled water that freezes into ice. The image that arises on the photographic plate as a consequence of those photo-chemical reactions literally 'freezes out'. As the image freezes out, there is a local decrease in entropy, and the encoding of information on the photographic plate. The only reason this is possible is due to the heat that is radiated away from the photographic plate into the environment as the photo-chemical reactions occur. But before that information can become encoded on the photographic plate, the atoms in the plate must become organized into a meta-stable state, which has the potentiality to thermodynamically encode information. The encoding of information with the distinct macroscopic appearance of an image only arises through the irreversible process of the amplification of a microscopic signal. That process only appears irreversible due to the heat radiated away into the environment. That irreversible process only goes forward with construction of a thermodynamically meta-stable state. That irreversible process only arises as the quantum state of potentiality branches into alternative paths. Every event is a decision point where the path branches. In either the sense of a quantum state reduction or many worlds, that irreversible process only arises ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1247 with the observation of an event. But the many world interpretation is the more natural thermodynamic interpretation, since all the alternative paths co-exist in an ensemble of all possible worlds. Irreversibility is only a characteristic of those worlds in which the total entropy of the world appears to increase over the course of time (Davies 1977, 172). Irreversibility arises with an ordered initial state of such a world (Feynman 1963, I 46-7). A key aspect of the encoding of information in such a world is the construction of thermodynamically meta-stable states that allow for the irreversible amplification of microscopic signals. This is the natural way to understand the nature of memory and the development of coherent organization in any system (Davies 1977, 174). Memory only arises from the order inherent in the initial state of that world (Feynman 1963, I 46-7). A meta-stable state is characterized by a potential barrier. A carbohydrate molecule is a meta-stable state of high potential energy that transitions to a more stable state of lower energy as it burns and heat is radiated away. The molecule is in a meta-stable state due to a potential barrier. The electromagnetic repulsion between protons is another example of a potential barrier. A potential barrier is like a hill between two valleys that must be climbed before the transition to the more stable state can occur. The meta-stable state is held in a higher potential valley, and the more stable state is a lower valley that is only reached if the hill between those two valleys is climbed. That hill is only climbed if kinetic energy is added to the molecule, which is why heat must be applied before the molecule will burn. Burning to a more stable state occurs as heat is radiated away, and the system settles into the lower potential valley. If that heat is not radiated away, the system has too much kinetic energy and the potential barrier can be climbed again, and the system can return to the higher potential valley and that meta-stable state. A meta-stable state also explains why the transition to the more stable state occurs with a cascade effect, or like an avalanche. Burning begins slowly, but accelerates to a faster and faster rate, just like water flowing down a river. An avalanche occurs suddenly, when the downward force of gravity overcomes the cohesive force of a snow pack that holds it together and to the mountainside. Once the fall begins, it accelerates. There is another way the transition can occur, which is a tunneling event. Due to quantum uncertainty in position and momentum, the system can tunnel through the potential barrier and reach the more stable state. But if the potential barrier is very large, the decay time for that tunneling event to occur is very long, and is unlikely to occur. The more likely way for the transition to the more stable state to occur is to add kinetic energy to the system, which allows the system to climb the potential barrier. In either case, as the system transitions to the more stable state, heat is radiated away. There is even a third way the transition can occur, which is the effect of a catalyst. As we add a catalyst to the system, we lower the potential barrier, and the transition to the more stable state is more likely to occur, either because the system has enough kinetic energy to climb the lowered potential barrier, or due to a tunneling event that is more likely to occur with a lowered potential barrier. In either case, heat is radiated away as the system transitions to the more stable state, and the system appears to burn. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1248 The addition of a catalyst to the system is the addition of potential energy. The potential barrier is lowered since we are adding negative potential energy. The addition of negative potential energy to a system like a carbohydrate molecule with a potential barrier allows that system to burn. But how was that potential barrier created in the first place? The potential barrier was constructed due to the addition of positive potential energy. The construction of the potential barrier in a carbohydrate molecule was constructed through the process of photo-synthesis, which is like the addition of positive potential energy to the system. That process only goes forward as the directed kinetic energy of a photon is converted into positive potential energy. But even the process of photo-synthesis requires that disordered kinetic energy is radiated away from the system into the environment. The process of constructing the carbohydrate molecule leads to an overall increase in entropy in the world just as much as the process of burning the carbohydrate molecule. We can construct a carbohydrate molecule through the process of photosynthesis, as the directed kinetic energy of a photon is converted into positive potential energy. We can burn that carbohydrate molecule with the addition of the negative potential energy of a catalyst. In either case, these processes can only go forward as heat is radiated away into the environment, and the total entropy of the world increases. All we are really doing is constructing a potential barrier, and then deconstructing that potential barrier. That potential barrier is the nature of a meta-stable state, which is like a hill that must be climbed before the transition to the more stable state can occur. The climbing of a hill in order to reach a more stable state is metaphorically represented in the myth of Sisyphus. The only way that more stable state is reached is if the system burns, and heat is radiated away. If there is no burning, the system is doomed to remain in the meta-stable state. The nature of biological symmetry breaking only arises with the addition of potential energy to a system, which is a process of eating. The addition of positive potential energy constructs the potential barrier of a meta-stable state, which is only deconstructed through a process of burning. The confusing aspect of the process of burning is that it can go forward with the addition of negative potential energy, which deconstructs the potential barrier. The construction of a potential barrier in a meta-stable state is a key aspect of the encoding of information in any system. Only thermodynamically meta-stable states allow for the irreversible amplification of microscopic signals. Only this process allows for the development of coherent organization of information in any system. This is the natural way to understand how information and memory are encoded in a mind. A key aspect of the development of coherent organization and memory in a mind is the development of a self-concept. In some sense, the self-concept is mentally constructed as a meta-stable state of high potential energy, which is characterized by a potential barrier. In some sense, that potential barrier is the expression of self-defensiveness. These emotional expressions inherently defend body survival, and allow for development of a body-based self-image that is emotionally held in mental imagination, which Damasio calls a proto-self (Damasio 1999, 154). This proto-self is a body-based self-image that is continuously constructed in all states of self-consciousness. That construction process arises with the maintenance of body stability (Damasio 1999, 141). In a thermodynamic sense, that body-based self-image is self-replicated in the same coherently organized ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1249 phase of organization, and the expression of self-defensive emotions maintains that coherent organization. That self-image is only a macroscopic appearance that arises from the way information is coherently organized at a microscopic level. Simply stated, it is not possible to have a self-concept without the self-replication of such a body-based self-image. A self-concept only arises as that body-based self-image is emotionally related to the images of other things held in memory (Damasio 1999, 169). The nature of those emotional relationships are body feelings, which represent the flow of emotional energy through the body. This process occurs on a moment-by-moment basis, and only depends on short-term memory of events (Damasio 1999, 112). Damasio calls this process core self-consciousness. If there are also long-term, or autobiographical memories, then there is also a sense of an autobiographical self (Damasio 1999, 174). Memory arises with the development of coherent organization in a developing organism. The possibility of constructing a self-concept requires a tremendous degree of coherent organization of information (Damasio 1999, 175). To fully develop a self-concept, a body-based self-image must be emotionally held in mental imagination over a sequence of events, and must be emotionally related to other images held in mental imagination. The holding of those images in mental imagination requires the self-replication of the form of those images over a sequence of events, which can only arise with development of coherent organization in the developing organism. But the memory of events is not the same as the consciousness that perceives those events. This is the mistake that Damasio makes. Consciousness can be present for every event even if there is no memory of prior events. Consciousness can be present for every event even if there is no self-concept. The mistake Damasio makes is that he assumes the physical world is the only reality. Within that physical world, there is no place for consciousness, and no place for the observer. He explicitly states: "There is no external spectator". He describes "the images that constitute the narrative" and "are incorporated in the stream of thoughts", and states "images in the consciousness narrative flow like shadows". He uses "the metaphor of the movie-in-the brain" and states those images "are within the movie" (Damasio 1999, 171). It is as though the images in the movie perceive themselves, and that a two dimensional image animated on the screen is its own observer, which is a paradox of self-reference. In one sense Damasio is absolute right. There is no place for the observer within physical reality. There is no physical explanation of consciousness, as he correctly points out. But the idea Damasio has of reality is too limited. He assumes physical reality is the only reality. In this sense, he is stuck in the nineteenth century, with his outdated ideas of absolute space and time and classical determinism. He assumes that reality only consists of matter and energy within some pre-existing space and time. The holographic principle, as embodied by all modern unified theories, explicitly demonstrates these assumptions are incorrect. Physical reality is like a movie of images that are displayed on a screen and observed by an observer, but that screen is only an event horizon that arises within empty space. That screen encodes information for that physical world. That screen always arises from the central point of view of the observer, which is 'external' to the screen. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1250 This description of the observer is a metaphysical description, not a physical description. The observer is only describable in physical terms as a point of view in empty space. It is impossible to take the meta out of physics since it is impossible to take the observer out of physics. Simply stated, without the observer there would be no physical world. The development of a self-concept in a child demonstrates the necessity of organism development prior to the development of a self-concept. A self-concept only appears in a young child around two years of age, with the development of language. Prior to this age, the child exhibits no evidence of a self-concept (Damasio 1999, 175). Both the development of a self-concept and the development of language capability depend on memory, which requires the development of coherent organization of information in the developing organism. Consciousness can be present for that developing organism prior to the development of memory, prior to the development of language capability, and prior to the development of a self-concept. Prior to the development of memory, that presence of consciousness has no memory of prior events. Prior to the development of a self-concept, that presence of consciousness has no sense of self. The development of a self-concept in a young child only arises through a process of emotional attachment. The emotional attachment of the child to the parent is necessary for the child to develop, for the simple reason the parent must feed the child for that development to occur. All development, growth and survival is dependent on a process of eating. Only the addition of potential energy to the organism allows for the development of coherent organization through a process of biological symmetry breaking. A self-concept only develops within the emotional context of a society. A human society is only a collection of emotional relationships between people. A human society only holds together due to emotional attachments between different people in that society. Emotional attachments are the nature of attractive interactions between different people that hold a society together. The fundamental nature of those attachments are the emotional relationships between self and other. Attachments between people only form as desires are satisfied. Attachments are only defended as desires are frustrated. In energetic terms, an attachment forms as the flow of energy through one body comes into alignment with the flow of energy through another body. Attachments are self-reinforcing in nature since those feelings of connection feel good. Attachments are defended since feelings of disconnection feel bad. Attachments begin with the birth of a child into a family, and persist throughout the life of that person as long as that person remains a part of a society. Without those emotional attachments, a society cannot hold together. All complex organisms must attach themselves to the parent organism early in their development, but to fully mature they must detach themselves. That development is arrested in an immature state if there is a failure of detachment. We recognize that immature state as a state of dependency on others. A person only remains a part of a family or a society if there is a failure of detachment. A person only breaks free of their bondage to a family or a society through a process of detachment, which is the only process that leads to autonomy and self-reliance. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1251 All the great spiritual writings of the world describe the process of spiritual awakening as a process of detachment. This cannot be stressed strongly enough. Spiritual awakening is only possible through a process of detachment. The fundamental reason for this state of affairs is that a self-concept only arises through a process of emotional attachment. A self-concept only develops in a young child through a process of emotional attachment to the parent. Without that emotional attachment, a self-concept cannot develop. A selfconcept only develops with the development of memory and coherent organization in the developing child, and is typically expressed through language. A self-concept is mentally constructed as a body-based self-image is emotionally held in mental imagination, and is emotionally related with body feelings to other images held in mental imagination. The holding of images in mental imagination is the nature of memory, which only arises with the self-replication of the form of those images over a sequence of events. The nature of the emotional expressions that relate those images only arise with emotional attachments that arise as desires are expressed and satisfied, and with self-defensive expressions that arise as desires are frustrated and attachments are defended. Without emotional attachments, the expression of a self-concept is not even possible. This is the fundamental reason the process of spiritual awakening requires a process of detachment. By its very nature, spiritual awakening is the end of the mental construction and emotional expression of a self-concept. Spiritual awakening is the awakening of a presence of consciousness to its true nature. That presence of consciousness is the observer of the mind. Without the emotional expression of a self-concept in its mind, the observer of the mind no longer emotionally identifies itself with a body-based self-image. Self-identification is only possible since the observer really feels like it is embodied in that body as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body. Those body feelings are inherent in every self-concept that emotionally relates a body-based selfimage to the image of some other thing. This is the only process that allows for the selfidentification of the observer with the form of a body-based self-image. The process of spiritual awakening brings to an end that emotional self-identification with a self-image. All the great spiritual writings of the world tell us the process of spiritual awakening only goes forward with a process of detachment, which finally brings to an end the emotional expression of a self-concept. That detachment process is the only way the observer of a mind can detach itself from its self-concept. This is explicitly stated in the Tao: He who is attached to things will suffer much The sage stays behind, thus he is ahead He is detached, thus at one with all Through selfless action, he attains fulfillment The satisfaction of desires feels good, which creates an emotional attachment of the observer to something in the world, and perpetuates the expression of that desire. As desires are satisfied, the flow of emotional energy through the body comes into alignment ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1252 with the flow of energy through some other thing in the world, and feelings of connection are expressed. The frustration of desires feels bad. As desires are frustrated, the flow of emotional energy through the body goes out of alignment with the flow of energy through some other thing, and feelings of disconnection are expressed. Out of that frustration, the desire to possess things, control things, and force things to satisfy desires is expressed. He who grasps loses Nothing ever wants to be possessed or controlled, and eventually all things resist those emotional attempts at control. The desire to hold onto, possess, and control things will ultimately turn all things into pain-giving things that frustrate desires, since nothing wants to be possessed or controlled. An observer that clearly sees the futility of its desire to control things is ultimately willing to let go of those things, and receive nothing in return, since it would rather be pain free than continue to hold onto a pain-giving thing. All can know good as good only because there is evil For having and not having arise together Misfortune comes from having a body Without a body, how could there be misfortune? Surrender yourself humbly; then you can be trusted to care for all things Love the world as your own self; then you can truly care for all things The willingness to let go of attachments leads to autonomy, which is the only process that allows for the development of self-reliance. Attachments perpetuate a state of immaturity and dependency on others. Development of autonomy is the process of letting go and growing up. The willingness to let go of attachments always feels like something is dying inside. What dies? Ultimately, the illusion of a self-concept dies. The illusion of being a person in the world dies. Even that illusion does not really die as long as the body lives. Only belief in that illusion dies. False belief in self and other dies. A self-concept is a mentally constructed belief that arises in emotional relationship with the concept of other. That belief dies when it is no longer believable. Belief comes to an end in the desireless state. Without belief, the self-concept is only a character role that we play, like an actor on a stage. The irony is that to know the truth, all desires must die, including the desire to know the truth. The self-concept only dies through a self-destructive process, which only begins if the self-concept is examined, and its falseness is exposed and clearly seen. That examination turns a self-concept into a pain-giving thing, which is the reason the observer is willing to let go of its attachment to it, and receive nothing in return. This self-destructive process only goes forward with willingness to suffer ego death rather than live the life of a lie. It is more important To see the simplicity To realize one's true nature To cast off selfishness ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1253 And temper desire If nothing is done, then all will be well Empty yourself of everything Without form there is no desire Without desire there is tranquility Therefore the sage seeks freedom from desire The ultimate desire is the desire to live, and the ultimate fear is the fear of death. Only a body can express desires. Only those emotional expressions allow for the self-replication of the form of the body while behaviors are enacted. A body is a coherently organized bound state of information that self-replicates its form over events in the flow of energy. A body only develops with the development of that coherent organization, and body death occurs with the loss of that organization. The nature of the flow of energy through the world is that all forms eventually become disorganized, since all energy flows in the sense of thermodynamics. That universal flow of energy allows for transformation of form into new form. Emotional expressions are inherently self-defensive in nature as they defend the survival of the body, and maintain that organization over a sequence of events. A self-concept is only emotionally constructed and self-replicated in a mind with those self-defensive expressions, as the concept of self is emotionally related to the concept of other things that appear in the world. The mental construction of a self-concept only arises as an emotional projection to past or future events, as a body-based self-image is emotionally held in mental imagination, and is related to the images of other things that appear in the world (Damasio 1999, 133). The holding of images in mental imagination is the nature of memory and anticipation of events, and is inherently emotional. The holding of a body-based self-image in mental imagination is inherently self-defensive in nature. Self-defensive expressions naturally arise with emotional attachments. It only makes sense to defend those attachments. All complex organisms must attach themselves to the parent organism early in their development, but to fully mature they must detach themselves. That development is arrested in an immature state if there is a failure of detachment. That failure of detachment only arises with an exaggeration and distortion of the normal expression of self-defensiveness in mental imagination. The failure of detachment only arises with an ego, or the mentally constructed concept of self and other, which perpetuates an immature state of dependency. Exaggerated and distorted self-defensive expressions only arise in mental imagination, as a body-based self-image is emotionally held in mental imagination through emotional projection to past and future events, and is emotionally related to the images of other things in the world. Those emotional relationships are the nature of self-referential thoughts, which only arise with the memory and anticipation of events, as images are held in mental imagination. The body no longer just responds to threats to its survival in the moment, but also ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1254 responds to imagined threats to its survival as constructed in mental imagination. Each self-referential thought is a stimulus for another self-defensive emotional response in the body, which leads to the construction of more self-referential thoughts. Self-defensive expressions become exaggerated and distorted in mental imagination, and create a vicious cycle, just like the distortion and amplification that arises in an out-of-control positive feedback loop. Self-defensive expressions become amplified and distorted in mental imagination due to the self-reinforcing positive feedback nature of mental imagination. Self-defensive expressions inherently defend the survival of the body. Self-defensive expressions are a necessary aspect of embodied life in an inherently dangerous world where bodies must eat each other in order to survive. With the expression of fear, the body moves away from those things that threaten its survival; with the expression of desire, the body moves toward those things that promote its survival; and with the expression of anger, the body moves against those things that threaten its survival. Emotional conflicts naturally arise in mental imagination as something is initially perceived as desirable, but then turns into something that is perceived as threatening. The expression of power is also an aspect of self-defensive expression. The expression of power is the nature of grandiosity, just as vanity is the expression of self-love, and narcissism is the expression of being in love with one's own self-image. People do things because they like the expression of power. Expression of power makes one feel powerful. The sense of entitlement to special treatment arises with this sense of self-importance. The accumulation of wealth is an aspect of the expression of power, as is the desire to force one's will upon others, and force others to satisfy one's desires. The expression of power is the expenditure of energy applied over time, just as work is the application of a force applied through a distance, and is all about the flow of energy through the world. The expression of power is about the desire to force others to satisfy one's own desires, which is just as self-defensive as the expression of anger, which is the desire to attack and destroy others, and the expression of fear, which is the desire to run away from others. These expressions only defend the survival of a body from the threats of other bodies in an inherently dangerous world where bodies must eat each other in order to survive. A body is born as information is coherently organized into the form of a body. A body lives as long as that form is coherently self-replicated in form. A body dies with the loss of that organization. All self-defensive expressions are ultimately futile, in the sense that all forms are ultimately transformed into new forms as energy flows through the world. Ecclesiastes nicely expresses the futility of everything that can be done in the world: I have seen all the works that are done under the sun, And behold, all is vanity and a chasing after wind. It cannot be stressed strongly enough that the only way self-defensive expressions can go forward is if the observer of a mind identifies itself with its body-based self-concept. Without its self-identification with the form of that body, it has nothing to defend. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1255 The emotional self-identification of an observer with its body-based self-concept can only arise if that observer really feels like it is embodied within that body, as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body. Its self-identification with the form of its body is its emotional attachment to that body, but that is only a belief that it believes about itself. That belief only arises as a perception, in the sense that perceiving is believing. Its self-identification with its body is the meaning it gives to that perception. Only a coherently organized body can express self-defensive emotions, which inherently defend the survival of the form of that body, and inherently are limited to that form. The flow of energy through a body can come into alignment with the flow of energy through other things, and create an emotional attachment to those forms, but if the body is to survive and self-replicate its form over a sequence of event, that coherent flow of energy at most can become limited to the body itself. Self-defensive expressions by a body always create a sense of self-limitation and self-identification with the form of that body. As a body-based self-concept is emotionally constructed in a mind, and the emotional body feelings inherent in that self-concept are perceived, the observer of that mind feels self-limited to that body. Only those self-defensive emotional expressions make belief in a self-concept believable, which is a false belief that the observer of the mind believes about itself. It believes that it is embodied and self-limited within the form of that body. It believes that it is the ego, or a body-based self-image inherent in its self-concept. Only the observer of the mind observes that body-based self-image as it arises in emotional relationship to the images of other things that appear in the world. The nature of the self-concept only arises with emotional relationships, as images are held in mental imagination and self-replicated over a sequence events. The falseness of the ego arises as the observer of the mind mistakenly identifies itself with a body-based self-image it observes. The self-concept arises in emotional relationships that relate the self-image to images of other things with emotional body feelings. The observer of the mind identifies itself with that self-image since it really feels like it is embodied in a body that expresses those emotional body feelings. In this sense, the self-concept is a false belief the observer of the mind believes about itself. As it perceives the emotional body feelings inherent in the mental construction of its self-concept, it believes its true nature is embodied within the form of a particular body it perceives on the viewing screen of its mind. That false belief is the observer's self-identification with the form of that body. That belief is false in the sense that the viewing screen of the mind only arises from the point of view of the observer. As the viewing screen arises, a presence of consciousness arises at that central point of view. That world arises the same way a dream arises from a dreamer. That world always belongs to the dreamer. Everything in that world, including its body-based self-concept, belongs to the dreamer. It only mistakenly identifies its true nature with the central character of that dream, which is its false self-identification with the form of a particular body that appears in that world from a particular point of view. The process that deconstructs the self-concept only goes forward with the willingness of the observer to disbelieve that false belief that it believes about itself. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1256 The focus of attention of the observer on its self-concept leads to an investment of emotional energy in its mental construction, and to an emotional attachment to that particular body. The attachment process arises as body desires are satisfied, the flow of energy through the body comes into alignment with the flow of energy through other things in the world, and feelings of connection are expressed. All attachments are limited in nature, and ultimately must become limited to the body itself. Only a coherently organized body can express emotions. Self-identification with that body arises as desires are frustrated, the flow of energy through the body goes out of alignment with the flow of energy through other things, feelings of disconnection are expressed, and expressions of self-defensiveness arise. With this expression, the observer really feels like it is embodied as it perceives those body feelings, and emotionally identifies itself with that body. The process of awakening always begins as a process of disillusionment and discontent. Only the observer of the mind can see the falseness of its own ego. Only that selfreflective process allows the observer to detach itself from its ego. The observer is not observing its own image, but only a body-based self-image with which it identifies itself. If the ego's falseness is clearly seen, discontent arises. Discontent is the desire to destroy the falseness of the ego, which is the emotional energy that allows the ego to fight for its own self-destruction. The ego fights for its self-destruction, but that war only comes to an end with a surrender and willingness to suffer ego death rather than live the life of a lie. The process of ego death is always a withdrawal of attention away from the ego, and a withdrawal of emotional energy in the mental construction of the ego, which is the only way the emotional construction of the ego is deconstructed. The withdrawal of emotional energy from its mental construction is a de-animation of the ego. This deconstructive process is the only way the ego is transcended. Only an observer can withdraw its attention away from its ego, and withdraw its investment of energy in the emotional construction of its ego. This deconstructive process only goes forward with disbelief, if the self-concept is clearly seen as a false belief the observer believes about itself. Only if the observer clearly sees the falseness of its self-concept is it willing to deconstruct its ego, and detach itself. The de-animation of its ego is the only way the observer of a mind can detach and de-identify itself from its ego, which only goes forward with disbelief. This self-destructive process is like the burning that occurs as an unstable state of high potential energy transitions to a more stable state, and releases heat that is radiated away. The withdrawal of emotional energy away from the mental construction of an ego is like the burning of the ego. The most stable state possible is the unchanging 'stateless state' of void. Everything ultimately burns down to nothing, just like a virtual particle-antiparticle pair that annihilates back into nothing. Those virtual pairs only appear to create a world of matter, as they appear to separate at the event horizon that is observed by the observer present at that central point of view. The nothingness of no-self is what remains as that observer detaches itself from everything in that world, enters into a state of free fall through empty space, and that entire world disappears. He who follows the Tao ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1257 Is at one with the Tao Returning to the source is stillness, which is the way of nature Stand before it and there is no beginning Follow it and there is no end The form of the formless The image of the imageless It is called indefinable and beyond imagination The farther you go, the less you know The Tao expresses the limits of all learned knowledge, like scientific knowledge, and its ultimate limitation vis-à-vis the ultimate knowledge. All learned knowledge is the nature of imagination, and is a part of the world of images we perceive. The ultimate knowledge isn't a part of the world of images we perceive, isn't imaginary, and isn't learned. It is awareness aware of its true nature, through dissolution into its true undivided formless nature, the indescribable experience of 'knowing nothing'. Those who know are not learned The learned do not know In the pursuit of learning, everyday something is acquired In the pursuit of Tao, everyday something is dropped Less and less is done Until non-action is achieved When nothing is done, nothing is left undone The world is ruled by letting things take their course It cannot be ruled by interfering The correct metaphor for the deconstruction of the ego is the burning of the ego. The ego is mentally constructed as a meta-stable state of high potential energy, which is characterized by a potential barrier. In some sense, that potential barrier is the expression of self-defensiveness. The expression of self-destructiveness is like hot emotional energy that counteracts the expression of self-defensiveness, and overcomes that potential barrier. Before that meta-stable state transitions to a more stable state, heat must be applied, just as heat must be applied before the meta-stable state of a high potential energy molecule will burn. Heat must be applied before the ego will burn. The expression of self-destructiveness is like hot emotional energy that allows the ego to burn. Once the ego begins to burn, heat is released and is radiated away. The withdrawal of emotional energy away from the mental construction of the ego is like the burning of the ego. Like any other kind of burning, it begins suddenly, like an avalanche, and accelerates. The emotional energy used to construct the ego is only withdrawn away from the ego through a process of surrender, which is the only process that deconstructs the ego. If that ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1258 emotional energy is not withdrawn away from the mental construction of the ego, there is no transition to a more stable state, and there is no burning of the ego, no matter how much hot emotional energy is applied through the expression of self-destructiveness. The process of burning away the ego only begins with an examination of the ego. That deconstructive process only goes forward if the observer of a mind looks within its mind and sees the falseness of its self-concept, from which arises the desire to destroy that false self-concept. The expression of self-destructiveness counteracts the self-defensive expressions of the ego. The expression of self-destructiveness is like the hot emotional energy that allows the ego to transition to a more stable state, but only if heat is also radiated away, which only occurs with a surrender, and the withdrawal of emotional energy away from the ego's mental construction. The burning away of the ego is expressed by the Buddha in the Fire Sermon: Burning, burning, burning, burning O Lord, thou pluckest me out Unless there is willingness to surrender, there is no forward movement. The meta-stable state of an ego cannot transition to a more stable state unless energy is radiated away, no matter how much hot emotional energy of self-destructiveness is applied to the ego. Surrender is withdrawal of emotional energy away from the ego's mental construction. The falseness of the ego is not only seen in one's own self-concept, but can also be seen in the self-concept of others. The expression of self-destructiveness can be expressed against the falseness of a self-concept as it arises in others, just as much as it can be expressed against a false self-concept that arises in oneself. Hatred of others is a strange combination of expressions of self-defensiveness and self-destructiveness. One's own false self-concept is defended, while the false self-concept of another is more clearly seen, and is attacked with the desire to destroy that false self-concept. The problem with hatred of others is that one's own false self-concept is not seen clearly enough, while the falseness of others is seen too clearly. The biblical instruction to 'pluck the plank from your own eye' rather than remove 'the speck' from the eye of another is as valid now as it has ever been. That speck is the emotional blinders of the ego that obstructs clear seeing. Unless there is willingness to surrender, there can be no forward movement, but only the state of being stuck with an ego. Obstructions arise as desires to hold onto things, control things, and force things to satisfy desires are expressed. Surrender is willingness to let go of things, sever attachments, and relinquish the desire to control things. It is willingness to abandon expressions of self-defensive personal will and accept universal will. Surrender expresses the willingness to accept everything as it is every moment, with no desire that things be any different. In a state of surrender, the flow of energy through a body comes into alignment with the universal flow of all things. The nature of universal flow is to follow the path of least action, since that is the most likely path in the sense of quantum probability. All expressions of self-defensive personal will are an interference ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1259 with the expression of universal will, and the normal flow of all things. The nature of that interference is what we call an interference pattern. Quantum theory describes the nature of an interference pattern as all the alternative paths that can be taken that deviate from the path of least action. Every interference takes an alternative path, which interferes with the normal flow of all things. In a state of surrender, only the path of least action is taken. The possibility of control only arises with the expression of personal will, and is always an interference with the normal flow of all things. Expressions of personal will arise from the potentiality of things, but deviate from the path of least action, and interfere with the normal flow of all things. That personal expression of potentiality always interferes with the normal universal expression of actuality, as the path deviates from the normal path. The expression of self-defensive personal will is always a waste of time and energy, since that expression interferes with the normal flow of all things, and does not follow the path of least action, which is the most energy efficient path to follow. That waste of time and energy is the meaning of the wasteland in the grail legend. The grail represents the achievement of the integrated state, as the flow of energy through all things comes into alignment, and unlimited feelings of connection are expressed. The wasteland represents expression of self-defensive personal will and self-identification with the form of a body. The normal flow of all things tends to follow the path of least action, since that is the most likely path, and the most energy efficient way to act. Any alternative path interferes with the normal flow of all things, and is always a waste of time and energy. Ramesh Balsekar nicely describes this state of non-interference: No personal individual effort can possibly lead to enlightenment. On the contrary, what is necessary is to rest helpless in beingness, knowing that we are nothing-to be in the nothingness of the no-mind state in which all conceptualizing has subsided into passive witnessing. In this state whatever happens will be not our doing but the pure universal functioning to which we have relinquished all control. Hindu philosophy comes closest to a scientific description of the true nature of reality. The Hindu concepts of the Creator, the Preserver, and the Destroyer are inherent in any unified theory like string theory, which embodies the holographic principle of quantum gravity. Inherent in a unified theory is an empty background space within which a universe is created on a cosmic event horizon, like a bubble in the void. The nature of the void is that empty background space that physicists call the vacuum state. That empty background space, referred to in Hinduism as Paramakash, is the Absolute nature of existence, in the sense that the form of all the things that appear to exist in any world arise from that nothingness. The process of creation can only arise with quantum uncertainty, as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs appear to separate at an event horizon, as observed by the observer present at that central point of view. That apparent separation creates a holographic virtual reality, as virtual particles appear to become real, and bits of quantized information are encoded on the surface of the horizon. Those bits of information tend to align with each other due to quantum entanglement, and are spontaneously organized into coherently organized bound states of information, which is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1260 the nature of the form of all things that tend to self-replicate form over a sequence of events in the flow of energy. Self-replication of form, while behaviors are enacted, is the nature of preservation of form. As energy flows in the sense of thermodynamics, forms tend to become disorganized. Eventually all forms are destroyed. All virtual particles eventually annihilate with their antiparticles. As a world of form holographically arises on an event horizon, an observer is divided from the 'one' source of consciousness, and is present at a point of view. That observer can return to its true undivided formless state through dissolution into that nothingness, referred to as Nirvana. Shankara refers to the absolute nature of reality as Brahman, the ultimate impersonal reality that underlies everything in the world, the source from which all things arise and to which they return. He refers to the divided presence of consciousness that perceives that world as Atman, or the Self. This is what he has to say about the nature of the world: Brahman is the only truth. The world is illusion, and there is ultimately no difference between Brahman and Atman. Socrates tells us to Know Thyself, but also has this to say about the nature of death: "To fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise, without being wise; for it is to think that we know what we do not know". Body death is only a transformation of form into new form. The divided consciousness of an observer can only be present for the form of a body, or return to its true undivided formless state through dissolution. Knowing the Self is enlightenment To die but not to perish is to be eternally present Brings freedom from the fear of death Eugen Herrigel describes the path of return in Zen in the Art of Archery: He must dare to leap into the Origin so as to live by the Truth and in the Truth, like one who has become one with it. He must become a pupil again, a beginner; conquer the last and steepest stretch of the way, undergo new transformation. If he survives its perils then is his destiny fulfilled; face to face he beholds the unbroken Truth, the Truth beyond all truths, the formless Origin of origins, the Void which is the All; is absorbed into it and from it emerges reborn. There is no reason for the existence of the 'existent one'. There is no reason for being. Being is prior to creation and perception, prior to identification with form, and prior to whatever forms appear to exist in the world. Those forms appear to come into existence on a 'plane of existence'. The 'existent one' is the source of the light of reason, and the source of all things that appear to exist in any world. That light is divided from the darkness with the creation of that world. With the disappearance of that world, that light returns to its true undivided formless state. That primordial state of existence can be called the 'non-existent', if by existence we mean 'being something in the world'. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1261 Being is born of not being Being at one with the Tao is eternal And though the body dies, the Tao will never pass away Because there is no place for death to enter The Buddha had something like this to say about the nature of the self-concept: 'you are what you think you are'. The conclusion of this statement is very simple. If there are no thoughts, then 'you are not'. The Tao also tells us: 'being is born of not being'. The possibility of 'being something' is created out of 'being nothing'. The only way to know that nothingness is through a process of detachment from everything that appears to exist within the world we perceive. Spiritual awakening is always a process of detachment. Awakening is consciousness non-identified with form. Awakening can occur while forms are still perceived, or as forms disappear. Forms are perceived if there is awakening within the dream, and forms disappear if there is awakening from the dream, but in either case, consciousness is not identified with form. Expression of self-referential thought is how a presence of consciousness identifies itself with the form of its body-based selfconcept. The end of thoughts is how it detaches itself from its self-concept. Consensual reality is just like a shared dream. The consensual reality of a world is shared among many observers, as observed from many different points of view. An observer can awaken from its dream if the dream comes to an end, but can also become lucid and awaken within its dream. The emotional construction of the ego is de-animated in the lucid state, but that world isn't de-animated. In the lucid state, the mind becomes silent. The mind only becomes silent if self-referential thoughts are no longer emotionally constructed. Without self-referential thoughts, the observer of a mind no longer has a mentally constructed self-concept with which to identify itself, and knows itself only as the silent observer of that world. It knows itself to be a presence of consciousness. Let the mind become still Surrender is the only way the mind becomes silent, as self-referential thoughts are no longer emotionally constructed in the mind. Thoughts are only an emotional relationship constructed in the mind, as a body-based self-image is emotionally held in mental imagination and is emotionally related to the images of other things also held in mental imagination. The self-concept only arises as the observer of the mind identifies itself with that self-image. An observer of a mind only becomes aware of its own presence, and knows itself as a silent witness of its world, if its mind becomes silent. Only with mental silence can the observer know itself as a pure presence of consciousness. Surrender is the only way the flow of energy through the body comes into alignment with the flow of energy through all things in the world, as universal will is accepted. Only in a state of non-interference can the observer feel connected to all things in the world. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1262 The lucid state is only possible with an emotional transformation, which is always a death-rebirth process. The segregated, self-defensive ego dies away, and an integrated self is reborn. The death of the segregated self is a deconstruction of form, and the rebirth of an integrated self is a transformation into new form. That emotional transformation is a change in the way form is organized, like a phase transition. Ice only melts into liquid water if a lot of heat is applied. The only way that transformation goes forward is with the expression of self-destructiveness, which is like heat that melts away the old form. The correct metaphor for the deconstruction of the ego is the burning of the ego, but in a thermodynamic sense, the burning away of the ego is not unlike melting away. The segregated self is organized through the expression of self-defensiveness. Since its form is body-based, that form survives through self-defensive expressions, which defend body survival. Self-replication of form is what the expression of self-defensiveness is all about, and self-identification with the form of a body is what the ego is all about. The self-concept is emotionally constructed in mental imagination with self-referential thoughts that are only like a story that the mind tells about how the body survives in the world. The problem isn't the body surviving in the world. The problem is the story told in mental imagination about how a body survives in the world. The self-concept only arises with that story. That story is composed of self-referential thoughts, which are mentally constructed beliefs that relate self to other. Implicit in each belief is the false belief the observer of the mind is embodied within the body of the central character of that story. That false belief is what the observer of the mind believes about itself as it perceives a mentally constructed belief, and feels like it is embodied as it perceives an emotional body feeling inherent in that belief. The problem isn't a body that expresses emotions in a world. The problem is a mind that emotionally constructs self-referential thoughts, which emotionally relate the concept of a body-based self to the concept of another. All those self-referential thoughts are false beliefs the observer of the mind believes about itself. The observer of a mind only detaches itself from its self-concept if it no longer believes that false belief about itself. The only process that detaches itself from its self-concept is to sever emotional attachments. An observer is self-identified with the form of a body due to those attachments. The only way it detaches itself is to sever them. The process is straightforward. The observer looks within its mind at its self-concept and sees its falseness. As the falseness of a self-concept is clearly seen, disillusionment arises, and the desire to destroy that self-concept. Attachments are severed with a surrender and the willingness to let go, which is a process of ego death. The Gordian knot of attachment cannot be untied, only severed. That is how the war of self-destruction comes to an end, but only if battle after battle is fought, which is like a death by a thousand cuts. The observer sees the battlefield as it sees how its self-concept is constructed out of those attachments. It is only willing to fight those battles, and let go of those attachments, if it clearly sees that its self-concept is an illusion, and that it would rather suffer ego death than live the life of a lie. This self-destructive process is the 'dark night of the soul'. This self-destructive process only goes forward if attachments are severed. That is the only way the ego is transcended. A self-concept is only constructed in the mind as a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1263 body-based self-image is emotionally related to images of other things that appear in the world. This emotional construction process is inherently self-defensive in nature, and only attachments are defended. It only makes sense to defend attachments, but the sense of 'making sense' is based on misperception. The answer isn't to 'stop making sense', but to stop making misperceptions. The ultimate attachment is to the body itself, which is the ultimate misperception. An observer attaches itself to its body as it perceives selfdefensive body feelings, and feels like it is self-limited to that body. Its belief in a bodybased self-concept is its self-identification with the form of that body. Since it feels like it is embodied, the survival of that body is defended as though its existence depends on it. That observer is never really embodied or limited to the form of its body. It only believes that it is embodied due to its self-limiting beliefs. Those self-limiting beliefs are selfreferential thoughts emotionally constructed in its mind, which relate its body-based selfconcept to the concept of something else in its world with body feelings. That observer only believes it is embodied since it really feels like it is embodied as it perceives emotional body feelings. It only detaches itself from its false self-identification with the form of its body if it disbelieves those false beliefs about itself. The process of detachment only goes forward if it clearly sees the falseness of those beliefs, and if those beliefs are no longer emotionally constructed in its mind. The only way emotional energy is withdrawn from the mental construction of its false self-limiting beliefs is through disbelief. Withdrawal of emotional energy is always a surrender, and the willingness to abandon expressions of self-defensive personal will and accept universal will. The emotional transformation that leads to the lucid state allows an observer to know itself as a presence of consciousness that is only present for the form of its body. It knows itself only as a witness. It knows itself as an observer present at a still point that only witnesses the form of that body, as those images play like movie images on a viewing screen. That transformation is only possible with the development of the integrated state, which is always a death-rebirth process, and a transformation of form into new form. That transformation only occurs if the observer of a mind clearly sees the falseness of its own ego, and clearly sees the falseness of all the self-defensive expressions that defend the form of its ego as though its existence depends upon it, which keeps it self-identified with that form. As it sees that falseness, self-destructiveness arises, which is the hot emotional energy that counteracts the self-defensiveness of the ego, like heat that melts ice back into water. That is the deconstructive part of the death process, but there is also a reconstructive part of the rebirth process. The segregated, self-defensive ego dies away, and the integrated self is reborn. That rebirth only occurs with a surrender. An integrated self is integrated only to the degree the flow of emotional energy through a body comes into alignment with the flow of all things. That alignment only occurs with acceptance of everything as it is every moment, with no desire to change or control anything. That acceptance expresses trust in universal will to sort out what is best for all things. The reward of that integration is unlimited feelings of connection to all things. The focus of attention of a presence of consciousness on its world always leads to an investment of time and energy in that world. Time and energy belong to the observer as much as anything else in that world. Whatever the observer focuses its attention on in its ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1264 world is what occupies the attention of the observer, and is how its time and energy is spent in that world. If the observer focuses its attention on meaningless distractions, that is how it spends its time and energy. If the observer focuses its attention on its mentally constructed self-concept, that is how it spends its time and energy. If the observer focuses its attention on the process of its own awakening, that is how it spends its time and energy. Only if the observer clearly sees the falseness of its self-concept will it turn away from it, lose interest in it, withdraw the focus of its attention on it, withdraw its investment of emotional energy in it, and finally bring its emotional construction in its mind to an end. That is the only way it can shift the focus of its attention away from its self-concept, and onto its own sense of being present for that world. Why is the observer willing to surrender and detach itself from its false self-identification with its body? Why is it willing to stop interfering with the normal flow of all things, stop expressing self-defensive personal will, stop defending the survival of its body as though its existence depends on it, stop identifying itself with the form of its body, and simply watch in a state of detachment as its body is transformed into a new form? Surrender follows naturally from seeing what is. It sees the true nature of its existence. It sees that what 'it is', is nothing but undivided formless pure being, which is at the source of everything. It sees it has nothing to gain, lose, or defend. It sees it has nothing to choose. It sees that body death is only a transformation of form into new form. It sees that its true nature cannot die, but only return to its true undivided formless state of pure being. A presence of consciousness is willing to surrender if it identifies itself only with pure being, and not with any form it perceives. It sees the world is no more real than a dream, and any form is no more real than a character in a dream. It sees the form of everything is an illusion created out of the nothingness of pure being. It does not identify itself with any form, but only with undivided, formless pure being. At the source of everything, there is nothing but undivided, formless pure being. The form of everything in a world is an illusion created out of the nothingness of pure being, like a dream that arises from a dreamer. As a world of form is created out of nothing, a presence of consciousness is divided from that nothingness to perceive that world. The birth, life and death of a body is only the development, self-replication and disorganization of that form. A presence of consciousness cannot die. It can only return to its true undivided, formless state of pure being. The true nature of being can never be reduced to a form perceived in the world, anymore than the true nature of a dreamer can be reduced to a character perceived in a dream. A dreamer can identify itself with a character in its dream, but that self-identification is inherently false. The true nature of consciousness can never be reduced to something perceived within the world, and yet every observer of a world knows it exists, and knows it is aware. In physical terms, the true nature of consciousness is only describable as a focal point of perception in empty space, and the true nature of being as void. Every body belongs to an observer, but the observer is not a body. Every mind belongs to an observer, but the observer is not a mind or a body-based self-concept. Every world ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1265 belongs to an observer, but the observer is beyond that world. If it is not its body, its mind, its world or its self-concept, what is it? What is beyond all these things? Even to say it is the consciousness for these things is not quite correct. What is beyond its consciousness for all these things? What is the source of everything in its world, and the source of its consciousness? The only scientific answer we can give is the void, which is the source of everything that appears in a world, as holographically displayed upon a viewing screen, and the source of the consciousness that is present at a point of view, and perceives that world. In physical terms, the void can only be described as an empty background space. An observer can know itself as the void if it dissolves back into the void. In this sense, the void is undivided formless pure being, the true nature of what it is. Where does the individual sense of being present, the sense of 'I am-ness', come from? The individual sense of being only arises as a world arises. As a world arises on an event horizon, like a movie of images that play upon a viewing screen, a presence of consciousness arises at a point of view, and perceives that world. That individual sense of being is already a movement in duality, as a presence of consciousness is divided from the 'one' source of consciousness with the creation of that world. The individual sense of being can be imparted to any form that appears in that world, as in the self-concept 'I am identical to the form of a body'. That self-identification with a particular body is only a perception that occurs from a particular point of view, and is only possible due to the individual sense of being that arises as a presence of consciousness arises. Without the perception of a self-concept, there is no sense of self. A presence of consciousness that returns to its true undivided formless state through dissolution into the 'one' source of consciousness no longer has an individual identity or any sense of self. There is no individual sense of being, no sense of 'I am', and no-self in dissolution. There is only 'oneness'. Dissolution into nothingness is the nature of nonduality. The individual sense of being present for a world is always a movement in duality. Awakening is consciousness non-identified with form. The only way awakening is possible is if there is no self-identification with form. Consciousness is always present for form, but it need not identify itself with any form. A form arises on a viewing screen, and consciousness is present at a point of view, as a world is animated like a movie of images. Every movie has its central form perceived from a central point of view. That central form is a body. Organs of sensory perception in a body appear to relay information about an entire world to a brain, like a video camera relays information to a digital viewing screen. All the information for that world, which includes the body, is defined upon the viewing screen. That apparent relay of information includes external sensory perceptions of the world and internal perceptions of emotional body feelings, but all of those perceptions are only a holographic appearance. A presence of consciousness perceives pain in that body if that body expresses pain, but there is only suffering if it identifies itself with that form. Suffering arises with self-identification and unwillingness to let go. Without self-identification and attachment to form, it is free to let go and become pain free. It does not feel compelled to hold onto a pain-giving thing as though its existence depends on it. It is always free to return to its true undivided formless state. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1266 The ten thousand things rise and fall while the Self watches their return They grow and flourish and then return to the source Returning to the source is stillness, which is the way of nature The Tao says the wise are impartial. Worlds come and worlds go, but the infinite potentiality of the source to create and destroy worlds is inexhaustible. Forms appear to come into existence in a world. Expression of self-concerned thought about what appears to happen in that world is a sign of ignorance, and indicates self-identification with form. Everything ultimately returns to nothingness. The only way to know that nothingness is through a process of self-destruction, which the Bhagavad-Gita expresses as: Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds. The only way that return is possible is through a process of self-destruction, but to destroy one's self makes no more sense than to kill one's self for one's own good. Truth realization makes no sense. No one benefits from it. The integrated state does make sense. An integrated self benefits from the integrated state, with feelings of connection to all things, expressions of creativity, and right actions that follow from clear seeing. The Buddha nicely summarizes what is achieved in the path of return: Truly, I have attained nothing from total enlightenment. There are only three possible ways to live a life in the world. Hinduism expresses the three ways to live a life with the concepts of the Creator, the Preserver, and the Destroyer. A life can be lived with the expression of creativity, self-defensiveness, or self-destructiveness. With expression of self-defensiveness, a self-concept is preserved. With the expression of creativity, the self-concept is transcended. With the expression of self-destructiveness, the self-concept is ultimately destroyed. A life lived in the world with the expression of self-defensiveness is a segregated, ego-bound life, self-identified with the form of a body. A life lived with the expression of creativity is an integrated, lucid life, which transcends all limited self-concepts. A life lived with the expression of self-destructiveness ultimately returns to the formless state of no-self, which is no life at all, and cannot be desired. The desireless state is a kind of death, and is not achievable with expression of desire. The integrated state is desirable, since it allows for expressions of creativity, unlimited feelings of connection, and right actions that follow from clear seeing. The integrated state arises with the awakening of a presence of consciousness, which is only possible if it no longer identifies itself with the form of its body. The only possible way to live a life in the world is to have a body. Even if consciousness awakens and identifies itself only with pure being, it can only live a life in the world if it has a body, but that world is like its dream, its body is like the central character of that dream, and it is like a lucid dreamer. It does not interfere with the normal flow of things. It simply watches as all things come and go, with no identification with any particular thing, but a general sense of identity with all things, since it knows everything in its dream belongs to itself and arises from its true nature. It is willing to let things come and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1267 go, with no desire to hold onto or control anything. Authentic desires arise in the flow of all things, as an expression of universal creativity. Inauthentic desires arise with the selfdefensive expression of personal will, and are seen as false, since they lead to the mental construction of a false self-concept and self-identification with the form of a body. In the lucid state, inauthentic desires are rejected as soon as they are seen as false. Anyone who experiences the expression of creativity knows there is no ego present while creativity is expressed. Only consciousness is present. If the ego arises, with its expression of self-concerned thoughts, that is the mental block to the expression of creativity. The ego is the obstruction. After the creative process is finished, the ego only takes false credit for that creative expression, since the ego had nothing to do with it. All great artists know that creativity has nothing to do with their egos. The sculpture is already there in the block of marble. It is only necessary to see it and remove the extraneous pieces. Creative actions follow directly from clear seeing. With creative expressions, only consciousness is present, not the ego. The expression of creativity transcends the ego. Creative expressions only arise as the flow of creative energy in a body comes into alignment with the flow of other things. The ego is a mental block in creative expressions. The ego is the obstruction that prevents clear seeing through selfidentification with form and self-defensive expressions. The phony ego only arises after the expression of creativity is finished, and takes false credit for creative expressions. The ego proclaims 'look what I did', but there is no ego in that creative expression, only the expression of universal creativity. The ego itself is such a creative expression. The expression of self-referential thoughts is inherently self-defensive in nature, since it defends the self-replication of the form of a self-concept. The only way the ego is deconstructed is with a self-destructive process. In that self-destructive process, thought is used as a weapon to destroy the self-referential thoughts of the ego. That is the only process that destroys the self-concept while the body still lives. Self-defensive expressions arise as an expression of personal will, and interfere with the normal flow of all things. A state of surrender is always a state of non-interference. Without those self-defensive expressions, a self-image is no longer emotionally held in mental imagination and related to images of other things, and a self-concept is no longer emotionally constructed in the mind. The mind becomes silent, and the observer has no self-concept with which to identify itself. This ego-deconstructive process is the only way the observer of a mind can bring itself into the focus of its own awareness. The desire for something is the nature of an attachment, which expresses the desire to live. The expression of that desire only comes to an end through a process of detachment. The ultimate detachment occurs as the observer withdraws its focus of attention away from its world, and withdraws its investment of energy in that world. That withdrawal of energy de-animates that world, and allows that world of form to disappear. A presence of consciousness only brings itself into the focus of its awareness with a silent mind, and only realizes its true nature as it focuses its attention upon itself as its world disappears. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1268 A purpose in life is not the same as a reason for being. As long as one has a purpose in life, a body lives. Longevity is a consequence of having a purpose in life, but that purpose is only like a role that an actor plays in a staged production. The observer only watches that performance from its seat in the audience. If the observer's only purpose is to survive in the form of its body, then body survival is its purpose. If its purpose is the expression of creativity, then creative expression is its purpose. If its only purpose is to know the true nature of what it is, then that purpose must express itself as a process of selfdestruction, and ultimately leads to either body death or ego death. The ego can fight for its own self-destruction, but that war can only come to an end with a surrender and the acceptance of ego death. That acceptance of ego death is always like the final stage of grieving. In the final stage of grieving, the death of something is accepted. The irony is that to know the true nature of what it is, a presence of consciousness must desire nothing, since its true nature is nothing. As long as the desire for something is expressed, it has a purpose in life, and its body lives. That isn't a reason for being, only a reason for living in the form of a body. That reason for living is always the desire for something, which expresses the desire to live. There is no reason for being, since the nothingness of being is the true nature of what it is. It can only pretend to be something in the world with its reason for living. If it has a mind that constructs self-referential thoughts, it knows itself as a segregated self, self-identified with the form of its body. If its mind becomes silent, it knows itself only as a pure presence of consciousness, or as an integrated self. If it has no reason for living, its mind and its world disappear, and it knows itself as the nothingness of no-self. No-mind means no world and no-self. Although not commonly discussed in this way, the purpose of psychoanalysis in its purest form is the achievement of the integrated state. In free association, the ego talks in an uncensored way, while the observer of the mind listens. The ego displays all its emotional conflicts, and the observer watches. Those conflicts are contradictory desires to hold onto, control, oppose, run away from, and force things to satisfy desires. Conflicts are understood in the sense of object relations, as emotional conflicts between self and other. Emotional relationships are in conflict since those desires are contradictory. The point of psychoanalysis is to expose the ego and its contradictory desires, which are seen as immature. The point isn't to satisfy contradictory desires, but to resolve the conflict. The way the conflict is resolved is called integration. The observer sees the immaturity and contradictory nature of the desires, and is willing to let go and grow up. Growing up is a process of letting go. Things are no longer seen as just good or bad. Satisfaction of desire feels good and frustration feels bad, but the desire to force things to satisfy desires only creates more bad feelings. Everything is seen as a mixture of good and bad. Acceptance of the good with the bad is called integration, and is considered the nature of emotional maturity. The psychoanalyst doesn't give a tranquilizer to mask emotional conflicts, but allows them to be exposed, and allows the observer to see them. This crisis situation is only resolved with the willingness to suffer ego death. That resolution is just like the final stage of grieving for the death of something, which is always an acceptance of death. Zen meditation in its purest form is just like this kind of psychoanalysis. There are two essential parts of the meditation. The self-destructive part is a process of clearly seeing ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1269 the falseness of the ego. As the falseness of the ego is clearly seen, the desire to destroy the self-concept arises. The surrender part is willingness to suffer ego death. The observer allows its ego to die away as the focus of its attention is withdrawn away from its selfconcept, and its investment of emotional energy is withdrawn away from the ego's mental construction. Withdrawal of that self-defensive emotional energy is a surrender. There must be willingness to suffer ego death. Without that self-destructive expression and surrender, the meditation cannot go forward and reach its intended goal. The important role the Zen master plays in this process is to clearly point this out to the meditator. Ramesh Balsekar summarizes this self-destructive process: Concepts can at best only serve to negate one another, as one thorn is used to remove another, and then is thrown away. Words and language deal only with concepts, and cannot approach Reality. The goal of this process is the achievement of a silent mind. Only with a silent mind can the observer of the mind bring itself into the focus of its own awareness, and know itself as a pure presence of consciousness. That observer only realizes its true formless nature if the observer focuses its attention upon itself as its world of form disappears. Let the mind become still Be still and know that I am God The Tao-Te-Ching literally means 'the way and its energy'. The word Tao means the way or the path, and refers to the natural path all things take, which is the path of least action. The word Te refers to energy, which in the ying-yang symbol is understood to come in both positive and negative aspects, and to be in a state of balance, just like a virtual particle-antiparticle pair that is created out of nothing and annihilates back into nothing. That nothingness is understood as the nature of oneness, the source of everything, and the ground of being. The Tao refers to the path of return as a return to that nothingness. The Tao also describes the path of return as a state of non-interference and non-doing. The word repent literally means 'to turn away', just as exodus means 'the way out', and the word atone means 'being at one'. All of these words refer to the path of return. An observer of a world can only know itself as a pure presence of consciousness if it turns away from that world and focuses its attention on its own sense of being. In this sense, the only sin to regret is ignorance, which is an observer that does not know its true nature, and mistakenly identifies itself with an image, or the form of something that it observes. Self-identification with form is the original sin. Prior to self-identification with form, an observer lives in a state of innocence, like a very young child prior to the development of a self-concept. After the self-concept develops, the observer lives in a state of ignorance, self-identified with the form of a body. Only with destruction of its self-concept can the observer live in a state of wisdom, referred to as eternal life. Only a body can die as form becomes disorganized. An observer can only return to its true state of timeless being. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1270 That timeless state of being is not a thing in the world. A detached observer continues to observe its world, but if its mind becomes silent, it no longer identifies itself with any form in that world since it no longer has a body-based self-concept with which to identify itself. It shifts the focus of its attention onto itself, and knows itself only as a silent observer of its world. The Book of Psalms describes this silent state of mind as 'Be still and know that I am God'. The New Testament also describes the unchanging primordial nature of existence with the expression 'Before Abraham was, I am'. The Bhagavad-Gita expresses the unchanging primordial nature of existence as: Never the spirit was born The spirit shall cease to be never Never was time it was not End and beginning are dreams The Bhagavad-Gita also describes the enlightened state: In the knowledge of the Atman Which is a dark night to the ignorant The recollected mind is fully awake and aware The ignorant are awake in their sense life Which is darkness to the sage The Bhagavad-Gita also describes the lucid state of a detached observer: The soul that with a strong and constant calm Takes sorrow and takes joy indifferently Lives in the life undying That which is can never cease to be That which is not cannot exist To see this truth of both Is theirs who part essence from accident Substance from shadow The lucid state is sometimes described with the mythological image of the central mountain of the world. It is as though a lucid observer looks down at its world from the central mountain of its world, which is at the center of its world. It looks down on its world, just like it looks at images on a distant horizon. It looks down on all the characters in that world, including the central character. This way of seeing the world is described as seeing things in a spiritual way. The realization of this way of seeing is non-identification with form. Every observer is at the center of its own world, and looks down on that world. That center is everywhere, since it is only another point of view in empty space. In this sense, everyone who observes a world is at the center of their own world. A lucid observer knows itself only as a pure presence of consciousness at a still point, and is not identified with anything it observes in that world. Every point of view in empty space is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1271 at the center of a potential world that arises on an event horizon. As an observer arises at that central point of view, its world arises on a distant horizon. That center is everywhere. The lucid state is often described like the experience of a lucid dream. In a lucid dream, the observer of that dream looks down on all the characters in that dream, which include the central character of the dream. That lucid observer has the sense of being 'in the dream' as the central character, but also has the sense of not being 'of the dream'. That observer knows it is not a character in its dream. It is nothing it perceives in its dream. It looks down on its dream, and it sees how the central character acts, but it has the strange sense of not being self-identified with the central character, and being outside its dream. That dream is only like a performance, and the central character is like an actor on a stage. As the lucid dreamer perceives that performance, it knows itself to be outside that stage, in the audience. It is as though the performance plays like a movie of images on a viewing screen while it observes the performance from its seat in the audience. The lucid dreamer does not control what appears to happen on the stage. It only watches the performance, which arises in the normal flow of all things. It is not 'of the dream', since it is not identified with the central character. There is another sense in which it is not 'of the dream'. It can awaken from its dream. If it awakens, the dream disappears. The lucid state is often described as the theater of consciousness in our greatest literature. Shakespeare refers to the world as a stage, populated by actors on the stage: All the world's a stage And all the men and women merely players Who is out there in the audience of the theater of consciousness, watching this play? To paraphrase Gertrude Stein: Is there really any 'there' there? Shakespeare does not give an answer, but does describe the futility of everything that can be done in the world: Life is but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury Signifying nothing Plato also refers to shadows as he describes the theater of consciousness and the lucid state. In the Republic he gives it emphasis in the section called the Allegory of the Cave: They see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave. To them, the truth would be literally nothing but the shadows of the images. See what will naturally follow if the prisoners are released and disabused of their error. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1272 See the reality of which in his former state he had seen the shadows; and then conceive someone saying to him, that what he saw before was an illusion. His eye is turned towards more real existence, he has a clearer vision. Shakespeare refers to shadows the same way Plato describes the shadows of images displayed on the wall of the cave, just like animated images displayed in a movie. Plato describes prisoners who observe the shadows, and mistake those shadows for their true nature. The prisoners believe something about themselves that is untrue. The prisoners believe they are the shadows they perceive. In a sense, the prisoners only believe that false belief about themselves since that is the way it 'feels' to them as they perceive it, and feeling is believing. Perceiving is believing, which is another way to say 'to act is to give meaning'. The meaning that we give to the things we perceive in the world arises with emotional actions, which we perceive as body feelings. Only emotional expressions make beliefs believable, and are inherent in all beliefs. Belief is not possible without a body. Beliefs only come to an end with the end of the emotional expressions that make those beliefs believable, which is the end of belief in a body-based self-concept. Socrates expressed this idea with his famous saying Know thyself. This is the motto for the movie the Matrix, which is a retelling of the Allegory. The Matrix is about a virtual reality created within the theater of consciousness. The story is about a prisoner self-identified with a character in that virtual reality, the journey that allows for escape from that prison, and the end of that false belief. That journey allows a knower to know its true nature, and no longer believe it is something it perceives. That knower believes it is the animated form of an image it perceives since that is the way it really feels, and feeling is believing. The central character of the Matrix is told 'you are the one', but is also told 'you've been living in a dream world', and when given the chance to awaken is told 'all I'm offering is the truth, nothing more'. Shakespeare also tells us that 'life is but a dream': We are such stuff As dreams are made on and our little life Is rounded with a sleep To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil Must give us pause Thoughts are actions like anything else that one can do, except they are acted out in mental imagination. When one does nothing, one also thinks nothing. Doing nothing includes thinking nothing. The focus of attention of consciousness on anything leads to an investment of emotional energy in that thing. Only that flow of energy allows for animation of that thing over a sequence of events. Thinking is a symbolic representation of doing constructed in mental imagination, and requires the same investment of emotional energy. With thinking, the focus of attention is on a body-based self-concept ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1273 held in mental imagination, as that self-concept is emotionally related to the concept of other things in the world. If the focus of attention is withdrawn from the self-concept, self-referential thoughts are de-animated, and the observer of the mind thinks nothing. Without self-referential thoughts, the observer has no self-concept with which to identify itself, and knows itself only as a pure presence of consciousness, or a silent witness of that world. It witnesses its world from the immovable center of that world, while all the images of that world play like a movie of images on a distant screen. Events still happen in the world, but all things tend to follow the path of least action in the normal flow of things. That is the normal way for the world to be animated. The detached observer does not interfere with the normal flow of things, but simple watches as things appear to happen. A detached observer does nothing in its world, but only looks down on that world like images that play on a distant horizon. The body of the central character is only another animated image on the screen. The detached observer is not self-identified with the central character, and no longer feels embodied in that body. With the lucid state, the mind becomes silent with the acceptance of everything as it is, without the desire to explain anything. Explanations are seen as false, since all explanations are inherently self-defensive in nature. Ultimately, nothing can be explained. As Einstein pointed out, everything that appears to happen in a world is probabilistic in nature, and is no more explainable than a dice game. Explanations only arise in that world like the narration of an animation by the central character of that animation. The end of self-referential thoughts is like the end of the narration of that animation by the central character. The lucid dreamer continues to observe that world, but knows it is nothing it observes, and is only witnessing that world. The de-animation of the ego is only possible in a state of non-interference. That world is still animated and actions occur in that world, but without self-defensive expressions of personal will and an ego that obstructs clear seeing, the lucid dreamer clearly sees the course of right action, which is the path of least action. Right action follows from clear seeing. There is simply acceptance of everything as it is every moment, with no desire to change or control anything. Things are accepted as they come and go, with no desire to hold onto things, and no desire to oppose anything. Actions arise naturally in the universal flow of all things without expressions of personal desire. With that acceptance, the flow of energy through the body comes into alignment with the universal flow of energy through all things, and feelings of connection to all things are expressed. Unlike emotional attachments, unlimited feelings of connection only arise in the detached state. A detached observer that enters into a lucid state feels connected to everything that appears in that world. That lucid observer knows that all things come and go like clouds in an empty sky, and knows itself to be a presence of consciousness that is present at a still point in that empty space. That detached observer is present for that movement, but is not attached to anything that appears to move and change. That detached observer knows that everything appears to move through expression of universal will, and knows itself only as a pure presence of consciousness that only observes that motion and change. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1274 It knows death is only a transformation of form into new form. It knows it can only be present for the form of things, or return to its true undivided, formless state of pure being. The lucid observer knows that the expression of universal will is a manifestation of universal intelligence, since consciousness is present for all things. The lucid observer puts its trust in universal intelligence to sort out what is best, and identifies itself only with the 'one' source of consciousness. It remains detached, but in a friendly way, without any desire to attach itself to anything that appears to change in the world. That observer simply witnesses things as they come and go in the flow of energy through all things. There is a normal curiosity about that world, and a sense of amusement and interest in things, but that observer remains unattached to anything that arises in that world. But the final detachment from the world only occurs with the de-animation of that world. The only way to understand detachment from everything, and the ultimate state of free fall through empty space, is with the concept of a force. The principle of equivalence tells us every force is equivalent to an acceleration. An acceleration implies an accelerating frame of reference with an observer present at the central point of view, which we can take as the origin of that frame of reference. Every accelerating frame of reference has an event horizon. A horizon is as far in space as an observer can see things in space, due to constancy of the speed of light. The holographic principle tells us all the information for all the things observed in that space is encoded on the event horizon, which acts as a viewing screen that projects images to the central point of view. The motion of all things in that space is only a holographic appearance, and that motion is relative, as all things appear to move relative to each other. It helps to deconstruct the principle of equivalence all the way down to an empty space that is only characterized by the information encoded on the viewing screen and the observer at the central point of view. When a person stands on the surface of the earth, that person experiences a gravitational field. All things dropped above the surface of the earth fall down with an acceleration rate a=g relative to the person. The earth's gravitational field is always equivalent to a spaceship that accelerates through empty space with an acceleration rate a=g. A person that stands on the floor of an accelerating space ship experiences the same acceleration of things dropped above the floor of the spaceship, which fall down with an acceleration rate a=g relative to the person. But that person is not itself in a state of free fall. Due to quantum uncertainty, the atoms in the body of the person cannot occupy the same space as the atoms in the floor of the spaceship, or the atoms that compose the surface of the earth. There is an effective repulsive force between the body and that surface. The floor of the spaceship, or the surface of the earth, holds up a person that stands upon that surface. Even if that body is in free fall in the earth's gravitational field, we have only eliminated the effects of gravity, and not the other fundamental forces. If we look closer inside the body of the person, we see all the atoms in that body are bound together due to the electromagnetic force of attraction between atoms. That force arises due to an uneven distribution of electric charges in space, and the electromagnetic force of attraction between negatively charged electrons and positively charged atomic nuclei. Even the atomic nuclei are bound together due to the nuclear force of attraction ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1275 between quarks. In the same way, the atoms in the earth or in the spaceship are also bound together. A body of a person is just as much a bound state as is the earth or the spaceship. Unified theories unify the electromagnetic force and nuclear forces with gravity through compactification of extra dimensions. The principle of equivalence applies to those forces just as much as it does to gravity. Every force is equivalent to an accelerating frame of reference in empty space. A state of free fall through empty space eliminates the effects of all forces. But the only way to understand that state of free fall is with the viewing screen description. All forces are equivalent to an accelerating frame of reference in empty space, which always has an event horizon, where all the information for all the things observed in that space is holographically encoded. The images of all the things observed in that space are observed from the central point of view of that frame of reference. Only the observer at that central point of view can enter into a state of free fall, in which case the effects of all forces are eliminated, and all those images disappear, since the viewing screen disappears. There is no event horizon for an observer in a state of free fall through empty space. The form of everything, as observed by the observer at the central point of view, disappears for an observer in a state of free fall through empty space. This is a natural consequence of the equivalence principle. The form of a body can appear to move in the world as the body moves relative to the form of other things in the world, but that appearance of movement is only a holographic appearance, as forms appear to move on a viewing screen. That appearance of movement of form is an illusion. Even the bits of information on the screen do not move around in space, but only become organized into the form of things. Bits of information can only come into and go out of alignment with each other, as forms are organized, self-replicated in form, and appear to move relative to each other while their behaviors are enacted. Forms only appear due to the organization of information, and they disappear as information is disorganized. The observer of a world appears to move around in that world, but that appearance of movement is only another illusion created as the observer identifies itself with the form of a body with its emotional attachment to that body. The observer only feels like it is embodied in a body that appears to move around, as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body. The observer does not really move. Only a perceivable world of form is animated. If the observer no longer feels embodied within the form of a body, and no longer identifies itself with that body, then the observer knows itself only as a pure presence of consciousness at a still point, while its world plays like a movie of images on a screen at a distant horizon. Self-identification with the form of a body is only possible as a presence of consciousness arises at a point of view while a world of form holographically arises on a viewing screen. The form of the body is emotionally self-replicated in form, and the observer feels like it is embodied within that body as it perceives the emotional body feelings expressed by that body. As an observer arises at a point of view, its sense of being present, its sense of 'I am-ness', also arises. That sense of being can be emotionally imparted to the perceived form of its body, as in the self-concept 'I am identical to the form of a body'. But that self-identification with the form of a body is inherently false, since the sense of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1276 being does not arise from the perceived form of a body. That sense of being is inherent to the observer. The sense of being arises as the observer arises from the 'one' source of consciousness, which is the primordial nature of existence. That individual sense of being is only emotionally imparted by the observer to the form of a body since the observer really feels like it is embodied as it perceive the emotional body feelings expressed by a body. The true nature of the observer is the consciousness present at a point of view in empty space, not the perceivable form of an image animated on a viewing screen that the observer perceives. The form of its body is only another animated image it perceives. Science only describes the perceivable world in terms of how information is encoded in that world, and how energy flows through that world. That scientific description is inherently mathematical in nature. The encoding of information and the flow of energy are described by computational rules. The universal flow of energy is described by thermodynamics, and describes how states of information evolve into other states of information. That universal flow of energy begins with a big bang event, and ends with the heat death of the universe. The encoding of information is described by quantum theory, which describes the discrete nature of how quantized bits of information are encoded in any state of information. Relativity theory requires those states of information are encoded on the surface of an event horizon, as observed by the observer present at the central point of view. Each fundamental pixel defined on the viewing screen encodes a quantized bit of information. The principle of equivalence expresses the equivalence of all observers present at all points of view in empty space. The fundamental principle of quantum theory is the uncertainty principle, which describes how virtual particleantiparticle pairs spontaneously arise within empty space, and how those pairs appear to separate at an event horizon, as observed from the central point of view. The encoding of information is inherently linked to the separation of virtual pairs at the event horizon. There is something truly remarkable about the way information is encoded on an event horizon. If we look at how classical physics describes the motion of point particles, those particles follow a path through space over time, and that path is determined by a principle of least action. Since that path is continuous, there is no discrete encoding of information as in quantum theory. Thermodynamics has a hard time even defining information in classical physics due to the lack of the discrete encoding of quantized bits of information. Quantum theory solves this problem by specifying quantized states of information where information is only defined in terms of quantized bits of information, but the price of quantization of information is to require a sum over all possible paths to define a quantum state of potentiality. Thermodynamics then describes in a very natural way how one state of information evolves into another state of information. Thanks to quantum theory, all information is encoded in a discrete way in terms of quantized bits of information. The problem is how to unify quantum theory with relativity theory. In relativity theory, there is no pre-existing space and time for point particles to move through, and to follow a path through space over time. All unified theories assume the existence of an empty background space, which is called the void or the vacuum state. The motion of a point particle through space over time is only a holographic appearance. All information is encoded on an event horizon, with one quantized bit of information ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1277 encoded per pixel defined on the viewing screen. The event horizon always arises from the point of view of the observer present at the central point of view. The encoding of bits of information is holographically equivalent to separation of virtual particle-antiparticle pairs at the event horizon, as observed by the observer at the central point of view. There is nothing objectively real about the third dimension. The concept of the third dimension is a mental concept like any other concept. That concept only arises with the self-concept, which is a self-identification with form. Those forms are inherently two dimensional images animated on a surface, which is an event horizon that is observed from a point of view in empty space. Self-identification with form creates the illusion of the third dimension. Without that self-identification with form, those images are seen two dimensionally. The concept of the third dimension only arises with the self-concept, and with self-identification with the form of a body. An interesting fact about young children is that prior to the development of conceptual thought and a self-concept around the age of two years old, a child has no concept of the third dimension (private communication Jonathan Dickau). The world is perceived with only two dimensions for a child younger than around two years of age. A self-concept only develops in a child around the age of two with the development of conceptual thought. Prior to that age, a young child has no concept of self, and no concept of a third dimension. Only with the development of a self-concept can the consciousness present for the mind of the child see its world three dimensionally. Prior to this age, a change in distance to an object is not distinguishable from a change in the size of the object. For a child without a self-concept, a change in the distance to an object is only perceived as a change in the size of the object. The concept of the third dimension only arises in a very young child with the emotional development of conceptual thought and a self-concept. This state of affairs is exactly how Susskind describes the holographic principle: "Why would a world with only two dimensions be exactly the same as one with three dimensions?" "If one projected" an image "onto the boundary by creating a shadow, the image would shrink and grow as the object approached and receded from the boundary." "From the point of view of the three dimensional interior, this is an illusion." "Growing and shrinking in the Flatland half of the duality is exactly the same as moving back and forth along the third direction in the other half of the duality." "Everything that takes place in the interior" "is a hologram, an image of reality coded on a distant two dimensional surface" (Susskind 2008, 417). Those three dimensional images are only an illusion, like the shadows projected onto a screen that is perceived at a point of view. The use of the word 'shadows' to describe the nature of that three dimensional illusion is eerily familiar to Plato's description in the Allegory of the Cave. The world only appears three dimensional since the fundamental nature of a presence of consciousness is to be present at a focal point of perception in empty space. All the bits of information for that world are holographically encoded on an event horizon that arises in empty space, as observed by the observer at the central point of view. The world appears three dimensional since it is only a holographic projection of images from the viewing screen to the observer at the central point of view. Inherent in the perception of the third ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1278 dimension is the self-identification of the observer with the form of a body perceived in that world. Without that self-identification with form, the world appears two dimensional. The perception of dimensions from a focal point of perception expresses the principle of equivalence, while encoding of information on an event horizon expresses the uncertainty principle, as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs appear to separate at the horizon. As long as the equivalence and uncertainty principles are valid, the perceivable world can only appear two or three dimensional, due to its holographic nature. The perceivable world tells us nothing about the nature of the observer of that world. The true nature of the observer can only be described as the void, or the empty background space the world is created within. As all the images for that world arise upon an event horizon that acts as a viewing screen, and those images are holographically projected to a focal point of perception, an observer arises at that point of view, and perceives those images. The observer at that point of view is a presence of consciousness that arises from the 'one' source of consciousness, as a world of form holographically arises from the void. The scientific ideas presented here about the ultimate nature of reality are fundamentally simple. This approach begins with the most fundamental principles of science. Through a straightforward process of logical deduction, it deduces the ultimate nature of reality. The fundamental scientific principles are simple, and the process of logical deduction is straightforward. There is really nothing very complicated about it. These ideas attempt to scientifically discuss that which cannot be simpler. The approach presented here is scientific, but leads to simplicity. Simply stated, nothing is simpler than nothing. Ultimately, there is nothing to learn, nothing to know, nothing to do, and nothing to become. At its most fundamental level, ultimate reality is that nothingness. The key thing about this kind of scientific explanation is that anyone can think it out for oneself. Once the fundamental principles are understood, anyone can think through the process of logical deduction. This is the kind of process students go through when they prove the Pythagorean theorem for themselves. Given the fundamental assumptions of geometry, the proof is straightforward. Anyone who engages in this process in a serious way can discover the answers for oneself. This is exactly the same kind of argument that leads to a natural explanation of spiritual enlightenment. The argument is simple, and is only based on fundamental assumptions. The key thing is to examine the assumptions, and be clear about what is assumed. Once the assumptions are clear, the process of logical deduction is straightforward. There is nothing mysterious about it. Anyone can think through the argument for oneself. This is exactly the same process of logical deduction that Plato used in his arguments. Although Plato did not say it exactly like this, his message was very clear. Everyone can examine one's own assumptions and think for oneself. The greatest spiritual message anyone can ever be given is to think for oneself. It is always a mistake to rely on outside authority figures. Since everyone has the same access to the source of reason, it is always possible to examine one's assumptions and think for oneself. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1279 Why is it a spiritual process to think for oneself? The most profound spiritual question anyone can ever ask oneself is 'Who am I?' Spiritual enlightenment is inevitable if this question is relentlessly followed to its inevitable conclusion. The only way a process of self-inquiry can fail to result in awakening is if one fails to do it. The question must be approached in the manner of an attack on the question itself, without compromise until all possible answers are exhausted and defeated. The self-concept only arises with answers to this question. The destruction of all possible answers is a process of self-annihilation. This is the only process that defeats the supremely confident ego and destroys character. That is the war the ego fights with itself, which only comes to an end with surrender and acceptance of ego death. Without self-referential thoughts, there is no answer. Without thoughts and a self-concept, the only possible answer is 'I am not'. The final answer is an answerless answer, the direct experience of knowing nothing and being nothing. Anyone who goes through this process knows nothing about oneself except 'I am'. Everything else one knows about is no more real than an illusory image one perceives in one's dream. The only thing that is really sacred in this world is the awakening process itself, which is the same as to say 'nothing is sacred', or to give 'the whole truth and nothing but the truth'. These scientific ideas about the awakening process are no more a process of awakening than reading a map is the same as making a journey to a far away and unknown land. An explanation of spiritual enlightenment is as false as any other mental concept. These scientific concepts are only like a map that points out travel directions, but anyone who is determined to make such a journey can always use a good map. The farthest that anyone ever can go is the destination called terra incognita, which is a state of unknowing. To paraphrase the Tao: 'Those that know, know nothing', and arrive at a state of unknowing. Susskind nicely, although unintentionally, summarizes that journey: "Very likely, we are still confused beginners with very wrong mental pictures, and ultimate reality remains far beyond our grasp. The old cartographer's term terra incognita comes to mind. The more we discover, the less we seem to know" (Susskind 2008, 441). Anyone who goes through the awakening process begins to see things clearly. One sees things clearly as they are every moment, without any desire that things be any different. Anyone can see things in this spiritual way if one awakens. There is nothing special about this way of seeing things. Everyone has the same ability to see things. One only has to open one's eye, or remove the emotional blinders of one's own ego that distorts one's ability to see things clearly. That distortion is one's emotional self-identification with the form of some thing one perceives. One does not just see a thing, but one sees oneself in the thing, which distorts one's ability to see the thing clearly, as one identifies oneself with the thing. This kind of emotional distortion arises with wishful thinking, mental imagination, and emotional projections driven by expressions of fear and desire. An awakened one does not identify oneself with anything one sees. All the things one sees are only images one perceives, like movie images on a screen. One knows one is always outside those images, only present at a focal point of perception in the audience. One is external to all the things one perceives. Nothing one perceives is internal to one's ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1280 true nature, and yet everything arises within one's true nature, since that true nature is nothingness, and everything perceivable arises within nothingness. One is never inside the form of something one perceives, and one does not identify oneself with anything one perceives. One can only describe what one sees, but even that description is external. A scientific description can usefully and accurately represent what the awakened see. Science is useful to the degree it accurately represents the things we see. Science is a description of our observations. If science accurately represents the things we observe, then science is a good description of those observations. Science is only useful to the degree it conforms to our observation of things. What science can never do is give a complete explanation of the true nature of what is observing those things. The true nature of consciousness is only describable as a point of view in empty space, and the true nature of being as void. There may be a reason for living, but there is absolutely no reason for being. It is not possible to explain how this is possible. It is what it is, or as the Book of Exodus says 'I am that I am'. It is the nature of nothingness. It is possible to explain how something is created from nothing, but only if that nothingness is the nature of consciousness. A perceivable world of form can holographically arise on an event horizon, as observed by the observer at the central point of view, since virtual pairs can appear to separate at the horizon as information is encoded on the horizon, but this is only possible if that empty background space is the true nature of consciousness. Shankara describes the undivided, formless, non-identified nature of consciousness as that unchanging, limitless, infinite empty background space: "That which permeates all, which nothing transcends and which, like the universal space around us, fills everything completely from within and without, that Supreme non-dual Brahman − that thou art". How is it possible for an observer to know itself at a still point? That observer is a divided presence of consciousness that arises at a point of view in empty space as a world arises on the surface of an event horizon. All the forms of information that appear in that world, like a body, are animated upon that surface. Greene describes this as: "Since there is no difference between an accelerated vantage point without a gravitational field and a non-accelerated vantage point with a gravitational field, we can invoke the latter perspective and declare that all observers, regardless of their state of motion, may proclaim that they are stationary and 'the rest of the world is moving by them', so long as they include a suitable gravitational field in the description of their own surroundings" (Greene 1999, 61). There are only three possibilities: 1. An observer that is emotionally attached to its body and self-identified with the form of that body. That observer appears to move in the world. That appearance of movement is an illusion created by self-identification with the form of a body. 2. An observer that becomes emotionally detached from its body and is no longer selfidentified with that form through a process of de-animation of its ego. That observer knows itself only as a pure presence of consciousness at a still point. 3. A detached observer that is non-identified with form, and that enters into a state of free fall through empty space through a process of de-animation of that world. That world ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1281 disappears, the effects of all forces disappear, all forms disappear, and that observer dissolves back into empty space, which is its true undivided formless state of pure being. Only an observer that detaches itself from its world can realize its true nature. That observer only detaches itself from that world, and enters into a state of free fall through empty space, if it no longer believes that it is anything in that world. That belief only comes to an end if it is no longer believable, which only occurs through a process of emotional detachment from everything in that world. Only emotional expressions make beliefs believable, since feeling is believing. In the desireless state, belief comes to an end. All self-concepts are false beliefs that come to an end in the desireless state. What appears to happen in the world is only personal if one believes one is a person. Ultimately, an observer that clearly sees the falseness of its self-concept, as emotionally constructed in its mind, is willing to suffer ego death rather than live the life of a lie. That detached observer is no longer identified with form. All animated forms of information disappear as the observer enters into a state of free fall through empty space, and its world disappears. A detached observer has nothing to reference its fall relative to, which is its dissolution into nothingness and oneness, and its return to its true undivided, formless state of pure being. Returning is the motion of the Tao It returns to nothingness It leads all things back Toward the great oneness There is a scene in the Matrix that expresses the incredible, almost fantastic nature of the world, which truly seems to be beyond belief. After Neo escapes from the Matrix, he returns with Morpheus and Trinity to see the Oracle. As they ride together, and Neo looks upon the virtual reality of the Matrix with awe, Morpheus says "Unbelievable, isn't it". As Einstein remarked: "The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility." And: "Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the universe." ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 Kowall, J., What is Reality in a Holographic World 1282 References Balsekar, Ramesh. 1997. The Bhagavad-Gita. Mumbai: Zen Publications. Bousso, Raphael. 2002. "The Holographic Principle". arXiv:hep-th/0203101v2. Rev.Mod.Phys.74:825-874. Damasio, Antonio. 1999. The Feeling of What Happens. New York: Harcourt. Davies, Paul. 1977. The Physics of Time Asymmetry. Berkeley: University of California. Ellis, Robert. 2011. "Taking the 'Meta' out of Physics". Feynman, Richard. 1963. Feynman Lectures on Physics. Reading: Addison-Wesley. Goldstein, Rebecca. 2005. Incompleteness. New York: Norton. Greene, Brian. 1999. The Elegant Universe. New York: Vintage. Lao Tsu. 1997. Tao Te Ching. Gia-Fu Feng, Jane English trans. New York: Vintage. Penrose, Roger. 1999. The Large, the Small and the Human Mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Penrose, Roger. 2005. The Road to Reality. New York: Knopf. Plato. 1991. The Republic. Benjamin Jowett trans. New York: Vintage. Shimony, Abner. 2009. "Bell's Theorem". The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Susskind, Leonard. 1994. "The World as a Hologram". arXiv:hep-th/9409089v2. Susskind, Leonard. 2008. The Black Hole War. New York: Back Bay. Zee, A. 2003. Quantum Field Theory in a Nutshell. Princeton: Princeton University. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

ON A POSSIBLE PHYSICAL METATHEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS arXiv:quant-ph/0212128v1 21 Dec 2002 Miroljub Dugić1,4 , Milan M. Ćirković2 and Dejan Raković3,4 1 Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, P.O.Box 60, Kragujevac, Yugoslavia E-mail: Dugic@knez.uis.kg.ac.yu 2 Astronomical Observatory, Volgina 7, 11160 Belgrade, Yugoslavia E-mail: arioch@eunet.yu 3 Faculty of Electrical Engineering, P.O.Box 35-54, 11000 Belgrade, Yugoslavia E-mail: Rakovic@net.yu 4 International Anti-Stress Center, Smiljanićeva 11/III/7, 11000 Belgrade, Yugoslavia E-mail: info@iasc-bg.org.yu; WWW address: www.iasc-bg.org.yu 1 ON A POSSIBLE PHYSICAL METATHEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS Abstract: We show that the modern quantum mechanics, and particularly the theory of decoherence, allows formulating a sort of a physical metatheory of consciousness. Particularly, the analysis of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of decoherence, along with the hypothesis that consciousness bears (more-or-less) well definable physical origin, leads to a wider physical picture naturally involving consciousness. This can be considered as a sort of a psycho-physical parallelism, but on very wide scales bearing some cosmological relevance. 1. INTRODUCTION In this study we would like to point out that modern quantum mechanics allows formulating a physical metatheory (metaphysical theory) of consciousness. This observation comes from some recent progress in the foundations of the so-called decoherence theory (Zurek 1991; Dugić 1996, 1997a,b, 1998), as well as some cosmological discourses (Barrow and Tipler 1986). In addition, the same program is important in view of the contemporary heated debate of reductionism versus holism in the philosophy of science (e.g. Edmonds 1999). We employ practically universally accepted hypothesis in physical considerations devoted to the issue of consciousness: there is a physical background (and/or physical basis) of consciousness that, as a physical system, can be described and treated by the methods of the physical sciences. This partially trivial assertion will later on prove useful for our considerations, finally leading to a wider physical picture naturally involving consciousness, and eventually pointing out something new as regards the connection between physics and (the physics of) consciousness. As will become clear below, this reductionist attitude is justified exactly because quantum mechanics (which we use as a physical basis for discussion) is generally perceived as introducing a substantial holistic element of modern physics. Therefore, by pointing out elements necessary for building a metatheory of consciousness, we may bridge the gap between these two positions, as well as explore the limits of the theory making process (Landauer 1967). There is of course no big practical use of the metatheories, generally speaking. But the observations this way provided usually enrich and/or widen our point(s) of view. In our opinion, probably the main point of the 2 present paper is that such a theory—metaphysical theory of consciousness— naturally follows from the foundations of quantum mechanics. 2. A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF THE THEORY OF DECOHERENCE Decoherence is a real physical process partly investigated in the physical laboratories (Devoret et al. 1985a,b; Brune et al. 1996, Amman et al. 1998). It’s history is long and rich of the different, both conceptual and methodological background. However, only recently the subject of decoherence met significant progress and has attracted significant attention of both theoreticians and experimental physicists. Decoherence can be qualitatively defined as follows: it represents a realistic physical process whose effect consists in establishing the (approximate) classical realism for the open physical systems. Let us briefly discuss this definition. Quantum mechanics introduces the concept of quantum indeterminism (quantum uncertainty), which consists in lack of the classical realism for some physical quantities of the quantum systems. E.g., the following statement does not have sense: ‘electron in the hydrogen atom has a definite (relative) position’; rather, the electron’s position is subjected to the famous uncertainty relations of Heisenberg. As opposite to this, the classical reality for a particle’s position requires a definite value of the position in each instant in time generally - being the particle an isolated system, or in interaction with the surrounding physical systems. Therefore, existence of definite value of the electron’s position requires, in quantum mechanics, an act of measurement of the position. Therefore, the process of quantum measurement establishes (D’Espagnat 1971) the classical reality for the measured physical quantity (quantummechanically: observable), and at heart of the quantum measurement process proves to be (Zurek 1982, Giulini et al. 1996) the process of decoherence. Needless to say, the transition from quantum uncertainty to classical reality in the course of the quantum measurement assumes external intervention on the measured object (i.e., of the measurement instrument (apparatus) on the object of measurement), which justifies referring to the measured object as to an “open” quantum system. In general, by an “open” physical system one assumes a system whose behavior and dynamics (evolution in time) are substantially determined by its interaction with its environment. Therefore, one may say that the effect of decoherence establishes at least 3 approximate classical realism for some of the open system’s observables, and is usually considered (Zurek 1991, Giulini et al. 1996) as the main candidate for resolving the long standing problem of the “transition from quantum to classical” (Zurek 1991, Omnes 1994). In the “macroscopic context”, i.e. as regards the macroscopic physical systems, the effect of decoherence is expected to meet the following criteria/requirements: (a) providing a definite border line between the open quantum system and its environment, (b) establishing at least approximate classical reality for some observables of the open system as a whole, and (c) to represent a comparatively quick physical process. Keeping in mind that the classic-physics world is at the “macroscopic context”, it is usually, albeit only plausibly assumed that the process of decoherence should bear ubiquity and universality in the context of the “transition from quantum to classical”. However, recently (Dugić 1996, 1997a,b), existence of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of decoherence has been proved. In particular, it means that the interaction between an open system (S) and its environment (E) should be of certain kind as to provide the occurrence of decoherence. As regards the “microscopic” physical systems (elementary particles, atoms, molecules), this result does not mean much; e.g., the interactions that are not of the kind required are widely used in quantum mechanics. However, in the “macroscopic context”, this result opens some questions. In the “macroscopic context”, the occurrence of decoherence is sometimes (Zurek 1993) plausibly considered as a necessary condition for fulfilling the above criterion (a), and consequently the other criteria (b) and (c). Particularly, it can be plausibly stated (Zurek 1993) that the decoherence provides us with the definite border-line between the two systems, S and E. Keeping this in mind, one directly concludes that in the “macroscopic context” nonoccurrence of decoherence (as pointed out in Zurek 1993) contradicts our macroscopic experience and intuition. Therefore one may state the question of physical relevance, meaning and importance of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of decoherence in the “macroscopic context”. 3. THE ROOTS OF THE PHYSICAL METATHEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS Prima facie, the nonoccurrence of decoherence is not physically relevant and can be interpreted as a pathology of the theory itself1 . However, this 1 More precisely: one can expect that quantum mechanical formalism, as usually, gives 4 is not really the case. A deeper physical/interpretational analysis offers an interesting interpretation naturally involving consciousness. As it was distinguished in Dugić (1996) and further elaborated in Dugić, Raković and Ćirković (2000), the decoherence theory allows the following analysis: Let us suppose that the two systems, an open system S and its environment E are in mutual interaction not leading to decoherence. Then, according to the plausible assumption (Zurek 1993) distinguished above, one cannot determine the border-line between S and E. But suppose that there exist such coordinate transformations as to allow redefining the interaction and leading to the definitions of the new physical systems—the new open system S’ and its environment E’. Now, relative to the coordinates of the new systems, S’ and E’, one may say that there occurs the decoherence effect leading to unambiguous definitions of both systems, S’ and E’, and simultaneously defining the desired border-line between the two systems. This transformation is substantial (cf. Appendix I for some mathematical details, and for a strict treatment see Dugić et al 2000), in the sense that the “old” systems, S and E, cannot be even in principle defined or observed.2 That is, one deals with the same composite system, S+E (identical with S’+E’), but the two definitions of the subsystems (the “old” one, S and E, and the “new” one, S’ and E’) are mutually exclusive! The process of decoherence, which establishes the classical reality only for the “new” subsystems, S’ and E’, clearly states: the open system S’ bears classical reality, and can be defined only simultaneously with its environment, E’. The composite system cannot be considered decomposable into the “old” “system” S and its “environment” E: they simply do not bear classical reality, which is generally expected in the “macroscopic” world. us more than we can expect and/or interpret in terms of the classical physics, and particularly in terms of the classical reality. To this end, one may expect that only those physical models referring to the occurrence of decoherence could be considered physically relevant or realistic, putting aside the non-realistic and irrelevant models for which decoherence does not take place. 2 As regards the whole system (S+E = S’+E’), the canonical transformations distinguished in Appendix I represent just the change of representation. However, as to the “subsystems”, this change is substantial: it transforms the interaction hamiltonian from a nonseparable form (for which decoherence does not occur), to a separable form (for which decoherence can occur). Having in mind the Zurek’s phrase “no systems-no problem”, we emphasize that the canonical transformations allow defining a system for which decoherence may occur—the system S’ and its environment E’—while leaving the “border line” between S and E indefinable. 5 When extended to complex systems consisting of a set of mutually interacting (open) macroscopic systems plus their environments, this notion obtains unexpected element. Actually, in a set of such systems, the local interaction on one place determines interaction (and therefore definition of the systems) at spatially distant place(s), thus making the macroscopic piece of the Universe (MPU) as an interconnected physical system, in which definition of each of its part (element) depends on the definition of a local system and its environment; and this can be rigorously proved (Dugić 1997b; Dugić et al 2000). It cannot be overemphasized: even for the complex systems, the different definitions of the MPU are mutually exclusive, in so far as only one of them bears classical reality. However, one may ask if the composite system as a whole, can—in the course of its time evolution—survive transition of the classical reality from one to another definition3 of the MPU. But this is nonphysical transition, for it cannot be observed. Actually, the conscious observer could never be aware of this transition, for the simple reason: according to the assumption (cf. Introduction) that consciousness bears a macroscopic (Raković and Dugić 2000; Dugić and Raković 2000) physical system as its origin, the transformation from one definition of MPU as a realistic system to another definition of the MPU bearing classical reality equally refers to the physical system which is the physical basis of consciousness. In other words, the different Universes define the different, mutually exclusive definitions of the systems, which the consciousness originates from. This gives us a clue for the physical metatheory of consciousness: The different definitions of the MPU, bearing classical reality or not, in principle, define the different consciousness. The physical bases of consciousness in the different Universes (MPUs) are mutually exclusive, bearing the following substantial characteristics for each Universe: (i) consciousness (through its macroscopic-physics origin) can be defined only simultaneously with defining the rest of the MPU, and (ii) the different Universes define the different, mutually exclusive consciousness. Therefore, consciousness, treated as a physical system, in the context of universally valid quantum mechanics is only a relative concept, its physical characteristics being determined by even remote pieces of the actual Universe. In practice, it means that observations in a given Universe can be performed 3 Using the above definitions: the “new” system S’ and E’ looses classical reality, while the “old” systems, now, bear classical reality. 6 only by the conscious beings physically (in the sense of our considerations) belonging to that Universe. This, the relative-metatheory of consciousness is a sort of psycho-physical parallelism bearing the holistic nature of the physical Universe, which naturally incorporates consciousness as its part (Wilber 1980; Hoyle 1982; Barrow and Tipler 1986). In their lucid and instructive analysis of the collapse problem in quantum mechanics, Barrow and Tipler (1986, pp. 464-471) offer five basic avenues for solution. Apart from unattractive solipsism and Everett’s “no-collapse” theory (which does offer a host of interesting physical and philosophical issues, but is uninteresting from our present point of view), these authors suggest that either any being with consciousness can collapse the wave function by observations, or a “community” of such beings can collectively collapse it, or there is some sort of “ultimate Observer” who is responsible for the collapse. From the point of view exposed above, it is clear that the nature of MPU and its link with consciousness implies that we may reject the first option also. Moreover, it could be argued that our proposal accommodates both the second and the third options.4 In a sense, our suggestion is antithetical to the famous proposal of Eugene P. Wigner (i.e. Wigner 1967) that the linearity of the Schrödinger’s equation fails for conscious entities, and that there is some inherently non-linear procedure taking place inside those entities. As pointed out by Penrose (1979, p. 295), this reductionist picture leads to a rather disturbing view of the reality and actuality of the universe, since according to this view, by far the largest part of the universe will exist only as a network of linear superpositions. Our picture, on the contrary, automatically implies complete realism, even when applied to those parts of the universe not observed by us, but only implied in the definition of MPU.5 This is certainly a strong merit in the holistic approach to both quantum mechanics and cosmology. 4. SOME COSMOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS 4 Interestingly enough, these are the two options which—Barrow and Tipler lament— “have not been explored to any extent” (Barrow and Tipler 1986, p. 469). 5 This applies to those parts of the universe unobservable by us in principle. For instance, if our universe possesses a particular kind of horizon, often called event (or de Sitter) horizon, galaxies, stars and possible intelligent beings beyond this horizon will be unobservable by us at all times, both at present and in arbitrarily distant future. However, our cosmological theories do suggest that such unobservable galaxies (and an infinite number of them!) are real. 7 The view that macroscopic parts of our universe play a central role in physical understanding of consciousness may not be so surprising ultimo facie, especially if one takes seriously numerous anthropic “coincidences” playing a role in both classical and quantum cosmology (Carter 1974; Barrow and Tipler 1986). It is a well-known property of the universe that many of the model parameters in an envisaged complete physical description must be fine-tuned in order for life and sentience to be possible; among those are the total cosmological mass density Ω, magnitude of the cosmological constant Λ, and strengths of various couplings (including the celebrated example of the fine-structure constant α). For instance, it is well-known that Ω (prima facie a random variable) has to be in a rather small interval between 0.1 and 10 for life (and, contingently, intelligence and self-awareness) as we know it to be possible.6 Other parameters are even more tightly constrained: it has been argued that a change in magnitude of nuclear interaction coupling of only about 10% would make nucleosynthesis of elements necessary for life utterly impossible. All these and many other examples testify on the fine-tuning present in the cosmological initial conditions, i.e. close to the Big Bang singularity. The similar, although less obvious conclusion applies to the issue of the arrow of time. As was first discussed by Wiener (1961), the existence of the time arrow as we perceive it around us is the necessary requisite for intelligence, and therefore presumably consciousness as well (see also the discussion in Barrow and Tipler 1986). However, there emerged a sort of consensus in last several decades on the crucial role played by cosmological initial conditions in determination of the arrow of time (Penrose 1979; Price 1996). Initial lowentropy state is a necessary requisite for subsequent flow of time; however, the real issue then becomes how such low-entropy state did come into being? The Penrose’s estimate of the probability of spontaneous regularization of Big 6 The total cosmological density O is a dimensionless quantity defined as the ratio of actual density of matter (including radiation and any yet-unknown matter particles and fields) to the critical density necessary for universe to recollapse under its own gravitational pull. Therefore, the universe will expand forever if O ≤ 1, and recollapse for O > 1 (which should be taken with the grain of salt, since the matter fields with “exotic” properties may make the actual situation more complicated). That O is surprisingly close to unity (within one order of magnitude uncertainty) was first noted by Dicke in early 1960-ies (famous “Dicke coincidences” from cosmological textbooks). This is the source of ambiguity which dominated XX century cosmology concerning future of the universe: will it expand forever, or recollapse to future singularity of “Big Crunch”. The best contemporary evidence strongly suggests the former alternative, although this can not yet be firmly established. 8 Bang in order to match the low-entropy initial conditions—evolving towards the observed state—is astonishing (see Appendix II for technical details) 123 1 part in 1010 (!) (1) This stupendous volume of the parameter space not leading to emergence of intelligence and consciousness cannot fail to emphasize the highly special nature of the initial cosmological conditions. This result represents a good basis for our view of the role of cosmological boundary conditions in the future physical theory of consciousness. However, this is not the end of the story. The role of MPU in the considerations above suggests that specific cosmological boundary conditions of some sort are necessary for the continuous existence of consciousness as we know it. Our conclusion is in accordance with the Empedoclean picture of contingency between physical and biological processes in the universe (e.g. Guthrie 1969). One example of such boundary condition is the Wheeler boundary condition, requiring that intelligent life selects out a single branch of the universal wave function from “smeared out” universe existing prior to the first measurement interaction. This serves as a physical basis for Wheeler’s so-called Participatory Anthropic Principle, which states that observers are necessary to bring universe into being (cf. Barrow and Tipler 1986). However, even a much weaker assumption could serve the same purpose in our picture. As a consequence, one could conjecture that consciousness might be the essential property of Nature at different structural levels (macroscopic and microscopic, animate and inanimate), as widely claimed in traditional esoteric knowledge (Wilber 1980)—which might be supported by analogous mathematical formalisms of the dynamics of Hopfield’s associated neural networks and Feynman’s propagator version of quantum mechanics (Peruš 1996)—implying that ”collective consciousness” of Nature itself behaves as a giant nonlocal quantum neural network with distributed ”individual consciousness” processing units. Such nonlocal pantheistic idea of consciousness is also supported by Raković’s physical model of altered and transitional states of consciousness, explained in the Appendix III. In addition, this model might provide additional route to the physical solution of the problem of the wave-packet reduction in the quantum measurement theory (Raković and Dugić 2000). 9 This picture also offers significant new insights in the nascent field of physical eschatology—a rather young branch of astrophysics, dealing with the future fate of astrophysical objects, as well as the universe itself. Landmark studies in physical eschatology are those of Rees (1969), Dyson (1979), Tipler (1986) and Adams and Laughlin (1997). Some relevant issues were also discussed in the monograph of Barrow and Tipler (1986), as well as several popular-level books (e.g. Davies 1994). Since the distinction between knowledge in classical cosmology and physical eschatology depends on the distinction between past and future, several issues in the physics and philosophy of time are relevant to the assessment of eschatological results and vice versa. In addition, we need to take into account the almost trivial conclusion, explicitly formulated and defended by Dyson in his classical paper (Dyson 1979): It is impossible to calculate in detail the long-range future of the universe without including the effects of life and intelligence. It is impossible to calculate the capabilities of life and intelligence without touching, at least peripherally, philosophical questions. If we are to examine how intelligent life may be able to guide the physical development of the universe for its own purposes, we cannot altogether avoid considering what the values and purposes of intelligent life may be. But as soon as we mention the words value and purpose, we run into one of the most firmly entrenched taboos of twentieth-century science. Future of the universe containing life and intelligence is essentially different from the past of the same universe in which there were no such forms of complex organization of matter.7 Consciousness is admittedly the most complex such form known, and therefore the issue of the future of the universe is inseparable from our understanding of the relationship between consciousness and the (macro)physical world. In particular, the relative definition of consciousness exposed above is subject to evolution describing large-scale structure of the universe, as studied in the eschatological discourse (cf. Tipler 1986). 5. DISCUSSION AND PROSPECTS 7 In addition, the premise that MPU generates a particular form of consciousness immediately obviates the common form of counterfactual cosmological analysis of (tacitly assumed) “lifeless” universes. In this sense our statement agrees with the abovementioned continual presence of consciousness; while counterfactuals are essential to theoretical reasoning in physical sciences, it is crucial that they are understood as such. 10 The process of decoherence is a realistic (objective) physical process. It particularly means that no ‘observer’ is required either for its unfolding, or for the final effect as it is strongly confirmed by the existing experiments (Devoret et al. 1985a,b; Brune et al. 1996; Amman et al. 1998). Therefore, our considerations refer to the objective effect of decoherence, and the above mentioned “psycho-physical parallelism” is not the one introduced by von Neumann and Wigner which assumes substantial role of consciousness in the process of quantum measurement. Particularly, in the von NeumannWigner interpretation of the measurement process it is assumed that consciousness is an external agency necessary and sufficient for the occurrence of the quantum-mechanical “collapse” of the quantum state of the object of measurement. In our considerations, consciousness is (cf. Introduction) treated through its physical basis as a macroscopic, i.e. an open quantum system, thus being a part of the “macroscopic piece of the Universe”, not the “external agency” as in the von Neumann-Wigner theory (Wigner 1967). Therefore, in the context of the universally valid quantum mechanics (which is precisely the context of the decoherence theory), one may not expect such a role of consciousness as regards the “collapse”. Rather, a new fundamental physical law is expectable in this regard (Leggett 1980; Prigogine 1997). Starting point of our considerations is the issue of (non)occurrence of decoherence (of (non)establishing the classical reality for open quantum systems). It brought the relative-theory of consciousness. But now, in turn, one may note that consciousness is able to justify classical reality of the MPU as well as of the measured quantum observables. Methodologically speaking, this “two-direction” relation between classical reality and consciousness justifies consistency of our conclusions, and represents the main characteristic of “psycho-physical parallelism” as discussed above. Interestingly enough, similar holistic thoughts and sentiments have been expressed (and rather conventionally disregarded) by undoubtedly one of the greatest physicists of all times, Erwin Schrödinger in his 1924. paper entitled “Bohr’s New Radiation Hypothesis and the Energy Law”. His words, in the colorful language of those formative years of modern science, sound appropriate for the conclusion of the present study (Schrödinger 1924): Thus one can also say: a definite stability of the state of the world sub specie aeternitatis can only occur through the connection of each individual system with the whole rest of the world. The separated individual system would be, from the standpoint of the unity, a chaos. It requires the connection as a permanent regulator, without which, energetically considered, it would 11 wander about at random. Is it an idle speculation, to find in this a similarity to social, ethical and cultural phenomena? Acknowledgement: M.M.Ć. wishes to thank Prof. Petar Grujić for his wholehearted encouragement and support, as well as to Maja Bulatović and Vesna Milošević-Zdjelar for kind help in finding several important references. APPENDIX I To illustrate the transformations we have in mind (the so-called canonical transformations) we will use a simplified, unrealistic example (model). Let us suppose that the (open) system S is defined by its “coordinate” xS , while its environment is defined by its “coordinate” xE . The transformations we have in mind are such that define the new (open) system S’ and its environment E’ that are defined by their “coordinates”: ξS ′ = ξS ′ (xS , xE ) ξE ′ = ξE ′ (xS , xE ) (2) which states (mathematically) analytical dependence of the “coordinates” of the “new” systems, S’ and E’, on the “coordinates” of the old systems, S and E. We further suppose existence of the inverse relations: xS = xS (ξS ′ ,′ ξE ′ ) xE = xE (ξS ′ , ξE ′ ) (3) in full analogy with (2). Needless to say, the composite system is one and the same, i.e. one may state: S+E = S’+E’. Let us suppose that the interaction in the composite system, when expressed in terms of “coordinates” of the “old” systems (S and E) proves not to lead to decoherence, while when expressed in terms of “coordinates” of the “new” systems (S’ and E’), this interaction leads to decoherence, thus establishing (approximate) classical reality for the open system S’ (and, simultaneously, for its environment E’). Then the transition: (xS , xE ) canonicaltransf ormations −→ (ξS ′ , ξE ′ ) (4) is physically substantial: due to the lack of classical reality of the “old” system (and its environment), it states that the inverse transformation to (4) is physically meaningless. Furthermore, due to the fact that the “new” 12 composite system’s observables are subject to quantum uncertainty, the “old” composite system’ observables are unobservable. Actually, the (quantum) measurements of the “old” observables, xS , xE require simultaneous measurements of the “new” observables ξS ′ , ξE ′ - which is forbidden by the uncertainty relations of the “new” observables. Therefore, even if one may ascribe the (approximate) classical reality to the “new” system’s observables, this is not the case with the observables of the “old” systems in so far as the interaction between S and E does not lead to decoherence. APPENDIX II In this Appendix we would like to show how one obtains the most profound example of fine tuning, the one dealing with the regular nature of the Big Bang singularity discussed by Penrose (1989) and quoted above in (1). The relevant measure of gravitational entropy is given, for the case of black hole, by the famous Bekenstein-Hawking formula (Bekenstein 1973; Hawking 1975): kc3 A (5) Gh̄ 4 where A is the black hole horizon surface area, and the rest are fundamental physical constants observed in the universe: k is the Boltzmann constant, c – velocity of light, G – Newtonian gravitational constant, and h̄ is the Planck constant devided by 2π. We perceive that the entropy of matter enclosed within horizon (not entering at all into a physical problem of the state of such collapsed matter) is proportional to the horizon surface area. In the simplest case, the one of spherically-symmetric black hole, horizon is the sphere with area A = 4πR2 , where the relevant radius R is the Schwarschild radius, given as SBH = 2Gm (6) c2 In this formula, m is mass of the black hole (observable, for instance, through its gravitational attraction of other objects or even deflection of light rays). Combining this result with (5), we obtain the following expression for gravitational entropy as a function of mass: R= 13 2πGk 2 m (7) h̄c Now we are in position to calculate the gravitational entropy of the matter within our visual horizon if we could somehow collapse it into a single gigantic black hole (since we can reasonably estimate the mass of all matter within the horizon). It will be the maximal entropy state, since, as shown by Bekenstein, the state of matter in the black hole is the most probable one, as far as gravitational interaction is concerned. Any other state (for instance the one we observe at present, where matter is clumped in galaxies, stars, planets, etc. and there is just a small number of black holes) is a priori less probable. It is worth noticing, however, that in the context of contemporary relativistic cosmological models, such situation actually occurred in the past: all matter within our visual horizon today was within the initial Big Bang singularity, which has much in common with the (local) black hole singularities. Finally, to establish quantitatively how much less probable is the observed entropy in comparison to (7), we need the historically all-important Shannon formula, giving the relationship between entropy and information (Shannon 1948): SBH = S = −k X pi ln pi , (8) i where pi is the probability of system considered being in state i.8 Even on a qualitative level, it is clear that the presence of logarithm in (8) is the source of huge exponential terms such as the one in eq. (1). It gives us a proper lever to compare our universe with the case in which all matter within our horizon is located in black holes. It comes out that, as Penrose (1989) discusses, our universe is of so small entropy compared to the generic one, that the probability of its reaching the observed state is stupendously small, as in (1). This is, as correctly emphasized by Penrose and Price, not only a source of cosmological, but probably all other arrows of time as well, and a profound example of fine-tuning to be accounted for by unified field theories of the near future. 8 It is worth noticing that there is some ambiguity in the literature, which concept of entropy is the more “fundamental” one and therefore (8) is sometimes written without the Boltzmann constant k, and it is said that the Shannon entropy for thermodynamical systems is equal to the fine-grained entropy in units of k. We neglect this rather semantic issue in the present discussion. 14 APPENDIX III The goal of this Appendix is to qualitatively sketch the model of transitional states of consciousness developed by Raković (1995; Raković et al. 2000). Namely, these states might be deeply connected with the role of ”collective consciousness” (as a composite quantum state Φ of all ”individual Q consciousness” φk : Φ ∼ φk ) in the quantum theory of measurement, where k ”collective consciousness” with its assembling (equivalent to convergence of Feynman’s propagator quantum mechanics to one of its propagators, Φi ) contributes in channeling reduction of initial wave function Ψ into one of (possible) probabilistic eigenstates Ψi - which implies that ”collapse” could be related with generation of microparticles’ local wormholes in highly noninertial microparticle’s interactions in quantum measurement situations (fully equivalent to extremely strong gravitational fields according to Einstein’s Principle of equivalence, where relativistic generation of wormholes is predicted; cf. Morris, Thorne and Yurtsever 1988; Thorne 1994). In a similar vein, in the Penrose’s gravitationally induced collapse (e.g. Penrose 1994) the very mechanism for this process could be continuous opening and closing of local microparticle’s wormholes, addresses of their exits being related (probabilistically) to one of (possible) eigenstates Ψi of corresponding quantum system—and everything being related to corresponding (probabilistic) assembling Φ→Φi of ”collective consciousness”, thus channeling the collapse Ψ→Ψi . The question how it is possible that these highly noninertial microparticles’ processes with inevitable relativistic generation of microparticles’ wormholes and other envisaged quantum-gravitational effects were not taken into account within quantum mechanics which is yet extremely accurate theory— might be answered as it was, but within the ad hoc von Neumann’s ”projection postulate” (von Neumann 1955) to account for quantum-mechanical ”wave packet collapse” in quantum measurement situations (implying also that this ad hoc procedure is based on quantum gravitational phenomena, as suggested by Penrose, being on deeper physical level than quantum mechanical ones!). On the other hand, the nonlocality of usually conceived ”collective consciousness” provides additional evidence for the nonlocal nature of quantum mechanics—otherwise demonstrated by tests of Bell’s inequalities and the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen effect (Bell 1987; Aspect, Dalibard, and Roger 1982). It should be also pointed out that the above ”collective consciousness”’ as15 sembling Φi (i = 1, 2, 3...) in quantum theory of measurement should be interpreted as purely probabilistic (with relative frequency of their appearance given by quantum-mechanical probability |ai |2 of realization of correspondP ing microparticles’ eigenstates Ψi , where ΦΨ = ai Φi Ψi ), depending not on i the previous history of the repeatedly prepared quantum system. However, this might not be the case for biological ”individual consciousness”’ assembling, being history-dependent deterministic one (resulting in deterministic convergence of the consciousness-related-acupuncture electromagnetic/ionic microwave ultra-low frequency-modulated oscillatory holographic Hopfieldlike associative neural network to the particular attractor in the potential hypersurface (Jovanović-Ignjatić and Raković 1999; Raković et al. 2000), or equivalently to deterministic convergence of Feynman’s propagator quantum mechanics to the particular propagator corresponding to φk , fixedly determined by ”individual consciousness”), implying that strong preferences in individual futures might exist, governed by individual mental loads, as widely claimed in Eastern tradition (Wilber 1980; Vujičin 1996). The same may apply to collective futures Φi , also governed by interpersonal mental loads (Raković 2000). It should be also noted that these preferences in individual and collective futures might be anticipated in transitional states of consciousness that might be the basis of intuition, precognition and deep creative insights (Jahn 1982). What is really anticipated in transitional states of consciousness of ”individual consciousness” might be the evolved state of cosmic ”collective consciousness” Φ(t) (to which our ”individual consciousness” φk has access, being the presumed constituting part of cosmic ”collective consciousness”), which is quantum-mechanically described by deterministic unitary evolution governed by the Schrödinger equation. A hypothesis that nonlocal individual/collective consciousness re-assembling (Φ→Φi ) is possible, with direct influence on the collapse of the observed system (Ψ→Ψi ), might be also supported by Princeton PEAR human/machine experiments (Jahn and Dunne 1988), where (even distant) human operators, solely by volition, have been able to influence the sophisticated machines with (otherwise) strictly random outputs, in a statistically repeatable effects (of the order of a few parts in ten thousand) - but individually not reproducible at any moment, which is a standard request in contemporary scientific experiments. All this can be accounted by intentional transitional transpersonal biological (non-Schrödinger governed) quantum gravitational tunneling of the ”operator’s individual consciousness” with mental address16 ing on the ”machine’s content of collective consciousness”, channeling intentionally the ”operator/machine composite state of collective consciousness” (Φ→Φi ), thus automatically influencing the machine output (Ψ→Ψi ) in the non-Schrödinger quantum-gravitationally governed collapse-like process (ΦΨ→Φi Ψi ). As a consequence one could further support the conjecture that consciousness might be essential property of Nature at different structural levels, macroscopic and microscopic, animate and inanimate, being presumably related to the unified field itself (Hagelin 1987). REFERENCES Adams, F. C. and Laughlin, G. 1997, Rev. Mod. Phys. 69, 337. Amman H. et al. 1998, Phys. Rev. Lett. 80, 4111. Aspect, A., Dalibard, J. and Roger, G. 1982, Phys. Rev. Lett. 49, 1804. Barrow, J. 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Dugić, M. 1997b, A Contribution to the Foundations of the Theory of Decoherence in Nonrelativistic Quantum Mechanics, Ph.D. Thesis, Faculty of Science, University of Kragujevac (in Serbian). Dugić M. 1998, J. Res. Phys. 27, 141. Dugić, M. and Raković, D. 2000, Eur. Phys. J. B 13, 781. 17 Dugić, M., Raković, D., and Ćirković, M. M. 2000, I. Kononenko, ed., Proceedings of New Science of Consciousness (Information Society, Ljubljana). Dyson, F. 1979, Rev. Mod. Phys. 51, 447. Edmonds, R. 1999, Foundations of Science 4, 57. Giulini, D., Joos, E., Kiefer, C., Kupsch, J., Stamatescu, I.-O. and Zeh, H. D. 1996, Decoherence and the Appearance of a Classical World in Quantum Theory (Springer, Berlin). Guthrie, W. K. C. 1969, A History of Greek Philosophy II (Cambridge University Press, London). Hagelin, J. S. 1987, Modern Sci. & Vedic Sci. 1, 29. Hawking, S. W. 1975, Commun. Math. Phys. 43, 199. Hoyle, F. 1982, Ann. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 20, 1. Jahn, R. G. 1982, Proc. IEEE 70, 136. Jahn, J. R. and Dunne, B. J. 1988, Margins of Reality (Harcourt Brace, New York).9 Jovanović-Ignjatić, Z. and Raković, D. 1999, Acup. & Electro-Therap. Res. Int. J. 24, 105 Landauer, R. 1967, IEEE Spectrum, September, 105. Leggett A.J. 1980, Prog. Theor Phys. Suppl. 64, 80. Morris, M. S., Thorne, K. S. and Yurtsever, U. 1988, Phys. Rev. Lett. 61, 1446. Omnes, R. 1994, The Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics (Princeton University Press, Princeton). Penrose, R. 1979, in General Relativity: An Einstein Centenary, ed. by Hawking, S. W. and Israel, W. (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge), 581. Penrose, R. 1989, The Emperor’s New Mind (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Penrose, R. 1994, Shadows of the Mind. A Search for the Missing Science of Consciousness (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1994). Peruš, M. 1996, Informatica 20, 173. Prigogine I. 1997, The End of Certainty (The Free Press, New York). 9 In connection with this reference, see also many archival publications and technical reports by PEAR (Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research); relevant pointers are on the following WWW address: www.princeton.edu/∼rdnelson/pear.html. 18 Price, H. 1996, Time’s Arrow and Archimedes’ Point (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Raković, D. 1995, in D. Raković and Dj. Koruga, eds., Consciousness: Scientific Challenge of the 21st Century (ECPD, Belgrade). Raković, D. 2000, Int. J. Appl. Sci. & Computations 7, 174. Raković, D. et al. 2000, Electro- and Magnetobiology 19, 195. Raković, D. and Dugić, M. 2000, Informatica, in press. Rees, M. J. 1969, Observatory 89, 193. Schrödinger, E. 1924, Naturwiss. 12, 720. Shannon, C. E. 1948, The Bell System Technical Journal 27, 379. Thorne, K. S. 1994, Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein’s Outrageous Legacy (Picador, London). Tipler, F. J. 1986, Int. J. Theor. Phys. 25, 617. von Neumann, J. 1955, Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics (Princeton University Press, Princeton). Vujičin, P. 1995, in D. Raković and Dj. Koruga, eds., Consciousness: Scientific Challenge of 21st Century (ECPD, Belgrade). Wigner, E. P. 1967, Symmetries and Reflections (Indiana University Press, Bloomington). Wilber, K. 1980, The Atman Project (Quest, Wheaton, IL). Zurek, W. H. 1982, Phys. Rev. D 26, 1862. Zurek, W. H. 1991, Physics Today 48, 36. Zurek, W. H. 1993, Prog. Theor. Phys. 89, 281. 19

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1299 Article Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality Steven E. Kaufman* ABSTRACT This article presents a general description of how the iterative relations of Existence to Itself create two different realities; 1) Realties that are composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself, which Realties or Relational Structures, taken together, make up the Structure of Reality, and; 2) realities that are not composed of Existence, but are created where Existence becomes defined in relation to Itself as a result of being in relation to Itself, and which realities or relative existences are the most proximal basis of what Existence apprehends as experience. Thus, Existence is described as that which, through relation to Itself, creates out of Itself the Structure of Reality and is also described as that which apprehends as experiential reality the products of its relations to Itself that are not composed of Itself. Ultimately, what we call Consciousness, i.e., that which apprehends experience, is shown to be not other than Existence that is involved in some relation with Itself and creating a relative existence as a result, which relative existence the Existence involved in that relation must then apprehend as experience. Key Words: existential mechanics, reality, experience, relation of existence, structure of reality. Overview There is experiential reality and there is the Reality that, through relation to Itself, both creates and apprehends experience, and these two realities are completely different in their nature, which is to say, they are not the same reality. Everything that we apprehend as reality, everything that we know, is an experiential reality. However, what we experience as reality is not what is actually there, because the nature of experiential reality is different than the nature of what is actually there as the underlying Structure of Reality. The Structure of Reality is composed of the Reality that simultaneously creates, through relation to Itself, both the Structure of Reality, which is composed of Itself as it is being in relation to Itself, as well as something that is not composed of Itself, which something it apprehends as experiential reality. Therefore, in order to describe the nature of reality it is necessary to describe both of these realities, as well as their relation to each other. In this work, the Reality that, though iterative relation to Itself, becomes the Structure of Reality while simultaneously creating something not composed of Itself that it apprehends as experiential reality, is referred to as Existence. This article is the first of a series of four articles that are, as a whole, titled Existential Mechanics because these articles describe the two different *Correspondence: Steven E. Kaufman, Independent Researcher. http://www.unifiedreality.com E-mail: skaufman@unifiedreality.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1300 realities that are created as a result of the motion of Existence relative to Itself, or put more generally, as a result of the relations of Existence to Itself. This introductory article presents a general description of the iterative process of Existential selfrelation, as well as a description of the two completely different realties that are produced with each iteration of that process. As will be described, the iterative process of Existential selfrelation is the process whereby Existence forms the progressive relations with Itself that create the different Relational Structures that are composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself, which, taken together, compose the Structure of Reality, while simultaneously creating, as a result of those same relations, different relative existences that are not composed of Existence, which relative existences are apprehended by Existence as different types of experience. In the second article the three different types of experience that we apprehend, i.e., emotional, mental, and physical, are each related to one of the three different and progressive levels of Realty or Relational Structure that emerge as a result of the iterative process of Existential selfrelation. Thus, what is presented in that article is a description of how Existence evolves into different levels of Reality composed of different Relational Structures, while at the same time creating at each level of Reality a distinct type of relative existence apprehended by Existence as a distinct and particular type of experience. The third article describes the Structure of Reality as the framework that underlies our overall apprehension of mental and physical reality and relates the different levels of Reality to different fundamental aspects of what we apprehend as mental and physical reality. Also in that article, the inner orientation of emotional and mental experience as well as the outer orientation of physical experience are described as a function of our particular position and perspective within the fractal Structure of Reality relative to the particular level of Reality at which each of those different types of experience are created. That article also describes the relation between what is expressed in quantum physics as the wave function and the underlying Structure of Reality from which that expression is derived, including a description of what occurs within that Relational Structure to produce the event referred to as the collapse of the wave function. The fourth article deals with the Individual’s creation of experience and the limitations inherent in the Individual’s creation of experience owing to the nature of experience as being the product of a relation in which the Individual that is apprehending the experience must always be involved. Ultimately, what the model of Reality and experience that is presented in this series of articles makes clear is that what we call Consciousness is not Itself the product of the machinations of anything that we experience as reality. Rather, it is experiential reality that is the product of the machinations of Consciousness, as Consciousness is shown to be not other than Existence that is being in relation to Itself and thereby unavoidably apprehending as experience the relative existences created as a product of its involvement in those relations. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1301 Introduction In my book, “Unified Reality Theory: The Evolution of Existence Into Experience,” (URT), which was reprinted as a series of articles in JCER, Vol 2, No 3 (2011) (http://jcer.com/index.php/jcj/issue/view/12) I described what we experience as reality as being the result of a process in which Existence forms progressive relations with Itself, with one level of Existential self-relation providing the basis for the next level of Existential self-relation and so on, sort of like a game of cosmic leap-frog, except there is really only one participant; Existence. In that book I described in some detail how Existence, through progressive self-relation, first creates out of Itself a Relational Structure referred to as the Relational Matrix, which Relational Structure then, as a result of further self-relation, differentiates into the Relational Structures referred to as Primary and Compound Distortion Processes. The Relational Matrix was related to what we experience as space-time, whereas Primary and Compound Distortion Processes were related to what we experience as electromagnetic radiation (energy) and matter, respectively. In that book I also described how the differentiation of Existence provides the basis for additional levels of Existential self-relation that create what Existence becomes conscious of as the three different types of experience, i.e., emotional, mental, and physical, with the focus being on the relations of Existence to Itself that creates what it apprehends as physical experience. And while I have, since the completion of URT, found no fault in the description presented therein with regard to the idea of Existence evolving through a process of progressive or iterative self-relation, including the general description of how the relations of Existence to Itself create what Existence becomes conscious of as experience, and specifically the description of physical experience as being the product of relations that can only occur once Existence has reached a certain level of differentiation, I must admit that I now find my explanations regarding the creation of the other two types of experience, i.e., emotional and mental, to have been in error with regard to the level of Existential self-relation at which they were described as being brought into relative existence as something that Existence becomes conscious of as experience. One purpose of this series of articles is to correct that error by describing the creation of both emotional and mental experience in their proper context within the model of Reality that was presented in URT. Another purpose of this work is to more clearly describe the completely different nature of the two products that result from any relation of Existence to Itself, with one of those products being a Relational Structure composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself, and the other of those products being a relative existence that is not composed of Existence, which arises where Existence, as it is being in relation to Itself, becomes defined in relation to Itself, with the created relative existence being the most proximal basis of what Existence becomes conscious of as experience. A further purpose of this work is to use what the Relational Matrix model says about the nature of experience to describe the limitations inherent in the creation of experience. Ultimately, the goal of this work is to present you, the reader, with a model of Reality and experience that will make it possible for you to understand that underlying everything you experience is Existence involved in some relation with Itself, and that you yourself are not other than that Existence, and that what you apprehend as experience is not that Existence, not what ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1302 you are, rather, it is your apprehension of something created as a product of some relation in which you, as Existence, are involved, and which product you unavoidably apprehend as an experience owing to your nature as Existence. 1. Terminology Part of the difficulty in describing what I am about to describe is that I am, to some degree, forced to use the same words to describe, indicate, or point toward things that are completely different in nature. For example, the word “reality” can be used to indicate both that which creates and is conscious of experience, as well as experience itself, when the nature of these two things are completely different, in as much as the nature of the existence of each is completely different. Which brings up another troublesome word that I am forced to use to indicate things that are completely different in nature, i.e., the word “existence.” There are two kinds of existence; an Existence (uppercase) that is not dependent on any relation, although it is not precluded from involving Itself in relations with Itself, and an existence (lowercase) that is completely dependent on the presence of some relation involving the other kind of Existence. Put another way, there is an Existence that Exists regardless of the presence or absence of any relation, and there is an existence that exists only in the context of some relation involving the other kind of Existence. These two kinds of existence, i.e., non-relative Existence and relative existence, are completely different with regard to the nature of their existence, which means that to use only the word “existence” to indicate both has no real meaning, in the same way using a single word to indicate both wetness and dryness would have no meaning, but would only serve to confuse. Just as your reflection appears, in the physical sense, to be you but is not actually you, so it is that the relative existences created by the relations of Existence to Itself seem to exist, but do not actually exist, in as much as their existence, such as it is, is of a completely different nature than the nature of the Existence that, through its relations to Itself, bring those relative existences into seeming existence. In this work the word “reality” is used to indicate the product or result of some relation of Existence to Itself. As already mentioned, the relations of Existence to Itself have two products, one that is composed of Existence and another that is not. Thus, there are two kinds of existence corresponding to two kinds of reality; a Reality (uppercase) that is composed of Existence as it is involved in some relation with Itself, and a reality (lowercase) that is not composed of Existence that is created where Existence, as a result of being involved in some relation with Itself, becomes defined in relation to Itself. And it is the apprehension of that reality by Existence that creates what we call an experiential reality. Both types of reality are produced by some relation of Existence to Itself, which is what makes them both realities, i.e., products of Existential selfrelation, but one of those products is composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself and the other is not composed of Existence, but is instead a sort of reflection of Existence, created where Existence becomes defined in relation to Itself. Thus, the term reality in general = product of Existential self-relation, but there is Reality and reality; Reality composed of Existence and reality not composed of Existence, respectively. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1303 Therefore, in this work I will discriminate between these two types of existence and their corresponding realities. Non-relative Existence, which in URT was referred to as Absolute Existence, I will now refer to as simply Existence. This Existence corresponds to the Reality of the Relational Structures that are themselves composed of Existence as it is involved in a particular set of relations with Itself, which Relational Structures were described in URT as the Relational Matrix and as Primary and Compound Distortion Processes. The other type of existence, i.e., the kind not composed of Existence, which is created as Existence, as a result of being involved in some relation with Itself, becomes defined in relation to Itself, will be referred to as a relative existence. These relative existences are the most proximal basis of the realities that Existence becomes conscious of as emotional, mental, and physical experience, i.e., as emotional, mental, and physical reality. That is, experiential reality is Existence’s apprehension of the relative existences that are created within Itself as a product of the relations with Itself in which it is involved. The difference between these two products of the relations of Existence to Itself, these two realities, i.e., Reality and reality, in terms of their nature is analogous to the difference between a rubber band as it sits twisted upon itself and the lines that arise where the rubber band, in being twisted upon itself, becomes defined in relation to itself, in that the former is composed of rubber, albeit rubber as it is being in relation to itself, whereas the latter is not composed of rubber, not composed of that which is involved in the relation that creates it. In essence, what Existence experiences as reality is, with respect to the nature of its existence, completely different than the nature of the Existence whose relations to Itself create the relative existences that it apprehends as experiential reality. Put another way, the nature of that which is apprehended as experience is completely different than the nature of that which apprehends experience. Figure 1 summarizes these terms and the relations between them as they will be used in this work. reality relative existence experiential reality Reality Relational Structure products of Existential self-relation not composed of Existence products of Existential selfrelation composed of Existence Existence Figure 1 The Basic Unit of Existential Self-Relation or Reality. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1304 This drawing depicts a relation of Existence to Itself along with the terms that will be used to describe the two types of products or results derived from any such relation. The two types of products derived from any relation of Existence to Itself are those that are composed of Existence and those that are not composed of Existence. When Existence becomes involved in a relation with Itself it creates out of Itself a Relational Structure or Reality composed of Itself as it is involved in that particular relation with Itself. Any relation of Existence to Itself also creates a relative existence that arises where Existence becomes defined in relation to Itself as a result of its relation to Itself. It is the created relative existence, as apprehended by Existence from the perspective of only one side of the relation that creates it, that is what the Existence involved in the relation that creates the relative existence is conscious of as experience, or as an experiential reality. Understanding the difference between these two types of existence and their corresponding realities is what in Eastern philosophies is referred to as discrimination between the Real and the unreal. These two types of existence and their corresponding realities also represent the “two truths,” i.e., the seeming and the Ultimate, at the core of Buddhist philosophy. However, the term unreal seems a bit harsh, since relative existences and their experiential counterparts do at least seem to exist, i.e., they have the appearance of existing. Therefore, I prefer to discriminate between the Real and the real, between that which is composed of Existence and that which has relative existence as its most proximal basis. In this work, words or terms that are capitalized, such as “Relational Matrix” and “Reality,” are capitalized to indicate that what is being referred to is composed of Existence, whereas words that are not capitalized, such as “experience” and “reality,” are not capitalized to indicate that what is being referred to is not composed of existence, and so is either a relative existence or is an experience, which, like all experiences, has a relative existence as its most proximal basis. As just described, the words “existence” and “reality” are generally used indiscriminately to indicate things that are completely different in their natures. That is, in the case of the use of these words there is a lack of discrimination. However, the opposite verbal and conceptual situation can also arise when two or more words are used to discriminate between what seem to be different things where no such discrimination is warranted because the things are not really different at all, which is to say, they are of the same nature. In such a case, the use of different words creates the false impression of some actual difference in nature where there is none. And such is the case with regard to the words “Existence” and “Consciousness.” In the words “Existence” and “Consciousness” we have two words that seem to indicate different things, when in actuality they indicate the same thing. The difference between Existence and Consciousness is not one of nature, but one of the state of that which is of a singular nature, as the difference between water and ice is not one of nature, but one of the state of that which is of a singular nature. Consciousness is Existence that is involved in a relation with Itself, which relation produces a relative existence that the Existence involved in that relation can apprehend from one of two possible perspectives within that relation, and in so doing become conscious of an experience. Thus, both Existence and Consciousness are the same “thing,” i.e., non-relative Existence. However, Consciousness is what Existence seems to be when it is apprehending or conscious of, as experience, the relative existence that its relation to Itself has created. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1305 Existence in the theoretical state of not being involved in any relation with Itself is what is referred to as Suchness, i.e., what Is as It is. Whereas that same Existence in the opposite state, i.e., involved in some relation with Itself, is called Con-chus-ness, which is to say, literally the opposite of Suchness, or what Is as It is being in relation. However, the opposition here is not one of nature, rather it is one of opposing states of that which is of a singular nature. Figure 2 summarizes these terms and the relations between them as they will be used in this work. reality relative existence experiential reality products of Existential self-relation not composed of Existence Consciousness Reality Relational Structure products of Existential selfrelation composed of Existence Existence (Suchness) (Awareness) Figure 2 The Relation and Identity between Existence and Consciousness. This drawing of the basic unit of Existential self-relation or Reality depicts Consciousness as being not other than Existence that is involved in a relation with Itself and as a consequence creating a relative existence that it apprehends as experience. 2. Why Existence Is Conscious of the Created Relative Existence as Experience In order to understand why Existence apprehends the relative existence created by its relation to Itself as experience, and in so doing functions as Consciousness, i.e., as Existence that is conscious of experience, it is necessary to understand or at least accept that Existence is intrinsically Self-Aware or, put another way, that Existence intrinsically knows that it Is. This intrinsic Self-Awareness, or just Awareness, is different from what is known or apprehended as experience, because it is not knowledge that is produced by any relation of Existence to Itself, rather it is just an inseparable part of Existence. Thus, Existence Is and It is Aware that It Is, Aware of its Being, not as a result of any relation, not as a result of anything, other than the fact of its own Existence. For this reason, another word that can be used to indicate Existence is Awareness, as shown in figure 2. Nonetheless, in this work the term Existence, rather than the term Awareness, is primarily used to indicate that which is Itself uncaused, but which, as will be described, is the ultimate Cause underlying all effects. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1306 In the context of the idea of Existence being intrinsically Aware of Itself, intrinsically Aware of its own Existence, it is possible to explain why Existence, when in relation to Itself and creating a relative existence as a result, apprehends that relative existence as an experience and so functions as Consciousness, and that explanation is as follows. When Existence is in relation to Itself it becomes defined in relation to Itself, and that definition, i.e., that relative existence, then exists within Existence, and is a part of Existence as long as it is involved in the relation that creates the relative existence. Thus, that relative existence is an inseparable part of the Existence that is involved in the relation that creates it, and the Consciousness of experience is just the intrinsic Self-Awareness of Existence, its intrinsic knowing of its own Being-ness, applied to that which also now exists within it, to that which its relation to Itself has created within Itself, and so is part and parcel of its Being, albeit its Being as it is being in relation to Itself. So Consciousness is the intrinsic Awareness of Existence applied to that which Existence has, through relation to Itself, created within Itself. As a mirror in relation to an object has no choice but to contain within itself a reflection of that object, so it is that Existence in relation to Itself has no choice but to contain within Itself the relative existence its relation to Itself creates. Put another way, when Existence is involved in a relation with Itself, something is created as Existence becomes defined in relation to Itself, and that something is what is here being called a relative existence. Thus, the created relative existence, while of a different nature than Existence, nonetheless becomes inseparable from Existence as long as Existence remains involved in the relation that creates it. And it is for this reason that Existence, while in relation to Itself and so creating a relative existence within Itself, apprehends that relative existence as experience, and so is in this state of Existential self-relation also known as or called Consciousness. 3. The Nature of the Individual and Experience As has been stated, what Existence is conscious of as experience has as its most proximal basis the relative existence its relation to Itself creates. The reason it has been put this way is that what Existence is conscious of as experience is not exactly the relative existence its relation to Itself creates. Rather, what Existence is conscious of as experience is the relative existence created by its relation to Itself, as that relative existence is apprehended by Existence from only one side of the relation that creates it. That is, experience is the created relative existence as it appears or is apprehended from a particular perspective within the Existence that is involved in the relation that creates it. The reason Existence does not apprehend the created relative existence simultaneously from both sides of the relation that creates it is because the relation of Existence to Itself that creates any relative existence also creates a duality within Existence, and this duality is the source of what we call Individuality, or the Individual. That duality is the duality between the Individual as it is being in relation to Existence, and Existence as the Individual is being in relation to It. And it is Existence functioning as an Individual, i.e., as an Individual Consciousness, that apprehends the created relative existence as experience, from its side of the relation that creates that relative existence. Thus, Existence or Awareness as a whole does not apprehend or become conscious of the relative existence its relation to Itself produces. Rather, Existence becomes conscious of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1307 experience at the level of the Individual, or through the Individual, i.e., through that part of Itself that is actively being in relation to Itself, which is to say, focusing Itself into a particular relation with Itself. To understand the relation of the Individual Consciousness to the Existence the Individual is being in relation to in order to create a relative existence that the Individual then apprehends as experience from its side of that relation, consider two people standing front to back. These two people are in relation to each other, but it is only the person in back, i.e., the person facing the other persons back, that apprehends the product of their relation, i.e., who sees the other person, because it is only that person who is focused in the direction of the relation. The other person is looking away from the direction of the relation, and so even though they are a part of the relation, they do not apprehend its product as an experience. Or even if they are both facing each other, they are each approaching the relation from a perspective that is the opposite of the other, and so each apprehends the product of that relation from a different perspective, from a different vector of approach, and so each is conscious of an experience that is the opposite of the experience of which the other is conscious. Existence, as it is in relation to itself creating a relative existence, is also Existence that already has a particular perspective on that relation, a particular vector of motion with respect to the relative existence created as a product of that relation. The relation of Existence to itself, the creation of a relative existence, and the apprehension of that relative existence by Existence functioning as Individual Consciousness from a particular perspective within that relation are not separate events, but are all interrelated events that occur simultaneously. Thus, it is a created relative existence, as apprehended by Existence on one side of the relation that creates it, that is what any Individual is conscious of as any experience. And so the relative existence created by the relation of Existence to Itself is not precisely what Existence becomes conscious of as experience, although it is the most proximal basis of what Existence becomes conscious of as experience. Put another way, the created relative existence as a whole is not what is apprehended by the Individual as experience. The created relative existence is like a sheet of paper in that it has two sides, one facing each pole of Existence involved in the relation that creates it, and experience is the apprehension by the Individual of just one of those sides. This is why every experience has an opposite or complement, i.e., because experience is the one-sided apprehension of what is a two-sided reality, and so any relation in which the Individual is involved that creates any experience must have as its basis a relative existence which, if apprehended from the other, opposite side of that relation, would result in the apprehension of its experiential complement. That is, the ability to be in one relation and create a relative existence apprehended from one side as one experience means that it must be possible, at least in theory, to be in the opposite relation and create a relative existence apprehended from the opposite side as the opposite or complementary experience. However, an Individual can apprehend only one of those complementary experiences in any moment, because the relative existence that is the basis of experience does not exist independent of the Individual’s involvement in the relation that creates it, which involvement always includes the Individual’s polarized position within that relation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1308 As an example, consider a coin as representative of the relative existence created by the relation of Existence to Itself, i.e., the relation of the Individual to Existence, which is then apprehended from one side of that relation as an experience. The existence of a head implies the existence of a tail, i.e., the existence of one side implies the existence of the opposite or complementary side. If you are looking at one side of the coin then you are not looking at the other. But the situation with experience is more subtle, because it is the polarized act of looking, i.e., the relation, that itself creates the coin, i.e., the relative existence, with its two sides, and the observer must be on one side of that coin or the other, and so apprehend as experience either head or tail, but not both at once. If the coin, i.e., relative existence, had an existence that was independent of the observer, then both sides could be simultaneously apprehended, as it would be approachable from both sides simultaneously. But as it is, the relative existence that is the basis of Individual’s experience has no existence independent of the Individual that is involved in the relation that creates it and which, from one side of that relation, apprehends the created relative existence as experience. This preclusion of an Individual’s simultaneous apprehension of experiential opposites or complements is a function of the fact that all experience is the product of a relation, and further, that all experience is that product as apprehended by an Individual from a particular and polarized perspective within the relation that creates it. Therefore, for an Individual to simultaneously create and apprehend opposite or complementary experiences would require the Individual to be involved simultaneously in what are mutually exclusive relations, like facing North and South simultaneously, and since that is not possible, it is not possible for an Individual to simultaneously apprehend experiential opposites. The Individual can’t be involved in one relation creating one experience and simultaneously be involved in the opposite, mutually exclusive relation, necessary for that same Individual to create and apprehend the opposite or complementary experience. If you are on someone’s left you are not on their right, if you are looking up you are not looking down, and if you are involved in a relation with Existence in which you create a relative existence that you then apprehend, from your Individual perspective, as a particular experience, then you are, by definition, not involved in the opposite relation with Existence, which relation would be necessary to create your Individual apprehension of the opposite or complementary experience. This preclusion of the Individual’s simultaneous apprehension of experiential opposites is responsible for the experiential limitations imposed upon the Individual that will be described later in this work, and specifically, it is responsible for the experiential limitations that result in the phenomena of wave-particle duality and quantum uncertainty. So, in summary, experience is the created relative existence as apprehended by Existence on one side of the relation to Itself that creates it, and we call such an Existence that is conscious of experience an Individual, and we say that the Individual possesses the quality of Consciousness, as the intrinsic Awareness of Existence is applied, in a polarized fashion, to that which Existence has, through relation to Itself, created within Itself. So many words, so little actually happening, as shown in figure 3. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1309 products of Existential self-relation not composed of Existence reality relative existence experiential reality Experiencer pole Experienced pole Individual Consciousness Reality Relational Structure products of Existential selfrelation composed of Existence Existence (Awareness) Indivisible Duality Figure 3 The Nature of the Individual. This drawing depicts the Individual as one pole of an Indivisible Duality composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself and as a result creating a relative existence that an Individual pole of that Existence, i.e., Existence functioning as an Individual Consciousness, apprehends from its perspective as experience. The Indivisible Duality, of which the Individual Consciousness is one pole, is composed of both poles of Existence, i.e., Experiencer and Experienced, as they are being in relation to each other. The Experienced pole is the Existence the Individual is being in relation to in order to create the relative existence it then apprehends, from its perspective within that relation, as an experience. However, the Experienced pole is not Itself the experience. The Experienced pole is that, which along with the Individual pole, i.e., the Experiencer, forms the relation that creates the relative existence that the Individual then, from its perspective within that relation, apprehends as experience. Now here I would like to say something about the word “individual” and the nature of what we call the Individual. As used in this work, Individual is another word for Consciousness, and both words indicate Existence that is involved in some relation with Itself and conscious of experience as a result of the intrinsic Awareness of Existence being applied, in a polarized fashion, to that which Existence has, through relation to Itself, created within Itself. However, the word “individual” is often misunderstood to mean or indicate a sort of isolated or separate entity, an entity somehow separable from the rest of existence. However, the Individual is actually one pole of what is an Indivisible Duality composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself and as a consequence creating the relative existence the Individual becomes conscious of as experience. That is, although the apprehension of experience may occur from the Individual perspective, the Individual is far more than just the pole of Existence that apprehends a particular relative existence from a particular perspective as a particular experience, as the Individual is in no way separable or divisible from the other pole of Existence with which it is involved in the particular relation that is creating the particular relative existence. That is, Existence may take a perspective on the relative existence its relation to Itself creates, an Individual perspective, but in ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1310 no way does its taking this perspective, which causes it to become conscious of experience, create any actual separation or division of Existence from Itself. The Individual, or Individual Consciousness, is Existence as it is being in relation to Itself, creating a relative existence, and conscious of that relative existence as an experience from a particular perspective within that relation. So Individual Consciousness, as Existence, has two inseparable or indivisible aspects or poles; the aspect or pole of Existence that is conscious of the created relative existence as experience, i.e., the Individual Consciousness or Experiencer pole, and the aspect or pole of Existence that the Individual pole is being in relation to in order to create and apprehend the relative existence as experience, i.e., the Experienced pole. That is, the Individual is actually an Indivisible Duality composed of these two poles of Existence, i.e., Experiencer and Experienced, as they are being in relation to each other. However, for various reasons, we tend to think of the Individual as an isolated entity, composed only of that aspect or pole of Existence that is conscious of experience, unconscious and unaware that we are, as Existence, inseparable from the other pole of Existence that we are being in relation to in order to create and apprehend experience. The Individual, owing to the uniqueness of the relations with Existence in which it becomes involved, may be unique and create experiences that are unique to Itself, unique to its perspective, for no other point of Existence can have that exact same perspective, but that uniqueness does not make the Individual in any way separable from any other point of Existence. Individuals are all unique, but they are all composed of the same Existential Substance, the same indivisible Existence, the same Awareness, and while the number of Individuals is infinite, or without end, Existence Itself remains singular. 4. The One Principle Sufficient for the Generation of All Things The German philosopher, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716), is credited with stating; “For the generation of all things, one principle is sufficient.” And in the model of Reality presented in this work, as well as in URT, that one principle can be identified and is as follows: To Exist is to be in relation. Leibniz, along with others, also expounded what he called the principle of sufficient reason, namely, that nothing happens without a reason. Formally, the Principle states that for every fact F, there must be an explanation why F is the case. Not everyone agrees with Leibnz, mainly it seems owing to the conclusions which he reached using this principle. Nonetheless, I am in agreement with Leibniz, although I think in terms of cause and effect. That is, there is no effect without a cause, and so for every effect there must be a cause that should be describable in terms of how it produces the effect. What I am going to do in this work is describe Reality, as well as reality, as the products of a very simple process of cause and effect. However, in order to explain Reality and reality in terms of cause and effect, I must first explain the nature of the cause and the nature of the effect. 4.1 The existence of Existence and why to Exist is to be in relation ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1311 Before we can move on to the cause and effect description of how Existence, through progressive self-relation, evolves into Reality while at the same time creating for Itself an experiential reality, according to the principle of sufficient reason, i.e., for every fact F, there must be an explanation why F is the case, there are two facts that must be explained; 1) The Existence of Existence and 2) why it is that “to Exist is to be in relation.” The first fact we have to deal with is the fact of the Existence of Existence, i.e., the fact that Existence Exists. That is, why is there anything? Why does Existence Exist? The answer, very simply, is because there can’t be nothing. That is, Existence Exists because there can’t be nothing, and there can’t be nothing because when there is nothing that nothing then is what is, which is to say, is what Exists. If all that Exists was to somehow be done away with so that there was absolutely nothing whatsoever of any sort, that complete and utter nothingness would then itself be what is, or what Exists. That is why Existence is said to be not created, or uncaused, and why it cannot cease to be, because Existence is what remains when there is nothing. Thus, Existence is said to be both what is as well as what is not. For this reason, Existence is always the Cause, but Itself is uncaused, which is to say, it is not, as Existence, an effect created by any process or set of relations. And even though the Relational Structures composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself are the result of a relation, the Existence of which those Relational Structures are composed Itself remains uncaused. However, the Existence of Existence alone does not in and of itself explain why things are as they are. For that we need the addition of the second fact, the one principle sufficient for the generation of all things, i.e., “to Exist is to be in relation.” Why is it that to Exist is to be in relation? What is the explanation as to why this is the case? Because what Exists, by virtue of its Being, is unavoidably in relation to Itself. Every point of Existence, regardless of the size of that point, is unavoidably in relation to the Existence that is not that point. Consider you are in an elevator with someone. Your position in that space makes unavoidable some relation with that person. Likewise, Existence occupies Existence, as it were, with Itself, and that position makes some relation with Itself unavoidable. Thus, to Exist is to be in relation. These two things taken together; that Existence must Exist, and that to Exist is to be in relation, are all that is needed to explain the whole of Reality and reality, i.e., what actually Is as well as what is experienced to be, in terms of a very simple process of cause and effect. 4.2 Existential cause and Existential and experiential effect In terms of the creation of Reality as well as the experience of reality, the Cause is always the same; the inevitability of Existence and its unavoidable relation to Itself. However, this Cause produces not one, but two different effects. One Effect is the creation of a Relational Structure composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself. The other effect is the creation of a relative existence that is apprehended by Existence as experience. And thus there is Cause and there is Effect and effect. In this work, everything is explained in terms of this Cause and these two very different effects. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1312 The evolution of Existence through progressive self-relation is an iterative process. An iterative process is one where the result of one iteration or cycle of a process is then fed back into that same process to produce another result, which result is then fed back into the process producing another result and on and on and on. Iterative mathematical processes are what produce the geometric structures called fractals. What we experience as physical reality appears fractal because the Relational Structures that are the basis of those experiences are themselves the product of an iterative process of progressive Existential self-relation that will be described below. As already stated, Existence and its relations to Itself, i.e., Cause, produce two effects, one composed of Existence and the other not composed of Existence. The Effect composed of Existence is a Relational Structure and the effect not composed of existence is a relative existence apprehended by Existence as experience. The Effect, or Relational Structure, produced by one iteration of the process of Existential self-relation, being something that Exists, falls under the principle “to Exist is to be in relation, and so then becomes the Cause that produces the next Effect and effect, i.e., the next Relational Structure and the next relative existence apprehended by Existence as experience. In this way, with each interaction of the process, the Relational Structure that is produced, i.e., the Effect, then becomes the Cause, allowing for another iteration of the process of Existential self-relation, producing another Effect and effect, which produced Effect then allows for another iteration of the process producing another Effect and effect and on and on and on…. The iterative process of Existential self-relation is diagramed in figure 4. The unseen and unknown Reality (what actually Exists) Reality - Relational Structure - Existence in relation to Itself Existence Cause Cause Cause Existential self-relatioon Effect Effect Effect Relational Structure Relational Structure Relational Structure It is This that apprehends this and can mistake Itself for this effect Cause To Exist is to be in relation relative existence experience effect relative existence experience effect effect relative existence experience relative existence experience reality - relative existence - experiential reality The seen or known reality (what seems to exist) Figure 4 The Iterative Process of Existential Self-Relation. This drawing depicts how the inevitability of Existence along with the unavoidability of its relation to Itself results in an iterative process of Existential self-relation through which Existence forms progressive levels of Reality and reality, i.e., progressive levels of Relational Structure and relative existence apprehended as experiential reality, respectively. Specifically, Existence and its relation to Itself, as ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1313 Cause, produces two effects. One of those Effects is a Relational Structure composed of Existence as it is being in relation to Itself and the other effect is the creation of a relative existence that is not composed of Existence, but which Existence apprehends as experience. The process is iterative because the Effect, i.e., the Relational Structure, produced as a result of one iteration of the process, being composed of Existence is then Itself subject to the principle “to Exist is to be in relation” and so Itself then becomes the Cause that produces the next Effect and effect, i.e., the next Relational Structure and relative existence apprehended by Existence as experience. The right side of the drawing is left open to indicate the ongoing and endless nature of this process. As will be described, this iterative process of Existential self-relation results in the creation of three different levels of Reality or Relational Structure. First, Existence creates out of Itself, through iterative relation to Itself, the Relational Structure described in URT as the Relational Matrix. Then, once the Relational Matrix Exists, Existence as that comes to be in relation to Itself, creating the Relational Structures described in URT as Primary and Compound Distortion Processes. Next, once Primary and Compound Distortion Processes Exist, Existence as that comes to be in relation to Itself, creating the Relational Structures we apprehend at the physical level as Organic Processes. However, no matter what we call it, it is all just Existence, albeit Existence involved in iterative relations with Itself, and as a result creating out of Itself different and progressive levels of Reality or Relational Structure. And at each of the three different levels of Reality or Relational Structure, a different type of relative existence is created that Existence involved in relations at that level apprehends as a different type of experience. What I intend to make clear is that there is really not so much happening as our experience of reality makes it seem. In fact, there is really only One Thing and one thing happening, but it just keeps happening over and over and over again, causing the One Thing to appear to be an infinity of things. The One Thing is Existence and the one thing happening is that Existence being iteratively in relation to Itself and creating as a result different Relational Structures and different relative existences apprehended as different experiences. It should be noted that what is here being described as the three different levels of Relational Structure, i.e., the Relational Matrix, Distortion Processes, and Organic Processes, are not produced by just three iterations of the process of Existential self-relation. Only once a particular level of Reality has evolved through countless iterations to a certain point is that level of Reality then, as a whole, Itself then fed into the process, as it were, producing as an Effect the next level of Reality or Relational Structure, which then Itself undergoes countless iterations until it has evolved to the point where it then, as a whole, is Itself then fed into the process, as it were, producing as an Effect the next level of Reality or Relational Structure. This is analogous to the iterative twisting of a rubber band upon itself where at some point in the twisting the rubber band, as it is already twisted, begins to bunch up on itself and so form another level of relation with itself. Likewise, only once a given level of Reality or Relational Structure has iterated to a certain point does it then become possible for that Relational Structure as a whole to form a relation with Itself and thereby produce, as an Effect, the next level of Relational Structure. It should also be noted that the one principle sufficient for the generation of all things, i.e., “to Exist is to be in relation,” applies only to that which actually Exists and not to that which has ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1299-1314 Kaufman, S. E. Introduction to Existential Mechanics: How the Relations of Existence to Itself Create the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1314 only the appearance of existing, i.e., experience. That is, only that which actually Exists can be involved in a relation with whatever else Exists, because that which only seems to exist does not Exist to do so. In the same way, your reflection may appear to be you, and so may appear to be capable of thinking and feeling as you do, but as it is only a reflection, as it only seems to be you, it does not actually possess those capabilities. Likewise, experience, being what only seems to exist, does not possess the quality of Existence required for it to become involved in a relation with either itself or Existence. Experience is the product of a relation, and is not itself the source of relation. Further, the apprehension of the created relative existence as experience is not produced by a relation between Existence as Individual Consciousness and the created relative existence. The relative existence is itself the product of a relation occurring between Existence, and its apprehension by Individual Consciousness does not involve any relation other than the relation of Existence to Itself that brings it into relative being. Put another way, the apprehension of the created relative existence as experience is not the product of a relation, but is the intrinsic SelfAwareness of Existence inevitability and unavoidably applied to that which is created within Itself as a product of its relation to Itself. Thus, the only relations that actually Exist are the relations of Existence to Itself. In the next article each of the three different types of experience that we apprehend, i.e., emotional, mental, and physical, will be related to a different level of Realty or Relational Structure. What will be presented is a description of how Existence evolves into different levels of Reality composed of different Relational Structures, while at the same time creating at each level of Reality a distinct type of relative existence apprehended by Existence as a distinct and particular type of experience. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Non-separability of Physical Systems as a Foundation of Consciousness Anton Arkhipov MindScope Program, Allen Institute, Seattle, WA, 98109 antona@alleninstitute.org Abstract A hypothesis is presented that non-separability of degrees of freedom is the fundamental property underlying consciousness in physical systems. The amount of consciousness in a system is determined by the extent of non-separability and the number of degrees of freedom involved. Non-interacting and feedforward systems have zero consciousness, whereas most systems of interacting particles appear to have low non-separability and consciousness. By contrast, brain circuits exhibit high complexity and weak but tightly coordinated interactions, which appear to support high non-separability and therefore high amount of consciousness. The hypothesis applies to both classical and quantum cases, and we highlight the formalism employing the Wigner function (which in the classical limit becomes the Liouville density function) as a potentially fruitful framework for characterizing non-separability and, thus, the amount of consciousness in a system. The hypothesis appears to be consistent with both the Integrated Information Theory and the Orchestrated Objective Reduction Theory and may help reconcile the two. It offers a natural explanation for the physical properties underlying the amount of consciousness and points to methods of estimating the amount of non-separability as promising ways of characterizing the amount of consciousness. Introduction What are the physical foundations of consciousness? This question, perhaps posed in a less modern way, occupied philosophers for millennia and motivated an increasing amount of scientific research in recent years. While the definition of what should be called consciousness is still sometimes debated, here we will focus on the basic definition of consciousness as the phenomenon of having a subjective experience [1,2]. It is what we have during normal waking 1 state or when dreaming during sleep, such as seeing a visual scene, experiencing an emotion, thinking of something. It is also the definition that is at the heart of the “hard problem" of consciousness [3] – why do we experience anything at all, and what determines the ability of some physical systems like brains – and, presumably, not others, like rocks – to have subjective experiences? To answer this question, we ultimately need a theory of how consciousness arises from physical constituents of the Universe, such as fields, particles, and their interactions. Two major theories in this space attracted much attention in recent decades: the Integrated Information Theory (IIT) of Giulio Tononi and colleagues [4–6] and the Orchestrated Objective Reduction (Orch OR) theory of Penrose and Hameroff [7–11]. The IIT starts from postulating several essential properties of phenomenal experience and derives from them the requirements that must be met for physical systems to have consciousness. In the resulting framework, consciousness reflects the intrinsic cause-effect power of the system’s components upon themselves as a whole (i.e., beyond the sum of the parts), and is quantified by the “integrated information” measure, also referred to as “Phi”. Orch OR, on the other hand, proposes that consciousness arises from ‘orchestrated’ coherent quantum processes (proposed to occur within microtubules in the brain’s neurons), where the continuous quantum evolution of each process terminates via the “objective reduction” of the quantum state. Each moment of such reduction of the uncertainty of the quantum state to a 100% certain classical realization corresponds in Orch OR to moments of consciousness. Many other proposals exist, especially with respect to the brain mechanisms and computational principles involved in consciousness, such as the Global Workspace Theory [12,13] and Global Neuronal Workspace Theory [14–16], the Higher-Order Theory of consciousness [17–20], Attention Schema Theory [21,22], the Free Energy principle [23,24], the Information Closure Theory [25], and others. These theories are interesting and important but focus more on the neural correlates of consciousness [2,26–28] or cognitive aspects and psychology of consciousness, rather than the basic physical underpinnings of consciousness as a physical phenomenon, or, as argued by Tegmark [29], as a state of matter. Here we consider the phenomenon of consciousness from such a first-principles, physics-based point of view. What are the fundamental physical characteristics that determine whether consciousness exists, and in which amount, in any physical system? Existing proposals offer possible answers (though we do not know at present whether true or not), but also leave some questions open. 2 For example, the IIT [5] takes a point of view that one may call ‘computational’, as it typically operates with systems composed of logical gates with discrete states (e.g., “on” and “off”) and connections that determine logical interactions. This is a valid approach, but can a theory of consciousness be derived from ‘regular’ physics operating with Hamiltonians, particles, and fields, with both continuous (e.g., position) and discrete (e.g., spin) degrees of freedom? After all, the brain, the only system for which we know with some certainty that it generates consciousness, is a piece of physical matter consisting of interacting particles like protons, neutrons, and electrons. If we have a Hamiltonian and a wave function of all the degrees of freedom in the brain, which is all there is according to the physics view, where does consciousness enter? Perhaps a theory answering this question can even turn out to be equivalent to IIT, once correspondence is established between the Hamiltonian-plus-wavefunction view and the logical-gates-plus-connections view (just like matrix-based and wave function-based formulations of quantum mechanics are equivalent to each other). The Orch OR theory [11] answers the question above by suggesting the objective reduction of the wave function as a fundamental consciousness mechanism, though this appears to require quantum coherence over the length scale of the whole brain (~1-10 cm) and time scale of a ‘conscious percept’ (typically assumed to be ~50-100 ms [30–32]). Though not impossible in principle, it remains to be seen whether such quantum phenomena operate on this scale in the brain; it is perhaps fair to say that the majority opinion at present is that the brain functions mostly in the classical limit. Furthermore, these difficulties aside, the Orch OR theory typically focuses on how consciousness comes to be, but one also needs to know how to quantify the amount of consciousness and its composition in the system. For example, when the wave function collapses according to the Orch OR recipe, which of the brain’s degrees of freedom are part of this process and which are not, and how does that matter for the conscious experience? Here we hypothesize that non-separability of the state of a physical system is the fundamental property determining the presence and amount of consciousness. In simple terms, nonseparability of some degrees of freedom in a physical system means that these degrees of freedom cannot be described, with regard to their state and time evolution, as independent variables, but form a truly inseparable complex that is not simply a sum of its parts. This offers a natural and general physics-based mechanism for the integration of a subset of components from a system into a ‘whole’ subsystem, that is internally united and separate from the rest of the system, which is a hallmark of consciousness. We propose that such non-separable complexes are conscious, and the extent to which they are conscious (i.e., the amount of consciousness each complex has) is determined by the extent of non-separability and the number of degrees of freedom involved. While mathematically the 3 non-separability concept appears simple – it requires that the function describing the state of a system cannot be represented as a product of functions describing the system’s parts – in practice it is anything but, and below we describe a number of observations following from our hypothesis and make suggestions for further inquiry in this area. The hypothesis appears consistent with both the IIT and Orch OR, suggesting that the fundamental property of nonseparability may be important to consider in attempts to refine, unify, and test theories of consciousness. Non-separability and consciousness 1. Hypothesis: the amount of consciousness in a physical system corresponds to the extent to which this system is non-separable. If we want to explore physical properties that form the basis of consciousness, it is useful to keep in mind as guiding goalposts the basic attributes of consciousness. Such attributes have been enumerated as five axioms forming the foundation of IIT [5], and we will repeat them here. (1) The intrinsic existence axiom states that a conscious system must be able to change its state due to interactions of its components. (2) The composition axiom says that experience is composed of multiple components within it. (3) According to the information axiom, any experience is specific, i.e., distinct from other experiences due to a particular set of components combined in that experience but not others. (4) The axiom of integration dictates that all components of a conscious experience are bound in a single whole – the irreducibility of a conscious state that is quantified by the “integrated information” measure, Phi. (5) The exclusion axiom posits that experience is definite in content: certain components of the system are ‘in’ the conscious complex, and others are not, and likewise this complex exists on a certain time scale, and not faster or slower. One may suggest that axioms (1-3) are satisfied by a large class of physical systems, where system components have sufficient interactions with each other to change the overall state; where the system’s state is determined by the states of multiple heterogeneous components; and where at least some distinct states of the system are non-degenerate in the sense that they correspond to distinct configurations of the system’s components and affect the system’s dynamics differently. But axioms (4) and (5) require some additional principle that would ensure integration of the system’s components into a ‘whole’ and establishing a boundary between what is ‘in’ and what is ‘out’ of the conscious complex. 4 We propose that non-separability is such a principle. Non-separability means that certain degrees of freedom in a system cannot be described as independent variables but need to be considered together as a ‘whole’. This directly establishes the integration and a boundary, per axioms (4) and (5) above. Some degrees of freedom may be separable from the rest, so they would be ‘out’. The rest are ‘in’, integrated together by virtue of a particular structure of their interactions with each other. Importantly, non-separability can apply to both continuous and discrete degrees of freedom. Note that determining whether certain degrees of freedom in a system are separable or not in a general case is a hard, unsolved problem, and a simple presence of interactions or correlations between degrees of freedom is not sufficient for non-separability, as we illustrate below. Characterizing separability or non-separability in a general case, also known as the state factorization problem, has been highlighted by Tegmark as highly relevant for the problem of consciousness [29], though, to our knowledge, a specific relationship between non-separability and consciousness like the one proposed here has not yet been established in the literature. The hypothesis we posit here is that non-separability is equivalent to consciousness, i.e., it is necessary and sufficient for consciousness, and a conscious experience is what it feels to be a non-separable system. In other words, when multiple degrees of freedom are intertwined in a non-separable state, they form a multi-dimensional complex that conforms to the IIT axioms above and possesses experiences determined by its states in this multi-dimensional space. The more dimensions are intertwined and the stronger the non-separability of these dimensions, the higher is the amount of consciousness. As a consequence, one obtains that any nonseparable system (of two degrees of freedom or more) has some amount of consciousness, which, however, is expected to be minuscule in most cases. Presumably, brains support extraordinarily large and well-organized non-separable states, which result in the type of human consciousness we are used to. Below, we discuss this hypothesis in more detail, consider a number of informative examples, and speculate about possible measures for characterizing the amount of consciousness, as well as about the relationship of our hypothesis with the IIT and Orch OR. For our current purposes, we assume that physical systems are governed by the regular quantum mechanics (i.e., leaving aside field theory, relativistic effects, or gravity), including its classical limit. 5 2. The non-separability concept and consciousness. We hypothesize that non-separability is equivalent to consciousness in that the extent of nonseparability and the number of degrees of freedom involved determine the amount of consciousness. Consider a function, 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … ), that fully describes the instantaneous state of a system with degrees of freedom 𝑥! , 𝑥" , … . Separability means that the function for the full system at a given time moment can be represented as a product of functions that depend on the different degrees of freedom, for example: 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … ) = 𝑓! (𝑥! )𝑓#$%& (𝑥" , … ). In this example, the degree of freedom 𝑥! is separable from the rest of the system, 𝑥" , … . Another example is shown in Figure 1, where we consider 10 degrees of freedom. The whole system is separable, but subsystems consisting of the degrees of freedom 𝑥' , 𝑥( , 𝑥) , 𝑥* , 𝑥+ and 𝑥, , 𝑥!- are non-separable: 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , 𝑥' , 𝑥( , 𝑥) , 𝑥* , 𝑥+ , 𝑥. , 𝑥, , 𝑥!- ) = 𝑓! (𝑥! )𝑓" (𝑥" )𝑔(𝑥' , 𝑥( , 𝑥) , 𝑥* , 𝑥+ )𝑓. (𝑥. )ℎ(𝑥, , 𝑥!- ). According to our hypothesis, these two non-separable systems possess certain (very small) amounts of consciousness, presumably more for the system with 5 non-separable degrees of freedom than for the system with 2 degrees of freedom. (However, as we will discuss below, non-separability may be weaker or stronger depending on the interactions between the degrees of freedom, and therefore the exact relationship between the amount of consciousness and the number of non-separable degrees of freedom in a subsystem can be complicated.) Thus, for any system, even the whole Universe, the function describing its state can potentially be decomposed into a product of functions that each describe subsets among all the degrees of freedom. The system is then decomposed into non-separable subsystems. Our hypothesis is that the non-separable subsystems form the units which have some amount of consciousness. What is the appropriate function 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … ) that should be considered when separability and non-separability of a physical system is in question? Generally speaking, this is the function describing the state of the system (in the sense of a microstate, as opposed to the equilibrium “state” in thermodynamics), that is, the quantum-mechanical wave function 𝜓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … ) or 6 density matrix, or the equivalents such as the Wigner function [33,34], the Marginal Distribution or Quantum Tomogram [35–39], etc. In a classical world, this can be the function that corresponds to the classical approximation of the wave function (or its equivalents). While any such function describes physical systems equivalently well, we propose below that the Wigner function may offer a particularly fruitful approach, as it has a direct equivalent in the classical case – the Liouville density function in phase space. Figure 1. The non-separability concept. Shown is an example of a system with 10 degrees of freedom. The system is described by the function 𝑓, which can be decomposed into a product of the functions describing the subsystems: the three subsystems with one degree of freedom each (𝑥! , 𝑥" , and 𝑥# ), one with two non-separable degrees of freedom (𝑥$ , 𝑥!% ), and one with five non-separable degrees of freedom (𝑥& , 𝑥' , 𝑥( , 𝑥) , 𝑥* ). Interactions between the degrees of freedom are schematically shown as edges. We hypothesize that the extent of non-separability and the number of degrees of freedom involved determine the amount of consciousness. In this example, the non-separable subsystems 𝑥$ , 𝑥!% and 𝑥& , 𝑥' , 𝑥( , 𝑥) , 𝑥* form separate entities, each of which has some amount of consciousness (very small, given the number of degrees of freedom involved). 7 3. Non-separability and the exclusion principle. The fifth axiom of consciousness posited by the IIT [5] is that of exclusion: certain components of the system are ‘in’ the conscious complex, and others are not. While the discussion above and the example in Figure 1 clearly establish that non-separability implies integration of the system’s components into a ‘whole’, one may ask whether they address exclusion itself. After all, in the IIT framework one needs to look for a combination of the system’s components that maximizes the integrated information Phi. In the example in Figure 1, the IIT requires that one computes Phi, e.g., for the two subsystems – one consisting of components {3, 4, 5} and the other of components {6, 7} – and compares that to the Phi of the subsystem of all five components {3, 4, 5, 6, 7}. If the latter gives the maximum of Phi, then {3, 4, 5, 6, 7} is the conscious complex and otherwise {3, 4, 5} and {6, 7} are two separate smaller conscious complexes. How does this concept figure in the non-separability hypothesis? The answer is that the exclusion principle is embedded in the concept of non-separability. The non-intuitive aspect of it is that non-separability is what one establishes after all the possible partitions have been considered. In the example in Figure 1, one can, of course, ask whether the subsystem {3, 4, 5} is separable from {6, 7}. But, if it was, the subsystem {3, 4, 5, 6, 7} would not have been non-separable. In other words, if any component or combination of components of {3, 4, 5, 6, 7} is separable from the rest, then, clearly, {3, 4, 5, 6, 7} cannot be non-separable. Practically, establishing non-separability would indeed require considering all possible partitions, similar to how one would approach maximization of Phi in the IIT. This can be a very hard, computationally expensive procedure (see more on this below). But the end result is that once non-separability of a system is established, by definition no subsystem within it can be described separately. If it could be, then the composite system would be separable, just like {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10} in Figure 1 is separable into {1}, {2}, {8}, {9, 10}, and {3, 4, 5, 6, 7}, but {9, 10} and {3, 4, 5, 6, 7} are not separable any further. Thus, non-separability establishes both integration and exclusion. 4. Non-interacting systems have zero consciousness. If non-separability is equivalent to consciousness, which physical systems have consciousness, and how much? To start addressing this question, let us first ask which systems have exactly zero consciousness by virtue of being strictly separable. 8 The simplest case is that of non-interacting systems, i.e., those where no degrees of freedom (which we also refer to as “components”, for convenience) interact with each other (Figure 2A). However, note that any component may be subject to an external potential. In this case, every component is completely independent of any other component, and such a system with no interactions between its parts is exactly separable [40], or factorizable: 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … ) = 𝑓! (𝑥! )𝑓" (𝑥" ) … = - 𝑓/ (𝑥/ ). / According to our hypothesis, this system will then have no consciousness on its own, and each of its parts will likewise have zero consciousness. Note that in principle it is possible to create a non-separable state (e.g., quantum-entangled – see more on the entanglement below) of a system and then effectively “turn off” interactions, after which the state may still remain non-separable. However, strictly speaking this example does not correspond to the case above, where the Hamiltonian of the system never contains any interactions between the component. Thus, we have shown that purely non-interacting systems are unconscious. It is important to note that in many cases interactions between components of a system may be weak but nonzero. Consider such systems that the strength of interactions between the components is controlled by a multiplicative parameter 𝑄, so that for 𝑄 = 0 all interactions are non-existent. Systems with high values of 𝑄 may have some amount of consciousness, but in the limit of 𝑄 approaching zero, interactions among the components disappear, and the system becomes separable and thus unconscious. This thought experiment suggests that, in the framework of our hypothesis, the amount of consciousness is best viewed as a continuous nonnegative number, rather than a binary one (i.e., “either consciousness is there or there is none”). In the former case, the amount of consciousness can take on infinitesimally small nonnegative values and approach zero as interactions become vanishingly small. 9 Figure 2. Separable non-interacting and interacting systems. (A) A system with components that do not interact with each other. This system is exactly separable, and the amount of consciousness it contains is zero. (B) A system of two interacting particles with position vectors 𝒓! , 𝒓" (relative to origin O in a coordinate system). The interaction is marked by a black line. By transforming to a different coordinate system (origin marked as O’), where the center-of-mass (“COM”, 𝑹) and relative (“rel”, 𝒓) motions are considered, one finds that the system is exactly separable (as there is zero interaction between 𝑹 and 𝒓). Thus, it also has zero consciousness, even though the interaction between 𝒓! and 𝒓" can be arbitrarily strong. 5. Interacting systems can also have zero consciousness. If no interaction means no consciousness, does it mean that any interacting system will have some amount of consciousness? It turns out the answer is no, as the following simple example shows. Consider two particles interacting via the potential 𝑣(𝒓! − 𝒓" ), where 𝒓! , 𝒓" are the coordinates of the particles (Figure 2B). Because of the interaction, the function describing this system in these original coordinates is non-separable: 𝑓(𝒓! , 𝒓" ) ≠ 𝑓! (𝒓! )𝑓" (𝒓" ) However, we can use a different set of coordinates, 𝑹= 𝒓! + 𝒓" , 𝒓 = 𝒓! − 𝒓" , 2 10 such that the Hamiltonian governing the evolution of this system now contains the potential energy term influencing only 𝒓, but not 𝑹. Therefore, just as before with the non-interacting system, the function describing the system becomes separable: 𝑓(𝒓! , 𝒓" ) = 𝑓012 (𝑹)𝑓#$3 (𝒓), where “COM” and “rel” refer to the Center of Mass and relative motion, respectively. This system is therefore factorized in the new basis of (𝒓, 𝑹), i.e., it is exactly separable into two subsystems: the center of mass and the relative motion, even though the interaction term 𝑣(𝒓! − 𝒓" ) = 𝑣(𝒓) can be arbitrarily strong. This illustrates another important point: even in the case when interactions between components are strong, a system may be separable and therefore unconscious. Furthermore, transformations like the one used in the example above can be applied to any physical system. In standard quantum mechanics (and therefore in the classical limit of quantum mechanics as well), one can change the Hilbert space basis in which a system is considered to a different basis using unitary transformations [29,40]. A system that is nonseparable in one basis may become separable in a different basis, as we have just seen. However, the factorization problem – finding the basis in which the wave function is factorized into the largest number of functions describing independent subsystems – has not been solved in its general form [29]. Since the description of the world in quantum mechanics is equally true under any unitary transformation of the basis, it seems proper to posit that the amount of consciousness should be conserved under these unitary transformations. Therefore, sampling all the unitary transformations is not necessary, and there should be a way to compute the amount of consciousness in any basis. Below we suggest that a metric of the amount of consciousness utilizing the concept like the entanglement entropy may be appropriate. However, while such a metric can be defined, computing it in practice can be very difficult and may benefit from sampling different unitary transformations of the basis. In this respect, the computation may be similar in difficulty to the case of computing the Phi measure of IIT [6,41–47]. The conceptual takeaway is that one needs to keep in mind the possibility of finding separable components of the system under various unitary transformations. The combinations of the degrees of freedom that remain non-separable under such transformations constitute the 11 conscious entities, where the amount of consciousness in each such entity is determined by the degree of non-separability and the number of degrees of freedom. For large multi-partite systems, the appropriate degrees of freedom that remain non-separable may very well be some macroscopic variables like membrane voltages of every neuron in a neuronal ensemble, rather than the underlying microscopic variables like the positions of every elementary particle that the neuronal ensemble is composed of. 6. Macroscopic objects and biological systems. The discussion above shows that strong interactions between system’s parts do not necessarily imply non-separability and, hence, consciousness. If that was not the case, our hypothesis would run into difficulties, since we would then expect high consciousness for any macroscopic object – that is, an object consisting of many particles and therefore containing many degrees of freedom – with sufficiently strong interactions between them, even if the system in question is simply a pot of water or a slab of copper. That is emphatically not the case. Most known strongly interacting systems of particles, such as solids, liquids, molecular complexes, etc., etc., appear to be separable or near-separable into many one- or few-dimensional subsystems. Strongly correlated systems, such as electrons in solids, are probably mostly separable. Elementary particles (quarks, protons, neutrons, electrons, neutrinos, etc.) constituting building blocks of physical systems can usually be separated to a great degree of approximation due to the orders of magnitude difference between the interaction energies within nuclei, atoms, etc., and between them (Figure 3A, B). What is left then in strongly correlated systems are usually a small fraction of overall degrees of freedom, like “free” electrons or other particles/quasiparticles in solids or liquids, waves, etc. These remaining degrees of freedom may still have strong correlations, but often these strong correlations lead to more separability. Typically, since the remaining degrees of freedom represent identical particles, transformations can be made that reduce the function describing the system state to a product of identical functions with only one or a few degrees of freedom each. This often takes on a form of excitations or quasiparticles (holes, phonons, polaritons, etc.) emerging from the sea of interacting atoms and electrons and behaving close to being independent from each other. The function describing the state of the whole system (e.g., its wave function) is then separable or approximately separable into a large number of functions, each describing the states of a small number of degrees of freedom – such as inner components of atoms, vibrations of the crystalline lattice, flow of electric currents, etc. 12 One may wonder if more exotic states of matter, such as Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) or superconductors present more substantial difficulties. However, such systems do also seem to be separable into many small parts, even if the parts are substantially different from the underlying elementary particles. The hallmark of both the BECs and superconductors, for example, is that a large number of particles (electrons, atoms) take on identical states and can be described with just one or a few degrees of freedom (such as the order parameter in the Gross-Pitaevskii equation), plus various quantized excitations [48–53]. Even phase transitions, which may be characterized by infinitely long correlations (such as in the case of second-order phase transitions), appear to have the same property: The underlying particles may become strongly correlated across vast distances, but that means that unitary transformations can be found that separate the state function into a product of many low-dimensional functions that follow approximately the same dynamics. This issue is described in details by Tegmark [29], and the salient observation is that typically it may be rather difficult to find a highly non-separable system. The most common situation, in fact, appears to be the one where a system is mostly separable due to the symmetries and the hierarchy of interaction energies that differ by orders of magnitude between scales. Compared to ‘inanimate matter’, biological systems are characterized by more heterogeneity, asymmetry, and mixing of scales. But even for such systems, a vast amount of the degrees of freedom are likely separable from each other. Most of the subatomic degrees of freedom are relatively independent from larger-scale phenomena (Figure 3A); the movements of atoms themselves can largely be separated from the movements of their various arrangements in molecular moieties such as rings and amino-acids (Figure 3B); and these in turn are relatively independent of the larger-scale dynamics of whole proteins, patches of membrane, segments of DNA, etc. (Figure 3C). At the level of organelles and cells, including neurons, the more microscopic degrees of freedom are also likely separable in many cases (Figure 3D). Indeed, formalisms like the one employing the Hodgkin-Huxley equations are often sufficient to describe to a high precision the dynamics (such as action potentials) relevant to neuron’s communication with other cells [54–56]. Such equations operate with membrane voltages and ionic concentrations, rather than the states of individual ion channels. At the level of whole organs, even brains, dynamics of individual cells may be separable from higher-level degrees of freedom (Figure 3E). For example, states of neuronal ensembles distributed across the brain may be more relevant at that level than the states of every neuron. Beyond this level of organ or perhaps an organism, separability is typically even more widespread, since organisms usually have very low-bandwidth channels of interaction with the rest of the world. 13 Figure 3. Separability in macroscopic objects such as biological systems. (A) Subatomic particles like protons, neutrons, and electrons interact stably and with high energy within the atom. Most of their degrees of freedom are effectively separable when considering interactions between atoms, where typically the whole atom can be seen as a single particle, perhaps with additional contributions from “outer” electron shells. The nucleus and the electron orbitals are not shown to scale (the real size difference is about 105). (B) Molecular moieties often have relatively rigid structure and multiple symmetries. Many degrees of freedom from the constituent atoms may be separable from the major molecular motions, e.g., amino acid side chains bend and rotate while maintaining their overall internal structure. (C) In macromolecular complexes immersed in liquids and biological membranes, movements of the numerous constituent molecular residues (e.g., amino acids, lipids, and water molecules) can often be separable from the large-scale dynamics, where many of the relevant degrees of freedom (though not all) may be the rigid-body motions, twists, compressions, and other modes of the macromolecular motions, as well as order parameters of the membrane continuum and concentrations of solutes. (D) At the cellular level, such as when considering neuronal activity, many of the underlying macromolecular phenomena may be separable. Higher-level composite degrees of freedom such as membrane voltage and ionic concentration gradients are in many cases sufficient to describe dynamics at this level. (E) For whole brains, it is likely that details of the activity within individual cells are separable from the larger scale dynamics of the neurons (reflected, e.g., in the somatic output membrane voltage and action potentials) and neuronal ensembles. 14 The conclusions that we can draw from these considerations so far, in the light of our hypothesis, are two-fold. First, the vast majority of degrees of freedom in almost any physical system, including biological ones, are separable or near-separable into low-dimensional subsystems that have very little to zero consciousness. Second, the only physical system we know to be conscious – the brain – seems unique in that, despite also being subject to rampant separability of most of its degrees of freedom, it somehow manages to maintain a relatively highly non-separable state with some of the remaining degrees of freedom. Strictly speaking, the latter point is a supposition, since we do not know for certain how separable or non-separable the brain really is. But this idea does not seem surprising, given that the brain is often considered to be the most complex piece of matter in the Universe, and its structure and dynamics (especially that of the presumed ‘seat of consciousness’, the thalamocortical system [1,2,27,57–59]) exhibit a balance between not-too-weak and not-too-strong interactions among many heterogeneous partners, across multiple length- and timescales (nm to cm and ms to years) [60], and without too many obvious symmetries. What the considerations above add, is that the non-separable conscious state in the brain likely forms over a relatively small number of mesoscopic/macroscopic degrees of freedom such as the neuronal membrane voltages and activity states of distributed neural ensembles. The astronomical numbers of all the other degrees of freedom, starting all the way from the elementary particles the brain consists of, are separable into one- or low-dimensional subsystems with little to no consciousness in each subsystem (Figure 3). These considerations are consistent with the IIT’s view on the causal emergence of a conscious complex relying on macroscopic components of the system rather than its microscopic constituents [61,62]. It is worth noting that the macroscopic degrees of freedom still may provide for a highly dimensional non-separable system. There are on the order of 1010 neurons in the human thalamo-cortical system [63,64], and even assuming that only a fraction of them form the main non-separable state, the dimensionality of that state still may be immense. If the correct level of granularity is neural ensemble, one can still easily expect hundreds or more such ensembles to form non-separable states (for reference, at least 180 areas are identified in the human cortex [65]), still providing for a rather high dimensionality. Finally, it is useful to keep in mind that separability of degrees of freedom may not occur cleanly along the macroscopic/mesoscopic/microscopic lines, which themselves are imprecise definitions. It is entirely possible that the main conscious non-separable complex in the human brain consists of both macroscopic and microscopic degrees of freedom. For example, the Orch OR mechanism of consciousness is typically assumed to take place in the quantum coherent states of spins in microtubules [11]. Other suggestions implicate spins and long-distance 15 communications between them in the brain via photons [66]. While no direct proof of these suggestions has been obtained yet, they are consistent with our hypothesis, as long as such microscopic degrees of freedom are interacting with each other and perhaps other macroscopic degrees of freedom in a non-separable way. 7. Feedforward systems are unconscious. An important class of systems in biology and among human-made machines are feedforward systems. In this case, interactions, or “connections”, between the system’s components are asymmetric (e.g., interactions between neurons via chemical synapses) and no component receives connections back from the components that it connects to (no such feedback is present either via direct back-connections or indirectly via a chain of connections with other nodes). This is illustrated in Figure 4. Examples of feedforward systems include sensory inputs to the brain such as the inputs from retina to the thalamus (although some amount of feedback to the retina from the rest of the brain exists [67]) and some of the most successful deep neural networks currently in widespread use [68]. In the framework of IIT, purely feedforward systems have zero consciousness [6]. We now show that the same holds under our hypothesis. Consider a feedforward system with components (nodes) 1, 2, … , the states of which are described by variables 𝑥! , 𝑥" , … . A set of nodes, with the states described by variables 𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … , provide inputs into the system and do not receive any connections from the rest of the system (Figure 4). For any node 𝑖, its state 𝑥4 is fully determined by the states of all the preceding nodes that connect to it, and the node 𝑖 has no effect on the preceding variables. This is also true for all the nodes sending connections to node 𝑖, and then for all the preceding nodes, and so on until we reach the input nodes. Therefore, the value of 𝑥4 is fully determined by 𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … , and we can replace it by some function, 𝑥4 = 𝑔4 (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ). In a feedforward system, this is a true function, meaning that nothing in this function depends on 𝑥4 . This is a simple, but fundamental difference from the non-feedforward case, where the states of the components influencing 𝑥4 in turn depend on the evolution of 𝑥4 itself. The same argument can be applied to each node in a feedforward system, and ultimately the state of every single node can be traced via a potentially complicated function to the state of 16 the external inputs to the system. We then obtain for the function 𝑓 describing the full system’s state: 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … , 𝑥4 , … , 𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) = 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … , 𝑔4 (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), … , 𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) = 𝑓(𝑔! (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), 𝑔" (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), … , 𝑔4 (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), … , 𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) = 𝐹(𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), where we replaced each variable by the function of the inputs, 𝑥! = 𝑔! (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), 𝑥" = 𝑔" (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), … and used notation 𝐹() for the function describing the state of the feedforward system that depends explicitly only on the inputs. Does this mean that the function describing the state of a feedforward system is separable? The answer is yes: 𝑓(𝑥! , 𝑥" , … , 𝑥4 , … , 𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) = 𝐹(𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) = 𝐹(𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) 𝐼(𝑥! )𝐼(𝑥" ) … 𝐼(𝑥4 ) … where 𝐹(𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ) does not depend on any of the system’s degrees of freedom and we introduced 𝐼(𝑥) ≡ 1. Thus, the system is fully separable and, according to our hypothesis, has zero consciousness, consistent with the IIT result. 17 Figure 4. Feedforward systems are unconscious. The system depicted here consists of nodes that interact with each other asymmetrically (as denoted by directed connections). Two nodes, inp1 and inp2, serve as inputs to the whole system. All interactions are purely feedforward (i.e., a node does not receive connections – either directly or indirectly via a chain of other nodes – back from those nodes that it connects to). Then, the state of every node x1, …, x8 is determined entirely by the states of the two input nodes, as defined by the function F(). More generally, description of a system has to take into account its environment too. Thus, a feedforward system with some inputs cannot be considered on its own – it is a part of the Universe that contains the system generating inputs as well. (It is possible, however, that this input-generating system together with the feedforward system have zero interactions with the rest of the Universe and are thus separable from it.) In this view, the state function describing the system generating the inputs AND the feedforward system receiving these inputs depends only on the variables of the system generating the inputs – and the feedforward system receiving such inputs is simply an appendix feeding off the dynamical variables of the inputgenerating system, whereas its own degrees of freedom are fully separable as shown above. It is also interesting to note that for any deterministic system its state at any time moment is fully determined by the initial conditions and external inputs over time up to that moment. This may seem like a case that is similar to a feedforward system, but there is a key difference, which ultimately shows in the equations of motion. For a feedforward system, these equations are reduced to functions that explicitly depend on the inputs only, whereas for a nonfeedforward system, including deterministic ones, the equations of motion depend on the interactions between the system components. This is then reflected in the state function describing these systems: for a feedforward system, it is fully separable and depends on the 18 inputs only, as shown above, whereas for a non-feedforward system it will depend on the internal degrees of freedom and may not be exactly separable. For non-deterministic feedforward systems, the considerations above still hold, with functions 𝑔! (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), 𝑔" (𝑖𝑛𝑝! , 𝑖𝑛𝑝" , … ), … becoming stochastic rather than deterministic, but still remaining dependent on the inputs only, which results in full separability. These considerations show that, even though the dynamics of the system’s components may be complex, what really matters are the internal interactions. This is consistent with the examples considered by Tononi and colleagues in the IIT framework [5,6]: a feedforward system can generate exactly the same output as a system with feedback, but the amount of consciousness, Phi, of this feedforward system is still zero, which is not the case for the system with feedback. 8. Non-separability and entanglement in quantum and classical systems. The concept of non-separability is intertwined with another, perhaps more often discussed concept, that of quantum entanglement. We now consider the similarity and distinction between these two concepts and discuss which formalism may offer a convenient framework to study non-separability in physical systems, especially in cases where the classical limit of quantum mechanics is involved. Quantum entanglement has been much discussed as a potential mechanism for consciousness (e.g., [11,66,69]). However, brains are ‘warm’ and ‘wet’, meaning that degrees of freedom in the brain are subject to substantial influence from the thermal motion. This implies that a quantum coherent state is unlikely to survive for long enough intervals of time to support consciousness, which we know to operate on the timescales of ~50-100 ms and beyond [30– 32]. Proposals that quantum entanglement underlies consciousness usually posit that such thermal influences may be overcome in certain degrees of freedom, such as nuclear or electron spins in proteins, e.g., in microtubules. While this may be possible, the degree to which this is realized in the brain and supports consciousness is unclear. So far, the only phenomenon that has been relatively convincingly shown to require strictly quantum processes while also having a functional role in the brain (specifically in the retina) is the animal magnetoreception via the radical pairs mechanism [70–74], though even that is still a matter of some debate. Chemical reactions, which inherently rely on quantum processes, occur throughout the brain, but they mostly seem to be coupled to the thermal bath, which prevents coherence and entanglement – with the radical pairs mechanism being one relatively well characterized exception. Thus, the extent to which quantum entanglement may occur in the brain and may be involved in consciousness remains to be elucidated. 19 In quantum mechanics, the concept of entanglement includes at least two separate notions – non-locality and non-separability. Non-locality means that, in the entangled pair of particles, knowledge of the state of one particle immediately tells us the state of the other, even if this other particle is far away. And non-separability is what we have been discussing so far, that the wave function describing such two particles cannot be factorized into the product of two functions, each describing one of the particles. This is an important distinction: quantum nonlocality is different from non-factorizability of the state vector. Both are features of quantum entanglement. Among the two, non-locality is a purely quantum phenomenon, whereas non-separability can exist in classical systems [75,76]. Indeed, electromagnetic fields in classical regime have been shown to exhibit “classical entanglement” (see, e.g., [75–80]), which, however, should be more properly called classical non-separability. Currently we do not know whether consciousness arises from purely classical processes, thus involving non-separability but not non-locality, or depends on quantum phenomena too, in which case it may involve non-locality (and therefore quantum entanglement). Is there a physical formalism that could possibly account for both options and also describe the possible transition between the two? Of course, all systems are described by quantum mechanics, including those in the classical limit. However, the typical quantum formalism employing the wave function is often hard to use to describe classical systems. One equivalent approach involves the Wigner function [33], which depends not on the positions only or the momenta only, as the wave function may, but on both positions and momenta of particles in the system (i.e., it is defined in the phase space). It is connected to the wave function by the following transformation: 𝑊(𝒙, 𝒑) = 4𝒑𝒚 1 C 𝑒 5 ℏ 𝜓(𝒙 + 𝒚/2)𝜓 ∗ (𝒙 − 𝒚/2)𝑑𝒚, 2𝜋ℏ where 𝜓(𝒙) is the wave function defined in the space of positions, and the positions and momenta are multi-dimensional vectors representing all the particles in the system. By contrast to the wave function, which is complex, the Wigner function has real values. But unlike a true probability density (such as the modulus squared of the wave function), the Wigner function can have negative values, as well as non-negative ones. Most interesting for us here is the classical limit, and obtaining it may often be more tractable for the Wigner function than for the wave function. It is still not as straightforward as setting the limit to zero for the Planck constant, ℏ → 0 (in general, obtaining the classical limit for quantum systems may involve additional conditions, such as accounting for the mean-field interactions: see, e.g., [81– 20 83] and references therein). But, when done carefully, it can be shown (see, e.g., [34,84]) that in the classical limit the Wigner function becomes the Liouville density function in phase space. Liouville density function is a true probability density in phase space (all negative values in the Wigner function are eliminated in the classical limit), representing the probabilistic ensemble of the system’s states. A detailed discussion of the properties of the Wigner function is beyond the scope of this paper and can be found elsewhere (see, e.g., the broadly accessible treatment in [34]). Of relevance are the following few observations: the Wigner function fully describes the state of a system, just like the wave function does; there is a direct correspondence between the Wigner function in the general quantum case and the Liouville density function in the classical case; and, if the wave function is separable, the Wigner function is also separable. Thus, in all the preceding material of this paper, the functions describing the state of the system can be Wigner functions (where each degree of freedom would be described by a pair of values like position and momentum, rather than just one value), just as they can be wave functions. The treatment of non-separability applies in the same way. Furthermore, for classical systems, all the same considerations will apply to the Liouville density function. Classical systems can be nonseparable, which is described as the case when the Liouville density function of multiple degrees of freedom cannot be represented as a product of functions depending on the subsets of these degrees of freedom. Two main conclusions follow. First, the Wigner function/Liouville density function formalism appears to offer a convenient framework for describing non-separability – and, if our hypothesis is correct, consciousness as well – for both quantum and classical systems. Second, because the Liouville density function describes a probabilistic ensemble in the phase space rather than an individual trajectory, the proper description of non-separability and consciousness relies on the properties of the ensemble and not a single realization of it, even in a purely classical case. This unintuitive result is consistent with the IIT, where the calculation of the amount of consciousness, Phi, considers not only the actual past, current, and future states of the system at a given time step, but also what those states could possibly be [5,6]. 9. Measure of consciousness. Can our hypothesis of equivalence between non-separability and consciousness inform the choice of measures for quantifying the amount of consciousness in a system? Below, we offer some general considerations regarding this question. 21 Let us first consider neurons in the brain and assume for the sake of a simple example that all phenomena relevant for computing the amount of consciousness occur in the classical limit. The previous section showed that one needs to estimate the properties of the statistical ensemble and not just a single classical realization of the system with all degrees of freedom. Assuming also that most of microscopic degrees of freedom are separable, perhaps one may limit the consideration to only the macroscopic degrees of freedom like the membrane voltage or firing rate of each neuron. Then we need to describe the separability properties of the Liouville density function for such firing rates and their conjugate variables such as the time derivative of the firing rates (to construct the complete phase space). Interestingly, we can see that the results might be different depending on the timescale considered. E.g., for microsecond time scales, the neurons effectively do not interact with each other, especially across the whole brain, since the axonal propagation speed and synaptic delays set the time of the downstream response after upstream spike to a few milliseconds. At these time scales, the system is likely very much separable. But on large timescales, such as ~50-100 ms that is often considered the time grain of human consciousness [30–32], most neurons will have enough time to communicate, and the system may become non-separable. We may then speculate that non-separability could possibly be estimated, at least for binary partitions, by assuming ergodicity over the time scale of interest (such as 100 ms). One can accumulate instantaneous values of the firing rates and their derivatives from smaller time bins such as 10 ms to obtain the distribution during the longer interval of 100 ms. This distribution could possibly be used as a proxy to the Liouville function, and one could attempt to test whether it is separable or not along bipartitions across the degrees of freedom. Unfortunately, such an approach can be complicated by the following issues. Consider two neurons, with firing rates 𝑥 and 𝑦. Ignoring their time derivatives for simplicity, the procedure outlined above will furnish an estimate of the distribution of 𝑥 and 𝑦, and one may want to check the correlation between 𝑥 and 𝑦 as a means to test for separability. Indeed, one can show easily that if the function describing the state of the system (such as the density function) is separable over 𝑥 and 𝑦, then the correlation between them is zero (see example in Figure 5 on the left). Thus, non-separable state is required to obtain non-zero correlations. Non-zero correlations are often observed for neurons in the brain, and one may take that as an indication of non-separability. However, the situation is more complicated even for the case of just two variables. For example, a non-separable function like 𝑓(𝑥, 𝑦) = 𝑒𝑥𝑝[−(𝑥 + 𝑦 − 𝐴)" /(2 𝐵" )] leads to non-zero correlations between 𝑥 and 𝑦 (Figure 5, middle). But, as we discussed before, we should consider whether the degrees of freedom can be separable in a different basis. And indeed, here we can simply transform the coordinates by rotating them 45 degrees, in which case the density function describing the system becomes separable (it only depends on one of 22 the two coordinates after the transform), and the correlation between the new coordinates is again zero (Figure 5, right). While this does not mean that ergodic estimates of the Liouville function outlined above will be useless, this simple example underscores again the difficulty of practical computation of non-separability. Figure 5. Correlations in separable and non-separable systems. On the left, and example of a system (𝑥, 𝑦) described by the separable function 𝑓(𝑥, 𝑦) = 𝑓! (𝑥)𝑓" (𝑦) is shown, where 𝑓! and 𝑓" are Gaussians. Correlation between 𝑥 and 𝑦 is zero. A non-separable example is shown in the middle, using the function 𝑓(𝑥, 𝑦) = 𝑒𝑥𝑝[−(𝑥 + 𝑦 − 𝐴)" /(2 𝐵" )]. There is a negative correlation between 𝑥 and 𝑦. However, as shown on the right, after coordinate transform (rotation of 𝑥 and 𝑦 by 45 degrees), this system becomes separable, with zero correlation between the two rotated degrees of freedom. Is there a solution to this problem? It may be informative to turn to studies of the related problem of entanglement in quantum mechanics, where many measures are in use. One standard measure is the entanglement entropy, which applies to pure quantum-mechanical states and can be defined, e.g., for a bipartition of system as the Von Neumann entropy of the state of one or the other resulting subsystems (the result is equal for either of the two subsystems). This quantity is zero if the system’s state is non-entangled (separable) and positive otherwise. Additional measures have been introduced to quantify the extent of entanglement for mixed states, such as the relative entropy of entanglement, logarithmic negativity, and others. While active research continues in this area, approaches to detect entanglement or compute the degree to which a system is entangled (typically, for bipartite systems) have been developed for a long time (see, e.g., refs. [85–87]). It is thus interesting to consider the possibility of applying similar metrics for the non-separability question, whether in quantum or classical case. Intriguingly, it has been suggested that in a quantum system having a welldefined classical counterpart, quantum correlations may be described by the mutual information of the corresponding classical system [88]. Computations of entanglement entropy starting from Wigner function have been achieved [89–91], and may be used to describe the 23 degree of non-separability in a classical system, taking the transition from the Wigner function to the classical Liouville density function in the phase space. As discussed above, we would expect in this case that quantum non-locality will vanish, but some degree of non-separability may remain. The entropy-based measures characterizing non-separability, like entanglement entropy, will then have non-zero values, although one would expect those values to be lower than for a similar quantum system in an entangled state containing non-locality. Thus, we may suggest that entropy-based measures like the entanglement entropy, especially when computed using the Wigner function or its classical equivalent the Liouville density function, can be useful in characterizing the amount of consciousness in a physical system. Proposals of specific formulas and characterization of their properties will require substantial future work, as the measures of entanglement discussed above are typically very difficult (NPhard) to compute. It will also be interesting to consider how such measures may relate to the computation of the Integrated Information Phi in the IIT [5,6,41–47], which is notoriously difficult to compute as well. Qualitatively, it seems plausible that Phi and entropy-based measures of entanglement have much in common, as both characterize the degree to which the system cannot be reduced to a simple sum of its parts. Indeed, a key concept in the IIT is “integration”, meaning that in a conscious state the constituent components are integrated in a unified ‘whole’. Our hypothesis implies integration as well, in the sense of non-separability and not necessarily information processing. Importantly, Tononi and colleagues themselves warn against understanding the “information” in IIT as the Shannon information. Furthermore, as Tegmark showed [29], integrated information in Shannon’s sense tends to be very small – especially so in quantum systems, where the maximum of integrated information one may be able to find is ~0.25 bit. Again, this underscores the point that integrated “information” in IIT should not be taken as Shannon information, but rather as the ability of components of the system to influence each other causally. Another aspect of consciousness according to IIT is “differentiation” – the property describing the observation that a conscious state may contain multiple attributes at once [5,6]. For example, if one has an experience of seeing a landscape, that may at once include seeing a mountain, trees on the mountain, the sky above, etc., etc. A related interpretation is that of a temporal differentiation [5,6,92–95], in that a rich experience like watching an engaging movie contains multiple percepts in unit time (say, within 10 seconds), whereas less rich experience like watching TV noise contains few percepts within the same unit time (while pixels may change dynamically in a TV noise, the experience to a human remains just that of a boring, undifferentiated TV noise). While integration is clearly a part of our hypothesized framework of 24 non-separability underlying consciousness, it is less clear that differentiation necessarily belongs to it as well. From first-hand experience, rich or more limited content of consciousness, such as watching an engaging movie vs. watching a dark sky, does not feel fundamentally different. Both are perfectly conscious experiences, but one is full of informational content and the other is quiet or relatively “empty”. We may therefore suggest that what matters for the amount of consciousness is the number of non-separable degrees of freedom rather than how fast or slow the dynamics along these degrees of freedom happens, or how rich that dynamics is. In this view, a number quantifying the amount of consciousness would describe the system’s capacity to have experiences (i.e., how it feels to have certain kind of experience, such as how it feels to experience space [96,97]), rather than the immediate richness of the content of the perception (i.e., what exactly is being experienced, such as seeing a certain object in space). This seems consistent with the idea expressed above, that the amount of consciousness is determined by the whole statistical ensemble, rather than a single trajectory (perhaps the latter may underly the immediate differentiation of the percept). It also should be noted that this view may not be inconsistent with the way Phi is computed in the IIT, as the integration is clearly a part of calculation of the Phi whereas the differentiation is less obviously so. To conclude, entropy-based measures like the entanglement entropy appear to be natural candidates for quantifying the amount of consciousness in the framework of our hypothesis. But we must also keep in mind that a single measure may not be sufficient to characterize all important aspects of consciousness. It will therefore be advisable to research additional measures that could characterize various different aspects of conscious states, such as the differentiation described above, or perhaps the effective dimensionality of the state [98–100], to name a few. Discussion We presented the hypothesis that non-separability is equivalent to consciousness, in the sense that non-separable degrees of freedom form a unified ‘whole’, a complex that exists intrinsically for itself in the multi-dimensional space defined by these degrees of freedom. We posit that such unified multi-dimensional existence constitutes consciousness. This view naturally suggests that the non-separable degrees of freedom are ‘in’ and the rest are ‘out’ of this complex, accounting for both integration and exclusion principles of the IIT [5]. Thus, any system can be represented as a collection of big and small complexes – some containing only a single degree of freedom, separable from all the others and thus completely unconscious, and 25 others containing two or more non-separable degrees of freedom and therefore having some amount of consciousness. The amount of consciousness is determined by the number of nonseparable degrees of freedom in the complex and the extent of their non-separability. Presumably, most such complexes that form in various physical systems contain very small amounts of consciousness that would feel like nothing from a human point of view, but some systems like brains manage to produce particularly high-dimensional and strongly nonseparable complexes resulting in levels of consciousness we are familiar with. We saw that non-interacting systems are exactly separable and therefore unconscious. We also showed that feedforward systems are exactly separable and therefore completely unconscious, an observation that is consistent with predictions of the IIT. Importantly, interacting systems can also be exactly separable, i.e., unconscious. In some cases, a system can be completely separable despite arbitrarily strong interactions between the system’s components. This underscores the notion that non-separability may not be as widespread or easily achievable as may appear from the first glance [29]. It therefore appears that many complex systems with heterogeneous interactions are also mostly separable, including familiar physical systems like liquids, gases, or metals, more exotic states of matter like superconductors, and even biological systems like biomolecules, cells, and organs. It seems likely that all such systems are separable into an astronomical number of tiny complexes, each consisting of one or a few degrees of freedom (e.g., separate particles or their collective modes of motion, such as rotations of molecular groups or quasi-particles like holes or excitons) and only loosely influencing each other. Again, brains are probably unique in creating much larger and sophisticated non-separable complexes. But we speculate that even in this case, the largest complexes in the brain, which presumably support what we experience as human consciousness, are separable from the vast majority of the brain’s degrees of freedom: subatomic, atomic, molecular, subcellular, and cellular. These largest complexes likely consist of only high-level collective degrees of freedom like neuronal membrane voltages or population firing rates, therefore utilizing only a tiny fraction of the brain’s total degrees of freedom. We also discussed quantum entanglement, which has two aspects – non-locality and nonseparability. In our hypothesis, non-locality per se is not necessary for consciousness, whereas non-separability is. Therefore, in the framework presented here, consciousness does not require quantum effects (including entanglement) and may occur in the classical limit. The hypothesis, of course, does not prescribe whether consciousness is a purely quantum or a purely classical phenomenon, and in principle permits the existence of both classical and quantum systems that are conscious. We argued that, in the light of this observation, the Wigner function-based description of quantum mechanics and its equivalent in the classical 26 case, the Liouville density function-based description, appear to be well suited for exploring non-separability and, thus, consciousness, in both quantum and classical systems. It is important to note that, although our hypothesis does not preclude consciousness in classical systems, in the quantum case it is consistent with the Orch OR theory [11]. More specifically, the Orch OR framework and that presented here describe different facets of consciousness. Orch OR describes how the moments of consciousness occur as a result of the classical realization of a specific state among multiple states that a quantum system may occupy (i.e., when quantum superposition is ‘reduced’ to classical certainty). Our hypothesis adds the conceptual framework describing how much consciousness there is in the system, which is determined by the non-separability of the system’s wave function (or, equivalently, its Wigner function). The Orch OR principle is outside of the ‘standard’ quantum mechanics and is related to the so-called ‘interpretations’ of quantum mechanics [101–103], which explain how a probabilistic quantum superposition may be related to the classical single-state certainty of individual state realizations. By contrast, the non-separability hypothesis operates entirely within standard quantum mechanics, as it explicitly involves non-separability of the state vector, which is an inherently probabilistic description of the ensemble of states that a system may occupy, even in the classical case (as in the Liouville density function formalism). Thus, the non-separability hypothesis and Orch OR theory provide complementary principles, reconciling the standard quantum mechanics and ‘outside of quantum mechanics’ views and describing different aspects of consciousness: how much consciousness there is and when and how the moments of consciousness occur. On the other hand, we emphasized throughout the paper that our hypothesis is conceptually similar to the IIT. We started from the IIT axioms, which reflect the most basic observations of the nature of consciousness, and discussed how these axioms, especially the integration and exclusion axioms, may be realized if one assumes that non-separability is equivalent to consciousness. Throughout the paper, we saw that this hypothesis leads to some of the same conclusions as IIT. These include the observations that feedforward systems are unconscious and that the amount of consciousness is determined not simply by the specific classical realization of the system’s state, but by a statistical description of possible states that a system may occupy. These commonalities suggest that our hypothesis and IIT may in fact be equivalent. Attempting a rigorous mathematical proof of such equivalence will be an interesting future direction of research, although formally connecting the information-theoretic IIT framework with the Hamiltonian- and wave-function-based approach of the non-separability hypothesis will clearly be a difficult undertaking. It is worth noting that IIT is typically formulated for discrete systems, whereas the framework proposed here applies to systems that may contain both continuous and discrete degrees of freedom. 27 It also remains to be seen whether the metrics of the amount of consciousness that we discussed, such as entropy-based measures of entanglement, are consistent or equivalent to the integrated information measure of IIT, Phi. Conceptually, they appear similar (and similarly very hard to compute for more than a few degrees of freedom), but details of the computation may matter in determining the relationship between such metrics. We also argued that one may need to use multiple metrics to characterize consciousness, such as entropy-based metrics to establish the extent of non-separability in the conscious complex, dimensionality metrics to characterize the inner space supported by the complex, differentiation metrics [5,6,92–95,104] to describe the contents of the consciousness, etc. Interestingly, both the non-separability hypothesis and IIT offer a plausible foundation for the proposed practical measures of consciousness like the Perturbational Complexity Index (PCI) [105–109], since the latter depends on the degree of integration between the systems’ components. However, a strict mathematical derivation of PCI from either IIT or non-separability hypothesis (or both) remains to be obtained. Finally, an important question is whether non-separability as a foundation of consciousness has anything to do with the computational power and efficiency of the underlying system. If we are considering a quantum system, like in the Orch OR framework, the answer is relatively clear. Quantum entanglement, which includes non-separability, supports unprecedented (for a classical computer) capabilities of a quantum computer [110,111]. Even in the absence of entanglement (i.e., non-locality), a quantum system still can offer computational power and efficiency well beyond a classical counterpart [112–115], e.g., due to the superposition phenomenon. To be clear, a classical computer can in principle simulate superposition or even entanglement, but will require an enormous amount of time and power to achieve that. In a classical limit, the situation may be less clear, but there are indications that even then nonseparable systems offer substantial advantages over separable ones [116–121], e.g., in terms of computational power, time required to carry out computations, and efficiency of learning. Thus, it appears that, even in a classical case, a non-separable system realizes a seamlessly integrated many-dimensional ‘whole’, in which complex computations can occur in a more straightforward way than in a separable system. Understanding the relationship between non-separability and computation will require much more research, but basic considerations above suggest that non-separability is likely beneficial for computation in classical and most definitely in quantum systems. Then it is easy to see that non-separability has an evolutionary advantage. It permits more efficient and faster computations that would improve the organism’s reaction to the conditions in its environment. The equivalence between non-separability and consciousness then means that consciousness 28 has an evolutionary advantage, which offers a fascinating explanation for the evolution of highly conscious animals like humans and their associated intelligence. Interestingly, computational experiments with simple ‘animats’ showed increase of the amount of consciousness, measured as the IIT’s integrated information Phi, with animat evolution [122,123]. In summary, we hypothesized that non-separability is equivalent to consciousness and that the number of degrees of freedom in a non-separable system and the extent to which they are non-separable determine the amount of consciousness they possess. We saw a number of consequences from this hypothesis, and it will be interesting to investigate many other related questions, such as the following. • What is the exact mathematical relation between this hypothesis, IIT, and Orch OR? • What are the appropriate metrics for the amount of consciousness, based on the measures of entropy, dimensionality, differentiation, etc.? • How can we test this hypothesis experimentally, given that quantifying non-separability in general is rather difficult? • What are the ramifications of the choice of basis for representing a physical system, given that the factorization problem has not been solved in a general case? • What are the computational properties of non-separability in quantum and classical cases, how are they realized in the brain, and what evolutionary advantages do they confer? • Does biological consciousness in the brain occur as purely classical non-separability, as purely quantum non-separability (and, possibly, entanglement that also includes nonlocality), or a combination of the two? 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Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1145-1148 Harp, S., the Brain as a Receiver and Consciousness as a Fundamental 1145 Essay The Brain as a Receiver and Consciousness as a Fundamental Steven Harp* ABSTRACT In this essay, I argue that there is no science that invalidates the model of the brain as a receiver and there is no proof that the brain generates consciousness and, because consciousness cannot be equated with physical matter, another model is necessary. I further argue that consciousness is unique and fundamental and consequently cannot be declared as physical or reduced to mere physical processes no matter how complex those processes. Key Words: brain, receiver, consciousness, fundamental, physical matter, physical process. Is the brain a machine that manufactures consciousness? Materialist science claims that the brain itself generates consciousness locally from physical stuff only. Materialist theories propose that consciousness is a product of neuronal activity and arises somehow at the synapses, or somehow through synchronous activity among neuronal networks, or somehow as a novel property of computational complexity among brain cells. These theories propose pathways that may mediate consciousness, but they do not answer the fundamental question of how consciousness or subjective experience may arise from physical phenomena. The theories do not account for how a chemical or electrical event in our brain that is not conscious becomes conscious, except to say that it happens ‘’somehow” at a critical point. Materialist science promises that the “somehow” will be revealed in due time and in accordance to the materialist view. The premises of materialism require that everything be physical. This view is therefore defined more by its underlying philosophy than by evidence. However, under scrutiny the theory that matter can generate consciousness leads to numerous absurdities. Consciousness and matter cannot be equated. Consciousness is not physical. Consciousness may have physical correlates but consciousness itself is entirely nonphysical. Neurotransmitters, neurons, brain chemistry, loops, circuits, ionic flux, electrical interference patterns, etc., are all physical correlates of consciousness but not consciousness itself. Unlike physical things, consciousness itself is not measurable. Consciousness has no mass, no location, no boundaries, and does not occupy physical space. But matter has location, mass, and physical dimension that can be measured. To clarify this, you may ask yourself, “What are the dimensions of my perception of yonder tree? What is the height of my perception of that tree in feet or inches?” Or, “What is the weight or length of my thought?” The contents of consciousness are simply not in the physical world as we know it. One can discover no units of measure for any aspect of consciousness. *Correspondence: Steven Harp, Independent Researcher. E-mail: sharpharp12@yahoo.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1145-1148 Harp, S., the Brain as a Receiver and Consciousness as a Fundamental 1146 Unlike the physical, consciousness itself is not directly observable. No instrument or technology can detect consciousness. Brain imaging devices measure such correlates as blood flow or oxygen consumption in a specific area of the brain. But this is not consciousness, awareness, or subjective experience. Furthermore, if the activity imaged in a specific area is to be considered a conscious or subjective awareness it would still require a unified self or observing homunculus somehow or somewhere in the brain. But neuroscience cannot trace the presence or absence of this kind of consciousness to any area of activity. There is no homunculus in the premises. Consciousness itself then seems to fall outside the domain of science. Science is about what is measurable or quantifiable. There is nothing that can be measured. There is nothing that can be observed. There is no evidence for the existence of consciousness in the physical world except by subjective report. And subjective report is consciousness reporting itself. Under the prevailing jurisdiction of materialist science, subjectivity is forbidden. If everything must be measurable, observable, and objective, then what is a materialist to do about the undeniable reality of consciousness? To succeed in its quest the materialist paradigm must find that critical point where a mind state and a brain state are identical. It is self-evident this is impossible within materialism’s own definitions. That does not mean consciousness is not real, nor does it mean consciousness is transcendent in some unknowable religious, philosophic, or spiritual sense. It does not mean that it is inaccessible to an inclusive empirical science. It simply means that consciousness is an integral and fundamental aspect of the universe, real, but immaterial and nonphysical. Consciousness is often described as “emergent”. A magnetic field generated by an electric current in a copper wire is not considered emergent. It is considered a physical reality in its own right. We do not insist that the magnetic field be reducible somehow to copper. If, as materialists claim, consciousness is generated by the brain, then to be consistent, materialists should give consciousness the status of existence in its own right, just as it became necessary to give the magnetic field an irreducible status. Magnetism is not considered a newcomer in the universe dependent on the advent of the copper wire. But consciousness is considered as an “emergent” phenomenon never before found in the universe until the advent of the brain. Consciousness, however, cannot be reduced to the brain. We cannot segregate reality. Consciousness is not a stellar intruder or the accidental consequence of a genetic algorithm gone wild. Everything that comes out of the universe belongs to the universe, including our consciousness. Consciousness is a cosmic property and will not go away. There is certainly ample precedent for the inclusion of new fundamentals in the cosmic inventory. Gravity, space, and electromagnetism were all introduced as new irreducible fundamentals that challenged prevailing models of reality. In an entirely different way, mathematics sets a precedent for a reality that is intangible, nonphysical, nonlocal, and seemingly transcendent to the physical world. Mathematics is real and yet immaterial. This is self-evident, and we accept the existence of mathematics on its own terms. Mathematics is undeniably present without any physical correlate, yet it has a relationship ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1145-1148 Harp, S., the Brain as a Receiver and Consciousness as a Fundamental 1147 to the physical world. Pi, for example, requires no round or circular objects for its existence or its truth. Likewise, consciousness may be conceived as having no physical dependence, yet having a relationship to the physical. Consciousness can be considered to be as self evidently nonphysical and ontologically fundamental as mathematics, and not merely derivative of the physical. Any attempt to equate consciousness with the physical results in absurdity. Consciousness requires no red atoms for red to exist. Given our knowledge of the process of perception, the idea of a colored atom is absurd. It is always and only consciousness that gives the quality of red to anything physical. And this applies to any and every quality in our subjective experience, whether red, pain, pleasure, thought, emotion, etc. To say these qualities are “emergent” and derived from computation or complexity explains nothing. The parts of the system are still physical and the gap from unconscious to conscious must still be crossed. Stating consciousness as emergent has some limited descriptive value but has no more explanatory value than claiming divine causes. Materialism promises that future science will reveal an answer consistent with its philosophical premise, that everything is ultimately physical. When it says “somehow unconscious matter becomes conscious at a critical point,” an explanatory gap is created. This gap can only be bridged by promises, premises, assumptions, definitional fiat, and appeals to consensus. To say that consciousness is nothing but atoms in motion is like saying that love, beauty, and music are nothing but atoms in motion, and we are nothing but a set of equations: that the entire cathedral of consciousness we live in is nothing but molecular activity. This is absurd. Our subjective experience is everything but atoms. We are everything that atoms are not. If consciousness is not an irreducible fundamental in the universe, then the very thoughts you have at this moment, your very sense of self, your deepest emotions, your memories, your noble thoughts, are all nothing but a user illusion. It is a user illusion of your illusory self. You are an illusion having an illusion. Your sense of self and all its contents are no more than atoms, fields, chemistry, computation, spin, forces, all just inert, unconscious, nonliving, dead physical matter. Not only is God dead, but now you are too! Compounding the hubris of materialist reductionism is the very uncertainty of what atoms themselves are. We know consciousness itself directly, but everything we know about atoms is an inference. Our categories of matter and energy are derivative of our perceptions and our measurements. The more we know about atoms, the less physical, the less objective, and the less tangible they seem to be. Under classical physics the atom was a solid, objective, separate and respectable particle. But with quantum physics it has become an enigmatic mathematical potential whose very manifestation is related to a conscious observer. We don’t know what matter is, and we don’t know what consciousness is. The claim that everything is physical is absurd and extreme, and based on a particular philosophy rather than empirical science. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1145-1148 Harp, S., the Brain as a Receiver and Consciousness as a Fundamental 1148 There is an alternative to the insolvent paradigm of materialist monism. The brain may be considered as a receiver of consciousness rather than a generator of consciousness. Consider the TV device as an analogy. Wherever you look inside the cabinet you cannot find the show. You can’t find Oprah in some diode or transistor. You can’t find color in some electrical circuit or logic gate. You can’t find any trace of the show anywhere in the TV device. There is nothing within this device that would enable you to calculate the program. You can influence the transmission of the program by turning knobs or by damaging internal parts. You can create static and distortion. You can unplug it and it will be dead. But this still does not prove the program was internally generated or emerges somehow from the complexity of the parts. The program persists independently. There is a correlation, but the TV device is not the program, just as the mind is not the brain. Mainstream science clings to its materialist explanations because its assumptions allow for no alternative …the brain must generate consciousness. Science continues to look for the origin of consciousness in the brain and within the conceptual framework of classical Newtonian physics. Meanwhile, consciousness itself remains like a ghost in our midst, an unexplainable seemingly supernatural presence of being that defies materialist analysis and materialist science. An understanding of consciousness as fundamental, elemental and irreducible, as belonging to and inherent in the universe would be revolutionary. It would open consciousness research to vast new areas of investigation. It would replace the materialist paradigm of the universe as lonely, dead, meaningless matter. It would change the way man views himself as deeply and fundamentally as the Copernican Revolution. Matter would be dethroned as the one ultimate reality, and consciousness would be given its true stature and significance in the Cosmos. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

1341 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality Article Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality Steven E. Kaufman* ABSTRACT In this article both the inner orientation of emotional and mental experience, as well as the outer orientation of physical experience, are described as a function of our particular position and perspective within the fractal Structure of Reality relative to the particular level of Reality at which each of those different types of experience are created. Additionally, the Relational Structure of Reality is described as the framework that underlies our overall apprehension of mental and physical reality by relating the different levels of Reality to different fundamental aspects of what we apprehend as mental and physical reality. Also described is the relation between what is expressed in quantum physics as the wave function and the underlying Structure of Reality from which that expression is derived, including a description of what occurs within that Relational Structure to produce the event referred to as the collapse of the wave function. Key Words: existential mechanics, reality, experience, big picture. Introduction What has been presented in the two preceding articles in this series is a description of how Existence, through the iterative process of self-relation, evolves into different levels or Reality or Relational Structure, while at the same time creating at each level of Reality a distinct type of relative existence apprehended by Existence as a distinct and particular type of experience. What I am going to do now is go further in relating what was described in those articles as the progressive Relational Structure of Reality to what we apprehend as reality, i.e., to what we experience all around us as reality. Because although what we experience as reality may not be what is actually and directly there as Reality, i.e., as Existence being Relational Structure, what we experience as reality is not unrelated to what is actually and directly there as Reality, because what we experience as reality is ultimately the product of the relations of Reality to Itself. 1. Inner and Outer Experience and The Fractal Nature of the Relational Structure of Reality One characteristic of fractals, which are themselves the result of an iterative process, is that they exhibit self-similarity, which is to say, the pattern of the whole is repeated at various levels throughout the fractal structure, as shown below in the two pictures of the fractal image known *Correspondence: Steven E. Kaufman, Independent Researcher. http://www.unifiedreality.com E-mail: skaufman@unifiedreality.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1342 as the Mandelbrot set. Thus, it is not coincidence that the Organic Processes that we apprehend as organic life are apprehended as being composed of differentiated cellular structures, as Reality Itself is composed of Existence that has differentiated by means of the Existential Cellular Structure conceptualized as the Relational Matrix. That is, what is apprehended as the differentiation of organic cellular structure, which is differentiation occurring within the third level of Reality, is an example of fractal self-similarity occurring at a more iterated level of Reality, repeating and reiterating, as it were, the more fundamental pattern of Existential cellular differentiation that occurs between the first and second levels of Reality. Put another way, what we apprehend as organic cellular structure is a result of the third level of Reality exhibiting the fractal characteristic of self-similarity as it repeats the structural pattern present at the first level of Reality. Likewise, what we apprehend as organic cellular differentiation is also a result of the third level of Reality exhibiting the fractal characteristic of self-similarity as it repeats the structural pattern present at the second level of Reality. In this way, the third level of Reality demonstrates the characteristic of fractal self-similarity, in as much as Organic Processes themselves reflect the pattern of the underlying whole within which they arise, as shown in figure 1. 1st and 2nd levels of Reality exhibiting cellular structure and differentiation of cellular structure, respectively. ISSN: 2153-8212 3rd level Relational Structure, i.e., Organic Process, exhibiting fractal characteristic of self-similarity through cellular structure and differentiation of cellular structure reflective of 1st and 2nd levels of Reality, respectively. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1343 Figure 1 (Upper Left) The fractal image known as the Mandelbrot set. (Upper Right) An enlargement of an area of the image on the left showing the fractal characteristic of self-similarity in which the pattern of the whole is present at a higher level of iteration within that whole. (Lower Left) A representation of the cellular structure of the Relational Matrix as well as two Distortion Processes, which Distortion Processes represent areas of differentiation of the Relational Matrix. (Lower Right) A very stylized drawing of an Organic Process, i.e., a third level Reality, exhibiting the selfsimilarity characteristic of fractal structures through both the presence of a cellular structure as well as through the differentiation of that cellular structure, as indicated by the different colored cells/circles. What this drawing shows is that Individual Organic Processes, apprehended as individual organisms or different forms of organic life, exhibit the fractal characteristic of self-similarity, as they reflect the pattern of the first and second level Relational Structures from which they arise as more highly iterated third level Relational Structures. Specifically, Organic Processes reflect the pattern of Relational Structure cellularity found at the first level of Reality and also reflect the pattern of Relational Structure cellular differentiation found at the second level of Reality. It is interesting to note that as we zoom in on a mathematically generated fractal, such as the Mandelbrot set, we get a view of a more highly iterated level of that fractal structure. Conversely, as we zoom in on the fractal structure of Reality Itself, as occurs when science in general and physics in particular probes into the nature of physical reality, we get a view derived from a less iterated level of the fractal structure of Reality, as shown in the lower half of figure 1. The reason for the opposite results generated by these seemingly identical approaches is that they occur from opposite perspectives. In the case of a mathematically generated fractal, we occupy a position, and so perspective, outside the fractal structure as a whole and so must zoom in to apprehend the more highly iterated areas that demonstrate the pattern of the whole. Conversely, in the case of the Fractal Structure of Reality Itself, which includes all three levels of Relational Structure, we occupy a position, and so perspective, within that Fractal Structure. Specifically, as third level Relational Structures, i.e., as Organic Processes, we occupy a position within a very highly iterated level of Reality, which is to say, a level of Reality that has been produced through countless iterations of Existential self-relation. For this reason, owing to our perspective from within the Fractal Structure of Reality, inward focus is focus in the direction of the levels of Reality from whence we have come as a result of the iterative process of Existential self-relation, sort of like looking out the back window of a moving car, and so yields experiences produced at lower levels of iteration rather than higher levels of iteration. Specifically, from our position within the third level of Reality, inward focus yields the apprehension of mental and emotional experiences. Conversely, and for the same reason, outward focus is focus in the direction that we are going as a result of the iterative process of Existential self-relation, sort of like looking out the front window of a moving car, and so yields experiences produced at higher levels of iteration rather than lower levels of iteration. Specifically, from our position within the third level of Reality, outward focus yields the apprehension of physical experiences. The relations between these two perspectives, i.e., from outside and inside side a fractal structure, as well as the relation between inner and outer focus from within the Fractal Structure of Reality, are shown in figure 2. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1344 inward focus from outside of the fractal structure proceeds from lower to higher levels of iteration you are here 2nd level of Reality 1st level of Reality 3rd level of Reality inward focus from within the fractal structure proceeds from higher to lower levels of iteration outward focus from within the fractal structure proceeds from lower to higher levels of iteration emotional experience mental experience “inner” experience physical experience “outer” experience Figure 2 The Relation of Inner and Outer Experience to Our Position and Perspective Within the Fractal Structure of Reality. These images of different magnifications of the Mandelbrot are used to describe the different results obtained from different directions of focus from perspectives both outside of and within a fractal structure. As shown above the image, from a perspective that lies outside the fractal whole, focus inward takes one into levels of higher iteration, whereas, as shown below the image, from a perspective that lies inside the fractal whole, which is where we are with respect to the Fractal Structure of Reality, focus inward takes one into levels of lower iteration, while outward focus takes one into levels of higher iteration. Specifically, from our perspective within the Fractal Structure of Reality at the third level of Reality, focus inward takes us into the second and first levels of Reality where mental and emotional experience, respectively, are generated, whereas focus outward takes us further into the third level of Reality where physical experience is generated. Put another way, as we focus outward from within the Fractal Structure of Reality at the third level of Reality, we apprehend experience that is derived from a more iterated or higher order of Existential self-relation, whereas as we focus inward from that same position and perspective we apprehend experiences derived from less iterated or lower orders of Existential self-relation. We are always generating emotional, mental, and physical experiences, at least while awake, but the degree to which we are conscious of any one of these three different types of experience ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1345 depends upon our direction and level of focus from within the Fractal Structure of Reality in a given moment. The perspectives and directions of focus described in figure 2 explain why physical experience seems to be “out there,” i.e., seems to lie outside of ourselves, while mental and emotional experience both seem to be “in there,” i.e., seem to lie inside of ourselves. This is also why, for example, deep thought coincides with a degree of obliviousness regarding what is happening in terms of physical experience, because one cannot focus completely in both directions at once, i.e., inner and outer, any more than one can simultaneously face due North and due South. Trees are fractal structures that exhibit the characteristic of self-similarity, in that they exhibit, at the third level of Reality, the pattern of the progressive Structure of Reality as a whole, with the trunk representing the first level of Reality, the branches representing the second level of Reality, and the leaves representing the third level of Reality. Organic Processes are the leaves that emerge from the Tree of Reality. As you look out at the world around you, you are like a leaf on a tree gazing out upon the other leaves, as well as upon the branches and the trunk, but what you see as the world is not the Tree of Reality Itself, not the progressive Relational Structures of which the Tree of Reality is composed. Rather, what you see as the world is the etching of that progressive Relational Structure in the form of physical experiences. Specifically, you see that progressive Relational Structure in the form of the physical experiences of organic reality, material reality and the reality of space itself, as through your outward focus you construct and apprehend external etchings of the third, second, and first levels of Reality, respectively. Everything is the way it is for some reason, and in the final analysis that reason always comes back to what we experience as reality having as its most proximal basis relative existences produced in concert with an underlying Reality or progressive Relational Structure that is the product of the iterative process of Existential self-relation. Further, it is the Existence that constructs out of Itself, through iterative relation to Itself, the progressive Relational Structure of Reality, that Itself apprehends as experience the relative existences created as a result of that same iterative process of Existential self-relation. In the next section I will examine in more detail how these two different products of the iterative process of Existential self-relation, i.e., different levels of Relational Structure and different relative existences apprehended as different types of experience, together form our overall experience of reality. 2. Our Perception of the Structure of Reality To summarize, each level of Reality rests upon a prior level of Reality or Relational Structure, with all of it arising from and being composed of Existence. Also, along with each level of Reality comes a particular type of relative existence apprehended as a particular type of experience. Thus, there is an order of progression of both Relational Structure and experience as Existence evolves through the iterative process of progressive Existential self-relation. And so it is that emotional experience arises along with the first level of Relational Structure, conceptualized as the Relational Matrix, making emotional experience the most fundamental experience and the Relational Matrix the most fundamental Relational Structure. Next, mental experience arises along with the second level of Relational Structure, conceptualized as Distortion Processes. Distortion Processes and mental experience therefore rest upon and extend ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1346 from the first level of Relational Structure. Finally, physical experience arises along with the third level of Relational Structure, conceptualized as Organic Processes. Organic Processes and physical experience therefore rest upon and extend from both the first and second levels of Relational Structure. The progressive Structure of Reality and the corresponding progression of experiential reality are shown in figure 3. L3 Levels of reality Levels of Reality physical experience (form and tangibility) Organic Processes Existence L2 mental experience (form) AA Y X 22 ++ Y X I O == O I Distortion Processes Existence L1 Joy emotional experience (formless) Despair Relational Matrix Existence relative existence (apprehended as expereince) the two products of Existential self-relation Relational Structure (composed of Existence) Figure 3 This drawing depicts both the progressive Structure of Reality as well as the corresponding progression of experiential reality. That is, it depicts the different levels of Reality or Relational Structure and their relation to other levels of Reality, as well as their relation to what is apprehended as experience at that particular level of Reality. In this drawing are condensed all the concepts presented up to this point regarding the evolution of Existence through the iterative process of Existential selfrelation. At the first level or Reality (L1) the Relational Matrix is depicted along with the emotional experiences (represented by the words joy and despair) that arise as a result of the same relations of Existence to Itself that create the Relational Matrix. At the second level or Reality (L2) Distortion Processes are depicted along with the mental experiences (represented by letters, numbers, and mathematical symbols) that arise as a result of the same relations of Existence to Itself that create Distortion Processes. At the third level of Reality (L3) Organic Processes (represented by the DNA molecule and the stick figure person) are depicted along with the physical experiences (represented by geometric shapes) that arise as a result of the same relations of Existence to Itself that create Organic Processes. It should be noted that although in these drawings the structure of Reality is depicted as being tiered in order to allow identification and explanation of the differences between the different levels ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1347 of Reality, in actuality successive levels of Reality are completely enmeshed within and inseparable from all preceding levels of Reality. As Individuals involved in third level Existential relations, and as a result conscious of physical experience, our perspective upon this progression of Relational Structure and experience is from the top down, as it were. That is, our perspective is from a position at the third level of Relational Structure looking down upon the prior levels of Relational Structure and experience upon which the third level of Relational Structure rests and from which it extends. As such, our perspective upon this progression of Relational Structure and experience is a complete inversion of the actual order of the progression of Relational Structure and experience that makes possible our apprehension of physical experience. What do we experience as physical reality as we, from the third level of Reality, look back upon the preceding levels of Reality, as well as within the third level of Reality? Before that question is answered, the first thing to understand is that as we look back upon the preceding levels of Reality, and within the third level of Reality, we do not apprehend the Relational Structures Themselves that Exist at those levels of Reality. Rather, what we experience as physical reality is our apprehension of the relative existence product that results from our Individual impactive Existential relations with those different levels of Relational Structure. That having been said, I will now address directly the question posed at the beginning of this paragraph with regard to what it is that we physically experience from the third level of Reality as we look back upon the preceding levels of Reality, as well as within the third level of Reality. Figure 4 summarizes what will be described in the next few paragraphs regarding the way we physically apprehend the Relational Structure of Reality from our perspective at the third level of Reality. Levels of Reality and reality physical perspective organic reality Organic Processes L 3 ----physical experience Existence energy matter Distortion Processes L 2 -----mental experience AA Y X 22 ++ Y X I O == O I space Existence Joy Existence Despair Relational Matrix L 1 ----emotional experience Existential perspective ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1348 Figure 4 Our Individual Consciousness’s are Existence that is involved in third level Existential self-relations. For this reason we apprehend reality through the eyes (or I’s) of our Individual Consciousness’s from the third level of Existential selfrelation. And so our perspective upon the iterative process of Existential self-relation as a whole is from the top down. Although at every level of Reality a different type of experience is created, while focusing outward from the perspective of the third level of Reality every level of Reality is apprehended as a different sort of physical experience. Thus, while focusing outward from the perspective of the third level of Reality the third level of Reality is apprehended as organic reality, the second level of Reality is apprehended as the material realities of energy and matter, and the third level of Reality is apprehended as the reality of space. As shown in figure 4, as we, from the third level of Reality, form impactive Existential relations within the third level of Relational Structure, i.e., with other Organic Processes, we apprehend organic reality. That is, we apprehend DNA, RNA, single celled organisms, multi-cellular organisms, plants, animals, etc. All of these things are our Individual apprehension or etching, in the form of physical experience, of third level Relational Structures that are Themselves conscious of physical experience to the degree made possible by the impactive Existential relations in which they can become involved as a function of their own particular Relational Structures. Put another way, what is directly and actually there where you apprehend any organic reality, be it at the molecular or cellular level, be it plant, animal or human, is Existence involved in third level Existential relations, producing both a third level Relational Structure, as well as a third level relative existence apprehended by the Individual Consciousness involved in the creation of that Relational Structure as physical experience. Next, as shown in figure 4, as we, from the third level of Reality, form impactive Existential relations with the second level of Relational Structure, i.e., with Distortion Processes, we apprehend energetic and material reality. Specifically, we apprehend the Relational Structures conceptualized as Primary Distortion Processes as electromagnetic radiation, and we apprehend the Relational Structures conceptualized as Compound Distortion Processes as matter. These things, these physical experiences, i.e., energy and matter, are our Individual apprehension or etching, in the form of physical experience, of second level Relational Structures that are Themselves conscious of mental experience. Put another way, what is directly and actually there where you apprehend any physical object is Existence involved in second level Existential relations, producing both a second level Relational Structure, as well as a second level relative existence apprehended by the Individual Consciousness involved in the creation of that Relational Structure as a mental experience. Put even more directly, what is directly and actually there where you apprehend any physical object is Existence involved in the relations with Itself that create for that Existence a mental experience. What is actually and directly there where we apprehend energy and matter is not thought, but is Existence is involved in the relations with Itself that create for the Existence involved in those relations the experience of thought. In essence, wherever you apprehend a physical object you are creating the experience of that object through your relation to a second level Relational Structure, which is to say, through your relation to Existence that is Itself creating and apprehending thought or mental experience. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1349 Finally, as shown in figure 4, as we, from the third level of Reality, attempt to form an impactive Existential relation with the first level of Relational Structure, i.e., with the Relational Matrix, what we experience physically is the absence of physical experience, which absence of physical experience we apprehend as the emptiness of space. As Organic Processes we can form impactive relations with second and third level Relational Structures, since Organic Processes are composed of second level Relational Structures involved in third level Existential relations. And as a result of those third level Existential relations with second and third level Relational Structures, we apprehend the physical experiences described in the preceding two paragraphs. However, it is not possible for us, as a third level Relational Structures, to form an impactive relation with the Relational Matrix, and this lack of relation to the Relational Matrix while focusing outward from the third level produces an absence of physical experience, apprehended as the void or emptiness of space. However, what is actually and directly there where we apprehend the emptiness of space is not a void. Rather, what is actually and directly there where we apprehend the emptiness of space is Existence involved in the first level relations with Itself that create both the first level of Relational Structure from which the other levels of Reality extend, as well as relative existences apprehended as emotional experience by Existence involved in those first level Existential relations. Thus, what is actually and directly there where we apprehend space is Existence that is conscious of emotional experience. However, because each successive level of Reality rests upon and is constructed from all prior levels of Reality, what is actually and directly there where we apprehend energy and matter is Existence that is conscious of both mental experience as well as emotional experience, whereas what is actually and directly there where we apprehend organic reality is Existence that is conscious of all three types of experience i.e., physical, mental, and emotional experience. This is why we, as third level Relational Structures, i.e., as Organic Processes, are conscious of all three types of experience. Thus, an Organic Process, which is conscious of physical experience, is composed of Distortion Processes, which are conscious of mental experience, and Distortion Processes are composed of the Relational Matrix, which is conscious of emotional experience. Existence at every level of Relational Structure is conscious of experience because every relation of Existence to Itself produces both a Relational Structure composed of Existence as it is involved in that particular relation with Itself as well as a particular type of relative existence apprehended by Existence involved in that particular relation as a particular type of experience. Thus, what in this work has been described as the three different levels of Reality are not things that are far off or distant, but are right here with us at all times, although they are simply not recognized as such, since they are unavoidably apprehended as different physical experiences rather than as different Relational Structures composed of the same Existence involved in different sets of relations with Itself. What is actually and directly there as Existence being in relation to Itself, and so being Relational Structure, can never Itself be the experience, for that is not what experience is. Experience is always the apprehension of the product of the relation of Existence to Itself that is not composed of Existence. Experience is always the apprehension of the relative existence that is created as Existence, through relation to Itself, becomes defined in relation to Itself. It is Existence, as Individual Consciousness, that does the apprehending of experience, but which is never Itself apprehended as experience. Thus, underlying the physical experience-etching of space is Existence being the Relational Matrix, while underlying the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1350 physical experience-etching of energy and matter is Existence being Distortion Process, whereas underlying the physical experience-etching of organic reality is Existence being Organic Process. 3. The Identity of Mind, Space, and the Relational Matrix The type of experience apprehended is not a function of what is actually and directly there, for that is always the same, i.e., Existence, albeit Existence involved in some relation with Itself. Rather, the type of experience apprehended by the Individual is a function of the nature of the Existential relation in which the Individual is involved that creates the relative existence apprehended by the Individual as experience. Thus, relations of Existential motion result in the apprehension of emotional experiences, whereas relations of Existential content result in the apprehension of mental experiences, while impactive Existential relations result in the apprehension of physical experiences. For this reason, while at every level of Reality a different type of experience is created, from the perspective of a particular level of Reality the different levels of Reality appear as an experience of the type produced at the particular level of Reality that is providing the perspective from which the different levels of Reality are apprehended as experiential realities. This is why, as was just described, from the perspective of the third level of Reality, or from a perspective of outer focus, every level of Reality is apprehended as a different sort of physical experience, as was shown in figure 4. The purpose of this section is to describe how the different levels of Reality appear from the perspective of the second level of Reality, where the relative existences apprehended as mental experience are created, in order to demonstrate that underlying our experience of both mental and physical reality lies the same progressive Relational Structure. Although we are third level Relational Structures, when we turn our focus inward, we are able to adopt a perspective derived from a prior level of Reality or Relational Structure, because we are composed of those levels of Reality as well. The outward focus that creates our physical apprehension of the Structure of Reality, described in the preceding section, is like standing on the roof of a two story building and looking over the side and back down at that building from the outside, in as much as standing on the roof of a two story building represents being at a third level of that building. By contrast, the inward focus that allows us to apprehend mental and emotional experience is like going back inside the building and walking down to the second and first floors, respectively, and seeing how it looks from the inside. Outer focus reveals to us external structure, i.e., the relations of Existence to Itself as apprehended from outside the Relational Structure that is composed of those relations, whereas inner focus reveals to us internal structure, i.e., the same relations of Existence to Itself as apprehended from inside the same Relational Structure composed of those same relations. This section is concerned with what we apprehend when we turn our focus inward and walk down and take a perspective from within the second level of Reality. Before I proceed with that, I feel the need to explain what I mean by the term “focus” In the same way that we have the innate ability to choose our direction of motion relative to our more fundamental Individuality, we have, as Individual Consciousness’s, the innate ability to use our Consciousness in a focused or unfocused fashion. We are each, as Individual Consciousness’s, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1351 like a ball of light that can shine in all directions at once and illumine everything a little, or we can take that same light and shine more of it in a single direction and illume what lies in that direction a great deal more, while at the same time illumining what lies in the other directions somewhat less. That is what I mean by focus. What we illuminate with our focus are the relative existences that we apprehend as various experiences, and that which does the illuminating is not different or other than that which, through relation to Itself, both creates the relative existence and apprehends it as experience. We can and do apprehend all three types of experience at once, but the more we are simultaneously apprehending all three types of experience the less detail we are able to apprehend with regard to any one type of experience. Apprehension of relative existences as experiences at a fine level of detail within any one level of Reality requires focus, which is to say, conscious focus or the focus of an Individual Consciousness. That having been said, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, all relations are relations of Existential content, and so result in the apprehension of some mental experience. Put another way, because second level Existential relations, i.e., relations of Existential content, create relative existences that must be apprehended by Individual Consciousness as mental experiences, the same levels of Relational Structure that are apprehended from the perspective of the third level of Reality as different physical experiences are, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, i.e., from the perspective that lies within the second level of Relational Structure, apprehended as different mental experiences. Specifically, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, the second level of Reality, which is composed of Distortion Processes, is apprehended in the form of the mental experiences of primary thought, and concept. Thus, the same level of Reality or Relational Structure that is the basis of what is apprehended as the physical experience of energy and matter from the perspective of the third level of Reality is, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, the basis of what is apprehended as the mental experience of thought and concept. Put another way, as is shown below in figure 5, energy/matter and thought/concept are not ultimately two different things; rather, they are different types of experience derived from different levels of relation to what is ultimately the same underlying level of Relational Structure. However, what is equally interesting is how the first level of Reality appears from the perspective of the second level of Reality. The first level of Reality is devoid of the Relational Structures conceptualized as Distortion Processes that are created along with the relative existences that are apprehended as the mental experiences of thought and concept. Thus, in the same way that, from the perspective of the third level of Reality, the first level of Reality appears as the physical experience that is the absence of physical experience we call space, so it is that, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, the first level of Reality appears as the mental experience that is the absence of mental experience we call mind. Put another way, the first level Relational Structure that is the basis of what is apprehended from the perspective of the third level of Reality as the physical experience of space, when apprehended from the perspective of the second level of Reality serves instead as the basis of what is apprehended as the mental experience of mind. Thus, as shown in figure 5, mind and space are not ultimately two different things; rather, they are two different types of experience derived from different levels of relation to what is ultimately the same underlying level of Relational Structure. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1352 Levels of Reality and reality physical perspective Organic Processes L 3 ----physical experience Existence mental perspective thought concept energy matter Distortion Processes L 2 -----mental experience 2 Distortion Processes I Existence space mind Relational Matrix Existence Relational Matrix L 1 ----emotional experience Existential perspective Figure 5 This drawing illustrates is the identity of mind, space, and the Relational Matrix, as well as the identity of thought/concept, energy/matter, and Distortion Processes. As shown in the column on the right, at every level of Reality a different type of Relational Structure and experience is created. However, as shown in the drawing itself, from the perspective of a particular level of Reality the different levels of Reality appear as an experience of the type that is produced at the particular level of Reality that is providing the perspective from which the different levels of Reality are apprehended as experiential realities. Specifically, from the perspective of the third level of Reality, the Distortion Processes that compose the second level of Reality are the basis of what is apprehended as the physical experience of energy and matter, whereas, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, those same Distortion Processes are the basis of what is apprehended as the mental experience of thought and concept. Likewise, from the perspective of the third level of Reality, the Relational Matrix, i.e., the first level of Reality, is the basis of what is apprehended as the physical experience of space, whereas, from the perspective of the second level of Reality, that same first level Relational Structure is the basis of what is apprehended as the mental experience of mind. As space is the physical experience that is the absence of physical experience that acts as the backdrop against which other physical experiences are apprehended, and from which other physical experiences seem to arise, so it is that mind is the mental experience that is the absence of mental experience that acts as the backdrop against which other mental experiences are apprehended, and from which other mental experiences seem to arise. Put another way, space is the seeming emptiness from which physical reality arises and the background against which it is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1353 apprehended, whereas mind is the seeming emptiness from which thought arises and against which seeming emptiness it is apprehended. These parallels exist, as it were, because space and mind are not two different things, rather, they are two different perspectives upon the same underlying Thing, which singular underlying Thing is the first level of Relational Structure. 4. The Relation of the Structure of Reality to What We Experience as Reality As shown below in figure 6, the progressive Structure of Reality is a singular Edifice, composed of Existence being in relation to Itself, and the different Relational Structures of which that Edifice is composed are apprehended by the Existence that composes it as different experiences from different levels and perspectives within that Edifice. As it is composed of Existence, the progressive Structure of Reality is What Is, whereas our experience of reality, not being composed of Existence, is what only appears to be, which is to say, it presents the illusion of being what is. The experience of reality is always something other than the Relational Structures of which the progressive Structure of Reality is composed, because the Relational Structures are composed of Existence whereas the relative existences that are the most proximal basis of experience are not composed of Existence, as they arise where Existence, through relation to Itself, becomes defined in relation to Itself. Put another way, there can be no experience that is itself a direct experience of the Existence that both apprehends experience and which, through iterative relation to Itself, constructs out of Itself the progressive Relational Structure of Reality that is ultimately the basis of all experience. reality = relative existence not composed of Existence apprehended as experience mental perspective physical perspective Reality Organic Processes thought concept mental reality mind energy matter Reality Distortion Processes Reality = physical reality space Relational Structure composed of Existence Relational Matrix Figure 6 The “Two Truths” of Reality and reality. This drawing shows, in a simplified fashion, the progressive Structure of Reality and the way the different Relational Structures of which that progressive Structure is composed act as the basis of what is apprehended by Individual Consciousness as ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1354 different experiential realities from different perspectives within that Structure. The experiential realities are named outside the Structure itself to indicate that they are always other than that Structure, whereas the “eyes” that represent Individual Consciousness apprehending experiential reality are placed within the Structure to indicate that that which apprehends experience is not different or other than that of which the Structure is Itself composed. As shown above in figure 6, there is a Reality composed of Existence being in relation to Itself and a reality not composed of Existence. The Reality composed of Existence consists of the Relational Structures that, taken together, compose the progressive Relational Structure of Realty, whereas the reality not composed of Existence is what we experience as reality. However, even though the reality not composed of Existence is what we experience as reality, it is that of which Reality is composed that Itself apprehends experience. Therefore, everything we experience is something other than the Existence that both apprehends experience and which, through iterative relation to Itself, constructs out of Itself the progressive Relational Structure of Realty. Thus, there is Truth and truth; the Truth of Reality and the truth of reality; the Truth of That which is composed of Existence and the truth of that which is not composed of Existence; the Truth of That which apprehends experience and the truth of experience itself. However, although we can never experience directly the Relational Structures composed of Existence that, taken together, make up the progressive Relational Structure of Reality, what we experience as reality is not unrelated to those Relational Structures. This is because what we experience as reality is our apprehension of the relative existences that are created as a different product of the same relations of Existence to Itself that also create the Relational Structures of which the progressive Relational Structure of Reality is composed. Thus, although what we experience as reality can never be what is actually and directly there, what we experience as reality can bear some relation to the way what is actually and directly there is organized in relation to Itself. For example, where you experience anything of any sort, what is actually and directly there is Existence involved in a set of iterative relations with Itself. Because the progressive Relational Structure of Reality is the product of the iterative process of Existential self-relation, that Structure is fractal in nature. However, as stated above, what we experience is not, and can never be, that Structure Itself, as it is directly. Nonetheless, physical reality, especially organic physical reality, appears fractal and displays the fractal characteristic of selfsimilarity. Thus, the most clear example that experience bears some relation to the way Existence is arranged or organized in relation to Itself as it creates out of Itself the Structure of Reality is the appearance of fractal characteristics in physical reality, one of which is shown in figure 7. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1355 Figure 7 Even though what is experienced as a leaf is not what is there directly, as what is there directly is Existence being iteratively in relation to Itself, the leaf nonetheless appears as a fractal structure and displays the fractal characteristic of selfsimilarity, inasmuch as it contains within itself the pattern of a tree as well as the pattern of the progressive Structure of Reality Itself, in terms of both its macroscopically visible progressive structuring as well as its microscopically visible cellular structuring and differentiation. In this way, even though we cannot experience the Existence that is directly there, since experience is by its nature not composed of Existence, what we experience as reality does bear some relation to the way the Existence that is directly there is organized in relation to Itself. There are two kinds of illusions; the appearance of something where there is actually nothing and the appearance of something where there is really something else. Experience presents us with an illusion of the latter sort. That is, there is something there where we experience reality to be, it’s just that we can’t experience the Reality that’s actually and directly there, because by its nature experience is always something other than That, i.e., something other than Existence. However, experience presents us with illusion only to the extent that we take experience for what is there directly. That is, experience may present itself as what’s there, but we do not have to fall for its act. One may see a snake where there is actually only a rope, but the reaction to what is seen will be very different depending on whether one is completely oblivious with regard to the existence of ropes, and so must believe that what is there is a snake, or whether one instead understands that all there really is are ropes, and in that understanding is able to see beyond what only appears to be. Mental and physical experiences represent different sorts of etchings of Reality, different etchings of Existence as it is involved in some relation or set of relations with Itself. Physical experience, as the apprehension of a third level relative existence, which third level relative existences arise when a Distortion Process becomes involved in an impactive Existential relation ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1356 with another Distortion Process, is a sort of external etching, an etching made from outside the Relational Structure being etched. Mental experience, on the other hand, as the apprehension of a second level relative existence, which second level relative existences are created as the result of the relations of Existential content that also create Distortion Processes, is a sort of internal etching, an etching made from inside the Relational Structure being etched. And while etchings are never what is actually and directly there, they do bear some relation to what is actually and directly there, in as much as they do provide some information regarding the way what is actually and directly there is arranged in relation to itself. 5. Quantum Physics, the Wave Function, Free Will, and the Structure of Reality Interestingly, a case for the identity of mind, space, and the Relational Matrix has already been made, albeit in different terms, in an article written by Graham Smetham and published recently in JCER Vol 2, No 5 (2011) titled “Mindnature: Origin of Physicality & Mathematics,” (http://jcer.com/index.php/jcj/article/view/152). In that article, Smetham makes the case that the reason mathematics, a mental discipline, is so effective at describing the behavior of physical reality, is because both the realm of mentality and physicality emerge from a deeper level of Reality that he refers to as Mindnature. “Indeed there are number of significant physicists moving towards a view that is consistent with Buddhist metaphysical perspectives that the ultimate nature of reality can only be described in terms of Mindnature (Yogachara/Chittamatra – Mind-Only, Dzogchen – Great Perfection).” “This view of the interdependent genesis of the two realms of dualistic manifestation; the realm of ‘physicality‘, which is the objective aspect of the dualistic manifestation from the deeper, unitary, implicate (to use a term for levels of non-duality used by physicist David Bohm) dimension of Mindnature, and the subjective realm of individuated ‘mentality‘ solves a crucial puzzle that has bothered many physicists and mathematicians. Eugene Wigner, for instance, referred to what he considered to be the ‘unreasonable effectiveness‘ of mathematics in describing and explaining the physical world of ‘nature‘; he called mathematics a ‘miracle‘ and ‘a wonderful gift that we neither understand nor deserve’. However, if both the realm of mentality and physicality emerge from a deeper level of universal Mindnature then it is surely not such a great mystery that mathematics, itself a product of mind, produces the conceptual patterns generated and followed by the ‘physical‘ functioning of reality.” (emphasis mine) At this point I would like to make the case that what Smetham refers to as Mindnature is what has been described in this work as the first level of Reality or Relational Structure, conceptualized here as the Relational Matrix. As described in this work, the realms of mentality and physicality are experiential realities that both have as their basis the second level Relational Structures conceptualized as Distortion Processes, which Distortion Processes have as their basis the first level Relational Structure conceptualized as the Relational Matrix. Thus, as described here, the realms of mentality and physicality both arise from the same underlying Reality, i.e., ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1357 the Relational Matrix, although what actually arises from that underlying Reality are second level Relational Structures conceptualized as Distortion Processes, with mental and physical experience being analogous to the internal and external etchings, respectively, of those Distortion Processes. The progressive Relational Structure of Reality is singular. The difference between mental reality and physical reality is not in the Reality that underlies those experiences, rather it is in the perspective upon that Reality, which is to say, the level of relation within that Reality from which those experiences are derived. Thus, mental reality and physical reality have as their ultimate basis the same Relational Structure apprehended from two different experiential perspectives, i.e., from two different levels of relation within that Relational Structure. Specifically, mental experience is the apprehension of the relative existences that arise along with the Distortion Processes that make up the second level of Reality, whereas physical experience is the apprehension of the relative existences that arise as those already Existent Distortion Processes become involved in another level of relation with each other. Consider a rubber band that is being twisted upon itself. And now imagine that you can never experience the rubber itself, never experience that of which the rubber band is composed, but you can experience the boundaries that arise where the rubber band comes to be in relation to itself. In this way the rubber band is analogous to Existence as it is being iteratively in relation to Itself. As the rubber band becomes more and more twisted upon itself two different types of boundaries arise. One type of boundary arises where the rubber band comes in relation to itself simply as a result of being twisted upon itself. The other type of boundary arises where the rubber band, as it is already twisted upon itself, folds back upon itself. The type of boundary that arises where the rubber band comes to be in relation to itself as a result of being twisted upon itself is analogous to the second level relative existences that are apprehended as mental experience. The other type of boundary that arises where the rubber band, as it is already twisted upon itself, folds back upon itself, is analogous to the third level relative existences that are apprehended as physical experience. Therefore, the relations where the rubber band is twisted in relation to itself are analogous to the relations of Existential content that create Distortion Processes. Put another way, the rubber band, as it is twisted upon itself, represents a Distortion Process, i.e., a second level Relational Structure. However, while we can experience a rubber band, because the rubber band is itself a physical experiential reality, we cannot experience second level Relational Structures; because they are composed of Existence and experience is always something other than That. All we can experience, either mentally or physically, are the boundaries, i.e., the relative existences, that arise where the Existence that is actually and directly there becomes defined in relation to Itself as a result of being in relation to Itself. In this analogy then, mental experience, and by extension mathematics, as the physical expression of symbols and relations derived from mental experience, represent etchings of the internal structure of the rubber band as it is twisted upon itself, and so also represent etchings of the internal structure of Existence as it is arranged in relation to Itself at the second level of Reality. Physical experience, on the other hand, represents an etching of the external structure of the rubber band as it is twisted upon itself, and so also represents an etching of the external structure of Existence as it is arranged in relation to Itself at the second level of Reality. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1358 Mental experience is not what is actually and directly there, but its form does bear some relation to the way what is actually and directly there is arranged in relation to Itself. Therefore, mathematical symbolism is able to bear some relation to the way what is actually and directly there is arranged in relation to Itself. But no matter how refined and subtle the symbolism, it remains an experiential reality, and as such cannot ever be what is actually and directly there. Therefore, the wave function, which in quantum mechanics describes the quantum state of a particle and how it behaves, cannot itself be what is actually and directly there, although it can express how what is there is arranged in relation to Itself. If we understand mathematics to be a physical expression of a mental reality, and mental realities to be the apprehension of second level relative existences that exist, as it were, in concert with the second level Realities conceptualized as Distortion Processes, which Distortion Processes are what actually underlie what we experience as material reality, then we can understand the wave function as a mathematical expression derived from the second level of Relational Structure, which is to say, a mathematical expression that describes a particular set of second level relations of Existence to Itself. Now here is where it gets interesting, because here is where it becomes possible to understand how observation, i.e., the creation of physical experience, results in what is referred to as the collapse of the wave function, and so here is where it becomes possible to understand what quantum physics really says about the nature of both reality and Reality. In simplified terms, the collapse of the wave function is the reduction of the physical possibilities expressed in or by the wave function into a single possibility as seen by an observer. The collapse of the wave function is a probabilistic, discontinuous change brought about by observation and measurement, and is one of two processes by which quantum systems evolve in time, according to the laws of quantum mechanics as presented by John von Neumann, the other process being a deterministic, continuous time evolution of an isolated system that obeys Schrödinger's equation or some relativistic, local equivalent. The case I am about to make is that the deterministic, continuous aspect of quantum mechanics is an experience derived from the second level of Reality, i.e., an experience derived from and within the second level of Relational Structure, while the probabilistic, discontinuous aspect of quantum mechanics, expressed as the collapse of the wave function, is the result of that second level of Relational Structure, mathematically etched out as the wave function, becoming involved in an impactive Existential relation, i.e., in a third level of Existential self-relation, in which case it then functions as the basis of a discrete physical experience. Put more succinctly, the wave function is an expression of a second level Relational Structure, at which level the relations that create physical experience do not Exist, whereas the collapse of the wave function is an expression of that same Relational Structure as it is involved in a third level Existential relation, which is the level of relation that creates physical experience. At the second level of Relational Structure the relations that create physical experience may not Exist, but the basis of those relations do Exist, as the second level of Relational Structure is Itself the basis of the third level Existential relations that produce the relative existences apprehended as physical experience. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1359 To understand the collapse of the wave function, let us return to the rubber band analogy. The rubber band, as it is twisted upon itself, represents the second level of Reality or Relational Structure, and the boundaries that arise as a result of the relations that create that level of rubber band relational structure are analogous to the relative existences that are the most proximal basis of mental experience, and so are also analogous to that which is the most proximal basis of the mathematical description of that level of Reality, which mathematical description is represented by the wave function. The collapse of the wave function is represented in this analogy by nothing more than the rubber band, as it is already twisted upon itself, folding back upon itself and thereby forming a different type of relation with itself, which different type of relation creates a boundary that is analogous to the relative existences that are the most proximal basis of physical experience. For physical experience to occur, a second level Reality, which finds its expression in the wavefunction, must become involved in a third level relation, i.e., in an impactive Existential relation. As already stated, this relation is analogous to the rubber band folding back on itself, not in a way that is another twist, which would be another iteration of a second level relation, but in a way in which it impacts itself, forming what is analogous to a third level Existential relation, which third level relations create third level relative existences apprehend by Individual Consciousness involved in those relations as a physical experiences. Prior to the actual event of its folding back upon itself, the potential exists for the rubber band, as it is already twisted upon itself, to fold back upon itself in any number of ways, each of which would produce a different relation and so a different boundary. However, once the rubber band has actually folded back upon itself, only one of those potential foldings has been actualized, or has actually occurred, which means that in that same moment the other potential foldings can no longer occur, and so cease to exist, as it were, as ways that particular rubber band, as it is already twisted upon itself, can potentially fold upon itself. In the same way, prior to its involvement in an impactive Existential relation, the potential exists for a Distortion Process, i.e., a second level Relational Structure, to become involved in a number of different impactive Existential relations, each of which would produce a different third level relative existence apprehended as a different physical experience. That potential finds its expression in the wave function. However, like the rubber band, once that Distortion Process has actually become involved in a third level Existential relation, only one of those potential relations has been actualized, or has actually occurred, which means that in that same moment the other potential third level relations can no longer occur, and so cease to exist, as it were, as potential sources of physical experience with respect to the particular second level Relational Structure in question. That loss of potential and the resultant physical actuality finds its expression in the collapse of the wave function. The physical experience does not just depend on what’s there, it depends on a combination of what’s there, as expressed by the wave function, and specifically how what is there comes to be in relation to Itself at the third level, expressed as the collapse of the wave function. The potential or possibility of physical experience lies in the second level Relational Structure, expressed by the wave function, as that second level Relational Structure can potentially become involved in a number of third level relations, and so potentially act as the basis of a number of different physical experiences. However, a second level Relational Structure, although it has the potential to become involved in a number of different third level relations, can in actuality only ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1360 become involved in one of those third level relations in any one moment, and so can only actualize as a physical experience one of the possible or potential experiences expressed in the wave function. The reason a second level Relational Structure can only become involved in one of the potential third level relations, and so produce only one physical experience, which production of a single experience is expressed as the collapse of the wave function, is because its involvement in a particular third level relation precludes its involvement in the mutually exclusive third level relations needed to actualize the other potential experiences expressed by the wave function. The collapse of the wave function, which is really the involvement of a second level Relational Structure in a third level relation, does not change what is actually and directly there in any fundamental way. Put another way, what is there as a second level Relational Structure does not fundamentally change as a result of its involvement in the third level relation that creates physical experience. However, what does change as a result of its involvement in the relation that creates a specific physical experience is its ability to be simultaneously involved in the third level relation that would create the opposite physical experience. Third level Existential relations obligate Existence to specific orientations with regard to Itself. The potential for different physical experiences is there not because what is actually there as a second level Relational Structure Exists in a probable state, in which it is maybe this or that. Rather, the potential for different physical experiences is there because physical experience is the product of another level of relation that Existence forms with Itself, and from the second level of Reality there are a number of ways that Existence, as a second level Relational Structure, can form a third level relation with Itself, and so there are a number of different physical experiences that can potentially or possibly be derived as a result of the involvement of a second level Relational Structure in a third level Existential relation. However, once the second level Relational Structure becomes involved in a specific third level relation, the other possible third level relations in which it could have potentially become involved are, in that same moment, taken off the table, as it were. Classical physics describes Reality, to the extent any Reality can be described, after the third level of relation has already occurred, i.e., once the second level of Reality has already committed to a certain third level relation. And so the description of physical reality by classical physics is not contradicted by observation, because it is a product derived from the same level of relation that it describes, i.e., the third level of relation. Quantum physics, on the other hand, describes the second level of Reality, to the extent any Reality can be described, in terms of what can only be observed at the third level of Reality, or as a product of the third level of Existential relation. Therefore, reality as described by quantum physics does not jive with or behave like reality as physically experienced, because quantum physics is a product derived from a level of Existential relation that is different from the level that creates physical experience. Specifically, quantum physics is derived from the second level of Existential self-relation, while physical experience is derived from the third level of Existential self-relation. It may seem far fetched that something that has so long puzzled physicists as the relation between reality as described by quantum physics and reality as physically experienced can be understood with something as simple as a twisted rubber band analogy. However, it works ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1361 because Reality Itself is the product of an iterative process of self-relation, analogous to the twisting of a rubber band repeatedly upon itself, while mental and physical experience are the apprehension of different types of boundaries that arise where Existence, through relation to Itself, becomes defined in relation to Itself, analogous to the boundaries that arise where a rubber band, as a result of being twisted upon itself, comes to be in relation to itself. The entire Universe is a single quantum system analogous to a single rubber band that has been and continues to be twisted upon itself, in as much as what underlies what we apprehend as the Universe is Existence that has formed and continues to form progressive relations with Itself. The difficulty in all of this has been the failure to understand what experience is and what it is not. What experience is is a boundary, and what it is not is what is actually and directly there. Understand the nature of experience and everything becomes understandable, because in order to understand the nature of experience you must also understand its relation to That which both apprehends and is the ultimate basis of experience. Fail to understand the nature of experience, think of experience as being what is actually there, and nothing can truly be understood, because while holding that mistaken thought you must become blind to what is actually there underlying the experience, which means that you then must also become blind to your own Nature, for it is not other than That. Things are the way they are for a reason, and that reason is not separable from what Exists, it is not separable from the relations in which what Exists becomes involved with Itself, it is not separable from the two different products of those relations, i.e., Relational Structure and relative existence, and it is not separable from the nature of what Existence apprehends as experience. There remains the issue of why it is not possible to predict precisely how the wave function will collapse and precisely which physical experience will be actualized. That is, it is not possible to predict with certainty the precise third level relation in which the second level Relational Structure will become involved. Put in terms of the rubber band analogy, as the rubber band sits twisted upon itself, it has the potential to fold upon itself from the left or the right, with each particular direction of folding creating a boundary as a result of that relation that is complementary to the boundary that would be created by its folding upon itself from the opposite direction, analogous to the creation of complementary physical experiences, such as positive and negative spin. According to quantum theory it is possible to know what is possible, but it is not possible to know with certainty which possibility will, upon observation, become the actuality. So, in this analogy, we can know the rubber band can fold this way or that, be involved in this or that relation to itself, and create this or that boundary, but as we observe it, causing that relation to actually occur, we cannot know which way it will go, left or right, and so cannot know which boundary will be created as a result. This situation is analogous to the observation of the spin state of a quantum system. The quantum system, which is really a second level Relational Structure, has no actual spin state. The spin state is a created physical reality-observation. One particular third level relation of the quantum system to Itself creates the experience of one spin state and the opposite, mutually exclusive relation of the quantum system to Itself creates the experience of the opposite spin state. That is, what is actually and directly there as the second level Relational Structure has no spin state, and further, has no physical attributes or characteristics whatsoever, as all physical attributes and characteristics are the apprehension of relative existences created as a result of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1362 third level Existential relations. In any case, it is not possible to determine, prior to observing the quantum system, which spin state will be observed, or more accurately, created. The reason for this is because there is an unknowable factor involved in the way second level Relational Structures become involved in third level relations. However, although there is an unknowable factor with regard to any specific Existential relation, that factor itself is not unknown to us as a phenomenon. It is just that, owing to our preconceptions regarding the nature of Reality, we do not ascribe that factor to what Exists at the more fundamental levels of Reality. In any case, to identify this unknowable factor that makes predetermination impossible, as physical experience emerges from the second level of Reality, let us put what is happening in terms of the model of Reality being presented here. It is not possible, prior to the involvement of the second level Relational Structure in a third level Existential relation, to determine the physical experience that will result from that relation. Therefore, it is not possible, prior to the involvement of the second level Relational Structure in a third level Existential relation, to determine how that second level Relational Structure will involve Itself in the third level relation that creates the observed physical experience. It is not possible to predetermine how a second level Relational Structure, i.e., quantum system, will involve Itself in a third level relation that creates an observed physical experience because what is actually and directly there where the quantum system is apprehended as being is Existence involved in a set of relations with Itself, and so what is actually and directly there is what has been referred to as an Individual Consciousness. And as was described earlier, every point of Existence, every Individual Consciousness, by its nature possesses free will, which is simply Existence’s inherent ability to choose how it will be in relation to Itself. Thus, the fundamentally indeterminate nature of Reality is not a function of the limitations inherent in experience itself, which limitations will be described in the next article in this series, nor is it a function of some inherent randomness, rather it is a function of the fundamental nature of Reality Itself as being composed of Existence, which by its nature possesses free will. And because free will inheres in the Individual, in the point of Existence, and arises from that point and that point alone, there is no way to determine prior to its exercise exactly how it will be exercised, and so no way to know prior to its being exercised precisely what the result of its being exercised will be, in terms of created physical experience. Before I elaborate further, there is a quote I cane across recently that I believe is apropos to this particular subject, and to this series of articles as a whole. “How does it happen that a properly endowed natural scientist comes to concern himself with epistemology?... Concepts that have proven useful in ordering things easily achieve such authority over us that we forget their earthly origins and accept them as unalterable givens. Thus they might come to be stamped as "necessities of thought," "a priori givens," etc. The path of scientific progress is often made impassable for a long time by such errors. Therefore it is by no means an idle game if we become practiced in analyzing long-held commonplace concepts and showing the circumstances on which their justification and usefulness depend, and how they have grown up, individually, out of the givens of experience. Thus their excessive authority will be broken. They will be removed ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1363 if they cannot be properly legitimated, corrected if their correlation with given things be far too superfluous, or replaced if a new system can be established that we prefer for whatever reason.” Albert Einstein, Obituary for Ernst Mach, Physikalische Zeitschrift (1916) As bizarre as it may seem that the Reality that underlies what we apprehend as the physical Universe possesses, at every scale, its own inherent free will, our own Existences’ provide evidence that this is indeed the case. That evidence is provided by the following very simple idea; that what Exists directly at every point in the Universe is not different than what Exists directly where you are. And what Exists most directly where you are? That which apprehends experience and which, according to its exercise of free will, becomes involved in the relations with Itself that create what it apprehends as experience. One of the biggest roadblocks to understanding the nature of Reality is the pervasive and yet unfounded idea that what Exists directly everywhere else in the Universe is somehow different from what Exists directly where we are. What Exists directly where we are is unquestionably that which apprehends experience and, as has been described here, is also that of which Reality is constructed and composed. By what logic and evidence do we reach the conclusion, which is really just an assumption or an "a priori given,” that what is fundamentally here is any different from what is fundamentally there? According to what actual evidence do we ascribe to ourselves, and ourselves alone, this attribute we call Consciousness, i.e., the ability to apprehend experience? Because the rock and the tree cannot tell us how they feel we then assume they feel nothing, that what Exists directly where they are apprehended as being does not Itself apprehend some sort of experience, even though they, like us, are part of the same Reality and therefore ultimately and inarguably composed of the same fundamental “stuff.” This conclusion, from a certain perspective, may seem obvious and therefore true, but as has happened throughout history, what is obvious and true from one perspective becomes obviously untrue from a broader perspective. Quantum physics has afforded us that broader perspective, but science itself cannot grasp what its own probing has revealed, as it remains mired in the idea that Consciousness is the product of some material or energetic machination, and so cannot see that the converse is what is actually true, i.e., that what we apprehend as material and energetic realities are products of the machinations of Consciousness, or more precisely, the machinations of Existence, the machinations of that which Itself apprehends as experience those material and energetic realities. It is difficult to solve a puzzle when one’s idea of what the puzzle should look like upon completion is a complete inversion of the way it will actually look when the pieces are placed in their actual order and arrangement relative to each other. There is no set of relations that creates Consciousness. Rather, Existence, which is inherently self-aware, through relation to Itself creates something other than Itself within Itself of which it then becomes aware, and we call that self-Awareness, when apprehending that which is other than Itself, Consciousness. And the result is Existence’s apprehension or consciousness of experience. Thus, Consciousness, i.e., that which apprehends experience, is not created, as it is not other than Existence apprehending that which is other than Itself created through relation to Itself. One goal of this work is to provide the reader with the opportunity to understand that Reality is constructed of Existence, and that the Existence of which it is constructed is not ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1364 different or other than that which apprehends experience, and so is not different or other than what you truly are, not different or other than that which is, at this very moment, apprehending as experience the words on this page. You do not possess the ability to apprehend experience, nor the attribute of free will, as a function of your central nervous system. You possess the ability to apprehend experience and the attribute of free will as functions of the nature of your being as Existence. The actual source of those abilities and attributes inheres in the Existence of which all Reality is ultimately composed, and every other point of Existence possesses those same abilities and attributes. What we apprehend as the central nervous system is ultimately a third level Relational Structure composed of second level Relational Structures, all of which are composed of Existence. The third level Relational Structure we apprehend as the central nervous system makes possible other third level relations and so is the proximal cause of our ability to experience physical reality in the particular way we do, but it is not itself that which apprehends experience. The apprehension of experience and the ability to exercise free will are both inherent in, and so functions of, the Existence that underlies what we apprehend as the central nervous system. The central nervous system is not itself the source of those abilities and attributes any more than a faucet is the ultimate source of water. Someone who knew of nothing beyond their house might consider the faucet to be the ultimate source of water, as that would be their perspective, whereas someone who had looked outside and seen the ocean would have an entirely different view of the matter. From our perspective within the third level of Reality, where our dominant experience is that of physical reality, the central nervous system appears to be the source of Consciousness and free will, but these are just erroneous ideas based on a limited perspective, in the same way the appearance of a flat Earth is an erroneous idea based on a limited perspective. What is actually and directly there where we apprehend physical reality is not inert matter, nor mindless energy, nor empty space. Rather, what is actually and directly there where we apprehend these physical realities is Existence involved in a set of relations with Itself, which set of relations produce for the Existence involved in those relations a set of mental and/or emotional experiences, and the Individual Consciousness that is actually and directly there continually chooses, just like us, the way it will involve Itself in relations with the rest of Existence. Inherent in every point of Existence, in every Individual, regardless of scale, is free will, which is the ability of the Individual to choose how it will be in relation to Itself. Therefore, while we get to choose how we will be in relation to the quantum system, it also gets to choose how it will be in relation to us, and the summation of those choices results in the physically observed reality. There is simply no getting around the fact that, if Reality is composed of Existence, then the nature of Existence, which includes free will, must play some part in what is observed as reality. No Individual chooses anything randomly, regardless of scale. All Individual choice is based upon an intention to create some experience, because all choice, all exercise of free will, results in the creation of this rather than that experience. That is, the results of the exercise of free will may appear to an outside observer as random events, but the exercise of free will is not itself random, as it is always aimed at the same goal; the creation of a more wanted or better feeling experience. Variety and apparent or seeming randomness arises as each Individual chooses how best to move in that direction, i.e., in the direction of what they want. No matter what level of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1341-1365 Kaufman, S. E. Existential Mechanics Part II: The Big Picture; The Relation Between the Structure of Reality and What We Experience as Reality 1365 Reality you are dealing with, you are dealing with conscious Individuality exercising free will, and so are left with a fundamental unpredictability and apparent randomness, because each point of Existence gets to choose its own way, which is to say, the way it will be in relation to Itself, which choice determines, in a fundamental way, the experiences the Individual both creates and apprehends as a result of its involvement in relations with the rest of Existence. The next and last article in this series deals with the Individual’s creation of experience and the limitations inherent in the Individual’s creation of experience owing to the nature of experience as being the product of a relation in which the Individual that is apprehending the experience must always be involved. Also in that article an explanation is presented regarding why the experience of positive emotion corresponds to a feeling of connection while the experience of negative emotion corresponds to a feeling of disconnection. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| October 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 9 | pp. 1074-1079 Kaufman, S. E., The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality 1074 Essay The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality Steven E. Kaufman* ABSTRACT It is the nature of experience as being the product of a relation that creates the Spiritualist/Materialist duality as an extension of the fundamental Existence/experience mentalconceptual duality, while it is the unavoidable and inviolable limitation inherent in the Individual's creation of experience that blinds the Materialist, through their attachment to the reality of experience, to the Reality apprehended by the Spiritualist. It is also true that the Spiritualist can be blind to the reality of the Materialist if they hold to tightly to what they, from their perspective, create as experience. Experiential reality is not unreal, it's just not as real as the Existential Reality which, through relation to Itself, both creates and apprehends it. Key Words: experiential basis, Spiritualist, Materialist, duality, existence. All experience is the product of some relation of Existence to Itself. More specifically, all experience is the product of some relation of an Individual Existence to some other part or aspect of Existence, as that product is apprehended from the Individual's side of the relation. Thus, all experience is the product of a relation in which the Individual that is apprehending the experience is involved. Therefore, in the absence of the Individual's involvement in a particular relation, there is no particular experience created and apprehended by that Individual. Conversely, every experience that an Individual apprehends requires the involvement of the Individual in some relation in order to create the product that is apprehended as the experience. And for every relation in which an Individual is involved creating a particular experience, there is a mutually exclusive relation in which the Individual cannot be simultaneously involved, which mutually exclusive relation is the relation in which they must be involved if they are to create and apprehend the opposite or complementary experience. Therefore, for every experience there is an opposite experience, and for every experience that we are having in any moment there is an opposite experience that we cannot, in that same moment, experience, because apprehending that opposite experience would require our involvement in a relation that is mutually exclusive of the relation in which we are already involved as we create and apprehend what it is that we are presently experiencing. This limitation upon what an Individual is able to experience in any one moment is both unavoidable and inviolable, because experience is not what's there, but is always something we ourselves, as Individuals, are involved in creating, according to our involvement in some relation with some other part or aspect of Existence, and our involvement in any relation in any moment makes it impossible for us to be, in that same moment, i.e., simultaneously, involved in any relation that is mutually exclusive of the relations in which we are already involved. *Correspondence: Steven E. Kaufman, Independent Researcher. http://www.unifiedreality.com E-mail: skaufman@unifiedreality.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| October 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 9 | pp. 1074-1079 Kaufman, S. E., The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality 1075 I call this limitation upon what an Individual is able to create and apprehend as experience in any one moment the principle of the preclusion of an Individual's simultaneous creation and apprehension of experiential opposites. It is this principle that is responsible for the phenomena of wave-particle duality and quantum uncertainty, because when an Individual is involved in a relation with an underlying Reality that creates a wave experience they can't be involved simultaneously in the mutually exclusive relation with that underlying Reality necessary to create a particle experience, and to the extent that an Individual is involved in a relation with an underlying Reality that creates any amount of any experience, they can’t be involved in the mutually exclusive relation with that underlying Reality necessary to completely create the opposite experience. Thus, to paraphrase Neils Bohr's famous quote regarding quantum descriptions of reality, experience is not about revealing what's there, rather experience concerns what we can create through relation to what's there, and so concerns what we can say about what's there. It is also this limitation upon what an Individual is able to create and apprehend as experience in any one moment that makes it impossible to feel good when you feel bad and vice versa, because when you are involved in the fundamental relation that creates either a wanted or unwanted emotional experience you cannot be involved simultaneously in the mutually exclusive relation necessary to create the opposite emotional experience. It is also this limitation that makes it impossible to know that the Earth is round as long as you think that it is flat, and to believe in evolution while believing in the biblical version of creation, because these are opposite conceptions, i.e., opposite mental experiences, and therefore must be created as the result of what are mutually exclusive relations and therefore, according to the principle of the preclusion of an Individual's simultaneous creation and apprehension of experiential opposites, cannot be created and apprehended in the same moment by the same Individual. And it is also this limitation upon what an Individual is able to create and apprehend as experience in any one moment that fuels the Spiritualist/Materialist, or Spiritualist/Science debate, because it is this limitation that makes it impossible for the Materialist to apprehend what the Spiritualist knows as long as the Materialist continues to see the world as composed of what is only experiential in nature. Because as long as the Materialist is involved in the relation in which they see the world as composed of matter or energy, of some physical experience, or even a mental experience, it is not possible for them to become involved in the relation in which they can apprehend that the world is composed of Existence, of Spirit, of Consciousness, i.e., composed of that which is not an experience, composed of that which is the opposite of experience. All experience comes in pairs of opposites or complements because all experience is the product of a relation, as that product is apprehended from one side of the relation. And so what we experience is always one side of a two sided coin, so to speak. And for every relation in which an Individual can be involved that creates one experience, there is an opposite, mutually exclusive relation which, if the Individual were involved in that relation, would create the opposite or complementary experience. Put another way, for every relation that creates the Individual's experience of one side of the coin, there is an opposite mutually exclusive relation that would ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| October 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 9 | pp. 1074-1079 Kaufman, S. E., The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality 1076 create the Individual's experience of the other side of the coin if they were able to be in that relation instead. (Remember though, there is no coin in the absence of the Individuals involvement in the relation that creates it.) And so we have hot/cold, good/bad, wanted/unwanted, wave/particle, light/dark, etc, etc. But owing to the principle of the preclusion of an Individual's simultaneous creation and apprehension of experiential opposites, we can only experience one or the other of the experiences in an experiential pair, or some portion of both, in any moment, because all experiential pairs or complements are the products of opposite and so mutually exclusive relations, which means that if we are involved in one relation creating one experience then we cannot be simultaneously involved in the opposite mutually exclusive relation necessary to create the opposite experience. There are three different types of experience: emotional, mental, and physical, and each of these three different types of experience has a different fundamental duality or complementarity that derives from the opposite and mutually exclusive relations in which Existence can be involved as it creates and apprehends that particular level of experiential reality. The most fundamental and so first level Existential relations are those that create emotional experiences, and those relations are relations of either aligned or oppositional Existential flow, as apprehended from the perspective of the Individual, and create what the Individual apprehends as wanted or unwanted emotion, respectively. The next and so second level Existential relations are those that create mental or conceptual experiences, and those opposing relations, which I have yet to specifically identify, create at their most fundamental level the opposing concepts of Existence and experience. Lastly, there are the third level Existential relations that create physical experience, and those opposing relations, as apprehended from the perspective of the Individual, are penetrating or penetrated, and create what the Individual apprehends as wave and particle experiences, respectively. The important point here is that at each level of experiential reality, i.e., emotional, mental , and physical, there is a fundamental experiential duality, and owing to the impossibility of an Individual's simultaneous apprehension of experiential opposites, being involved in the relation that creates one of these fundamental experiences makes it impossible to be involved in the relation necessary to create the other experience. And so it is that when you feel bad you can't feel good, because while you are flowing in opposition to your Self you can't be flowing in alignment with your Self. And so it also is that when physical reality appears as a particle it cannot appear as a wave, because when you have the perspective of being penetrated by a particular Reality you don't have the perspective of penetrating that particular Reality. And for the same reason, i.e., owing to the impossibility of an Individuals simultaneous apprehension of experiential opposites, when you conceive of the world as being composed of experience you can't conceive of it as being composed of Existence, as composed of Consciousness, as composed of that which, through relation to Itself, both creates and apprehends experience. The Materialist, or Experientialist, be they a scientist or otherwise, can no more comprehend the validity of spirituality than can someone who is looking North simultaneously also look South. It's not the fault of the Materialist or Experientialist that the other side of the coin remains hidden, it's just that they have a perspective that does not allow the other side to be seen, to be created as something they can experience. The Materialist or ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| October 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 9 | pp. 1074-1079 Kaufman, S. E., The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality 1077 Experientialist is being limited by an experiential mechanism of which they are not aware, and of which they cannot possibly become aware unless and until they release their grip on the idea of the primacy of experiential reality, on the idea of experiential reality as having an existence that is in any way Experiencer independent, because that idea is mutually exclusive of the idea of experience as being completely Experiencer dependent, which idea is necessary to conceive of experience as something that is created rather than as the revelation of what's actually there. The Experientialist sees experience as primary and that which apprehends experience as secondary, which is why the Materialist conceives of and tries to explain Consciousness as the product of some sort of neurological mechanism, as the product of brain function, as the product of what is a physical experiential reality. Conversely, the Existentialist sees Existence as primary and experience as secondary, and so conceives of and tries to explain experience as the product of some mechanism of Existence or Consciousness, as the product of what is not Itself an experiential reality. Both views cannot be correct. One view sees these two realities in their actual relation, while the other sees them in the opposite of their actual relation. One view of the relation between these two realities, i.e., Existence and experience, sees experience as it is, which is as being Experiencer dependent, while the other view of the relation between these two realities is based on a view of experience as it is not, which is as being Experiencer independent. Now the rub in all of this is that Existence is itself a concept, an experience, and so conceiving of the world as composed of Existence is still seeing the world as composed of what is ultimately an experience. However, there is a subtle difference between conceiving of the world as being composed of Existence and conceiving of the world as being composed of experience. When one conceives of the world as being composed of Existence, it becomes possible to know that experience is not what's actually there, and so for one who sees the world as composed of Existence there is at least the possibility of knowing that what's actually there is not the concept of Existence, but rather something non-experiential that the concept indicates or points toward, which is Itself beyond experience, as both the Creator and Apprehender of experience. Conversely, when one sees the world as composed of what they experience, composed of matter, or energy, or thought, or wave-functions, or even emotion, they must think of what they experience as being what's actually and directly there, they must think of experience as Experiencer independent, and so cannot see experience as referring to something other than itself, as referring to something other than what is only another, perhaps more subtle, experience. We cannot do other but view ourselves through the lens of experience, in the form of emotional, mental, and physical experiences, and moreover, in the form of emotional, mental, and physical dualities. And so when we feel, we must feel good or bad, and when a physicist tries to identify the character of a thing it must appear as wave or particle, and when we conceive of what we are, when we conceive of the world, of our nature and its nature, we must see it in terms of Existence or experience, as composed of either Existence or experience, or their conceptual equivalents, for those are the most fundamental conceptions of reality and themselves represent the fundamental reality duality. The question often posed is: What is the nature of reality? However, this is really a trick question because reality as a whole consists of two completely different and yet related realities, and the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| October 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 9 | pp. 1074-1079 Kaufman, S. E., The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality 1078 overall nature of reality can only be understood in the context of these two realities and their relation to each other. Thus, the nature of reality is that there are two realities; the reality of experience and the Reality that, through relation to Itself, both creates and apprehends experiential reality. And though these two realities are completely different in nature, in as much as one is created whereas the other is uncreated, they are nonetheless inseparable, like a mirror and the reflection contained within it. We think that what we experience as reality, and especially what we experience as physical reality, is what's actually there. For example, we see a rock and we think that what's there where the rock appears to be is just that, i.e., a rock. However, what we experience as reality isn't what's actually and directly there where the experience seems to be, because what we experience as reality is just a boundary that's created where Existence here and there meet, as that boundary is apprehended from the perspective of our Individual Existence as we take part in the relation that creates that boundary, that relative existence, which we then apprehend as experience. Put another way, what we experience as reality isn't what's actually and directly there where the experience seems to be, because what's actually and directly there is the fundamental Reality of Existence, and experience is just what seems to be there, the same way a reflection can seem to be what's actually there where there's really only a mirror or some other reflective surface. And just as we look out at the world and think that what's actually there is what we experience as being there, so it is that we look at ourselves and think that's what's actually here where we are is also some sort of experience. That is, we look at ourselves and see a man, a woman, we see short, we see tall, we see black, we see white, etc. etc. However, just as what's actually and directly there where we see a rock, or any object, or even empty space, is the fundamental Reality of Existence, or more correctly, the fundamental Reality that the concept of Existence points toward, what's actually and directly here where we see ourselves is that same fundamental Reality. And so it is that I say that what Exists most directly where you are is what Exists directly everywhere else as well, and that is the non-physical, non-experiential ConsciousnessExistence that is, at this very moment, apprehending not only these words, but the meaning underlying these words, both owing to and limited by the relations which you are, as an Individual point of Existence, in this moment involved. However we usually don't see ourselves as that, we don't know ourselves as the fundamental Reality, because we instead know ourselves as the other type of reality, i.e., as an experiential reality, as what is only a reflection that rests on the surface of our True Nature. This condition, wherein the fundamental Reality sees Itself and the world as being composed of what is only an experiential reality, and in so doing loses sight of Itself, loses sight of its True Nature, is referred to as self-ignorance or maya, and how this condition is created and maintained by an Individual point of Existence can be understood when one understands not just the Experiencer dependent nature of all experiential reality, but also the limitation by which any Experiencer is bound in their creation of experience. Once again, that limitation is that for every experience you are creating there is an opposite experience you cannot create in that same moment, because every experience you create requires that you be involved in some relation with Existence and your involvement in that relation makes it impossible for you to be simultaneously involved in the opposite relation necessary to create the opposite experience. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| October 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 9 | pp. 1074-1079 Kaufman, S. E., The Experiential Basis of the Spiritualist/Materialist Duality 1079 Thus, it is the nature of experience as being the product of a relation that creates the Spiritualist/Materialist duality as an extension of the fundamental Existence/experience mentalconceptual duality, while it is the unavoidable and inviolable limitation inherent in the Individual's creation of experience that blinds the Materialist, through their attachment to the reality of experience, to the Reality apprehended by the Spiritualist. It is also true that the Spiritualist can be blind to the reality of the Materialist if they hold to tightly to what they, from their perspective, create as experience. Experiential reality is not unreal, it's just not as real as the Existential Reality which, through relation to Itself, both creates and apprehends it. _____________________________________________ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1238-1241 Oliver, A. J., On the Subject of Consciousness in Samapatti 1238 Report On the Subject of Consciousness in Samapatti Alan J. Oliver* ABSTRACT Here I report my recollections of my experiences of Samapatti. These experiences led me to the view that consciousness is not necessarily confined to an event arising from electrochemical interactions in the brain. It is equally likely that the electrochemical processes in the brain arise from consciousness. My reading of the Yoga Sutras lends substance to view that there is a distinction between Mind and another level of conscious awareness called Buddhi. When we speak of Mind we are talking about our normal awareness, which is involved with sensory inputs, memory and imagination. Buddhi on the other hand is the observer of the Mind. Key Words: consciousness, Samapatti, Yoga Sutras, Buddhi. All I have to go on are my recollections of my experiences of Samapatti [1-4]. I have to bear in mind that, as one who was ‘born that way’ rather than one who enters Samapatti through meditation, my experiences may not necessarily be the same as those of the latter. Indeed, I have never noticed any difference between what I experienced in meditation and my normal everyday state. Similarly, I do not feel more relaxed in meditation or in the Samadhi state. What I do know about my Samadhi, which is what facilitates Samapatti, is that I am aware of two different viewpoints, and am able to say which one is my own. In some of those experiences I do have an awareness of what the subject feels. More significantly is what that person’s interpretation of what I had thought at the time. For example, in the case of the lady with the fractured leg, I began the session by asking her to sit quietly with her eyes closed. With my eyes closed I thought about her leg and had ‘known/felt’ that her tibia was in a state of shock around the area of the fracture. I thought I would like to remove the information related to the experience of shock and replace it with some fresh energy. I thought the shock would be like a black energy, and that I would like to replace it with some bright energy which would be a bright golden colour. I opened my eyes I found she had opened hers and was obviously very excited; she said I had removed this black stuff from her leg and replaced it with some bright golden energy. Given that I have no visual imagery, it is clear that with the two minds coalesced, she had experienced my thoughts and had, through her own imagination, visualised them. It is also obvious that I had shared her visualisation of my thoughts. * Correspondence: Cr. Alan J. Oliver, Port Elliot, South Australia. E-mail: thinkerman1@bigpond.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1238-1241 Oliver, A. J., On the Subject of Consciousness in Samapatti 1239 I find it interesting that when I recall one of these experiences I can only have it as a narrative; there is never the actual object or event as an experience which reactivates any visceral or visual response. When I sat beside my daughter as she lay in a coma I went into an intense state of bliss. If I was in the Samadhi state, then I would have to say I was experiencing her state. She died some hours later and I have never had any grief about her death. In fact, I never have grief about any death. The bliss remained for some days afterwards. And as always, my memory of that event is just a narrative. I would dearly love to feel that bliss again but it never happens. Many of the people I know have expressed a degree of envy of my ‘empty’ mind and I believe this stems from what they have learned from a teacher/guru or from books about meditation. I doubt if my empty mind is the same as one who attains that state through meditation. I have no fixed position on things and find it almost impossible to plan anything. Most of what I can contribute to a conversation comes either from knowing what interests the other person or is an answer to a question. Even then my answer often is a surprise to me because it can be something I have not even thought about. I would have to say their question evokes the answer. For many years I had conversations with Dr. Bevan Reid, a medical doctor and cancer researcher who I regarded as a mentor. Our friendship came from a common interest in consciousness as information in virtual space. Much of what he said was related in terms of biophysics, and as I listened intently I was able to carry on the conversation sensibly. He came to the view that I understood everything he said, and in retrospect I can say that it was just Samapatti in action. My Samapatti had me feel as comfortable with the subject as he did; for his part, he felt that I was comfortable with it and was a colleague. I would notice afterwards that most of what he had said was way beyond me so far as the physics was concerned, and yet I could understand it anyway. Nevertheless, it left me with his certainty that it all made sense and I am grateful for that relationship, however undeserved on my part. The Samapatti experiences had started when someone was referred to me to take a look at her disturbed cat. It had been knocked around like any stray cat and was relatively antisocial. She said it would only sit on her lap for a minute or two and had not washed itself in the two years she had known it. I placed this smelly cat on my lap and placed my hand over its head. It went to sleep immediately. At the same time I had mental images of flashing lights like a number of computer games playing simultaneously. In retrospect I would say the lights were more like a stream of migraine or some similar condition. After some time these lights gave way to a quiet but unusual garden scene. The view seemed to be at cat eye level and the plants were very large although recognisable. The main surprise was the absence of green and blue colours; everything was in shades of red, yellow and brown. The scene lasted for about twenty minutes and then I thought the cat should wake up. It woke immediately and began washing itself. Its owner was very impressed, but not as surprised as I was. During the Samapatti I was aware that the garden was familiar and, at the same time that I had never seen it before. Since I have no visual imagery it is obvious that I had watched the cat’s dream. My thought that the cat should wake up was my mind’s awareness of the cat’s waking processes. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1238-1241 Oliver, A. J., On the Subject of Consciousness in Samapatti 1240 So this is the opposite situation to the one with the lady with the fractured leg. In that case the lady interpreted by thought as a visual event, while in the cat’s case I was able to experience visually the cat’s dream. This flow of information from the subject’s mind and to the subject’s mind indicates a true coalescence of two minds, validating the state as Samapatti. It was experiences such as these that led me to the view that consciousness is not necessarily confined to an event arising from electrochemical interactions in the brain. It is equally likely that the electrochemical processes in the brain arise from consciousness. My reading of the Yoga Sutras lends substance to view that there is a distinction between Mind and another level of conscious awareness called Buddhi [5]. When we speak of Mind we are talking about our normal awareness, which is involved with sensory inputs, memory and imagination. Buddhi on the other hand is the observer of the Mind. This explains the different viewpoints one can experience/know in Samapatti, and also explains the absence of an object of memory. In my experience of memory, a narrative of the original observation of the Mind’s experience of the event or object is all that remains. Sadly, Bevan Reid has passed away; if he was here now we would probably be discussing whether what Yoga calls Buddhi is similar to the Higgs field of particle physics or Bohm’s Implicate Order. In Yoga there are evolutionary levels beginning before or from Buddhi and extending to a state prior to matter becoming atomic. In my earlier contributions to JCER I gave a diagram of the various levels encountered in the descent of consciousness into matter. I have often speculated that the vertical axis of that diagram could be considered as a spectrum of wavelength beyond the Plank Length. These levels are described as subtle energies, and it is entirely probable that the ancient writers were describing electrons, protons, leptons, neutrons, fermions, bosons and quarks etc. of modern physics. The presence of Buddhi can also be the socalled effect of an observer on an experiment in quantum mechanics. In respect of consciousness and Samapatti, it seems to me that Buddhi is the common thread, be that as a field or something else, it is certainly quite distinct from matter. This distinction really infers that Buddhi exists independently of matter. When it encounters matter, or vice versa, it imbues that matter with a degree of consciousness which, in living matter, we call Mind. There are clearly many minds, and a common ground of intellection observing these minds. Thus, the state of Samapatti allows the two minds to apparently coalesce. I would say that what really happens is that when one is in the state of Buddhi it is able to observe the subject’s mind as well as that of the seer. To that extent it would be true to say that there is only one observer, Buddhi. Whatever is observed at the level of Buddhi is known by both minds, but is mostly known just by the seer’s mind because the subject’s mind is not active at that same level. For example, in a healing situation the seer will experience the subjects’ pain or distress and will know it is not her/his pain or distress. The subject will experience the seer’s calmness and feel the same calmness, interpreting this as a change in her/his pain or distress. In the case of a man suffering from Huntington’s chorea his shaking would stop for periods of up to 45 minutes. I assume that, since he did not shake during sleep, his experience of my calmness produced a similar state during the time of being in Samapatti. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1238-1241 Oliver, A. J., On the Subject of Consciousness in Samapatti 1241 The most satisfying experience was the couple of years of intensive Samapatti with my friend Emma, who suffered with breast cancer. The calmness she experienced during that period reduced the worry of having cancer to quite a degree. During the last two months she was in a hospice and I would sit in Samapatti beside her bed throughout the night. The Samapatti, coupled with her morphine medication had her be relatively comfortable over what would have been a painful time. I had suggested that the bliss she said she felt is what one feels after death. On the last night she welcomed me with the announcement that she was getting married; she said she was going to marry Emma. She died peacefully the following evening. I stopped doing this form of healing because I wanted to understand how it worked. Part of my concern was that I had no idea of what was happening, and wondered if it was valid. I also know that it was not something I could teach anyone. Now I know how it works and am satisfied with that knowledge. I have read quite a number of articles in which scientists present theories of consciousness though the medium of mathematics. Perhaps one of these days they will crack the code, although what comes to mind is something from Jung in an introduction to “The secret of the golden flower,” by Richard Wilhelm. In a passage on Chinese Yoga he said “The right man will always produce right action, even with the wrong method. The wrong man will never produce right action, not even with the right method. This is because there is no method.” It just might be the case that, so far as consciousness is concerned, here again, there is no method. Refererences 1. Oliver, A. J. (2010), Addressing the hard problem. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 1:1: pp. 46-49. 2. Oliver, A. J. (2010), What I think about consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 1:2: pp. 153-158. 3. Oliver, A. J. (2010), Consciousness, lack of imagination & Samapatti. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 1:6: pp. 651-656. 4. Oliver, A. J. (2012), An ongoing model of reality. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 3:3: pp. 374-379. 5. Pandit Usharbuddh Arya, the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Himalayan Institute. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1385 Article Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective Tamar Levin * Abstract This paper suggests an integrative framework for conceptualizing human consciousness and compliments it with existing research data. The framework is based on the holographic and trans-disciplinary worldviews and their implied implicate-explicate order and the holographic knowing-becoming-experiencing-valuing human being who interacts interdependently with/within different levels of reality. The framework conceptualizes universal consciousness as a fundamental part of reality/universe that complements physical potentialities and brings them to actual physical states. It regards human consciousness as both structure and system, state and process, means and end, experience, information and energy, having a metaphysical /spiritual /implicit /implicate layer and a physical/ material /explicit and / explicate layer expressed via biological, chemical, and physical processes. It also considers human consciousness as incorporating inward-outward 'space' processes and a backward-forward 'time' system's view expressing/influencing different modes of thinking, feeling, and behaving, and personal and transpersonal elements. The framework focuses on the unique functions, and interactions in heart-soul and brain-mind relations and their effects on states of consciousness. The subjective nature of consciousness is conceptualized in terms of the essence of individuality manifested by the root of the soul, the genetic spiritual-DNA code, and the individual's historic evolution through different life-cycles. Keywords: Consciousness, 'Hard problem' of consciousness; Mind-brain relations; Soulheart relations, Spiritual code Introduction This paper suggests an integrative theoretical framework for conceptualizing the meaning of human consciousness and compliments it with existing research data. The framework seeks to improve our understanding of the "hard problem" of consciousness (Chalmers, 1995/6), its nature, structure and role. The basic assumption of this paper is that the meaning of consciousness cannot be conceptualized by a mechanistic, human-detached, predictive theory for which classical physical Newtonian and positivist epistemology could serve as a model (Penrose, 1994). It can only be comprehended in the broader context of the recent postmodern ‘scientific revolution' or more accurately within the paradigm of holistic science. Such a paradigmatic view suggests that the concept of consciousness must be guided by a much broader, flexible, integrative, and holistic view providing deep epistemological, * Correspondence: Tamar Levin, Professor Emerita of Education, Tel Aviv University, Isarel E-mail: tami1@post.tau.ac.il ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1386 ontological, methodological, and cultural insights. This view would have to overcome the prejudicial way in which science applies itself solely to the material level of reality or else external matters that disregard the existence or interaction with the interior. The adoption of a holistic philosophy involves rejecting the familiar sense of control and security, discarding existing thought patterns, replacing blind reliance on exclusively linear and deterministic processes with non-linear, cybernetic, chaotic processes based on a systemic approach embracing complexity, networks, and hierarchic order. This philosophy rejects a belief in the indisputable objectivity and certainty of scientific truth, moves towards recognition of the limits of scientific knowledge, and acknowledges human wisdom, capabilities, and intuition. It also recognizes the need for a contextual view of reality and the need to accept uncertainties. The holistic view (Capra, 1996) thus requires a paradigmatic shift away from parts toward wholes, from an entirely reductionist and mechanistic outlook toward a more organic approach, thereby rejecting the division, fragmentation and analysis of wholes into particles, and supporting integration, connectedness, synthesis, and complementation instead. It is important to also add that the holistic perspective is not only a philosophical paradigmatic trend it is also deeply rooted in the theory of quantum mechanics (Primas; 2003; Niculescu, 2008; Hu & Wu, 2010). Holistic science presents two generic theoretical frameworks offering a potential basis for illuminating the meaning of human consciousness as a phenomenon, experience, information, and energy with multivariate facets of structure, aim, and function. These theoretical frameworks are the holographic and the trans-disciplinary worldviews. Each of these views possesses a unique set of features such that when considered jointly they will help us to understand human consciousness by addressing a limited set of core principles. The holistic framework proposed here requires us to broaden the scientific worldview and address areas of knowledge and processes which embrace the physical and metaphysical, facts and ideas, matter and mind, local and non local, experiment and experimenter. As a result, we will no longer need to turn to “hard science” for objective, reliable knowledge and "non-scientific" spiritual traditions for wisdom, recognition of the subjective mind, internal and intuitive knowledge, and thence consciousness. In the following section let us examine the primary characteristics of the two worldviews referred to above. The Holographic View Holograms are a manifestation of the properties of light, the production and transmission of light, and the interaction of light with itself. They are three-dimensional images reproduced from a pattern of interference generated by a split coherent beam of radiation. Each point of the hologram contains all the information from the object upon which this beam is focused. A hologram is also defined as a pattern that is a whole complete unto itself, while being part of a greater pattern. This implies that any change in the hologram pattern is mirrored across the hologram as a whole. The central idea being that in a hologram the whole is contained or represented in every part, or stated differently the information (or features) are not localized, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1387 but distributed. However, different parts will yield different perspectives of the whole relative to where the part is located in the hologram. Inspired by the work of physicist David Bohm (1980), with roots reaching back to the very foundation of quantum theory, we can understand the universe as a kind of holograph, and everything in it as only ghostly images, projections from a level of reality so beyond our own that it is literally beyond both space and time (Talbot, 1991). It is a giant hologram, quite literally, a system of holographic surfaces within surfaces, in fact, a nested hierarchy of surfaces, in which each surface contains its own "world" of information (Germine, 2004). When referred to the holographic nature of the universe, Bohm (1980) suggested that despite its apparent solidity the universe is at heart a phantasm, a gigantic and splendidly detailed hologram of infinite dimensions. It is an undivided wholeness enfolded into an infinite background source that unfolds into the visible, material, and temporal world of our everyday lives. In other words, every part of the hologram contains all the information possessed by the whole; every particle is an image constructed from information enfolded into a vacuum, thus providing a dynamic holonomic order in which a change anywhere in the pattern is mirrored in the whole. These facts also mean there is a deeper level of reality we are not privy to, a more complex dimension beyond our own; and at this deeper level of reality everything in the universe is infinitely interconnected although we view the contents of the universe as separate because we only see a portion of their reality. Related to the fact that a transformed, distributed image on a holographic plate/surface contains the information to create the three dimensional image, Bohm and Hiley (1993) developed the quantum potential field theory, which argues the existence of a global, prescriptive influence on the behavior of particles and notes that the non-local nature of quantum potential reflects a type of intrinsic wholeness in the physical world that contrasts sharply with the ontologically reductionist view of classical physics. The theory suggests that particles are guided by a field that allows their properties to converge freely in a meaningful state, rendering a composite answer to questions relating to each particle’s individual existence. It further proposes that every particle reaches an explicate state after starting and being part of implicate order of potential states. That is, the implicate order is a domain of reality characterized by flux and potentiality, whereas explicate order is the order of stable phenomena and actuality. In other words, an implicate order exists, representing the universal, holographic subtext of reality, which unfolds in every moment to produce the explicate order we all observe, thus implying that the world we perceive with our five senses represents only a tiny fragment of reality. Talbot (1991) uses the example of a piece of holographic film and the image it generates to exemplify implicate-explicate order. Accordingly, the film is the implicate order because the image encoded in its interference patterns is a hidden totality enfolded throughout the whole, and the hologram projected from the film represents the explicate order because it represents the unfolded and perceptible version of the image. State differently, that which we perceive as reality is like a projected holographic image, while the larger matrix from which that image is projected can be compared to the hologram – a level of reality that is not accessible to our senses or direct scientific inquiry. Thus the nature of the hologram as a "whole in every part" and the idea that the implicate order is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1388 reflected through the explicate order provide us with an entirely new way of understanding the organization and the order of the universe and any other system that is holographic (Koestler, 1972). No wonder then why many scholars have relied on the holographic view when attempting to bridge science and spirituality (Grof, 1993; Capra, 1996; Laszlo, 2004). Indeed, Holonomy, the twin concept of holography, which denotes the dynamic order that displays the attributes of the whole being in the part, was originally developed as a world view of human and particularly about human consciousness, implying a combination of opposites, as it is both part and whole; functioning autonomously while working interdependently (Koestler, 1972). That is, the holographic framework offers revolutionary principles for understanding the relationships between the parts and the whole. In contrast to traditional thought, the part is not just a fragment of the whole but under certain circumstances the part can reflect and contain the whole. In addition, the holographic frame illuminates the important existence of primary and secondary order/ level of the universe where the primary is beyond the senses and the secondary is the actual. It is indeed the implicate-explicate order which Germinario (2004) analogically equates with the unconscious and conscious process/state, respectively. In quantum mechanics terms, the holograph idea being referred to as a quantum holography implies that the wave function on a lower level or dimension of observation is observed as a particle at a higher level. Also, at the lower level of experience, namely, the experience of the particle, there is a plurality of possibilities, whereas at the higher level of experience, there appears to be a single actuality (Germine, 2004). Furthermore, the implicate order provides a holographic medium through which apparently disconnected individuals/ experiences/information become connected. Thus, the implicate order is connected to Jung and Pauli’s (1955) idea of synchronicity—the instantaneous connection of people and events beyond the senses—which is equated with the quantum-physical principle of non-locality and quantum entanglement (Combs & Holland, 1990). The holographic worldview thus rejects the wave-particle, experience-information, part-whole, and non-local and local dualities and also suggests that the universe seems more like a great thought than a great machine, as noted by James Jeans (1930). The Trans-disciplinary (TD) Worldview The trans-disciplinary (TD) scientific worldview is described by Nicolescu (2008a) as the science and art of discovering bridges between different areas of knowledge and different beings. This worldview takes our thinking beyond an inter-disciplinary combination of academic disciplines and offers a new approach of understanding science, spirituality, and society. It essentially covers four complimentary dimensions of human endeavor: ontology (being and becoming) epistemology (knowledge and knowing), methodology (perceiving and doing) and axiology (value and valuing) (McGregor, 2009). Trans-disciplinarity thus integrates scientific, social, cultural, and spiritual concepts and ideas, with a view not only to understanding the present world but to moderating its evolution, and to facilitate the quest and need for an integrated approach to exploring our experience of the world, our consciousness, as mysterious, unperceivable, and transcending our wisdom. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1389 Grounded in complex system theory, trans-disciplinarity conceives the universe as a complex, global, and living system, between whose elements are mutual and dynamic links (Kauffman, 1993; Prigogine, 1980). Trans-disciplinary ontology respects the complex and dynamic relationships among at least ten different realities organized along three levels/dimensions of reality: (a) the external world of humans including cosmic/planetary realities where information flows, (b) the internal world of humans where internal perceptions flow; and (c) the Hidden Third which is the invisible realm linking all levels of reality. In other words, human experiences, interpretations, descriptions, representations, images, and formulas all meet on this third level. These levels/dimensions of reality fit in with Heisnberg's conceptualization of levels of reality in which the first level corresponds to the states of things, which are objectified independently of the knowledge process; the second corresponds to the states of things inseparable from the knowledge process, and the third level corresponds to the states of things created in connection with the knowledge process. In a trans-disciplinarity worldview, therefore, all phenomena exist only in relation to one another, including the relationship between the human being (observer) and the levels/dimensions of reality (the universe / observed). Stating differently, based on complex system theory, trans-disciplinarity takes the focus which is oriented toward the individual human being, in all his/her subtle dimensions, beyond the obvious physical one. Thus, transdisciplinarity emphasizes the complex, interdependent, and co-evolving nature of, and relations within, physical, biological, psychological, and ecological systems, and recognizes not only that natural environments shape human beings’ intellectual, emotional, physical, social, and spiritual dimensions, but also that the body, mind, and spirit influence each other and the natural environment. In contrast to the one-dimensional reality of classical thought, trans-disciplinarity acknowledges multi-dimensional ontology. It is concerned with the dynamics of several different levels/dimensions of reality in at least ten different realities being in action at the same time, and accepts that an object can exists on different levels/dimensions of reality simultaneously despite possible attendant contradictions or conflicts. “Different levels of reality” in the trans-disciplinary context refers to a set of complex structures that are invariant regarding the action of certain general laws. Two levels of reality are known as different according to Nicolescu (2000), if, during the passage from one to the other, there is a break in the laws and in fundamental concepts such as time, space, causality, logic, and existence. Each of the ten realities along the three levels is characterized by its incompleteness; yet, together, in unity, these realities generate new, infinite knowledge (Nicolescu, 2006). Also, no level of reality constitutes a privileged place from where one can understand all other levels of reality. A level of reality exists or is established because all the other levels exist at the same time (Nicolescu, 2005) even if they are unnoticeable. Thus, the numerous levels/dimensions of reality reflect the different structures or layers of a single reality. Based on the conception of different levels of reality and the processes characterizing the movement/transition between them, Nicolescu (2005) suggests that the trans-disciplinary approach reunites both reductionism and non-reductionism. Through the concepts of the "Hidden third" and the "logic of the included middle" the continuous interconnectedness of reality is restored and the logic of trans-disciplinarity and complexity is defined. It is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1390 grounded in the characteristics of energy and consequently applies to all real phenomena, processes, and entities and mainly applies to a reality of dualities or dichotomies (Brenner, 2007). It enables communication and mediation between the contradictory rational principles that characterize different levels of reality/information and the perceptions that underlie individual views of the levels of reality. And through an iterative process, it enables us to move between different realities or areas of knowledge in a coherent manner and to generate a new "simplicity". The Hidden Third, which restores the continuous interconnectedness of reality, forms a bridge between different levels/dimensions of reality and a person’s perceptions of them. Thus, the spiritual, psychical, biological, and physical levels are united through the Hidden Third. As such they serve as a solid basis for ending human fragmentation. It essentially suggests that human beings can potentially exist in multiple realities. This corresponds with Peirce's (1966) view of the human being as the only being in the universe which can conceive an infinite variety of possible worlds and simultaneously inhabit different levels of reality. It also corresponds with the idea of unity between a human being and the universe, as reflected in Sri Nisagargadatta Maharaj saying: When I say “I am.” I do not mean a separate entity with a body as its nucleus. I mean the totality of being, the ocean of consciousness, the entire universe of all that is and knows." To illustrate the resistance inherent in perspective shifting when moving from one reality to another and connecting with unfamiliar or rival modes of thinking and view points, transdisciplinarity talks about the "zone of non-resistence" which is a place, state, or process in which people become open to other perspectives, ideologies, value premises, and belief systems, and basically letting go of aspects of how they currently know the world. This zone resists our current way of knowing and seeing the world, and thus acts as a catalyst for shifts in and emergence of new perspectives. The zone of non-resistance challenges our understanding of the development and existential effects of the human being beyond the merely physical-material presence/being, to include both mental and spiritual characteristics. Thus, trans-disciplinarity does not restrict itself to exclusively material or physical concepts. Rather, it recognizes the limits of human knowledge and the need to deal with uncertainties, non-locality, and the transcendent and trance-sensory/sensual aspects of human experience. It is open to relate to the existence of the invisible, untouchable, the unexpected, and the unforeseeable. It also abandons the separatist view of human beings as separate from the world and information around them through a mental and spiritual discourse where meaning making is essential, and searches for an integrated approach in the exploration of experiencing the world as mysterious, unperceivable, and transcending beyond our wisdom. This framework then supports Kant's view (in Carter, 2002) that in order to build on cosmic models science would need to be driven into the transcendental realm. Trans-disciplinarity therefore reflects a dynamic relationship with an experience of ubiquitous absolute consciousness (Combs, 2004; Gebser, 1985; Grof & Grof, 1990). Trans-disciplinarity then embraces also epistemological pluralism, which restores the sacred to the scientific worldview. It recognizes the limits of human knowledge and the need to deal with uncertainties, non-locality, and the transcendent and trans-sensory/-sensual aspects of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1391 human experience. It deeply respects yet cuts across the various fields of knowledge, institutional boundaries, cultural borders, and religious and spiritual traditions that frame our intellectual, insightful, and methodological view of the world. Therefore, it is also open to relating to the existence of the invisible and the unexpected. Believing that information is present in all things, not only human beings (Laszlo, 2009), trans-disciplinarity is conceived as a theoretical concept and action-oriented paradigm that describes and explains patterns of scientific co-operation and problem-solving. Laszlo (2004) even maintains that an integral science of trans-disciplinary scope constitutes a scientific revolution, shifting its worldview from a view of unified theories of physics or at best, theories of every physical thing, towards an integral science that promises to be a science of physical, biological, and psychological “things.” In fact, what the trans-disciplinary framework represents is harmony between the various fields of knowledge, namely all forms of knowledge, the intuitive and cosmic combined. Trans-disciplinarity also connects "outer" knowledge and "inner being" knowledge, such as inspirational, intuitive, interpretative knowledge in the belief that this unity is feasible and intelligible. As such, it accepts Heisenberg's (1962) appreciation of intuition and intuitive knowledge, viewing them as the only type of thinking that can bridge the existing gaps between known and novel concepts. In other words, trans-disciplinarity allows us to see the inherent integration between the rational knowledge of scientific empiricism and the inner, less-visible, knowledge of spiritual experience. It both enables and requires that beside sensory experience and its empiricism and mental experience and its rationalism, spiritual experience and mysticism and spiritual practices and their experiential exploration (data), should also be regarded as a natural component of universal knowledge. In this context Despre, Brais, & Avellan (in Klein, 2004) advise us that scientific knowledge alone cannot inform the process of solving complex problems with strong elements of uncertainty and contextuality — but rather that influential, ethical, and aesthetic forms of knowledge are also involved. Trans-disciplinarity is therefore a framework of complementarity in which two seemingly contradictory views and dimensions of reality can both be equally true and valid as long as the conditions for apprehending the two different views do not overlap. It thus allows us to move beyond dichotomized thinking, into the space that lies beyond. Grounded in an integrative or united scientific worldview and complex system theory, trans-disciplinarity, similarly to the holographic view, represents a paradigmatic shift from parts to whole and from an entirely reductionist and mechanistic approach to a holistic, organismic, emergent, or evolutionist one. It replaces the exclusive reliance on linearity and deterministic processes with non-linear and chaotic processes grounded in systems thinking of complexity, networks, and hierarchic order. It moves away from the almost irrational belief in the objectivity of a science detached from human beings and is replaced by a contextual, participatory, and interactionist information view of reality, implying also that reality depends on us” because “we are part of the movement of reality” (Nicolescu, 2008b, p. 15). This worldview also aligns with Bohm's view of the universe as a whole, with all its particles, including human beings, and the conception of an indivisible, dynamic whole in which classification into separately and independently existing parts has actually no fundamental ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1392 status, and where energy/matter/space/time/and information are deeply intertwined and cannot be considered independent (Bohm, 1993; Nicolescu, 2008). It is also consistent with the holographic view of a reciprocal enfolding and unfolding of patterns of information where all potential information regarding the universe is holographically encoded in the spectrum of frequency patterns that constantly attach us. However, compared to the holographic paradigm, its added value as a basis for conceptualizing consciousness lies in its conception of the existence, functions and structures of the epistemological and axiological dimensions of the universe. In particular, it goes to the roots of knowledge, our way of thinking, and our construction and organization of diverse kinds of knowledge. Even more importantly, it stresses the integration of the knower in the process of knowing and the synergetic interaction with the different levels of reality. These epistemological attributes represent the concept of an intelligent or cognitive participatory universe using a less abstract conception and terminology than the holographic worldview, and thus reflect the idea suggested by Wheeler (1990) and later supported by Chalmers (1995b) that information, not matter, is the most fundamental building block of the universe and that the universe's intellect/mind/or information can and needs to be embodied, reflected, in and through matter. The following sections discuss the implications of the holographic and trans-disciplinary worldview for our understanding of consciousness. We will start with a general discussion of the basic assumptions concerning the nature of consciousness and later specify its most basic, crucial ingredients, their nature, structure, roles and functions. Holographic Trans-disciplinary framework and Consciousness Based on this combined holographic and trans-disciplinary framework which conceptualizes the human being as a knowing-becoming-acting-valuing object-subject individual hologram of the holographic universe rather than external and superior to it, all the rules of the universe apply to us humans. In other words, human beings are perceivers of the quantum universe, receivers of the information radiating from the holographic universe, transmitters of information radiating from their own holographic nature, and participants in the evolution of the cognitive / intelligent universe. As such a human being is considered both a whole and a part, both a wave and a particle, and human consciousness can be regarded as both a structure and a system, a state and a process, a means and an end, an experience ("subjective") and information ("objective"), having both intrinsic and extrinsic orders, components, and layers as well as local and non local manifestations. In other words, if the bodies of us humans are three-dimensional, this proposed framework suggests that our consciousness is not threedimensional, but multidimensional. Indeed, when William James (1909/1977) introduced the concept of a field of consciousness into modern psychology, he believed that normal waking consciousness in humans is but one special type of consciousness and that no account of the universe in its totality can be final if it disregards other potential forms of consciousness. Moreover, his symbolic conclusion that ‘we are like islands in the sea—separate on the surface but connected in the deep’ can be considered a different way of expressing the idea of implicate- explicate order relationship embedded in the united conceptualization of the combined holographic and trans-disciplinary ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1393 worldview. This same idea is also supported by Stapp (1995), who argued that the fundamental process of nature lies outside space-time but generates events that can be located in space-time. It is also expressed in Goswami's (2008) belief that the universe exists as formless potential in myriad possible branches within the transcendent domain and only becomes evident when observed by conscious beings. And clearly it also expresses the ideas of quantum connectedness and quantum entanglement noting that we are forever entangled with our individual quantum holograms and the hologram of the universe. Indeed, the application of the holographic trans-disciplinary framework/worldview to the conceptualization of human consciousness suggests that human consciousness is an inherent part of the universe, a dynamic knowing system that cannot function without the 'Universal Consciousness', even though we may be unaware that this Universal Consciousness exists. No wonder then that the various disciplines’ literature associates human consciousness with such concepts as the “'quantum mind'; “universal mind”; “universal reality”, “universal field of intelligence”, and “transcended consciousness”. These concepts all actually link the evolution of human consciousness with the evolution of the universe as a whole. Moreover, the holographic-trans-disciplinary view sees human consciousness as having both physical and metaphysical manifestations which are subject to both internal and external influences and can potentially lead human beings to manipulate their own state of consciousness and ultimately bring about their own and the universe’s evolutionary development. That is, having both local and non-local expressions of operating/processing/experiencing, this approach emphasizes the fact that human consciousness not only affects human survival and development, but also that of nature, in other words, the survival and evolution of the universe. When applying the holographic-trans-disciplinary conceptualization to human organs, for example, the brain, we cannot conceptualize consciousness as a brain biochemistry byproduct, but rather as a fundamental "nonphysical" experience/force/system/energy/ field of information which is expressed via biological chemical and physical processes. Or to paraphrase Pribram (2004): the medium is not the message. The idea that a human being is a becoming-knowing-emitting/activating-valuing subject-object, a hologram, within a transdisciplinary holographic universe, coupled with the implied holographic nature of the human's organs, also suggests that human consciousness engages in local as well as non-local activity at different levels/dimensions of reality. Indeed, the holonomic brain theory suggested by Pribram (1997) indicates that the neural impulses are only relaying information from one part of the brain to another, whereas the actual processing of information occurs in the spectral domain of energy frequency—outside space and time. He further maintains that brain processes and psychological processes are different aspects of a more basic process. These ideas are aligned with the holographic nature of the universe, indicating that the underlying fabric of the physical systems contains information originating in the implicate order which exists beyond space and time. Undeniably, research evidence relating to the non-locality of consciousness has also been demonstrated in studies showing that people who are emotionally attuned can remotely synchronize their brain waves. Moreover, considerable empirical proof of remote viewing and precognition has been found (see; Bem, 2011; Broderick, 2007; Radin, 1997a/b; 2004; Targ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1394 & Puthoff, 1974). This includes experiments in human-machine interaction which demonstrate the ability of people to affect the performance of random physical systems in accordance with pre-stated intentions (Jahn & Dunne, 2000; 2011). Additionally, evidence from mind-body medicine studies shows the ability of mental images, thought, and conscious intentions generated by the mind and directed to specific parts of the body, to produce profound physiological changes (Benor, 1990; Rein, 1992; Plante & Thoresen, 2007). The integrative nature of this framework combining the assumptions, structure and principles underlying both the trans-disciplinarity and holographic worldviews, relates to ontological issues but no less important also to epistemological issues. Therefore beyond the structural nature of the holographic 'world within worlds' and the holographic principle characterizing implicate-explicate order, the framework also reflects the relationships between the nature of the forms, meaning, and values corresponding to the different levels/dimensions of reality. Thus, having defined the existence of the zone of non-resistance, namely, the transcended or sacred zone, it actually points to the essential "survival" – consciousness foundation – of all other surfaces/dimensions. It also implies that consciousness is not neutral but rather valueladen (Edelman, 2004). And it is at that level of knowledge, the interaction with the various potentialities, which defines the processes of information interpretation and elaboration, that human being can realize their personal desires, hopes, and choices — in other words: exercise their free will (Stapp, 1997) when moving from the implicate to the explicate. That is, while information/intelligence/mind interpenetrates the universe, it needs appropriate physical structures to be embodied. Consciousness – Reversing and reconsidering the systems In contrast to the holographic-trans-disciplinary framework of consciousness, the conception of consciousness according to the classical mechanistic perspective of science is unidimensional and superficial, But the worst thing it does is to reverse and place the wrong emphasis on the systems involved, so that the secondary becomes the primary (information is distinguished from and takes precedence over experience); the marginal becomes central (focus on parts rather than wholes); the means become the end (techniques/procedures rather than interpretation); structure is emphasized over function; the local ignores the non local, the external replaces the internal (visible explicit and causal replace implicit, tacit, and synergetic), and the cognitive/thought and rational dimensions surpass emotions, intentions, and attitudes. Consequently, we mainly contemplate the external (objective) manifestations of consciousness and fail to nurture and overlook the need to be aware of the intrinsic (subjective) nature of human consciousness and its development. We equate existence with 'being real' rather than accepting the idea that it is possible for something to exist and still be unreal (Levin, 2011). Furthermore, we consider meaning as separate from experience and form and regard meaning and values as separate and independent entities rather than viewing consciousness as a meaningful process which is also value-laden. We cling to what feels certain but neglect to believe in the potential capacity for personal possibility. We honor authoritative habits of mind which supplant belief with individual free will. By concentrating solely on the body and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1395 brain we disregard the central role of the spirit and soul. Emphasizing what is formally “known” and consensual leads us to ignore the creative, intuitive, and experiential; and focusing on the personal ego, causes us not to see, and to alienate the existence of others, and the world around us. To reverse this upside-down state or suggest a holistic and integrative perspective calls for no less than an utter transformation of worldview. Human consciousness The theoretical collaboration between trans-disciplinarity and the holographic worldview sees universal consciousness as a fundamental part of reality/the universe that complements physical potentialities and brings them to actual physical states. According to this view, human consciousness is an invaluable mental /emotional/ experiential human resource/ state / process of knowing that enable both human beings and the universe to survive, find equilibrium, and grow. Viewed as an autopoietic (self-creating) system, human consciousness may be considered a unity involving the coexistence of dynamic states and/or emergent processes, which include three major complementary components: 1. The sub-conscious — relates to the mental / emotional information or experiences of which we are unaware, that mainly consist of memories (generational and incarnational) and their interdependent by-products and influences (Reber, 1992; Grof, 1993); 2. The conscious — which refers to the mental / emotional / experiential events or information/knowledge that we are aware of and that we are aware that we are aware of. This component is influenced by and influences cultural, social, and educational experiences, and experiences in our personal present. It is sometimes referred to as “ego consciousness” or simply 'ego' (Jung, 1934/67; Grof, 1993); and 3. The higher-consciousness or super-subconscious — comprised of our pure mental / emotional / experiential identity beliefs and/or intentions. This component is embedded in and reflects one's unique self, uncontaminated by external or internal circumstances and experiences. This is the transpersonal or transcendental component of consciousness, connecting human consciousness with the universal mind, and reflecting the underlying value or pure meaning associated with a given mental /emotional/ experiential being, event or process (Jung, 1934/67; Assagioli, 1993; Grof, 1993). Consciousness, therefore, contains personal and transpersonal parts, each of which has specific characteristics. The aforementioned three components are not merely three distinct types of conscious experience. Rather they are intrinsically intertwined and manifestations of a single, whole, integrated system. The three parts can therefore proceed in parallel and could be viewed phenomenologically as the unified components of a single stream. A person’s state of consciousness is in fact characterized by the nature and degree of balance among the three components. In other words, the three components of consciousness, the three types of existence/experience/information/energy are facets of a single, unified, structurally complex, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1396 dynamic, self-organizing system. It is an integrative system – a 'space-time' system, defined by its unity. It builds on and functions on both inside/inward-outside /outward 'space' system processes, and a backward-forward 'time' system's view—which both represent and influence different modes of thinking, feeling, and behaving. This conception of the contextual nature of human consciousness is consistent with Einstein's view that: "Time and space are modes by which we think and not conditions in which we live“, and with Kant's argument that time and space are not inherent qualities of the physical world but rather a reflection of how the mind operates. It also reminds us of Popper and Eccles's (1977) view of conscious experience as the result of interactions among three worlds: the brain, culture, and mentation. In this partnership between explicit (personal) and implicit/tacit (transpersonal) consciousness components, which exists within a holographic trans-disciplinary framework, the implicit/transpersonal components are fundamental and vital to the evolution and expression of the explicit and reflect subconscious states/processes that are less directly controlled by personal qualities and routine experiences, and not automatically affected by short-term, cognitive, emotional, behavior-driven events in the present. To a large extent, we actually "live" in our subconscious, and it is our subconscious which is responsible for our mental “acrobatics” (Velmans, 1991; Harman, 1993; Libet, 2006). Our consciousness is an echo of sorts, an amplification system which the subconscious can call on at will. Whitehead's (1978) view supports this idea, noting that during conscious acts/states, recollection or subjective memory occurs which can recall earlier times from the blurred recesses/breaks in the subconscious. We are thus conscious of only a tiny fraction of what surrounds us. This conscious-subconscious relationship could be analogically equivalent to Polyani’s (1966/2009) focal-tacit knowledge relationships reflecting the idea that “tacit knowledge,” whose origins and essential epistemic contents are not part of ordinary consciousness, assists in accomplishing a task in focus, and functions continuously as background knowledge because it is more fundamental. Namely, all knowledge is either tacit or rooted in tacit knowledge and therefore the focal and tacit knowledge dimensions are complementary. In other words, the subconscious-conscious relationship like tacit-focal knowledge relationship expresses a sort of implicate-explicate order, namely a developmental process moving from the covert to the overt and from the vague to the specific. Furthermore, human consciousness is not only affected by past memories but also by its unique transcendental self – the higher self or the higher sub-consciousness – which is non-local and belongs to the “conscious” universe, the "conscious mind," or to universal/collective subconscious (Jung, 1959). Therefore the super/higher-subconscious is the doorway for accessing the universal level of consciousness. Research evidence supports the proposed conceptualization of human consciousness with both experimental and phenomenological studies. For example, studies of people under hypnosis and undergoing past life regression (Bowers, 1990; Holroyd, 2003) show that they exhibit lively ideas, beliefs, emotions, attitudes, and behaviours relating to a different level of reality. In the case of past life regression, although the person’s experiences relate to either their generational or incarnational past, in both cases, a sub-conscious dimension is involved. In addition, studies of meditational states with varying contents and depths of the meditative ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1397 experience are also likely to involve a purer, cleaner self than the self under non-meditative conditions since the meditating self has transcended and accessed the higher self or supersubconscious (Grof, 1993). And as stated earlier, laboratory experimental studies provide evidence on the capability of human beings to affect through mental concentration alone physical systems the way certain kinds of machines operate (Dunne & Jahn, 1992). In each of these cases (hypnosis or meditation) the people, as cosmic beings, transmit/receive energies of different frequencies. Therefore when considering research, it should be possible to quantitatively detect the different energy frequencies that characterize each state of consciousness. Moreover, it should also be possible to explore the differences between the frequencies, wavelengths, and strengths that differentiate the subconscious, conscious, and higher subconscious components of human consciousness. This would help us to quantitatively prove the overall existence, role, and evolution of the components of human consciousness and understand their nature, strength, unique role, and function. It would also provide insights into individual differences in states of consciousness that people can experience, including states of consciousness in certain mental illnesses. Finally, we are likely to be able to mathematically formulate the type and amount of energy characterizing each component of the human consciousness. Nevertheless, even in the absence of this quantitative data to describe the strength or type of energy emitted/received by each type of consciousness at the present time, the central and dominant role of the sub-conscious states compared to the conscious state has been argued and supported theoretically by Helmholtz & Kihlstrom (1984); Kihlstrom (2007, 1984), and Jung (1967), each with his individual view of the subconscious, and their models/theories could thus become an important guide for future insights and further research directions and designs. The following sections will more specifically delineate the conceptualization of the elements, structures, information, processes, and relationships involved in the proposed conceptualization of the human consciousness. The implicit/hidden and explicit layers of human consciousness As active participants in the evolution of the holographic trans-disciplinary universe, human beings constantly respond to and transform their surroundings. They also carry the same characteristics of the universe which means that as organic or complex wholes, and parts of a whole, the whole and parts, the global and local, are all so thoroughly implicated as to be indistinguishable, and that each part is both in control as well as sensitive and responsive. Thus, when relating to the various levels of reality through the holographic trans-disciplinary framework, this article suggests that the brain should be viewed as having a two-layered structure/process/system or as belonging to two different reality levels/dimensions. This means that the brain (explicit) and mind (implicit/hidden) each with its own rules, logic, and functions, both relate to the same physical system but at different levels/dimensions of reality. This is congruent with Popper’s belief that the mind and brain exist/function in two separate realities, as well as with Pribram's view of the holographic nature of the brain (1997). It also ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1398 supports Eccles’ argument (1994) that the mind controls matter rather than the other way round. It is also reminiscent of William James' (1890/1981) analogy for the brain-mind relationship: that light passing through a prism is not produced by the prism but is rather transmitted by the prism. Similarly, as Laszlo (2004) claims '"The observation that brain function is associated with consciousness does not entail that the brain creates consciousness” (p. 108). That is, the present framework argues that the function of the brain's components (explicit layer) is not to produce the mind but rather to express the experience/information/energy of the hidden layer representing the mind. This is the implicate layer, which is often unseen and unfelt, which evokes the explicit brain's components with its biophysical, biochemical transmissions. This dual "layered" or multiple world view also applies to the heart (explicit) and soul (implicit) as will be specified and addressed later in the paper. Therefore, the brain and heart are the material, biological-physical explicit “representation", whereas the mind and the soul are the non-material, meta-physical, spiritual, implicate “representation.” The physiological elements not only interact with the underlying non-material/metaphysical experience/information/energy component—the brain with the mind + the heart with the soul—they are also in fact expressions or manifestation of the implicate layer, as noted by Max Planck who claimed that matter should be regarded as a derivative of consciousness (quoted in The Observer (25 January 1931)). It also agrees with Primas (2009) and Pauli's (1994, p.260) view maintaining that since the mental and the material domain are governed by common ordering principles, they should therefore be understood as “complementary aspects of the same reality”. Whereas traditionally the mind and soul are described in psychological and philosophical terms and the brain and heart are described in neuro-biological, neuro-cardiological and medical terms, according to the holographic trans-disciplinary holistic scientific framework, the brain and mind and the heart and soul are not dualities. Rather they are descriptions/manifestations/expressions of different layers/levels/dimensions of the same system. Establishing the relationships between these descriptions poses a great scientific challenge, though it is also quite feasible. The underlying concept of this proposed scientific framework is that each pair (mind-brain and heart-soul) forms a whole which cannot be analyzed but must be addressed using a different order of explanation — the order of the implicate and explicate. This explanation is compatible with the ontological analysis of quantum theory which proposes that quantum processes are guided by information, and that it is this active information, which aims toward in-formation, that operates on both the physical (brain and heart as matters) and metaphysical entities (mind and soul expressions). Therefore a change of information and meaning in the soul or mind also involves a change in the actual being/operating/experiencing of the body. The present proposed framework, then, no longer identifies reality with the physical universe or solely associates the human being with a physical being. This is because mind, soul, and consciousness belong to the unseen subtle metaphysical level of reality and constitute the fundamental implicate order that manifests in the explicate or the physical. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1399 We can equate the implicate and explicate layers of human consciousness with Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s (1970) idea when he wrote that, to differing degrees, everything has both a “within” and a “without.” The “within-without” relationship is expressed in the following saying, focusing on the primary influence of the inner-subtle parts of consciousness: "We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience”. Regarding the 'within' as consciousness he believed that the meaning of the coexistence of the “within” and the “without” is such that the “within” not only affect but is also being affected by the 'without', thus implying that these relationships are synergetic and could be both local and nonlocal. Heart-Brain /Soul-Mind Dialogues According to Kihlstrom (1997) consciousness links beliefs (perceptions, memory, thoughts), feelings, and desires, as well as mental representations of the self as the agent or stimulus of an event/experience. It is therefore reasonable to suggest that consciousness processes, as non physical /non material processes, are not just a matter of neuroscience but also a basic matter of neuro-cardiology, namely of the heart. A similar conclusion was reached by Pearce (2001), who noted that it is the dynamic interaction of the head brain (intellect) and heart brain (intelligence), of biology and spirit, which allows transcendence from one evolutionary place to the next. Indeed for centuries, the heart has been considered the source of emotion, courage, and wisdom, a source of energy and deep emotion which activates our deepest values, transforming them from something we think about to what we live (Cooper & Sawaf,1997). Furthermore, the heart according to Lacey and Lacey (1978) communicates with the brain in ways that significantly affect how we perceive and react to the world and can also affect a person’s behavior. It is thus suggested that the heart and brain act synergistically as coexisting factors, interacting to produce a compounding effect, in which the biological heart and brain are the physical (mechanical) basis of consciousness, whereas the soul and the mind, respectively, are the subtle, mental-spiritual basis. The idea that the heart is the center of a person’s psychology is considered a revolution in our understanding of consciousness and the self (Pearsall 1998). Nevertheless there are ample data to substantiate it. It is argued that the heart is the largest source of biophysical energy in the body and in our psychological life (Armour & Ardell, 1994; McCraty et al., 1998). The heart possesses its own intrinsic nervous system that operates and transmits complex patterns of neurological and hormonal pressure and electromagnetic information to the brain and body. And even more basically, the heart, having a “mind” of its own, plays a role in the experience of emotions and feeling, a person’s will, and in learning, knowing, and healing (Russek & Schwartz, 1994; Pearsall, 1998; Armour & Ardell, 2004; McCraty et al, 2009). The heart is thus regarded as having a secret life, intricately connected to a person’s feelings, thoughts and desires. Indeed, based on different experiments, studies show (Sandman et al., 1982; Rau et al, 1993; McCraty, 2003: McCraty et al, 2004; McCraty & Tomasio, 2006) that the heart is the most sensitive organ to emotional states; that the heart rate increases or decreases following shifts ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1400 in attention and conscious awareness, and more generally, that the heart has its own form of intelligence, independent of the brain, and that it can perceive internal and external stimuli and react independently to the outside world. Also, the heart seems to communicate “an infoenergetic code” which is conveyed through thousands of miles of blood and other vessels and 75 trillion cells belonging to the heart and circulatory system. Moreover, the studies also suggest that the energetic interactions between the heart and brain play an important role in psycho-physiological processes the heart can learn without “the conscious mind” knowing. Additional set of studies by McCraty et al (2009), for example, demonstrates that the heart plays a major role in capturing impressions of non-local information and sending them to the brain. The heart is therefore not just a pump, but to paraphrase McCraty (2009, p.40): "with each beat, the heart not only pumps blood, but also continually transmits dynamic patterns of neurological, hormonal, pressure, and electromagnetic information to the brain and throughout the body". Focusing more on the heart's “intelligence” Cooper and Sawaf (1997) argue that the heart is not only a pump, but more than that since it knows things our minds cannot and do not know. Moreover the heart possesses an intricate neural network, and its energy field appears capable of sensing events before they actually happen. Furthermore, recent neuro-science findings demonstrate that although both the brain and the heart access non-local information, the heart receives some of that information before the brain. These examples of findings suggest that there is a very strong feedback mechanism between the brain and the heart involving the control and awareness of emotions. Additionally, as noted by McCraty et al (2009), it is generally accepted that the afferent neurological signals that the heart sends to the brain have a regulatory effect on many of the ANS (automatic nervous system) signals that flow from the brain to the heart, the blood vessels, and the other glands and organs. Moreover, there is also evidence that the heart's input, depending on its nature, either facilitates or inhibits working memory and attention, cortical processes, cognitive functions, and performance. Therefore, since the communication of energetic information in biological systems is best understood in terms of the information processing principles of holographic theory (Pribram, 1991; Pribram & Bradley, 1998), the holographic trans-disciplinary framework proposes that consciousness involves a two-way dialogue between the heart and the brain in which the heart and the brain act synergistically as coexisting factors, which interact to produce a compounding effect. Metaphorically it could be exemplified as the two electrical parts of a bulb which can only produce light when operating together. The brain therefore seems a necessary but insufficient condition alone for the occurrence of a conscious/mental state. According to Armour and Ardell (2004) among others, the heart has its own intrinsic nervous system that operates and processes information independently of the brain or nervous system. This is what allows a heart transplant to work, because usually the heart communicates with the brain via nerve fibers running through the vagus. However, during a heart transplant, these nerve connections do not reconnect for an extended period of time, if at all, and nevertheless the transplanted heart is able to function in its new host through intact capacities and an intrinsic nervous system. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1401 Furthermore, according to McCraty et al (2004a, b), not only the brain but the heart too holographically encodes and distributes energetic information. And there is compelling evidence to suggest that the heart’s energy field is coupled to an information field that is not bound by the limits of time and space. Evidence for this was found in a rigorous experimental study by McCraty et al (2004a, b) which explored the proposition that the body receives and processes information about a future event before the event actually happens. The study’s results provide astonishing data showing that both the heart and brain appear to receive and respond to information regarding a future event. However the evidence also shows that the heart appears to receive intuitive information before the brain. In addition, we also find evidence that the energetic patterns generated by one's heart are not only detectable in ones' own brain waves, but that the energetic information in the heart waves of one person can also be detectable in the brain waves of another when they touch (Song, Schwartz, & Russek, 1998). When viewing the heart-brain dialogue within the holographic trans-disciplinary framework, it is important to realize that neither the brain activities nor the heart produce mental operations. The biological heart and brain are the physical or mechanical foundation of consciousness, whereas the soul and the mind are the mental-spiritual basis, and it is the mental or tacit that manifests in the explicit—the “within” that is expressed through physically and potentially visible operations. In other words, beneath the biological, chemical, and physical operations lie unseen, hidden-invisible, subtle, covert, psychological and spiritual, mind-type and soul-type energies/information/experiences that enfold and unfold explicit manifestations of consciousness. Thus, the tacit experiences/information/ energies are expressed through (by using) different physiological neurological, biochemical types of operations or processes. Multiple research evidence demonstrates that consciousness involves both heart and brain processes, that both the implicit and explicit "levels/dimensions of reality" and various relationships between the components of consciousness, participate in creating a defined state of consciousness. The set of studies known as Near Death Experience (NDE); Out of body Experience (OBE) or After Death Experience (ADE) describes and analyzes the perceptions reported by people who were declared clinically dead and revived (examples: Newberg & D'Aquili, 1994; Lawrence, 1997; Ring & Cooper, 1997; Alvarado, 2000; Metzinger, 2005). In these experiences, with both blind and sighted populations, the results show that patients were able to report on events that happened while their brains were not functioning, describing in detail events that were happening when they were clearly comatose or even clinically brain dead. These results support the idea that some form of consciousness exists on an entirely different level/dimension of reality, thereby communicating with universal information/energies that we refer to as “higher sub-consciousness”, and that this consciousness component/state is not localized in the brain nor bounded by neither time nor space. This relates also to the view put forward by Sheldrake (2003) regarding consciousness, or mind, as an information field that extends far beyond the brain to wherever our attention goes. Similarly, studies of long-term comatose patients who were revived reveal that they could report every detail of what happened in their surroundings, and even further afield events ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1402 relating to family members, even though they were clinically defined as unconscious. This also demonstrates that the mind and soul can continue to work even though the brain is impaired and barely functioning (Sabom, 1982: Greyson & Flynn, 1984). Furthermore, the research data reveal that after NDEs or relatively extended periods of unconsciousness, subjects often report long-term after-effects. They express changes in worldview, show an increased interest in spirituality and the meaning of life, have greater empathic understanding and a reduced fear of death (Greyson, 1983, 1998; Lommel et.al, 2001). These results suggest that a becoming-knowing-acting-valuing holographic subject-object has undergone a consciousness evolution when being in a consciousness state within different levels/dimensions of reality. This could also relate to the phenomenon termed by Wilber (2000) "integral therapy" occurring between the individual and the exterior domains – namely the universe. The Heart the Soul and the Genetic code Heart and Soul Unlike many of the models, theories, and frameworks that conceptualize consciousness focusing mainly on the brain-mind relationship, the holographic-trans-disciplinary framework emphasizes the unique functions and roles of the heart-soul relation and their effect on states of consciousness, subjective space, and the nature of the universe. Based on its characteristics and implications for the human being's holographic subject-object, this framework suggests that the heart, like the brain, has both tacit and explicit layers. This means that the heart and its tacit layer – the soul – is the human being’s primary identity energy centre which is associated with the essence of the individual. It is the innermost and core part of the human being and represents our “true self”, the phenomenal locus of identity (Metzinger, 2005). Indeed, most cultures consider the heart as the location of the soul, the “center” of the human body. The soul is seen as the moral and emotional core of a person, responsible for the guidance of people’s behavior and performs such psychological functions as feeling, thinking, memory, and wishes. Moreover, the heart, unlike the brain, contains and conveys information and energy that constitutes the essence of who we are, our true self, our soul, and the unique individual code – the self-identity of the individual (Hurtak; 1977; Zukav, 1989). Thus, as Pearsall (1998) maintains, the heart actually conveys the code that represents the essence of our individuality – who we are – the individual's unique identity. This implies that we can say that human beings do not have a soul but rather that the human being is actually a soul. The remarkable stories of heart transplant recipients bear testimony to these “secrets” of the heart, soul, and unique, individual, self-identity. For example, findings of heart transplantation research have shown that quite soon after heart transplantation, patients’ basic identity characteristics start to change. Although one could hypothesize that this is because living cells possess "memories," this explanation seem unsatisfactory since in the field of transplantation the heart is the only organ that affects the person's nature or selfhood. Thus, if we take heart transplant and rejection transplant studies and combine them with the idea suggested by Jung (1967,), James (1902/1961), Maslow (1971), Erikson (1980), Rogers (1980) and Grof & Grof (1990) that a human being has a spiritual identity in addition to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1403 his/her physiological-mental identity, then one could argue that the heart is not just the biological heart, the biological organ, but rather the seat of the metaphysical or spiritual self, the seat of its unique identity (Zukav, 1989). More precisely, the heart unlike any other bodily organ is the seat of the root of the soul which seems to embrace the unique spiritual/hidden/tacit identity of the individual, whereas any other human organ includes soul tailored energy/particles that are specific to each organ. Furthermore, if the human being is conceptualized as a mini-universe, we can suggest that we should regard the root of the soul in the “part-whole” relationship within the heart and within the context of the becoming-knowing-acting-valuing universe and human being, as the basic and deepest implicate level/dimension/surface of the holographic being and holographic heart. In other words, we should view the root of the soul as a part that affects all the particles/sparks/energies of the soul, but also as a “whole" (the root soul) in the "part" (the heart), representing the deepest, sacred level of identity expressing the human being's pure potential self or pure identity, which gives every human being their unique and specific potential character. Analogically to the brain, which affects and controls the body parts, the root of the soul also influences all the soul's particles/energies, wherever they reside in the human subtle body/being. The root of the soul can thus be viewed as a sacred spark or central source of individual light/energy that helps regulate human consciousness and connects and unites the human consciousness to the universal mind. That is, it connects human consciousness to the universe through its higher sub-consciousness component. It is the deepest part of the human soul, its deepest nature and essence. Thus, if we combine the holographic-trans-disciplinary theoretical framework with its conception of human consciousness as affected by inwardoutward and past and future interactions with Pearsall (1998) and Hurtak’s (1977) ideas on the heart code, it can be suggested that the root of the soul carries a particular/specific spark/information/energy that accompanies the human being throughout his/her life cycles. Therefore, the spiritual core, the soul root contains identity quantum potential characteristics that are carried by the spiritual code and consist of deep and meaningful memories of personal history, and one’s incarnational history and evolution. This information which collates the personal experiences from a person's lifetime cycles could be viewed as analogous to Jung's (1967) idea of the collective unconsciousness representing the universal inheritance of all human beings. It is thus suggested that in any conscious or unconscious process, the root of the soul mediates between the heart, the brain, and the universe. The Spiritual Genetic Code — Soul and Heart Our self identity expressing the essence of who we are means that the human being carries a set of genetic instructions, that is, a code or blueprint which sets out the individual’s potential and operates simultaneously and constantly at different levels/dimensions of reality. Indeed the existence of a genetic code in body cells was established through the discovery of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). However, to be consistent with the view of the human being as a mini-universe – a holographic knowing-becoming-experiencing-valuing subject-object - we ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1404 also need to conceptualize/consider the possible existence of another layer of the DNA a subtler layer of the DNA. In other words, the holographic trans-disciplinary framework and its embedded principles that the implicate manifests in the explicate and that mind and matter are complementary suggests that the nature of the unique identity of a human being's genetic code should also be expressed as two interrelated layers: the spiritual/meta-physical representing the spiritual genetic code and the biological presenting the material/physical code. The suggested spiritual genetic code relates to human preferences, likes, dislikes, propensities, fears, innermost feelings, etc. – in other words, the unique potential nature of human self identity: the human spiritual essence. In other words, viewed from the twin perspectives of different levels/dimensions of reality, the integrated/complementary genetic code can be conceived as the core identity quantum potential of the human being, which is built on both the spiritual/metaphysical and physicalmental dimensions/layers/orders of the universe/human being. This conclusion is consistent with Miller and Webb’s (1973) idea that DNA carries the whole structure of a human being – that is not just its physical form, but also the processes affecting its spiritual survival. Whereas science has discovered that DNA determines and carries the human physical-mental code, it has yet to systematically unveil the human meta-physical/ spiritual code. Indeed studies have already came up with evidence concerning the quantum subtle energy phenomenon in our genetic makeup (Rattemeyer et al, 1981: Garjajev & Ohno & Ohno, 1986; Dossey, 1991; Garjajev et al, 1992; Poponin, 1995; Rein, 1996; Fosar & Bludorf, 2003). That is, the findings strengthen the idea that the human being genetic code has a spiritual layer, suggesting that the DNA acts as a transducer converting subtle energy into conventional electromagnetic energy which is then radiated from the DNA to produce a variety of intracellular events at the biochemical level. The studies exploring the vibrational behavior of the DNA also show that over and above its biochemical function as a protein producer, the human DNA acts as a complex electronic biological internet that communicates with its environment, it oscillates coherently and response to ordinary electromagnetic fields. More specifically, the studies also show that: 1. DNA and particularly non-coding DNA, often referred to as junk DNA or infinite potential DNA, can be expressed, influenced, and written through vibrational interference and can be influenced and programmed by words, thoughts, music, feelings, patterns, and frequencies; 2. living chromosomes function as a holographic computer using endogenous DNA laser radiation, thus implying that, through its chromosomes, DNA is capable of altering its natural laser coherent radiation, being transformed into coherent radio (sound) wavelengths, and sending information capable of affecting a distant organism; 3. the presence of DNA affects light photons even once it is withdrawn – the “phantom effect” and, 4. DNA can create patterns of disturbance in a vacuum which produce magnetized wormholes. These wormholes are tunnel connections between entirely different areas of the universe through which information can be transmitted outside space and time. DNA can attract these pieces of information and transfer them to our consciousness. More generally, scientists have acquired new knowledge regarding human biology and cell science which recognizes that the environment, and more specifically, our perception and interpretation of the environment, directly controls the activity of our genes (Lipton, 2006). The conclusion is that DNA functions as a holographic projector of the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1405 psychophysical system, a quantum bio-hologram, both at the cellular level and the level of the whole organism (Miller et al, 2002). The framework of consciousness presented here thus refers to the tacit metaphysical layer of DNA, the spiritual/metaphysical genetic code, as a central component of human character. It defines the nature and essence of the pure potential of the becoming-knowing-acting-valuing holographic human being whose activities interact interdependently with different levels of reality and therefore not only affect their personal life/choices/ and processes but also the balance, survival, and evolution of the universe. In other words the spiritual genetic code is also mediated by the universe to adapt to the universe's survival needs (Miller & Webb, 1973) and, therefore, at times, the universe is likely to generate and seal into a new soul the desired profile of its spiritual character or spiritual genetic code. For the same reason, the spiritual genetic code is also actively involved, directly and indirectly, in the processes of consciousness. An individual’s nature and characteristics largely determine their ability to transcend to a super sub-consciousness and certainly to access the universal mind. Moreover, an individual’s nature and characteristics mediate the dialogue and actually form the doorway to the dialogue between the conscious and subconscious, the hidden and subtle dimensions of human consciousness. The spiritual genetic code, whether of a newly developed soul or an incarnated soul on its life cycle journey, not only resides within the root of the soul, but actually in every cell and organ and in the soul particles/sparks. This is due to its distinctive role in the life of the human being and the universe and in the holographic characteristics of DNA and as an outgrowth of its sacred nature and structure, which is the tacit dimension of DNA. This framework and the findings which points to the huge power of wave genetics support Pearsall (1998) idea of the heart code expressing the unique individual subtle identity code, expressing the human being unique history, and also Hutrak's (1977) claim that the spiritual genetic code consist of information and energies that use language codes to reflect the spiritual characteristics and values needed for the survival and evolution of the human being and the universe. This framework also provides scientific explanations to research evidence on the effects of prayer on people's health (healing) and mentalities and also why affirmations, hypnosis and healing processes can have such strong effects on humans and their bodies (Levin, 1993) . It is therefore the root of the soul and its spiritual genetic code, the “whole (genetic code) within a part” (root of the soul/each body cell), which largely determines the potential subjective nature of human consciousness. The genetic code along with the human being's educational, generational, and incarnational experiences helps regulate the subjective nature of human consciousness in conjunction with the mind, the physical properties and processes of the heart and brain, and of no less importance, the dynamic and active universe, its structure, and needs. In other words, the complex and dynamic nature of human consciousness manifested in its interactions between past present and future, and inward and outward experiences, through a dialogue between the heart and the brain, and the soul and the mind, mediated by the root of the soul, leads to adaptive intentions, experiences and behaviors that are necessarily idiosyncratic for each individual. This highlights the fact that the individual unique self influenced by the soul root and its genetic code and history (generational and incarnational) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1406 has a "point of view" which actually expresses the subjectivity baseline of consciousness. This implies that even twins would not share identical consciousness states/processes/ experiences, because although they might share similar historic experiences and physical characteristics, nevertheless, each one has its own soul and a unique spiritual genetic code. An integrative framework of consciousness The holographic trans-disciplinary framework of consciousness presented here suggests an integrative and novel view of human consciousness which conceives the human being as a “universe in miniature” or a micro-cosmos and applies the same principles to humanity and the universe alike. Based on holistic science rather than the classical mechanistic and atomistic models or the quantum mechanics paradigms exclusively, the integrative framework of consciousness describes a view of human consciousness as an inherent part of the universe that cannot function without recourse to universal consciousness, although we may not be aware that such a universal consciousness exists. It implies that human consciousness, intentions, thoughts and feelings, have a tremendous capacity to access both personal individual history and the history of the universe directly, and to become part of the sustainability and evolution of the universe and human self. This goes along with Kant's view which sees human beings not as passive experiencers of the world but as the creators of the world they experience. Accordingly, the combined characteristics of the holographic and trans-disciplinary worldviews imply that, as an expression of inner experience and regardless of the nature and level of that experience, human consciousness is both structure and system, state and process, means and end, experience, information and energy, having a metaphysical /spiritual /implicit /implicate layer and a physical/ material /explicit and / explicate layer. It is a transcendent state/process which takes human beings beyond the limits of their knowledge and experiences and places them in a wider context. The transcendent dimension offers humans a glimpse of the supreme and a feeling of being able to draw closer to the unattainable and the infinite dimension within themselves and the world around them. Building on the communication between heart and soul, brain and mind, and world around us through energetic, neurological, biophysical, and biochemically interactions, the energetic interactions stand out as the fundamental/tacit/implicate potential dimension, and reflect the strong effect that the individual's essence has on the nature of human consciousness through the soul and spiritual genetic code. This is the subjective core of the nature of human consciousness. This framework of consciousness then satisfies Chalmers' (2004) call to integrate two classes of data into a scientific framework of consciousness: first-person data or data about subjective experience, and third-person data, namely data regarding behavior and brain processes. This conceptualization is consistent with Eccle's (1991) view that human beings are spiritual beings with souls that inhabit a spiritual world and material beings with bodies and brains that inhabit a material world (p. 241), but that this does not represent a duality, but rather a unified whole. It thus transcends the idea of mind-body, spiritual-physical dualities. The conceptualization also suggests that the soul-heart relation which expresses the individual code or subjective nature of human consciousness mediates, controls, and facilitates the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1407 individual's consciousness processes and states; the brain-mind relationship; the nature and strength of human beings’ involvement in the different levels of reality, and the relationships among the elements of consciousness: the conscious, unconscious, and super-unconscious. This view then not only addresses but explains the subjective nature of consciousness known as the "hard" problem of consciousness—a challenge eagerly expected and awaited by science. From a meta-perspective, the suggested holographic and trans-disciplinary framework of consciousness is integrative and reflects the following three different and complimentary meanings of integration: collaboration, entirety, and unity. While each of these components individually provides a nuanced interpretation of integration, each independently and separately does not provide a complete description and explanation of the concept of consciousness. Only together do they present a sort of collage of different viewpoints arising from different fields of knowledge, different levels of reality, and from the deepest layers of the universe and the human individual. Only when the proposed framework of consciousness is viewed through these three complimentary lenses can we say that it presents a comprehensive, exhaustive, coherent, and balanced meaning of consciousness. The first and more conventional understanding of the proposed integrative framework is concerned with cooperation between its components and processes in a system of valuable mutual interrelationships. As such, the framework not only describes the elements that make up its structures, attributes, functions, and roles to produce an integrated whole, it also involves integrating the interrelationships among these elements. Thus it reflects the notion that the whole is different from the sum of its parts. In other words, as an integrative framework, it not only describes the parts and the sum of the parts, it also describes the dynamics between the harmonically and mutually related basic elements/parts, to construct a different whole. Furthermore, this collaborative dimension of integration reflects the nature of consciousness through the literal meaning of consciousness – knowing together – expressing the idea that through its parts and their interrelations human beings become related to each other and to the universe. The second dimension of integration in the proposed framework is its entirety. This aspect of integration relates to its totality, to ensuring that the framework includes everything needed for the conceptualization. Nothing valuable to its meaning is left out, whether a smaller feature or a larger whole, a conventional concept or a novel one, a factor visible to our senses or one that is invisible or hidden. And while the framework does not elaborate on every constituent of the brain or the heart for example (neuron, neuro-transmitter, etc), it does include them in principle when referring to the physical nature of both the brain and the heart. From a third and somewhat complimentary viewpoint, it is important to regard the unity of integration (holistic dimension) as a salient feature of the proposed integrative framework. This does not assume that the whole is built from the parts comprising its identity, but the opposite in fact. The whole is conceived as the referral object which represents/expresses its essential existence, namely, its nature and uniqueness. This means that not only is the whole not defined by its specific contents, the whole defines an essence that exists in every part. In other words, specific factors, information, experiences and outcome processes are actually ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1408 explained by the whole. This dimension of the human being which is a unity or whole represents the root of the soul and the genetic coding, both spiritual and physical. Although it is considered a part of our whole being, the root of the soul and the spiritual genetic code also express the whole, the potential of the human's real self, impressed upon each individual aspect of our spiritual/physical being. To sum up, the conceptualization of consciousness presented here as a dynamic state and emergent process of knowing-becoming-participating-valuing of a holographic subjectobject, seem to fulfill the five widely-agreed criteria of adequacy for a conception of consciousness as suggested by Honderich (2004). The criteria relate to the seeming nature of consciousness, subjectivity, reality (including non-abstractness,) mind-body causation, and the differences between different kinds or parts of consciousness. First, phenomenologically, consciousness is conceived here as a unified component of a single stream, with three sub-components, ego consciousness, sub-consciousness, and higher sub-consciousness, which can and should function in parallel. The first two of these subcomponents are being relatively well-known and discussed in other models/frameworks. Nevertheless, the particular conceptualization of consciousness as a united state-process which is proposed here provides an added value to each of the components enabling more to be said about each of them. Second, it recognizes, and makes real and unique sense, of the subjectivity of consciousness which is mediated by the human being’s unique self and influenced by cultural and personal experiences and education and by past, present and future experiences. The proposed subjective nature of consciousness is rooted in theory and research. Moreover the Self – the subjective aspect of consciousness is stressed as the core of the nature of human consciousness, demonstrating that human consciousness is not only affected but also affects and influences the world it actually experiences. Third, the proposed conceptualization makes consciousness, including thoughts, beliefs, perceptions, emotions, intention, and inspiration real and not abstract experiences. It does so by characterizing and differentiating the roles, functions, and meaning of each component of consciousness and by delineating the functions of its unified whole: to achieve the survival, balance, adaptation, growth, and transcendence of the human being and the universe. Fourth, the holographic trans-disciplinary conceptualization indeed builds on ordinary interactions between the physical and the meta-physical, implicit and explicit, spiritual and physical manifestations of consciousness. Fifth, when consciousness is defined as a state and a process, as experience and information, as local and non-local, or as specific and global/universal a differentiation is made between its three main elements, which quite clearly regards the universal mind as the fundamental part/process of nature that complements physical potentialities and brings them to actual physical manifestation. It also regards human consciousness as a fundamental "nonphysical" experience/force/system/ energy/field of information expressed via biological, chemical, and physical processes. In other words, consciousness is considered a fundamental layer of our existence. Finally, it is important to emphasize that the integrative framework of consciousness suggested here is not just theoretical. The structure, ideas predictions, and many of the framework’s assumptions as presented in this paper, are already supported by research ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1385-1416 Levin, T., Holographic Trans-disciplinary Framework of Consciousness: An Integrative Perspective 1409 evidence, and we should naturally await future exploration of the overall conceptualization discussed above. The challenge now faced is to quantitatively examine and mathematically formulate the nature and effects of the subtle tacit energy frequencies, wavelengths, power, and intensities that express and characterize the components of human consciousness within its holistic framework – a feasible challenge indeed. References Alvarado, C. (2000) Out-of-Body Experiences. In Cardeña, E., Jay Lynn, S., & Krippner S. 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Synaptic clock as a neural substrate of consciousness arXiv:2002.07716v2 [q-bio.NC] 5 Mar 2022 Bartosz Jura Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Institute of Applied Psychology, Jagiellonian University, Cracow, Poland Correspondence: bartosz.jura@uj.edu.pl In this theoretical work the temporal aspect of consciousness is analyzed. We start from the notion that while conscious experience seems to change constantly, yet for any of its contents to be consciously perceived they must last for some non-zero duration of time, which appears to constitute certain conflict. We posit that, in terms of phenomenological analysis of consciousness, the temporal aspect, and this apparent conflict in particular, might be the most basic property, likely inherent to any conceivable form of consciousness. It is then outlined how taking this perspective offers a concrete way of relating the properties of consciousness directly to the neural plasticity mechanisms of learning and memory, and specifying how exactly subjective experience might be related to processes of information integration. In particular, we propose synaptic clock to constitute a content-specific neural substrate of consciousness, explaining how it would correspond to this temporal aspect. Then, we propose a viewpoint, in which moments of subjective time have different durations, depending on the type of information processed, proportional to the time units of corresponding synaptic clocks, and being in principle different for different brain regions and nervous systems in different animal species. Relation and possible contributions of this viewpoint to the extensional model of time consciousness are discussed. Finally, we consider the two alternative views on the structure of consciousness, namely a static and a dynamic one, and argue in favor of the latter, proposing that consciousness can be best understood if change is considered its only dimension. Keywords: activity-dependent synaptic plasticity, evolutionary ecology, information integration theory of consciousness, learning and memory, neural correlates of consciousness, subjective time experience, time 1 Introduction ical time, seems to be based on an assumption that this relation is of a one-to-one nature, namely that any one ’tick’ of some underlying physical system will always correspond to one ’tick’ of subjective experience. However, as so far there seems to be no evidence for this to be the case (and it is hard to imagine how this sort of dependency could ever be verified experimentally), a reasonable approach to take is to assume that this relation is not necessarily of such a straightforward nature. Here we take this approach and argue that, in case of biological systems, combining certain observations coming from the two domains, specifically the fact of linking of subjectively experienced events that occurred in temporal proximity [3], with the knowledge about putative neural mechanisms of learning and memory and, in particular, of linking memories over time [4, 5], might be informative in terms of elucidating what are the contentspecific neural substrates of consciousness. Conscious experience is usually assumed to be confined to momentary presents–a moments of ‘now-ness’. This notion, however, poses serious difficulties for explaining how any perception of change (e.g., a melody), or a lack of change (e.g., a silence), is possible, with different models trying to reconcile this two seemingly contradictory properties being attributed to consciousness [1]. Some authors even argue that such perceptions of change might actually be illusions [6]. Here, we analyze the temporal aspect of consciousness, and consider an idea that a content-specific neural substrate of consciousness can be found directly in the It has been long observed that an association between two percepts, thoughts, or contents of conscious experience in general, can be created in a form of relational memory if they occur in temporal proximity. It is unclear, however, what exactly does it mean for two such events in one’s mental life to occur in temporal proximity. How long such a temporal distance between two events of the same or different modalities can be, or, first of all, how can the time of the flow of conscious experience be measured? Is it adequate for it to be expressed and measured in the units of physical time, i.e., the ones in which time is measured by conventional, physical clocks (like those used to time neural activity in standard brain imaging experiments)? In order to address these questions in a strict manner, it is necessary to determine what exactly is the relation between subjective experience, i.e., consciousness, and, on the other hand, objective reality, part of which the physical clocks are. In other words, assuming that one’s subjective experience is always related to some physical processes, to have a definition of what exactly constitutes a physical substrate of consciousness, what within that substrate constitutes a given experience with some specific contents, and what kind of rule, if any, governs the progression and succession of various contents. A notion, common especially outside the field of ’temporal consciousness’ research [1,2], that subjective time indeed can be expressed in the units of what is considered phys1 mechanisms of neural plasticity underlying the processes of learning and memory. In particular, we put forward arguments showing why synaptic clock, a hypothetical mechanism based on activity-dependent synaptic plasticity we recently proposed [7], could constitute such a substrate. This proposal is analyzed in light of certain aspects of different current theories, in particular theories relating consciousness to processes of learning and memory and plasticity of the nervous system [8–11], as well as theories that relate consciousness to processes of activity (or, information) integration, like the information integration theory (IIT) [12, 13]. IIT starts from a set of axioms derived from a phenomenological analysis of consciousness, and posits that consciousness is related to the capacity of a system for information integration. We start with a notion that consciousness seems to be inherently temporal in nature, that is notion laying somewhat beyond the scope of attention of IIT and many other theories (see also [2] and for an overview of theories [14]), and argue that, nonetheless, our approach might be particularly informative for attempts of defining how exactly consciousness could be related to processes of information integration. In the last section, we consider consciousness in more general terms, showing how analysis of the actual meaning of this ’temporality’ of consciousness can be informative for attempts of defining its ’place’ within the physical world, or the exact relation between one’s subjective experience and the objective reality. In particular, this approach allows to propose a specific interpretation of a view according to which the brain actually learns to be conscious [9]. 2 Synaptic clock as a neural substrate of consciousness 2.1 Temporal aspect of consciousness considered from an evolutionaryecological perspective also a lack of any changes in the outside world, that is, for instance, the predator not moving towards the animal after it did not make any rapid movements that would attract the predator’s attention. Defined in this way, the A Environment 1 Environment 2 Organism 1 Organism 2 Time Time B sensory cues / feedbacks ORGANISM ENVIRONMENT motor actions C number of changes 1 1 0 Figure 1: Temporal aspect of consciousness considered from an evolutionary-ecological perspective. (A) Time as an universal dimension in interactions of organisms with their respective environments. (B) Organism– outside world feedback loop of interactions. (C) Comparison of clock models with discrete vs. persistent ticks. Judgments of the duration of a time interval, according to different clocks, all ticking at the same rate–a classic one with discrete ticks (top), and two with persistent ticks of different non-zero durations (middle and bottom), as in the synaptic clock model. Although the total number of ticks generated over the interval as a whole is equal according to each of the clocks (as would be assessed retrospectively), what differentiates these clocks is the timing of the short sub-interval (between gray dashed lines), with different numbers of changes occurring, which is due to different durations of the persistence of their respective ticks. From the perspective of individual organisms, the specific sequences of events over their lifetime are unique for organisms from different species as well as for every individual within a given species (Figure 1A, top part). However, all those events always take place in time, they take time, and the distance between consecutive events can always be considered as temporal in nature. They can be marked, in a sense, on lines, that would look identical for every organism (Figure 1A, bottom part). To traverse any spatial distance, or learn a space, it always takes some amount of time, whereas time passes even without one changing its spatial position. From this perspective, interactions of an organism with its surroundings can be depicted as a loop (Figure 1B), in which sensory cues that the organism receives at any given moment of time depend on, that is, are feedbacks for, the motor actions it performed in previous moments of time. It should be noted that by "motor actions" we mean here also a lack of any actions, that is, for instance, a decision made by the animal, caused by it having spotted a predator, to stand still and not make any movements. And by "feedbacks", analogously, we mean here motor actions are always associated with some underlying neural activity (be it even such resulting in the suppression of execution of some specific movement, or continuation of a previous one), as well as some sensory cues or feedbacks will be at all times processed and evaluated and will be related to some neural activity, in order to assess what outcomes the motor actions had brought for 2 the organism (resulting in, at least, fluctuations of what could be considered a baseline-level emotional state). In this sense time can be therefore considered a universal ecological dimension, offering an evolutionaryecological perspective suggesting that some universal rules might have developed utilizing this fact, as all aspects of organisms’ functioning are, in a sense, subordinated to this dimension. The perspective outlined is in particular the perspective of an individual’s subjective experience. Namely, along a line like the ones on Figure 1A proceed one’s mental states, i.e., conscious experiences, occurring, in a sense, in between the generation of motor actions and detection of sensory cues/feedbacks, as is also the case for neural activity with which they would be related. What an individual experiences at any given moment is the flow of contents of experience, or, in other words, the flow of subjective time. 2.2 tually appearing and/or disappearing. We assume that such an experience of time flow is real (rather than a mere illusion) [17, 18]. However, despite this constant flow (which cannot be voluntarily stopped–see the Discussion for an extended argumentation pertaining to this point), a percept, thought, or any content of experience in general needs to last for some non-zero duration of time in a seemingly unchanged form in order to be consciously perceived (i.e., ’registered’ in consciousness), which appears to constitute certain conflict. How to reconcile these two notions? How long exactly such contents persist in consciousness? We argue that such persistence is due to a form of immediate memory, analogously to the transient persistence of visual stimuli, that would persist in, or actually as consciousness, for a certain amount of time, before it is ’replaced’ by another content (and that can potentially proceed to be stored as a longer-lasting memory). Based on studies in the visual system, it is estimated that in humans such percepts last usually not less than tens of milliseconds and not more than hundreds of milliseconds [16, 19]. In other species this is assessed by indirect measures, and represented by the values of Critical Frequency of Flicker Fusion (CFF), determining the durations of the persistence of visual stimuli that leads to fusion of consecutive stimuli, which lay in the range from less than ten milliseconds (in insects), to below one hundred milliseconds (in turtles) [20]. However, what about other types of mental states, beyond primary sensory perception, e.g., more abstract thoughts? How long they can, or should, last in different conscious systems that can possibly be thought of? The values of CFF display a specific species-varied pattern that can be attributed to certain evolutionary-ecological processes [20], suggesting that the persistence of visual percepts is precisely tuned in particular species. It thus seems reasonable to assume that the persistence of other types of contents of conscious experience will also be shaped evolutionarily, in accord with the visual system’s CFF, so that they last as long as it is suitable for individuals from species living in given circumstances. That is, not too long and not too short, likely being proportional to intervals separating behaviorally relevant events in which a corresponding type of information is processed. That this is indeed the case is suggested by the variable speed of our subjective perception of time flow. The fact that intervals of clock time of a given objective duration appear to us as having variable duration may imply, that the contents of experience can persist for different amounts of time, making us unable to distinguish shorter fragments (sub-intervals) within intervals in which those contents were fixed (as illustrated on Figure 1C). This phenomenon seems to depend on the type of information processed. For example, it seems that processing of more abstract information, like a spatial information about environment, related with the feeling of knowing "where I am at the moment", or when solving a mathematical problem, is related to contents of experience that persist for longer time periods, increasing the perceived speed of time flow (when it is assessed with reference to some indications of the objective clock time). While in principle a retrospective judgment of interval duration Experience of time flow as the most basic aspect of consciousness It seems to us that reasoning like the above can be extended even further, and it can be posited that the most basic aspect common to the conscious experience of any system, if only it is endowed with consciousness, is the very fact of the perception of time flow, as everything else might be, conceivably, perceived differently. Namely, for instance, perception of colors: what I perceive as color red can be completely different from what you perceive as color red [15]. We use the same word to describe it–"red"–and we agree that what we both are seeing is "red", but what each of us actually sees, and thus means by "red", can be completely different (e.g., your "red" could be my "green", and vice versa) and there is no way to communicate it. The same applies to all other elements of mental life in general. Moreover, in terms of different percepts in a given individual, what we can only say about them is, for instance, that what I perceive as color red is different than what I perceive as color blue, or that color red is different than a percept of a sound, but I am unable to say how exactly they are different, or what exactly makes them so. Perhaps, if we assume that the ability to have those percepts is a product of evolution, the corresponding qualities, as far as such correspondence can be defined, will be similar in individuals within the same species (although, in fact, there seems to be no utilitarian reason whatsoever for this to be the case), but they might likely be very different in individuals from distant species, e.g., in humans and in flies, respectively. This reasoning leads eventually to the conclusion that the most basic aspect of conscious experience that will be common to any conceivable form of consciousness, in different systems, is the very feeling of the fact of time flow, i.e., constant flow of conscious experience. Assuming that consciousness is subject to evolution and might be present in simpler forms also in simpler systems, then even in the case of a simplest conscious system conceivable, capable of having only an experience of "this rather than not this" [16] (e.g., "light rather than not light"), it will experience the flow of time. That is, at least, an experience of "this rather than not this" ac3 can be impacted by various memory distortions or ‘failures’, preventing an information about events that just occurred to be retrieved from a memory store, explaining thus variability of such a judgments [3, 21], we argue that the persistence of contents of experience continuously affects the perception of time flow, and the issue of its duration is worth addressing. The concept of synaptic clock, which in the cognitive domain is based on generalization of a rule based on the visual CFF to other aspects of brain function, describes how the persistence of different types of information could span broader time ranges, resulting in different ’CFF’s, being subject to specific selective pressures [7] (Figure 1C). This thus situates the synaptic clock as a potential content-specific neural substrate of consciousness, that will correlate with the persistence of various contents in conscious experience, a hypothesis which we shall consider next. 2.3 (1) plasticity-related proteins (PRPs), needed to actually implement a longer-lasting synaptic change, and (2) some external (i.e., extracellular), more global reinforcing signals (e.g., dopamine; which stimulate/modulate the production of PRPs and/or directly modulate the synaptic change), that both can be delivered to the synapse with a delay after an initial synaptic event [4]. The arguments (approaching the issue from different angles) could be as follows: • Consciousness is informative, i.e., constituted always by some specific content. And it can be stated, in general terms, that whereas the role of neuronal firing and synaptic transmission is to transmit signals, the role of synaptic plasticity is to encode and store information within a network. It is then reasonable to assume that information that is actually being encoded by particular synapses will correspond to the contents of an ongoing conscious experience; Synaptic plasticity as contentspecific substrate of consciousness • Every one content of conscious experience persists in time, for some non-zero duration of time. It can be stated, in general terms again, that whereas an action potential is a discrete event, meaning that it does not persist anywhere but propagates from one place to another, synaptic memory trace, in contrast, does persist for a prolonged period of time in a well-localized site. It is a persistence of a previous activity state; Usually, when potential neural correlates of consciousness are being considered, including their content-specific subsets, what is thought of most naturally as a candidate mechanism is, essentially, neurons firing action potentials. Such correlates are sought primarily in patterns of neuronal firing, global or localized to specific systems, reflected directly by spikes or by oscillatory activities of field potentials, interpreted as effects of synchronized firing of groups of cells [13, 14]. As neuronal firing is necessary for the nervous system and organism as a whole to function properly, it is perhaps also necessary for conscious experience as such, and thus its contents, to be possible to occur in such organisms. It will always be there, in one way or another correlating with experience. However, there seems to be no evidence showing why neuronal firing as such should be in a privileged position in this regard, and should constitute a substrate directly related to some specific contents of a conscious experience. Instead, there are some features of synaptic activity, and of synaptic plasticity as represented in the synaptic clock hypothesis in particular, that we will now discuss, and that allow to see it as more well-suited (and having more to ’offer’, in terms of a broader repertoire of possible mechanisms in play) as a candidate for a content-specific neural substrate of consciousness, than neuronal firing per se. Synaptic clock hypothesis assumes a brain-wide distribution of default durations of persistence of transient, activity-dependent synaptic traces. By synaptic trace it defines an event of transient synaptic plasticity, based on a generalized notion of synaptic tagging, constituting a memory trace of previous synaptic input, or, more generally, of previous synaptic activity. As an instance, we will consider here a general case of an event of synaptic tagging (as is studied mostly in rodent hippocampal cells), triggered by weak synaptic stimulation, mediated by activation of NMDA receptors, associated with protein synthesis-independent early phase of Long-Term Potentiation (LTP), or Long-Term Depression (LTD), and which can be transformed into a late phase of LTP (lLTP) or LTD, with the late phase being dependent on • Conscious experience changes constantly. And while synaptic trace is something that persists, it also is, by definition, a synaptic change. Together with the point above it thus directly corresponds to our main issue as discussed above (and elaborated on below, in the last section); • NMDA receptors, as mediating an activitydependent formation of dynamic neural assemblies, have already been proposed to be implicated in the occurrence of phenomenal states [8]; • According to IIT, consciousness is related to information integration. And synaptic trace, in itself, integrates information. Specifically, on the one hand, taking the example of spike-timingdependent Hebbian plasticity, as embodied in the process of LTP mediated by NMDA receptor activation, it is triggered by, and necessitates, the integration of a specific pattern of presynaptic activity with postsynaptic depolarization, all with specific timing, which altogether might determine whether the synapse will undergo LTP or LTD, which in turn determines its effect on subsequent network activity, routes of signal transduction, and eventually behavior. Besides that–and, for our perspective, more importantly–the late phase of plasticity (l-LTP) is dependent on specific PRPs and neuromodulatory signals, delivery and action of which depends on the behavior of animal and patterns of neural activity in a prolonged time window after, as well as before, the initial synaptic stimulation. The final fate of synaptic change, and future activity of the circuit it is a part of, is thus determined by, i.e., 4 integrates, a combination of numerous events and specific patterns of activity; learning itself, as well as memories that were created in some specific life circumstances and are then recalled in a given conscious experience, are always associated with some emotional state, or value, according to this view consciousness is thus tightly related to emotions [9]. And since emotions are related to neuromodulatory effects in the brain, with neuromodulators, like dopamine, acting on synaptic traces, possibly with a delay, and thus modulating learning–synaptic clock can be thus seen as a mechanism which directly receives, or ’senses’, the information about an outcome that a preceding or ongoing neural activity has brought for the organism, as conveyed by the emotional state associated with a given conscious experience (a notion on which we shall elaborate in the last section). • Relating to the above point, a substrate of consciousness is sought, among other mechanisms, in recurrent interactions, that might be involved in certain top-down signaling processes in the brain [11]. As this type of activity is especially likely to activate NMDA receptors, whose activation at the moment of a recurrent signal would be enabled due to the cell’s membrane depolarization caused by a preceding stimulation by feedforward signal, and NMDA receptors are implicated in synaptic plasticity, like LTP, it is thus hypothesized that consciousness might be not due to recurrent interactions per se, but rather due to a sequence of events that they trigger, starting with the initiation of synaptic plasticity [8, 11]. This would implicate the proposed mechanism of synaptic clock into effects associated with recurrent interactions in the brain; Based on these points, synaptic clock is thus a concrete candidate for a content-specific substrate of consciousness, as it (1) is capable of accounting for certain basic phenomenal properties of consciousness, related to its temporal nature, (2) relates consciousness to specific neural mechanisms of learning and memory (which puts it in line with certain aspects of theories relating consciousness to processes of learning and memory and/or recurrent signaling), and (3) defines exactly (i) where, and (ii) in what (biological) senses, information will be integrated strongly. To specify, what will constitute a content-specific substrate of consciousness is in this view not a single one but rather all currently active synaptic clocks, with the focus of attention (externally or internally directed) affecting which circuits have greater contribution to the actual contents of an experience, with the ‘contribution’ of specific circuits, cells, or synapses, to be determined, we argue, based on whether and how they affect the overall ongoing experience of time flow. In the following section we will further specify how this should be understood from a broader perspective of a network, part of which the synapses are and activity of which the synaptic plasticity affects. • IIT posits that even inactive, i.e., non-firing, cells can contribute and shape the contents of a conscious experience (but not cells that are artificially, e.g., pharmacologically, blocked–i.e., functionally detached from the rest of a network) [16]. In line with this notion, synaptic traces are assumed to persist as well in neurons which are silent, in terms of not generating action potentials at the moment. This could limit a possible pool of inactive cells that should be taken under consideration, defining when a given cell can directly, i.e., positively, affect a conscious experience. That is, only when a synaptic clock that has been activated in that cell is still active. It seems more likely that only such a cells will directly affect an ongoing experience, as opposed to ones in which there is nothing that could be considered a trace, or ’evidence’, of any activity that would make it involved in network activities and make it directly contribute to a conscious experience (on how to understand this ‘direct contribution’ we elaborate further below); • Neural substrate of consciousness may not be fixed, restricted to some specific circuits or populations of cells, or specific patterns of neuronal activity, but rather be related to the performance of higherlevel functions and as such be more ’flexible’–a view suggested by the plastic nature of nervous system, manifesting itself especially in the reorganization of circuitry underlying certain cognitive or behavioral functions after brain injury [10, 22]. In line with this, regardless of which exact areas or circuits will be involved in execution of a particular function and processing of relevant information, corresponding synaptic clocks might possibly be activated in those circuits; 3 On the duration of a single moment of subjective time 3.1 Subjective moments of time with different durations As is inferred mostly from animal experiments, cellular and synaptic mechanisms that are responsible for ’allocation’ and initial encoding of memory of particular events, determining which cells and synapses will be recruited to a particular memory trace (defined as a pattern of activity of specific neuronal ensemble), are also the ones that lead to linking memories of events that occurred close in time [5, 25, 26]–which suggests that mechanisms of neural plasticity underlying learning and memory will in themselves lead to creation of associations, in a form of relational memory, between contents of experience that occur in temporal proximity. However, then the questions are, (1) how to measure and express this temporal distance for contents of conscious experience of the same or different modalities, and what is its maximum value • Consciousness has been hypothesized to be related to neural activity that underlies learning, as opposed to activity underlying events that are yet too ’weak’ or ’unimportant’ to require learning, or, on the other end, activity underlying performance of already-learned automatic functions that does not need to be updated [9, 23]. Since the process of 5 each other than they had been before the association was formed. This reasoning, as it seems, can be extended also to complex systems [28]. As contents of conscious experience we include here all the content that constitutes a given experience at a given moment, no matter how ’weakly’ one would be aware of its presence or contribution to the experience, or whether one is able to recall and reflect on that experience in a retrospective manner after some time has passed. That is, also contents constituted by processes like remembering events, or percepts, perceived in the past, no matter how distant, or cognitive manipulation of a given percept, as well as visualizing and thinking about future ones–all of which, in this view, constitute another experience in its own right, occurring at some present moment of time, and being a form of ‘immediate memory’, as defined above, related thus to some neuronal activity, synaptic stimulation and, consequently, formation and persistence of synaptic traces, i.e., activity of synaptic clocks. Subjective time flows with variable rate, as we know it from introspection, and it seems that it flows with yet different rates for individuals from different species [20]. From the effective perspective of one’s subjective experience, this can be attributed to an effect resembling the flicker fusion effect in visual system, with contents of experience persisting for some non-zero duration of time before they will disappear, making ’room’ for other contents (as we argued already above). Such a persistence determines thus an irreducible unit of subjectively perceived time, not divisible into shorter fragments, constituting a single moment of subjective time, which, however, will be related to some portion of neural activity extended in time–a window of ’neural’ time of non-zero duration. We posit that durations of such moments of subjective time will be proportional primarily to the time units of synaptic clocks, in principle different in different brain regions and across animal species, depending on the type of information processed by given synapses (determined, in general, by the anatomical and functional connectivity of a given region; approximate distribution of which was proposed in [7]), and that those moments constitute temporal windows for the formation of associations between different events, aspects of which are processed by a given region. Synaptic tagging, being an early stage of activitydependent synaptic plasticity, on which the concept of synaptic clock is based, allows for ’late-associativity’–a prolonged time window in which, presumably, associations can be created between events that are separated in time on the neural level [4]. Although, perhaps, the durations of those moments will depend also on other, complementary plasticity mechanisms involved in processing of successive events and memory ’allocation’, like the transient cellular-level plasticity, i.e., altered neuronal excitability. Altogether, the discussed mechanisms will be causing certain ’inertia’ after an initial neural activation, which will result in a ‘fusion’ (or ‘integration’) of the spatio-temporal neural representations of different events processed by a given region. As an instance, for hippocampus and a sensory area, as depicted in Figure 2: a circuit in which the moments are longer, e.g., the hippocampus, will integrate information about the aspects of events that it processes for any two events that oc- to which creation of such associations is restricted, and (2) what it can tell us about the exact nature of contentspecific substrates of consciousness? We propose that a pragmatic approach to these questions (which, however, should be seen as only a practical approximation) is to assume that an association between different contents of conscious experience can be formed only if they occur at the very same moment of subjective time, with moments of subjective time having different durations, as expressed in ‘neural’ time, depending on the type of information processed (Figure 2). single moment of time HIPPOCAMPUS SENSORY AREA Event 1 Event 2 Figure 2: Duration of a single moment of subjective time. Durations of single moments of subjective time, proportional to the time units of synaptic clocks in different brain regions, in which different types of information are processed, constituting temporal windows for the formation of associations between events. Two events, certain aspects of which are processed by both regions, being simultaneous as judged from the perspective of the hippocampus, are not simultaneous when judged from the perspective of the sensory area. Values presented are hypothetical, and not necessarily in scale. It can be noted that, in general terms, the transmission of effective signals in the nervous system, and correspondingly the interactions of organisms with their environments, are directional, i.e., neural activity always leads eventually to some behavioral output (in the sense as defined above–be it even suppression of a motor action). Assuming that any one conscious experience is always associated with some neural activity (that is, in organisms endowed with both nervous system and consciousness), then the most basic overall situation of a biological system, being part of some environment, having some specific experience, can be described as: behaving in a certain way when it experiences "this rather than not this". In this view, the effect of any experiencedependent synaptic plasticity elicited in such situation, related with the contents of concurrent experience, will be to alter the possible patterns of neural activity and consequently, due to the directionality, behavioral output. From this perspective, instead of a notion of memory traces as faithful representations of particular events, one should expect memory to behave more like a fluid [27], with neural plasticity serving primarily the ultimate goal of the organism, namely of adjusting its behavior to particular circumstances it finds itself in. In such elementary case, to create an association between different contents of experience, in a form of relational memory, primarily due to plasticity of pre-existing synaptic connections within an overlapping neural substrate, will be to make the patterns of neural activity and behavioral output related to those contents convergent, i.e., more similar to 6 cur within its current moment of time, thus ’seen’ by it as one event, even if one of those events occurred in a distant past according to the sensory area endowed with moments of shorter duration, i.e., with traces of activity left by that event in the sensory area having decayed long time ago, as judged from its perspective. 3.2 3.3 Relation of the proposed viewpoint to the extensional model of time consciousness The proposed viewpoint naturally corresponds with the extensional approach to time consciousness, which posits that experienced moments are extended in time and have some duration, with such a model finding a support in empirical evidence coming from psychology and cognitive neuroscience [1,32]. It is naturally considered in humans, and estimates that the experienced moment has a duration in the range of a few seconds, affording thus a temporal segmentation in perception and action [30–32]. Our viewpoint would suggest to extend this approach with the evolutionary-ecological perspective and theoretical considerations about other species, and speculate that the experienced moments will tend to have such durations as to be behaviorally optimal. Based on the considerations in this section, the synaptic clocks might be seen as a natural candidate for a concrete neural basis, determining the durations of such a moments (with synaptic clock, as based on a generalized notion of synaptic tagging, or synaptic ‘eligibility trace’, directly corresponding to the ongoing phase of predictions’ evaluation and processing of ‘prediction errors’, as formulated within the predictive coding framework, see [2]). In this view it can be considered that many (‘local’) moments, with varied durations, will be operating in ‘parallel’, each corresponding to an active synaptic clock. How to infer the durations of subjective moments from the level of network activity Subjective time understood as representing an order of events can be reconstructed from patterns of populationas well as single cell-level neuronal activity (as shown in particular in the lateral entorhinal cortex [29]). The present theory posits that if one extracted a (hypothetical) component of the evolution of a given activity pattern that could be attributed to plasticity of the neural substrate, then such components in different brain regions, or subpopulations of cells, would change with different rates, with synapses with shorter time units returning to putative baseline levels more rapidly after an initial stimulation event. One possible practical way of determining the putative durations of the subjective moments, would be thus to measure the similarity between network responses (a degree of overlap of the network activity patterns) to a pair of dissimilar stimuli applied at varied inter-stimulus intervals, and compare this dependence for stimuli of different modalities and corresponding brain regions (assuming that a relatively comparable measure of stimuli’ dissimilarity can be devised, for pairs of stimuli of different modalities, e.g., visual and spatial, respectively; and controlling for the convergence of pathways in more highlevel associative areas). Due to the persistent activitydependent changes in synaptic efficacy as well as neuronal excitability, cells that were activated by a preceding stimulus tend to be preferably recruited to process also subsequent, even dissimilar ones, occurring in temporal proximity [5], a process which, according to the present hypothesis, should be characterized by different time constants in different brain region (e.g., shorter in primary sensory areas, longer in associative ones), allowing thus to determine the relative durations of corresponding subjective moments. Addressing now more strictly what we mentioned in the previous section (as well as the question [2] above), what will determine the contribution (or lack thereof) of specific circuits, cells, or synapses (when seen from the perspective of a network they are a part of) to a conscious experience, is in our view their contribution (or lack thereof) to this very effect of ‘fusion’ of the spatiotemporal neural representations of events occurring close in time. This proposed form and role of the interaction of stimulus-related with pre-stimulus activity, relates our viewpoint to the temporo-spatial theory of consciousness (TTC), as it is a mechanism that would lead to an expansion of stimulus to points in time and space beyond the ones at which it actually occurs–a process to which TTC attributes a central role [14]. 4 Consciousness change as continuous 4.1 The identity of experienced change and immediate memory Addressing the above-discussed dichotomy between experienced change and immediate memory more strictly, it can be noted that change, by definition, is always relative to something. In the case of conscious experience, its change is relative to memory. It is not possible to conceive of any consciously experienced change without having also memory of some preceding state, or, the other way round, to conceive of memory without change. In order for some contents of experience to become a "memory" (and be recalled later) the experience needs to undergo a change. Hence, it can be stated that the constantly experienced change and, on the other hand, immediate memory (i.e., contents of experience, ’fading’ into the past gradually), are in fact two different views on the same phenomenon. Without any of them, or actually without it, the result would be the same, namely, one would be in a state that could be described as an ’eternal’, i.e., not-changing, present moment. This is why the processes of neural plasticity, in particular such that can be described as being at the same time a change and a persistence of memory trace of some previous activity state, seem to be well suited to constitute content-specific neural substrates of consciousness, and this is what we shall discuss in more detail next, which should allow us to look at the above considerations from yet another perspective. 7 4.2 being different ’things’, with borders or empty gaps between them, but instead that consciousness is continuous (along any dimensions), namely, that it is a continuous change (Figure 3B). The alternative views on the structure of consciousness The notion of the identity of change and memory seems to be contained in the Bergson’s concept of duration [33,34], with duration being the persistence of one’s entire memory, accumulated over the lifetime, in light of which every new experience is interpreted (what could be labeled as ’implicit imagery’), and being constantly modified over time by integration with those new experiences. However, it appears to us that this theory, and a particular viewpoint that stems from it, cannot be understood properly or be useful without reconsidering two of its central aspects, namely (1) its treatment of the concept of memory ’storage’, and, especially, (2) in what sense the term ’time’ is used by it. A t x } ? B The conventional view on the structure of consciousness (present, among others, in the IIT’s axiom of “composition”) assumes that: (1) at any given moment of time it consists of a collection of separate elements, each of which constitutes a different entity–„the percept of chair that I see on the right side of my visual field is something different than the percept of computer screen that I see in the center of my visual field”, and (2) it consists of a succession of separate collections of such elements in time, with elements at each moment of time being different entities–"the percept of chair that I am having right now is something different than the percept of that chair that I had a minute ago", which is depicted on Figure 3A with such an elements represented by different points. t axis on Figure 3A denotes time, and x axis can be thought of as representing a collection of percepts at a given moment of time, for instance reflecting different points along one dimension of a visual field. This view, in its essence, assumes that those elements are different things and can be represented as such a collection of points, with each point having different value (representing, for example, ’colors’ of ’adjacent’ percepts within a current visual field). This assumes that consciousness has some dimension(s) of what could be referred to as ’space’ (x, a set of all currently experienced percepts) and a dimension of time (t, a succession of collections of elements, with the points taking different values, with some of them possibly becoming equal zero, e.g., no auditory input and hence no percepts of sounds). This view, however, that such elements, represented by points, are different ’things’, leads inevitably to the notion of borders and empty gaps between neighboring points, that would separate different points from each other (a problem which remains even if we assume that the number of points within any interval along any of the axes is infinite). Whether it will refer to its physical substrate or to consciousness as such, it is unclear how big such a gap is, or how long it lasts, or what does it consist of, etc. Moreover, since it is by definition empty, nothing can traverse it, and thus no interaction between neighboring points and no dynamics of the conscious experience is possible. This would be in fact a situation, as described already above, of being ’stuck’ in an ’eternal’, non-changing present moment, without any consciously experienced change or memory. The alternative view, which is conceptualized by the notion of duration, and which, as it seems, better describes what we experience directly, is that there are no separate points, C change HIPPOCAMPUS a SENSORY AREA b a b change D Figure 3: Change as the dimension of consciousness. (A– B) Alternative views on the structure of consciousness: (A) static collections of elements vs. (B) continuous change. (C) Relative positions along the dimension of change, related to different types of information processed by two example brain regions. (D) Perception of an element of experience (fragment in between the black dashed lines at the ends) vs. perception of the process of its generation (fragment in between the gray dashed lines in the middle). However, if this is indeed the case and a useful theory is to be built upon this notion, then it seems that, first of all, the use of term ’time’, and ’space’ as well, is inadequate and, moreover, might be somewhat misleading, as is the case with the duration theory. What appears to us as a constructive approach is therefore to consider change itself as the only dimension of consciousness. 4.3 The dimension of change However, once this is recognized, the conclusion is that, in fact, there are no separate elements experienced at a 8 given moment of time, nor is there a linear flow of conscious experience along an axis of time, as it is commonly thought of, with separate past, present and future time moments, but instead that consciousness is always, in a sense, in the same moment of time and that all experiences are in fact one whole. This situation is not identical to the one considered above, namely of an ’eternal’ non-changing moment, nor is it a form of ’presentism’, according to which time does flow but only present moments are actually real [1], as this is, strictly speaking, not a moment of ’time’, or a ’spatially’ separable fragment of experience, but a constant change. In other words, consciousness has no discrete ’spatial’ or ’temporal’ dimensions, nor is there a distinguished dimension of ’time’, along which something would proceed. The difference between the conventional notion of dimension of time and that of change is that a single static point located anywhere along the dimension of change represents, in itself, a change, in the sense as outlined above, namely, a specific continuous change relative to immediate memory. Whereas in the case of dimension of time, such a static point would always represent no change, in any quantity measured. As behaviors of any system are typically considered in terms of changes of some quantity with time (i.e., along the dimension of time), and the goal then is to account for its dynamics, the reasoning outlined here may thus suggest that this kind of analysis is not possible. And it appears to us that indeed this might be the case, and that ultimately what can be only studied about consciousness is its ’kinematics’, i.e., constructing statistical descriptions of how it behaves, or, in other words, what observable effects it produces (à la Best System Analysis approach to the laws of nature [35]). However, since we have a direct access to our consciousness from the ’inside’, meaning that we actually experience it, and are able to reflect on it, we posit that what might be an especially promising step forward is the fact of the variability of rate of subjective time passage that we perceive, which in combination with indirect knowledge about that rate in other species [20], might be informative, first of all, as to what does it mean to move along the axis of change, as depicted on Figure 3C. The rationale for speaking about consciousness as having a dimension of change, rather than being simply a discrete point of change, is that since it is continuous, it seems that it cannot be confined to a static, i.e., discrete, point of a constant ’rate’, but instead it will at all times ’accelerate’ or ’decelerate’, as is suggested by the variability of subjectively perceived time flow, which can be represented as motion along the axis. The model from Figure 2 could be now modified in a manner as depicted in Figure 3C, with more ’rapid’ changes occurring according to the sensory area, as compared to the hippocampus’ judgment, according to which much less change has occurred within the same interval of objective time (and we are using here the time-related grammatical forms–"occurring", "has occurred"–only because of the lack of a more suitable language). However, the varied ’rate’ of change, that is what is represented as the one-dimensional axis of change, is not quantitative, as it is by definition a continuum. It can be considered as such only in light of a retrospective reflection on a given experience, as a way of abstract description of the actual experience (assessing "how many changes occurred"). Instead, from the subjective perspective of actual experience, change does not have any particular rate, it just is the way it is, and its ’rate’ is something we can infer only retrospectively by comparing it with what we then consider to be some different fragments of experience. The dimension of change is thus to be treated rather as an abstract tool, offered by an act of introspection (ability to manipulate what we consider to be separate pieces of experience), whereas an actual experience simply changes in some specific way inherent to it. In other words, quantitative descriptions, using the language of mathematics, based on the notion of mathematical point, are incompatible with the essentially qualitative reality of conscious experience. The act of abstraction and comparing past experiences appears to rely on memory of those experiences, that must be somehow stored and preserved over time since the events originally occurred, which concept we shall consider next, analyzing whether and how it can be reconciled with the notion of continuous change. 4.4 Are memories stored? The notion of continuous change seems to contradict our conviction that there are separate elements in every conscious experience, constituting different entities, and that time flows linearly, i.e., from past to future, with past events, memory of which has been retained, having logic continuation and consequences in present events. The concept of memory ’storage’, on which this view is based, assumes that events that were experienced in the past, i.e., in some previous moment of time, can be somehow ’saved’, in a form of memory trace, instead of ceasing to exist, and then retrieved from that store in some present moment of time, namely, that what is considered a memory recall and an event that is recalled can all be marked on a line, or an array, like the one on Figure 3A, with past moments of time, when the original memorized event took place, being something different than the present moment, when it is recalled. However, what does it mean exactly that memory is ’stored’, and what evidence there is to support such notion? Studies on mechanisms underlying memory, with memory being assessed mostly in behavioral paradigms in animals, suggest that memories are stored in the brain in a form of neural memory traces, termed "engrams" [36], being specific patterns of activity of neuronal ensembles requiring plastic synaptic changes to be encoded and then replayed, that constitute representations of some particular events from the past. However, it can be noted that every instance of what is thought of as recall of a memory, always occurs in a context different than the one in which it was supposedly formed, resulting in an overall experience being different than (i.e., altered relative to) the original one (even for the very reason that this is an event of "memory recall", accompanied by an awareness of this act of remembering), and it always takes place in a present moment of time. Moreover, the flow of conscious experience seems to be continuous, without any clearcut borders between past and present moments, that would separate events that were memorized from subsequent remembering of those events. Neural plasticity, 9 to which the formation of memory is attributed, seems to result primarily not in the formation of representations of particular events, but rather in adaptations to ever-changing situational demands [27]. Technically, any activity-dependent act of synaptic plasticity makes it less, not more, likely–or actually, considering an entire system, impossible–that an identical overall pattern of network activity will be replayed in the future (Figure 4). Thus, we do not have any direct evidence to support the notion that anything is ’stored’, and can be then recollected, or that there is any separate ’past’, as commonly thought of assuming a linear progression of time moments. We have a direct evidence only that our conscious experience changes constantly. Especially in light of the fact that in the brain there seems to be no separation of sites of information processing from the sites of memory storage. Any memory-related processes (be it encoding, consolidation, maintenance, retrieval, reconsolidation, forgetting, etc) are all constituted by some information processing in the brain that takes place, and affects the functioning of organism, in the ‘present’. There is thus no evident need to assume that what we experience as "memory" is something that was stored (anywhere, be it brain or mind) at some point in the past. ticular events, referring to particular time points in the past), which in turn is based on the notion of a linear flow of time, both of which are, as we have attempted to show, not adequate as a descriptions of consciousness. It appears to be a case of circular reasoning, which is resolved by the adoption of the dimension of change. Accepting that no ’storage’ (in the conventional sense of this term) of memory ever occurs eliminates the problem (and that is not to say that it is not practical to treat and study the cognitive and behavioral processes of memory ’access’ as if memories were indeed, in some sense and in certain approximation, stored [3]). But then, what makes the contents of my experience appear to me like they represent an event from the past being remembered in some present situation?–a question that reduces to a more basic one: what constitutes the ’meaning’ of any one conscious experience (allowing to distinguish for example a remembering of an event from the perception of an actual event)? 4.5 Seeing or remembering: On the meaning in the contents of a conscious experience One could expect that such meaning should be a result of the intrinsic structure of a given conscious experience, in which, if it is taken in its entirety, there is contained information about different elements of the experience and about relations between them, i.e., how they are arranged. For instance, that there was a past when a given event took place, and that it is remembered now in the present while different percepts are also being perceived forming a coherent image of the current surroundings, and so on, with the contents of such experience acting thus like a static ’time capsule’, by analogy to fossils, which can be seen as ’memories’ indicating that there was some past in which they were created [37]. The same reasoning would extend to visualizing the future, which is always done using some elements from memory, and is done in the present, constituting an actual experience. Such a meaning would allow to compare also durations of different past intervals, i.e., assessing the number of changes that occurred, and apply as well to any other experience constituting hence a coherent whole (with phenomenal consciousness and cognitive access to its contents being in this view synonymous concepts, with every instance of "cognitive access", or a failure of one, constituting actually another experience [38]). However, in contrast to fossils as such, whose ’meaning’ needs to be derived by an external observer, our experiences seem to be self-interpreted, suggesting that such a static images are not sufficient. We argue that what makes this kind of meaning, being intrinsic in the contents constituting an experience, possible, is first of all that they are not static, but rather continuously change. In the case of a static image we come back essentially to the array from Figure 3A, that is a collection of points, in which situation it is unclear whether one’s experience is confined to only one particular point or to all of them at the same time, which anyway does not lead to the construction of a coherent whole, regardless of how structured such an image, constituted by a collection of separate elements, would look from the synaptic change Figure 4: Illustration of the effect of an activitydependent synaptic modification on the network activity patterns. Once the weight of the synaptic connection between a pair of cells is changed, the replay of an overall pattern of network activity identical to the one that was related to an original experience becomes not possible. Now, as soon as the input cell starts firing, its activity ’attracts’ the activity of the output cell, resulting in a different overall pattern of network activity. It looks like the conventional view on time is based on the static notion of memory (‘static’, in the sense that even though in this view memory traces can be altered or erased, they are nonetheless assumed to represent par10 outside, for an external observer. And if any meaning cannot be derived in case of any of such collections individually, it seems to be not possible also to derive it from a set of collections, each without any meaning (as such an attempt would be like looking along yet another dimension of the array). We posit that what enables the construction of experiences with this kind of meaning, is a dynamic, immediate process of collecting information within ’frames’ of continuous change, which could be described as sampling, and integration of this information into a meaningful whole–a process of continuous learning, which we shall consider below. In the view outlined, what we consider an explicit recall of a memory, has the same function as any percept. It serves to guide current behavior. It is thus, as a consequence, reasonable to assume that there is no fundamental difference between structured memories and percepts. This point of view, and analyzing how these two phenomena are related and what they have in common, in terms of their ’temporal’ aspect, might be particularly informative for and will lead us eventually to addressing an issue: what constitutes the difference between subject and object, after we accept that the dimension of consciousness is change? 4.6 or need to assume its ’storage’, or to assume a notion of static past, that would need to be taken into considerations. Our approach, however, still suggests taking as a starting point the theory of ’direct’ perception [34, 41], which posits that all percepts are images, that essentially are some selected fragments extracted, in a sense, from an overall continuous stream of information that the physical reality is–an ability which evolves, and is developed in and, to a lesser degree, learned by individuals. 4.8 The theory of ‘direct’ (‘ecological’) perception [41], assumes that the perception of a specific environment’s structure arises due to sampling, in which visual information is sampled over time, in a process dependent on a moving focus of attention, and integrated in a certain way, in a loop which involves motor reactions allowing to sample different perspectives of the environment, leading to the extraction of features that are invariant, in order to produce a coherent image guiding possible actions in that environment. It seems that the maximum rate of such a sampling will be proportional to the value of CFF in a given species. Whereas visual system as a whole samples continuously, the resolution of its basic elements will be limited by the CFF values. In terms of neural substrate of perception, this theory suggests that the content of what is being perceived at a given moment, due to perception being a prolonged process, will be dependent on an activity not only in the retina and primary visual areas, but rather it will involve also activity of certain motor circuits, that altogether constitute a perceptual system, with the engagement of specific neural substrates being modulated by the attentional processes, i.e., attention focused on different portions or aspects of the environment. Taking into consideration the fact that even minor parameters of brain activity can affect the functioning of the brain as a whole [42, 43], it can be expected that what is actually being perceived, in details, will be determined by collective activity patterns that may involve, to varied degrees, networks of the entire brain. We posit that other types of information, processed by different systems, are sampled and integrated in a similar manner, within temporal windows of duration specific to them, as represented by the time units of synaptic clocks, which allows a given system to form a meaningful ’image’. For example, resorting to Figure 2, with the hippocampus receiving inputs from sensory areas, it will construct a single image integrating many images constructed at a higher rate (e.g, 60/sec) by the afferent areas. But also in the opposite direction, if a sensory area receives input from the hippocampus (possibly an indirect one), it will construct its consecutive images using information about a single image being constructed by the hippocampus. Consequently, the contents of conscious experience related to the activity of a region will be determined by the informational content integrated over the temporal window of duration specific to that region, through a process that will include also immediate feedback information about the effects that the activity in this tem- How to deal with panpsychism It is argued by some that the fact, or actually–feeling, of the flow of time might be not only the most basic aspect that our consciousness shares with mental lives of individuals from other species, as discussed above, but also be the only aspect that it shares, in some way, with the physical reality, as formulated in a view assuming that time is real and plays a central role (as opposed to the concept of a block universe in which nothing really changes) (see, for example, [1, 39]). This perhaps could be understood within some form of the panpsychism view, according to which something resembling what we know as "consciousness" constitutes the intrinsic nature of matter [11, 40]. We expect that if this is indeed the case, then considerations of the physical reality would benefit from adopting a reasoning as the one outlined above, as purely logical argument, and putting change as this reality’s only dimension. Taking this particular perspective, we shall then adopt a view, according to which the difference between a perceiving subject (i.e., one’s conscious experience) and perceived object (i.e., objective reality) lies not in spatial, but rather in the temporal domain [34]. However, as we have resigned from using the term ’time’, or ’temporal’, arguing why it is inadequate, we posit that this should be defined rather in terms of change. 4.7 Sampling and integration of information Direct perception The view on the difference between subject and object, when defined in ’temporal’ terms, posits essentially that a subject is wherever the ’pure’ (i.e., autobiographical/episodic) memory of all of the subject’s past experiences are stored, whereas objects are located always in the present, in the currently unfolding moment [34]. We diverge from this view in assuming that since memory is always manifested in the present, there is no evidence 11 poral window is having on the organism. Contents of a conscious experience as a whole will arise from the sampling and integration of information by all subsystems, which perhaps could be studied using an approach like that of IIT [12]. This viewpoint naturally entails the embodied and proactive theories of mind, according to which conscious experience is not a result of representational processes in the head, but rather is determined by sensorimotor activity of the whole body which proactively navigates the world and is dynamically coupled with the environment, which might determine the dynamics of subjective experience of time flow [18]. 4.9 using any arbitrary units, and it constitutes a process of continuous learning. 4.10 How the brain learns to be conscious In the sense as outlined above, a neural memory trace, encoded in a network in a set of synaptic connections, can be seen as a structure that enables an individual to extract and ’perceive’ a specific information in the physical world. Therefore, an analogy can be drawn between the process of generation of memory traces (engrams) and an evolutionary process of generation of structures enabling the organisms to perceive a specific type of information in their environment, i.e., to have a specific type of percepts (e.g., of a red light), with inadequate structures, and traces, being eliminated (one might object that an episodic memory contemplated in daytime is not something that can be considered equal to a percept used pragmatically in some specific situation to navigate in the environment. However, we posit that, if considered in light of change, they both equally serve to accomplish pragmatic goals in respective specific circumstances, e.g., when using some elements from memory in order to solve a mathematical problem. The point is that individuals are evolutionarily adapted, and learn, to daydream only in situations in which this type of behavior is desirable, and not in situations of an immediate danger and need for a directed action). This analogy can be defined in particular on the level of plasticity of single synapses, with emotions acting as selective pressures, eliminating neural memory traces that are not desirable for the brain. Conscious experience is always associated with emotional states. Such state can be a fear, or at least a feeling of discomfort, or a pleasure, or at least a feeling of comfort, but it is never neutral. As discussed already above, emotions modulate learning, in particular through the activities of neuromodulatory systems, modulating neural plasticity on the level of synapses, thus shaping the structure of neural networks. Some circuits may be affected to a lesser degree, when related behaviors are automatic and usually do not need to be adjusted (e.g., primary sensory and motor pathways), and others are more affected, however all seem to be susceptible to such a modulation [44,45]. It is thus like the brain was organizing itself, through the neuromodulatory effects related with emotions, or actually a sort of micro-emotions [6], restricting how it changes, by changing its memory as a whole, and thus selecting what information exactly it is capable to ’perceive’, i.e., what contents of experience it can have. Subjective emotional states, indicating whether organism is in a desirable or a non-desirable overall state, are present regardless of what are the contents of a given experience. Emotions seem to permeate every experience. Whereas, in contrast, it is possible to think (although it does not seem possible to imagine, or feel) that objective reality changes only in some neutral, ’random’ way. We posit therefore that the difference between subject, i.e., our subjective experience, and object, nature of which might itself resemble our consciousness, should be sought rather in the domain of (micro-)emotions, in how they organize the components of a physical system so that it changes in a desirable way. That is, such a way, Two sides of conscious experience The processes of generation of percepts, including such being the elements of a memory recall, as well as of any other contents of experience, have already been either evolved, i.e., they have been evolutionarily ’mastered’, or learned, and now they are unconscious and seem to be immediate, not requiring any effort. Namely, a given content of experience simply appears in consciousness at some point, e.g., as in the comprehension of speech where individual words simply appear in consciousness. We posit that all such contents of experience, including memories, are, similarly to percepts, fragments that are ’extracted’ from the physical reality as a whole, and stabilized in an apparently unchanged form for some period of time. They thus constitute specific ’paths’ paved in change, out of all possible paths that could be there at the moment. Whereas, in contrast to the above, what is conscious is a process of generation of one’s memory as a whole, that is, a process of generation of behavioral adaptations. This is what we experience directly, as continuous learning. The actual experience, that appears to us as unfolding in time, is like one were ’inside’ of the process of generation of some specific contents of experience (e.g., a percept). ‘Zooming in’ that process, one can see it unfolding, i.e., changing in a specific way, seeing thus its fine structure (which is like being confined to a specific, exact point in time), but is then unable to perceive its global structure and thus will not see that percept as a whole (by analogy to the uncertainty principle, as known from time-frequency analysis of time series; as illustrated on Figure 3D). In sum, there are two sides from which any one conscious experience can be considered, corresponding to immediate memory and change, respectively (as described above): when we look at it in a ’retrospective’, abstract manner, at any stage, we see some specific contents of experience already formed, persisting in consciousness for some period of ’time’. Processing of different types of information, related to different contents of experience, moves us then along the axis of change (Figure 3C), proportionally to the corresponding values of ‘CFF’, affecting differently our assessment of the duration of that experience and thus speed of time flow. However, looking at it from the other side, when the experience is actually unfolding, without our reflecting on it, then each such window, that would be proportional to 1/CFF, lasts simply as long as it does and its duration cannot be measured 12 that it is able to perceive those pieces of information, e.g., as explicit memories or through more implicit imagery, that give it most adaptive advantage. In this sense it can be said literally that the brain learns (and, also, teaches itself) to be conscious [9], and we posit that the synaptic clock represents an elementary process through which this occurs. Namely, we posit that synaptic clocks determine ’temporal’ windows (which, however, should be understood in light of the dimension of change) in which the following occurs: (1) information is sampled and integrated, with the type of information depending on the region, which leads to the extraction of invariant features within the sample, (2) the sampling and integration in this prolonged window depends on the activity of the organism, its behavior, and feedbacks it receives from the environment, (3) the result of functioning of all the clocks, as well as of each clock in particular, is a meaningful ’image’, constituting some contents of experience (e.g., of remembering an event), (4) the effect that those contents are having on the organism is continuously evaluated by dedicated systems, which leads to (micro-)emotions, reflecting the brain’s ’opinion’ on its present state, (5) emotions act through neuromodulation, and PRPs, continuously affecting the synaptic (or, in general, neural) changes, (6) the modulation of synaptic changes alters the routes of signals’ flow through the network, and thus content of information sampled. 5 Discussion 5.1 Few more arguments for the synaptic clock mechanism One could therefore expect that the durations of persistence of such synaptic memory traces, in particular of their initial stage corresponding to synaptic tagging, can be shaped evolutionarily in a flexible manner, where longer-lasting, behaviorally not immediately beneficial traces can be ’tested out’, not being under a strong requirement of limiting the energy expenditure; • Activity-dependent synaptic plasticity and LTP in particular might serve different functions in different brain systems, that is, encode different types of memory and thus give different results in terms of specific circuits’ functioning and cognitive processing [50]. Correspondingly, through one general mechanism of "synaptic clock" various effects on the networks’ activities and associated cognition could be realized. If time is a universal ecological dimension, the existence of varied distributions of instances of "synaptic clock", that are shaped by how organisms interact with their environments, especially by rates of those interactions, being adjusted to their specific needs, would suffice different organisms and different brain systems, in this sense making it a parsimonious explanation; • At the moment of a synaptic event corresponding to an experience that should be memorized, the availability of various PRPs, potentially needed to actually implement the synaptic change, might be varied, and they can be at different stages of their production process [51,52]. It is conceivable that in different synapses, with synaptic traces of different durations, there might be a varied dependence of plasticity on the PRPs at different stages of the production process. Namely, activity-dependent synaptic plasticity in synapses with gradually longer time units of synaptic traces could be less dependent on: only already-synthesized proteins immediately available at the synaptic site (produced due to some preceding events)→mRNAs whose translation has been paused at the elongation stage and can be reactivated on demand→mRNAs before translation initiation→de novo transcription. Varied time units of synaptic traces would thus lead to varied dependence of activity-dependent synaptic plasticity on the history of a given synapse’ and cell’s activity. Although it is rather unclear whether this would in itself constitute a desirable feature. In support of the existence of a general mechanism of synaptic clock, based on a generalized notion of synaptic tagging, in terms of its possible adaptive values, also the following arguments could be put forward: • Modeling studies on artificial neural networks show that such networks can develop complex computational functionalities [46], or learn to guide behavior in simulated robotic applications [47], when they are trained using learning rules based on rewardmodulated Hebbian-like plasticity with a single reward signal. In such paradigms the activity of a network in previous steps of time makes the synaptic connections involved in that activity eligible for subsequent reinforcement, with what can be in general considered synaptic tags. One could expect that developing a distribution of synaptic traces whose durations of persistence are varied and adjusted specifically to enable the action of such signals on particular synapses, being first of all not too short but also not too long, would be even more effective for specific learning purposes and thus beneficial for organisms (and perhaps even more so with suitably shaped trace-decay functions, as envisioned for neural eligibility traces by Klopf, see [48]); 5.2 Synaptic clock as a neural substrate of consciousness vs. possibly no consciousness in certain states or systems How to reconcile the proposed mechanism of synaptic clock, or some related mechanism based on neural plasticity, as a substrate of consciousness, with cases of certain systems or situations in which, possibly, there is no consciousness associated with them? For instance, in case of (1) cerebellum, which, as it seems, does not give rise to any evident conscious experiences, (2) dreamless sleep, or (3) lower animals, e.g., marine mollusks (like Aplysia • Synaptic learning and memory is estimated to be relatively cheap energetically, in terms of metabolic costs of sustaining a synaptic memory trace [49]. 13 Californica), which may or may not be conscious–despite substantial amounts of neural activity and plastic synaptic changes in all of them [13, 24, 50]? Our main argument is that we aimed to find an account for certain properties of consciousness, and what is proposed is that whenever consciousness is possible to occur the persistence of its contents will correlate with some synaptic traces (or some analogous processes; and possibly with only a subset of them). Not that synaptic plasticity is in itself sufficient for any conscious experience to occur. Importantly, the present proposal should be understood from the above-described broader perspective of networks, activity of which the synaptic plasticity shapes. For consciousness to be possible, what is perhaps necessary are other mechanisms that constitute predispositions for, and prerequisites of, the actual proper neural correlates of consciousness [14]. Also, some additional lines of reasoning could be proposed for two of the above cases. Namely, for: (1) cerebellum–this structure is organized into largely non-overlapping functional modules, receiving mapped inputs from the environment, with little interaction possible between separate modules [12]. This property, combined with the fact that it may have the putative synaptic clocks with the time units so short that almost nonpersistent (since it can be considered a part of low-level sensory/motor circuitry), will prevent this structure from contributing (strongly) to the above-described ‘fusion’ of spatio-temporal representations of non-co-temporal inputs. As a result, its impact on conscious experience will be not ’noticeable’; (2) sleep–from the perspective of one’s conscious experience the dreamless sleep can be viewed as a period in which the perceived time flow speeds up so that this period seems to last ‘infinitely’ short (when assessed in retrospection). It is thus like the moment just after awakening was a continuation of the one just before falling asleep or, alternatively, the one just before the last dream experienced during the night ended (and because of that one cannot be sure when exactly the dream occurred, that is, whether it was just before the awakening or, maybe, just after falling asleep). Hence the supposed lack of consciousness during the dreamless sleep could support the view that when no low-level sensory data is being processed in an integrated manner, and no voluntary movements executed, the remaining type of information processing speeds up the time flow so substantially. Addressing this issue of sleep more strictly, this ‘temporal’ situation of dreamless sleep seems to be analogous to a ‘spatial’ one, of the blind spot in our visual field, existence of which we are not directly aware of, unless we are informed about the properties of a putative underlying physical system–then we are ‘aware’ of it, but still not directly. In other words, a lack of (supposed) information (as in these two examples) is not the same as would be an information about a lack [1, 21]. 5.3 [18,53]) to the current models of the large-scale structure and composition of time itself (i.e., the time of the universe as a whole), with those models assuming either no real passage of time (as in the block universe model) or some forms of objective cosmic passage (see [1]). What we consider ’space’ and ’time’ could actually be abstractions derived from the two opposite extrema of the change axis, with the notion of ’space’ derived from a small amount of change (an almost constant configuration of objects, not changing over time) and the notion of ’time’ derived from rapid changes (what can be imagined as if everything in our conscious experience was changing constantly in a random manner, without any recurring elements or regularities, then we could not conceive of or have any conception of space, just of ’pure’ time). Meditation practitioners report experiences described as “timelessness” (commonly occurring jointly with an experience of “spacelessness”) [54]. The term “timelessness”, however, is used to refer to specific experiences of an altered sense of time, that is experiences of being “outside of time”, as opposed to being “now”, inside a present situation. 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ON A PHYSICAL METATHEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS Miroljub Dugić1,4, Dejan Raković2,4, and Milan M. Ćirković3,5 1 Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, P.O.Box 60, 34000 Kragujevac, Yugoslavia E-mail: dugic@knez.uis.kg.ac.yu ; Fax: (+381 34) 335-040 2 Faculty of Electrical Engineering, P.O.Box 35-54, 11120 Beograd, Yugoslavia E-mail: rakovic@net.yu ; Fax: (+381 11) 324-8681 3 Astronomical Observatory, Volgina 7, 11000 Beograd, Yugoslavia E-mail: arioch@eunet.yu ; Fax: (+381 11) 419-553 4 International Anti-Stress Center, Smiljanićeva 11/III/7, 11000 Beograd, Yugoslavia E-mail: info@iasc-bg.org.yu ; Web site: www.iasc-bg.org.yu; Fax: (+381 11) 444-7646 5 Department of Physics and Astronomy, SUNY at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY 11794-3800, USA Abstract. We show that the modern quantum mechanics, and particularly the theory of decoherence, allows for formulating a sort of a physical metatheory of consciousness. Particularly, the analysis of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of decoherence, along with the hypothesis that consciousness bears (more-or-less) well definable physical origin, leads to a wider physical picture naturally involving consciousness. This can be considered as a sort of a psycho-physical parallelism, but on rather wide scales bearing some cosmological relevance. 1. INTRODUCTION In this paper we want to point out that modern quantum mechanics allows for formulating a physical metatheory (metaphysical theory) of consciousness. This observation comes only from some recent progress in the foundations of the so-called decoherence theory [1-3]. In addition, this program is important in view of the contemporary heated debate [4] of reductionism versus holism in the philosophy of science. We employ practically universally accepted hypothesis in physical considerations devoted to the issue of consciousness: there is a physical background (and/or physical basis) of consciousness which, as a physical system, can be described and treated by the methods of the physical sciences. This, partially trivial assertion will later on prove useful for our considerations, finally leading to a wider physical picture naturally involving consciousness, and eventually pointing out something new as regards the connection between physics and (the physics of) consciousness. As will become clear below, this reductionist attitude is justified exactly because quantum mechanics (which we use as a physical basis for discussion) is generally percieved as introducing a substantial holistic element of modern physics. Therefore, by pointing out elements necessary for building a metatheory of consciousness, we may bridge the gap between these two positions, as well as explore the limits of theory making process [5]. There is of course no big practical use of the metatheories, generally speaking. But the observations this way provided usually enrich and/or widen our point(s) of view. In our opinion, probably the main point of the present paper is that such a theory - metaphysical theory of consciousness - naturally follows from the foundations of quantum mechanics. 1 2. A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF THE THEORY OF DECOHERENCE The most general physical situation in the decoherence theory [1-3,6,7] is as follows: There is a (quantum) system (S) which is in unavoidable interaction with its environment (E). The system S is so an open quantum system to which the unitary (reversible, Schrodinger) evolution in time cannot be ascribed. For the composite system “system + envirnment (S+E)”, one applies the hypothesis of the universal validity of quantum mechanics, i.e. that the system S+E evolves according to the Schrodinger law. That is, the unitary evolution in time of the composite system S+E is generated by the Hamiltonian: Hˆ = Hˆ S + Hˆ E + Hˆ int (1) where Hˆ i , i = S , E represent the “self-Hamiltonians” of mutually noninteracting systems, and the term Ĥ int represents their interaction (the interaction Hamiltonian). For the conservative systems, the corresponding unitary operator of evolution in time for the composite system is given by the expression: ( ) Uˆ (t ) = exp − 2πiHˆ / h . (2) Usually, for some plausible physical reasons and for mathematical simplicity (but without loss of generality), one adopts the following simplification: ( ) Uˆ (t ) ≅ Uˆ int (t ) = exp − 2πiHˆ int / h . (3) Now, the main task of the decoherence theory is to calculate the subsystem’s (S’s) “density matrix”, ρ̂ S defined by: ( ρˆ S = trE Uˆ int (t ) Ψ (t = 0) SE SE Ψ (t = 0) Uˆ *int ) (4) where: “ trE ” denotes “tracing out” (i.e. integrating over) the environmental degrees of freedom, Ψ (t = 0) SE represents the initial state of the composite system, and “*” denotes the hermitian conjugate. The “symptom” of the occurrence of decoherence (i.e. of the decoherence effect) is that there exists an orthonormalized basis i S in the Hilbert state space of the system S, for which one obtains at least approximately diagonal form of the density matrix; such a basis is sometimes [6] referred to as to the “pointer basis” of the system S. The diagonalization is mathematically presented by: { } ρ Sii ' ≅ 0, i ≠ i ' (5) where ρ Sii ' ≡ S i ' ρˆ S i S . 2 Most of the operational tasks in the decoherence theory are of the following kind: to find out the “pointer basis” for the system S; i.e. to find the set of mutually at least approximately orthogonal states for the system S to which eq.(5) applies. However, it has been shown recently [1-3] that the occurrence of decoherence substantially depends on some yet general characteristics of the interaction Hamiltonian. Particularly, the existence of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of decoherence has been pointed out. Physically, this result represents the necessary conditions for the existence of the “pointer basis” of the open system S. 3. IS NONEXISTENCE OF THE “POINTER BASIS” PHYSICALLY RELEVANT? Nonexistence of the “pointer basis” - which mathematicaly follows from the quantum mechanical formalism1 - can be interpreted2 as that one cannot put a definite border-line between the two subsystems, S and E, of the composite system S+E. In the “macroscopic context” [7-10], this can be considered unphysical (or counterfactual), so bearing no physical significance, at least as regards the “realistic” physical systems (models). However, this is not all that can be told in the “macroscopic context”. To show this, we will briefly overview below the results of Dugić [1-3]. Actually, if one cannot define the border-line between3 S and E, one may think of the cannonical transformations in the composite system S+E as a whole, so eventually obtaining the following physical situation: there exists a pair of the systems, S’ and E’, whose mutual interaction allows for the occurrence of decoherence, i.e. for defining the “pointer basis” of the new system S’, but only simultaneously with defining the new environment E’. More precisely, we have the situation presented by the following scheme: −transformations {improper interaction in S+E} canonical   → {proper interaction in S’+E’} (6) where “proper” (“improper”) interaction means that one may (may not) define the “pointer basis” of the system of interest, S’ (S). It is crucial to note that both the new system S’ and its (new) environment E’ are - if at all - only simultaneously defined. As to the “old” systems, S and E, one may say that they stay undefined (plausibly4: unobservable). It is also crucial to note that the canonical transformations in eq.(6) are such that the degrees of freedom5 of both S’ and E’ are (analytical) functions of the degrees of freedom of both S and E. Mathematically, this reads, e.g.: ξ S 'i = f i (x Sα , p Sα ; X Eβ , PEβ ) π E ' j = f j (x Sα , p Sα ; X Eβ , PEβ ) (7) with obvious notation. The inverse transformations are physically irrelevant for the two reasons. First, these are meaningless due to nonexistence of the border-line in the system S+E. Second, knowing 1 Once more speaking of the fact that, usually, quantum mechanics offers us more than we can classically understand, or expect. 2 See Zurek [6], and for more detailed discussion see Dugić [3]. 3 I.e. if one cannot define the subsystems S, and E, through their (a priori given) degrees of freedom. 4 Cf. Zurek [6]. 5 Coordinates and momenta. 3 the value of, e.g., the coordinate x Si , does not follow from knowing the values of the degrees of freedom of the system S’+E’ - which is due to incompatibility of the observables of S’+E’. Therefore, the transformation eq.(6) is substantial: the (sub)systems S’ and E’ are “objective”, while the “old” systems S and E are unobservable (cf. footnote 4). 4. THE ROOTS OF THE PHYSICAL METATHEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS When the system S’ is a macroscopic (many-particle) system, the results of the previous section strongly support [3] the following statement: no a local action in the system S’+E’ could help in “objectification” (i.e. in physical “appearance”) of the subsystems S and E. This notion follows from the fact that, as assumed, S’+E’ is not an isolated6 system. Then the interactions of S’ and E’ with the surrounding physical systems lead to a holistic nature of the complete system (which can be considered as isolated): a local interaction in the system S’+E’ determines analogous interaction in a distant place7. The isolated system can be referred to as the macroscopic part of the Universe (MPU). Then, the MPU is interconnected so that no a local action can change the definition of its parts. But what about the global actions - i.e., of the global changes (the transformations inverse to eq.(6))? Interestingly, the answer is: such global transitions are unobservable. To illustrate this, let us employ the hypothesis made explicit in Section 1. The physical basis of consciousness - which is a necessary part of the act of the “observation” - is also a macroscopic system. The global transition inverse to eq.(6), by definition, involves the degrees of freedom of this system, for it is considered [11,12] as an open system. Therefore, the global transitions lead to redefining of the physical basis of consciousness, thus giving rise to the following, a wider physical picture: each “Universe” defined by its parts, S+E, or S’+E’, be it “objective” or not, defines a corresponding “kind” of consciousness - through definition of a physical system which is assumed (cf. Section 1) to be its physical basis. But this gives the roots of the physical metatheory of consciousness: consciousness is a relative concept, not independent on the (quite general) definition of the MPU. I.e., the physical basis of consciousness can be defined only simultaneously with the “rest” of the “Universe”, in accordance with the holistic nature of the MPU as pointed above. This is not so surprising, especially if one takes seriously numerous anthropic “coincidences” playing a role in both classical and quantum cosmology [13]. This, in our opinion, is another feature of the “psycho-physical parallelism”, and a sort of the relative-physical-theory of consciousness, which defines consciousness only in relation to the definition of the macroscopic part of the Universe. As a consequence, one could conjecture that consciousness might be the essential property of Nature at different structural levels (macroscopic and microscopic, animate and inanimate), as widely claimed in traditional esoteric knowledge [14] - which might be supported by analogous mathematical formalisms of the dynamics of Hopfield’s associated neural networks and Feynman’s propagator version of Quantum mechanics [15]. Such nonlocal pantheistic idea of consciousness is also supported by Raković´s physical model of altered and transitional states of consciousness, which might provide additional route to the 6 This is not in contradiction with the expression (2). Actually, the interaction of a “system” with its environment dominates so giving rise to fast decoherence effect, while all the other interactions can be neglected during the time intervals of the order of the “decoherence time”. This perturbation-like situation is a general feature of the decoherence theory: the open systems suffer very fast decoherentization, while the remaining dynamics is driven by their mutual interactions - as particularly stressed in Section 4 of Ref. [10]. 7 Interaction of S’+E’ determines interaction, but also the definition of a remote system S’’+E’’, and vice versa. 4 physical solution of the problem of the wave-packet reduction in the Quantum measurement theory too [11,16,17]. 5. CONCLUSION It is pointed out that recent progress in decoherence theory implies that the physical basis of consciousness can be defined only simultaneously with the “rest” of the “Universe”, in accordance with the holistic nature of the MPU as pointed above. This, in our opinion, is a feature of the “psycho-physical parallelism”, and a sort of the relative-physical-theory of consciousness, which defines consciousness only in relation to the definition of the macroscopic part of the Universe. REFERENCES 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. M.Dugić, On the occurrence of decoherence in nonrelativistic quantum mechanics, Physica Scripta 53 (1996), pp. 9-17. M.Dugić, On diagonalization of the composite-system observable. separability, Physica Scripta 56 (1997), pp. 560-565. M.Dugić, A Contribution to the Foundations of the Theory of Decoherence in Nonrelativistic Quantum Mechanics, Ph.D. Thesis, Faculty of Science, University of Kragujevac, 1997 (in Serbian). R.Edmonds, Pragmatic Holism (or Pragmatic Reductionism), Foundations of Science 4 (1999), pp. 57-82. R.Landauer, IEEE Spectrum, 1967 September, pp. 105-109. W.H.Zurek, Environment-induced superselection rules, Phys. Rev. D 26 (1982), pp. 1862-1880. D.Giulini, E.Joos, C.Kiefer, J.Kupsch, I.-O.Stamatescu, and H.D.Zeh, Decoherence and the Appearance of a Classical World in Quantum Theory, Springer, Berlin, 1996. W.H.Zurek, Preferred states, predictability, classicality and the environment-induced decoherence, Prog. Theor. Phys. 89 (1993), pp. 281-302. W.H.Zurek, Decoherence and the transition from quantum to classical, Physics Today 48 (1991), pp. 36-46. R.Omnes, The Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1994. D.Raković and M.Dugić, A critical note on the role of the quantum-mechanical collapse in physical modeling of consciousness, Informatica (2000), in press. M.Dugić and D.Raković, Quantum-mechanical tunneling in associative neural networks, Eur. Phys. J. B 13 (2000), pp. 781-790. J.D.Barrow and F.J.Tipler, The Anthropic Cosmological Principle, Oxford University Press, New York, 1986. K.Wilber, The Atman Project, Quest, Wheaton, IL, 1980. M.Peruš, Neuro-quantum paralellism in mind-brain and computers, Informatica 20 (1996), pp. 173-183. D.Raković, Consciousness and quantum collapse: biophysics versus relativity, The Noetic J. 1 (1997), pp. 34-41. D.Raković, Fundamentals of Biophysics, Grosknjiga, Beograd, 1995 (in Serbian). 5

1438 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Self Article Transcending the Shamed Self Gary Schouborg, PhD* (Intended for V2N7, Self-Transcendent Experience, Gregory M. Nixon, Editor-at-Large) Abstract To contribute to understanding self-transcendence, this article provides an account of my personal experience of transcending my shamed self. This requires explaining the kind of self and shame involved. In mystical literature, the consciousness that remains after selftranscendence is sometimes called the Self or non-ego, in contrast to the self or ego, which is the empirical, executive self of ordinary consciousness and functioning. The self includes specific selves that play distinctive roles in various contexts. The specific self transcended in my personal experience was the shamed self, one that was experiencing the self-rejecting emotion of shame. Ordinary discourse as well as philosophical and empirical research often employ the term shame generically while failing to distinguish among at least eight closely related emotions: shyness; embarrassment; fear of rejection; feeling exposed, vulnerable, inferior, or unfulfilled; and self-rejection—shame in the strict sense, the emotion caused by my selfevaluation that I do not deserve love, even my own. The article proceeds in six parts: a summary introduction; a phenomenological account of shame; a phenomenological account of my personal experience of shame; a phenomenological account of my personal experience of transcending my shamed self; a phenomenological account of the aftermath; and an outline of a naturalistic explanation of my self-transcendence. Throughout the article, the term Self refers to an embodied, observing Self that avoids overly identifying with any aspect or function of the self, rather than an ontologically disembodied entity that transcends nature. Keywords: self, Self, self-transcendence, shyness, embarrassment, fear of rejection, fear of being exposed, vulnerability, sense of inferiority, unfulfillment, internalization, shame, naturalism. Follow, poet, follow right To the bottom of the night, With your unconstraining voice Still persuade us to rejoice; - W. H. Auden, In Memory of W. B. Yeats * Correspondence: Gary Schouborg, 1947 Everidge Court, CA 94597-2952. Email: gary@garynini.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1439 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel Summary Introduction The self that was transcended one summer evening in 1990 was the shamed self: desperate to feel lovable, to feel deserving of love. Its concern was not whether this or that attribute or behavior was lovable, but whether it itself, wholly and at its core, was. I may never completely understand why it felt unworthy of being loved, but I can identify some milestones along the road to its transcendence. Transcendence, not fulfillment, is the right word. The shamed self was not transformed from feeling unlovable to feeling lovable. It dissolved in favor of an emerging Self that knew from its innermost experience that feelings of one’s being lovable or unlovable are grounded in nothing but illusion. Ontological Clarification The Self that emerged was not some higher being that transcended the natural world. It was merely the humble, empirical self now freed from over-identifying with any of its attributes. Such a Self knew such things about itself as its having the name Gary, 6’0”, 160 lbs, living in Walnut Creek, California, USA, planet Earth, in 1990 CE. But it also experienced itself as more than the sum of these attributes, so that most importantly it did not derive its own value from whatever practical or social value any particular attribute might have for it or anyone else. It knew from its innermost experience that any such derivation was an illusion. Epistemological Clarification This knowledge was experiential, not theoretical. The Self did not have theoretical insight that there could be no valid answer to the question of whether it was lovable or unlovable, no theoretical insight that the question was itself an illusion. One of its many selves was a professional philosopher who was acutely aware that, as far as he knew, no objectively grounded answers to the question had ever been given; and it was impossible to prove that none could ever be given. Consequently, the Self did not emerge from some theoretical conviction of reason. Instead, it arose along with a simultaneously emerging satisfaction in living that made the question irrelevant. In much the same way, one might resolve a marital spat neither by proving who was right and who was wrong nor by sweeping the conflict under the rug, but by doing something sufficiently loving that the spat becomes inconsequential. The Shamed Self The shamed self is a self-rejecting self, one that believes that it is unworthy of even its own love. The shamed self is not the Self, which refuses to buy into such illusory global selfevaluations, but which limits its self to specific, pragmatic self-evaluations based on objective performance measures, whether intuitive or formal. For example, the Self simply enjoys being loved and is merely disappointed when it is not, since it draws no self-evaluative conclusions ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1440 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel about whether the experience is deserved. Even when it thinks of itself as lovable or unlovable in some particular, it bases its understanding pragmatically on facts. For example, if I have a speech impediment, I may think of myself as unlovable in the narrow sense that as a matter of fact others avoid my company because of it. I may go further and believe that they have good reason for avoiding me because of the effort they must make to understand me. I may go even further and find myself annoying to listen to. But I create a shamed self only when I go further still and believe that my impediment makes me as a whole unworthy of any love at all. In an act of emotional suicide, I reject my self. As a result, I transform the naturally unpleasant experience of being unloved into something much more: conclusive evidence that I am through and through undeserving of love. Once I take that logical leap I create a debate within myself about whether or not I am really worthy of love. When confronted with alleged evidence of my being unworthy, I desperately counter it by trying to find reasons for feeling worthy. To paraphrase Kierkegaard, from the labyrinth of that debate there is no escape. For in my view— which I will not argue for in this article, but which was critical for my self-transcendence—is that reason cannot settle the question of self-worthiness either by itself or based on evidence. The Self transcends the shamed self only by experiencing the irrelevance of the issue to its personal happiness. The Phenomenology of Shame Emotions are complex phenomena that are associated with neurophysiological, behavioral, affective, and cognitive processes (Izard, 1977; Tangney, 1990). The role that each kind of process plays varies so much from one emotion to another that psychology currently has no settled way to categorize emotions (Griffiths, 1997; Kagan, 1984). The difficulty is that we cannot study emotions directly, but only indirectly through gathering self-reports or observing neurophysiological and behavioral processes (Darwin, 1872/1998; M. Lewis, 1992, 1995; Miller, 1995; Simon, 1992). Data-gathering challenges arise because self-reports can be dishonest, inaccurate, or semantically ambiguous—that is, individuals may differ in their understanding of the words involved. One person’s shame may be another’s embarrassment or shyness or guilt or something else altogether. Behaviors and neurophysiological processes may not be uniquely associated with different emotions. Covering one’s face is associated with shyness and embarrassment as well as shame, though in subtly different ways. Some emotions may even lack one or more of the four processes. For example, feeling guilty does not seem to have any characteristically associated behavior, and feeling startled may not involve cognition in any meaningful sense (M. Lewis, 1995). These problems are multiplied when a situation evokes more than one emotion. Within the space allotted for this article, it is not possible to establish conceptually and empirically a definition for shame, distinguishing it from the many other closely related and often conflated emotions. I will therefore give a brief account that aims to be intuitively ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1441 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel plausible enough to explain my experience of self-transcendence. Shame, then, is the emotion characterized by the belief that I am wholly unworthy of love, even my own (equivalently, I do not deserve to be loved, even by myself; I deserve to be wholly rejected, even by myself; I am unlovable, even to myself; I am ashamed of myself; I am shameful). This definition distinguishes shame proper from at least seven other emotions that are often confused with it: shyness; embarrassment; fear of rejection; and feelings of exposure, vulnerability, inferiority, or unfulfillment. I do not intend this set of eight emotions to be exhaustive. I will refer to it as the shame-family of emotions in virtue of two facts: they are often associated with negative evaluations of the global self rather than of some particular attribute, and consequently they are often confused with one another. Sometimes they are usefully grouped together generically as shame; at other times, however, clearly differentiating them is critical. That is the case here in order to understand the precise nature of my experience of self-transcendence and the implications for understanding transcendence more generally. The shame-family is sometimes, but decreasingly, confused with the guilt-family of emotions: fear of punishment, desire for punishment, disappointment with oneself, regret, and guilt proper. A consensus has developed for distinguishing broadly between the guilt-family as involving negative feelings caused by one’s bad behavior and the shame-family as involving negative feelings caused by believing one’s whole self to be bad (Alexander, 1963; Izard, 1977; H. B. Lewis, 1987; M. Lewis, 1992; Lindsay-Hartz, de Rivera, & Mascolo, 1995; Lynd, 1958; Tangney, 1990; Tangney & Fischer, 1995). I will not discuss the guilt-family of emotions except in those few instances where guilt proper and shame proper are usefully distinguished. In those cases, I will define guilt as the emotion characterized by the belief that I have done something morally wrong (equivalently, I have done something I ought not to have done; I have failed to do something I ought to have done; all of these versions can be altered to refer to future action—I intend to do—or present action—I am doing—as well). For convenience, I will refer to guilt proper and shame proper simply as guilt and shame, respectively. I will never use the two latter terms generically unless I am directly or indirectly quoting someone else. Shyness Shyness is a neurophysiological withdrawal response from social stimuli that is devoid of any appraisal of the individual’s situation but simply notes the presence of a social stimulus (Kagan, Reznick, & Snidman, 1988; Kagan, Snidman, & Arcus, 1992; M. Lewis, 1992, 1995). It is triggered just by the awareness of being exposed. The absence of appraisal distinguishes shyness from the other members of the shame-family. Shyness seems to be the most rudimentary expression of a need for privacy, a need to choose when I will be exposed to others. Embarrassment Emotions ranging from shyness to a less intense version of shame are often indiscriminately called embarrassment (M. Lewis, 1992, 1995; Lynd, 1958; Rochat, 2009). However, I will define ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1442 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel embarrassment as the emotion characterized by the self-evaluation that I deserve disapproval. It is beyond the scope of this article to establish that the reason why the literature currently does not allow a fully satisfactory account of embarrassment (M. Lewis, 1992, 1995) is that has not yet discovered this definition. For present purposes, we can distinguish embarrassment by imagining ourselves embarrassed and asking if we believe that we deserve to be wholly rejected or unloved; and if we do believe that, asking ourselves if it is then more accurate to say we feel ashamed rather than embarrassed. All other members of the shame family can be defined in similar fashion. Fear of rejection Throughout this article, fear of rejection means fear of emotional rejection. Nomadic peoples abandon the old and infirm when they can no longer take care of them. This does not mean that nomads cease loving or respecting them, yet they do reject them physically from the community. In itself, that has nothing to do with shame, though of course anyone might mistake it for emotional rejection, which with additional factors could result in shame. Like shame, fear of rejection involves the whole self—fear that one’s very presence will be shunned (Rochat, 2009)—since one’s presence cannot be partially rejected. Instead of a parent telling a child to go to their room, it is usually not effective to tell them to stand half-in and halfout of the doorway. In any case, what makes emotional rejection different from merely physical rejection is the involvement of deserved disapproval. What makes it different from shame is that the rejection is compatible with the belief that the child is worthy of love. Giving a child a time-out is not shaming them if the parent clearly conveys either that depriving them of the presence of the rest of the family is punishment for bad behavior or that the child must leave because communication between them and the rest of the family is temporarily not possible or takes more effort than the parent is willing to expend. Feeling exposed The philosopher Scheler held that shame lies in the conflict between the public and private spheres of consciousness (cited in Emad, 1972). Many behavioral scientists have made similar claims (Aronfreed, 1968; Buss, 1966; Erikson, 1950). However, one can feel exposed without even being embarrassed, let alone ashamed. There is no necessary link between feeling exposed and believing that one does not deserve to be loved, even by oneself. It is conceptually possible for anyone feeling exposed to reply in the negative when asked whether or not that implies that they are unworthy of love. Feeling vulnerable Exposure means that we are uncovered, consequently unprotected, and therefore vulnerable. If then the cause of shame is not necessarily exposure, perhaps it is the vulnerability that we ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1443 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel feel when exposed. Freud (1930/1962) speculated that shame over our nakedness is partly derived from the vulnerability of our genitals that resulted when we assumed an upright stance. Lynd (1958) writes similarly about vulnerability more generally. However, not every experience of being vulnerable produces shame. Anyone told that they have terminal cancer will almost certainly feel both vulnerable and unashamed. There is no necessary link between feeling vulnerable and believing that one does not deserve to be loved, even by oneself. It is conceptually possible for anyone feeling vulnerable to reply in the negative when asked whether or not that implies that they are unworthy of love. Feeling inferior Shame has been closely associated not only with exposure and vulnerability, but also with inferiority. This is understandable since being exposed and vulnerable puts us in an inferior position to others; and, conversely, if we are in an inferior position, we may feel exposed and vulnerable. Furthermore, we depend upon one another in many ways, so that inferiority can make us less dependable and therefore subject to criticism. Especially in competitive societies certain kinds of inferiority almost inevitably make a person ashamed since inferior performance can result in being shunned. Freud never explicitly compared shame with a sense of inferiority, referring to shame always in relation to feelings about sex (Hazard, 1969; see also the references to shame in the Index of Freud, 1953-1964). Subsequent psychoanalysts, however, refer to both shame and feeling inferior as a tension between ego and superego (or ego ideal) (Alexander, 1938; Piers, 1971). However, there is no necessary link between feeling inferior and believing that one does not deserve to be loved, even by oneself. It is conceptually possible for anyone feeling inferior to reply in the negative when asked whether or not that implies that they are unworthy of love, unless of course they are using “feeling inferior” as a synonym for “feeling unworthy of love,” as may sometimes be done. Feeling unfulfilled Piers identified shame with “the particular inner tension which stems from failure to reach one's own potentialities” (1971, p. 25). Others have identified this with guilt (Dabrowski, 1973; Freud, 1923/1960; Gendlin, 1973; Izard, 1977; Lynd, 1958). Helen Block Lewis sees the ego ideal as generating either shame or guilt or simply a goal. “Some discrepancy between self and ideal is 'normal,' not necessarily as the affective state of shame and guilt, but as a motive for striving” (H. B. Lewis, 1971, p. 110). My proposed definition of shame explains why. Unfulfillment can generate either shame, guilt, disappointment with oneself, or regret, depending upon the belief involved. It can produce regret if I want to reach my potentialities and believe that I cannot. It can produce disappointment with myself if I expected to reach my potentialities, wanted to, and now believe that I am incapable of doing so. It can produce guilt, if I believe that I am morally bound to reach my potentialities and that I am inexcusably failing to do so. It can produce shame, if I believe that failing to reach my potentialities is shameful. And it can produce any combination of these emotions at the same time, since the corresponding beliefs ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1444 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel can coexist. In short, there is no necessary link between feeling unfulfilled and believing that one does not deserve to be loved, even by oneself. It is conceptually possible for anyone feeling unfulfilled to reply in the negative when asked whether or not that implies that they are unworthy of love. Internalization At various times, theorists have sought to identify one or other members of the shame-family with shame through the mechanism of internalization. However, internalization changes only the conditions under which an emotion is triggered; it does not, for example, change fear of rejection into shame. It means only that one can fear rejection not only under external threat but also independently of it. As we have seen, what changes fear of rejection into shame is the belief that the rejection is deserved. The belief itself is the mechanism that both internalizes fear of rejection and transforms it into shame. There is no necessary link between fearing rejection and believing that one deserves it. It is conceptually possible for anyone experiencing an internalized feeling of rejection to reply in the negative when asked whether or not that implies that they are unworthy of love. My Personal Experience of Shame This section describes those of my personal experiences that illustrate shame and closely related emotions. The first aim is to confirm that my account of shame does not refer only to a conceptual possibility, but to an emotion that I have actually experienced and that I suspect others have as well. The second aim is to explain the nature of my experience of selftranscendence, why I sought it, and how it affected my life. The third aim is to provide a concrete challenge to accounts of self-transcendence that assert the existence of an experience that is more grand and other-worldly than my own. By being specific and personal, I hope to provide a modest baseline to help shed light on three possibilities: these more grand accounts are necessarily vague because of the higher nature of the experience; they are vague but improvable depictions of a higher experience, or they are vague only because they inadequately depict resolutions of personal conflicts like my own. This selective autobiography aims to illustrate a life-long dialectic between an insecure and passive doer who was ashamed of himself and a more self-confident and assertive thinker who never quite gave up on himself. When challenged, my deepest instinct is to withdraw to fight another day, a strategy that expresses itself in a dialectic of short-term faintheartedness and long-term resilience. For most of my life, this meant a dysfunctional passivity that kept me from keeping up with life’s challenges, leading to intense self-loathing. Yet there remained a profound determination that was continually preparing for a better day. When this conflicted self was transcended, it awakened to a Self where bewildered passivity became an alert receptivity and where desperate grasping at hypotheses became a calm understanding of simple realities. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1445 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel Mama’s Boy 1936 - 1941 The tendrils of this self that felt unworthy began early. My very first memory is of waking up from a nap to hear my parents arguing. My dad was driving a two-seat coupe along a two-lane Nebraska country road, my mother beside him. Lying behind and above them on the shelf between the seat and back window, I could have complained about their fighting. Instead, I withdrew from the conflict by going back to sleep, a life-long practice of a passivity both healing and leaving me vulnerable to shame, a radical kind of non-assertiveness where we not only fear rejection from others, but join them in believing it deserved. I found respite from my parents’ arguments in a farm outside Harvard in south-central Nebraska. The main attractions there for me were my grandfather and my cousin Ricky, one and a half years younger than I was. My grandfather was a warm presence who was delighted with Ricky and me, telling us stories and singing us ballads, most memorably Streets of Laredo. Ricky and I were inseparable and so energetically playful that my grandfather dubbed us the Katzenjammer Kids, after the mischievous brothers in the popular comic strip of that time. A doting grandmother and mother completed my experience of life as fundamentally welcoming and secure, a feeling that ultimately overcame a profound vulnerability for feeling shame. My lack of resilience was tested when my mother returned with me to Beatrice to live with my father, his parents, and my sister Gayle, who was two years younger than I was. My father’s loud and angry impatience with my childhood weaknesses, fears, or annoying behaviors was wrapped into one punishing epithet, “mama’s boy,” which unmistakably conveyed something wrong not just with this or that behavior of mine, but with me. His condemnation was supported by the fact that I was indeed sometimes too weak to do certain things. Although I loved outside play with neighborhood boys, my body was more slender and soft than muscular and robust. I did indeed usually cower at threats rather than fight back. I did indeed prefer my mother’s consoling arms to his angry, impatient voice; and I did indeed enjoy her play to his. Although my mother defended me against him, I found him the more persuasive of the two because he was the more threatening. There being more evolutionary urgency in avoiding threats than in seeking rewards, I involuntarily sided with him even to my own disadvantage. (Korchin, 1976, attributes the name of this syndrome, "identification with the aggressor," to Anna Freud.) He was the more threatening not only because of his physical strength but because his language was more emotionally powerful than hers. The “mama’s boy” that he disdainfully hurled at me was language already deeply embedded in my social world, against which my mother offered merely her opinion in language that was not so socially charged. Consequently, this disdainful self-perception took firm root, to be struggled against but not eradicated until I was in my 50s. Lurking deep within, it transformed normal insecurities into facets of shame. They not only warned me of threats of social snubs and rejections, but insisted that whatever contempt came my way was well deserved. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1446 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel Back Home 1941 - 1942 In early 1941, my father enlisted in the Army Signal Corps. While he was away and America still in the Depression, my mother was unable to care for both Gayle and me by herself. Nor could either set of grandparents take us both on. So my mother left Gayle with the Schouborgs and took me to live with her parents, who had recently moved to Scottsbluff near the westernmost border of Nebraska. The never-fulfilled plan was for my parents, Gayle, and me to get back together when things were more settled. The train ride to my maternal grandparents was my return home. The love that my mother and grandparents had for me was so genuine, unwavering, and delicious that I never doubted the innocence of anything I felt deeply. Even when I felt my deepest shame, I never completely lost that sense of innocence. It gave me an emotional clarity dramatically illustrated in my earliest memory of playing doctor. Taking a neighborhood girl into our garage, I beheld, stroked, and kissed her naked cleft with a blissful wonder that would do the Buddha proud. At the same time, I could not have been more terrified of discovery had a giant spider been lurking outside the door. But at no time did I feel a hint of doing anything wrong or shameful, just something wonderful but forbidden. The feeling was too deep to be felt as anything but innocent. So in that garage in Scottsbluff, Nebraska, in the Fall of 1941, my sense of innocence survived even my terror of disapproval and punishment. Worthiness or unworthiness had nothing to do with it. This was indeed a kind of self-transcendence, however temporary the transformation. The emotional security and nourishment at home left me free to enjoy self-initiated, solitary, intellectual projects. In one instance, I asked my mother to buy me a pad and pencil so I could count numbers from one to a hundred. I remember vividly the satisfaction I felt in the physical act of writing down the numbers and the mental experience of moving with confidence from one number to the next, finally arriving at a hundred. The experience is my earliest and treasured memory of experiencing the life of the mind. Social Challenges 1942 - 1951 Shortly after Pearl Harbor, when I was still five, my mother’s side of the family joined the hoard of Midwesterners migrating to Los Angeles to seek work in aircraft plants. The standing room only train ride filled with newly drafted soldiers, sailors, and marines left me with an abiding memory of a world filled with strong, friendly adults who were my reliable protectors. Peers, on the other hand, were another matter. When starting school in East L.A., standing in the doorway before the first-grade class as the teacher introduced me, I surprised myself by bursting into tears. I do not recall any fears beforehand or any interactions (good or bad) afterward with my new classmates. My best guess is that meeting a full room of strangers was a boatload of stimulation that overwhelmed me. I have always needed time to digest both food and interactions with others. In any case, a month later when my mother, grandparents, and I ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1447 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel moved to an apartment four miles west of downtown L.A., I succeeded in not embarrassing myself like that again when the nun introduced me to the first-grade class of St. Paul’s Grammar School. But I did so only through a deliberate act of will. Grammar school put its own stamp on my dialectic between short-term faintheartedness and long-term resilience. I excelled academically because I always had time to pursue scholastic tasks. Although modestly above average athletically, my performance was limited not only by my slight build but also by my lacking the killer skill to act decisively in the moment. Similar factors militated against any better success with girls. Unfortunately, my peers and the culture at large, and my blue-collar family as well, greatly valued action over thought, so that I not only found myself unable to accept my average abilities in sports and romance, but I compensated by exaggerating my failures, which coalesced onto my mama’s boy shame like barnacles on a great ship. The earnest and naïve nuns who taught us unwittingly nourished both my penchant for thought over action and for exaggerated self-recrimination whenever I failed social or divine standards. In the 1940s, their emphasis was so rule-bound as to undermine a natural trust in personal judgment and therefore self-assertion. Railings against materialism were too heavy-handed for us Catholic children to see that moral danger lies not in material things as such but in our attitude toward them. Focus on attitude would have encouraged the short-term challenge of constructively engaging the world rather than the long-term challenge of keeping it at a distance while concentrating on the world to come. Ubiquitous of course were warnings against the sins of the flesh, which were subject to eternal hellfire. Encouragement of common sense, with its practical engagement with the world, might have made us wonder whether eternal hellfire might be something of an over-reaction, however undesirable we suppose such sins are. Not limiting herself to exaggerations about sins of the flesh, the seventh-grade nun told us that the slightest venial sin was so abhorrent in the eyes of God that we ought not tell a white lie even to prevent World War III. Encouragement of common sense, with its practical engagement with the world, might have made us wonder whether the consequences of a World War III might far outweigh whatever evil there might be in a white lie. In fact, those with common sense dismissed such teachings outright. But as ungrounded in the practical and as proficient in the abstract as I was, I bought them hook, line, and sinker. The authority of the nuns, who were supposedly giving me Truth from God Himself, along with the weightiness of the consequences—my eternal destiny—fed my other-worldly orientation all the more. And because that orientation undermined trust in common sense or personal judgment, it made me that much more vulnerable to shame, the ultimate act of self-rejection. Conscious Self-Rejection 1951 - 1954 Graduation from St. Paul’s in 1950 therefore found me vulnerable to social challenges that were intensified in high school by the inexorable rush of hormones, dramatically increasing the normal adolescent insecurities—shyness; fear of disapproval; fear of rejection (external or ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1448 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel internalized); fear of being exposed vulnerable, inferior, or unfulfilled—and the shame that they so cruelly triggered. The cycle of self-rejection even intensified into self-awareness when one day my freshman year, ridiculed by some classmates for something I have long forgotten, I quite consciously refused to stand up for myself because I “knew” they were right. So I desperately tried to avoid isolation by joining with others in rejecting myself. Digging My Way Out Fortunately, along with my self-loathing I still had my family and best friend. They gave me a deep sense of the goodness of life simply from the experience of our being together, a sense that proved ineradicable however easily I could lose sight of it. Further and completely unexpected support arose only a few months before I graduated. A fellow classmate approached me with a proposition: “Would you like to have a coke with me and each of us will tell the other what others think about him?” This was triply intriguing for me. First, he and I had seldom if ever spoken a word to each other in the three years that we had been in class together. I was flattered that he noticed me. Second, the question had never occurred to me, since I never doubted that everyone but Gus despised me, however friendly they might appear at times. Third, I instantly found the prospect of talking about myself with someone who was interested in me inherently appealing and deeply relieving. The classmate’s effect on me was immense. To this point, I had made no connection between academics and my personal life. In my blue-collar upbringing, doing well in school was simply a way to get a good job; it never occurred to me that I could usefully turn that studious energy onto my personal life. Now out of the blue came someone who not only gave me feedback on what others thought of me, but even more importantly demonstrated how he himself made use of such feedback. Not least of his healing attention was his genuine surprise at how little I thought of myself and at how paranoid (his word) I was about others’ disdain for me. When at the end of the summer he left to enter the Jesuits, his example of self-reflection planted the seed for me to enter four years later in order to “explore inner space,” as I put it then, by exploring my inner experience in the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises. Thanks to this one person’s initiative, I began to develop tools for digging my way out of the emotional grave in which I had buried myself, a continuous process that would eventually bear significant fruit forty years later. College 1954 - 1958 My account of non-coed college dating can be short and sour: I made no developmental progress to speak of. This was in the 1950s, when describing a girl as a good conversationalist meant that she was not hot but could talk about sports. Fortunately, majoring in engineering gave me male classmates who benefited me socially as well as intellectually, since they had the same interests I had and respected my academic excellence. About ten of us developed into an informal fraternity of good friends. The friendly and respectful feeling went beyond this circle ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1449 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel to the rest of our class year and to other years as well. My social circle therefore widened beyond just my best friend and me, and my positive sense of myself broadened accordingly. However, it was still dwarfed by the deep conviction that, with the exception of my best friend, they did not know the real me. The self-reflection that began in conversations just before graduation at Loyola High continued in the philosophy classes required of all undergrads at Loyola University. In junior year epistemology, I took immediately to the question of what we can know and how we can know it, since it opened a fascinating door to the theoretical suppositions behind my engineering studies and most especially my life values. This theoretical bent also shifted my interest from electrical engineering in my junior year to the foundations of math in my senior year. The latter took on an increasingly psychological emphasis as I became intrigued with the psychological question of how the mind could come up with such astounding creations from perspectives whose existence I had never suspected. This personal bent was also fed that year by the Jesuit approach to moral philosophy in terms of natural law, which was a Copernican revolution for me. Instead of demanding that we be good little boys and girls and follow rules to prove ourselves worthy of heaven, natural law told us that the moral demands on which we had been raised as Catholics were based on our nature. Catholic moral teaching was really an instruction manual telling us how we can find happiness by understanding how we are built. Although I was oblivious to how much the account of nature was manipulated to conform to Catholic doctrine, the basic principle of looking to nature for guidance was what took hold for me. Toward the end of my senior year, then, four inner dynamics merged that impelled me to join the Jesuits. The first was my feeling of failure with women. At the ripe old age of twenty-two, I concluded that if I had not found the right woman by now I never would, since all the desirable ones would be taken. The second grew out of the excitement that I found in the natural law approach to moral philosophy, which based my behavior toward others on my nature and theirs rather than on proving myself a good person. I instinctively felt this to be a significant step into adulthood and a mature understanding of what Catholicism had to offer the world— an inspiring perspective that I wanted to share with others as a Jesuit priest. The third dynamic was my temperament, with which you are by now familiar: the Jesuits offered a life of reflection shielded from the practicalities of everyday living. The final dynamic was a vision of the spiritual life as an exploration of inner space. The Jesuits: 1958 - 1970 The morning of August 14, 1958, at L.A.’s Union Station, I boarded the train for the Jesuit novitiate in Los Gatos, California, just south of San Jose. My mother all but collapsed in tears, much to my embarrassment in contrast to the calm goodbyes of the mothers of the other two men entering that day, who had recently graduated from Loyola High. Once on the train, I was relieved to be out from under my mother and her emotionality. My lack of any regrets, the result of having emotionally cut all my ties in this radical decision, was reinforced by the high ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1450 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel spirits of the other two, who were also enthusiastically looking forward to a grand but challenging adventure. The novitiate and juniorate 1958 - 1961 Ignatius counseled Jesuit Masters of Novices to keep their charges so busy that they would not have time to think of fleshpots outside the novitiate walls. That may sound sinister to some, but it was well-intentioned, designed to develop a disciplined focus. It was effective, at least for me. Unfortunately, the Master of Novices was as narrowly focused as any boot-camp sergeant. Although I had entered with a vision of exploring inner space, my understanding of what that meant was so inchoate and my personal history so governed by moral rules that I did not notice that the novitiate training was intense indoctrination rather than a process that facilitated listening to my deeper impulses. Again, this was not deliberately sinister even though it was naively seditious. The Master was a moralistic and rule-bound man who believed what he taught; and he drove those beliefs home with a force intended to keep us from straying after we left the protective confines of the novitiate. Unsurprisingly, I experienced little emotional development in such an atmosphere. Quite the opposite. Having put all my eggs in this lifetime basket, I subordinated all I had to following the Jesuit rules and practices faithfully and precisely, greedily grasping at personal merit rather than opening myself up to an emotional flowering. This attitude persisted when I graduated from the novitiate to the juniorate studies in the humanities, giving myself headaches from avariciously reading everything I could. Having given up all my possessions, my body, and my will in vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, I had nothing else in which I could find selfworth but my learning. Revealingly, I was shocked one day to discover looking back at me in the mirror a severely ascetic face drained of the warmer friendliness it had before it entered the novitiate. The philosophate 1961 – 1964 The narrow world of the novitiate and juniorate opened up slightly in the summer of 1961, when I took the train to St. Louis, Missouri, to study graduate philosophy and math at Saint Louis University. I lived at Fusz Memorial, the dormitory exclusively for Jesuit scholastics (Jesuits in studies before ordination). The university was co-ed, which introduced some normalcy to our lives compared to the cloistered existence of the novitiate and juniorate. Other sources of alternate viewpoints began to loosen my dogmatic bent: Jesuit scholastics from all over the U.S., some even from other countries, who had been taught diverse perspectives on Jesuit spirituality; Bill Wade, a legendary and beloved Jesuit philosopher-curmudgeon who attacked our assumptions with wit and incisiveness; leading historians of philosophy; and Erich Fromm’s Man For Himself. The book was the first step in freeing me from Jesuit rationalism, by which I mean an over-emphasis on the conceptual to the disregard of personal experience. The moral philosophy at Loyola University pointed me beyond rules to the empirical, but only as highly ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1451 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel constrained by Catholic non-empirical beliefs. It also referenced human nature only abstractly, not in terms of personal experience. Moral philosophy in the Saint Louis philosophate followed suit. Fromm, however, although agreeing implicitly with Jesuits in grounding ethics in reason against relativism, did so through his experience as a psychoanalyst. I concluded that behaviors were not right or wrong because of abstract moral principles, but because of how they affected the way we related to ourselves and others. I instantly recognized that this was the perspective I had been looking for since I had begun self-reflection near high school graduation in 1954. As a result, I abandoned my studies both in math as too remotely connected to the personal and in Catholic scholastic philosophy as too rationalistic or ungrounded in the personal. More socially cut off than I wanted to be from people—even most of my Jesuit peers—by being consumed with philosophy, I also hoped that this more experiential approach would make me more popular. Regency 1964 – 1966 Regency is the two to three year break between Jesuit philosophy and theology studies when scholastics teach high school or college or take advanced degrees. Superiors assigned me to teach philosophy for two years at my alma mater, Loyola University. Even greater than my excitement was my relief that I was not going to teach high school. Still in the firm grip of my painful adolescence, I was terrified of facing high school boys. However, I was much less afraid of college young men, because my college peer experience had been rewarding, I loved philosophy, and I felt I had something to offer them that they would appreciate. I was deeply gratified and relieved to find this truer than I had hoped. Along with their support, the Jesuit community was very friendly and supportive, especially the young liberal priests, who encouraged my questioning of basic Catholic assumptions. Another major influence on me during regency was theoretical. The writings of Bernard Lonergan, a leading Jesuit philosopher and theologian, merged the traditional seminary staple of Thomas Aquinas with Kant’s critical philosophy and an empiricist (speaking broadly) emphasis on a never-ending, self-correcting inquiry into experience as the way to distinguish knowledge from mere insight or belief. He thus provided a theoretical framework for my interest in personal experience that had begun at the end of high school, got a booster shot from reading Erich Fromm in the philosophate, and became more tangible yet when one of the Jesuit priests introduced me to the personal coaching methods of Carl Rogers. None of the above influences threatened my Catholic faith, but only liberalized it. The seeds of my eventual break from Catholicism, and from Christianity more generally, came in counseling students about sex with their girlfriends. When they asked how far they could go before committing a mortal sin, and instead of giving them rules I invited them to reflect on what was emotionally going on between them, they invariably took me to be telling them to do what they wanted. Up to this point, I had disagreed with the church on this or that point, but now I concluded that it was systematically misguiding people by insisting on rules rather than helping ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1452 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel them reflect on their personal experience so they could develop more caring relationships with others. Consequently, my students were primed to hear only a black and white moralistic choice: either what you want to do is forbidden or it is allowed. There is no need for you to understand your relationship to others beyond what the rules tell you. This began my systematic disagreement with the church, a process that was fed by my increasing focus on inner experience that terminated eventually not in the unprovable denial of the existence of God but in finding the notion of God irrelevant to figuring out how to live my life. Regency at Loyola University, then, was a wonderful gift to me. It was a proving ground for my intellectual and teaching abilities. It provided friends who enjoyed me personally and supported my relentless inquiry into what makes life really meaningful and what morality contributes. It gave me an intellectual framework for identifying the relevance of personal experience to that inquiry. It even gave me some slim hope that as a man I was not invisible to women, an issue I needed to resolve even if I remained celibate. In short, it helped me immeasurably along the road of building some self-respect, of creating some sense of being capable of making my way in the world. Nevertheless, it left largely untouched my feeling of being unworthy of love. My first reaction upon meeting any stranger was still that they would find me of no interest, that I would be essentially invisible to them. The theologate 1966 – 1969 The three years of theology studies were roughly a straight-line development of the themes that emerged in regency. One notable experience was spending the summer of 1967, the height of the Haight, taking philosophy classes at Cal Berkeley. One of the Jesuits with me was an Adonis whom many coeds shined up to while ignoring me as though I were invisible. I was particularly hurt since I had hoped that the counterculture, with its anti-1950s aesthetic, would not put the same premium on good looks. However, my perception was that people were people no matter what their ideology. If you had less than matinee idol looks, some woman might settle for you but never really love you. I did not condemn women for that; after all, it was only the mirror image of my own lack of interest in any woman who was not hot. (Stendhal: Beauty is the promise of happiness.) Accepting both viewpoints, I literally told myself that neither I nor anyone like me deserved love, since we had nothing to offer others. The University of Texas at Austin 1969 – 1978 Intellectually, the philosophy faculty at Texas quickly took me the last small step in abandoning the Jesuits, the Catholic Church, Christianity, and the notion of God. At Alma, I was still very much the budding liberal philosopher intent on showing how church doctrine was relevant to the contemporary world. The grounds for my optimism was that I was recognized as an intellectual leader in my peer group and the theology faculty at Alma was reputed to be worldclass. So I concluded that the declining influence of the church was due only to its failure to get out its message, which I was well equipped to explain. At Texas, however, I was immediately ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1453 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel exposed to thinking that was conceptually more sophisticated than anything I had seen in the allegedly world-class theology at Alma. In addition, it led wherever logic and the relevant evidence would take it, whereas even the most sophisticated Jesuits seemed subtly constrained by church doctrine. Feeling completely free and at home in this secular environment, I did not so much leave the church as recognize that it no longer played a role in my life. In early 1970, I informed my Jesuit superiors of this fact and moved out of the Jesuit community near campus. My nine years in Austin were the loneliest in my life as I increasingly opened my heart to its deepest yearnings through a series of failed affairs that included one marriage. In retrospect, there were several reasons why none of these relationships succeeded; but at the time all I could see was that I did not have enough manly charisma to keep any woman interested, at least not any woman whose interest meant anything to me. Whatever the women’s reasons, two related dynamics were common to all the relationships: I unknowingly demanded of each one that she heal my feelings of shame; and I was so caught up in this need that I was unaware of what she thought and felt about me other than that she either wanted to make love with me or she did not. If she did, I was briefly ecstatic; if she did not, I was crushed. Primal therapy 1974 The process of shaming was for me a hollowing out of feeling, intensely focused as I was on proving myself worthy in the eyes of others. My Jesuit, philosophical, and psychological selfreflection had at this point given me exceptional conceptual clarity about myself, but still left me feeling empty because it was primarily only a view from the outside onto my shame. Primal therapy, with its emphasis on feeling, seemed a possible antidote. And so it was, to the extent that it gave me access to my feelings. This was so true that when a friend took me to a Buddhist lecture, what in its teachings I found incomprehensible before primal therapy I now found crystal clear. The difference was a shift from reading Buddhist teachings as ontology—theories of the objective nature of reality—to interpreting them as phenomenology or descriptions of inner experience, a view to which primal therapy opened me without ever mentioning anything about Buddhism. A Turning Point: December 20, 1976 The emphasis of primal therapy was “getting into feelings,” especially ones very early in life before mainstream science thinks the brain can store autobiographical memories. Whether such early memories really exist, later ones do that are deeply painful and unresolved. Primal therapy had techniques for accessing them by breaking down intellectual defenses. One danger, at least with the therapist I had in Austin, was that participants were so intent on feeling deeply that they often manufactured feelings to please the therapist. Even more dangerous was the assumption that opening up painful feelings would necessarily resolve them. Sometimes they could be more powerful than an individual could digest, at least with the limited skills of this therapist, as I concluded one night in the winter of 1976. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1454 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel For several months I had been dating a woman in an open relationship. One evening I knew she was dating someone who was probably going to spend the night. Early the next morning, I drove over to her place “to get into feelings” about how her involvement with someone else affected me. When I saw his car still parked in front of her house, I was overwhelmed with pain, flooded with my deep conviction that no woman worthwhile could love me. That day I bought a .38 revolver to put an end to my unlovable existence. That night, lying on my bed with my head propped up on the pillow, I placed the gun three times into my mouth but could not bring myself to pull the trigger. When I saw that I did not have the nerve, I decided that I was going to have to build a satisfying life without relying on some “princess” to make me happy. I was going to have to find my happiness within myself. My pain was so overwhelming, that it was clear that my situation was way over the head of the primal therapist. Fortunately, a friend directed me to the chief clinician of the Travis County Mental Health Mental Rehabilitation office in Austin. He was only vaguely aware of primal therapy and skeptical of the process I was going through. But he was also a listener. When I told him that I believed in my process, but while I went through it I needed someone as a reference point to guard me from going in a destructive direction, he agreed to help. His warm, personal support and some theoretical frameworks he provided to help me understand my experience were of immense value. For the several months we were together, I wept deeply several times a day over my sense of loss, loneliness, and unworthiness to be in human company. I ended therapy when I finally broke the back of my shame by realizing that even I did not deserve this much loathing. Breaking shame’s back did not yet bring the peace I sought, anymore than breaking a fever instantly heals all the damage the illness has done. Just as the body must restore and rebalance healthy processes, so I had yet to find that inner satisfaction in life that is our birthright and that exists independently of the normal joys and disappointments of our daily lives. Although I no longer punished myself with self-loathing, I still knew no road to happiness except by satisfying my ordinary desires, which were consequently exaggerated in lieu of my inner emptiness. As a result, on New Year’s Eve 1977 I married an especially attractive woman even though I knew deep down that we were wrong for each other, but from whom I could not walk away because her good looks fed my self-esteem. We separated a year later when I received my PhD, she was finishing hers, and our potential career paths diverged more than we were willing to work through. Deeply disappointed from also failing to receive an academic appointment, I returned to L.A. to look for a job. Moral epistemology and psychology merge 1976-1978 Ever since I was an undergrad I had been interested in moral epistemology, the study of the basis in reason for our value judgments. There is no space here for the details on my own view, so I will just note that by the late 1970s I concluded that moral judgments have no basis in reason—no objective truth or validity—but are misleading expressions of the desires we hold ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1455 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel most dear. This philosophical view merged organically with my psychological exploration of inner experience, resulting in a doctoral dissertation on the implications for the psychological diagnosis of guilt and shame (Schouborg, 1978), where I identified substantially the same characteristic beliefs that I have presented here. My personal conclusions, which were too controversial to include in my dissertation, were that guilt and shame are emotions that cause us unnecessary suffering because they are confused expressions of closely related emotions that are useful in helping us navigate our interactions with others. This was for me both an intellectual and experiential view. The intellectual component concluded that there was no objective validity to the value judgments involved in guilt and shame. The experiential component came largely from my experience in primal therapy, which helped me access and discriminate among the closely related members of the guilt-family and shame-family of emotions. More recently, my position has evolved in parallel to my earlier one on God. Roughly, just as arguments either for or against the existence of God ultimately depend on circular reasoning, so also do arguments for or against the validity of value judgments. And just as I eventually walked away from thinking about God because it was not useful in living my life because thoughts of God are misleading expressions of our inner experience, so I eventually walked away from guilt and shame for the same reason. This merger of philosophical and experiential reflection broke the stranglehold that traditional thinking about guilt and shame had on my self, easing the way for the radical letting go that was my self-transcendence in 1990. AT&T and Pac Bell 1981 – 1990 Given my college minor in electrical engineering and major in math, along with my communication skills from the Jesuits, I thought a professional sales position at Pac Bell would be a snap. I soon discovered, however, that I was unable to perform at my best in the harried rush of the business world. This was especially true when I transferred to American Bell in 1982, the newly deregulated AT&T. Time to digest information was a luxury that did not exist, and I am not a quick study. I was moderately successful but constantly struggling to keep my head just above water. I was therefore very excited when in 1986 Pac Bell accepted my proposal for a position in corporate education to help evaluate training effectiveness. This was an academiclike position, giving me time to make a substantial start on a manual that I later published on the subject. However, the position was eliminated in 1989 as part of the continued downsizing stemming from the 1982 deregulation of AT&T. Asked to head the sales team of a major Pac Bell customer, after much soul searching I declined in order to start a consulting partnership with two other trainers whom I had met at Pac Bell. This was the most difficult decision of my life. My eight and a half years in sales and corporate education at AT&T and Pac Bell were the only ones in my life in which I earned a comfortable wage, along with excellent benefits that were especially meaningful to a 53-year-old. Yet I did not have the heart to return to sales. When I entered the Jesuits, I felt that I was doing God’s ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1456 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel will and embarking on a great adventure of exploring inner space. When I left the Jesuits, I felt that I was continuing that exploration. But when I declined the sales position with Pac Bell, I had no idea whether I was following a creative impulse or was just too lazy to make the effort required of a sales executive. What I knew for sure was that I was abandoning financial security that many would envy. This was the most instinctual decision of my life, in the sense that it was based almost exclusively on feeling and almost no understanding of either its psychological integrity or the consequences of following it. But good or bad, I had no will but to yield to it. As it happens, my yielding to feeling by letting go of grasping for certainty foreshadowed and prepared me for self-transcendence. Transcending the Shamed Self The Experience 1990 Becoming an independent consultant was a two-edged sword. Success required the same sales effort I escaped when I left Pac Bell. Depending on that effort for a successful partnership did not increase my zest for it. I therefore inevitably followed the path of least resistance and returned to research and writing in philosophy, psychology, and spirituality. Except for the occasional consulting work, I lived like a research professor with no teaching responsibilities, but also without a steady paycheck. Thus free to follow my inner promptings, I was reading some poetry one afternoon when it suddenly occurred to me that I was at peace. For most of my life, however much I enjoyed what I was doing, I could not completely escape the dissatisfaction I felt from not having a woman whom I imagined would make me completely happy. When employed at AT&T and Pac Bell, this gave way to a longing to feel competent, which felt like a step up in my development since it was a desire for something within rather than external to me. That afternoon I felt a peace I had never experienced before and that I instantly understood did not emerge from anything I had done—indeed, from anything I could do. No woman or feeling of competence or any achievement could give me this. Most importantly, no self-evaluation or worthiness could create it either. It was a peace beyond anything my self—that is, the ordinary executive functions of sensing, thinking and acting—could create, a peace that only my Self—that is, a consciousness beyond that of ordinary executive functioning—could experience. It came to me only after I had exhausted all my efforts to create it my self. My life of philosophical and experiential reflection had cleared the way for it but could not produce it, which is why such peace is called grace (from the Latin gratia, meaning gift). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1457 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel The Aftermath The Self that was at peace was not the self that had normal insecurities about social rejection, the kind that can sometimes be reduced by self-affirmations (Stinson, Logel, Shepherd, & Zanna, 2011). For that sort of issue is pragmatic, one that the self can address by calculating threats to rejection and developing skills to deal with them. In the aftermath of my selftranscendence, I therefore had a Self and a self that were complementary aspects of my conscious life, the latter creating the ordinary joys and disappointments in life and the former providing an abiding satisfaction in living that gives emotional perspective within which to experience them. The abiding satisfaction in life that I now experience is unconditional in the sense that it exists independently of whether my desires are met or not. It is not unconditional in the metaphysical sense that I experience it independently of the natural world of time and space. I most particularly do not experience it independently of desire in the sense that it kills desire, which is the creative engine of life. Quite the opposite, this abiding peace gives zest to desire. For by providing equanimity when desire is unfulfilled, it frees me of an exaggerated fear of failure. And by freeing me from that, it allows me to enjoy the quest rather than be anxious until achievement is at hand. And when achievement is at hand, this abiding peace allows me to enjoy it in its inherently ephemeral nature rather than counter-productively trying to hang onto it. Explanation It is beyond the scope of this article to explain adequately the nature of my experience of selftranscendence and the peace that resulted. The sections on the phenomenology of shame and on my life aimed not only to provide a context to understand as precisely as possible the experience itself, but also to set the groundwork for explaining it. Briefly, my view is that this article gives strong reasons to suppose that my experience of self-transcendence was well within the natural experience of every human being, however different the biographical details. Anyone disagreeing with this view must show either that my phenomenology of shame is not adequate or that my account of my personal experience is implausible. As for whether any nonnatural experience of self-transcendence exists as well, perhaps my naturalistic account might serve as a useful reference point with which to contrast any proposed non-naturalistic hypothesis. Within a naturalistic framework, I have argued that the inner peace that results from selftranscendence is what I called soma, a sense of unconditional well-being (Schouborg, 2003a, 2003b, 2003c), thinking of it as a primal bodily feeling alongside those associated with ordinary experience. However, it is difficult to imagine that one could focus attention on the specifics in one’s practical daily life while simultaneously being aware of a sense of unconditional wellbeing. I am now more inclined to think that unconditional peace is the satisfaction inherent in ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1458 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 9 | pp. 1438-1462 Schouborg, G., Transcending the Shamed Sel every experience that is not distorted by grasping attitudes. It would come and go just as our awareness of our feelings comes and goes as we go about practical tasks. But it would still be unconditional in the sense that we cannot intentionally produce it ourselves. We can only allow it to emerge naturally by not overly identifying with what we are doing. To formulate this hypothesis more precisely will require considerably more research, both phenomenological and neuroscientific. 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Mathematical Foundations of Consciousness Willard L. Miranker 1 , Gregg J. Zuckerman 2 Departments of 1 Computer Science, 2 Mathematics Yale University ! ! 5/15/08 ! ! This work is dedicated to the memory of our mentors. “Mathematics as an expression of the human mind reflects the active will, the contemplative reason, and the desire for aesthetic perfection. Its basic elements are logic and intuition, analysis and construction, generality and individuality. Though different traditions may emphasize different aspects, it is only the interplay of these antithetic forces and the struggle for their synthesis that constitute the life, usefulness, and supreme value of mathematical science.” 1 Richard Courant (1941). “One expects that logic, as a branch of applied mathematics, will not only use existing tools from mathematics, but also that it will lead to the creation ! of new mathematical tools, tools that arise out of the need to model some real world phenomena not adequately modeled by previously known mathematical structures.” 2 Jon Barwise (1988). ! Abstract: We employ the Zermelo-Fränkel Axioms that characterize sets as mathematical primitives. The Anti-foundation Axiom plays a significant role in our development, since among other of its features, its replacement for the Axiom of Foundation in the Zermelo-Fränkel Axioms motivates Platonic interpretations. These interpretations also depend on such allied notions for sets as pictures, graphs, decorations, labelings and various mappings that we use. A syntax and semantics of operators acting on sets is developed. Such features enable construction of a theory of non-well-founded sets that we use to frame mathematical foundations of consciousness. To do this we introduce a supplementary axiomatic system that characterizes experience and consciousness as primitives. The new axioms proceed through characterization of socalled consciousness operators. The Russell operator plays a central role and is shown to be one example of a consciousness operator. Neural networks supply striking examples of non-well-founded graphs the decorations of which generate associated sets, each with a Platonic aspect. Employing our foundations, we show how the supervening of consciousness on its neural correlates in the brain enables the framing of a theory of consciousness by applying appropriate consciousness operators to the generated sets in question. Key words: foundations of consciousness, neural networks, non-well-founded sets, Russell operator, semantics of operators 1 1. Introduction Analytic writing on mind and consciousness dates to Aristotle’s De Anima (Ross, ed. 1961). Yet to this day the phenomena of consciousness continue to elude illuminating scientific characterization. We should not be surprised at this since, “A physical scientist does not introduce awareness (sensation or perception) into his theories, and having thus removed the mind from nature, he cannot expect to find it there.” Schrödinger 1958 The self-referential qualities of consciousness place it outside conventional logic(s) upon which scientific models and frameworks have heretofore been constructed. However more contemporary mathematical development has begun to deal with features of self-reference. We shall address Schrödinger’s critique by assembling and extending such development thereby putting self-reference as a form of awareness into theory. In this way we shall frame mathematical foundations for a theory of consciousness. Then as an application to a neural network model of brain circuitry, we shall exhibit a theory of consciousness using these foundations. 1.1 Mathematical thought and its limits Platonism, that is, the interplay of ideal1 and physical worlds, characterizes a central feature of mathematical thought. The briefest summary of the evolution of this Platonic dualism in mathematical thought and modeling might be made by citing the contributions of Euclid (the axiomatic method), Aristotle (the law of the excluded middle), Cantor 1895 (set theory), Russell ~1899 (his well-known paradox in set theory), Zermelo 1908 and Fränkel 1922 (the axioms of set theory that serve to accommodate Russell’s paradox) and Gödel (incompleteness, a self-referential development). We shall extend this line and employ the axiomatic theory of sets to further characterize self-referential features. The work of Zermelo-Fränkel and others transformed sets from so-called naïve objects into mathematical primitives (i.e., ideal Platonic objects). The Russell paradox and its accommodation demonstrate limitations on mathematical thought (about sets and related constructs). Today we are not surprised by such a limitation, since we have the wellknown example of Heisenberg. The Platonic character of the latter is characterized by the Heisenberg inequality, its ideal form (Dym, McKean 1972), and its real world character by the limitation on the accuracies with which certain concurrent measurements can be made. The quality of self-reference (set self-membership) underlying the Russell paradox informs development of the ideal Platonic structures (i.e., of placing awareness into theory) required for constructing the mathematical foundations we seek. 1.2 Consciousness and its limits As with the self-referential potentiality of naïve set theory, the self-referential character of consciousness appears paradoxical. It seems to be an illusion. The incompleteness of mathematical thought demonstrated by Gödel, suggests that all 1 An ideal object or concept in the Platonic sense will sometimes be referred to as a Platonic object or concept or for emphasis as an ideal Platonic object. 2 thought, and so consciousness in particular, is not explainable via a conventional approach such as by a Turing machine computation (Penrose 1989). Incompleteness, while precluding establishment of certain knowledge within a system, allows for its establishment by looking onto the system from the outside. This knowledge from the outside (a kind of observing) is reminiscent of consciousness that provides as it does a viewing or experiencing of what’s going on in thought processing. Note the correspondence of these observations to Freud’s meta-psychology where he recognizes a disconnect between mental and physical states, “…mental and physical states represent two different aspects of reality, each irreducible to the other (Solms 1994).” However we may say that Freud’s psychoanalytic method is a tool devised for penetrating the mental from the outside via the physical. Compare Freud’s dual aspects of reality with the Platonic pairing of Descartes 1637, namely the res cogitans (ideal) and the res extensa (physical). To frame a set theoretic correspondent to these features note that in axiomatic theory, a set has an inside (its elements) and an outside (the latter is not a set, as we shall see), and this allows a set to be studied from the outside. We liken this to interplay between the ideal (Platonic) and physical (computable) worlds, the latter characterizing a model for study from the outside of the former. So we expect consciousness to be accessible to study through extensions of the self-reference quality characterized by axiomatic set theory, in particular, by a special capacity to study a set from the outside. We do not claim that this gives a complete characterization of consciousness, although it might very well do so in the end. Rather this approach is an effectual way to introduce awareness into a theory (accommodating thereby Schrödinger’s critique) and so to penetrate this elusive phenomenon. 1.3 Summary Sect. 2 begins with a description of the crises in mathematical thought precipitated by Cantor’s set theory and characterized by the Russell paradox. We describe how Gödel’s discoveries inform the crises and furnish motivation for our development. We introduce a mathematical framework that includes sets, graphs, decorations, and the notion of nonwell-founded sets and which enables annunciation of the anti-foundation axiom of set theory. This axiom allows replacement of the Russell paradox by a logically coherent dichotomy and is key to framing our approach characterized by observation of sets from the outside. In Sect. 3 we introduce the Russell operator R, a distinguisher between so-called normal and abnormal sets. A number of properties of R is collected, these to play a central role in the foundations to be developed. Then we introduce a number of other operator mappings along with interrelations, these to supplement R in the analysis of sets to follow. This operator syntactic framework is followed by a semantic development in which experience and consciousness are introduced as primitives. A Semantic Thesis for consciousness is then proposed, and a list of axioms for associated operators along with a 3 descriptive semantics for each axiom is given (compare Aleksander, Dunmall 2003). The axioms along with their semantics are used for characterizing both the primitives and consciousness. R is shown to satisfy the axioms, giving it thereby the role of a so-called consciousness operator. This existence of a consciousness operator establishes consistency of the new axioms. Examples both of sets and operators illustrating the syntax and semantics are given. In Sect. 4 we give a description of tools for building a theory of consciousness upon the foundations developed. This begins with a formal process for labeling and then decorating a graph. The process establishes a way to induce the existence of a virtual set associated intrinsically with a graph (a two-level or self-referential feature). We then introduce a mapping construct called a histogram, a tool for applying this set with graph association process to a special class of graphs arising in brain circuitry. The M-Z equation is then developed, this equation characterizing a method for specifying the intrinsic set in question, including those that arise in brain circuitry. Finally the theory of consciousness is formulated as an application in which we employ neural network theory (Hebb’s rule for synaptic weight change and the McCulloch-Pitts equation for neuronal input-output dynamics, (see Haykin 1999)) to specify the special class of labeled graphs in question. This two-level procedure is interpreted as a Platonic process (that is, the association of a virtual set with a graph) by means of what we call a Neural Network Semantic Thesis. An example of a neural state that instantiates the concept of a particular natural number is given. To complete the description of information processing from sensory perception through to consciousness, a third, purely physical, so-called Neurophysiological Thesis is introduced. Sect. 4 concludes with a critical description both of these three theses and the analytic formalisms developed earlier. This critique serves to illuminate the mathematical foundations of consciousness developed. In Sect. 5 we ascribe syntactic and semantic nomenclature to a collection of basic operators, also offering interpretations of the role each plays in our theory. The flow of information from sensory input to conscious experience is described. Speculation is offered on the role of the sets we have constructed in this information flow. Finally a class of operators that characterize qualia is described. In Sect. 6 directions of future work are laid out. These include (i) examples and applications of the M-Z equation developed in Sect. 4, including the development of associated dynamics induced by the consciousness operators, (ii) the study of the diagonalization of K A , a special consciousness operator that informs the study of qualia and their neural correlates, (iii) connection of our mathematical foundations with processes of evolution, (iv) study of bi-simulation of graphs that characterizes the case that two memes share a thema, (v) model theoretic foundations of Aczel theory dealing ! with the consistency of the Z-F axioms with anti-foundation replacing foundation, (vi) study of the algebra of the fundamental operators appearing in Table 3.1, and (vii) classification of the consciousness operators and the connection of doing this to Gödelian incompleteness. The axioms of set theory that we employ explicitly are given in an appendix. This is followed by a glossary. 4 2. Preliminaries In this section we describe the crises in mathematical thought engendered by the notions developed by Cantor, Russell and others. Then we describe the evolution of the crises according to the development of Zermelo-Fränkel, Gödel and others. We continue with the introduction of terminology and properties that provide the setting for our work. 2.1 Crises in mathematical thought We begin with Cantor’s definition of a set, often regarded as the naïve notion of set. “A set is a collection into a whole of definite, distinct objects of our intuition or thought.” When specificity is required, we shall hereafter use the term collection for a set in the sense of Cantor’s definition. Cantor’s use of the word “thought” shows that set theory is entwined with consciousness from the start. In fact, Cantor’s definition is circular, replacing one mystery by another. It replaces the unanswered questions: what is a definite object? what is thought? by others, namely: who does the collecting? the thinking? The latter have a correspondence to the questions often raised in consciousness studies, “Who is doing the looking? the experiencing?” Suppose the words “intuition or thought” in Cantor’s definition are replaced by the word “consciousness”. This would make it an exception to Schrödinger’s critique, relating it to what is perhaps the only other known exception, namely to Von Neumann’s (mysterious) appeal to the observer’s consciousness of the outcome of a measurement to specify the moment of collapse of the wave function during a quantum mechanical measuring process. Cantor’s definition of a set supports a logical inconsistency, resulting in several paradoxes. The most accessible of these is the Russell paradox that goes to the essence of that inconsistency. This paradox is expressed in terms of the Russell naïve set N, which is the collection of all sets x such that x is not a member of x. The logical inconsistency of N is revealed by the following observations: 1. Since N is a set, either N " N or N " N . 2. If N " N , then N " N . If N " N , then N " N . (2.1) The annunciation of this paradox by Russell (Zermelo is thought to have known ! ! a major crisis in mathematical and philosophical earlier of the paradox) precipitated ! ! ! Frege ! thought. In 1893, had just completed development of an axiomatic treatment of sets when a letter to him from Russell informing him of the paradox overturned his central thesis. Various mathematicians (Bernays, Gödel, Hilbert, Russell, Von Neumann, Whitehead…) attempted to rework the foundations of mathematics so as to resolve the(se) paradox(es). It is the axiomatic approach to set theory that provides for us the most fruitful resolution, motivating our own development. (See the appendix for these axioms.) The key feature of the axiomatic approach is to regard the concept “set” as a 5 primitive (an undefined notion), and the concept “is an element of” as a primitive relation. The axioms are chosen to ensure that there does not exist a set y such that x " y if and only if x " x ; in other words, within axiomatic set theory, there is no Russell set. Even so, this axiomatic approach allows for a coherent elaboration of the quality of selfreference in set theory, and so, it supports the connection of the study of sets to the ! development of the mathematical foundations we are after. ! We use Z-F, the Zermelo-Fränkel axioms of set theory, however replacing FA, the Foundation Axiom (a latter day addition by Von Neumann to the original Z-F list) by AFA, the Anti-foundation Axiom. To distinguish a set in the sense of these axioms from a collection of Cantor, we shall use the terminology, bona fide set for the former. Although successfully accommodating the paradox, the axiomatic development of set theory brought with it a deeper problem: is the axiomatic system itself consistent? That is, can we derive a logical inconsistency from the axioms? Gödel produced a two level approach to this issue. At a mathematical level is a set theoretic formula, and at a metamathematical level is the proposition asserting the consistency of set theory. We interpret this as an instance of self-reference, a viewing of a mathematical object metamathematically, that is from the outside. Gödel showed that if axiomatic set theory is consistent then it is incomplete. This incompleteness is widely celebrated (see GödelEscher-Bach of Hofstadter 1979, Emperor’s New Mind of Penrose 1989, Scientific American 1968…). One might say that Gödel replaced one crisis in mathematical thought by another. Subsequently, mathematicians (Aczel, 1988…) did show that if Z-F with FA deleted is consistent, then Z-F with AFA replacing FA is also consistent. These results of Gödel and his successors provide for us the framework to develop our self-referential two level approach that consists, in particular, of a syntactic level and a semantic level. 2.2 Sets, graphs, decorations, the axiom of anti-foundation The special nature of set theory can be traced in part to the use of two different notions of belonging associated with sets. One is denoted by " (the primitive concept ‘is an element of’) and the other by " (for the concept ‘is a subset of’). For clarity we adopt the following notational conventions. ! ! a) Sets will be denoted by Latin characters, a, A, b… Braces will also denote a set, the contents of which and/or conditions specifying the set placed within the braces: { list of set elements and /or conditions for being a set element} . b) Mappings between sets will be denoted by lower case Greek characters, ", # ... c) Relations and operators as well as certain special objects to be introduced called classes will be denoted with upper case script Latin letters, A, B,…R… A generic ! operator will be denoted by an upper case script O. ! d) The empty set { x x " x} will, as usual, be denoted by " . The existence of " follows from the Z-F Axioms of Existence and Comprehension (see the appendix). ! ! ! 6 We shall restrict our attention to pure sets specified as follows. Definition 2.1: A set is a pure set if its elements are sets, the elements of its elements are sets… Note that any finite collection (naïve set) of objects that are not themselves bona fide sets furnishes an example of a not pure set. Our presentation involves both normal and abnormal sets, these set types specified as follows. Definition 2.2: A set x is normal if x " x . It is abnormal if x " x . The Quine atom specified in the following definition supplies and example of an abnormal set. ! ! Definition 2.3: The Quine atom " is the set defined by the condition " = {"} . We shall make use of a collection of notions specified in the following paragraph. (See Aczel 1988, Chap.!1.) ! 2 A graph will consist of a collection N of nodes and a collection E of edges, each edge being an ordered pair ( n, n ") of nodes. No knowledge of the nature of the elements of N is required. If ( n, n ") is an edge, we shall write n " n # and say that n " is a child of the node n, the latter called a parent of the node n " . A path is a sequence (finite or infinite) ! n 0 " n1 " n 2 "L ! ! ! of nodes n 0 , n1, n 2 K linked by edges ( n 0 , n1 ), ( n1, n 2 ) K A pointed graph is a graph together with a distinguished node called its point. A pointed graph is accessible, i.e., is ! an accessible pointed graph (apg), if for every node n there is a path n 0 " n1 "L " n from the point n 0 to the node n. If this path is always unique then the pointed graph is a ! ! tree, and the point is the root of the tree. A decoration of a graph is an assignment of a set to each node of the graph so that the elements of the set assigned to a node are the sets ! assigned to the children of that node. Alternatively a decoration is a set valued function d on ! N such that "a # N, da = {db a $ b} . (2.2) ! A picture of a set is an accessible pointed graph that has a decoration in which the set is assigned to the point. A given set may have many pictures. Being well-founded, a key ! property of graphs and sets is specified in the following definition. Definition 2.4: A graph is well-founded if it has no infinite path. It is non-well-founded otherwise.. 2 What we call a graph is in fact a directed graph. For convenience we drop the descriptor directed throughout. 7 With this terminology, we collect the known results stated in the following proposition. Proposition 2.5: i) Every well-founded graph has a unique decoration. ii) Every well-founded apg is a picture of a unique set. iii) Every set has a picture. Continuing, we define well-foundedness for sets. Definition 2.6: A set is well-founded if its picture is well-founded. It is non-well-founded otherwise. An alternate name for a non-well-founded set is a hyper-set, but we prefer never to use the latter term. We now state the anti-foundation axiom that is central to the development. Note it is stated for general graphs that are neither necessarily pointed nor necessarily accessible. AFA (Aczel): Every graph has a unique decoration. Some consequences of this axiom are given in the following proposition. Proposition 2.7: 1. Every pointed graph is the picture of a unique set. 2. Non-well-founded sets exist. 3. A non-well-founded graph will picture a non-well-founded set. 4. Every set is the decoration of at least one apg. Proof: See Aczel 1988. The relationship between these concepts is summarized in terms of two mappings, the tree mapping " and the decoration of the point P mapping " is shown in Fig. 2.1. ! " : tree map #$ $ $$ Pointed graphs $ $ $ $& Sets % :decoration ! of the point Figure 2.1: Schematic of the mappings " and " There!are many graphs "i , the decoration of whose point is a given set A. That is, for the map " , we have ! ! (2.3) "#1 = "#2 = L = A . ! However there is a unique pointed graph, "# = "# ( A) called the canonical tree of A, such ! that "#$ = A and ! (2.4) "A = #$ ( A) . ! ! ! 8 The canonical tree of a set is specified in the following definition. Definition 2.8: A finite collection x, x1,K, x n of sets forms a chain beginning at x if x n " x n#1 " L " x1 " x . The tree " x of x is the graph whose nodes are chains beginning at x and whose edges are given by ( x n " x n#1 " L " x1 " x, x n +1 " x n " L " x1 " x ) . ! ! ! " (#, p) will denote the set associated with the node p of the graph " in the decoration ! of the latter. So "# = " (#,P ) is the set in the decoration of the pointed graph " that ! corresponds to the point P of " . Then a sufficient condition for normality of a set is given in the following proposition. ! ! 3 ! Proposition 2.9: If for every child c of P, " (#,c ) $ " (#,P ) , then " (#,P ) is normal. ! 2.3 Classes and mappings Classes are primitives introduced by Gödel. A collection of sets with a common ! is not a set is called a proper property is called a class. A set is!also a class; a class that class. The elements of a class are sets, the sets being the primitives defined by the Z-F axioms with the AFA replacing the FA. Conversely, any set is a member of a set. We now formalize the notions of several types of classes to be used. These are: relations, functions, and operators. They are illustrated by the nest of concepts shown in Fig. 2.1, the outermost member of which is comprised of the classes. Inside of classes is the collection of relations. A relation is a class consisting of ordered pairs of sets. Inside of relations is the collection of functions. A function is a relation with the graph property: namely, if (x, y) and (x,z) , both being ordered pairs of sets in a relation F, implies that y = z , then F is said to have the graph property. Inside of functions is the collection of operators. An operator O is a function whose domain is the class of all sets. ! An operator is a relation, since O x is the unique y so that ! (x, y) " O. ! Classes ! Relations ! Functions Operators Figure 2.1: Nesting within the theory of classes 3 Proofs that follow directly from definitions are omitted throughout. 9 3. The Russell Operator, Operator Syntax and Semantics, Semantic Thesis, Axioms In this section we supply syntax and semantics for some operators of relevance for our axiomatic treatment of consciousness. We start in Sect. 3.1 with the characterization of the Russell operator, since it plays a central role. Then in Sect. 3.2, we introduce a relevant collection of operators and develop mathematical properties (syntax) for them. In Sect. 3.3, we state the Semantic Thesis that characterizes consciousness as the action of operators on experience. Consciousness and experience are introduced as primitives, and an open axiom system for them is elaborated. The axioms are accompanied by semantic characterizations of the associated operators. 3.1 The Russell operator The Russell operator R plays a special role in the syntax and semantics of the development of the Semantic Thesis. R is defined by its action on a set A as follows. Definition 3.1: R A = { x " A x # x} . We see that R may be viewed as a selector of the normal elements of A and a rejecter of the abnormal. A formal definition of a selector (operator) will be given in Def. 3.14. ! R is a special case of a generic operator O P specified in terms of a predicate P(y) as O P A = y " A P( y) . { } (3.1) ! ! We recognize this as the Z-F Axiom of Comprehension. So O P A is a bona fide set. It follows that ! (3.2) x " y # O P x = x "O P y . ! This relation holds in particular for O P taken equal to R. ! ! ! The Russell paradox is no longer relevant as a paradox. It is replaced by the operator R as examination of the proof of the following theorem reveals (compare (2.1)). ! Theorem 3.2: "A , R A " A . Moreover, RA is normal. Proof: Assume there exists a set z such that R z " z . Then by the definition of R there are two both of which lead to contradictions. Namely, ! options, ! 1. R z " R z , in which case R z " R z , ! ! 2. R z " R z , in which case R z " R z . result is !A corresponding ! ! ! ! ! ! !Proposition 3.3: "A , A " R A. ! ! 10 Proof: By definition, if x " R A, then it is both true that x " x and x " A . Then A " R A implies both A " A and A " A , a contradiction.  We make the with Theorem 3.2. ! ! following observations associated ! ! ! ! The collection a) of all sets is not itself a set. b) Every set has an inside and an outside, where the inside of a set consists of its elements. c) The complement of a set (the class of sets not in the given set) is not a set. d) If "y # B, y $ y , then B " B . e) If "y # C, y # y , we cannot conclude that C " C . Since R takes a part of A outside itself, note the relevance of b) to the ability to ! ! observe a set from the outside, a feature described in Sect. 1. To illustrate e) we first ! ! introduce the notion of the dual of a set. Definition 3.4: The dual x * of the set x is given by x * = { x * , x} (3.3) ! Existence and uniqueness of the dual of a set follows from the AFA. e) is illustrated by the following two examples. ! Example 1: Since " # ", taking C = " satisfies the hypotheses, and we have C " C. Example 2: Take x and y to be unequal normal sets, and let C = { x " , y " } . Then it Is easy!to see that C " ! C. ! Let U = { x x = x} be the class of sets. (U is also referred ! to as the universe of sets.) Let N = { x x " x}!be the class of normal sets, and let A = { x x " x} be the class of abnormal sets. Then we have the following proposition concerning the classes A, N and !U and the Russell operator R. ! ! Proposition 3.5: a) N is a proper class. b) U is a proper class. c) A is a proper class. d) U = N " A. e) R A = N " A, #A . Proof: We shall prove ! a), b) and c). (See footnote 3). ! not. ! a) Assume Then N = A for some set A. R A " A by Theorem 3.2. But then R A " N, a contradiction. ! ! 11 b) Assume not. Then U = B for some set B. Now { x " B x # x} is a set by the Axiom of Comprehension. However { x " B x # x} = N by definition. This is a contradiction since N is a proper class. ! contrary that A is a set. !Then there exists a unique a set A such that c) Suppose to the x " A # x " x . Then using see that "y # N, y " # A . Let ! AFA, we C = { x " A #y " N such that x = y " } . C is itself a set (Axiom of Comprehension) that we can also write as C = { y " y # N !} = {{ y " , y!} y # N } . ! ! (3.4) ! Then using the Z-F Axiom of Union, we can write ! ! U C = U { y # , y} , ! (3.5) y "y where U on the left is the monadic union operator4. Then !! ! R (UC ) = U { y} = N. (3.6) y "y ! This is a contradiction, since R (UC ) is a set and N is a proper class. 3.2 Syntax  ! ! 3.2.1 Fundamental operators We shall employ the following four basic dyadic set operations o, ", #, $ , defined as follows. o : (O 1 o O 2 ) x = O 1 O 2 x " : (O 1 " O 2 ) x = (O 1 x) " (O 2 x) ! " : (O 1 " O 2 ) x = (O 1 x) " (O 2 x) : (!O 1 " O (3.7) !! " ! ! 2 )!x = (O 1 x) " (O 2 x) ! ! !! ! ! ! ! ! The last, the ! difference of operators, is defined in terms of set subtraction, given by the !! ! ! ! ! ! following Boolean rule. ! !! ! x " y!= x!" (x # ! y) . ! (3.8) The associative law (O 1 O 2 )O 3 = O 1 (O 2 O 3 ) follows from the definition of o . ! To supplement R we introduce four additional basic operators I, E, B and D, where ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 4 The monadic union operator U is defined as follows: U A = { x x " a for some a " A} , which is a set by virtue of the Axiom of Union. ! ! 12 a) I is the identity operator, I x = x , b) E is the elimination operator, E x = ", c) B is the singleton operator, B x = { x} , and ! x " = D x = { x " , x} . (See Def. 3.4.) d) D is the duality operator, ! While we defer introduction ! of semantics for the basic operators until Sect. 5, we make the following observations about them. ! ! i) IO = OI, for any operator O. ii) E is not a right-zero operator, since for example, BE " E. Note that E is idempotent (E 2 = E). Note also that (BE) x = B " , so that in particular, (B n E) x = B n " for any non-negative integer n. iii) Since { x, y} = { x} " { y} , showing that { x,!y} is a derivative notion (see a) in Sect. 2.2),!we can write ! ! ! ! !! x " = (B x " ) # B x. (3.9) ! ! The operators B and D are related as follows. ! ! D = (BD) " B. (3.10) 3.2.2 Properties of the basic operators The quadruple of basic operators B, E, I and R and form a non-closed system ! illustrated in the following operator multiplication table. E I R B E E E E E I E I R B R E R R RB B BE B BR BB Table 3.1: Multiplication table for the basic operators. Next we introduce the counter-Russell operator, T = I – R. Note that T A = A " R A = A " A. (3.11) Consider the following proposition relating R and T to normal and abnormal sets. ! ! Proposition 3.6: Let B be a normal set and C an abnormal set. Then RBB = BB, but RB C = " . Alternatively, TB C = B C but TB B = ". We also have the following proposition exhibiting properties of R and B. ! ! ! ! 13 Proposition 3.7: i) x " A # B x " A . ii) R A " A # BR A " A . iii) R A " R A . ! ! By Def. ! 2.2, R A is normal. Additional syntactic relations (conceptual operator ! statements) are given in the following theorem, proposition and corollary. ! ! Theorem 3.8: a) I " R = R. ! b) B " R = E. c) I " (BR) = E. d) I " (RB) = E. ! ! e) RB=B " I. f) RB " BR " E. ! BR " RB " E. ! ! The two statements!in f) are not the same since there is no monadic minus for sets. ! Examples illustrating ! the two relations in f) are (RB " BR)BD " # " and ! (BR " RB) " # $, respectively. Proposition 3.9: RBR = BR. ! ! ! ! Proof: The proof is a direct consequence of Prop. 3.6 and Prop. 3.7.  Corollary 3.10: (RB " BR)R = E, and (BR " RB)R = E. This corollary gives a connection between the Prop. 3.9 and relation f) in Theorem. 3.8. ! ! 3.2.3 Characterization of R The following proposition and corollary gives a complete characterization of R. Proposition 3.11: If x " y # O x = x "O y , then OB uniquely determines O. (3.12) The conclusion of the proposition may be restated alternatively as ! ! ! ! "x , O x = { y " x OB y = B y} . (3.13) Proof of Prop. 3.11: We make the following two preliminary observations. (i) The hypothesis implies that "x , O x " x , and hence that (ii) O 2 x = O x " O x = Ox. Continuing we now the question: is y " O x ? However ! address ! when ! ! y " O x " B y " O x , by definition. In the hypothesis we may replace x with B y and y with O x to conclude ! ! ! ! !that OB y = By " O( Ox) ! = By " Ox, (3.14) ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 14 ! ! the last employing (ii). Now B y " O x " B y " Ox =By by definition. This and (3.13) implies y " Ox if and only if OB y = By. (3.15) ! ! ! From this and (i) we conclude that y " O x " y # x and OB y = By.  ! Corollary 3.12: Let the operators O 1 and O 2 satisfy the hypothesis of the proposition, and let O 1 B = O 2 B. Then O 1 = O 2 . ! ! ! The notion of an operator called a selector (compare Def. 3.1 f) is specified as follows. ! ! !Definition ! 3.13: A!class ! of operators called selectors5 are those that satisfy the hypothesis x " y # O x = x "O y of Prop. 3.11. Selectors form a commutative system, as the following proposition shows. ! ! Proposition 3.14: If O!1 and O 2 are selectors, then O 2 O 1 = O 1 O 2 =O 1 " O 2 . Proof: Let z = O 1 x " x . Then O 2 z = z "O 2 x . Then O 2 (O 1 x) = ( O 1 x) " O 2 x = O 1 x " O 2 x = (O 1 " O 2 )x . ! ! ! ! ! ! !! ! !!  In!particular, consciousness operators K to be introduced in Sect. 3.3, being selectors, !! !! ! ! !! !! ! commute. Theorem 3.8(f) provides an example of a non-commuting pair of operators. ! !! ! Characterization of the Russell operator is the subject of the following theorem. Theorem 3.15: R is characterized by the following two properties. 1. x " y # R x = x "R y . 2. RB = B " I. (3.16) Proof: #1 follows from ! (3.2).!#2 is the result e) of Theorem 3.3. Then the proof of the ! characterization R of is an immediate consequence of Prop. 3.11 and Corollary 3.12. ! 3.2.4 Schematic illustrating syntax of sets and operators The Venn type diagram in Fig. 3.2 illustrates some of the notions being discussed. The diagram is intended to be composed in a homeomorphic representation of the Euclidean plane. In the diagram sets and classes are represented by open rectangles. That is, they do not contain their boundaries. For example in terms of the rectangular coordinates " and " in the plane, the empty set is given by " = # , $ # 2 + $ 2 < 0 2 . { } The class of abnormal sets is represented by the largest shaded rectangle. The class of normal sets is represented by the largest un-shaded rectangle. A set’s name is displayed ! ! ! 5 Thanks to the referee for noting that a notion of selector occurs in relational databases. 15 at the tail of an arrow pointing to that set. To interpret the diagram, considerthe large rectangle A in the middle of the figure. A is positioned in a general position, that is, so that some of its elements are abnormal (shaded) and some are normal. F is a subset of A. C (toward the lower right) is a set all of whose elements are normal, and G is a subset of C. D (upper right) is a set all of whose elements are abnormal, and H is a subset of D. The remaining sets indicate the result of applying one or more operators to the sets and subsets just identified. A = Class of abnormal sets A = Class of abnormal sets D RBA = " = RBD ! H BA BD only one d) only one F A b) RBA RBD a) RF = F " N C RA = A " N ! ! RBC G BRA c) B " = BRD BC = BRC N = Class of normal setsigure 3.2: A schematic illustrating set mappings and other concepts ! N = Class of normal sets Figure 3.2: A schematic illustrating the properties assembled in Theorem 3.3 16 Illustrated in Fig. 3.2 are 6 possibilities for sets and 7 for fundamental operators: 2 for A, depending on whether BA " A or not. (See the phrase “only one” in the figure.) 1 for set C, namely, BC " C. 2 for D, depending on whether BD " D or not. (See the phrase “only one” in the figure.) 1 for " , a technical possibility, since " can not be illustrated. ! The 7 illustrated fundamental operators are E, I, B, R, T, BR, and RB, although E, I ! and T are illustrated implicitly. ! ! ! The conclusions a) - d) of Theorem 3.8 are illustrated in the figure by the sets and/or labels of sets that are pointed to by dashed arrows with the corresponding labels. These labels are placed in the margins of the figure. For example, the c) in the left hand margin labels both a dashed arrow pointing to the set BRA and a dashed arrow pointing to the label of the set A. These two sets, shown as disjoint in the figure, illustrate conclusion c) of the theorem. One can see that conclusions e) and f) are also illustrated. The result x " y # R x = x "R y , (3.17) following from (3.2) showing that R is a selector is illustrated in its three different cases. ! ! 1. R F, the part of F in!N equals F " R A. 2. H " D # A then R H = ". 3. G " C # N then R G = G " C = G . ! 3.3 Semantics and consciousness operators ! ! We now develop a model in which experience and consciousness are taken as ! ! primitives. These primitives may be composed of layers. In this case, our primitives model the corresponding basic layers, namely what we have knowledge and understanding about through our sensations and perceptions (this last being a Cantor-like statement). When necessary for clarity, the basic layers shall be called primary experience and primary consciousness, respectively. While we perceive these basic layers, they are essentially ineffable. The higher layers, should they exist, might very well be beyond ineffability. We focus on the basic layers, and we take our primitives to be models of them. Our goal to specify an illuminating axiomatic system for these primitives. So we may say that as with set theory, we commence with a Cantor-like (naïve) manner and then refine it by means of an axiomatic approach. We shall characterize a collection of operators called consciousness operators, the generic element of which is denoted by K. We take a set x to model a primary experience. Such a set, being a primitive, may be viewed as a Platonic object. Then our Semantic Thesis is stated as follows. Definition 3.16 (Semantic Thesis): Consciousness is a result of a consciousness operator being applied to experience. 17 We now give the first four axioms of an open (and developing) system that serves to characterize the experience and consciousness primitives. The axioms and their semantic interpretations justify the Semantic Thesis. We begin with the following definition. Definition 3.17: Let x model a primary experience. Then K x models the awareness, an induced experience. Consciousness is an instance of a specific operator K acting on experience. ! The first three axioms along with their semantic interpretations and a name for each are displayed in the following table. Axiom ! ! Semantic interpretation of the axiom a) "x, K x " x Experience generates its own awareness b) "x, x # K x Awareness does not generate the primary experience c)! "x, K x " x Awareness is removed from experience ! Name of Axiom Generation Irreversibility Removal Table 3.3: First three axioms for a consciousness operator. ! ! Axioms a) and b) are motivated by the properties of the Russell operator a) and b), respectively given in Theorem 3.8. By taking y = K x in the following Prop. 3.18 and using axioms a) and b), we conclude that a set of the form K x is normal. This may be interpreted semantically as the normality of awareness. ! The following analytic statement of axiom c) (BK x) " x = # . (3.18) follows by noting that y " x and y " x implies y " y . ! The following table displays algebraic statements of these axioms along with examples of operators that violate each statement. The existence of " shows that B and ! ! ! I violate c). Algebraic statement Violating examples a) O " I = O O=B ! b) B " O= E O = B, T c) (BO) " I = E O = E, B, I ! Table 3.4: Algebraic statements of the first three axioms for a consciousness operator. ! ! We now append a fourth axiom that in fact is stronger than axiom a). 18 d) If x " y , then Kx = x" K y ! ! Awareness of a sub-experience is determined by the Selection sub-experience and awareness of the primary experience Table 3.5: The fourth consciousness operator axiom. ! Axiom d) is motivated by its syntactic counterpart expressed by the condition (3.12) of Prop. 3.11. Axiom d) is the statement that K is a selector. The consistency of the axioms a) - d) is demonstrated by producing an operator that satisfies all of them. Indeed, R is such an operator as the following theorem shows. Theorem 3.18: The Russell operator R satisfies the axioms a), b), c) and d). Proof: The proof follows from properties of R assembled in Sect.3.1 and Sect. 3.2. The following result describes the action of K on the primary experience B " . Proposition 3.19: KBE = BE. ! Proof: Axiom c) implies that KBE " # BE " . Axiom a) implies that KB " # B " . Together these two statements imply that KB " = B " .  There are other operators ! besides ! R that satisfy axioms a) - d),!as the following ! example C of a consciousness operator shows. ! ! C x = { y " x y # y; $z " y, z % &} . (3.19) So since all elements of C x are normal, C x is a normal set. Moreover C x " R x, so that C is a sub-operator of R. To show that C " R note that for the set A = {{", #}} , we ! have R A = A , but C A = " . To show that C satisfies the axioms, we proceed as follows. ! ! ! a) By definition C x " x , so!axiom a) is satisfied. ! b) Since ! C x " R x and x " R x, then x " C x. So axiom b) is satisfied. ! c) To prove that C satisfies axiom c), we show the algebraic equivalent axiom c). Namely ! that BC " I = E. Then suppose " z such that C z " z . There are two ! options. ! ! 1. C z " C z . This implies that C z " C z , a contradiction, since by definition every element of C x is normal. ! ! ! 2. C z " C z . This implies that either C z " C z or " # C z . Hence C z " C z " # C z . However "!# ", contradicting the normality of C z . implies ! ! ! d) (3.2) shows ! that C satisfies axiom d). ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 19 While the axioms of a consciousness operator appear to be limiting, we are able to exhibit an infinite collection “{K A A " U}” of such operators. In particular generalizing (3.19) yields the following. K A x = { y " x y # y, T ( y " A) = #} . (3.20) ! Comments on a connection of qualia to a diagonalization of K A are given in Sect. 6. ! ! 4. Labeling of Graphs, Histogram Construction, M-Z Equation, Neural Networks ! We begin with a prescription for labeling a collection (Sect. 2.1). This is extended to a technique for decorating a labeled graph. Given a graph, this procedure forms the basis for inducing the existence of a set intrinsically associated with a labeled graph. Then a construction of what we call a histogram is made. The latter is a novel tool used in proposing the M-Z equation, which comes from a synthesis of Aczel’s theory of decorating labeled graphs and the theory of neural networks. An interpretation is made that portrays the sets decorating a labeled graph as Platonic constructs. So this application and interpretation constitute a theory of consciousness constructed on the foundations developed here. 4.1 Labeling of graphs A labeling " of " is a set valued function of the nodes N of " . a a "a, #a $ N . (4.1) ! ! ! A decoration of a labeled graph is a set valued function a a d" a , where (compare (2.2)) ! d" a = {d"b a # b} $ "a, %a & N . (4.2) ! This system of equations along with the following theorem shows how labeled decorations are a basis for inducing the existence of a set intrinsically associated with the ! labeled graph. (Compare the notion of the picture of a graph in Sect. 2.2.) Existence and uniqueness of d" is the subject of the following theorem. Theorem 4.1: Given " = ( N, E, # ) , a corresponding decoration d" of " exists and is unique. (Aczel, Theorem 1.10.) (Compare with AFA in Sect. 2.2.) ! Example: Take " = ( N, E ) to be the graph of the set ". " is!specified by N = {a} and ! ! E = {a " a} . Then with "a being any set, we have . d" a = {d" a} #!"a! ! ! (4.3) ! If "a = {b} , a singleton, then d" a = {d" a, b} . Then d" a = b# = Db is the dual of b. ! ! ! ! ! 20 4.2 The histogram construction We now introduce a construct called the histogram of a function that replaces a set valued function on a collection by a set valued function on a pure set. The construct is used to apply Theorem 4.1 to a collection of graphs abstracted from models of brain circuitry to be introduced in Sect. 4.4. Let A be a collection of unknown elements, and let B be a set. Consider a mapping, f : A " B , and define f "1 (b) = {a # A f ( a) = b}, $b # B . (4.4) We suppose that the number of elements in this set, f "1 (b) is finite for every b. Then the histogram of a!mapping is specified as follows. ! Definition 4.2 (Histogram): The histogram H f of f is the following set of ordered ! pairs. (4.5) H f = b, f "1 (b) b # B, f "1 (b) $ % . {( ) } ! Note that H f is a bona fide set (see Sect 2.1), and in particular, that H f " B # N + . ! 4.3 The M-Z equation, the weight function, the voltage function We call a function w : E " Q, a weight function. The rationals Q comprise a set, ! ! since each non zero rational number q corresponds to the ! triple ( m,n,± ) , where ±m /n (m and n being relatively prime natural numbers) is the value of q. The choice of the rationals for the range of w is made for definiteness and clarity. ! ! ! Let E denote the set of edges of a graph " that terminate in the node a, that is, a E a = {( p, a ) p " N, p # a}, $a " N . ! (4.6) ! We make the following local finiteness hypothesis. ! "a, E is finite. Hypothesis 4.3: a Then let6 w a = w E a , so that w a : E a " Q is a function from a finite unordered collection ! into the rationals. Let H wa be the histogram of the mapping w a . H wa is a finite set since E a is a finite ! ! collection. Note that H wa " Q " N + . (4.7) We now define the M-Z equation. ! ! ! ! 6 ! !of a mapping f to a sub collection y of the domain of f. Recall that f y denotes ! the restriction 21 ! Definition 4.4 (M-Z equation): Given " = ( N, E,w ) , label " with the labeling " : a a H wa . Then the labeled decoration of " is specified by the M-Z equation, namely d" a = {d!"b a # b} $ H wa , %a (4.8) ! & N. ! Comparing (4.8) to (2.2) where a decoration is defined, we may interpret the set H wa as a forcing term in the M-Z equation for the decoration d" a . In a forthcoming work ! (Miranker, Zuckerman 2008), a number of examples and applications of the M-Z equation is assembled. ! ! We shall be interested in an extension of the above development that involves what we call a voltage function v : N " {0,1} . (The choice of {0,1} is made for definiteness and clarity.) Take E a,v = {( p, a ) p " a, v ( p) = 1}, #a $ N , (4.9) ! ! ! ! and let w a,v = w E a,v . Note that the histogram H wa,v = " if E a,v = " . Now label " with " : a a H wa,v . Then the M-Z equation that specifies the labeled decoration of the labeling ! " = ( N, E,w,v ) is given by (4.8) with H wa replaced by H wa,v . Namely, ! ! ! ! d" a = {d"b a # b} $ H wa,v , %a & N . ! ! (4.10) ! ! In Fig. 4.1 we give a schematic of the process of labeling a neuron with a histogram ! r active efferent neurons (each with v = 1) ... P1 w1 ! w!r ! ! ! ... Pr a Afferent neuron a with r active feeds replacement of the neural configuration by the corresponding labeled graph H wa,v Node corresponding to neuron a with the histogram H wa,v for a label ! Figure 4.1: Labeling a neuron with a histogram ! Recall that the histogram is constructed ignoring the numbering of the efferents. 22 ! 4.4 Application to a neural network model of brain circuitry The brain is commonly taken as the seat of consciousness, the latter supervening on the workings of the brain’s neural networks. (While for some, it is the entire physical body and even the environment that is taken as the seat of consciousness, there is no loss of meaning for our argument to take the more limited view.) We shall show how our constructs apply to a neural network to produce a labeled decorated graph. This in turn allows us to incorporate neural networks into the mathematical foundation of consciousness. Take a neuron Q and trace its inputs (afferents) backward and its outputs (efferents) forward to elaborate a neural network. Replacing a neuron and its dendritic and axonal processes by a node and its synapses by directed edges, there results a graph " emanating from the node (also called Q) corresponding to the chosen neuron. Typically this network has reentrant connections, and so, " is non-well-founded. An illustration of a possible " fragment is given in Fig. 4.2. Note the correspondence to the cords and knots of Kanger, 1957. ! node Q representing a neuron and its dendritic and axonal processes ! edges corresponding to afferent synapses edges corresponding to efferent synapses re-entrant edge Figure 4.2: A neural net with a single node Q interpreted as a graph. This network and so also " is associated with two families of parameters, namely, the synaptic weights w and the output of its neurons’ activities. The latter are expressed as voltages, denoted v. Hebb’s rule is the customary model of synaptic weight change. The changes in voltage outputs are modeled by input-output threshold equations, the simplest version of which is!the McCulloch-Pitts model (Haykin 1999). For clarity, we employ the simplest meaningful form of these two models, using them to specify updates of w and v, the latter written as w old ( a " b) #update ##" w new ( a " b) and v old ( a) "update ""# v new ( a) , respectively. Definition 4.5 (Hebb’s rule): ! ! w new ( a " b) # w old ( a " b) = $v old ( a)v new (b) . (4.11) In (4.11), a is an efferent neuron, b is a corresponding afferent and w ( a " b) is the weight of the synapse connecting neuron a to neuron b. (For convenience we allow at ! most one such connection per pair of neurons.) The voltage v ( a) is the neuronal activity of a. For consistency with Sect. 4.3, the scaling constant " is chosen to be a rational ! number. ! ! 23 Definition 4.6 (McCulloch-Pitts equation): & ) v new ( a) = h(( # w old ( p " a)v old ( p) $ % ++ . ' p:p "a * (4.12) In (4.12) h is the Heaviside function, the real number " is a threshold, and the sum is over all neurons p that forward connect directly to neuron a. ! Note that (4.11) and (4.12) form a coupled dynamical system. ! 4.4.1 Neural state, its decoration. The neural net semantic thesis At any instant of time, the coupled dynamical system (4.11) and (4.12) may be viewed as specifying the current states of the functions v and w. We use the term neural state to describe this instantaneous state of the neural assembly. Referring to the weight and voltage functions of Sect.4.3, we use the v and w to specify a labeling, "w,v : a a H wa,v of the graph " as described in that section. Then we may use (4.10) to specify a labeled decoration, d"w ,v of " . We shall also refer to d"w ,v as the labeled decoration of the corresponding neural state. We now state our Neural Net Semantic Thesis. (See the ! Semantic Thesis of Def. 3.16.) ! ! ! ! Thesis): Each value of the Platonic function d Definition 4.7 (Neural Net Semantic "w ,v encodes a dynamic preconscious experience associated with the corresponding neuron (i.e., node of " ). As the brain processes information, the weights and voltages change as!characterized by the Hebbian dynamics and the Mc-P dynamics. These in turn inform changes in ! associated preconscious experiences. 4.4.2 Platonism Neural networks are physical, that is, they may be observed and their weights and voltages can be measured. The set values of the labeled decorations d"w ,v are not physical. Since they are located in some virtual space, we regard a value of d"w ,v as Platonic. (Compare Schrödinger’s quote in Sect. 1.) ! ! If " is well-founded, its labeled decoration can be constructed in a recursive manner ! statement for the decoration (Aczel 1988). However while the AFA supplies an existence of a non-well-founded graph, it does not give a method to construct that decoration. The universe of graphs is divisible into two parts, one in which labeled decorations are recursively computable and the complement. The computability for graphs in the first part is a reason for classifying these corresponding sets as physical and not Platonic. The non-computability of graphs in the second part reinforces their Platonic status. 24 4.4.3 Example: A neural state instantiating a concept; Memes and themata Consider the model neural network in Fig. 4.3a composed of three McCulloch-Pitts neurons, a, b, c with the synaptic weights w ba , w ca , w bc (where for example, w ba denotes w ( a " b) ) and with the voltages v ( a) = v (c ) = 0 and v (b) = 1. With these data and with the time frozen, the network becomes what we have called a neural state. When the APG (shown in Fig 4.3b) associated with this neural state is appropriately labeled with the ! ! ! ! specified weight and voltage data and then decorated, the diagram in Fig. 4.3b, a picture ! ! voltages vanish, the histograms are empty. of a particular set " results. Since the source Then for the sets of the decoration, we have " = {B,C} , where B = " and C = {"} . ! Diagram ! Fig 4.3b, illustrating a decorated labeled APG, arises from the neural state in Fig. 4.3a. The APG in Fig. 4.3b is a representation of!the Von Neumann ordinal 2, so that ! ! 2. (A number of additional APG is an instantiation of the ordinal examples are found in Miranker, Zuckerman 2008, where concepts and their instantiations are termed memes, and where the instantiation of an interpretation of a concept as a set is called the thema of that concept (of that meme).) We see that the set " decorating the point is the thema of the meme instantiated by this APG. The thema " along with the diagram in Fig. 4.3a are Platonic instantiations. The corresponding actual neural state being modeled (as by the model in Fig. 4.3a) is physical instantiation of that meme. The neural state (as illustrated ! ! a v ( a) = 0 v (b) = 1 ! ! " w ba b v (c ) = 0 w ca w bc ! 4.3a: Neural ! ! Fig state with neurons a, b, c ! c ! B C Fig 4.3b: Corresponding APG with point " in Fig. 4.3a) and the APGs (such as illustrated in Fig. 4.3b) are only examples of a vast number (in principle an unbounded number) of neural states and!corresponding APGs that have this same thema " . All such APGs are pictures of the set " , so by analogy, we might say that each such meme whose thema is " is a picture of " . 4.5 Correspondence of the semantic theses, a neuro-physiological thesis ! among the semantic theses of Sects. 3.3 ! and 4.4 is shown in Fig. 4.4. The relationship ! of information. !The lowest arrow is a flow of Each arrow in Fig. 4.4 describes a flow physical information. The second is a flow from physical to Platonic information. The highest is a flow of psychic (Platonic) information. Fig 4.4 portrays the following notion. Definition 4.9 (Neuro-physiological thesis): The neuro-physiological thesis (Fig. 4.4, lower left), denoted the movement of sensory information from a sense organ to the brain where it is processed to frame an internal physical representation of that information, and from where a primitive called consciousness is made manifest in a virtual space. Note a parallel between the information flow in Fig. 4.4 with Plato’s line of knowledge . 25 Conscious experience Operator Semantic Thesis Conscious processing Preconscious values of labeled decorations Neural Network Semantic Thesis Preconscious processing Brain assemblies (neural networks) Neuro-physiological Thesis Unconscious processing Sensory input Figure 4.4: The theses of consciousness. The shading demarks the Platonic realm. 5. Observations: syntactic and semantic nomenclature In this section we shall develop an elaboration of the consciousness operators introduced in Sect. 3.3 by exploiting aspects of the constructs developed in Sect. 4. The fundamental operators of set theory introduced in Sect. 3.2.1 will contribute as well. This elaboration will provide additional applications of the theory presented here. This is motivated by the syntactic and semantic nomenclature ascribed to these operators, which Op Syntactic Semantic E Elimination Erasing/Forgetting I B Identity Brace R Russell T AntiRussell D Duality Interpretation Erases set representing Platonic experience Accepting/Receiving Leaves set unchanged Conceiving Creates higher order set (a singleton) out of a set Perceiving Bifurcates set contents & retains normal elements Rejecting/Denying Counters R, retaining the abnormal elements Reinforcing/Elaborating Elaborates the concept of a set Axiom(s) Existence of " Extension Pair ! and singleton Comprehension Union AFA Table 5.1: Semantic interpretations of basic operators 26 is summarized in the Table 5.1. Also shown in this table is an interpretation of each operator along with the axiom(s) that the operator codifies. In Fig. 5.2 we schematize the flow of information from sensory input to conscious experience. The upper boxes describe the syntactic level, the lower the semantic. A neural network in the brain typically corresponds to a non-well-founded graph. Hopfield networks supply examples. The corresponding labeled decorations are not recursively computable. They are schematized in the box labeled “Functions d" with values in virtual sets ” in Fig. 5.2. Is it a time dependent one of these deorations that emerges into consciousness? If so, how is the corresponding neural network selected? ! Preconscious processing Unconscious processing Conscious processing Neuronal propagation Sense Pp organ Sensory input Neural network Functions d" with values in virtual sets Representation in brain !Primary experience Physical space Physical realm K (consciousness Labeled decoration operators) K d" (a collection) ! Awareness, induced exper., consciousness Virtual space Platonic realm Figure 5.2: Consciousness: Syntactic and semantic views of the processing from the physical to the virtual. Shading distinguishes the ideal Platonic realm from the physical. 6. Future directions 6.1 Applications of the M-Z equation In ongoing work (Miranker, Zuckerman 2008) numerous examples of applications of the M-Z equation are developed in the context of neural network modeling of brain circuitry. In particular the development of the notion of memes (i.e., concepts that are represented by pictures) and their themata (Platonic interpretations or themes of a concept collection) briefly introduced in Sect. 4.4.1 is made and complemented with examples. That work is extended to multi-graphs, a more faithful model of brain circuitry. Then a notion of histogram dynamics (Sect. 4.2) is introduced as a way to study the discrete time dependence of the associated notions of awareness and consciousness. Abstractions of those dynamics are developed as a tool for their study. The non-well-founded set theoretic framework that provides the context of these developments leads to a notion of 27 a hierarchy of perceptual realities that we expect will inform understanding of the features of consciousness. 6.2 Diagonalization of the family of operators K A ; qualia: We propose to study the diagonalization K diag , of the family of operators K A introduced in (3.20). The diagonalization is specified as follows. ! K diag x = { y " x y # ! y, and "z # x $ y, z % z} . ! (6.1) K diag satisfies axioms a) – c) of Sect. 3.2. However taking A1 = {{", #}} and ! ! ! diag A2 = {",!#, {", ! #}} as two choices!for A in (3.20), it follows that K A is not a subset of K diag B . So failing axiom d) precludes K diag from being a consciousness operator. Nevertheless we expect K diag to be an operator of ! interest. For instance, take the set d" a specified by the M-Z equation in (4.8) and put a equal to p,!the point of a graph, that graph corresponding to a neural network. If this neural network is the neural correlate of ! a quale7, we ascribe the semantics of that quale to the Platonic set K d " p d" p , itself located ! ! in a virtual space. This quale is positioned in the rightmost box in Fig. 5.2. 6.3 Evolution ! The characterization of the dynamics of memes (set pictures) and themata (the sets that are pictured) as an adaptive process, employing such Darwinian concepts as competition, selection, reproduction as well as fitness and genomics is also the subject of ongoing work (Miranker 2008) that finds motivation in the foundations developed here. We expect that variations of our development will provide mathematical foundations for the study of evolution driven by so-called selfish replicators, both genetic and mimetic (Dawkins 1979, Blackmore 1999). 6.4 Other directions 1. Study of the bisimulation of graphs, a notion that characterizes when two memes share a thema. We expect this to lead to a mathematical theory of memes and themata. 2. Model theoretic foundations of Aczel theory dealing with the consistency of the AFA with the Z-F Axioms from which FA has been deleted. 3. Study of the algebra of the set theoretic operators generated by the fundamental operators appearing in Table 3.1. An example of such an operator is I " BK. 4. Classification of the consciousness operators K and the connection of such a classification to Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem. 5. Examples and applications of the M-Z equation. ! 6. Application of these foundations to the grammar of programming languages. 7. Study of the trajectories generated by iterating application of a consciousness operator 7 A quale is the perception of a color, an aroma…, or the perception of a feeling, such as hunger, fear... The neural correlate of a quale is the neural circuitry in the brain that is active when the quale is perceived. Some attribute the location of the quale to this circuitry. 28 Appendix: Axioms of Set Theory We make explicit use of the following axioms of set theory. Existence: "z ( z = z) . Extensionality: "z( z # a $ z # b) % a = b . Pairing: ! "z[ a # z & b # z] . Union: ! "z(#x $ a)(#y $ x )( y $ z) . ! Comprehension: ! "z#x [ x $ z % x $ a & & ( x )] . ! Here " can be any formula in which the variable z does not occur free. Except for the axiom of existence these axioms along with the Axioms of Infinity, ! Collection, Power Set and Choice can be found in Aczel (1988). We do not state the latter four axioms since we use them only implicitly. Note that Aczel uses the name ! Axiom of Separation for the Axiom of Comprehension. The FA is stated as follows. Axiom of Foundation: "x ( x # a) $ ("x # a)(%y # x )¬( y # a) . The FA is not included in the original Z-F list. It was proposed by Von Neumann. We don’t use the FA, and we replace it by the AFA stated as follows. ! Anti-Foundation Axiom: Every graph has a unique decoration. The AFA, due to Aczel, is central to our development. Glossary8 Terminology Experience/primary experience...a set x/primary layer when there are layers of experience Consciousness…Kx, where K is a consciousness operator. See Semantic Thesis in §3.2 Awareness….Kx, where K is a consciousness operator. See Semantic Thesis in §3.2 Graph….a collection of nodes with certain pairs of the nodes specified as edges Directed graph….a graph in which the nodal pairs are ordered (edges are directed) Pointed graph….a directed graph with a distinguished node, the point Accessible pointed graph (apg)….a pointed graph, every node of which is reachable from the point by a chain of directed edges Decoration….the unique assignment (specified by (2.2)) of sets to the nodes of an apg Picture of a set….the pointed graph in whose decoration, the set corresponds to the point 8 For convenience, some of the definitions listed here are abbreviated. In such cases more complete definitions are found in the text. 29 Labeled graph....a graph with an arbitrary assignment of sets (the labels) to the nodes Labeled decoration….a labeling dependent decoration of a graph (specified by (4.0)) Histogram….replaces a collection by a set as the domain of a set valued function M-Z equation….specifies the labeled decoration of a graph arising from neural networks Hebb’s rule….specifies the synaptic weight change in a model neuron McCulloch-Pitts equation….specifies the binary valued output of a model neuron Set types Collection….a set as defined by Cantor Naïve set….another name for a collection Set….a primitive construct, the subject of the Z-F axioms Bona fide set….a set, emphasizing its being specified as a primitive defined by Z-F Pure set….a set whose elements are sets, whose elements of elements are sets… Path….a sequence of nodes (finite or infinite) linked by directed edges Well-founded picture….a graph whose paths are finite (in particular, one without loops) Non-well-founded picture….a graph with an infinite path Well-founded set…. a set whose picture is well-founded Non-well-founded set….a set whose picture is non-well-founded Normal set….a set that does not contain itself Abnormal set….a set that contains itself Platonic set….a not physical set, a not computable set, a set located in a virtual space Classes Class….a collection of sets with a common property Proper class….a class that is not a set U….the class or universe of sets A….the class of abnormal sets N ….the class of normal sets Fundamental Operators E….elimination I….identity B….brace, singleton R….Russell T….anti-Russell D….duality operator C….a particular consciousness operator Types of Operators O….a generic operator K….a generic consciousness operator K A ….a special class of consciousness operators parameterized by a set A K diag ….diagonalization of the family of operators K A Selectors….operators O with the following property: x " y # O x = x "O y ! ! ! ! ! ! 30 References Aczel, P. 1988. Non-Well-Founded Sets. CSLI Publications. Aleksander, I., Dunmall, B. 2003. Axioms and Tests for the Presence of Minimal Consciousness in Agents. In Machine Consciousness, O. Holland, ed., Imprint Acad. Aristotle. 1961. (Ross, D. Ed). De Anima, Oxford at the Clarendon Press. Barwise. J. in the forward to Aczel 1988. Bernays, P. 1954. A System of Axiomatic Set Theory, VII. J. Symbolic Logic 1981-86. Blackmore, S. 1999. The Meme Machine, Oxford Univ. Press. Cantor, G. 1895. Beiträge zur Begründung der Transfiniten Mengenlehre, 1. Mathematische Annalen 46; 481-512. Courant, R., Robbins, H. 1941. What is Mathematics. Dawkins, R. 1976. The Selfish Gene. Oxford University. Descartes, R. 1637. Discours sur la Methode. Dym, H., Mckean, H. 1972. Fourier Series and Integrals. Academic Press. Fränkel, A. 1922. Zu den Grundlagender Cantor-Zermeloschen Mengenlehre. Mathematische Annalen 86; 230-237. Frege, G. 1893. Grundsetze der Arithmetik, begriffsschriftlich abgeleitet, Vol. 1. Jena, Volume 2 published in 1903. Gödel, K. see Jech. Haykin, S. 1999. Neural Networks a Comprehensive Foundation. Prentice Hall. Hilbert, D. 1900, Address to the International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris. See also Kaplansky. 1977. Hilbert’s Problems. University of Chicago. Hofstadter, D. 1979. Gödel Escher Bach; An Eternal Golden Braid. Hrbacek, K., 1999. Introduction to Set Theory. M. Dekker. Jech, T. 2002. Set Theory. Springer. Kanger, S. 1957. Provability in Logic. Univ. of Stockholm: Almquist and Wiksell. Stockholm Studies in Philosophy. Miranker, W. 2008, Memes and their Themata. In preparation. Miranker, W., Zuckerman, G. 2008. Applications of the M-Z Equation. In preparation. Penrose, R. 1989. The Emperor’s New Mind. Oxford Univ. Press. Plato. 360 BCE. The Republic. Translated by B. Jowett. Russell, B., Whitehead, A., 1910-1913. Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica. Schrödinger, E. 1958. Mind and Matter. Cambridge Univ. Press. Solms, M. 1995. Chromosomes on the Couch. Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, 9; 107-20. Von Neumann, 1925. Eine Axiomatisierung der Mengenlehre. Jurnal für Reine und Angewandte Mathematik 155; 219-240. Whitehead, A. see Russell. Zermelo, E. 1908. Untersuchung uber die Grundlagen der Mengenlehre, I. Mathematische Annalen 65; 261-281. 31 Power set: Infinity: "z#x [(#u $ x )( u $ a) % x $ z] . "z[("x # z)$y¬( y # x ) & ($x # z)("y # z)( x # y )] . ! Collection: Choice: ("x # a)$y% & $z("x # a)($y # z)% . ! ("x # a)$y ( y # x ) & ("x1 # a)("x 2 # a)[$y ( y # x1 & y # x 2 ) % x1 = x 2 ] " #z($x % a)($y % x )($u % x )[ u % z & u = y ] . ! ! ! ! 32 33

Measuring the Complexity of Consciousness Xerxes D. Arsiwalla1,2,3 and Paul Verschure1,2,3,4 1 arXiv:1801.03880v1 [q-bio.NC] 11 Jan 2018 2 Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia, Barcelona, Spain. Barcelona Institute for Science and Technology, Barcelona, Spain. 3 Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain. 4 Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain. {x.d.arsiwalla@gmail.com} Abstract. The quest for a scientific description of consciousness has given rise to new theoretical and empirical paradigms for the investigation of phenomenological contents as well as clinical disorders of consciousness. An outstanding challenge in the field is to develop measures that uniquely quantify global brain states tied to consciousness. In particular, information-theoretic complexity measures such as integrated information have recently been proposed as measures of conscious awareness. This suggests a new framework to quantitatively classify states of consciousness. However, it has proven increasingly difficult to apply these complexity measures to realistic brain networks. In part, this is due to high computational costs incurred when implementing these measures on realistically large network dimensions. Nonetheless, complexity measures for quantifying states of consciousness are important for assisting clinical diagnosis and therapy. This article is meant to serve as a lookup table of measures of consciousness, with particular emphasis on clinical applicability of these measures. We consider both, principle-based complexity measures as well as empirical measures tested on patients. We address challenges facing these measures with regard to realistic brain networks, and where necessary, suggest possible resolutions. Keywords: Consciousness in the Clinic, Computational Neuroscience, Complexity Measures. 1 Introduction In patients with disorders of consciousness, such as coma, locked-in syndrome or vegetative state, levels of consciousness are assessed in the clinic through a battery of behavioral tests and neurophysiological recordings. In particular, these methods are used to assess levels of wakefulness (arousal) and awareness in patients [28], [27]. Such assessments have led to a two dimensional operational definition of consciousness for clinical purposes. Assessments of awareness use behavioral and neurophysiological (fMRI or EEG) protocols in order to gauge how patients perform on various cognitive functions. Assessments of wakefulness are based on metabolic markers (if reporting is not possible) such as glucose uptake in the brain, captured using PET scans [17]. As such a clinically-oriented definition of consciousness enables classification of closely associated states and disorders of consciousness into clusters on a bivariate scale with awareness and wakefulness on orthogonal axes. Under healthy conditions, these two levels are almost linearly correlated, as in conscious wakefulness (high arousal and high awareness) or in deep sleep (low arousal and low awareness). However, in pathological states, wakefulness without awareness can be observed in the vegetative state [28], while transiently reduced awareness is observed following seizures [16]. Patients in the minimally conscious state show intermittent and limited nonreflexive and purposeful behavior [20], [19], whereas patients with hemi-spatial neglect display reduced awareness of stimuli contralateral to the side where brain damage has occurred [30]. Given the aforementioned scales for labeling states and disorders of consciousness, the crucial question is how should one quantify awareness and wakefulness from neurophysiological data? This is particularly useful for non-communicative patients such as those in coma or states of minimal wakefulness. For this reason, several dynamical complexity measures have been developed. In this article, we first describe theoretically-grounded complexity measures and the challenges one faces when applying these measures to realistic brain data. We then outline alternative empirical approaches to classify states and disorders of consciousness. We end with a discussion on how these two approaches might inform each other. 2 Measures of Integrated Information Dynamical complexity measures are designed to capture both, network topology as well as causal dynamics. The most prominent among these is integrated information, denoted as Φ. This was first introduced in [37] and is defined as the quantity of information generated by a network as a whole, over and above that of its parts, taking into account the system’s causal dynamical interactions. This reflects the intuition going back to William James that conscious states are integrated, yet diverse. Φ seeks to operationalize this intuition in terms of complexity, stating that complexity arises from simultaneous integration and differentiation of the network’s structure as well as dynamics. Differentiation refers to functional specialization of neural populations, while integration, as a complementary design principle, results in distributed coordination among neural populations. This interplay generates integrated yet diversified information believed to support cognitive and behavioral states. The earliest proposals defining integrated information were made in [37], [36] and [34]. Since then, considerable progress has been made towards the development of a normative theory as well as applications of integrated information [12], [14], [35], [1], [29], [7], [8], [26], [33], [5]. The core idea of integrated information as a whole versus parts quantity has been formalized in several distinct information measures such as neural complexity [37], causal density [32], Φ from integrated information theory: IIT 1.0, 2.0 & 3.0 [34], [12], [29], stochastic interaction [39], [11], stochastic integrated information [14], [1], [9] and synergistic Φ [23], [22]. Table 1 summarizes these measures along with corresponding information metrics upon which they have been based. Table 1. Theoretical complexity measures alongside their corresponding information metrics. Integrated Information Measures Information Metrics Neural Complexity Mutual Information (MI) Causal Density Granger Causality (GC) Stochastic Interaction Kullback-Leibler Divergence (KLD) IIT 1.0 & 2.0 KLD Stochastic Integrated Information MI or KLD IIT 3.0 Earth Mover’s Distance Synergistic Φ Synergistic Information However, computing integrated information for large neurophysiological datasets has been challenging due to both, computational difficulties and limits on domains where these measures can be implemented. For instance, many of these measures use the minimum information partition of the network. This involves evaluating a large number of network configurations (more precisely, the Bell number), which makes their computational cost extremely high for large networks. As for domains of applicability, the measure of [12] has been formulated for discrete-state, deterministic, Markovian systems with the maximum entropy distribution. On the other hand, the measure of [14] has been devised to continuous-state, stochastic, non-Markovian systems and in principle, admits dynamics with any empirical distribution (although in practice, it is easier to use assuming Gaussian distributions). The formulation in [14] is based on mutual information, whereas [12] uses a measure based on the Kullback-Leibler divergence. Note however, that in some cases the measure of [14] can take negative values and that complicates its interpretation. The Kullback-Leibler based definition computes the information generated during state transitions and remains positive in the regime of stable dynamics. This gives it a natural interpretation as an integrated information measure. Both measures [12], [14] make use of a normalization scheme in their formulations. Normalization inadvertently introduces ambiguities in computations. The normalization is actually used for the purpose of determining the partition of the network that minimizes the integrated information, but a normalization dependent choice of partition ends up influencing the value and interpretation of Φ. An alternate measure based on the Earth Mover’s distance was proposed in [29]. This does away with the normalization problem (though the current version is not formulated for continuous-state variables). However, the formulation of [29] lies outside the scope of standard information theory and is still difficult for performing computations on large networks. More recently, these issues have been addressed in [9], using a formulation of stochastic integrated information based on the Kullback-Leibler divergence between the conditional multivariate distribution on the set of network states versus the corresponding factorized distribution over its parts, while implementing the maximum information partition instead of the minimum information partition. Using this formulation, Φ can be computed for large-scale networks with linear stochastic dynamics, for both, attractor as well as non-stationary states [9] (for network simulations see [2], [3], [10]). This work also demonstrated the first computation of Φ for the resting-state human brain connectome. The connectome network is estimated from cortical white matter tractography data, comprising 998 voxels (nodes) with approximately 28,000 weighted symmetric connections [24]. [9] show that the dynamics and topology of the healthy restingstate brain generates greater information complexity than a (weight-preserving) random rewiring of the same network. Even though this formulation of stochastic integrated information was successfully implemented for the human cerebral connectome, a network of 998 nodes and about 28,000 edges, it was limited to linearized dynamics. This is well-defined in the vicinity of attractor states such as the resting-state, however, it would be desirable to extend this formulation to include non-linearities existing in brain dynamics. 3 Empirical Measures Ideally, integrated information was intended as a measure of awareness, one that could account for informational differences between states and also disorders of consciousness. However, as described above, for realistic brain dynamics and physiological data that task has in fact proven difficult. On the other hand, the basic conceptualization of consciousness in terms of integration and differentiation of causal information has motivated several empirical measures that seek to classify consciousness-related disorders from patient data. For example, [13] investigated changes in conscious levels using Granger Causality (GC) as a causal connectivity measure. Given two stationary time-series signals, Granger Causality measures the extent to which the past of one assists in predicting the future of the other, over and above the extent to which the past of the latter already predicts its own future [21], thus quantifying causal relations between two signaling sources. This was tested using electroencephalographic (EEG) data from subjects undergoing propofol-induced anesthesia, with signals source-localized to the anterior and posterior cingulate cortices. [13] found a significant increases in bidirectional GC in most subjects during loss of consciousness, especially in the beta and gamma frequency ranges. Another useful measure of causal connectivity is transfer entropy, which extends Granger causality to the non-Gaussian case. However, so far this has only been implemented on neuronal cultures by [40] and holds future potential as a clinically relevant measure. Yet another measure that has already proven useful as a clinical classifier of conscious levels is the Perturbational Complexity Index (PCI), which was introduced by [18] and tested on TMS-evoked potentials measured with EEG. PCI is calculated by perturbing the cortex with transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in order to engage distributed interactions in the brain and then compressing the resulting spatiotemporal EEG responses to measure their algorithmic complexity, based on the Lempel-Ziv compression. For a given segment of EEG data, the Lempel-Ziv algorithm quantifies complexity by counting the number of distinct patterns in the data. For example, this can be proportional to the size of a computer file after applying a data compression algorithm. Computing the Lempel-Ziv compressibility requires binarizing the time-series data, based either on event-related potentials or with respect to a given threshold. Using PCI, [18] were able to discriminate levels of consciousness during wakefulness, sleep, and anesthesia, as well as in patients who had emerged from coma and recovered a minimal level of consciousness. Later, the Lempel-Ziv complexity was also used by [31] on spontaneous high-density EEG data recorded from subjects undergoing propofol-induced anesthesia. Once again, a robust decline in complexity was observed during anesthesia. These are complexity measures based on data compression algorithms. A qualitative comparison between a data compression measure inspired by PCI and Φ was made in [38]. While compression-based measures do seem to capture certain aspects of Φ, the exact relationship between the two is not completely clear. Nonetheless, these empirical measures have been useful for clinical purposes, in terms of broadly discriminating disorders of consciousness. Another relevant complexity measure is the weighted symbolic mutual information (wSMI), introduced by [25]. This is a measure of global information sharing across brain areas. It evaluates the extent to which two EEG channels present nonrandom joint fluctuations, suggesting that they share common sources. This is done by first transforming continuous signals into discrete symbols, and subsequently computing the joint probabilities of symbol pairs between two EEG channels. Before computing the symbolic mutual information between two time-series signals, a weighting is introduced to disregard conjunctions of identical or opposite-sign symbols from the two signal trains as that could potentially arise from common-source artifacts. In [25] wSMI was estimated for 181 EEG recordings from awake but noncommunicating patients diagnosed in various disorders of consciousness (including 143 from patients in vegetative and minimally conscious states). This measure of information sharing was found to systematically increases with consciousness. In particular, it was able to distinguish patients in the vegetative state, minimally conscious state, and fully conscious state. In Table 2 we summarize the above empirical measures along with their domains of application. 4 Discussion The paradigm-shifting proposal that consciousness might be measurable in terms of the information generated by causal dynamics of the brain as a whole, over the sum of its parts, has led to precise quantitative formulations of informationtheoretic complexity measures. These measures seek to operationalize the intuition that the complexity associated to consciousness arises from simultaneous integration and differentiation of the brain’s structural and dynamical hierarchies. However, progress in this direction has faced practical challenges such Table 2. Empirical complexity measures alongside their tested domains of application. Empirical Measures Granger Causality Tested Application Domains Wakefulness vs propofol-induced anesthesia using EEG Perturbational Complexity Index Wakefulness, sleep, anesthesia, coma & minimal consciousness using TMS-evoked EEG Lempel-Ziv Complexity Wakefulness vs propofol-induced anesthesia using EEG Weighted Symbolic Mutual Information Vegetative, minimally conscious & fully conscious states using EEG as high computational cost upon scaling with network size. This is especially true with regard to realistic neuroimaging or physiological datasets. Even in the approach of [9], where both, the scaling and normalization problem have been solved, the formulation is still applicable only to linear dynamical systems. A possible way to extend this formulation to non-linear systems such as the brain might be to first solve the Fokker-Planck equations for these systems (as probability distributions will no longer remain Gaussian) and subsequently estimate entropies and conditional entropies numerically to compute Φ. Another solution to the problem might be to construct statistical estimators for the covariance matrices from data and then compute Φ. In the meanwhile, for clinical purposes, it has been useful to consider empirical complexity measures, which serve as classifiers that very broadly discriminate states of consciousness, such as between wakefulness and anesthesia or broadly between disorders of consciousness. However, these measures do not strictly correspond to integrated information. Some of them are based on signal compression, which does capture differentiation, though not directly integration. So far these methods have been applied on the scale of EEG datasets. One has yet to demonstrate their computational feasibility for larger datasets (which might only be a matter of time though). All in all, bottom-up approaches suggest important features that might help inform or constrain implementations of principle-based approaches. However, the latter are indispensable for ultimately understanding causal aspects of information generation and flow in the brain. This article is intended as a lookup table spanning the landscape of both, theoretically-motivated as well as empirically-based complexity measures used in current consciousness research. Even though, for the purpose of this article, we have treated complexity as a global correlate of consciousness, there are indications that multiple complexity types, based on cognitive and behavioral control, might be important for a more precise classification of various states of consciousness [15], [6]. 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1463 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. Article Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light Blake T. Dotta & Michael A. Persinger* Consciousness Research Laboratory, Behavioural Neuroscience & Biomolecular Sciences Programs Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ontario Canada P3E 2C6 ABSTRACT Measurements by a photomultiplier tube at distances of 15 cm from the head demonstrated significant increases in biophoton energies along the right side but not the left when subjects imagined white light in a dark environment. The increased power density of ~ 3 x 10-11 W/m2 did not occur when the same subjects thought about mundane experiences. The calculated increased photon energy while imagining white light was equivalent to the involvement of action potentials from about 107 cerebral cortical neurons. These values are consistent with the typical numbers of neurons involved with imaginative states as inferred from fMRI technologies and the hypothesized origins of biophotons from lipid and redox reactions within cell membranes. We suggest these results support Bόkkon's hypothesis that specific visual imagery is strongly correlated with the release of biophotons and may be the actual experience of organized matrices of photons. The cognitive coupling with photon emissions would also support the electron spinmediated hypothesis of Hu and Wu for the origin of consciousness. Key Words: biophotons, Bόkkon biophoton hypothesis, cerebral hemispheres, imagination, human brain, quantitative EEG (QEEG) visualization. 1. Introduction All living tissues exhibit a narrow band of very weak photon emission (Popp, 1988, Van Wijk and Schamhart, 1988). The dominant frequencies of these biophotons occur within the near ultraviolet to the near infrared range (Popp 1979). In the order of 100 photons are emitted per cm2 per s (106 photons/m2∙s) from surface boundaries such as the skin as reported by both Van Wijk et al (2006) and Cohen and Popp (1997). They employed photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) with sensitivities in the 200 to 800 nm range. Assuming an average wavelength of 500 nm (6 x 1014 Hz, with a velocity=c), the energy per photon would be 4 x 10-19 J for a sum of about 4 x 10-13 W/m2. For comparison the densities for cosmic rays near the earth's surface are in the order of 10-13 W/m2 which is within the same order of magnitude as that produced from natural radioactive isotopes from the ground and atmosphere (Koenig et al, 1981). In the following experiment we measured and explored photon *Corresponding author: Dr. M. A. Persinger, mpersinger@laurentian.ca Thanks to Dr. W. E. Bosarge, Jr., Chairman, Quantlab LLC for financial support. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1464 emissions from the cerebrum during reversible cognitive sequences while dark-adapted normal subjects sitting in the dark imagined white light or engaged in casual ideation. There has been evidence that very photon-active volumes of matter, such as the human brain (Dotta et al, 2011a), may generate higher densities of photons coupled to cognitive activity. For example, the energy associated with action potentials from neurons can be described as the product of 1.2 x 10-1 V (the net change of 120 mV) and the unit charge of 1.6 x 10-19 A∙s, that is, 2 x 10-20 J (Persinger, 2010). The wavelength equivalence is 10 µm, the approximate width of a neuronal soma. In addition, if visible biophotons around (for example) 500 nm wavelengths were frequency (or phase) modulated through intrinsic processes whose net change was ~10-20 J, the shift would only require ~10 nm, the width of a plasma cell membrane. That membrane-relevant information might be mediated by photons becomes even more salient when one considers quantitative values. The times required for a photon moving at the velocity of light to traverse the width (~10 nm) of a plasma cell membrane and for an electron (Bohr magneton) to complete one (unit) orbit are both in the order of 10-16 s. The convergence of the values between the times required for a photon to traverse a neuronal membrane and for a single electron orbit would be congruent with the conditions to produce or reflect entanglement. As suggested by Hu and Wu (2006) quantum entanglement originated from the primordial spin processes in non-spatial and non-temporal pre-space time. Consequently the fundamental parameters constrained by this condition affect the physical and chemical reactions and properties in all forms of matter. Living systems are composed of matter. Electrons become entangled through the spin process by exchanging one or more entangling photons. Power densities of biochemiluminescence from brain tissue (Dotta et al, 2011a) and hippocampal slices have been measured in the order of 10-13 to 10-12 W/m2 (Isojima et al, 1995; Kobayashi et al, 1999). The hippocampal emissions were not spurious and were phase-locked to intrinsic theta activity (Sun et al, 2010). In humans there is evidence that intracerebral changes in biophoton activity are related to consciousness and phosphene phenomena (Sun et al, 2010, Bόkkon, 2005; 2009). In his original and imaginative articles Bόkkon (2005; 2009) suggested that biophotons mediate information within brain space during dreams (in particular) and wakefulness. In fact intracerebral biophotons were proposed to generate pictures during thinking. Subsequent calculations and integration of the literature suggested that retinotopic electrical signals could be converted into synchronized bioluminescent photons by cellular redox and reactions of free radicals within cell membranes to produce intrinsic biophysical pictures during visual perception and imagery (Bokkon and D’Angiulli, 2009; Bokkon et al, 2011). Recently Wang et al (2011) tested Bόkkon’s theory and was the first to demonstrate spontaneous and visible light-induced photon emission from rat eyes. Bόkkon’s theory is compatible with Wu and Hu’s (2006) hypothesis that unpaired electron spin networks are the “mind screen”. In their model the neural plasma membranes and intrinsic proteins represent the interface between the mind screen and memory matrices. When the diffusing dynamics associated with nitric oxide (NO) and oxygen (O2) are viewed as pixel-activating agents, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1465 the triad of processes form the neural substrate of consciousness. Thus, quantitative measurements, rational calculations, and carefully constructed theories predict strong correlations and perhaps an identity between human thinking and photon emissions from the same cerebral volume. While investigating the photon emissions by PMT from cultures (about 106 cells) of mouse melanoma cells that were “stressed” at room temperature (20ºC) in the dark during the 12 hr after removal from incubation we observed distinct periods of increase in energy emission in the order of 10-11 W/m2 (Dotta et al, 2011b). This was equivalent to 10-14 J over the width of the culture dish (and PMT aperture) or about 10-20 J/s per cell. The conspicuous effects were in sharp contrast to cell cultures maintained at 37˚C where applied energies are often required to evoke discernable biophoton emissions. Biochemical treatments to test the involvement of several molecular pathways strongly implicated the plasma membrane as the source (Dotta et al, 2011b). Given the sensitivity of our instrumentation to measure the likely plasma membrane-related changes in energy emission from cells we decided to measure the photon emission from the sides of the heads of normal volunteers. We (Hunter et al, 2010) had reliably measured obvious increases of photon emission in the order of 10-11 J/s at about 15 cm from the right temporoparietal region of Sean Harribance, a person known for exceptional intuition about peoples’ memories when they were near him as well as for inhibiting cancer cell growth. When engaging in these activities Harribance reported that he concentrated on "cerebrally-generated white light" during a specific cognitive state that was associated with not only a specific configuration of quantitative electroencephalographic activity but measureable emissions of photons from the right but not the left side of his brain at the level of the temporoparietal lobes. 2. Methods and Materials A total of 16 men and women between the ages of 20 and 30 years of age volunteered as subjects. Photon emissions from the right and left sides of each subject's head were measured with a Model 15 Photometer from SRI Instruments (Pacific Photometric Instruments) with a photomultiplier tube (PMT) housing (BCA IP21) for a RCA electron tube (no filters). The tube was positioned in counterbalanced order approximately 15 cm from the left or right side of the subject's head at the level of the temporal lobes. This distance was selected based upon our pilot study with Sean Harribance as well as for convenience and to minimize any potential subtle contributions from simple heating. The PMT was covered with about 5 cm of cloth to obtain optimal sensitivity as defined by no change in slope over increments of 10 min. Calibration for photon emission had been completed by comparing the unit response directly to a digital luxmeter at higher intensities (> l lux) and by measuring the response to a LED at 10 mA (5 millicandella; 2 millilumens/45 degree) at various distances for intensities much less than 1 lux. Lux was transformed to Watts/m2. Calibration indicated that a change of 1 unit at the maximum sensitivity of 1500 with an input current of 0.01 (.001 max) in order to obtain measures within the medium range of the 0 to 100 unit meter was equivalent to 5 x 10-11 W/m2. At this PMT setting the “background photon ‘noise’” for the meter was mid-range (about 45 units); higher sensitivity (.003) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1466 exceeded 100 units and displayed a saturated response. The output was transformed to mV (millivolt meter) and sent to an IBM ThinkPad laptop (Windows 95) in another room where samples were taken three times per second (the limit of the laptop software) during the experimental period. The essential procedure was an a,b design repeated three times while the measurements were taken from either the left or the right side of the head. After dark adaptation for about 15 min each blindfolded subject was told to relax, think of white light all around him or her and to focus light into the PMT, relax, focus, relax, and then focus. The duration of each component (relaxation or "imagining white light") ranged between 45 and 90 sec but was the same for each subject. The biophoton emissions (from 135 to 270 measures from the 3 samples/s) were averaged for each of the six (3 thinking about light, 3 not thinking) intervals. To discern if there were differential hemispheric power densities of light emissions, photon emissions were measured by the PMT from the left or right side of each subject’s head at the level of the temporoparietal lobes. For half the numbers of subjects the left hemisphere was measured first while for the other half of the numbers of subjects the right hemisphere was measured first. The measurement procedure was the same for each hemisphere. We selected “white light” as the target cognition because the results of our many pilot experiments while studying introspection and entoptic imagery suggested that diffuse white light for dark adapted normal people sitting blindfolded in the dark is the easiest to enhance voluntarily through imagination. 3. Results As can be seen in Figure 1 there were statistically significant net increases [F(1,14)=5.39, p <.001; eta2=.30] in photon emissions over the right hemisphere when the subjects imagined light. The changes were not statistically significant over the left hemisphere. Imagining light or not imaging light explained 30% of the variance in the net increase (M=0.51, SD=0.32 units) in photon emission from the right hemisphere as compared to the left hemisphere (M=0.15, SD=.26). An increase of 1 unit, based on two methods of calibration, was equivalent to 5 x 10-11 W/m2. There was no statistically significant difference in baseline photon emissions during relaxation periods between the left and right sides of the head. For illustration, the means and standard deviations for PMT measurements during periods of not imagining and periods of imaging light for the left and right side of the head are shown for one subject in Figure 2. Post-experiment interviews verified that each subject had imagined "seeing white light" in the dark and had tried by imagination to focus the light into the PMT after the instructions and relax during the intervening periods. The “content” of those relaxation periods were later reported to be primarily thoughts about imminent classes, tests, or meeting with friends. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. Figure 1. Means and standard errors of the mean (vertical bars) for the net change in photon energy measured by the photomultiplier tube 15 cm from the left or right side of the skull during imagining white light vs not imagining light. A change in 1 photon energy unit is equivalent to 5 x 10-11 W/m2. Figure 2. Means and standard errors of the mean of net changes in photon energy from the left and right side of the skull of a single subject while sitting in a dark room and either relaxing(did not think of light) or visualizing white light. Summed durations of each condition (not imagining vs imagining light) was 135 s. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1467 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1468 4. Discussion We selected the simple instruction to "visualize white light" to assess Bόkkon's (2005; 2009; Bokkon et al, 2009, 2011) innovative concepts that when a person "generates" an image during thinking or dreaming there are actual photons emitted within the cerebral matrices. This subjective visual image may be the perception of actual photons. Given the recent calculations by Bόkkon et al (2010) that photon intensity is higher inside of cells than without during "visual perception", we had reasoned that some extracerebral emission should occur at levels sufficient to be measured in the dark with a PMT. The magnitude of this increase in photon emission was at least 10,000 times weaker than what one would perceive looking at the stars on a clear, moonless night but about 100 times greater than the background energies from cosmic radiation. We suggest that the right hemisphere effect is not simply because of its slightly greater blood flow (Roland and Friberg, 1985) or electroencephalographic voltage (Niedermeyer et al, 1987) for alpha activity. The magnitude for these values are only about 10% more over the right than the left hemisphere while the photon emissions were a factor of 3 (300%). The greater proportion of white matter within the right hemisphere compared to the left would also be consistent with our working hypothesis that the emissions of photons are strongly correlated with the action potentials of axons. An average increase of 0.5 units for our system where a 1 unit increase is 5 x 10-11 W/m2, would be equivalent to 1.4 x 10-1 m2 (half the spherical surface area at 15 cm) multiplied by that value or between 3 and 6 x 10-12 J/s. When divided by the essential quantum of 2 x 10-20 J/action potential (Persinger, 2010) this would be equivalent to about 108 action potentials. Assuming the average activity of 10 Hz per neuron, this means that an additional 107 (on average) neurons within the cerebral cortices were activated during the imagining of light by the subjects. These values are remarkably similar to those predicted by Bόkkon et al (2010;2011) for the numbers of photons involved with the final stage of non-linear (iterative) biochemical reactions in the V1 and V2 regions of the cerebral cortices during visual imagery. The estimates are even more convergent when Bόkkon et al’s (2010) calculations are considered. Given there are about 20 billion neurons per hemisphere (Blinkov and Glezer, 1968; Pakkenger and Gundersen, 1997) and each hemisphere displays a surface area of 80,000 mm2, an increase of about 1% of available neurons for this imagined task would have occurred. For comparison, imagining visual images or reconstructing visual experiences during fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) or PET (positron emission tomography) measurements can involve voxels with summed volumes of about 100 to 150 mm3 (e.g., Brewer, et al, 1998). With an average of 58 neurons per 0.001 mm3 within the cerebral cortices, the total numbers of neurons for this volume would be about 107. This is the same order of magnitude that was associated with our subjects who simply imagined "white light" in the dark. That the putative biophoton emissions were related to cerebral processes, in this case “thinking” about white light (rather than “heat” or origins from “reflected light” from the scalp or hair) is suggested by two major observations. First, the significant neurocognitive effect occurred along the right hemisphere but not the left. Second, the amount of energy emission was comparable to that ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1469 associated with the estimated numbers of neurons associated with cognitive processes and satisfies the theoretical predictions by Bόkkon et al (2010) for visual imagery. Superficially at least there appears to be discrepancies between what we assume are the essential cellular spatial dimensions and the range of measurements by the PMT. The width of a plasma cell membrane is ~10 nm and the width of an average neuronal soma is ~10 µm while the primary range of detection for the PMT was between 400 and 800 nm. This discontinuity could be resolved if we assumed the presence of frequency or phase modulation of light during the generation of biophotons. For example the energy associated with 500 nm wavelengths is ~4 x 10-19 J which is more than a factor of 10 greater than the “quantum unit” (Persinger, 2010) of 10-20 J associated with both the action potential and the resting membrane potential. However if a 500 nm wavelength was frequency modulated by the width of a membrane (~ 10 nm) to 490 nm (~4.1 x 10-19 J) the net difference in energy would be 10-20 J. In other words the “carrier” frequencies would be photons within the visible range but the cellular or action potential-related patterns of information would be mediated within the frequency-modulation or phase-modulations of that “carrier band.” Traditionally the difference between the group velocity of a wave (the overall shape of the wave’s amplitudes) as it propagates though space, and the phase velocity within the wave envelope, has been considered minimal. However the recent evidence that the photon displays a non-zero mass (Tu et al, 2005) allows for the dispersion of light which produces frequency dependence in velocity. As a result, group velocity will differ from phase velocity. This would contribute to a third state of polarization in which the vector of the electric field is along the line of motion, the “longitudinal photon”. Digital sequences, which define information generated from a single neuron, could be carried within a single phase or frequency shift that would be potentially facilitated by the “longitudinal” photon. The conspicuous congruence between the time (~10-18 s) required for a photon moving at c to traverse the plasma cell membrane and the time required for the single rotation of an electron (or the time required to move to another atom) indicates that light emission/absorption and the single orbital time of an electron within the matter that composes membranes may be more interactive than previously assumed. That visual images may be organized as fields of biophotons as conceptualized by Bόkkon requires a re-evaluation of traditional approaches to the relationship between brain activity and cognitive processes. The generation of photons by cognition, particularly imagination, may have profound theoretical and philosophical implications for theories of consciousness. Thought-coupled patterns of photon emission increase the importance and perhaps practical application of quantum entanglement. If Wu and Hu’s (2006) primordial spin process is considered and consciousness resides within the domain of unpaired nuclear and/or electron spins and entangled photons which constitute the “minds pixels”, then a non-local nature of at least a subset of consciousness might occur. Pre-spacetime would be a holistic domain located outside of space-time but connected through quantum channels to everywhere in space time (Wu and Hu, 2006). Although apparently conceptual, the quantitative solution for the total volume of an electron and “quantum thread” with Planck’s length ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1470 as its radius are congruent. With an estimated volume of an electron around 10-44 m3 a cylinder with a radius of 1.6 x 10-35 m (Planck’s length) would have a cross sectional area of 8 x 10-70 m2. For this “thread” to have the equivalent volume of an electron its length must be 1026 m, or effectively the width of the universe. Such a “holographic-like” quality to the electron and proton could accommodate the calculations by Persinger and Koren (2007). They showed that the time required for one Planck’s length to expand one Planck’s length required the age of the universe. On the other hand the time required for the width of the universe to expand one Planck’s length was Planck’s time, about 10-44 s. The necessary convergence between these two boundary conditions (Koren and Persinger, 2010), like Wu’s and Hu’s (2006) model, does not contradict classical relativity because the latter’s framework involves physical events occurring within space-time. There is also a potential application to the relationship between the electromagnetic quantum associated with light and gravitational phenomena (Persinger, 2012). If we assume the upper limit for the rest mass of the photon is ~10-52 kg and Planck’s length (10-35 m) is the minimal distance then the intrinsic (unit) of gravitational attraction would be [(10104 kg2/10-70 m2)∙6.67 x 1011 m3/kg s2], or, between 10-45 and 10-44 N. If this force were extended over the width of the visible universe of about 1026 m, the central tendency for the energy would be 10-19 to 10-18 J. This energy divided by Planck’s constant is between 1014 Hz and 1015 Hz or within the order of magnitude of the band of the visible spectrum, i.e., light. Although the gravitational forces are very small they are comparable to those associated with the distance between the potassium ions that maintain the resting membrane potential of the plasma membrane of the neuron. The average distance between these ions within the ~0.6 nm layer of the approximately million charges over the surface of the membrane is about 10 nm (Persinger, 2010). The energy associated with electric forces of 10-12 N between any two equally spaced charges when applied over the width (10-8 m) of the membrane is about 10-20 J. With typical oscillations in the order of 10 Hz, the energy per second would be about 10-19 J. On the other hand the gravitational force between the mass of two potassium atoms separated by about 10 nm is ~10-45 N, the same magnitude as the forces that would exist between two photon rest masses separated by Planck’s length. Consequently the gravitational force between two potassium ions on a plasma membrane surface spread over the width of the universe (1026 m) would also result in energies of about 10-20 J. The different velocities associated with different frequencies (Tu et al, 2005) that result from a discrete mass for the photon have significant implications for the specious present, the duration of time that is considered “now”. When applied to the Lorentz equation the dilatation of time can range from a few minutes to several tens of years, depending upon the frequency of the photon. For visible wavelength frequencies, such as the band recorded in the present studies, the widening would be in the order of 3 days or less. However if higher frequency photons were emitted with specific types of cerebral activity coupled to consciousness, the widening could involve more than a decade (Dotta and Persinger, 2009). It may be relevant that the difference in energy equivalences of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1463-1473 Dotta, B. T. & Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. 1471 the masses associated with relativistic compression of the length of an electron between its classical radius and Compton’s radius (2.4 x 10-12 m) is approximately 10-20 J, the value for the neuronal quantum associated with the action potential (Persinger et al, 2008). Acknowledgement: Thanks to Dr. W. E. Bosarge, Jr., Chairman, Quantlab LLC for financial support. References Blinkov, S.M., Glezer, I.I. 1968. The human brain in figures and tables: a quantitative handbook. N:Y.: Plenum Press. 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Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 805 Article What We Can Learn about Consciousness From Altered States of Consciousness Imants Barušs* Department of Psychology, King’s University College at The University of Western Ontario ABSTRACT Philosophers and other scholars sometimes take their own experience to be the measure of reality in theories of consciousness. The purpose of this paper is to present some data from altered states of consciousness that need to be taken into account in any adequate interpretations. At the outset, the four common definitions of the term consciousness are clarified and the spectrum from materialist to transcendent beliefs about consciousness and reality held by consciousness researchers is presented. This is followed by a list of alterations of consciousness. In the substance of the paper, three salient issues are presented: feelings of reality, anomalous information transfer, and somatic plasticity. In each case, some of the implications for theories of consciousness are discussed. Key Words: altered state of consciousness, reality, experience, definition of consciousness, materialist, transcendent, feelings of reality, anomalous information transfer, somatic plasticity. Clarifying the Study of Consciousness Philosophers, psychologists, and other scholars sometimes take their own experience as the measure of reality in their theories of consciousness. Or, to use methodological terminology, their theory is based on a sample size of one and the inherent limitations of that single individual. So, for example, by looking to his own experience, William James found that thinking (which, according to James, is what consciousness is) is just the breath (James, 1904, p. 491). Daniel Dennett proposed a cognitivistic theory of consciousness that fit “all the dear features” that he had discovered in his “inner life” (Dennett, 1978, 173). And so on. I am not criticizing the effort to look to one’s own experience when theorizing — it is, in fact, necessary to do so — but, instead, I am asking for respect for the limitations of such a methodology and for attention to reports of events that lie outside of its boundaries. There is much to be learned from research into altered states of consciousness that bears on any theories of consciousness, in particular, and theories of mind and reality in general. In this paper I clarify some basic matters concerning the study of consciousness, then provide a list of alterations of consciousness, and, finally, discuss three issues that arise in the context of altered states of consciousness that have implications for understanding consciousness. * Correspondence: Professor Imants Barušs, Department of Psychology, King’s University College at The University of Western Ontario. E-Mail: baruss@uwo.ca ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 806 In order to clarify some basic matters concerning the study of consciousness, it is necessary to delineate the four main definitions of consciousness that I have found in the academic literature. I have numbered these as consciousness1, behavioural consciousness2, subjective consciousness2, and consciousness3. Consciousness1 refers to an organism’s ability to discriminate stimuli and act in a goal-directed manner as determined by outside observation of the organism. How much discrimination and goal-directed activity is necessary is clearly a variable for which one can choose a lower bound. One can also restrict the definition to particular classes of organisms such as vertebrate animals thereby excluding invertebrates, plants, robots, and so on. Behavioural consciousness2 can be conceptualized as the application of consciousness1 to itself and refers to an organism’s behavioural demonstration of knowledge of its own situation. Behavioural consciousness2 can also be regarded as an operational definition of subjective consciousness2, which refers to the stream of the explicit contents of one’s awareness. Or, to give a closely related meaning, subjective consciousness2 refers to experiential events characterized by intentionality. Consciousness3 is the sense of being that a person has for herself; what we could call existential qualia (Barušs, 1987; 1990; 2008). It is important to distinguish between these meanings in that, for instance, consciousness1 can be nonconscious relative to subjective consciousness2 and it is important not to infer that data about one meaning of consciousness automatically applies to another (e.g., Barušs, 1992). Throughout this paper I will use the word “consciousness” to loosely denote this constellation of meanings, some of which might be more relevant in a particular instance than others, and will refer to the specific meanings as necessary. Often researchers use the notion of consciousness, not in a technical sense, but as a Rorschach blot on which to project their favourite ideas about the nature of reality. These ideas are not necessarily based on empirical research or logical reasoning, but are simply beliefs held by a researcher for whatever reason. In studying consciousness, it is important to understand the relationship between notions about consciousness and personal beliefs about reality. Robert Moore and I examined the relationship of notions of consciousness and beliefs about reality in a survey that we carried out in 1986 with 334 participants who could potentially write about consciousness in the academic literature. Using a number of multivariate statistical analyses, we found a material-transcendent dimension underlying beliefs about reality. In the following description of that dimension, I am using the terms that appeared in the questionnaire, with whatever meanings they were taken to have by the respondents. These would not necessarily match the conventional meanings of these terms in philosophy or other disciplines. In fact, we had found in pilot questionnaires that we needed to keep the questionnaire items conceptually simple. Furthermore, the correspondences given in this description are based on statistical averaging and any given individual could well differ from these norms in idiosyncratic ways. We were able to identify three positions along a material-transcendent dimension: materialism, conservative transcendence, and extraordinary transcendence. Those tending toward materialism believed that the world was a physical place governed by deterministic laws, had physical monist ideas about the mind-body problem, believed in science as a way of acquiring knowledge, and had no religious affiliation. Those tending toward the conservatively transcendent position were characterized by religious beliefs as well as believing that meaning was an important aspect of reality. They were dualists, advocated hermeneutic methodologies, and indicated Christian or ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 807 Judaic religious affiliation. Those tending toward the extraordinarily transcendent position believed that they had had experiences that science could not explain, such as out-of-body experiences or mystical experiences. They were mental monists, believed in paranormal means of acquiring knowledge and checked off the box that said “own beliefs” when providing information about religious affiliation. For materialists, consciousness is just information in an information-processing system, an emergent property of the brain or a computational system, and always characterized by intentionality. In any case, consciousness is just a byproduct of nonconscious physical processes of one sort or another. Those tending toward the conservatively transcendent position like the subjective definitions of consciousness, think that consciousness is evidence of a spiritual dimension within people, and that it gives meaning to reality. Hence consciousness is important for them. For those tending toward the extraordinarily transcendent position, consciousness is all there is. They prefer defining consciousness in the context of altered states of consciousness rather than the ordinary waking state and see consciousness as the key to inner growth while also being the ultimate reality. Upon further statistical analyses, it became apparent that the distinction between notions of consciousness and beliefs about reality was an arbitrary one and at that point these patterns of ideation were simply regarded as beliefs about consciousness and reality (Barušs & Moore, 1989; 1992; Barušs, 1990). Clearly some of the versions of consciousness and reality found by Moore and myself contradict each other. The tendency might be to say that those with materialist beliefs are “right” while those with transcendent beliefs of any sort are “wrong.” What sort of people would hold such strange beliefs? Well, that is an empirical question that one of my thesis students set out to answer. She gave 75 student volunteers the Beliefs about Consciousness and Reality Questionnaire (BACARQ) derived from the original survey, as well as Jackson’s Personality Research Form — E, which is a measure of personality traits (Jackson, 1999). She found that there was a correlation between transcendence and “understanding,” a personality trait that is characterized by being curious, logical, astute, and so on. Contrary to expectation, students tending toward transcendent beliefs had a more rational approach to reality than students tending toward materialism. And these were unlikely to have been students who were simply trying to please the researchers because of a negative correlation between transcendence and social recognition. In other words, those scoring higher on transcendence were less likely to seek approval of others or care what others thought about them (Jewkes & Barušs, 2000). The personality trait of understanding is an aspect of the personality trait of openness. And there have been known to have been small correlations between openness and intelligence (as measured by IQ tests), so the question arose of whether there was a correlation between transcendence and intelligence. The research literature concerning unusual beliefs and intelligence is inconsistent with the assumption apparently commonly made that anyone who holds transcendent beliefs is just plain stupid and that if such people had more wits about them they would be materialists. That is an empirical question. Another of my thesis students investigated the connection between transcendence and intelligence by giving 39 undergraduate students the Beliefs about Consciousness and Reality Questionnaire as well as Jackson’s Multidimensional Aptitude Battery — II, which is a measure ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 808 of IQ. All of the relationships that were found indicated that there was a positive correlation between transcendence and intelligence. In particular, Item 9 from the questionnaire, which reads “There is no reality other than the physical universe” had a correlation of r = –.48 (p=.002) with Full Scale IQ. In other words, those who were the most intelligent thought that there was more to reality than the physical universe. A scatterplot of the Total Beliefs score on the BACARQ against Performance IQ appeared to show that those with lower IQ tended somewhat toward transcendent beliefs, those with midrange scores on Performance IQ had the least transcendent beliefs, and those with high IQ had the most transcendent beliefs. Indeed, quadratic regression of Total Beliefs scores on Performance IQ had better goodness of fit than linear regression (R2 = .10 vs. R2 = .02). This prompted a median split at a score of 107 for Performance IQ which resulted in a correlation of r = .65 (p = .003) between Total Beliefs and Performance IQ. Given that Performance IQ is conceptualized as a measure of a person’s intellectual agility when encountering novel challenges, it would appear that those with the most transcendent beliefs are also those who are most intellectually able (Lukey & Barušs, 2005). So what? First, not everyone is a materialist, using the characterization of materialism that arises constructively from the statistical analyses of our questionnaire data. Second, for a small student sample, rejection of materialism is associated with a more rational approach to reality. Third, for an even smaller student sample, rejection of materialism is associated with greater intelligence. So it is okay not to be a materialist. And there are other reasons to open up the beliefs spectrum. For example, materialism cannot explain matter (Barušs, 2007; 2010). What is perhaps germane here is the significance that is given to altered states of consciousness by those who tend toward the extraordinarily transcendent state of consciousness. For them, it is not so much within the ordinary waking state that consciousness reveals itself, but in its alterations. So let us turn to the alterations of consciousness. A List of Alterations of Consciousness Before talking about specific issues that arise from a study of altered states of consciousness, it would be instructive simply to list some of the relevant alterations of consciousness. I use the expression “alteration of consciousness” as a more general term than “altered state of consciousness” (which implies a stable state that is clearly separable from the ordinary waking state along some appropriate dimensions.) The following is a list of alterations of consciousness along with some explanatory notes. Unless indicated otherwise by citations, the material in this list has been taken from my book Alterations of Consciousness (Barušs, 2003). 1. the ordinary waking state, daydreaming, absorption, mindfulness 2. sensory restriction 3. sleep, parasomnias 4. hypnagogic and hypnopompic states 5. dreaming, nightmares, dream incubation, lucid dreaming, precognitive dreaming, shared dreaming 6. hypnotic trance, fantasy proneness, trance, dissociated states, dissociative identity disorder, possession, mediumship 7. out-of-body experiences ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 809 8. alien abduction experiences 9. drug-induced states 10. flow, mystical states, transcendent states, pure consciousness, nondual states, states of no-self 11. death, impending death states, near-death experiences, shared near-death experiences 12. putative memories of: pre-birth experiences, previous-lifetime experiences, future lifetime experiences, between-lives experiences 13. pathological states such as derealization, depersonalization, depression, psychosis, anxiety, the ordinary waking state 1. There are a number of definitions of daydreaming, depending upon the combination of spontaneity, subjectivity, and fancifulness one adopts for one’s definition. Usually, one conceptualizes daydreaming as being opposed to focussed thinking. In our Western intellectual tradition, we have epistemically privileged focussed rational thinking in the ordinary waking state, although acknowledging that insights could occur during reverie as described, for example, in Graham Wallas’ (1926) description of the four stages of problem solving. Absorption is a focussed state of mind with attenuated self-reflection that can occur by itself or in the context of hypnotic trance, trance, flow, and concentrative styles of meditation. Mindfulness usually refers to sustained monitoring of the events of one’s experiential stream and includes disidentification with the contents of mind as well as an attitude of equanimity toward those contents. 2. Sensory restriction, known previously as sensory deprivation and also called “restricted environmental stimulation technique,” refers to the reduction of sensory input. This can be done, for example, by staying in a dark and quiet room, lying in a floatation tank, or by experiencing a uniform sensory field, such as in so-called Ganzfeld experiments. 3. Sleep is a biologically induced altered state of consciousness. Parasomnias are sleep disorders such as sleep terrors and sleepwalking. Highly complex behaviours can occur during sleepwalking, such as in the case of Kenneth Parks who drove his car to his parents-in-laws’ house and killed his mother-in-law while asleep. 4. Hypnagogic and hypnopompic states are transition states that occur while falling asleep and waking up, respectively, often characterized by vivid imagery. These are sometimes liminal states in which nonconscious material surfaces in awareness. 5. Dreaming occurs during non-rapid eye movement sleep, during which there is lowered brain metabolism, as well as during rapid eye movement sleep during which brain metabolism is about the same as it is during wakefulness. Nightmares are dysphoric dreams. Lucid dreaming is dreaming in which one knows that one is dreaming; that ability can be deliberately cultivated. Precognitive dreaming entails dreaming about events that occur in the future. Shared dreaming includes both meshing dreams, in which two people dream the same dream contents, and meeting dreams, in which two or more people encounter each other in their dreams. Experimentation with shared dreaming involves becoming lucid while dreaming and then seeking to meet with another lucid dreamer to exchange specific information (Waggoner, 2009). Whereas there is considerable evidence for precognitive dreaming, there is less proof for shared dreaming, although its occurrence appears to be likely. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 810 6. Hypnotic trance is whatever state one enters upon being hypnotized. This is not the same state for everyone but depends upon one’s hypnotic susceptibility and the dispositions that allow for such susceptibility. In some cases, such trance is simply compliant behaviour in the ordinary waking state. In other cases, it could be due to fantasy proneness or dissociation. Fantasy proneness refers to a person’s ability to imagine something as though it were real, without mistaking the imagined events as being real. Often, hypnotic behaviour is the result of dissociation, whereby there are functional disconnections within a person’s psyche. “Trance,” in general, is a term used for a number of states in which there is the appearance of the presence of subjective awareness and self-determination, but no significant actual awareness or selfdetermination. Dissociative identity disorder is a psychiatric disorder in which alternate personas or fragments take turns being that person. Possession refers to states in which a person appears to have been taken over by something other than who that person ostensibly is. There can be confusion between possession and dissociative identity disorder in that possession could simply be the manifestation of a persona derived from that person’s psyche or, vice versa, that personas are possessing entities such as deceased relatives, if that is possible. In other cases, it appears that both dissociative identity disorder and possession are occurring within the same body. Mediumship is the ostensible transmission of information or energy from dimensions of reality other than ordinary physical manifestation. 7. Out-of-body experiences are experiences in which a person has a somasthetic sense of being outside of her body, irrespective of whether or not there is any sense in which she is actually outside of her body. 8. Alien abduction experiences are experiences in which a person believes that she has been abducted by aliens and can include feelings of extreme terror, missing time, and bodily scars such as “scoop marks.” At present there are no known explanations for these experiences. 9. Psychoactive drugs induce alterations of consciousness to varying degrees. The most interesting of the drug-induced states are those caused by psychedelics such as ayahuasca, dimethyltryptamine, d-lysergic acid diethylamide, psilocybin, and mescaline. 10. Flow is a state of exceptional well-being in which one is absorbed in a challenging activity for which one has the requisite skills. Mystical states are characterized, in brief, by a sense of unity with all that exists, noetic revelation, and joy. Transcendent states are states that are judged to be superior in some sense to the ordinary waking state. Pure consciousness refers to states of consciousness without intentionality, i.e., states of consciousness in which the sense of existence occurs but in which there are no contents of consciousness. Nondual states are states in which the duality between subject and object disappears. And states of no-self are states in which a person’s sense of self disappears (e.g., Roberts, 1993). 11. Death is an altered state of consciousness, although it is not clear exactly what sort. Impending death states are states of consciousness close to death in which a person might hallucinate the presence of deceased relatives or other beings. Near-death experiences are reports of experiences in which a person has usually been close to death for some period of time without breathing, heartbeat, or brainwaves. Shared near-death experiences are similar to shared dreams, in that the near-death experience of a person having that experience is shared by a person who is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 811 possibly in the same room but who is not close to death (Moody, 2010). 12. Either spontaneously or through hypnosis, guided imagery, or some other means, people appear to “recall” experiences that occurred before they were born, experiences from apparently previous lifetimes, experiences from “future” lifetimes, or experiences from between lives. 13. Consciousness can also be altered in pathological states such as derealization disorder in which feelings of reality are lost; depersonalization disorder, in which the sense of self is lost; depression, psychosis, and anxiety. And finally, it is not difficult to argue that the ordinary waking state is also a pathological state (cf. Walsh, 1984; Malamud, 1986). Feelings of Reality The first issue that I would like to discuss is concerned with feelings of reality (FORs). Feelings of reality are “how real reality feels” qualia. One way to think about them is to consider William James’s notion of a penumbra surrounding a particular thought that creates the context within which that thought occurs (James 1890/1983). The psychological study of experience has largely consisted of the examination of the contents of experience that are the focus of attention and not the context within which they occur. One reason for that is simply that it is more difficult to empirically observe the context, precisely because it is not the focus of attention. This is comparable to the study of dark matter and dark energy whose existence needs to be inferred from the observations of matter that does reflect light (Panek, 2011). One of my thesis students studied FORs of participants in the ordinary waking state, in an imagined near-death experience, and, as recalled in memory from an actual near-death experience. She found that FORs varied across different states of consciousness (Sangster, 2004). For most people reality feels real. However, there are states of diminished FORs such as those that occur in derealization disorder, in which the events that are going on for a person do not feel as though they were real. This can be a terrifying feeling (American Psychiatric Association, 2000). But FORs can also be enhanced in some altered states of consciousness such as neardeath experiences, lucid dreams, alien abduction experiences, and transcendent states. My thesis student found that FORs were clearer, more intense, and more distinguishable in the altered states that she studied compared to the ordinary waking state (Sangster, 2004). The obvious question is, are feelings of reality a good criterion for what is actually real? If the answer is yes, then some near-death experiences, lucid dreams, alien abduction experiences, and transcendent experiences are more real than ordinary reality. If the answer is no, then the reality of reality must rest on criteria other than FORs. If so, what exactly are they? How is the reality of whatever is going on to be determined? How valid is reliability, for example, as a criterion of what is real? And is there any evidence that the ordinary waking state is epistemically privileged? And if it is not, and we let go of the assumption that what is going on in the ordinary waking state is “real,” then what are we left with? Why does this matter? Samuel Johnson refuted Bishop Berkeley’s idealism by kicking a large stone (Boswell, 1823). The idea behind this refutation is that no one can deny the objective ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 812 solidity of physical manifestation because it feels real. In other words, because feelings of reality are so evident in the ordinary waking state, phenomena in that state must be made out of ontically substantial “things.” Of course, logically, that makes no sense, but I sometimes still hear that sort of “refutation” when the substantiality of matter is challenged. In a lucid dream, I found myself in a room in a tall building that was indistinguishable from a room in the ordinary waking state of consciousness. Recalling Samuel Johnson’s “argument,” I deliberately walked over to the dream wall and pounded on it with my fist, hard, several times. Yup. It was solid, just like Johnson’s stone. FORs were the same for me in my lucid dream as they would be in my ordinary waking state of consciousness. Upon hearing this story, one of my students repeated my experiment in her lucid dream and also found the walls in her dream to be solid. However, just because the walls in our dreamscapes were solid, does not mean that they were made out of anything. The feelings of reality in my dream do not allow me to conclude that the wall was made out of “things.” Similarly, just because physical manifestation appears to us to be solid does not mean that it is made out of any “thing.” And, indeed, we know from subatomic physics that elementary particles do not have continuous existence, spatial extension, or stable properties (Kempf, 2008; Kochen & Specker, 1967; Barušs, 2010). In other words, there is nothing down there out of which to construct reality. Matter is not made out of anything. So what does this tell us about consciousness? Cutting FORs loose from our assumptions about the nature of reality gives us a greater opportunity to call into question the nature of physical manifestation. Materialist theories of consciousness, such as those proposed by Christof Koch (2012), depend upon the viability of ontologically robust matter, at least at the macroscopic scale. But if we can be so easily mislead about the solidity of the objects of our experience, then how excited should we get about materialist theories that promise to give an account of consciousness in terms of what could end up being as hallucinated as my dream wall? My example also suggests a way forward for understanding the nature of consciousness. In Tibetan dream yoga, for instance, the idea is to master the dream state. This includes using the will to direct dream events. In my lucid dream, after banging on the wall, I decided to go through the ceiling in order to get to the top of the building. At first I could not, because the ceiling was solid, but because I knew that I was dreaming, I knew that it was just a dream ceiling, and so I kept willing myself to go through it until I successfully penetrated it. The idea is that the insights and skills learned during the dream state can be carried over to the waking state, until the waking state is recognized to be as much a projection of one’s mind as is the dream state (LaBerge & Rheingold, 1990). Then, perhaps when we kick Johnson’s stone, the foot goes through (cf. David-Neel, 1929/1971; Pulos & Richman, 1990; Braude, 2007). If physical manifestation proves to be a projection of the mind, then consciousness is ontologically primary relative to matter. This tells us something about consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 813 Anomalous Information Transfer A common occurrence in alterations of consciousness is the presence of information in places where it should not be. For instance, in experimental studies, mediums were asked to provide information about a person known to the experimenter but whom the mediums had not met. The mediums in those studies got over 80% of the information correct through anomalous means (Schwartz, 2002). My students tell me that they do not care what the empirical research reveals, that they will believe it when they see it. In response to students’ skepticism, I bring to class Angie Aristone, who has worked as a medium and who has been involved in some of my research projects. She often gets specific information about students that she should have no way of knowing. For example, in one case she turned to one student and told her that her mother was one of seven children in the family. She told her several other things, then turned to another student in the class and said that her mother was one of seventeen children in the family. Both numbers were correct. I have also seen her correctly imitate gestures that were made by the deceased while they were alive. For instance, she told one student that his grandfather was telling him to follow his heart and not “this,” where “this” referred to a gesture by the medium whereby she held up her hands and flapped her fingers against her thumbs. I turned to the medium with a quizzical expression on my face, unable to understand the intended meaning of the gesture. The student, however, said that that was what his grandfather used to do to indicate that he should not listen to what other people said. Examples such as these can be evidential for some people (Barušs, 1996). For more robust proof we need scientific studies such as those conducted by Gary Schwartz. But less evidential examples can illustrate characteristics of anomalous phenomena and help to guide research. So here is another example, this time of precognitive dreaming, which does not constitute robust proof, but serves as an illustration of anomalous information transfer. I had written a book and sent it to several publishers when, on the night of September 14, 2004, I had a dream in which I dreamt that I was sitting in a cafeteria after having bought a lottery ticket. I could see that I had won, even though the ticket was upside down. I wondered if the ticket had expired but when I turned it over I saw that the expiration date was October 17; that the ticket was good. Lottery tickets represent academic publication in my dreams because I think of academic publication as a lottery rather than being merit-based. The ticket being upside down represented the precognitive process itself, in that, in my waking life I did not know that the book would be published; however, I did know that in my dreams. I interpreted the date as the date on which the manuscript would be accepted for publication. Nothing happened on October 17, 2004, but on October 17, 2005, the book was accepted for publication. The date of acceptance had apparently accurately appeared in my dream. Montague Ullman carried out two studies of precognitive dreaming at the Maimonides Medical Center in 1969 and 1970. Malcolm Bessent was the dreamer in both cases. In the second study, for instance, Bessent was awakened on eight nights for periodic dream reports the night before he experienced a randomly chosen multisensory presentation about a particular theme, and again on the eight nights after he had experienced the presentation. The dreams from the night before ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 814 and the night afterwards were compared to the multisensory experience to determine which of them more closely matched the presentation. For seven of the eight nights, the dream contents for the precognitive nights more closely matched the presentation than the dream contents of the subsequent nights. Indeed, in one case, Bessent correctly predicted during his dream reports that the next day’s presentation would be about birds, which it was (Ullman & Krippner, 1973). These studies have sometimes been erroneously reported in the secondary literature in such a way as to make it incorrectly appear that the researchers were incompetent (Child, 1985). The occurrence of anomalous information transfer suggests that thoughts can occur in subjective consciousness2 that are not the product of sensory input or the brain’s own localized activity. Furthermore, these anomalous impressions can refer to events that are temporally displaced from the time of their occurrence. Perhaps subjective consciousness2 or consciousness3 are not confined to the skull. Perhaps time is not linear so that the stream of consciousness is only an apparent stream. What is it about reality that allows information from outside one’s light cone to nonetheless show up? The fact that events such as these occur, tells us something about what consciousness is like. Somatic Plasticity The third issue I want to address is the extent to which the body can change in unexpected ways. We have the notion that intentions that we have within subjective consciousness2 can be realized as behaviour. The recurrent example that I have heard at consciousness conferences is that of raising one’s arm: I decide to raise my arm and my arm goes up. But there are some unexpected examples of somatic plasticity. The first example is that of hypnotic analgesia. Simply by inducing a hypnotic trance, it becomes possible to carry out surgery on some people’s bodies. An example of this was given by a surgeon who performed liposuction surgery on himself while standing over the course of four hours. What is noteworthy about this case is not only the degree of dissociation that the surgeon was able to induce, but the fact that analgesia was maintained despite the continuous bombardment of cutaneous nerve endings which would ordinarily be experienced as being extremely painful (Botta, 1999). In these cases, there seems to be a nonconscious mechanism that is triggered simply by suggestion, but that has the capacity to block painful sensory input from being experienced as such. As an extension of cases of hypnotic analgesia, there can be significant physiological changes when a person with dissociative identity disorder switches between alters. Such changes can include changes in handedness, visual acuity, sensitivity to allergens, and responses to medication. For instance, I am aware of two cases in which a person awakened from anaesthesia during surgery when she switched to an alter that had not been anaesthetized. These changes can extend to unusually rapid healing with switches between alters. (Such rapid healing has also been reported in some cases following near-death experiences (Atwater, 2007; 2011; Moorjani, 2012).) What is interesting is the extent to which physiological changes can occur in response to changes in self-identity. Simply by believing oneself to be someone else results in partial physiological adaptation to the altered identity (Barušs, 2003). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 815 There is a whole subdiscipline of psychoneuroimmunology examining connections between the contents of one’s experiential stream and the activity of the immune system. For instance, in one of a series of studies, sixteen participants were asked to imagine trauma to their bodies requiring a type of white blood cell known as neutrophils to migrate from the bloodstream to the site of the imagined trauma. Blood was taken before and after the visualization and a 60% decrease in neutrophil counts was found along with decreased neutrophil adherence. It appeared that so many neutrophils had left the bloodstream that the ones remaining to be measured were those with low adherence. In a further study, 27 participants were asked to imagine increasing the adherence of the neutrophils while keeping them in the bloodstream. This time an increase in the adherence of the neutrophils was found. There was also a correlation between neutrophil adherence and the quality of imagery ratings (Schneider, Smith, Minning, Whitcher, & Hermanson, 1990). In this case there was an intention to change the activity of white blood cells and a visualization of the desired changes. Changes to the right caudate nucleus of the brain were found in nine people whose brains were imaged using positron emission tomography after ten weeks of cognitive-behavioural therapy with a mindfulness component for the successful treatment of obsessive compulsive disorder. The idea here is that mindfulness allowed for disidentification with the usual pathological brain patterns and the intentional redirection of the brain toward healthier functioning in a process of self-directed neuroplasticity (Schwartz, 2005; Schwartz & Begley, 2002; Schwartz, Stapp, & Beauregard, 2005). In 1979, eight elderly men were taken on a retreat for one week during which time they had to live as if it were 1959. A control group of eight men got to experience the same retreat except that they reminisced about 1959. The participants in the experimental group had greater improvements on joint flexibility, finger length, manual dexterity; higher IQ; better weight, height, gait, and posture than the participants in the control group (Langer, 2009). By pretending that they were twenty years younger, the bodies of the elderly men in the experimental group became functionally younger. In this case there is the deliberate effort at the level of consciousness2 to act as if a counterfactual state of affairs were actual. If changes such as these can occur in one’s body in correspondence with one’s own intentions, then the question arises of whether it is possible to affect not only one’s own body, but that of someone else. That is an empirical question. I tested it under the rubric of remote healing, i.e., healing someone at a distance. The remote healing literature is mixed, with some studies finding persuasive evidence for it and others failing to do so (e.g., Byrd, 1988; Krippner & Achterberg, 2000; Leibovici, 2001). My study was done entirely over the Internet. I e-mailed participants indicating the time at which I would begin a session for them and asked them to answer three questions, on a scale of one to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 816 six, indicating whether they experienced anything unusual, whether they were more fatigued than they expected to be, and whether they felt more energized than they expected to be. Then I flipped a coin and if it landed heads I would conduct a remote healing session for them. If it landed tails I did nothing further. In the remote healing sessions I used techniques derived from Matrix Energetics, a system of transformation developed by Richard Bartlett, whereby one essentially imagines alternatives to the occurrent reality (Bartlett, 2007; 2009; Barušs, 2012). From May 26, 2010 until May 11, 2012 there were 22 participants in the study with a total of 138 sessions — 72 of which were experimental and 66 control. There were one to eleven sessions per participant with a median of seven. The average length of sessions was 22 minutes (with a standard deviation of 8 minutes). In each case, the means for the sessions in the experimental sessions were numerically greater than the means for the control sessions. The absolute value of the difference between being more energized and more fatigued was not only numerically greater for the experimental condition (with a mean of 2.08 and standard deviation of 1.58) than the control condition (with a mean of 1.56 and a standard deviation of 1.59) but statistically significantly greater at p = .04 (one-tailed). This did not surprise me, given that the written reports that I had received from participants indicated changes in energy and, often, enhanced concentration and feelings of well-being, at the time of an actual session. So, in the case of remote healing, there were changes to other people’s self-reported energy levels corresponding to my healing intention and visualization of changes for them. And so, events occurring during hypnotic trance, absorption, dissociated states, mindfulness, behaving as if, and remote healing, suggest that somatic events can coincide with changes in subjective consciousness2. Can mental events cause changes to one’s own or someone else’s physical body? Can mental events cause the brain to change? Is consciousness ontologically primary? Is the brain a byproduct of consciousness3? Does the sense of existence bring in the specifics of manifestation, including physical manifestation? I do not know the answers to those questions. I suspect that they are “yes” (Barušs, 2009; 2010). But at the least, by opening the door of what goes on in altered states of consciousness, we can learn something about what we can and cannot say about consciousness. I want to make it clear that I am not asking anyone to believe anything that I say. Knowledge is not based on belief, but on appropriate empirical research (Barušs, 1996). It is important to read the primary literature and to visit the laboratories doing the research reported in this paper. Or better yet, the reader can set up her own experiments to determine the truth of the matter. Author Note This paper is based on a talk given during the California Cognitive Science Conference on April 28, 2012 at the University of California Berkeley. I thank my research assistants Carolyn van Lier for tracking down information that was used in this paper, Monika Mandoki for providing me with feedback, and Shannon Foskett for providing feedback, editing, and proofreading the manuscript. I also thank King’s University College and Medical Technology (W.B.) Inc. for financial support that enabled the research that was reported in this paper as well as assistance with its preparation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 805-819 Barušs, I., What We Can Learn about Consciousness from Altered States of Consciousness 817 References American Psychiatric Association (2000). 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The 4 percent universe: Dark matter, dark energy, and the race to discover the rest of reality. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Pulos, L. & Richman, G. (1990). Miracles & other realities. Vancouver, Canada: Omega. Roberts, B. (1993). The experience of no-self: A contemplative journey (Rev. ed.). Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Sangster, L. T. (2004). Characterizing feelings of reality. Bachelor’s thesis, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. Schneider, J., Smith, C. W., Minning, C., Whitcher, S. & Hermanson, J. (1990). Guided imagery and immune system function in normal subjects: A summary of research findings. In R. G. Kunzendorf (Ed.), Mental imagery (pp. 179–191). New York: Plenum. Schwartz, G. E. (with Simon, W. L.). (2002). The afterlife experiments: Breakthrough scientific evidence of life after death. New York: Pocket. Schwartz, J. M. (2005). Mental health, spiritual information, and the power of the mind to shape the brain. In C. L. 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Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1209 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I Exploration A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I Marcus A. Stolk* ABSTRACT All technological equipment we invent and use for quantifying life, colour and light are only an extension and derived out of available human intelligence, and as such it may not be of first importance. Rather, it seems that the research of futuristic human and creational intelligence is of first importance, and here the phenomena of the appearance and influence of light and colour may give crucial understandings. This article is about colour. Foremost of all it is an attempts to explore a new approach to the study of colour and its influence, not by making colour the central focus, but by making us humans the central focus and the way we function and operate. Within this perspective, a new model of colour exploration will be launched based on creational intelligences relating to human intelligences. Part I of this article contains: Introduction; 1. A Short Historic Trace; and 2. The Five Creational and Human Intelligences. Key Words: colour research, influence of colour, creational intelligence, human intelligence. Introduction This article is about colour, but it is more than that. Foremost of all it is an article that attempts to explore a new approach to the study of colour and its influence, not by making colour the central focus, but by making us humans the central focus and the way we function and operate. Within this a new model of colour exploration will be launched that is based on creational intelligences relating to human intelligences. These creational and human intelligences are themselves in part derived out of the study of the properties of light and colour. Latest scientific discoveries and theories within quantum physics will be used as evidence to support this model. It however needs to be understood that this article is an exploration and highly philosophical, until proven as fact. Because the territory we are bound to enter into is huge, it needs to be understood as well that this article cannot describe in depth all the territories of research it involves, varying from colour and light to human physiology and psychology, quantum physics, history and the study of ancient cultures, esoteric knowledge, symbology, philosophy, religion, the observation of nature and natural principles and much more. This article will describe in a coarse outline the main important, but a literature list will be added for those that further want to pursue and research the content and possible implications of this article. The article itself will start with a historic trace, basically to show that we might be on the brink of a shift from an old mechanistic world view to a possible new inter-connective spirited world view. It will show as well that we might suffer limited intelligence perception * Correspondence: Mark Stolk. E-Mail: stolk.mark@gmail.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1210 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I due to history and if this is the case, how this relates to colour research. Apart from opening up the theory of the Five Intelligences, some practical advice will be given in how to work the Five Intelligences in relation to colour research. The article will end with a list of colour nuances relating to different qualities, derived out of the application of the Five Intelligences in colour research. 1. A Short Historic Trace Ever since Homo Sapiens appeared on the stage of evolution, it has wondered about- and it has been interested in colour, it´s influence, effects and properties. Yet, the experience of colour by man throughout time has changed and differed. In the early stages of the awakening of mankind´s consciousness colour must somehow have had magical properties. In its direct contact with nature, colours to, what we usually call, “the primitive man”, not just represented certain processes and forces in nature, it seems that colours were those forces. The early application of pigments in drawings and paintings of various kinds, like the cave drawings, must have been a sacred and magical act. To our ancestors it meant that something could be given or be enhanced with “soul” or life force. The ancient Egyptians had, as an example, a word for colour that also meant the character of a living being. It seems that colour was not a mechanical phenomenon, but a living phenomenon and that it had an active living influence. This can still be seen in the German language, where colours are used as verbs. “Der Himmel blaut” and “der tag graut” refer to this active living influence. It does not only suggest that the sky “blues” or the day “greys”, it suggest as well that we, as observers, can be “blued” or “greyed”. In many languages colour naming related directly to the observation of natural phenomena. The root of the word green is in many languages strongly related to the words grass and grow. “As green as grass” could as such be replaced by “as green as green” or by “as green as growth” meaning that bright colour green we see in spring time. As such it means that something is young, fresh, inexperienced and not yet full-grown. Red, as an example, has in many languages the same root as the word blood. And red got associated with the abilities, nature and properties accorded to blood, such as its ability to “boil” or to “passionate”. The “soul” or “character life-force” of a colour was not deducted in an analytical, logical way, but through a process of organic logistics, which here means the comparison evaluation of the felt natures, functions, properties and abilities of inter-relating forms of life. As such it seems that colours became representative of qualities as well and that they took on a symbolical meaning, different at times from culture to culture, all depending on the natural surrounding ecology. In the west red stands as such for the colour of passionate love, black is the colour of death, darkness and evil, whilst white stands for purity... It seems that this process of organic logistics, as mentioned above, used logic in a very different way than the culture we live in today. It did not separate things out of its surrounding context to then analyse them and break them down in microscopic small parts, but it was aware of the inter-connection function of all living things and the fact that things somehow interact by a similarity of frequency and through sameness in quality. The way our ancestors used numbers are a good example of this organic logistic way of looking at life. Even more so than colours, colours represented a universal language by which one could understand the meaning and purpose of life. Numbers were not just a mean to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1211 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I quantify things, but they were seen as governing influences, as a kind of natural laws. As such the understanding of numbers is not just important in relation to the way many of our ancestors looked at life, it is important as well in understanding the way many of our ancestors used colour. Colour used in a three-fold system would have a different meaning, nature and function then when being used, as an example, in a four-fold, five-fold, six-fold, or seven-fold system. A good example of how many of our ancestors related to life in an organic logistic way can be seen in the famous drawing of Leonardo da Vinci, the Vitruvian Man, depicting a man standing in two positions in a square and circle. Within the drawing, it is easy to draw a pentagram when one connects the limbs and the head of the man standing in the circle. The pentagram, as it is used here, relates perhaps to the divinity of the human design, and the human ability to develop. The circle and square around it might relate to the masculine and feminine four seasonal outplay of the divine principle; location, place and position versus cycle and wave, order and stability versus movement and change. The man standing in the position of a physical cross represents the seen world of matter and its carnal position on earth, whilst the same man standing in the form of the letter X represents the unseen influence of the heavens and the spiritual possibilities of man. During the enlightenment period an important, gradual shift took however place, away from the all-integrating logistic way of perceiving life. The Cartesian view of the body as separate from the soul and the mind, and the classical Newtonian view of matter versus energy, with solid objects flying predictable around in what was thought to be empty space, brought along a mechanistic view on the world and on ourselves. We became machines, bodies that supposedly take the shape they do because of genetic imprinting, protein synthesis and blind mutation. Consciousness resided in the cerebral cortex of the brain, a result of a simple mix between chemicals and brain cells. The Darwinian view on the evolution of the species reduced man to nothing more than an accident of nature, which resulted in an increasing split taking place between science and religion. The ancient credo “If you study the universe, you study man and if you study man, you study the universe” lost it´s true meaning. The effects of the enlightenment were obviously not just negative. Many good things came forth out of it. The achievements within medical science are just one example. Apart from this it put an increasing halt in many parts of the world to many of the superstitions of our ancestors that led at times to great cruelty, such as the witch hunts, the religious crusades and the incarceration of psychologically disabled people who were seen as vehicles of satanic influences. But the enlightenment brought along its cruelties as well and perhaps its greatest cruelty is that it banned the existence of a creational and evolving intelligence. This was left ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1212 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I to religion to deal with, but many forms of religion did not evolve themselves and ended up being “classic”, based in the past and in dogmas that do not necessarily match our times. If this is true, might this mean that this influenced the experience and the study of colour and its influence as well? And might it be that this led to a division in colour research between the “scientists” and “the religious and spiritual inclined”, which is still present today? In such a division the religious and spiritual inclined colour specialists often refer to more organic logistic based classic colour systems, such as the chakra system, shamanistic colour systems and even Goethe´s colour theories, whereas the scientists want objective truth, which means that the influence of a certain colour needs to be proven in the “test tube”, by 50.000 participants partaking in a colour experiment through an x-amount of double blinds. Both approaches have their limitations, and it is as if there is a war going on between, what can loosely be titled as, the left brain hemisphere versus the right brain hemisphere. An example of these limiting approaches now follows. The last decades there has been an increasing scientific interest in light therapy. Although light therapy was already popular in the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century, it went underground for many decades, because of the power and interests of the medical industry. Light therapy was ridiculed and in many cases classified as non-scientific. Today big concerns and industries do however flock around the research of (coloured) light and its influence, mostly because of possible new market profit. Phillips, as an example, has done extensive research on the influence of coloured light. They experimented, as an example, with blue light in classrooms in Holland, and they found out that blue light heightens the concentration of the children present. This in itself is fantastic, but the danger is that it now can seem to be proven that blue light heightens concentration. And yes, in a world full of stress with an overload of influences and impressions blue might have a calming and relaxing effect, it can settle the instinct and our nervous system, and as such it assist in concentration. But blue can also have a dispersing effect and work opposite to concentration, if a person is to “blue”, which means he or she is to calm or to relaxed and too much based in the “parasympathetic” nervous system, having difficulty to practically handle things and to see them through. In this case red might help to concentrate efforts. The problem with this kind of scientific research on the influence of colour seems to be that it often “departmentalizes” colour, taking it out of its bigger context, not understanding its bigger context, and not understanding the why of colour, why it is there in the first place. This is left to the religious and spiritual “new age” colour specialists to deal with, but it is of no interest to the hard-core colour scientist. And in most cases the hard-core scientific inclined colour researcher cannot relate at all to the mostly non-scientific approach of the religious or spiritual colour specialists. These religious and spiritual colour specialists might as an example say that blue equals creativity and communication because the fifth chakra in the throat goes with the colour blue. They might even personally experience this to be the case, but they cannot proof it. As such, a whole colour therapy can be built on this, but the question obviously is, does it really work? And thus, in talking about the qualities of the colour blue mentioned here, how does creativity and communication at all relate to concentration? The question must therefore be if there is another approach possible into the study of colour and its influence, that rises above the fore-mentioned limitations and this seemingly existing division, an approach that perhaps should not put colour central, but the human as a first. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1213 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I Because how can we understand colour for real, if it could be the case that we only use parts of the intelligences available to us, or if parts of us, like the hemispheres of the brain, are at war with each other? Within this context it seems obvious as well that all the technological equipment we invent and use to analyse and quantify life in its various forms, colour and light including, are only an extension and derived out of human intelligence, and as such not first importance. It must be that (the research of) human intelligence is first importance. Colour objectivity One of the first problems one encounters in colour research is the question if colours have objective values and if it is possible to accord objective qualities to colours. It is known that colour pigments subtract light, and that colour pigments influence each other when put next to one another. A red colour on a green field will appear to be more red than a similar red on a yellow field, a red colour on a black field seems to radiate more and appears more red, then the same red on a white field. Further it can be said that colours also depend on light circumstances, and one phenomenon that can be mentioned here is the Purkinje shift. In low light circumstances, as an example during dawn or dusk, the colours blue and green are more prevalent and appear brighter in intensity in relation to the colours red and yellow. This phenomenon in which colour observation is influenced by different relating colours, colour saturation and light intensity is called colour relativity. Much can be said about this, especially in relation to the natural laws that influence this phenomenon. But if it possible to accord objective values and qualities to different colours, it seems that we first of all have to start with the origin of colour, rather than looking at the declension of colour into the more material worlds, where colours appear as pigments. Therefore the study of according possible objective values and qualities to colour starts with looking at colour as a phenomenon of light and energy and the additive mixing of colour, rather than the subtractive mixing of colour, in which colour pigments subtract light and influence each other differently in different light circumstances. The second problem we encounter does not lie in colour itself, but in the human observation of colour. Green is what it is, but how this will influence individuals is depending on factors such as the personal (energy) state, the environment and cultural backgrounds and as well personal experience and character. It appears that green has a different influence on someone charged up with an overload of green force, than someone who is lacking this. And green will affect a person living in a desert differently than as an example a person living in the midst of green forests. And it might be that a person with a creative inclination reacts different on the colour green than a person with a more analytical bias. The question is if we can rise above these impediments. Is it possible that the human can connect to levels of intelligence in which our observation and experience of colour is objective? Without such possibility colour will always have a subjective character. This article is as such primary a “philosophical until proven as fact” search for objective intelligence, present perhaps not just in creation but in the human as well. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1214 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I Colour exhibition “The Vitamins of Colour” in ware house Illum Copenhagen 2002 / 2003 which attracted over 30.000 visitors in which experiments were done with the public in lighted up Spectrum tents. 2. The Five Creational and Human Intelligences This Section will deal with a philosophical model based on five creational intelligences and how these relate to us humans and eventually to colour research. Each of the five intelligences is named by a colour, in which the qualitative influence of each colour represents the intelligences described in their nature and function. In following order the names of these colours are White Intelligence, Green Intelligence, Yellow Intelligence, Blue Intelligence and Red Intelligence. Central in this argumentation stands the idea that the creation manifested itself in stadia out from unseen plasma-genic energy states into seen, material states. An interesting example of this is the four elements: Fire, air, water and earth and the quint essence of these, called ether. Although not relevant for current research in physics, they give a good organic logistic description of the process of creation in five stages, from ether, to fire, to air, water and earth. When we look at these elements in relation to “food”, it is interesting that many living organisms, including the human, can do a long time without physical food (the element of earth), a few days without liquids (the element of water), a limited amount of minutes without oxygen (the element air) and only a few seconds without impressions, including signals, pulses and energies of various kinds (the element of fire). The more unseen and less physical it gets, the more we need it. Without signal impulses to our brain and heart we would be dead in seconds. If we consider impressions to be a food, then it seems that the quality of our ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1215 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I impressions and what we think and feel is of far greater influence then we currently might give credence to. If we take the influence and quality of impressions seriously, which will be difficult to prove on a purely chemistry basis, because we are dealing with not-, or only in part measurable energies, we also take the influence of colour more serious. Colours, colour ranges, shades and combinations can therefore perhaps stimulate or sedate certain cognitive processes and / or bodily processes, such as the ability to learn mathematics, to think creative or to improve blood circulation. As such colours can be seen as a kind of “vitamins”. The main question in this is however if the creation started in the unseen worlds of energies first, in which these energies are imbued with intelligence, or are perhaps at core intelligences themselves, using energy as causing duct ways of action and effect. All what manifested itself after this might be at first sight nothing more than a physical declension and mirror of the creational urge. In the research of light and colour it looks like therefore that the creation started as a state of pure, plasma-genic energies, not as light. Light seems to be a second derived appearance of the creational manifestation (and God spoke, let there be light). In a third stage of materialisation colours as spectrum wavelengths of lights appear, followed by a fourth further stage of materialisation in which pigments appear. The question is in how far and how pigments are caused and determined by preliminary stages of intelligence, and as such chemically programmed to only absorb and process certain wavelengths of light, whilst others are “passed” on. This leads us to the fifth stage, in which a certain pigment is only “active” as long as there is light or as long as it is “charged” with light, which might mean that colours can even have an influence in the dark if we consider the law of energy conservation. If the manifestation of creation took place in five stages, the question is if these stages are animated with intelligences that somehow relate to human intelligences. In which it is interesting from an organic logistic perspective that the human itself is five-fold or pentagram shaped in its design, having five senses to process different energies and speeds. This suggest as well that the human might be creational intelligent, and that it is not finished or arrested in its abilities to co-create and evolve. White Level intelligence: "Permission" In the past ether was seen as a sort of magic creational energy filling up space out of which all the other, more materialized elements appeared. Today it is more than interesting that scientists postulate that space is not empty, with here and there some constellations of milky ways, but that it actually is filled with a not measurable, and perhaps even intelligent kind of energy. It is proven that particles are nothing more than little knots of energy which briefly emerge and disappear back into an underlying field of energy, called the Zero Point Field. The Zero Point Field is a repository of all fields and all ground energy states and all virtual particles and the ultimate memory bank, because everything in the universe is connected by waves, which are spread through time and space, carrying on to infinity, exchange information through interference. As such the Zero Point Field is the ultimate and absolute intelligence and what we used to call the vacuum is in fact the beginning and the end of everything. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1216 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I The Zero Point Field can therefore be compared to a kind of womb in an unbiased state in which new creational birth can take place if disturbed in one way or the other. If we want to give a colour to this creational intelligence, white seems most fitting because it is unbiased, colourless and it signals purity. From now on this stage of creational intelligence will be referred to as White Intelligence. The question is if the human also has a kind of white intelligence that can connect to the absolute intelligence of the Zero Point Field. It is interesting that every species has different functioning senses and sense ranges to produce its own perceived reality through which it can achieve optimal interaction with its environment. A dog can hear things outside of the range of human audible perception, an insect sees certain colours different than we do. The human is thus programmed to perceive within a certain range, as an example the visible part of the whole electro-magnetic band of energies, which we call the rainbow spectrum. Apart from this, we are in our awareness bound up with space, time and definition, and it seems that we therefore cannot fully perceive creational white intelligence. But could it be that a part of the available human intelligence can connect itself to white creational intelligence? The question is in how far we are able to do this and how well we are able to translate this intelligence consciously, which might depend on personal development and the evolutionary state of the human race as a whole. This seems to be a question of permissions, and in the human case the question relating to this would be how we ourselves can optimize and magnify our permissions. In Chapter three of this article more will be said about white intelligence, also in relation to colour research. Green level intelligence: "create" Out from this state of creational white intelligence, this “ether” or “Zero Point field” of unlimited, not bound up with time and space, latent possibilities, a creation has taken place. In many religions the act of creating is seen as a masculine principle (God) that somehow effected the unbiased creation in its white state, after which creation itself became feminine. The reasons for creation might have been an urge in creation in its white state to become conscious, because how can something become conscious of itself without a possibility of reflection. It seems that a differentiation of energies has taken place in an (in part) transition of pure energy into a state of less pure, more materialized energy. Quantum calculations show that our universe, and us in it, live and breathe in what amounts to a sea of motion- a quantum sea of light. Light, as mentioned before, is therefore not the original energy, but a first, more material derivation of a kind of plasma energy and as such it can be related to the element of fire and the food of impressions. It is interesting to mention that the subatomic particles that cause light, constantly jump into existence out from the Zero Point Field and back again, and as such exist in a kind of “ghostly” state. No particle ever stays at rest but is constantly in motion due to the Zero Point Field constantly interacting with all subatomic matter. Thus the energy level of any known particle can´t be measured, because it is always changing. Another strange phenomenon of subatomic particles is that they cannot be quantified, they sometimes behave like particles and sometimes like waves and sometimes like both a wave and particle at the same time. Apart from this these quantum particles are omnipresent. For instance, when transiting from one energy state to another, electrons seem to be trying out all ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1217 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I possible new orbits at once, like a property buyer attempting to live in every house on the block at the same instant, before choosing one to settle in. At the level of green intelligence nothing is therefore certain and set. There are no definite locations and everything is in a state of pure potential, of infinite possibility. This is a state of pure creation. If we are to give a colour to this state of creational intelligence, green seems to be most fitting, because it is a colour that consist out of blue (our planet) and yellow (our sun) and it unites within it two gendered polarities that can give birth to new life. From now on this state of creational intelligence will be referred to as Green Intelligence. How now does this state or stage of creational green intelligence relate to the human? Is there any evidence for similar kind of phenomena to be found in the human that occur within creational green intelligence? An interesting example is the way we receive information through our senses and how this is converted and translated as electrical data along the nerves leading to a specific area in the brain that relates to that specific organ. At this level, the nervous reaction to the information of the different sense organs seems to be similar, there is either an increase or a decrease in the different compounds of the electrical nervous impulses. No colour, sound, smell, taste or touch sensation is transferred through the nerves. All nerves are the same, they all transfer electrical impulses, which can carry certain codes of information. It is as if the information at nerve level exists in a kind of “ghostly” state, it is not defined, decoded and determined yet and the information is omnipresent, before it activates a sensory cognitive pathway connected to a specific area of the brain that is responsible for decoding and translation. Suppose now that any incoming information we receive through our senses could activate not just one, but more sensory or cognitive pathways, then we would look at a union of senses. Any information received through, as an example the eye, would not just activate the sensory or cognitive pathway relating to that part of the brain relating to sight and the ability to see colours, but it would also activate other parts of the brain, relating to other senses. The implications of this are enormous, because it would mean that each specific colour would have a specific smell, a specific sound, a specific taste and a specific feeling attached to it. Specific forms, specific movements, specific patterns, proportions or distances would not just evoke one range of experiences, but a throughout, overall range of sensory experiences. As such, we might be looking here at a hardly discovered, universal language, a language we might be able to discover and / or evolve to. Imagine as an example a building with a specific function, as an example to heal brain injuries, in which all materials, all proportions, all colours, all forms used are all physical manifestations of the same signal, amplifying that signal in multiple ways to create one effect, one function, rather than a building with all kind of contradicting “background noise” signals. All of this is not impossible. In the medical world there is a phenomenon which is called “Synethesia”, which is also called the “Union of Senses”. It is a neurologically based condition, often called an affliction, in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. People who report such experiences are known as synesthetes. It is interesting that Synesthesia turns up 8 times more with artistic people than with ordinary people. The question is if, and how the human can best, connect to and activate this state of green intelligence. And how to translate it! It seems obvious that this somehow must have to do ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1218 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I with activating a variety of sensory cognitive stimuli, which together might create a connection of sensory experiences in the brain. What does, as an example, a certain colour feel like? What is its movement, its rhythm, its temperature, sound, shape, smell, taste and tone? To do this on a conscious and repetitive basis (in whatever field of interest) might signal to our brain to activate this creative state of a “union of senses”. Apart from this, it will also sensitize other functions, such as listening to our instinct. Another aspect that might help to activate green intelligence, is to think “out of the box”, generating wild ideas and not curtailing them instantly, which, as we will see, blue and red intelligences do. “Out of the box” seemingly not logical questions can activate new sensory and cognitive pathways as well. In chapter three of this article some practical examples of how to use this green intelligence in colour research will follow. Yellow level intelligence: "quality orchestration and evaluation" The next level or stage of creational intelligence has to do with the appearance of colours as lights. A classic example is white light falling through a prism breaking up in spectral colours (the rainbow). This is the level where the “unseen” becomes visible for the first time, and colour is as such a more physical description or cloak of the energy it houses within itself. It seems there was a need in the creation, bound up with natural laws, for a further differentiation and an increasing materialization to create consciousness. This stage can therefore be characterized as a first visible embodiment and a reflection of the creational urge. Fine matter forms up, which is primary not bound up with space and time as we commonly experience it. How does this relate to the human? It is most interesting to see that this kind of differentiation goes on in many forms of life on many levels. A good example are cells within our body that can specialize themselves in heart cells, kidney cells, brain cells and so forth. When we look at the nerve impulses that activate certain sensory or cognitive pathways that lead to specific areas in the brain responsible for decoding and translation, then we are looking at a similar process of functional differentiation and increasing materialization (location). At this level it however seems that the incoming information is objective, and it is the same for all humans, because we share basically the same kind of anatomy. The incoming information is not yet changed by- and related to previous experiences bound up with space and time (the past). This is what blue intelligence does, and at this level our programming resulting from education, the culture and environment we live in, our psychology, character, personal energy balances and so forth is nil. In relation to the question how this all relates to the human, it is proven that our cells absorb light and colour and that photons can activate and orchestrate different bodily functions. Recent scientific research has pointed out that specific wavelengths (colours as well) might be responsible for the fact that our body with its different parts and functions can manage complicated feats instantly and simultaneously. D.N.A. is actually one of the most essential storage places of light and photon emissions. In biology the great question is how every living thing takes shape. How do cells know how to organize themselves in each stage of the bodily building process to become an arm or a leg or a heart? The favourite idea is that this is chemically controlled, that there is a kind of genetic program. But if D.N.A. controls ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1219 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I everything, what is then the feedback mechanism which enables to synchronize the activities of different genes and cells to carry out systems in unison? Is it possible that there is a kind of organizing, orchestrating intelligence that uses light frequencies and wavelengths and that itself is not subject to physical matter (chemicals)? Jacques Benviste, a French scientist, has proven in his experiments in diluting chemical substances in water, that water has a memory. He and his team diluted chemical substances in water in such a way that no molecule of the original substance was present in the water. Still, the water had the same therapeutically effect, and sometimes even more so, than when it contained certain chemicals. His experiments went even further and he proved that you can transfer specific molecular signals by using an amplifier and electromagnetic coils. Later he used a multimedia computer. Over thousands of experiments, Benviste and others recorded the activity of a molecule on a computer and replayed it to a biological system ordinarily sensitive to that substance. In every instance, the biological system has been fooled into thinking it has been interacting with the substance itself and acted accordingly. Rupert Sheldrake, another scientist, postulates that there are fields of energy with a culminant memory that remember how plant and animal species should look and act. Sheldrake calls this “Morphic resonance”, which in his view is the influence of like upon like through space and time. When we talk about “like influencing like” independent of space and time, what do we mean? In quantum physics it has been discovered that there is a strange phenomenon in the subatomic world which is called non-locality. In short it comes down to a quantum entity, like an individual electron, having the possibility to influence another electron regardless distance and regardless a measurable exchange of energy. It has been postulated that quantum particles that once were in contact, keep a connection, even if they are physically departed, which causes the actions of one to forever influence the actions of the other, in spite of distance and perhaps even linear time. Perhaps we see a similar kind of phenomenon occur within human perception, where we, as an example, do recognize the same quality in notes in different octaves. Take as an example the note c in a lower octave and then go one octave up; there is a clear distance in the height of the tones, but we recognize them as same-same. They resonate the same inherent quality. Perhaps this is also how we primary recognize the same kind of species. Although there might be similarities in form and shape, our human system might foremost of all pick up the same resonance or signal, which activates a “recognition”. The question is what else is out there that we currently do not perceive, because we have no mental patterns to recognize it yet and certain sensory or cognitive pathways leading to parts in the brain have not, or only in part been activated. Another interesting example of quality resonance is how we experience colour on a flat 2D surface. Red advances, blue retreats, and as such we experience a quality of space and depth that we cannot measure. Could it therefore be possible that the human in its functioning is depending on two complementary systems. One system measures and analyses the world and is based in space and time, a kind of “quantitative system”. The other system is not based in linear time and 3D space and it evaluates everything in a qualitative way. In this system things of similar quality are indissolubly connected with each other. This explains many things, such as healing on distance, which requires a call and response mechanism that is harmonic to each other, the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1220 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I ability to feel what another person feels, telepathy, déjà vu, the feeling of being able to travel through space and time and the strange experience of being present in the past, now and future at the same time. The connective factor in all of this seems not to just be a mental one, but perhaps foremost of all an emotional one. The question therefore is if the creation has an emotional connective intelligence based on qualities in which light and colour are duct ways of communication? If this is the case, colour might be foremost of all a mediator of qualities. A green tomato signals out that it is not ripe yet, whereas a red tomato does. A specific colour nuance might not just connect a person to everything else that has the same colour nuance, but also to the properties and qualities that are harmonic to that colour. It might therefore be that a specific pink stimulates patience, whilst a bright light green might stimulate spontaneity. As such even different regions on our planet might be governed by prevalent colour wavelengths that stimulate the appearance of certain qualities possible, and it is interesting that all the five main religions in the world today originated more or less on the same longitude. Perhaps even linear time is governed by a sequence of colour influences, which permitted certain developments. The question is how we, humans, can connect ourselves to this level of qualitative intelligence, in which the experience is direct and objective without it being coloured by our previous experiences? Is it necessary for a human to consciously develop those qualities that are similar to the motives and reasons for all that exists and maintains it? To go to where it lives, to bridge the distance, mentally, emotionally and otherwise? Our sun is a yellow star and as such we are living in a yellow solar system, even though we experience the light of the sun as colourless (white). It takes about eight minutes for the light of the sun to travel through space to reach us, living on our blue planet. If we ourselves however would travel with the speed of light, we would experience no time, simply because no time would have passed. It is interesting, that in relation to this phenomenon, that time has generally been considered to be a primary, independent and universally applicable order, perhaps the most fundamental known to us. Now many scientists propose it is secondary and that, like space, it is to be derived from a higher-dimensional ground, as a particular order. It might even be that there are many such particular interrelated time orders that can be derived for different sets of sequences of moments, corresponding to material systems that travel at different speeds. This also proposes that the way we generally learn things is a slow process, often based on repetition, but there are perhaps far quicker ways of learning or getting to know things, which has to do with connecting oneself to other strata of intelligence and time orders. The best colour to be given to this stage and level of intelligence seems to be yellow, and from now on this intelligence will be referred to as yellow intelligence. In chapter three more examples will follow of how this intelligence can be connected to and how it practically can be applied in colour research as well. Blue level intelligence: "selection and meaning" This brings us to the next stage and level of creational intelligence, which is bound up with space and time as we commonly understand and experience it. It is on this level where matter becomes a “concrete reality” and where it can be quantified and measured. To make ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1221 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I evolution and development possible it seems that space and time are required and as such an even further materialization and differentiation was needed, stemming out from the creational urge for consciousness. Spectral lights and other specific frequencies and wavelengths that can be called fine matter, took on an even more material cloaks of matter that got fixed with, and determined by a chemical blue print or genetic code that already was present in the finer matter as energy. It seems acceptable that within the occurring variety of life forms, each form of life is uniquely programmed to only respond and react to a part of the total spectrum of electro-magnetic energies. A good example of this is pigments, that do not possess light themselves, but that can process light. A blue pigment is programmed to pass on that part of (white) light that is blue, whilst the rest of the light is absorbed and transformed in heat or fluorescent radiation. If it is true that the finer matter (yellow intelligence) possesses a range of qualitative intelligence that is determining for the creation and existence of a whole range of more coarse material life forms, then it can be said that an organ, like our eye, is the physical manifestation of what created it, in this case the ability or quality of sight. A quite strange, perhaps even funny notation is the hypothesis that yellow intelligence does not see us physically, but possibly it can see us as “a (present- or not present) range of coloured lights”, depending on the qualities we have developed in ourselves. Perhaps the permission to experience time, is only granted to higher developed beings like the human, because time seems to be a necessary factor for the development of consciousness. Without the ability to experience time, place and position it is impossible to change history and the direction of things. We would not be able to select and elect, and we would not be able to attract new intelligence and we would be nothing more than programmed and predictable responders, determined by the tide of changing influences. Free will, that aspect that makes us humans, is bound up with time. And it might be that slow time orders, such as the one we live in, offer a greater possibility and freedom to make choices and a greater permission to make mistakes, and as such to develop, then faster time orders where the wrong choices (mistakes) can be fatal and destructive for whatever lives on that level. Time and space make it possible for us to “quantify” the world around us, and to measure and order the place and position of things. Our analytical ability is, as it seems, fully depending on this level of intelligence. We can “departmentalize”, isolate things out of their greater context, and this ability makes us human. This stage and level of intelligence has to do with giving meaning to the different impressions we as humans receive from the different stages and levels of intelligence. In our brains all the different information is correlated and related unto our memory, our forever expanding data bank. The great danger is however when this intelligence predominates the other intelligences. It reduces the human to nothing more than a chemically programmed, soul-less machine living in a world within itself that has no a deeper meaning and quality connection to life itself. Intellectualism and invention rule, often on the cost of empathy for other forms of life and because it is “analytical”, it cuts itself of from the greater whole, often resulting in a feeling of loneliness and separation that needs to be quenched by outer distraction. The memory banks and the way they are programmed by upbringing, education and culture colour all incoming information in a for the brain and memory banks comfortable dimension, in which there is nothing new under the sun. And what does not fit within the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1222 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I programming is rejected, which results in a repetition of the past in seemingly new formation, but new it is not. This level of intelligence has therefore a selecting function. It measures what can be accepted and what needs to be rejected, and this is depending on such things as safeties involved, logic, reasonability, principles, values, resources, available time but also aspects like personal- and group psychology, what socially is acceptable and the environment we find ourselves to be in. Our instinct is as such a programmed, automatic function that seems to have a blue intelligent nature and function: It protects us from danger and warns us in time if we listen to it. As such creation itself might have instinctive functions and filters that guarantee that all that is of importance to the maintenance and furtherance of life is not warped, perhaps especially in relation to the higher intelligences and time orders where mistakes do cost. The question is however how the human can be open to new intelligence and all that that has not yet manifested itself in recognizable programming. In other words: Is it possible to detect where our “blue print” obstructs the connection with higher intelligences and how we can minimalize the effect of not constructive programming in order to obtain a greater objectivity and less local focus? Classical scientific research definitely has its validity, but it is incomplete as it cannot measure the quality influence of life. One cannot put love in the test tube! In relation to colour research (and many other fields of research) it is therefore of enormous importance to know the psyche and psychology of individuals, groups and nations and to understand what the colouring is. An Eskimo will experience the colour white different to someone living in France and on Greenland the Eskimo have around thirty words to describe the different whites they experience in the snow landscape around them. Personality tests can assist as well to discover the colouring a person has which influences test results. What colour wavelengths, as an example, is a certain person or group of people prevailing in? A “red” person will experience red different then a “blue” person and this can be included in colour research. Apart from this our energy levels fluctuate constantly, and if we are, at core, beings of light, it might mean that at certain moments in time our “red battery” is empty. As soon as we are exposed to a surplus of “red force” we might experience this as calming and peaceful, because it restores and harmonizes our energy balances. For others this same red might however turn up as an irritation, simply because they have enough or too much of it. Colour can therefore “passify”, sedate or activate and this differs from human to human from moment to moment and this will colour the experience of colour. Certain kinesiology tests can, as it seems, give some insights into the colour energy balances of people but perhaps certain equipment will be invented in the future that can do this as well, and “proof” this being the case. Another possibility, which in the end might proof to be the only one sufficient, is personal development. It can be expected that someone working with colour on an intense daily basis will develop more affinity with- and insight in colour, especially if they have a genuine passion for it. Apart from this it can be said that similar waves exchange information when they interfere. To obtain a more objective insight in colour it therefore says that it is needed to develop to where it lives and to connect to the qualities that go with this. As such it might ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1223 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I be difficult for a person to experience the quality of patience in a colour if not having any patience at all or if this is rejected as a possibility by former programming. What this finally suggests is that colour, in its totality, cannot be understood one dimensional and through one form or level of intelligence. This argumentation considers all intelligences to be important. The colour that can be given to the intelligence we have dealt with here is blue. From now on this creational intelligence of selection and giving meaning to things will be called Blue Intelligence. In chapter three more examples will follow about the practical application of blue intelligence, also in relation to colour research. Red level intelligence: "functionary" The last level of creational intelligences has to with specialised function in action, in which each “embodiment” or “cloak of force” acts out its blueprint, what it is programmed to do or elects to do. Each embodiment or cloak of force is always "a living organism" as long as it processes those energies that gave it life in the first place and as long as it functions according to its programming or blue print. A stone is a living organism, a colour is as well, they are both derivations of the intelligence of creation. Death occurs when something stops to function actively, and this means that the cloak for a certain force or the embodiment for a certain force can no longer process the force that gave life to it. As energy cannot be destroyed, it can only transform or return to the source of its arising. Death as such is a process of transformation and / or return. Red has a repetitive and insisting nature and it is interesting that our cells multiply quicker under the influence of (infra) red light, whilst genetic changes quicker occur under the influence of (ultra) violet light. Red is, of all colours we can see, the most physical colour and lowest in energy. It is the first colour to appear out of darkness, when an object is heated up (Blackbody Radiation). Red intelligence has therefore a physical, practical, repetitive automatic function and it can live its own life after it has been programmed by the other intelligences. An example of this is the way we brush our teeth. We no longer have to think about how to do it. Something does it for us. Habits are formed up under the influence of red intelligence, and the more time and space there is for red intelligence to repeat itself, the stronger the habits become. And the more difficult it is to change them. And this can work for or against progression and development. In this context it can be said that blue and red intelligence are repeaters of the past, if they are not open for the influence of the other, higher intelligences. At the level of red intelligence the perceived (personal!) reality in blue intelligence is acted upon and projected outside oneself. All actions, and this includes thoughts, emotional states and physical actions become confirmative of one´s reality, as what one does, by tuning fork, attracts more of the same. Thus someone who has never given a thought to the fact that there might be more to life than just "work, food, football and sex" will not be able to perceive that this might be a fact! In chapter three of this article more examples will follow of how red intelligence can be practically applied, also in relation to colour research. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1224 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I Addition 1: Further implications of the Five Intelligences on evolution and immortality The Five Intelligences and its argumentation are a hypothesis until proven as fact. But the hypothesis of the Five Intelligences might have huge implications on what we perceive immortality to be and what we determine organic life to be and on evolution itself. If there is a natural law that says that everything returns to the source of its arising it would perhaps mean that each of the five levels of intelligence turning up in and processed by one or more of the other five levels of intelligence will eventually return to where it came from. Red intelligence will therefore return to red level intelligence, blue intelligence will therefore return to blue level intelligence and so forth. In the constant return of the species we therefore witness at the level of red intelligence a “dust to dust, ashes to ashes” disintegration of form and on the other hand the forming up of new form. This repetition of “forming form and disintegration of form” (aging) belongs to red level intelligence. The only immortality to be found here is the constant repetition of this process, which is orchestrated by blue intelligence and powered by the other higher intelligences. Each organic life form, whether it is a star, a stone or a human, is subject to this process, although the span of time differs from one form of organic life to another. The notion of immortality changes however at the level of blue intelligence. Here we talk about blueprints or D.N.A. in various forms that repetitively orchestrate the coherent functioning of certain life forms, and which can survive individual life forms. At chemical level this has been scientifically proven, but at an energetic level we might however talk here about that what can be called soul, the so called feedback mechanism which enables to synchronize the activities of individual genes and cells to carry out systems in unison, bodily functions included. Although “soul”, as it is mentioned here, seems to be immortal in comparison to the forming and disintegration of bodily form at the level of red intelligence, it is in the end bound up with time and space, because time and space belong to the levels of blue and red intelligence. This means that soul at this level is not immortal, but can only exist within a certain ecology or space for a certain permitted amount of time. Certain species, like the dinosaurs, are extinct, yet the question is if the soul force of these creatures is still around as an active living influence, and if it will be there as long as our planet is in its current state and stage of evolution. It might however be that there is a kind of soul that is immortal, but for it to be immortal, it would belong to the higher levels of intelligence, yellow, green and white, that are not bound up with space and time. In the English language there is, as an example, the word spirit, which suggests another kind of entity than soul. Many languages however do not have or make this distinction. At the level of yellow intelligence immortality is a permanent feature, because yellow intelligence seems not to be bound up with 3D space and linear time. This is the level of permanent life sustaining qualities, yet it does not imply that qualities cannot change and are immortal in the sense of fixed. A quality like care, which can be witnessed in many kind of, especially higher developed, organic life forms in the caring of a mother for its young, might itself have changed during the millions of years from more raw and coarse to more refined. Whereas in certain animals this specific quality of caring is robotic, passed on from generation to generation through genetic blueprint, we as humans might have a far greater freedom and choice to develop and refine this, which explains the constant stream of information update about how to raise a child. The concept of qualities being able to “evolve” makes complete sense in relation to the existence of green intelligence, which provides ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1225 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I futuristic opportunity for development and creative change. Without this opportunity for development and creative change there could not be a quality development. And this brings up an interesting philosophical question: Has the threshold for immortal existence changed, because there is different quality requirement today then four billion years ago? At the level of green intelligence immortality means permanent opportunity for creational change. Like yellow intelligence, green intelligence it is not bound up with space and time, but it needs space and time, and the intelligences residing here, for the development of its intelligence and the actualisation and realisation of its creative opportunities. As such, creation at this level is opportunistic, and it is looking for opportunities where creational change can go on. In other words: it is looking for that which is like it is, for that which is open to change and for those forms of existence that are not yet fixed in their development, which puts an interesting question to the purpose of human life and evolution. Addition 2: Post script on the philosophical argumentation of the Five Intelligences including levels of colour usage and their motives. In the preceding a coarse argumentation has been outlined in relation to five creational intelligences stages and levels. As it seems, these stages or levels do proceed in linear fashion from one to another, starting in white intelligence, ending up in red intelligence. Colour and light have been used to illustrate this process. However, not all that exists manifests itself through colour or light, and there are many other forms and aspects of energy that have not been part of this argumentation. Further it can be said that each stage or level might house all the other intelligences inside itself and therefore this philosophical model might be more complicated. If we, as an example, look at the stage or level of yellow intelligence, then it seems that this level cannot house just yellow intelligence and qualities, like the ability to make emotional connection through space and time of things similar in quality. It seems that this level or stage also must have a green function or green intelligence, because qualities might have developed themselves through evolution. It will however be green intelligence operating at the level of yellow intelligence, not at the level of green intelligence itself. Further it can be said that this level or stage of yellow intelligence must have a blue function or blue intelligence present in itself as well to maintain and protect itself. And perhaps it has a red function as well, because this will give this level and stage of yellow intelligence the active impetus to repeat what works and functions well. And then there is the question which qualities are latent, “in waiting” in a white state to get into existence. Qualities we do not know yet and cannot imagine that await activation. If all the levels of creational intelligence carry the other creational intelligences within themselves, at their level, it must be, as an example, that green intelligence functions different on different levels of creational intelligence. This might not seem important, but it is most interesting in relation to colour usage and the motive and reason why a colour is used. Take as an example a pigment that is cobalt blue in its hue. Pigments belong in this argumentation to the stages of creation called blue intelligence. Yet, how pigments are used determines what pigments can become an “anchor” for, what kind of influence and intelligence can live on it, radiate through it. This depends all on the mind set of those using it, their reasons, motives and level of personal development. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1226 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I The first level of colour usage is “red” natured, based in habits and blind imitation, with minimal concern and consciousness about the colour used. This extends to habitual likes and dislikes about certain colours, the following of trends, “the quick getting to result due to economic pressures” syndrome and using colour in a “red is the colour for love” way. The usage of colour in this way provides for a flat quality experience, because the human intelligence that uses colour and imbues it with intelligence is robotic and automatic. The colours might look fancy, but they radiate a kind of “inhumaneness” and lack of care, simply because they do not promote and stimulate human potential. The second level of colour usage is “blue” natured, and it is perhaps mostly mental and instinctively based. Here colours are used to capture or match the nature of natural or cultural influences such as spring, or the country side with styles such as “Classic”, “Mediterranean” or “Manhattan”. There is at this level an instinctive feeling about the causing effect of colour resulting in phrases like “gloomy colour combinations” and “joyful harmonic colours”, and it shows up in a more mental way in such things as road signs to regulate safety and direction, in the branding and marketing of products, colour trends that match the times we live in and so forth. The usage of colour in this way is more conscious, more deliberate and more intuitive. Imagine as an example what it would cause if we suddenly change the red in traffic lights to blue! Would we still be alerted in the same way to stop in time? The third level of colour usage is “yellow” natured, and it is objective or it claims to be objective (such as red is the colour for love). Here colours are used consciously, because at this level colours or colour combinations represent qualities and can stimulate and activate certain qualities, such as gentleness, creativity, compassion, learning and instruction and so forth. Colour takes on a representative meaning stemming forth out of a qualitative connection to the qualities that are congenial to it. The usage of colour in heraldry, flags and symbols seems originally to have stemmed out from this level. Today we are perhaps looking at a whole new science of possible objective colour usage that can assist human development in various ways. The fourth level of colour usage is “green” natured, and it is caused by and an expression of evolutionary update. Here colours or colour combinations become duct ways that can assist the human in change, new potential, in opening up to new unknown possibilities. This implies the possibility of a whole new human creational science and developments and technologies that the world might not have seen before, or only in very limited ways. The fifth level of colour usage is “white” natured, plasma-genic. It seems to be complete fiction to talk about colour usage at this level at all, because at this level nothing is defined and materialized yet. It is out of time, unbiased, unlimited in potential not yet manifested… Perhaps the shade black (complete darkness), which is on one hand the absence of colour and light and on the other hand the great absorber of colour and light, comes closest to assist in creating an utter receptive ecology in and around one self that is completely still, not expectant, latently waiting to be stirred… Although we speak here about colour usage, in actual fact we might be speaking about human usage, which is all depending on education, circumstances, personal choices and in the end motives. And in here lies a caution, because as one can rise, so one can fall. Many fast food restaurants, as an example, use the colour orange, or the colour combination red and yellow, because they know it literally stimulates hunger. The motive is however not high, but one of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 11 | pp. 1209-1227 1227 Stolk, M. A., A New Approach to Creational and Human Intelligence Related to the Study of Colour and Its Influence: Part I profit and self-interest. Yet, in the end motives will decide in how far one is able to connect to new intelligence… Experiment in changing the taste of water with the influence of spectral lights. According to many visitors red water tasted like iron, yellow water tasted sweet, blue water taste soft and violet water tasted sharp. The other colours did not give distinct results. (Colour exhibition “The Vitamins of Colour Copenhagen, Illum, 2003) (Continued in Part II) Note: References are listed at the end of Part II ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

1474 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation Article Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation Philip E. Gibbs* Abstract Following the CERN announcement on December 13, 2011, physicists have been giving some very different assessments of the chances that the ATLAS and CMS detectors have seen the Higgs boson. Combining the three things I will consider, I get an overall probability for such a strong signal if there is no Higgs to be about 1 in 30. Perhaps I have failed to account for combinations where more than one of these effects could combine. That requires further coincidences but lets just call the overall result 1 in twenty. In other words, everything considered I take the observed result to be a two sigma effect. Key Words: Higgs Boson, God Particle, CERN, LHC, ATLAS, CMS. December 16, 2011: Has CERN Found the God Particle? A calculation Yes I know that physicists don’t use the term “God particle” but it has entered into popular culture and when the terms “Higgs Boson” and “God Particle” were trending on Twitter and Google earlier this week it was the latter that went the highest. Contrary to what some scientists imagine of the interested public, very few think that there is some religious significance attached to the particle because of this name, it’s just a catchy moniker and we need not be afraid to use it. Following the CERN announcement earlier this week, physicists have been giving some very different assessments of the chances that the ATLAS and CMS detectors have seen the Higgs boson. The CERN DG says merely that they have seen some “interesting fluctuations”, while Tommaso Dorigo, (an expert on the statistical aspects of the CMS analysis) calls it “firm evidence“. Theorist Lubos Motl is even more positive. He says that it is a “sure thing“, but another theorist Matt Strassler has criticised such positive reports. He regards the situation as 50/50 and backed this up with a poll of experimenters that came up 9 to 1 in favour of uncertainty. This contrasts with a similar poll by Bill Murray who is lead Higgs analyst for the ATLAS collaboration. In an interview he reported a 10 to 0 vote that the Higgs had indeed been found. What is the question? So can we make a more objective and quantitative assessment of the current level of uncertainty over the result? You might want to know the probability that the Higgs Boson has been seen for example. Unfortunately this quantity depends on the prior probability that the Higgs Boson exists. Theoretical physicists have a very wide range of opinions on this depending on which theories they favour. Experimenters are supposed to make * Correspondence: Philip E. Gibbs, Ph.D., Independent Researcher, UK. E-Mail: phil@royalgenes.com Note: This report is adopted from http://blog.vixra.org/2011/12/16/has-cern-found-the-god-particle-a-calculation/ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1475 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation their assessments independently of such prejudices. So how can we measure the situation objectively? Luckily there is a different question that is model independent. We can ask for the probability that the experiments would produce results as strong or stronger than those reported if there were no Higgs Boson. This conditional probability removes the theory dependence in the question so the answer should be a number that everyone could in principle agree on. The smaller this probability is, the better the certainty that the Higgs Boson has been found. Before we can calculate the result we must define precisely what we mean by the “strength of the result”. This has to be a single number so it should come from the combined results of both experiments. I will define it to be the maximum value of the CLs likelihood ratio anywhere on the plot. This takes into account both the exclusion side and the signal side of the statistics and is standard use for Higgs searches. Don’t worry if you are not familiar with this quantity, it will become clearer in a minute. Can we trust the combination? The Higgs combination groups have tried to spread propaganda that my unofficial combinations cannot be trusted because only people familiar with the inner details of the experimental analysis are capable of doing it correctly. This is not true. I repeatedly acknowledge that my method is an approximation and that only the official combination can be used to claim a discovery, but it is a good approximation and is perfectly acceptable for making a rough assessment of the combined certainty. They warn that people should not add the event histograms from separate experiments but that is not how my combination is done. They say that only the experts can understand the systematic uncertainties of the detectors well enough to do the combination, but these uncertainties are all built into the individual exclusion plots that they have shown and are therefore taken into account when I combine them. They warned in the past that there are correlations between the background calculations because both experiments use the same algorithms. These correlations are there and must be accounted for to get the most accurate combination possible, but they have been shown to be small. You can ignore these correlations and still get a very good approximation. In fact the largest source of error comes from the fact that the approximate combination method assumes a flat normal probability distribution at each mass point, when in reality a more complex function based on Poisson distributions would be correct. Happily the central limit theorem says that any error function with a finite variance becomes approximately normal given high enough statistics, so the approximation gets better as more data is added. When the combination group published their first result in November I was able to compare it with my unofficial combination done in September. This confirmed that the approximation was good. This was no surprise to me because it had already been demonstrated with the Tevatron combinations and some earlier unpublished LHC combinations. I acknowledge that my combinations for some of the individual channels were not so good because the number of events has been low, especially for the ZZ channels. This will have improved for the latest ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1476 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation results because there is now much more data but still these individual channel combinations should be considered less certain than the overall combination. The assessment I am doing today depends mainly on that, so this is not a big issue, however it is worth showing one further comparison between my combination and the official one for a signal channel. the plot below shows the official combination for the diphoton channel published in November when ATLAS used just 1.1/fb and CMS used just 1.7/fb. The red line is the unofficial result from viXra. It will be interesting to see how much this has improved for 5/fb. What must be evaluated? It is possible to do a systematic evaluation of the probability in question using the combined plot. This takes into account the statistical uncertainties as well as the theoretical uncertainties in the background due to imprecise measurements of the standard model parameters (e.g. W mass) and the approximation methods used in the theory. It also includes the uncertainty in the energy resolution and other similar uncertainties in detector performance. All these things have been considered by the experts from the experimental collaborations and built into the plots, so we don’t need to know the details to do the calculation (If anyone tries to claim otherwise they are wrong) However, there is also the possibility that the experimenters have made some more fundamental kind of error. There may be a subtle fault in the detectors that has not shown up in all the calibration tests which causes an excess on the plot where there should not be one. This should not happen because there are hundreds of people checking for such errors and they are all very competent. Nevertheless bad luck can strike and throw everything out. This ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1477 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation has been the case before and it is probably the case with the OPERA result indicating that neutrinos are faster than light. A second similar possibility is that the theorists have underestimated the accuracy of some of their calculations so that the background calculation is a little off in one mass range. The analysis involves subtracting a very small signal from a large background, especially in the diphoton channel, so the scope for magnifying any inaccuracy has to be considered. A miscalculation of the signal size is also possible but less likely to lead to a bad result. As I said, the published plots include all the known experimental and theoretical uncertainties, but these other unknown errors in experiment and theory cannot be accounted for exactly. They can only be estimated based on past experience. Some “expert theorists” say that us more “naive theorists” don’t appreciate these facts. Do we really sound so stupid? What is the chance of an experimental fault? How often do experimental faults contribute to a false positive like the excess reported this week? We can only look at past performance but I am not aware of any careful surveys, so a guestimate is required. Someone else may be able to do better. The answer might be one in a hundred but let’s be more conservative and say one in ten. If you think it is more common please fell free to reevaluate for yourselves. However, with the CERN Higgs result we have good evidence that such a fault is not the cause of the excess. That is because there are two independent experiments reporting a very similar result. ATLAS and CMS may seem very similar from the answers they produce, but the detector technologies they use are quite different. The chance of a common fault producing the excess in both detectors must therefore be very small. I am going to assume that this is negligible. If anyone thinks otherwise please explain why. This means that if the excess is due to such a fault it must be a coincidence that it has a similar effect for both experiments. If there is a one in ten chance of a fault for one experiment, the chance for two independent experiments is one in 100, but even then that is the chance that they would produce the fault at different places. Lets have a look at the two signal plots together. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1478 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation The positions on the maximum excess differ by about 2 GeV but the mass resolution is around 2% so this is not an inconsistency. If these excesses are produced by detector faults then the chance of them lining up so close would be small. How small? That depends on some unknowns. we can’t just say the fault could appear anywhere in the mass range, so let’s be conservative and just call it a one in three chance. Overall then we arrive at a one in 300 chance for the observed excess to be explained by a coincidental combination of detector faults. I think this is conservative. Someone else might estimate it to be more probable. What is the chance of a theoretical Fault? The other outside possibility is that the result has been afflicted by a misunderstood background so that the observed excess is really just a subtle effect of the Higgsless standard model that the theorists failed to recognize or estimate correctly. Again this is unlikely but it happens and must be considered. How often does it happen? Once in a hundred perhaps? I will be more cautious and assume one in ten. You may think that is an underestimate in which case you can make your own evaluation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1479 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation But again we have more than one place to look. The separate experiments could well be affected by the same theoretical error but the different decay channels are much more independent. There may be some small chance that a single theoretical error could affect all the channels but this would have a small probability, say one in a hundred. If you think it is bigger please justify how that could happen. So now let’s look at the combined signal plots for the three main channels; diphoton, ZZ->4l and WW->lvlv. For the WW plot I can’t use the latest CMS results because the plots shown are frankly rubbish quality. I hope they will improve them before publication. However the WW channel has good sensitivity even with less data so I will show the combination from the summer. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1480 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation All three channels show an excess in the same low mass region so if this is due to independent faults it would require a coincidence. However, the excess is not as good in ZZ and WW as in the diphoton channel. I am going to put the probability at one in a hundred overall and add to this the probability of one in a hundred for a common fault that affects all three. So the overall chance for a fault from theory is one in 50. Some people will say that this is a low estimate and some people will say that it is low. Others will say that it is nonsense to attempt such an estimate. Never mind, I am just giving it my best honest shot. Let others do the same. What is the chance of a statistical fluctuation? The last thing to consider is what is the probability of getting s signal as string or stringer than that observed according to the statistical analysis. Actually this also takes into account some theoretical uncertainty and measurement error, but mostly it is statistical. This is a probability that can be worked out more scientifically, but it does include the Look Elsewhere Effect which is partly subjective. First consider what would be the chance of seeing a signal as strong as the one reported at the fixed mass point of the maximum excess if in fact there was no Higgs Boson. The plot shows a three sigma excess at 124-125 GeV. This would have been much stronger if the peaks from the two experiments had coincided more closely, possibly about 4 sigma. This discrepancy may be due to some detector calibration that could be corrected but it is correct that we do not take that possibility into account. The 3 sigma excess is what we should work with. As everyone knows, the probability of a three sigma fluctuation is one in 370, but that allows for fluctuations up or down. So the probability for an excess this big or stronger at this point is one in 740. But we need to know the probability for an excess this strong anywhere on the plot. In other words we need to multiply by the Look Elsewhere Effect factor. Have a look at the plot over the entire range ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1481 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation Notice that for the entire range from 130 GeV to 600 GeV the line remains within 2 sigma of the zero line. Big deviations are indeed rare but how rare? Another point to consider is that if there was a three sigma fluctuation at say 180GeV, the Higgs would still be excluded at that point. This would not count as such a strong signal. This is why I specified that the strength should be measured using the CLs statistic which takes the ration of the probability for the signal hypothesis over the probability from the null hypothesis. This means that the probability of getting a signal as strong in the regions where the Higgs is excluded is much smaller. In fact we can neglect this altogether. So we need only count the regions from 114 GeV (using LEP) to about 135 GeV and perhaps 500 to 600 GeV. Hoe big is the LEE factor for these regions. This depends on the width of the signal which we see to be about 5 GeV in the low mass range due to mass resolution of the detector, and which is much bigger above 500 GeV due to a very large natural width for a high mass Higgs Boson. The LEE factor will therefore be about 6 but let’s call it 10 to be extra cautious. This gives a final answer for the probability of a fluctuation to be about one in 70. The final answer? Combining the three things I have considered I get an overall probability for such a strong signal if there is no Higgs to be about 1 in 30. Perhaps I have failed to account for combinations where more than one of these effects could combine. That requires further coincidences but lets just call the overall result 1 in twenty. In other words, everything considered I take the observed result to be a two sigma effect. What about prior probabilities? there is one more thing you need to take into account when considering how likely a result of any number of sigmas significance is going to stand the test of time. That is your prior estimate for the probability of it being true. The OPERA neutrino observation is a good example of an extreme case. A six sigma effect was observed, but he prior probability of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1482 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1474-1482 Gibbs, P. E., Has CERN Found the God Particle? A Calculation neutrinos going faster than light would be considered very small by most theoretical physicists. It follows that the probability for this result to go away is quite high despite the statistical significance. An experimental fault is likely to be the biggest contributing factor despite the care of the experimenters. In fact most 3 sigma excesses for observations beyond the standard model do go away. This is because the prior chance of any one such effect being correct is very small. You can consider this to be part of the Look Elsewhere Effect too. However, the observation of the Higgs Boson is a very different case. Most theoretical physicists would estimate the prior probability for the existence of a Higgs (like) Boson is very high. The standard model provides a very simple explanation of electroweak symmetry breaking but there is no simple way to understand a Higgsless universe. This makes the prior probability high which means that the chance of the 2 sigma result going away is small. There is a bigger chance however that it could move to a different mass. Not everyone agrees with this. Some people do not think that the Higgs Boson can exist. Stephen hawking is one of them. These people would assign a low value to the prior probability that the signal for the Higgs will be seen and so they will consider it very likely that the present observation will go away. I doubt that there are enough people of this opinion to account for much doubt among the experimenters. How long will it take to settle this? To claim a discovery the combined results must give a 5 sigma excess without considering the Look Elsewhere Effect. How long this takes depends on a certain amount of luck. If the peaks of the excesses comes closer together with more data, then the excess will grow faster than you would otherwise expect. In that case the matter might be settled with just twice as much data and the whole thing will be over by the summer. On the other hand, if they are unlucky it could easily require the full dataset from 2012 to get enough data to finish the job properly. It will then not be until March 2013 when the combination is ready that they will finally be able to declare a discovery. References 1. http://blog.vixra.org/2011/12/16/has-cern-found-the-god-particle-a-calculation/ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Understanding Physical Processes in Describing a State of Consciousness: A Review Charles Johnstone a and Prashant S. Alegaonkar b* a Department of Natural Sciences, Mbeya University of Science and Technology, Mbeya, Tanzania b Department of Physics, School of Basic Science, Central University of Punjab, Bathinda 151001, PB, India ABSTRACT The way we view the reality of nature, including ourselves, depend on consciousness.It also defines the identity of the person, since we know people in terms of their experiences. In general, consciousness defines human existence in this universe. Furthermore, consciousness is associated with the most debated problems in physics such as the notion of observation, observer,in the measurement problem. However,its nature, occurrence mechanism in the brain and the definite universal locality of the consciousness are not clearly known. Due to this consciousness is considered asan essential unresolved scientific problem of the current era.Here, we review the physical processes which are associated in tackling these challenges. Firstly, we discuss the association of consciousness with transmission of signals in the brain, chain of events, quantum phenomena process and integrated information. We also highlight the roles of structure of matter,field, and the concept of universality towards understanding consciousness. Finally, we propose further studies for achieving better understanding of consciousness. Keywords:Consciousness, Physical processes of consciousness, Quantum consciousness, conscious information, pattern of consciousness 1 1. Introduction Currently, number of disciplines like philosophy, religion, physiology, neurobiology medicine, physics mathematics and computational sciencesare pursuing studies to develop understanding about the human consciousness. The subject is complex, multidisciplinary, and open ended.A systematic investigation would lead to enrich the knowledge about the consciousness thereby developing new insight and perspective of the human (subject) existence. There aremultiple definitions of consciousness developed in context to different approaches taken. However, at a fundamental level,the consciousness of a subjectis a state of wakefulness to perceive and interact with the surroundings. This alsoinclude state of sleep and coma. Moreover, consciousness is defined asan experiencerepresented in the form of content that has a temporal sense. It is a kind of private entity of an individual subject referred to as qualiai.e.a subjective experience[1].Consciousness,also,has a correlation with the mind. Speaking in a broader sense, it isa type of psychological state and related processes that could be connected to the state of consciousness in a complex fashion. A state of spontaneity that an individual subject possess is also termed as a self-consciousness. Consciousness has associated with the awareness, understanding, and intelligence of a subject[2] which indicates thatthe consciousness must have manifested together with the very first life. Since the awareness of the surrounding environment is essential for the survivalof a subject to distinguish the sources of food, energy, hazardous things,and extinctions[3]. Another notable definition proposed by Grandy and Buffalo [4]states thatthe consciousness occurs due to theinteraction of a subject with the external environment in which one type of energy interacts with another form of the energy. This definition warrants the existence of more forms of the consciousness apart from the human consciousness such as 2 atomic, chemical, and molecular consciousness. However, therea stillan open debate about existence of consciousnessin other creatures or physical systems apart from the subject. The subjective reality of the naturedependsuponthe consciousness [5], conversely,consciousness is unitarily subjective,experiential and manifest in the form ofuniversal existence. Ultimate quest is: how consciousness originates in theuniverse? what is its mechanism of emergence? Hameroff and Penrose [5] identified three possible origins: (1) an evolutionary biological adaption of the brain and nervous system: in this case consciousness is considered as epiphenomenal,universally non-intrinsic, and has no distinct role [6]–[9]. (2) Dualism and spirituality: according to the spirituality consciousness has been in the universe all along and canonically influences all physical matter and human behavior [10, 11]. Dualism outlinestwo distinct realms of existence; the material universe that we perceive around us and the nonphysical universe that is related to the conscious mind. However, in recent years this assumption is losing its popularity among many scientists since it violates the law of conservation of energy[12]. (3) Consciousness as the physical events: These events exist in the universe as ‘noncognitive event or proto-conscious event’[5]. They can be transformed into consciousness byenhancing various conditions and physiological activating agents [13]. For example, in neuroscience and biology these events are associated with neuronal activitywhich gives rise to conscious moment.According to this approachconsciousness is consideredas a fundamental feature of the universe and it can be accounted by known or yet known physical laws of the universe. There are number of enigmatic features of consciousness whose description isstill unclear.These includes; (1) the nature of the subjective experience; why are we always under a subjective experience?, (2) the binding problem; which refers to how distributed activities of the 3 brain are unified into one content, (3) free will or non-computability, (4) nonlocality[14].Further, as discussed earlier, Hameroff and Penrose [5] have highlighted that the nature, mechanism of occurrence in the brain, and definite universal locality of the consciousness are not clearly known. In this regard, consciousness is considered to be an essential unresolved scientific problem of the current era[15].According to Max Tegmark consciousness is like an elephant in a room[16].This argument implies that, consciousness is the biggest sensitive problem waiting for the solution. This claim brings an attention of the scientific community to explore consciousness as a valid area of the scientific research. A better understanding of consciousness requires both empirical studies and a theoretical approach. The empirical studies can be used to gather informationabout the consciousness and corresponding theory could provide the behaviour of consciousness beyond the obtained empirical data. To give an example, why does consciousness disappear during aesthesia while the brain activity is intense and synchronous? Why does itdie out in early sleep where the brain is still active? And why it is relatedwiththe cerebral cortex and not with the cerebellum with its complex neuronal network[17]? Further, the good understanding of human consciousness would lead to the fresh treatment of brain injuries, phobias, and a deeper understanding of mankind[18].One of the step towards understanding consciousness is to revisit the question raised by Schrodinger about; what physical process or event is associated with consciousness [19]? Our review focuses on addressing this question. Towards achieving this, we explored the association of consciousness with transmission of signals in the brain, chain of events, quantum phenomena process and integrated information. We also discussed the roles of structure of matter, field, and the concept 4 of universality towards understanding consciousness. Throughout our discussion we have highlighted the open questions which requires further attention of researchers. 2. Association of consciousness with transmission of signal in the brain The brain consist of about10 billion nneurons, 100 trillion synapses and 10 billion glia cells, and each neuron can be connected to the thousands of others neurons[20]. Due to this,the brain is considered as one of the most complex systems in the universe. The human brain also appears as the system of network with high structural organization. It functions as the supersystem that integrates different organizational levels, ranging from the neuron and the synapses, to a local cortical circuit and subcortical nuclei, to large-scale network. And the active communications between all these parts of the brain which can be mediated by the chemical or electrical mechanism of information transmission is also known as the brain activity. The key question which we want to discuss here is, can the brain generate consciousness? To defend this question neuroscientists,posit that consciousness arises from the neuronal computational of the brain networks. The neuron can receive, process, and transmit information. It is well-accepted that neurons communicate with each other’s, at the synapses using the chemical or electrical mechanisms. Chemical transmission is mediated using the neurotransmitters, where the electrical operates by passing current from presynaptic neuron to postsynaptic neuron. The process of opening of the channel in the presynaptic vesicular grid and discharging neurotransmitters into the synaptic cleft is known as exocytosis. The electro-chemical signal transmission in the brain provides a satisfactory explanation of the low-level neural function such as sensory, reflex,and motor. But it fails to provide a reasonable explanation for higher brain functions such as consciousness, emotion, learning, and 5 perception. This is due to the number of spikes fired by the neurons generated from the electrochemical transmission which are considered as the mechanism of encoding neural information, their fire rate are not fully correlated with the neural function, because sometimes are very space or silentunder the appropriate behaviour condition[21], [22]. The other reason is about the low speed of action potential transfer in the neuron limited to about 120 m/s and it even more lower across the chemical synapse. It is difficult to account the rapid change of conscious state by this speed. This challenge has led to the proposal of other mechanism for information transmission in the brain. Among these include an attempt to use quantum tunneling, which is discussed in the subsequent section. Towards resolving the inability of electro-chemical signal transmission to account for the consciousness, Beck and Eccles [23] proposed the quantum model for the release of neurotransmitter at the synapses in the cerebral cortex. According to this model, the quantum tunneling of quasiparticles which triggers exocytosis is related with the influences of consciousness.The tunneling process of quasiparticles was characterized by two energies [23]; thermal energy, 𝐸 = 1 2 𝑘 𝑇,where 𝑇 is temperature and 𝑘 is Boltzmann constant and he quantum mechanical zero-point energy𝐸 = (∆ ) = ℏ ∆ , where 𝑀 is the mass of the particle, ∆𝑝 is momentum, ∆𝑞 is localized distance and ℏ is planks constant divided by 2𝜋. The borderline was established as 𝐸 = 𝐸 , 𝐸 ≫ 𝐸 for quantal and 𝐸 ≫ 𝐸 for the thermal regime. The critical mass of quasiparticles 𝑀 were determined by taking fixed values for 𝑇 ≈ 300𝐾 and ∆𝑞 ≈ 1𝙰, these yields 𝑀 ≈ 10 𝑔 = 6𝑀 where 𝑀 is the mass of hydrogen. This indicates that a quantum particles whose mass is less 6𝑀 undergo quantum tunneling across a potential barrier by triggering exocytosis [23]. This estimate also show that the trigger mechanism occursin atomic process and is not a temperature sensitive. However, this predictions 6 was later disproved by experimentsin vitro as vesicle fusion driven by neuronal protein machinery is arrested at 4 ℃[24]. ` Georgiev and Glazebrook [25] have extended Beck and Eccle model to a molecular basis by identifying the quantum quasiparticle as Davydov soliton (DS). The DS acts as the twist for protein α-helices and triggers the synaptic transmissionacross the helical zipping of the SNARE complex, a protein molecule for vesicle fusion. According to this model, the mass of DS is about 5% of the hydrogen mass [25], [26], this is much less compared to the 6𝑀 obtained by Beck and Eccle. Since DS has a small mass, it can tunnel through a potential barrier of 1-2 nm thick[25]. It is similar to the conformational changes of the SNARE complex that are needed for synaptic fusion [27]. The other significant feature of this model is its ability to accommodate temperature dependence [26]. Where the thermal oscillations of the potential barrier increase the probability of tunneling. The model also supports the physics of consciousnessat the biomolecular level, especially in the neurotransmission process via the SNARE protein complex which induces exocytosis in the synaptic cleft. Finally, according to this model, the quantum chemistry of the SNARE complex can be considered as a substance for further investigation in association with the natureof consciousness. Another promising alternative mechanism for neural transmission and processing of signalthe brain which may in future will provide an account for consciousness, is an attempt to use biophoton[28].These are ultra-weak photon emission (UPE) from living organism, emitted near UVA,visible, and near IR in the spectral range of 350 to 1300 nmand their intensity ranges from 102-103photon/(cm2s) [29]. Some studies have shown that biophoton activities can be transmitted along the axonal fiber of neural circuit [28], [30].However, in order to achievea better understanding of biophoton transmission in the brain, we need to understand; the origin of 7 the biophoton signal in the brain, the role of biophoton in neural communication and informational processing, the mechanism by which bio-photon is transmitted across the neural circuit, and how to construct a model for bio-photonic transmission[31]. 3. Consciousness as the chain of events The argument of consciousness as the discrete of events has a long history. It can be traced back to the time of William James [32] who formulated ‘specious present’ doctrine of temporal experience. It shows the content of one’s perceptual experience spans a time-based interval.According to Stroud[33] the discrete events of consciousness occur like movies frame at 24 to 72 frame per second (24 to 74 Hz). Buddhist text quantify conscious moments as 6,480.00 in 24 hours (75 Hz) for Sarvaastivadins while for some ChineseBuddhists is one thought per 20 ms (50 Hz) [34].For neuroscientists the best correlate of consciousness occurs at gamma synchrony (30 to 90 Hz) electroencephalography (EEG)[35], [36]. This implies that consciousness consists of discrete events occurring within brain regions at varying frequencies. It can be 40 to 90 conscious moment per second.The source of these events is associated with cortical and thalamocortical oscillation in different frequencies bands. They can be used to provide the constrained framework for investigation of computation leading to awareness [35]. Moreover, the subjective nature of our experiences suggests that neuronal events evolve continuously. This creates an open question whether we experience the world as continuous signal or discrete sequence event. Schrodinger proposed that, the sensations, perceptions, and memories are the construct from which the universe is composed of. The consciousness experienced by an individual subject relates to the unitary consciousness manifested universally. It has been proposed by Schrodinger 8 that, under specific conditions consciousness manifest in the brain. However, what enables such manifestation? does it depend on the physical property of brain? what kind of material process is associated with consciousness? is still unclear. Schrodinger was of the opinion that, from the experience of an individual subject, consciousness is connected to the specific chain of events in the organized active matter of the brain through nervous function. It involves the mechanism by which the subject responds to periodic and aperiodic events for adaption of the changing surrounding. Figure I: Schematic representation of sphere of consciousness envisaged by Schrodinger showing density of periodic and aperiodic events contributing to response of a subject. Further, Schrodinger departs from the western philosophical model of consciousness put forwarded by Spinoza, Gustav Theoder Fchne [19]. Schrodinger illuminated the idea of sphere of consciousness that distinguish events in which aperiodic event are on the surface of sphere as schematically shown in Figure I. The periodic events are fade and away from surface of 9 consciousness sphere. Schrodinger also speculated the relevance of quantum phenomenon to the bio-systems which can be extended to consciousness as discussed in subsequent section. 4. Consciousness as the quantum phenomena process Quantum mechanics,as afundamental theory in Physics remarkably explained the behavior of matter at an atomic and sub-atomic level.In recent years, number of biological processes such as photosynthesis, bird navigation, and olfactory reception have been iterated using quantum physics[16–20].This has paved a notional foundation for the application of Quantum Mechanics in describing Bio-systems.Probably the agreement betweenthese two fields can be attributed to the size and the scale of the objects. Earlier, the use ofQuantum Mechanics to explain the behaviour of life has been discussed by Erwin Schrodinger [19]. He proposed that, human life has a tendency of heredity which has a molecular basis.This was later confirmed as the DNA: the genetic basis of the human evolution [42].Thus,interfacing Quantum Mechanicswith Bio-systems has two-foldfocus: (1) can bimolecular behavior beinterpreted quantum mechanically? (2) are nontrivial quantum phenomena relevant to life? [37]. The greatest challenge thatremained unaddressed is to explain how consciousness emerges from the structure, processes, and function of the brain which is a bio-system thatoperates at a physiological temperature under certain physical laws. At a fundamental level, it can be argued that, all bio-systems are the quantum systems, composed of molecules and can be implemented forthe quantum mechanical effects, especially, superposition, coherence, entanglement, tunnelingfor accountingconsciousness[23-24]. This view has been surveyed subsequently. 10 (a) Collapse of the wave function The wave function represents the probability of finding a particle at a location in a quantum system. Moreover, it has a property of superposition that shows diffraction and interference i.e. to co-exist at multiple places. Such a superposed quantum state reducesto a single state or collapse to a classical statewhen the measurement has been performed, which is termed as the collapse of a wave function.It is referred as the measurement problem. The wave function obeysSchrodinger’s formulation which is indeed linear and predictiveaboutits behavior, however, itdoes not account for the measurement. The nonlinearity encounters due to the state of measurement which isdiscontinuous, and non-deterministic. Several attempts have been made to overcome the measurement problem. The conventional view is that of Copenhagen interpretation where the quantum states are reduced by measurement, environmental entanglement, and conscious observation (i. e. subjective reduction SR or R). However, in this article, we will restrict to those approaches which are associated with the consciousness. One of the approaches is Von Neumann and Wigner who hypothesized that consciousness causes a collapse of the wave function.Von Neumann [45] proposed that, the mathematics of quantum mechanics permits the collapse of the wave function to be located at any position in the causal chain from the measuring device to the human perception of the measurement.He carried out the treatment of relating Quantum Mechanics to various causal and statistical method of describing nature of consciousness. Neumann pointed out a peculiar dual nature of Quantum Mechanics procedure that could not be satisfactorily explained.He pointedout that, the transformation of a state φ to 𝜑 under the action of energy operator generate a pure causal state given by φ'= φ = e( given by:𝑈 = 𝑒 ( ℏ ) 𝑈𝑒 ( ℏ ) /ℏ ) φ. However, such a state is a mixture of unitary state as anoutcomeof causal change.The state can be represented with 11 respective probabilities which is not the process resulted from the causality. There is the fundamental difference between 𝑈 and 𝑈 in terms of reversibility in which later is irreversible. Figure II: Schematic representation of psyco-physical parallelism proposed by John Von Neumann in which evolution of the quantum state φ and φ is shown indicating mixing of the states of U and 𝑈 . He pointed out a basic requirement of the scientific viewpoint in the form ofa psychophysical parallelism. According to him, such mechanism enables toprovide additional physical inputs of the subjective perception attributing the apparent feature of reality of the physical world. In other words, this is equivalent toallocate physical processes in the objective environment, in ordinary spaceled to conscious experience, as shown schematically in Figure II. Based on the Von Neumann’s chain, Wigner proposed that the measurement is completed when consciousness is attained [46]. According to Wigner’s friendexperiment, measurement isassumed to be the interaction that creates impressions in our consciousness,thereby causing 12 modification of the wave function of the system. This assumption is in agreement with that of London and Bauer [47]argumentwhich states that consciousness completes the process of quantum measurement. According to this claim, no physical process causes the collapse of the wave function. The task of the state reduction is directly linked to the consciousness. However. it is unclear that,how consciousness can cause the state reduction of a physical system? In later years, Wigner by himself dismissed this proposal due to the two reason: (a) physical reason; macroscopic objects can never be considered as an isolated system, which means quantum mechanics does not applytothe description of the behavior of macroscopic bodies, (b) philosophical reason; the implication of solipsism on physical reality and the interpretation of the wave mechanics [46]. His idea was maintained by Stapp [48] who argued that subjective reduction of the wave function collapse in neurons is associated with the consciousness exist in the brain. This approach assumes that measurement is an act of the consciousness. This approach implies an attempt to solve the consciousness-causation and measurement problem simultaneously. Where,correlation betweenconsciousness and measurementis still unclear. However, there are certain motivations behind this approach which include; measurement by a conscious observer, consciousness-causation problem, and conscious observation have definite results.Despite these motivations, the approach is unpopular, this might be due to theobjection raised against it which are impression and dualism[49].Surprisingly inrecent years, there has been a proposal to combine quantum collapse dynamics withthe mathematical theory of consciousness such as integrated informationtheory (IIT)to yield a precise interpretation of the consciousness[49]. The focused question of this view iswhether can a collapse model be defined by the quantitative measure of consciousness, such as the Phi (Φ) measure of IIT.The assumption behind this is that Φ resists superposition and the superposition of Φ triggers collapse. The model 13 developed on this basis is affected by the quantum Zeno effect and lack of precise symmetries between brain states associated with the different experiences [49], [50].Yet this model is open for the empirical testing, which implies that the consciousness-collapse model needs further attention of the researchers[49]. Particularly,invariable-locus models where special properties serve as the locus for the collapse, and alternative models where the physical correlate of the consciousness encompasses complex wave function property, or which involves the independent variation of consciousness with any physical properties. Another approach is that of the multiple-world interpretationwhose foundation lies in Hugh Everett's doctoral thesis [51]. According to this view, consciousness does not cause the collapse of the wave function, instead, it results in the branching of the universe into a parallel universe.For example,the case of the Schrödinger cat experiment results in two parallel universes, one in which the cat is alive and the other in which the cat is dead. These branches of the universe are associated with the outcome of measurement and are considered as the subjective experience of the corresponding observers. But what causes the split of the universe? It is still unclear, due to the uncertainty in measurement process [52]. Further, the formation of multiple universes violates the conservation of mass-energy [53]. (b) Orchestrated objective reduction theory Another remarkable application of quantum mechanics in consciousness is that of Penrose and Hameroff in their orchestrated objective reduction theory (Orch OR). In this theory, consciousness is considered as the result of coherent quantum superposition of tubulin of microtubules which terminate based on objective reduction (OR)[2]. Each superposed state has its space-time geometry, as the degree of coherence mass-energy differences which attain the 14 threshold of separation related to quantum gravity, at this point the system reduces to the single state, termed as the ‘‘conscious now’’ [54]. It is attained at 𝜏 ≈ ℏ , Where 𝐸 is gravitation self- energy of superposition, ℏis Planck’s Dirac constant and 𝜏 is coherence time. This kind of reduction of quantum state to classical is interpreted as the conscious perception and it generates a particular pattern of the microtubule-tubulin conformational state that regulates neural activities[14]. Due to this, Orch OR theory operate at the interference between classical neurophysiological and quantum mechanical forces. Furthermore, the time taken from superposition to collapse is associated with pre-conscious while the time at the collapse is related with the point at which transition from pre-conscious to conscious occur. The conscious perception which occurs in this situation is non-computability (non-deterministic), this is due to the self-collapse of OR which is related to quantum gravity[5]. In Orch OR theory, quantum entanglement act as a means of interconnection of tubulin qubits that are superposed with other superpositioned tubulins in the microtubules lattice. This enables the superposition of microtubule tubulin of many neurons, which allows unity and binding of conscious content.Furthermore, Consciousness interconnect in the universe between the quantum holographic brain to the quantum holographic space-time reality by means of a quantum information entanglement [55]. Here, space-time is considered as the manifestation of quantum information entanglement [56], [57]. Quantum entanglement is taken as the form of information which prevails in the space-time. By this argument consciousness can also be associated with structure of the space-time geometry [5]. This approach allows the extension of consciousness into space-time contrary to Descartes arguments that mental entities are unextended[58]. But how consciousness depends on the existing space-time or does it have its own space-time is still a matter of investigation. 15 (c) Limitation of quantum physics towards addressing consciousness The Orch OR has received several critics since its inceptions. According to Tuszynski [15] the critics can be grouped into three categories; (1) Lack of experimental evidence linking between single synapse and dynamics of neural assemblies activity. Thus, experiment validation is needed to verify the relevance of the quantum process to cognitive processes. (2) currentlythere seems no quantum mechanical properties to describe psychological and neurophysiological phenomena. (3) an irrelevance of biological structure to quantum effects, it argued that large structures such as neurons and microtubules do not support quantum effects, since they function at high temperatures. The high temperature in the quantum system causes decoherence and eliminates the possibility of quantum effects playing roles in the brain process. Our discussion focuses on the critics based on feasibility of quantum effects in microtubules. Since it is one of the maincomponents of the theory apart from the quantum gravity. The aspect of quantum gravity is open for testing[59],but the problem is the technological barrier [60], [61]. However, a recent attempt of quantum formulation of Einstein equivalence principle (EEP) has shown that it’s validity of classical EEP does not apply for quantum formulation.[62].This suggests that the validity of EEP in quantum theory requires an independent experiment verification not inferred from classical experiment. The promising future experimental investigation should be centered on the condition where general relativity affect internal dynamics of low energy quantum system [62]. 16 Microtubules have been suggested as the site which can support quantum effects. It serves different biological functions such as; cell division, cell movement, transport for macromolecular, and maintenance of cell form and function. However, the attractive features of microtubules for quantum effects includes; (1) the presence of aromatic amino acid. (2) short distance between aromatic amino acids in adjacent tubulin dimer (~𝑛𝑚) (3) the long-range order of the microtubule lattice (4) the directionally polarized and helical arrangement of tubulin in a microtubule [63]. Despite all these properties, the feasibility of quantum effects in microtubules has been criticized by Tegmark [64] who showed that the decoherence time scale (~10 10 − 𝑠) for microtubules are very shorter as compared to the relevant timescale for the cognitive process which lies on the order of (~10 − 10 𝑠). This drawback has been refuted by Hagan et al., [65] who argued that Tegmark didn’t use the Orch OR theory conditions in his calculation and thus his proposal was irrelevant. By using the Tegmark formulae;𝜏~ √ , Where 𝑚 is the mass of ionic species, 𝑇 is the temperature, 𝑎 is the distance from the ion to the position of the superposed state, 𝑠 is the maximal separation between the position of the tubulin mass in the alternative geometries of the quantum superposition and 𝑁 is the number of elementary charges comprising that state,Hagan and his colleagues recalculated decoherence time for microtubules by incorporating Orch OR theory conditions (superposition separation, charge versus dipole, and dielectric constant) and obtained (10 − 10 𝑠) which is sufficiently close to the relevant neurophysiological range scale [65]. The highertemperature results into strong decoherence. As biological systems are wet and warm, for this reason they are liable environment for decoherence. However, it has been shown that biological system avoids decoherence by using several mechanisms, these includes; (i) isolation of the quantum system from environmental interaction by shielding/screening. For example, the microtubule is shielded by the counterion 17 Debye plasma layer and water-ordering actin gelation [66]. (ii) Thermodynamic gradient: it allows the biological system to act as a heat engine to reduce the effective temperature of certain molecular complexes. For example, the slow release of energy from ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate) molecules at the actomyosin complex, implies a quantum coherence on the macroscopic scale [67]. (iii) Decoherence-free subspaces: in the case of quantum computer building this is related to identifying sub-spaces of Hilbert space that are free from the coupling of the system with its environment. On the other hand, it occurs when the system freezes other degrees of freedom by sort of quantum Zeno effect due to being strongly coupled to its environment at a certain degree of freedom. This allows entanglement and quantum superposition to persists [68]. (iv) The structure of microtubules also contributes to the avoidance of decoherence since it is suited for topological quantum error correction [66]. Furthermore, the ongoing experimental testing of Orch OR theory of consciousness to detect presence of quantum process in microtubules and their sensitivity to an anesthetic under the project ‘‘Effects of an aesthetic molecules on quantum vibration in microtubules’’ is expected to generate new understanding of the theory at the nanoscale [69]. As recently, Stuart Hameroff [70] claimed that Orch OR has broad explanatory power and can be easily falsified by demonstrating the absence of quantum interference in microtubules, or if exist, proves it insensitive to anesthesia. This is one of the strongest supports for validity of the theory if will be proved experimentally. The decoherence effects seem to be a major challenge for biological quantum systems and the quantum theory of consciousness. Although decoherence destroys quantum coherence, it may at the same time enhance the transfer of energy [71]. Studies show that the coherence lifetime for photosynthesis and radical pair mechanism is in Picoseconds and microseconds respectively [72]–[74]. These time scales are smaller compared to the regular neuron firing time 18 scale which is in milliseconds. It appears the biological system extends beyond these time scale to attain the neuronal firing time scale for the cognition state, otherwise firing of nerves do not occur in this time scale. However, an open question remain as how the biological system attain this condition? The study by Fisher [75] using entangled Posner molecules propose the existence of longer coherence time for even a day. Rooting his study on the concept of Hu and Wu [76] who postulated that consciousness is mediated by spin quantum. He explored the feasibility of quantum cognition based on nuclear spin. Nuclear spin are weakly coupled to environmental degree of freedom, for this reason their phase coherence time lasts for five minutes or longer [77], [78]. Magnetic and electric field perturbation causes the decoherence of the nuclear spin. For this reason, nuclear with spin 𝐼 > 1, the presence of quadrupole moment which couples with the electric field and in addition to the magnetic field produced by nearby nuclei cause quicker decoherence. Where for nuclei with spin 𝐼 = 1 2 are more weakly decohered only by magnetic field. Thus, the element with half nuclear are essential for hosting putative neural qubit [75]. However, the application of nuclear spin in brain is still lacking of realization of conditions such as.; biological qubit with long nuclear-spin coherence time, transportation mechanism of qubit, quantum memory storage of qubit at molecular scale, quantum entanglement mechanism in multiple qubits, and the chemical reaction which induces quantum measurement on the qubits [75]. The validation of these conditions will aid in supporting or denying the existence of nuclear spin quantum process in the brain. (d) Quantum brain dynamics The idea of Quantum brain dynamics (QBD) proposes that water which forms around 80% of the brain, rather than being passive, it could be an active player in the brain process. The 19 electrical dipole of water molecules in the brain constitutes a cortical field. The cortical field contain energy quanta behaving as particles, which are known as corticons[79].Corticons are said to exist everywhere in the cerebral cortex and they interact with the main dynamic of neural network. This phenomenon gives rise to the transmission of signals within the body. According to Ricciardi and Umezawa [80], memory is equivalent to macroscopic quantum state with long-range correlation. Based on this model, the brain is considered as the biological system equivalent for dynamic symmetry breaking.Its formulation is based on quantum field theory (QFT)[81]. The motivation for using QFT isbecause information in any materials is carried by ordered pattern, maintained by certain long-range correlation,and mediated by massless quanta[81]. The generation oflong-range correlation occurs due to the spontaneous breakdown of symmetry. It is responsible for generating and maintaining an ordered pattern (coherence) in the system. The vacua or coherent state are responsible for memory storage. The recording process of memory in the vacuum state is achieved by coherent condensation of Nambu Goldstone modes. These are massless boson particles that appear to be the dynamical response to the breakdown of symmetry, responsible for quantum mediating longrange correlation among the atoms. The symmetry breakdown occurs in QFT since there exist infinitely many ground states which are unitary inequivalent, contrary to quantum mechanics where all ground states are physically equivalent and thus do not support symmetry breakdown. Jibu and Yasue [79] extended the idea of Ricciardi and Umezawa into a quantum theory of brain dynamics (QBD) to address the problem of consciousness. They hypothesized that the creation and annihilation generate consciousness. However, the authors do not give a reason as to why consciousness arises from this physical interaction and not from the interaction between electrical potential and chemical in the synapses. According to their view, consciousness may be 20 considered as a fundamental property of field, photon, or corticons. And it emerges from the interaction between the cortical field and other waves propagating along the neuronal network. The other extension of Ricciardi-Umezawa model as discussed in subsequent section are based on memory. As this approach continuous to contributes a better understanding of the mystery of memory, there is an open question as whether it canalso assist towards understanding consciousness. The quantum brain model associated specific memory to a specific vacuum code. Once this is selected for printing certain information, there is no other vacuum state successively accessible for recording another information,unless external stimulus carrying new information creates new vacuum state by phase transition. This causes the destruction of the previously stored information (overprinting). To overcome this problem Vitiello [82] extended the model to dissipative dynamics, where infinitely many vacua are independently accessible. This allow hugenumber of information to be recordedwithout destroying the previous information, thus allowing a huge memory capacity. To achieve this an assumption is made to break both the rotational symmetry and time-reversal symmetry before information recording process[82]. This makes the brain state to be completely determined after information has been recorded. And it cannot be takenback to the previous state.This fact is referred to well-known warning ‘‘...NOW you know it!...’’, which means once you know, you becomedifferent from the previous time. This introduces the arrow of time into brain dynamics; the distinction between the past and the future based on the information recording. Another development of the quantum brain model is that of Pessa and Vitiello [83] who extended the model to the role of entanglement, quantum noise, and chaos. In their model, they have shown that doubling the degree of freedom of the system accounts for quantum noise in the 21 fluctuating random force in the system-environment coupling. Since brain-environment entanglement is permanent, this implies that quantum noisy effects are intrinsically and inextricably present in the brain dynamics. They have also shown that trajectories in memory space may exhibit chaotic behavior. This may account the high perceptive resolution in the recognition of the inputs.The recent extension of a quantum field theory of the brain is that of Nishiyama et al [84]whom they have extended the model to non-equilibrium electrodynamics in open system. The main assumption of this extension is to introduce the non-equilibrium multienergy-mode analysis in open system which lacks from the presented models above. This would assist to demonstrate whetherdecoherence, the main criticism of QFToccurs or not in the open system. Towards achieving this, they derived Klein-Gordon equations and Kadanoff-Bayem equations to describe the non-equilibrium, charge-energy conserving, and entropy-producing dynamics. These equations can be applied to analyze microtubules coupled to water battery surrounded by biochemical supply and for information transfer between two coherent regions via microtubules[84]. 5. Consciousness as an integrated information The human life always involves transmission of information such as genetic information, verbal information, historical information, digital information, or written information. It seems life and information are inseparably united. Information always carries a physical substance like nerve impulse in the brain, sound wave in air and electromagnetic signal in space. Further, according to Chalmers[85] information has two aspects, physical one and awareness. Awareness is taken as the property of information like mass as the property of matter or frequency as the property of field. As we discussed in introduction section consciousness is associated with 22 awareness, it can also be equated with information. Hence the substrate of consciousness must possess the ability of encoding information.Information is the fundamental property of the universe, it is found everywhere, not limited to human brain, living matter or space-time[86]. Due to this, equating consciousness with information imposes the difficult to account for the phenomenon at all.If consciousness is everywhere, why objects apart from the human brain do not exhibit conscious? To resolve this, a further approach is proposed to equate consciousness with information that exist only in certain dynamics states [87]. Based on this assumption not all information’s are conscious. This introduces another question; what are the dynamic features which distinguish a conscious information from unconscious one? In the next subsequent section, we discuss the application of this approach based on integrated information theory. Integrated information theory (IIT) is the mathematical theory of consciousnessthatrelate consciousness withintegrated information (Phi Φ) [88], [89]. In this approach, consciousness is considered as the fundamental quantity like mass, charge, or energy. This allowsfor study of the subject on what physical laws or properties it obeys, just as physicists have studied new forces, fields, and particles in the past. Based on this regard, IIT proposes five axioms of consciousness; (1)existence; consciousness is a real and undeniable fact. However, its existence is intrinsic, it exists from its own perspective. (2) Composition; it is structured such as red, a tree, a table, a book, etc. These structures allow for distinctions of physical objects of the universe. (3) information;it is specific, each experience differs from many other possible experiences. (4) integration;it is unified,irreducible to the non-interdependent component.For example, experiencing a blue book is irreducible to seeing a book with no blue color, plus a blue color patch but no book.(5) exclusion; it is definite in terms of content and spatiotemporal grain. It has borders, excludes others, and also flows at a certain speed[88], [89]. Are these properties 23 sufficiently enough to account the phenomena of consciousness? The answer actually is No,they are not sufficient [90].IIT accept this by upholding that all its axioms are self-evident [89], [91]. They can be used to further understanding of consciousness. IIT transforms these axioms into the language of physics to check whether the physical substrate of consciousness satisfies these properties. It uses the construct of mechanism (logic gates, neurons-like) and system (computer, neural architectures) to validate the postulates of the axioms.With an assumption of the physical substrate of consciousness must possess maximum intrinsic cause-effect power[17]. IIT offer severalpredictions. Some of these include; (i)the loss and recovery of consciousness are associated with the breakdown and restoration of integrated information in the brain respectively[92]–[95].The loss of integrated information in the brain corresponds to unconsciousness states such as dreamless sleep, anesthesia, and comma. For example, consciousness vanishes in an anesthesia, because anesthetic molecules cause function disconnection in posterior complex thereby interrupting the cortical communication and hence generates loss of integrated information.(ii) Brain lesions; it causes unconscious if it disrupts the capacity for information integration. Clinician face a challenge to measure the consciousness of injured-brain, unresponsive patient based on the subject to interact with environment.To resolve this problem IIT suggests the measure of level of consciousness to be assessed based on the Φ dominant conceptual structure.The perturbation complexity index (PCI)measure of level of consciousness using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) data set in wakefulness, sleep, and anesthesia, decreases in all condition of loss of consciousness[96]. This approach shows promising results for the application of IIT in analyzing empirical data of consciousness. It includes characterizing various states of consciousness in human brain such as sleep, anesthesia, and coma. This is promising technology for doctors in the future for detection of whether patient 24 are conscious or not, especially for patient suffering from ‘locked-in’ syndrome, a condition where a patient cannot move or communicate[16].(iii) Consciousness is associated with only certain regions of the brain. For example, the cerebellum with an enriched network of neuronal connections does not give rise to consciousness while the cerebral cortex is associated with the generation of consciousness. This is because the cerebral cortex comprises elements that are functionally specialized and at each time interact rapidly and effectively[88], [97], [98]. This type of organization is associated with a high Φ value.(iv)The length of experience is correlated with the time interval at which its relevant physical element attains a conceptual structure with the highest Φ value. In other words, it is associated with the discrete-time interval at which cause-effect power attains a maximum. Despite all these predictions, IIT suffers from different limitations. Itsformulation is based on the discrete with the finite number of states, where a physical system such as the brain change continuously, for example, the position of particles can take any of an infinite number of values [99], [100]. Applying the IIT formula to such a system yields Φ infinite which is unfeasible result. It also requires explosivecomputational for estimating the Φ value for a real system, this makes its application to be impractical for the brain[89], [101].The other criticismis the lack of empirical evidence for its formulation, non-functionalism, unclear quantification of consciousness, and definition of consciousness [90], [91], [102]. However, recently there has been an attempt to resolve the computational cost of IIT by the use of searching algorithms for minimum information partition and measuring Φ from high-density electroencephalography [101], [103].The successful of this attempt is expected to increase the applicability of the theory. 6. Consciousness as the structure of matter 25 Despite of stronglyassociation of consciousness with the physical matter of the brain, there still unclear how consciousness emerge from the operative structure of matter and their processes[104]. The realization ofspecific operative structure of matter associated with consciousness would provide a ground for its existence and prediction. As the study of physics, biology and neuroscience deals with material structure and their processes at different level, can assist us to tackle the problem.It is expected these subjects could provide an integrated ground structure forthe validity, interpretive and predictive power of consciousness.The relation of consciousness with matter can be viewed into two aspects; (i) human consciousness is a continuation, so its origin is similar to that of matter and life, and (ii) complex dynamic physical organization of operation of matter and brain are related with consciousness [104].Based on these two aspects we can search for the possible physical substrate of consciousness from inorganic matter, organic matter and life, molecular metabolic, global regulatory system, and nervous system. According to Tegmark [105]consciousness can be understood as the state of matter, with distinctive information processing abilities. This approach treats consciousness as an emergent phenomenon like solids, liquids, and gases.In physics, these emergent properties are measured by quantities like viscosity, compressibility. For example, when a substance is viscous, it termed as fluid, otherwise is solid.And if it compressible it a gas, otherwise it is a fluid.Can’t we have properties like these to measure consciousness?Taking an example of emergent phenomena such as wetness, a drop of water is wet, while ice crystals and steam of cloud are not wet, though they are made from identical molecules of water.This phenomenon occurs since wetness depends only on the arrangement of molecules. In otherwords, wetness as emergent phenomena like solids, liquids, and gases have properties above and beyond the properties of their particles. It is also 26 known as substrate-independent property. Likewise, what is crucial in consciousness alsois the particles rearranged.For example, being in different states of consciousness such as awake, dreamless sleep, and coma corresponds to different pattern rearrangement of particles[16]. These rearranged bunch of particles can be represented as the mathematical pattern in spacetime. Because mathematics equations of physics can describe patterns and regularities of the working of nature.As it has been proclaimed by Galileo Galilei nature is ‘‘a book written in the language of mathematics’’ and Eugène Wigner also has highlighted the usefulness of mathematics in natural sciences[106], [107]. Based on these assumptions, mathematics can be used to describe nature including consciousness. However, the implementation of this approach requires the identification physical parameters embedded within consciousness and its appropriate mathematical construct. Tegmark [105] propose an alternative approach to the hard problem of consciousness as coined by Chalmers[85], to start with the hard fact, that is some of the arrangement of the particle are conscious while others are not. This approach raises one fundamental question; what properties of particle arrangement make the difference? This question can be resolved by establishing a scientific approach. For example,one can establish a theory that can predict whysome particles arrangementsare conscious and other are unconscious. This approachaffirms that consciousness is a scientific field contrary to what philosopher Karl Popper popularized that it is not a scientific field. Furthermore, taking Tegmark's[16] ideathat consciousness is the way information feels when processed in a physical system. And as discussed earlierconsciousness is the substrate-independent, due to this, the important property is the pattern of information processingand not the structure of the physical system.Therefore, consciousness isconsidered as an informational processing, then from this assumptionone can ask what properties are neededfor 27 an information processing tobe conscious? By exploring this question Tegmark [16], [108]proposed four basic principles which distinguish a conscious matter from another physical system, these are (i) information principle; it mush has substantial information storage, (ii) dynamic principle; it refers to informational processing capability, (iii) Independence; it must differ from the rest of the world, and (iv) integration principle; it does not consist of nearly independent parts.His speculative on these factors gives insightful findings. For example,classical physics allows the integration of information about half of its bits by using error-correcting codes. Further, the information stored in the Hopefield neural network is naturally error-corrected, but the 10 neurons support only 37 bits of integrated information.But the content of information of our experience are larger than 37 bits. This is known as an integration paradox[108].The generalization of these results to quantum information yielded more lower bits. Due to these, integrated principle needs addition information. Furthermore, investigation is needed to address whether; (i) does error-correcting codes existin the brain? (ii) can we find non-Hopefield neural network which can support more than 37 bits of integrated information[105]?Another finding is that of independence principle, where the best decomposition of Hamiltonian H by Hilbert space factorization is found in the energy eigenbasis, where H is diagonal. This resultleads to Quantum Zeno Paradox;it implies that when the universe is decomposed into maximally independence objects, then all changes grinds to halt.It produces a static world. As conscious observer does not perceive reality as static, due to this, independence principle also needs supplement additional principle.The interesting findingsis that of dynamic principle, where the energy coherence 𝛿𝐻 ≡ 2𝑡𝑟𝜌̇ was found to be a measure of dynamics. where 𝜌 represents the total density matrix.The best result was obtained by modest percentage reducing the 𝛿𝐻 which enabled complex and chaotic dynamics, where increasing 𝛿𝐻 28 was unable to support complex information processing. Finally, these principles are open for validation and can be used as tentative criteria for distinguishing conscious system from unconscious. 7. Consciousness as a field In this approach, consciousness is considered to possess similar feature likethat of physical fieldsuch as ability to have duration and extension in the space. The origin of this idea can be traced back to the time of Gestalt-psychology in early twentieth century, where Köhler proposed that electric fields are cortical correlate of percepts[109].This assumption was contrary to atomist movement who argued that perception experience is the sum of sensory input. It emphasized perception is more closely related to field, rather than particle. The theory was disproved by Lashley[110]who showed short-circuit ofcurrent of visual cortex of monkey brain’s do not cause any disturbance of visual functioning. However, in later years, the method adopted by Lashley’s to disprove the theory was found to be inappropriate, it doesn’ttest whether disrupt affected vision-related current in the brain[111].Being influenced by Lashley’s critics work,Libet[112] proposed that consciousness is a field, which is not in the form of known physical fields, he called it conscious mental field. It is difficult to observe this kind of fieldby directlyknown physical methods. It confines the theory into the realm of philosophy. Though Libet’s theory proposes hypothesis for scientific testing, its success will not go beyond the electromagnetic field theory of consciousness discussed below.This theory struggled for several years to get publication dueto Lashley’s legacy results[110]. The conscious electromagnetic field proposes that consciousness is the manifestation of the brain electromagnetic field [113].According to this theory, the massive neurons membrane 29 depolarization generates electromagnetic field perturbations that influences the probability of firing of adjacent neurons.It has been also confirmed experimentally that endogenous field influences the brain functioning under physiological conditions[114]. Since neurons are densely populated in the brain about 10 neurons/mm2, so the adjacent neurons forms a complex overlapping of the field with the superposition of fields of millions neurons[115]. This feature represents the ability of the theory to integrate vast quantities of information in the single physical system. It also accountsfor the binding of consciousness. Further, the theory also proposes; ‘‘Digital information within neuron is pooled and integrated to form an electromagnetic information field. Consciousness is that component of brain’s electromagnetic information fieldthat is downloaded to motor neuron and is capable of communicating its state to the outside world [113]’’ According to this theory, the superposition field is free from the influence of external field at all, due to the high conductivity of the cerebral fluid which creates an effective ‘faraday cage’ that insulates the brain from external fields [116]. But one can ask why the faraday cage do not deny the exit of generated electric field, which would suppress the possibility of recording electroencephalography (EEG) from the scalp? Further, why cannotradio waves with high frequency, main voltage with the same frequency as the oscillation proposed being conscious, and powerful magnetic field inside magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) affect the faraday cage? McFadden’s [116] responded to these questions as follows; the source of EEG signals is the assemblies of neurons firing synchronously, not single firing neuron. This cause neurons to distribute and amplifies field effects. (a) The high frequencies of radio waves make them unfeasible to interact withthe low frequency brain-waves, (b) the electromagnetic oscillation at 30 main voltage radiates ineffectively, hence no power is detectable, (c) the magnetic field inside MRI machines do not have right spatial configuration to couple with the putative conscious field. The theory is still incomplete. Towards improving it, their proponents propose crucial area which needs to be tackled,these includes; (1) formulation of mathematical model for examining the interactionbetween neurons and electromagnetic field, (2) exploration of the interaction between ion channel and brain’s electromagnetic field at the quantum level,(3) examination of the role of biological neurons in the fields of information processing, and (4) investigation of the possible role of electromagnetic field inartificial intelligent[117]. 8. Consciousness as the universal phenomena According to Upanishidh principle[118] consciousness pervades and illuminates the mind-body, enabling to function as shown in Figure III. It exists even when the mind-body is not there. This approaches also proposes that consciousness is not the part of the mind-body, but it can be known by the function of the mind-body. This approach is contrary to modern neuroscientists, where consciousness is considered to emerge from the functioning of the brain. Upanishidh approach posits scientific argument which can be explored for further understanding of consciousness. These includes; consciousness as universal phenomena, nonlocal, non-causal, it is known from the interaction of the brain. It will be interesting to establish a scientific understanding of the consciousness based on the Upanishidh principle. In our future study we will explore this phenomenon. 31 Figure III:Upanishidh Upanishidh illustration of consciousness process 9. Outlook As consciousness has been associated with quantum computation in microtubules, the study of microtubules at the nanoscale is expected to bridge the gap between nanoscience and consciousness. It will bring a new insight of consciousness at the smallest scale. Probably, it will help us to understand why single single-cell cell organisms like paramecium exhibit cognitive behavior although do not possess neurons, synapses, or the brain. Another area of study is that of investigation of existence of operating quantum network architectures in the he brain[15]. brain This approach, will assist in identifying the physically physically-based based quantum mechanism of consciousness. Further, quantum network will lead to quantum memory and communication channel for information processing andd transfer. In recent, there is a proposal fora Quantum brain network (QBraiNs), interdisciplinary fieldd integ integrating ating knowledge and method from quantum computing, artificial intelligence, and neurobiology neurobiology[119]. The aim of this is to develop connectivity between the quantum computer and the human brain. It is expected to yield a hybrid classical-quantum cl networks of wetware and hardware nodes. The quantum field approach has enlightened a better understanding of memory, there is an open question as whether it can also assist towards understanding consciousness. Although consciousness seems not to speak the language of physical mathematics, mathematics but future understanding of consciousness in terms of physical mathematics is of crucial importance. importance It will 32 enable us to compute the quantity or value of consciousness of a physical system. The achievement of this will help to predict different phenomena of consciousness which are still unclear. For example, what distinguish conscious system from unconscious? Are animals, plant, and artificial intelligent system conscious?Theelectro-chemical transmission of signals does not provide a reasonable explanation of higher brain functions such as consciousness, emotion, learning, and perception. 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McFadden, “The CEMI field theory: Seven clues to the nature of consciousness,” in The emerging physics of consciousness, Springer, 2006, pp. 387–406. [118] S. Swami, “Consciousness beautifully explained in 200 sec,” OFFICIAL CHANNEL of Swami Sarvapriyananda, 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n6NvDpcwLM (accessed Dec. 14, 2022). [119] E. R. Miranda, J. D. Martín-Guerrero, S. Venkatesh, C. Hernani-Morales, L. Lamata, and E. Solano, “Quantum Brain Networks: A Perspective,” Electronics, vol. 11, no. 10, p. 1528, 2022. Funding: This study has been supported by Indian Council of Cultural Relations (ICCR) under African Scheme for an author Charles Johnstone to pursue his Ph.D. studies in India. Conflict of interest: The authors declare no competing interests. Ethical approval: No ethical approval is required in this study. Informed consent: Not applicable to this study. Author contributions: PSA: idea, planning, critical revisions CJ: literature search, structuring, drafting 45

arXiv:1804.03606v1 [physics.hist-ph] 10 Apr 2018 Quantum mechanics, objective reality, and the problem of consciousness Ranjan Mukhopadhyay Department of Physics, Clark University, Worcester, MA 01610. Email: ranjan@clarku.edu April 11, 2018 Abstract The hard problem in consciousness is the problem of understanding how physical processes in the brain could give rise to subjective conscious experience. In this paper, I suggest that in order to understand the relationship between consciousness and the physical world, we need to probe deeply into the nature of physical reality. This leads us to quantum physics and to a second explanatory gap: that between quantum and classical reality. I will seek a philosophical framework that can address these two gaps simultaneously. Our analysis of quantum mechanics will naturally lead us to the notion of a hidden reality and to the postulate that consciousness is an integral component of this reality. The framework proposed in the paper provides the philosophical underpinnings for a theory of consciousness while satisfactorily resolving the interpretation problem in quantum mechanics without the need to alter its mathematical structure. I also discuss some implications for a scientific theory of consciousness. 1 Introduction At the heart of our scientific endeavor to understand the world, exist two explanatory gaps relating to the nature of reality and of consciousness. The first, better known, gap concerns the relation between subjective conscious experience and physical neurological processes in the brain. The relationship between the quantum micro-world and the classical world that we experience constitutes the second gap. As I will discuss, these explanatory gaps appear to be fundamental and pose a barrier to our understanding of the nature of the world and our place in it. The thesis that I seek to develop in this article is that these gaps are inter-related and cannot be addressed in isolation. The purpose of this paper is to examine critically these explanatory gaps and to discuss the possible nature of a self-consistent philosophical framework that could simultaneously address them. The first gap is well-known, rooted as it is in the mind-body problem with a long history in philosophy and metaphysics, both in the East and the West. It is intimately related to the puzzle of how consciousness fits in with our notion of the physical universe; it is my 1 attempt to resolve this puzzle that constitutes the central motivation for the paper. The second gap, while relatively modern, is however no less fundamental. It lies at the heart of our interpretation of quantum mechanics, and challenges our very notion of an objective observer-independent external reality. To quote Arthur Fine (1996) “Realism is dead. ... Its death was hastened by the debates over the interpretation of quantum theory, where Bohr’s nonrealist philosophy was seen to win out over Einstein’s passionate realism. Its death was certified, finally, as the last two generations of physical scientists turned their backs on realism and have managed, nevertheless, to do science successfully without it.” The notion of realism, however, lies at the heart of human scientific enterprise, and scientists in most fields of science take it for granted that they want to discover some aspect of how the world really works. The notion of an objective external observer-independent reality is also central to our day-to-day existence and activity. Thus I propose a commitment to realism, implying that I will assume, at the outset, the existence of a physical reality that is referenced by our physical theories, including quantum mechanics, and that this reality is objective in the sense of existing independent of us and our perceptions. I will also use the phrase ‘empirical reality’ somewhat loosely to refer to the physical world that we experience without assuming a priori its objectivity; indeed we would like the precise relation between ‘empirical reality’ and objective physical reality to emerge from our analysis. While my assumption of realism might run counter to some of the accepted wisdom in quantum mechanics, I will argue later that the true issue with quantum mechanics is not about realism versus anti-realism, rather it concerns the nature and role of consciousness. Since so much has been written on the possible connection between quantum mechanics and consciousness, let me clarify my position at the outset. I will do so in two parts. We will find that in order to make sense of quantum mechanics we need to address both the question of what quantum mechanics is telling us about the nature of reality, and, also, how to relate ‘quantum reality’ to our experience of external reality. The second question is crucial, the entire measurement problem in quantum mechanics revolves around it, and it is in seeking to address this question that we encounter consciousness. But why does the interpretation of quantum mechanics, in turn, have any bearing on our understanding of consciousness? I am not proposing a quantum theory of consciousness. On the contrary, I will argue that quantum mechanics itself points us away from physicalism: the view that all that exists is physical, that is, describable by physics and physical laws. I will let quantum mechanics guide us towards an alternative self-consistent philosophic framework, where consciousness should be treated as being just as fundamental as physical reality (my position will, however, be distinct from Cartesian dualism). 2 The hard problem of consciousness I begin with an examination of the first gap concerning the relationship between consciousness and the brain. The “common sense” view today among many scientists, is that mental processes and consciousness correspond, in some sense, to physical activities in the brain. Maybe consciousness is an emergent property of complex highly organized matter in the form of the brain. Such an approach appears sensible; after all, there clearly is sufficient evidence that chemical changes in the brain affect our mental states. Moreover, neurological 2 studies provide direct evidence that different mental and emotional states can be distinguished in terms of the patterns of neural activity (neuronal firings) in the brain (Laureys et al., 2008). Yet there appears to exist a gap between subjective experience and physical neurological processes in the brain as highlighted by philosophers such as Nagel, Jackson, and Chalmers (Nagel, 1974; Jackson, 1982; Chalmers 1995, 1996, 2002b). David Chalmers has distinguished between two types of problems related to consciousness: the easy problems and the hard problem. The hard problem is the problem of how and why we have qualia (the subjective aspects of our experience or sensations). How do objective physical processes in the brain give rise to subjective sensations that are only accessible in the first person? Chalmers contrasts this with the so-called easy problems, which though maybe not easy to solve in practice, can in principle be solved by understanding the physical mechanisms that can perform that function; examples include the understanding of the ability to discriminate, categorize, and react to environmental stimuli and the integration of information by a cognitive system. Much has been written about the nature of the hard problem, though specialists differ widely on the character and implications of the gap (see Chalmers, 2002a, for a variety of positions). Of particular relevance are the books by Chalmers (Chalmers 1996, 2010) that discusses the gap and builds a strong case against a physicalist interpretation of consciousness. Rather than reproducing these arguments, let me simply highlight here one aspect of the gap by focusing on the sensation of color. We have a certain subjective sensation of ‘blue’ when we see the color blue, and a different sensation of ‘green’ when we see the color green. What dictates the quality of the sensations? I could study all the physical processes involved, from the activation of appropriate photoreceptors in the eye to the pattern of firing of neurons in the brain, but where in all this lies the actual personal experience of the sensation of color? As argued by Nagel in his article “What is it Like to Be a Bat?” (Nagel, 1974), consciousness has essential to it a subjective character, a what it is like aspect. And it is not at all clear that this subjective first personal experience can be entirely represented within an objective physical framework. I will occasionally use the phrase ‘phenomenal consciousness’ to highlight this subjective aspect of consciousness. Since challenging a physicalist interpretation of phenomenal consciousness has sometimes been compared to the vitalist position held by some biologists in the early twentieth century, it is important to highlight the essential difference between the two positions. While Chalmers has successfully done so in his book (Chalmers, 1996), due to the central importance of these arguments for this paper, I will briefly highlight the difference in terms of a simple, though maybe somewhat technical, thought experiment. Imagine developing an extremely complex and powerful computer simulation of a living cell; in the simulation we would input all the physical constituents (all the atoms, for example), all the physical interactions between the constituents, all the relevant structural information, and then let the simulation run. If the simulation can demonstrate all the physical functions that a cell performs and that we associate with life, then there is no further reason for vitalism. There are very good reasons why developing such a simulation is not feasible and probably not a good idea, but here I am purely making a logical point and will not worry about the practicalities of such a simulation. Now imagine developing, similarly, a simulation of the entire brain (at whatever level of detail that is appropriate, also if we need to include all our sense organs in the simulation, so be it) in order to understand how conscious experience 3 emerges from the brain and its physical activities. If such a simulation were successful, it should be able to predict the relation between the quality of subjective experience and physical processes in the brain. It should be able to predict how, if we change some structural aspects of the brain, our subjective experiences get modified, as appears to be the case with synaesthesia (Ramachandran et al., 2003). Again not worrying about the practicalities of such a simulation, the problem that we will encounter is the following: even if the simulation could successfully capture the causal relationship between all physical processes in the brain, how would we represent qualia in our physical simulation? We encountered no problem of a similar nature with the simulation of a living cell. A little thought should convince us that for the possible success of the simulation in explaining consciousness, we are left with the options of either denying the phenomenological reality of conscious experience altogether, or we could develop an elaborate set of rules relating physical processes to conscious experience. The second position, it can be argued, is not a physicalist position since these rules would then have to be treated as fundamental and will not themselves follow from physical laws (we could probably characterize this as a form of property dualism). Thus the only viable position compatible with physicalism appears to be the denial of the phenomenal reality of qualia and thus the need to explain subjective experience, a position I find unsatisfactory considering that subjective sensations and perceptions are what we experience directly and we experience the external world only indirectly through our subjective sensations/perceptions. In this article I will assume the existence of phenomenal experience and consequently rule out this possibility. For a physicalist, there could be further options that are available, such as the possibility that some new hitherto unimagined laws of physics will negate the above argument, and while it is difficult to rigorously rule out all such possibilities, they appear mysterious to me at present. An alternative to physicalism, that of radical idealism, as proposed in the eighteenth century by Bishop Berkeley, which posits that consciousness is primary and matter (or the external world) is secondary, a creation of the mind, also appears problematic in explaining inter-subjective agreement between observers; it is, moreover difficult to sustain as a scientist. If the external world is a construct of the mind, why do we need to design and execute carefully controlled experiments to study nature, as is the norm in science? A historically popular third alternative, characterized in modern language as substance dualism, and closely associated with the philosophy of René Descartes, holds that the mind is a nonphysical substance in a physical body. This alternative seems rather mysterious as well as it is not clear how the supramaterial consciousness acts upon matter. If the mind and body are separate, why and how do different mental states manifest themselves in different patterns of neural activity in the brain? It also appears that some laws of physics have to be violated for the immaterial to affect the material; precisely where and at what level this breakdown of physical laws is occurring appears mysterious. A fourth alternative is that consciousness is a fundamental feature or property of reality and not an emergent feature that can be explained away in terms of purely physical processes (This alternative actually encompasses a range of views, see Chalmers (2002b) for a systematic exposition). One possibility is that while physical reality is causally closed, there are laws or properties over and above the physical that relate to consciousness, a view advocated by David Chalmers in his book (Chalmers, 1996). A closely related position, expressed for example by neuroscientist Christoff Koch from Caltech, is that consciousness 4 is inherent in the fabric of reality (Koch, 2012), that consciousness is woven into the very nature of the cosmos. How should we think about this possibility? While sometimes consciousness has been compared to a fundamental property of matter such as electrical charge, electrical charge can be associated with elementary particles and it is not clear that the same can be said about consciousness. Should we say that each particle carries some amount or quantum of consciousness? Since the brain is made up such a gigantic number of elementary particles, how then can we make sense of the cohesiveness and unitarity usually associated with human consciousness? There is also a second issue to consider. We believe that our subjective experiences and states can guide our action, but how can that be so if the physical universe is causally closed, and consciousness is an additional property of matter? This point has been discussed in detail by Chalmers (1996), but nevertheless leaves us uneasy. Also there appears something disconcerting in the idea that even in principle we can never know or test whether a creature (or machine or robot) is conscious since presence or absence of consciousness will not influence the physical behavior of that system. Despite these apparent problems, this appears as the most promising alternative, and I propose that if we want to understand and make sense of this alternative more clearly, we should probe more deeply the nature of physical reality itself. I will wrap up the discussion in this section with one comment. Why is it so difficult to find a self-consistent framework to elucidate the mind-brain relationship? The difficulty, it appears, is the self-contradictory nature of the relationship between the subjective and objective. On the one hand, as discussed before, a strong case has been made for an unbridgeable gap between the two. On the other hand, the subjective and objective also appear to interpenetrate strongly: as stated earlier, different mental and emotional states can be distinguished in terms of the patterns of neural activity. We know that drugs and diseases that affect the functioning of brain affect also our subjective states. Moreover, we believe that our subjective experiences and subjective mental states guide our actions, thus the subjective seems capable of acting on the objective. Finally (and paradoxically) we also have some expectation that the objective physical universe is causally closed. Can a philosophical framework reconcile these apparently contradictory aspects of the relationship? Perhaps surprisingly, we will answer in the affirmative. 3 Physical reality and quantum mechanics In everyday living, we assume the external world that we observe and experience corresponds to an objective external reality existing independent of us. However, a moment’s reflection should convince us that what we view as objective external reality is in fact our internal mental representation of such a reality, based on incoming sensory information. Let me elaborate on this point by assuming here a conventional view of reality. At the time of writing, I perceive a table in front of me. Presumably what is happening is that light reflected from the table is reaching my eyes and an image of the table is being created on the retina. This image generates electrical signals from photoreceptor cells, these signals travel to the brain and cause neuronal firings in the brain. Thus all that is reaching my brain are electrical signals that carry information from my sense organs. From these neuronal firings, somehow my brain is generating an image of the table. Thus, in some manner not quite 5 understood, from their internal neurological states, our brains appear to create both our internal and our external world, with the external world being projected outside of the ‘self.’ Thus what we are immediately aware of is not an objective external world but rather our internal mental representation of external reality. Logically, the most we can say is that this representation is self-consistent. It might be that external reality is organized exactly as we view it, but that is not a-priori a logical necessity. Nevertheless, it seems reasonable to ask whether we have any good reasons to believe that reality is not organized as it appears to us. Let us then ask what physics can tell us about the nature of reality. As we will see, quantum physics does fundamentally challenge our notion of reality (for popular accounts of quantum mechanics, and thought-provoking discussions, see for example, Herbert, 1985; Rosenblum et al., 2006; Scarani, 2006; Kumar, 2012). One of the most well-known aspects of quantum mechanics is the so-called wave-particle duality. As a result of dramatic developments in physics in the early twentieth century, physicists realized that light displays particle-like properties in addition to being electromagnetic waves, and moreover, that elementary particles such as electrons also display a wave nature. The wave nature of a quantum particle can be characterized by a function of space and time, known as the wavefunction, which represents the state of the particle and, for technical reasons, its deterministic time evolution as governed by Schrödinger’s equation is known as unitary evolution. Schrödinger had speculated that an object’s waviness was the smeared out object itself, so we could think of an object as a wavepacket: a burst of localized wave. However, there was a problem with this interpretation since any observation trying to locate an electron at some spot either finds a whole electron or no electron at all, never part of an electron. Instead the square of the amplitude of the wave at any spot gives us the probability of finding the electron at that spot, if we look. Thus the accepted terminology is to call the wave a probability wave and to call the amplitude of the wave the probability amplitude. There is however a subtlety here concerning the difference between finding the particle at some spot versus the particle being there even if we have not performed an observation or measurement. To highlight why this difference is crucial and central to the mystery of quantum mechanics, let us consider a particular experimental set-up. Consider a set-up where a beam of quantum particles, which could be photons, electrons, neutrons, or atoms, falling on a semi-transparent mirror where part of the beam gets reflected and part gets transmitted. This mirror will be called a beam-splitter, and can be so constructed that the intensity of transmitted beam equals the intensity of the reflected beam. Moreover the incident intensity is turned down so low that at any instant of time we can reasonably consider at most one particle in the equipment. For each particle falling on the mirror, there is a 50% probability that it is transmitted and 50% that it is reflected. Two completely reflecting mirrors are set up along the paths (as shown in figure), directing the two beams towards a second semi-transparent mirror that also reflects 50% and transmits 50% of the particles. Following reflection or transmission at the second beam-splitter the particles could emerge along two possible channels/paths, represented in the figure as channels A and B. Particles along channel A are reflected at one semi-transparent mirror and transmitted through the other, whereas those along channel B are reflected by both or transmitted by both. Such an arrangement is called the Mach-Zehnder interferometer and highlights the weirdness of quantum phenomena. Classical probability theory predicts that 6 beam splitter Path 1 Path 2 Channel A beam splitter Channel B Particle detector Figure 1: Experimental set-up for the Mach-Zehnder interferometer. 50% of the particles come out along channel A and 50% along channel B. This is because half the particles following path 1 get reflected to channel A and half transmitted to channel B, and similarly for particles following path 2. The observed results are dramatically different. All the particles come out along channel A, none along channel B (Granger et al., 1986); (for a popular and splendid discussion of this experiment, see Scarani, 2006). Quantum mechanics explains this by positing that the wavefunction of each individual particle hitting the beam-splitter splits in two, with part being reflected and part being transmitted, and predicts the correct result as an interference effect between the two parts of the wavefunction at the second beam splitter (the two parts of the wavefunction cancel out along channel B, leading to zero probability of particles being found in this channel). As a further check, quantum mechanics predicts that if the path-length of one of the paths is altered slightly (by placing additional mirrors along the path), the phase relation between the two parts of the wavefunction is altered and then particles will come out along both channels. The predictions of quantum mechanics are borne out quantitatively by experiments, providing a brilliant confirmation of quantum mechanics. The only way we can understand the experimental results is by allowing the particles to follow both paths (the alternative, that particles are guided by pilot waves that determine their trajectories, falls in the class of hidden variable theories that we will discuss briefly later in the paper). However, if we try to measure which path the particle followed by placing particle detectors, or in the case of atoms, by shining light on one of the paths, we will find the particle in its entirety always on path 1 or path 2, but the interference effect also disappears simultaneously and particles emerge along both channels. 7 The upshot of the above argument is that the quantum particle simultaneously takes path 1 and path 2 unless we try to measure which path it is in. The so-called collapse of the wavefunction upon measurement is the centerpiece of the standard textbook approach to quantum mechanics developed by Niels Bohr and his group in the 1920s/30s, and is known as the Copenhagen interpretation (Wheeler and Zurek, 1983). What constitutes a measurement? What is clear is that interaction between two quantum particles does not constitute a measurement since such an interaction is governed by Schrödinger’s equation, which is deterministic and does not lead to any collapse of wavefunction. The Copenhagen approach is to sharply demarcate between small things governed by quantum mechanics and Schrödinger’s equation, and large classical objects such as a measuring device. Schrödinger’s equation applies to quantum systems as long as we’re not measuring. Measurement involves interaction with a classical object and the collapse of a wavefunction during measurement is not governed by Schrödinger’s equation. Where does the boundary between a quantum and classical object lie? This is a particularly pertinent question since continued development in technology allows physicists to experimentally study systems at all length-scales between the atomic and the macroscopic. And nowhere have we so far found direct evidence of Schrödinger’s equation breaking down. So is there a way to figure out when a system behaves as a quantum system and when it behaves classically? In regards to superposition of states and quantum interference, the demarcation between the classical and the quantum arises, at least in part, from the phenomenon of decoherence. To understand decoherence, we will first touch upon the idea of entanglement, an idea that dates back to an important paper by Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen (EPR; 1935). What they demonstrated is that quantum mechanics allows us to prepare two (or, in general, multiple) quantum particles such that their states are correlated, so that a measurement on one will directly effect the measurement on the second particle even though the two particles may be separated over an enormous distance. We say that the states of the two particles are entangled so that we cannot assign well-defined states to the individual particles, and entanglement has been demonstrated experimentally by numerous experiments. In this sense, quantum mechanism has an inherent holism (the idea of non-separability of quantum constituents) built into its mathematical structure. Given the inherently nonlocal mathematical structure of quantum mechanics, if the theory of quantum mechanics is complete and if we assume the position of realism outlined in the introduction, this appears to imply that reality in intrinsically nonlocal. Nonlocality, however, challenges our notion of cause and effect since from Einstein’s theory of relativity we know that if disturbances or signals can propagate faster than the speed of light, they can also propagate backwards in time. It appeared that a way out was provided by hidden variable theories, which posited that quantum description is incomplete, that is, that the wavefunction does not provide a complete description of the true state of the particle, and that there are hidden variables related to the state of a quantum particle which affect the outcome of a measurement. In a seminal article by John Bell (1982), he proved a theorem, now known as Bell’s theorem, which makes it possible to experimentally differentiate between quantum mechanics and any local realist interpretation of quantum mechanics. The predictions of quantum mechanics have been convincingly borne out by experiments (Aspect et al., 1981) ruling out local hidden-variable theories. We are thus left with only the following alternatives: either to abandon realism or the notion of locality, or both (D’espagnat, 8 2003). Let us return now to the quantum-classical gap. For an object to behave classically, the quantum state of the object entangles with that of the environment. The system can no longer be described by a pure quantum state. Provided Schrödinger’s equation does not break down, if the states of two particles get entangled their states could remain entangled for ever even though they may have stopped interacting directly with each other, indicating that it is reasonable to believe that the whole universe is in one entangled quantum state, with the quantum state of any object entangled with that of all others. So it seems like there are two levels of reality: the classical and the quantum; how do we relate them? The concept of decoherence (Zurek, 2003; Dass, 2003) is often invoked in this context. To understand the idea of decoherence, let us go back to the experiment with the beam splitter (Fig. 1). Consider a beam of atoms that is being split and atoms along one of the paths are allowed to interact with the environment; thus, that component of the wavefunction entangles with that of the environment. So the ‘phase’ relationship between the two parts of the wavefunction (along paths 1 and 2) changes from instant to instant, implying in practical terms that the interference pattern will change from instant to instant. If we do an average over some time period, Dt, (or average over a few trials, as is necessary to obtain any pattern) the interference effect will disappear, and the system will appear exactly as if each particle were at random either in path 1 or path 2. Nevertheless if we were earlier saying that the particle was actually in both paths, it appears unreasonable to now say that the particle is just going through one path independent of observation, thus not resolving the measurement problem. To appreciate the difficulty, think of a classical random event such as a coin toss. While we may not know beforehand whether the outcome will be a head or tail, we expect it will have a definite outcome independent of whether anyone observes it. If we could imagine a quantum coin, then if ‘head’ and ‘tail’ are two allowed states, any superposition of the two states is an equally valid state. And unless the coin was specially placed in a head or tail state, we accord no special status to the head or the tail state and have no reason to believe the coin would be purely in the head state or purely in the tail state. Ignoring all the other microscopic degrees of freedom of the coin, physics tells us that in the classical limit the state of the coin entangles with that of the environment, and following the coin toss, this entangled state has two relatively separate (decoherent) branches: one corresponding to a head and the other corresponding to a tail (Dass, 2003). So, in this sense, it appears that both the head and tail come up. If we take the concept of quantum states seriously, some prominent options are: (1) observation by a conscious observer collapses the entangled wavefunction to one of the two branches (Wigner, 1963), (2) the “multiverse” splits into two branches/worlds, with a different outcome in each branch (many-worlds interpretation) (Everett, 1957) (3) there is an objective physical mechanism for wavefunction collapse (Ghirardi et al., 1986) and (4) quantum description of physical reality is incomplete, for example David Bohm’s nonlocal hidden variable theory (Bohm, 1952). However none of these interpretations have found universal acceptance. There are of course other possibilities that could be compatible with realism, of particular relevance is one of the newest interpretations known as quantum Bayesianism which treats the wave function as subjective, encoding the observer’s personalist Bayesian probabilities for the outcomes of his measurements on the system, while acknowledging the existence of an objective reality (Fuchs, 2010). Nevertheless, this approach also leaves the precise relation between objective reality and empirical 9 reality unresolved. 4 Two levels of reality In this section, I will develop a self-consistent view of quantum reality and consciousness, and in the next section I will discuss where this view stands in relation to the multiple interpretations of quantum mechanics. For our subsequent discussion, I will use the standard term “unitary quantum mechanics” (the word unitary, in this context, is used in a technical, mathematical sense, and not in its general English-language usage) to denote the theoretical notion that the physical states of physically isolated systems at all lengthscales can be treated as quantum states and their temporal evolution is deterministic and governed by Schrödinger’s equation (or, more generally, its relativistic counterparts). Unitary quantum mechanics essentially posits that Schrödinger’s equation (or its appropriate relativistic counterparts) applies at all length scales from the very small all the way up to the scale of the total universe. Given the remarkable success of quantum theory, and the fact that we have not yet found a single concrete context where we can show that unitary time development of the quantum state (as governed by Schrödinger’s equation) breaks down, unitary quantum mechanics seems to be a reasonable starting point. The case for unitary quantum mechanics is bolstered by examples of the macroscopic manifestations of quantum mechanics as in superconductivity and Bose Einstein condensation. One of the most dramatic confirmations of unitary quantum mechanics comes from an experimental study that was related to a 1985 paper entitled ‘Quantum mechanics versus macroscopic realism: is the flux there when nobody looks?’, where A.J. Leggett and A. Garg (1985) suggested a quantitative test to determine whether a macroscopic object would at all times be in one of its distinct macroscopic states or whether quantum mechanics and quantum superposition would prevail. Twentyfive years later Agustin Palacios-Laloy and colleagues reported an experimental realization of the Leggett-Garg test (Palacios-laloy et al., 2010; Mooij, 2010) where using a superconducting circuit similar to the one proposed originally, they demonstrated that the behavior of their ‘macroscopic object’ clearly follows the predictions of quantum mechanics. While unitary quantum mechanics is usually associated with Everettian many worlds interpretation (Everett, 1957), in this section we will view unitary quantum mechanics with fresh eyes, and return to the many worlds interpretation in the following section. What can we say about quantum reality referenced by the mathematical structure of unitary quantum mechanics? It turns out to be easier to describe quantum reality in terms of the negative rather then positive. What we know is that this underlying reality is marked by the absence of distinct, spatially localized objects as we experience at the classical level. More generally, we have no localized particles as well at this level, what we call quantum particles should be more legitimately thought of as excitations of non-local ‘fields’ (Hobson, 2013). The most striking feature is the notion of non-separability, as discussed earlier. Quantum non-separability precludes in a novel way the possibility of defining individual objects independently of the conditions under which their behavior is manifested. It relates to the idea of entanglement in quantum mechanics: if the states of two particles are entangled, we cannot assign well-defined states, even in principle, to the individual particles. In this sense, reality is intrinsically non-local and interconnected at this level, though, technically, 10 interactions are still local, thus ruling out the possibility of faster-than-light signaling. Here is what unitary quantum mechanics seems to imply: that there are two levels of reality, one corresponding to our experienced classical reality and the second, an underlying level of reality, referenced by the mathematical structure of quantum mechanics. Our classical world appears as one of the relatively independent branches of the underlying reality. If there existed only a single observer, saying that the observer is only aware of a part or a branch of total reality, while maybe philosophically unsatisfactory, poses no great logical challenge. The logical problem is to account for intersubjective agreement about external reality among multiple observers. Let us, at this stage in the argument, remind ourselves of the discussion on consciousness. We were lead to the alternative that consciousness should be treated as being an irreducible component of nature, one possibility being that it is inherent in the fabric of reality. Since empirical reality is an emergent structure, applying fundamental rules or properties at this level does not seem to make sense and thus, if we were to treat consciousness as being fundamental, it seems entirely reasonable to assume that consciousness is an irreducible component of the underlying level of reality. Let us then posit some form of dualism at the underlying level, some component or principle in addition to physical reality governed by the laws of quantum mechanics, but which does not directly affect the unitarity of quantum mechanics. In this paper, I will use the phrase ‘underlying protoconsciousness’ to refer to this irreducible component of underlying reality that is distinct from the physical aspects and provides the ground for phenomenal consciousness. Bearing in mind that at this level, physical reality is fundamentally non-local, that there are no demarcated, localized objects with which we can associate consciousness, we can expect underlying protoconsciousness to be nonlocal as well. We could then postulate that awareness of the particular quantum branch that corresponds to empirical reality fundamentally arises from this deeper underlying level of consciousness. We now see how the two pieces, the discussion of the nature of consciousness and that of the nature of reality, have to fit together. Our picture gives us both a framework for thinking about the relationship between mind and matter, and also provides us with an explanation of the role of the observer in quantum mechanics, in terms of an underlying level of reality. At the underlying level the temporal evolution of the total quantum state is deterministic and unitary, randomness and probability arise at the empirical reality and can be associated with the lack of knowledge of full reality, which fits in within a Bayesian framework of probability. At the underlying level, protoconsciousness should be treated as distinct from the physical aspect of reality and does not directly act upon the physical, thus avoiding the problems of Cartesian dualism. This leaves us with a view of reality, which, while to me entirely consistent with a scientific framework, does overlap with ancient religious and mystical traditions, both Eastern and Western. The proposed view overlaps with the views proposed by Goswami (1995), and could be characterized as a form of veiled realism propounded by d’Espagnat (2003, 2006): the notion of a true objective reality which is veiled from direct experience. It constitutes a middle way between materialism/physicalism and radical idealism. How, within this view, do we treat the ontological status of empirical physical reality? An analogy with the ontological status of rainbows within a classical physical world helps clarify the issue, as highlighted by d’Espagnat (2006). Within classical physics, the question of how a rainbow forms poses no great conceptual challenge. Nevertheless the question of the 11 ontological status can easily become confusing. Within a classical, mechanistic approach, a rainbow, obviously, may not be considered to be an object per-se, as its position (and even existence) is clearly dependent on the position of the observer. Should we say that the rainbow is non-existent and a creation of the observer? That clearly is not true either, rooted as the formation of the rainbow is in objective physical processes such as reflection of light. We could propose the existence of an infinite multitude of rainbows, where the observer picks out one from this infinite multitude depending on his or her location; but it is not clear whether such a view serves more to mystify a reasonably straightforward physical phenomenon. We face a similar problem when trying to clarify the ontological status of empirical physical reality. On the one hand, within our view it is rooted in objective observerindependent reality, existing as a branch of the underlying physical reality. On the other hand, it is also true that underlying consciousness is implicated in the process of selection of a particular branch as empirical reality. This, of course, should not be taken to mean that empirical physical reality depends on our individual consciousness; rather, I suggest interpreting this in terms of an intertwining of physical reality and consciousness at the empirical level. There is also an interesting issue here regarding wavefunctions. While we started with the assumption that quantum states are real, we found that the universe is in an entangled state, and since in unitary quantum mechanics there is no objective collapse of the quantum state, typically we cannot assign objective well-defined states to an individual particle even after a measurement. Thus the wavefunction represents our knowledge regarding the state of the particle, rather than the true state. The true universal wavefunction is hidden and not experimentally accessible, even in principle. In this sense, our view of unitary quantum mechanics could be characterized as a nonlocal hidden variable theory and indeed bears some resemblance to late physicist David Bohm’s philosophical vision of reality (Bohm and Hiley, 1993). We now revisit the mind-body problem. In the proposed framework, both matter and mind at the experiential level emerge (not in any temporal sense) from the underlying reality – a reality that is characterized by fundamental unity and non-separability of all of nature. In that sense this position is not dualism in the conventional Cartesian sense, but neither is it monism in either the materialist or idealist sense (it could be regarded as a version of dual-aspect or neutral monism) since we postulate that the physical and the mental are two distinct aspects or attributes of underlying reality. We could somewhat loosely regard underlying protoconsciousness as the link between physical cognitive processes of the brain at the empirical level and our individual conscious minds. While our framework does not preclude the possibility of neural correlates of consciousness (Tonomi and Koch, 2008) it does preclude the possibility of logically deducing facts about the quality of subjective experience directly from the neural correlates and physical principles. In regards to causal closure, by insisting on unitary evolution of quantum states, we have ensured that the physical universe is causally closed at the underlying level but not at the empirical level. If the lack of causal closure appears disturbing, it is important to remember that the laws of physics that appear at the empirical level, such as Newton’s laws of motion, should not be treated as fundamental laws, they are approximate and statistical laws that emerge from the underlying quantum dynamics. Thus while they hold, often with high precision, for a wide range of macrophenomena, situations where, for example, microscopic fluctuations might get amplified 12 to a macro-level would not be accurately or completely described by such laws. Finally, since consciousness participates in the generation of empirical reality while, simultaneously, physical neurological processes are connected to our conscious mental states, we find an interpenetration of the objective and subjective at the empirical level; we encounter this interpenetration both in our search for a resolution of the mind body problem and also for a satisfactory interpretation of quantum mechanics. While my proposed view resembles strongly that of the philosopher Baruch Spinoza, let me here briefly relate my view to the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, a central figure in modern Western philosophy. My view of the two levels of reality parallels Kant’s distinction between phenomenal (thing-as-perceived) and noumenal (thing-in-itself) reality (Kant, 1968), though my line of reasoning for arriving at this view is distinct from his. It is a nontrivial statement that the mathematical structure of quantum physics appears to penetrate, at least partially, into noumenal reality. This helps explains why, as physics attempts to probe more deeply into the nature of reality (as in high-energy physics, string theory etc.), physics also seems seems to move farther and farther away from our experience of reality. For our discussion, however, what appears particularly relevant is Kant’s notion of the “transcendental unity of apperception,” or, transcendental self, in short. Underlying our experiential empirical selves, Kant proposed the concept of a transcendental self that organizes and unifies all our experience in terms of an “I” that is experiencing them. It provides the condition for our conscious experience but, as Kant argues, is itself unknowable by introspection and cannot be described in empirical terms. I suggest that the notion of a transcendental self is intimately linked to the proposed notion of an underlying protoconsciousness (in Kantian terms, the noumenal self), though I will leave the precise relation between the two as an open question at present. What I am offering in this paper is not a theory of consciousness, but rather the philosophical underpinnings for such a theory. A theory of consciousness would need to explain and elucidate why phenomenal consciousness is associated with certain processes and not with others; in our framework, it might also need to clarify further the relationship between our individual minds and underlying consciousness (just as quantum mechanics clarifies the relation between the underlying inter-connected physical reality and separable, localized, clearly demarcated, classical objects at the empirical level). Even without a detailed analysis, as would be required for such a theory, we can say something more about the relationship between mind and matter. Our framework implies that reality manifests itself as a form of interactionist dualism (but not Cartesian dualism) at the empirical level, so that if a complex system or creature were to be conscious, its consciousness will be manifested in some form in its behavior; implying some behavioral signatures of consciousness. At the empirical level, the proposed framework implies that we treat the structure of conscious experience and physical neurological processes as two inter-dependent realms of research, but neither reducible to the other. It is important to emphasize that while this view does not, in my opinion, place consciousness outside the domain of science it does have implications regarding the aim of a scientific theory of consciousness. The aim of such a theory will not be to ‘explain’ consciousness in physical or biological terms, but rather to provide an unified (and presumably causal) framework to integrate first-personal data (data about subjective experience, in the form of verbal reports) with third-personal data (data about physical neurological processes), as suggested by Chalmers (2010, Chapter 2). Finally, while for physicalism both the unity 13 of apperception as well as the separation between the “self” and the brain’s representation of the external world remains puzzling, in our framework the unity of experience is a given; what still needs explanation is the notion of the self at the empirical level. This is a puzzle that, I believe, can be addressed scientifically since an infant is likely not born with a sense of self but rather such a sense develops presumably from the infant’s interaction with the physical and social environment. 5 Addressing the reality crisis in quantum mechanics In the words of Nick Herbert (1985) “One of the best-kept secrets of science is that physicists have lost their grip on reality.” This reality crisis manifests itself in the multiplicity of interpretations of quantum mechanics with no signs of reaching closure. Is accepting one or the other interpretation a matter of personal taste, or are there fundamental objective criteria for choosing between them? What is the relation between them and where does consciousness fit in within the multiplicity of interpretations? In order to address these questions, let us start with Everettian many world theory. The starting point of Everett’s analysis was unitary quantum mechanics and the notion of an universal wave-function characterizing the physical state of the entire universe (Everett, 1957). This is not unlike our starting point in the previous section. In Everett’s analysis, the focus then was to understand how reality would look to observers located within this universe. For objectivity, he replaced conscious observers by mechanical recording devices obeying natural laws, and studied the probabilistic correlation between such devices, thus addressing the question of inter-subjective agreement. He demonstrated how a deterministic process could appear random and irreversible to an observer. Nevertheless, despite the brilliance of his analysis, a fundamental problem remains. As discussed earlier, the universal wavefunction continues to branch, and each branch corresponds a classical/semi-classical world. From the viewpoint of quantum mechanics, all branches are equally real. Yet we experience a single empirical reality and we all agree about this reality. What decides which branch we experience as our empirical reality? Unitary quantum mechanics combined with physicalism, as assumed by Everett, can provide no answer to this question, thus ultimately unable to relate quantum reality back to our experience of reality (while there now exist several versions of many worlds interpretations, see Barrett (1999), Wallace (2012), to my knowledge none of them have successfully addressed the issue of a single empirical reality). It is due to this inability that the many-worlds interpretation seems particularly counterintuitive. As soon as we acknowledge the singularity of our experience and of empirical reality, it becomes clear that there has to be a selection at some level. It is this selection that is central to quantum mechanics. If unitary quantum mechanics holds and quantum mechanics provides a complete description of physical reality, then consciousness has to be involved in some way in this selection, since nothing in quantum mechanics confers any special status to one branch. In light of the previous discussion, I propose the following statement as one of the central messages of quantum mechanics: “our empirical reality is continuously being selected from a plurality of options at an underlying level of reality.” While this is not an interpretation-free statement, it will help us organize the interpretations of quantum mechanics in terms of the 14 two issues of ‘selection’ and ‘underlying reality.’ Let us examine the issue of selection, which manifests itself in the interpretations in different ways, such as in the form of collapse of the wavefunction or as intrinsic probabilities. A very general question we can ask is whether the selection can be understood in terms of a physical mechanism or do we need to invoke consciousness. If we accept the role of consciousness in the selection process, the issue of inter-subjective agreement leads us rather directly to the notion of an underlying nonlocal protoconsciousness (one other possible alternative is an objective consciousness-induced collapse of the wavefunction which would then lead us to Cartesian dualism; I do not consider it explicitly here since I find it difficult to sustain as a self-consistent option; see Stapp, 2007, for an alternative view). Possible physical mechanisms for selection can be divided into two categories: deterministic or intrinsically random. If they are deterministic, as for example in Bohm’s hidden variable theory, EPR paradox in conjunction with Bell’s theorem implies the necessity of superluminal (faster-than-light) signaling, directly impacting our notion of cause and effect. Moreover, while such a theory might still be possible for non-relativistic quantum mechanics, extending it to relativistic quantum mechanics and to high energy physics remains a challenge. Bohm himself considered his theory as an attempt to demonstrate that there was an alternative to the standard Copenhagen interpretation, which might lead to further clues, rather than as something final (Hiley, 2010). One other possibility raised by some researchers is that unknown processes at the extremely small lengthscales (Planck scales) would lead to a collapse of the wavefunction (Ghirardi et al., 1986). If these processes are deterministic, that however merely moves the issue of selection one step down the line without resolving it. Now let us turn to the possibility of intrinsic randomness. There is a subtle argument against the notion of intrinsic randomness or intrinsic probability being rooted entirely in physical reality; the argument springs from considerations of the nature of time. In order to make sense of the notion of intrinsic randomness, we have to be able to root the temporal concept of the ‘present’ entirely in physical reality; since intrinsic randomness would mean that even if the past and present are known with infinite accuracy, the future is not completely determined. However, the simultaneity of two spatially separated events has been shown to be frame-dependent by the theory of relativity, implying the impossibility of an objective global ‘present’ or ‘now’ (see also McTaggart (1908) for an independent argument against the objectivity of the present). If we cannot however root the concept of the ‘present’ in objective reality, how can we make sense of objective intrinsic randomness? To me, the only true alternative to a consciousness-based selection, as proposed here, might be a theory of objective collapse arising from some currently unknown physics presumably related to quantum gravity, as proposed, for example, by Penrose (1996). If we implicate consciousness in the selection process, it also becomes clear why realism is a choice. We could formulate quantum mechanics purely in terms of empirical reality, but the interpenetration of the objective and subjective makes it impossible for such a formulation to be entirely consistent with realism. The so-called collapse of the wavefunction after measurement, for example, is not some objective physical process but is related to our change in knowledge of the system. Thus how best to formulate quantum mechanics, at least in part, becomes a matter of choice and convenience. On the other hand we could formulate quantum mechanics in terms of an underlying reality, but have to bear in mind the role of consciousness in tying this underlying reality back to empirical reality. The 15 question of what is the best representation of underlying reality: entangled states, or fields, or quantum information, is interesting but lies outside the purview of this paper. There is also a deep and fascinating question about what we can know about the state of underlying physical reality; recall that what we mean by wavefunction as it pertains to measurements relates to our knowledge of the state of the particle, and is not the true quantum state. Without undertaking a deep analysis here, we can nevertheless point to one aspect that we do have access to, namely, the number of distinct options available for each selection. In the technical language of quantum mechanics, this is the dimensionality of the Hilbert space, and it is thus not mysterious that this quantity has been emphasized strongly in one of the newest interpretations known as quantum Bayesianism (Fuchs, 2010). Finally, our analysis could also have important implications for a third explanatory gap on the relation between physical and subjective time that I hope to explore in greater detail in the future. Consider, for example, the flow of time, a notion that is central to our experience of time but falls apart when we try to analyze it physically (see Davies, 1995, Chapter 12, for a discussion). Here again we find indirect evidence for the interpenetration of the subjective and objective. Our analysis suggests that the flow of time is related to the generation of empirical reality, and due to the role of underlying protoconsciousness in this process, it is not surprising that we cannot describe the flow of time in purely physical terms. 6 Conclusions Phenomenal consciousness does not fit in naturally with our notion of physical reality. On the one hand, as briefly outlined in the paper, a strong case against physicalism has been developed by philosophers such as David Chalmers. On the other hand, finding a satisfactory alternative framework has also been challenging. In this paper, I have proposed an alternative framework, positing that underlying our experiential level of reality, there exists a deeper level of reality that is nonlocal and fundamentally interconnected. I have argued for a fundamental aspect of underlying reality that is distinct from the physical, which provides the basis for subjective conscious experience. In this framework, the physical world is causally closed at the underlying level, but not at the empirical level. Experienced empirical reality is emergent from this underlying reality and while we can for most practical purposes treat empirical physical reality as objective and observer-independent, the assumption of a consciousness-independent physical reality breaks down when we attempt to understand the relation between phenomenal consciousness and the physical brain processes. I have demonstrated in this article how the proposed view of underlying reality could follow from quantum mechanics and how it resolves the interpretation problem in quantum mechanics. It also provides a resolution to the interlocking problems of mental causation and phenomenal consciousness (how phenomenal consciousness can act causally on physical neurological states) that were highlighted by Jaegwon Kim (2005). In the proposed view, subjective conscious states should be treated as being fundamental but intertwined with neurological states, and can act on the physical brain without violating any established physical laws or principles. The proposed view has important implications for a scientific theory of consciousness. Such a theory presumably has to be rooted in empirical reality, just as quantum mechanics in its developmental phase had to be formulated in terms of a classical reality. 16 At the empirical level, the relationship between subjective experience and physical brain processes should thus be treated as being just as fundamental as the elementary laws of physics, and the task of a theory of consciousness would be to provide a causal framework which would relate the two but without attempting to reduce one to the other. Acknowlegements I acknowledge stimulating discussions with and helpful suggestions from Prof. Les Blatt and Prof. Scott Hendricks. REFERENCES Aspect, A., Grangier, P., and Gerard R. (1981) Experimental Tests of Realistic Local Theories via Bell’s Theorem, Phys. Rev. Lett., 47, pp 460-463. Barrett, J.A. 1999. The Quantum Mechanics of Minds and Worlds, Oxford University Press. Bell, J.S, (1982) On the impossible pilot wave, Foundations of Physics, 12, pp 989-99. 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Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1516 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Article The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Graham P. Smetham* Abstract Quantum Bayesianism or QBism is a new approach to quantum interpretation which offers a radically subjectivist and pan-experientialist account of the functioning of quantum ‘reality’ and the emergence of the ‘classical’ world. In a recent collection of essays Elegance and Enigma: The Quantum Interviews there is a debate between one of the supporters of the QBism paradigm, C. A. Fuchs, and the instigator of ‘quantum Darwinism’, W. Zurek, as to the viability of such a radically subjectivist position. Zurek suggests that the ‘many worlds’ interpretation and the QBism perspectives are extreme views and his perspective steers a ‘middle way’ between the two. In this article I show that an almost identical metaphysical debate occurred in fourteenth and fifteenth Tibetan Buddhism concerning the nature of ultimate reality. The two debates are examined, contrasted and the conclusion that it may be the case that quantum reality may be describable in differing complementary and interrelated ways is drawn. Keywords: Quantum Bayesianism, QBism, Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Buddhism, epiontic paradigm, many worlds interpretation, subjectivism, Fuchs, Zurek, ‘extreme views’, Madhyamaka, ‘middle way’, Yogacara-Cittamatra, Mind-Only, Emptiness, Tsongkhapa, Gorampa, Dolpopa. There is yet another new approach to understanding the nature of quantum theory, an approach which according to one of its ardent proponents Christopher A. Fuchs allows “no room for most of the standard year-after-year quantum mysteries.”1 ‘Quantum Bayesianism’ generally refers to a viewpoint on the nature of ‘quantum states’ developed by C. M. Caves, C. A. Fuchs and R. Schack, the version which will be considered in this paper is that presented by Fuchs under the catchy rubric of ‘QBism’. The core perspective adopted by Quantum Bayesianism and QBism (as we shall be concerned with the work of Fuchs the term ‘QBism’ will be used henceforth) is that the probabilities which are usually associated with a ‘quantum state’ are entirely subjective and are not therefore, in reality so to speak, connected with anything in an external or underlying quantum realm. Thus the second section of Fuchs’s paper ‘QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism’ is headed ‘Quantum States Do Not Exist’, and therein Fuchs tells us that: The world may be full of stuff and things of all kinds, but among all the stuff and all the things, there is no observer independent, quantum-state kind of stuff.2 So it appears, then, that Fuchs’s position lays down a gauntlet for a few of his colleagues such as Wojciech Zurek who has declared that: * Correspondence: Graham Smetham, http://www.quantumbuddhism.com E-mail:graham@quantumbuddhism.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1517 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! …quantum states, by their very nature share an epistemological and ontological role – are simultaneously a description of the state, and the ‘dream stuff is made of.’ One might say that they are epiontic. These two aspects may seem contradictory, but at least in the quantum setting, there is a union of these two functions.3 Zurek’s putative type of ‘quantum state’ may be comprised of epiontic ‘dream stuff’ but presumably this kind of stuff must be hovering on the edge of existence, however ghostly its essence may be! However, it is important not to be too hasty in drawing conclusions, for the last paragraph of Fuchs’s above mentioned paper tells us that the QBism research program: …hints of a world, a pluriverse, that consists of an all-pervading “pure experience,” as William James called it. Expanding this notion, making it technical, and letting its insights tinker with spacetime itself is the better part of future work. Quantum states, QBism declares, are not the stuff of the world, but quantum measurement might be. Might a one-day future Shakespeare write with honesty, Our revels are now ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and Are melted into air, into thin air .. . We are such stuff as quantum measurement is made on. As we all know the final line in the original is “We are such stuff as dreams are made on,” so it would seem that the kind of quantum stuff dreamt of by Zurek and quantum non-stuff conjured up by Fuchs should have some sort of connection. In fact if Fuchs really wants to stick with his Shakespearian modification it would follow that quantum measurement is actually made on some kind of ‘stuff.’ It is quite clear that in this area of thought we are in a quantum conceptual field of fine distinction and exquisite knife edge balance of implication, a situation which has existed since Bohr originally tried to meld together the apparently antithetical realms of the ‘quantum’ and ‘classical’ domains. It will probably come as a surprise to many physicists to be told that similar, in fact in some respects identical, debates concerning the ‘ultimate’ nature of reality were central within the development of Mahayana (Great Vehicle) Buddhist metaphysical philosophy, starting some two thousand years ago with the great Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna (2nd century) who elucidated the central Madhyamaka (Buddhist ‘Middle Way’) concept of shunyata or ‘emptiness’. This metaphysical perspective asserts that all phenomena lack ‘inherent existence’ or they do not exist ‘from their own side’. One metaphor often used in this context is that of dream-like phenomena; thus in discussing the nature of agents and the results of actions by apparent agents Nagarjuna asserted that: The agent and the results … are all … like an illusion, and like a dream.4 And Nagarjuna, the founder of the Madhyamaka metaphysical analysis, in his remarkable work Mulamadhyamakakarika (Fundamental Verses on the Middle Way) shows that this metaphysical condition, the lack of ‘inherent existence’ (svabhava) or the lack of independent internal essence, applies to all phenomena: They are without nature, just like space, But since they come about due to mere dependent origination, They are not utterly nonexistent, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1518 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Similar to cause and effect in dreams.5 It is this essential lack of independent and self-enclosed ontological essence in all phenomena which is given the term ‘emptiness’ (shunyata) in Madhyamaka Buddhism. Another observation that follows from the fact of emptiness that Nagarjuna made concerns the ‘reality’ of phenomena: Everything is real and not real, Both real and not real, Neither real nor not real…6 In Madhyamaka philosophy terms are always used with precision, a situation which unfortunately is not always the case in quantum debates wherein, of course, the mathematics will be precise and rigorous but often terms like ‘real’ or ‘existence’ are used with everyday imprecision. The term ‘real’ within Madhyamaka means that an entity is a final, ultimate, fixed, eternal and absolute aspect of reality. So using the term in this sense means that absolutely nothing in the experiential realm of dualistic awareness has this nature of reality, in fact quantum theory indicates that Nagarjuna’s ‘tetralemma’ is correct, phenomena at the quantum level do ‘hover’ between existence and non-existence. Buddhist philosophers were deeply concerned with the knowing the ‘real’ nature of ultimate reality. Their project of attaining direct non-conceptual insight and understanding of its nature clearly required that they had a pretty good conceptual idea of its nature; and the methods of conceptual metaphysical analysis they developed gave them insights which the West only penetrated with the advent of quantum theory. The issue of the ‘real’ nature of ‘reality’ also seems to be crucial to Fuchs’s argument as he tells us that his gripe with the notion of ‘quantum states’ is that the belief in the reality of them is the reason that ‘patching the leaking boat’ of quantum theory has become a thankless ask: The only source of leaks was the strategy of trying to tack a preconception onto the theory that shouldn’t have been there. What is this preconception? … The preconception is that a quantum state is a real thing – that there were quantum states before there were observers; that quantum states will remain even if all observation is snuffed out by nuclear holocaust.7 An observation which dramatises the issue of the nature of nuclear ‘reality’ perfectly! With regard to Zurek’s ‘epiontic’ ‘quantum Darwinism’ perspective Fuchs writes that: Zurek’s “let quantum be quantum”? It is, as far as I can tell, a view that starts and end with the wave function. There is no possibility that two observers might have two distinct (contradicting) wave functions for a system, for the observers are already in a big giant wave function themselves. So when I say “Why the quantum?” is the most pressing question, I mean this specifically in an interpretive background in which quantum states aren’t real in the first place. I mean it within a background where quantum states represent observer’s personal information, expectations, degrees of belief.8 So Fuchs’s notion of ‘QBism’ appears to be radically subjectivist; it seems to attempt to remove belief in anything beyond the “observer’s personal information, expectations, degrees of belief.” A few sentences on in his response to one of the questions asked by Maximilian Schlosshauer (What are the big issues?), in the recently published Elegance and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1519 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Enigma: The Quantum Interviews, Fuchs expresses his belief that “quantum theory is actually about how to structure one’s degree of belief.”9 And the thing which Fuchs clearly believes that it is necessary not to structure any degree of belief in is the universal wave function as presented by Zurek, or at least Fuchs’s understanding of Zurek. Certainly Zurek’s answer to the question as to his favourite interpretation supports Fuchs’s view of Zurek’s view. Zurek says: I think the relative-state view of Everett (and Wheeler!), in a form which does not prejudice the interpretation by making it into “many worlds”, is the best framework for interpretation. It is the most flexible (and most quantum!) way to think about quantum theory and our universe.10 So Zurek accepts to a fairly high degree of belief the ‘reality’ of a universal quantum wave function of reality; whereas it seems that Fuchs has no degree of belief in such a universal ‘quantum state’. When we turn to the section of Elegance and Enigma devoted to the question ‘What are quantum states?’ Zurek takes up Fuchs’s gauntlet and rushes into the quantum affray: …one is tempted to altogether deny the existence of quantum states and reduce them to mere information in possession of the observer. But this is not completely fair … [The] interdependence between the “objective existence” and “mere information” roles of quantum states makes it difficult for me to buy into programs that go all the way in either of these two directions. Zurek, then, declares his intention to steer a ‘middle course’ between the two possible extreme beliefs that he identifies and makes the following criticism of the QBism perspective, which Zurek considers to be the extreme view opposite to the full-blown ‘many-worlds’ interpretation: At the opposite end of the spectrum are attempts to derive “all of the quantum” from subjective, observer centered point of view. Naïve subjectivist approaches fail in one obvious way: the observer has to be outside of the quantum realm, so that his subjective view of the universe can be based on something firm and nonquantum. How to construct an observer who is outside the quantum realm – so that his subjective information can be the basis for the quantum world out there – from subjective quantum pieces is difficult to imagine. Note Zurek’s characterization of the QBist viewpoint: “Naïve subjectivist approaches.” The gloves are off and we are in the midst of serious quantum controversy! Zurek tells us that he believes that examining such ‘extreme’ views about the nature of quantum reality, on the one hand the ‘many-worlds’ view that everything possible is actual and, on the other, the QBist subjectivist view that there is nothing actual beyond subjective beliefs, is “a valuable exercise”11 Zurek believes, however, that the truth of the situation “lies between the two extremes.” We can outline the possible quantum positions that have been suggested so far as follows:  Extreme View 1 – ‘Many Worlds’ of the universal wave function. There is an eternally existent ‘real’ wave function of reality and within this wavefunction there are ‘real’ multiple universes or worlds within which everything that is possible within the universal wave function does become really actual in some universe or world. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1520 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way!  Extreme View 2 – QBism. There is nothing inherently and absolutely existing as a ‘real’ external or underlying ‘reality. There are only personal experiences which give rise to subjective ‘degrees of belief.’  Zurek’s Middle Way between extremes. Zurek says that: I firmly believe that pushing even such extreme points of view as many worlds or the subjectivist approach to “the quantum” is a valuable exercise. We have definitely learnt a lot from Everett and DeWitt, and we definitely learnt a great deal from Bohr, who at least some of those pursuing the subjectivist approach cite as their intellectual forefather. I believe the truth lies somewhere between these two extremes: I take from Everett the lesson that quantum theory is the best tool for explaining its own workings, but I take from Bohr (and Wheeler) the firm conviction that when we find out how it works, we will realize that information was an integral part of the machinery. (One might say that this attempt to have the best of both points of view is complementarity).12 Zurek’s viewpoint suggests that the situation is such that a single collective world is ‘epiontically’ created within the field of potentiality of the universal quantum wave function through the operation of internal ‘subjectivist’ information processing of some sort. This viewpoint establishes a ‘middle way’ between extreme ‘objectivism’ and extreme ‘subjectivism.’ This configuration of extreme positions regarding the nature of quantum reality with a ‘middle path’ between them echoes a crucial fourteenth-fifteenth century debate within Tibetan Buddhism regarding the exact nature of the ‘ultimate’ reality of ‘emptiness’. At first sight it is indeed remarkable to find these two debates, in apparently dramatically differing areas of discourse, having such a deep similarity. However we are in fact dealing with the ‘same’ ‘ultimate’ nature of reality, as Vlako Vedral has pointed out: Quantum physics is indeed very much in agreement with Buddhistic emptiness.13 Not only do we find the same configuration of viewpoints, we also find the same passion. In his introduction to the section on ‘My Favorite Interpretation’ section of Elegance and Enigma Schlosshauer writes that: And there’s no magic cure-it-all: with every interpretation, you win some but you also lose some, and whether something is to be regarded as a gain or a loss in any given instance will depend on who you ask. Two people may see one and the same aspect of a particular interpretation in starkly different lights. Take Everett’s scientific-realist reading of the wave-function formalism as an example. One person may celebrate this interpretive move as the one that lets the quantum do the talking; as the one that takes to heart the message of quantum theory in the most consistent and unadulterated manner; as the one that has no need for wasting and mincing words, for hiding behind philosophical and semantic smoke screens, for elevating man-made terms such as “irreducibly classical concepts” and “complementarity” to principles of nature. But another person may feel the exact opposite, judging the desire to promote a formal entity - the wave function - to the all-encompassing, objectively existing essence of the universe as symptomatic of a classical mindset. And they might see the Everett interpretation as possessed by a philosophical agenda ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1521 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! of absolutism and monism - an agenda that William James, long before Everett's time, captured thus: So the universe has always appeared to the natural mind as a kind of enigma, of which the key must be sought in the shape of some illuminating or power-bringing word or name. That word names the universe's PRINCIPLE, and to possess it is, after a fashion, to possess the universe itself. “God,” “Matter,” “Reason,” “the Absolute,” “Energy” are so many solving names. You can rest when you have them. You are at the end of your metaphysical quest.14 With regard to the Tibetan Buddhist debates concerning the nature of ultimate reality the Buddhist scholars José Ignacio Cabezón and Geshe Lobsang Dargyay point out in their book Freedom form Extremes – Gorampa’s “Distinguishing the Views” and the Polemics of Emptiness that: …there are probably few cultures that have mastered the art of the polemical insult to the extent that Tibetans have. And this undoubtedly is part of what makes the genre a spectacle, and therefore what makes it popular. Tibetan polemicists sometimes claim that their opponents are under the influence of drugs, or of various diseases, or worse, that they are possessed by demons - for why else would they be babbling nonsense. They compare them to dumb animals (sheep is the preferred species). They accuse them of pride, but too stupid to know even how to boast, they do their ‘dance’ with "the decapitated head rather than the tail of a peacock hung from their behinds.”15 Disputes within the foundations of quantum theory look quite tame in comparison! In their introduction to the fifteenth century Tibetan Buddhist philosopher and practitioner Gorampa’s Madhyamaka philosophical classic Distinguishing the Views and Practices Cabezón and Dargyay make a similar point to that made by Zurek concerning the usefulness of establishing the nature of extreme positions in order to find a middle course: …polemic can be sometimes exaggerated and grotesque. It polarizes viewpoints, people and schools. But it is precisely this type of polarization – this “differentiation” – that brings great clarity to issues.16 And the views concerning the Madhyamaka (‘Middle Way’) concept of ‘emptiness’ (shunyata) that Gorampa deals with are:  Those who claim that the extreme of eternalism is the Madhyamaka  Those who claim that the extreme of nihilism is the Madhyamaka  Those who claim that the freedom from extremes is the Madhyamaka17 By its very designation as the ’freedom from extremes’, it is quite clear that the third option is the correct view for Gorampa, for he is trying to determine the ‘correct’ conceptual formulation for the Madhyamaka which is the Buddhist concept of the ‘middle way between extremes’. In the following discussion I shall identify the first view of eternalism with that of the universal wave function; the second view of nihilism with QBism, and the ‘freedom from extremes’ may be loosely compared to Zurek’s suggested ‘middle path.’ Before embarking on our path towards understanding the middle path between extremes as it applies within both the discourse concerning the foundations of quantum theory and the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1522 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Buddhist metaphysics of ‘emptiness’, it is important to distinguish a point of deep differentiation between Western scientific and philosophical aims and those of a Buddhist philosopher-practitioner. The point of differentiation is found in the use of the term ‘practitioner’. In the above quote from William James the point is made that the Western metaphysical aim is that of discovering the word that “names the universe’s PRINCIPLE.” Western thought in general is in search of purely theoretical and intellectual knowledge. For Buddhist philosopher-practitioners, on the other hand, metaphysical analysis is a starting point for cultivating a direct non-conceptual nondual awareness of the ultimate nature of reality through advanced meditation techniques. According to Buddhist psycho-metaphysical doctrine it is entirely possible to generate focused meditation states which take as their object a clearly understood conceptual ‘generic image’ such as ‘emptiness’. It will be difficult for anyone who has not practiced some form of focused meditation (such as jhana or lamrim) meditation to understand the technique alluded to here for such states generate a complete unwavering focused awareness with is entirely free of distraction by intrusive thoughts. The mind is completely and unwaveringly focused on the meditation object. In the second stage of these advanced meditation methods the conceptual generic image which is focused upon dissolves and when this occurs the practitioner achieves direct non-conceptual knowledge. This is the aim of philosophizing and practice – a direct non-conceptual knowledge. Having correct and appropriate conceptual knowledge, however, is necessary in order to generate non-conceptual insight. With this in mind we can return to steering a middle course to ultimate reality. According to Buddhist psycho-metaphysical philosophy in general the problems that human beings produce in their course through life, and at a much deeper level the actual appearance of the experiential world itself, are generated from a deep seated ‘grasping’ at phenomena as being truly existent. One way of understanding this is to consider any perception of a seemingly ‘external’ entity that a sentient being may have. Although it may appear to the being in question that the perception is just a neutral perception, according to the fundamental Buddhist worldview all perceptions on the part of unenlightened sentient beings are suffused with a deep primordial psychological investment in their reality. All sentient beings ‘grasp’ at phenomena, both external and internal, as being real. Sentient beings desperately want phenomena to be ‘real’ precisely because they crave and delight in ‘existence’. According to Buddhist thought the functioning of this deep investment and craving in the reality of reality distorts reality by giving it more reality than it actually has. There are various aspects of this grasping which when analysed give rise to subtle distinctions within Buddhist philosophy. We shall begin by considering some distinctions in the analysis of the ultimate metaphysical structure of reality as presented by the fourteenth century Madhyamika (a practitioner of Madhyamaka) Tsongkhapa, one of the philosopher-practitioners discussed by Gorampa. As we shall see Gorampa accuses Tsongkhapa of presenting a nihilistic version of emptiness. The Svatantrika (Autonomist) school of the Madhyamaka consider that the essential metaphysical problem is that human beings (we will exclude non human sentient beings now because they are hardly likely to indulge in this kind of analysis) believe that objects really do exist externally and independently without any dependence on the minds of observers. Objects which are completely independent of the minds of observers would be truly and ultimately existent. For the Svatantrikas, however, whilst all phenomena ultimately lack true substantial reality, seemingly external entities do have a kind of nominal existence because they do exist conventionally by dint of ‘characteristics’ which inherently and naturally exist at ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1523 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! the conventional, as opposed to the ultimate, level of the process of reality. According to the Svatantrika viewpoint as presented by Tsongkhapa, then, the emptiness of phenomena lies in their not ultimately existing independently of the minds of observers. A Svatantrika practitioner therefore would meditate on phenomena as not being separate from the observing mind. This is expressed by saying that the object of negation for Svatantrika practitioners is the existence of phenomena separate and independent of mind. According to Tsongkhapa the Prasangika (Consequentialist) viewpoint is a ‘higher’ and more comprehensive understanding of emptiness because it gets at a much more subtle aspect of the emptiness of phenomena: …the measure of something being truly existent is that it is found when the object labelled by a certain name is searched for. That is the subtle object-to-be-negated… The simple negation of such ‘truth’ – that is the truth that is not found when it is searched for by means of reasoning that is explained in the Madhyamaka texts – is emptiness; it is a non-affirming negation, and it is the ultimate philosophical viewpoint of the Madhyamaka; it is the real ultimate truth and the ultimate reality of phenomena.18 Here Tsongkhapa gives a different ‘object of negation’ for understanding emptiness, and, whilst it is possible to get a notion of what is meant by examining and pondering the viewpoint intellectually, to really understand a practitioner would also mediate by actually performing the negation in a focused meditation and holding the result in the focused meditation, thus deepening direct insight. In order to understand this view of emptiness the Prasangika-Madhaymaka gives the example of a chariot as an object to be negated as being a non-empty, inherently existent entity. The chariot reasoning which searches and fails to find the inherent reality of a chariot is: A chariot does not inherently exist because of not being its parts, not being other than its parts, not being in its parts, not being that within which its parts exist, not possessing its parts, not being the composite of its parts, and not being the shape of its parts.19 If the chariot is inherently existent then it must exist in its own right, which is to say independent of other phenomena, including its parts. This means that whereas on the conventional level the chariot and its parts are mixed together, so to speak, from the perspective of an ultimate analysis we must separate them out and treat the chariot as having its own individual and separate nature and then investigate the nature of the relationship with its parts. Suppose we ask: “Is the chariot identical to its parts?” This cannot be correct because the parts are many whilst the chariot is one. Furthermore the chariot can be viewed as a separate agent that conveys its parts when it moves. If the chariot were identical with its parts then conveyer and conveyed would be identical which is absurd. On the other hand the chariot cannot be different from its parts because if this were so the chariot would be one entity separate from its parts. We would then be able to put the chariot in one place, as it were, whilst placing its parts elsewhere. We might now ask if the chariot is in its parts or if the parts are in the chariot. For the chariot to be inherently in its parts or for the parts to be inherently in the chariot the chariot and the parts would have to be completely separate than each other. The chariot is not separate from its parts, for instance, in the same way that a box is separate and independent of its contents. The same is true if the chariot were to inherently possess its parts; the two would have to be separate just like a man who possesses a cow. But the chariot does not stand separately from its parts as would be required for these ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1524 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! configurations to be applicable. Such an ‘ultimate’ analysis, or reasoning in search of the ultimate existence of the chariot shows that it dissolves and is not findable as an entity in its own right. It is clear that the Svatantrika and Prasangika versions of emptiness are subtly but definitely different. In the case of the Svatantrika ‘interpretation’ the experienced phenomena of conventional reality (which corresponds in terms of quantum physics to ‘classical’ reality) have a kind of ghostly basis in that they have ‘characteristics’ which are somehow ‘out there’. These ‘characteristics’, although they are not in any way identical, or even remotely like, the solid reality of materiality experienced by sentient beings, provide the basis upon which minds impute a ‘conventional’ or ‘classical’ independent world which appears to be independent of’ mind and minds but, in ultimate reality, is not. The similarity of the metaphysical configuration of the Svatantrika viewpoint to Zurek’s notion of epiontic quantum Darwinism should be apparent. The Svatantrika notion of ghostly external ‘characteristics’, which are the basis for the arising of a conventional or classical world, is thoroughly analogous to Zurek’s presentation of ‘quantum states’: …can quantum states replicate basic properties of classical states? I believe the answer is a resounding yes: the essence of this view of the emergence of the classical lies in “quantum Darwinism” - in the selective proliferation of information about certain preferred states throughout the environment. Once this happens, such information becomes effectively objective: by trying out different possible measurements on subsets of states, the observer can find out the underlying state that has spawned such a progeny. To be sure, states of the measured environment subsystems will be destroyed, but there are still plenty more copies of the original in the environment, so one can find out what that state is, by trial and error, without erasing the information that is shared by the whole set of them. So in a sense, as a consequence of quantum Darwinism one can kill a messenger without endangering the message. Moreover, as there are many copies, many observers can do this independently. It is not difficult to see that they will always agree about their findings. Thus, quantum Darwinism explains how robust objective reality collective states that can be found out without being destroyed - can be built out of fragile quantum states.20 Zurek’s ‘fragile quantum states’ are the Svatantrika ghostly (‘dream-stuff’) ‘characteristics’ which are the basis for the emergence of conventional or classical ‘reality’. Fuchs’s QBism, on the other hand, corresponds more readily to the Prasangika version of emptiness which is a ‘non-affirming negation’, a negation of inherently existing phenomena which really does not affirm anything in place of the phenomena which has apparently been ultimately ‘reasoned’ out of existence. Recall the chariot deconstruction which leaves one hanging in, well, emptiness. This metaphysical deconstruction can be applied to all phenomena because any phenomenon can be reduced to its parts in space or time. If you think that quarks are really ultimately existing inherent bits and pieces of reality just ponder the following observation by Nobel Prize winning Frank Wilzcek: The quantum Grid, which embodies our deepest understanding of reality, requires many qubits at each point of space and time. The qubits at a point describe the various things that might be happening at that point. For example, one of them describes the probability that (if you look) you will observe an electron with spin up ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1525 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! or down, another the probability that (if you look) you will observe an antielectron with spin up or down, and another the probability that (if you look) you will observe a red u quark with spin up or down.21 So presumably the Prasangika deconstruction should end at the level of Wilzcek’s ‘quantum Grid’. But what does this Grid consist of? Zurek would surely invoke ‘quantum states’ at this point. Fuchs, however, has declared that “quantum states do not exist.”22 According to Gorampa, Tsongkhapa’s Prasangika version of emptiness amounts to nihilism; Fuchs is often accused of being a solipsist, an accusation he vigorously denies. In his paper QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism Fuchs offers the cartoon image shown in figure 1 and explains its significance in elucidating QBism as follows: In contemplating a quantum measurement, one makes a conceptual split in the world: one part is treated as an agent, and the other as a kind of reagent or catalyst (one that brings about change in the agent itself). The latter is a quantum system of some finite dimension d. A quantum measurement consists first in the agent taking an action on the quantum system. The action is represented formally by a set of operators {Ei} - a positive operator-valued measure. The action generally leads to an incompletely predictable consequence Ei for the agent - The quantum state |ᴪ> makes no appearance but in the agent’s head; for it captures his degrees of belief concerning the consequences of his actions, and, in contrast to the quantum system itself, has no existence in the external world. Measurement devices are depicted as prosthetic hands to make it clear that they should be considered an integral part of the agent. The sparks between the measurement-device hand and the quantum system represent the idea that the consequence of each quantum measurement is a unique creation within the previously existing universe. Two points are decisive in distinguishing this picture of quantum measurement from a kind of solipsism: 1) The conceptual split of agent and external quantum system: If it were not needed, it would not have been made. 2) Once the agent chooses an action {Ei} to take, the particular consequence Ek of it is beyond his control - that is, the actual outcome is not a product of his whim and fancy.23 Figure 1 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1526 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! There are some intriguing aspects to Fuchs’s derivation of his QBism perspective, wherein the quantum wave function “makes no appearance but in the agent’s head” wherein it “captures his degrees of belief concerning the consequences of his actions”. Fuchs tells us the quantum wave function has “no existence in the external world” but, paradoxically, the “quantum system itself” apparently does, “conceptually” speaking, have some kind of, at least provisional, ‘existence’ in the ‘external world.’ An incongruous feature of this analysis is that Fuchs makes a provisional dichotomy into agent and the ‘catalyst’ quantum system in order to perform his conjuring trick of moving the quantum state or wave function from the place where it is traditionally, so to speak, located, which is where Fuchs’s nebulous ‘quantum system’ now resides, into the agent’s head. The ‘quantum state’ now becomes nothing but a constantly evolving personal set of ‘degrees of belief.’ This personal set of ‘degrees of belief’ arises on the basis of the set of experiences which have occurred to the particular person up until the present time. Once this perspective has been developed, however, the ‘quantum system’ seems to dissolve into, perhaps you guessed it, emptiness! (See figure 2). Although Fuchs refers to a putative ‘quantum system’ conceived of as being external to the subjectivities ‘interacting’ with it, in his discussion this nebulous conceptual convenience seems to entirely lack any defining characteristics. It seems, therefore, to be nothing other, if even this, than an ‘empty’ indefinable pool of possibility. Figure 2 In the QBism perspective what appeared to be a ‘quantum state’, which was thought to ‘exist’ in some sense ‘external’ to the observer, now becomes a summary of the person’s information input which has been acquired to date. Fuchs paraphrases a quote by James Hartle to elucidate this point: A quantum-mechanical state being a summary of the observers’ information about an individual physical system changes both by dynamical laws, and whenever the observer acquires new information about the system through the process of measurement. The existence of two laws for the evolution of the state vector becomes problematical only if it is believed that the state vector is an objective property of the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1527 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! system. If, however, the state of a system is defined as a list of [experimental] propositions together with their [probability of occurrence], it is not surprising that after a measurement the state must be changed to be in accord with [any] new information. The “reduction of the wave packet” does take place in the consciousness of the observer, not because of any unique physical process which takes place there, but only because the state is a construct of the observer and not an objective property of the physical system.24 The ‘two laws of evolution’ referred to here are 1) the smooth development of the wave function as it was thought to function in traditional quantum theory and 2) the ‘collapse of the wave function’ or ‘reduction of the state vector’ which appeared to occur when a ‘measurement’ takes place. These two phases are now smoothed out because there is simply nothing in the external world to which any ‘collapses’ or ‘reductions’ could take place; it’s all in the mind of the observer, of which there are , of course, many, each pursuing their own course of decision making and acquiring ‘information’ to update their quantum degrees of belief systems. In this quantum viewpoint the ‘quantum system’ really does seem to become analogous to an infinite pool of ‘empty’ and unstructured foundationless creative potentiality which has no graspable feature whatsoever. The universe becomes a mysterious, infinitely and spontaneously creative field of ‘emptiness’, or ‘empty’ potentiality, from which experiences, including experiences of our own embodiment, magically appear as if almost from nowhere. Thus in Fuchs’s published email correspondence with colleagues we read: For my own part, I imagine the world as a seething orgy of creation...There is no one way the world is because the world is still in creation, still being hammered out. It is still in birth and always will be...(To Sudbery-Barnum 18.8.03) Something new really does come into the world when two bits of it [system and appatatus] are united. We capture the idea that something new really arises by saying that physical law cannot go there - that the individual outcome of a quantum measurement is random and lawless. (To Caves-Schack 4.9.S1) A quantum world,.[is] a world in continual creation (Fuchs (2005) p.1) There is no such thing as THE universe in any completed and waiting-to-bediscovered sense...the universe as a whole is still under construction...Nothing is completed...even the “very laws” of physics. The idea is that they too are building up in precisely the way - and ever in the same danger of falling down as - individual organic species. (To Wiseman 24.6.02) How does the theory tell us there is much more to the world than it can say? It tells us that facts can be made to come into existence, and not just some time in the remote past called the “big bang” but here and now, all the time, whenever an observer sets out to perform...a quantum measurement...[I]t hints that facts are being created all the time all around us (To Musser 7.7.04)25 The QBism perspective is a radical form of pan-experientialism: The expectation of the quantum to classical transitionists is that quantum theory is at the bottom of things, and “the classical world of our experience” is something to be derived out of it. QBism says “No. Experience is neither classical nor quantum. Experience is experience with a richness that classical physics of any variety could ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1528 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! not remotely grasp.” Quantum mechanics is something put on top of raw, unreflected experience.26 And within this heady vision of a dance of pure experience the act of spontaneous creativity takes centre stage: To put it still differently, and now in the metaphor of music, a jazz musician might declare that a tune once heard thereafter plays its most crucial role as a substrate for something new. It is the fleeting solid ground upon which something new can be born. The seven tracks titled Salt Peanuts in my mp3 player are moments of novelty in the universe never to be recreated.27 It seems that the Madhyamika master Nagarjuna’s answer to the riddle of the ultimate nature of existence is entirely consistent with QBism: For those for whom emptiness is possible, Everything is possible, For those for whom emptiness is not possible, Nothing is possible.28 But it is important to bear in mind that Buddhist ‘emptiness’ doesn’t mean ‘nothingness’, it is an infinitely fertile realm of spontaneous creative potentiality. In his outline derivation of the QBism perspective Fuchs tells us that for the agent involved in making a measurement “the actual outcome is not a product of his whim and fancy.” The problem, however, with this assertion is that there is absolutely nothing in the account which actually can account for the actual outcome not being “a product of his whim and fancy.” On the QBism view given by Fuchs we simply have to accept that the world is this way, it is miraculously co-ordinated such that it is not subject to whim and fancy, but we cannot query as to the source of this co-ordination. In his derivation Fuchs makes a ‘conceptual’ use of a putative ‘quantum system’ which appears to be ‘external’ to the agent but, as we have seen, this seems to be a ‘conceptual’ convenience which is as insubstantial as ‘emptiness’. For as Fuchs forcefully tells us: …quantum states are not something out there, in the external world, but instead are expressions of information. Before there were people using quantum theory as a branch of physics, before they were calculating neutron-capture cross-sections for uranium and working on all the other practical problems the theory suggests, there were no quantum states. The world may be full of stuff and things of all kinds, but among all the stuff and all the things, there is no unique, observer-independent, quantum-state kind of stuff. This viewpoint, which simply accepts a ‘conventional’ world of ‘stuff and things’ but refuses to speculate on the nature of an ontology underlying the functioning of the ‘stuff and things’ is remarkably close to the Madhyamaka-Prasangika view as depicted by the seventh century Madhyamika Chandrakirti: Vases, canvas, bucklers, armies, forests, garlands, trees, Houses, chariots, hostelries, and all such things That common people designate, dependent on their parts, Accept as such. For Buddha did not quarrel with the world! Parts and part possessors, qualities and qualified, desire and those desiring, Defined and definition, fire and fuel – subjected, like a chariot, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1529 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! To sevenfold analysis are shown to be devoid of real existence. Yet by worldly, every day convention, they exist indeed.29 Here Candrakirti lists a few items of ‘stuff and things’ which appear to exist as ‘inherently real’ entities in the ‘worldly, every day convention’. These things do indeed appear to exist most definitely and undisputedly. However, when, like the chariot analysis which has been indicated previously, these things which are ‘dependent on their parts’ are subjected to the sevenfold analysis (an entity which is dependent on its parts does not inherently exist because 1) it is not identical with its parts, 2) it is not completely separate from its parts 3) it is not in its parts, 4) it is not something within which its parts exist, 5) it does not possess its parts, 6) it is not the composite of its parts, and 7) it is not the shape of its parts) they vanish into emptiness, they are clearly not there in the way that they appear to be: As when you dream or see a city in the clouds, A mirage of a pool, an optical illusion, or an image in a glass, The things you see are unproduced, are all without existence. But how do we perceive them? It should not be possible!30 This Prasangika view (although it must be pointed out that the ‘Prasangika’ label came later within Tibetan classification, Chandrakirti would have not considered himself to be such) seems to be thoroughly consistent with QBism. When Chandrakirti says that the things of the ‘common’ conventional world are unproduced he means that they are not produced as inherently existing entities from some deeper underlying substantial cause, they literally hang in emptiness. There are just perceptions without any underlying ground of perception. The Prasangika Madhyamika accepts the appearance of the common world of conventionality as groundless, hanging in emptiness so to speak. To illustrate how applicable this is to Fuchs’s perspective we can consider his treatment of the “Wigner’s friend” scenario. In the usual presentation of this quantum conundrum we consider that Wigner has left his friend to make a measurement of some quantum system and the friend keeps his result private. Wigner returns does not know the result. Now the paradox is supposed to reside in the fact that the friend, having ‘collapsed’ the wave function of the quantum system in question is happily in his quantumly collapsed state, he is not hovering in a quantum superposition of contradictory possibilities. Wigner, however, from the perspective of traditional quantum theory, must ‘see’ his friend as a hovering mist of quantumly superposed possibilities. There would seem to be a contradictory situation as to the ‘quantum state’ of the friend. This, according to Fuchs, indicates the kind of problems which arise when we take the notion of ‘quantum states’ seriously: Who has the right state of information? The conundrums simply get too heavy if one tries to hold to an agent-independent notion of correctness for otherwise personalistic quantum states. The Quantum Bayesian dispels these and similar difficulties of the “aha, caught you!” variety by being conscientiously forthright. Whose information? “Mine” Information about what? The consequences (for me) of my actions upon the physical system!”31 From this perspective there are only personalised perception, action, and belief systems (within which various beliefs have degrees of uncertainly), which presumably includes unconscious structures of degrees of belief, and, furthermore: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1530 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! You see, for the QBist, the real world, the one both agents are embedded in - with its objects and events - is taken for granted. What is not taken for granted is each agent's access to the parts of it he has not touched.32 As in the Prasangika version of Madhyamaka the perceptions of the various agents seem to hang unconnected with each other in a space-like emptiness, and yet the conventional world as it appears at a ‘common level is ‘taken for granted’. Indeed, the Quantum Bayesian perspective seems to remove the very notion of physicality from within its domain: The only substantive conceptual issue left … is whether quantum mechanics is obligated to derive the notion of agent to whose aid the theory was built in the first place? The answer comes from turning the tables: Thinking of probability theory in the personalist Bayesian way, as an extension of formal logic, would one ever imagine that the notion of an agent, the user of the theory, could be derived out of its conceptual apparatus? Clearly not. How could you possibly get flesh and bones out of a calculus for making wise decisions? The logician and the logic he uses are two different substances - they live in conceptual categories worlds apart. One is in the stuff of the physical world, and one is somewhere nearer to Plato's heaven of ideal forms.33 It is, however, necessary to be circumspect and perhaps slightly suspicious of some of Fuchs’s philosophical ploys as he appears to want to deny a ‘quantum-state-stuff’ of the world at the same time as “positing quantum systems as ‘real existences’ external to the agent”34 From a Madhyamaka perspective apparent entities which are conjured somehow from emptiness should not be considered to be ‘real’. It seems far more appropriate to identify Fuchs’s ‘quantum system’ with ‘emptiness’. However, the Prasangika flavour of emptiness does not fall into the extreme subjectivist (although not solipsist) viewpoint that appears to be central in QBism which seems to entirely eliminate any linking mechanism between the belief structures of groups of individuals. According to Fuchs: …if ghostly spirits are imagined behind the actual events produced in quantum measurements, one is left with conceptual troubles to no end. … there can be no such thing as a right and true quantum state, if such is thought of defined by criteria external to the agent making the assignment…35 Buddhism, however, has as one of its core doctrines the assertion that karma, the universal law of cause and effect, operates on all levels of reality, including the manifestation of the apparently material world (the Western notion that karma is a purely moral mechanism is mistaken). Because of this all Buddhist schools of philosophy need some way to account for the operation of karma. The way in which the Yogacara-Cittamatra (Yogachara-Chittamatra) school of thought accounted for the operation was by asserting the existence of a ‘ghostly’ ground or foundation consciousness (alayavijnana). According to the Yogacara-Cittamatra the alyavijnana stream of subtle substantiality collects the traces of the activities of all sentient beings; these traces remain latent until the surrounding conditions and potentialities are such that they are manifested at a future point in time. The alayavijnana is in many respects analogous to a universal wave function and one can consider that the process through which ‘seeds’ are karmically ‘deposited’ into this fundamental subtle ground of reality accounts for the potentialities within wave functions. So we may draw an analogy between the universal alayavijnana and Zurek’s universal wave function. And the Prasangika viewpoint criticizes the Yogacara-Cittamatra notion of a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1531 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! universal subtle consciousness, which is supposed to function to carry ‘seeds’ of potentiality, in a fashion quite concordant with Fuchs’s criticisms of Zurek’s position. Consider Fuchs’s remarks concerning the notion of an ‘unknown quantum state’: The term is ubiquitous: unknown quantum states are teleported, protected with quantum error correcting codes, used to check for quantum eavesdropping, and arise in innumerable other applications. From a quantum-Bayesian point of view, however, the phrase can only be an oxymoron, something that contradicts itself: If quantum states are compendia of beliefs, and not states of nature, then the state is known to someone, at the very least the agent who holds it. But if so, then what are the experimentalists doing when they say they are performing quantum-state tomography in the laboratory? The very goal of the procedure is to characterize the unknown quantum state a piece of laboratory equipment is repetitively preparing. There is certainly no little agent sitting on the inside of the device devilishly sending out quantum systems representative of his beliefs, and smiling an experimenter on the outside slowly homes in on those private thoughts through his experiments. What gives? Here Fuchs lampoons, in true Tibetan Buddhist style, the notion of an ‘unknown quantum state’. The point is that according to Fuchs there are no ‘ghostly’ yet subtly substantial ‘quantum-state-stuff’ entities that independently ‘exist’ somehow externally. Candrakirti criticizes the notion of a subtle realm of potentiality giving rise to actuality on similar grounds: Potential cannot be in what is actual; With what is not yet born it cannot be aligned. No owner can there be of what does not exist, Or such could be ascribed to childless women’s sons! You say that consciousness will manifest and thus it has potential. We say that since there is now no potential, there will be no consciousness. Phenomena arising in a mutual dependence Do not have true existence… If consciousness emerges from a ripened potency already past It will have come from a potential that’s extraneous to itself. And since the instants of this continuity are alien to each other Anything and everything can come from anything.36 The first two lines indicate the ‘oxymoronic’ nature of the proposed viewpoint. The notion that potentialities are ‘actual’ entities is contradictory; if they are ‘actual’ then it follows they cannot be ‘potential’ exactly because they are already ‘actual’. Thus the notion of non-existent yet potential entities is like the notion of a ‘childless women’s sons’. The Pransagika view is simply that consciousness and that which consciousness is conscious of arise through ‘mutual dependence’, and mutually dependent entities are not truly or inherently existent. The final verse indicates that a potentiality in the past is a completely extraneous, alien and separate entity from a present consciousness. This means there is no relationship of any kind between them, therefore, if someone thinks that these two things can be related then any two things of any kind whatsoever, however different, could also be related. Such a view, however, poses serious problems for the central Buddhist concept of karma, for how can a karmic action which has completely ceased in the past have any effect in the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1532 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! present? The Prasangikas had a way around this problem. For them the entire process of reality could be considered as consisting of momentary flashes or pulses of apparent, yet ultimately ‘empty’, ‘existence’. Each existential pulse had a moment of arising, a moment of abiding, and a moment of disintegrating. Furthermore, for them ‘disintegratedness’ is a ‘functioning thing’ which conditioned further momentary pulses of ‘disintegratedness’; momentary pulses of ‘disintegratedness’, then, are responsible for the operation of karmavipaka, or cause and effect, (the Prasangika’s version of a ‘quantum state’!). Within the worldview of the Prasangika-Madhyamaka, then, there is a linking mechanism which can account for co-ordination and coherence within the process of reality. This does not however seem to be the case with QBism. This is indicated by Fuchs’s treatment of the Wigner situation wherein the QBism approach simply does not require co-ordination and coherence between the agents involved, however friendly they may be. Recall Fuchs’s exuberant endorsement of the QBist ‘personalist’ perspective: Whose information? “Mine” Information about what? The consequences (for me) of my actions upon the physical system!”37 Towards the end of his paper ‘QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism’ Fuchs discusses the QBist approach to quantum cosmology. He begins by citing a quote from David Deutsch concerning the necessity for the observer to be ‘inside’ the universal quantum system in the context of cosmology: The best physical reason for adopting the Everett interpretation lies in quantum cosmology. There one tries to apply quantum theory to the universe as a whole, considering the universe as a dynamical object starting with a big bang, evolving to form galaxies and so on. Then when one tries, for example by looking in a text book, to ask what the symbols in the quantum theory mean, how does one use the wave function of the universe and the other mathematical objects that quantum theory employs to describe reality? One reads there, ‘The meaning of these mathematical objects is as follows: first consider an observer outside the quantum system under consideration ....’ And immediately one has to stop short. Postulating an outside observer is all very well when we're talking about a laboratory: we can imagine an observer sitting outside the experimental apparatus looking at it, but when the experimental apparatus - the object being described by quantum theory - is the entire universe, it's logically inconsistent to imagine an observer sitting outside it. Therefore the standard interpretation fails. It fails completely to describe quantum cosmology. Even if we knew how to write down the theory of quantum cosmology, which is quite hard incidentally, we literally wouldn't know what the symbols meant under any interpretation other than the Everett interpretation.38 Fuchs says about this that: But this is nonsense. It is not hard to imagine how to measure the universe as a whole. You simply live in it.39 According to Fuchs: Quantum theory advises an agent to make all his probability assignments derivable from one quantum state. Write it like this if you wish: |ᴪuniverse> ISSN: 2153-8212 (17) Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1533 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! why not? We are swimming in this ocean called the universe, and we have to do physics from inside of it. But then all the rest of the universe is outside each of us. Eq. (17) represents an agent’s catalog of beliefs for the relevant things outside. The only point here is that QBism has every bit as much right to do cosmology as any other crazy interpretation of quantum mechanics. The only difference is that QBism does it from the inside. And he gives a cartoon illustration of a stick person ‘building up’ a personalized QBist universe for his or her personal use. I have added the bottommost stick person to add the necessary Buddhist foundation. As we can see Fuchs’s agent is actually walling him or herself up into a private prison of personalized degrees of belief about a multitude of possibilities which then somehow carve a unique individualized field of experience of a ‘universe’. In this vision each agent would have their own equation (17) so there would be a multitude of walled off personalized ‘universes’ (figure 4). Fuchs is accused of being a solipsist; but he is quite correct when he says that he is not, in fact he is a multiversal solipsistic pluralist! Figure 3 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1534 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Figure 4 Fortunately for the poor solipsistic inhabitants of all these personalized universes, however, there is a way out. The belief systems which are blocking them in are all ultimately floating in ‘emptiness’ and are constructed within ‘emptiness’. So all they need to do is become ‘enlightened’ and see through the illusion that these deep seated belief systems generate. And what they need in order to do this is to ‘realize’ the fact that the blocks, representing all the experiential phenomena of the personalized universe, are ‘empty’ of ‘inherent existence’ which means that they ‘do not exist from their own side’, which is one formulation of what emptiness means. And, remarkably, in a QBist reality this is exactly true, all the blocks representing experienced phenomena in Fuchs’s cartoons are, on the basis of his own quantum interpretation, no more that the result of a systems of beliefs of various degrees of certainty or uncertainty operating within quantum emptiness! As previously outlined the Buddhist philosopher-practitioner Gorampa (Gorampa Sönam Sengé 1429-1489) considered that the Tsongkhapa (Tsong kha pa Blo bzang grags pa – 13571419) version of the Madhyamaka, which is that ‘emptiness’ is realized only through a mere non-affirming negation of the inherent existence of phenomena amounts to ‘nihilism’. This is because it appears that a negation which affirms absolutely nothing would surely leave absolutely nothing. Tsongkhapa, of course, disagreed; his view was that what was left was the pure experience of emptiness which should not be described in conceptual terms. On the other extreme of the debate to Tsongkhapa is the slightly earlier Buddhist ‘master’ Dopopa (Dol bu ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1535 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! ba rab rgyal mtshan or Dolpopa Sherab Gyaltsen – 1292-1361). The following is Gorampa’s description of Dolpopa’s view which involves two interdependent types of ‘emptiness’. This view begins from the perspective of Tsongkhapa’s ‘emptiness of own nature’, which means lack of ‘inherent existence’: Anything that is a conventional truth is, like a dream and an illusion, from time immemorial, empty of its own nature; that is why the emptiness of these [conventional truths] is called “emptiness of own nature.” Moreover, since this form of emptiness is, by nature, but a simple absolute negation … it is a nihilistic emptiness…, an inanimate emptiness …, and a partial emptiness… It is not the ultimate truth - the perfect, unmistaken emptiness.40 So, although Dolpopa agrees that Tsongkhapa’s kind of ‘emptiness of own nature’ is an emptiness, he also asserts that it is only partial and not the whole story. According to Dolpopa the Buddhist teachings which teach only ‘emptiness of own nature’ only applies to conventional reality, which corresponds in the terminology of quantum theory to ‘classical’ reality. All the phenomena of conventional reality, which is the reality experienced by unenlightened beings, are empty of own nature, they do not have any internal solid core. However Dolpopa says of ultimate reality that: Reality, the real, the ultimate truth, is not empty of its own nature. It is, however, empty of everything that is by nature imaginary or dependent, that is, of all compounded phenomena that are by nature conventional. This reality is the perfect, unmistaken emptiness, the ultimate truth, the dharmakaya, the perfect end, thusness, the emptiness that possesses the best of every quality…41 Dolpopa is aware of the necessity of Tsongkhapa’s view of the ‘emptiness of own nature’ for the path which enables a practitioner to achieve enlightenment but when he describes the ultimate nature of reality he is famed for his assertion of its perfect stability and perfect unchangingness as the perfect nature which ‘empty’ of ‘other’ conditioned phenomena : Just that final Buddha, the matrix of the one-gone-thus, the ultimate clear light, element of attributes, self-arisen pristine wisdom, great bliss, and partless pervader of all is said to be the basis and source of all phenomena, the void basis, and the basis pure of all defilements. It also is said to be endowed with the qualities of the body of attributes beyond the count of the sands of the Ganges River within an indivisible nature.42 Dolpopa’s descriptions of the ultimate nature of reality in his monumental and magnificent work on other-emptiness, Mountain Doctrine, Ocean of Definitive Meaning: Final Unique Quintessential Instructions are replete with phrases that resonate with the theoretical entity that modern physics calls the wave function. Some of the synonyms offered by Dolpopa, which are indicative of an appreciation of the fact that the underlying nature of the process of reality is a Mind-like field, or matrix, to use Planck’s terminology (“Mind is the matrix of all matter.”43), of potentiality are:        Body of attributes Element of attributes Source of attributes Source of all phenomena Basis that is empty of all phenomena Emptiness endowed with all aspects Emptiness of the ultimate ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1536 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way!                         Emptiness of specific characteristics Emptiness of all attributes Emptiness of the indestructible Aspectless endowed with all aspects Signless basic element Basic constituent of cyclic existence Pure basis Basis empty of all phenomena Limit of reality Limit of cyclic existence Limit of emptiness Matrix of phenomena The uncompounded noumenon Noumenon of phenomena Illusory like noumenon Self-cognizing and self-illuminating ultimate pristine wisdom Inconceivable sphere Sphere of nonduality Knowledge of all aspects Ultimate mind of enlightenment Natural spontaneity Nature of dreams Containing all worlds Buddha Matrix The characterisations ‘body of attributes’, ‘element of attributes’, ‘source of attributes’, ‘matrix of phenomena’, ‘noumenon of phenomenon’ and ‘source of all phenomena’ and so on adumbrate what physicists consider today to be a wave function quantum realm, the realm of potentiality which exists prior to manifestation through observation. The epithet ‘containing all worlds’ indicates the close connection with the quantum many-worlds hypothesis. We might also note that the nature of this fundamental element, or matrix, of reality is described as ‘a nature of dreams,’ a designation which resonates with Zurek’s description of the quantum epiontic ‘dream stuff’ of reality.44 Dolpopa’s elucidation of the ‘element of attributes’ states that, whilst it is fundamentally undifferentiable, at the same time all possible attributes which might be manifested are contained within it: It also is said to be endowed with the qualities of the body of attributes beyond the count of the sands of the Ganges River within an indivisible nature.45 And: Just as space is asserted as always pervading all, So the uncontaminated Buddha-element of attributes also is asserted as always pervasive, Just as space pervades all forms in the sense of opening a way for them, So it also pervades the groups of sentient beings.46 And: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1537 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Just as space which has a non-conceptual and unobstructed nature Pervades undifferentiably all physical phenomena So the luminous nature of mind, the primordially undefiled element of attributes, Also entirely pervades without differentiation all states of persons. That naturally pure element of attributes is the general character or noumenon of all phenomena…47 And: Dwelling in the bodies of all In a dual and nondual manner The principle essence of effective things and non-effective things. Abiding pervading the stable and the moving, It is asserted as just having the form of illusion.48 And: Space is the element of attributes. The element is thought of as ‘seed.’ It exists inside all phenomena. It is the cause of all supreme states. Just as oil exists in sesame, Just as fire exists in wood, So it exists in all phenomena. Though it exists in that way In all phenomena, it is not seen.49 And this ultimate perfect nature, the ‘source of all phenomena’, is itself ‘empty of other’, which means that its perfect nature is not sullied or disturbed by all the conditioned phenomena of the conventional world. When this level of reality is directly experienced in deep meditation it is a unwavering blissful continuity of nondual awareness. Dolpopa’s viewpoint makes a lot of sense, and when Dolpopa’s view is appreciated it is also possible to see the full relevance of Tsongkhapa’s position. Figure 5 shows an unenlightened human being observing a conventional and ‘classical’ phenomenon which has come into apparent existence from the ‘ultimate’ quantum realm through the operation of the agent’s belief systems which produces the appearance of the classical world. As far as this unenlightened being is concerned such appearances appear very real, the apparent solidity of the ‘material’ world is very persuasive. From this point of view it is Tsongkhapa’s view of the ‘emptiness of own nature’ which is of paramount importance. In order to become enlightened a practitioner needs to ‘realize’ this truth directly and without any trace of doubt, enlightenment is an existential transformation of consciousness which operates at the deepest level of psychophysical embodiment. Figure 6 show the situation from the point of view of an enlightened being whose consciousness resides in the ultimate realm. Such a being, a buddha, has ‘gone beyond’ the conventional realm and they abide in the ultimate. From their point of view the ultimate realm is ‘empty’ of the apparent phenomena of the conventional realm. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1538 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Figure 5 – Tsongkhapa’s configuration of ‘emptiness of own-nature’ Figure 6 – Dolpopa’s configuration of ‘emptiness of other’ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1539 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Gorampa, however, considers that Tsongkhapa’s ‘emptiness of own nature’ and Dolpopa’s ‘emptiness of other’ are extreme views and argues for a ‘middle way’ of ‘freedom from extremes’: The third system is the view of the Madhyamaka as Freedom from Extremes, a view that has been cultivated and then explained to others as the unanimous opinion and the single melody of the scholar-practitioners of the Tibetan nation up to the time of the glorious Sa skya pa scholars… Madhyamaka [literally, “the Middle way”'] refers to the freedom from all extremes, like existence and nonexistence, and is and is-not. That is why it is necessary to eliminate all grasping at extremes and all grasping at signs. Furthermore, since the subsequent grasping at extremes will not be eliminated unless one first negates “the truth” that is the object of the grasping at truth, it is necessary to set forth the truthlessness of all things, both external and internal, by means of … reasoning … This is the rough object-to-be-negated … But having negated that, there is a tendency to grasp at the very emptiness of truth as if it were a real thing Just as someone mounted on a horse may not fall off on the right side, but may still fall off on the left side; likewise, those who grasp at emptiness have not gone beyond falling into the extreme of nihilism and that is why even the grasping at emptiness must be refuted. And since grasping at things as if they were both empty and non-empty, and neither must also be refuted, no object grasped in terms of the four extremes is found. It is the nongrasping of things in any of those four ways that we call “the realization of the Madhyamaka view” But if there arises a one-sided grasping of the form, “this is the Madhyamaka view, then whether one grasps thing as empty as Tsongkhapa does or as non-empty as Dolpopa does, since one will not have gone beyond a grasping at extremes, this is not the Madhyamaka view.50 The ‘Sa skya scholars’ were a particular lineage of the Sakya school of Tibetan Buddhism. Gorampa was an important Sakya scholar, Dolpopa was a founder of Jonang school and Tsongkhapa was the founder of the Gelug school. The phrase ‘truthlessness of all things’ refers to the lack of ‘inherent existence’ or ‘emptiness’ of all phenomena which is Tsongkhapa’s position. Gorampa considers that Tsongkhapa’s position veers too much in the direction of negation whilst Dolpopa errs on the side of too much affirmation. According to Gorampas’s view the enlightened mind embraces all phenomena but clings or grasps at none, in other words it does not cling to even the ultimate. The enlightened mind comprehends the phenomena of the conventional world and the emptiness of the ultimate realm simultaneously. Figure 7 is a somewhat feeble attempt to portray this graphically. We can now map the three quantum views we looked at earlier, the two ‘extreme’ interpretations: the objective many-worlds universal wave function, and Fuchs’s subjective quantum QBism suggestion, and the quantum ‘middle way’ advocated by Wojciech Zurek, with the two ‘extreme’ Madhyamaka views: Dolpopa’s universal ‘matrix of phenomena’, Tsongkhapa’s subjective ‘emptiness of own nature’ perspective, and Gorampa’s claimed correction to the Buddhist ‘middle way’ in his view of the ‘freedom from extremes.’ ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1540 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Figure 6 – Gorampa’s ‘freedom from extremes’ The ‘many-worlds universal wave function’ vision of reality asserts the objective existence of the wave function. As Dieter Zeh has said: If quantum theory appears as a ‘smokey dragon’ …, the dragon itself may now be recognised as the universal wavefunction, greatly veiled to us local beings by the ‘smoke’ represented by our own entanglement with the rest of the world. However you turn it: In the beginning was the wavefunction.51, And presumably this means also that the end will be the wave function. And in the manyworlds flavour of the universal wave function all worlds contained within this ‘smokey dragon’ of existence ‘exist’, or are ‘real’ for the experiential continuums of the sentient beings involved, although ultimately illusory. Dolpopa’s universal ‘element of attributes’, or ‘matrix of phenomena’ is also viewed as the permanent and unchanging ‘objective’ basis for the illusory phenomena which appear within it but are in ‘reality’ not part of it. Thus for Dolpopa all the worlds of the ‘conditioned’ phenomena within his matrix are considered to be illusory whereas the basis itself is ultimate reality. Tsongkhapa, on the other hand, adopted a viewpoint consistent with a radical subjectivist perspective because he considered that the phenomena experienced by all sentient beings were the result of the operation of two sets of internal modes of mistaken perception, the ‘afflictive obscurations’ and the ‘obstructions to omniscience’. Both of these have been built up over beginningless time through repeated rebirths. ‘Afflictive obscurations’ are the most ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1541 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! gross of the two, being generated by afflicted emotions such as greed and anger. ‘Obstructions to omniscience’ consist of subtle layers of deep belief that experiential phenomena are inherently real. According to Tsongkhapa when a Buddhist practitioner removes all the obscurations and obstructions they thereby realize the ‘empty’ nature of the process of reality and thus become enlightened. This view can be compared, at least in its metaphysical essence, with the subjectivist QBist perspective. We have seen how Gorampa attempted to embrace and harmonize the two Madhyamaka ‘extremes’. Here’s what Zurek says about the quantum situation: Measurement – perception – is the place where physics gets personal, where our role and our capabilities as observers and agents of change in the universe (and our limitations as entities subject to the laws of physics) are tested - or, rather, where we get put in our place. I believe that quick solutions, and I include both the Copenhagen interpretation and many worlds here, have a tendency to gloss over the real mystery, which is how do we - that is to say, how does life - fit within the quantum universe. I think we have managed to constrain the possible answers (for example, through research on decoherence), but I believe there is more to come. The virtue of the focus on quantum measurement is that it puts issues connected with information and existence at the very center. This is where they should be.’52 If we take the identification of ‘measurement’ with ‘perception’ that Zurek makes in the first sentence and use it in the penultimate sentence we arrive at a statement of his ‘epiontic’ quantum ‘middle way’: The virtue of the focus on quantum perception is that it puts issues connected with information and existence at the very center. This is where they should be. Zurek’s model suggests that it requires the ‘epiontic’ operation of a deep level of quantum ‘subjectivity’ which provides the drive towards perception, operating at levels much deeper than the higher levels of embodied consciousness, in order that the ‘objective’ probabilities within the universal wave function come into experiential ‘reality’. Thus his perspective would seem to embrace both the ‘objective’ and ‘subjective’ dimensions. Zurek also makes the relevant observation that: I think many of us have way too much confidence that our everyday language can capture everything that we will ever encounter in our quantum universe. Clearly (and as Bohr insisted!), it should capture whatever crosses into the classical realm. But mathematics is the language of quantum theory, and trying to translate it into everyday language is often simply impossible.53 The Polish-American scientist and philosopher Alfred Korzybski, developer the theory of ‘general semantics’ coined a catchy phrase for this kind of insight, he said ‘the map is not the territory’.54 Within Buddhist metaphysical philosophical debates it is generally accepted that the various ‘ultimate’ viewpoints are explorations of the advantages and the limitations of various ways of conceiving of the metaphysical depth of reality. As Buddhist scholar Jeffrey Hopkins says they are tools for developing the practitioners ‘metaphysical imagination.’55 It is also generally accepted that no one view, amongst the views that are appropriate to ultimate reality (materialism for instance is definitely not appropriate), is the absolutely final and immovably correct one. The final knowledge of the nature of reality is attained by non-conceptual direct ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1542 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! experience. And one aspect of the ‘middle way’ is the skillful practice of being able to employ all possible views upon the ultimate nature of reality to the extent of their applicability within any context. All limited views, when grasped and reified as ultimate to the exclusion of all others, can become nothing more than obscuring misunderstandings. Only by understanding that all views are limited viewpoints upon the ultimate non-fixed and ultimately nonconceptual view can such views be correctly applied: Attachment to one’s view and Aversion to the views of others are nothing more than conception. Therefore if you first overcome attachment and aggression And then analyse, you will be liberated.56 Only by appreciating the terrain from all viewpoints can its full nature be fully comprehended. This perhaps might be a useful addition to the mindset to those involved in the debate concerning the foundations of quantum physics and the implications for our knowledge of reality. During the course of this exploration to find a ‘middle way’ the notion of ‘inherent existence’, which is a technical term – svabhava, ‘own-being’ or ‘innate-nature’ – used in Buddhist philosophy, has played a significant role. Although this term has a crucial central role in Buddhist analysis it actually denotes something which, according to Buddhist metaphysics, does not exist anywhere in the universe. It seems to be the case, as the physics writer Jim Baggott puts it, that: There is simply nothing we can point to, hang our hats on and say this is real.57 Or, as a Madhyamika philosopher would say the notion of a phenomenon within reality which has own internal fully established nature, am inherent core of substantial reality which exists in a completely self-contained, self-enclosed fashion is like the notion of a ‘rabbit’s horn’ or a ‘barren woman’s child.’ In this sense all phenomenon within the universe are ‘empty’ of inherent existence and, furthermore, this also indicates that all phenomena are interdependent. Even furthermore, such a view means that in a very real sense the phenomena within the universe may actually lack any foundation; if, that is, we are searching for an inherently real foundation. Quantum physicist and philosopher Bernard d’Espagnat, having reached the conclusion that physics is incapable of ever unveiling the nature of a quantum ‘veiled’ reality conceived of as existing separately and independently of consciousness, suggests that insights into the nature of reality might very well come from other directions amongst which he refers to Buddhist thought which: …rejects the notion of a ‘ground of things’ and even lays stress on the opposite notion, the one of an ‘absence of foundation’ or ‘emptiness.’ 58 If this were to be the case then the notion of the ‘foundations of quantum theory’ might be slightly askew. Physicists generally consider that the hallmark of a viable physical theory is its effective mathematical formulation, but Gödel’s theorems have shown that mathematics itself lacks a solid logical foundation. So what should that tell us? Reading through a book like the recently published set of interviews with leading quantum physicists, Elegance and Enigma: The Quantum Interviews, it is difficult not to come away with the impression that the great majority of physicists, to differing degrees, really are ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1543 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! looking for ‘inherently real’ foundations for their quantum theory. The overall impression is that most of those involved in the discussion think there are some kind of inherently real quantum nuts and bolts, so to speak, yet to be found. Thus Tim Maudlin, a professor of philosophy at Rutgers University, says: “Fundamental principles” in physics ought to refer to the specification of an exact physical ontology (what exists) and a dynamics (how what exists behaves in space and time). Without these “principles,” one does not have a clear physical theory at all. And everything else, such as the analysis of interactions in laboratory (“measurements”), physical capacities for transmitting information, the computational power of physical systems, and so on, is understood in terms of physical constitution of things and the laws that govern the basic physical items. It is rather misleading to call this “interpretation,” or even “foundations”: it is rather a description of physics as a discipline.59 GianCarlo Ghiradi, a professor emeritus of physics at the University of Trieste says: I believe that quantum mechanics requires neither a reconstruction nor an interpretation. I take the position that it requires a reformulation that makes it internally and logically consistent - and, even more importantly, that allows it to account for our definite perceptions concerning macroscopic events.60 Shelly Goldstein, professor of mathematics, physics and philosophy at Rutgers University: And if what we extract from the fundamental principles is just plain old standard quantum mechanics, formulated in the usual textbook way, then insofar as the foundations of quantum mechanics is concerned, we will have accomplished precious little, since we still would not know precisely what it is that quantum mechanics says about physical reality.61 Anton Zeilinger, professor of experimental physics at the University of Vienna: I expect that the ultimate reconstruction has to start from very simple fundamental principles that are intuitively clear - very much in the same way as, for example, in the general theory of relativity, where we have the equivalence principle.62 The mindset is clear; it seems that there is a deep expectation that a fixed and final ‘inherently existent’ and completely self-consistent foundation is essential. David Mermin, a professor of physics emeritus at Cornell University, on the other hand, endorses the ‘radical’ metaphysically relativistic proposal of the ‘consistent histories’ approach: …the consistent historians elevate it to a fundamental ontological principle. Reality is multi-faceted. There can be this reality or there can be that reality, and provided you refrain from combining actualities from mutually inconsistent realities, all of the incompatible realities have an equally valid claim to actuality. This tangle of mutually incompatible candidates for actuality (associated with different “frameworks”) constitutes the no-collapse side of consistent histories. … This multiplicity of incompatible realities reminds me of special relativity where there is time in this frame of reference and time in that frame of reference, and provided only that you do not combine temporal statements valid in two different frames of reference, one set of temporal statements is as valid a description of reality as the other.63 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1544 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! This corresponds to what the modern Buddhist philosopher B. Alan Wallace refers to as ‘ontological relativity’ which is the metaphysical position that asserts that ‘reality’ can and does manifest in various different, although interrelated ways: According to Einstein, the speed of light is invariant across all inertial frames of reference. Anyone anywhere traveling at any velocity always perceives light as traveling at the same speed, regardless of the direction it is traveling. Einstein's special theory of relativity pertains to inertial frames of reference traveling in straight lines at constant speeds, and in his general theory he expands this principle to include all frames of reference, whatever their speed or direction. Both theories are as much about invariants as they are about relativity. In the theory of ontological relativity there is one truth that is invariant across all cognitive frames of reference: everything that we apprehend, whether perceptually or conceptually, is devoid of its own inherent nature, or identity, independent of the means by which it is known. Perceived objects, or observable entities, exist relative to the sensory faculties or systems of measurement by which they are detected-not independently in the objective world. This is the broad consensus among psychologists, neuroscientists, and physicists. 64 This metaphysical position is basically the one advanced by Hawking and Mlodinow in their recent book The Grand Design: Model-dependent realism short circuits all this argument and discussion between the realist and anti-realist schools of thought. According to model-dependent realism, it is pointless to ask whether a model is real, only whether it agrees with observation. If there are two models that both agree with observation … then one cannot say that one is more real than another. One can use whichever model is more convenient in the situation under consideration.65 Model-dependent realism accepts that the nature of reality is such that it necessarily manifests in differing, yet coherently interdependent, ways. Because of this some models, materialism for instance, can definitely be ruled out. In Hawking and Mlodinow’s formulation the terms ‘realist’ and ‘anti-realist’ are used quite loosely for, in fact, Model-dependent realism necessarily will have to impute a lack of ‘inherent reality’ to all models. The whole metaphysical point of such a perspective is that it is the very nature of reality to manifest in a coherently coordinated variety of different ways; this is exactly what one would expect in a quantum epiontic universe. At the beginning of this article a quote from William James concerning the nature of the metaphysical quest was offered, the last paragraph of which is: So the universe has always appeared to the natural mind as a kind of enigma, of which the key must be sought in the shape of some illuminating or power-bringing word or name. That word names the universe's PRINCIPLE, and to possess it is, after a fashion, to possess the universe itself. “God,” “Matter,” “Reason,” “the Absolute,” “Energy” are so many solving names. You can rest when you have them. You are at the end of your metaphysical quest.66 However it appears that we may have to accept the fact that the nature of reality may be such that a constrained ‘epiontic’ metaphysical relativism, or ‘ontological relativity’ as Wallace calls it, is required within which various differing, and yet interconnected, conceptual formulations are possible, the only final ‘knowledge’ being a direct experiential non-dual awareness achieved by very few. In a sense one might say that quantum theory is not so much ‘elegance and enigma’ but demonstrates the elegance of enigma. The elegance is the result of the universal Mindnature exploring its multifaceted qualitative experiential potentialities. And ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1545 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! it is only within direct non-conceptual experience that we can possibly have any final knowledge of reality. Recently I had a brief online discussion with the computational neuroscientist Luigi Acerbi who in his ‘Epionticity’ blog67 has written that “reading in the same sentence words such as ‘quantum’, ‘God’ and ‘consciousness’” makes him “quite skeptical about the content of the text.” With regard to my assertion that ‘the ultimate nature of reality is mind-like’ (a proposition he designates as ‘M’) he blogged: I do not care about the truth value of M. I simply think that at this point of human knowledge M is a vacuous, ill-defined, pointless statement, mostly confusing and misleading since it carries a lot of undesired baggage (nothing personal, I believe the same about many famous grand statements). According to various definitions of mind or matter, possibly including my own ones, the ultimate nature of reality is Mind. Good, well done. Now what? Do we have a mathematical theory of Mind, even a tentative one, that we can apply to the universe … To this I replied: The answer is – one adopts a rigorous practice of meditation in order to get enlightened. Then you do not need a mathematical description of mind because you directly know the non-dual nature of fundamental awareness. In one metaphor one can say that the enlightened being becomes the mind of the universe and a mathematical description becomes irrelevant. Anyway we already have a mathematical equation of the functioning of mind – it’s called the Schrodinger equation. Of course the Schrodinger equation is not the only equation we have of the functioning of Mind, or Mindnature. In a universe which displays ontological relativity there will be different interrelated formulations in the way that Heisenberg’s matrix mechanics and the Schrödinger equation are equivalent, or the various different flavors of string theory interpenetrate and overlap. The extent of the significance of the discovery of the Mindnature ground of reality was expressed by the physicist Henry Stapp when he wrote: …the re-bonding [between mind and matter] achieved by physicists during the first half of the twentieth century must be seen as a momentous development: a lifting of the veil…68 And, as Stapp has indicated on many occasions this ‘lifting of the veil’ has shown the validity of the notion of ‘free-will.’ Furthermore, further and deeper investigation reveals that human beings have ‘free will’ within a spiritual universe, the evolution of which is towards enlightenment. The finding of a new mathematical equation surely pales into insignificance when viewed in the light of the possibility of transforming one’s own consciousness towards deeper levels of universal awareness. We now know that human beings, given the right conditions, have the freedom to pursue the ultimate aim of the universe itself, which is the attainment of the farther reaches of human nature, which is buddhanature. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1546 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Sources: Allday, Jonathan (2009). Quantum Reality: Theory and Philosophy. CRC Press. Baggott, Jim (2005). A Beginner's Guide to Reality. Penguin Books. Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004). Science and Ultimate Reality. Cambridge University Press. Bohm, D (2002) Wholeness and the Implicate Order (First published: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980; Routledge Classics, 2002) Brunnhölzl, Karl (2004) Center of the Sunlit Sky: Madhyamaka in the Kargyu Tradition. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications. Brunnhölzl, Karl (2007). Straight from the Heart: Buddhist Pith Instructions. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications. Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007). Freedom From Extremes: Gorampa’s “Distinguishing The Views” and the Polemics of Emptiness, Wisdom Publications Chandrakirti and Jamgon Mipham (2002). Introduction to the Middle Way: Chandrakirti's Madhyamakavatara with Commentary by Jamgon Mipham. Translated by the Padmakara Translation Group. Boston: Shambhala Publications. d’ Espagnat, B (2003). Veiled Reality: An Analysis of Present-Day Quantum Mechanical Concepts, Westview Press. Dewer, Tyler (Translation & Introduction) (2008). The Karmapa's Middle Way: Feast for the Fortunate by the Ninth Karmapa, Wangchuk Dorje. Snow Lion, New York. Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003). The Tests of Time: Readings in the Development of Physical Theory. Princeton University Press. Mechanics, Princeton University Press. Garfield, Jay (1995) (Translator). The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way (Nagarjuna's Mulamadhyamakakarika). Oxford University Press. Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010). The Grand Design: New Answers to the Ultimate Questions of Life. Transworld Publishers – Bantum Press. Hopkins, Jeffrey (1996). Meditation on Emptiness. Wisdom Publications, U.S.A. (First published 1983). Hopkins, Jeffrey (1987). Emptiness Yoga: The Tibetan Middle Way. Snow Lion Publications, U.S.A. Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006). Mountain Doctrine: Tibet's Fundamental Treatise on Other-Emptiness and the Buddha Matrix by Dol-bo-ba Shay-rap-gyel-tsen. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications. Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011). Elegance and Enigma: The Quantum Interviews, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. * Tsöndrü, Mabja Jangchub (2011) (Trans: Dharmachackra Translation Committee). Ornament of Reason: The Great Commentary to Nagarjuna’s Root of the Middle Way. Snow Lion Publications. Vedral, Vlatko (2010). Decoding Reality. Dutton. Wallace, B. Alan (2007). Hidden Dimensions: The Unification of Physics and Consciousness. Columbia University Press. Wilczek, Frank (2008). The Lightness of Being. Penguin. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1547 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p8 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p2 3 Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p136 – Wojciech H. Zurek: ‘Quantum Darwinism and envariance.’ 4 Tsöndrü, Mabja Jangchub (2011) p366 5 Brunnhölzl, Karl (2007) p27. 6 Garfield, Jay (1995) p250 7 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p45 8 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p45-46 9 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p46 10 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p85 11 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p107 12 ibid 13 Vedral, Vlatko (2010) p200 14 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p162 15 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p17 16 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p56 17 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p71 18 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p81 19 Hopkins, Jeffrey (1996) p181 20 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p107 21 Wilczek Frank (2008) p119-120. 22 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p2 23 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p7 24 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p2 25 All these quotes taken from Timpson, C. G., Quantum Baysesianism: A Study p24-25 26 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p23 27 ibid 28 Brunnhölzl, Karl (2004) p214 29 Chandrakirti and Jamgon Mipham (2002)p91 30 Chandrakirti and Jamgon Mipham (2002) p91 31 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p7 32 ibid 33 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p8-9 34 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p17 35 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p5 36 Chandrakirti and Jamgon Mipham (2002) p91 37 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p7 38 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p25 – quote is from The Ghost in the Atom 39 Fuchs, Christopher A. “QBism, the Perimeter of Quantum Bayesianism”, p25 40 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p73 41 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p75 42 Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006) p561 43 Das Wesen der Materie” (The Nature of Matter), speech at Florence, Italy, 1944 (from Archiv zur Geschichte der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Abt. Va, Rep. 11 Planck, Nr. 1797) 44 Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p136 – Wojciech H. Zurek: ‘Quantum Darwinism and envariance.’ 45 Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006) p561 46 Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006) p84 47 Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006) p84 1 2 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1516-1548 1548 Smetham, G. P., The Elegance of Enigma: Quantum Darwinism, Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) & Quantum Buddhism – In Pursuit of a (Quantum) Middle Way! 48 Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006) p124 Hopkins, Jeffrey (2006) p147 50 Cabezón, J. I. & Dargyay, Geshe Lobsang (2007) p95 51 Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p119 – H. Dieter Zeh: ‘The wave function: it or bit?’ 52 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p159 53 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p140 54 Alfred Korzybski coined the expression in "A Non-Aristotelian System and its Necessity for Rigour in Mathematics and Physics," a paper presented before the American Mathematical Society at the New Orleans, Louisiana, meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, December 28, 1931. Reprinted in Science and Sanity, 1933, p. 747–61 55 Hopkins, Jeffrey (1987). 56 Dewer, Tyler (2008) 57 Baggott, Jim (2005) p228 58 d'Espagnat, Bernard (2006) p440 59 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p208 60 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p207 61 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p206 62 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p212 63 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p281 64 Wallace, B. Alan (2007) p72 65 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p46 66 Schlosshauer . M, (ed.) (2011) p162 67 http://www.discronia.com/epiontic-foreword/ 68 Stapp, Henry: ‘Quantum Interactive Dualism’ p18 49 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

1555 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1555-1556 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Important photon Emission Results Reported by Michael Persinger’s Group News Important Photon Emission Results Reported by Michael Persinger’s Group Huping Hu* & Maoxin Wu ABSTRACT Michael Persinger’s Group at Laurentian University, Canada, have recently reported very important experimental results on photon emissions related to novel macroscopic quantum phenomena and brain functions. One of their findings has been published Brain Research Vol. 1388 (2011), Another is currently in press at Biophyiscal Chemistry. A third finding has been published in NeuroQuantology Vol 9 Issue 4 and a fourth finding is published in the current issue of JCER (Volume 2 Issue 10). Here we briefly describe their findings for the readers of JCER. Key Words: photon emission, biophoton, brain, magnetic field, macroscopic quantum effect. 1. Photon Emissions from Separate Brains Sharing Same Magnetic Field In Brain Research [1], Persinger’s group reported that light flashes delivered to one aggregate of cells evoked increased photon emission in another aggregate of cells maintained in the dark in another room if both aggregates shared the same temporal and spatial configuration of changing rate, circular magnetic fields. They also reported that increased photon emissions occurred beside the heads of human volunteers if others in another room saw light flashes during the presentation of the same shared circumcerebral magnetic fields. They further reported that when the shared magnetic fields were not present, both cellular and human photon emissions during the light flashes did not occur. 1. Doubling of Local Photon Emissions from Chemical Reactions Sharing Magnetic Field In Biophyiscal Chemistry (in press) [2], Dotta and Persinger report the doubling of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatially separated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. 3. Storage and Retrival of Temporal Patterns of Photon Emissions from the Same Space In NeuroQuantology [3], Persinger and Dotta reported that the temporal patterns of photon emissions can be stored and retrieved several days later from the “same space.” In particulars, they found temporal patterns of the photon emissions as “spontaneous” spikes within 3 to 5 days Correspondence: Huping Hu, Ph.D., J.D., QuantumDream Inc., P. O. Box 267, Stony Brook,, NY 11790. E-mail: editor@prespacetime.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 1556 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| December 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 10 | pp. 1555-1556 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Important photon Emission Results Reported by Michael Persinger’s Group after the actual manipulations when the same magnetic field configuration was present but no manipulations were done. 4. Increased Photon Emissions from the Brain While Imagining White Light in the Dark In the present issue of this journal [4], Dotta and Persinger reports significant increases in biophoton emissions along the right side but not the left when subjects imagined white light in a dark environment. They reports that the increased biophoton emissions did not occur when the same subjects thought about mundane experiences. 5. Summary Michael Persinger’s Group at Laurentian University, Canada, have recently obtained very important experimental results on photon emissions related to novel macroscopic quantum phenomena and brain functions. We have briefly described here their findings and the readers of JCER are encourage to read their actual papers for details. Due to time constraints, we have made no attempt to relate the work covered here with those of other researchers. References 1. Dotta, B. T, Buckner, C. A, Lafrenie, R. M., Persinger, M. A., Photon emissions from human brain and cell culture exposed to distally rotating magnetic fields shared b separate light-stimulated brains and cells. Brain Research, 1388: pp. 77-88 (2011). 2. Dotta, B. T, Persinger, M. A, Doubling of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatiallyseparated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. Journal of Biophysical Chemistry; In press (2012). 3. Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Temporal Patterns of Photon Emissions Can Be Stored and Retrieved Several Days Later From the “Same Space”: Experimental and Quantitative Evidence. NeuroQuantology, 9(4): pp. 605-613 (2011). 4. Dotta, B. T., Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2(10): pp. 1538-1548 (2011). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

830 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness Article Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness Glen McBride* School of Psychology, University of Queensland, Queensland, 4072, Australia ABSTRACT A model is presented of the mind of free living animals, expressing evolved normal behavior, and the steps between such minds and the conscious minds of people. Animals recognize each other and changes in surroundings. This requires two sources of information, from memory and the senses with a comparitor. Constantly comparing all sensory input with memories requires memories organized into maps that allow any change to be detected. Change elicits an Orienting Response, a moment of high attention, emotion, learning and decisions. Awareness involves monitoring and ORs, but living only in the present. These OR moments are stretched in emotion, hunting, interaction and exploration. They are times closest to consciousness, but memories are restricted to immediate situations. Acquiring story-telling required full access to memory models, of places, social relationships and stories, with the ability to examine these models for planning behavior and social interactions. A model is developed of relations between feelings and specialization of behavior. Attention to details is central to consciousness. Key Words: attention, behavior specialization, consciousness, emotions, evolution, functions, monitoring, recognition, social relationships. An ethologist can see the organization of behavior in natural contexts where evolved functions may become apparent. The origins of our brains and minds are in gregarious animals, seen best through their functional behavior. My picture of the mind was built in the many hours spent quietly watching, with time to build a model of what was happening. The picture is complemented by the observations of ethologists working with many other species, from birds to primates. Animals receive pictures on their retinas of every scene they pass. These pictures are then transferred to the brain, the visual cortex, where we and presumably other animals ‘see’ something very similar as an image constructed by the brain. We and animals have a central skill of specializing attention, an attendor, by which animals can attend to that whole mental image or any small details in it, for essential signs of food or danger may lie in those details. The brain has created the image so effectively that we think we are seeing surroundings, not an image quite separate from the surroundings. Within our mind picture, the ability of an attendor to direct attention to any detail of that mental image is a skill that I believe is central to understanding consciousness. That attendor also controls the redirection of eye orientation, allowing animals to consciously look at details within or extend the field, without understanding how. * Correspondence: Glen McBride, Prof. Emeritus of Social Ethology, School of Psychology, Univ. of Queensland, Queensland, 4072, Australia; 16N/120 Duporth Ave., Maroochydore, Queensland, 4558. Australia. E-Mail: g.mcbride@uq.edu.au ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 831 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness We and animals can also recognize anything we see, or detect any change since we saw that familiar scene yesterday. Recognition and detecting change is impossible without two images, one directly from the visual senses and one by access to an image from memory of the same scene, object or individual we saw and memorized previously. A comparator to compare the two images allows us to recognize or detect any change of detail. This process requires that the image sensed becomes the key to elicit automatic retrieval of the exact memorized image stored yesterday for active comparison. If there is no change, the comparison is discarded because the images of the next saccade and scene are already arriving for comparison. The comparison doesn’t need remembering – short term memory is adequate. But yesterday’s memories can be updated, replaced by today’s. This monitoring process is endless and ongoing. Without it there could be no recognition of anything, no detection of change, no detection of or recognition of what psychologists call ‘stimuli’. Every ethologist has seen the result of change detection; a tree branch has blown down across a familiar path or a potential predator appears on the sensed image. The animal stops, alert with high attention, presumably examining the change on the comparator. If in a group, they might gather closely, alert. If a predator, is it hunting, resting or grooming? This is an Orienting Response (OR), a moment of high attention, emotion and learning. You have a similar OR when returning home after a partner has rearranged some furniture. There is immediately a halt with an OR, that moment of full attention, feelings and analysis, learning of the new, and a decision for the next action. Memories of other such changes are retrieved. In that OR you notice furniture moved, and perhaps a chair moved out; how can you see something missing except by reference to yesterday’s picture of the room? Other issues may be elicited, feelings of irritation since this is happening too frequently or one’s favorite chair is moved. To decide on the next movement is a ‘what to do’ decision, a goal must be chosen. We choose the goal consciously, but do animals also need a moment of consciousness in the OR at the sight of a potential predator? Memories of previous experiences and emotions at this moment would be relevant and important. They too must then decide on their next movement. They have made decisions for millions of years. The fallen branch loses its OR within a week, it is habituated and quickly becomes the new image in memory. Potential predators are not easily habituated. I have seen ORs retained without change for a week, until I moved away. What happens in these later ORs with no predator present? Has the place become dangerous? Is more detail being learned, more easily to detect predators? Choosing what to do next seems conscious; then subconsciously planning the next movement to that goal is planning a future, however brief. But movement can’t be planned without a “to where?” Can this be answered without reference to the maps of these surroundings held in memory? Attention must remain on that danger? If flight is chosen, a familiar path might give an advantage over the predator. Anyone who has watched animals has seen such situations. What I have described is an awareness system, general throughout mammals and birds. Except for the OR, it needs no consciousness, but is probably the first step on a long path towards human consciousness. The philosopher of science, Daniel Dennett in 1991 described it as ‘the unconscious driving experience’. For much of our lives we too walk or drive around familiar places, aware and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 832 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness monitoring, but, without an OR, remembering almost nothing about our trip. There is no real consciousness. We, like animals, are living only in the present, dealing with the images as they arrive, paying increased attention and remembering only when change is detected, but every change must be then learned and mental maps updated for tomorrow. Some ORs precede immediate and dramatic changes in behavior, flight is obviously one, but a ‘where to’ is needed. My best account of planning behavior to achieve a chosen goal comes from Miller, Pribram and Galanter, (1960). They suggest that to do anything, to stop work and have a cup of coffee requires a plan for the future behavior, to stand up, to take several steps, change direction to enter the kitchen, pick up the jug and fill it by turning the water on, waiting, then off, then switching etc etc etc. You get the coffee but there are a hundred component movements nested hierarchically. You monitored them all. And of course, the coffee was itself part of writing your book. The significance of this digression is that making that plan un- or semi-consciously involved fitting you and your behavior into the rooms and arrangement of your house. You can’t make behavioral plans without referring to that memorized model of your house, fitting you and each part of the plan into your mental model of your house. Then your attendor must monitor the process unconsciously, modifying any step, finding the missing sugar etc. The plan made, you get up and make that coffee. For most behavior, deciding on the goal may be conscious, but the planning details and the ongoing monitoring, mostly unconscious. Our ancestors were arboreal. They had no simple two dimensional house to walk through to get a meal. Every movement needed plans through a maze of branches. The plans they made to move somewhere were always through a complex array of branches, a model of which was stored in their memories. It had to be if they were to race quickly in an emergency. Every day as they moved through this world, they were comparing everything they saw, and thus moved through, with the pictures they had made yesterday – or last week. Change detection was essential. That python or broken branch could turn up anywhere. We and other animals are change detecting organisms. Our memories are maps or models of our worlds. Frith (2007) describes similar complex mental models in human minds. One component of this memorized model of the world around them is always a mental model of self, their weight, the distance they could jump, could they fit into this space, how long were those arms, or legs, how each leg must be raised to step over a log, where and what shape was that head and mouth for fighting and eating, what could fit into the mouth and what could not? Plans could only be made by integrating that mental model of self within and through the mental maps of the immediate surroundings. The attendor has always had freedom to move that self through the mental model of surroundings; behavior plans could not be built without a self. Decisions not integrating self were meaningless. My point is that those mental images or models of the world they moved self through daily were always available and essential; always the images compared were the latest, sometimes required urgently, always updating with any change found. Every OR ended with decisions, innumerable decisions, eons before any human consciousness was present. These mental models were the context for any new behavior being planned, consciously or subconsciously. Mental models of places included danger, security, experience. They were functional and natural selection cares for nothing but function. Perhaps for animals during an OR, there were some moments of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 833 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness consciousness? But a known world was an expected world, a predictable world, changing life from a tactical to a strategic existence. When a new fruiting tree was discovered, getting there demanded a new path to be planned. When chased out of familiar range, new and unfamiliar spaces had to be explored. Is exploration like an extended OR? There must be extended periods of high attention and learning, knowing and attending carefully where potential dangers might lurk. We know there is spatial learning, since animals move into new spaces, explore, then very quickly arrange their daily cycle of activities into selected places for the daily cycle of resting, sleeping, feeding, body care etc. They have created new functional mental maps of the place. In time, experiences and emotions become attached to the maps of every place. Plans for behavior may be for a future of a minute, many hours or even days. The males of a chimp troop may set off to hunt a monkey – lasting a few hours. A bird may build a nest taking several days. Jane Goodall, in a film, “The Baboons of Gombe”, showed the arrival of a large male, remaining outside her troop for days; it finally made its move to join, fighting senior males and winning, then approaching the alpha male, submitting appropriately and then joining the troop. Had the male spent those days observing to build a mental map of the hierarchy of social relationships within the troop before joining? The plan covered several days and included knowledge of that hierarchy. Of course such plans are revised and modified throughout, but so is the process of making that cup of coffee. There are many modern books on the organization of brains, but none allow me to see the organization of behavior within its environment. Yet Chris Frith (2007) presented an account of an exciting mental model of the outside world, with its ability to predict ongoing behavior, a rare treat among books on brain and behavior. To use such models, I also see it as essential that animals need some attendor, directing the brain to operate semiconsciously while aware, then in an OR, consciously examining details in sensory input, then making decisions relating to that input, to find food and avoid predators. There needed a command centre, part of a mind. This mind needed immediate access to all information arriving from the senses with an attendor to examine this information constantly for relevance – food sources, danger, suitable sites for shelter or resting, and for gregarious animals, distance from neighbors. It also had to have all details of its host, the individual’s body. The tasks were never to deal with the environment, but to fit that body and all its functions into and through the environment. Function demanded the total integration of body and surroundings. That attendor had also to control the sense organs automatically, redirecting eyes, ears and noses to where extra information was needed. It was this attendor that ‘looked at’ the mental picture the eyes were delivering and the brain was reconstructing. In an OR, the attendor function in the mind had to have access to memorized images of yesterday’s scenes, previous relevant experiences, and the ability to make decisions, choose goals, behavior plans and order their delivery. It then needed the ability to monitor the progress of the plans, modifying them as detailed relevant information arrived, for example, the need to step over an obstacle. In ordinary living in the present moment, it was that attendor ‘looking at’ the pictures the eyes and other senses were delivering, moment by moment, stepping over logs, but not conscious of the endless comparing them with memories of yesterdays images – normal awareness. Dennett (1991) described this model of a mind overlooking a ‘Cartesian ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 834 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness theater’. He though the model inadequate, I believe it essential. I have included a mental model of a physical self, which he does not. I see that attendor/mind command centre as the subject of natural selection, for it alone dealt with every functional behavior; it demanded that the brain evolved to provide both a mind and every function that mind needed to control by decisions, leaving the brain to quietly and subconsciously deliver every service required, leaving as much as possible to occur automatically, an unconscious system. The animal doesn’t need to ‘know’ how it detects change or recognizes by a comparison system any more than it needs to actively control its heart beating. The amount of information its sensory and comparing systems are handling is stupendous. Yet the animal ‘sees’ images of where it is, its neighbors, their ranks and locations, but all is expected, familiar – until a change occurs. Mostly it lives in an expected world, aware but not conscious. The same awareness system operates for all social organization; presumably spatial and social environments use the same awareness/monitoring/OR/deciding system. In an expected world, animals need only awareness. The Orienting Response had to be ‘invented’ to deal with the unexpected. That OR was central to functional living, a triumph of evolution. Is it where the first moments of consciousness evolved, attending to the details of any change or recognition? Those moments were critical to life, at the heart of survival. I see those moments being stretched for learning new ranges or social situations during exploration, and for hunting, fighting or playing where quick analysis and responses were needed. Yet these situations still only needed memories of direct relevance to the immediate situation. The centrality of attention, the need for conscious access to experience, memories and emotions, the need to decide and make new goals for living are what natural selection provided for dealing with problems. Where better to look for an existing set of talents to modify further into a human consciousness when this became a functional requirement? Animals live in societies. Birds sing every morning; like the surroundings, they are sensed, recognized as familiar, habituated, expected, and not different from yesterday. We call them communication, signals, but they are merely part of the social environment of every animal. The cock crows, the lion roars, the wolf howls and marks its territory by scent. Monitoring reports to others that ‘nothing has changed, today is as yesterday’, so the monitoring minds decide to ‘ignore’ them. They are signals without responses, expected information, just environment. I define environment as ‘that part of surroundings that are learned, habituated, in which change can be detected’. This covers any component of surroundings meaningful to the species, social or spatial. (People have become a group-making species, forming groups to extend the range of our environments, to monitor weather, earthquakes and of course our borders, and set up communication to share the ORs for any change detected in this vast human environment.) The important point is that animals live in social worlds, created by forming social relationships with each other, even simple ones that create dominance hierarchies or territories. Social relationships are central to social life and stable societies because they are based on agreements between individuals, often little more than spatial agreements. The agreement a subordinate makes is never to intrude into the personal space of a dominant. The dominant does not attack again; every moment it monitors that the subordinate behaves appropriately. These agreements are thus monitored constantly, every moment, just as is the environment sensed moment by ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 835 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness moment by the same change detecting mechanism, the aware mind. Chance & Jolly (1970) described the attention structure in their primate troop where individuals always monitored those higher in rank, and McBride et al (1963), found no random movements in henhouses, each bird turned aside when approaching dominant neighbors. Animals maintain predictable social environments. Change, social or environmental is detected, usually with decisions to restore stable social and spatial structures. Spacing is usually a part of any dominant-subordinate relationship, always with agreement between the two, even if only by acquiescence by the subordinate. Gregarious animals live in whole sets of these social relationships, forming a dominance hierarchy. Alternatively territorial animals fight; on this side, A wins and over the other side, B wins. They glower at each other across what is a territorial boundary, an agreed border. In both situations, life becomes expected and predictable. All are monitoring every moment. In birds, the predawn songs simply allow the monitoring to continue, reminding of the singer’s continuing presence before the day starts. Stability is maintained by constant monitoring of everyone by everyone for the expected, detecting the unexpected. A missing birdsong at dawn is the dramatic change that can occur, with major change in the society as a previously non-territorial individual moves in to take over what will now be a much smaller territory. Other established neighbors ensure this. The newcomer has created new spatial relationships with each territorial neighbor. A breach in society has been restored by the behavior of all individuals choosing to act in their own interest. But everyone ‘heard’ that missing call with an OR. Monitoring ensured that any societal change detected is rectified. Our minds were designed in this animal world. Social worlds can become very complex. In a group of n individuals, there are n(n-1)/2 social relationships. Cheney and Seafarth, (2007) watched baboon troops of 80 individuals, which meant that each individual had 79 social relationships. But in their troop there was a further subdivision into matrilines, extended families; individuals had to know the matrilines of each other, and usually some detailed knowledge of important social relationships of others, and even recent history of interactions between others. They were memorizing the experiences of others as well as their own as relevant to themselves! They lived within a matrix of social relationships, dominating every moment of their lives. Mentally mapping such an aggregation is impressive, and monitoring so many details is demanding, for every interaction observed must still be compared with what is expected. Every change observed needed attention and they describe many such changes and the responses of individuals. In such societies, planning to move among individuals requires knowing and acknowledging the rank and orientation of each individual passed. Could this plan be created without some conscious reference to the mental maps of that spatial and social world? The individual would be in a state of high attention throughout every move, yet this something each animal does daily, every constraint planned ahead of the moving? In such troops, or in our hominid ancestors living in small bands for millions of years, nothing could ever be done by anyone without always checking the social constraints operating all around them every day. Our ancestors knew each other for whole lifetimes. Our history and evolution occurred in these bands. Everyone knew his/her place and the constraints self-imposed by their agreements with everyone else. Most relationships were not built directly; every ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 836 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness youngster grew and played into all of the relationships in their lives, though probably females moved between neighboring bands at times of plenty when competition between the bands was minimum. Perhaps alpha individuals, male or female in the separate hunting and gathering groups that set out daily may have had some freedom to make unconventional decisions – touches of free will, but not much. Conformity was security, monitored and probably important. Natural selection for any independent thinking and decision making, free will, must have occurred only rarely. The point is that animals can have very complex social and physical environments incorporated into their mental maps/models, with their ranks and experiences with each other. The attendor building any plan for behavior must move mentally through these maps, checking every detail of a move in advance. The concentrated attention must involve or be close to consciousness. Yet most of their lives, even these primates would be living in the present, with normal awareness except for those moments of OR, play, exploration or moving through complex social situations. Our ancestors evolved speech, something quite different from all other species. McBride, (1968) proposed that this evolved by telling whole stories, firstly by miming exciting events, over time substituting signs and eventually words for missing components of stories. This step needed no new skills; every primate watches and understands the stories all around them daily in their troop; mirror neurones ensure this. We know animals can read the behavior of others, for they see behavior and join in – social facilitation. Frith, (2007) suggests that they even anticipate behavior. Only by everyone gaining hundreds of whole experiences from others would the evolution of this step become inevitable. With every experience shared and those from previous generations told in stories, every youngster faced life with more understanding of dangers and tactics than any adult could accumulate alone. The evolution of such a function was inevitable. But in making this step, the controls on access to memories had to be removed. I have shown the situations where relevant memories are elicited automatically during ORs and periods of high attention. But one couldn’t tell stories without accessing detailed memories of the story to be told, not at the moment of excitement, but much later, surrounded by others, watching the story, mirror neurons challenged. Without access also to the hundred remembered experiences of others from stories learned, storytelling could not have carried evolutionary value. Telling stories made that next step to human consciousness – by letting our attention move at will through the memories of any past event or story. I suggest that we have brought two important functions from animal ancestors, unconscious awareness, (the Dennett driving experience) and the Orienting Response, probably with better control of consciousness of experiences. For these experiences are the hard problem described by Chalmers (2010). From storytelling, we have added consciousness of memories and planning to every event to which we attend; we can also attend to memories directly, of places, of social situations and relationships, and of an abstract world we have slowly created from stories. Perhaps the stories we learned were once of real experiences, but we have added abstract stories of minds, of universes, of mathematical, scientific or philosophical models. When our ancestors discovered farming about ten thousand years ago, the size of bands grew into villages and then towns. For the first time in our history, our ancestors found themselves living among strangers, albeit strangers of their own tribe. Living in anonymous groups among ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 837 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness strangers is probably the greatest change made in our whole evolution, but it is hardly described. We have adapted, building thousands of changes in our behaviors, our mental models and minds. Every change must have elicited new adaptations, all to spread among people, always demanding big changes in the mental mapping of our minds and behaviors. We still live mainly among families and familiars, mixed among the thousands or millions around us. We produce thousands of small groups in which we work, pray and play. Each of us is a member of many of them. The complexity of our society is great, matched by the mental maps we are able to construct, for we have adapted. Many of us forget that we are a recent and evolving species, still trying to produce fair and effective societies, not by natural selection, but now by our own decisions. Looking at any modern society, we see only crude and primitive attempts at fair societies created by endless trial and error. Living as we do, we ignore that we evolved in small completely familiar bands or tribes. We deal with abstractions so easily that we forget to ask about the steps we made from our simple origins, recently as hominids or more distantly as animals, primates. Possibly all or certainly most of the changes in our primate evolution were behavioral. Behavioral means under the control of minds. The evolution of language, the biggest step, was certainly all behavioral. Minds achieved the transition and brains were forced to find ways to provide so many new services. What changes came from the ready access to memories brought by language? The attention system could move freely through a whole past, spatial, social, abstract and experiential. Our ancestors had a past that allowed them to attend freely to any memories – they didn’t need to live only in the present, though we still do often, remembering nothing of much of every day. The mental maps of people expanded as stories added information they could not have had themselves. A mental story world was added to the already environmental world mental maps of places and societies. A world of abstractions emerged – without images, only words, but still to be mentally modeled. Central is the ability to move that attendor around in this mental world, as animals had always been able to do while planning any social or spatial behavior, to choose a story or part of a story. You can certainly decide to move attention around the image maps you have of your home, or the home of your parents when you were a child. You can certainly move around your social world maps, considering the state of your social relationships, or that world of stories, experiential or abstract. Isn’t this what we call conscious thinking, dependent on memories? As a scientist with mental maps of many biological models, I too can move around any of these, with my monitoring now set to find any inconsistencies between them. I read a new book or attend a lecture and find new information. There are no images in these mental models, yet I can direct attention to and through them as easily as I do to the spatial and social maps. New information means my mental models must be altered. Each detail must be compared with relevant details of every similar model, always comparing and monitoring, always seeking differences, inconsistencies. Every inconsistency elicits an OR, then my close attention to the models to make changes of some sort, or find a way of bringing consistency. Isn’t this what any animal does when faced with changes in its physical or social environment? Isn’t thinking the ability to move freely through all of the mental models we carry of every specialty in our lives, seeking and comparing? Don’t we OR whenever we detect any inconsistency in bringing in new ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 838 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness information? Where does the OR fit in current models of consciousness? Can consciousness studies operate without the OR? It is certainly the most likely part of the origin of human consciousness, and where one might look for any consciousness in animals. I believe that anonymous societies have created new scope for free will. In our vast cities there are many unwatched pockets where people may choose behavior with fewer social constraints. Out of sight in my home, I can beat my wife. One can behave selfishly or criminally and young people can choose to have sex outside marriage. The constraints of family, neighborhood, religion, work or social groups can be largely avoided. Anonymity favored freedom of action – far more than in tiny tribes. Free will always involves decisions to make behavior. Making decisions is possibly one of our oldest animal talents, probably unconscious. ORs may have brought experiential and emotional information relevant to any decision, but we can seldom know if they contributed to the decision. The decision was once probably always unconscious. The mind had information to allow planning for the decided behavior. Always there were constraints, mostly social. The decision always felt right – there had to be positive emotional reinforcement. We now make decisions with relevant information, sometimes worrying for hours or days. We probably still make the decision unconsciously, notifying the mind and being rewarded emotionally if the decision feels right. We believe that we made the decision logically and perhaps we did. But I suspect it would be difficult to dodge such an ancient unconscious process. Certainly Ap Dijksterhuis (2004) in the University of Amsterdam has recently shown that such ‘unconscious’ intuitive decisions can be more effective than those after time was allowed for conscious reasoning. Yet saying ’intuitive’ does not eliminate the need for some sort of cognitive process, albeit subconscious ones. Decisions to plan behavior have always faced the potential of constraints in complex social worlds. I suspect every decision faces a moment of constraint checking. Decisions may be to break moral rules, but a conscience OR will remind us! Always it was better to deal with potential social constraints mentally before, rather than behaviorally after movement has begun. Think of moving through that baboon troop. As an ethologist, I wonder at the relevance or ‘experience’ of the qualia of seeing red or a musical note (Chalmers, 2010). Animals probably see colors in whole scenes, seldom single colors unless it is a blue sky. Seeing colors is functional and feelings or experiencing them is from whole or details of scenes. Red might mean certain fruit, food and a momentary anticipation, nothing more. But I remember as a small boy the regular question about my favorite color. The question implied that there must be some feeling about colors, allowing me to choose one above all others. I chose red and my little brother chose green. In the eighty years since, I discovered no function or relevance in that choice. Yet the learning imposed on me by that decision still allows me to like or dislike a color, then forget it immediately. I suspect color and other qualia would not exist without such learning as children. Emotions are different. Natural selection didn’t create emotions just for us. Very early in animal evolution there were situations where animals needed to become specialized, hiding some behaviors and fostering others. Behavioral specialization was a great triumph of natural ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 839 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness selection, allowing specialization for fighting, for play, building nests, for interacting by grooming or sex. Sometimes there was advantage in having feelings that were appropriate while in these states, mildly or strongly. Sometimes there was advantage in expressing those feelings, so that others would recognize them - communicating them. Others certainly needed to recognize anger or play. Specialization of behavior is common, seasonally for breeding or migration, or for shorter periods, walking and being aware, resting, nursing, playing (Beckoff & Pierce, 2009), body care, anger, and in most interactions. Many of these have feelings or emotion, some expressing the emotion as in anger, submission, pain or excitement. In other cases, the feelings arise from situations, defeat or victory, frustration or resentment. Here too, the behaviors become specialized, appropriate to the feelings. Other cases occur when the emotion is transferred through empathy, and behavioral constraints are present (Beckoff & Pierce, 2009). We seldom recognize that the links between these specialized states we call emotions and specialized behavior are functional and have been created by natural selection, as has their communicative expression when it occurs. It is possible but unlikely that natural selection found advantages in favoring feelings without some essential behavioral functions. Think of one of the powerful emotions, associated with the fight-flight response. The animal is ready for extreme activity, many physiological changes are emerging in preparation for exertion. We and other animals recognize the behavioral specialization that accompanies the emotion. Do all emotions have these properties? Mostly we don’t know; we have usually been more concerned with the feelings of people, seldom asking about which behaviors are now ready or unready. Yet I suspect no emotions we accept in people and any accompanying specializations are restricted to people. Perhaps the exception is for the many momentary feelings expressed in our faces or bodies during conversations or lectures, for these too are communicative. As strongly visual animals, we work through spatial images in very much of our thinking and consciousness. This may seem different from thinking about abstract models obtained by stories, but is it really different from thinking through the rooms in your family home, now or years ago? For we still retain those images. Animals also must have models of the social world around them and be able to move around within them. These talents are certainly functional. What I have written is not an account of consciousness or thinking, but a model of what seems a likely story of animal awareness and what natural selection might have done to change this into a functional human consciousness in our evolution. It says nothing about brains or the problem of mind-brain divide. For it seems to me that the understanding of brains is far from complete. Yet it seems that the mind and attention system that the brain creates is the command centre for individuals in their environment, highly functional and thus central to natural selection. For it is the behavioral commands produced by the mind that are functional; millions of years/generations have created this system. The way the brain is forced by minds to produce these commands is irrelevant; only the functions achieved are important. I suspect that when changes are demanded of brains, there are seldom new developments, but modifications of pre-existing but now less used functions. We do know that creating new behaviors can produce new circuitry within brains. Brain scientists have this double problem, how is this aware mind created and organized, then how are its operations conveyed and executed. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 840 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 830-840 McBride, G., Ethology, Evolution, Mind & Consciousness Trained as a geneticist, I can see the importance of evolving a control system, integrating the self and the social and physical environment, making decisions that involve images of the whole individual integrated within any memorized environment. Any new functions learned/developed by that mind must become subject to natural selection. The brain must also produce any new behavioral responses the mind demands, perhaps at first crudely, then a functional flexible facility to produce them more readily evolves by genetic assimilation (Baldwin, 1896, Waddington, 1955). My model of the mind is an attention system that mediates between the animal and all its capabilities and its environment. Central is its use of awareness and consciousness to evaluate sensory input and control any behavioral or emotional responses of that mental model of self to that mental image of the outside world. Awareness covers living in the present moment, while consciousness gives momentary glimpses of the attending system, emotions, memories of past experiences, and making decisions for behavior. The brain does all the unconscious work, managing the body and serving the directions given by the mind. In the step from animal to human, language demanded continuous access to memories, to tell stories, build models from them, and to direct that attendor to examine past experiences or the maps and models of the spatial and social world that animals have always built. Story telling enabled a new set of world models to be built; the human mind could access these, locating any inconsistency and planning paths through them as animals could the previous models and maps. References Dijksterhuis, A. (2004) Think different: the merits of unconscious thoughts in preference development and decision making, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 87 (5), pp.586-598. Baldwin, J.M. (1896) A new factor in evolution, American Naturalist, 30 pp. 441-51. Beckoff, M. & Pierce, J. (2009) Wild Justice: The moral lives of animals. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Chalmers, D.J. (2010) The character of consciousness. New York: Oxford University Press. Chance, M. & Jolly, C. J. (1970). Social groups of monkeys, apes and men. Jonathon Cape, London. Cheney, D. L. & Seyforth, R.M. (2007) Baboon metaphysics: The evolution of a social mind, Chicago: Chicago University Press. Dennett, D.C. (1991) Consciousness explained, Boston: Little, Brown. Frith, C. (2007) Making up the mind: How the brain creates our mental world, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Co. McBride, G. James, J.W. & Shoffner, R.N. (1963). Social forces determining spacing and head orientation in a flock of domestic hens. Nature: 197: 1272-1273. McBride, G. (1968). On the evolution of human language, Social Science Information: 7 pp. 91-85. Miller, G.A. Galanter, E. & Pribram, K.A. (1960) Plans and the structure of behavior, New York: Rinehart & Winston. Waddington, C.H. (1953) The “Baldwin Effect”, genetic assimilation and ‘homeostasis’. Evolution: 7 (4) pp. 386-387. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

1 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Article Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Michael A. Persinger* 1,2,3, Blake T. Dotta1,2, Kevin S. Saroka1,3 & Mandy A. Scott1 Consciousness Research Laboratory, Behavioural Neuroscience1, Biomolecular Sciences2 and Human Studies3 Programs, Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada P3E 2C6 ABSTRACT The hypothesis by Hu & Wu that networks of nuclear spins in neural membranes could be modulated by action potentials was explored by measurements of the quantitative changes in photon emissions, electroencephalographic activity, and alterations in the proximal geomagnetic field during successive periods when a subject sitting in the dark imagined white light or did not. During brief periods of imagining white light the power density of photon emissions from the right hemisphere was about 10-11 W∙m-2 that was congruent with magnetic energy within the volume associated with a diminishment of ~7 nT as predicted by the dipole-dipole coupling relation across the neuronal cell membrane. Spectral analyses showed maxima in power from electroencephalographic activity within the parahippocampal region and photon emissions from the right hemisphere with shared phase modulations equivalent to about 20 ms. Beat frequencies (6 Hz) between peak power in photon (17 Hz) and brain (11 Hz) amplitude fluctuations during imagining light were equivalent to energy differences within the visible wavelength that were identical to the intrinsic 8 Hz rhythmic variations of neurons within the parahippocampal gyrus. Several quantitative solutions strongly suggested that spin energies can accommodate the interactions between protons, electrons, and photons and the action potentials associated with intention, consciousness, and entanglement. Key Words: photons, consciousness, nuclear spin networks, geomagnetic intensity, spectra analyses, cosmology, electroencephalographic activity, extracerebral representation of memory. 1. Introduction Contemporary concepts of consciousness and modern neuroscience are converging towards the mechanisms and processes established in the late 19th century and early 20th century by quantum theorists and experimentalists. Most of the complex molecular processes that appear to govern neuronal changes coupled to brain functions converge on a quantum of approximately 10-20 J (Persinger, 2010). Primary phenomena ranging from the energy equivalence of the potential differences between the potassium ions associated with the resting membrane to the change in voltage that defines the action potential are associated with this “neuronal” quantum. Hu and Wu (2004) developed a testable model that nuclear spin networks in neural membranes could be *Corresponding author: Dr. M. A. Persinger, mpersinger@laurentian.ca ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 2 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness modulated by action potentials through the subtle and indirect dipole-to-dipole coupling (Jcoupling) between two nuclear spins that emerge from discrete interactions between nuclei and proximal electrons. Recently we (Dotta et al, 2011a) showed that photon emissions from depolarizing cell cultures (removed from incubation temperatures) were primarily emitted from the plasma membrane. If spin is a fundamental quantum process with an intrinsic connection to the morphology of spacetime, then Hu and Wu’s (2004) concepts could be manifested through photon emission during specific brain activity. The concept that photons are not only a primary correlate of neuronal activity but may occur as photon fields which are the visual experience was developed by Bokkon (2005) and verified experimentally (Wang et al, 2011). The quantitative energetic relationships between the photon emission, frequency-specific cerebral activity, and alterations in the adjacent geomagnetic field in which the person is immersed should be congruent and might reveal a method to pursue the hypothesis that quantum entanglement originates from the primordial spin processes (Hu and Wu, 2006). That light, gravity, and geomagnetic changes are intercalated would have significant implications for how information within the brain is represented in extracerebral space (Persinger, 2008) as well as maintained over extraordinarily large durations of time. 1.1. Previous Research The potentially powerful coherence between the electromagnetic frequencies associated with the visible wavelength and cerebral functions, including consciousness and thought, has been strongly suggested by experimental and correlational studies. Kobayashi et al (1999a) found that baseline photon emissions from rat brains were between ~10-11 and 10-12 W∙m-2. The value decreased by about 60% of baseline levels following a protracted period of hypoxia. During hyperoxia (100% O2 inhalation) photon emission intensity was enhanced by 130% relative to baseline particularly over the frontal regions (Kobayashi et al, 1999b). Theta wave power within slices of hippocampus, the gateway to declarative memory, was coupled to the intensity of the photon emissions. In four separate studies (Hunter et al, 2010; Dotta and Persinger, 2011; Dotta et al, 2012; Saroka et al, 2013) we have found significant increases in photon emissions primarily from the right hemisphere (rarely from the left) while people sat in complete darkness (~1∙10-11 W∙m-2) and alternatively thought about a bright white light or random experiences. Our basic experimental design has been a triplicate procedure where by the subject repeats the process of “resting” (imagining no bright light (30 s)) and imagining projecting white light (30 s) in tandem sequences three times in order to verify reliability. The intensities of the photon emissions from the right hemisphere were strongly (0.90) correlated with the total EEG power for all bands over the left prefrontal region only during the periods when the subjects were “imagining white light” (Dotta et al, 2012). The original experiment (Hunter et al, 2010) with an individual who generated conspicuous photon emissions as measured by analogue photomultiplier tubes (PMT) from his right hemisphere while imagining a white “cosmic” light demonstrated a significant inverse ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 3 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness correlation between the intensity of the horizontal geomagnetic field (perpendicular to the temporal plane) and the intensity of photon emission. Decreases over 10 to 15 s of 15 nT and 5 nT at 0.25 m and 1 m from the right side of his head were associated with the same magnitude of energy (10-11 J) that was associated with the net increase in photon emissions during that period. This energy, assuming each action potential is associated with 1.9∙10-20 J, would be the equivalent of the activity of about 1 billion neurons. The human cerebral cortices contains in the order of 20 to 40 billions of neurons. Replication of that study with another subject during simultaneous measurement of photon emissions while imaging white light (Saroka et al, 2013) and geomagnetic intensity 0.25 cm from the right hemisphere verified the inverse correlation between increased photon emissions and decreased intensity of the adjacent geomagnetic field within the horizontal plane. Factor analysis indicated both variables loaded significantly (0.62, -0.83, respectively) on the same factor. Neither the correlations nor this factor structure emerged during the instructed intervals when the person was not imaging white light. The slope of the equation indicated that for every 10 nT decrease in the intensity of the earth’s magnetic field in the horizontal plane there was an increase of 0.5∙10-11 W∙m-2 in photon emissions from the subject’s right hemisphere. The present study was designed to replicate and to extend the previous research by measuring the phenomena from the subject’s right hemisphere by a digital photomultiplier unit, quantitative electroencephalography, and magnetometer simultaneously while she engaged in repeated intervals of imagining white light compared to not imaging white light. We reasoned that if the relationship between the three domains of measurement were as reliable and robust as what we had measured, employing dozens of subjects, previously, the effects should be both conspicuous and repeatable within a single setting. 1.2. Calculations and Inferences According to Hu and Wu’s (2004) prescient interdisciplinary hypothesis, nuclear spin networks in neural membranes are associated with relatively strong fluctuating internal magnetic fields that are modulated by the action potential through indirect dipole-to-dipole coupling or Jcoupling. The process is defined as the indirect scalar interactions between two nuclear spins which emerges from the discrete interactions between local electrons and their associated nuclei. J-coupling reveals information about bond distances and angles and, when applied to Nuclear Magnetic Resonance spectroscopy, allows the inference of information regarding the connectivity of molecules. It is not unusual for J-coupling or proton-to-proton couplings to be reflected within the frequency range shared by electroencephalographic activity of the human brain. According to Hu and Wu the J-coupling frequencies between 1H and 1H are in the range between 5 and 25 Hz. The magnetic dipole strength between magnetic moments associated with spin is classically described by: B=(µom) (4πr3)-1, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 4 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness where µo is the permeability of free space, m is the magnetic moment and r is the distance between the dipoles. The nuclear (proton) magneton displays a magnetic moment of 1.41∙10-27 A∙m2. For the distance of 1 nm, the width of a membrane channel, the resulting magnetic field is 3∙10-6 T. However across the cell plasma membrane of approximately 10 nm, the internal magnetic fields that could be displayed would be in the order of ~3∙10-9 T or 3 nT. The actual value could range between 1 and 9 nT depending upon the precision of µ. For air (N,O), which is slightly paramagnetic, it is 1+3.8∙10-7. For water, which is slightly diamagnetic, the relative permeability is 1-9∙10-6. Consequently Hu and Wu’s hypothesis predicts that the magnetic fields associated with spin-related, J-coupling across the plasma membrane should be about 5 nT. The energy associated with photon emission should be equivalent to this value. From Hu and Wu’s perspective as well as that of Penrose (1960) spin is a fundamental quantum process with an intrinsic connection to the structure of four dimensional space-time. The spin angular momentum of any system has been quantized as: S=h∙2π-1√(s(s+1)), where “h” is Planck’s constant (6.6241∙10-34 J∙s) and the values for s are n/2 or 0, ½, 1, 3/2… . From contemporary views all known matter, composed of fermions, have s=1/2. Hence the value would be 0.92∙10-34 J∙s. To result in an energy that is within the range of the net change in voltages (-90 mV to -70 mV to +50 mV) associated with an action potential (1.9 to 2.2∙10-20 J), the frequency required would be between 2.1 and 2.4∙1014 Hz which is equivalent to a wavelength (assuming c, the velocity of light in a vacuum) between 1.24 to 1.44 µm. This is the typical width of a synapse (1 to 2 µm) within the human brain. When the slight attenuation of c (~2∙108 m∙s-1) within brain space is considered, the value is remarkably close to Bohr’s distance for the relationship between the fine structure frequency (obtained from velocity) or the time for one orbit of an electron around a Bohr magneton and the masses of the proton and electron which he quantified as: f=1.32 ωo√mM-1 where ωo is the fine structure frequency of 6.2∙1015 Hz, m is the mass of an electron and M is the mass of the proton. The spin for photons is s=1 which would be associated, according to the above equation, with 1.49∙10-34 J. For an action potential with an energy equivalent of 2.2∙10-20 J the equivalent wavelength would be 2.03 µm. The difference in wavelengths between the latter value and those associated with action potentials (1.24 to 1.44 µm) is equivalent to a range between 590 and 790 nm. This includes, effectively, the visible spectrum that is primarily measured by photomultiplier units. This convergence suggests that spin between particles particularly protons and their Jcouplings should be associated with intrinsic field strengths somewhere between 1 and 10 nT. Associated emissions of photons from neuronal cell membranes should match, when surface area and volume are accommodated, the energy coupled to those changes. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 5 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness 2. Method and Materials 2.1 Subject The subject was a 28 year old female graduate student in Psychology. She is First Nations Mushkegowuk Cree from James Bay, Ontario and is also of mixed European ancestry (from mother’s and father’s side, respectively). She has been a meditation practitioner for approximately 5 years and a Level II Reiki practitioner for two years. 2.2 Procedure We applied the procedure that reliably shows the relationship between thinking about white light while sitting in darkness and the photon emissions from the right side of the head. The subject sat facing east (as determined by declination) in a comfortable arm chair that was housed in an industrial acoustic chamber that was also a Faraday cage. The chamber windows were covered with thick black terry cloth towels such that when the lights were extinguished in the chamber and in the room containing the chamber, the background intensity of ambient light was less than ~10-11 W∙m-2. We had found that when the background ambience is higher magnetic fieldevoked photon emissions from cells either do not occur or are not measureable (Dotta et al, 2013). The Sens-Tech LTD DM0090C digital photomultiplier unit was placed and supported by a platform composed of cardboard 15 cm from the temporal plane of her head. The sensor of the MEDA FVM-400 Vector magnetometer (with the X-plane perpendicular and the Y-plane parallel to her head) was also placed 15 cm away and was situated about 5 cm away from the PMT. Repeated measurements demonstrated no discernable artifacts from within either instrument during their operations. The subject wore a 19-channel Electro-Cap with sensors placed according to the 10-20 International Standard of Electrode Placement; impedance for all sensors were below 5 kOhms and bandpass filtered between 1.5 and 50Hz. The appropriate impedance of the sensors was verified. All three computers that measured photon emissions, quantitative EEG, and the three planes of the proximal geomagnetic field were stationed outside of the chamber. Each of the first three authors operated one of the measurement procedures. After the chamber door was closed, the subject and one of the experimenters communicated only through the lapel microphone and speaker system. She was asked to think about sending light out from her consciousness into the sensor of the PMT for about 2 min which was followed by 2 min of relaxation. The procedure was repeated four times with a rest of about 5 minutes between the 2 min-2 min pairs in order to reset some of the equipment (from outside of the chamber). The numbers of photons were sampled 50 times per second (20 ms Δt) while the EEG data from all sensors were sampled at 250 times per second. The geomagnetic field measures were sampled 3 times per second. The differences in collection times were limited by the software associated with the different equipment. We selected 2 min sequences for measurement rather than 30 s, employed in previous studies, to ensure time for the cognitive processes to maximally affect the photon emissions. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 6 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness 2.3 Data Extraction and Analyses Data collected from the photomultiplier unit was completed by a Lenovo Thinkpad laptop computer with a Windows 7 operating system. Counting was conducted with Sens-Tech Limited application software. Data was saved with this software, extracted, and then imported to SPSS 17 for analyses. Brain activity was monitored continuously using a Mitsar-201 quantitative electectrographic amplifier. Data collection was completed using WinEEG software. The software supplied with the magnetometer that sample the intensity (to the nearest nT) in each plane 3 times per second was downloaded for PC SPSS analyses. For the QEEG approximately 20 second segments of raw data were collected from the beginning of each baseline and subsequent imagination conditions; a total of five trials (10 epochs) were extracted. This data was then imported into MATLAB for the computation of mean spectral analysis function within successive 1-Hz frequency bins from 1 to 25 Hz for each sensor using the bandpower function. The sum of power within each frequency bin was taken for the left and right hemispheres by adding all the left (Fp1,F7,F3,T3,C3,T5,P3,O1) and right (Fp2,F8,F4,T4,C4,T6,P4,O2) hemispheric channels. We also computed sLORETA activation scores for the left and right parahippocampal regions. This was completed with the sLORETA ROI function for each 1 Hz increment between 1 and 25 Hz as well as for conventional frequency bands between delta and gamma. This data was then imported into SPSS for further statistical analysis. All statistical analyses of the data from the different measurements were completed by PC SPSS 16. Specific types of analyses for examination and their rationales are included in the Results section. 3. Results and Comments 3.1 Quantitative EEG There was marked increased in power within the delta (1 to 4 Hz) band and the low beta to gamma band (13 to 35 Hz) associated with bilateral activation within the parahippocampal gyri within both hemispheres during periods when light was imagined compared to the non-imagining intervals (rest periods). Because of the redundancy of differences, particularly within the 1 Hz increments of the beta and gamma bands, factor analyses were completed. Two factors emerged. The first factor was associated with bilateral activation of the parahippocampal region within the beta-gamma band (eigen value=7.5; 47% of variance explained). Figure 1 clearly shows the increased power within these bands during each interval the subject imagined white light. One way analysis of variance indicated there was significantly [F(7,39)=22.57, p <.001; omega2 estimate=83% of variance explained) more power within this band during the imagining compared to the “non imagining” periods. (The first trial was not included because of the marked continuing decrease in photon emissions.) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 7 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Figure 1. Factor (z) scores for quantitative electroencephalographic activity from the parahippocampal region of the subject’s brain within: A) the beta-gamma frequency range, and, B) the delta frequency range during successive intervals of resting (“mundane” thoughts) and imagining white light. Each interval was 120 s. Vertical bars indicate standard deviations. On the other hand, the second factor showed that the power within the delta band gradually declined as a function of time during the experiment. The factor that contained the variables associated with this deactivation over time bilaterally within the delta range was smaller (eigen value=2.1) and explained less of the variability (13%). The difference in z-score means over time was significant statistically [F(7,39)=10.97, p <.05]. 3.2. Photon Emissions The results of the digital PMT measurements are shown in Figure 2. In order to facilitate comparison, z-scores were completed based upon the numbers of photon counts during the previous interval. A z-score of 0.1 is equivalent to ~43.5 photons (range 16-65) per 20 ms (Δt). The numbers of photon counts for each of the 15 s successive intervals of the 120 s of measurement are shown. Only during the first 15 s of each of the 4 trials where white light was imagined was the photon emission significantly higher than the equivalent first 15 s of the resting trials. There was no significant difference between the imagining and not imaging white light for any of the subsequent 15 s segments of the blocks of trials. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 8 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Figure 2. Mean z-scores for changes in photon counts for each of the 8, 15 s segments during the 5 pairs of imaging white light vs not imagining white light. The only significant difference occurred during the first 15 s. Vertical bars indicate standard deviations. 0.1 SD=435 photons per 20 ms. The increase in numbers of photons in standard units (~1.1) would be (4.6∙101 photons∙ Δt)∙(5∙101 Δt∙s-1) or 2.3∙103 photons∙s-1. In the above context the surface area of the sphere at 15 cm away from the subject’s head is 0.9∙103 larger than the aperture of the PMT. When considered in equivalent m2 the average would be ~1.7∙106 photons per s. Assuming a central energy for photons of 4∙10-19 J∙photon-1 (mid wavelength), the value would be ~0.3∙10-11 W∙m-2. This value is within measurement error of what we found with analogue PMTs in previous studies. The background, when she was not imaging, would be approximately 50 times less or within the range of cosmic ray energies (10-13 W m-2). 1 Spectral analysis of the photon emissions during the 15 sec (750 Δt measurements) after the instructions to either image white light or to rest was completed for the differences between each of the periods when light was being imagined compared to the previous baseline for each of the pairs (trials) of observations. There were no conspicuous frequency profiles that visibly defined the two conditions, except for the marked paucity of power within the 7 Hz to 9 Hz range during the imaging periods. Visual inspection of the profiles however indicated narrow frequency “windows” where the power spectra for the photon emissions for the imagining periods were correlated across time whereas the corresponding baseline periods were not. To formally analyze this observation, successive Spearman rho correlations (to minimize the effects of extreme values) of the raw power values for each of the periods (no-imagining, imagining of white light) as a function of frequency were completed as a function of the 0.05 Hz increments. Only the interval between 15 Hz and 17 Hz displayed statistically significant (rhos between 0.46 and 0.57, dfs=38, p <.001) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 9 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness intercorrelations between the light imagining periods while corresponding baseline values were not significant statistically (rhos between .15 and .17). In order to discern where the maximum differences occurred across the power spectrum the differences scores were converted to z-scores for each of the trials. Only those power values from the spectra that were greater than the absolute value of 2 standard deviations (above or below the mean) were converted in to 1s while all other (lesser) values were set equal to 0s. We employed the absolute value because we assumed that either a marked increase or decrease in photon emissions between the imagining vs the previous baseline interval could reflect functional significance. Visual inspection of the trains of 0s and 1s as a function of each frequency unit (total=384 increments) between 0.27 Hz and 25 Hz (the Nyquist Limit for 50 samples per second) indicated that there was an increase in the deviation of photons emitted for all of the trials (pairs) in the following range: 2.27 to 2.74 Hz, 5.41 to 6.61 Hz, 16.5 to 17.9 Hz, 21.6 to 24.6 Hz. The total mean numbers of extreme changes in photon emissions as a function of 1 Hz intervals between 1 and 24 Hz for all trials combined are shown in Figure 3. (Because there were 15 increments per Hz, the actual number of events would be multiplied by 15). The typical standard error of the mean was about .12. The most conspicuous feature was the statistically significant elevation of extreme deviations in photon emissions during light imaginings between 16 and 17 Hz. This is within the range of 1H∙1H coupling predicted by Hu and Wu and suggests the importance of the proton in this process. The numbers of sequential frequency increments with a value of 1 were within the range expected by chance. However the proportion of fractional Hz increments that contained 2,3,4, 5, or >5 (there were only two) successive series of 1s were 28%, 38%, 20%, 11%, and 3%, respectively. The equivalent frequency for 2 to 4 successive 1s, was between 0.2 to 0.4 Hz. Within the frequency band of 5 and 24 Hz this fraction of 1 Hz would be equivalent to the range of 10 to 25 ms with a median duration of 20 ms. This value is often associated with the recursive cohesive potentials associated with consciousness that move over large areas of the cortical manifold in a rostral to caudal direction (Llinas and Pare, 1991; Llinas and Ribary, 1993). In other words during intervals when white light was being imagined phase changes in the frequency of the amplitude fluctuations of the photon emissions associated with the recursive creation of consciousness increased compared to the previous baseline or resting mentations. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 10 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Figure 3. Mean numbers (multiply by 15 for total) of photon emissions (or absorptions) > 2 standard deviations around the running mean per 1 Hz increment. Vertical bars indicate standard deviations. 3.3 Comparisons Between Photon and QEEG Data The most conspicuous feature of the photon emissions during the experiment was the decline in absolute power over the sessions as shown in Figure 4. This pattern was very similar to decline in the factor scores for the power within the delta EEG range shown in Figure 1. Figure 4 shows the z-scores based upon the quantitative measures of Figure 4. Z-scores (standardized scores) for the mean numbers of photons (50 samples per s) and standard deviations for those numbers recorded during successive 120 s segments for the 10 trials (5 pairs of intervals of imagining and not imagining light). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 11 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness absolute “raw” numbers of photon counts for all 10 measurements (5 pairs of imagining-nonimagining) for the means and standard deviations for each measurement. Both the means and dispersions (standard deviations) decrease by about 3.5 standard deviations (z-scores) over the session. The greatest change was after the first pair of trials. To discern if there was any temporal coupling between the numbers of extreme deviations in photon emissions and electroencephalographic power, the total power for each 1 Hz increment between 1 and 24 Hz from the left and right hemispheres were obtained. To allow direct comparisons with the photon data the power for the 1st 15 sec of each imagining interval was subtracted from the 1st 15 s from the previous rest interval. The means of the differences were also calculated. As can be seen in Figure 5, there was a moderate strength (~0.55) correlation between the QEEG power over the left hemisphere and photon emissions (over the right hemisphere) for the first trial only. The EEG power differences for the second and third pairs were not significant statistically (not shown). Figure 5. Scattergram between the numbers of temporal increments (multiply by 15 for actual values) per 1 Hz with increment of z> 2.0 deviations for photon emissions between the first 15 s intervals associated with imagining light compared to the previous interval (not imaging) and the difference in total electroencephalographic voltage for the left hemisphere (leftnet) per 1 Hz increment for µV changes between the first 15 s of imaging light compared to the first 15 s of the previous interval. Given the observations with Sean Harribance (Hunter et al, 2010), who showed marked increased activity within the paraphippocampal regions when he was engaging in imagining light associated with “receiving” information about the cognitive history of other people, the power only from the left and right parahippocampal region was obtained for each of the 1 Hz frequency increments. Although there was no significant correlation between the photon emission measures and QEEG power for any of the single trials, there was a significant correlation (rho=0.54) for all trails combined between the power ranges over the left parahippocampal region and photon ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 12 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness emissions. Stated alternatively, only the standardized scores for all of the trials for the spectra of the EEG and photon emissions were significantly correlated. We calculated the differences in the z-scores per Hz for the power for the left and right parahippocampal region and for the photon emissions. The results are shown in Figure 6. A positive score indicates that relatively more of the total power over the frequencies occurred for photon emissions while a negative score indicates that relatively more power over the range of frequencies occurred within the electroencephalographic activity. It is clear from the positive slope that relatively more of the EEG power occurred within its lower frequencies while more of the photon emission numbers occurred within the higher frequencies. When the 24 1 Hz increments were divided into two populations, one below 13 Hz and one above 12 Hz, there was clear evidence that significantly [F(1,22)=17.75, p <.01, omega2 equal 31%] more of the power (M=0.83, SEM=0.27) from photons occurred within the higher frequency band than the lower frequency band (M=-0.83, SD=0.42) compared to the greater proportional power in the lower (<12 Hz) frequency band for the electroencephalographic activity. Figure 6. Differences in z-scores for the average of the z-scores for the left and right parahippocampal electroencephalographic power vs the z-scores for the numbers of extreme photon emissions (from the right hemisphere) as a function of frequency between 1 and 24 Hz. In Figure 6 the conspicuous paucity of power within the changes in EEG power at 11 Hz between the previous non-imaging and imagining sequences is evident. On the other hand, for photon emissions, the only deviation from normality, that is more than 2 standard deviations, was at 17 Hz. The difference between these two frequencies, 6 Hz, might be considered a beat frequency within the theta range. Some approaches have suggested that certain states of consciousness may be associated with the “beat” frequencies, or their harmonics, that are generated by the cerebral cortical activity within the two hemispheres. It is relevant that for bipolar measurements of EEG activity between the two hemispheres the actual pattern is the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 13 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness time-varying potential difference of the voltage fluctuations between the two sensors over the two hemispheres which is effectively a beat frequency. 3.3. Changes in Proximal Geomagnetic Field Intensity The correlation (r, rho) between the change (in nT) for the horizontal component of the geomagnetic field and the numbers of photon counts for the 2 min intervals was strongly negative (-0.90, -0.83, respectively). This effect was similar to what we have measured in two previous studies (Hunter et al, 2010; Saroka et al, 2013). The novel pattern revealed in this study was the reliable diminishment of the range in variability of geomagnetic intensity along the caudal-rostral plane of the subject’s cerebrum while she was imagining white light compared to when she was not. Figure 7 clearly shows the maximum range in change of the earth’s magnetic field intensity parallel to the long axis of her brain during the 10 successive, 2 min durations. B refers to the “before” periods (no imaginings) and L refers to the imagining intervals. For trials 2 through 5 (the first is not included because of the markedly deceasing rate of change in the photon emissions) the z-scores for the photon emissions were 1.38, 1.56, -0.52, 1.46, 0.27, 2.17, -0.98, and 1.47, respectively. Consequently the decrease in the change of the intensity in the geomagnetic field was clearly associated with an increased cerebral photon emission. The mean decrease in range during the intervals of imagining white light was about 7 nT. This value is within the range predicted by Wu and Hu’s spin-spin interaction model for the proton over the distance that defines the plasma membrane. Spectra analyses revealed peaks in power for periods of about once every approximately 10 s. Figure 7. Range in change in the parallel (to head) component of the earth’s magnetic field during no imaging (B) and imagining white light (L) durations (each 2 min). Note that the range of change was marked diminished with each imagining interval. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 14 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness If the mean decrease of ~7 nT variation was related to the reliable increases in photon emissions during the first 15 s of each episode of imagining light then the magnitude for their energies within the functional volume occupied by the subject’s cerebrum (radius equal 21 cm, i.e., radius of the cerebrum+15 cm) and the measurement sphere should be similar. The diminished fluctuation in the domain parallel with the cerebrum would be associated with a decreased energy of B2∙(4πµ)-1 m3 or (7∙10-9)2 T2∙(2∙10-6 N∙A-2)∙1.4∙10-2 or 7.2∙10-13 J. The area of the “sphere” defined by the measurement radius would be 5.4∙10-1 m2 such that energy per area would be 1.3∙10-12 J∙m-2. Only 2 Hz (1/s) would be required to result in a power density of 2.6∙1012 W∙m-2. An increase in this value was measured from the photon emissions during periods of imagining white light while a decrease in variability of the geomagnetic field during these periods was associated with a comparable magnitude of energy. This convergence strongly suggests that the energy increase from the light emission and the energy decreases from the diminished variability in the ambient geomagnetic field shared the same source of variance. 4.0 General Discussion 4.1. Summary and Interpretations of Present Study The results of this study replicate and extend the results of previous measurements that a specific state of consciousness associated with imagining white light displays convergent energies that correspond to the changes in the intensity of the geomagnetic field around the brain. The subject in this experiment exhibited the reliable ability to increase and decrease photon emissions from the right side of her brain that was reflected in the increased power within the beta and gamma range of activity. Relative measurements of the largest deviations in photon emissions also occurred across this broad range. These changes were reflected in the reversible decrease and increase in the range of change in the proximal (at 15 cm from the head) intensity of the geomagnetic field in the plane parallel to the subject’s rostral-caudal axis. The average change in intensity was 7 nT which is precisely within the range of the values predicted by Hu and Wu’s (2004) model for proton-proton interactions or J-coupling within the neural membrane that is coupled with the action potential. The energy associated with this change in magnetic field strength at the distance measured from the cerebrum was equivalent to ~10-11 W∙m-2 which was the same order of magnitude as the increase in energy associated with the photon emission. We suggest that the approximately 7 nT decrease in geomagnetic intensity along the rostral-caudal plane that corresponded with the equal increase in photon emission indicates that the energy from very small changes in the proximal intensity of the geomagnetic field, action potentials associated with neuronal activity, and cerebral photon emissions derive from the same (or very related) shared source of variance. One process by which this interaction could occur was revealed in the directional component of the change in the geomagnetic field. The reliable decrease in intensity during periods of imagining light vs not imagining light occurred in the caudal-rostral direction parallel to the long axis of the subject’s brain. Llinas and his colleagues (1991;1993) had observed that the electromagnetic fields associated with consciousness move as an integrated wave or field over large cerebral surfaces along a rostral-to-caudal direction once every ~20 ms with phase ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 15 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness modulations between ~10 and 20 ms. One simple model is that the recursive rostral to caudal cerebral waves interacted with the geomagnetic field in this plane to produce interference patterns. Similar to a hologram, the photons generated from this process were emitted as a photon field. This intrinsic 20 to 25 ms or “40 Hz” gamma band has been associated with consciousness and has been discussed by several thoughtful authors (Edelman, 1989; Nunez, 1995; McTaggart, 2001). The duration is closely commensurate with the time required for action potentials to complete the pathway or circuit that includes the hippocampal formation and cerebral cortices in the human brain. One would expect such a powerful duration to be represented within photon fields associated with action potentials if one were causal or both if there were a shared third variable. In the present study the median number of successive fractional Hz units from the spectra analyses was 3 or the equivalent of 0.2 to 0.4 Hz. For the mid range of electroencephalographic activity measured in this study this would be equivalent to a superimposed ripple of about 40 to 45 Hz, that is, peak-to-peak durations of between 25 and 20 ms, respectively. From one perspective the appearance of this duration superimposed upon the base frequencies could be considered a form of phase modulation. Superimposition of faster frequencies upon a slower baseline is a conspicuous property of hippocampal neurons. An approximately 40 Hz ripple (the “primary modulation mode” of the cerebral cortices) is superimposed upon the fundamental ~7 Hz theta band periodicity of the pyramidal cells within Ammon’s fields. The hippocampus both accesses and receives input from the entire cortical manifold through its connections with the entorhinal cortices of the parahippocampal region. That an interference or “beat” pattern, which is the subtraction of two simultaneously applied frequencies may have occurred, was suggested by the marked reciprocal differences in relative power within the electroencephalographic output from the parahippocampal region and the right hemispheric photon emissions. The z-score of approximately -4 for electroencephalographic activity around 11 Hz and the opposite value +2.5 (or +4 if the adjacent 16 Hz is considered) at 17 Hz for photon emission would result in a beat frequency of ~6 Hz. This is well within the theta range which has been associated with multiple altered states. Although this beat value is about 1.8 Hz lower than the classical Schumann resonance generated within the earth-ionosphere cavity (in air), it may be instructive that the velocity of light from which this is calculated and occurs within water (the primary medium of brain space) is 2.6∙108 m∙s-1 and hence the equivalent frequency would approach 6 Hz. In addition higher order modes of the fundamental frequency of about 8 Hz are separated by ~6 Hz (Schlegel and Fullekrug, 1999). A less known feature of the earth-ionospheric phenomena has been the detection of line splitting of the Schumann resonances. According to Tanahashi (1976) there is a split of about 0.2 Hz in the Schumann peak, i.e., 7.8 Hz and 8.0 Hz, although this can range between 0.2 and 0.4 Hz in the first mode and 0.1 to 0.6 Hz in the second mode. The significance of the splitting has not been explored. It may be possible that the duration of the spectral patterns of the photon fields being generated by the subject’s brain, whose integrated frequency was also in the range of 0.2 to 0.4 Hz, and was equivalent to the ~20 ms duration or “40 to 45 Hz” band associated with consciousness, could reveal a mechanism by which information could be interfaced between the two resonating systems. It is not spurious that the fundamental frequency for both the human cerebrum (assuming a bulk velocity of ~4.5 m∙s-1 and a circumference of 0.6 m) and the earth ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 16 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness (velocity of light and 4∙107 m circumference) would converge to an identity within the normal distribution of cerebrums on this planet. If consciousness is recreated every ~20 ms through these recursive electromagnetic fields traversing the cortical manifold, then the velocity of this movement along the rostral-caudal axis of about 14 cm of the average cerebrum would be ~7 m∙s-1. A frequency of 6 Hz, would require a “circle” with a circumference of 1.2 m. In our present experiment the photons and geomagnetic intensities were measured at a distance whose equivalent spherical diameter from the center of the subject’s brain would have been 1.3 m. If this convergence is valid, the 6 Hz detected would reflect a type of moving field rotating around the subject’s head at the distance of measurement. The potential “beat” frequency of 6 Hz when applied to the wavelength of light discerned by the PMT is not a trivial energy. The energy associated with a frequency of 5.45∙1014 Hz (550 nm) is 36.1∙10-20 J. A difference of only 6 Hz (5.39∙1014 Hz) results in an energy of 4.97∙10-21 J. The change in energy for a 6 Hz increment at 790 nm, is 4.0∙10-21 J. This range of change is very relevant when applied to the intrinsic activity of stellate cells within layer II (stratum stellare of Stephan) of the entorhinal cortices within the parahippocampal gyrus, the primary input (the perforant pathway which terminates in the dentate gyrus) and output locus for the hippocampal formation (Gloor, 1997). The most prominent feature of these neurons, in addition to their aggregation into bands and islands of cells that can be observed as small focal convexities (verrucae gyri hippocampi) on the cortical surface, is their intrinsic low amplitude oscillations of ~8 Hz of about 2.6±0.5 mV. The energy equivalence of this change in voltage would be 4.2∙10-22 J and when multiplied by the intrinsic frequency (8 Hz) would be 3.4∙10-21 J per neuron. This value, given the range in magnitudes for the cells and the dispersion values for our measures, is congruent with the energy associated with the beat difference between the electroencephalographic activity within the parahippocampal area and the brain’s photon emissions. The total energy from all neurons (~107) firing within the parahippocampal region, assuming the unit value noted above, would have been about 10-14 W. Although apparently convenient, the surface area of this region would be about 10-3 m2 which would have generated the equivalent of 10-11 W∙m-2, which was observed in our study. Why the parahippocampal gyrus and its primary component the entorhinal cortices would couple structurally with the ambient geomagnetic field, particularly within the right hemisphere must be pursued. In addition to being about 40 g heavier on average, the right hemisphere in general displays slightly more white matter {or “tract systems”) and is organized as a large field rather than a cluster of interconnected regions which more accurately represents the left hemisphere. Several correlation studies have shown that changes in power within the electroencephalographic activity of the right hemisphere, especially the temporal and frontal lobes, are associated with changes (increases) in geomagnetic activity even within the range of 20 to 40 nT (Mulligan et al, 2010). The effect is sufficient to alter the threshold for visual phenomena within the upper left peripheral visual field, an indicator of right temporal-occipital activity (Belisheva et al, 1995). We did not measure a large difference in electroencephalographic power between the left and right parahippocampal region; both areas were associated with the photon emissions. This is not ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 17 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness surprising considering the unique connection between the hippocampal gyri through its own interhemispheric pathway: the dorsal hippocampal commissure, which is located in the rostral ventral portion of the splenium of the corpus callosum (Gloor et al, 1993). One would expect marked interactions between the two hemispheres. What is clear is that the left hemispheric electroencephalographic activity, involved with voluntary thinking and the sense of self, may have controlled the photon emission from the right hemisphere as indicated by the significant correlations. Like any correlation, there could be a third variable, not measured, that controlled both the conscious intention and the photon emissions. The ~7 nT changes in local magnetic field strength associated with the emissions of photons from the subject’s brain may involve a more global increment of intensity than suspected. For example, according to Campbell (1997) distribution of the intensities of the interplanetary magnetic field peaks conspicuously between 6 and 7 nT. The typical average increase in geomagnetic variation during the full moon when this mass traverses the tail of the geomagnetic field is ~5 nT. Even the non-potential field within the geomagnetic environment that is often employed to resolve inconsistencies between the gradients for north and east components are in the order of 10 nT (Winch, et al, 2005). That biological systems are sensitive to these intensities was clearly shown by St-Pierre et al (2007). Vulnerability to mortality following seizure induction in weaned rat pups was particularly enhanced when they had been exposed for several days perinatally to 5 nT, 7 Hz fields but not to strengths less or greater than this value. 4.2. Implications of the Spin-Spin J coupling Mechanisms The results of this study, that support Hu and Wu’s concepts of spin-spin interactions at the nuclear level and action potentials, evoke several considerations that could be relevant to more profound understanding between quantum phenomena, neuronal activity, and consciousness. These include the possibility that, if microcosm reflects macrocosm, what occurs in the single particle system also is reflected in the multiparticle system, such as the brain. A second possibility is that the relationship between gravity and light may occur as equivalences within certain mass-charge conditions that occur within the human cerebrum. The third possibility is that applications of specific temporal-spatial patterns of magnetic fields might mediate their consciousness-altering effects through the J-coupling process. The first question is does the cerebrum display the equivalent of magnetic moment (A∙m2 or J∙T1 )? If we assume a unit time (s) and the equivalence of a square meter, the photon emission energy was ~3∙10-12 J. When divided by the mean of the average change in magnetic field intensity of 7∙10-9 T the result is the value 4.2∙10-4 A∙m2. There is evidence of a circumferential movement of cerebral cortical electromagnetic energies and forces through cerebral space. Llinas and his colleagues (1991; 1993) as well as Nunez (1995) have shown that large-scale areas over the cerebral cortices display a continuous, recursive regeneration along the rostral to caudal direction once every approximately 20 ms with phase modulation between 10 and 20 ms. In other words it might be described as a rotating cerebral cortical field. We think it is relevant that the “default” mode for introspection is represented primarily within medial structures that include the anterior cingulate and posterior (precuneus) regions that could complete the ellipselike pathway. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 18 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness According to classic formula for magnetic moment: [(v∙r-1) (kg∙m2) (A∙s)] ∙kg-2 =A∙m2, hence, v∙r-1=f, If we assume 4∙1010 neurons (40 billion) each with 106 charges that maintain the resting cell membrane or define the action potential (Persinger, 2010) and 1.6∙10-19 A∙s per charge the cerebral value would be ~4∙10-3 A∙s (Coulombs). With a cerebral mass of about 1.5 kg and an “analogous” moment of inertia (kg∙m2) of 1.5∙10-2 kg∙m2 (assuming cross-sectional horizontal area of 10-2 m2), the intrinsic frequency is ~10 Hz. This is within the range of the electroencephalographic power peak, the intrinsic resonance of the cerebral volume (~7 to 8 Hz) assuming a bulk velocity of 4.5 m∙s-1 of information (Nunenz, 1995) and a circumference of 60 cm, and the Schumann resonance of the earth. The second implication relates to the possible mediation between the phenomena of gravity and geomagnetic (electromagnetism) intensity through the parameters associated with the human brain. Although there have been multiple theoretical pursuits to converge the two phenomena, the relationship may be more of a quantitative equivalence rather than a grand unifying equation (Persinger, 2012a). Within the terrestrial frame, Minakov et al derived (1993) a mathematical intersection between a gravitational wave and the first harmonic of the Schumann resonance, or about, 12 Hz. Vladimirski (1995) measured an enhancement in the order of 10-3 within G (the gravitational constant) with lower global geomagnetic activity within the 50 to 100 nT range. If we assume linearity, then a diminishment of 10 nT should be associated with an increase in the order of 10-4. If G (m3∙kg-1s-2) is to be equal to T (Tesla, magnetic field strength, kg∙As2), then one set of transformation dimensions would be (kg2∙m-3), Σ(A∙s)-1, and s (time). In other words one equating relation could be the square of the mass per volume, inverse sum of the charge that constitutes the system, and time. In this context the system is the human cerebrum. For a change of 10-4 in G such that the value is 10-15 m3kg-1s-2 and when multiplied by the square of the cerebrum mass (2.25 kg2) divided by its volume (1.1∙10-3 m3), this product multiplied by the inverse of the total charge (which we have calculated previously to be 4 ∙10-3 A∙s) for one second would be 0.5∙10-8 T or 5 nT. This is within the range of the diminished geomagnetic intensity that was measured when photon emission occurred from the volume of the subject’s brain. One method to confirm the reliability of an inference is to discern if comparable values emerge with different approaches. If gravity is intrinsically related, then the energies measured from the brain should be consistent with local applications of G. According to Nishida et al, (2000) the fundamental spheroidal modes or background free oscillations within the earth occur in the range between 2 mHz and 7 mHz (periods of 8 min to 2.4 min, respectively) whose peak to peak amplitudes are in the order of 0.5 nGal (nanogalileo), with little frequency dependence (1 nGal=10-11 m∙s-2). This acceleration phenomenon, when applied to the mass of the cerebrum (1.5 kg) and multiplied by its average length (0.12 m), would result in energy levels of ~1 ∙10-12 J. The equivalent per m2 would be 10-10 J∙m-2. If the near frequency was 7 mHz, the available ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 19 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness power would be in the order of 10-12 W∙m-2 which is within the range obtained from the light emission from the subject’s cerebrum while imaging white light. Hu and Wu’s concept of spin-spin relationships to consciousness strongly suggest that the entanglement processes would occur primordially, before the emergence of major matter, when presumably the fundamental “phenomena” was light or its physical equivalent. Assuming the upper limit of the rest mass of a photon is <1∙10-52 kg (Tu and Gilles, 2005) and the cerebrum’s mass is 1.5 kg, there would be 0.6∙1052 photon equivalents in a cerebral mass. A reasonable assumption is that the temporal existence of these prephotons would reflect Planck’s time of 1044 s. Assuming the midpoint of the visible spectrum recorded in this study of 4∙10-19 J there would be 1030 J per cerebrum but if each existed for 10-44 s the total integrated energy would be 10-11 J. The third consideration of Hu and Wu’s concepts is that they are quantitative, involve measureable mechanisms and processes, and should be subject to experimentation. Although quantitative convergence of solutions and theoretical explorations are meaningful and integral components of imagination and exploration, the experiment is the most powerful tool of the scientific method to support contentions and extrapolations. For more than two decades we (Persinger, et al, 2010; Persinger and Saroka, 2013; Saroka et al, 2010) have been examining the effects of weak (nanoTesla to microTesla), physiologically-patterned magnetic fields upon the behavior, subjective experiences, electroencephalographic profiles and inferred alterations of intracerebral activity (by Low Resolution Electromagnetic Tomography) associated with the human brain. Two separate approaches suggest that the application of the appropriately-patterned magnetic field applied with intensities around 1 to 5 μT might directly affect the processes that mediate the phenomena observed in this study. The magnetic energy stored within the volume of a cell that displays a soma width of 10 μm would be about 10-20 J. If one assumes the true volume is a factor of 10 larger, because of the massive contribution of dentritic and axonal extensions of the functional membrane, then the energies within each neuron available to the membrane would be within the 10-19 J range associated with photon (light) emissions. The second approach, a modification of Faraday’s solution, for 3 μT fields with our most effective pattern that involves 3 ms point durations would result in the product of (3·10-6 T) ·(3.3·102 Hz) and when applied across the surface area of a soma (3.14·10-10 m2) would be a voltage of ~3·10-13 V. If the resistance of extracellular fluid adjacent to the cell membrane is 300 Ω cm, then it could approach 0.3 Ω across the distance of the width of a soma, or 10 μm. The current in this “ring” would be 10-12 A. Application of the Biot-Savart law with (μi) · (4πr2)-1, where μ is permeability, “i” is the current, and r is the radius of the soma, would result in a “secondary” induced magnetic field strength of (10-19 μ∙i) divided by 2.5·10-11 m2 or ~0.4·10-8 T, that is about 4 nanoTesa. This is within the order of magnitude of the magnetic field associated with the spin-spin field strengths across the membrane predicted by Hu and Wu’s model as well as our empirical measurements. This would suggest that the strength of these experimentally applied fields could interact or alter the photon emissions. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 20 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness From the perspective of an energetic and particulate model, the energy stored within the cerebral volume and reflected in each neuronal space contains sufficient quantum to facilitate emission of photons within the visible spectrum. At the same time the secondary magnetic fields induced by Faraday-like mechanisms from the primary production of changing electric fields from the transcerebrally-applied fields create the intensity of magnetic fields within the nanoTesla range. Both of these conditions converge to influence the spin-spin processes associated with consciousness. This may explain why this technology has been reported to produce such significant alterations in states of consciousness that would otherwise require pharmacological ingestions in order to be simulated. 4.3 Spin, Gravitons, Light Emission from the Cerebrum and Consciousness Hu and Wu’s (2006) spin-mediated theory of consciousness assumes that quantum spin is the “seat of consciousness”. Within a dynamic process spins are the interface between the particulate composition of the brain and the energetic or wave functions associated with the electromagnetic fields of cognition. They suggest that spin is the “mind pixel”. According to the theory “consciousness is intrinsically connected to the spin process and emerges from the selfreferential collapses of spin states; the unity of mind is achieved by entanglement of these mind pixels”. Spin is embedded in the microscopic structure of space-time and may be more fundamental than space-time itself. The zitterbewegung associated with spin, according to Hu and Wu (2006) may be responsible for quantum effects of fermions in general. There are at least two quantitative supports for their hypothesis. First, if we assume the spin=2 for a graviton, according to the description of spin, which is h∙2π-1 ∙√(s(s+1), the equivalent wavelength to match the energy equivalence (~1.9∙10-20 J) of the action potential (0.90∙1014 Hz∙1.06∙10-34 J∙s) is 3.34∙10-6 m. For spin=1/2 for fermions (e.g., protons and electrons), the equivalent wavelength from the energy required to obtain the energy equivalence of the action potential is 1.44∙10-6 m. The difference between critical wavelengths for the fermion and the graviton transformations is 1.9 µm. This is precisely the value derived by Bohr from 1.32 ωo √m∙M-1 where m and M are the masses of the electron and proton, respectively and omega is the frequency equivalence of the fine structure velocity. In other words, as required by Hu and Wu’s model, the metric of energy difference between the fermion and graviton converges on the universal constant for the relationship between the particles and their motion that constitute our matter. The second quantitative solution that supports the assumption that spin processes and the correlative entanglements occurred in pre-space-time would require a convergent quantity between the forces derived from the smallest unit of space to the largest unit of space. Such “non-intuitive” relationships have been shown previously. For example Persinger and Koren (2007) showed that the time required for the smallest unit of space, Planck’s constant to expand one Planck’s length is the age of the universe while the time required for the universe to expand one Planck’s length is Planck’s time (~10-44 s). In other words the largest and smallest unit of space is conjoined by the reciprocally shortest and longest time frames that are within are current quantitative system. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 21 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness It may be relevant, even from a more qualitative philosophical tradition (Persinger, 1999), that any process requires at least two increments of time (Nyquist limit). Because the increment of time required to discern an increment of space that constitutes a phenomenon is systematically related across measurements, e.g., picosecond temporal measurements are optimal to discern pmeter (atomic) phenomena while ms measurements are optimal for mm (neuronal) phenomena, there will always be one increment of space (the universe) where there would be only one increment of time. Consequently there can be no “process” or “time” according to traditional perspectives. The very beginning as well as the very end would exist simultaneously (Persinger, 2012b). The Casimir effect, which is closely related to gravitation, is described as: ((π2 ∙240-1) ∙ћc) ∙a4 multiplied by (S). In this instance “a” is the separation between the two surfaces and S is the surface area. If we assume “a” is Planck’s length, and the area is the surface area of the universe (assuming r=1.23∙1026 m), the total force would be 10.9∙10165 N. If the surface area is accommodated by dimensionless parameter A (0.44) for the actual surface area, the value is 4.8∙10165 N. In comparison if we assume Persinger’s (2009) estimate of the universe’s mass, derived from the density of 1 proton∙m-3 which is within the critical limit, of 2.38∙1052 kg, and the width of the universe, then application of the square of the Zitterbewugen (10.4∙1086 s-2) results in a total force of 6.1∙10165 N. This convergence is remarkably meaningful, and suggests that the total force of the entire universe based upon its mass, length and intrinsic vibration is consistent with the force derived from its smallest space applied across the universal surface. However what is particularly salient for Hu and Wu’s approach is the results of the force per unit Planck’s volume. Assuming ~3.5∙10183 Planck’s lengths voxels (unit volumes) in the volume of the universe, there would be ~1.7∙10-18 N per voxel. When applied across the neutral hydrogen wavelength (21 cm), the element that composes the major mass of the universe, the energy is ~3.7∙10-19 J. The wavelength of this energy (multiplied by Planck’s constant and then divided into the velocity of light) is about 540 nm, that is, visible light. These convergences indicate that visible light coupled to the energies of action potentials may be the key to entanglement that first emerged in the distant past. That entanglement occurs between photons or at least distant loci within which they are associated by the electromagnetic properties of separate spaces has been shown several times in the laboratory (Dotta et al, 2011b; Dotta and Persinger, 2012). References Belisheva, N. K., Popov, A. N., Petukhova, N. V., Pavlova, L. P., Osipov, K. S., Thachenko, S. E. and Baranova, T. I. Quantitative and qualitative evaluations of the effect of geomagnetic field variations on the functional state of the human brain. Biophysics, 1995; 40: 1007-1014. Bokkon, I. Dreams and neuroholography: an interdisciplinary interpretation of development of homeotherm state in evolution. Sleep and Hypnosis, 2005; 7: 61-76. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 22 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Campbell, W. H. Introduction to Geomagnetic Fields, 1997, Cambridge Press: Cambridge. Dotta, B. T., Buckner, C. A., Cameron, D., Lafrenie, R. M. and Persinger, M. A. Biophoton emissions from cell cultures: biochemical evidence for the plasma membrane as the primary source. General Physiology and Biophysics, 2011; 30: 301-309 (a). Dotta, B. T., Buckner, C. A., Lafrenie, R. M. and Persinger, M. A. Photon emission from human brain and cell culture exposed to distally rotating magnetic fields shared by separate light-stimulated brains and cells. Brain Research, 2011; 1388: 77-88 (b). Dotta, B. T. and Persinger, M. A. Increased photon emissions from the right but not the left hemisphere while imagining white light in the dark: the potential connection between consciousness and cerebral light. Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research, 2011; 2 (10): 1463-1473. Dotta, B. T. and Persinger, M. A. “Doubling” of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatially-separated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. Journal of Biophysical Chemistry, 2012; 3: 72-80. Dotta, B. T., Saorka, K.S. and Persinger, M. A. Increased photon emission form the head while imagining light in the dark is correlated with changes in electroencephalographic power: Support for Bokkon’s biophoton hypothesis. Neuroscience Letters, 2012; 513: 151-154. Dotta, B. T., Karbowski, L. M., Lafrenie, R. M. and Persinger, M. A. Photon emission form melanoma cells during brief stimulation of patterned magnetic fields: is the source coupled to rotational diffusion within the membrane? (in submission). Edelman, G. M. The remembered present: a biological theory of consciousness. Basic Books: N.Y., 1989. Gloor, P. The temporal lobe and limbic system. 1997, Oxford: N.Y. Gloor, P., Salanova, V., Olivier, A. and Quesney, L. F. The human dorsal hippocampal commissure: an anatomically identifiable and functional pathway. Brain, 1993; 116: 1249-1273. Kobayashi, M., Takeda, M., Ito, K-I., Kato, H. and Inaba, H. Two-dimensional photon counting imagining and spatiotemporal characterization of ultraweak photon emission from at rat’s brain in vivo. Journal of Neuroscience Methods, 1999; 93: 163-168 (a). Kobayashi, M., Takeda, M., Sato, T., Yamazaki, Y.., Kaneko, K., Ito, K-I., Kato, H. and Inaba, H. In vivo imagining of spontaneous ultraweak photon emission from a rat’s brain correlated with cerebral energy metabolism and oxidative stress. Neuroscience Research, 1999; 34: 103-113 (b). Hu, H. and Wu, M. Action potential modulation of neural spin networks suggests possible role of spin. NeuroQuantology, 2004; 4: 309-317. Hu, H. and Wu, M. Thinking outside of the box: the essence and implications of quantum entanglement and the story of spin-mediated consciousness theory. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 1: 5-16. Hunter, M. D., Mulligan, B. P., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S., Lavallee, C. F., Koren, S. A. and Persinger, M. A. Cerebral dynamics and discrete energy changes in the personal environment during intuitive-like states and perceptions. Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research, 2010; 1: 1179-1197. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 23 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Llinas, R. and Pare, D. Of dreams and wakefulness. Neuroscience, 1991; 44: 521-535. Llinas, R. and Ribary, U. Coherent 40 Hz oscillations characterizes dream state in humans. PNAS, 1993; 90: 2078-2081. McTaggart, L. The field. Harper Collin: N.Y., 2003. Minakov, A. A., Nikolaenko, A. P. and Rabinovich, L. M. Gravitational-to-electromagnetic wave conversion in electrostatic field of earth-ionospheric resonator. Radiofizika, 1993; 35: 915-923. Mulligan, B. P., Hunter, M. D. and Persinger, M. A. Effects of geomagnetic activity and atmospheric power variations on quantitative measures of brain activity: replication of the Azerbaijani studies. Advances in Space Research, 2010; 45: 940-948. Nishida, K., Kobayashi, N. and Fukao, Y. Resonant oscillations between the solid earth and the atmosphere. Science, 2000; 287: 2244-2246. Nunez, P. L. Towards a physics of the neocortex. In P. L. Nunez (ed). Neocortical dynamics and human EEG rhythms. Oxford University Press: N.Y., 1995, pp. 68-132. Penrose, R. A. Spinor approach to general relativity. Annals of Physics, 1960; 10: 171-201. Persinger, M. A. On the nature of space-time perception of phenomena in Science. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 1999; 89: 1210-1216. Persinger, M. A. On the possible representation of the electromagnetic equivalents of all human memory within the earth’s magnetic field: implication for theoretical biology. Theoretical Biology Insights, 2008; 1: 3-11. Persinger, M. A. A simple estimate of the mass of the universe: dimensionless Parameter A and the construct of “pressure”. Journal of Physics, Astrophysics, and Physical Cosmology, 2009; 3:1-3. Persinger, M. A. 10-20 Joules as a neuromolecular quantum in medicinal chemistry: an alternative approach to myriad molecular pathways? Current Medicinal Chemistry, 2010; 17: 3094-3098. Persinger, M. A. Potential origins of a quantitative equivalence between gravity and light. The Open Astronomy Journal, 2012; 5: 41-43. (a) Persinger, M. A. Convergent calculations that dark solutions are reflective of mass-energy yet to occur. International Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2012; 2: 125-128. (b) Persinger, M. A. and Koren, S. A. A theory of neurophysics and quantum neuroscience: implication for brain function and the limits of consciousness. International Journal of Neuroscience, 2007; 117: 157-175 Persinger, M. A. and Saroka, K. S. Comparable proportions of classes of experiences and intracerebral consequences for surgical stimulation and external application of weak magnetic field patterns: implications for converging effects in complex partial seizures. Epilepsy and Behavior, 2013, in press. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 24 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 01-24 Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. & Scott, S. A., Congruence of Energies for Cerebral Photon Emissions, Quantitative EEG Activities and ~5 nT Changes in the Proximal Geomagnetic Field Support Spin-based Hypothesis of Consciousness Persinger, M. A., Saroka, K. S., Koren, S. A. and St-Pierre, L. S. The electromagnetic induction of mystical and altered states within the laboratory. Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research, 2010; 1: 808-830. St-Pierre, L. S., Parker, G. H., Bubenik, G. A. and Persinger, M. A. Enhanced mortality of rat pups following inductions of epileptic seizures after perinatal exposures to 5 nT, 7 Hz, magnetic fields. Life Sciences, 81; 2007: 1496-1500. Saroka, K. S., Mulligan, B. P., Murphy, T. R. and Persinger, M. A. Experimental elicitation of an out of body experience and concomitant cross-hemispheric electroencephalographic coherence. NeuroQuantology, 2010; 8: 466-477. Saroka, K. S., Dotta, B. T. and Persinger, M. A. Concurrent photon emission, changes in quantitative brain activity over the right hemisphere, and alterations in the proximal geomagnetic field while imagining white light. Journal of Life Sciences and Medical Research, 2013, in press. Schlegel, K. and Fuellerkrug, M. Schumann resonance parameter changes during high-energy particle precipitation. Journal of Geophysical Research, 1999; 104: 10,111-10,118. Tanashi, S. Detection of line splitting of Schumann resonances from ordinary data. Journal of Atmospheric and Terrestrial Physics, 1976; 38: 135-142. Tu, L. C. and Gillies, G. T. The mass of the photon. Reports of Progress in Physics, 2005; 68: 77-130. Vladmirskii, B. M. Measurements of gravitational constant and heliogeophysical electromagnetic perturbations. Biophysics, 1995; 40: 915-923. Wang, C., Bokkon, I., Dai, J. and Antal, I. First experimental demonstration of spontaneous and visible light-induced photon emission from rats eyes with particular emphasis on their roles in discrete dark noise and retinal phosphenes. Brain Research, 2011; 1369: 1-9. Winch, D. E., Ivers, D. J., Turner, J. P. R., Stening, R. J. Geomagnetism and Schmidt quasinormalization. Geophysical Journal International, 2005; 160: 487-504. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 20 - Article The Ising Model of Spin Interactions as an Oracle of Self-Organized Criticality, Fractal Mode-Locking & Power Law Statistics in Neurodynamics Chris King* ABSTRACT This short report highlights properties of fractality and self-organized criticality in the Ising model of ferromagnetism and how these ideas can be applied using wavelet transforms to comparisons with the study of self-organized criticality in neurodynamics. Matlab programs are provided to freely replicate the results. Key Words: Ising Model, spin, interaction, oracle, self-organization, criticality, fractal mode locking, Power Law, statistics, neurodynamics. Introduction The Ising model [1] investigates the phase transition between ferromagnetism and paramagnetism through the Metropolis-Hastings algorithm [2] run inside a Monte Carlo loop [3]. For negative interaction strengths between spin pairs, an anti-ferromagnetic spin-glass results in which adjacent spins have lowest energy when their spins alternate up and down. * Correspondence: Chris King http://www.dhushara.com E-Mail: chris@sexualparadox.org ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 21 - Fig 1: The Ising model of ferromagnetism as an example of phase transition criticality. In the lower figure a cellular simulation based on a given cell element interacting with the four nearest neighbours (above and below and to either side) in a rectangular array. The array is iterated according to the Hamiltonian, in this case for 3000 steps. In blue magnetization is plotted as a function of interaction strength of individual spin elements, with the theoretical curve outlined in red. For low interaction strengths (or equivalently for high thermal energies by comparison with the interaction strength) we have paramagnetism in which individual domains of cells of aligned spin are randomly distributed and net magnetization will occur only in the presence of an external magnetic field. As the interaction strength increases, there is a critical phase transition to the ferromagnetic state after which the spins become polarized into large domains with aligned spins and in the asymptotic limit dominance of either spin up or spin down results in bifurcation towards a fully saturated state of net magnetization 1 or -1. At the critical transition value of J = ~0.44 magnetization domains form a fractal distribution similar to states of self-organized criticality, such as earthquakes and sandpiles, in which the critical state is maintained by fractal avalanches. In the top row interaction strength is plotted for both positive and negative interaction strengths on a larger array that shown in the lower figure. When the interaction strength is negative spins have a lower energy when adjacent spins are opposite, so we then have the antiferromagnetism of a spin-glass. Negative values also have a critical transition, but this does not result in net magnetization as the lowest energy states form a chequer-board having zero net polarization. However, as there are two complementary chequer-board arrangements, large domains still develop, with frustration along their boundaries, where the energy cannot be minimized. In the insets are shown corresponding charts of energy versus magnetization and interaction strength. Methods A set of Matlab m-files performing computational Monte Carlo simulations, developed from [4] following [5] are provided in the link in appendix 2. The equations supporting the algorithm and some of the theory is displayed in appendix 1. Generally the computational simulation is performed using only nearest neighbours directly above and below and to either side of an element of a rectangular array, (although more elaborate neighbourhoods are also used in figure 2). This closest neighbour computational process coincides with the Bethe-Peierls approximation [6] to Ising spin states in statistical mechanics. An array is initiated in a random configuration and is iterated cell by cell, flipping a set proportion of the spins in each iteration if a random variable exceeds the energy difference between the cell and its flipped state in relation to its four neighbours. This provides a thermodynamic model in which spins will flip to a lower energy state but may also, with exponentially diminishing probability, become flipped to a higher energy one. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 22 - Figures 1 and 2 show the results of this investigation both for the fractal dynamics of the critical phase transition to ferromagnetism with positive interaction energies and for the capacity to form fractal mode-locked states in an anti-ferromagnetic spin-glass state with negative interaction energies. Figure 3 also shows this fractal critical behavior by analyzing the connected regions within the final state of the array. Fig 2: The effect of increasing polarization on an anti-ferromagnetic spin-glass in which the lowest energy state has neighbouring cells having oppositely aligned spins. In the lower figure (a) is shown the magnetization for a 2-D spin glass in which only the four closest neighbours interact, as the external field B is increased. There is a strong plateau in which a chequer-board lowest energy state with adjacent spins opposite is maintained. (b) There is also a hint of plateuing at a magnetization of ~0.5 in which ¼ of the spins would be aligned one way and ¾ the other. The top row arrays show states corresponding to various values of the external field. (c) The theoretical distribution for a 1-D spin-glass with negative interaction strength (Schröder) is a ‘devil’s staircase’ in which mode-locking occurs for an interval neighbourhood of each rational magnetization state in which a regular periodic arrangement, such as uduud, can result in rational periods of any order. (d) The 2-D simulation failed to show any further model-locking even when the interacting neighbourhood was enlarged to include more distant interactions (with an inverse square 2-D dipole interaction), however in the corresponding 1-D simulation (with an inverse linear dipole interaction) a series of plateaus formed at rational magnetization values. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 23 - The negative interaction strength regime was also explored using variations on the Matlab algorithm, in both 2-D and 1-D modes, to test for the fractal devil’s staircase of mode-locked states [7] referred to in Schröder [8]. The lack of additional plateaus was hypothesized to result from energy interaction confinement to nearest neighbours, so variants of the algorithm were developed in which more distant neighbours were also involved in the energy function through dipole interactions in their respective dimensionalities. While the 2-D model failed to demonstrate additional mode-locking states, the 1-D model did then return a series of near stationary intervals surrounding several fractional states of magnetization, consistent with the results in Schröder. Fig 3: Log-log plot of region size versus number of regions of this size range for J = 0, 0.2, 0.4406868, 0.6, 1 coloured blue, green, black, magenta and red respectively, each for an average of five Monte Carlo runs of 3000 iterations, showing that the critical state has a consistent fractal power law distribution (black) by contrast with stochastic sub-critical J which lack large regions and partitioned super-critical J which have a preponderance of a few large regions, (lower red and magenta sections) containing a small number of small random incursions (left). Recent research in neurodynamics by Bullmore’s group [9] has highlighted the close correspondence between the fractal dynamics of the critical state of the Ising model, other models such as the Kuramoto model [10] and self-organized criticality in brain dynamics. We thus extended our use of the Matlab algorithm to replicate some of the methods used in their work. We thus adapted a wavelet analysis algorithm to portray the time behaviour of the Ising model in terms of wavelet amplitudes and the phase correlations between pairs of channels. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 24 - Fig 4: Above: Wavelet transforms of the summed outputs of an 8x8 sub-array of a 96x96 Ising simulation at the values J = 0, 0.4406868, 1 for zero external field demonstrate fractal time variation of a combined channel at the critical value. The dominance of low frequency wavelet amplitudes at J=1 reflects the partitioning into large domains. The high frequency contributions at J=0 reflect the small scale randomness. Below: Plots of phase lock of the complex correlation function between superimposed channels for the same values of J as above, showing that the fractal nature of the critical state also extends to a fractal distribution of temporal phase lock episodes. The black regions for J = 1 result from zero wavelet amplitudes of one or other channel at higher frequencies causing the argument of the complex correlation function to be undefined. In Figure 4 is shown an absolute wavelet transform for an exponential series of frequencies for sub-critical, critical and super-critical interaction strengths, demonstrating that the fractal nature of the critical state can be readily detected using wavelet transforms. We defined and used a complex version of the Morlet wavelet rather than the Hilbert wavelet transform of Bullmore’s group, but have otherwise followed their methods, using an Ising simulation on a 96x96 array and then summed the binary [-1,1] values on each 8x8 sub-array to form 12x12 effectively 64-bit channels of ‘real’ amplitudes – iterated over the last 8192 iterations of a 12,192 iteration run. The successive iterates were firstly given a direct wavelet portrait using the absolute amplitude of the real part of the wavelet coefficient array to generate the upper series of profiles in Figure 4. Pairs of channels were then phase correlated and the phase angle of the resulting complex argument taken in the range ISSN: 2153-8212 to generate a set of two-channel correlation profiles, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 25 - giving a portrait of the fractal distribution of the critical state in terms of time intervals of phase correlation between a pair of channels. Fig 5: Log-log plot of number of intervals on which a pair of channels have phase lock with respect to the length of the phase lock. J = 0, 0.4406868, 1 coloured blue, black, and red respectively. The critical state (black) approximates a power law distribution, while J = 0 lacks longer phase lock intervals and J=1 is dominated by large intervals corresponding to the large domains and very short intervals caused by frustration between competing domains. Finally we pooled phase correlation intervals of several pairs of channels using Bullmore group’s criteria to test for a power law relationship at criticality over 4 orders of magnitude of interval length (exponentially double the range of fig 6). These results were not averaged over short time intervals as in their work, and were performed only for a small number of pairs, but do show an approximate power law distribution in the log-log plot of figure 5 as a proof of principle for the Matlab program which can be compared with their results as shown in figure 6. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 26 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - - Fig 6: (Left): Probability distribution of phase lock interval (PLI) between pairs of processes at critical (black line) and at hot temperature (low interaction strength) (blue) plotted on a log-log scale. The black dashed line represents a power law with slope a~{1:5. (Right) Probability distribution of lability of global synchronization (the number of channel pairs in phase lock over a given interval) at critical temperature (black line) and at hot temperature (low interaction strength) (blue); the black dashed line represents a power law with slope a~{0:5) (Bullmore et. al.). Appendix 1: Summary of the Theory and Equations The Hamiltonian for the interaction is . The ratio of probabilities for a flip is . The spins of particles in which r > 1 or r < 1 but greater than a uniformly distributed random number have the potential to be flipped if a second random number exceeds a given threshold regulating the proportion flipping in each iteration. The values for the theoretical thermodynamic curves shown in figure 1 are outlined below:. The wavelet coefficients the phase synchronization are given by: ISSN: 2153-8212 coherence Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. and the lability of www.JCER.com global Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 20-27 - 27 - Appendix 2: Matlab Programs Download Link http://www.math.auckland.ac.nz/~king/DarkHeart/Ising/Ising.zip References [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ising_model http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolis-Hastings_algorithm [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Carlo_method [4] Gudmundsson J 2008 Monte Carlo Method and the Ising Model http://www.isv.uu.se/~ingelman/graduate_school/courses/montecarlo/handin/jon_emil_gudmundsson.pdf [5] Fricke T 2006 Monte Carlo investigation of the Ising model http://web1.pas.rochester.edu/~tobin/notebook/2006/12/27/ising-paper.pdf [6] Huang K 1963, 1987 Statistical Mechanics, John Wiley and Sons, NY p 321. [7] http://www.math.auckland.ac.nz/~king/DarkHeart/DarkHeart.htm [8] Schröder M. (1993) Fractals, Chaos and Power Laws ISBN 0-7167-2136-8 p 357. [9] Kitzbichler M, Smith M, Christensen S, Bullmore E (2009) Broadband Criticality of Human Brain Network Synchronization PLoS Computational Biology, 5, e1000314. [10] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuramoto_model [2] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 84 Article Existential Cause & Experiential Effect Steven E. Kaufman* ABSTRACT The idea that what we experience as physical-material reality is what's actually there is the flat Earth idea of our time. That is, the idea that physical-material reality is what's actually there where we experience it to be is an idea that, based upon appearances, seems to be true, in the same way that while standing in the middle of Illinois the Earth appears to be flat, but from a broader perspective is seen to be but an illusion of limited perspective. That broader perspective is afforded by the limitations of experience revealed by quantum physics in the form of the phenomena of wave-particle duality, quantum uncertainty, and quantum entanglement, which limitations, in revealing the nature of experience to be Experiencer dependent, provide insight into the way in which experience is created as the product of a relation of Consciousness, i.e., What Is Actually There, to Itself. However, the same limitations of experience revealed by these phenomena serve to hide from view what these phenomena reveal about the nature of experiential reality, including how experiential reality is created, when considered within a materialistic framework, i.e., within a framework wherein material reality is conceived of as being what's actually there. Thus, although it may seem that we live in a world of material cause and effect, we actually live in a world of Existential cause and experiential effect. That is, we live in a world where the cause is always some relation of Consciousness-Existence to Itself, and the effect is always the experience that is created and apprehended by the Individual Consciousness involved in that relation. Key Words: existential cause, experiential effect, Existence, Consciousness, material world. We do not live in a material world. That we live in a material world is an illusion. The material world is an experiential world, and as such it is a reflection that arises within and rests upon the Mirror of What Actually Exists, and it is in the world of that Mirror that we actually live, whether we know it or not. However, the material world is not itself an illusion, as it exists as a reality, i.e., as an experiential reality, as a reflection exists on the surface of a mirror. The illusion is the thought that material reality is what actually exists where it appears to be, the illusion is the thought that material reality is what's actually there where it appears to be, in the same way that it is an illusion to think that a reflection is what's actually there where it appears to be, since what's actually there is whatever it is upon which the reflection rests and within which it arises. In the case of the reflection-experience that is material reality, what's actually there upon which that reflection rests and within which it arises is Consciousness-Existence, i.e., that which through relation to Itself both creates and apprehends experiential reality. And so the materialists have it backwards, which is to say, they see the relation between material reality and Consciousness in a way that is the complete opposite of their actual relation. That is, materialists *Correspondence: Steven E. Kaufman, Independent Researcher. http://www.unifiedreality.com E-mail: skaufman@unifiedreality.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 85 see material reality, or some version of material reality, e.g., quantum reality, as producing Consciousness through some sort of material cause and effect, wherein material reality is the cause and Consciousness the effect. Because materialists take material reality in one form or another for what's actually there, they are unable to recognize Consciousness as what's actually there, just as when one takes a reflection on the surface of a pond for what's actually there the pond becomes hidden. It is in this context, in this experiential framework, that it must seem to the materialist that material reality is the cause and Consciousness the effect, when again, their relation is the exact opposite, i.e., Consciousness is the cause and material reality or experiential reality, is the effect. Consider that you were raised in a world where you were taught that reflections were the reality, were what's actually there, and then at some point you become cognizant of a mirror. What then are you to make of the mirror and of its place in reality? The position of actuality, of cause, is already occupied, and so the mirror must somehow be crammed into the position of effect. This is what occurs in the materialist view of reality, wherein one attempts to account for Consciousness within a framework where material reality is taken as causal, taken for what's actually there. That is, Consciousness is seen as effect not because it is effect, but because that is how it must be seen within a materialistic framework, within a framework where material reality is seen as causal. It is as if one spent their life thinking that a board was the causal reality, and then they come across a tree and, still holding to the idea of the board as causal, they then go about trying to figure out how the tree comes from the board. We understand the absurdity and futility of trying to figure out how a tree comes from a board, because we understand their cause and effect relation. Materialists however do not understand the absurdity and futility of trying to figure out how Consciousness comes from materialexperiential reality, because what they understand as their cause and effect relation is the exact opposite of their actual cause and effect relation. When an Individual sees what's up as down, that Individual must then see what's down as up. And when an Individual conceives of effect as cause, that Individual must then conceive of cause as effect. This linkage in the way an Individual must apprehend what are opposite or complementary experiences is a function of an experiential limitation I call experiential entanglement, which limitation, like all experiential limitations, is a function of the fact that all experience is the product of a relation in which the Individual Consciousness that is apprehending the experience must themself be involved. That all experience is the product of a relation in which the Individual that is apprehending the experience must themself be involved, along with the fact that opposite or complementary experiences are always the product of opposite and so mutually exclusive relations, imposes some limitations upon what it's possible for an Individual to create and apprehend as experience in any one moment. One of those limitations is that it's not possible for an Individual to be simultaneously involved in the mutually exclusive relations necessary to create opposite experiences. I call this limitation the principle of the preclusion of an Individual's simultaneous creation and apprehension of experiential opposites or, more succinctly, the experiential preclusion. It is this experiential limitation, this experiential preclusion, that is responsible for the phenomena of wave-particle duality and quantum uncertainty, since this experiential limitation ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 86 dictates that for any experience that an Individual creates there is an opposite experience that Individual cannot create in that same moment, because creating that opposite experience would require the Individual's involvement in a relation that is mutually exclusive of the relation in which the Individual must presently be involved in order to create what they are already, in that moment, apprehending as experience. Thus, if an Individual Consciousness is involved in a relation with an Underlying Actuality, which is also Consciousness, that creates what that Individual apprehends as a particle experience, that Individual cannot, in that same moment, be involved in the mutually exclusive relation with that Underlying Actuality necessary to create a wave experience. Opposite or complementary experiences are always the product of opposite and so mutually exclusive relations, and it's not possible for an Individual to be simultaneously involved in mutually exclusive relations, just as its not possible for an Individual to simultaneously face North and South, since facing one direction means you are not facing the other. However, this experiential limitation, this experiential preclusion, does not just operate in the creation of quantum experience, rather, it operates in the creation of experience at all levels, emotional, mental, and physical. At the emotional level it is the experiential preclusion that makes it impossible for you to feel good when you feel bad, and vice versa, as positive and negative emotions, wanted and unwanted emotions, being opposite experiences, are the products of opposite and so mutually exclusive relations. At the mental level it is the experiential preclusion that makes it impossible to know the Earth as round as long as you know it to be flat, to believe in evolution while believing in the biblical version of events, or to know Consciousness as what's actually there while knowing material reality to be what's actually there. We are not generally aware of the functioning of this experiential limitation, this experiential preclusion, because what it does is create an experiential blind spot with regard to whatever experiences are the opposite of those you are presently creating and apprehending as reality. And what is a blind spot but a place you don't know that you can't see because it already seems to you that you are seeing what's there. There is another limitation upon what it's possible for an Individual to create as experience owing to the fact that all experience is the product of a relation in which the Individual that is apprehending the experience must themself be involved, which limitation is the corollary of the experiential preclusion just described. The experiential limitation that is the experiential preclusion has to do with what it's not possible for an Individual to apprehend as experience owing to the impossibility of that Individual being simultaneously in mutually exclusive relations, e.g., facing North and South simultaneously. The other experiential limitation, which I refer to as experiential entanglement, has to do with the way in which an Individual must create experience through relations that are mutually inclusive of the relations in which they are already involved, mutually inclusive of the relations in which they must be involved in order to create what they are presently creating and apprehending as experience. Thus, one experiential limitation involves what an Individual can't create as experience according to mutually exclusive relations in which they can't be simultaneously involved, while the other experiential limitation involves what an Individual must create as experience according to mutually inclusive relations in which they must be simultaneously involved. And both of these ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 87 limitations have as their basis the fact that all experience, rather than being something that just sits there waiting for us to happen across, is the product of a relation in which the Individual that is apprehending the experience must themself be involved, which necessary involvement of the Individual in some relation in order to create what they apprehend as experience then imposes upon that Individual limitations regarding other relations in which they can become involved as long as they continue to remain involved in a particular relation in which they create and apprehend a particular experience. Every particular experience that an Individual apprehends is the product of a particular relation in which that Individual must be involved in order for them to create and apprehend that particular experience. Therefore, as long as an Individual continues to have a particular experience they must remain involved in the particular relation that creates for them that particular experience, and the necessity of their being in that particular relation in order to continue to create that particular experience imposes upon that Individual two related limitations with regard to other relations in which they can become involved in order to create other experiences, one of which is a limitation imposed by the impossibility of the Individual being involved simultaneously in mutually exclusive relations, and the other of which is a limitation imposed by the necessity of the Individual's simultaneous involvement in mutually inclusive relations. The experiential limitation involving mutually exclusive relations, i.e., the experiential preclusion, dictates what it's not possible for an Individual to create and apprehend as experience according to what that Individual is presently creating and apprehending as experience, whereas the experiential limitation involving mutually inclusive relations, i.e., experiential entanglement, dictates the way in which an Individual must create and apprehend experience according to what that Individual is presently creating and apprehending as experience. Both of these limitations, i.e., the experiential preclusion and experiential entanglement, are functioning at all times in the Individual's creation of experience at every level of experience, emotional, mental, and physical, as well as between levels of experience. As already stated, it is the experiential preclusion that makes it impossible to feel good while feeling bad, and vice versa. However, it is experiential entanglement that seems to color all other experience with wantedness or unwantedness when one is feeling good or bad, respectively. How many poems and songs have been written about how when one falls in love all the world is suddenly brighter, or how when love is lost all the world is suddenly dark? Such associations between different experiences are the result of experiential entanglement, i.e., the necessity of the Individual's involvement in what are mutually inclusive relations as they create what they apprehend as experience in any one moment. To feel love, a very positive and wanted emotion, one must be in a relation of Existential alignment, whereas to feel the opposite, a very negative and unwanted emotion, one must be in a relation of Existential opposition. The experiential preclusion dictates that if you are in one relation then you are not in the other, as these relations are mutually exclusive. Experiential entanglement dictates that whichever relation you are in, i.e., Existential alignment or opposition, then all other relations in which you become involved in that same moment as you create mental and physical experience must be mutually inclusive of that relation, meaning they must be relations that have the same aligned or oppositional orientation, and so must be created as experiences that have the same quality of wantedness or unwantedness as that of the emotional experience that is also being created in that moment. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 88 Also as already stated, it is the experiential preclusion that makes it impossible to conceive of the Earth as being round while conceiving of it as being flat, as those are opposite experiences that must then be the product of what are mutually exclusive relations. However, it is experiential entanglement that dictates that as long as one conceives of the Earth as being flat then the idea of a round Earth must be seen as false or unreal, because as long as one is creating and apprehending the mental experience-concept of the Earth as being flat then the only way to simultaneously conceive of the Earth as round is through a relation that is mutually inclusive of the relation in which the Individual is already involved as they create for themself the ideaexperience of the Earth as being flat, which mutually inclusive relation is one that creates the idea-experience of the Earth as not-being round. The Earth cannot be conceived of as being both flat and round simultaneously by a single Individual, as those are opposite concepts and therefore limited in their creation by the experiential preclusion. But the Earth can be conceived of as being flat and not round simultaneously, because those are not opposite concepts, as they are derived from what are mutually inclusive relations. And owing to experiential entanglement, if the Earth is conceived of as being flat, if that is the idea that is being held to, if that is the idea that the Individual is actively creating, then from that perspective, from within that relational framework, the idea of the Earth's roundness must be conceived of as being false. Thus, one experiential limitation dictates what cannot be created simultaneously as experience by an Individual according to what that Individual is already creating as experience, while the other experiential limitation dictates what an Individual must create as experience according to what that Individual is already creating as experience. Put another way, in terms of relations, one experiential limitation, i.e., the experiential preclusion, dictates the mutually exclusive relations in which an Individual cannot become involved in order to create experience according to the relations in which that Individual must already be involved in order to create what they are presently apprehending as experience, while the other experiential limitation, i.e., experiential entanglement, dictates the mutually inclusive relations in which an Individual must become involved in order to create experience according to the relations in which that Individual must already be involved in order to create what they are presently apprehending as experience. And this then brings us back to Existential cause and experiential effect, and to the unavoidable reversal of the actual relation between Consciousness and experience, wherein experience must be conceived of as cause and Consciousness as effect, by any Individual that holds to the idea of material reality as being what's actually there, in which context material reality must, according to experiential entanglement, be seen as causal, and in which context, also according to experiential entanglement, the actual cause, i.e., Consciousness, must then be seen as effect. Put another way, materialists can't help but conceive of Consciousness as an effect of material reality owing to the limiting effect of experiential entanglement, which limiting effect dictates that Consciousness, if it is to be apprehended at all, must be apprehended from a relation that is mutually inclusive of the relation that creates the idea of material reality as casual, from which relational framework Consciousness must then be viewed or seen as effect. When up is seen as down, if down is to be seen at all, it must be seen as up, and when effect is conceived as cause, if cause is to be conceived at all, it must be conceived as effect. That is experiential entanglement, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 89 which, like all experiential limitations, is a function of the fact that what we experience as reality is not there as we experience it to exist independent of our experience of it as such, but rather only exists as we experience it to exist according to some relation in which we, as Individuals, are involved with What Is Actually There, understanding that What Is Actually There is not different or other than What Is Actually Here where we are, both of which are non-experiential Consciousness-Existence. And so, owing to experiential entanglement, as long as we see material reality as being what's actually there it must also seem that we live in a world of material cause and effect, although we really live in a world of Existential cause and experiential effect, a world where Consciousness, through its relations to Itself, is always the cause and experience is always the effect. The problem for idealists, i.e., those who consider Consciousness to be primary or casual, has been explaining how the somethingness of material and experiential reality can be produced by the non-experiential Reality of Consciousness. The missing link has been with regard to how it is that Consciousness-Existence creates experience, and so creates what we, as Individual points of Consciousness, apprehend as material reality in particular and experiential reality in general. However, that missing link has been found and it is as follows: Consciousness-Existence creates experience by being in relation to Itself, because as a result of any relation of ConsciousnessExistence to Itself something is created that is not Consciousness, which created something the Individual Consciousness involved in that relation apprehends, from its perspective within that relation, as experience, as an experiential reality. The actual relations between all these different concepts are shown in the drawings below. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 90 the Mirror - Existence-Consciousness -The More Fundamental Individuality - Reality - Brahman - Tao experience- the reflection apprehended by the Individual - reality wanted experience the Mirror - Existence-Consciousness- The Individual - Reality - Atman - Tao allowing - aligned Existential flow What’s Actually There What seems to actually be there the Mirror - Existence-Consciousness -The More Fundamental Individuality - Reality - Brahman - Tao experience- the reflection apprehended by the Individual - reality unwanted experience the Mirror - Existence-Consciousness- The Individual - Reality - Atman - Tao resistance - oppositional Existential flow Figure 1 These two drawings each depict a sort of cross section of Consciousness-Existence being in relation to Itself and as a result creating what it then, from the perspective of the Individual, apprehends as experience. The dashed lines represent What Actually Exists, i.e., Existence-Consciousness-Reality, etc., while the solid line represents that which What Actually Exists creates as a result of its relation to Itself, which creation is then apprehended from the perspective of the Individual as an experiential reality, which experiential reality, like a reflection that rests within a mirror, can be taken, i.e., mistaken, for what's actually there, in which case, owing to experiential entanglement, What's Actually There as Cause must then appear to only seem to exist as effect, if it is seen to exist at all. The drawing at the top depicts a relation of aligned Existential flow, i.e., a relation in which the Individual is choosing, via its exercise of free will, to project Itself in alignment with the flow of its More Fundamental Individuality, thereby creating for Itself an experience-reflection that is apprehended as having a wanted quality, while the drawing at the bottom depicts the opposite, mutually exclusive relation of oppositional Existential flow, i.e., a relation in which the Individual is choosing, via its exercise of free will, to project Itself in opposition to the flow of its More Fundamental Individuality, thereby creating for Itself an experiencereflection that is apprehended as having an unwanted quality. And because anything that an Individual apprehends as experience must be created as a result of some relation with Existence in which the Individual that apprehends the experience is themself involved, and because an Individual cannot choose to flow simultaneously both in alignment with and opposition to Itself, as those are mutually exclusive relations, an Individual cannot simultaneously create and apprehend both wanted and unwanted experiences. That is one limitation upon an Individual's creation of experience, limiting what an Individual can create and apprehend as experience in any moment according to the relations in which that Individual must already be involved in order to create what that Individual is already apprehending as experience. And since an Individual cannot simultaneously be involved in the mutually exclusive relations necessary to create opposite experiences, this then means that in any one ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 91 moment whatever relations in which an Individual is involved in order to create what that Individual is apprehending as experience must be mutually inclusive relations. This is the other limitation upon an Individual's creation of experience, dictating what an Individual must create and apprehend as experience in any moment according to the relations in which that Individual must already be involved in order to create what that Individual is already apprehending as experience. Thus both limitations serve to restrict what an Individual can, in any one moment, create and apprehend as experience based upon other relations in which that Individual is already involved as it creates what it is already, in that moment, apprehending as experience. However, one limitation is negatively restrictive, whereas the other is positively restrictive, as the former dictates what cannot be created as simultaneous experience by a single Individual, whereas the latter dictates what must be created as simultaneous experience by a single Individual. Wave-particle duality and quantum uncertainty are negatively restrictive experiential phenomena that have as their basis the negatively restrictive experiential limitation referred to as the experiential preclusion, whereas quantum entanglement is a positively restrictive experiential phenomenon that has as its basis the positively restrictive experiential limitation referred to as experiential entanglement. The experiential limitations that manifest so vividly and paradoxically at the quantum level are happening at every level of experience, with regard to every experience we create, it's just that we don't recognize the moment to moment operation and functioning of these limitations owing to our complete immersion in the experiential reality, in the reflection, we are, through our relations to the rest of Existence, creating. Quantum phenomena are only paradoxical in the context of a materialistic framework, in the context of a conception of reality where material reality is apprehended as causal. Conversely, in the context of an idealistic framework where material and quantum reality are seen as effect, there is no paradox, rather, there is instead the expected result of limitation owing to the relations necessary for the Cause to create the effect. Of course if you think that things are as they are regardless of your experience of them as such it then must seem strange and paradoxical that something could appear as either wave or particle. But if you realize that things only are as they are according to your involvement in the relation that causes you to apprehend them as such, as a particular experience, then it is not paradoxical that while in one relation one appearance-experience would be created and while in the opposite relation the opposite appearance-experience would be created. It also seems paradoxical in the context of a materialistic and therefore mechanistic framework that having one experience could somehow instantaneously, and so outside the boundaries of any possible material mechanism, influence what else is experienced. But again, if you realize that things only are as they are according to your involvement in the relation that causes you to apprehend them as such, it is not paradoxical that being involved in the relation that creates one experience dictates what other relations are possible for you in that same moment and so dictates what else can be created as experience by you in that moment. The difference between paradox and understanding lies in whether one sees experience as being what's actually there, be it either a gross material or more subtle quantum experience, or whether one sees experience as a reflection that arises upon and rests within something that is completely and utterly non-experiential, and yet is Itself the basis of all experience. Thus, this explanation of the nature of Reality and reality, the nature of What's Actually There and what seems to actually be there, is not an explanation devoid of science. To the contrary, it is an explanation that rests upon the furthest reaches of science, as it rests upon the limitations of experience encountered as scientists have tried to quantify and examine the smallest bits of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 92 material reality, i.e., it rests upon the phenomena of wave-particle duality, quantum uncertainty, and now upon the phenomenon of quantum entanglement as well. Scientists have not yet figured out the basis of these phenomena because they continue to look at them within a materialistic framework, i.e., within a framework where material reality is still seen as primary and therefore causal. And science will never, be it another hundred or a thousand years, find an explanation for these phenomena within a materialistic framework, because these phenomena have no explanation from within that framework, because these phenomena are the not the product of any material cause and effect relation, rather they are the product of an Existential cause and experiential effect relation, and it is only within that framework that their basis can actually be explained. Is it possible to explain how a tree comes from a block of wood? It is certainly possible to try. But is it possible that such an explanation will ever have any actual validity, since the very basis of the explanation is based upon an inversion of the actual cause and effect relation between the objects in question? No. Is it possible to come up with a material or quantum reality based mechanical explanation for wave-particle duality, quantum uncertainty, and quantum entanglement, as well as Consciousness? It is certainly possible to try, as science has demonstrated. But is it possible that such an explanation will ever have any actual validity, since the very basis of the explanation is based upon an inversion of the actual cause and effect relation between the objects in question? No. There are many scientists who have understood that these phenomena indicate that Consciousness must be part of the equation, but there are few if any who understand that in that equation it is Consciousness Itself that is completely causal and material reality, experiential reality, that is purely the effect, because as scientists they operate within a conceptual framework of objectivity and material causality, which, owing to experiential entanglement, makes it impossible for them relegate to the position of pure effect that which they experience as reality. The idea that what we experience as physical-material reality is what's actually there is the flat Earth idea of our time. That is, the idea that physical-material reality is what's actually there where we experience it to be is an idea that, based upon appearances, seems to be true, in the same way that while standing in the middle of Illinois the Earth appears to be flat, but from a broader perspective is seen to be but an illusion of limited perspective. That broader perspective is afforded by the limitations of experience revealed by quantum physics in the form of the phenomena of wave-particle duality, quantum uncertainty, and quantum entanglement, which limitations, in revealing the nature of experience to be Experiencer dependent, provide insight into the way in which experience is created as the product of a relation of Consciousness, i.e., What Is Actually There, to Itself. However, the same limitations of experience revealed by these phenomena serve to hide from view what these phenomena reveal about the nature of experiential reality, including how experiential reality is created, when considered within a materialistic framework, i.e., within a framework wherein material reality is conceived of as being what's actually there. At this point I would like to make very clear that none of this, in anything that I have written or will write regarding this subject, is meant as a criticism of Individual scientists or of science in general. Rather, all of this is, from my perspective, nothing more than a recognition and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 93 description of a very ironic example of how the nature of experience, which includes the limitations inherent in the Individuals' creation of experience, makes unavoidable the presence of an experiential blind spot for each and every Individual, regardless of scale, and also regardless of profession, consisting of whatever experiences are the opposite of those which they are presently and actively creating and apprehending. The inability of scientists, as Individuals, to conceive of what the phenomena of wave-particle duality, quantum uncertainty, and quantum entanglement say about the nature of experience is ironic because the very limitations of experience revealed by these phenomena are the same limitations that keep Individual scientists from understanding what these phenomena reveal about the nature of experience. Thus, the revealed limitations are themselves concealed by the unavoidable functioning of the limitations that are being revealed. It's a very sticky wicket indeed, and this sticky wicket, is exactly the same sticky wicket, the same set of experiential limitations, that are responsible for the functioning of what Vedantists refer to as maya, i.e., the situation whereby What's Actually There as Consciousness-Existence appears to Itself from the perspective of the Individual as the material, manifest, and phenomenal universe. That is, the same experiential limitations that hide from science what its own experiments reveal about the nature of experience, and so about the nature of all experiential reality, are the same experiential limitations that hide from us, as Individuals, both the True Nature of the universe as well as own True Nature as being ultimately composed of nonexperiential Consciousness that, through relation to Itself, both creates and apprehends experience. Put another way, at a much more fundamental and subtle level of Existential selfrelation and so experiential creation, the same experiential limitations that continue to pull the wool over the eyes of science, i.e., literally the I's of science, meaning Individual scientists, are the same experiential limitations that make it possible for Existence to pull the wool over its own I's, i.e., over Itself operating at the level of the Individual, and so hide from Itself its True Nature. Thus, although it may seem that we live in a world of material cause and effect, we actually live in a world of Existential cause and experiential effect. That is, we live in a world where the cause is always some relation of Consciousness-Existence to Itself, and the effect is always the experience that is created and apprehended by the Individual Consciousness involved in that relation. However, the relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself do more than just produce experience. That is, the effect of the relations of Existence to Itself have as their effect more than just the production of an experience. If the relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself produced only experience, then there would only be two complementary experiences that it would be possible for an Individual Consciousness to create and apprehend. That is, if the relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself produced only experience and nothing else then those relations would only be able to produce, as an effect, the two most fundamental complementary experiences, i.e., wanted and unwanted emotion, because if the relations of Existence-Consciousness to Itself produced only experience and nothing else there would then be only two Existential relations possible; first level relations of aligned or oppositional Existential flow, producing for the Individual the experience of wanted or unwanted emotion, respectively. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 94 However, the relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself do not just produce experience as an effect. Rather, the relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself also produce as an effect a Relational Structure that is composed of Consciousness-Existence as it is being in relation to Itself creating what it is apprehending as experience. And so the Cause produces an Effect and an effect. That is, the Cause, i.e., Consciousness-Existence, through relation to Itself, produces as a result or effect of any relation to Itself two different effects, one of which is composed of Itself, i.e., the Relational Structure, and the other of which is not composed of Itself, i.e., experience. And so the Cause creates Effect and effect, and the Effect, being not other than Cause, can once again serve as Cause and, through relation to Itself, create another Effect and effect, which Effect can serve again as Cause and iteratively on and on, ad infinitum, resulting in the creation of a fractal Reality Structure, a fractal Relational Structure, composed of Cause as it has become and is becoming progressively and iteratively structured in relation to Itself, while at the same time creating as effect a progressive series of experiential realities, extending from the emotional, to the mental, to the physical, that have as their basis the different possible relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself made possible by the fact that the relations of ConsciousnessExistence to itself produce not only effect, i.e., not only experience, but also Effect, i.e., Itself structured in relation to Itself as Relational Structure that then serves as the basis of a new Existential relation and so a newly created and apprehended experience. Thus, the basis of the evolution of Reality and reality is not survival, because Existence cannot help but Exist. Rather, the actual basis of evolution, i.e., the evolution of Reality and reality as a whole, and not just the evolution of organic reality, the perceived evolution of which is just the tip of the evolutionary iceberg, is the desire of Existence to create and apprehend a new experience, a newly wanted experience. That is, Existence continues to project Itself into ever expanding levels of Self-relation and experiential creation because it wants to, and it wants to simply because it feels good to do so. In understanding the motivations of What Is Actually There in creating all of this, both as Relational Structure and experience, we need look no farther than our own motivations, as ultimately we are not other than That. Everything we do we do because we think that as the end result we will feel better, that we will experience a more wanted emotional experience. The rest of Existence is no different, because it Exists within the same parameters of experiential creation that we Exist, which is with the ability and necessity of choosing to create in each moment either a wanted or unwanted emotional experience as a result of choosing to be involved in a relation of aligned or oppositional Existential flow. Existence cannot help but Exist, and as it Exists it cannot help but be in relation to Itself and so cannot help but create, at the very least, a wanted or unwanted emotional experience. However, although each Individual point of Existence has no choice but to create some emotional experience, each Individual gets to choose the sort of emotional experience it creates, because each Individual gets to choose the aligned or oppositional nature of its fundamental and unavoidable relation to Itself. And since Existence has no choice but to choose to create one or the other of these opposite emotional experiences in each and every moment, it naturally chooses to create the wanted rather than the unwanted, it naturally chooses to create that which is attractive rather than that which is repulsive. That is the Nature of Existence and so that is our Nature as Individual points of Existence. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 95 The difference between us, as Individual points of Existence involved for the moment in the Existential relations that create physical experience-reality, and the vast majority of Existence, is that most of Existence is cognizant of its role in the creation of experience and so consciously chooses its involvement in the fundamental and unavoidable Existential relation that determines whether it creates and apprehends wanted or unwanted experience, whereas we are mostly unaware of our role in the creation of what we apprehend as experience, in which case we are still choosing in each moment our involvement in the fundamental and unavoidable Existential relation, and so still choosing in each moment whether we create and apprehend wanted or unwanted experience, but rather than doing so consciously we are doing so unconsciously and reflexively. This is why we often end up creating the unwanted while trying to create the wanted, because without knowing it we are choosing to resist rather than allow, choosing to flow in opposition to our Self rather than in alignment with our Self, because in not understanding the nature of experience we must also fail to understand our role in the creation of experience. And in failing to understand our role in the creation of experience, experience is then seen as being Experiencer independent, existent as it is experienced to exist regardless of whether we are experiencing it or not. And owing to experiential entanglement, when experience is mistakenly conceived of as being Experiencer independent it then also mistakenly seems that the way to get to a wanted experience is by eliminating the unwanted and clinging to the wanted, when in actuality both of these attitudes actually unknowingly place us in relations of Existential opposition and so cause us to create and apprehend experiences that’s have a quality of unwantedness rather than the desired wantedness. Again, owing to experiential entanglement, when one concept is seen in reverse of its actual nature, any related opposite or complementary concept must also be seen as the reverse of its actual nature. And so when we conceive of experience as being Experiencer independent, which is not its actual nature, since its actual nature is that of being Experiencer dependent, we must then also conceive of how to create wanted experience in a way that is the opposite of the way it is actually created. So it is that we try to create wantedness through resistance, through selfopposition, and so we argue, we fight, we push against, we engage in wars, we try to eliminate the unwanted and cling to the wanted, attitudes known as aversion and attachment, respectively, because from within our inverted conceptual framework this appears to be the way to accomplish what is ultimately the prime directive of every point of Existence, which is to create and apprehend a more wanted experience. There is no evil, there is only Existence that's confused about how to go about creating wantedness. And so we do not live in a material world, and so we do not live in a world of material cause and effect. Material reality does not cause Consciousness as an effect. We live in a world of Existential cause and experiential effect, where the relations of Consciousness-Existence to Itself are the cause and experience, which includes material-experiential reality, the effect. Therefore, the organic brain is not a material reality that produces as an effect Consciousness. Rather, Consciousness, through its relations to Itself, produces the Relational Structure composed of Itself that we apprehend as the organic brain. It is therefore not a question of how does the brain produce Consciousness, rather it is a question of how does Consciousness use the Relational Structure we apprehend as brain to create experience for Itself, to become involved in relations with Itself that create what it then apprehends as higher order physical experiences. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 96 What we apprehend as brain is actually composed of Consciousness, as is everything, as is empty space. The same non-experiential thing that Exists directly where we each are as Individuals is the same non-experiential thing that Exists at every point in the universe and beyond. What Exists directly where you are is not your body, rather, what Exists directly where you are is the non-experiential Consciousness that apprehends the material experience of body. That what is there where you are appears to be a material body is no different than a reflection appearing to be what's there where there is actually a body of water. Thus, the ability to create experience, to apprehend experience, is intrinsic to every point in the universe and beyond. However, the type of experience created and apprehended is dependent upon the ability or way Existence can be in relation to Itself. And what the Relational Structure we apprehend as brain does is allow for Existential relations that would otherwise not be possible, and so allows for the creation of experiences that would otherwise not be possible. For Consciousness to create and apprehend experience it has to be in relation to Itself and for it to create and apprehend a particular experience it has to be in a particular relation. The relations that create emotional experiences are different than the relations that create mental experiences, and the relations that creates mental experiences are different than the relations that create physical experiences. Consciousness cannot just decide that it is going to have a physical experience and produce for Itself such an experience in the absence of the Relational Framework composed Itself that allows for the particular Existential relation that produces as an effect that particular type of experience. And underlying the experiential reality-reflection that we apprehend as the organic brain is the Relational Framework or Relational Structure composed of Consciousness-Existence that allows for the Existential relations that produce as their effect what Consciousness then apprehends as physical experience. And so again, the question is not how does the brain produce Consciousness, because it doesn't, rather the question is how does Consciousness, structured in relation to Itself in the way we apprehend as the brain, produce for Itself a particular physical experience? But even more interesting is the question regarding how Consciousness, through its exercise of free will, through its intrinsic ability to choose its direction of flow relative to Itself, uses Itself structured as what we apprehend as brain to control Itself structured as what we apprehend as body. And it may be that this exercise of choice manifests in what is apprehended as quantum spin states. Underlying every reflection is a reflective substance of some sort and underlying every experiential reality, every rock, every molecule, every atom, every quark, every gluon, every whatever, even space, is the Reflective Substance that is Consciousness structured in relation to Itself, Consciousness being in relation to Itself and as a result of those relations having configured and continuing to configure Itself into Relational Structures that are composed of Consciousness and so composed of, at each and every point regardless of scale, that which has the intrinsic ability to choose its direction of flow relative to Itself. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 97 I used to think that quantum randomness was a function of the experiential limitations, a function of our complete inability to actually ever directly experience What's Actually There, because What's Actually There is ultimately non-experiential, ultimately of a Nature that is different or other than the nature of experience. Then I realized that there was a more simple and direct explanation, because underlying every experience, no matter what we call it, and no matter how small or large the experience, rests Consciousness that, like ourselves, is always free to choose to flow this way or that, in alignment with or opposition to Itself, according to how the Consciousness that is there directly is choosing to exercise its free will. And so the creation of any experience, which always involves some relation of Existence to Itself, always involves two choices, one of which we make as Individuals as we choose how to be in relation to What's Actually There, and the other of which is made by What's Actually There as it chooses how to be in relation to What's Actually Here, which in all cases involves Consciousness-Existence choosing how it will be in relation to Itself. And since what we as Individuals create and apprehend as experience is the product of that relation, what we as Individuals create and apprehend as experience must then be the product of both of those choices, one of which we control completely and the other of which over which we have no control whatsoever, because both of those choices arise from and rest solely within the Consciousness that is Actually and Directly There, as a function of how the Individual Consciousness that is Actually and Directly There is choosing to exercise its free will. And because one of the determining factors in the creation of experience is inherently beyond our Individual control, the creation of experiential qualities other than those of wantedness and unwantedness must have some degree of unpredictability. The creation of the experiential qualities of wantedness and unwantedness is predictable because the other factor in the creation of experiential wantedness and unwantedness is the direction of flow of our More Fundamental Individuality, which is constant, and so the creation of experiential wantedness and unwantedness only varies as we, according to our exercise of free will, change our direction of flow relative to That. You can offer numerous different Individuals the choice of ice cream or stepping off the side of a steep cliff, and no matter what it remains possible that one or more may choose the cliff rather than the ice cream, and you have no way of knowing which ones might do so or how many, because there is an inherent unpredictability in the Individual exercise of free will. An Individual will always choose what seems to create for Itself the most wanted experience, as that is its Nature, as that is the nature of Existence, but what seems to create the most wanted experience will vary with Individual perspective. And it is this inherent unpredictability in the Individual exercise of free will that lies at the root of quantum unpredictability, because experience is always the product of a relation, and in every relation there are two Individuals making a choice that determines how they will be involved in that relation, and it is the combination of those choices that determines what each Individual will, from their perspective within that relation, create and apprehend as experience. Thus, from the perspective of the idealist the question is not why is quantum experience unpredictable, rather, the question is why should quantum experience be expected to be any more predictable than Individual behavior, since in both cases What's Actually There is Consciousness ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 84-98 Kaufman, S. E., Existential Cause & Experiential Effect 98 exercising free will? It only seems that experience should be predictable in the context of considering what's actually there to be consciousless matter, i.e., in the context of a materialist framework, in the context of a materialist conception of reality, where experience is seen as cause and Consciousness as effect. However, as has been shown throughout this work, in the opposite conceptual context, i.e., in the context wherein Consciousness is conceived as cause and experience as effect, the experiential effects, i.e., wave-particle duality, quantum uncertainty, quantum entanglement, and quantum unpredictability, rather than being paradoxical, become what is expected. Further, once these phenomena are recognized as limitations that arise naturally and unavoidably as a result of the way experience is created as the product of a relation in which the Individual that apprehends the experience must themself be involved, these phenomena, rather than appearing to be operant only in the creation of quantum experience, can be understood as manifestations at the quantum level of universally operant experiential limitations, i.e., experiential limitations that operate in the creation of every experience at every level, limiting what we can feel and know based upon what we are already choosing to feel and know, and dictating how we must feel and know based upon what we are already choosing to feel and know. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 273 Exploration The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord Robert Campbell * ABSTRACT The rudiments of System 4 are reviewed in brief by first reviewing the Universal Hierarchy that is specified by the Primary Universal Term UT9. This specifies the meaning implicit in each of the four active interfaces or Centers that constitute all of the nine Terms of System 4. There are only nine possible ways that these four interfaces can mutually relate with respect to a common inside and outside, each way delineating a Term. There are nevertheless expressive and regenerative modes to most of the Terms that allow System 4 to span and integrate events in space and time. The Primary and Secondary Universal Sets have transform sequences that span four Particular Steps and that regulate the six Step Transform sequences of both modes of the Particular Terms into three four Step Cycles. Three Particular Sets transform through the six term sequence one Step apart. Since there are seven expressive terms and five regenerative terms in the transform sequence of each Particular Set it takes twelve Steps in three four Step Cycles to complete all sequences. These transform Steps correspond precisely synapse by synapse to how the human nervous system has evolved to meaningfully integrate experience. This is powerful confirmation of System 4 as an accurate representation of the Cosmic Order as it applies in living biological systems. It specifies the structural pattern implicit in the evolutionary process of the biosphere. It also applies to biological evolution as it may occur anywhere in the universe. Key Words: Cosmic Order, human nervous system, spinal nervous system, space and time, evolution, proprioception, muscle spindles. Introduction The illustrations below show how the human nervous system meaningfully integrates experience synapse by synapse at the spinal level. Meaning and learning evolve throughout our life, according to how our nervous system is structured. Elements of experience are learned piecemeal and are gradually assimilated into more coherent complex actions and thoughts. Each element of experience can be considered a unit memory. For a baby, grasping with the fingers is one of the first things we learn. We are born much more helpless than other animals and must learn nearly everything through conscious effort even before we have language to assist us. As we shall see below, proprioceptive simulation, in the regenerative mode of System 4, is indispensable to this learning process. The proprioceptive nervous system tells us how the body is positioned in space, even for a baby grasping with its fingers. Proprioceptive neuromuscular spindles, the tiny sensory organs located throughout the muscles of the body, are structured to allow simulation of anticipated actions before they are carried out. Simplified illustrations show * Correspondence: Robert Campbell, P.O. Box 182, Karon Post Office, Phuket, 83100, Thailand. Website: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com E-Mail: bob@cosmic-mindreach.com Note: This article is based on author’s work of 2006 (see http://www.cosmicmindreach.com/System4_Sequence_Steps.html0 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 274 that they are structured to allow simulation independent of the parent muscle. The regenerative mode simulation that anticipates a future response alternates with the expressive mode that is a conditioned response from the past. So learning is more than just a causal process of conditioned responses to external stimuli, although this plays a part. Learning also involves anticipation of a future desired result and a process of simulation to achieve it. Input from both a causal past and an anticipated future must find mutual reconciliation in current action sequences. We are biologically structured to span space and time and integrate history. As we learn and assimilate behavior piecemeal it tends to become automated as habitual at the spinal level. The spinal cord is an unconscious brain that is nevertheless invested with an intuitive (or instinctive) capacity to make adjustments according to proprioceptive sensory input. As we mature, language greatly enhances our cerebral abilities to consciously simulate experience in abstraction and formulate far reaching plans that nevertheless require continual adjustment according to the ever changing flux of circumstance. Note: A review of the article System 4 Terms is recommended. The meaning implicit within each of the nine Terms is given here in brief, along with a brief outline of the transform sequences of Particular and Universal Sets. A more complete explanation of the meaning implicit within each Term is given at http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/System4Terms.html. A Simplified Outline of System 4: The following simplifies and condenses the essentials of System 4 as the various term transformations mutually interact. Keep in mind that language is limited in the degree to which it can describe how the System works, so that meanings must be interpreted contextually. Meaning is implicitly defined by the way the System works in each specific circumstance. The methodology of the System both requires and facilitates direct intuitive insight into the dynamics of phenomenal experience as it is presented to us. It delineates the structure and process of phenomenal experience, and the human nervous system at the spinal level has structurally evolved to work in precise accord with System 4. Since System 4 is structural rather than behavioral it embraces all possible varieties of behavior. The Universal Hierarchy: As explained more elsewhere there is a System 4 hierarchy involving 4 active Centers(C) that implicitly give direction to one another as follows: (C1)IDEA → (C2)KNOWLEDGE → (C3)ROUTINE → (C4)FORM The words associated with each Center are very general indications of meaning associated with the structural development of meaning within each of the nine System 4 Terms as they may apply in any circumstance. It is noteworthy, even remarkable, that these four words structurally define coherent meaning within each Term as they dynamically relate to one another in the evolving matrix of interactions through the 12 Step Sequence outlined below. We can easily see that the hierarchy applies to any human activity. There is always an Idea that gives direction to our learned Knowledge that in turn directs a Routine of visceral and muscular activity that results in an altered Form of the body in concert with the Form of the environment. The hierarchy is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 275 universal and is designated by Term 9 of System 4. If we focus on the neurological and muscular processes that animate us we can see that the four words in the universal hierarchy have biological correlates as follows: C1 – Host (Idea): The Host human being is an archetypal energy pattern that is clothed in molecules in common with the whole universe. We have evolved in the biosphere over hundreds of millions of years as real people housed within a physical body. We are the proprietors of our body, responsible for its care and maintenance, but we are also more than the physical molecules that make it up. We animate our bodies according to subsumed ideas that we entertain and may commit our actions to. The subsumed ideas are generated by electronic processes going on in our central nervous system. There is a specific pattern of electrochemical activity associated with the generation of every creative idea that we Host. We continue to evolve accordingly. C2 – Organs (Knowledge): Knowledge is invested in our body’s infrastructure. It is implicit in the complement of Organs that make us up and that have evolved over a history of learning, including our evolutionary history as a species and the species that historically preceded us. The vertebrate lineage from reptiles to humans has a similar quadruped body plan of similar Organs that is archetypal in character. This allows us to benefit from an evolutionary history of learning to which we are indebted. Knowledge is especially implicit in the neurological Organs of our bodies, in our central and peripheral nervous systems that allow us to integrate our experience meaningfully. This includes our personal history of learning and the synaptic connections that have developed in our nervous system as a result. Knowledge in this biological respect thus embraces how Organs are organized to meaningfully interrelate. C3 – Cells (Routine): Cells are the factories that constitute Organs and that manufacture our molecular forms through highly recursive biochemical Routines that are catalyzed by complex legions of protein enzymes that catalyze even themselves. They increase reaction rates by millions of times and so are indispensable to every cell’s living function. Cells sustain our biological bodies and its complex interdependent array of processes, from blood cells that transport energy to muscle cells and to the nerve cells that animate our muscle organs. Because enzymes remain chemically unaltered and employ phosphate ions as the energy of exchange, each Cell is a highly organized energy pattern that clothes itself in molecules according to its needs. The archetypal energy patterns of Cells that have evolved over eons direct molecular Forms not vice versa. Molecules are not street smart. C4 – Molecular Form: The physical universe is constructed of 92 naturally occurring atomic elements that chemically combine into inorganic and organic molecules of potentially endless variety in biological systems. Atoms and molecules have closed surfaces generated by System 3. They have opaque surfaces that allow us to see, feel, and interact with physical Forms through the Form of our body which we have an archetypal capacity to animate as we wish in response to our physical ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 276 circumstance. We have evolved biologically through the agency of System 4 which is subsumed by System 3 such that we live in the context of the physical universe with a physical Form. We can thus reinterpret the universal hierarchy as it biologically relates to human behavior as follows: Host (C1) → Organs(C2) → Cells(C3) → Molecular Form(C4) Idea(1) → Knowledge(2) → Routine(3) → Form(4) The above four Centers define the meaning implicit within each of the nine Terms. Six of the Terms are particular and three Sets of Particular Centers follow through a repeating Six Step Term Sequence I, 4, 2, 8, 5, 7 one Step apart in the following order: Step 1.-T1 - Perception of need in relation to response capacity. Step 2.-T4 - Ordered sensory input alternately from the environment or simulated. Step 3.-T2 - Creation of idea as a potential action response or creative concept. Step 4.-T8 - Balanced response to sensory input stimuli as a motor output to muscles. Step 5.-T5 - Action sequence of muscular activity with proprioceptive feedback. Step 6.-T7 - Sequence encoded as a unit memory for recall to T1 and another sequence. Because the three Sets follow one Step apart Terms 8, 7, and 4 alternate with Terms 1, 2 and 5. Term 7 is a memory term since the inverse of the number 7 is 1, 4, 2, 8, 5, 7 repeating. There are Expressive and Regenerative modes for most of the Terms. In the Regenerative mode Centers 1 and 2 exchange places. All of the Particular Terms except T8 have a Regenrative Mode that simulates an anticipated action and an Expressive Mode that is conditioned from past experience. The Particular T8E is always Expressive and acts as a pivot for transformations between Expressive and Regenerative sequences. A total of 12 Steps are thus required for all three Sets to complete 7 expressive and 5 regenerative Term transformations in their respective sequences. In each Step, Expressive and Regenerative Particular Terms from the three Sets interact to span past and future. They thus span and integrate space and time. The 12 Steps are divided into three 4 Step Cycles by the Universal Sets that each have transform sequences that span 4 Particular Steps. Each such Particular Set term Sequence follows a 12 Step path through the nervous system, synapse by synapse. There can be many parallel Particular Sequences active at once through parallel neural pathways since the nervous system is structured with the same number of synaptic junctions in each pathway. The Universal Sets integrate all Particular pathways into a coherently organized and meaningful activity. The Primary Universal Set and Its Transform Sequence: Term 9 is the Universal Hierarchy specified by the Primary Universal Set. It begins each Cycle in the Term 9 position where it stays for Steps 1 and 2. The four active interfaces (centers) of UT9 prescribe the 4 Step Cycles. UT9 has universal access to relevant T7 Host memories of the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 277 Quantum Sensorium called the Void. It identifies them as relevant Ideas(1) for recall in Step 1. In Step 2 the recall is Known(2). Then it transforms mid Cycle to a Regenerative UT8R term concerned with universally balancing available energy resources to fuel a priority of action needs in all the various Particular pathways. It budgets energy expenditures. Each Cycle ends after four Steps when the Primary Universal Set transforms from UT8R back to T9 to begin the next Cycle. The Term 8 Regenerative mode UT8R always belongs to the Primary Universal Set because it implicitly specifies the context as the Host species. The Primary and Secondary Universal Terms cohere together. The Primary Set relates to the Host species. The Secondary Set relates to specific Host human beings. The Secondary Universal Set and Its Transform Sequence: The Secondary Universal Set begins each Cycle as Term 3. UT3 is concerned with the Transference of Idea into Form, via the coalescence of Knowledge with Routine. As T9 identifies relevant Host Ideas(1) as memories in the Void in Step 1, UT3 integrates then as a coherent action plan that can translate Idea(1) into Form(4). In Step 2 of each Cycle UT3 transforms to UT6 which is the Corporeal Body of a specific Host human being. UT6 does not transform in Step 3, but the Primary Universal Set transforms to UT8R which coheres with it. This works like the coherence in the Space Frame side of System 3. In this case it budgets energy resources to an integrated proposed action plan implicit in the UT6 Host. In Step 4 the UT6 Term transforms to a universal T2E expressive idea term, where UT8R coheres with it again. This explicitly commits resources to an integrated planned idea entertained by the Host. At the end of each Cycle both Universal Sets transform back to their original positions to begin a new Cycle. Because there are three synchronous Particular Sets all twelve Particular Terms are represented in each Cycle in different Sets. Summary of Term Transformations Step by Step: A review of the article System 4 Terms will be very helpful. System 4 may be summarized in chart form as follows. Expressive and Regenerative particular terms, as well as universal terms, are shown for each sequential Step. Particular Regenerative Terms are shown in bold. New sensory input from the environment comes via T4E in Set 3 in Step 1. Sensory input T4E in one Set of Step 1 of each Cycle is always coupled to memory recall T7R to begin a related simulation sequence. Memory recall must always be linked directly to sensory input in order for our thoughts, feelings, and actions to be relevant to ongoing circumstantial input. This must also be reconciled with the previous action sequence T8E (simultaneous motor instructions to muscles) in order for there to be a smooth transition from sequence to sequence. The following chart will be a helpful reference in the sequence illustrations that follow. The regenerative Terms at the spinal level are accommodated by gamma motor neurons that project to muscle spindles. A gamma motor simulation in T1R is followed by a muscle spindle simulation in T4R that generates proprioceptive feedback about body position in space. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 278 Step Set 1 Set 2 Set 3 Set U1 Set U2 Cycle 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 T8E T5E T7E T1E T4E T2E T8E T5R T7R T1R T4R T2R T7R T1R T4R T2R T8E T5E T7E T1E T4E T2E T8E T5R T4E T2E T8E T5R T7R T1R T4R T2R T8E T5E T7E T1E UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R UT9 UT9 UT8R UT8R UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E UT3 UT6 UT6 UT2E 1 2 3 A Note on the Void: The Void is the timeless, formless and thus boundless conjugate reciprocal of the physical universe of form. It is a spatially indeterminate quantum energy field also called the Quantum Sensorium. It is a master memory bank. The System 3 diagram illustrates how the universe is discontinuous. It oscillates very rapidly back and forth between still atomic space frames and timeless and formless quantum frames in a cosmic holographic movie. Each recurrence of a space frame defines a Primary Interval of Time in the successive of the cosmic movie. The only action in each atomic space frame is light or electromagnetic radiation. EM radiation comes from atomic processes and thus can only transmit a certain distance in each space frame relative to each individual atom. Light is thus quantized into synchronous pulses consistent with the Planck universal quantum of action. That is why the speed of light is universal with respect to each atom. Relative motions introduce relative space frame skipping in the integrated fabric of space and time which accounts for the Lorentz Transformations of Relativity Theory. Because the Void is timeless the space frames close ranks to present the illusion of continuous space and time. Atomic particles are both waves and particles at the same time. In System 3 the Void is generated in the quantum frame the Particular Terms 3 since the Routine and Form coalesce within the photon Idea interface. Routine and Form project inside each other thence timelessly out through the photon which constitutes a quantum energy equivalent of an atom. The electron and proton are coalesced as a photon quantum of energy. The simultaneous reconciliation of internal and external invests the quantum of energy with timeless or eternal characteristics that are nevertheless subject to synchronous recall. Term 7 of System 4 has similar characteristics and constitutes a biologically structured element of the Void that is subject to recall as a memory that may be tailored to current circumstances in the synchronous projection ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 279 of physical form. In unusual circumstances the Void is accessible in human experience. All form vanishes without trace, including the form of one’s own body but without loss of identity. It is an awesome experience of union with all without specific content. Refer to Endnote 9 at http://www.landesbioscience.com/journals/cib/2012CIB0052R.pdf. Cosmic experiences that transcend and subsume the Void and with it the whole of history, space and time are also possible. See http://scigod.com/index.php/sgj/article/view/225/260. Simulation in Neuromuscular Spindles The Regenerative Mode requires the simulation of an anticipated act before it is actually enacted. The top simplified diagram below does not distinguish between nuclear bag and nuclear chain fibers, nor between different sources of motor innervation. The second simplified diagram does but does not show the sheath. These tiny short bundles of a few short muscle fibers are enclosed in a sheath and connected to parent muscles throughout the body. They can be independently activated by gamma motor neurons that constitute about 30% of the motor neurons in the ventral horns of the spinal cord. The muscle spindle simulation in T4R follows a gamma motor simulation in the T1R Step that precedes it. Muscle spindles are thus situated throughout the body to simulate activity independently of the parent muscles of the body. In doing so they generate proprioceptive feedback about the body's anticipated changes in position in any given action sequence, before it is carried out. We sense this sensory feedback when we feel an urge to dance to a tune with a rhythm that moves us. Redrawn from Cunningham’s Textbook of Anatomy ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 280 Redrawn from Ganong, W. F., Review of Medical Physiology The muscle spindles monitor the relative state of parent muscle contraction and muscle tone as well as being structured to enact simulations independently of the parent muscles and generate propriocpetive sensory feedback about the simulated position of body muscles and thus the anticipated relative position of body parts in space. The Sequence Illustrations: The above twelve Steps in the table are illustrated below one Step at a time, showing how the three Particular Sets and two Universal Sets interact in each synchronous Step. Each Term is illustrated with a brief description of how it works in relation to the nervous system of a human being who has just suffered a scalding burn to the forearm. This involves more than a reflex jerk away from the burn. The person may be carrying a pot of scalding tea and stumbles into a running child causing the tea to spill on the forearm. The response must do more than jerk the arm away from the scald which could spill more perhaps on the child. Rapid inhibition of an excessive movement is possible via brain stem centers such as the raphe nucleus. This can provide time for a rapid simulation of a better corrective movement. The whole body is involved as the person must also avoid falling from the collision. Simulations alternate with direct sensory input at lightening speed in a case like this. Proprioceptive sensory neurons are much larger than pain neurons and transmit rapidly from throughout the body. It takes considerable concentration to follow and fully understand the sequence. Understanding each Term requires a lot of intuitive reflection that must be interpreted in context. Because there are so many things happening both synchronously and sequentially it takes a great deal of concentration as well as breadth of mental grasp. Once understood however, it can be applied to understand how the whole nervous system integrates experience meaningfully. Each cycle is a repeat of Cycle 1 but with Terms of different Particular Sets in each position. There are also sensory neurons for pressure and vibration and the other sensory systems such as vision, hearing, balance, taste and smell that all work in a self-similar way. This will be explored more in the article on the Cerebellum which plays a crucial role in integrating various sensory inputs with cerebral functions. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 281 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 282 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 283 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 284 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 285 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 286 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 287 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 288 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 289 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 290 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 291 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. 292 www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 273-293 Campbell, R., The Nervous System Part 1: Spinal Cord 293 Conclusion The above sequence illustrations demonstrate that the human nervous system at the spinal level integrates meaning synapse by synapse in precise accord with the System of delineating the Cosmic Order by which we have evolved. The associated Nervous System article Part 2 on the Cerebellum shows how other sensory inputs at the spinal and brain stem level are meaningfully integrated with conscious cerebral functions including the motor projection of consciously intended behavior patterns. This detailed accord between the structural dynamics of System 4 and the nervous system can hardly be a coincidence. The strict structural correspondence is both sufficient and necessary to explain how the nervous system integrates experience synapse by synapse, irrespective of the immense diversity of human behavior. It embraces all possible varieties of phenomenal behavior. It concerns the ontological structural of Being that subsumes the epistemological knowledge of phenomenal behavior. The article focuses only on the evolutionary variant of the System as a learning experience. There is also an involutionary variant where Center 3 and 4 exchange places. Values become inverted. Things are done as ends in themselves rather than meaningfully relating to circumstance. This leads to fragmentation and decay. The evolutionary and involutionary variants are mutually exclusive such that their expressive and regenerative modes are at cross purposes. The expressive mode of the evolutionary variant is the regenerative mode of the involutionary variant and vice versa. This allows the involutionary variant to feed on the evolutionary variant, while the evolutionary variant can redeem the energies of the involutionary variant. We experience this as a choice implicitly presented to us in most circumstances between mutually opposed value judgments. There is a bi-polar moral dilemma at the roots of perception. The involutionary variant is introduced at the following link: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com/Human_Values.html ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

36 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Article Cosmological Foundations of Consciousness Chris King* ABSTRACT How the biological brain generates subjective consciousness remains the principal abyss in the scientific description of reality, a problem complementary to the cosmological theory of everything, and equally as challenging, because it takes the scientific model beyond the confines of objective reality. This paper examines the cosmological basis of consciousness and subjective experience in biological organisms. It draws on principles of symmetry-breaking and interactive non-linear dynamics to establish the cosmological status of biogenesis, and biological tissues as fractal forms of interactive symmetry-breaking. It then investigates the Archaean genetic expansion as a source of the envelope of functional machinery forming the basis of neural activity, based on the universal excitability of all living cells. Finally it examines the biophysical basis for consciousness, both in single cells, and in the human brain and its ‘Cartesian theatre’ of consciousness, to elucidate cosmological principles underlying the mind-body relationship. Key Words: cosmological foundation, consciousness, reality, subjective experience. * Correspondence: Chris King http://www.dhushara.com E-Mail: chris@sexualparadox.org Note: This is supporting material for Journal of Cosmology Article 103. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 37 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Fig 1: Cosmic symmetry-breaking and its interactive fractal and chaotic effects leading to biogenesis. (a) Life portrayed as the consummation of interactive complexity (Σ) resulting from symmetry-breaking of the fundamental force of nature in the big-bang (α), whatever ultimate fate is in store (Ω). Inset (i) possible fractal inflation , (ii) the distribution of dark energy and matter and the matter of stars and planets. (b) Logarithmic time scale of cosmological events showing life on earth existing for a third of the universe’s current lifetime. (c) Symmetry-breaking of the forces of nature results in the color and weak forces generating 100 atomic nuclei, while gravity and electromagnetism govern long-range structure determining biogenesis, from fractal chemical bonding, to solar systems capable of photosynthetic life in the goldilocks zone of liquid water. (d) Interactive effects of cosmic symmetry-breaking lead to hierarchical interaction of the forces, generating hadrons, atomic nuclei and molecules (i). Nonlinear energetics of chemical bonding lead to a cascade of cooperative weak-bonding effects, which generate fractal molecular complexity, from the molecular orbitals of simple molecules (ii), through the 3D structures of complex proteins and nucleic acids (iii) to supra-molecular cell organelles (iv), cells (v), and tissues (vi) and organisms. (e) These fractal effects are complemented by the chaotic effects of gravity as a non-linear force, resulting in extreme variation of the planets, generating a diversity of potential conditions for biogenesis, similar to the dynamic variations surrounding the Mandelbrot set. 1. Introduction: Scope and Design This is the full version of a pair of twin papers, comprising a compact overview (King 2011b) which refers extensively to this paper as supporting online material. The overview presents the general principles, while this paper contains all the references and a full discussion of all the research developments and ideas. 2. Non-linear Quantum and Cosmological Foundations of Biogenesis Although it is now well-known science that the universe appears to have begun in an explosive ‘big-bang’ possibly accompanied by a phase of cosmic inflation and that these events are also associated with symmetry-breaking of the forces of nature into the highly asymmetric weak and strong nuclear forces, electromagnetism and gravity we experience today, the cosmological implications of this for the existence of life and hence consciousness (King 1978) are far less well-understood and not fully recognized. Two preconceptions have tended to cloud this recognition of the cosmic role of biogenesis. The first is that life is fragile and insignificant by comparison with the maelstrom forces of stellar energies, let alone black-holes or the cosmic big-bang. This is criticism of life’s cosmological status is incorrect because life is sine-qua-non the ultimate interactive consequence of cosmic symmetry-breaking. Nowhere else do the forces of nature enter into such complete fractal expression in complexity. Furthermore, although life’s energetics are miniscule on a cosmic ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 38 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 scale, they are robust over cosmological time, to the extent that life has continued on Earth for a full third of the universe’s lifetime. The second is that chemistry has been incorrectly perceived as a matter of ball-and-stick molecules, of almost arbitrary structure, generally driven by highly determined reaction conditions suited to push the process towards a few desired products. This approach does not deal well with situations where very simple reactants lead to increasingly complex and diverse products. In a Nature article for the current ‘Year of Chemistry’, Ball (2011) notes the demise of such notions, toward a dynamic view of chemical bonding, but this misconception led to a slowing of prebiotic discovery the 20th century, so that, despite Miller and Urey’s (1959) founding work on spark syntheses mid century, the key biogenetic pathways to replication are only beginning to be elucidated, nearly a decade into the third millennium. The realities of non-linear quantum interaction are that, due to the charge interactions of electron wave functions and atomic nuclei, molecular orbitals form as a non-linear perturbation of the basic linearity of Hamiltonian dynamics. The non-linear energetics that results in strong covalent and ionic bonds does not stop there, but leads to a cascade of successively weaker H-bonding, hydrophobic and van-der-Waal’s interactions, whose globally cooperative nature is responsible for the primary, secondary, and tertiary structures of proteins and nucleic acids, and in a fractal manner to quaternary supra-molecular interactions, cell organelles, cells, tissues and organisms. Fig2: (a) Symmetry-breaking quasi-periodic table of the bioelements displays covalent optimality. (b) Optimality of H20 in terms of internal weak-bonding expressed in its high boiling point. (c) Evidence for a symmetry-breaking origin of the genetic code. (d) Realized and proposed direct synthesis paths from primordial precursors such as HCN to nucleotides (Powner et. al. (2009, 2010). Thus, while genetic coding and regulation is necessary for organizing the structures of the tissues that make up our bodies and brains, it is certainly not sufficient and can only encode organismic development because the fundamental laws of molecular interaction, upon which ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 39 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 such coding depends, are non-linear and fractal. In this sense, tissue is the natural interactive full complexity product of cosmic symmetry-breaking. The tissue of the conscious human brain represents the Copernican pinnacle of integrated functional complexity in the universe and lays a claim to a cosmological status, as fundamental as the big-bang. Fractal molecular energetics combines with chaotic gravitational dynamics to cause an extreme variety of local conditions in varying solar systems, which give our own planets and their satellites an extreme diversity from one another, and each of the many hundreds of extra-solar planets discovered and the billions of estimated planets in our galaxy their own bewildering extremes. These conditions lead to a situation similar to the Mandelbrot set of the quadratic iteration, in which local states form an endlessly varying fractal domain in the phase space of possible conditions. A Mandelbrot universe virtually guarantees a goldilocks biogenesis cosmologically, through the dense exploration of dynamical space by the chaotic system. The distribution of the bioelements shows very clear evidence of symmetry-breaking optimizations that are a direct result of the non-linear nature of the periodic table of the elements in which the symmetry-breaking of charge in atomic matter, leads to a series of quantum periodicities of the s, p, d and f orbitals and their hybrids which is not periodic energetically so that the second row elements CNO are optimally covalent. This causes the covalent basis of life to be founded on the splitting of H with CNO, stemming from the high energy optimally strong multiple -CN, -CC-, and >CO bonds, which are cosmically abundant in forming star systems (Buhl 1974) and readily undergo polymerization to heterocyclic molecules, including the nucleic acid bases A, U, G, C and a variety of amino acids, as well as optically active cofactors such as porphyrins. The covalent symmetry-breaking of periodicity is complemented by a series of other optimalities. The increasing electronegativity of the first row sequence CNO leads to the optimality H2O as an extreme polar structure-invoking medium, bifurcating molecular dynamics between hydrophilic and non-polar phases, in addition to pH, polar and H-bonding effects, which define the structures and dynamics of proteins, nucleic acids, membrane, ion and electron transport - all fundamentally essential to the existence of life. The alkali and alkaline earth elements K+/Na+ and Ca++/Mg++ are bifurcated in their ionic relationships e.g. in cell membrane potentials. Second row elements S and P also become involved contributing unique properties of third row element elements, weaker S-S bonds and Fe-S interactions critical for electron transport, and the energetics of oligomeric PO43- ions, in cellular energetics as ATP, and in catalyzing nucleic acid polymerization and forming its backbone. Finally the electrontransferring properties of the transition elements enter into major catalytic roles. This does not imply that this arrangement of bioelements is the only one in which life could exist, as the discovery of organisms adapted to using arsenic in the place of phosphorus, even in the DNA backbone (Wolfe-Simon et. al. 2010) demonstrates, but it does confirm that life as we know it does have optimal properties of a symmetry-breaking nature cosmologically. These may extend as far as the establishment of the genetic code, where major assignments of the first and second codon appear to be based on cosmic abundance and hydrophilicity versus non-polarity, as well as other generic features (King 1982). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 40 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 The critical transition, for the origin of replicative life to take place, is a stable context in which the four nucleotides comprising RNA can be generated from primordial cosmically-abundant molecules such as HCN and HCHO and then polymerize and become able to catalyze their own replication. Although the first syntheses produced the purines adenine and guanine readily, cytosine and uracil, the complementary pyrimidine bases, making up the other half of the pairs A-U and G-C, were not at detectable levels. However Stanley Miller, 43 years after his original pioneering experiment, with Michael Robertson, discovered a way for the primordial pond to make them in high yield. When he added more urea than was produced in the spark synthesis, it reacted with cyanoacetaldehyde, another by-product, producing large amounts of pyrimidines. (Cohen 1996, Horgan 1996). A major stride has recently been made which put the direct primal synthesis in a more definitive perspective. Sutherland’s group (Powner et. al. 2009, 2010) have both produced a prebiotically plausible route for synthesizing pyrimidine nucleotides and have a putative pathway that could also lead to the synthesis of the purine complements in a ’one-pot’ process. Critically in the presence of phosphate is necessary to the polymerization pathway. Ferris (1996) added montmorillonite, a positively charged clay believed to be plentiful on the young Earth, to a solution of negatively charged adenine nucleotides, spawning RNA 10-15 nucleotides long. When these chains, clinging to the surface of the clay, were repeatedly washed with the solution, they grew up to 55 nucleotides long. The discovery that RNA appears to be the catalyst of peptide-bond synthesis in the modern ribosome (Guthrie 1992, Pace 1992, Noller et. al. 1992) and the capacity of modified ribozymes to act as amino-acyl esterases (Picarilli et.al. 1992), the first step in protein synthesis, establish RNA has the capacity to act as synthetase as well as transfer, messenger and ribosomal functions. Szostak's group (Szostak et. al. 1995, Wilson and Szostak 1996) have evolved ribozymes capable of a broad class of catalytic reactions. Co-researcher David Bartel has evolved RNAs that are as efficient as some modern protein enzymes. His ribozymes can stitch small pieces of RNA together without breaking larger molecules apart, using high-energy tri-phosphate bonds similar to ATP (Cohen 1996). Zhang and Cech (1997, 1998) isolated RNAs that could efficiently link specific amino acids together from a random pool of 1015synthetic RNAs. They also found that a small region of many of the RNAs they selected was 70 per cent identical to some regions of the ribosomal RNA. Lincoln and Joyce (2010) have also demonstrated RNA ligation processes using complementary catalytic RNAs which provide a plausible basis for RNA to ‘pull itself up by its bootstraps’ into reproductive autonomy. Many of the fundamental molecules associated with membrane excitation, including lipids such as phosphatidyl choline and amine-based neurotransmitters, have potentially primordial status (King 1996). Amine-based neurotransmitters, from acetylcholine to the catecholamines and serotonin as well as simple amino acids glutamate and GABA may have the capacity to modify membrane dynamics directly, through polar interactions with the terminals of membrane lipids, and have later been coopted by evolution into protein binding to ion channels and receptors as a result of these properties. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 41 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Fig 3: (a) Catalytic nicotine-adenine dinucleotide is essential in respiration. (b) Large and small subunits of the ribosome are centrally and functionally RNA [pink] (c) Molecular fossil evidence for a viral-based cellular transition from the RNA world to DNA based chromosomes, through cellular cooption of viral RNA-directed RNApolymerase, followed by reverse transcriptase and finally DNA-dependent DNApolymerase. (d) Independent evolution of archaeal and bacterial cellular life from a non-cellular form of life at the interface of olivine and acid, iron-rich sea water forming ‘lost city’ undersea vents able to solve the concentration and encapsulation problems. 3. Emergence of the Excitable Cell: From Universal Common Ancestor to Eucaryotes There is abundant genetic evidence for an era when RNA played the roles of both an informational molecule and a protein-like catalyst through its tertiary structure. The ribosome is still centrally an RNA-based functioning unit common to all life forms, implying that protein translation evolved during the RNA era. Eucaryote nuclear chemistry is still very much RNAbased with extensive RNA processing. Cellular metabolisms also depend extensively on nucleotide-based cofactors from NAD through to cyano-cobalamin, or vitamin B12. The evidence is consistent with the polymerases for this transition coming from viral genomes and with DNA replication evolving independently in bacteria and archaea/eukaryotes. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 42 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Likewise both fermentation and the cell walls and membranes of bacteria and archaea/eukaryotes differ genetically, implying two independent evolutionary origins. A novel unstable interface phenomenon may provide a plausible explanation for how cellular life originated, well into the RNA era after ribosome-based protein translation was in place (Martin and Russell 2003). ‘Lost city’ undersea vents generate a gigantic chemical garden of porous carbonate columns at the interface of cosmically-abundant crustal mineral olivine interacting chemically with [then acid carbonate and iron-rich] sea water, releasing hydrogen, alkaline fluids and heat. These vents have been found to provide a unique pore-filled active interface, conducive to the coexistence of complex organic molecules, lipid membranes and iron-sulphur complexes, with a proton gradient, and capable of concentrating nucleotides exponentially. This provides a plausible environment for an open RNA-era protoplasm to survive, and for autonomous cellular life to evolve (Lane 2009). Fig 4: (Left) Archaean genetic expansion around 3.3 billion years ago generated most critical genes common to life (David and Alm 2010) (Right) Evidence of ubiquitous horizontal transfer of genes between bacterial species at different trigger levels (Dagan et. al. 2006). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 43 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Once the branches of cellular life evolved, cell excitability based on ion channels and pumps rapidly became universal. As early as 3.3 billion years ago there was a massive genetic expansion, which gave rise to the majority of critical genes necessary to all forms of life over a remarkably short period in evolutionary time (David and Alm 2010). This was also accompanied by high levels of horizontal gene transfer driven by a cross-species pan-sexuality promoted by viruses and plasmid conjugation and transfer. Estimates of the computing power of the collective bacterial and archaeal genome contain some almost astronomical figures (King 2009). To give a very rough idea of the computing power of the combined bacterial genome alone, taking into account bacterial soil densities (~109/g), effective surface area (~1018 cm2), genome sizes (~106), combined reproduction and mutation rates (~10-3/s) gives a combined presentation rate of new combinations of up to 1030 bits per second, roughly 1013 times greater than the current fastest computer at 2 petaflops or about 1017 bit ops per second. Corresponding rates for complex life forms would be much lower, at around 1017 per second because they are fewer in total number and have lower reproduction rates and longer generation times, but they are still vying with the computation rates of the fastest supercomputer on earth. This picture of bit rates coincides closely with the Archaean expansion scenario noted above and suggests that evolution has been a two-phase process in which the much higher bit rates of the collective single-celled genome, under promiscuous sexuality and horizontal transfer, has arrived at a global genetic solution to the notoriously intractable protein folding problems of the central metabolic, electro-chemical and root developmental pathways, which are then later capitalized on by multi-celled organisms, through gene duplication and loss, as well as the creation of new specialized genes at a much lower rate. The excitability associated with chaotically sensitive cells and conscious brains might thus have cosmological status if evolution has successfully explored the phase space of catalytic processes making excitability and quantum sensation possible. The eukaryotes appear to have evolved through a number of pivotal gene fusions, which dramatically enriched their genomes and ultimately led to the plants, fungi and animals. Both the respiring mitochondrion, common to eukaryotes, and the plasmid of plants, are bacterial endosymbionts, engulfed by ancestral cells of eukaryotes. There is further evidence that only the informational nucleic acid-processing genes of eukaryotes originated with them and that the majority of metabolic genes have been inherited from mitochondrial, or other bacterial genetic fusions (Horiike et. al. 2001). Horizontal transfer and gene fusion has led to a situation where both sexuality and excitability, along with all the critical components for neural dynamics including ion-channels specific for Ca++, K+ and Na+, G-protein linked receptors (Perez 2003) and a fast action potential are common to the spread of eucaryote cell types, from giardia and paramecium to metazoa. Meech and Mackie (2007) note that ion channel structure appears to have been established during the soup of lateral gene transfers that drove bacterial evolution and that all major classes arose before the metazoa, with several showing homology to bacterial versions. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 44 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 A fundamental question arises. Is the sort of dynamics we associate with the conscious brain essentially a product of the complex interconnectivity of circuitry, as artificial neural nets and computational approaches might suggest? Or is it a fundamental aspect of living cells, which evolved with the earliest eukaryotes? Fig 4b: Evolutionary trees of transcriptional elongation factor EF-2 and b-tubulin outlining the spread of eucaryote evolution in relation to the animals and humanity (King and Carrol 2001). The spread of genes governing excitability, including ionchannels, neurotransmitters and G-linked proteins are universal to the eucaryote tree. Pyramidal and other neurons are very complex dynamical systems, far from the trivial additive units which formal McCulloch-Pitts ‘neurons’ present in theoretical artificial networks. They engage up to 104 synaptic junctions, having a variety of excitatory and inhibitory synaptic inputs involving up to four or five different types of neurotransmitter, with differing effects depending on individual receptor types, and their location on dendrites, the cell body, or axon-axonal connections. Neuronal synaptic connections also involve many non-linearities, feedbacks and sigmoidal tipping points. Furthermore, as noted, many critical features we associate with neurons, and their associated neuroglia, in the conscious brain, including excitability and the use of neurotransmitter molecules, are not only shared by other cells in the human body, but extend down to the earliest single-celled eukaryotes (Mackie 1990). Amoebae, although they lack specific sense organelles, are highly sensitive to chemical and electrical signals, as well as to bright light. Earlier work demonstrated membrane potentials in Amoeba proteus (Bingley 1966) associated with pseudopod formation, and action potentials have been found in the amoeba Chaos chaos (Marshall 1965, Tasaki and Kamiya), Ciliates and Diatoms (Taylor 2009). In ciliated protozoa, such as Paramecium (Kung and Eckert 1972, Hennessey 2005) and Tetrahymena (Onimaru 1980) action potentials are associated with the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 45 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 coordinated motile actions of cilia in cellular locomotion, avoidance and exploration (Ramoino et. al. 2006). Paramecium utilizes Ca++-dependent Na+ ion channels, as well as K+ channels, enabling osmotically neutral action potentials, as in metazoan nervous systems (Saimi & Ling 1990). Paramecia possess GABA a and b receptors (Ramoino et. al. 2004, 2006), b-adrenergic ( Wiejak et. al. 2002) and glutamate receptors (Bernal-Martínez and Ortega-Soto 2004) as well as those for a variety of other molecules (Ladenburger et. al. 2006) essential for sensing their chemical environment. Single celled organisms share a need for cellular memory to sample concentration gradients, since they are too small for differential sensing spatially. The connection between bursting and beating in excitable cells was established by the ChayRinzel model and ensuing experiments (Chay and Rinzel 1985), which established chaotic dynamics in neurons, pancreatic b-cell exocytosis, and inter-nodal cells in the alga Nitella (Hayashi et. al. 1982). The association between excitability and exocytosis spanning the eukaryotes (Lledo 1997) is significant in that synaptic vesicles are produced by exocytosis. The aggregation of slime moulds such as Dictyostellium is mediated by cyclic-AMP (Halloy et. al. 1998, Goldbeter 2006). The ciliated protozoan Tetrahymena pyriformis (Brizzi and Blum 1970, Essman 1987) and flagellated Crithidia jasciculata (Janakidevi et. al. 1966) utilize serotonin, and the former also metabolizes dopamine and epinephrine (Takeda and Sugiyama 1993, Nomura 1998).Tetrahymena pyriformis also has circadian light-related melatonin expression (Köhida et. al. 1993). Fig 5: Real-time purposive behavior in single cells (a) Paramecium reverses, turns right and explores a cul-de-sac. (b) Human neutrophil chases an escaping bacterium (black), before engulfing it. (c) Chaos chaos engulfs aparamecium. Action potentials in Chaos chaos (d) and paramecium (e). Period 3 perturbed excitations in alga Nitella indicate chaos. (g) Frog retinal rod cells are sensitive to single quanta in an ultra-low intensity beam, with an average rate of one photon per click, but sometimes zero, or two, due to uncertainty in the beam. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 46 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Complex behavior is not confined to metazoans. Both amoebae and ciliates show purposive coordinated behaviour, as do individual human cells, such as macrophages. The multi-nucleate slime mould Physarum polycephalum can solve shortest path mazes and demonstrate a memory of a rhythmic series of stimuli, apparently using a biological clock to predict the next pulse (Nakagaki et. al. 2000, Ball 2008). Chaotic excitation provides an excitable single cell with a generalized quantum sense organ. Sensitive dependence would enable such a cell to gain feedback about its external environment, perturbed by a variety of quantum modes - chemically through molecular orbital interaction, electromagnetically through photon absorption, electrochemically through the perturbations of the fluctuating fields generated by the excitations themselves, and through acoustic and mechanical/osmotic interaction. Since such sensitivity predates the computational function of neural nets, dynamical chaos became fundamental to the evolution of neuronal computing. A single cell has no intercellular form of computation and has to rely on internal genetic regulation to provide memory and a strategy for survival, so the sensory sensitivity of the membrane in response to internal and external cues is its key function. When we move to the earlier metazoa we find sponges, despite lacking a nervous system, sport acetylcholinesterase, catcholamines, and serotonin (Mackie 1990, Wayrer et. al. 1999). Likewise protein kinases C and in particular tyrosine kinases are universal to choanoflagellates (King N et. al. 2001, 2008) and metazoa from sponges to humans (Kruse et. al. 1997). Coelenterates represent the first group with genuine neurons. Serotonin neurons have been found in the coelenterate Renilla along with catacholamines and melatonin (Kaas 2009, Anctil et. al. 1982, 1984, 1991). GABA and glutamate receptors mediate pacemaker and feeding response in the coelenterate Hydra as well as diverse neuropeptides and putative Hox genes (Kaas 2009). Hydra, which supports only a primitive diffuse neural net and whose tissues can dynamically reorganize themselves, and whose nervous system is in continuous transformation and dynamic reconstruction, involving inter-conversion of cell types (Koizumi and Bode 1991, Burnett and Diehl, Bode 1992), has a rich repertoire of up to 12 forms of ‘intuitive’ locomotion (King 2008), and is able to coordinate tentacle movements, tumbling, sliding and other forms of movement using similar global dynamics to those in amoebae andParamecium, and much more advanced organisms. Thus we already have the neurotransmitters, G-linked protein receptors, ion channels and essentially the entire complement of neuronal machinery we associate with vertebrate and human nervous systems. The basis of central nervous system function and dynamics is thus common to the entire animal kingdom. This universality continues up the evolutionary tree so that chemicals psychoactive in humans, from LSD to caffeine, are also known to affect the web building of spiders (Noever et. al. 1995) implying that the very different nervous system designs of arthropods and vertebrates mask a deeper identity of dynamical basis shared by virtually all the metazoa. We can thus see that ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 47 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 metazoan nervous systems have arisen from the adaptive dynamics of individual eucaryote cells, rather than being composed of unrelated logical networks. As we move up the evolutionary tree to the complex nervous systems of vertebrates, we see the same dynamical features, now expressed in whole system excitations such as the EEG, in which excitatory and inhibitory neurons provide a basis for broad-spectrum oscillation, phase coherence and chaos in the global dynamics, with the synaptic organization enabling the dynamics to resolve complex context-sensitive decision-making problems, involving memories of past situations and adaptations to current ones. Nevertheless the immediate decision-making situations around which life or death results, in the theatre of conscious attention, are qualitatively similar in nature to those made by single celled organisms, such as Paramecium, based strongly on immediate sensory input and short term anticipation of immediate threats, in a context of remembered situations from the past that bear upon the current existential strategy. Fig 6: Structural overview of the brain as a dynamical organ. (a) Major anatomical features including the cerebral cortex, its underlying driving centres in the thalamus, and surrounding limbic regions involving emotion and memory, including the cingulate cortex, hippocampus and amygdala. (b) Conscious activity of the cortex is maintained through the activity of ascending pathways from the thalamus and brain stem, including the reticular activating system and serotonin and nor-adrenaline pathways involved in light and dreaming sleep. Processes which enable global dynamics to be affected by small perturbations. (c) Evidence for dynamical chaos includes modulated strange attractors (Freeman 1991), and broad spectrum excitations with moderate fractal (correlation) dimensions (Basar et. al. 1989). These dynamics are complemented by holographic processing across the cortex illustrated in an experimental representation of olfactory excitations corresponding to recognized odors ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 48 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 (Skarda and Freeman 1987). (d) Stochastic resonance enables fractal instabilities to grow from ion channel to neuron to hippocampal excitation (Liljenström and Uno 2005). (e) Chandelier cells can facilitate an spreading of excitation to many pyramidal cells (Molnar et. al. 2008, Woodruff and Yuste 2008). (f) Wave front coherence in processing becomes manifest when a cue is recognized by the subject (left) (g) Correlation matrix and dendrogram of cortical slice is consistent with fractal selforganized criticality (Beggs and Plenz 2003, 2004). 4. A Dynamic View of the Conscious Brain Here follows a brief overview of the essential features of dynamics in the conscious brain, in relation to our purpose of uncovering the cosmology of consciousness. Further details can be found in King (2008). Structurally the mammalian brain consists of the 5 to 6 layer nerve sheet of the cerebral cortex, receiving and transmitting through the nuclei of the thalamus (with the exception of the direct sensory pathways of smell). Overall states of consciousness are modulated by ascending neural pathways from basal brain centers, sending dopamine, serotonin and nor-adrenaline pathways fanning out across the cortex, regulating conscious activity, from waking life, through sleep and dreaming, to psychedelic experience. A looping limbic system also runs around the edge of the cortex, providing emotional responsiveness, flight and fight sensitivity, and the consolidation of episodic memory. Unlike the digital computer, which is a serial digital device based on a discrete logic of 0s and 1s, the brain is a massively parallel dynamic organ, with only some 10 or so synaptic junctions between sensory input and motor output. This is essential for the brain to be able to solve complex environmental problems and immediate threats to survival in seconds to milliseconds, which would be classically intractable problems in computational terms. Unlike a computational process, which may take days or years to complete, conscious processing has to be ready at all times for split-second reactions and the role of global consciousness is clearly to provide a dynamic conduit for integrating all the parallel attributes of the perceived context into a vital response which anticipates threats to survival and key opportunities, rather than to become stranded solving an unboundedly complex problem. This explains why, despite some 1010 neurons and 1014 synaptic junctions, we have trouble handling mare than a simple 7 digit number in working memory, while potentially being able to recognize millions of visual images we have seen before and listen to one critical conversation over the babble of a crowded room. Although the action potential of the long axons of pyramidal cells is a semi-discrete pulse-coded analog firing rate, many neurons and indeed those forming the organizing centre of many processes have continuously graded potentials. The electrical activity of the human brain, as expressed in the EEG consists of broad spectrum waves indicative of chaos (King 1991), rather than the discrete resonances of ordered dynamics. While some aspects of the EEG, such as the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 49 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 alpha rhythms of visual relaxation, may be housekeeping activities, oscillations in the gamma band have been associated with conscious thought processes (Crick and Koch 1992). This is consistent with the brain using globally-coupled oscillations in its central conscious processing, which are chaotic in the time domain, but are ‘holographic’ transforms of the experiential envelope of senses and secondary areas spread across the regions of the cortex in functional columns spanning the cortical layers. Chaotic dynamics both enable brain states to fully explore the phase space of possibilities without becoming stuck in an inappropriate dynamic and provide sensitive dependence on unstable inputs which provide arbitrary sensitivity to small instabilities in the event of an uncertain response. Walter Freeman (1991), based on his studies of rabbit olfaction, has given us a good model of perception, as a transition from high-energy chaos to a lower energy strange attractor which provides for learning new symbolic representations through changes in the potential energy landscape during learning, giving a clear basis for the ‘aha’ of “eureka!” in insight learning in terms of a bifurcation from the unstable chaos of the unresolved problem to the order of the clarity of the insight, explaining how a ‘brain-wave’ can come ‘out of the blue’. The ‘holographic’ picture (Mishlove and Pribram 1998), which is consistent with the many-tomany nature of synaptic mappings results in a cortical structure in which different cortical regions represent varying aspects of conscious experience in much the same way a Fourier transform represents all the frequencies in a waveform. Sensory areas for vision, hearing, smell touch and other emotional and bodily sensations are complemented by secondary processing areas e.g. of spatial relations in the parietal cortex and time-related and semantic categories in the temporal cortex. So-called ‘Oprah Winfrey’ cells specific for a certain person or face in the temporal cortex (Reddy et. al. 2009, Callaway 2009), represent landmarks on a fractal transform space of subjective experience over time. The ongoing process is driven and organized by centres in the frontal prefrontal cortex forming our model of intentional action and future strategies of life. This means that each experience is globally represented across the cortex in terms of the diverse characteristics, which together make up the full context of the so-called ‘Cartesian theatre’ of subjective experience, (Baars 1997, Dennett 1991), centered on our sensory views of the world around us conditioned by our past experiences and their semantic contexts - a term derived from the dualistic cosmology of Rene Descartes (1644) - cogito ergo sum - who closely identified ‘thought’ with subjective consciousness: "what happens in me such that I am immediately conscious of it, insofar as I am conscious of it". Thinking is thus every activity of a person of which he is immediately conscious. Charles Darwin (1871) argued that a continuity of mind exists between humans and other animals. It is the innate capacity to have subjective experiences, and what influence these have on organismic survival, that we need to examine in the long-term evolutionary context, because these may arise from adaptive advantages running back to single celled eukaryotes. This is a completely different question from the unique properties of the human mind, in terms of language and creative intellect, that separate humanity from most, or all, other animals (Hauser 2009). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 50 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Barrs (2001) describes the theatre of the conscious in terms of global workspace - working memory and its associated backdrops. Baars’ approach suggests that consciousness is associated with the whole brain in integrated correlated activity and is thus a property of the brain as a whole functioning entity rather than a product of some specific area, or system, such as the supplementary motor cortex (Eccles 1982, Fried et. al. 1992, Haggard et. al. 2005). Furthermore, the approach rather neatly identifies the distinction between unconscious processing and conscious experience in terms of whether the dynamic is confined to local or regional activity or is part of an integrated coherent global response. It is also consistent with there being broadly only one dominant stream of conscious thought and experience at a given time, as diverse forms of local processing give way to an integrated global response. A series of experiments, many by teams working with Stanislas Dehaene, involving perceptual masking of brief stimuli to inhibit their entry into conscious perception (Sergent et. al. 2005, Sigman and Dehaene 2005, 2006, Dehaene and Changeux 2005, De. Cul et. al. 2006, 2009, Gaillard et. al. 2009) studies of pathological conditions such as multiple sclerosis (Reuter et. al. 2009, Schnakers 2009 ) and brief episodes in which direct cortical electrodes are being used during operations for intractable epilepsy (Quiroga et. al. 2008) have recently tended to confirm the overall features of Baars’ model of consciousness founded on the global work space (Ananthaswamy 2009 a,b, 2010). This couples with a recently ‘discovered’ system called the ‘default network’ (Fox 2008), which was unearthed when background readings discarded from many brain scan studies were found to have common dynamical features. It has been proposed that the default network is an active brain process we drift into when not preoccupied in more essential tasks dominating our attention, and that it may have adaptive value in rehearsing strategic situations important for our survival. One can loosely identify the default network with the process of daydreaming, reminiscence, worrying and idle thought, but in these terms it looks clearly like a manifestation of global work space in action and hence provides another view on the global mechanisms being brought into play in conscious experience (Vanhaudenhuyse 2010). Since Libet’s original experiments (1983, 1989) in which he detected a ‘readiness potential’ in the supplementary motor cortex before the free decision to press a button was consciously registered by the subject, there has been debate about whether conscious free will, or subconscious brain processes, are the source of our decision-making. Recently experiments testing this question more closely have only added to the debate. Trevena & Miller (2010) allowed subjects to decide whether or not to press the button and found the same readiness potential regardless of the decision to act. They also found no correlation with the side of the brain activated when either left or right hands were used to press the button. Their results, which have been widely discussed (Ananthaswamy 2009, Geert et. al. 2010, Gomes 2010, suggest that Libet’s brain states simply indicate non-specific readiness, although other studies by Brass's group (Soon et. al. 2008) do appear to show activity in the frontopolar cortex, which was statistically predictive of the decision, up to 10 s in advance of conscious decision-making, and then in the parietal cortex stretching from the precuneus into posterior cingulate cortex, relating to timing and handedness. The difficulty here is that the brain may need to anticipate rapid actions by indeed building frontal cortex models which are statistically predictive of lokely outcomes which are then called on by conscious decision-making to minimize latent response times. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 51 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 We can sense the many cortical areas that come into play in the Cartesian theatre and the balance between conscious and subconscious processes from mental activities, such as recalling that it was raining when watching Oprah Winfrey start up her new TV channel, while at the same time anxiously rehearsing a talk we have to give, trying to visualize the easiest route to drive to get there, and desperately trying to remember a the name of a colleague we will meet there, which later pops into our awareness out of the blue. The brain may distinguish attended conscious experience from fragmented sub-conscious processing and the ground-swell of competing neurological excitatory ‘noise’ by the wave-front coherence of coupled neurons oscillating together in phase, while the other unrelated out-ofphase signals do not achieve a global resonance and tend to cancel. This phase front processing is mathematically homologous to quantum measurement (Pribram 1993), where quantum uncertainty dictates that we can measure the energy of a wave-particle only by counting the number of coherent wave fronts passing over a time interval. There are a number of processes, from the amplifying dynamics of certain dedicated cell types such as chandelier cells (Molnar et. al. 2008, Woodruff and Yuste 2008), through states of stochastic resonance (Liljenström and Uno 2005), to self-organized criticality (Beggs and Plenz 2003, 2004) and chaotic sensitivity itself, which provide a neurophysiological basis to support arbitrary sensitivity of the global dynamic, when in unstable equilibrium at a tipping point, enabling a single neuron or even a single ion channel or receptor complex to tip the global balance when the global conditions warrant it, making it potentially sensitive to quantum perturbations. This type of wave-based dynamic processing gives the brain unique capacity to combine the sensitivity of chaos and the intrinsic uncertainty and entanglement of quantum excitations in a way that is impossible for current digital computers, and which may provide a means for direct conscious experience in real time to complement the processing power of our brains to ensure our survival, explaining how consciousness emerged in evolution. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 52 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 Fig 8: Features of quantum processing in proposed models. (a) Microtubule MAP proteins as envisaged in the OOR model. (b) The ensuing relationship between classical and quantum computing and consciousness. (c, d) gated K+ ion channels from MacKinnon’s group (Zhou et. al. 2001). (e) Fractal kinetics in the channels (Liebovitch et. al.) (f) Synaptic junction as in Eddington’s (1935) suggestion of quantum uncertainty of the vesicle. 5. Chaos, Quantum Dynamics and Conscious Anticipation The two most profound questions confounding science about the brain are (1) how and why brain function generates subjective experience, which would seem extraneous to computational efficiency and (2) whether there is any basis for our continuing impression that our subjective conscious intentions can actually be transformed into physical consequences in acts of ‘freewill’, when the physical determinacy of ongoing brain states would appear to be necessary and sufficient to determine all outcomes for the organism, leaving our subjectively conscious impressions of personal autonomy and intentionality a mere delusion. Here we want to explore as simply and directly as possible how known functions, central to neurodynamics might be able to exploit quantum uncertainty, or quantum entanglement, to enhance survival prospects of the organism. If the brain uses transitions out of chaos in its processing, it makes it possible for an unstable brain state, poised at a tipping point, to become arbitrarily sensitive to neurons, or ion channels, in the circuits ultimately sensitive the change and hence manifest quantum indeterminacy. The immediate question that arises is, how could quantum uncertainty or entanglement at this point aid the process and hence the survival of the organism? Is this just precipitating a random process or is there a way in which quantum sensitivity might be able to aid the survival of the organism? Physicists have struggled with this question and have come up with a variety of answers, from the ‘pilot wave’ theory of David Bohm et. al. (1981, 1985), to Roger Penrose’s (1989, 1994) objective reduction, based on graviton interactions. Since the birth of quantum mechanics, both physicists and prominent brain scientists have drawn attention to the fact that the quantum universe is not deterministic and that quantum uncertainty could provide a loophole through which conscious free will might not be in conflict with biology. A number of proposals have been made. Eddington (1935, 1939) and Eccles (1966, 1970) discussed the possibility of quantum-mechanical action of the vesicle and pointed out that the uncertainty of position of a vesicle of 400 oA diameter and mass 3 x 10-17g is about 30oA, comparable with the thickness of the membrane. Concluding that intentional volition might then be inconsistent with the chance probability-based calculations of particle statistic, Eddington then effectively suggested a form of hidden correlation in sub-quantum dynamics: a correlated behaviour of the individual particles of matter, which he assumed to occur for matter in liaison with mind. Walker (1977) noted quantum tunneling in synaptic transmission and Eccles (1986) noted the relation between mental events, neural events and quantum probability fields. David Bohm (1980) introduced the notion of ‘implicate order’ generating both consciousness and the physical universe. Henry Stapp (2007) described the interaction of consciousness with the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 53 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 physical universe in terms of mental collapse of the wave function influencing the physical brain state in a manner that involves choice. Eccles (1969) took a more direct position of emergent mentalism, resulting in an ongoing debate about how the conscious mind might interact with neurodynamics (Sperry 1987, 1989, 1992, Vandervert 1991a,b). Central to many ideas of quantum brain dynamics is the notion of coherent excitation (Frolich 1968, Umezawa 1993) possibly through a quantum field associated with the brain. Several theories of quantum consciousness introduce additional constructs, for which there is little experimental evidence or demonstrated relevance to actual neurodynamics. Frolich’s theory later elaborated by others (Jibu & Yasue 1995, Vitiello 2002) proposes that the electric dipoles of the water molecules constitute a quantum field, with ‘corticons’ as the quanta, in addition to coherent neuronal excitations. This cortical field is postulated to interact with quantum coherent waves generated by the biomolecules in neurons in the neuronal network as a means, for order to be maintained through long-range dipole interactions, which not only interact with the neuronal network, but can also function to control it. An even more controversial proposal involving replicatable DNA water structures has been reported (Coghlan 2011). A pivotally influential theory developed by Roger Penrose and Stuart Hameroff makes one of the most detailed attempts to sketch out a plausible theory of quantum consciousness. Penrose (1989, 1994) first developed ideas of how ‘objective’ reduction might occur outside quantum measurement, through gravitational interaction, through a non-computable influence embedded in the fundamental level of space-time geometry, from which mathematical understanding and consciousness derived. This attempts to avoid the double bind of physical causality and quantum randomness of collapse, which appears to have no utility for consciousness or free will. He was then joined by Stuart Hameroff (Hameroff and Watt 1982, Haglan et. al. 2002, Hameroff 2006) who suggested that microtubules might be able to function as quantum computers at the molecular level, which might be linked to Penrose’s reduction process. This led to the orchestrated objective reduction of OOR view of consciousness. Hameroff and Penrose (2003) note that tubulin exists in two forms and could thus enter a quantum superposition of states. They thus envisage tubulin acting as a quantum cellular automation, interleaving between classical and quantum computational states. However microtubules are extensively involved in transport of essential molecules and whole organelles, as well as cytoskeletal architecture and synaptic growth, and it is unclear they have a direct role in the fast forms of excitation of the electrochemical states we associate with conscious awareness. In the OOR model, consciousness is a passive result of a quantum computation, which occurs in the pre-conscious state and is resolved objectively by a self-energy splitting of the gravitational centres of mass of the superimposed states in objective reduction and conscious awareness emerges only subsequently, based on the outcome. The model proposes the neuron can very rapidly alternate quantum computing with normal function by temporarily isolating the microtubules from the membrane through disassociating the linking MAP proteins (to avoid quantum decoherence effects). This would mean the quantum computation is isolated from the global brain state during the quantum computation cycle. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 54 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 This theory has led to more discussion and debate than any other. Tegmark (2000) made a prominent critique of the model, claiming quantum decoherence would destroy the proposed mechanisms over much too shorter time scales. Hagan, Hameroff and Tuszyński (2002), and Hameroff et. al. (2002) responded with further versions of the theory. Hameroff (2006, 2009) has further proposed that condensates in microtubules in one neuron can link with microtubule condensates in other neurons and glial cells via gap junctions and thus generate an extensive quantum state suggested to be a Bose-Einstein condensate. However these ideas have also been subject to criticisms of their viability (Georgiev 2007, 2009a,b, McKemmish et. al. 2009). As well as critiquing the OOR model, Georgiev (2003, Georgiev et al. 2007) has also investigated the role solitons could play in microtubule-based processing, and supports some of OR’s conclusions. Part of the difficulty of the overall theory is that, although it proposes very specific processes, both the unusual interpretation of quantum physics and central emphasis on microtubules in brain function, are not generally accepted ideas in their fields although an experimental test of OR has been proposed (Marshall et. al. 2003). A Bose-Einstein condensate would provide an extreme form of quantum coherence, which would present the same problems for brain state differentiation that EM field theories have. OOR itself invites an epiphenomenalistic interpretation of consciousness in which the notions of personal autonomy and free will take a passive role to objective reduction. Quantum ‘cell-automaton’ microtubule computing stands as an extraneous addition to existing essential biological functions. It is hard to see how microtubules can carry out these functions efficiently if they are also harnessed to arcane forms of non-algorithmic quantum ‘computing’ on a switch-on switch-off basis. The evolutionary principle is an important test here. What role could such quantum computing conceivably have in Paramecium, or Hydra, which do possess fully developed microtubules? This problem does not apply to membrane excitation, where any quantum properties are integral to, and consistent with, known cellular function central to how neurodynamics operates. Bernroider (2003, 2005) has a different model for quantum interaction closer to the prominent features of neuronal excitation - that quantum coherence may be sustained in ion channels for long enough to be relevant for neural processes. He proposes that the channels could be entangled with surrounding lipids and proteins and with other channels in the same membrane. Bernroider bases his work on recent studies of the potassium (K+) ion channel by MacKinnon and co-workers (Jiang et. al. 2003, Zhou et. al. 2001, Morais-Cabral et. al. 2001, Doyle et. a. 1998) who have shown that the K+-specific ion filter works by holding two K+ ions bound to water structures induced by protein side chains that have a structure consistent with models of quantum computing using ion traps and that the correct interpretation of the action of the ion channel is through quantum coherence, possibly extending to entangled states between ion channels as well. David Chalmers (2003) notes “collapse dynamics leaves a door wide open for an interactionist interpretation” with mind and body mutually interacting as separate entities. He suggests " the most promising version of such an interpretation allows conscious states to be correlated with the total quantum state of a system, with the extra constraint that conscious states (unlike physical states) can never be superposed.” ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 55 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 This is where we now take the discussion. The natural complement to conscious experience and willful decision-making is not just the ion channel or microtubule, but the whole brain dynamic. To develop a realistic theory of consciousness, we thus have to consider how whole brain states might be capable of forms of quantum interaction and we need to understand how this might take place in terms of the really central neurophysiological processes common to all excitable cells. In terms of the global brain processes believed to be the signature of conscious experience, rather than subconscious processing, chaotic and unstable fractal dynamics based on selforganized criticality become key to providing a link between the global states of consciousness and the molecular and quantum level. Non-linear chaotic dynamics provides several attributes pertinent to this process. Non-linear oscillatory couplings have a natural propensity for coherent excitation through mode-locking, providing a natural mechanism for wave-front coherence and for solving the ‘binding problem’ – how diverse cerebral processing comes together. Freeman (1991) has drawn attention to the idea that the oscillations of the EEG are driven through cyclic excitation of cortical excitatory and inhibitory neurons. Modulating the lateral connections between inhibitory neurons to enhance the non–linear feedback would provide a direct means of drawing closely related frequencies into phase synchrony on a common step of the fractal ‘devil’s staircase’ of mutually locked states. Chaotic dynamics is, by definition, arbitrarily sensitive to small perturbations, and we have seen, several neurophysiological processes, from chaos, through stochastic resonance, to self-organized criticality, which could make it possible for a critically poised global dynamic to become sensitive to local influences, down to the level of the ion channel. Many aspects of synaptic release are highly non-linear, with many feedback loops involved in the biochemical pathways. A single vesicle excites up to 2000 ion channels, so a smaller fluctuation could set off a critically-poised ion channel and trigger a chain reaction of excitation. In addition to being candidates for quantum coherence, as noted above, voltage gated ion channels display fractal kinetics consistent with a quantum fractal model of protein conformational dynamics (Liebovitch 1987a, b, 1992). Ion channels, such as that for acetylcholine display non-linear (quadratic) concentration dynamics, being excited by two molecules, consistent with chaotic dynamics at level of the ion channel. The belief that quantum non-locality suppresses classical chaos, at least in closed systems, in processes such as scarring of the wave function (Gutzwiller 1992) received a timely clarification when it was discovered that systems with more than one quantum mode are liable to enter a state of quantum entanglement when one mode is in a quantum state corresponding to chaos (Chaudhury et. al. 2009, Steck 2009). The experimental system uses a suspended Cs atom, which is both in a magnetic field and hit by a laser to give a double twist to the orbits. When the atom is stimulated in a manner corresponding to the chaotic regime, the electronic and nuclear spin states become entangled. This shows that, in addition to the wave function 'scarring' the repelling unstable orbits with ‘attractive’ probabilities, suppressing chaos, the quantum system preferentially becomes entangled with a coupled system. Hence molecular kinetics, which are chaotic billiards are likely to lead to entangled quanta throughout the tissue. Chaotic brain dynamics may thus lead to a complex quantum entangled state if there is a chaotic link between the global and quantum levels. One characteristic of time-dependent quantum 'chaos' is transient ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 56 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 chaotic behavior ending up in a periodic orbital scar as wave spreading occurs. This would suggest that chaotic sensitivity, with an increasing dominance by quantum uncertainty over time, would contribute to which entanglements ultimately occur in a given kinetic encounter. Fig 9: Wheeler delayed choice experiment (1) shows that a decision can be made after a photon from a distant quasar has traversed a gravitationally lensing galaxy by deciding whether to detect which way the photon traveled or to demonstrate it went both ways by sampling interference. The final state at the absorber thus appears to be able to determine past history of the photon. Quantum erasure (2) likewise enables a distinction already made, which would prevent interference, to be undone after the photon is released. Feynman diagrams (3) show similar time-reversible behavior. In particular time reversed electron scattering (d) is identical to positron creation-annihilation. (4a) In the transactional interpretation (Cramer 1983), a single photon exchanged between emitter and absorber is formed by constructive interference between a retarded offer wave (solid) and an advanced confirmation wave (dotted). (b) EPR experiments of quantum entanglement involving pair-splitting are resolved by combined offer and confirmation waves, because confirmation waves intersect at the emission point. Contingent absorbers of an emitter in a single passage of a photon (c). Collapse of contingent emitters and absorbers in a transactional match-making (d). (5) Scarring of the wave function of the quantum stadium along repelling orbits (Gutzwiller 1992). (6) Generation of quantum entanglement by quantum chaos in the quantum kicked top (Chaudhury et. al. 2009, Steck 2009). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 57 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 The evolutionary argument is a potent discriminator of models of consciousness. We need to think of forms of generation of consciousness, which fit naturally into the emergence of most, if not all, key genetic pathways long before the emergence of metazoa. This means the essential biophysical or quantum attributes making consciousness possible should be shared, not just by humans or higher levels of computation we associate only with human cognition, but common at least to all mammals, probably all metazoa and plausibly all eukaryotes. If we have theories of consciousness, which can have a basis only in forms of quantum computing which would only be meaningful in a human cognitive context, and require radical redirections of essential cellular structures to achieve this, but have no basis in the survival of simple animals or single cells, the theory doesn’t fulfill the evolutionary test. Hence the point of view in this report is based on central neurodynamic processes emerging from the excitability of single celled eukaryotes and fundamental properties of quantum theory. The explanation uses a version of quantum theory called the ‘transactional interpretation’. However this is not essential to the argument, since its predictions coincide largely or exclusively with those of conventional quantum mechanics (Afshar 2005, 2206, Afshar et. al. 2007, Unruh 2007, Georgiev 2007, 2008), but it does emphasize future boundary conditions, which could play a part in conscious anticipation. It also has an attribute in common with Penrose’s idea of non-algorithmic computing, shared with pair-splitting EPR quantum entanglement experiments (Aspect 1981, 1982a,b), in that the boundary conditions do not permit a classically-causal exploitation, but this would not result in a contradiction, because the brain state will be uncertain, and the mind’s anticipatory insight comes ‘out of the blue’ as a coincidental ‘hunch’. However, if subjective consciousness has a complementary role to brain function, correlated with coherent, or entangled, quanta emitted and absorbed by the biological brain, it is then correlated with events in the brain’s future states, as well as having access to memories of the past. The Feynman diagrams of quantum interactions point out a fundamental issue of quantum field theory, in that it is temporally reversible. We have a space-time diagram and interconnections by real or virtual particles across space-time, but in principle the process is micro-reversible and indeed the Feynman diagram for electron scattering, when the electron path is time reversed, becomes precisely that for positron creation and annihilation. Moreover in real quantum experiments, such as quantum erasure and the Wheeler delayed choice experiment, it is possible to change how an intervening wave-particle behaves by making different measurements after the wave-particle has passed through the ‘apparatus’. Indeed all forms of quantum entanglement also possess this time-symmetric property. Feynman’s absorber theory (Davies 1974), which noted that the predictions of quantum mechanics were preserved if we instead considered the time-reversed interactions of the absorbers, was subsequently extended by John Cramer (1983,1986) into the ‘transactional interpretation’ of quantum mechanics, in which space-time handshaking between the future and past becomes the basis of each real quantum interaction. Here the emitter of a particle sends out an offer wave forwards and backwards in time, whose energies cancel. The potential absorbers respond with a confirmation waves, and the real ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 58 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 quantum exchange arises from constructive interference between the retarded component of the chosen emitter’s offer wave and the advanced time-reversing component of the chosen absorber’s confirmation wave. The boundary conditions determining the exchange thus involve both past and future states of the universe. Upon wave function collapse the exchanged real particle traveling from the emitter to the absorber is identical with its negative energy antiparticle traveling backwards in time. Regardless of the particular interpretation of quantum mechanics, an exchanged particle has a wave function existing throughout the space-time interval in which it exists, so any process involving collapse of a wave function has boundary conditions consisting of potential absorbers extending in principle throughout space-time involving future boundary conditions. The subtle involvement of advanced interactions in entanglement becomes abundantly clear in pair-splitting experiments involving two entangled particles where measurement e.g. of the polariztion of one particle immediately results in the other having complementary polarization although neither had a defined polarization beforehand. The only way this correlation can be maintained within the sub-quantum realm is through the wave function extending back to the creation event of the pair and forward again in time to the other particle. To the extent that consciousness might be involved in the collapse of wave functions of emitted and absorbed excitons, it is sampling a nascent ‘history’ extending into the futures of the emission events. This could be a universal quantum phenomenon, which is not understood, because quantum measurement generally depends on detecting absorbed particles, either individually in counters, or statistically in spectra. Emission events are generally detected by sampling the emitted quantum, effectively an absorption, resulting in decoherence. However, if subjective consciousness has a complementary role to brain function, correlated with coherent, or entangled, quanta emitted and absorbed by the biological brain, it is then correlated with events in the brain’s future states, as well as having access to memories of the past. A possible basis for the emergence of subjective consciousness, which could also be pivotal in explaining the source of free-will, is thus that the excitable cell gained a fundamental form of anticipation of threats to survival as well as strategic opportunities, through anticipatory quantum non-locality induced by chaotic excitation of the cell membrane in which the excitable cell becomes both an emitter and absorber of its own excitations, modulated by the global constraints of the process into distinct quantum modes. Unlike quantum computing, which depends on not being disturbed by decoherence caused by interaction with other quanta, the transactional principle applies to all real particle exchanges, and the boundary conditions remain, even if a more elaborate interaction, involving particle scattering, takes place, so stringent arguments in terms of decoherence may not apply. This may be a fundamental quantum property shared by all physical systems, including macroscopic systems with coherent resonance. The coherent global excitations in the gamma range researchers associate with ongoing conscious states, may thus be precisely the anticipatory ‘excitons’ in the quantum model. Such excitation sensitivity could nevertheless also prime the organism for related processes, including quantum entanglement and quantum computing. Quantum entanglement has been ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 59 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 observed in healthy tissues, in quantum coherence imaging (Warren 1998, Samuel 2001) and has been proposed to play a possible role in bird navigation (Buchanan 2008), with entangled electrons lasting up to 100 microseconds (Courtland 2011). Excitations in photosynthetic antennae have also been shown to perform spatial quantum computing (Engel et. al. 2007, McAlpine 2010), and finally quantum vibration. and not merely molecular shape fitting to receptors, has been shown to mediate olfactory preferences in fruit flies (Courtland, Rachel 2011 Fly sniffs molecule's quantum vibrations New Scientist 14 Feb) opening the field to similar effects in nervous systems, bringing enzyme activation energy transition states and synaptic transmission using quantum tunneling (Walker 1977) and Bernroider‚Äôs (2003, 2005) ionchannel channel proposals into natural context. The solotonic nature of the action potential and potentially coherent EEG excitations could lead to entangled dynamics of individual ion channels giving the cell and coupled neurosystems a basis for global entanglement. By making the organism sensitive to a short envelope of time extending from the present into the immediate future, as well as the past, the subjective consciousness of complex animals could thus gain an evolutionary advantage making the organism acutely sensitive to anticipated threats to survival as well as hunting and foraging opportunities. It is these primary needs, guided by the nuances of hunch and familiarity, rather than complex formal calculations, that the highly complex central nervous systems of vertebrates have evolved to successfully handle – catching prey and being sensitively wary of the shadows on the forking paths down to the water hole. Such temporal anticipation (Dunne 1962) need not be of causal efficacy but just provide a small statistical advantage, as noted in Darryl Bem’s recent experiments on anticipation (Aldhous 2010), particularly if complemented by computational brain processes providing the context for such ‘intuition’. These objectives are shared in precisely the same way by single-celled organisms and single cells in our own bodies. Because of the vastly longer evolutionary time since the Archaean expansion than the Cambrian metazoan radiation and the fact that all the components of neuronal excitability were already present when the metazoa emerged, the logical conclusion is that quantum anticipation was an evolutionary feature of single celled eukaryotes, long before the metazoa evolved. It may be hard to comprehend the notion of ‘cellular consciousness’, but it is equally difficult to directly envisage the consciousness of another human or animal, and we do so, only through common insights about our reported mental states and the enhancements to our own consciousness that come from the rich presence of mirror neurons in our own brains (Rizzolatti & Craighero 2004) giving our subjective model of reality a sense of attunement with others, particularly mammals with whom we share an emotional resonance. This view of consciousness could be associated with other quantum sensitive phenomena whose outcomes are unpredictable, including the uncertainty of fundamental particles. If the ‘free-will’ theorem (Conway & Kochen 2006, Goldstein et. al. 2010) has any validity, will would also extend to quanta. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 60 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 6. Quantum Sensitivity, Sensory Transduction and Subjective Experience One of the mysteries that distinguish the richness of subjective conscious experience from the colorless logic of electrodynamics is that sensory experiences of vision, sound, smell and touch are richly and qualitatively so different that it is difficult to see how mere variations in neuronal firing organization can give rise to such qualitatively different subjective affects. How is it that when dreaming, or in a psychedelic reverie, we can experience ornate visions, hear entrancing music, or smell fragrances as rich, real, intense and qualitatively diverse as those of waking life? Fig 7: Expression of rhodopsin in the CNS shows both strong selective neuronal expression and a focal expression in the occipital cortex consistent with expression in the primary visual areas. Since the senses are actually fundamental quantum modes by which biological organisms can interact with the physical world, this raises the question whether subjective sensory experience is in some way related to the quantum modes by which the physical senses communicate with the world. Clearly our senses are sensitive to the quantum level. Individual frog rod cells have been shown to respond to individual photons, the quietest sound involves movements in the inner ear of only the radius of a hydrogen atom and single molecules are sufficient to excite pheromonal receptors. Similar modes of quantum interaction may occur in the central nervous system. At a basic level, all excitable cells have ion channels, which undergo conformation changes associated with voltage, and orbital or ‘ligand’-binding, both of internal effectors such as G-proteins and externally via neurotransmitters, such as acetyl-choline. They also have osmotic and mechanoreceptive activation, as in hearing, and can be also activated directly and reversibly by photoreception in certain species. At a ground level, all conformation changes of ion channels ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 61 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 are capable of exchanging photons, phonons, mechano-osmotic effects and orbital perturbations, representing a form of quantum synesthesia. Since the brain uses up to 40% of our metabolic energy for functions with little or no direct energy output, it is very plausible that some of the ‘dissipated’ energy could be involved in generating novel forms of interaction. Research on gap junctions (Dermietzel 1998, LeBeau et. al. 2003, Hormuzdi et. al. 2004) has also shown that these direct electro-conductive junctions may play a part in maintaining excitations in the gamma range thought to be coupled to active thought processes and even higher frequencies up to 100 kHz, detected in the hippocampus (Draghun et. al. 1998, Buhl et. al. 2003). Electrical junctions do not occur among pyramidal cells but have been found to occur in fast-spiking and low threshold spiking populations of inhibitory neurons in the cortex (Galaretta et. al. 1999, Gibson et. al. 1999, Fries et. al. 2002). Recent research in whole genome mapping of the mouse brain (Lein et. al. 2007, Allen Brain Atlas) has made it possible to investigate the potential central nervous function of genes that might otherwise be associated primarily with peripheral sensory transduction. All of the following molecules are expressed in the mouse brain (King 2007) at least in the form of RNA transcripts, as well in their role in sensory organs. The first putative transduction molecule for mammalian touch, stomatin-like protein 3 (SLP3, or Stoml3) has been reported (Wetzel et. al. 2007), and putative molecules in the auditory transduction pathway, epsin, and cadherin 23 or otocadherin (Parkinson & Brown 2002, Di Palma et. al. 2001) have only been reported in the last five years and otoferlin in 2006 (Parsons 2006, Roux et. al. 2006). In parallel with the usual cilia-based photo-transducer molecule c-opsin are retinal ganglion cells, which use melanopsin, or r-opsin related to insect opsins, which depolarize rather than hyperpolarize (Fernald 2006, Su et. al. 2006). Both types of opsin also work in opposition in the reptile parietal (pineal) eye. Encephalopsin has also been found in the brain and other tissues (Blackshaw & Snyder 1999). The occurrence of putative sensory transduction genes in the central nervous system is consistent with a novel biophysical model (King 2007) - that the distributed functioning of the central nervous system provides an 'internal sensory system' which can generate abstracted experiences forming an 'internal model of reality' using the same physical principles as are involved in sensory transduction in a bi-directional manner, enabling coherent generation and reception of biophysical excitations. There are however problems with this picture. While vision and olfaction mediate excitation indirectly through G-protein linked receptors, hearing occurs directly through the stereocilia of the inner ear deforming mechanically sensitive ion channels. It is far from obvious how these processes could be activated reversibly in the CNS. Nevertheless the idea that additional modes of quantum communication may occur in the brain receives continuing interest. Several consciousness researchers have proposed that neural excitation is associated with electromagnetic fields, which might play a formative role in brain dynamics (Pocket 2000, McFadden 2002). McFadden proposes that the digital information from neurons is integrated to form a conscious electromagnetic information (cemi) field in the brain. Such a field could help explain how consciousness is bound together into one coherent state, however it remains unclear whether a coherent electromagnetic field would retain the complexity required for brain function and why coherent synaptic activation of coupled ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 62 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 neurosystems wouldn’t achieve the same result. Nevertheless Gray (2004) claims there is little or no real evidence for such effects. Attention has recently been focused again on biophotons (Popp et. al. 1988, 1992, 2002) as a possible basis of processing in the visual cortex based on quantum releases in mitochondrial redox reactions (Rahnama et. al. 2010, Bókkon et. al. 2010). Microtubules have also been implicated (Cifra et. al. 2010). 7: Complementarity, Symmetry-breaking, Subjective Consciousness, and Cosmology This leads us to the ultimate questions and paradoxes of what is the deepest and most perplexing chasm facing the scientific model of reality in the third millennium. What is the existential nature of subjective consciousness, including its many manifestations, from waking life, through dreaming to psychedelic and meditative experience, and does it have a cosmological status in relation to the physical universe? The key entities forming the existential cosmos all appear to be symmetry-broken complementarities. Quanta manifest as wave-particles with complementary discrete particle and continuous wave aspects, which cannot both be sampled simultaneously. The fundamental forces are symmetry broken in a manner that results in complementary force-radiation bearing bosons and matter forming fermions. In the standard model these have strongly symmetry broken properties, with completely differing collections of particles. Supersymmetry attempts to assert a deeper symmetry between bosons and fermions in which each boson has a fermion partner to balance their positive and negative energy contributions, broken by fundamental force diversification, but other theories, capitalizing on E8’s 112 ‘bosonic’ and 128 ‘fermionic’ root vectors completing E8’s 240 dimensions, suggest this symmetry-breaking could be fundamental (Fielder and King 2010). In a real sense the conscious brain forms the culminating interaction in complexity of cosmic symmetry breaking so could require a theory as complicated to solve the dimensions of consciousness. Fig 10: Psychedelic and dreaming states provide conscious experiences as intense and subjectively veridical as real world sensory experiences, but with very different ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 63 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 structure and dynamics (Andrew Ostin http://psion005.deviantart.com/, Memory of the Future Oscar Dominguez 1939) The relationship between subjective consciousness and the physical universe displays a similar complementarity with profound symmetry breaking. The ‘hard problem of consciousness research’ (Chalmers 1995) underlines the fundamental differences between subjective ‘qualia’ and the continuity of the Cartesian theatre on the one hand, and the objective, analyzable properties of the physical world around us. This leads Chalmers to discount both conventional theories and quantum theories of consciousness as adequate as they stand to give rise to consciousness, although this position would not appear to discount conscious free-will being complementary to a quantum process whose outcome was unpredictable. The existential status of subjective consciousness also displays properties that have the potential to put it on a cosmological footing. Although we depend on a pragmatic view of the real world, knowing we will pass out if concussed and die if we cut our veins, from birth to death, the only veridical reality we experience is the envelope of subjective conscious experience. It is only through the consensual regularities of subjective consciousness that we come to know and accept the real world and discover its natural and scientific secrets. As pointed out by Indian philosophy, this suggests that, in some sense, mind is ‘finer’ or more fundamental than matter, despite the appearance of annihilating forces in the universe at large. Some interpretations of quantum theory (Wigner 1970) suggest that the consciousness of the observer may be necessary for reduction of the wave packet, from a quantum superposition of states, to one outcome or another e.g. in Schrödinger’s ‘cat paradox’. Certainly, although quantum predictions give only superimposed probabilities, we always witness real outcomes – the cat is alive or dead – not hovering uncertainly between. One cosmological interpretation of consciousness is that it functions to solve this problem of super-abundance, by reducing the probability multiverses to the unique course of history we know and witness. This view of the consciousness supports many of the conclusions of biocentrism (Lanza 2009). Similar symmetry-broken complementarities apply to the biological world, where the dyadic sexes of complex organisms and many eukaryotes are both complementary and symmetry broken, with themes of complementary discreteness and continuity even more obviously expressed at the level of sperm and ovum than in our nevertheless highly symmetry broken human organismic sexual forms. We also have other manifestations, dynamical in the complementarity of chaos and order in generating complexity, and strategically in the complementarity of cooperation and defection in the Prisoners’ Dilemma of game theory, which leads to logical paradox, in which neither can be fully eliminated and successful strategies, such as tit-for-tat, involve a mix. For this reason we give the name Sexual Paradox (Fielder and King 2004, 2010) to these forms of symmetrybroken complementarity. Introducing a further assumption, such as Bohm’s implicate order, or Penrose’s platonic realm, is not without its rationale, as the current description of the quantum-relativistic universe is incomplete, and a variety of pre-theories have been proposed such as the preons, or rishon ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 64 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | January 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 1 | pp. 36-70 triplets, which could make up both quarks and leptons, but as things stand the principle of symmetry-broken complementarity appears to lie at the very source of our cosmology. The mental viewpoint leads to a perspective on consciousness as cosmological complement to the physical universe, however, taking either side of this complementarity as paramount appears to lead to paradox. The lessons of quantum and fundamental particle complementarity and symmetry-breaking, sexuality and with it the Yin-Yang complementarity of the Tao and of Shakti-Shiva in Tantric mind-world cosmologies, let alone the essential respect for the physical universe for our own survival, places the source of the cosmological mystery in the symmetrybroken complementarity of objective universe and subjective consciousness. 8. Conclusion This leads to a view of the cosmology of consciousness as a chain of events in which (1) the symmetry-breaking of the forces of nature in our ‘inflationary’ origin, leads interactively (2) to biogenesis on planets in the goldilocks zone of sun-like stars, and (3) over evolutionary time to a genetic solution to the excitable cell, which then (4) through fractal elaboration becomes tissues and ultimately the integrated excitations of brain tissue manifesting (5) the ultimate expression of cosmology in mind-world complementarity, thus enabling the universe itself over its own evolutionary process (6) to come to terms of accommodation with its own relativities of space, time and existence during the brief periods that each of the sexual individuals in this chain of events have an opportunity to manifest this cosmic paradox within their own subjective experience, discovering that, in a fundamental sense, subjective consciousness is a cosmological complement to the objective physical universe. 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(1998) MR Imaging contrast enhancement based on intermolecular zero quantum coherences Science 281 247 Wetzel C et. al. (2007) A stomatin-domain protein essential for touch sensation in the mouse Nature 445: 206. Weyrer S, Rutzler K, Rieger R (1999) Serotonin In Porifera? Evidence from Developing Tedania Ignis, The Caribbean Fire Sponge (Demospongiae) Memoirs of the Queensland Museum 660-666. Wiejak J, Surmacz L, Wyroba E. 2002 Immunoanalogue of vertebrate beta-adrenergic receptor in the unicellular eukaryote Paramecium Histochem J. 34(1-2) 51-6 Wigner E.P. (1970) Found. Phys. 1, 35 Wilson C., Szostak J. (1995) In vitro evolution of a self-alkylating ribozyme Nature 374, 777-82. Wolfe-Simon Felisa et. al. (2010) Microbiology: Bacteria that thrive on arsenic Nature 468, 734-734 doi:10.1038/468734a Woodruff, A and Yuste R (2008) Of Mice and Men, and Chandeliers PLOS Biology 6/9 243 Zhang B., Cech T (1997) Peptide formation by in-vitro selected ribozymes Nature 390, 96-100. Zhang B., Cech T (1998) Peptidyl transferase ribozymes: trans reactions, structural characterization and ribosomal RNA-like structures Chemistry and Biology 5, 539-553. Zhou, Y., Morais-Cabral, A., Kaufman, A. & MacKinnon, R. (2001) Chemistry of ion coordination and hydration revealed in K+ channel-Fab complex at 2.0 A resolution Nature, 414 43–8 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 863 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II Article Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II Graham P. Smetham* Abstract Whilst it is true that a great deal of the details of the experimental science which is presented in programmes presented by Cox, Al-Khalili and others is correct, the overall metaphysical perspective within which these details are presented is for the most part appallingly incorrect because they do not accord with the details of modern physics, quantum physics in particular. The metaphysical framework which underpins the general worldview of the programmes presented by both Cox and Al-Khalili largely corresponds to what Stapp refers to as a ‘knownto-be-false’ materialist perspective. The inappropriate materialist metaphysical dogmatism which underlies such programmes leads to some silly nonsense being presented without any challenge. This article cuts through the metaphysical madness. Keywords: Quantum theory, quantum ‘particles’, quantum ‘woowoo’, quantum entangle-ment, Brian Cox, Jim Al-Khalili, Hawking and Mlodinow, Richard Feynman, Henry Stapp, Rupert Sheldrake, Schrödinger, Planck, Heisenberg, Rosenblum & Kuttner, Robert Maxwell, Anton Zeilineger, Buddhist metaphysics, Madhyamaka, sum over histories, ESP, parapsychology, telepathy, reincarnation, mind and matter, consciousness, quantum metaphysics, incorrect representation of science, Diamond Cutter Sutra. This universal interconnectedness is also embodied in the central Buddhist doctrine of dependent origination and interconnection (paticcasamuppada) which asserts that at the fundamental level of reality there is absolutely no aspect of phenomenon which is disconnected from any other. It is worth noting Cox’s remark during his exposition of the Pauli Exclusion Principle concerning what he referred to as “the illusion of solidity” which is produced because of the fact that electrons try to “avoid each other” which, Cox says “is the reason I don’t fall through the empty atoms in the floor.” It is at points such as this that I feel a desperate need to be in the audience with a dispensation to stop the lecturer at any salient point and question them more deeply on the meaning of comments such as this, which are thrown in such a throwaway fashion despite the fact that they are deeply significant. This observation indicates that the appearance of solidity in the floor beneath one’s feet, which is Planck’s early notion that the there is continuous ‘stuff’ beneath ones feet, or Cox’s assertion that there is the solid ‘rock’ of planet Earth beneath one’s feet, and so on, is an illusion. None of it is there in the way that it appears to be. The reason that * Correspondence: Graham Smetham, http://www.quantumbuddhism.com E-mail:graham@quantumbuddhism.com Note: This article is adopted from the first chapter of the author’s next book “'Quantum Buddhist Wonders of the Universe'. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 864 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II he, and we, do not fall through floors and cannot walk through walls is not that there actually is solid stuff supporting or obstructing us, it is because of the electromagnetic forces acting between our bodies and floors and walls The material world, including our bodies, is made up of force fields rather than solid stuff. Figure 9 – Avatamsaka Sutra Remember Cox’s dramatic statement to the audience that they were ‘empty’? This also means that the way in which they appear to themselves is an illusion precisely because, when analyzed to the atomic level, Dharmakirti’s observation that all ‘conventional’ phenomena, including sentient beings, are comprised of “some mutually supporting infinitesimal particles that, through that causal support, serve the functions associated with the concept” that they appear to be (e.g. water jugs, rocks, trees, ponds, sentient beings etc.) is precisely correct. Even if the apparent ‘particles’ of the quantum realm were to be ultimate entities, by which we must mean if we are being honest about the meanings of our terminology, that they are indivisible, completely independent and eternal bits and pieces of reality, then the everyday world would be an illusion created from the ‘real’ atomic bits and pieces. Cox is, perhaps unconsciously, aware of this which is why he used the term. However, as we shall see, if one was to push him on this point the evidence is that he would resist the notion that the reality we experience really is an illusion precisely because his mission seems to be to rescue the reality of what is actually an illusion. Only in off guard moments would he use such words as ‘illusion’, probably thinking he was using the term metaphorically, because for Cox reality is a real illusion. His entire metaphysical makeup requires him to somehow cook the quantum books ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 865 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II in order to try and pretend that the illusory nature of reality is an illusion and reality is really real! Cox wants to have the intellectual kudos of saying such mind-boggling things as “you are vast and empty” at the same time as reassuring his audience that they really are real in just the way that classical physics always thought of reality! To do this however he has to indulge in remarkable amounts of evasion and obfuscation, not to mention illusion! Anton Zeilinger is professor of physics at the University of Vienna and director of the Vienna branch of the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Zeilinger is a pioneer in the new field of quantum information and is renowned for his experimental demonstration of quantum teleportation with photons. Zeilin-ger has received many awards for his scientific work and is a member of six Scientific Academies. I think we can be pretty sure that his bottom is unmarked by Zodiacal symbolism. However, in an article in the volume of cutting edge quantum theory Science and Ultimate Reality in appreciation of the work of the famous twentieth century physicist John Archibald Wheeler he wrote of Wheeler’s: …realisation that the implications of quantum physics are so far-reaching that they require a completely novel approach in our view of reality and in the way we see our role in the universe. This distinguishes him from many others who in one way or another tried to save pre-quantum viewpoints, particularly the obviously wrong notion of a reality independent of us.1 In other words Zeilinger is telling us that quantum theory requires that reality is not independent of observers. In his more recent book Dance of the Photons: From Einstein to Quantum Teleportation he writes in similar vein about Einstein’s attitude to the phenomenon of entanglement, which is the fact that just like Cox’s electrons any entangled quantum entities can have instantaneous influence on each other over vast distances, that: It now becomes clear why Einstein had to criticize quantum mechanics, why he called entanglement “spooky.” His picture of the real, factual reality that exists in its essential properties indepen-dent of us, this picture of a separation of reality and information, does not seem to be tenable in quantum physics.2 Einstein’s criticism was based on his mistaken determination to resist the quantum evidence. He stuck to his prejudice that an ‘objective’ ‘real’ world independent of observers must exist whereas the quantum evidence, as indicated by Zeilinger, is just the opposite. Cox, however, is someone who is trying “to save pre-quantum viewpoints, particularly the obviously wrong notion of a reality independent of us.” The realization that the notion of ultimate elementary particles is ruled out by quantum theory came quite early on. This realization was expressed by physicist David Bohm as follows: …one finds, through a study of quantum theory, that the analysis of a total system into a set of independently existing but inter-acting particles breaks down in a radically new way. One discovers, instead, both from consideration of the meaning of the mathematical equations and from results of the actual experi-ments, that the various particles have to be taken literally as projections of a higher-dimension reality which cannot be accounted for in terms of any force of interaction between them.3 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 866 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II More recently quantum physicist H. Dieter Zeh, in his paper ‘There are no Quantum Jumps, nor are there Particles!’, writes that: …there does not seem to be any reasonable motivation (other than traditionalism) for introducing concepts like particles, quantum jumps, … or classical properties on a fundamental level.4 Cox, however, is having none of it. For him people like Zeilinger and Zeh, and a whole lot more respectable and respected non-hippy physicists, must surely be labeled woo-woo merchants (in fact we shall see shortly that in Cox’s view this must extend to Stephen Hawking) because they clearly assert that the realm of reality which classical physics considered to be independent of consciousness cannot be so. Cox’s worldview, however, ignores the phenomenon of consciousness except for the odd offhand remark such us “we are the way in which the Universe becomes conscious of itself.”5 How this happens is not explained. Despite this oversight Cox indicates to his audience of stars that he is engaged in explaining the entire nature of the universe! In their recent book The Quantum Universe: Everything that can happen does happen Cox and Forshaw resort to some dubious intellectual techniques in order to “save pre-quantum viewpoints, particularly the obviously wrong notion of a reality independent of us.” They try to convince their readers that the ultimate nature of reality is made up of ‘real’ quantum particles. They begin, ironically, by quoting Richard Feynman’s observation concerning the impossibility of taking the notion of ultimate particles seriously: Subatomic particles, Feynman wrote, “do not behave like waves, they do not behave like particles, they do not behave like clouds, or billiard balls, or weights on springs, or like anything that you have ever seen.”6 Then, because Feynman has used the term ‘subatomic particles’ in a passage which clearly shows that such entities cannot be ‘particles’, they incoherently assume that such entities can be claimed to inherently and independently exist as ‘particles’: Let’s get on with building a model for exactly how they do behave. As our starting point we will assume that the elemental building blocks of Nature are particles. This has been confirmed … by the double slit experiment, where particles always arrive at specific points on the screen.7 But this is simply not true. The double slit experiment does not in any way prove that “the elemental building blocks of Nature are particles”. The double slit experiment indicates that the assumed ‘particles’ seem to arrive as ‘particles’ but, when there are two slits open and no-one trying to detect which slit the ‘particle’ goes through, they must travel as spread out waves of potentiality. The next few paragraphs are for those readers not familiar with the double slit experiment. According to Richard Feynman the double slit experiment is ‘designed to contain all of the mystery of quantum mechanics.’8 Jim Al-Khalili refers to the behavior displayed in this experiment as ‘nature’s conjuring trick’9, which is a very apt rubric. When light is shone through two narrow slits onto a screen beyond the slits as shown in Figure 10, the two light rays which emerge from the slits, which have a wave-like behaviour, interact with each other to produce a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 867 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II pattern of light and dark stripes. This happens because the light waves which meet from the different slits are either in phase, in which case they reinforce each other, or they are out of phase, in which case they cancel each other out; areas where the light waves are in phase are bright, and where they cancel dark areas are produced. Figure 10 Light is generally thought of as being comprised of ‘particles’ of electro-magnetic wave-energy called photons; little pieces of electromagnetic vibra-tion that should be indivisible. The conjuring trick occurs when we send the photons, each one of which should be an indivisible wave-particle, through the slits one at a time. Because we are sending light particles through the apparatus one at a time it would seem reasonable to suppose that they would go through one of the slits, not both. It also seems reasonable to suppose that there will be no other wave-particles on the other side to interact with, so we would not expect to get the light and dark stripes, which should only occur because of the interaction of many waves going through slits at the same time. There should be just two stripes, one for each slit. This, however, does not happen. The light and dark interference pattern still remains just as it was when a lot of wave-particles were going through the slits. And it is this behaviour which presents the conundrum as to how a supposedly indivisible ‘particle’ can spread out to pass through both slits and yet arrive at the screen as an apparent ‘particle’. Although the waveparticle does have a wave aspect it is also supposed be an indivisible particle which should travel like a particle, which means it should go through just one of the slits. Now suppose we decide to really find out what is going on; we change the experiment so that we place a detector at one of the slits to see which slit the wave-particles travel through. As soon as we do this the interference stripes disappear. It seems as if just looking at the slits to see what is happening changes the way that the wave-particles behave. It actually appears that if we do not look the wave-particle divides itself up, in a way that it should not be able to, in order to go ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 868 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II through both slits. As soon as we look, however, it changes its behavior so that it goes through just one of the slits. It appears to ‘know’ when we are looking. When we look, then, we find that it is a particle. But when we do not look, it becomes something else. And this something else seems to be able to do the impossible. It divides itself up, whilst still remaining one indivisible thing, and then comes back together on the other side. Jim Al-Khalili likens this to a skier going around a tree on both sides (figure 11). Figure 11 This not only happens with light wave-particles, it also happens with electrons, protons, atoms, and molecules, all of which have a quantum wave aspect (figure 12). When there is no way of knowing which path the ‘particles’ take the interference pattern appears, which seems to suggest that they take both paths, even though this should be impossible because the particle aspect should be indivisible. When we know which path is taken, however, the interference pattern disappears. The remarkable implication of this evidence is that conscious interference in the experiment has a direct effect at the quantum level. As Rosenblum and Kuttner say: Physics had encountered consciousness but did not yet realize it.10 It looks as if the nature of the quantum realm is surprisingly mutable and is able to respond to the entire configuration of the experimental apparatus, including the observers and the nature of the observation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 869 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II Figure 12 The development of quantum theory has required that physicists conceive that quantum sized ‘particles’ only ‘materialize as ‘particles’ when they are registered in some way by consciousness, although the exact mechanism is not agreed. Between registration by consciousness or consciousnesses the quantum phenomenon which may register as a ‘particle’ actually travel as waves of potentiality described by a mathematical wave function, which describes the probability of ‘particle’ appearing in various places. The wavefunction (when squared) does not give the probabilities of where a pre-existing particle can be found. It actually gives the probabilities that, when a measurement interaction, seemingly involving consciousness, is performed at a particular time and in a particular location, the measurement will register the presence of a particle. The particle, however, does not exist prior to the interaction. According to Rosenblum and Kuttner: The object was not there before you found it there. Your happening to find it there caused it to be there.11 Not all physicists would be happy with stating the quantum situation so bluntly, but there is a fairly impressive consensus that consciousness is implicated in some way. Many however, like Bernard d’Espagnat, are emphatic that The doctrine that the world is made up of objects whose existence is independent of human consciousness turns out to be in conflict with quantum mechanics and with facts established by experiment. 12 A forceful observation which indicates that consciousness and the quantum realm are inti-mately interconnected. The manner in which consciousness appears to interact at the quantum level is described by a mathematical device called a quantum wavefunction. This mathematical equation precisely describes the time evolution of the state of a quantum system, a ‘state’ being the, possibly infinite, collection of possibilities contained within the wavefunction. Penrose describes the situation that: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 870 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II From time to time – whenever we consider that a ‘measurement’ has occurred – we must discard the quantum state that we have been laboriously evolving, and use it only to compute various probabilities that the state will ‘jump’ to one or another of a set of new possible states.13 And, significantly, the new states appear as classical ‘particle’ states, whereas prior to the measurement event the wavefunction is a purely abstract mathematical construction to which a ‘particle’ reality cannot be ascribed. It clearly appears that between measurements the wave aspect of the quantum realm is dominant. Cox and Forshaw, however, are intent on pretending that the notion of a ‘quantum particle’ is a legitimate and viable account of the quantum situation even though their own discussion clearly indicates that wave behaviour is fundamental: … the double slit experiment requires that the electrons ‘interfere with themselves’ when they pass through the slits. And to do so they must in some sense be spread out. This is not as impossible as it sounds: we can do it if we let any single particle be in many places at once … From now on we will refer to these counter-intuitive, spread-out-yet-point-like particles as quantum particles … we are moving away from everyday experience … and must follow Heisenberg and learn to feel comfortable with views of the world that run counter to tangible experience … because the real world simply doesn’t behave in an everyday way. We must therefore keep an open mind and not be distressed by all the weirdness. Shakespeare had it right when Hamlet says: ‘There are more things in the world Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”14 In the early days of quantum mechanics Heisenberg lamented after a late night discussing the quantum situation: Can nature possibly be as absurd as it seems to us in these atomic experiments?15 This clearly indicates that Heisenberg was deeply shocked that the quantum level of reality behaved in such a deeply counterintuitive manner, as the other physicists of the time were. Physicists at the time were expecting to find some sort of inherently existing fundamental ‘particles’, but there did not seem to be any. Because there were, and are, no inherently existing ‘particles’ at the quantum level, the manner in which Heisenberg began to “feel comfortable” with the situation is indicated in the following quotes: The conception of objective reality of the elementary particles has thus evaporated not into the cloud of some obscure new reality concept but into the transparent clarity of a mathematics that represents no longer the behavior of particles but rather our knowledge of this behavior.16 … the act of registration of the result in the mind of the observer. The discontinuous change in the probability function … takes place with the act of registration, because it is the discontinuous change in our knowledge in the instant of registration that has its image in the discontinuous change of the probability function.17 When the old adage "Natura non facit saltus" (Nature makes no jumps) is used as a basis of a criticism of quantum theory, we can reply that certainly our knowledge can change suddenly, and that this fact justifies the use of the term ‘quantum jump’.18 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 871 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II It seems quite clear that Heisenberg considers the jump from quantum wave to experienced particle as involving a change of state of knowledge, and in the first quote Heisenberg clearly rules out the notion of ‘elementary particles.’ Stapp, who actually discussed quantum issues with Heisenberg, says regarding Heisenberg’s views: Let there be no doubt about this point. The original form of quantum theory is subjective, in the sense that it is forthrightly about relationships among conscious human experiences…19 By no stretch of the imagination did Heisenberg “learn to feel comfortable with views of the world” involving ‘quantum particles.’ The irony in Cox and Forshaw’s absurd attempt to ‘save the appearances’ of ‘quantum particles’ is almost painful because the apparent attempt at misdirection is so obvious: if ordinary type ‘particles’ do not behave the way that the quantum world does then, Cox and Forshaw declare, let’s define a new kind of ‘particle’ which does not behave like a ‘particle’ at all, but mostly like a wave, and call this concoction a ‘quantum particle’. Even though the behaviour of our new type of ‘particle’ bears no relation to the old definition of ‘particle’ and is actually completely contrary to the definition of a ‘particle’. Who cares, the quantum world is so at variance to the everyday world we might as well just define the same words to mean completely different, even contrary, things and then use these new words to pretend that there isn’t so much difference between the two levels of reality at all! But in order to perform this illusion of undermining the reality of quantum illusion in his lecture Cox employs some desperately implausible methods. When discussing the way in which electrons behave in the double slit experiment Cox tells the audience: [Richard Feynman] says this … [the electron] needs to be able to interfere with … so it must at least go through the other slit as well and get to that point. And there must be some mechanism for these paths interfering with each other. Feynman, however, did not say this at all. In his lecture on the subject, after summarizing the quantum mathematical rules he said: One might still like to ask “How does it work? What is the machinery behind the law?” No one has found any machinery behind the law. No one can “explain” any more than we have just “explained.” No one will give you any deeper representation of the situation. We have no ideas about a more basic mechanism from which these results can be deduced.”20 In their book C & F, adding insult to injury, admonish their readers that if they fail to comply with their technique of using the same word to mean completely different things whilst pretending they are the same type of thing then they are failing in imagination! The truth of the situation, however, is that it is C & F who are failing to realize that ‘there are more things in the world … than are dreamt of in [C & F’s] philosophy,” they are failing to realize that a pretend ‘particle’ which does not conform to the essential characteristics of the definition of a ‘particle’ is not, as Feynman realized, a ‘particle’. What C & F are actually doing is misusing language in order to accommodate their realist, essentially materialist prejudices. And yet, in a another spectacular piece of quantum misdirection they further admonish their readers to abandon their ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 872 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II prejudice that words cannot mean entirely contrary things depending on whether they apply to the quantum or the everyday world: The key ideas are very simple in their technical content, but tricky in the way that they challenge us to confront our prejudices about the world.21 But the really tricky aspect of C & F’s exposition is the way in which they constantly explain the functioning of the quantum world in terms of waves at the same time as insisting that their new ‘counterintuitive’ and implausible conceptual concoction of a ‘quantum particle’ is up to the task of behaving exactly like a wave, even though by definition it should not be able to: We are therefore going to have to decide how to make our quantum particle ‘an extended travelling thing.’22 Of course we would all like to make reality conform to our prejudices, but somehow Cox has managed to persuade a large section of the scientific community and the BBC into his quantum conceptual perfidy: We need to allow the wave to go through both slits in order to get an interference pattern, and this means that we must allow all possible paths for the electron to travel from source to screen. Put another way, when we said that the electron is ‘somewhere within the wave’ we really meant to say that it is simultaneously every-where in the wave!23 Perhaps C & F feel very deeply that they “need to allow the wave… ” whist pretending there is some kind of ‘particle’ masquerading somewhere, but if “it is simultaneously everywhere in the wave” then ‘it’ is not a particle! It is intriguing in this context to recall what Jim Al-Khalili said about the quantum phenomenon of the ‘collapse of the wave function’ at the end of his Atom series: An atom is spread out all over the place until a conscious observer decides to look at it. So the act of measurement creates the entire universe. So at this point in his TV career Al-Khalili clearly considered that an atom was a spread out wave phenomenon and only became particle-like when consciousness got involved, a view radically at variance with Cox’s idiosyn-cratic approach. The photo (figure 10) shows Professor John Wheeler in mid flow of explaining the distinction between the ‘classical’ realm and the ‘quantum’ realm. On the left of the photo the blackboard drawing shows a ‘classical’ size object moving between two points. At every point in time it has a definite position and it therefore seems to follow a definite trajectory between the points. In other words it behaves like an everyday object or a ‘particle. The section of the blackboard drawing behind Wheeler’s head indicates the situation at the quantum level; quantum ‘entities’ behave in a completely different and counterintuitive manner; they spread out or ‘smear out’ over increasingly large areas and fade into a ghostly semi-existence of potentiality. When unobserved ‘quantum particles’ are not ‘particles,’ they are a ‘smeared out’ potentiality fields of possible ‘particle’ experience. Stapp says that the central distinguishing feature ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 873 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II between these two levels of reality is that on the ‘classical’ level motions are “apparently independent of our human observations of them.”24 The hugely significant word in this observation is ‘apparently’. Stapp, in line with Planck, Schrödinger Heisenberg, Zeilinger, Penrose and many others, indicates that quantum theory clearly indicates some kind of ‘entanglement’ of mind and matter. In fact according to Stapp quantum theory requires that Mind is the primary ontological aspect of reality: There is, in fact, in the quantum universe no natural place for matter. This conclusion, curiously, is the exact reverse of the circumstances that in the classical physical universe there was no natural place for mind.25 Figure 10 - John Wheeler elucidating the distinction between quantum and classical reality. Cox, however, seems determined to avoid any mention of the quantum level entanglement with mind. The approach that Cox adopts for his explanation of the double slit experiment is the Feynman ‘sum over paths’ approach. In this analysis a ‘particle’ is imagined to take every possible path from one point to any other point. The reason for this is that the issue which needs to be accounted for in the situation of the double slit experiment is how it is possible for a ‘particle’ to ‘know’ about both slits in order to behave in a manner appropriate to the experimental setup. The solution that Feynman came up with, a solution which led to extremely powerful mathematical techniques for solving quantum puzzles, was that a quantum ‘particle’ may be considered to “explore the entire universe instantaneous-ly,” as Cox described the amazing quantum vision which tells us that at every moment of time every quantum ‘particle’ is ‘instantaneously explor-ing’ every quantum nock and cranny of the entire universe. One can only wonder how such a ‘particle’, busily and instantaneously spreading itself over the entire universe, actually gets time to come back to itself so to speak and be a ‘particle’! Figure 11 is taken from Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow’s book The Grand Design: New Answers to the Ultimate Questions of Life in which they also use the Feynman ‘sum over paths’ approach: Feynman realized … that particles take every possible path connecting … points. This, Feynman asserted, is what makes quantum physics different from Newtonian physics. The situation at both slits matters because, rather than following a single definite path, particles take every path, and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 874 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II they take them all simultaneously! That sounds like science fiction, but it isn’t. Feynman formulated a mathematical expression - the Feynman sum over histories - that reflects this idea and reproduces all the laws of quantum physics. In Feynman's theory the mathematics and physical picture are different from that of the original formulation of quantum physics, but the predictions are the same. In the double-slit experiment Feynman's ideas mean the particles take paths that go through only one slit or only the other; paths that thread through the first slit, back out through the second slit, and then through the first again; paths that visit the restaurant that serves that great curried shrimp, and then circle Jupiter a few time before heading home; even paths that go across the universe and back. This, in Feynman’s view explains how the particle acquires information about which slits are open…26 Figure 11 This description appears to imply that if it is possible to formulate a mathematical expression to describe the process of reality which appears to contravene our everyday notions then although it “sounds like science fiction … it isn’t.” In this case H & M are referring to the Feynman sum over histories equation, which Cox wrote out on a blackboard during his lecture (figure 12). This is the equation which, according to H & M & C & F indicates that quantum particles “take every path, and they take them all simultaneously!” Now a significant philosophical issue which arises at this point is that, even if we accept for the sake of argument that ‘quantum particles’ actually exist, are such ‘particles’ really and truly in reality constantly and continuously and instantaneously traversing an infinite number of “paths that go across the universe and back?” Such notions really require us to examine our notions of reality! At the moment I have a glass of Chardonnay next to my computer. Is it really true in reality that there are self-enclosed independent self-contained ‘particles’ of the ‘stuff’ of reality making up my wine that are constantly traversing every quantum Planck unit of space at every moment of time? When I take a sip am I really in reality imbibing quantum bits and pieces which have just arrived back from ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 875 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II the ‘Andromeda Galaxy?’ If you think I am being obtuse here I suggest you go and listen to end of Cox’s lecture: Figure 12 Quantum theory explains how the REAL world emerges from subatomic particles that explore the universe, the entire universe, in an instant! Does Cox mean to suggest that the subatomic particles are UNREAL? Does he really know what he is talking about? If we ask for philosophical and conceptual coherence and clarity he clearly does not, for as Penrose has pointed out: Undoubtedly the world is strange and unfamiliar at the quantum level, but it is not unreal. How, indeed, can real objects be constructed from unreal constituents?27 It is obvious that such a situation would not make sense. However, as we have seen when discussing Dharmakirti, it makes perfect sense for something unreal to emerge from real constituents. Indeed according to quantum cosmologist Lee Smolin: How something is, or what its state is, is an illusion. It may be a useful illusion for some purposes, but if we want to think fundamentally we must not lose sight of the essential fact that ‘is’ is an illusion.28 But listening to Cox it seems that everything is REAL, there really are bits and pieces of reality instantaneously zooming around the entire universe at every moment in time whilst also staying put in order to constitute my glass of wine or the million pounds worth of diamond he cradled in his hand whilst informing his audience that every bit of it was instantaneously flying around exploring the entire universe! Furthermore, if every quantum particle in existence is instantaneously exploring every quantum corner of the entire universe it is absolutely amazing that every sentient being does not telepathically know everything there is to know about the entire universe, including other sentient beings. After all every quantum particle of every sentient being is instantaneously acquiring knowledge about everything there is to know about the entire universe at every moment of time! Let us return to the issue of whether the entities imaginatively used to derive a physically significant mathematical equation must automatically be given the status of ‘elements of reality’, to steal a term indicating real reality from Einstein. The imaginative moves made by James ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 876 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II Clerk Maxwell to derive his hugely significant equations of electromagnetism provide a profound example. The following outline is taken from the book The Great Equations: The hunt for cosmic beauty in numbers by Robert P. Crease. Maxwell explicitly set out to use ‘physical analogies’ in order to derive his equations: I shall use physical analogies to develop mathematics more suited to electrical science. Bear in mind that these are only analogies. If we do, we can think more clearly, for we will be neither too distracted by the mathematics on the one hand, nor too stuck on the physical conceptions from which these are borrowed on the other.29 Maxwell was impressed with Michael Faraday’s ‘vague and unmathematical’ idea of an electric ‘field’ consisting of ‘lines of force’ and set out to produce a rigorous mathematical account of this ‘ethereal substance’30 through which the ‘mechanical phenomena’ of electromagnetic force was supposed to be transmitted. Maxwell certainly considered that his field was ‘real’ and his vision of it has echoes of Cox’s cosmic interconnectedness: The vast interplanetary and interstellar regions will no longer be regarded as waste places in the universe, which the Creator has not seen fit to fill with the symbols of the manifold order of His kingdom. We shall find them to be already full of this wonderful medium; so full, that no human power can remove it from the smallest portion of space, or produce the slightest flaw in its infinite continuity. It extends unbroken from star to star; and when a molecule of hydrogen vibrates in the dog-star, the medium receives the impulses of these vibrations; and after carrying them in its immense bosom for three years, delivers them in due course, regular order, and full tale into the spectroscope of Mr. Huggins, at Tulse Hill.31 Maxwell carried out his mathematical tour-de-force in a paper called ‘On Physical Lines of Force’, written in 1861-62, and, as Crease says “it contains one of the greatest uses of analogy in the history of science.” The source of Maxwell’s analogy was an observation by another physicist that a magnetic field could be thought of as being made up of points each of which could be thought of as a “tiny spinning ‘molecular vortex’”32. Crease writes of Maxwell’s image: Let’s say a magnetic field consists of such rotating ‘cells’, as he calls them, whose axes are along magnetic lines of force as if threaded on a string; the stronger the field, the more rapidly the cells spin. But Maxwell knows it is mechanically impossible to have cells on neighboring strings spin the same way - clockwise, let’s say - for those on one string would rub the wrong way against those in the next. Maxwell rescues the picture by assuming that the space in between is filled with something similar to what engineers call ‘idle wheels’ - smaller beads, in contact with the cells, that rotate counterclockwise, permitting the cells to rotate clockwise. These beads stay in place when the neighboring cells are rotating at the same speed, but changes in the speeds of the vortices cause the beads to move in a line, and they are passed from one cell to another.33 This ‘mechanical’ analogy enabled Maxwell to achieve one of the most profound mathematical achievements in the history of science, in many respects setting the stage for the subsequent emphasis on mathematical formulism within physics, but: He was under no illusion that he had created a picture, a representation, of electromagnetism. All he wanted to claim was that this strange model did whatever electrical and magnetic phenomena did, and thus that its mathematics would also work for them.34 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 877 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II Figure 13 – Maxwell’s mechanical analogy Subsequently it turned out that the notion of a substantial field, which Maxwell conceived of as being really real ‘out there’ in reality, did not correspond to an actually independently existing ‘element of reality.’ The mathematical equations derived from Maxwell’s work with beautiful precision to describe and predict the regularities of human experience, but none of the mechanisms and entities used in the derivation actually ‘really’ exist as independent and inherent bits and pieces of reality. All that ‘seems’ to be ‘real’ is the mathematics and the experiences upon which the mathematics is based. No wonder physicist Max Tegmark has gone so far as to suggest that ultimate reality is mathematics! Unfortunately, however, this view lacks experience. There is another significant episode in the development of quantum theory which is relevant in the context of relationship between models of reality and reality as we might think it really is. This is the polarisation of viewpoints between Schrödinger and Heisenberg: Heisenberg understood that Einstein and Schrödinger wanted ‘to return to the reality concept of classical physics or, to use a more general philosophic term, to the ontology of materialism.’ The belief in ‘an objective real world whose smallest parts exist objectively in the same sense as stones and trees exist, indepen-dently of whether or not we observe them’, was for Heisenberg a throw-back to ‘simplistic materialist views that prevailed in the natural sciences of the nineteenth century’.35 We have already noted Heisenberg’s rejection of any kind of naïve realism concerning elementary ‘particles.’ Although Schrödinger’s viewpoint was not quite as crudely rooted in materialism as Heisenberg perhaps presented it, he did want to think of his equation as representing something ‘physically’ and independently existent, suggesting that it might be “intimately connected to the cloud like distribution of electric charge as it travelled through space.”36 Heisenberg, on the other hand, emphasised the: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 878 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II …subjective element in atomic events, since the measuring device has been constructed by the observer, and we have to remember that what we observe is not nature in itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning.37 Heisenberg’s ‘matrix mechanics,’ therefore brings to the fore a kind of discontinuous spontaneity within the interdependent matrix of observer and observed which did not necessarily entail the necessity for a deeper substantiality. Both Schrödinger and Heisenberg were thoroughly convinced of the correctness of the truth of their respective positions; each considered that their representation in some sense captured the structure of reality as it really is. Because of the ‘lack of visualisation’ in matrix mechanics Schrö-dinger felt ‘repelled’ by Heisenberg’s view. Heisenberg, on the other hand told Wolfgang Pauli: What Schrödinger writes about the visualizability of his theory is probably not quite right,’ in other words its crap.38 How remarkable, then, that eventually Schrödinger demonstrated that these two ways of conceiving the quantum realm are mathematically equivalent, or are different mathematical formulations of the ‘same’ underlying process of reality! Although this discovery did not give the final honours to either of the two quantum perspectives, it did indicate the essential correctness of Heisenberg’s view that any physical theory describes ‘nature exposed to our method of questioning.’ Heisenberg’s insight prefigured the metaphysical position advanced by Hawking and Mlodinow in their recent book The Grand Design: Model-dependent realism short circuits all this argument and discussion between the realist and anti-realist schools of thought. According to model-dependent realism, it is pointless to ask whether a model is real, only whether it agrees with observation. If there are two models that both agree with observation … then one cannot say that one is more real than another. One can use whichever model is more convenient in the situation under consideration.39 In Hawking and Mlodinow’s discussion the terms ‘realist’ and ‘anti-realist’ are used quite loosely for, in fact, model-dependent realism necessarily will have to impute unreality to models, such as the existence of ultimate little balls of ‘matter’ which have been shown to be non-existent by experiment. And, on the other hand, a ‘provisional’ reality would have to be accorded to those models which are in accord with observations. Hawking and Mlodinow point out that: … situations in which … very different theories accurately describe the same phenomenon - are consistent with model-dependent realism. Each theory can describe and explain certain properties and neither theory can be said to be better or more real than the other. Regarding the laws that govern the universe what we can say is this: there seems to be no single mathematical model or theory that can describe every aspect of the universe…40 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 879 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II It seems, then, that unadulterated really ‘real’ reality so to speak is forever beyond conceptual reach. It is, as Bernard d’Espagnat puts it, a ‘veiled reality,’41 a reality which reveals aspects of its nature through different ‘measuring’ interactions with conceptual systems of consciousness but never reveals its full nature to conceptual understanding. Hawking and Mlodinow, however, do present a spectacular account of the nature, functioning and development of what we take to be ‘reality’. They describe the fact that in the double slit experiment when ‘which way’ information is collected, information which tells the experimenters which path any apparent ‘particle’ has apparently traveled, the interference pattern disappears, a result which shows that conscious intervention has a determining effect on the experimental outcome. They present their conclusion is as follows: Quantum physics tells us that no matter how thorough our observation of the present, the (unobserved) past, like the future, is indefinite and exists only as a spectrum of possibilities. The universe, according to quantum physics, has no single past, or history. The fact that the past takes no definite form means that observations you make on a system in the present affect its past.42 And they press the point home with a description of the Wheeler cosmic delayed choice doubleslit thought experiment which indicates that observation has a backwards in time quantum effect, an experiment which was subsequently performed on a terrestrial scale by Zeilinger and his team. H & M conclude: …the universe doesn’t have just a single history, but every possible history, each with its own probability; and our observations of its current state affect its past and determine the different histories of the universe, just as the observations of the particles in the double-slit experiment affect the particles’ past.43 And so we come to the astonishing proposal. From the timeless point of creation a spontaneous universal creative act projects all possible futures into a universal possibility or potentiality space. At the point of creation everything that possibly can happen becomes potential, so at the point of creation all possible future histories of the universe come into being as potentialities, although not yet experienced realities: In this view, the universe appeared spontaneously, starting off in every possible way. Most of these correspond to other universes …. Some people make a great mystery of this idea, sometimes called the multiverse concept, but these are just different expressions of the Feynman sum over histories.44 Clearly the H-M-TOE (Hawking-Mlodinow Theory of Everything) corresponds in a fashion to the multiverse scenario, except that the usual multiverse vision claims that, as in the title of Cox & Forshaw’s book, ‘everything that can happen does happen’, whereas in the H-M-TOE all possibilities are projected as potentialities into the future, the spontaneous creative burst creating the multiverse of possible worlds. A hugely significant feature of the H-M-TOE presentation is the fact that the ‘observers are part of the system’45 and whereas in the usual multiverse scenario, the many-worlds theory, helpless ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 880 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II observers are haplessly and unknowingly rent asunder to occupy an exponentially increasing vast number of new ‘parallel worlds,’ in the H-M-TOE observers have serious work to do: The histories that contribute to the Feynman sum don’t have an independent existence, but depend on what is being measured. We create history by our observations, rather than history creating us.46 In other words the observers, or what Wheeler called ‘observer-participants,’ are able to weed out possible universes, and thereby select those which remain in the possibility mix, even backwards in time. Thus one of the central chapters in The Grand Design is entitled ‘Choosing Our Universe’: The idea that the universe does not have a unique observer-independent history might seem to conflict with certain facts that we know. There might be one history in which the moon is made of Roquefort cheese. But we have observed that the moon is not made of cheese, which is bad news for mice. Hence histories in which the moon is made of cheese do not contribute to the current state of our universe, though they might contribute to others. This might sound like science fiction but it isn’t.47 It is quite clear that we are being told that the reason why the moon is not made of Roquefort cheese is because the observer participants of this particular universe have observed that the moon is not made of cheese. The observations made by the observer-participants have filtered out, backwards in time, the possibility of a cheese moon and also, at the same time, have determined the possibilities that are projected into the future. And, as Hawking and Mlodinow say, this is not science fiction (although I seriously doubt whether there really was ever, in any universe, the possibility of the moon being made of cheese; might it be possible to push the metaphors of popular science towards the realms of impossibility?). SOURCES Al-Khalili, Jim (2003), Quantum: A Guide for the Perplexed. Weidenfield and Nicolson, New York. Allday, J. (2009), Quantum Reality: Theory and Philosophy. CRC Press. Aharanov, Yakir and Rohrlich, Daniel (2005), Quantum Paradoxes: Quantum Theory for the Perplexed. Wiley-VCH. Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004), Science and Ultimate Reality. Cambridge University Press. Bohm, D (2002) Wholeness and the Implicate Order (First published: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980; Routledge Classics, 2002). Bohm, David (2003), The Essential David Bohm ed Nichol, Lee (Routledge, London) Brunnhölzl, Karl (2004) Center of the Sunlit Sky: Madhyamaka in the Kagyu Tradition. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications. Capra, F (1975), The Tao of Physics Shambhala Publications. Cox, B & Forshaw, J. (2011), The Quantum Universe: Everything that can happen does happen, Allen Lane. Crease, R (2009), The Great Equations. Robinson Publishing. d' Espagnat, B (2003), Veiled Reality, Westview Press. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 881 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003), The Tests of Time: Readings in the Development of Physical Theory. Princeton University Press. Dunn John D. (2004), Foundations of Dharmakirti’s Philosophy, Wisdom Publications Inc. Engle, Artemus B. (2009), The Inner Science of Buddhist Practice: Vasubhandhu's Summary of the Five Heaps with Commentary by Sthiramati. Snow Lion, New York. Feynman, Richard (1988), QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter. Princeton University Press. Goswami, Amit (2008), Creative Evolution. Quest Books. Ghirardi, G. (2005), Sneaking a Look at God's Cards: Unraveling the Mysteries of Quantum Mechanics, Revised Edition, Princeton University Press. 1st Ed – 1997, il Saggiatore, Milano. Gribben, John (1996), Shrodinger's Kittens and the Search for Reality. Phoenix. Guenther Herbert V. (1984), Matrix of Mystery: Scientific and Humanistic Aspects of rDzogs-chen Thought. Shambhala Publications. Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010), The Grand Design: New Answers to the Ultimate Questions of Life. Transworld Publishers – Bantum Press. Hay, Tony & Walters, Patrick (2003), The New Quantum Universe. Cambridge University Press. Heisenberg, W. (1990), Across the Frontiers. Ox Bow Press Heisenberg, W. (1999), Physics and Philosophy. Prometheus Books – first published 1958. Kafatos, M., Nadeau, R. (1999), The Conscious Universe: Parts and Wholes in Physical Reality, Springer. Kumar, M (2008) Quantum: Einstein, Bohr and the Great Debate about the Nature of Reality , Icon Books Lingpa, Dudjom (2002) (Trans: Richard Barron & Susanne Fairclough), Buddhahood Without Meditation, Padma Publishing. Mensky, M. B. (2010), Consciousness and Quantum Mechanics: Life in Parallel Worlds: Miracles of Consciousness from Quantum Reality, World Scientific Publishing. Oerter, Robert (2006), The Theory of Almost Everything. Pi Press. Penrose, Roger (1995), Shadows of the Mind. Oxford University Press:1994, Random HouseVintage:1995 Penrose, Roger (1999), Emperors New Mind. Oxford University Press:1989, Oxford University Press paperback:1999 Penrose, Roger (2005), The Road to Reality: A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe. Vintage. Rosenblum, Bruce and Kuttner, Fred (2006), Quantum Enigma: Science Encounters Consciousness. Oxford University Press, U.S.A. Smolin, Lee (2002), Three Roads to Quantum Gravity. Perseus. Stapp, Henry (2004), Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics. Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 1993, 2004. Stapp, Henry (2007), Mindful Universe. Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. Thupten Jinpa (translator) (2008) The Book of Kadam. Wisdom Publications: Library of Tibetan Classics. Thrangu Rinpoche, Kenchen (2001), Transcending Ego: Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom. Namo Buddha Publication., Boulder, Colorado Vedral, Vlatko (2010), Decoding Reality. Dutton. Wallace, B. Alan (2008), Embracing Mind. Shambhala Publications Inc. Zeilinger, Anton (2010), Dance of the Photons. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 882 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II REFERENCES 1 Barrow, John D., Davies, Paul C. W., Harper, Charles L. (eds) (2004) p201 – Anton Zeilinger: ‘Why the quantum? “It” from bit”? A participatory universe? Three far-reaching challenges from John Archibald Wheeler and their relation to experiment.’ 2 Zeilinger, Anton (2010) p268 3 Bohm, D (2002) p237 4 Zeh, H. D. ‘There are no Quantum Jumps, nor are there Particles’ p5 - www.rzuser.uniheidelberg.de/~as3/no-quantum-jumps.pdf 5 Cox, B. & BBC - Wonders of the Universe. 6 Cox, B & Forshaw, J. (2011) p27 7 ibid 8 Feynman, Richard (1988) p130 9 Al-Khalili, Jim (2003) 10 Rosenblum, Bruce and Kuttner, Fred (2006) p67 11 Rosenblum, Bruce and Kuttner, Fred (2006) p75 12 d'Espagnat, Bernard, ‘The Quantum Theory and Reality’ Scientific American, Nov. 197 13 Penrose, Roger (1999) p293 14 Cox, B & Forshaw, J. (2011) p28 15 Oerter, Robert (2006) p49 16 Heisenberg, W (1958), The Representation of Nature in contemporary physics, Daedalus 87 (summer), 95-108 - p100 17 Heisenberg, W (1958), p. 55 18 Heisenberg, W (1999) (first pub 1958), p. 54 19 Stapp, Henry (2007) p11 20 Feynman R. Lectures on Physics Volume III, 1. p10 21 Cox, B & Forshaw, J. (2011) p45 22 ibid p29 23 ibid p31 24 Stapp, Henry (2004) p233 25 Stapp, Henry (2004) p223 26 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p75-76 27 Penrose, Roger (1995) p313 28 Smolin, Lee (2002) p53 29 Crease, R (2009) p137 30 Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003) p 224 31 Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003) p244 32 Crease, R (2009) p139 33 ibid 34 ibid 35 Kumar, M (2008) p321 36 Kumar, M (2008) p214 37 Dolling, L.M.; Gianelli, A. F. & Statile, G. N. (eds) (2003) p469 – Werner Heisenberg: from ‘Physics and Philosophy.’ 38 Kumar, M (2008) p212 39 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010)p46 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | July 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 7 | pp. 863-883 883 Smetham, G. P., Empty Diamonds & the Diamond Cutter Sutra: Mindful Reflections on Materialist Metaphysical Dogmatism II 40 Ibid p58 d' Espagnat, B (2003) 42 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p82 43 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p83 44 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p136 45 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p135 46 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p140 47 Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard (2010) p140 41 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

arXiv:1108.2865v1 [cs.AI] 14 Aug 2011 Conscious Machines and Consciousness Oriented Programming Norbert Bátfai University of Debrecen Department of Information Technology batfai.norbert@inf.unideb.hu August 16, 2011 Abstract In this paper, we investigate the following question: how could you write such computer programs that can work like conscious beings? The motivation behind this question is that we want to create such applications that can see the future. The aim of this paper is to provide an overall conceptual framework for this new approach to machine consciousness. So we introduce a new programming paradigm called Consciousness Oriented Programming (COP). Keywords: programming paradigm, machine consciousness, conscious computer programs, intuitive computer programs, quasi-intuitive Turing machines, ConsciousJ programming language. Contents 1 Introduction 1.1 Previous and Similar Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 3 2 Machine Consciousness 2.1 Some Intuitive Examples for Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 The Trick of Consciousness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2.1 An Evolutionary Aspect of the living in the past . . . 2.3 The Consciousness as a Computing Paradigm . . . . . . . . . 4 4 7 11 12 3 Consciousness Oriented Programming 12 4 Use Cases for the COP 13 4.1 Programming on Paper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 4.1.1 Quasi-Intuitive Machines and Languages . . . . . . . . 13 4.2 Programming on Computer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 4.2.1 ConsciousJ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 1 5 Conclusion 21 6 Acknowledgements 21 List of Figures 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 The author walks across the zebra crossing. . . . . . . . . . . This drawing is an illustration based on the match between FC Barcelona and Levante UD in the Primera División on February 24, 2008. It is created with the FerSML football simulation platform Bátfai [2010a], Bátfai [2010b]. . . . . . . A simple schematic drawing of the well-known conception of ”living in the past”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . An architectural model for the universal quasi-intuitive machine. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . An architectural model for a machine QIM that accepts the language QIM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Turing machine SLM for the case E ∈ R. . . . . . . . . 0 The Turing machine SLM for the case E ∈ RE \ R. . . . . . The Turing machine SWM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 8 12 14 15 16 16 17 List of Tables 1 Execution results of the delay aspect (with the variable BALLLIFESPAN set to 100.000). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Listings 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 1 The source code for the Game class. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The source code for the Ball class. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The source code for the Sensory interface. . . . . . . . . . . . The source code for the Player class. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The source code for the Delay aspect. . . . . . . . . . . . . . A ”conscious” code snippet written in a fictitious language called ConsciousJ. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A ”conscious” class written in ConsciousJ. . . . . . . . . . . . 7 9 9 10 10 19 19 Introduction Eugen Wigner wrote in his essay [Wigner, 1967] that ”observation of infants where we may be able to sense the progress of the awakening of consciousness” is a possible method to solve the mind-body problem. I have three 2 children and I have been observing them when I can. They are now 3 and 5 years old. The older child has already been perfectly able to arrange the everyday events in time, the younger two haven’t been able to speak about it with any degree of accuracy yet. With hindsight, moreover, at the age of 2, they couldn’t handle the term timeliness. In the course of human cognition, there has been a need to know the future from time immemorial. The success of this effort has been culminating at Newton’s mechanical world-view in the late 19th century. But since then the quantum mechanics has turned this deterministic world-view upside down, opening the way to use new quantum phenomena of a deeper level of reality. But even though the Orch OR [Penrose and Hameroff, 1998] model of quantum consciousness is an exciting and promising theory, we have to restrict ourselves to investigate computer programs and machine consciousness because computers of nowadays have no quantum computing parts. We believe that one of the drivers of evolutionary evolving of natural intelligence was the process of replacing, by natural selection, the automatic response of living matter with foresight. In this work, in compliance with this outlined motivation, we emphasize the pursuit of predicting the future as the cornerstone of the definition of machine consciousness. 1.1 Previous and Similar Works Several recent studies have included definitions of machine consciousness. For example, [Starzyk and Prasad, 2011] outlined an architectural model inspired by the functional organization of the human brain. Their definition [Starzyk and Prasad, 2011, pp. 9] says that a machine is conscious if the functional components concerned are present at the machine in question. This and similar (for example, CogAff [Sloman and Chrisley, 2002], Lida of GW [Baars and Franklin, 2009]) models typically involve a detailed description of a sophisticated architectural system and focus on the question of ”How”. By contrast, in our opinion, the conditions of the definition should be in a format that the fulfillment of these can be easily checked. Accordingly, in this paper we are not interested in the question of ”How”. We place only one aspect at the heart of the definition of machine consciousness, namely conscious machines must be able to see the future. This aspect is not totally unknown because it is used in creating the goal- and utility-based agents [Russell and Norvig, 1995, pp. 42-45], but we will go further than that. Our approach for machine (self-) consciousness supposedly will be very compute intensive, so it may be interesting that in [Bátfai, 2009] we outlined an idea about where the necessary computations should be performed in the case of the operating systems. 3 2 Machine Consciousness First, we give the general frames of definitions in which the term ”computer program” is interpreted broadly, that is the Turing-like machines, the various web applications, the command-line interfaces, the GUIs, the kernel of operating systems and goal- or utility-based agents are regarded as computer programs. Definition 1 (Knowing the Future Input). A computer program knows its future input if it can predict that better than a random guess. Definition 2 (Knowing the Future State). A computer program knows its future state if it can predict that better than a random guess. Definition 3 (Conscious Computer Programs). The behavior of a computer program is considered conscious if it knows its future input. Definition 4 (Self-Conscious Computer Programs). The behavior of a computer program is considered self-conscious if it knows its future state. Definition 5 (Intuitive Computer Programs). The behavior of a conscious computer program is considered intuitive if its operation is based on its own predicted input rather than the real input. It is obvious that the consciousness is not an a priori property by our discussion. In addition, several levels of consciousness should be examined in given time intervals. Typically, the examination has two aspects, first we must study the source code. Second, we must observe the operation of the program. These remarks also indicate that our definitions are framed at a very, very high abstract level, in the concrete cases we probably will need to apply some inner simulation like the one introduced in [Hesslow and Jirenhed, 2007]. In conclusion, as regards the fulfillment of the definitions set out above, developers will obviously need to use sophisticated functional structures in the particular cases. 2.1 Some Intuitive Examples for Definitions The intuitive usage of the definitions will be illustrated in this section. First, let’s have a look at the following trivial examples in relation to the question of what data may be the input of a computer program. The input of a Turing machine is a word placed on its tape. The input of a CLI may be a set of commands entered by the user. The input of a GUI may be the set of user’s activities. The input of a RoboCup [Kitano et al., 1997] agent is a set of information received from its aural (what it can hear), visual (what it can see) and body (what is its physical status) sensors. And finally, the activities of processes may be regarded as the input of the scheduler of an operating system. 4 But in the case of a Turing machine, interpreting of the term ”knowing the future input” is worthy of further discussions, because the interpretation of its operation is not wholly straightforward. As an initial approximation, the concatenation of the former input words and the Turing machine in question should be given as an input to a ”conscious” and modified universal Turing machine. Another approach is to apply a prefix Turing machine, where the current future input should be to the right of the input head on the unidirectional input tape. Example 1 (Walking Across the Zebra Crossing). This is a trivial example of daily life. Every day the author goes across the zebra crossing shown in Figure 1. Here I am standing (at a safe) 3-4 meters away from the kerb. Then I am going to start to go when the traffic light for cars has changed to yellow, because I know from former personal experience that the traffic light for pedestrians changes to green soon afterwards. This ”conscious” behavior represents an advantage for the author over the other pedestrians, because while he are already on the move, others will be waiting for the green signal of the traffic light for pedestrians. Figure 1: The author walks across the zebra crossing. Example 2 (Conscious Stock Market Charts). In a given time period, a stock market chart may be regarded as a conscious program if it can also successfully predict the time series of stock data in question. However, we can mention that another different type of input may be interpreted as further input data in an interactive case. For example, an interactive chart program may also examine and successfully predict the habits of its user. In general, 5 we may remark that investigating the user’s habits and patterns is an existing research field, for example see [Tseng et al., 2007], [Velayathan and Yamada, 2006] and [Blouin et al., 2011]. Example 3 (Conscious Databases). In a naive approach, for example, the next couple of rows might be predicted by the table of a relational database that will contain the rows in question. But perhaps it makes more sense to think in terms of conscious behavior of OLAP systems, because the prediction is crucial to achieve good results in this field. Example 4 (Conscious Text Editors). A successfully predicted input of a conscious text editor may be the next couple of words that will be entered by the user. In the world of text editing on mobile devices, it was a natural phase of development, for example, typing in predictive (iTap) mode is widely used in mobile phones to sending SMS or searching on the Web. We may notice that, nowadays, the investigation of several word prediction systems is an active research area, particularly with regard to mobile telephony [Kamvar and Baluja, 2007], [Agarwal and Arora, 2007]. Example 5 (Self-Conscious Chatter Bots). In this example, we are in a fortunate position that allows us to ask directly the questions about (knowing) the future. In compliance with this, we asked chatterbot Alice [Wallace, 2011], [Wallace, 2003], who won the Loebner Prize [Powers, 1998] 3 times in 2000, 2001 and 2004, the next questions about her future. Human: Hello, Alice! ALICE: Hi there! Human: I am writing a paper about machine consciousness, do you mind if I ask you a few questions? ALICE: Will you include me in your essay? Human: Yes, I will. ALICE: I understand. Go ahead. Human: What are you going to do tomorrow? ALICE: You can find out if you become a botmaster. Human: Will you be conversing with me tomorrow? ALICE: I’ll burn that bridge when I come to it. OK I will try to be conversing with you tomorrow. If a conscious Alice had responsed the following answer based on some analytics, our satisfaction would increase. Human: What are you going to do tomorrow? CX ALICE: I will be expected to talk to someone. Example 6 (Self-Conscious RoboCup Agents). A player agent may be regarded as a self-conscious program if it can run inner and simplified future 6 simulation cycles of Soccer Server [Chen et al., 2002] and based on it can also successfully predict the future state of itself. Example 7 (Intuitive RoboCup Agents). In the situation shown in Figure 2, a self-conscious RoboCup agent may be regarded as an intuitive program if it can pass the ball to an open space so that a teammate able to reach it as an unexpected through pass. These are the magical moments of real football. Figure 2 schematically shows such a situation that happened in the match between FC Barcelona and Levante UD at the Camp Nou stadium on February 24, 2008 [YouTube, 2011], where the goal of Samuel Eto’o was assisted by Lionel Messi in the 55th min. 2.2 The Trick of Consciousness A computer program can be trivially made conscious, if we shift its virtual present to the true past. In other words this means that its all input has been delayed in time and in the meantime, we open a loophole to access input data of the present. It is a use case of the well-known conception of ”living in the past”. This latter is described, for example, in [Hameroff, 2006], [Hameroff, 2003]. The following AspectJ Java code illustrates exactly this conception of time shifting. It is a simple game in which the two players P and Q try to catch the ball that moves with random walk on a field of fixed 80x24 size. Players win a point when they catch the ball. public c l a s s Game { public s t a t i c f i n a l int FIELD X = 8 0 ; public s t a t i c f i n a l int FIELD Y = 2 4 ; public s t a t i c f i n a l int BALL LIFESPAN = 1 0 0 0 ; public s t a t i c void main ( S t r i n g [ ] a r g s ) { f i n a l B a l l b a l l = new B a l l ( ) ; f i n a l P l a y e r p l a y e r P = new P l a y e r ( 0 ) , playerQ = new P l a y e r ( FIELD X − 1 ) ; int p o i n t s P = 0 , pointsQ = 0 ; f o r ( int i = 0 ; i < BALL LIFESPAN ; ++i ) { b a l l . move ( ) ; new Thread ( ) { public void run ( ) { 7 Figure 2: This drawing is an illustration based on the match between FC Barcelona and Levante UD in the Primera División on February 24, 2008. It is created with the FerSML football simulation platform Bátfai [2010a], Bátfai [2010b]. playerP . perception ( b a l l . y ) ; } }. start ( ) ; new Thread ( ) { public void run ( ) { playerQ . p e r c e p t i o n ( b a l l . y ) ; } 8 }. start ( ) ; i f ( b a l l . x == 0 && p l a y e r P . y == b a l l . y ) { ++p o i n t s P ; } i f ( b a l l . x == FIELD X − 1 && playerQ . y == b a l l . y ) { ++pointsQ ; } } System . out . p r i n t l n ( p o i n t s P + ” ” + pointsQ ) ; } } Listing 1: The source code for the Game class. The ball can move all four directions with the same probability or, to be more precise, its movement is a random walk. class Ball { int x = Game . FIELD X / 2 , y = Game . FIELD Y / 2 ; void move ( ) { int dx = ( int ) ( Math . random ( ) ∗ 3 ) − 1 ; int dy = ( int ) ( Math . random ( ) ∗ 3 ) − 1 ; i f ( x + dx < Game . FIELD X && x + dx >= 0 ) { x += dx ; } i f ( y + dy < Game . FIELD Y && y + dy >= 0 ) { y += dy ; } } } Listing 2: The source code for the Ball class. The players can only move up and down on the sides of the field. They endeavor to catch the ball when it reaches the sides of the field. Our examples, the players P and Q are aware of the reality via an interface called Sensory. interface Sensory { void p e r c e p t i o n ( int b a l l Y ) ; 9 } Listing 3: The source code for the Sensory interface. c l a s s P l a y e r implements S e n s o r y { int x = 0 , y = Game . FIELD Y / 2 ; public P l a y e r ( int x ) { this . x = x ; } public void p e r c e p t i o n ( int b a l l Y ) { move ( b a l l Y ) ; } protected void move ( int b a l l Y ) { i f ( y < ballY ) { ++y ; } else i f ( y > ballY ) { −−y ; } } } Listing 4: The source code for the Player class. The execution of the perception method of the interface Sensory is blocked for 500 millisecond by the following AspectJ aspect. aspect Delay { public pointcut p e r c e p t i o n C a l l ( ) : c a l l ( public void P l a y e r . p e r c e p t i o n ( int ) ) ; before ( ) : p e r c e p t i o n C a l l ( ) { try { Thread . s l e e p ( 5 0 0 ) ; } catch ( I n t e r r u p t e d E x c e p t i o n e ) { e . p r i n t S t a c k T r a c e ( ) ; } } } Listing 5: The source code for the Delay aspect. It may be noted, as a curiosity, that using the 500 millisecond duration in the inserted code snippet was suggested by [Penrose, 1989] which presents 10 Libet and Kornhuber’s results on the timing of consciousness [Libet et al., 1979], [Kornhuber et al., 1976]. But it is immaterial in this case where the results were observed are shown in Table 1. In addition, our living in the past aspect implementation is sufficiently buggy, for example, it has no mutual exclusion for protecting scores and coords. Nevertheless, this simple example delivers the expected results, namely that the scores decrease as we increase the amount of delay time. Table 1: Execution results of the delay aspect (with the variable BALLLIFESPAN set to 100.000). Naive example of the living in the past Time [ms] Aver. Scores Exec. Time [min] javac 1088 9.7 javac 1156 10.0 no aspect 1162 9.6 no blocking 1036 9.7 0.001 249 11.2 0.01 246 10.0 0.1 239 10.2 0.5 227 9.9 1 226 10.0 2 183 9.9 5 142 10.1 50 68 11.3 200 57 16.9 500 53 23.5 1000 52.5 33.7 The reader can easily see that our example aspect does not contain any loopholes and any analytic codes, either. But, for example, in the case in which the movement of the ball is smooth (that is well predictable) writing some successful analytics and prediction codes, of course, could be trivial. 2.2.1 An Evolutionary Aspect of the living in the past Why may this approach be interesting from the point of view of the awakening of consciousness? Because it may be possible that living matter could 11 have developed such living in the past aspects, in which they can run analytics and prediction methods. Doing so can start the evolutionary process simply and solely because the organisms who make wrong predictions become extinct. In this sense, applying living in the past offers an ability for the organisms to develop a successful prediction mechanism, since a predicted, interesting event that occurs in the ”delay window” shown in Figure 3 can be effectively verifiable, because it has already happened. Figure 3: A simple schematic drawing of the well-known conception of ”living in the past”. Finally, it may be mentioned that the most recent sensational and paradoxical results of precognition [Bem, 2010] perhaps may be easily explained in the context of the living in the past. 2.3 The Consciousness as a Computing Paradigm In the world of computer programs, the barbarian methods of natural selection may be partially waived because computers have the necessary computing resources that they can subsequently execute analytical computations, that is, for developing good solutions it is not necessary to extinct whole generations or races of living species. In our opinion, a paradigm shift is needed to achieve the age of intelligent machines. The base of a new paradigm may be using our simple definitions of machine consciousness, that may be called consciousness oriented programming. 3 Consciousness Oriented Programming Consciousness oriented programming is a new way of approaching software development, in which two basic situations can be distinguished today. • Existing computer programs should be further developed to be conscious or self-conscious computer programs in line with our previous 12 definitions. In general case, it is nearly impossible to modify computer programs, but the situation is not hopeless if modifications are implemented as new aspects in the sense of AOP [Kiczales et al., 1997]. • New computer programs should be developed in conformity with the spirit of our definitions. In both cases, the development of consciousness will require using prediction methods and the development of self-consciousness will require applying inner simulation in the sense mentioned in Section 2. 4 Use Cases for the COP In this section, we follow the spirit of the definitions outlined previously. 4.1 Programming on Paper Notation 1 (Predicted and Real Input). Denote hp(redicted)i i : N (⊆ N) → I(nput) the sequence of the predicted input and hr(eal)i i : N (⊆ N) → I(nput) the sequence of the real input, where I denotes the set of all possible inputs. Definition 6 (Consciousness Indicator Sequence). We define the consciousness indicator sequence hci i : N (⊆ N) → {0, 1} as follows ci = ( 0 if pi 6= ri , 1 if pi = ri . Definition 7 (Conscious Computer Programs). In a given time interval, the behavior of a computer program is referred to as conscious if its consciousness indicator sequence is not Kolmogorov-Chaitin random [Li and Vitányi, 2008]. We should remark that this definition does not kill the consciousness, because the Kolmogorov-Chaitin randomness is algorithmically undecidable. The next section will diverge from the proposed inner prediction mechanism to a simpler way, and meanwhile we will stay within the classical framework of Turing machines. 4.1.1 Quasi-Intuitive Machines and Languages In the majority of cases in this subsection, a comma between words denotes the concatenation of these words which are suitable encoded if necessary. 13 Definition 8 (Universal Quasi-Intuitive Machines). Let T be a Turing machine and let p be a positive real number. An universal quasi-intuitive machine Qx,p is created by the following scheme shown in Figure 4, provided that there exists a sequence of words x1 , . . . , xn (= x) having the properties that i = 1, T (xi ) = yes 2 ≤ i ≤ n, Qxi−1 ,p (T, xi ) = yes (1) (2) In Figure 4, U denotes an universal Turing machine and ”d(x, y) < p” denotes a Turing machine that can indicate that the input words x and y are similar to each other. If this machine Qx,p stops it makes the computation of the function Qx,p (T, y) = QIM (x1 , . . . , xn−1 , x, y, T, p), QIM : {0, 1}∗ n+3 → {yes, no}. The architectural model for the machine QIM is shown in Figure 5. Figure 4: An architectural model for the universal quasi-intuitive machine. Remark 1 (Comparisons of the Words). Using the normalized information distance (NID) [Li et al., 2003] as the metric distance d(x, y) of the two words x and y is theoretically exciting, but in this case we cannot build the Turing machine Qx,p that contains such a ”d(x, y) < p” machine, because this is not an existing machine due to the Kolmogorov complexity function is not partial recursive [Li and Vitányi, 2008, pp. 127, pp. 216]. Specifically, the computability of NID is discussed in [Terwijn et al., 2011, 2010]. But then we can successfully use the normalized compression distance (NCD) [Li et al., 2003, Vitányi et al., 2008, Cilibrasi and Vitányi, 2005] instead of the theoretical normalized information distance because the compression distance is trivially partial recursive [Terwijn et al., 2011]. Another trivial option may be to use the Google similarity distance (NGD) [Cilibrasi and Vitányi, 2007] or the normalized web distance (NWD) [Cilibrasi and Vitányi, 2009] as the metric d. In the following, we suppose that the predicate d(x, y) < p is recursive. 14 Remark 2. In the intuitive sense, x ∈ {0, 1}∗ is such a word that has already been accepted by the Turing machines T or Q. Definition 9 (The Universal Quasi-Intuitive Language). The universal quasiintuitive language QIL = {x1 , . . . , xn (= x), y, T, p | T is defined, T (x1 ) = yes, Qxi−1 ,p (T, xi ) = yes, 2 ≤ i ≤ n and Qx,p (T, y) = yes}. Theorem 1. QIL ∈ RE. Proof. To verify assertion QIL ∈ RE, it is sufficient to observe that the language accepted by the machine QIM shown in Figure 5 is equal to QIL. (We believe that we can prove a bit stronger theorem QIL ∈ RE \ R.) Figure 5: An architectural model for a machine QIM that accepts the language QIM . Definition 10 (Similar Languages). Let E ⊆ {0, 1}∗ be a given language and let p ∈ R be a positive real number. The language SLE = {y | y ∈ {0, 1}∗ , d(x, y) < p, x ∈ E} is said to be similar to E. Theorem 2. E ∈ RE ⇒ SLE ∈ RE \ R. Proof. In the case E ∈ R, we can construct a new Turing machine SLM shown in Figure 6 which accepts SLE . To see why the language SLE is not recursive, consider the case of y ∈ / SLE , it is possible that the new machine SLM will never halt, because it is possible that the part labelled ”For all x/d(x, y)<p” will continue searching for suitable x for ever. It may be noted that the the canonical ordering of {0, 1}∗ , for example shown in [Rónyai et al., 2004], can be applied to help to enumerate the words of the language E by the part labelled ”For all x”. 0 In the case E ∈ RE \ R, we can construct a new Turing machine SLM shown in Figure 7 which accepts SLE . It may be also noted here that a 15 Figure 6: The Turing machine SLM for the case E ∈ R. 0 Figure 7: The Turing machine SLM for the case E ∈ RE \ R. procedure based on Cantor’s first diagonal argument, for example shown in [Rónyai et al., 2004], can be applied to enumerate the words of the language E by the part labelled ”For all x is in E”. Definition 11 (Quasi-Intuitive Languages). With the notation already introduced in Definition 8, a quasi-intuitive language QILT is defined as ∞ T T QILT (= ∪∞ i=1 QILTi ) = ∪i=1 Ip,i , where Ip,i is constructed by the following scheme: T Ip,1 = {x | T (x) = yes} T Ip,i+1 = (3) T {y | x ∈ Ip,i , Qx,p (T, y) = yes}, i ≥ 1 (4) where y ∈ {0, 1}∗ is an arbitrary word or, for example, y ∈ L(G) generated by some generative grammar G. Theorem 3. Let n ∈ N be a given natural number and let T be a Turing machine. Then LT ∈ RE ⇒ QILTn ∈ RE \ R. Proof. Let us observe that T Ip,1 = LT T Ip,i+1 (5) = LT ∪ SLI T p,i 16 (6) Definition 12 (Similar Words). Let L ⊆ {0, 1}∗ be a given language and let p ∈ R be a positive real number. We define the language of similar words as follows SWL = {x, y | x ∈ L, y ∈ {0, 1}∗ , d(x, y) < p}. Theorem 4. L ∈ R ⇒ SWL ∈ R. Proof. We can construct a new Turing machine SWM shown in Figure 8 which accepts SWL and always halts. Figure 8: The Turing machine SWM . Definition 13 (Quasi-Intuitive or Self-Similar Words). Let T be a given Turing machine and let s ∈ {0, 1}∗ be a word such that T (s) = yes. Finally, let hri i : N (⊆ N) → {0, 1}∗ be a finite or infinite sequence of arbitrary words. The union of the elements of the sequence of sets Ii is said to be self-similar, if the sequence is created by the following method: I1 = {s} ( Ii ∪ {ri }, i ≥ 1, Ii+1 = Ii , if ∃x ∈ Ii : Qx,p (T, ri ) = yes otherwise. Remark 3 (Consciousness Indicator Sequence). In the case of the selfsimilar W words, the consciousness indicator sequence may be interpreted as cn = x∈In+1 Qx,p (T, rn ). Example 8. Let T be a Turing Machine, which accepts the language {an bn cn 17 | n ≥ 1}, d = 1/4 and the word s = aaaaaabbbbbbcccccc = a6 b6 c6 . I1 = {s} r1 = aaaaaabbbbbbaaaaaa = a6 b6 a6 , I2 = {s}, c1 = no r2 = aaaaaabbbbbbccc = a6 b6 c3 , I3 = {s, r2}, c2 = yes r3 = aaaaabbbbbccccc = a5 b5 c5 , I4 = {s, r2, r3}, c3 = yes r4 = a7 b7 c7 , I5 = {s, r2, r3, r4}, c4 = yes r5 = c1 a5 b5 c4 , I6 = {s, r2, r3, r4, r5}, c5 = yes r6 = c3 a6 b5 c4 b2 , I7 = {s, r2, r3, r4, r5}, c6 = no r7 = c3 a6 b5 c3 , I8 = {s, r2, r3, r4, r5, r7}, c7 = yes r8 = r6 , I9 = {s, r2, r3, r4, r5, r7, r8}, c8 = yes where the CompLearn package [Cilibrasi, 2011] is used to compute NCD: N CD(s, r1 ) = 0.3125 N CD(s, r2 ) = 0.176471 N CD(s, r3 ) = 0.25, N CD(r2 , r3 ) = 0.294118 N CD(s, r4 ) = 0.4375, N CD(r2 , r4 ) = 0.470588, N CD(r3 , r4 ) = 0.5625 N CD(s, r5 ) = 0.25, N CD(r2 , r5 ) = 0.235294, N CD(r3 , r5 ) = 0.1875, N CD(r4 , r5 ) = 0.25 N CD(s, r6 ) = 0.35, N CD(r2 , r6 ) = 0.3, N CD(r3 , r6 ) = 0.3, N CD(r4 , r6 ) = 0.3, N CD(r5 , r6 ) = 0.25 N CD(s, r7 ) = 0.263158, N CD(r2 , r7 ) = 0.210526, N CD(r3 , r7 ) = 0.210526, N CD(r4 , r7 ) = 0.210526 N CD(r5 , r7 ) = 0.157895 N CD(r7 , r8 ) = 0.15 We should remark that the symmetry of NCD may be violated among short words [Cilibrasi and Vitányi, 2005]. For example, N CD(a7 b7 c7 , a6 b6 c3 ) = 0, 235294 6= 0, 470588 = N CD(a6 b6 c3 , a7 b7 c7 ). 4.2 Programming on Computer In the world of real programming, we do have plan to develop such APIs which can be used to successfully implement our definitions of machine consciousness. For some given types of applications, we are going to investigate the development of a suitable, open source Java and AspectJ APIs to enable seeing the future. 18 4.2.1 ConsciousJ Designing a new programming language is another exciting possibility. At the conceptual level, the following ConsciousJ code snippet illustrates the usage of two new keywords ”conscious” and ”predicted”, though certainly the language ConsciousJ does not exist yet. In our case, this new language to be developed can be imagined as an extension of Java or AspectJ. conscious c l a s s P l a y e r { int x = 0 , y = Game . FIELD Y / 2 ; protected void move ( predicted int b a l l Y ) { i f ( y < ballY ) { ++y ; } else i f ( y > ballY ) { −−y ; } } } Listing 6: A ”conscious” code snippet written in a fictitious language called ConsciousJ. In practice, this code snippet shows that the uncertainty is appeared at the level of the programming language. A ConsciousJ class consists of attributes and methods, plus it may contain predicted attributes. This conception is shown in the following fictitious code snippet in Listing 7. conscious c l a s s P l a y e r implements Runnable { int x = 0 , y = GameS . FIELD Y / 2 ; int p o i n t s = 0 ; Ball ball ; int time = 0 ; int next = 6 ; int b a l l Y H e l p e r = 0 ; o r g . c o n s c i o u s j . pred . K a l m a n F i l t e r kp ; o r g . c o n s c i o u s j . pred .ARMA ap ; o r g . c o n s c i o u s j . pred . Simp lePa st sp ; predicted o r g . c o n s c i o u s j . p r i m i t i v e t y p e . I n t b a l l Y ; public p o i n t c u t moveCall ( ) : c a l l ( protected void move ( predicted int b a l l Y ) ) ; 19 input ( ) : moveCall ( ) { this . ballY . r e c e i v e ( ballY ) ; i f (++time < 1 0 0 0 ) { t h i s . b a l l Y . method ( sp ) ; } e l s e i f ( time < 5 0 0 0 ) { t h i s . b a l l Y . method ( ap ) ; } else { t h i s . b a l l Y . method ( kp ) ; } i f ( time % next == 0 ) { b a l l Y H e l p e r = t h i s . b a l l Y . next ( ) ; } ballY = ballYHelper ; } public P l a y e r ( int x , B a l l b a l l ) { this . x = x ; this . b a l l = b a l l ; new Thread ( t h i s ) . s t a r t ( ) ; } public void run ( ) { for ( ; ; ) { move ( b a l l . y ) ; try { Thread . s l e e p ( 2 0 ) ; } catch ( I n t e r r u p t e d E x c e p t i o n e ) { e . printStackTrace ( ) ; } i f ( b a l l . y < 0) { break ; } } } 20 protected void move ( predicted int b a l l Y ) { i f ( y < ballY ) { ++y ; } else { −−y ; } } } Listing 7: A ”conscious” class written in ConsciousJ. 5 Conclusion The idealized objective of COP is to integrate the agent-based approach into daily software development practices. What is more, the agents should be able to see the future, or, using words of Alan Turing’s [Turing, 1995] essay, everyday softwares should be able to see a short distances ahead. Naturally these words by Turing were really meant for humans. The present paper presented an overall conceptual framework so that it could contribute to the attainment of this objective. 6 Acknowledgements The work is partially supported by TÁMOP 4.2.1./B-09/1/KONV-20100007/IK/IT project. The project is partially implemented through the New Hungary Development Plan co-financed by the European Social Fund, and the European Regional Development Fund. References S. Agarwal and S. Arora. Context based word prediction for texting language. In Large Scale Semantic Access to Content (Text, Image, Video, and Sound), RIAO ’07, pages 360–368, Paris, France, France, 2007. LE CENTRE DE HAUTES ETUDES INTERNATIONALES D’INFORMATIQUE DOCUMENTAIRE. URL http://portal.acm. org/citation.cfm?id=1931390.1931426. B. J. 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URL http: //portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=216408.216410. G. Velayathan and S. Yamada. Behavior-based web page evaluation. In Proceedings of the 15th international conference on World Wide Web, WWW ’06, pages 841–842, New York, NY, USA, 2006. ACM. ISBN 1-59593-323-9. doi: http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1135777.1135905. URL http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1135777.1135905. P. M. B. Vitányi, F. J. Balbach, R. Cilibrasi, and M. Li. Normalized information distance. CoRR, abs/0809.2553, 2008. 24 R. Wallace. The Elements of AIML Style, 2003. alicebot.org/style.pdf. URL http://www. R. Wallace. Alicebot, 2011. URL http://alicebot.blogspot.com. E. P. Wigner. Remarks on the mind-body question. Symmetries and Reflections, page 179, 1967. YouTube. The match between FC Barcelona and Levante UD at the Camp Nou stadium on february 24, 2008, 2011. 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Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 119-124 Deshpande, P. B., & Kulkarni, The Brahma Uncertainty Principle 119 Article The Brahma Uncertainty Principle Pradeep B. Deshpande1* and B. D. Kulkarni2 Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering, University of Louisville, and President, Six Sigma and advanced Controls, Inc. P.O. Box 22664, Louisville, KY 40252-0664. 2. Distinguished Scientist, Chemical Engineering Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory, Homi J Bhabha Road, Pune-411008. 1. Abstract The authors present a new uncertainty principle which contains a major impact factor, the level of consciousness of the experimenter and/or the subject if any, that can lead to uncertain results. A number of experiments have been conducted to back up this uncertainty principle. The findings may lead to a new understanding of certain observed phenomena. Keywords: uncertainty principle, six sigma, Heisenberg principle, scientific investigation. INTRODUCTION In quantum mechanics, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle states that the more precisely one property among a pair of properties is measured, the less precisely the other can be controlled, determined, or known. It places a fundamental limit on the accuracy with which certain pairs of physical properties of a particle, such as position and momentum can be simultaneously known (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncertainty_principle). Over many years now, a number of situations have been encountered in which the results reported by numerous reputed professionals and Yogis are not reproducible by some others and some times even by them. The following are few examples: 1. Dr. David R. Hawkins, co-author of Orthomolecular Psychiatry (1) with the Late Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling developed a methodology for discerning truth from falsehood with muscle testing (2). In his method, the tester places his two fingers on the extended arm of a subject and makes a declarative statement and then pushes down on the arm quickly. If the statement is true, the subject’s muscles are able to withstand the pressure and the arm remains extended. But if the statement is false, the subject is unable to withstand the pressure and the arm goes down. Dr. Hawkins reports 97% accuracy based on a sample of 4,000 subjects. Medical professionals have also reported success with the methodology (3). In the latter investigation, researchers replaced the manual pressure technique by a computer-connected dynamometer to remove human bias which recorded the force applied to the extended arm and the duration over which the force was applied. Unfortunately, in the latter study, the 89 subjects who proved the hypothesis knew what the correct answers to the queries were. Such will not always be the case while discerning * Correspondence: Prof. Pradeep B. Deshpande, Six Sigma & advanced Controls, Inc. P.O. Box 22664, Louisville, KY 40252-0664, http://www.sixsigmaquality.com E-mail: pradeep@sixsigmaquality.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 119-124 Deshpande, P. B., & Kulkarni, The Brahma Uncertainty Principle 120 truth from falsehood. There is grumbling on the internet about the inability to reproduce Dr. Hawkins’s results. We suggest that the method will give correct answers when the experimenter has a sufficiently high level of consciousness but not otherwise. In the context of this paper, Dr. Hawkins’ method can be put to use for two purposes; one, to measure the level of consciousness and the other to discern truth from falsehood. Both will be found useful in this work. 2. Dr. Masaru Emoto, claims that beautiful and intricate water crystals result when prayer is spoken over it. According to Dr. Emoto, an ice crystal of distilled water exhibits a basic hexagonal structure with no intricate branching. Emoto claims that positive changes to water crystals can be achieved through prayer, music or by attaching written words to a water container (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masaru_Emoto). Figure 1 is a photograph of the water crystal before and after prayer taken from the internet. (a) Before Prayer (b) After Prayer Figure 1. Water Crystals Before and After Prayer 3. In an earlier paper (4) we reported that in a number of meditation and Pranayam programs, some 20% of the participants experienced unusual results such as an expression of sheer joy, a peaceful and blissful state, spontaneous levitation, etc. Furthermore, participants may or may not experience this state every time. 4. In reputed journals such as Nature and Science a number of papers were first published but subsequently withdrawn because the results could not be replicated. We hypothesize that in the examples 1-3 and in some cases in 4 above, the missing major impact factor responsible for the inability to reproduce the results is the level of consciousness of the experimenter and/or the subject if any. Since in ancient Indian thought, the name of Brahma is associated with pure consciousness, we have coined the name The Brahma Uncertainty principle for this principle. We state the principle as follows: Not withstanding experimental error, the inability to reproduce a previously validated observation means that the level of consciousness of the experimenter or the subject is insufficient. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 119-124 Deshpande, P. B., & Kulkarni, The Brahma Uncertainty Principle 121 Consciousness pervades in everything that exists and therefore it is logical to surmise that the Brahma Uncertainty Principle is operational at all levels of existence including the physical and nonphysical. In the following paragraphs we present the rationale for why we believe this principle is true and present some experiments to back up our claim. MEASUREMENT OF LEVEL OF HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS We now take up the topic of human consciousness. We could have used muscle testing to illustrate the measurement of the level of consciousness but here we present a simpler method. The measurement device is a crystal pendulum hung with a chain and a glass bead attached at the other end (see Figure 2). These pendulums are available commercially for a low price for anyone who desires to conduct these experiments. Figure 2. Crystal Pendulum For the purposes of this work, the crystal pendulum may be used in one of two ways: 1. To measure the level of consciousness of an individual: Hold the pendulum by the bead in the two fingers of your hand and once the pendulum begins to oscillate in a back-andforth manner, make the declarative statement, “On a scale of 100 to 1,000, the level of consciousness of xxxx” is, and then start counting from 100 upwards in increments of say 50. At the correct level of consciousness, the pendulum should start rotating. Bear in mind that tremors in one’s hand can induce the back-and-forth motion of the pendulum easily in 1 that the energy required for motion is tiny ( i 2 ). 2 2. To Discern Truth from Falsehood. To discern truth from falsehood, hold the pendulum by the two fingers of your hand and make a declarative statement which has a true or false answer. The experimenter is not expected to know what the correct answer is. For false ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 119-124 Deshpande, P. B., & Kulkarni, The Brahma Uncertainty Principle 122 declarative statements, the pendulum is expected to move in a pendulum-like manner and rotate clockwise for correct responses. An interesting property of the pendulum device is also revealed when used with life-supporting and life-detrimental foods and drinks. When held a couple of inches over foods and drinks, the pendulum is expected to rotate clockwise looking down for life-supporting substances (called positive Pranic), counterclockwise for life-degrading foods (Negative Pranic), and back-and-forth for neutral foods. The latter is but a small variation of the use of the measurement device for discerning truth from falsehood. ASSESSING THE STRENGTH OF THE PRINCIPLE To ascertain the validity of the new uncertainty principle we tested the pendulum device with a number of individuals with varying levels of consciousness. Each level of consciousness being associated with a unique perception of truth, we concede that it is a bit presumptuous on our part to assert that we know who is what level of consciousness. However, any experimenter would face the same dilemma. The experiments involve two identical bottles filled to the same level, one with drinking water and the other with alcohol. We then presented the two bottles one at a time and asked the subject to hold the pendulum a couple of inches over the open bottle. The subject must not know what the content of the specific bottle presented is although a colorless liquid in both bottles is visible. Here, the pendulum has two possible motions; clockwise and counterclockwise. Over water, the pendulum is expected to rotate clockwise looking down and counterclockwise over alcohol. Many individuals are able to produce the correct motion of the pendulum if they are aware which bottle has what. The level of consciousness comes into play when the tester does not know the content of the bottle. With each subject the experiment is repeated five times giving us % correct responses. We have observed that with some individuals, the pendulum does not produce any motion while with some others correct answers are obtained, some of the time. Of specific interest are yogis, saints, and healers. We selected an enlightened Indian yogi and an American healer, the latter with a Ph. D. in psychology, with whom we have had the good fortune to interact. Both of them produced one hundred percent correct answers. We are confident that if this experiment were to be repeated with enlightened ones, one hundred percent accuracy will be seen. We are aware that for hypothesis testing the experiments would be configured somewhat differently but it is equally true that the probability of getting all five correct answers in a row is small. Our experience and these experiments have led to prepare a plot of Level of Consciousness vs. % Correct Answers shown in Figure 3. It basically envisions individuals into three categories; ones who calibrate low, those who are in the middle with rising level of consciousness, and a third with a high level of consciousness. The plot is believed to be accurate in the qualitative sense. We encourage readers to investigate this phenomenon further. Our perception that there is a spread in the level of consciousness which shrinks at increasing values of the level of consciousness is evident in Figures 3(a) and (b). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 119-124 Deshpande, P. B., & Kulkarni, The Brahma Uncertainty Principle (a) %CA vs. LOC 123 ((b) LOC vs. %CA Figure 3. Level of Consciousness (LOC) vs. % Correct Answers (%CA) DISCUSSION We do not know to what uses the reader may put the Brahma Uncertainty principle to as the potential applications are vast. However, from our perceptive, the chief application is in discerning truth from falsehood. At first reading this may appear to be a binary outcome but upon reflection it will be clear that while truth is one, falsehood may take on multitudes of dimensions. It did not come as a surprise to us to find that the two individuals who calibrated high have an abundant level of compassion, love, kindness, etc., while the individuals who calibrated low appeared to have a high sense of ego, etc. The ability to discern truth from falsehood has a myriad of powerful applications with enormous material benefits. We were also not surprised to find that the specific individuals who calibrated high, revealed no interest in materially benefiting from their prowess. By the same token, those who may undertake the journey to raise their level of consciousness are unlikely to retain interest in material benefits as they make progress. Dr. Hawkins also makes this point (2). Some readers may take the concepts in this paper to be mystical. We suggest that mysticism is science not yet understood but we must be watchful for mysticism and superstition are close cousins and therefore all observations must be validated with six sigma principles (5). CONCLUSIONS A new principle of uncertainty has been presented. It applies to phenomena where the level of consciousness of an individual emerges as a major impact factor. Experience about a large number of individuals is corroborative of the Brahma Uncertainty principle. The concepts in the paper may lead to a new understanding of certain observed phenomena that defy reproducibility (possibly high-dimensional systems near criticality or intrinsic inherent stochastic systems). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 119-124 Deshpande, P. B., & Kulkarni, The Brahma Uncertainty Principle 124 REFERENCES [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] David R. Hawkins and Linus Pauling, Orthomolecular Psychiatry: treatment for Schizophrenia, June 1973 (Available from Amazon.com). David R. Hawkins, Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis and Calibration of the Level of Human Consciousness, Veritas Publishing, W. Sedona, AZ 1995. Daniel A. Monte, John Sinnott, Mark Marchese, Elisabeth A, Kunnel, and Jeffrey M. Greeson, Muscle Test Comparisons of Congruent and Incongruent Self-Referential Statements, Perceptive and Motor Skills, 88, 1999 pp. 1019-1028. Deshpande, P. B. and Kulkarni, B. D., Towards a Science of Consciousness: Hunt for Major Impact Factors, JCER, Vol. 2, No. 5, July 2011. Pradeep B. Deshpande, Six Sigma for Karma Capitalism, Six Sigma and Advanced Controls, Inc., Louisville, KY 2011. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

An Integration of Integrated Information Theory with Fundamental Physics arXiv:1407.4706v1 [q-bio.OT] 3 Jul 2014 Adam B. Barrett∗ Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science and Department of Informatics University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QJ, UK [Published Feb. 4, 2014 in the Consciousness Research specialty section of Frontiers in Psychology, article no. 5(63).] Abstract To truly eliminate Cartesian ghosts from the science of consciousness, we must describe consciousness as an aspect of the physical. Integrated Information Theory states that consciousness arises from intrinsic information generated by dynamical systems; however existing formulations of this theory are not applicable to standard models of fundamental physical entities. Modern physics has shown that fields are fundamental entities, and in particular that the electromagnetic field is fundamental. Here I hypothesize that consciousness arises from information intrinsic to fundamental fields. This hypothesis unites fundamental physics with what we know empirically about the neuroscience underlying consciousness, and it bypasses the need to consider quantum effects. Introduction The key question in consciousness science is: “Given that consciousness (i.e., subjective experience) exists, what are the physical and biological mechanisms underlying the generation of consciousness?”. From a basic property of our phenomenology, namely that conscious experiences are integrated representations of large amounts of information, Integrated Information Theory (IIT) hypothesizes that, at the most fundamental level of description, consciousness is integrated information, defined as information generated by a whole system, over and above its parts (Tononi, 2008). Further, given the private, non-externally observable nature of consciousness, IIT considers consciousness to be an intrinsic property of matter, as fundamental as mass, charge or energy. Thus, more precisely, IIT posits that consciousness is intrinsic integrated information, where by intrinsic information it is meant that which is independent of the frame of reference imposed by outside observers of the system. The quantity of consciousness generated by a system is the amount of intrinsic integrated information generated (Balduzzi and Tononi, 2008), whilst the qualities of that consciousness arise ∗ adam.barrett@sussex.ac.uk 1 from the precise nature of informational relationships between the parts of the system (Balduzzi and Tononi, 2009). IIT has garnered substantial attention amongst consciousness researchers. However, it has been criticized for its proposed measures of integrated information not successfully being based on an intrinsic perspective (Gamez, 2011; Beaton and Aleksander, 2012; Searle, 2013). The proposed “Φ” measures are applicable only to networks of discrete nodes, and thus for a complex system depend on the observer choosing a particular graining. More broadly, information can only be intrinsic to fundamental physical entities, and descriptions of information in systems modeled at a non-fundamental level necessarily rely on an extrinsic observer’s choice of level (Floridi, 2009, 2010; Gamez, 2011). Here I propose a potential solution to this problem, what might be called the field integrated information hypothesis (FIIH). Modern theoretical physics describes the universe as being fundamentally composed of continuous fields. Electrical signals are the predominant substrate of information processing in brains, and the electromagnetic field that these produce is considered fundamental in physics, i.e., it is not a composite of other fields. Thus, I hypothesize that consciousness arises from information intrinsic to fundamental fields, and propose that, to move IIT forward, what is needed is a measure of intrinsic information applicable to the configuration of a continuous field. The remainder of this article is laid out as follows. First I discuss the concept of fundamental fields in physics, and how if one takes the view that consciousness is an intrinsic property of matter, then it must be a property arising from configurations of fields. In the following section, I discuss the hypothesis that consciousness arises from integrated information intrinsic to fundamental fields, the shortcomings of existing approaches to integrated information, and the possibility of constructing a measure that can successfully measure this quantity for field configurations. I then explain how IIT and the FIIH imply a limited form of panpsychism, and why this should not be considered a problem, before contrasting the FIIH with previously proposed field theories of consciousness, such as that of Pockett (2000). Finally, the summary includes some justification for this theoretical approach to consciousness. Fundamental fields and consciousness Contemporary physics postulates that “fields” are the fundamental physical ingredients of the universe, with the more familiar quantum particles arising as the result of microscopic fluctuations propagating across fields, see e.g., Oerter (2006) for a lay person’s account, or Coughlan et al. (2006) for an introduction for scientists. In theoretical terms, a field is an abstract mathematical entity, which assigns a mathematical object (e.g., scalar, vector) to every point in space and time. (Formally a field is a mapping F from the set S of points in spacetime to a scalar or vector field X, F : S → X.) So, in the simplest case, the field has a number associated with it at all points in space. At a very microscopic scale, ripples, i.e., small perturbations, move through this field of numbers, and obey the laws of quantum mechanics. These ripples correspond to the particles that we are composed of, and there is precisely one fundamental field for each species of fundamental particle. At the more macroscopic level, gradients in field values across space give rise to forces acting on particles. The Earth’s gravitational field, or the electromagnetic field around a statically charged object, are examples of this, and the classical (as opposed to quantum) description is a good approximation at this spatial scale. However, both levels of description can be considered equally fundamental if the field is fundamental, i.e., not some combination of other simpler fields. Note that the electromagnetic 2 LEPTONIC MATTER electron neutrino (νe ) electron (e) muon neutrino (νµ ) muon (µ) tau neutrino (ντ ) tau (τ ) QUARK MATTER up (u) down (d) charm (c) strange (s) top (t) bottom (b) BOSONS Electromagnetic force: photon (γ) Strong force: gluon (g) Weak force: W− W+ Z Gravity: graviton∗ Higgs mechanism: Higgs (H) Mass (GeV/c2 ) Electric charge Strong charge Weak charge < 1.3 × 10−10 0.0005 < 1.3 × 10−10 0.106 < 1.4 × 10−10 1.78 0 -1 0 -1 0 -1 No No No No No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 0.002 0.005 1.3 0.1 173 4.2 2/3 -1/3 2/3 -1/3 2/3 -1/3 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 0 0 No No 0 0 Yes No 80 80 91 -1 1 0 No No No No No No 0 0 No No 126 0 No Yes Table 1: Table of the fields/particles that are considered fundamental. Familiar matter arises from leptons and quarks, while the forces of nature arise from interactions of matter with “carrier” bosons. Mass is given in giga electron volts per speed of light squared (Gev/c2 ≈ 2×10−27 kg). Electric charge is in standard units relative to minus the charge of the electron, i.e., one unit equals 1.6 × 10−19 Coulombs. A description of the group theoretic strong and weak charges is beyond the scope of this article, but the table shows which fields have strong and weak charges. *The gravity field is considered fundamental and is well-studied, but the gravity particle (graviton) has not to date explicitly been observed; at quantum (i.e., very microscopic) spatial scales, a consistent set of field equations for gravity have yet to be constructed. 3 and gravitational fields are both examples of fundamental fields, with the corresponding fundamental particles being the photon and the graviton. Particles are divided up into matter particles and force-carrying particles, but all types of particle have associated fields; all the forces of nature can be described by field theories which model interactions, i.e., exchanges of energy, between fields. See Table 1 for a list of fields/particles that are considered fundamental according to this so-called “Standard Model” of particle physics. To be consistent with modern theoretical physics, a theory of consciousness that considers consciousness to be a fundamental attribute of matter must describe how consciousness manifests itself in the behavior of either fundamental fields or quantum particles. Since we know that the brain generates electric fields with a rich spatiotemporal structure, and that, for the main part, information processing in the brain is carried out by electrical signaling between neurons operating mostly in the classical (as opposed to quantum) regime (Koch and Hepp, 2006), empirical evidence favors the former. Thus, on the view that consciousness is a fundamental attribute of matter, it must be the structure and/or dynamics of the electromagnetic field (which is an example of a fundamental field) that is fundamentally the generator of brain-based consciousness. Once one ascribes electromagnetic fields with the potential to generate consciousness, it is natural to ask whether other fields might also have the potential to generate consciousness. According to modern physics, there was a symmetry between all fields at the origin of the universe, although these symmetries were broken as the universe began to cool (Georgi and Glashow, 1974; see Hawking, 2011 for a lay-person’s account). It could be argued by Occam’s razor that it makes more sense to posit that potential for consciousness existed at the outset, and hence potential for consciousness is a property of all fields, than that it emerged only during symmetry breaking. However, in practice, it is unlikely that any complex consciousness could exist in any field other than the electromagnetic field, for reasons to do with the physics and chemistry of the electromagnetic field compared with other fields. Considering the four forces: strong, weak, electromagnetic and gravitational, the strong and weak forces don’t propagate over distances much larger than the width of the nucleus of an atom, and gravity alone cannot generate complex structures by virtue of being solely attractive; in contrast, the electromagnetic field can propagate over macroscopic scales, is both repulsive and attractive, and is fundamentally what enables non-trivial chemistry and biology. Considering fields associated with matter, these in general do not have any undulations at spatial scales larger than the quantum scale; the non-trivial structures in these fields are essentially just the ripples associated with the familiar quantum matter particles, i.e., electrons and quarks, and various “exotic” particles detectable in particle physics experiments (see Table 1). Finally, the recently discovered Higgs field has essentially a uniform structure; quantum interactions exist between the Higgs field and many of the other fields, and this is fundamentally the origin of mass in the universe (see e.g., Coughlan et al., 2006; Oerter, 2006). Thus, the physics of the electromagnetic field uniquely lends itself to the generation of complex structures. The Field Integrated Information Hypothesis Given the above, I propose that the principal conceptual postulates of IIT should be restated as follows. Consciousness arises from information intrinsic to the configuration of a fundamental field. The amount of consciousness generated by a patch of field is the amount of integrated information intrinsic to it. When a patch of field generates a large quantity of intrinsic integrated information, 4 mathematically there is a high-dimensional informational structure associated with it (Tononi, 2008; Balduzzi and Tononi, 2009). The geometrical and topological details of this structure determine the contents of consciousness. The task now is to correctly mathematically characterize intrinsic integrated information, and construct equations to measure it. A true measure of intrinsic integrated information must be frame invariant, just like any fundamental quantity in physics. That is, it must be independent of the point of view of the observer: independent of the units used to quantify distance or time, independent of which direction is up, and independent of the position of the origin of the coordinate system; and also independent of the scale used for quantifying charge, or field strength. The “Φ” measures put forth by existing formulations of IIT (Balduzzi and Tononi, 2008; Barrett and Seth, 2011) are not applicable to fields because they require a system with discrete elements, and fields are continuous in space. One could ask, however, whether a perspective on a system in terms of discrete elements could actually be equivalent to an intrinsic field-based perspective, thus obviating the need for a field-based measure. To see explicitly that this is not the case, let us revisit the photodiode, which, according to the existing theory (Tononi, 2008), has 1 bit of intrinsic information by virtue of having two states, on or off. There is a wire inside the photodiode, and the electrons inside the wire are all individually fluctuating amongst many different states. The electromagnetic field generated by the diode, and the circuit to which it is connected has two stable configurations for as long as the circuit is connected. But other more general configurations for an electromagnetic field are ruled out by each of these states. Considering the system at this level of description yields a distinct perspective, and would lead one to deduce that the amount of information generated by the system’s states is some quantity other than 1 bit. Thus the field-based perspective is not equivalent to the observer-dependent discrete perspective. The idea here is that a formula should be obtained that could in theory be applied universally to explore the intrinsic information in any patch of spacetime, without requiring an observer to do any modeling, i.e., one would just measure field values in as fine a graining as possible to get the best possible approximations to the intrinsic informational structure. Only a formula in continuous space and time would allow this. If a discrete formula were to be applied, there would always be the possibility of encountering an informational structure on a finer scale than that of the formula. (Unless the graining required by the formula were the Planck scale, i.e., the scale of the hypothesized superstring, on which continuous models of physics break down; however there do not exist complex structures at that scale.) In practice however, observations of systems are necessarily discrete, so discrete approximations to a continuous formula could be useful for empirical application. See Balduzzi (2012) for some recent work on the information-theoretic structure of distributed measurements. We don’t yet know how to properly calculate intrinsic information, so must remain agnostic on the precise amount of intrinsic integrated information generated by photodiodes, or of anything. However, the failure of existing approaches does not rule out the construction in the future of a successful formula. While it is beyond the scope of this present paper to make a serious attempt at solving this problem, I speculate that a formula in terms of thermodynamic entropy as opposed to Shannon entropy might be more likely to succeed, as the former is inherently an intrinsic property, whereas the latter was constructed for the purpose of describing an external observer’s knowledge of a system (Floridi, 2009, 2010; Gamez, 2011; Beaton and Aleksander, 2012). 5 Integrated Information Theory and panpsychism Searle (2013) criticizes IIT for its stance that integrated information always produces consciousness, stating that this ludicrously ascribes consciousness to all kinds of everyday objects and would mean that consciousness is “spread thinly like a jam across the universe”. Koch and Tononi (2013) counter that only “local maxima” of integrated information exist (over spatial and temporal scales): “my consciousness, your consciousness, but nothing in between”. If local maxima of intrinsic integrated information in field configurations always generate consciousness, then there must be minute amounts, say “germs”, of consciousness all over the universe, even though there would be no superordinate consciousness amongst groups of people. Thus, IIT and the FIIH do imply a form of panpsychism. However, the phenomenology assigned to an isolated electron in a vacuum, or even a tree, which has no complex electromagnetic field, would be very minimal. Since the only consciousness we can be certain of is our own, the positing by integrated information theories of germs of consciousness everywhere is no reason to dismiss them. A theory should stand or fall on whether or not it can elegantly and empirically describe human consciousness. For those uncomfortable with subscribing to a panpsychist theory, a possible way round the problem is to assign an attribute “potential consciousness” to matter at the most fundamental level. Then, the quantity of potential consciousness is simply the quantity of integrated intrinsic information. But only when there is a large amount of intrinsic integrated information with a sufficiently rich structure to be worthy of being compared to a typical healthy adult human waking conscious moment, should we say that the integrated information has “actual consciousness” associated with it. A line could thus be drawn somewhere between the potential consciousness of an isolated electron in a vacuum and the actual consciousness generated by my brain as I write this article. The problem with such a distinction however is that potential consciousness would still be assigned phenomenal content, so it is perhaps more elegant to just use a single term “consciousness” for the whole spectrum of integrated information. On the other hand, since consciousness is defined by some as any mental content, but by others as only self-reflective mental content, there is no single terminology that appeals to everybody. The key point, irrespective of the precise definition of consciousness, is that on the theory discussed here, intrinsic integrated information is what underlies subjective experience at the most fundamental level of description. Alternatively, one could further imagine different lines being drawn for different purposes. For example, a threshold of conscious awareness above which surgery cannot be performed; or thresholds at which various people are comfortable eating animals. Relation to previous electromagnetic field theories of consciousness There have been several other theories of consciousness put forward that identify consciousness with various types or configurations of fields, see Pockett (2013) for a review. Notably, Pockett’s electromagnetic field theory (EMT) of consciousness (Pockett, 2000, 2011, 2012) posits that “conscious perceptions (and sensations, inasmuch as they can be said to have independent existence) are identical with certain spatiotemporal electromagnetic patterns generated by the normal functioning of waking mammalian brains” (Pockett, 2013). In the most recent formulation of this theory, the key feature of field patterns underlying consciousness is the presence of a neutral region in the middle of a radial pattern. This hypothesis was motivated by the observation that such field patterns appear 6 during recurrent cortical activity, (with the neutral region in layer 4), and the empirical association of consciousness with recurrent processing (Pockett, 2012). A problem common to previous field theories of consciousness (Libet, 1994; Pockett, 2000, 2013; McFadden, 2002) is that they claim that cutting outgoing neural connections from a slab of cortex that generates a conscious experience will not affect the ability to report that conscious experience. EMT argues that the electromagnetic field within such an isolated hypothetical slab would still propagate through space and enable communication between the conscious field generated by the slab and the spatially contiguous larger conscious mental field. This is not however compatible with the laws of physics. Any cutting of synapses to or from regions of cortex that are generating consciousness will alter the field, and will therefore alter the conscious experience. There is no electromagnetic field residing in the brain other than that generated specifically by all of the neural and chemical activity. And it does not make sense to talk of the brain’s electromagnetic field and its firing neurons and synapses as being able to exist independently of each other. On the theory put forward here, neurons can be considered the scaffolding that enable very complex electromagnetic field configurations to be sustained. As far as describing the mechanisms of perception and cognition that generate the specific contents of consciousness in any given scenario, the current paradigm of associating it with neural activity is of course the only valid and useful level of description. However, in terms of explaining more fundamentally how matter gives rise to consciousness, a description in terms of fields would be much more elegant than a description in terms of the complex entities that are neurons. Another shortcoming of previous field theories of consciousness is that none of them relate physical properties of proposed correlates of consciousness to properties of phenomenology, i.e., they do not posit “explanatory correlates of consciousness” (Seth, 2009). The FIIH raises for the first time the possibility of constructing a field theory of consciousness that can account for a fundamental aspect of phenomenology, namely that conscious experiences are integrated representations of large amounts of information. Discussion In this paper I have hypothesized that, at the most fundamental level of description, human consciousness arises from information intrinsic to the complex electromagnetic fields generated by the brain. This “FIIH” builds on the axioms of IIT, namely that consciousness is integrated information, and that consciousness is an intrinsic and fundamental property of matter analogous to mass or charge. However, it also implies that a new mathematical formalism is required to properly quantify intrinsic integrated information, since electromagnetic fields are continuous in space, and existing “Φ”-type measures of integrated information are applicable only to discrete systems (which require an observer dependent perspective). The idea that consciousness can be identified with certain spatiotemporal electromagnetic patterns has been previously put forward in other electromagnetic field theories of consciousness. But by suggesting that integrated information is the key factor, the theory here connects, for the first time, such electromagnetic field theories of consciousness to basic aspects of phenomenology. The hypothesis is admittedly rather speculative, and any proposed mathematical formula for conscious level in terms of information intrinsic to an electromagnetic field will be difficult to test directly, simply because we do not have the technological tools or the computational resources to 7 record in full detail the three-dimensional electromagnetic field structure generated by the brain. Rather, this can only be sampled at a spatial scale that is sparse compared to the finest scale of its undulations. However, there is a strong case to be made that the theoretical development of the ideas presented here has substantial value. Theories in physics have been vigorously pursued for their logic and beauty, in the absence of imminent direct experimental tests. For example, there is a vast amount of work being conducted on string theory; there, rather than experimental verification, the goal is an elegant explanation of our existing empirical knowledge of particle physics and gravity. If there already existed several analogous theories of consciousness, then one could argue that it would not be useful to add to the speculation. However, there is as yet no compellingly believable set of equations for describing, fundamentally, how consciousness is generated. IIT has potential in this direction, but a major step forward for the theory would be a truly plausible formula for intrinsic information applicable to fundamental physical entities. The FIIH provides a conceptual starting point for achieving this. All this is not to say that such a theory will aid understanding of all aspects of consciousness; indeed the multi-faceted nature of consciousness requires descriptions at many different levels. Non-reductionist frameworks are required to understand the complexity of the biological machinery that enables the brain to do any kind of information processing, conscious or unconscious, and to understand the differences between conscious and unconscious cognitive processes neural dynamics and behavior must necessarily be modeled at multiple levels of description. Finally, any theory can potentially indirectly make predictions. Indeed IIT has already inspired heuristic measures of information integration/complexity that have been successfully applied to recorded electrophysiological data and are able to distinguish the waking state from diverse unconscious states, i.e., sleep and anaesthesia under various anaesthetics (Massimini et al., 2005; Ferrarelli et al., 2010; Casali et al., 2013). The results are in broad agreement with the predictions of IIT and provide encouragement for further theoretical work on the relationship between information integration and consciousness. Theories built from the FIIH could make new and distinct predictions about the types of structural and/or functional neuronal architectures that are capable of generating consciousness; and new theory can only further inform the quest for ever more reliable measures of consciousness that can be applied to observable brain variables. Acknowledgements I thank Emily Lydgate and Anil Seth for invaluable discussions during the writing of this paper, and Daniel Bor and David Gamez for very useful comments on draft manuscripts. ABB is funded by EPSRC grant EP/L005131/1. References Balduzzi, D., and Tononi, G. (2008). Integrated information in discrete dynamical systems: motivation and theoretical framework. PLoS Comput. Biol. 4(6), e1000091. Balduzzi, D., and Tononi, G. (2009). Qualia: the geometry of integrated information. PLoS Comput. Biol. 5(8), e1000462. 8 Balduzzi, D. (2012). On the information-theoretic structure of distributed measurements. EPTCS 88, 28-42. Barrett, A.B., and Seth, A.K. (2011). Practical measures of integrated information for time-series data. PLoS Comput. Biol. 7(1), e1001052. Beaton, M., and Aleksander, I. (2012). World-related integrated information: enactivist and phenomenal perspectives. Int. J. Mach. Conscious. 4(2), 439-455. Casali, A.G., Gosseries, O., Rosanova, M., Boly, M., Sarasso, S., Casali, K.R., Casarotto, S., Bruno, M.A., Laureys, S., Tononi, G., and Massimini, M. (2013). A theoretically based index of consciousness independent of sensory processing and behavior. Sci. Trans. Med. 5(198), 198ra105. Coughlan, G.D., Dodd, J.E., and Gripaios, B.M. (2006). The Ideas of Particle Physics: An Introduction for Scientists. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ferrarelli, F., Massimini, M., Sarasso, S., Casali, A., Riedner, B.A., Angelini, G., Tononi, G., and Pearce, R.A. (2010). Breakdown in cortical effective connectivity during midazolam-induced loss of consciousness. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 107, 2681-2686. Floridi, L. (2009). Philosophical conceptions of information. Lect. Notes Comput. Sci. 5363, 13-53. Floridi, L. (2010). Information: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gamez, D. (2011). Information and consciousness. Etica Pol. 13(2), 215-234. Georgi, H. and Glashow, S.L. (1974). Unity of all elementary particle forces. Phys. Rev. Lett. 32, 438-441. Hawking, S. (2011). A Brief History Of Time: From Big Bang To Black Holes. New York, NY: Bantam. Koch C., and Hepp, K. (2006). Quantum mechanics in the brain. Nature 440, 611-612. Koch, C., and Tononi, G., (2013). Can a photodiode be conscious? New York Review of Books. New York, NY: Rea S. Hederman. Libet, B. (1994). A testable field theory of mind-brain interaction. J. Conscious. Stud. 1(1), 119-126. Massimini, M., Ferrarelli, F., Huber, R., Esser, S.K., Singh, H., and Tononi, G. (2005). Breakdown of cortical effective connectivity during sleep. Science 309, 2228-2232. McFadden, J. (2002). The conscious electromagnetic information (cemi) field theory: the hard problem made easy? J. Conscious. Stud. 9(8), 45-60. Oerter, R. (2006). The Theory of Almost Everything: The Standard Model, the Unsung Triumph of Modern Physics. New York, NY: Plume. Pockett, S. (2000). The Nature of Consciousness: A Hypothesis. Lincoln; NE: iUniverse.com. 9 Pockett, S. (2011). Initiation of intentional actions and the electromagnetic field theory of consciousness. Hum. Mente 15, 159-175. Pockett, S. (2012). The electromagnetic field theory of consciousness: a testable hypothesis about the characteristics of conscious as opposed to non-conscious fields. J. Conscious. Stud. 19(11-12): 191-223. Pockett, S. (2013). Field theories of consciousness. Scholarpedia 8(12), 4951. Searle, J.R. (2013). Can information theory explain consciousness? New York Review of Books. New York, NY: Rea S. Hederman. Seth, A.K. (2009). Explanatory correlates of consciousness: theoretical and computational challenges. Cogn. Comput. 1(1), 50-63. Tononi, G. (2008). Consciousness as integrated information: Biol. Bull. 215(3), 216-242. 10 a provisional manifesto.

N O S UBSTITUTE FOR F UNCTIONALISM - A R EPLY TO ‘FALSIFICATION & C ONSCIOUSNESS ’ arXiv:2006.13664v3 [cs.OH] 30 Apr 2021 A P REPRINT Natesh Ganesh Information Technology Lab, ACMD, NIST Boulder Dept of Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder Boulder, Colorado 80305 natesh.ganesh@colorado.edu May 4, 2021 A BSTRACT In their paper ’Falsification and Consciousness’ [1], Kleiner and Hoel introduced a formal mathematical model of the process of generating observable data from experiments and using that data to generate inferences and predictions onto an experience space. The resulting substitution argument built on this framework was used to show that any theory of consciousness with independent inference and prediction data are pre-falsified, if the inference reports are considered valid. If this argument does indeed pre-falsify many of the leading theories of consciousness, it would indicate a fundamental problem affecting the field of consciousness as a whole that would require radical changes to how consciousness science is performed. In this reply, the author will identify avenues of expansion for the model proposed in [1] allowing us to distinguish between different types of variation. Motivated by examples from neural networks, state machines and Turing machines, we will prove that substitutions do not exist for a very broad class of Level-1 functionalist theories, rendering them immune to the aforementioned substitution argument. Keywords Consciousness · Falsification · Unfolding Argument · Substitution Argument · IIT · Causal Structure 1 Introduction A formal model of generating data through experiments in consciousness science and then using this data to make predictions and inferences onto an experience space was introduced in [1]. This model was then used to propose a clear definition of falsification, followed by the‘substitution arguments’. The authors also pointed out that the unfolding argument from [2] would be a special case of their results. It is very interesting work, accessible and proposes a necessary descriptive mathematical framework that could prove to be very useful moving forward. The author will assume that the readers are familiar with the work in [1] and for the sake of clarity, we will try and borrow the symbols and terminologies from it as much as possible. The reply is structured as follows - we will start by discussing the main definitions and theorem(s) from [1] in section 2, identify and correct specific aspects of the model from the original work. Following this expansion, we will then use some of the proposed examples for substitutions in [1] to show why these specific substitutions do not imply pre-falsifications for a broad class of Level-1 functionalist theories in section 3. In section 4, we will follow it up with a formal definition of this class of functionalist framework and a proof that no substitutions exist for them. In section 5, we will briefly explore the difference between Level-1 and Level-2 functionalism. The note will conclude in section 6 summarizing the work and briefly discussing the implications. A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 Figure 1: Borrowed from [1] - ‘This picture illustrates substitutions. Assume that some data set o with inference content or is given. A substitution is a transformation T of physical systems which leaves the inference content or invariant but which changes the result of the prediction process. Thus whereas p and T (p) have the same inference content or, the prediction content of experimental data sets is different. Different in fact to such an extent that the predictions of consciousness based on these datasets are incompatible (illustrated by the non-overlapping circles on the right). Here we have used that by definition of Por , every p ∈ Por yields at least one data set o0 with the same inference content as o and have identified as o and o0 in the drawing.’ 2 Understanding the Substitution Argument We start with one of the central definitions and results from [1] (refer to Fig.(1) from [1]) that will be the focal point of the discussions here. These include (a) Definition 2.1 - falsification is defined as ‘there is a falsification at o ∈ O if we have inf (o) ∈ / pred(o)’. (b) Definition 3.1 - or -substitution is defined as ‘a or -substitution if there is a transformation S : Por → Por such that at least for one p ∈ Por - pred · obs(p) ∩ pred · obs(S(p)) = φ’. (c) Definition 3.8 - Inference and prediction data is defined as independent ‘if for any oi , o0i and or , there is a variation v : P → P such that oi ∈ obs(p), o0i ∈ obs(v(p)), but or ∈ obs(p) and or ∈ obs(v(p)) for some p ∈ P .’ (d) In section (3.4.1), minimally informative is defined as that for every o ∈ O, there exists an o0 ∈ O such that pred(ō) ∩ pred(ō0 ) = ∅. (e) The substitution argument is given in Theorem 3.10 - ‘If inference and prediction data are independent, either every single inference operation is wrong or the theory under consideration is already falsified.’ One of the major things to note is that while the minimally informative criterion guarantees that there are at least two sets of observable data with different predictions, it does not constrain their corresponding inferences in any manner [3]. Thus frameworks for which we have pred(ō) ∩ pred(ō0 ) = ∅ could also have inf (o) ∩ inf (o0 ) = ∅ and still be minimally informative. A more robust and expanded definition of independence can be built based on this observation by expanding on what definition (3.8) intended to capture - “in most experiments, the prediction content oi and inference content or consist of different parts of a dataset. What is more, they are usually assumed to be independent, in the sense that changes in oi are possible while keeping or constant” [1]. While we can have (oi , o0i ) pairs that preserve or , it does not necessarily imply that all (oi , o0i ) pairs have to satisfy this constraint (and it would be erroneous to assume otherwise). Thus we could have a set of prediction data {o0i } generated by a variation (as defined in [1]) that maintains the same or , but does not contain o00i (or a set of them) with inf (o) ∩ inf (o00 ) = ∅ that ensures that the minimally informative criterion (pred(ō) ∩ pred(ō00 ) = ∅ ) is met. Furthermore varying oi while keeping or constant does not necessarily mean we vary the prediction pred(oi ) i.e. we can have oi 6= o0i but still have pred(oi ) = pred(o0i ). This expanded idea of independence is aligned with the underlying motivation, while not being equivalent to falsification by definition [3]. Utilizing the original definition of variation, we see that for any (oi , o0i ) pair that maintain the same or there are variations of two types (i) Type-1 variations where oi 6= o0i , but pred(o) ∩ pred(o0 ) 6= ∅. 2 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 (ii) Type-2 variations where oi 6= o0i , but pred(o) ∩ pred(o0 ) = ∅. It is immediately evident that while both variations allow for prediction and inference data to be independent, only Type2 variations imply pre-falsifications. Thus independence (under this expanded set of variations) does not necessarily imply falsifications by definition and we could have frameworks with prediction and inference data independence through only Type-1 variations. Thus Theorem 3.10 is incomplete at best since Definition 3.8 of independence does not account for Type-1 variations. The correct restatement of the theorem would then be Theorem 1 ‘If inference and prediction data are independent under a Type-2 variation, either every single inference operation is wrong or the theory under consideration is already falsified.’ Since all variations that produce independence do not immediately entail falsification, the claim that - ’our results show that if the independence of prediction and inference holds true, as in contemporary cases where report about experiences is relied upon, it is likely that no current theory of consciousness is correct’ in [1] only holds if is shown that the variation is of Type-2 for the theory. The question now becomes one of determining whether substitutions identified in different existing frameworks are produced by variations of Type-1 or 2. This will be the focus of the next section with respect to some of cases suggested in the paper. The authors of [1] also make the case for why obs : P → O and pred : O → E mappings are better characterized as correspondences, while inf can be considered to be a function. They argue that while inf can be a correspondence, it can redefined to be a function by redefining the experience space E to a new space E 0 := {inf (o)|o ∈ O}, ’where every individual element e0 ∈ E 0 describes what can be inferred from one dataset o ∈ O, so that inf 0 := O → E 0 is a function.’ While this might be coherent mathematically, the authors do not explain the effect of redefining E to E 0 has on the pred correspondence or explore the more general case of both pred and inf being correspondences (if it does not affect the actual theorems). If inf (o) is a subset of elements in E as opposed to a single element, it would entail a change in falsification to inf (o) ∩ pred(o) = ∅ and complicate both variations and substitutions since we could now have variations that maintain or and have pred(ō) ∩ pred(ō0 ) but still not entail falsification since pred(o) ∩ inf (o) 6= ∅ and pred(o0 ) ∩ inf (o0 ) 6= ∅. However this is a minor objection and unrelated to the rest of this reply. Since this is a first step in formalizing these ideas, it is justifiable for the authors of [1] to not cover the more general cases in their work yet. However one hopes that the change in inf from correspondence to function is explored in detail and if it does not affect the final results as claimed in the paper, a clear and rigorous derivation of that will be provided in future work. 3 Application of the Substitution Argument to Neural Networks & Turing Machines The authors of [1] would have served the readers better by providing a very clear example of the application of the substitution argument to some of the proposed cases of data independence stated in the paper. In this section, we will examine the existence and type of variations in the case of powerful and widely used models of computation - neural networks, a simple finite state machines and Turing machines. Let us start with the case of artificial neural networks discussed in the paper. The authors state - ‘For any ANN, report (output) is a function of node states. Crucially, this function is non-injective, i.e., some nodes are not part of the output. For example, in deep learning, the report is typically taken to consist of the last layer of the ANN, while the hidden layers are not taken to be part of the output. Correspondingly, for any given inference data, one can construct a ANN with arbitrary prediction data by adding nodes, changing connections and changing those nodes which are not part of the output. Put differently, one can always substitute a given ANN with another with different internal observables but identical or near-identical reports. From a mathematical perspective, it is well-known that both feedforward ANNs and recurrent ANNs can approximate any given function (Hornik et al. 1989; Schafer and Zimmermann 2007). Since reports are just some function, it follows that there are viable universal substitutions.’ It seems like the authors are claiming that the arguments presented in their discussion imply the existence of universal substitutions for neural networks but is that really the case? Since there is no example accompanying the claim, we will take up a simple example of a recurrent neural network and apply the substitution argument as faithfully as possible to the discussion above. We would like to acknowledge that a bulk of the work in this section is not very novel and is built on the analysis performed by Hanson and Walker in [4] and [5]. Consider a general recurrent neural network (RNN) N with I number of input neurons, an arbitrary number H of hidden neurons and T output neurons. Let the input-to-hidden neuron weights, hidden-to-hidden weights and hidden-to-output weights be given by WI , WH and WT . The dynamics of the hidden states ht and output ot of the recurrent neural network at time t is given as ht ot = σ(WH ht−1 + WI xt ) = WT ht 3 (1) A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 where σ can be a non-linear activation function like ReLu or sigmoid. Note that ht is a H-dimensional vector. By the discussion of such neural networks in [1], we have the hidden states ht as part of the prediction data and output states ot as the inference data. From existing literature we know that it is possible to construct a different RNN N 0 that can produce the same input-output behavior but with a different hidden-to-hidden weight matrix. Thus N 0 would have the same number of input and output neurons I and T respectively as N . However we assume that N 0 has a different 0 number of hidden neurons H0 . The corresponding weight matrices are given as WI0 , WH and WT0 . We will assume that the new hidden state of this RNN is given as h0t (a H0 -dimensional vector) while inputs and outputs remain the same at xt and ot . The dynamics are given as h0t 0 0 = σ(WH ht−1 + WI0 xt ) ot = WT0 h0t (2) Thus N and N 0 both give the same output ot (corresponding to inference data) while changing the hidden states (corresponding to prediction data). ht 6= h0t since they are vectors of different dimensions. Under the definitions used in [1], this would imply that prediction and inference data are independent and viable substitutions exist. But whether this particular substitution in the neural network implies falsification depends on whether or not the variation is of Type-1 or 2. The answer is that it depends upon the framework or theory of interest and it’s effect on the pred function. We will explore this further with a functionalist framework F. We define a functionalist framework to be one in which ‘the states are typically described in terms of functional behaviors ("stop", "walk", "go", etc.) but what really gives them meaning mathematically is only their topological relationship with one another. This implies that at this level, the formal description of the computation is not grounded in any particular physical representation and could, in fact, be realized by radically different causal structures. This abstract treatment of computation corresponds to what Chalmers’ refers to as the “finite-state automaton” (FSA) level of description, due to the fact it is defined in terms of a global finite-state automaton. Beneath this level is what Chalmers refers to as the "combinatorial-state automaton" (CSA) description. The only difference between the FSA and CSA levels of description is that the latter specifies the computational states of the former in terms of a specific labeling or encoding of the subsystems that comprise the global system.’ [5], [6]. We will simply refer to the FSA and CSA levels of description as Level-1 and Level-2 descriptions respectively in order to be more general and avoid any baggage with the terms - FSA and CSA. Under this computational hierarchy, we have F to be a Level-1 functionalist framework. While specific representations are important to understand the physical implementation, the pred function for such a F would be dependent on the functional states {s} as defined in the Level-1 description only and not on the particular of any specific encoding at Level-2 i.e. Level-1 functionalist frameworks are not representationalist simply because they employ representation. In the case of the neural network, the states in the Level-2 description are defined by their relationship to other states {ht−1 , xt } → {ht , ot } i.e. their functional structure. Though h and h0 are vectors of different dimensions (corresponding to their particular physical representations in their respective networks), both networks maintain the same input-output relationship and as a result, we would have for every h ∈ {h} a corresponding h0 ∈ {h0 } such that {ht−1 , xt } → {ht , ot } and {h0t−1 , xt } → {h0t , ot } for all input-output pairs (xt , ot ). Thus ht and h0t correspond to the same functional state st (say) at Level-1. We can think of the pred function for F as composed of two functions abs which maps the particular physical realization of Level-2 to the higher Level-1 FSA description, followed by a pred0 function that maps the (abstract) functional state st to the experience space - pred() = pred0 (abs()). Hence we have the specific encodings of the hidden states ht 6= h0t but would still have pred(ht ) = pred(h0t ) = pred0 (st ) (since pred function only depends upon the Level-1 functional state), while the output remains the same for both N and N 0 . Thus the variation from N and N 0 does not imply pre-falsification. It is trivial to see that if we were drop the time element t from the states, the same arguments can be extended to feedforward neural networks with varying number of hidden neurons. Since the assumptions made here are very general, we claim that for a Level-1 functional framework F, any substitution of ‘a given ANN with another with different internal observables but identical or near-identical reports’ [1] will always correspond to a Type-1 variation and never imply pre-falsification of F if we take the inferences to be true. To see the dependence of the above discussion on the framework in question, let us consider a different framework of consciousness F 0 in which the result of the prediction function is dependent on the dimensionality of the hidden-state vector i.e. pred(ht ) = g(dim(ht )). In this framework we can clearly see that pred(ht ) need not be equal to pred(h0t ) since the two vectors are of different dimensions. In such case, the relationship between N and N 0 corresponds to a type-2 variation and we would have framework F 0 to be falsified by Theorem 1. While the dependence on dimensionality of the hidden state is a contrived example that is easy to visualize, the same argument would apply to any framework that distinguished between any ht and h0t (that have the same functional structure as per a Level-1 description) with respect to the pred function as a result of the difference in their physical encoding/representation i,e, 4 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 Physical Implementation-1 obs abs Variation abs Level-1 Description obs Physical Implementation-2 Level-2 Description Figure 2: Modified from [5] - We created the mirror image of the Fig.(1) from [5] by starting from two different physical implementations 1 and 2 of the tollbooth on the left, having feedback & no feedback respectively. This picture is closer to the idea of performing experiments and collecting data from a physical system. Since both implementations maintain the same input-output relationship while producing different representations of their internal states, they are variations of each other. The corresponding CSA encoding representations that constitute the Level-2 description are given in the middle. We can see that an abstraction function abs will generate the same higher Level-1 description of the Mod 8 FSA in both cases. CSA or Level-2 description. We will see this in greater detail when studying an example comparing systems that do and do not contain any feedback next. Diving deeper into the differences between Level-1 (FSA) and Level-2 (CSA) descriptions - “In digital electronics, as well as models of the human brain, this encoding is usually given in terms of binary labels that are assigned to instantiate the functional states of the system. Consequently, transitions between states in the CSA description fix local dependencies between elements, as the correct Boolean update must be applied to each “bit” or “neuron” based on the global state of the system. Furthermore, once a binary representation is specified it constrains the memory required to instantiate the computation, as the number of bits that comprise the system is now fixed. The final level of the hierarchy is the specific choice of logic gates used to implement the Boolean functions specified at the CSA level. [5]. This is best understood from the example worked out in [5] where they show that a causal structure theory of consciousness like Integrated Information Theory (IIT) makes different predictions for different CSA representations and as a result are either pre-falsified or are unfalsifiable depending on whether the inference is made at the FSA/Level-1 or CSA/Level-2 respectively. We will borrow Fig.(1) from [5] and modify it to fit the case here to give Fig.(2). We see that starting with the two physical implementations 1 and 2, we have two physical systems from which our prediction and inference data is generated using the obs correspondence. We will have the internal states and outputs of the implementation correspond to prediction and inference data respectively. Since both implementations maintain the same output while having different CSA encoding representations for the internal states, the two systems can be seen as a variation of each other. This difference in the state representations correspond to the difference in their physical implementations - feedback vs no-feedback. We can then generate the higher Level-1 FSA description that represents the functional structure shared by both Level-2 CSA descriptions using a suitable abstraction functions abs. From the Fig.(2), we have the state 1001 from CSA representation-1 to have the same topological relationships as the state 1112 from CSA representation-2, and both of these correspond to state H in the Level-1 description. Since the predictions of a Level-1 functionalist framework 5 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 only depend on functional states in the Level-1 description, we would have pred(1001 ) = pred(1112 ) = pred0 (H). Thus variations like the one in Fig.(2) that maintain the input-output relationship also maintain the functional structure and are thus Type-1 variations that do not pre-falsify the framework. On the other hand, we can see that for frameworks that produce different predictions based on different CSA representations i.e. pred(1001 ) 6= pred(1112 ), such a variation would be of Type-2 and imply pre-falsification if the inferences at the Level-1 description are considered to be valid. A similar claim on the existence of substitutions for Turing machine was also made - ‘Turing machines are extremely different in architecture than ANNs. Since they are capable of universal computation, they should provide an ideal candidate for a universal substitution’ [1]. To explore this, we will start with a mathematical definition of a Turing machine M from [7] as a 7-tuple M = {Q, Λ, b, Σ, δ, q0 , F } where • Q is a finite, non-empty set of states. • Λ is a finite, non-empty set of tape alphabet symbols. • b ∈ Λ is the blank symbol. • Σ ⊆ Λ\{b} is the set of input symbols. • q0 ∈ Q is the initial state. • F ⊆ Q is the set of final or accepting states. • δ : (Q\F ) × Λ → Q × Λ × {L, R} is a partial function called the transition function. In a Turing machine, the input is encoded into the tape and Turing machine (or specifically the state registry) starts at an initial starting state. There is a transition function that maps the current state of the state registry and the symbol on the tape to a new state of the registry, a change in the symbol on the tape at the current position and a shift in the read/write head to either the left or right (L/R) by one position. The complete configuration of the Turing machine can be seen as the combined state of the state registry and the symbols on the tape. And we can view the functioning of the Turing machine as set of transitions between these different complete configurations {q, x} ∈ Q × Σ. The machine halts with the state (registry) of machine in {qF } ∈ F and the output on the tape. A simple example of a general substitution in Turing machines is through the use of a universal Turing machine U which can simulate an arbitrary Turing machine M on arbitrary input by reading both the description of the machine to be simulated as well as the input to that machine from its own tape. Thus a universal Turing machine U can also be defined by a similar 7-tuple with an expanded set of input symbols ΣU (to accept original inputs and description of M) and states space of the state registry QU . When the machine U halts, the symbols on the tape should correspond to the same output generated by M upon halting. The complete configuration of U is given by {q 0 , x0 } ∈ QU × ΣU . Since U will produce the same output on the tape as M upon halting for the same inputs, albeit through a different set of registry states from the space QU and transition function δ U , we can construct a substitution using the concatenated state {q0 q1 q2 ...qF } and {q0U q1U q2U ....qFU } as prediction data of M and U respectively, and the final output on the tape when the machine halts as the inference data. Now imagine a Level-1 functionalist theory of consciousness T . We can see that for any input-output pair (x, o), we can write the corresponding Turing machine realization as (q0 , x) → (q̄ = {q1 q2 ....qF }, o) and (q0U , x × XM ) → (q̄ U = {q1U q2U ....qFU }, o) in M and U respectively, where XM is the description of M as input to U. We can rewrite the initial state of U by combining XM into the initial state q0U to produce q0U ∗ = (q0U , XM ) and thus maintain the same ‘input’ x. Plugging this back in for the machine U, we have (q0U ∗ , x) → (q̄ U = {q1U × ....qFU }, o) Even though {q} and {q U } are elements in different spaces and q̄ and q̄ U are of different lengths (M and U need not produce the output in the same order of time-complexity), their topological functional relationship remains the same across configurations of the two Turing machines. Thus for every q̄ ∈ {q̄} with (q0 , x) → (q̄, o), there is a q̄ U ∈ {q̄ U } with (q0U ∗ , x) → (q̄ U , o) across all input-output pairs (x, o). This is isomorphic to the example of the hidden states in the RNN example used earlier in the section. The very same arguments can be extended here to show that though q̄ 6= q̄ U , we would have predT (q̄) ∩ predT (q̄ U ) 6= ∅ while output remains the same. For such a theory of consciousness T , the variation between Turing machine M and an universal Turing machine U is a Type-1 variation and does not imply pre-falsification. Both Turing machines here are universal models of computations capable of simulating any computable function and equivalent to other universal models like Lambda calculus, cellular automata, recursive functions, etc. It follows that for a Level-1 functionalist theory T as defined above, a variation between any two universal models of computation will be a Type-1 variation with respect to T and will not imply it’s pre-falsification. Of course, as in the case of the RNN, we can construct a theory of consciousness T 0 that is sensitive to Level-2 descriptions such that the variation from M to U is of Type-2 and T 0 is pre-falsified by Theorem 1. The examples discussed in this section strongly hint at the non-existence of Type-2 variations for Level-1 functionalist theories of consciousness. We will prove that this is indeed the case in the next section. 6 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 4 No Substitute for Level-1 Functionalism - A Formal Proof The authors of [5] proposed the following idea - ’For a theory to avoid the epistemic problems revealed by IIT under the isomorphic transformation we introduce requires that no transformation or "substitution" exists that changes the prediction without affecting the inference. This, in turn, implies that beneath the specified level of inference, a mathematical theory of consciousness must be invariant with respect to any and all changes that leave the results from the inference procedure fixed. In other words, if you can make a change to the physical system that does not affect what will be used to infer the conscious state of the system, then such a change must not affect the prediction of the theory either.’ In this section, we will build on the examples from the previous section and provide a short formal proof (by contradiction) that no substitutions exist by showing no Type-2 variations exist for Level-1 functionalist theories (of consciousness). As a result, these cannot be pre-falsified by the substitution argument of [1]. We have briefly described Level-1 functional description in the previous section but will provide a more precise definition here. A Level-1 functionalist framework TF is defined in terms of • Functional states sTF ∈ S TF which are defined mathematically in terms of their topological relationship to other functional states. They are thus independent of any particular encoding or representation. • This topological relationship, which we call the functional structure GF can be characterized as the map: F (sT(t−1) , xt ) → (sTt F , ot ) defined over all (xt , ot ). xt and ot are inputs and outputs at time t. Note that we F can also combine ot into the functional state sTt F and rewrite the map as (sT(t−1) , xt ) → sTt F . If there are a 0 collection of functional states {s} and {s }, and for every s ∈ {s}, there is (atleast) a s0 ∈ {s0 } such that (s(t−1) , xt ) → (st , ot ) and (s0(t−1) , xt ) → (s0t , ot ) over all (xt , ot ) pairs, then {s} and {s0 } share the same functional structure and the corresponding s ∈ {s} and s0 ∈ {s0 } are equivalent functional states. • The result of the prediction correspondence pred only depends upon the set of functional states {sTF }. If s ∈ {s} and s0 ∈ {s0 } are equivalent functional states, then pred(s) = pred(s0 ) (or in a broader sense pred(s) ∩ pred(s0 ) 6= ∅). In general, the pred function/correspondence from [1] defined for prediction data o ∈ O can be decomposed into a composition of two functions - an abstraction function abs : O → S TF that maps prediction data in O to functional states in S TF . And a predTF : S TF → E that maps functional states to prediction results in the experience space E. Thus pred(o) = predTF (abs(o)). This abstraction function abs : O → S TF always exists since it can always be constructed for a Level-1 functionalist framework. In the prediction data oi , let there be a particular physical representation of states {hTF } ∈ HTF . If F F {hTF } is such that for every input-output pair (xt , ot ), we have (hT(t−1) , xt ) → (hTt F , ot ) and a sT(t−1) ∈ {sTF } with F F F (sT(t−1) , xt ) → (sTt F , ot ), then we define abs(hT(t−1) ) = sT(t−1) , thereby constructing it into existence. By the very definition of a Level-1 functionalist theory of consciousness, predTF : S TF → E also exists and would be built according to the particular framework. The output in general would be a non-invertible function of the functional state i.e. ot = g(sTt F ) is a coarse-graining over the functional states. In the case where ot has been concatenated to the functional state, the function g simply traces out the non-output parts of the functional state. Note that since g is assumed to be a non-invertible function, g −1 need not exist and thus sTt F = g −1 (ot ) is not necessarily defined. If we view the output as corresponding to the inference data or , we have that {sTF } 6⊆ {o} (i.e oi 6⊆ or ) and thus we have not defined our Level-1 functionalist framework to be (pathologically) unfalsifiable as described by the conditions in [1]. We will briefly take a moment here to discuss the Reductio ad absurdum argument from [1]. The authors argue that for experiments in the natural sciences - “If there are two quantities of interest whose relation is to be modeled by a scientific theory, then in all reasonable cases there are two independent means of collecting information relevant to a test of the theory, one providing a dataset that is determined by the first quantity, and one providing a dataset that is determined by the second quantity.” They explain this with an example of the relationship between temperature T0 and it’s relationship to the energy of microphysical states. They argue that in order to determine this for any particular model we would make two different measurements - one that would access the microphysical states and measure their kinetic energy (say) which would correspond to the prediction data (om ) and the other would use a thermometer to obtain a dataset oT0 that replaces the inference dataset. They claim that ‘these independent means provide independent access to each of the two datasets in question’ and this ’differs from the case of theories of consciousness considered here, wherein the physical system determines both datasets.’ We are not certain as to whether independent is used according to how it has been defined earlier in the paper. Nonetheless, we do not understand why in this example, the authors of [1] believe that the temperature measurement of the system P using the thermometer does not depend upon the physical system P ? The measurement obtained from the thermometer is in fact a calibrated value that provides a coarse-grained macroscopic description of the underlying microscopic kinetic energies (via a Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution of particle speeds). So if the authors identify no issues associated with the example they provided, then 7 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 it should follow that for the sake of consistency, they will have no objections to the Level-1 functionalist framework defined above since the inference data/output is simply a coarse-grained result of the functional states achieved through an non-invertible function. We can now proceed further with our framework TF . Since the functional states sTF ∈ S TF are independent of any specific encoding, we will define the set {HiTF } as the collection of different representations/encodings of Level-1 functional states that realize the same functional structure TF - {HiTF } = {H1TF , H2TF , ..., HN , ...}. Each element HjTF ∈ {HiTF } is itself a collection of states {hTi F } that corresponds to a very particular physical representation of the individual functional states that maintain the same functional structure as any other HkTF ∈ {HiTF }. Under this definition of {HiTF }, consider any pair of encodings H, H0 ∈ {HiTF } (where we have dropped TF to keep the equations cleaner). Since both H and H0 have the same functional structure 0 0 0 GF , by definition we have that for every hj , hj ∈ H, there is a hk , hk ∈ H0 , such that (hj(t−1) , xt ) → (hjt , ot ) and 0 (hk(t−1) , xt ) → (hkt , ot ) for all input-output pairs (xt , ot ). This means that the different encodings hj and hk correspond to equivalent functional states. We thus have that for different encodings H and H0 that share the same functional structure, we can write using the abs and predTF function from before, s = abs(hj ) ∈ {s}, s0 = abs(hk ) ∈ {s0 } where predTF (s) = predTF (s0 ) (or predTF (s) ∩ predTF (s0 ) 6= ∅). We will now prove by contradiction that Type-2 variations do not exist for Level-1 functionalist frameworks. Let us say that there is a pre-falsification achieved through the existence of Type-2 variation for the theory TF . This means that there is a v : P → P such that the inference data or is kept constant while the prediction data changes from oi to o0i = obs(v(p)) 6= oi , and the corresponding predictions do not overlap either i.e. we have pred(o) ∩ pred(o0 ) = ∅ for v. From discussions in [1], we take the prediction oi and inference or data to correspond to particular encodings of the functional states and outputs respectively in order to be able to apply the functionalist model of interest. This means that oi ≡ H, obs(v(p)) = o0i ≡ H0 and or = {o} (outputs). As oi 6= o0i , we have that the corresponding encodings H and H0 are different in some measurable way. Since v is a variation that maintains the inference data for the same experiments (i.e. maintains all input-output pairs across the variation), that would mean that for every 0 0 hj ∈ H, there is a hk ∈ H0 such that (hj(t−1) , xt ) → (hjt , ot ) and (hk(t−1) , xt ) → (hkt , ot ) for all input-output pairs (xt , ot ). This means that both H and H0 have the same functional structure by definition (and are elements of {HiTF }). This would also mean that the hj and hk from above correspond to equivalent functional states (say s and s0 ) such that s = abs(hj ) ∈ {s}, s0 = abs(hk ) ∈ {s0 } with predTF (s) = predTF (s0 ) (or predTF (s) ∩ predTF (s0 ) 6= ∅). The pred function for TF was defined as a composition of two functions predTF and abs functions. Thus for any (arbitrary) single prediction pred(o) = pred(hj ) = predTF (abs(hj )) and the corresponding prediction on the data obtained after the variation - pred(o0 ) = pred(hk ) = predTF (abs(htk )). Since we know that for any hj ∈ H and hk ∈ H0 that share the same functional relationships, we have predTF (abs(hj )) = predTF (abs(hk )). This means that for any single prediction pred(o) = pred(o0 ) (or rather pred(o) ∩ pred(o0 ) 6= ∅). Since the choice of hj was arbitrary, we have pred(o) ∩ pred(o0 ) 6= ∅ over the prediction dataset. But we began with the assumption that v is a Type-2 variation with pred(o) ∩ pred(o0 ) = ∅. This is clearly a contradiction and thus no such Type-2 variation v exists for a Level-1 functionalist theory TF . Thus prediction and inference data are independent via Type-1 variations and there no substitutions. Hence we have proved that such functionalist frameworks cannot be pre-falsified by the substitution argument presented in [1]. While the unfolding argument can be seen as a special case of the substitution argument, the above proof indicates that the claim about Level-1 functionalist theories like GWT, HOT and PP frameworks being unaffected [2] by the unfolding (and now substitution) argument still hold. While we have shown that no substitutions exist for Level-1 functionalist theories, there is an underlying question about the status of Level-2 functionalist frameworks and whether some of the current leading frameworks fall under that category. This will be the focus of our next section. 5 Level-1 vs Level-2 Functionalism One might be tempted to characterize frameworks that depend on the CSA descriptions as Level-2 functionalist theories, since the different states in each individual representation is defined in terms of it’s relationship to other states under the same representation. (The author is not sure what the Level-1 structure corresponds to if functional structure is defined at Level-2.) However with functional structure defined based on Level-2 state encoding, we can see how one can look at the different encodings of the same Level-1 functional state and mistake them to be different Level-1 states - for eg: both 1111 and 0012 in Fig.(2) correspond to same Level-1 state E in the context of the entire functional structure. However we see that 1111 → 0111 and 0012 → 1012 (and 1112 → 0002 ) which can lead to an erroneous conclusion that 1111 and 0012 correspond to different Level-1 functional states. The important thing to note is the superscript 1 and 2 over the states that correspond to different Level-2 descriptions and we must view these state encodings within the context of the entire CSA representation i.e. the overall functional structure to determine if they correspond to 8 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 the same Level-1 functional state. If we fail to do that and distinguish between 1111 and 0012 , then we are capturing something else about the states - like the difference in architecture - feedback vs no-feedback that is reflected in the φ calculations for IIT [5]. We would then be more accurate in describing frameworks that differentiate based on these Level-2 descriptions by the specific factor/constraint that produced the difference in representations in the 1st place (for eg: it would be more accurate to call the framework that distinguishes between CSA representations 1 and 2 in Fig.(2) as a feedback theory of consciousness). This is the case in [8] where the author discusses a specific type of functionalism called machine state functionalism where ‘any creature with a mind can be regarded as a Turing machine (an idealized finite state digital computer), whose operation can be fully specified by a set of instructions (a “machine table” or program) each having the form - If the machine is in state Si , and receives input Ij , it will go into state Sk and produce output Ol (for a finite number of states, inputs and outputs)’ [9]. The machine table as defined above would be a collection of these instructions of the form (Si , Ij ) → (Sk , Ol ) which is similar to how we characterized functional structure here. However this particular definition of machine state functionalism is adopted at a Level-2 description in [8], which leads to Level-2 functionalism (as discussed above). As a result, changes to the automaton from feedback to feedforward architectures that is reflected in the Level-2 state encodings are viewed as changes to the functional structure. Since the Krohn-Rhodes decomposition [10] used to achieve the transformation between the two state representations assumes the preservation of the underlying (Level-1) functional structure, there is now confusion as to what actually constitutes functional structure. We could have different definitions for Level-1 and Level-2 functional structures, where the Level-1 structure is preserved across different Level-2 representations (arising from different physical realizations) and it is not as per the definition of the Level-2 structure. While this would be coherent in principle, results and claims now trivially become about which definitions have been adopted. In order to avoid this, it is important that we adopt and practice the use of terms in a consistent manner by determining which of the two definitions of functional structure is closer to what we originally intended to capture. This difference between defining functional structure at Level-1 vs Level-2 descriptions also corresponds to the unresolved debate between role and realizer functionalism [9]. Given how functionalism and functional states are conceptualized to be independent of the realization details plus given the arguments in favor of role functionalism [9], the author leans more towards a Level-1 definition as being closer to what functional structure intended to characterize. Consequently, claims made about Global Workspace theory (GWT), Global Neuronal Workspace theory (GNWT) along with other functionalist frameworks in [8] based on Lemma 2.9 do not follow unless one adopts a Level-2 definition of functional structure (According to Definition 2.8 in [8], a Level-1 functionalist picture as defined in the previous section will not satisfy Lemma 2.9 for the same reasons it is immune to the substitution argument). While the description of GNWT from [11] that is used in [8] highlight a very architecture specific Level-2 type description (which could motivate one to view GNWT as a Level-2 functionalist framework), the authors of [11] clearly state in their paper that this particular description is “from a neuronal architecture standpoint.” Furthermore they start this description by pointing out that the original GNWT relies on the following main assumptions - “that conscious access is global information availability: what we subjectively experience as conscious access is the selection, amplification and global broadcasting, to many distant areas, of a single piece of information selected for its salience or relevance to current goals” - which is more of a Level-1 description that is independent of how selection, amplification and global broadcasting is realized. The authors in [2] make a similar point with respect to Global Workspace, Higher-Order Thought (HOT) and Predictive Processing (PP) theories which they characterize as Level-1 functionalist frameworks - “The unfolding argument does not apply to these theories because they propose that systems are conscious in so far as they implement the right kind of function–independently of the causal structure. Of course, these theories are usually couched in terms of recurrent or top-down processing, or other seemingly causal-structure terminology, but they can be formulated in other kinds of networks too” and provide a feedforward toy model of GWT to further strengthen their case. We can leave the status of whether these leading theories of consciousness are Level-1 or Level-2 functionalist frameworks as open, but reiterate that claims of pre-falsification only apply if their functional structure is couched in Level-2 descriptions. Since we can always construct an abstraction function abs to map from the Level-2 to Level-1 description, it is possible to construct a Level-1 version of a Level-2 framework and avoid pre-falsification via substitution. On the other hand, one could argue that we can always construct a specific Level-2 realization of a Level-1 theory (by constraining aspects of the architecture, use of neuronal units, etc), which would then be fallible to the substitution argument. This would at best only pre-falsify by substitution that specific Level-2 version and not the underlying Level-1 framework, and at worst bring us back to square one on whether or not the Level-2 description is a functionalist framework to begin with. Finally, if we used the definition of functional structure from [8] and followed the results of [5], it seems like we would have both functionalist and causal structure being defined on the same Level-2 (CSA) descriptions which appears to be contradictory to how many view both and would only lead to further confusion. It would be important to pin this down in a coherent and consistent manner before they lead to further debates over pre-falsification. 9 A PREPRINT - M AY 4, 2021 6 Summary & Conclusion The work presented in [1] represents a good first step in formalizing the techniques used in the science of consciousness. The corresponding substitution arguments would have important implications in the field of consciousness by pointing at fundamental problems in the manner in which experiments are conducted that would pre-falsify many of the current major frameworks of consciousness. However we find that claims like - “We come to a surprising conclusion: a widespread experimental assumption implies that most contemporary theories of consciousness are already falsified” by the authors are currently unjustified once you take into account that independence was defined to trivially imply pre-falsification. In this reply, we introduced a more complete definition of independence that allowed us to expand variations from the original paper into Type-1 and Type-2. We then redefined Theorem 3.10 from [1] using Type-2 variations and then explored substitutions in the case of neural networks, state machines with and without feedback and Turing machines. We showed that for these particular example cases, the substitutions of interest were not of Type-2 with respect to a Level-1 functionalist framework and hence does not entail pre-falsification. We then presented a formal proof of the non-existence of Type-2 variations for Level-1 functionalist frameworks of consciousness and completed the reply with a discussion of Level 1 and 2 functionalist theories and where contemporary theories of consciousness fall into. Currently, we are uncertain as to whether or not most leading functionalist pictures of consciousness are of Level-1 or 2. What is more certain however is that they have not already been pre-falsified independent of that determination. References [1] Kleiner, Johannes and Hoel, Erik, "Falsification and consciousness." Neuroscience of Consciousness, (2021): niab001. [2] Doerig, Adrien, et al., “The unfolding argument: Why IIT and other causal structure theories cannot explain consciousness.” Consciousness and Cognition, 72 (2019): 49-59. [3] Hanson, Jake R, Personal Communication, 2020. [4] Hanson, Jake R, and Sara I. Walker. “Integrated Information Theory and Isomorphic Feed-Forward Philosophical Zombies,” Entropy 21.11 (2019): 1073. [5] Hanson, Jake R., and Sara I. Walker, “Formalizing Falsification of Causal Structure Theories for Consciousness Across Computational Hierarchies,” arXiv preprint, arXiv:2006.07390 (2020). [6] Chalmers, D. J., “A computational foundation for the study of cognition,” Unpublished, 1993. [7] Hopcroft, John and Ullman, Jeffrey, Introduction to Automata Theory, Languages, and Computation, Addison–Wesley, Reading Mass, 1979. [8] Kleiner, Johannes, “Brain states matter. A reply to the unfolding argument,” Consciousness and Cognition, 85 (2020): 102981. [9] Levin, Janet, “Functionalism,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, (2004). [10] Krohn, K, Rhodes, J, “Algebraic theory of machines - I: Prime decomposition theorem for finite semigroups and machines,” Transactions of the American Mathematical Society, 1965, 116, 450–464. [11] Dehaene, Stanislas, Jean-Pierre Changeux, and Lionel Naccache, “The global neuronal workspace model of conscious access: from neuronal architectures to clinical applications,” Characterizing consciousness: From cognition to the clinic?, (2011): 55-84. 10

133 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Article Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Chris King* ABSTRACT Despite its seemingly ephemeral basis in a sappy organismic brain at the 'apex' of evolution, subjective consciousness may be too fundamental a property to be explained, except in terms of fundamental physical principles, as a complementary manifestation to quantum non-locality, which directly manifests the principle of choice in free-will in generating history. This cosmology is intrinsically sexual. Subject-object complementarity is different from either panpsychism or Cartesian duality. The subjective aspect is described as complimentary to the physical loophole of quantum uncertainty and entanglement, just as the wave and particle aspects of the quantum universe are complementary. Subjective and objective are interdependent upon one another with neither fully described in terms of the other. Furthermore, the transactional interpretation is intrinsically sexual in the sense that all exchanges are mediated through entangled relationship between an emitter and an absorber in which reduction of the wave function is a match-making sequence of marriages. This sexual paradigm is not simply an analogy, but is a deep expression of the mutual complementarity and intrinsic relationship manifest in the existential realm, physically and subjectively. Key Words: subjective, objective, complementary, quantum uncertainty, non-locality, quantum entanglement, sexual paradox, consciousness, brain. * Correspondence: Chris King http://www.dhushara.com E-Mail: chris@sexualparadox.org ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 134 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain The Enigmatic Three Pound Universe The brain is the gateway to the deepest enigma of modern science - subjective consciousness and the paradox of free will in a physical universe. It thus holds all the trump cards in the final frontier of scientific discovery, whose surface has only so far barely been scratched. Although researchers in the reductionist paradigm of artificial intelligence and related areas have sought to see the brain as simply a glorified computer, there is little about the brain which in any way resembles the digital device we have invented to carry out our computational tasks. For a start, the brain is a very bad computer. We have a memorizable digit span of only about seven figures and find even simple arithmetic calculations difficult without the aid of a pencil and paper. By contrast, we are able to remember whether or not almost a million different scenes are familiar or have been seen before, hinting at an almost unlimited 'environmental' memory capacity. This kind of contrast is reflected in everything we know about the anatomy and physiology of the brain. Although the first nervous system to be studied, the giant axon potential of the squid, does have an apparently discrete response, it is in fact a pulse coded analogue signal which is being transferred, whose rate of discharge is proportional to the continuous depolarization at the cell body. When we come to examine even the simplest nervous systems such as the ganglia of the sea slug aplysia we find that it is the 'silent' analogue cells with continuous potential changes which act as the organizing centres for behavior, with the pulse coded cells merely acting as long distance relays. Similarly when we look at brain waves in the cortical electroencephalogram or EEG, we find socalled 'brain waves' such as the a, b, and g rhythms, which are not only continuous changes but broad spectrum vibrations more characteristic of chaos or edge of chaos dynamics, than the exact resonances of an ordered dynamical system. In complete contrast to the essentially serial nature of the digital computer despite attempts to introduce some relatively trivial parallel architecture, the overweening paradigm for the central nervous system is 'parallel distributed processing'. Generally there are as little as 10 synapses between input and output despite there being between 1010 and 1011 neurons and around 1015 synapses in the cerebral cortex. Central nervous networks are also intrinsically fractal in architecture because of the many-to-many nature of connections arising from the tree structure of a neuron's dendrites and axons. The combination of this manyto-many fractal architecture and the wavelike nature of neuronal transmissions is a key concept in Karl Pribram's description of the 'holographic brain' (Pribram R553). Phase-locking can mark out populations of cells sharing a common 'experience' or process from other randomly related stimuli. This 'holographic' view is supported by much physiological evidence. EEGs, particularly in the gamma band 40-60 Hz (cycles/sec), and their averaged event-related potentials, display phase coherence in a situation when a given perception is recognized, and out-of-phase chaotic 'hunting', when we are trying to orient to an unfamiliar experience. Phase beats are the basis of the quantum uncertainty relationship (p 299) implying a potential connection. The complementarity between continuous wave coherence and the discrete local information carried to a given neuron or synapse is deeply similar to wave-particle complementarity. Another important complementarity is provided by the reliance many neuronal connections make on non-linear processes and diverse chemical neurotransmitters to transduce information across the synaptic junction. Neurotransmitters come in a variety of types both excitatory and inhibitory ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 135 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain of both temporary short-term effect and of potentially permanent effect in the long-term potentiation or LTP involved in memorization. Despite the development of sophisticated techniques for visualizing brain activity such as those for speech (left), and ingenious work tracing connectivity of activity between neurons in the cortex such as that establishing distinct parallel processing regions for colour and movement in vision (right, Zeki R777), no objective brain state is equivalent to a subjective conscious experience. The difficulty of bridging this abyss is called the hard problem in consciousness research (Chalmers R112) If we consider what brains actually have to do to ensure our survival we can see at once why this might be the case. Many problems which simulate environmental decision-making are computationally intractable. A good example is the traveling salesman problem - finding the shortest distance around n cities, which to be computed classically requires tracing every possible route which grows super-exponentially as (n-1)!/2 To calculate a route around some 30 cities would take a modern serial computer the entire history of the universe to complete. A gazelle standing at a forking in the paths to a water hole would become stranded and eaten by the tiger if it had to resort to classical computation. Moreover many of these problems are prisoners' dilemma problems in which the 'opponent' is forever changing their strategy, making computation historically out-of-date. The tiger may for example choose the safest looking path, or switch unpredictably. Finally there is no single answer to many of these decisions, most of which have many possible outcomes rather than one computational solution, which is why we have evolved to have free choice in the first place. The way the brain appears to have evolved to solve this problem is to engage a kind of Darwinistic internal ecosystem of resonating excitations, which are chaotic in time and enable holographic wave processing in 'space' across the cortex. In a dynamic brain, phases of chaos are essential, both to provide the sensitivity on initial conditions of chaos which is essential to respond acutely sensitively to the outside world, and to provide the unpredictable, seemingly random, variation required to prevent the system getting caught in the rut of one overwhelming 'attractor' - the nemesis of all ordered systems. The overall architecture of the mammalian brain consists of an overarching cortex acting as a modifier of resonant excitations ascending from mid-brain centres in the thalamus and deeper basal brain centres driving phases of alertness, sleep and dreaming. The cortex has a modular parallel architecture with sensory and cognitive processing for different modes occurring in parallel in distinct centres. For example upward of 24 centres have been identified for vision, handling colour and motion in separate parallel processing units. These parallel differentiations ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 136 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain extend to specific types of feature such as separate regions for recognition of different human faces and of human facial emotional expressions. Each of these modular regions is in turn organized into a series of columns on a scale of about 1mm which act as feature detectors for example of lines with a specific orientation. Processing occurs in three to five distinct cellular layers comprising a mix of excitatory and inhibitory cells forming feedback loops enabling processing such as contrast enhancement. Typical cortical structures (centre) are a combination of five-layers of neurons (left), each composed into columnar modules about 1mm on the cortical surface. Such modules are sensitive to stimuli such as a line of a given orientation. Blob centres in layer II are also shown (p 365). Although specific sensory area have functional and anatomical specializations neural plasticity can enable changes of functional assignment indicating common principles throughout the cortex. Ocular dominance columns (right) for left or right eye illustrate functional columnar architecture. Given only some 30,000 protein-producing structural genes in the human genome, there are far too few to genetically determine exact details of brain structure on a cell-to-cell basis in a hardwired manner. The best specificity that can be managed consists of general rules of synaptic growth between specific cell types in different areas, which is what we see in cell migration and synaptic contact during development. In the visual system, the developing retina first begins to manifest chaotic excitation. Only then does differentiation in the lateral geniculate become evident and in turn from its dynamical excitation the visual cortex becomes differentiated for pattern recognition. Thus while genes may be able to encode interconnections between specific excitatory and inhibitory cell types and to promote growth of axons between cell types in different regions, the central nervous system depends on dynamical excitation to establish the developed architecture of its connections. Genetic determinism is thus a myth. Genes create developmental potentialities, which are shaped by excitation in both development and the environment. Nature thus utilizes nurture. This dynamical basis for development is reflected in cortical plasticity, where emerging changes in function can result in regions previously assigned to one function taking over another. Examples are changes in binocular optical dominance when one or other eye is covered, through to the phenomenon of the phantom limb, where regions assigned to a removed limb become invaded by other functional areas, resulting in sensory confusion, and the illusion that the limb is still present, perhaps even painful. Changes also take place during higher learning such as becoming fluent in a new language. These kinds of specialization and development are reflected in the modular organization of the cortex we see in positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of the language and perceptual areas of the cortex. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 137 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain The cerebral cortex is divided between front and rear broadly into motor and perception areas by the Sylvian fissure, which divides frontal regions and the motor cortex from the somatosensory (touch) and other sensory areas, including vision and hearing. The broadly sensory 'input' and associated areas of the parietal and temporal cortices are complemented by frontal and pre-frontal areas which deal with 'output' in the form of action rather than perception and with forming anticipatory models of our strategic and living futures. These active roles of decision-making and 'working memory', which interact from pre-frontal cortical areas complement the largely sensoryprocessing of the temporal, parietal and occipital lobes with a space-time representation of our 'sense of future' and of our will or intent. Another motif with undertones of sexual complementarity (p 388) is the fact that we possess two left and right hemispheres which are to all purposes separate cortices linked only by massive underlying parallel circuitry in the corpus callosum. Although much has been romanticized about our left and right brains in terms of the contrast between intuition and structured reasoning, and some people almost banish the sub-dominant hemisphere to inarticulate zombie-like status, there is abundant evidence for a degree of complementarity between foci in the two hemispheres, for example analytic language versus creative expression, linguistic versus musical perception, and holistic versus mechanical modes of thought. Such lateralization has also been associated with the complementarity between different types of mathematical reasoning, the continuous ideas of topology (p 492) and calculus being associated with the right hemisphere, by contrast with the discrete operations of algebra (p 493) hypothetically assigned, like language to the left. The two key language areas, Broca's frontal area for verbal speech fluency and Wernicke's temporal area for semantic resolution are traditionally on the left. However one should note that lateralization is more prominent in males and that females have generally greater facility with language, despite their language processing being less lateralized (p 389). As of 2010 a slew of research has emerged, which shows that handedness is not just confined to humans, but extends widely throughout the 'bilaterally-symmetric' animal kingdom spanning arthropods and vertebrates. Vetrebrates from fish through birds to mammals are liable to hunt or forage with their right eyes and look for predators with their left, which allows brain areas in each cortex to become better adapted at serving each of these challenges. Prisoner's dilemma game theory simulations show that the safety in numbers when many members of a species adopt the same asymmetric strategy is offset to the best advantage of all players when there is a smaller subpopulation adopting the contralateral strategy thus confusing th epredator without becoming a primary target (Southpaws: The evolution of Handedness 2010 Nora Schultz New Scientist). The cortex itself is relatively inert in electrodynamical terms and may actually form a complex boundary constraint on the activity of more active underlying areas such as the thalamus, which contains a number of centers with ordered projections to and from corresponding areas of the cortex. Characteristic of the mammalian brain is also the peripheral 'limbic' system forming a loop around the periphery of the cortex, connecting primary frontal regions mediating integrated decisionmaking in action and the emotional centres of the cingulate cortex with the flight and fight centre ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 138 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain of the amygdala, the long-term sequential memory of the hippocampus and basic bodily and sexual functions of the hypothalamus in great feedback loops whose dynamics are characteristic of changes in emotional mood and its influence on our outlook and strategic direction. The limbic system lies at the core of mammalian emotionality from fear and anger to love and our capacity to transcend immediate genetic determinacies. The overall dynamical organization of the mammalian brain is also evident in the major ascending distributed pathways from the basal brain using specific neurotransmitters such as dopamine, noradrenaline and serotonin, which modify alertness and light and dreaming sleep (see New Scientist 28 Jun 2003 29) and are also modulated by psychedelics such as psilocin and mescaline. These fan out from basal brain centres into wide areas of the cortex connecting into specific cortical layers where processing is taking place. The large pyramidal cells which coordinate output thus have several different types of neurotransmitter modulating their excitation, both in an excitatory and an inhibitory manner. Walter Freeman's model of chaos in sensory perception (Skarda and Freeman R646, Freeman R226) gives a good feeling for how dynamical chaos (p 498) could play a key role in sensory recognition, for example, when a rabbit sniffs the air for a strange smell. The olfactory cortex enters high energy chaotic excitation forming a spatially correlated wave across the cortex, causing the cortex to travel through its space of possibilities without becoming stuck in any mode. As the sniff ends, the energy parameter reduces, carrying the dynamic down towards basins in the potential energy landscape. If the smell is recognized the dynamic ends in an existing basin, a recognized smell, but if it is a new smell, a bifurcation eventually occurs to form a new basin (a new symbol is created) constituting the learning process. The same logic can be applied to cognition and problem solving in which the unresolved aspects of a problem undergo chaotic evolution until a bifurcation from chaos to order arrives at the solution in the form of a flash of insight - "eureka!". Chaos in perception: Freeman's model of olfaction is represented (a) by differing distributed excitations on the cortex. (b) A state of high energy chaos during inhalation gives rise to a lower energy attractor under recognition or learning. (c) Electroencephalogram shows broad spectrum waves with a finite correlation dimension, consistent with chaotic excitation. (d) A chaotic orbit generated by an EEG. (e) Neurons are fractal trees, potentially enabling inter-relationship between global instability and molecular or quantum uncertainty if the system is critically poised. (f) Top to bottom, ion channel is a single molecule which may display non-linear (quadratic dynamics) being turned on by two neurotransmitter molecules; synaptic vesicles budding at the membrane; a synaptic bulb containing vesicles and their recipient ion channels across the cleft. Eddington pointed out that the uncertainty of position of a vesicle is ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 139 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain approximately the width of the membrane. Ion channels display stochastic activation (Liljenström R417) and have been modeled using fractal kinetics (Liebovitch R414). Indicators of the use of chaos in neurodynamics come also from measurements of the fractal dimension (p 499) of a variety of brain states, from pathology through sleep to restful wakefulness. Recordings from single neurons, and from other cells such as the insulin-releasing cells of the pancreas confirm their capacity for chaotic excitation. The organizers of neural systems are also frequently non-pulse coded 'silent' cells capable of continuous non-linear dynamics. Despite the approximate linearity of the axonal discharge rate with depolarization, virtually all aspects of synaptic transmission and excitation have non-linear characteristics capable of chaos and bifurcation. For example the acetyl-choline ion channel has quadratic concentration dynamics, requiring two molecules to activate. Many cells have sigmoidal responses providing non-linear hyper-sensitivity and are tuned to this threshold. The electroencephalogram itself although nominally described as having brain rhythms such as alpha, beta, gamma and theta actually consists of broad band frequencies, rather than harmonic resonances, consistent with a ground-swell of chaotic excitation (King R367, R369, R370, R373). Broadly speaking neurodynamics is "edge of chaos" (p 506) in the time domain and parallel distributed in a coherent 'holographic' manner (Pribram) spatially. Phase coherence (e.g. in the 40 Hz band) has been associated with binding between related parts of the brain supporting an integrated perceptual experience, providing a mathematical parallel with quantum wave coherence. While artificial neural nets invoke thermodynamic 'randomness' in annealing to ensure the system doesn't get caught in a sub-optimal local minimum, biological systems appear to exploit chaos to free up their dynamics to explore the 'phase space' of possibilities available, without becoming locked in a local energy valley which keeps it far from a global optimum. Into this picture of global and cellular chaos comes another scale-linking property, the fractal (p 499) nature of neuronal architecture and brain processes and their capacity for self-organized criticality at a microscopic level. The many-to-many connectivity of synaptic connection, the tuning of responsiveness to an arbitrarily sensitive 'sigmoidal' threshold, and the fractal architecture of individual neurons combine with the sensitive dependence of chaotic dynamics (p 500) and self-organized criticality (p 501) of global dynamics to provide a rich conduit for instabilities at the level of the synaptic vesicle or ion channel to become amplified into a global change. The above description of chaotic transitions in perception and cognition leads naturally to critical states in a situation of choice between conflicting outcomes and this is exactly where the global dynamic would become critically poised and thus sensitive to microscopic or even quantum instabilities. Evidence for complex system coupling between the molecular and global levels. Stochastic activation of single ion channels in hippocampal cells (a) leads to activation of the cells (c). Activation of such individual cells can in turn lead to formation of global excitations as a result of stochastic ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 140 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain resonance (d). Individual cells are capable of issuing action potentials in synchronization with EEG peaks (e) (Liljenström R417). From the synaptic vesicle, we converge to the ion channel, which in the case of the K+ voltagemediated ion channel with its fractal kinetics (Liebovitch R414), and further to the structure and conformational dynamics of proteins, both of which operate on non-linear fractal protocols. The brain is thus capable of supersenstivity to the instabilities of the quantum milieu (Eccles R181). Chaotic excitability may be one of the founding features of eucaryote cells (King R363, R366). The Piezo-electric nature and high voltage gradient of the excitable membrane provides an excitable single cell with a generalized quantum sense organ. Sensitive dependence would enable such a cell to gain feedback about its external environment, rather than becoming locked in a particular oscillatory mode. Excitation could be perturbed mechanically and chemically through acoustic or molecular interaction, and electromagnetically through photon absorption and the perturbations of the fluctuating fields generated by the excitations themselves. Such excitability in the single cell would predate the computational function of neural nets, making chaos fundamental to the evolution of neuronal computing rather than vice versa. The chemical modifiers may have been precursors of the amine-based neurotransmitters which span acetylcholine, serotonin, catecholamines and the amino acids such as glutamate and GABA, several of which have a potentially primal status chemically. Positively charged amines may have complemented the negatively charged phosphate-based lipids in modulating membrane excitability in primitive cells without requiring complex proteins. It is possible that chaotic excitation dates from as early a period as the genetic code itself and that the first eucaryote cells may have been excitable via direct electrochemical transfer from light energy, before enzymebased metabolic pathways developed. Left: Single pre-synaptic pyramidal action potential leads to multiple post-synaptic excitations. Right: Structure of chandelier or axon-axonal cells with dendrites (blue) and axons (red). Recently it has been discovered that a specific class of cortical neuron, the chandelier cell is capable of changing the patterns of excitation between the pyramidal neurons that drive active output to other cortical regions and to the peripheral nervous system, in such a way that single action potentials of human neurons are sufficient to recruit Hebbian-like neuronal assemblies that are proposed to participate in cognitive processes. Chandelier cells, which were only discovered in the 1970s, and are more common in humans than other mammals such as the mouse, and were originally thought to be purely inhibitory, are axonaxonal cells, which can result in specific poly-synaptic activation of pyramidal cells. (Molnar, G et. al. 2008 Complex Events Initiated by Individual Spikes in the Human Cerebral Cortex PLOS ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 141 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Biology 6/9 222, Woodruff, A and Yuste R 2008 Of Mice and Men, and Chandeliers PLOS Biology 6/9 243) It is thus natural to postulate that, far from being an epiphenomenon, consciousness is a feature which has been elaborated and conserved by nervous systems because it has had unique survival value for the organism. We are thus led to an examination of how chaotic excitation may have evolved from single-celled animals through the early stages represented by Hydra, which, despite having an unstructured neural net, has no less than 12 modes of locomotion, to the complex nervous systems of metazoa. We have seen how chaotic excitation provides for exploration of phase space and sensitivity to internal and external fluctuations. However the conservation of consciousness may also involve features expressed only by chaotic systems which are fractal to the quantum level. It is a logical conclusion that the conscious brain has been selected by evolution because its biophysical properties provide access to an additional principle of predictivity not possessed by formal computational systems. One of the key strategies of survival is anticipation and prediction of events (King R365, Llinás R420). Computational systems achieve this by a combination of deductive logic and heuristic calculation of contingent probabilities. However quantum nonlocality may also provide another avenue for anticipation which might be effective even across the membrane of a single cell, if wave reductions are correlated in a non-local manner in spacetime. Above: Output from a frog retinal rod cell displays sensitivity to single quanta (Blakemore). Below: Phase shift in an electron traversing an open molecular medium shows chaotic phase shift (Gutzwiller R274) supporting a quantum chaotic model at the molecular level despite quantum suppresion of chaos in closed systems (p 501). Enzymes also depend on quantum tunneling to lower their transition energies, supporting a variety of quantum effects at the molecular level in brain function. The limits to the sensitivity of nervous systems are constrained only by the physics of quanta (p 298) rather than biological limits. This is exemplified by the capacity of retinal cells to record single quanta, and by the fact that membranes of cochlear cells oscillate by only about one H atom radius at the threshold of hearing, well below the scale of thermodynamic fluctuations. Moth pheromones are similarly effective at concentrations consistent with one molecule being active, as are the sensitivities of some olfactory mammals. The sense modes we experience are not merely biological. They encompass the basic qualitative modes of quantum interaction with the physical universe - giving sensory consciousness plausible cosmological status. Vision deals with interaction between orbitals and photons, hearing with the harmonic excitations of molecules and potentially with membrane solitons as well. Smell is the avenue of orbital-orbital interaction, as is taste. Touch is a hybrid sense involving a mixture of these. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 142 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain The very distinct qualitative differences between vision, hearing, touch and smell do not appear to be paralleled in the very similar patterns of electrical excitation evoked in their cortical areas. If all these excitations can occur simultaneously in the excitable cell, its quantum-chaotic excitation could represent a form of cellular synaesthesia, which is specialized in representing each individual sense mode. Thus in the evolution of the cortical senses from the most diffuse, olfaction, the mammalian brain may be using an ultimate universality, returning to the original quantum modes of physics in a way which can readily be expressed in differential organization of the visual, auditory, and somatosensory cortices according to a single common theme of quantum excitability. This is consistent with cortical plasticity which enables a blind person to use their visual areas for other sensory modes. Chaotic excitation thus leads naturally to a cellular multiquantum-mode sense organ responding to external perturbations of the environment by sensitive dependence. Can Transactions explain Conscious Intentional Will? Supposing this chaotic sense organ found that these quantum properties also aided not just the perception of the world around it, but the anticipation of situations in the world critical to survival, through a novel form of physics which forms the basis of subjective consciousness. This is the critical function of any nervous system. A form of quantum anticipation of its own immediate future may be possible using the inner relationships of quantum entanglement transactional handshaking with future states (p 308). This anticipation would have critical selective advantage for the organism and thus became fixed in evolution. This may explain directly why the brain is sentiently conscious rather than just being a computer. Computational capacity could be complemented with transactional anticipation through the chaotically fractal central nervous system. The work of Libet (R412) suggests the brain engages such time referrals. The transactional process is also compatible with quantum computation (Brown R86) using a superposition of states. The use by the brain of complex excitons may make it sensitive to an envelope of states spanning immediate past, present and future - the anticipatory 'quantum of the conscious present'. Such excitons might have restricted interactions which would isolate them from quantum decoherence effects (Zurek R784) as illustrated by quantum coherence imaging (Samuel R608, Warren R728). Hameroff and Penrose (R284) suggest that the brain may be able to function as a quantum computer and have speculated that neuronal microtubular protein units may function as quantum cellular automata in such computations, however their OOR model lacks the anticipatory properties and thus the raison d'etre for subjective consciousness described here (p 310). Quantum transactions (p 308) offer a timesymmetric coupling between past and future states and may help explain the existence of consciousness as a way of anticipating ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 143 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain future situations and 'free-will' as a physical manifestation of conscious anticipation. What is interesting here is that the 'binding problem' - how sensory experiences being processed in parallel in different parts of the cortex are bound together to give the conscious expression we associate with our integrated perception of the world - has no direct solution in terms of being hard-wired to some collection point - the ultimate seat of consciousness. Every indication is that consciousness is distributed and bound together by non-linear resonances in the brain, such as gamma band phase coherence. This is very similar to the problem of quantum measurement (p 300) and exactly what we would expect if self-resonances were being used as part of a quantum transactional (p 308) solution to the perception-cognition dilemma. Just as with phase coherence, transactional interactions involve wave components interfering - the usual retarded ones and advanced ones travelling backwards in time, superimposing to form the real waves occurring in phase coherence. In the transactional model of conscious intention, subjective consciousness enters into the picture as the inner complement of the quantum space-time hand-shaking process. This violates the classical causality of initial states determining future states, which we associate with the Newtonian universe and temporal determinism. This is a consequence of special relativity and the fact that the boundary conditions of collapse include future contingent absorbing states (p 308). Since quantum transactions are general to all quantum interaction, their manifestation in resolving the fundamental questions of intentional action in the physical world gains a cosmological dimension. The conscious brain may thus be a key avenue for the expression of quantum non-locality in space time - a consummation of cosmology, not in the alpha of the big-bang, nor in the omega of finality but in the sigma of interactive complexity (p 298). The brain has at the same time been evolving towards a type of universality (p 325) expressed in flexible processes for multi-sense processing and modeling. The qualitative differences between the sense modes are not matched by qualitative differences of cortical structure and electrochemical activity. Experiencers of synaesthesia witness multi-sense perception, suggesting conscious neural activity is potentially multisensory. A cosmological question is now raised. Is evolution simply accident, or is it part of the way the quantum universe explores its own space of possibilities, in reaching towards a universal expression of the entangled physical universe? If so what is the status of sensory consciousness? Hydra poses a dilemma for theories of cognitive development based on neural net organization rather than the complex adaptability of individual neurons. Hydra can reassemble ectoderm and endoderm if turned inside out and has a disseminated neural net (a) with no global structure, except for a slight focus around the mouth. Nevertheless it can coordinate eating in a similar manner to an octopus (b) and possesses more diverse types of locomotion than animals such as molluscs and arthropods which have structured ganglia. These include snail-like sliding, tumbling, inch-worm motion and use of bubbles and surface films. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 144 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain In a quantum universe we have the many-universes dilemma, inspiring the Schrödinger cat paradox (p 302). In the real world, if we wire a cat to a Geiger counter with possibly lethal consequence, when we open the box, the cat is either alive or dead, not in a superposition of both. Transactional supercausality (p 308) explains this paradox as follows - the many probability multiverses solve a problem of super-abundance by hand-shaking across space-time to reduce the packet of all possible emitter-absorber connections to one 'happy marriage' . The universe, thus becomes experientially historical. Napoleon meets his Waterloo, but Britain wins Trafalgar, despite the feigned uncertainty of Nelson's blind eye. The same goes for all the hopeful monsters of evolution when mutations become successful. Quantum non-locality appears to have a method, through space-time hand-shaking, to determine which of the multi-verses hovering in the virtual continuum will actually become manifest. The role of consciousness as a cosmological process appears to mediate effectively between the world of the cosmic subjective, represented in physics as quantum non-locality, with the uniqueness of historicity, which never fully converges to the statistical interpretation of the cosmic wave function, because each change leads to another, throughout cosmic epochs. This leads to a deep question, shared by all human cultural traditions, from the dawning of shamanism, through Vedanta to the Tao and even in the Judeo-Christian prophetic tradition, that mental states of awareness and subsequent happenings are interrelated. If historicity is interactive with both the quantum realm and the existential condition, what are the consequences for science, society and cosmology itself? Our description of reality here suggests that the physical universe has a complement - the subjectively conscious existential condition. Such a view both of the cosmological role of evolution to sentience and the brain as an interface between the cosmic subjective and the physical universe puts us right back into the centre of the cosmic cyclone in a way which Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes, Leonardo and Albert Einstein would have all appreciated. Consciousness may then not just be a globally-modulated functional monitor of attention, subject helplessly to the physical states of the brain, but a complementary aspect to physical reality, interacting with space-time through uncertainty and quantum entanglement in a manner anticipated by Jungian synchronicity. Although subjective consciousness, by necessity, reflects the constructive model of reality the brain adopts in its sensory processing and associative areas, this does not fully explain the subjective aspect of conscious experience. Conscious experience is our only direct avenue to existence. It underlies and is a necessary foundation for all our access to the physical world. Without the consensuality of our collective subjective conscious experiences as observers, it remains uncertain that the physical world would have an actual existence. It is only through stabilities of subjective conscious experience that we come to infer the objective physical world model of science as an indirect consequence. For this reason, despite its seemingly ephemeral basis in a sappy organismic brain at the 'apex' of evolution, subjective consciousness may be too fundamental a property to be explained, except in terms of fundamental physical principles, as a complementary manifestation to quantum non-locality, which directly manifests the principle of choice in free-will in generating history. This cosmology is intrinsically sexual. Subject-object complementarity is different from either panpsychism or Cartesian duality. The subjective aspect is described as complimentary to the physical loophole of quantum uncertainty and entanglement, just as the wave and particle aspects ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 145 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain of the quantum universe are complementary. Subjective and objective are interdependent upon one another with neither fully described in terms of the other. Furthermore, the transactional interpretation is intrinsically sexual in the sense that all exchanges are mediated through entangled relationship between an emitter and an absorber in which reduction of the wave function is a match-making sequence of marriages. This sexual paradigm is not simply an analogy, but is a deep expression of the mutual complementarity and intrinsic relationship manifest in the existential realm, physically and subjectively. Furthermore, the theory suggests the evolution of sexuality, as it is found in metaphyta, is not simply an analogy with quantum complementarity, but is an emergent expression of the same complementarity principle. The single ovum, by necessity, is driven to seek fertilization through a solotonic wave of excitation which extends across the membrane. The multiple sperm, by contrast, are particulate packets of molecular DNA, without a cellular cytoplasmic contribution. Thus biological sexuality is utilizing quantum complementarity in the symmetry-breaking of gender. The pivotal role of complementarity is reflected in both the Tantric (p 459) and Taoist (p 452) cosmologies. In Tantra, the subject-object relation is an intimate sexual union, which, in its retreat from complete intimacy, spawns all the complexity of the existential realm. In the Taoist view the same two dyadic principles are the creative and receptive forces which in their sequential transformation in the I Ching (p 457) give rise to all the dynamic states of existence. In Taoist thought, the cosmological principle is manifest in three phenomena, chance, life and consciousness, the very same phenomena appearing here in quantum physics, evolution and brain dynamics. The transactional principle clearly establishes the marital dance of emitter and absorber as the foundation of historicity - the collapse of the infinite shadow worlds of multiverses into the one line of history we experience in life, evolution, consciousness and social and natural history. Randomness remains a scientific mystery, explained ultimately by quantum entanglement. The source of the scientific concept of randomness lies in theories, such as probability theory, statistical mechanics, and the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics which draw generalities from an incomplete knowledge of the system. However the source of supposedly random events in the real world lies either in highly unstable systems, which themselves may draw their uncertainty from the quantum level, or directly from the phenomena of reduction of the wave function under the probability interpretation. The transactional approach seeks to explain the sub-stratum of entanglement in a deeper interaction. This could provide an ultimate explanation for the origin of randomness in the underlying sexual weave of transactions. The diversity of wave-particles resulting from cosmic symmetry-breaking (p 310) finds its final interactional complexity, in which all forces have a common asymmetric mode of expression, in complex molecular systems. It is thus natural that fundamental principles of their quantum interaction may be ultimately realized in the most delicate, complex and globally interconnected molecular systems known - those involved in brain dynamics. In this sense the brain is the culmination of a fractal interaction induced by' alpha limit' of cosmic symmetry-breaking - the cosmic sigma limit just as the heat death is an omega limit (p 298). What is the relationship between the existential observer and the universe at large? What is the relation between conscious subjectivity and the objective physical world? This is a question ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 146 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain which has plagued philosophers and scientists from the early Greeks through Bishop Berkeley and Descartes to modern researchers, from Francis Crick (Crick and Koch R137), who believes consciousness to be a product specific brain oscillations and their neural mechanisms, to David Chalmers (R112), who sees the 'hard problem in consciousness research' as a fundamental philosophical chasm, which can only be crossed through a greater description of reality. Despite the advances of modern scanning techniques, a chasm still remains between the brain states under a researcher's probe and the subjective experiences of reality we depend on for our awareness of the physical world. This comes on top of a fundamental complementarity upon which we depend for our existence. Although we live as biological organisms, raise families, navigate our lives and perform our science on the assumption of the existence of the physical world, we access physical reality only through our subjective sensory experiences. Without the direct veridical access we have to subjective experience, there would be no conscious 'observers'. It remains unclear under these circumstances that one could establish that the physical universe would exist in any objective 'sense'. Ironically, a purely objective physical world description considers only brain states, leaving subjective consciousness to the perilously ephemeral status of an epiphenomenon, or not existent at all. However the physical world is really a consensual stability property of our conscious experiences, despite the fact that we are physical organisms whose consciousness appears to depend on our remaining alive. We can both consciously agree that the table is a table or that we will bleed if cut, so the subjective aspect is capable of representing the objective. The objective is capable in turn of 'incorporating' the subjective in terms of uncertainty in the physical. A fully cosmological theory would have to encompass both. This access to the subjective is profoundly augmented by a variety of subjective states, some of which have no direct correlate in the physical world, yet can be commandingly real to the observer. Firstly consciousness is constructive, and fills in details to generate a subjective description of reality which can often lead to peculiar results as illustrated by visual illusions). More significantly we have a spectrum of subjective states, from meditative trance, through psychedelic hallucination, the intense phases of dreaming, to near death experience. Although various tests can be made by the astute subject to distinguish dreaming from waking reality, the very fact of dreaming as an alternative veridical reality raises a deep question about the nature of the everyday world we perceive. Is it nothing but an internal dream state anchored by additional stability constraints provided by sensory input? If we are actually witnessing exclusively and only our internal model of reality, what then, if at all, is the manifest nature of the physical world? And what IS the existential status of this 'internal model' we ALL appear to share subjectively even if in somewhat differing ways? If this is the only reality we actually do experience, isn't subjective reality in some sense a universal? The brain may be one of the few places where the supercausal aspect of wave-packet reduction can be fully manifest, as a result of its unique capacity to utilize entanglement in its dynamic resonances. It is difficult to conceive of a physical system which could in any way match the brain as a potential detector of correlations and interrelationships within the domain of quantum mechanics. Cosmology is not simply a matter of vast energies, but also quantum rules. In these rules of engagement more fundamental even than symmetry-breaking, the stage appears to be set for the emergence of sentient organism as the culminating manifestation in complexity of quantum interaction. In this sense the conscious brain may be the ultimate inheritor and interactive culmination of the quantum process at the foundation of the universe itself. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 147 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Understanding the Sexual Brain The human brain, by comparison with that of any other species shows extreme adaptable generality - the hallmark of humanity as a metaspecies, defining its own ecosystemic niches in an environment now determined in significant measure by the interactions between humans and the varied social strategies they adopt to ensure survival in a human society. This picture extends well back into our gatherer-hunter emergence where, despite the occasional ravages of large carnivores, humanity has been a resourceful long-lived species with a life expectancy not dissimilar to our current span amid long periods of leisure and socio-sexual activity. By comparison with other species, which are often primed by chemical or other overt cues of estrus of a specific programmed nature which drives reproductive opportunity, humans have a subtle and complex set of cues for sexual attraction. Women remain sexually attractive throughout most of the ovarian cycle (all if you count Tantric practices) and pheromonal influences are so subtle, given concealed ovulation, that neither sex is fully aware of these cues, even when they are conscious of their existence. Nevertheless love and sex are both highly addictive, central drives whose energy and vitality are absolutely essential for our survival so we would hardly expect them to have evolved to be a matter of whim. As we shall find, they are woven into the deepest and most ancient parts of our brains as well as being expressed in an elegant and complex way in the cortex. If the development of the visual system is any clue to sexual differentiation, we would expect to see differentiation emerging dynamically in the same way vision does. On the other hand, the effects of hormonal modifiers such as steroids are pervasive. Given that development occurs under markedly different hormonal regimes in male and female embryos, this provides a rich opportunity for evolution over time to adapt to specific enhancements of the nervous system in each sex that prove favourable to survival. We would thus expect sexual differences to be pervasive and subtle at all levels, from neurosystems down to cellular and synaptic, and for these to vary in a variety of ways which reflect the ongoing dynamic process of adaption in individual species. Consistent with this picture, the mid-brain centers, which researchers seek to identify with specific sexual behaviors, such as sexual orientation, are less clearly defined in humans than in rats and other mammals with clearly defined mating patterns. Moreover the most interesting sexual differences so far discovered revolve around major differences in emphasis of skills relevant to the gatherer-hunter way of life in a variety of ways which extend far beyond issues of simple sexual orientation. It is these differences and their consequences that are of profound interest to human society in reaching for a fertile social paradigm which takes best advantage of our complementary faculties. Again, consistent with maximum adaptability of the human CNS, individual differences in many of these skills are greater than the overall differences between the genders. This all occurs in a context that paternal imprinting in mammals (p 346) appears to specifically favour development of mid-brain emotional systems while the maternally imprinted genes favour the development of cortical structures. The entire development of the cortex and its relationship to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 148 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain the emotional centres may thus be a product of a genetic arms race between the male and the female. Some trends which have been regarded as a hallmark of human 'superiority' such as lateralization and cerebral lobe dominance turn out to be more a characteristic of male mammals generally, extending to testosterone-promoted cortical asymmetry in rats, shared by men in language and other development in a way which makes for intriguing contrast with women. However even some of these features, such as the differences in size and shape of the corpus callosum connecting the two cerebral hemispheres remain ambiguous to varying degrees in humans. One should note that handedness appears to operate with a distinct, although related basis, to cerebral lobe dominance. Most left-handed people, have the same cerebral lateralization as right-handed people. Love's Addictive Hunger, Empathy, Cooperation and Revenge Nisa's penetrating comment (p 102), "Sex is food: ...hunger for sex can cause people to die" shows that the idea of sex and sexual lust as 'gratification' and a hunger and thirst abound. Falling in love is particularly 'driven' by sentiments like "I can't get enough of you". Love, sex and addiction are associated in the popular mind, by addicts and lovers alike, and also now, by scientists. Stimulants like cocaine act on the brain's dopamine system, and so mimic the thrill of desire and anticipation. Depressant drugs like heroin, on the other hand, produce the opposite kind of pleasure - a dreamy satiation and freedom from pain, caused by their action .on the brain's opioid system. A speedball, a cocktail of cocaine and heroin, can be likened to a rapid, hyped-up sex simulation, moving rapidly from desire to climax. According to neuro-scientist Annarose Childress, what those systems usually do is control our sexual behaviour: "This circuitry has been well preserved throughout evolution to enable animals to eat and reproduce. Those functions have been around long before cocaine and opiates" (Szalavitz R680). Whether nicotine, cocaine, heroin or alcohol, the more directly or profoundly a drug affects the dopamine system, the more craving and pleasure it produces. Dopamine responses to sex are known to vary between male and female rats. In male rats, she says, dopamine levels go up when they smell a female, see her or have sex. Anything to do with being introduced to a female, dopamine goes up, but female rats only get a 'hit' of dopamine when they can control sex". In the wild, females normally allow the male near, then flee, returning a few times, before they will eventually accept his advances. This 'pacing' ensures the rat is optimally primed for pregnancy. A release of estrogen sensitizes the dopamine system, so it will give her a 'kick', and simultaneously maximizes the odds of successful conception. High levels of the receptor VlaR in the ventral pallidum are associated with monogamous behaviour in the prairie vole, a species specifically associated with oxytocin and vasopressin bonding (p 353). Other voles with fewer of these receptors seek multiple partners. It seems as though the monogamous voles get more pleasure from their partners, or become more addicted to them, while the promiscuous voles get more joy from novelty. Intriguingly oxytocin seems to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 149 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain reduce both the extreme effects of cocaine and opiates and their withdrawal symptoms, indicating that bonding may also heal the cravings of love. Top: (a,b) regions with higher activity in romantic love (c) lateralized lower activity. Bottom: Romantic and Maternal love compared. (Bartels and Zeki R46, R47) Bartels and Zeki (R46) used functional magnetic resonance imaging fMRI to scan the brains of 17 volunteers who described themselves as 'truly and madly' in love. During the scans, each was shown pictures of their loved one, or a friend of the same sex as their partner. Seeing a lover prompted activity in four brain regions that were not active when looking at pictures of a friend, and caused a significant reduction in the activity of another area. Two active areas lay deep in the cortex, the medial insula which may be responsible for 'gut' feelings, and a part of the anterior cingulate, which is known to respond to euphoria-inducing drugs and believed to be involved in emotional experience. Two lie in a deeper region known as the striatum, which is active when we find experiences rewarding. Deactivations were observed in the posterior cingulate gyrus and in the amygdala (regulating flight and fight) and were rightlateralized in the prefrontal, (a region that is overactive in depressed patients), the parietal and middle temporal cortices. This suggests that the cortex is functionally specialized for 'love'. The combination of these sites differs from those in previous studies of emotion, suggesting that a unique network of areas is responsible for evoking the most overwhelming of all affective states, that of romantic love. The authors note that "given the complexity of the sentiment of romantic love, it was not surprising to find that the activity was within regions of the brain found to be active in other emotional states, even if the pattern of activity evoked here is unique". Bartels and Zeki (R47) have extended this work to compare romantic and maternal love and find some interesting parallels and differences. In particular, aspects of female romantic love fall closer to the patterns seen with maternal love than those in men. Romantic and maternal love are highly rewarding experiences, both linked to the perpetuation of the species and therefore have a closely linked biological function of crucial evolutionary importance. The authors used fMRI to measure brain activity in mothers while they viewed pictures of their own and of acquainted children, and of their best friend and of acquainted adults as additional controls. The activity specific to maternal attachment was compared to that associated to romantic love. The authors conclude that: "Both types of attachment activated regions specific to each, as well as overlapping regions in the brain's reward system that coincide with areas rich in oxytocin and vasopressin receptors. Both deactivated a common set of regions associated with negative emotions, social judgment and 'mentalizing', that is, the assessment of other people's intentions and emotions. We conclude that human attachment employs a push – pull mechanism that overcomes social distance by deactivating networks used for critical social assessment and negative emotions, while ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 150 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain it bonds individuals through the involvement of the reward circuitry, explaining the power of love to motivate and exhilarate". Those madly in love also have converging levels of testosterone (p 349). In a study of the process of falling in love, Helen Fisher, Arthur Aron and Lucy Brown (Fisher R211) asked 7 male and l0 female volunteers who claimed to be 'madly in love' to look at pictures of either their loved one or another familiar person. Their fMRI scans show that, early on in a romantic relationship, dopamine-rich brain regions associated with motivation and reward become overactive when people see pictures of their sweetheart. The more intense the relationship, the greater the activity. Yet although love feels like an intense emotion, the researchers were surprised to see no extra activity in the emotional parts of the brain, such as the insula and parts of the anterior cingulate cortex. These regions are not activated until the later, more mature phases of a relationship. The findings suggest that romantic love is merely a motivation or drive, like hunger or thirst. Fisher explains: "Early on in a relationship, the brain seems to be very focused on planning and pursuit of pleasurable reward. This drive is mediated by the right caudate nucleus and right ventral tegmentum - the same brain regions that become active when you eat chocolate" (Szalavitz R679). The team saw patterns of brain activity in the anterior cingulate cortex that resembles those in obsessive-compulsive disorder. The activity is correlated with the length of a relationship, lasting just into the emotional stage, by which time we overcome our obsession and form a more lasting bond, or not as the case maybe. An Italian team has reported that serotonin levels in the blood plummet in people who fall in love (New Scientist, 31 July 1999 42). People who suffer from OCD as well as those with depression, also have low levels of serotonin, however the cingulate area is very sensitive to serotonin levels, so taking antidepressants could wreck a person's chances of falling in love. There are also noticeable sexual differences. Women in love show more emotional activity earlier on in a relationship. Their memory regions are more active as they look at pictures of their partner, perhaps paying more attention to past experience. In men ,love looks more like lust, with extra activity in visual areas that mediate sexual arousal and the regions associated with penile erection. Despite all this, the region responsible for making aesthetic judgements rates attractiveness in a very honest way, agreeing well with the ratings of independent observers. Fisher comments: "We say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but part of the brain keeps track of the objective view" (ibid). Brain regions lit up by se-stimulation in three areas: (Linda Geddes Sex on the brain: What turns ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 151 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain women on, mapped out New Scientist 6 Aug 2011, Journal of Sexual Medicine, DOI: 10.1111/j.1743-6109.2011.02388.x) A 2011 study has finally shown the areas that light up under fMRI when women self stimulate either their inner vagina, the clitoris or the nipples, supporting the case that each of these areas in females have their own erogenous capacity and that vaginal orgasm is not simply clitoral orgasm. Furthermore nipple stimulation lit up genital areas supporting the erotic sensitivity of the nipples in females. A PET study shows that many areas of the brain switch off during female orgasm. "At the moment of orgasm, women do not have any emotional feelings," says Gert Holstege of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. His team compared the brain activity of 13 heterosexual women in four states: simply resting, faking an orgasm, having their clitoris stimulated by their partner's fingers, and clitoral stimulation to the point of orgasm. As the women were stimulated, activity rose in the primary somatosensory cortex, but fell in the amygdala and hippocampus, involved in alertness and anxiety, confirming that women cannot enjoy sex unless they are relaxed and free from worries and distractions. However, during orgasm, activity fell in many more areas of the brain, including the prefrontal cortex, compared with the resting state. From an evolutionary point of view, the brain may switch off emotions during sex because the chance to produce offspring becomes more important than the survival risk to the individual. Only one small part of the brain, in the cerebellum, was more active during female orgasm. The cerebellum is normally associated with coordinating movement, though there is also some evidence that it helps regulate emotions. When women were faking an orgasm areas of the brain involved in controlling conscious movement lit up, and there was none of the extreme deactivation (Le Page R792). Hypothalamic differences in activity when men and women watch erotic images consistent with the activity of dimorphic centres in the hypothalamus. Left: male and female responses subtracted show a unique male activation centre. This has a close relationship to a region (right) differentially illuminated when males find erotic scenes particularly exciting (Karama et. al. R354). Mario Beauregard (Karama et. al. R354) uses fMRI to explore which brain areas become activated when men and women view erotic films. Not surprisingly, the visual areas are busy; but so too are many evolutionarily ancient circuits associated with emotion - the limbic system, anterior temporal pole and amygdala, and a region of the orbito-frontal cortex (OFC). Previous research found that these areas are important in prioritizing, decision making and giving emotional colour to an experience, and may subconsciously trigger physiological responses and desire. Pornographic images have been found to make men briefly blind to the orientation of immediately following neutral images (Sexy images cause temporary blindness New Scientist 20 August 2005). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 152 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Such response mechanisms extend further than sexual love into cooperation, defection and all the dimensions of the prisoners dilemma. De Quervain et. al. (R158) asked whether choosing to punish a defector would recruit brain circuits implicated in reward processing. They found that when subjects administered a monetary punishment to defectors, a the striatum was activated, indicating that punishing a defector activates brain regions related to feeling good about revenge rather than feeling bad about having been violated (Knutson R384). Indeed, these striatal foci lie near brain areas that rats will work furiously to stimulate electrically. They then asked whether the striatum would be activated even when administering the punishment carried a personal cost. They found that the striatum was still activated, as was a region in the medial prefrontal cortex, implicated in balancing costs and benefits. Effective punishment, as compared with symbolic punishment, activated the dorsal striatum, which has been implicated in the processing of rewards that accrue as a result of goal-directed actions. Subjects with stronger activations in the dorsal striatum were willing to incur greater costs in order to punish. The degree of striatal activation during no-cost punishment predicted the extent to which subjects chose to punish at a personal cost (that is, under less satisfying conditions). This finding suggested to the investigators that striatal activation indexed subjects' anticipation of satisfaction, rather than satisfaction per se. Above activation of areas by cooperative playing of the prisoners' dilemma game among women (Rilling R583). Below Left frontal and right striatal areas activated by 'sweet revenge' (de Quervain R158). The similarity of the areas suggests anticipated social rewards motivate both these contrasting behaviors. Ironically, punishment of defectors in this study activated the same regions (that is, striatum and MPFC) that were activated when people rewarded cooperators in a recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study (Rilling et. al. R583). The monetary awards were apportioned after each round. If one player defected and the other cooperated, the defector earned $3 and the cooperator nothing. If both chose to cooperate, each earned $2. If both opted to defect, each earned $1. Mutually cooperative social interactions in the prisoner's dilemma game were associated with activations in anteroventral striatum, rostral ACC, and OFC that were not observed in response to monetary reinforcement in a nonsocial control condition. OFC activation but not the other areas was also observed for mutual cooperation with a computer partner, suggesting that the ACC and striatal activations may relate specifically to cooperative social interactions with human partners. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 153 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Moment of female orgasm recorded in fMRI. Activation in the prefrontal cortex (A) is clearly visible, as well as activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (B). New Scientist A pattern of neural activation is thus identified that may be involved in sustaining cooperative social relationships, perhaps by labeling cooperative social interactions as rewarding, and/or by inhibiting the selfish impulse to accept but not reciprocate an act of altruism. These seemingly diametrically opposite social behaviors are united by a common psychological experience - both involve the anticipation of a satisfying social outcome. While the former study of defectors included male subjects, the f MRI study of cooperators included only females. Future research will undoubtedly need to explore which social interactions most powerfully motivate men compared with women (as well as members of different social groups). Activation of left frontal and right parietal areas involving mirror neuron activity (Iacoboni R335). Another set of brain areas to do with both empathy and one's reactions and behavior in relation to others associated with 'reading the minds' of others (MotlukR491) has been discovered in the form of so-called 'mirror neurons' which although they may be in areas we usually associate with motor function intentional action and even the expression of language, contain a population of neurons which react in the same way when the same action is being performed by another individual (or even another species). Monkeys were found to have neurons in a frontal area (Di Pellegrino R168, Rizzolatti and Craighero R586) that discharge both when the monkey does a particular action and when it observes another individual (monkey or human) doing a similar action. Imitation may be based on a mechanism directly matching the observed action onto an internal motor representation of that action. To test this hypothesis (Iacoboni et. al. R335), normal human participants imitated a finger movement and to perform the same movement after spatial or symbolic cues. Brain activity was measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging. If the direct matching hypothesis is correct, there should be areas that become active during finger movement, regardless of how it is evoked, and their activation should increase when the same movement is elicited by the observation of an identical movement made by another individual. Two areas with these properties were found in the left inferior frontal cortex and right superior parietal. Rizzolatti and Arbib (R585) have commented that such mirroring, occurring in 'motor' areas such as Broca's area associated with language expression would give a basis for a transition to language, based on mirroring of actions gestures, cries and facial expressions. Such mirroring is also central to the empathy we associate with the way emotions transcend simple barriers of genetic determinism ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 154 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain through imprinted instinct as well as the capacity to assess complex social situations of deceit and betrayal. Sex, Brain and Steroids One of the most outstanding examples of sexual dimorphism is in the brains of song birds where a whole sexually-typed brain region grows in the male only, waxing each spring and waning in the autumn. In mammals, timed bursts of hormones such as testosterone are believed to play critical roles in gender-typing certain key areas of the hypothalamus involved in female and male reproductive behavior around the time of birth, particularly in species such as rats and voles. Roger Gorski and his colleagues at the University of California at Los Angeles have shown that a region of the pre-optic area of the hypothalamus is visibly larger in male rats than in females. The size increment in males is promoted by the presence of androgens in the immediate postnatal, and to some extent prenatal, period. Laura Allen in Gorski's lab has found a similar sex difference in humans. While rats have a very marked difference in their sexually dimorphic nuclei, humans vary only moderately between males and females, exemplified by the spinal bulbocavernosus centre which exists only in rat males, but is merely 28% different in human males and females because the muscles it controls work both in the base of the penis, promoting ejaculation and in the muscles constricting the vagina (Blum R66 30). To make matters worse, excision of such nuclei in rats causes only transient disturbance to sexual behavior and in monogamous prairie voles, the sexually dimorphic nuclei, whose differences between adolescent males and females are evident, become difficult to differentiate in parentally engaged bonded male and female pairs (Blum). This suggests that these centres may be dynamic consequences of activity rather than simply genetic differences determining sexual orientation. Each case of sexual dimorphism seems to be part of a distributed network of sexually dimorphic neuronal populations which normally interact with each other. There are also marked differences in hormonal specificity in the development of brain and behaviour across mammalian species. Paradoxically in rats for example, testosterone aromatized to estradiol plays a major role in sexual determination in the male brain, preventing programmed apostosis (cell-death) the sexually dimorphic centres. This flood of estrogen is apparently quenched in females by binding to excess a-fetoprotein (Kandell et. al. R353). In prairie voles oxytocin in females and vasopressin in males are linked to parental care of the newborn (Angier, Blum) ((p 353), (p 33)). Neither of these clear-cut processes can be demonstrated to work in the same way in primates and in particular in humans. Even the role of testosterone in imprinting the human brain around the time of birth is debated. The review by Marc Breedlove's team (Cooke et. al. R131) notes "there is ample evidence of sexual dimorphism in the human brain, as sex differences in behavior would require, but there has not yet been any definitive proof that steroids acting early in development directly masculinize the human brain". Many studies link testosterone to dominance in men (Mazur and Booth R451) and women (Grant R254). Because the nervous system is plastic, any sexual dimorphism seen in the adult brain could be the result of differences in experience, either during development or in adulthood, rather than as a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 155 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain direct result of fetal steroid action. Obviously a sexual dimorphism present at birth could not be due to sex differences in experience or social stimulation. One dimorphism present at birth is the sex difference of some 15% in the weight of the human brain, an issue trumpeted by some male scientists with political agendas. Deborah Blum (R66 38) notes: "More than any other gender comparison in biology, it's fair to say feminist scholars hate this one the most. Brown University geneticist Anne Fausto-Sterling argues this work is biased from the start. Male scientists consistently find male scientists have bigger brains. Since we tend to assume bigger is better the implications are obvious." Bente Pakkenberg claims there is a corresponding slightly higher number of brain cells in a man, 23 billion as against 19 billion. However Raquel and Reuben Gur have found that the male human brain loses neurons at almost three times the rate of women, probably due to the influence of androgens, so in mid life the male frontal lobe ends up the same size as in women (R66 52). Similar results apply to the hippocampus involved in sequential memory. Sandra Wittelson has also found that women have about 15% more neurons in layers four and five, packed more tightly than in men - 35,000 in women in each sample and 30,000 in men (Blum 60). Because it is mirrored by the sex difference in body weight, brain size may be an indirect result of steroid hormone action. Testicular androgens may masculinize the secretion of factors such as growth hormone or its companion factors to give males a larger body and brain. But the effect does not seem to be specific to the nervous system, so it is unlikely that it can account for sex differences in human behavior. The brain structure that has been best studied in humans is the sexually dimorphic nucleus of the pre-optic area (POA) also called INAH-1. Swaab and Fliers (R675) found that males had a larger nucleus, with more neurons, than females, but this sex difference in neuronal number is not detectable in children younger than 6–10 years of age. Allen and Gorski (R9) and Le Vay (R409) could not replicate this sex difference but both did find dimorphism in INAH-3. However no one has examined its size in human development, so we do not know whether dimorphism is present at birth (and likely to be engendered by fetal steroids) or arises later in life (and could alternatively be due to social influences). The conflicting reports concerning sexual dimorphism in the human brain indicate sexual dimorphism is more subtle in the brains of humans than of other animals (Cooke et. al. R131). It may also be a consequence rather than a cause of sexual orientation. Another strategy for asking whether fetal steroids affect the human brain is to find whether inadvertent exposure to fetal hormones alters sexually dimorphic behaviors. Unfortunately, the results of such studies are contradictory. Females with androgen overproduction from congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) do behave more like boys, showing more rough and tumble play and tomboy behaviors than other girls. As women, CAH patients usually are sexually attracted to men, but are also more likely to be attracted to women than are other women (p 386). However it is hard to eliminate cultural factors here. CAH females have slightly masculinized genitalia and this effect could also be due to differences in their social experience, because of family or personal gender confusion. Androgen insensitive XY individuals, who look like normal females externally, display feminine spatial learning behavior and verbal behavior, and are sexually attracted to men. But this might be due to their unambiguous upbringing as girls. If, as in rodents, the estrogens coming from aromatized testosterone masculinized the developing human brain, then we would expect these ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 156 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain people to display masculine behaviors despite their feminine exterior. Androgen insensitive rats present feminine exterior, but a masculine SDN-POA, and a refusal to display feminine 'lordosis'. The feminine behavior of androgen insensitive humans indicates that aromatized metabolites of androgen cannot be playing a major role in masculinizing the human brain, either because steroids have no effect on the developing human brain, or because steroids act through androgen receptors themselves to exert such an effect. It is also possible that in humans, androgen receptors must be functional for estrogen receptor activation to be effective or to occur at all. Contrasting this, Melissa Hines (R318) found that women who had been exposed to the estrogen diethylstilbestrol (DES) in utero showed greater evidence of cognitive lateralization (for a dichotic listening task and a visual search task) than their non-DES-treated 'sisters'. We shall see that this is a characteristic of males. However the effect is small and cannot be readily related to most human sex differences in behavior, so estrogen may be making only a small contribution to human neural sex differences. On the other hand a twin boy who had had a surgical mishap at 8 months and was given a sex change operation and reared as a girl decided at puberty to identify as a male and successfully became married with step children, suggesting masculinization had occurred (p 362). Sexual differences in specialized abilities also fluctuate with hormone levels in both women during the ovarian cycle and in men, suggesting hormones continue to have a dynamical influence on gender difference in brain function (p 348). Despite the fact that there is not yet any conclusive proof that fetal steroids directly masculinize the human brain, the rampant masculinizing effect of androgen during early brain development of other vertebrates makes it seem likely that at least some such influences remain in our species. There is however no doubt that adult steroid manipulations do alter human behavior and both the behavior and the neural structure of other species. Gay Genes and Cultural Brains The saga of the 'gay gene' is probably one of the most sensational and hotly disputed genetic discoveries. Bailey and Pillard (R35) made the first of two twin studies in which a genetic basis for sexual orientation was found in both human males and subsequently females. The same year Simon Le Vay (R409) found an area in the hypothalamus (INAH-3) which was larger in men than women but more intermediate in gay males. Homosexual men are also claimed to have a larger suprachiasmatic nucleus and a larger anterior commissure than heterosexual men. Moreover another dimorphic nucleus the so-called 'bed nucleus' of the stria terminalis BNST or BSTc, which is larger in human males than females is even larger in homosexual men (Zhou. et. al. R781) suggesting hyper-masculinization rather than 'feminization'. However these measures, made in adulthood, cannot tell us whether the brain caused, or are a result of the differences in sexual orientation. As few of these orientation dimorphisms have been replicated, their status remains uncertain. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 157 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Interstitial nuclei of the anterior hypothalamus INAH-3,4 display sexual differences (Kandel et. al. R353). Section of the hypothalamus showing differences between male (left) and female (right). It is this centre that Le Vay claimed was closer to the female profile in homosexual men. Because these are adult structures and the brain adapts to behavior, it is difficult to distinguish fetal cause from cultural effect. In adult rodents, the BNST, is 75% larger and contains many more cells in males and the anteroventral periventricular nucleus, or AVPV, is both larger and richer in cells in females. If a male rat is castrated shortly after birth, its BNST and AVPV will develop in the female pattern. Conversely, if a female rat pup is treated with testosterone its adult brain will be indistinguishable from a male's. A single gene Bax, from the Bcl2 family shaping neuron growth and death, has been found to govern the pruning of neurons. In the Bax-"knockout" mice used by Forger and her colleagues (R216), both the BNST and AVPV had many more cells than are seen in mice and the number of cells was equal in males and females. Pathways linking odor to reproductive activity include the vomeral nasal organ (VMO) olfactory bulb (AOB) medial amygdala (MeA) bed nucleus (BST) and preoptic area (mPOA) (Cooke et. al. R131). Asymmetries in the amygdala seed region. In 2008 a study of 25 heterosexuals of each sex and 20 homosexyal also of each sex by Savic and Lindstrom (R793) found that cerebral and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 158 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain amygdala asymmetries of the homosexual group reflected those of the opposite sex in heterosexuals. This again suggests that gays may inherit brain structures that more closely resemble the oppostie sex, but how this might lead to attraction towards the same sex or whether it is inevitable 'from the womb' or still subject to social selection remains to be established. Despite the comments of some scientists such as the one below, it is premature to conclude we are born with a rigid sexual orientation, since identical twins which share the same genes display opposite sexual orientation around 50% of the time when one of the twins is gay. "As far as I'm concerned there is no argument any more - if you are gay, you are born gay" Dr Qazi Rahman, Queen Mary, University of London However this is far from the case. 'In a landmark study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior in October 2003, Robert Spitzer interviewed 200 men and women who once considered themselves homosexuals but who had lived their lives as heterosexuals for at least five years. Most of the participants had undergone some form of reorientation therapy. In addition to determining whether such therapy actually worked, Spitzer wanted to know just how dramatically people could alter their orientation. To his surprise, most of his subjects not only reported living long-term (more than 10 years) as heterosexuals, they also declared they had experienced "changes in sexual attraction, fantasy and desire" consistent with heterosexuality' (Epstein, Robert 2009 Do Gays Have a Choice? Sci. Am. Mind, Jun 20/3). In 1993 Dean Hamer announced (R283) that he had found a gene on the X-chromosome that had a powerful influence on sexual orientation. Homosexuality is highly heritable, as twin studies show. Among 54 gay men who were fraternal twins, there were 12 whose twin was also gay. Among 56 gay men who were identical twins, there were 29 whose twin was also gay. Since twins share the same environment, whether fraternal or identical, such a result implies that a gene or genes accounts for about half of the tendency for a man to be gay. A dozen other studies came to a similar conclusion. Hamer's team interviewed 110 families with gay male members and noticed that homosexuality seemed to run in the female line. If a man was gay, the most likely other member of the previous generation to be gay was not his father but his mother's brother. That suggested the gene might be on the X-chromosome, the only set of nuclear genes a man inherits exclusively from his mother. However his work has been scientifically disputed. By comparing a set of genetic markers between gay men and straight men in the families in his sample, he found a candidate region in Xq28, the tip of the long arm of the chromosome. Gay men shared the same version of this marker seventy-five per cent of the time; straight men shared a different version of the marker seventy-five per cent of the time. Consistent with this discovery, Trivers noted that, because an X-chromosome spends twice as much time in women as it does in men, a sexually antagonistic gene that benefited female fertility could survive even if it had twice as large a deleterious effect on male fertility. However Michael Bailey's research on homosexual pedigrees has failed to find a maternal bias to be a general feature. Other scientists, too, have failed to find Hamer's link with Xq28. However the discovery of the fertile mother effect in about 14% of gay men (p 384) may clarify these contradictions. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 159 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Homosexual orientation shows heritability in both sexes. By comparing identical and dizygotic twins we can estimate how much genes (~30%), family and siblings (~20) and environment and culture (~50%) affect sexual orientation. Even given the strong genetic influence, culture is still the major determining factor. Nature is more than complemented by 'nurture' here (Kandel et. al. R353). There have been reports of several physiological differences between homosexual and heterosexual men that could reflect nervous system involvement. Homosexual men are, on average, shorter than heterosexual men, will have undergone puberty at an earlier age than heterosexual men and will have more symmetrical left-versus-right fingerprint patterns than heterosexual men. The proportion of gay people is also a matter of debate. Michael Bailey estimates that 2-3% of US men are exclusive homosexuals and 1.5% of women. Occasional bisexuals double the number and the idly curious swell it to perhaps 8.7% of men and 11.1% of women - considerably less than the 20% some political proponents would claim. Masters, Johnson and Kolodny (R449 373) report even lower figures from a spectrum of international studies, around 1.4% of men and 0.4% of women reporting same sex contact in the previous year in a typical French study, with similar figures from Britain, Japan, Philippines, Thailand, Denmark and Holland with no study reporting figures as high as 10% when bisexuality is included. Gwen Broude (R83) points out the higher incidence of male homosexuality is consistent with the shotgun male reproductive strategy of trying to have sex with everything in sight. There is little evidence for a biological pattern of exclusive homosexual orientation in ape societies (p 66) nor in world societies in which male homosexuality is part of the social norm, from Greece (p 203) through Amazonia (p 149) to New Guinea (p 171), where Sambia males go through a period of obligate homosexual activity before entering marriage. Deborah Blum in 'Sex on the Brain' (R66) devotes a chapter to differences in sexual orientation, aptly entitled 'the second date' for its quotable quote, attributed to Daryl Bem: "There's a joke in the gay community that goes like this 'What does a lesbian bring on her second date?' - 'A U-Haul'. 'And what does a gay man bring on his second date?' - "What second date?' Don Symons elaborated this into the theory that male gay behavior, rather than mimicking female behavior, is an extreme of where biology leads men without women - i.e. to sew male wild oats to oblivion. By contrast lesbian women display extreme nesting. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 160 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain In studies, gay males and lesbian females do show diametrically opposite sexual behaviors, which conform strongly to the reproductive strategies of their own sex, rather than the implied gender reversal of their same-sex orientation. Gay men display a runawaymale pattern of sex with many strangers, while lesbians bond with established partners. This belies claims of gay men to be more 'feminine' sexually than heterosexual men. These sexual strategies of males and females are confirmed in heterosexual dating experiments, where women consistently refuse casual offers of sex from male strangers, conforming to the careful, choosy strategy, while almost all men offer to accept a sexual advance from a strange woman (R449 433). There is however a large difference between married heterosexual and homosexuals on whether love is central to a sexual relationship. 41% of married women and 27% of married men do not approve of sex without love, but only 19% of lesbians and 7% of gay men do so (R449320). Left: Percentage of partners who were strangers. Right: Lifetime number of homosexual partners (R449). Blum (R66) claims women seem to be more flexible sexually and more tolerant of sexual orientation. She reports that many lesbian women experience attraction to men but simply don't act on it. By contrast men tend to subdivide more into homophobic males and freely flaunting gays. Bem also considers the gay genetic influence may be about another personality trait than sexual orientation, which may cause social factors which predispose to sexual orientation, such as sex differences in play interest between classic childhood sex role play such as dolls and making house versus action games and sports, which themselves seem to be partially inherited. Edward O. Wilson also suggested gay men might favour survival of their relatives by helping with children and in cementing family ties. There is some evidence for this in ancient American Indian cultures and it might apply in matrilineal societies, where mother's brothers figure strongly in parenting without having to reproduce, but it is far from established generally. The more flexible attitude of women towards sexual orientation is reflected in studies of the brains of heterosexual adn homosexual women and men watching erotic movies. "Heterosexual women's level of arousal increased along with the intensity of the sexual activity largely irrespective of who or what was engaged in it. In fact, these women were genitally excited by male and female actors equally and also responded physically to bonobo copulation. (Gay women, however, were more particular; they did not react sexually to men masturbating or exercising naked.) The men, by contrast, were physically titillated mainly by their preferred category of sexual partner - that is, females for straight men and males for gay men - and were not excited by bonobo copulation. The results, the researchers say, suggest that women are not only aroused by a variety of types of sexual imagery but are more flexible than men in their sexual interests and preferences."(Portner, Martin The Orgasmic Mind. Sci. Am. Mind, Jun 2009 20/3) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 161 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain This is consistent with the much higher attribution of bisexual receptivity of women at around 25%. Roughgarden (R593) suggests same-sex orientation is too frequent to be a genetic 'error' and proposes that social selection in the form of both same-sex and heterosexual bonding acts as a major filter to reproductive opportunity (p 55). However, only a few species use social sex profligately and often have purely non-sexual forms of grooming and amatory behaviour, so it remains unclear that a 'rainbow' of sexual orientations plays a significant role in reproductive advantage. Even in bonobos where socio-sexual bonding is abundant (p 66), it is only female socio-sexuality which is a significant selector of reproductive fitness. In 2004 Camperio-Ciani and co-workers (R134) discovered the 'fertile mother effect' - that female relatives of gay men had more children on average than the female relatives of straight men. But the effect was only seen on their mother's side of the family. Mothers of gay men produced an average of 2.7 babies compared with 2.3 born to mothers of straight men. And maternal aunts of gay men had 2.0 babies compared with 1.5 born to the maternal aunts of straight men. The effect accounts for about 14% of the incidence of gay individuals. This provides a resolution of the sexual paradox implied by the reduced heterosexual fertility of gay men - in Camperio-Ciani's words: "The same factor that influences sexual orientation in males promotes higher fecundity in females." Simon LeVay puts a genetically determinist spin on the idea this is a gene for overweening attraction to males: "This is a novel finding. We think of it as genes for 'male homosexuality', but it might really be genes for sexual attraction to men. These could predispose men towards homosexuality and women towards 'hyper-heterosexuality', causing women to have more sex with men and thus have more offspring." However the evidence doesn't necessarily indicate that this is a gene causing genetically deterministic sexual orientation but merely female fecundity. "There is no single gene accounting for these observations. It's a combination of something on the X chromosome with other genetic factors on the non-sex chromosomes," Camperio-Ciani says. He estimates that about 20% of the predisposition to being gay is caused by genetic factors, including the following birth order effect, to which he attributes 7%. A (right-handed) male with one or more elder brothers is also more likely to be gay than a man with no siblings, only younger siblings, or with one or more elder sisters. Each additional older brother increases the probability of homosexuality by roughly 1/3. Since the most important variable is how many sons their mother carried before them (rather than how many older brothers grew up in their household), these data suggest a maternal effect on the developing fetus. The effect has now been reported in Britain, the Netherlands, Canada and the United States, and in many different samples of people. Ray Blanchard (Blanchard and Cantor R64), who has pioneered studies on the 'fraternal birth order effect' estimates that 1 out of 7 gay men can attribute their sexual orientation to this cause (see "The big brother effect New Scientist 29 Mar 2003 44-8). The best explanation concerns a set of three active genes on the Y chromosome called the H-Y minor histocompatibility antigens. One of these genes encodes AMH. What the other two genes do is not certain. They are not essential for the masculinization of the genitals, which is achieved by testosterone and anti-Mullerian hormone alone. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 162 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Effects of successive older brothers on birth weight and the probability of being gay from an equal population of heterosexual and homosexual men (New Scientist 29 Mar 2003 44-8). These gene products are called antigens because they provoke a reaction from the immune system of the mother. As a result, the immune reaction is likely to be stronger in successive male pregnancies. Ray Blanchard, one of those who studies the birth-order effect, argues that the H-Y antigens' job is to switch on other genes in certain tissues, in particular in the brain and indeed there is good evidence that this is true in mice. If so, the effect of a strong immune reaction against these proteins from the mother would be partly to prevent the masculinization of the brain, but not that of the genitals. That in turn might cause them to be attracted to other males, or at least not attracted to females. Baby mice immunized against H-Y antigens grow up to be largely incapable of successful mating, consistent with this idea. Paradoxically, data from John Manning and Marc Breedlove with both gay men and those with older brothers suggests there is an increase in testosterone consistent with the idea that later male offspring may be primed to be more competitively physical. Researchers have also noticed skewing in the usually random X-chromosome inactivation (p 342) when investigating 97 mothers of gay men with 103 mothers of heterosexuals. They found this in 23% of mothers with two gays sons, 14% of mothers with one but only 4% of those with none, although there appears to be no skewing in their daughters (New Scientist 6 Nov 2004 14). The article notes that such skewing is usually associated with genetic disorder but the mothers all appear to be healthy. Whether of biological or socio-dynamic, origin, gay men and straight women appear to share stimulation of sexual centres when sniffing a male pheromone AND, by contrast with estrogenic EST, lavender, cedar oil, eugenol or butanol. PET and MRI scans revealed that the ordinary odours activated parts of the brain associated with smelling in all test subjects. But AND also excited the anterior hypothalamus and medial preoptic area of gay men and straight women alike, brain areas associated with sexual behaviour, as did EST for straight men. However the brain scans revealed no anatomical differences between any of the participant's brains (Savic et. al. R614). In a second study by Dr. Charles Wysocki due to appear in Psychological Science, gay men preferred the odours of other gay men and heterosexual women, but the smell of gay men were least liked by heterosexual men and women and lesbians, suggesting sexual orientation affects both pheromone production and responses. Highly sexed females are 27 times as likely as men to become attracted to their own sex. A survey of 3500 people showed that 0.3% of men and 8% of women were attracted to their own sex. For most women, a high sex drive increases sexual attraction to men and women. In men, a high sex drive simply exaggerates existing sexual orientation (Lipps R419). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 163 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain In women, testosterone comes predominantly from the adrenals. Congenital adrenal hyperplasia, or CAH, and another associated condition, polycystic ovarian syndrome PCOS, in which ovulation fails to complete, result in increased testosterone levels in females. Mild 'symptomless' forms of the polycystic condition are 2-3 times as common in lesbian women, in whom a high proportion - up to 80% in one study (BBC) - display mild signs of the condition, suggesting a linkage between hormones and female sexual orientation. Otoacoustic emissions (faint clicks emitted from the tympanic membrane either spontaneously or in response to click presentation) are also more masculine (i.e., quieter) in lesbians compared to heterosexual women. A similar, effect is seen in the female twins of boys, a slight freemartin-like effect echoing the sterile androgenized twins of male calves which Frank Lillie correctly observed in a classic 1917 publication was due to male hormones altering a genetic female (Fausto-SterlingR202 163). CAH is caused indirectly by a failure of 21-hydroxylase which the adrenal cortex uses to produce other steroids such as cortisol, causing an overflow of precursors to testosterone (p 351). With CAH as well, some researchers note changes of play in girls to more traditionally rough and tumble 'tomboyish' interests, forsaking "clothing, cosmetics, doll-play and infant care", even when the condition is hormonally corrected shortly after birth. These trends were found to continue in adolescence in "modeling, football, working with engines" as opposed to admittedly contrived 'feminine' traits such as "fashion magazines, cheer-leading or keeping a diary" (Campbell A R103 126). Those who are treated with hormones only later in childhood show male patterns of sexuality when they become young adults, including quick arousal by pornographic images, an autonomous sex drive centered on genital stimulation, and the equivalent of wet dreams. Anne Fausto-Sterling (R202 75) critiques such studies as imposing expectations of gender biased behavior, questioning the lack of doll play because there was more interest in pets, stating that: "All in all, the results provide little support for a role for prenatal hormones in the production of gender differences". She extends this however to a professedly political position, working from an avowedly cultural constructionist feminist attitude toward sexual orientation, and lesbianism in particular, as if 'gender' itself is simply a social construct and there are as many 'genders' as human cultural 'morality' or transsexual and individual gender orientation will embrace. Simply equating the democracy of human equality with a genderless social construction fails to understand the critical issue about biological gender. Since we do have two sexes, evolution is likely to select for biological traits which, in their complementarity achieve a greater prospect of survival than any genderless social construction. Just as there is a danger in jumping overboard with political correctness in assuming male homosexuality is 'born in the genes', so assuming a political rejection of biology may commit cultural feminists to exactly the fate committed by patriarchs throughout history, who, in rejecting the completion of sexuality, while seeking paternity certainty, repressed woman and nature alike, by refusing to accept the healing power of natural sexuality on the human condition. Neither is it clear such 'political science' is good biological science. Fausto-Sterling (R202 26) openly admits such a highly political position in regard to the gay gene research so avidly pursued by gay male scientists: "A few years ago, when the neuroscientist Simon Le Vay reported that the brain structures of gay and heterosexual men differed (and that this mirrored a more general sex difference between ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 164 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain straight men and women) he became the centre of a fire storm. Although an instant hero among many gay males, he was at odds with a rather mixed group. On the one hand, feminists such as myself disliked his unquestioning use of gender dichotomies, which have in the past never worked to further the equality of women. On the other, members of the Christian right hated his work because they believe that homosexuality is a sin that individuals can choose to reject." Fausto-Sterling then pinpoints the issue central to her: "politically the nature/nurture framework holds immense dangers ... In most public and scientific discussions, sex and nature are thought to be real, while gender and culture are seen as constructed. But these are false dichotomies". She then cites trans-gender individuals, female genital mutilation, and sex-change operations, (while opposing some of these practices), as instances of the shaping of 'sex' by culture, as if this avowedly political position can be realized by 'affirmative' action. Anne Campbell (R103 22) criticizes this political approach as deceptive: "Many feminists have objected that the very questions posed by scientists are laden with tacit political agendas and that the scientific method can never be value-free. The solution they offer is for researchers to announce their politics at the same time as their results ... this has the side effect of allowing the reader to pick and choose in terms of the author's politics and to be prejudicially positive to articles that gel with their own agendas. Fausto-sterling for example writes of the difficulty she experiences in distinguishing between 'science that is well done and science that is feminine'. She is also surprisingly honest about the double standard that she employs in evaluating data which are not congenial to her ideological position: 'I impose the highest standards of proof for example on the claims about biological inequality, my high standards stemming directly from my philosophical and political beliefs in equality'. Theories that are not consistent with a feminist viewpoint usually fail to achieve this higher standard. Feminists are keen to promote high-quality research - but this claim is made difficult by their inability to distinguish between feminist science and good science. many feminist journals will refuse to publish data that are unacceptable to their ideological position. This state of affairs has already inhibited open debate among those who fear that they will incur feminist wrath, and if it continues, it will seriously jeopardize academic freedom." Campbell cites a fundamental issue about the pursuit of knowledge. "The postmodern rejection of grand theory (feminist theory excepted) which emphasizes close qualitative description of experiences and discourse which are contextually and historically bound. This effectively replaces theory with subjectively interpreted description. Since there are multiple possible descriptions of any event and no objective criterion for deciding between them the best one is the one that resonates with the feminist readers own experience and intuition" - but this invalidates any notion of validity outside one's own personal perspective, hence also any historical truth of men's oppression of women as well. We have noted that biological gender may be a minimum energy solution which allows for natural slippage in transsexual and homosexual behavior. Orientation to the same sex is noted in many species besides humans. Certain male sheep seem to display a rigid orientation to other ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 165 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain males, suggestive of a genetically imprinted effect. However one of our closest species, the bonobo uses frank homosexual engagement in sexual socialization. Females will engage sexual rubbing to orgasm and males sexually massage one another's genitals. The female clitoris has even evolved to facilitate mutual female-female 'coitus' called 'hoka-hoka' for its ecstatic cries. However here the context of sexual activity is manifestly psycho-social and not just reproductive. An entire troop may engage a sexual spree on sight of food and many of these homosexual encounters appear to be appeasement to reduce tension rather than driven by sexual appetite. Moreover this behavior fits naturally without conflict into the reproductive behavior of bonobo colonies. Although bonobos are genetically adapted to such behavior it is flexible bisexuality with a motive of reconciliating tensions rather than committed exclusive attachment to the same sex. In studies of human sexual orientation, a gulf separates culturally constructionist ideas of sexual orientation advanced in particular by some schools of lesbian feminist thought which see sexual orientation as a social choice and the professed enthusiasm the male gay community has for each discovery that suggests a 'born to be gay' genetic basis for exclusive homosexuality either in genetic or neuroscience discoveries. There is some justification to both these points of view. Twin studies of Bailey and Pillard show that a genetic component may explain 30% of both male and female homosexual orientation, familial influences another 20%. Bailey himself worried that the statistics might have been inflated by the fact that the respondents had been found through gay activist newspapers (Blum R66 133). However the remaining cultural influence of some 50% is still the major factor and even though genetic influences may play an early formative role, we need to keep in mind the hallmark capacity of human adaptability is over and above all other species to retain a personal autonomy over our choices and fates. The evidence both from bonobos and our own physiology suggests this remains true for sexual orientation, despite genetic influences. The Gatherer-hunter Cortex Although women's brains are slightly smaller on average than men, Jill M. Goldstein and coworkers have found that certain areas in the frontal cortex and emotional limbic system, including the hippocampus, are relatively larger in women, while parietal regions dealing with spatial orientation and the amygdala dealing with emotional impulses are relatively larger in men. Moreover Sandra Witelson and colleagues have found that language areas in the temporal lobe and in the frontal lobes have a greater density of neurons in women (Cahill R99). Such variations are likely connected with steroids in development as they contain some of the highest levels of sex hormone receptors. Doreen Kimura (R361), studying sex differences in the human brain notes broad differences in activities, contrasting spatial and linguistic ability, as well as mathematical reasoning. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 166 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Incidence of aphasia after stroke are significantly different between men and women (Kimura R361). Women have on the mean, comparable (and often superior) intelligence to men. Females are generally more accomplished in language development and social maturity, particularly during adolescence, although men tend to have the edge in the mechanics of mathematical manipulation and spatial map reading (R361). In all of these, except mathematical manipulation individual differences are much greater than gender differences. These differences also reflect, to a degree, gatherer-hunter specializations of the two sexes. Major sex differences in intellectual function seem to lie in differing patterns of ability rather than in overall level of intelligence. Men, on average, perform better than women on certain spatial tasks. Men have an advantage in certain spatial tasks, such as tests that require the subject to imagine rotating an object or manipulating it in some other way. They outperform women in navigating their way through a route. Map reading has become a cliché of gender difference. Further, men are more accurate in tests of target-directed motor skills-that is, in guiding or intercepting projectiles. They do better on disembedding tests, in which they have to find a simple shape, once it is hidden within a more complex figure and men tend to do better than women on tests of mathematical reasoning (R361). Deborah Blum jokingly comments "my favorite part of this is that the wonders of human math/spatial skills are based on sexual promiscuity" noting that map reading is not just for hunting but for keeping track of one's sexual partners. See also Geary (R234). These maths skills differences appear to be real. The most comprehensive study published in Science in 1995 found that in maths and science in the top ten percent, boys outnumbered girls three to one. In the top one percent there were seven boys to each girl. By contrast in language skills there were twice as many boys at the bottom and twice as many girls at the top. In writing skills girls were so much better, boys were considered 'at a rather profound disadvantage' (Blum R66 58). This tallies with the less lateralized distribution of language in females, as the creative use of language may occur in the subdominant right hemisphere. Women tend to be better than men at rapidly identifying matching items, a skill called perceptual speed. They have greater verbal fluency, including the ability to find words that begin with a specific letter or fulfill some other constraint. Women also out perform men in arithmetic calculation and in recalling landmarks from a route. Moreover, women are faster at certain precision manual tasks, such as placing pegs in designated holes on a board. In addition, women remember whether an object, or a series of objects, has been displaced. On some tests of ideational fluency, those in which subjects must list objects that are the same color, and on tests of verbal fluency, in which participants must list words that begin with the same letter, women also outperform men. And women do better than men on mathematical calculation tests (Kimura R361). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 167 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Deborah Blum (R66 56), following the research of Thomas Beaver, notes that there are two ways of following a route, using landmarks or calculating distances traveled and that women tend to navigate by landmarks 'the gas station past the furniture store' as opposed to 'turn left on 69 for 15 miles then right for a mile and left'. Beaver has found that, in both rats and humans, although males did better on featureless mazes; in tests where the distances were changed, but the landmarks were correct, females performed better than males. This difference in approach may be reflected in the larger hippocampus in women. There is some evidence gay men make more use of landmarks than heterosexual men (R563), although they also use male distance and direction strategies, but no evidence for a difference between lesbian and heterosexual women. The only measure on which they appear to shift is on language production or verbal fluency. Like straight men, lesbians tend to be more sparing with words than straight women. Gay men, however, are inclined to speak as much as straight women. Effect sizes of 0.25 and 0.75 illustrated for a normal distribution To compare the magnitude of a difference across several distinct tasks, the difference between groups is divided by the standard deviation. The resulting number is called the effect size. Effect sizes below 0.5 are generally considered small. There are typically no differences between the sexes on tests of vocabulary (effect size 0.02), nonverbal reasoning (0.03) and verbal reasoning (0.17). On tests in which subjects match pictures, find words that begin with similar letters or show ideational fluency such as naming objects that are white or red-the effect sizes are somewhat larger: 0.25, 0.22 and 0.38, respectively. Women tend to outperform men on these tasks. Researchers have reported the largest effect sizes for certain tests measuring spatial rotation (effect size 0.7) and targeting accuracy (0.75). The large effect size in these tests means there are many more men at the high end of the score distribution. We have noted that women also have slightly smaller brains with slightly fewer cells on average, but all these features are in relation to the relative body size of women, and do not indicate any significant differences in mental capacity. There are also significantly different types of functional organization in the cerebral cortex between men and women. These are strongly illustrated in the differences in the aphasias which result from strokes in the frontal and parietal regions of the cortex (p 388). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 168 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Sexual dimorphisms in language under letter recognition, rhyming and semantic category tasks, with a visual task as control, averaged over 19 males left and 19 females right, all right handed. By subtracting task fMRIs one can test for semantics or phonology alone (Shaywitz et. al. R636). One of the most outstanding studies of language is that of the Sally and Bennett Shaywitz, in which a series of language tasks were examined under functional magnetic resonance imaging. The tasks were subtracted to highlight language activity over other functional activity. They show the less lateralized language function in women. The Gurs' studies on the resting brain (Blum R66 61) found male activity occurred more from the amygdala and women from the cingulate gyrus, two parts of the limbic emotional system, one ancient and reptilian and the other of more recent evolution, suggesting men are primed to react physically and women verbally. Contradicting these studies, Steven Petersen found little or no differences in region, although the male brains worked a little harder (R66 62). This increased activity may be correlated with the higher rate of cell death in males. It is assumed by many researchers studying sex differences that the two hemispheres are more asymmetrically organized for speech and spatial functions in men than in women. Parts of the corpus callosum, a major set of axons connecting the two hemispheres, may be more extensive in women. Perceptual techniques that probe brain asymmetry in normal-functioning people sometimes show smaller asymmetries in women than in men, and damage to one brain hemisphere sometimes has a lesser effect in women than the comparable injury has in men. In 1982 it was reported that the back part of the corpus callosum, an area called the splenium, was larger in women than in men. This finding has subsequently been both refuted and confirmed. The view that a male brain is functionally more asymmetric than a female brain is long-standing. Androgens have been claimed to increase the functional potency of the right hemisphere. In 1981 Marian Diamond found that the right cortex is thicker than the left in male rats but not in females. Jane Stewart, and Bryan E. Kolb (R99), pinpointed early hormonal influences on this asymmetry: androgens appear to suppress left cortex growth. In the 1990s Marie-Christine de Lacoste and her colleagues reported a similar pattern in human fetuses (Kimura R361). They found the right cortex was thicker than the left in males. Thus, there appear to be some anatomic reasons for believing that the two hemispheres might not be equally asymmetric in men and women. Despite this expectation, the evidence in favor of it is meager and conflicting, which suggests that the most striking sex differences in brain organization may not be related to asymmetry. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 169 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain Responses to humourous cartoons (Azim et al. R29) show significant differences in frontal processing and a more decisive response in emotional centres when women appreciated the joke. Significant differences exist in the way the two sexes respond to and process humour (Azim et al. R29) Males and females share an extensive humor-response strategy as indicated by recruitment of similar brain regions: both activate the temporalé occipital junction and temporal pole, structures implicated in semantic knowledge and juxtaposition, and the inferior frontal gyrus, likely to be involved in language processing. Females, however, activate the left prefrontal cortex more than males, suggesting a greater degree of executive processing and language-based decoding. Females also exhibit greater activation of mesolimbic regions, including the nucleus accumbens, implying greater reward network response and possibly less reward expectation. Women were more analytical in their response, and felt more pleasure when they decided something really was funny. "Women appeared to have less expectation of a reward, which in this case was the punch line of the cartoon, so when they got to the joke's punch line, they were more pleased about it." Women subject humor to more analysis with the aim of determining if it was indeed funny. Men were prepared to laugh along with slapstick. There are significant limbic differences which reflect these trends. Males’ hippocampi appear to thrive on short-term stress but to succumb to long-term stress while females have the reverse pattern (Cahill R99). Emotionally stressful experiences also fire up the right amygdala in men but the left in women. This tends to make men acutely aware of central aspects of the situation while women are made more aware of the surrounding details and ambience. Men also tend to have significantly higher serotonin levels making them less liable to depression Response to an unpleasant experience, in the amygdala, differs between men, who respond in the right amygdala and are drawn to central features, and women who respond in the left amygdala and remember more of the context (R99). Tania Singer et al. (R644) analyzed the brain activity of 32 volunteers after their participation in the Prisoners' Dilemma, which we know allows players to cooperate or double-cross one another, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 170 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain and so fosters camaraderie or enmity between them. Following the game, participants were placed inside an fMRI imager and saw their fellow players zapped with electricity. The scans revealed changes in activity as players who had cooperated got zapped, compared with those who had double-crossed them in the game. The results suggest that men get a much bigger kick than women from seeing revenge physically exacted on someone perceived to have wronged them. In a study by Haier et. al. ( R277) men used nearly 6.5 times the amount of gray matter related to general intelligence than women, whereas women used nearly 10 times the amount of white matter. Baron-Cohen (R43, R44) suggests the female brain is adapted to 'empathy' while the male brain is adapted for understanding and building systems. These differences are at least partly innate. Even at 24 hours after birth sex differences emerge with girls looking longer at faces and boys longer at inanimate mobiles. This appears to relate to pre-natal testosterone with higher levels correlating with less eye contact and slower vocabulary development at 12 and 18 months respectively. Of course parents tend to reinforce such gender stereotypes in their boys and girls often claiming male maths skill is 'a whizz' while female achievement is 'hard work', but the innate differences still appear to exist. Similarly the preference of boys for action toys and girls for dolls is reflected in similar choices made by monkeys (R99). Serotonin levels are often higher in men, consistent with women suffering more from depression (R99). The empathic factor also appears to relate to networking. In "The First Sex", Helen Fisher (R210) contrasts step-by-step analytic thinking, which discounts extraneous data to get at the essential principles, with a web-based associative networking mentality that gathers together disparate facts and nuances and integrates them into a coherent social process. Although both sexes do both, she claims from a host of studies that across disparate cultures, men more naturally assume the former and women the latter. Many sexual differences found between women and men may be adaptions to gatherer hunter life. Good map reading is important for hunting in the wild. By contrast women are better at classifying a large number of similar objects in a space consistent with recognizing plants and tubers. These factors also relate to differing styles of social grouping between the male hierarchies and coalitions of females we find in ape societies, although here again both sexes can and do use both strategies. For example, although male chimps form hierarchies, and female chimps and bonobos form coalitions, female competition can also give rise to hierarchies, and male coalitions play an important role in dominance and competition. Women also often show a much more developed sense of place, developing a sustaining 'home' environment, while single men tend towards a more shiftless existence. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 171 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain (a) Changes of educational trends from male preferential patterns have seen girls leap ahead in university admission rates. Compare figure (p 49). (b) Female adolescent literacy surpasses that of males (BBC 16 Sep 2003). It seems clear that the sex differences in cognitive patterns arose because they proved evolutionarily advantageous. And their adaptive significance probably rests in the entire period of say 100,000 years during which Homo sapiens has emerged, and not just the cultural phase of the last 10,000 years, although this too will be having a cumulative effect. The organization of the human brain was determined over many generations by natural selection. As studies of fossil skulls have shown, our brains are essentially like those of our ancestors of 50,000 or more years ago. For these longer epochs during which our brain characteristics evolved, humans lived in relatively small groups of gatherer-hunters (p 84). The division of labor between the sexes in such a society probably was quite marked, as it is in existing hunter-gatherer societies (p 106). Men were responsible for hunting large game, which often required long-distance travel. They were also responsible for defending the group against predators and enemies and for the shaping and use of weapons. Women most probably gathered food near the camp, tended the home, prepared food and clothing and cared for children. Such specializations would put different selection pressures on men and women. Men would require long-distance route-finding ability so they could recognize a geographic array from varying orientations. They would also need targeting skills. Women would require short-range navigation, perhaps using landmarks, fine-motor capabilities carried on within a circumscribed space, and perceptual discrimination sensitive to small changes in the environment or in children's appearance or behavior. Men's hunting is often silent vigil, while women's gathering is frequently talkative and full of gossip which could explain some of the linguistic differences. Nevertheless both sexes and particularly men who are uncertain of their offspring depended on the grapevine and their intuitive senses of fidelity and betrayal to ensure their genes were passed on into the selective process. Mellowing with age in which older people are better at perceiving happiness has been confirmed in neuroscience experiments and may have been a specific gatherer-hunter asset in elders facilitating conflict resolution (Journal of Neuroscience DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0022-06.2006). In an ironic reflection of these differences, a study by the Pew Internet Project found that as of late 2005 roughly the same percentage of men and women in the US are serious internet users, but use it differently. Men value the net for the freedom it gives them to try new ways of doing things. By contrast women like the opportunities the net gives them to make and maintain human connections (Gender gap alive and well online BBC 29-12-05). "This moment in internet history will be gone in a blink," said Deborah Fallows, senior research fellow at Pew who wrote the report." We may soon look back on it as a charming, even quaint moment, when men reached for the farthest corners of the internet, trying and experimenting with whatever came along, and when women held the internet closer and tried to keep it a bit more under control." Yet these differences are older than culture itself. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 172 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 133-172 King, C., Sexual Paradox in the Conscious Brain References All references are active hyperlinks. Those of the form Rnnn refer to the bibliography page: http://www.dhushara.com/paradoxhtm/biblio.htm ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

A Neurocomputational Theory of Consciousness based on the Internal Manipulation of Representations A PREPRINT Gianluca Baldassarre1 Giovanni Granato1 arXiv:1912.13490v2 [cs.AI] 5 Dec 2022 Laboratory of Computational Embodied Neuroscience, Laboratory of Computational Embodied Neuroscience, Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies, National Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies, National Research Council of Italy, Rome, Italy Research Council of Italy, Rome, Italy School of Computing, Electronics and Mathematics, University of Plymouth, Plymouth, U.K. Consciousness, a central element of human cognition, has been studied with multiple scientific approaches spanning neuroscience, psychology, artificial intelligence and robotics. Unfortunately, poor integration between these fields limits a full and clear understanding of consciousness. Here we contribute to improving this integration by proposing, within a neurocomputational framework, the ‘Goal-Aligning Representations Internal Manipulation’ (GARIM) theory of consciousness. The central idea of the GARIM theory is that consciousness supports the active manipulation of goal-relevant internal representations (e.g., world states, objects, and action sequences), making them more aligned with the goals pursued. These manipulations allow the conscious agent to internally produce the knowledge it lacks to cope with novel conditions and goals, increasing the flexibility of goal-directed behaviour. The manipulation of representations is supported by four neuro-functional macro-systems (hierarchical perceptual working memories, abstract working memory, internal manipulator, motivational systems) that operate through a set of computational manipulation operations (abstraction, specification, decomposition, composition). The theory also presents the concept of ‘GARIM agency’, proposing that subjective conscious experience derives from the ability of agents to generate and control a vivid internally simulated reality. Furthermore, the theory highlights the criticalities of the experimental investigation of consciousness, suggesting a new approach to test consciousness in biological and artificial agents. Finally, the theory provides insights into the design of computational models of human consciousness and more flexible AI and robotic architectures. Overall, the GARIM theory proposes a new view of consciousness, a unifying perspective on flexible cognition, and a general framework of goal-directed behaviour. 1 The authors have equally contributed to the paper. Introduction What is consciousness and what is its function? For centuries this has been a hotly debated question in philosophy (e.g., Chalmers, 1995; Dennett, 2018). In recent decades, theoretical and technological advancements in cognitive neuroscience have allowed these question to become a main target of scientific investigation. Several scientific theories propose links between the brain and consciousness, focusing on several aspects such as the integration of information (Koch, Massimini, Boly, & Tononi, 2016; Tononi, 2008; Tononi, Boly, Massimini, & Koch, 2016); the existence of hierarchical convergence and divergence zones elaborating cognitive/emotional brain information (Damasio, 1989; Meyer & Damasio, 2009); the selection of relevant information into a central workspace and its ‘broadcasting’ to peripheral ar- eas (Baars, 1997, 2005; Baars, Franklin, & Ramsoy, 2013; Baars, Ramsøy, & Laureys, 2003); the top-down activation of multiple hierarchical brain systems by the frontoparietal system (Dehaene & Changeux, 2011; Dehaene, Kerszberg, & Changeux, 1998b; Dehaene & Naccache, 2001); the difference between first-order and higher-order representations, possibly conveying information about the agent itself (Brown, Lau, & LeDoux, 2019; Cleeremans, 2011); and the coordination of effective brain-body-environment sensorimotor interactions (O’Regan & Noe, 2001; O’Regan, Myin, & Noë, 2005). Advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive robotics have enabled computational modelling of key cognitive processes supporting consciousness. On one side, computational approaches specify existing neuropsychological theories on consciousness. On the other side, studies on consciousness have the potential to guide the realisation of more flexible AI and robotics systems. The advancement 2 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 of interdisciplinary fields such as machine consciousness (Reggia, 2013) and consciousness-inspired machine learning (e.g., Bengio, 2017) exemplify the potential synergies between these scientific and technological approaches. Notwithstanding the relevance of these advancements, both theories of consciousness and computational proposals still show limitations. First, with few exceptions (e.g., within neurorapresentationalism; Pennartz, 2015, 2018), the main theories of consciousness do not propose a systematic integration with studies on goal-directed behaviour. This limitation prevents the emergence of a clear functional perspective on the leading function of consciousness, for example to support high-level processes such as planning and problem solving. Second, many theories of consciousness lack an articulated neurocomputational grouding while modern approaches to cognition seek explanations grounded on both the neural mechanisms of the brain and its computational functions (Churchland & Sejnowski, 1992; Dayan & Abbott, 2001b). Although some theories have led to computational models of consciousness (e.g., Dehaene, Kerszberg, & Changeux, 1998a; Pasquali, Timmermans, & Cleeremans, 2010; Tononi, 2008), there is still not a clear description of the system-level manipulations of information that occur during conscious processing. Third, AI and robotic systems still show a rigid behaviour, failing to face novel conditions or goals and to exhibit a flexible general-purpose cognition (Hassabis, Kumaran, Summerfield, & Botvinick, 2017; Lake, Ullman, Tenenbaum, & Gershman, 2017). Overall, these limitations negatively impact both our understanding of consciousness and its use to improve intelligent machines. This work contributes to overcome these limitations by introducing, within a neurocomputational framework, the Goal-Aligning Representation Internal Manipulation (GARIM) theory of consciousness. The core idea of the GARIM theory is that consciousness enhances the flexibility of goal-directed behaviour by supporting the manipulation of goal-relevant internal representations, for example concerning world states, objects, and action sequences. These manipulations generate the knowledge that the agent lacks to improve the alignment of such representations with set goals, especially when these are new or are pursued in novel conditions. A higher ‘alignment’ with goals means that the active representations are more likely to generate actions that lead to the successful achievement of those goals. This idea is developed by building on our previous ‘threecomponents theory of flexible cognition’ (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; Granato, Borghi, & Baldassarre, 2020), proposing that human flexible cognition is supported by goaldirected manipulations of internal representations. Departing from these theoretical and computational proposals, the GARIM theory articulates the neurocomputational processes underlying flexible conscious cognition. The GARIM theory is based on specific assumptions and key features. First, the theory assumes that consciousness has an adaptive function in human cognition. Specifically, consciousness increases the flexibility of goal-directed behaviour through the manipulation of internal representations, leading to greater alignment with set goals. Second, the theory proposes that consciousness is supported by distributed brain representations that we call here Goal-based Integrated Neural Patterns (GINPs). These are coherent patterns formed by goal-relevant sub-representations distributed in multiple brain regions (e.g., they encode perceptual, motor, and motivational contents). Third, the theory proposes that four highly-integrated neuro-functional brain macrosystems support conscious processes: hierarchical perceptual working-memories, an abstract working memory, an internal manipulator, and motivational systems. Fourth, the theory proposes that these macro-systems exert four manipulation processes on representations: abstraction, specification, decomposition, and composition. These operations modify sub-parts of the GINP to generate the missing knowledge required to realise the set goals. Fifth and last, the theory contributes to the investigation of the subjective aspects of consciousness (the ‘hard problem of consciousness’; Chalmers, 1995) by introducing the new concept of GARIM agency. This expression indicates that the subjective experience of consciousness originates from the internal manipulation of representations. In particular, it leads to control and perceive the simulated internal reality similarly to what done with external reality. Therefore, the internal reality is accompanied by a high vividness and felt emotional intensity. Figure 1 summarises the main contributions of GARIM theory and the organisation of this work. We first present a review of the concepts used to develop the theory, drawn from consciousness theories, cognitive science of goaldirected processes, and relevant AI and robotics mechanisms. This presentation has a modular structure, allowing the reader to make selective reading based on pre-existing knowledge and interests. Building on these concepts, we then explain the GARIM theory in detail. Next, we compare the GARIM theory with the other major theories, accounting for the key aspects of consciousness they highlight. We then analyse the empirical support of the theory by considering both experimental and clinical evidence. Finally, we consider the implications of the theory for the design of new AI and robotic systems. The GARIM theory gives four main contributions to the investigation of consciousness. First, the theory contributes to specify the neurocomputational mechanisms underlying the main theories on consciousness. This allows the integration of those elements within a common functional and computational framework that pivots on goal-directed processes. As a second contribution, the GARIM theory clarifies some aspects of subjective experience. In particular, it pro- CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS Figure 1. The schema shows the key fields leading to the development of GARIM and its main contributions. Note that this schema also shows the overall organisation of this work. poses the novel concept of GARIM agency to explain the subjective experience that accompanies conscious phenomena. As a third contribution, the GARIM theory generates insights for the experimental and clinical fields studying consciousness. In particular, the theory is shown to be compatible with some important experimental predictions of other theories on consciousness. Moreover, the theory gives indications for building new experimental paradigms for testing consciousness. Last, the theory offers an interpretation of the relationships between certain clinical impairments and consciousness. As a fourth contribution, the GARIM theory furnishes indications for building novel neurocomputational models of consciousness, and AI and robotic architectures. The models could operationalise the theory, allowing its corroboration with specific empirical data and more detailed comparisons with other theories. The new AI and robotic architectures could exhibit elements of human-like goal-directed flexibility that overcome the rigidity of current intelligent machines (Hassabis et al., 2017; Lake et al., 2017). Building blocks for an integrative neurocomputational theory of consciousness This section introduces the concepts and experimental evidence drawn from several scientific and technological fields that have been used to develop the GARIM theory. Overview of relevant theories of consciousness Table 1 presents an overview of the main theories of consciousness. These are now considered in detail. Integrated information theory (IIT) of consciousness. A first relevant theory is the integrated information theory of consciousness (Tononi, 2004, 2008; Tononi et al., 2016). The theory proposes that systems exhibiting highly discriminating and integrated physical architectures potentially have a high level of consciousness. Discrimination refers to the 3 ability to encode and rule out several alternative representations of percepts and events. Integration refers to the capacity of the system to encode several different associations between the different aspects of stimuli. For example, a set of independent diodes in a camera can respond to a stimulus with a few alternative internal activation patterns, whereas the thalamo-cortical system can respond with many different patterns. The capacity of the latter is based on its highly interconnected architecture that allows it to encode the multiple possible relationships between the sub-parts of stimuli. A major strength of this theory is the proposal of the Φ coefficient, a quantitative measure of the level of information integration. A high information integration of the system indicates a higher ‘meaning’ ascribed to experience, and hence a higher level of consciousness. A recent update of the theory (Koch et al., 2016) has identified a ‘hot zone’, located within the brain parietal cortex, that supports the formation of conscious contents. Instead, the frontoparietal system is proposed to support the control and execution of cognitive tasks. Convergence-divergence zones theory (CDZT) of consciousness. Another influential theory of consciousness proposes that the brain main processes rely on convergencedivergence zones (Damasio, 1989; Damasio & Meyer, 2009b; Meyer & Damasio, 2009). The hierarchical organisation of CDZs explains the difference between conscious and subconscious representations. In particular, the theory proposes that the brain is organised on multiple peripheral CDZs, mostly corresponding to sensory cortices (e.g., visual and auditive), and major central CDZs, corresponding to associative cortical areas (e.g., prefrontal, parietal, and temporal cortices). The central CDZs, receiving a bottom-up information flow from the peripheral CDZs, perform a top-down retro-activation on them. This retro-activation increases the meaningful integration of percepts, resulting in conscious experience. Furthermore, the top-down retro-activation also supports imaginary processes, leading to conscious thought detached from perception. Finally, peripheral CDZs’ activations that fail to activate associated patterns in central CDZs lack retro-activation and remain unconscious. The theory also focuses on the emotional dimension of conscious experience by referring to the somatic marker hypothesis (Bechara & Damasio, 2005). The term ‘somatic marker’ refers to the influence of somatic signals that reach the central CDZs. These signals assign emotional valence to experiences and thoughts, giving them sufficient neural priority to enter consciousness processing (Verdejo-García, Pérez-García, & Bechara, 2006). The theory also offer an embodied perspective to the subjective experience of consciousness. In particular, it proposes that subjective experience is supported by central CDZs’ representations that encode the sensorimotor relations between the agent, the objects, and events in the external environment 4 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 Definition Key concepts Neural correlates Key references Integrated Information Theory (IIT) Discriminative integrated information Cortex-thalamus system Tononi, 2004, 2008 Tononi et al., 2016 Convergence-Divergent Zones Theory (CDZT) Hierarchical and bidirectional flows Somatic markers Cortical bidirectional pathways (primary and associative cortices) Damasio & Meyer, 2009a Meyer & Damasio, 2009 Global Workspace Theory (GWT) Consciousness’ theatre, Working memory, Broadcasting Sensory cortices, Fronto-parietal system, Frontal areas Baars, 1997 Baars et al., 2013 Global Neuronal Workspace Theory (GNWT) Two computational spaces, Ignition Short-range systems (e.g., unimodal cortices), Long-range systems (e.g., fronto-parietal system) Mashour, Roelfsema, Changeux, & Dehaene, 2020 Dehaene & Changeux, 2011 High-order Theories (HOTs) First order representations, Second order (meta) representations, Inner awareness Frontal cortices, Fronto-parietal system, subcortical structures Brown et al., 2019 Sensory-Motor Theory (SMT) Embodiment, Sensory-motor contingencies Not considered O’Regan & Noe, 2001 O’Regan et al., 2005 Table 1 Main theories of consciousness considered here (selected for their coverage of different consciousness elements): key concepts, neural correlates, and key references. (Damasio & Meyer, 2009b). Global Workspace Theory (GWT) of consciousness. One of the first and most influential theories on consciousness, posing a strong emphasis on its adaptive functions, is the global workspace theory (Baars, 1997; Baars et al., 2013). The theory proposes that consciousness relies on a set of fundamental elements that might metaphorically be associated with the elements of a theatre, the ‘theatre of consciousness’. The theory posits that the fundamental elements of consciousness are the conscious contents of the mind such as percepts, thoughts, and judgements (the ‘actors in the stage’), the global workspace of working memory where conscious contents are represented (the ‘theatre stage’), selective attention that allocates limited processing resources to specific contents (the ‘theatre spotlight’), executive functions (the ‘director’) that decide which contents to activate on the basis of the agent’s current goals, and the unconscious background processes (the ‘audience’) that contribute to propose raw information chunks to the global workspace. The theory proposes that alternative contents compete to enter the global workspace and thus become conscious. Selective attention processes, guided by the executive functions, in turn guided by motivations and goals, choose which conscious contents win the competition. The winner contents are broadcasted from the global space to the other processes to support further processing, for example decision making and self-monitoring. The theory has been later given a biological grounding, in particular the ‘theatre elements’ have been linked to neural structures and processes (Baars, 2005; Baars et al., 2003). For example, local visual cortex supports the backstage, frontoparietal cortical pathways direct the spotlight, and prefrontal areas host executive functions controlling it. Global neuronal workspace theory (GNWT) of consciousness. The global neuronal workspace theory was initially proposed to specify the possible brain mechanisms underpinning the GWT and later has received extensive empirical support (Dehaene & Changeux, 2011; Dehaene et al., 1998b; Dehaene & Naccache, 2001; Mashour et al., 2020). Some aspects of the theory have been formalised with computational models (Dehaene & Changeux, 2005) and also linked to the possible development of conscious artificial intelligent systems (Dehaene, Lau, & Kouider, 2017). The hypothesis proposes the existence of two computational spaces of brain networks to explain the emergence of conscious experience. A first space is formed by many specialised functional modules (e.g., sensory areas, motor systems, memory areas, evaluative components) characterised by high-density short/medium range connections. A second space, called ‘global workspace’, is formed by a distributed set of associative areas (the prefrontal, parietal, temporal and cingulate cortices) and cortical-subcortical networks (the fibres of the corpus callosum and the corticothalamic system). These cortical and subcortical systems communicate through excitatory long-range projections (Dehaene & Changeux, 2011). Based on this anatomical organisation, the global workspace generates global activation patterns (ignitions) that involve large networks of possibly distant interconnected neurons. In particular, a workspace pattern inhibits or favours patterns within peripheral specialised modules that support representations of different aspects of conscious contents (e.g., perceptions, emotions and actions related to an object). While the workspace shows strong local competition leading to a single persistent winner pattern, specialised modules allow for a parallel activation of multiple patterns due to the locality of their connections. These dynamics give rise to coherent neural activations with vari- CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS able duration that encode conscious contents. The biological underpinnings of the GNWT have been extended to envisage the existence of ‘buffers’ (working memories) between the sensorial cortices and the neuronal workspace (Raffone, Srinivasan, & van Leeuwen, 2014, 2015). Higher-order theories (HOTs) of consciousness. The higher-order theories represent a family of theories and concepts on consciousness originally formulated within philosophical fields (for a review, see Brown et al., 2019). All HOTs share the idea that first-order representations (e.g., the activation of patterns within the early stages of the visual cortex) are necessary but not sufficient to have a conscious experience. In particular, an agent can generate conscious contents only after first-order states have been evaluated and meta-represented by higher-order representations. The Radical Plasticity theory (Cleeremans, 2007, 2011), an instance of HOTs, proposes that meta-representations show three specific features (robustness, stability and distinctiveness). Most HOTs also suggest that a certain level of ‘inner awareness’ of one’s ongoing mental processes is necessary to have a full expression of consciousness. This claim implies the concept of self-consciousness and points to the difference between noetic (semantic) consciousness and autonoetic (self) consciousness (Vandekerckhove & Panksepp, 2009), also having ethological implications (Brown et al., 2019). Despite the philosophical origin of HOTs, their claims have been later supported with empirical evidence, for example highlighting the contribution of frontal networks in the formation of conscious higher-order representations (Lau & Rosenthal, 2011). These interpretations are corroborated by other theories of consciousness (Baars et al., 2003; Dehaene & Naccache, 2001; Seth, Baars, & Edelman, 2005), suggesting that frontoparietal networks play a key role in conscious perception. At last, HOTs (LeDoux & Brown, 2017) propose that first- and second-order representations, and self awareness, also involve the interaction between the brain subcortical and cortical systems, thus explaining the emotional aspects of conscious experience. Sensorimotor theory (SMT) of consciousness. The sensorimotor theory of consciousness proposes that conscious experience pivots on the interactions between the brain, the body, and the environment (O’Regan & Noe, 2001; O’Regan et al., 2005). The theory is developed within the theoretical frameworks of embodied cognition (M. L. Anderson, 2003; Borghi & Cimatti, 2010; Garbarini & Adenzato, 2004) and Enactivism (Hutto, 2005). The theory substantially diverges from the other theories as it de-emphasises the role of central brain processes and representations, highlighting instead the importance of sensorimotor experience for the emergence of consciousness. The theory proposes that sensorimotor contingencies (the events linking actions to sensory changes; Jacquey, Baldassarre, Santucci, & O’Regan, 2019) are fundamen- 5 tal in determining the phenomenal sensations that accompany conscious experience. Differences in these sensorimotor activities distinguish sensory experience and reasoning/imagination processes. In particular, sensory experience has ‘alertness’ - the capacity to exogenously attract our attention - and ‘corporality’ - the fact that bodily actions immediately modify the sensory input. Goal-directed behaviour and cognition: relevant concepts This section introduces the key concepts on goal-directed behaviour and cognition, extracted from many fields such as Cognitive Neurosciences, Neuropsychology, and Cognitive Sciences. Table 2 summaries these concepts and the corresponding neural correlates. Concepts from cognitive neuroscience. Habitual behaviour automatically triggers stereotyped actions (and thoughts) on the basis of previous experiences and the current environment state (Yin & Knowlton, 2006). Differently, goal-directed behaviour allows agents to select actions on the basis of their ‘goals’ and the learnt actionoutcome associations (Balleine & Ostlund, 2007). Studies on goal-directed behaviour (Passingham & Wise, 2012a; Thill, Caligiore, Borghi, Ziemke, & Baldassarre, 2013; Tsujimoto, Genovesio, & Wise, 2011) define ‘goals’ as internal representations of desirable future states of the environment that (a) can be internally re-activated in their absence, and (b) can trigger actions directed toward achieving them. Some important instances of goal-directed processes are decision making, a process selecting actions based on the evaluation of the utility of their outcomes (Glimcher, Camerer, Fehr, & Poldrack, 2009), planning, a process flexibly assembling novel action sequences to accomplish goals (Delatour & Gisquet-Verrier, 2000; Pfeiffer & Foster, 2013), and problem solving, a process similar to planning but involving a partial knowledge on key elements such as the world states and actions (Newman, Carpenter, Varma, & Just, 2003). The following sections introduce key mechanisms and neural correlates underlying these goal-directed processes (for more details, see Baldassarre, Caligiore, & Mannella, 2013; Caligiore, Arbib, Miall, & Baldassarre, 2019; Cisek & Kalaska, 2010; Diamond, 2013; Fuster, 2008; Mannella, Gurney, & Baldassarre, 2013; Passingham & Wise, 2012b). Representations of the world and actions: the hierarchical sensory-motor cortical pathways. The brain is formed by different cortical hierarchical pathways encoding world states and actions at an increasing level of abstraction (Goodale & Milner, 1992). These systems are partially segregated by sensory modality (e.g., vision and hearing; Felleman & Van Essen, 1991) or by the target motor systems (e.g., arm and hand movements; Rizzolatti & Matelli, 2003). Here we focus on the visual system as an example of hierarchi- 6 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 Field Sub-field Key concepts Neural correlates Cognitive neuroscience Goal-directed behaviour and processes: Decision making Planning Problem solving World and actions representations Goals and world models Selection of patterns Motivations Hierarchical cortical pathways Prefrontal cortices Basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops Cortical/subcortical networks Neuropsychology Executive functions: Working memory Inhibitory control Cognitive flexibility Goal-based control Representation storing Internal selection/suppression Representation switching Basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops Anterior cingulate/prefrontal cortices Frontoal-parietal system Cognitive science Attention/imagination, Planning/problem solving Overt/covert Top-down/endogenous vs. bottom-up/exogenous Creativity and insight Cortical networks (e.g., fronto-parietal system) Subcortical structures (e.g., basal-ganglia and hippocampus) Table 2 Scientific fields/sub-fields that propose concepts and neural mechanisms underlying the GARIM theory of consciousness. cal sensory-motor system, but similar hierarchies support auditory (Felleman & Van Essen, 1991) and somato-sensory systems (Iwamura, 1998) (the olfactory system has instead a substantially different organisation; Royet, Delon-Martin, & Plailly, 2013). The visual ‘ventral pathway’ carries information from the retina to the occipital and temporal cortices. These cortical stages progressively extract increasingly abstract and complex representations, from simple object features to patterns encoding objects and faces thus supporting their recognition (Felleman & Van Essen, 1991). The visual ‘dorsal pathway’ shares some initial occipital areas with the ventral pathway but then involves other occipital and parietal cortices. This pathway extracts suitable information on objects (e.g., size and location) to support the online interaction with them (in particular by encoding ‘affordances’; Fagg & Arbib, 1998; Rizzolatti, Luppino, & Matelli, 1998). The information processed from both the ventral and dorsal pathways is integrated into the prefrontal cortical systems. These systems coordinate motor areas at a high level and exert a top-down modulation on perceptual hierarchies (Passingham & Wise, 2012b). The acquisition of the representations within the cortical pathways relies on unsupervised learning processes, possibly affected by reward signals that preserve goal-relevant information (Arber & Costa, 2022; Caligiore et al., 2019; Granato, Cartoni, Da Rold, Mattera, & Baldassarre, 2022). Representations of goals and world models: integration of information within the prefrontal cortical systems. The frontal cortices support the preparation of actions and action sequences (supplementary motor and pre-motor cortex) and their detailed motor performance (motor cortex). In particular, the prefrontal cortex (PFC) hosts higher-level cognitive processes leading to the selection and modulation of goaldirected actions/sequences (Fuster, 2008; Mars, Sallet, Rushworth, & Yeung, 2011). The PFC supports these processes on the basis of a highly interconnected system of partially specialised functional areas. In particular, the medial (mPFC) and orbitofrontal (OFC) cortices process affective and perceptual information, the ventral PFC (vPFC) integrates vi- sual and auditory information to form visual and auditory goals, and the dorso-lateral PFC (dlPFC) integrates information in space and time (Fuster & Bressler, 2015; Passingham & Wise, 2012b). Importantly, the PFC can encode goals at multiple levels of abstraction and involving different modalities. For example, the goal representation of ‘food’ might involve multiple areas such as the mPFC encoding the visual features of food, and networks involving the vmPFC/OFC and subcortical structures (e.g., amygdala and hypothalamus) encoding its biological valence (Berridge, 2004; Mirolli, Mannella, & Baldassarre, 2010; Passingham & Wise, 2012a; Roy, Shohamy, & Wager, 2012). Instead, dlPFC and vPFC encode more abstract goals/sub-goals (e.g., ‘open the fridge’) and cognitive/behavioural rules (e.g., ‘focus on the fridge handle to open it’; Granato & Baldassarre, 2021) that are instrumental for achieving the goals (Fuster & Bressler, 2015; Tsujimoto et al., 2011). The PFC is also able to represent the environment dynamics encoded as ‘world models’ (Fuster & Bressler, 2015; Mars et al., 2011; Passingham & Wise, 2012a). The PFC implements these world models by integrating dynamical knowledge on how the physical environment might evolve, also possibly considering action effects (Soltani & Koechlin, 2022). The PFC supports world models on the basis of re-entrant loops with subcortical structures, in particular the basal ganglia-thalamus and hippocampal systems (Fuster, 2008; Hasz & Redish, 2020; Houk, Davids, & Beiser, 1995; Patai & Spiers, 2021; W. Tang, Shin, & Jadhav, 2021). The PFC networks are organised on the basis of (a) local inhibitory connections, underlying local pattern selection based on winner-take-all competitions, and (b) longrange excitatory connections, supporting the goal-based activation of overall neural patterns formed by sub-parts located in different areas (Cisek & Kalaska, 2010; Fuster & Bressler, 2015; Kappel, Nessler, & Maass, 2014). This structure is subject to different types of learning processes (Caligiore et al., 2019; Puig, Rose, Schmidt, & Freund, 2014; RanjbarSlamloo & Fazlali, 2019). CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS This neural organisation and processes play important functions for the GARIM theory. The local connectivity facilitates the selection of local unconscious and conscious contents that then form global goal-directed neural patterns glued by long-range connectivity. Goals and world models support the manipulation of representations. In particular, the active goals direct the selection processes while the world models support the dynamic transition between successive global patterns (flow of thought). Pattern selection: the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops. In the brain, the representations of goal-directed neural patterns encoding key elements such as world states, goals, and actions, are selected based on two mechanisms. These selections are partly based on the cortical mechanisms seen above. However, the selection processes are also based on the dedicated mechanisms of the basal ganglia-thalamocortical loops (Houk et al., 1995; Redgrave, Prescott, & Gurney, 1999). These loops are partially segregated into functional macro-modules (Squire et al., 2012; Yin & Knowlton, 2006) such as the ‘motor loop’ (involving motor cortices), the ‘associative loop’ (involving parietal, temporal, and prefrontal cortices), and the ‘limbic loop’ (involving orbital, medial, and insular prefrontal cortex). These macro-loops are further segregated into ‘channels’, supporting a fine selection of cognitive contents (Mink, 1996; Redgrave et al., 1999). The basal ganglia keep thalamo-cortical representations under constant inhibition and release their activation through a double-inhibition mechanism when needed. In particular, the cortical information sensorimotor flows, supported by the hierarchical pathways discussed above, are ‘intercepted’ by the basal ganglia (via the thalamus) to perform a selection of cortical contents at different levels of abstraction (Baldassarre, Caligiore, & Mannella, 2013). The basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops are very important for the GARIM theory, as they constitute an accurate selection mechanism underlying the internal manipulations of representations. These manipulations operate on motor representations (within the motor loop) and on mid-/high-level perceptual representations and thoughts (associative loop) under the guidance of motivations and selected goals (limbic and associative loop). Motivations and emotions: multiple interactions between cortical and subcortical networks. Motivations are mechanisms that contribute to select thoughts and behaviours and to drive learning processes with the generation of primary and secondary rewards and punishments. Motivations in particular support the formation of goals, their reactivation, and the acquisition and triggering of the goal-directed behaviours (Mars et al., 2011). Motivations can be clustered in three groups (Baldassarre & Mirolli, 2013; Panksepp, 1998; Ryan & Deci, 2000; White, 1959). Extrinsic motivations (e.g., hunger and thirst) are directed to attain material resources and outcomes having a biological valence. Social 7 motivations (e.g., offspring care and social grouping) are directed to attain social ‘resources’ and outcomes again having a biological valence. Intrinsic motivations (e.g., novelty, surprise, and competence) are directed to the acquisition of knowledge and skills that only later serve the acquisition of material and social resources. The role of emotions and their neural correlates is still a debated topic (Cabanac, 2002; Scherer, 2005). Emotional states consist of body and brain states that promote the production of adaptive behaviours (e.g., engagement, avoidance, and social facial expressions; Damasio, 1998; Ekman & Davidson, 1994; Panksepp, 1998). These states are accompanied by subjective experiences (‘feelings’) that have a certain intensity (‘arousal’) and a positive/negative charge (‘valence’). The states are triggered by a cognitive evaluation of the body, brain, and environment conditions (‘appraisal’) with respect to the agent’s needs and goals. Thus, while motivations tend to guide learning and trigger thoughts and behaviour, emotions predispose the body and brain to get into adaptive modes of functioning. Motivations and emotions are supported by multiple subcortical/cortical networks. In particular, extrinsic motivations and emotions rely on body-brain interaction processes involving brain systems such as the hypothalamus, the amygdala, and the medial/temporal cortex (C. D. Frith, 2007; Gangestad & Grebe, 2017; Mirolli et al., 2010; Panksepp, 1998; Schultz, 2002). Social motivations and emotions are based on the recognition of relevant social patterns (e.g., particular social interactions and facial expressions) based on systems such as the amygdala, the orbitofrontal cortex, and the insula (Amaral, 2002; Gallese, Keysers, & Rizzolatti, 2004; Nieuwenhuys, 2012; Rolls, 2004). Finally, intrinsic motivations and emotions are based on the detection of the agent’s knowledge gathered by systems such as the hippocampus (for novelty detection: Kumaran & Maguire, 2007; Lisman & Grace, 2005), the anterior cingulate cortex (for surprise processing; Lavín, San Martín, & Rosales Jubal, 2013; O’Reilly et al., 2013; Paus, 2001), and the prefrontal cortex (for competence processing; Ribas-Fernandes et al., 2011). Importantly for the GARIM theory, motivations aid the control of internal attentional and learning processes, leading to the selection (manipulation) of different cognitive contents depending on internal and external conditions. Furthermore, motivations and emotions contribute to the evaluation and subjective experience of the outcomes of behaviour and of internal simulations. Concepts from Neuropsychology. Executive functions and goal-based representation storing and switching. Executive functions (EFs; Diamond, 2013; Miyake et al., 2000) are a set of processes that support coherent control of cognitive and behavioural responses based on feedback from the environment. EFs rely on three 8 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 fundamental processes: working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility. Working memory (WM) is a concept extensively studied in psychology (Conway et al., 2005) and refers to the storing of unimodal (Fiehler, Burke, Engel, Bien, & Rösler, 2008; Raffone, Srinivasan, & van Leeuwen, 2014) and multimodal representations (Baddeley, 2000; Wolters & Raffone, 2008) for a prolonged time windows. WM is strongly related to the process of ‘chunking’ (Graybiel, 1998; OReilly & Frank, 2006), the decomposition of WM information into items on which attention can work. WM is a key process at the basis of goal-directed behaviour in that it supports the active storing ad selection of goals/sub-goals, world states, actions and world models. Inhibitory control (IC) is another important process underlying goal-directed behaviour. Interacting with the WM, IC allows agents to focus on the selected goals/sub-goals by performing an internal suppression of distractors, such as other possible goals, intervening stimuli, and irrelevant habitual actions (Durston et al., 2002; Wiecki & Frank, 2013). Cognitive flexibility (CF), which relies on the interaction of WM and IC, is the capacity to change the cognitive and behavioural responses on the basis of feedback. In particular, CF supports flexible goal-directed behaviour on the basis of ‘representation switches’ (Berg, 1948; Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; Heaton, Chelune, Talley, Kay, & Curtiss, 1993). The integrated functioning of WM, IC, and CF supports higher-order executive functions such as goal monitoring, planning, and problem solving (Diamond, 2013). Studies regarding the neural correlate of EFs highlight many brain structures supporting them (Goldman-Rakic, 1996; Hartley & Speer, 2000; Robinson, Calamia, Gläscher, Bruss, & Tranel, 2014). In particular, WM is supported by basal ganglia-cortical loops, hippocampus, and higherorder prefrontal cortices. IC mostly relies on basal-ganglia, ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and anterior cingulate cortex (Durston et al., 2002). Cognitive flexibility relies on a distributed network involving various portions of basal-ganglia, prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, and parietal cortex (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; Leber, Turk-Browne, & Chun, 2008). Goal monitoring relies on the prefrontal cortex (Desrochers, Burk, Badre, & Sheinberg, 2015) while error detection (violation of expectations) is associated with the anterior cingulate cortex (Benn et al., 2014). Several features of the EFs form distinct elements of the GARIM processes. Thus, WM encodes goals and other highlevel conscious contents; IC (closely linked to basal-ganglia inhibiton) aids internal manipulation mechanisms; and representation switching, CF, and higher-order EFs represent functions supported by consciousness. Concepts from Cognitive Science. Attention. Attention plays a key role in goal-directed behaviour, as it supports the selection of relevant informa- tion (in particular based on ‘selective attention’; Treisman & Gelade, 1980). Attention processes involve two processes (Lavie, Hirst, de Fockert, & Viding, 2004; Rizzolatti, Riggio, Dascola, & Umiltá, 1987), namely ‘overt attention’, orienting sensors in the environment (e.g., with eye saccades), and ‘covert attention’, selecting information internally. Both covert and overt attention can support the formation and selection of representations of elements relevant for goaldirected processes, such as the representations of objects, goals, actions, and world models. Neural systems underlying covert and overt attention partially overlap and involve distributed subcortical and cortical systems such as basal ganglia and cortical frontal eye fields (Hikosaka, 1998; Moore & Zirnsak, 2017; Rizzolatti et al., 1987). A second relevant distinction on attention is based on the ‘source’ that guides the focus shift (Posner & Petersen, 1990). In particular, ‘bottom-up/exogenous attention’ refers to externally-driven shifts caused by salient stimuli, while ‘top-down/endogenous attention’ involves a voluntary shift driven by the agent’s goals and intentions (Corbetta & Shulman, 2002; Ognibene & Baldassarre, 2015). Although bottom-up exogenous attention can be biased by goal-relevant activations (Long & Kuhl, 2018), endogenous attention plays a more important role for goal-directed behaviour and processes (e.g., planning and problem solving). Both top-down and bottom-up attention processes involve distributed fronto-parietal networks and subcortical structures (Petersen & Posner, 2012), although the exhibit a partial partial neural dissociation (Buschman & Miller, 2007). Covert top-down goal-directed attentional mechanisms are central to the GARIM theory as they are the functional equivalent of the representation manipulation mechanisms. Within the GARIM view, bottom-up attention might lead salient stimuli to access consciousness but the top-down processes then intervene to stabilise or remove them from it. Planning. Planning has been studied in different fields. Cognitive science posits that planning is based on internal simulations that search for single actions or action sequences leading to the goal (‘plan’) by testing different possibilities ‘inside the mind’ rather than in the environment (Gerlach, Spreng, Gilmore, & Schacter, 2011b). These processes are based on knowledge (‘world models’) of the possible effects that actions could cause if performed in the current state of the world and the future states to which the performed actions could lead (Delatour & Gisquet-Verrier, 2000; Morris & Ward, 2004; Pfeiffer & Foster, 2013). As expected for higher-order processes, neural correlates of planning particularly involve PFC and hippocampus (Balaguer, Spiers, Hassabis, & Summerfield, 2016) Planning is an important high-level process that relies on the GARIM manipulation mechanisms. These processes select different possible sequences of actions and generate an internal simulation (based on the world models) to evaluate CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS 9 their capacity to accomplish the goal. Concepts from artificial intelligence and robotics Problem solving. Problem solving is a process which, although involving search processes in common with planning, possibly faces additional challenges related to the lack of clear knowledge on the ‘problem components’ (problem states, goal, operators; Bassok & Novick, 2012). Starting from the early studies on problem solving (Newell & Simon, 1972; Simon, 1975), some research focuses on tasks with ‘well defined components’ such as the Tower-of-Hanoi puzzle. Although this type of tasks are commonly used to study planning processes (Kaller, Rahm, Köstering, & Unterrainer, 2011), they are also considered well-defined problem solving tasks (J. R. Anderson, Albert, & Fincham, 2005; Donnarumma, Maisto, & Pezzulo, 2016). This section introduces relevant concepts from AI and robotics, as summarised in Table 3. These fields contribute to the investigation of brain/cognition by supporting computational modelling approaches. At the same time, they might benefit from the scientific knowledge on brain/cognition to envisage new strategies to build more efficient and flexible intelligent machines (Baldassarre, Santucci, Cartoni, & Caligiore, 2017). Symbolic and sub-symbolic representations, and neural networks. Goal-oriented processes have always played a central role in the development of artificial intelligence systems (Russell & Norvig, 2016). In synergy with cognitive sciences, the first AI approaches focused on problem solving. In particular, they posited that human intelligence is primarily directed to accomplish final goals by searching the most suitable sequence of actions from a starting state (Simon, 1975). The type of representations used to encode the problem components strongly affected the evolution of the field. In particular, the initial problem solving systems used ‘atomic’ representations (i.e., symbols), which made the action sequence search inefficient due to combinatorial explosion. Later, studies on planning (Russell & Norvig, 2016) ‘factorised’ (decomposed) the representations of states into elements (e.g., ‘objects’) and relations between elements (e.g., ‘being part of’, ‘being on’), and represented them with a logical format. This drastically reduced the computational cost needed to search the action-sequence solutions. In parallel with these developments, ‘connectionistic approaches’ proposed alternative systems based on ‘subsymbolic representations’, that is, representations of features encoded in neural patterns (McClelland & the PDPResearchGroup, 1986). This approach has now led to develop the deep neural networks at the basis of the recent success of AI (Goodfellow, Bengio, & Courville, 2017). Neural networks are commonly applied to automatically learn stimulusresponse mappings but they have also been used to implement goal-directed processes such as planning (e.g., Baldassarre, 2003; Rehder, Wirth, Lauer, & Stiller, 2018; Wayne et al., 2018). Recent research has proposed that deep neural networks can model broadcasting processes of human consciousness (Bengio, 2017). This is based on their capacity to form disentangled internal representations and to represent interdependencies between few of them. Machine consciousness. Machine consciousness (MC) is a research field aiming to define the key elements that AI and robotic systems should have to show a certain level of consciousness (Aleksander, 1995; Gamez, 2008). MC adopts both scientific and technological approaches to accomplish this objective (Reggia, 2013). The scientific approach aims to develop and validate computational models built on the basis of the main theories of consciousness. The technologi- On the other hand, problem solving can involve problems with ‘ill defined components’. These require the participants to find suitable ‘representations’ of states and/or operators, for example to imagine novel actions or anticipate their possible effects (Bassok & Novick, 2012). Solving these problems requires creative imagination to produce the lacking knowledge (‘productive thinking’), as initially studied by Gestalt psychology (Bassok & Novick, 2012; Wertheimer, 1945). Some problems with ill-defined components are obtained from classic planning tasks as the Tower-of-Hanoi by presenting them in challenging formats (Kotovsky, Hayes, & Simon, 1985). Others are inspired to real-life situations, such as the classic ‘Duncker problem’ (Duncker, 1945). Here participants are required to fix a candle on a wall using some pins available in a box and some matches. The solution of the problem is to pin the cardboard box on the wall and then set the candle on it. This solution requires cognitive flexibility supporting a ‘change of perspective’ on the elements of the problem (Chrysikou, Motyka, Nigro, Yang, & ThompsonSchill, 2016; Guilford, 1967). This allows one to overcome the ‘functional fixedness’ (leading one to see the box only as a container), focus on its properties (e.g., ‘cardboard can be pinned’), and thus arrive to imagine its possible function as ‘candle support’. As highlighted by the ‘representational change theory’ (Ohlsson, 1992), here the solution is found with an insight through which the solver builds a suitable novel representation of some key problem components (the box). In the brain, problem solving processes involves distributed frontal and parietal systems (Robertson, 2016; Unterrainer et al., 2004; Waltz et al., 1999). Problem solving with ill-defined components leads to the highest expression of the function of consciousness. Indeed, it requires extensive manipulations of internal representations both to formulate a solution plan and to internally construct the missing knowledge on its ill-defined elements. In addition, it requires continuous evaluation of the alignment of the internal representation with the pursued goal. 10 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 Field Sub-field Key concepts Artificial intelligence Symbolic planning Neural networks State-action sequence research Featured-based neural representations, visual planning Robotics Machine consciousness Five axioms (world representations, imagination, attention, planning, emotion) Key features (internal models, broadcasting, higher-order repres., attention, integration) Table 3 The table shows the key concepts extracted from the fields of artificial intelligence and robotics. cal approach aims to integrate elements of consciousness into AI and robotic systems to improve their flexibility and adaptability. Aleksander and Dunmall (2003) proposes fives ‘axioms’ stating which fundamental capabilities an intelligent system should have to exhibit a minimal level of consciousness. The axioms refer to the capacity to: (1) represent elements of the world (‘depiction’); (2) recall sensations and world representation in the absence of their referent elements in the environment (imagination); (3) select parts of the world representations (attention); (4) create and control sequences of states and actions (planning); (5) process affective states to evaluate the action effects (emotion). Gamez (2008) proposes that MC artificial systems can be grouped into four classes based on their ‘consciousness simulation level’. The following paragraphs explain the classes and mention some models of them both to exemplify them and to show typical MC models. A first class (MC1) involves the systems that exhibit a ‘conscious like’ external behaviour. For example, IBM’s Watson (Ferrucci, 2012; Lewis, 2012) and Deepmind’s AlphaGo (Holcomb, Porter, Ault, Mao, & Wang, 2018) exhibit human-level competence in playing complex games. A second class (MC2) encompasses systems endowed with internal ‘cognitive processes’ similar to those of conscious agents (e.g., attentional processes or world models). For example, the LIDA architecture (Kugele & Franklin, 2021) is based on the GNW theory (Franklin, Strain, Snaider, McCall, & Faghihi, 2012) and is composed by various cognitive components (e.g., different learning mechanisms, attention processes, and motivation) making it able to control an autonomous artificial agent. Another example is the CRONOS system (Holland, 2007). This is based on an embodied cognitive architecture, having internal models of the world and of its own body, and it exhibits human-like cognitive processes such as motivation and imagination (Marques & Holland, 2009). The architecture was also used to guide an anthropomorphic embodied robot (Jäntsch, Wittmeier, & Knoll, 2010). The third class (MC3) involves systems having braininspired architectures, for example based on neural networks having a biologically grounded connectivity. For example, Dehaene’s models (Dehaene et al., 1998a; Dehaene, Sergent, & Changeux, 2003) have a brain-inspired internal connectivity reflecting some principles of the GNW theory and reproducing human behavioural data from psychological experiments (e.g., the Stroop task and attentional blink task). Gamez (2010) proposed further models belonging to MC3 based on the IIT principles and showing a highly integrated brain-like connectivity mimicking the thalamo-cortical system. The model was also used to move and predict the movement of a virtual sensor (saccades). The fourth and final class (MC4) encompasses systems able to engage in phenomenological forms of conscious subjective experience. There is a hot debate regarding the implementation of this kind of artificial systems (Carter et al., 2018; Reggia, 2013), but for now no artificial system seems to be able to undergo a human-like conscious internal experience. At last, a relevant review (Reggia, 2013) highlights that the proposals of MC can be categorised in five key classes depending on the main principle they are built on, that is: (1) internal models of the agent itself (self-modelling); (2) information broadcasting; (3) higher-order level representations; (4) attention processes; (5) information integration. The following sections show that the GARIM theory, due to the completeness of its central hypothesis, satisfies all five axioms suggested by Aleksander (1995). Moreover, aiming to integrate the main existing theories on consciousness, it involves all the five approaches indicated by Reggia (2013). Last, the theory represents a computational framework for building artificial systems belonging to MC1, MC2 and MC3 classes, and proposes a specific hypothesis on the systems possibly belonging to the MC4 class. The Goal-Aligning Representation Internal Manipulation theory of consciousness This section presents the major features of the GARIM theory of consciousnes (see Figure 2). The theory proposes that consciousness is based on five main elements: (1) an overall adaptive function; (2) specific neural patterns and processes that form conscious goal-directed representations; (3) four brain anatomo-functional macro-systems that support the manipulation of representations; (4) four classes of computational operations that perform such manipulations; (5) an articulated process, the GARIM agency, that gener- CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS ates subjective conscious experience. The following sections present these elements in detail. The adaptive function of consciousness Some theories discussed in the previous sections propose an adaptive function of consciousness. In particular, the GWT and GNWT suggest that consciousness boosts decision making and flexible behaviour. The GARIM theory specifies these adaptive aspects of consciousness, linking them to the structured framework of goal-directed behaviour. In general, the GARIM theory posits that: The adaptive function of consciousness is to enable agents to manipulate their internal representations (e.g., perceptions, thoughts and actions) to enhance goal-oriented processes (e.g., decision-making, planning and problem-solving), thereby increasing the flexibility of behaviour; in particular, these manipulations produce new knowledge that increases the goalalignment of representations used to cope with familiar or novel situations and goals. According to this interpretation, conscious processes aim to create a strong relationship between goals (themselves representations) and the representations that generate the actions directed to their achievement. These relationships have an adaptive role for human daily-life behaviours. Indeed, humans are usually guided by unconscious habitual reactions. However, in case of new goals or situations habitual strategies are no longer suitable. Indeed, previously learned reactive behaviours could lead to miss the goals. Moreover, also in case of familiar situations and goals there is always space for improvement. In addition, although an agent may be very good at achieving certain goals at a certain level, these goals might be misaligned with the agent’s goals at a higher level. Novel conditions/goals, opportunities for improvement, and misalignments at different goal levels might trigger the activation of consciousness manipulation processes. These manipulations produce new knowledge that increases the alignment of internal representations with the pursued goals. For example, the produced knowledge might consist in new plans, new representations of problem components (e.g., objects and actions), or insights on different goals that might be pursued to accomplish higher-level goals. Goal-based Integrated Neural Patterns (GINPs): the neural encoding of conscious contents The GARIM theory introduces a new concept related to the encoding of conscious contents, the Goal-based Integrated Neural Pattern (GINP; see Figure 3). A GINP is a brain active neural representation that (a) is consciously perceived and as such is intentionally manipulable by the agent, and (b) is related to the pursued goals. Only one GINP can occupy consciousness at a certain moment. However, the GINP continuously evolves in time under the operation of representation manipulations, thus giving rise to a sequence 11 of GINPs. GINPs have a compound nature, in particular they are formed by what we call here sub-GINPs (note that we call sub-GINPs also active mental contents that are unconscious, and hence are not part of the GINP). Sub-GINPs encode different aspects of goal-directed processes (e.g., percepts, motivations, goals, actions, and expected action outcomes). Importantly, sub-GINPs can vary along two dimensions: consciousness level and goal-relevance. Based on these two dimensions, we identify four types of sub-GINPs. PartGINPs: conscious representations that have a high level of goal-relevance and stability in time, and thus strongly affect the agent’s behaviour. Non-GINPs: unconscious representations that have no or little relevance to the goals pursued, but are slightly activated by external events or related internal active representations (e.g., as in priming). Pre-GINPs, unconscious representations that have a high level of goalrelevance, are slighlty activated (e.g., by priming), but do not have the support of top-down attention; they can influence conscious representations on the basis of unconscious processes. Temp-GINPs, representations that have a low level of relevance to the goal, but nevertheless temporarily access consciousness (e.g., highly salient stimuli detected by bottom-up attention mechanisms, distracting thoughts with an internal origin); they access consciousness only temporarily as top-down attention suppresses them due to their low goal-relevance. Brain correlates of GINPs correspond to the activation of a distributed neural pattern involving many structures at multile levels of the brain (see figure 3). In particular, sub-GINPs are encoded in different brain macro-systems and tend to coactivate, supporting the goal-directed conscious manipulation of representations. For example, the GINP related to a goal such as ‘patting a dog’ could be formed by sub-GINPs related to a dog visual appearance (visual areas), the sound of its barking (auditive areas), the word ‘dog’ (language areas), the action of ‘patting’ (motor areas), etc. The difference between non-GINPs/pre-GINPs and temp-GINPs/part-GINPs accounts for the differences between subliminal/implicit/unconscious and supraliminal/explicit/conscious representations highlighted by many brain studies (Meneguzzo, Tsakiris, Schioth, Stein, & Brooks, 2014) and theories of consciousness. For example, the Radical Plasticity theory states that implicit mechanisms lead to the emergence of explicit meta-representations (Cleeremans, 2007, 2011). Instead, the GWT and GNWT propose an interaction between pre-conscious and conscious activations (Dehaene & Changeux, 2005; Dehaene et al., 2003). In agreement with these proposals, GINPs are conscious representations that integrate multiple conscious sub-GINPs (e.g., sensory, motivational, and motor representations) co-occurring to accomplish goals. Unconscious pre-GINPs can favour the emergence of suitable GINPs depending on their coherence with the pursued goals, 12 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 Figure 2. Scheme of the main elements and input concepts of the GARIM theory of consciousness. while non-GINPs might become temp-GINPs representing distractors. The different types of sub-GINPs also allow the GARIM theory to make a clear distinction between awareness and consciousness. Awareness refers to the fact that an unconscious non-GINP or pre-GINP accesses consciousness, thus becoming respectively a short-lived temp-GINP or a stable part-GINP. Consciousness instead refers to the fact that the consciousness manipulation operations act on conscious contents (temp-GINPs and part-GINPs) to improve the overall goal-alignment of the GINP. This distinction implies that awareness involves only a partial ‘preparatory’ aspect of consciousness. Instead, an agent becomes fully conscious of a mental content only when it performs further manipulations on it to improve the GINP goal-alignment. The four functional components of consciousness The GARIM theory proposes that consciousness relies on four ‘components’ (Figure 4), supported by partially overlapping anatomo-functional brain macro systems. Many re- search fields investigate and frame these brain systems in isolation. Here we integrate and build on these contributions by proposing how the four macro systems support the operation of consciousness. (1) Perceptual working memory component. Many scientific fields (e.g., cognitive neuroscience, neuropsychology, cognitive sciences) and theories of consciousness (e.g., CDZT and SMT) assign a great importance to the concept of perceptual hierarchies and perceptual representation storing. The perceptual working memory is a first key component of the overall GARIM system. This component is formed by partially segregated ‘unimodal’ sub-systems that perform bottom-up sensory processing. These operations lead to form increasingly abstract perceptual sub-GINPs (e.g., from lowlevel features, as edges and corners, to high-level representations, as objects). The same component also supports a topdown information flow, causing the re-activation of the peripheral sub-GINPs. These operations give rise to the imagination of goals and the mental simulations to accomplish them (e.g., to support planning and problems solving). The CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS 13 a key role in selecting the contents of these memories. Figure 3. Top: Different types of Goal-based Integrated Neural Patterns (GINPs). Bottom: example of possible neural correlates of a GINP; the GINP is formed by three partGINPs (orange, grey, and violet), possibly coding for different goal-relevant elements (e.g., the perceptual features of the goal, the affordances related to its achievement, and the possible action sequence to accomplish it). component also implements peripheral modal working memories. These maintain active perceptual representations having a short duration and a high level of detail (e.g., sub-parts of a goal such as the hair of a dog to pat). This component plays a key role in the sequential processes that lead to the emergence of goal-directed conscious representations. In particular, the bottom-up information flows convey pre-GINPs/non-GINPs, encoding elements from the external world or from the body, to higher-level cognitive areas. At the same time, manipulation processes cause a top-down flow, potentially transforming pre-GINPs into part-GINPs, that is, goal-relevant consciously processed representations. The manipulation processes also tend to inhibit temp-GINPs, that is, non-GINPs that succeeded to access consciousness. In the brain, the perceptual working memory component is supported by cortical hierarchical pathways. These encode information at multiple levels of abstraction, instantiating extensive associative networks of sub-GINPs. According to the GNWT and cognitive neuroscience, fronto-parietal cortical pathways play an important role to support these modal working memories. In addition to this, the GARIM theory proposes that the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical circuits play (2) Abstract working memory component. Most theories of consciousness (e.g., GWT, GNWT, and CDZ theory) ascribe a central role to working memory. The GARIM proposes that the abstract working-memory component supports the active maintenance and integration of different goalrelevant sub-GINPs (e.g., related to contexts, behavioural strategies, predictions, and values). In particular, sub-GINPs in this component are encoded in a more abstract format with respect to perceptual sub-GINPs, thus representing a form of meta knowledge. Importantly, abstract sub-GINPs encode both spatial and dynamical temporal relations of the world elements (environment, objects, and agents). Spatial relations (e.g., wholepart, parts-of-a-whole, being-inside, being-over, shapesimilarity relations) ‘glue’ together different elements in the world (e.g., two objects). Dynamic relations encode world models, capturing the temporal relations between the elements in the world (e.g., the representation of the action of ‘patting the dog’ might be linked to the representation of the outcome ‘dog waving its tail’). By encoding spatial and temporal relations, abstract working memory supports the knowledge productive function of goal-directed processes (e.g., the the formulation of a decision or a problem solution). Within the brain, abstract multimodal sub-GINPs are encoded by different prefrontal cortices (e.g., dlPFC, vlPFC, and ACC) and related subcortical areas (e.g., basal gangliathalamo-cortical loops). Within each cortical area, neural winner-take-all mechanisms allow the activation of only one or few possible patterns at a time. Importantly, the abstract working memory component plays a ‘hub role’ in the system by putting in relation sub-GINPs in different areas (e.g., different zones of the fronto-parietal network). In particular, it dynamically integrates abstract sub-GINPs with perceptual sub-GINPs, thus realising a close interaction with perceptual working memory. These interactions could for example support a visual planning process by activating a sequence of sub-GINPs that encode the world states to traverse to achieve a goal. (3) Internal manipulator component. Several theories of consciousness attribute a central importance to attentional processes and their top-down influence on conscious information (e.g., the GWT, GNWT, CDZT, and HOTs). The GARIM theory proposes that an internal manipulator component, acting as an adaptive ‘attentional scalpel’, manipulates the contents of abstract and perceptual workingmemories. In particular, it selects and warps perceptual and abstract sub-GINPs to generate sequences of GINPs with increasing goal-alignment. Importantly, these dynamic transformations of GINPs represent the adaptive function of consciousness. Indeed, they allow the conscious agent to produce new knowledge to improve its performance with familiar and novel situations and goals. 14 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 Neuro-Functional Elements of the Goal-Aligning Representation Internal-Manipulation (GARIM) Theory Figure 4. Schema showing the ‘components’ (sets of functionalities) of the GARIM theory of consciousness, and their relation with specific anatomo-functional systems of the brain. The red-to-blue coloured gradient indicates the decreasing involvement of motivational/emotional processes, and the ‘goal proximity’, of the processes implemented in the related brain areas. In the brain, the manipulator’s operations are supported by two major macro-selection and micro-selection mechanisms. The former correspond to the disinhibition mechanisms of basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops. The latter are supported by local inhibitory circuits of cortex, in particular of the cortical fronto-parietal system. The influence of basal ganglia on the cortex has a diminishing gradient, moving from frontal to posterior cortical areas. (4) Motivational component. Some theories (e.g., the CDZT and HOTs) highlight the role of motivational and emotional processes in consciousness. The GARIM theory proposes that a motivational component indirectly guides the manipulator by contributing to select goals at different levels of abstraction within the abstract working memory. These goals then strongly affect the manipulator’s operations. Moreover, the motivational component also directly drives the manipulator through motivations and emotions. The motivational component also contributes to giving an emotional nuance to conscious representations. In particular, perceptual sub-GINPs (e.g., representations of external stimuli and anticipated outcomes) are evaluated (appraisal) on the basis of their contribution to the satisfaction of needs and the achievement of goals (goal-alignment). This process thus supports the integration of cognitive and emotional aspects of goal-directed behaviour. Moreover, the motivational and emotional valence assigned to sub-GINPs plays a key role for the subjective experience of consciousness. In particular, this valence strongly affects the agent’s subjective perception of the simulated internal reality (see section ‘GARIM agency and the subjective experience of consciousness’). In the brain, motivational and emotional evaluations drive the selection processes of basal ganglia and cortical winnertake-all mechanisms. In particular, motivational and emotional evaluations generated in subcortical structures (e.g., the hypothalamus, amygdala, hippocampus, and the nucleus accumbens) reach the basal ganglia starting from the the limbic loop. Moreover, they reach various cortical areas starting from PFC ventral areas (e.g., orbital, medial, and insular cortex). The four classes of GARIM computational operations The integrated functioning of the four components supports the goal-directed manipulation of internal representa- CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS tions. The manipulation involves four classes of operations called here GARIM operations (Figure 5). These modify the GINPs and are subjectively experienced by the agent as intentionally directed operations (see section ‘GARIM agency and the subjective experience of consciousness’). The four classes of operations are now considered in detail. Figure 5. The four classes of GARIM operations that the manipulator performs on internal representations. (1) Abstraction. Abstraction causes the generation of sub-GINPs at different levels of abstraction, from perceptual sub-GINPs to more abstract sub-GINPs. Abstraction also executes a goal-dependent dimensional reduction, capturing in a parsimonious way goal-relevant aspects of low-level subGINPs. Abstraction allows the production of representations having a suitable level of abstraction for the contexts and the pursued goals. For example, in pursuing the goal ‘grasping the cup’, this operation might transform the detailed perceptual representation of the cup into a more abstract representation. This representation might for example encode goal-relevant features, such as the shape and position of the cup, but abstract over colour and texture. In the brain, abstraction relies on the hierarchically organised stages of cortical pathways. The organisation of basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical macro loops (limbic, associative, motor) facilitate the selection of patterns at suitable levels of abstraction. (2) Specification. Specification performs the inverse operations with respect to abstraction. For example, starting from an abstract sub-GINP concerning an object having a certain function (e.g., ‘something to drink with’) it can generate a sub-GINP corresponding to a specific object (e.g., ‘my preferred tea cup’). Since specification involves mappings from a few to many features, it requires a goal-directed and contextualised generation of suitable information (e.g., the imagination of the perceptual details of ‘my preferred cup’ when the goal is ‘drink tea at home’). These operations are made possible by the generative networks of the perceptual and abstract working memories, and the selections of the manipulator. These 15 generative processes are at the basis of human creativity and productive thinking, for example allowing the formulation of new solutions to problems. In the brain, specification relies on the top-down ‘inverse’ activation of cortical pathways, moving from multimodal representations in frontal cortices to the modal representations of lower sensory cortices. The generation of the more detailed representations is guided by the cortical and basalganglia selection processes biased by motivations, emotions, and goals. (3) Decomposition. Decomposition can perform the separation of representations into parts (sub-GINPs) on the basis of motivations and goals. This operation executes a different kind of manipulation with respect to abstraction and specification. While the latter ones execute a ‘vertical manipulation’ that changes the level of abstraction of representations, decomposition performs a ‘horizontal manipulation’ that keeps the level of abstraction fixed. For example, decomposition could extract the representation of an object (e.g., ‘a tea cup’) from the background, or the representation of a part of the object (e.g., ‘the handle’) from the whole object (e.g., ‘the cup’). In the brain, decomposition could be supported by neural structures similar to those of specification, thus involving the cortex and basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops. However, it might more strongly involve the channels and sub-channels within those loops to disinhibit specific cortical contents. Cortical local winner-take-all mechanisms should facilitate the selection of sub-parts of neural patterns. (4) Composition. Composition performs the inverse operations with respect decomposition, integrating many subGINPs into larger sub-GINPs or into a coherent whole GINP. Through composition, the agent can build global items starting from its parts (e.g., to consider a ‘cup body’, ‘handle’, ‘tea’, and ‘tea spoon’, as a whole ‘tea cup’). Composition supports various aspects of goal-directed processes. For example, it supports the generation of plans (e.g., by chunking a sequence of actions and their effects) or imaginary processes leading to solve a problem (e.g., building a new tool by aggregating various parts). Composition executes a different manipulation with respect to abstraction. The latter performs a dimensional reduction (loss of information) while composition generates ‘chunks of representations’ at the same level of abstraction. However, composition and abstraction could give rise to adaptive synergies. For example, they could lead to integrate many sub-GINPs at same level of abstraction, and then transform the resulting sub-GINP into a more abstract one (e.g., chunking ‘reaching’, ‘grasping’, ‘transporting’, and ‘drinking’ to then form the abstract goal ‘taking a tea’). In the brain, composition might rely on the synchronous activation of neuronal patterns. Moreover, it might rely on local and distal connections linking semantically related neural 16 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 patterns (e.g., two different colours within the visual cortex, or the ‘red’ colour in the visual cortex and ‘alertness’ in an affective area). The integrated functioning of the GARIM operations: conscious knowledge transfer boosts flexibility. The GARIM operations give rise to a super-ordinate function we call conscious knowledge transfer (CKT). CKT refers to a transfer of knowledge from familiar contexts to novel contexts, thus supporting flexible human cognition and behaviour. In particular, CKT operates by flexibly abstracting, specifying, dividing, and composing the sub-GINPs that encode the current knowledge (e.g., related to objects, goals, actions, and expected outcomes). This allows the agent to build the new knowledge needed to improve performance, successfully act in changed conditions, or accomplish novel goals. Differently from the concept of generalisation, CKT leads to the generation of new knowledge beyond previous experiences. While generalisation involves interpolation processes (e.g., the imagination of a goal position that involves an object positioned between two previously experienced positions), CKT involves extrapolation processes (e.g., the imagination of an object located anywhere in a known space). These operations are based on the extraction of relevant regularities from previous experiences to transfer them to novel demanding situations. Problem solving tasks with ill defined components are best suited to illustrate the operation of CKT and the GARIM operations. Such problems are challenging because their solution requires the construction of missing knowledge on the ill defined components. For instance, consider the classic Duncker problem we previously considered Duncker (1945). The agent solving the problem could use decomposition to parse the scene, thus sequentially activating the sub-GINPs that encode the different objects of the environment. When focusing on the cardboard, the agent might use decomposition and specification to analyse the different feature subGINPs of the cardboard (e.g., the usual function, the shape, and the material). The activation of these sub-GINPs, together with the contextual priming of the pin sub-GINP, could then recall the representation of a previous experience in which the agent used pins to stick cardboard drawings on the wall. This might lead the agent to use composition to transfer the piece of knowledge ‘cardboard things can be pinned on walls’ (a sub-GINP) to the cardboard box (another sub-GINP). At last, the resulting sub-GINP could be abstracted and compared compared with the initial goal of ‘attaching the candle to the wall’. A high correspondence between the two would imply a high goal-alignment of the GINP achieved thanks to the CKT. Comparisons of the GARIM theory with other theories The GARIM theory integrates several concepts proposed by the theories of consciousness presented in the Section ‘Overview of relevant theories of consciousness’. Table 4 summaries these key concepts and highlights how the GARIM theory encompasses them all. Below, we compare the GARIM theory with the other theories in detail. IIT. The GARIM theory does not delve into specific aspects of information theory, but it takes into account key features of the IIT such as discriminability and integration (Tononi, 2008). We expect the GARIM perceptual and abstract working memory components to perform a high ‘discrimination’ of experiences. In particular, the manipulator component selects specific perceptual and abstract subGINPs between several alternative ones, thus assigning a specific and stable meaning to experiences (high discrimination). At the same time, we expect the knowledge elaborated by the GARIM operations to have a high ‘integration’. Indeed, the generation of GINPs having a high goal-alignment requires the capacity to generate several possible alternative clusters of sub-GINPs. In turn, this generation requires a high connectivity between sub-GINPs (high integration) to support a dynamic and highly flexible ‘assembling’ of them. We thus expect the specific computational models developed according to the principles proposed by GARIM theory to have a high measure of the Φ coefficient (Tononi, 2008). The GARIM theory, however, has also important differences with respect to the IIT theory. First, the IIT theory lacks a functional explanation of conscious processes, a fundamental feature for developing a comprehensive theory of consciousness (Cerullo, 2015). Indeed, it has been shown that it is possible to build computational systems with a high Φ but which perform dull calculations, far from what one would expect from conscious agents (Aaronson, 2014; Seth, Izhikevich, Reeke, & Edelman, 2006). Second, the GARIM theory takes into account the key role of goals in the generation of conscious contents. Specifically, the theory proposes that the dynamics of the sub-GINPs are orchestrated by the top-down manipulator to increase the GINP goal-alignment. CDZ theory. The GARIM takes into account key elements of the CDZ theory (Damasio, 1989), further specifying and enriching them with neuroscientific and computational details. The GARIM theory attributes a key role to the neural hierarchies of the brain, involving in particular the representations of the perceptual sensory cortices (peripheral CDZ) and the multimodal cortices (central CDZ). These representations correspond to perceptual and abstract sub-GINPs, respectively. Furthermore, the GARIM theory proposes that these sub-GINPs are generated by bottom-up and top-down information flows. Bottom-up flows support the encoding of perceptions in perceptual and abstract working memories at increasing levels of abstraction. Top-down flows generate goal-directed sub-GINPs that are functional to the achieve- 17 CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS Key concepts Theories Information integration and discrimination Hierarchical bidirectional flows Broadcasting, Ignitions First/second order representations, Inner awareness Embodiment, Sensorimotor contingencies Goal-aligning representation manipulations Integrated information theory (IIT) 33 7 7 7 7 7 Convergence-divergent zones theory (CDZT) 7/3 33 7 7 3 7 Global workspace theory (GWT) Global neuronal workspace theory (GNWT) 7 3 33 7 7 7/3 High-order theories (HOTs) 7 7/3 7 33 7 7 Sensory-motor theory (SMT) 7 7 7 7 33 7 Goal-aligning representation internal manipulation theory (GARIM) 3 3 3 3 3 33 Table 4 Main concepts of the theories of consciousness considered in this work. Symbols: 3 3: concept pivotal for this theory; 3: concept encompassed by this theory; 7/3: concept partially encompassed by this theory; 7: concept not encompassed by this theory. ment of the goal. Both flows are controlled by the topdown manipulator guided by motivations and goals. Thus, the GARIM theory specifies the CDZ theory by proposing that generativity underlies the top-down activation of peripheral CDZs by central CDZs. Furthermore, the GARIM theory enriches the CDZ theory by proposing that the manipulator, pivoting on the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops, performs the selection of relevant information travelling along cortical hierarchies. In line with the CDZ theory, the GARIM theory also takes into account the role of emotions and motivations for the assignment of valence to experience. However, the theory also specifies that the motivational systems realise these processes through the GARIM operations working on the sub-GINPs. Finally, in line with the CDZ theory, the GARIM theory emphasises the role of emotions and motivations for subjective experience. In particular, it proposes that top-down manipulation processes activate peripheral sensory areas (imagination) and emotional/motivational systems (similar to the somatic marker hypothesis; Damasio, 1989). The resulting activations then send a feedback to the central areas, thus associating a high level of perceptual vividness and emotional valence to subjective experience (see Section ‘GARIM agency and the subjective experience of consciousness’). GWT and GNWT. The GARIM theory integrates the main concepts of the GWT (Baars, 1997) and the GNWT (Dehaene & Changeux, 2011). In addition, it enriches those concepts by specifying the possible goal-directed computations (e.g., manipulation functions) and the brain mechanisms that might underlie them. First, as the GWT and GNWT, the GARIM theory assumes a ‘centre-multiple periphery’ architecture underlying consciousness as well as goal-directed behaviour. In particular, it proposes multiple perceptual working memories that transmit information to the abstract working memory. This integrates such information and dispatches the result back to the peripheral structures (the ‘broadcasting’ of GWT and GNWT). Second, the GARIM mechanisms forming the GINPs based on the activation of sub-GINPs agree with the ‘ignition’ mechanism proposed by the GNWT. Indeed, an ignition is a coherent activation of local neural patterns located in central and peripheral areas. Third, the GARIM theory ascribes a key role to the fronto-parietal brain system, proposing that it is fundamental for the top-down goal-directed control of sensorimotor cortical pathways. While sharing these important elements with the GWT and GNWT, the GARIM theory further specifies them. First, it enriches the concept of ignition by introducing a new key element: the goal-based control of the sub-GINPs that are selected to enter consciousness and form GINPs (hence GINPs rather than simply INPs). In particular, goals guide the internal manipulator to perform a top-down selection on sub-GINPs favouring those that have a high goal-relevance. Second, while assigning an important role to the cortical fronto-parietal system, the GARIM theory highlights the key role that the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical system plays to manipulate sub-GINPs. Finally, the GARIM theory computationally specifies the functioning of the bottomup and top-down information flows in terms of the abstraction/specification and generativity mechanisms (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021). HOTs. The GARIM theory specifies the key concepts of the HOTs (Brown et al., 2019) and further specifies them in terms of computational brain mechanisms. First, the GARIM theory proposes that the hierarchical organisation of perceptual and abstract working memories, aided by the manipulation operations, encode and select sub-GINPs at increasing levels of abstraction. The abstract sub-GINPs hence en- 18 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 code the contents of lower-level perceptual sub-GINPs at a more abstract level. Abstract sub-GINPs thus form metarepresentations, a key element of the HOTs. Moreover, the Radical Plasticity Theory (Cleeremans, 2011), an instance of HOTs, proposes that unconscious mechanisms lead to the emergence of conscious meta-representations showing stability, strength, and distinctiveness. The GARIM theory proposes that sub-GINPs tend to encode distinctive elements of goal-directed processes, also based on basalganglia and cortical selection mechanisms. Moreover, unconscious non-GINPs can briefly access consciousness and become temp-GINPs that are soon discarded; instead, unconscious pre-GINPs can access consciousness and become strongly-activated stable part-GINPs. Finally, the GARIM theory can also account for the ‘inner awareness’ postulated by HOTs. In particular, the goal-directed internal manipulations of representations give rise to a sense of agency that can be equated to, and specifies, inner awareness (see Section ‘GARIM agency and the subjective experience of consciousness’). Sensorimotor theory. In agreement with the SMT (O’Regan & Noe, 2001), the GARIM theory supports the idea that consciousness plays a fundamental function for adaptation. However, the SMT proposes that the key function of consciousness is the generation of a close coupling between motor action and its perceived effects. This coupling is sensed as a strong ‘motor action-sensed effect’ contingency. Instead, the GARIM theory proposes that the key function of consciousness is to enhance goal-directed processes to increase behavioural flexibility. It has been observed that the SMT pushes the embodied view of cognition towards anti-representationalist positions (Pennartz, 2018). The GARIM theory departs from these positions as ‘representations’ and the ‘manipulation of representations’ are key concepts for it. However, the theoretical and computational aspects underlying the SMT and the GARIM theory have been recently reconciled (Baldassarre et al., 2018; Jacquey et al., 2019; Mannella et al., 2018). These works propose the agents’ internal representations of contingencies might pivot on goals. In particular, goals might be the link between actions and their perceived effects. Finally, the SMT is the theory that most clearly emphasises the importance of agency for the generation of subjective conscious experience. This view resonates with the concept of ‘GARIM agency’ illustrated in the next section. However, this concept refers to sensorimotor contingencies experienced in the internally simulated reality whereas the contingencies of the SMT are experienced in the interaction with the environment. GARIM agency and the subjective experience of consciousness The nature of conscious subjective experiences is widely debated in many fields, which commonly refer to it as the ‘hard problem of consciousness’ (Chalmers, 1995). At the same time, the investigation of the neural correlates of consciousness is considered ‘the weak problem of consciousness’. Many philosophers propose different ideas to explain the uniqueness of subjective experience. For example, Chalmers (2003) proposes the ‘zombie argument’, for which any physicalist explanation of subjective experience is deemed to fail. Others emphasise the unique nature of private subjective experience (Nagel, 1974). These ideas has been further specified through the debated concept of qualia (Nida-Rümelin & O Conaill, 2021), characterising the fundamental features of subjective experience (e.g., privateness; Dennett, 1988). Searle (2004) proposes the ‘Chinese room’, a mental experiment conceiving the possibility of processing information without having a true grasping of its meaning. Recently, the scientific literature started to investigate subjective experience. In particular, the scientific theories of consciousness take into account specific aspects of subjective experience, such as the concept of the qualia space, capturing the functioning of highly integrated brain networks (Tononi, 2008); the emotional resonance involved in conscious experience (Damasio, 1996); the dynamic information broadcasting supported by the consciousness global work space (Baars et al., 2013; Seth et al., 2005); the non-linear activation of a complex distributed fronto-parietal brain network (Dehaene & Naccache, 2001); the inner awareness based on higher-order representations of lower-order cognitive contents (Brown et al., 2019); the feelings that accompany sensorimotor contingencies affecting the agentenvironment circular interactions (O’Regan & Noe, 2001). Machine consciousness also considers the subjective aspects of conscious experience. For example, Gamez (2008) proposes a C4 level of internal simulation that encompasses conscious and subjective phenomenal experience. Moreover, the ‘internal model approach’ (Reggia, 2013) stresses the importance of the perception of self during conscious experience. Although the GARIM theory does not offer a solution to the hard problem of consciousness, it proposes a new perspective on it. In particular, the theory proposes that conscious agents intentionally control the internal manipulator to shape the GINPs, that is, the contents of consciousness. In this way, they create an internal simulated reality having three key features. First, the simulated reality involves some aspects of the agent itself (‘self models’). This selfsimulation can be enhanced based on previous experiences with other intentional agents (Fernandez-Duque, Baird, & Posner, 2000). Second, the manipulator activates low-level CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS part-GINPs that enrich the GINP with detailed perceptual representations. In this way, the GINP is continuously evaluated with respect to its alignment with goals, motivations, and emotions. The detailed perceptual and emotional partGINPs generated (which might be equated to ‘qualia’) are thus perceptually detailed and have an emotional valence similar to the agent’s experience in the external environment. For this reason, the simulated internal reality is vividly perceived and felt as emotionally charged. Third, the intentional manipulations of the internal representations cause imagined effects similar to those caused by motor actions performed in the external environment. Therefore, the manipulations produce a sense of agency (Jeannerod, 2003) for which the agent perceives itself as the cause of actions and hence of the effects perceived in the internally simulate reality. We therefore define the new concept of GARIM agency to denote the following elements that generate the subjective experience that accompanies the conscious manipulation of internal representations: (a) the agent includes certain aspects of self in the internal simulations; (b) the agent perceives the internal simulations with a perceptual vividness and emotional charge similar to experiences in the external world; (c) the agent intentionally controls the manipulations of the internal reality, and perceives itself as the cause of the changes experienced, similarly to the actions performed in the external world. 19 tional/perceptual vividness, manipulation control) in correspondence to the different levels of the imagination complexity. Although this approach mostly focuses on imagination and simulation processes, many studies have shown that these are at the core of problem solving and planning skills (De Pisapia, Bacci, Parrott, & Melcher, 2016; Gerlach, Spreng, Gilmore, & Schacter, 2011a; McFarland, Primosch, Maxson, & Stewart, 2017) A GARIM agency scale. The concept of GARIM agency allows the proposal of a quantitative GARIM consciousness scale. The three features of the GARIM agency (self-model, emotional/perceptual vividness, and manipulation control) approximately correspond to three increasing levels of GARIM consciousness: phenomenal consciousness, access consciousness, and manipulation consciousness (Figure 6). We explain the three levels on the basis of examples of typical human activities. Measuring the GARIM agency The GARIM agency is expected to be empirically detectable and measurable through the methodologies of clinical and cognitive neuroscience. Generally, physical agency is investigated by adopting different decision-making tasks in which the participants have a partial control on the action outcomes (Chambon, Sidarus, & Haggard, 2014; Moretto, Walsh, & Haggard, 2011; Wenke, Fleming, & Haggard, 2010; for a review see Grünbaum & Christensen, 2020). The experimenter covertly alters the level of controllability, thus making participants able to have a variable effect on the task, ranging from unpredictable to fully predicable. Questionnaires are generally combined with these tasks to investigate the subjective ‘experience of ownership and agency’ of the participants. We propose that the measurement of the GARIM agency requires an increased focus on imaginary goal-directed processes. In particular, tasks should require participants to simulate an internal reality at different levels of complexity. For example, participants could be asked to imagine a pool game in which the balls exhibit different levels of predictability, for example following simple linear trajectories or complex non-linear trajectories. By integrating neuroimaging techniques with self-report questionnaires, one could measure the involvement of the three key features of the GARIM agency (self-model, emo- Figure 6. A scale of consciousness based on the concept of GARIM agency. Phenomenal consciousness, the lowest level, pivots on the peripheral activations of perceptual/emotional sub-GINPs, triggered by either external perceptual inputs or internal bottom-up processes (e.g., emotional/motivational events). The emergence of an unexpected goal-irrelevant perceptual event is an example of this GARIM agency level. Indeed, while possibly showing some emotional/perceptual vividness, this event activates a temp-GINP (conscious goalirrelevant representation) and is accompanied by a low level of control and GARIM agency. If instead the representation is a pre-GINP with a high goal-relevance then it can stabilise into a part-GINP and cause the passage to a higher levels of GARIM agency. Access consciousness, the middle level, involves a mild 20 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 top-down selection that leads to a weak competition where different sub-GINPs compete for consciousness access. This GARIM agency level can be exemplified by the state of mind-wandering (Gruberger, Ben-Simon, Levkovitz, Zangen, & Hendler, 2011). This is a brain state, usually accompanying the performance of routines, that generates conscious sequential thoughts representing partially (goal-) relevant part-GINPs (e.g., thoughts on possible actions). In this respect, Christoff, Irving, Fox, Spreng, and Andrews-Hanna (2016) suggest that mind-wandering involves a shallow “deliberate constraint”, that is, a partially deliberate cognitive control on own thoughts. Based on our proposal, this process should involve continuous transformations of pre-GINPs into part-GINPs and viceversa, intermixed with analogous processes for non-GINPs and temp-GINPs and possibly goal switching. These processes would be the effect of the weak top-down control, and indeed, mind-wandering often happens without consciousness (Schooler et al., 2011). Manipulation consciousness, the highest level of the scale, is characterised by a high control on internal representations. This state is exemplified by specific forms of mindfulness achieved in meditation (Kabat-Zinn, 1990; Malinowski, 2013). For example, focused meditation aims to induce a high goal-directed attentional focus (e.g., on own breath). This amplifies the access to consciousness of goal-relevant information (part-GINPs), and leads to a non-judmental state by strategically suppressing internal/external distractions (temp-GINPs) and ruminations (Y.-Y. Tang, Holzel, & Posner, 2015; Yates & Immergut, 2015). Similar features can be shared by brain states supporting a high attentional engagement in competitive sport sessions (He et al., 2018; Memmert, 2009; Miller & Clapp, 2011) or intellectual games (e.g., chess; Atherton, Zhuang, Bart, Hu, & He, 2003; Hänggi, Brütsch, Siegel, & Jäncke, 2014; Wang, Zuo, Wang, Tao, & Hao, 2020). Overall, the GARIM agency is expected to continuously float along the different levels of consciousness. However, we expect that healthy awake people remain most of the time within middle level of consciousness, for example as when carrying out daily routines (e.g., house reordering and shopping). The rest of the time they might have transitory fluctuations into the lower levels and limited periods of time into the highest levels. The following section introduces the idea that there are states of consciousness corresponding to altered GARIM agency levels that fall between the middle and the low levels of consciousness. Altered states of the GARIM agency. The GARIM theory and the scale presented in the previous section furnish an interpretation of some states of consciousness that could involve an altered state of GARIM agency (Figure 6). For example, alterations of the GARIM agency could involve pseudo-hallucinations and hallucinations (TellesCorreia, Moreira, & Goncalves, 2015). Both states are experienced in the absence of external stimuli. However, pseudo-hallucinations are perceived as unreal dummy perceptions whereas hallucinations are perceived as real perceptions. Interestingly, the two show different levels of sensory controllability and vividness, which are higher in pseudohallucinations (van der Zwaard & Polak, 2001). These evidence is compatible with an alteration of the GARIM agency. Dreams and lucid dreams are other consciousness states that could involve an altered GARIM agency. Dreams involve an uncontrolled imagination during the REM sleep while lucid dreams involve a partially controlled imagination. Both states correspond to the generation of a vivid internally simulated reality (Revonsuo, 2006), but they are characterised by an altered level of control. However, a higher level of control distinguishes lucid dreams from dreams and Voss, Holzmann, Tuin, and Hobson (2009) suggest that a stronger activation of frontal areas could cause this difference. Our proposal is compatible with this evidence as the alterations of the GARIM agency should depend on the influence of the top-down manipulator, supported by the brain fronto-parietal system operating in synergy with the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical system. Experimental and clinical implications of the GARIM The GARIM proposal represents a theoretical framework that has implications for several fields. In this section we first consider the its contribution to the understanding of the concept of ‘intelligence’. Then its interpretation of some psychological and neuropsychological evidence on consciousness. GARIM and intelligence The GARIM theory is not a theory of human intelligence but it contributes to its understanding. In particular, it contributes to clarify the relationships between intelligence, flexible cognition, and consciousness. The term ‘intelligence’ refers to a composite construct encompassing multiple areas of competence (Gardner, 2000) and is measured with different scales of intelligence (e.g., WAIS; Benson, Hulac, & Kranzler, 2010). Recently, new theoretical frameworks have stressed the difference between domain-general and domain-specific intelligence (Burkart, Schubiger, & van Schaik, 2017), also strengthening the relationship between intelligence and goal-directed behaviour (Chiappe & MacDonald, 2005; Tegmark, 2017). In our previous computational proposals we modelled the interaction between domain-general processes (e.g., working memory and motivational systems) and domain-specific competence (e.g., sensory and motor learning). This allowed the study of task-related representation learning (Granato et al., 2022) and goal-directed representation manipulation (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; Granato et al., 2020). On the basis of these works, we explicitly proposed the idea that the CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS flexibility characterising domain-general intelligence rests on the goal-directed manipulation of representations (Baldassarre & Granato, 2020). We specified this idea by proposing the ‘three-component theory of flexible cognition’, positing that the goal-directed manipulation of representations is at the basis of the flexibility of human cognition. The GARIM theory extends these ideas from goaldirected flexible manipulation to conscious manipulation. In particular, it proposes that consciousness boosts flexibility, a key aspect of domain-general intelligence. This flexibility might aid the acquisition of domain-specific competences through the top-down guidance of the learning processes happening in the brain peripheries. These domainspecific competences support unconscious sensorimotor processes guiding automatic behaviour acquired with long experience and learning. This proposal is compatible with some important features of other theories of consciousness. For example, the Radical Plasticity Theory (belonging to the HOTs) suggests that consciousness boosts learning processes. Moreover, the GWT and the GNWT suggest that the global-workspace information broadcasting improves the local learning of representations within peripheral brain sub-modules (e.g., motor modules). Moreover, the proposal is compatible with the concept of information integration proposed by the IIT. Flexible intelligent behaviour should indeed require a high information integration within higher-order brain areas (e.g., the abstract working-memory), in turn influencing the lower-order ones (e.g., the motor and perceptual areas). Our proposal is also relevant for AI and robotics. These have been very successful in developing task-specific systems, but still lack effective general human-level intelligence. (Hassabis et al., 2017; Lake et al., 2017). For example, C1 models of machine consciousness (e.g., IBM’s Watson and Deepmind’s AlphaGo; Ferrucci, 2012; Holcomb et al., 2018; Silver et al., 2016) show a high domain-specific competence in playing complex games but do not exhibit general purpose processes and behaviours. Therefore, we propose that conscious representation manipulation is a key process underlying general intelligence both in humans and possibly in AI/robots. A GARIM-based interpretation of experimental and neuropsychological evidence of consciousness The GARIM theory can be used to interpret psychological and neuropsychological evidence on consciousness. Moreover, it can suggest new experimental paradigms to investigate the functional role and processes of consciousness. Lesion studies, consciousness and the GARIM theory. The relationship between brain lesions and consciousness disorders is still not fully clear. In particular, there is no research that systematically links impairments of frontal systems and basal ganglia, which play a key role for our pro- 21 posal, with consciousness disorders. However, the empirical support of HOTs indicates that PFC lesions cause a deficit in perceptual discrimination and metacognitive capabilities (Lau & Rosenthal, 2011). Moreover, recent proposals suggest that PFC lesions could influence consciousness in unnoticeable ways (Fox et al., 2020). On the other hand, various studies show that basal ganglia lesions cause a general consciousness impairment (e.g., Rohaut et al., 2019) and perceptual categorisation disfunctions (e.g., Seger, 2008). Moreover, a bulk of studies (Ell, Marchant, & Ivry, 2006; Ell, Weinstein, & Ivry, 2010; Price, Filoteo, & Maddox, 2009; Ward, Cavanna, et al., 2013) show that focal damages of basal ganglia impair explicit/conscious reasoning but not implicit/unconscious categorisation. Despite these studies do not explicitly investigate the neural correlates of consciousness, they are relevant as they refer to impairments of conscious processing. The GARIM theory gives a notable importance to PFC systems and the basal ganglia and thus it is expected to account for the effects on consciousness of their impairments. In particular, the theory predicts that extended lesions to PFC and the associative portions of basal ganglia would impair respectively abstract working memory and the top-down manipulator. These lesions corrupt the generation of conscious high-level representations and the representation manipulation functions of consciousness. Importantly, these damages could also alter the subjective aspect of consciousness (namely the GARIM agency), potentially causing the emergence of hallucinatory perceptual representations. This expectation is coherent with several experimental works (Fornazzari, Farcnik, Smith, Heasman, & Ichise, 1992; C. Frith, 1996; McMurtray et al., 2014; Wodarz, Becker, & Deckert, 1995) attesting the emergence of hallucinatory episodes after frontal and basal ganglia lesions. Note that the concept ‘conscious goal-directed representation manipulation’ proposed by the GARIM theory is different from other concepts linked to consciousness disorders, for example vigilance/awareness levels. Based on our proposal, a focused lesion of consciousness core underlying systems (e.g., the PFC and basal ganglia) would not cause a general loss of consciousness (e.g., coma). Moreover, it would not impede the access of stimuli to consciousness. It would rather decrease the agent’s ability to promote goal-relevant pre-GINPs to consciousness, or to suppress temp-GINPs distractors. Moreover, it should make it unable to execute conscious representation manipulations during the performance of goal-directed tasks. This impairment would indeed affect the key consciousness function, thus preventing the generation of new knowledge to increase goal-alignment. Experimental evidence: GARIM theory predictions. The GARIM theory does not yet have direct empirical support, but it produces specific experimental predictions. Importantly, these predictions are in line with the experimental 22 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 evidence provided by other theories of consciousness. First, the GARIM theory predicts that perceptual subGINPs involving the posterior higher-order sensory cortices should remain active throughout the performance of tasks involving consciousness. This to support bottom-up abstraction and top-down generative processes. This prediction matches the experimental evidence at the basis of the IIT. Indeed, by contrasting stimulation effects during coma and wakefulness, this shows that a sustained activation of the posterior ‘hot-zone’ is necessary for consciousness (Koch et al., 2016). Notice how, based on its functional nature, the GARIM theory also specifies the possible role of such activations (performance of bottom-up abstraction and top-down generative processes). Second, the GARIM theory also predicts that the emergence of GINPs is preceded by the activity of the topdown manipulator, involving the synergistic activation of the fronto-parietal system and the basal ganglia. This prediction agrees with the evidence produced by the GNWT on contrastive tasks (e.g., masking, binocular rivalry, attentional blinking; Aru, Bachmann, Singer, & Melloni, 2012) proposing that consciousness emerges due to a strong activation of the fronto-parietal areas (‘ignitions’; Dehaene, Changeux, & Naccache, 2011). The activation of the top-down manipulator and the emergence of a GINP would correspond to the ignition processes detected in these studies. In addition, the GARIM theory further predicts that, given the same stimuli, different ignitions (GINPs) would emerge when different goals are pursued. Third, some studies argue that there can be a dissociation between attention and explicit/conscious processing (Koch & Tsuchiya, 2007). These proposals are usually linked to bottom-up attention rather than top-down attention. Indeed, attention processes are generally considered ‘necessary’ to pass from unconscious to conscious processing (Pitts, Lutsyshyna, & Hillyard, 2018; Raffone, Srinivasan, & van Leeuwen, 2014; Van Boxtel, Tsuchiya, & Koch, 2010), but they may not be ‘sufficient’. In this respect, the GARIM theory predicts that: (a) stimuli having a high relevance for the pursued goals have a higher chance to be selected by attention and thus to access consciousness; (b) stimuli with a high bottom-up saliency might succeed to access consciousness but they will remain within it only if ‘confirmed’ by top-down goal-directed attention mechanisms. Finally, the GARIM theory predicts that a prefrontalbasal ganglia activation is necessary to generate a goal representation sub-GINP. This prefrontal activation precedes and guides the GINP generation and conscious goal-directed behaviour. This prediction agrees with evidence reported by the HOTs. In particular, these show that a prefrontal activation is necessary to support second-order activations (Lau & Rosenthal, 2011) and the evaluation of own knowledge (metacognition). Our proposal agrees with these interpretations, as GINPs involve second-order representations integrating perceptual, motivational, and motor representations. Moreover, the GARIM theory specifies that conscious processes involve both the manipulation of representations and the evaluation of their alignment with the pursued goal. Although the GARIM theory agrees with this indirect evidence, we believe that the tasks on consciousness proposed so far can only partially test the basic principles of the theory. The next section expands on this idea. Towards new tasks and protocols testing the GARIM theory. Notwithstanding the growing evidence, empirical support of the major theories of consciousness is still unsatisfying (Del Pin, Skóra, Sandberg, Overgaard, & Wierzchoń, 2021; Doerig, Schurger, & Herzog, 2021; Melloni, Mudrik, Pitts, & Koch, 2021; Yaron, Melloni, Pitts, & Mudrik, 2022). The GARIM theory helps to identify the problems that prevent the collection of more solid empirical evidence on consciousness. Common experimental protocols (e.g., contrastive methods; Aru et al., 2012) mostly focus on the first stage of conscious processing, requiring experimental participants to detect a stimulus and to perform simple actions in response to it (e.g., reply ‘yes/no’ or ‘choose one of three options’, e.g., by voice or by pressing buttons). According to the GARIM theory, these tasks are not sufficient to test a ‘full consciousness’, namely the functional role consciousness. In particular they focus only on the awareness process of consciousness, for which candidate non-GINPs/pre-GINPs access consciousness by becoming temp-GINPs/part-GINPs. Instead, these tests are not sufficent to detect the operation of consciousness manipulation processes that might follow consciousness access. Indeed, to do so, tests should involve new goals or new conditions that require goal-directed processes, such as planning or problem-solving. Alternatively, they should require the re-evaluation of action-goal or subgoalobjective relationships to increase goal-alignment. Weiskrantz (1995) discussed a possible experimental approach potentially testing goal-directed conscious processes. The author considers how blindsight patients can successfully discriminate stimuli without awareness (Pöppel, Held, & Frost, 1973; Weiskrantz, 2004). Moreover, paraplegic patients can produce limb responses again without awareness (Weiskrantz, 1991). With both patients, ‘commentary actions’ (e.g., ‘press a button’ or ‘verbally report your experience’) are necessary to check the presence of awareness. Similarly, to test these processes in animals it is necessary to pre-train them in the use of commentary actions (e.g., press a button; Cowey & Stoerig, 1995). The key point is that both humans’ and animals’ commentary actions might involve habitual processes rather than intentional conscious processes. To avoid this problem, the author suggests that experiments should explicitly test the presence of goal-directed processes through suitable paradigms (e.g., devaluation; Balleine & CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS Dickinson, 1998; Mannella, Mirolli, & Baldassarre, 2016). This proposal supports the idea that experimental verification of manipulations of goal-directed representations can be a key step to check the operation of consciousness. We started to investigate the concept of representation manipulation with computational models (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; Granato et al., 2020) by using the Wisconsin Card Sorting test (Heaton et al., 1993). Even if this test measures executive functions and not consciousness, it involves an explicit categorisation and requires important representation manipulation processes (e.g., the selection of different internal representations to best support a flexible goal accomplishment when the environment conditions change). Despite its relevant features, however, the test is not yet able to check various aspects of consciousness considered relevant by the GARIM theory (e.g., multi-stage planning or problem solving). Overall, adequate tasks testing the GARIM processes should complement existing paradigms focused on testing awareness. In particular, an ideal task should have these elements: (a) test perceptual awareness, for example require to identify/categorise input patterns based on explicit rules; (b) require to achieve new goals, or to face new conditions, or to improve performance by improving goal-alignment, thus requiring the internal manipulation of representations to produce new knowledge (e.g., by decision making, planning, or problem solving); (c) test the specific use of the GARIM manipulation operations (abstraction, specification, decomposition, composition); (d) test the online metacognitive monitoring of goal-alignment; (e) test subjective aspects of consciousness (e.g., through methods that measure the GARIM agency levels considered in the previous section). 23 tical and basal ganglia mechanisms). These models should be primarily evaluated for their capacity to account for, and predict, empirical phenomena. The design of AI and robotic systems should follow a different approach. In this case, the GARIM theory represents a source of ideas to guide the development and integration of consciousness-related algorithms and functions into existing systems. The new algorithms and functions should be evaluated for their capacity to improve behavioural flexibility, performance, and learning speed of AI/robotics systems. The next sections present the first indications that the GARIM theory provides for computational modelling and for AI and robotics. Towards computational models of the GARIM theory The GARIM theory, involving four components, represents an update of the three-component theory of flexible cognition (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; Granato et al., 2020). We already operationalised the three-component theory with a computational model (Figure 7) that was validated with human experimental data. In particular, the model reproduces data from participants performing the Wisconsin card sorting test (WCST; Berg, 1948; Heaton et al., 1993). We adopted the WCST because, although it was initially proposed to test executive functions in general, it has now become the most commonly used neuropsychological test of cognitive flexibility (Miles et al., 2021). In this respect, the test requires a top-down switching of internal representations to successfully accomplish a goal when the environment changes (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021). Implications of the GARIM theory for computational modelling, AI and robotics The GARIM theory takes into account both biological and computational aspects of consciousness. Indeed, falling within the scope of machine consciousness, our proposal has both scientific and technological implications. First, the theory paves the way to the development of new computational models of consciousness guided by its principles. These models could corroborate the theoretical foundations of the theory and produce quantitative predictions to be tested against specific empirical data. Second, the theory provides insights possibly usable to enhance the current AI and robotics systems. Scientific and technological purposes require different modelling approaches and different criteria to evaluate models (see the four levels of machine consciousness; Gamez, 2008). Indeed, the computational models following the GARIM principles could emulate both the brain functions related to consciousness (e.g., top-down manipulation) and the underlying neural mechanisms (e.g., the competitive cor- Figure 7. A computational model of the three-component hypothesis (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021), representing a precursor of the GARIM theory. The model is a starting point for building GARIM-inspired computational models. Overall, the model emulates human flexible goal-directed cognition and behaviour. Moreover, it presents a computational realisation of three of the four components postulated by the GARIM theory, namely a hierarchical genera- 24 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 tive model, an executive working memory, and a top-down manipulator. Although this model specifically aims to solve the WCST and does not consider conscious processing, it could still capture the C1 and C2 levels of simulation proposed by machine consciousness (Gamez, 2008). In particular, the model shows an explicit rule-based categorisation process relevant for consciousness functions. Moreover, the model presents various architectural and functional elements supporting consciousness in the brain. For these reasons, this model is a possible starting point for building new computational models of consciousness based on the GARIM theory. To this end, we now propose a general ‘blueprint architecture’ encompassing key ideas that might be used to design specific GARIM models. The architecture is composed by the four GARIM components (Figure 8): (a) a perceptual hierarchical component; (b) a working memory component; (c) a manipulator component; and (d) a motivation component. Specific GARIM models can be implemented following different approaches that emulate the brain mechanisms at different levels of detail. First, the models can be implemented with neural networks abstracting over most details of the brain mechanisms (as we done in Granato & Baldassarre, 2021; see Figure 7). For example, as done in this model, the perceptual component could be based on a generative deep neural network (Hinton, 2012; Hinton, Osindero, & Teh, 2006). The working memory could rely on recurrent local circuits (OReilly & Frank, 2006). Lastly, the manipulator could reproduce a double inhibition mechanism capturing the basal ganglia selection processes (Baldassarre, Mannella, et al., 2013). On the other side of the spectrum, the GARIM models could be implemented with computational approaches that emulate finer biological details of the brain (e.g., spiking neurons; Dayan & Abbott, 2001a; Dehaene & Changeux, 2005). The level of the model abstraction, based on the amount of biological constraints incorporated in it, should be adjusted according to the research objectives. Perceptual component: abstraction and generativity. The perceptual hierarchical component should be able to perform both abstraction and generativity. Deep belief networks (DBN; Hinton, 2012; Hinton et al., 2006) are suitable for implementing this function. They are able to learn representations of the input patterns at increasing levels of abstraction based of the statistical regularities and task demands (Granato et al., 2022). Moreover, they are able to produce new representations on the basis of previous inputs and topdown generative processes (Granato & Baldassarre, 2021). Predictive coding is another suitable approach to implement this function (Donnarumma, Costantini, Ambrosini, Friston, & Pezzulo, 2017; Pezzulo, 2014; Rao & Ballard, 1999). This approach proposes that high-level neural patterns predict detailed ones at lower processing levels and learn to encode the differences. Systems based on predictive coding have also been used to implement goal-oriented systems (Jung, Matsumoto, & Tani, 2019a). Spiking-neuron neural networks and spike timing dependent plasticity mechanisms are another approach that can be used to learn representations of relevant elements, and timed chains of them (Kappel et al., 2014). These models can also be used to implement world models encoding sequences of world states within planning architectures (Basanisi, Brovelli, Cartoni, & Baldassarre, 2020; Rueckert, Kappel, Tanneberg, Pecevski, & Peters, 2016). Generating perceptual and higher-order GINPs. The perceptual and abstract working memory components of the models should support the generation of GINPs. In models employing brain-like mechanisms, these process might rely on local neural competitions taking place at different levels of abstraction. The local connectivity, able to support these competitions, should be based on populations formed by neurons linked by excitatory connection, and competing with other populations through inhibitory connections (Lund, Yoshioka, & Levitt, 1993; Weliky, Kandler, Fitzpatrick, & Katz, 1995). These circuits would implement neural competitions between local neural populations, leading to the selection of one or few of them (e.g., as modelled in competitive neural circuits and self-organising maps, Diehl & Cook, 2015; Kohonen, 2001; Mysore & Kothari, 2020). The local winning populations could excite other winning populations in distal areas through long-range excitatory connections (e.g., as modelled in Miikkulainen, Bednar, Choe, & Sirosh, 2006). Overall, these processes should lead to the generation of sub-GINPs (local winning populations), for example encoding perceptual, motor, and emotional features, and GINPs (global clusters), ‘gluing’ together the subGINPs (as also proposed by the CDZT and GNWT Dehaene & Changeux, 2005). Working memory component: the long-lasting activation of sub-GINPs. The working memory component should support the long-lasting activation of neural patters (sub-GINPs and GINPs) in the absence of the internal and external triggers initially causing them. Recurrent neural networks (RNN; Barak & Tsodyks, 2014) are suitable models to emulate these functions. These networks support a longlasting neural activation, mimicking the dynamic re-entrant circuits of PFC and basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops. At the same time, basal ganglia-like selection mechanisms of the manipulator could upload/down information from such recurrent circuits (Holcman & Tsodyks, 2006; OReilly & Frank, 2006). Reservoir computing is another approach usable to implement dynamic working memories. Reservoir networks are based on a recurrent stochastic connectivity whose rich dynamic patterns can be recruited by ‘read-out units’ trained to produce desired dynamic patters. Reservoir networks can be based on firing-rate neurons (e.g., ‘echo-state networks’; Jaeger, 2001) or spiking neurons (e.g., ‘liquid state CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS 25 GARIM blueprint architecture Figure 8. The GARIM blueprint architecture: an overview of the architecture components and functions. Italics in brackets: main brain neural mechanisms (structure and processes) implementing the component. machines’; Maass, Natschläger, & Markram, 2002). Manipulator component: selection mechanisms sculpting GINPs. The manipulator component should be able to implement the GARIM operations that sculpt GINPs to generate new knowledge. Computational models reproducing the anatomy and functioning of the basal gangliathalamo-cortical loops (Schroll & Hamker, 2013) could be a starting point to implement manipulation operations. First, these models could perform the selection of cortical contents (sub-GINPs) based on the core double-inhibition mechanism of basal ganglia (Gurney, Prescott, & Redgrave, 2001). Second, these models could mimic the capacity of basal ganglia to regulate the selection processes, for example to select one/many elements, or to support random exploratory selections or focused ‘locking-in’ selections (e.g., see Fiore et al., 2014; Prescott, Gonzalez, Gurney, Humphries, & Redgrave, 2006; Schroll & Hamker, 2013). Cortical winner-take-all processes could contribute to tune the selections at a finer levels (Arber & Costa, 2022; Mysore & Kothari, 2020). Overall, these selection processes would support the GARIM operations, dynamically manipulating sub-GINPs to form goal-directed GINPs. For example, the hierarchical organisation of these mechanisms might support the selection of perceptual and goal representations at different levels of abstraction/specification. In addition, mechanisms that support multiple selections in parallel could support decomposition/composition. At last, lock-in mechanisms could support the prolonged activation of specific sub-GINPs (e.g., a distal goal during planning; Baldassarre, Mannella, et al., 2013). Motivation component: extrinsic and intrinsic motivations guiding GINPs manipulation. Extrinsic motivations could be implemented in multiple ways, assigning valence to stimuli and other cognitive contents (Tye, 2018). Models that mimic innate brain structures could charge specific stimuli with a biological positive/negative valence (e.g., ‘painful stimuli’ or ‘good food’), thus biasing internal processes and guiding learning. On the basis of these primitive values, associative ‘Pavlovian’ learning mechanisms could support the attribution of ‘secondary’ valence to previously neutral stimuli (Mannella et al., 2016; Mattera, Pagani, & Baldassarre, 2020). Social motivations tend to rely on similar brain structures and mechanisms as extrinsic motivations, with the main difference that they are triggered by social stimuli rather than material resources (e.g., see Alfieri, Mattera, & Baldassarre, 2022). Intrinsic motivation mechanisms related to novelty/surprise and competence require different simulation 26 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 mechanisms. Novelty could be implemented by mechanisms based on pattern recognition and surprise by mechanisms based on predictors (Barto, Mirolli, & Baldassarre, 2013), similarly to what might happens in the hippocampus (Kumaran & Maguire, 2007). Competence mechanisms could be implemented based on ‘goal-matching processes’ that compare the pursued goal with the achieved world state (Baldassarre, Mannella, et al., 2013; for other models of intrinsic motivations see Baldassarre & Mirolli, 2013). Motivations would play a key role in guiding the manipulator operations. In particular, stimuli representations should be ‘charged’ with extrinsic or intrinsic valence, thus guiding the selections and learning processes of the manipulator. This could employ reinforcement learning mechanisms (Sutton & Barto, 1998), similar to those supporting action selection learning (Granato, Cartoni, Da Rold, Mattera, & Baldassarre, 2021). Moreover, motivations could guide the formation and activation of goal representations: motivations and goals can then guide the manipulator to perform the goal-directed selections of representations at the basis of planning or problem solving (Baldassarre, Mannella, et al., 2013; Basanisi et al., 2020; Rueckert et al., 2016; Santucci, Baldassarre, & Mirolli, 2016). Emotions, which can regulate the general ‘functioning mode’ of the system and help to evaluate experiences, have more rarely been the subject of computational models (Marsella, Gratch, & Petta, 2010). Existing models can be used to implement the motivation component, for example for the emotional ‘appraisal’ of internal simulations. (Paiva, Leite, & Ribeiro, 2012). Integrating the components: the challenges of implementing conscious models. The development of computational models that integrate the GARIM components and processes represents a great challenge. In particular, the multiple functions and learning processes implemented by the components should work in close synergy similarly to what happens in the brain (Caligiore et al., 2019). Overall, integrated GARIM architectures should support these functions: (a) The perceptual hierarchical component and the working memory should learn sub-GINPs (encoding stimuli, actions, and affective states) at multiple levels of abstraction and in modal and multimodal ways; these learning processes should be based on unsupervised and reinforcement learning processes. (b) These components, and especially the working memory, should ensure a persistent activation of sub-GINPs under the bias of the manipulator. (c) The motivations and emotions should guide the formation and selection of goals to pursue. (d) The motivation and working memory components should produce metacognitive evaluations on the level of goal-alignment of the active GINPs. (e) Together, motivations and goals should guide the manipulator to decide the sub-GINP that should access consciousness (part-GINPs), or exit it (temp-GINPS); moreover, the manipulator should suitably compose/decompose and abastract/specify the subGINPs to increase the GINP goal-alignment. (f) The simulated internal reality (active dynamic GINP) should produces top-down generative imagination processes supporting the specification of sub-GINPs, also allowing their emotional evaluation. (g) The goal-aligning manipulation operations, imaginary processes, and emotional evaluations, could together generate a subjective experience in the agent. The integration of all these processes is clearly a major challenge for future research on computational modelling of consciousness. Towards GARIM-based AI and robotics architectures This section illustrates the contributions that the GARIM theory can make to enhance the autonomy and effectiveness of AI and robotics systems. Adaptive functions of Consciousness for AI and robotic systems. The introduction of consciousness-like processes into AI and robotic architectures could contribute to enhance several aspects of them. We now first consider the major limitations of the current AI and robotics systems, showing how some functions considered by the GARIM theory might contribute to face them. Next we discuss possible machine learning models that might be used to start to implement such functions. Flexibility. Flexibility is a great limitation of current AI systems. In particular, they are usually incapable of coping with new tasks or new conditions and to solve problems with partial knowledge (Hassabis et al., 2017; Lake et al., 2017; Marcus & Davis, 2019). The GARIM theory proposes that human behaviour flexibility depends on the brain capacity to internally manipulate the representations of goal-relevant elements (e.g., objects, goals, actions). These manipulations give humans the ability to actively adjust and integrate the knowledge gained in previous experiences to cope with novel goals and conditions. The development of GARIM-based mechanisms into AI/robotics architectures could thus boost their flexibility. Learning speed. The learning efficiency is a second major limitation of current AI and robotic systems. In particular, they are time consuming and they need extremely large datasets to learn (Lake et al., 2017; Marcus & Davis, 2019; Ullman, 2019). The GARIM theory introduces the super-ordinate representation manipulation function called conscious knowledge transfer to transfer knowledge between tasks and domains. The introduction of this function into AI/robotics architectures could accelerate their learning processes. In addition, it might allow the solution of tasks with few or no direct experience on them. Creativity. Creativity and imagination are strongly limited in AI/robotic systems (Hassabis et al., 2017; Lake et al., 2017; Marcus & Davis, 2019). The GARIM theory proposes CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS that the goal-directed top-down manipulation of representations, in particular working on the representations within the sensorimotor hierarchies, leads to generative and creative processes. The development of AI/robotic architecture with these manipulation functions should boost their skills, for example making them able to elaborate creative solutions for problems. Human-AI value alignment. Many authors argue that AI systems should be able to interact safely with humans, aligning their values and goals with those of humans (Bostrom, 2014; Gabriel, 2020; Harari, 2016). The GARIM theory provides some suggestions on how this could be done. First, GARIM architectures would be more flexible, thus facilitating interactions with humans. In addition, they would be able to reason about emotional issues, an important element to have appropriate interactions with humans. (Huang, Rust, & Maksimovic, 2019). Finally, they would have a motivation component, thus facilitating the design of humanlike value systems (Dignum, 2018). Machine consciousness: designing GARIM-based systems starting from current AI and Robotics. This section gives initial indications on how possibly implementing GARIM functions based on currently available AI/robotic models and algorithms. Figure 9 illustrates the ‘AI GARIM architecture’, a general scheme that might be followed to design specific AI and robotics systems. Perceptual component. This component should implement abstraction and generativity functions. Regarding abstraction, convolutional neural networks (CNN; Goodfellow et al., 2017), and the already considered deep belief networks (DBN; Hinton, 2002; Hinton et al., 2006), are very effective models that can learn ‘features’ of input patterns at multiple levels of abstraction. Regarding generativity, three relevant ‘families’ of models have been proposed to support it (Goodfellow et al., 2017): DBNs, considered above, variational autoencoders (VAEs; Kingma & Welling, 2013), and generative adversarial networks (GANs; Goodfellow et al., 2014). Although these models have a great power to solve several tasks, both CNNs and generative models still show limitations that might prevent their use to implement GARIM functions. CNNs are not generative and are trained with a supervised algorithm. This feature makes these networks less useful for autonomous agents. VAEs are based on two distinct components, a bottom-up abstraction component (‘encoder’) and a top-down generative component (‘decoder’). As a consequence, they cannot easily integrate the processes of these components and would require two distinct manipulators to control them. GANs are formed by a ‘discriminator component’ and a ‘generator component’: the latter could be useful to implement GARIM functionalities, while the former could be used to distinguish between imagined and perceived stimuli. Unfortunately, the ‘generative stochastic 27 engine’ of both VAEs and GANs is limited. In particular, it is localised in the middle ‘bottleneck’ layer in VAEs and the discriminator input layer in GANs. Therefore, the two models cannot have generativity at multiple levels of abstraction. Interestingly, DBNs show a bidirectional architecture implementing both bottom-up abstraction and top-down generative processes. Moreover, their ‘generative engine’ is distributed into all its stochastic-units, thus supporting generativity at multiple levels of abstraction. Working memory component. This component should support the information reverberation in the absence of the corresponding patterns from sensors or internal processes. The component should be able to learn which patterns to store and which not, also on the basis of goals. Recurrent neural networks are a first powerful tool usable to implement working memory. This capacity is based on an architecture having re-entrant connections and thus capable of dynamically storing information (Choi, Matsumoto, Jung, & Tani, 2018). Long-short term memories (LSTM; Hochreiter & Schmidhuber, 1997) are networks based on units with a ‘gated selfconnection’ and gates in input and output connections. The opening/closing of the gates can upload/download information in the neuron, making it capable of storing memories for long times. These networks are commonly used to solve classification and regression tasks with input sequences. However, they have recently been updated with additional mechanisms that can support deliberative (goal-directed) processes as needed by the GARIM theory (e.g., see Jung, Matsumoto, & Tani, 2019b). Neural Turing machines (Graves, Wayne, & Danihelka, 2014; Wayne et al., 2018) are neural networks that support deliberative processes. These networks use ‘working memory slots’ that are based on numerical vectors. These slots are read/written by ‘neural heads’ that are trainable with gradient-based algorithms. These features allow these networks to implement trainable logic-like reasoning. However, the pre-defined level of abstraction of these memory slots make them unsuitable to implement the GARIM operations of composition/decomposition, thus limiting their flexibility. Manipulator component. This component should implement two main functions. First, it should support the autonomous learning and performance of the goal-directed manipulation of representations (states, goals, actions, etc.). Second, it should support the goal-directed control of these manipulation processes. A number of AI mechanisms, introduced above, can be used to implement working memories and ‘neural heads’, or other mechanisms, to ‘read/write’ such memories. These mechanisms can be an important mean to implement the manipulation of representations. The implementation of goal-directed processes also requires the performance of a number of structured and temporised operations, such as the goals/sub-goals activation/de- 28 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 AI GARIM architecture Figure 9. Blueprint AI GARIM architecture. The figure shows some AI algorithms that could be used to implement the functions of the GARIM components. Bold text: names of the components; Plain text: functions; Italics text, in brackets: algorithms/models; Dash-highlighted text: representations on which consciousness processes operate. activation. Examples of these are: the generation and search of correct action sequences, the prediction of actions outcomes, the exchange of information between the different components of the system. These operations are relatively easy to implement with symbolic representations and programming controls (e.g., ‘if-then’ and ‘loop’ operations; Russell & Norvig, 2016) but very difficult to implement with neural mechanisms. Current systems thus tend to be based on hybrid neural/symbolic mechanisms. This is an important open problem as the non-neural parts of the models could obstacle the information integration capabilities of the system. Hybrid systems (Konidaris, Kaelbling, & Lozano-Perez, 2018; Oddi et al., 2019; Sun, 2016) implement low-level cognitive processes based on neural representations and learning algorithms. At the same time, they implement highlevel cognitive processes based on symbolic representations. This double representation format allows them, for example, to implement symbolic PDDL planning while using neural mechanisms to implement sensorimotor processes. These approaches have limitations for our scope. In particular, they introduce inhomogeneous representations at the low and high representation levels, requiring different mechanisms to manipulate them. Neural Turing machines and models like MERLIN (Graves et al., 2014; Wayne et al., 2018) use memory slots and neural heads to perform complex tasks that require the achievement of multiple subgoals. This approach is mainly used to solve single reactive tasks but it can also be used to solve deliberative problems (Chaplot, Pathak, & Malik, 2021). Neurosymbolic AI (for a review see Garcez & Lamb, 2020), and in particular recent visual planning models (Jung et al., 2019b; Nair et al., 2018), perform planning task on the basis of goal-directed processes and distributed representations (states, goals, actions, etc.). These processes allow high flexibility, supporting generalisation capabilities that cannot be achieved by symbolic planning/problem solving. However, for now they cannot compose/decompose the manipulated elements. Transformers (Vaswani et al., 2017) implement neural internal attention mechanisms and dynamic circuits. Their memory and attention units are integrated within the trainable input-output layers of neural networks. These models are very effective in recalling any learnt information, even if experienced much earlier. Transformers have been mainly used to successfully solve natural language processing tasks but require a slow supervised-learning training (Blakeman & Mareschal, 2022). These systems have the potential to also support deliberative processes (Chaplot et al., 2021) and have been indicated as relevant to implement consciousness-like processes (Bengio, 2017). For instance, new systems based on transformers have been shown to be able to implement extensive selections of internal representations to solve complex natural language processing tasks Le, Nguyen, Ho, Bui, and Phung (2021). These approaches might be used to implement the operation of the GARIM manipulator acting on 29 CONSCIOUS MANIPULATION OF INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS several representations (sub-GINPs). Motivation component. Extrinsic motivations are usually emulated trough reward signals (Sutton & Barto, 1998). The are also used to implement ‘pseudo-rewards’ used in model-based hierarchical reinforcement learning to guide reinforcement learning based on goal-matching events (Botvinick, Niv, & Barto, 2008). Intrinsic motivations have demonstrate to effectively support the autonomous acquisition of knowledge of robots (Baldassarre & Mirolli, 2013). Indeed, intrinsic motivation mechanisms can drive the investigation and learning of novel/surprising experiences, leading to the acquisition of new state representations and models (Barto et al., 2013; Cartoni & Baldassarre, 2018; Oudeyer, Kaplan, & Hafner, 2007; Schmidhuber, 1991). Moreover, they can lead to the acquisition of ‘intrinsic goals’ and motor skills to accomplish them (Barto, Singh, & Chentanez, 2004; Nair et al., 2018; Santucci et al., 2016). However, intrinsic motivations are commonly used to guide intelligent machines and robots to seek knowledge in the external environment. Instead, according to the GARIM proposal they could guide the internal building of the knowledge that the agent lacks. Overall, there are few AI approaches that emulate the generation of emotions (for reviews see Mirolli et al., 2010; Paiva et al., 2012; Sun, Wilson, & Lynch, 2016). These models could be used as a starting point for implementing the emotion-based evaluation of the internally generated reality required by GARIM models. Machine consciousness: what is missing? The two architecture schemes we proposed for guiding the development of GARIM-based computational models (Figure 8) and GARIM-inspired AI/robotic architecture (Figure 9) are proposed to include the main elements needed for developing conscious artificial systems. For example, they include the main features of machine consciousness systems (Reggia, 2013), namely: self-modelling, information broadcasting, higher-level representations, attention processes, and information integration. Moreover, they include the key processes proposed by Aleksander (1995): world models, imagination, attention, planning, and affective evaluation. However, critical elements for building conscious machines may still be missing. We briefly list them here. First, the four macro-systems proposed by the GARIM theory require important low-level functions to support the emergence of consciousness. For example, the brain shows a high capacity for creating associations, and at the same time to avoid unbounded activation. This are based on its grid-like circuits and finely regulated inhibitory processes. These features are missing in common artificial neural network architectures, which favour bottom-up/top-down directional information flows with few recurrences (Lynn & Bassett, 2019). Second, the brain exhibits highly dynamic processes that are likely based on fixed point/cycle/toroid attractors, that neu- ral networks are still not able to fully emulate. These elements might be needed to implement the GARIM processes supporting the selection of multiple goal-aligned sub-GINPs (Breakspear, 2017). Third, the flexible selection functions implemented by the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops are only partially captured by current neural network systems. Fourth, strongly-coupled sensorimotor loops engaged by animals with the environment are often absent in AI systems. Moreover, current robots have still a very limited autonomy to interact with the environment. Agent-environment interactions might instead be very important to acquire internal representations strongly coupled with the real environment. Last, current systems lack a language system that adequately describes sensorimotor experience and has a grounded semantic. Overall, the realisation and integration of all these elements, possibly important to support the emergence of consciousness, is still a great open challenge. Much of the flexibility of the brain is based on its highly structured and highly integrated architecture, which seems difficult to reproduce in artificial systems. Indeed, the brain highly integrated Pavlovian, habitual, and goal-directed processes is the product of a long evolutionary process that we cannot reproduce in machines (Baldassarre & Granato, 2020; Baldassarre et al., 2017; Caligiore et al., 2019; Ullman, 2019). The possibility of having conscious intelligent machines without relying on such a highly integrated architecture is thus open problem. Conclusions In this work we introduce the Goal-Aligning Representation Internal Manipulation (GARIM) theory of consciousness. The theory proposes a functional view of consciousness. Consciousness emerged in the course of evolution to support the production of more flexible goal-directed behaviour. This function is based on the ability of conscious processes to perform internal manipulations of representations of all elements involved in goal-directed processes (e.g., objects, goals, actions, plans; and sets or parts of them). These manipulations of representations allow conscious agents to internally construct the knowledge they lack in order to achieve desired goals. For example these processes allow them to better predict the consequences of actions and thus support decision-making, to formulate action plans to achieve desired goals, or to devise solutions to solve problems. Thus consciousness continuously operates on its own contents, encoded in the brain currently active goal integrated neural patter (GINP), to improve its goal-alignment. This refers to the probability that the GINP will produce actions that successfully realise the desired goals. The brain performs these manipulations on the basis of four highly integrated macro-systems: (a) perceptual working-memories, based on the hierarchical sensorimotor pathways of the cortex, encoding percepts at different lev- 30 GIANLUCA BALDASSARRE1 els of abstraction, and employing generative mechanisms to support imagination and internal simulations; (b) an abstract working memory, based on the basal ganglia, hippocampal and prefrontal cortex systems, hosting abstract dynamical representations; (c) an internal manipulator, based on the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops and the fronto-parietal system, performing the manipulation processes; (d) a motivational component, based on distributed cortical and subcortical systems, supporting the formation and activation of goals and guiding the manipulation processes. The four systems implement four classes of manipulation GARIM operations, all dependent on the pursued goals: (a) abstraction, which selects more abstract representations of mental contents; (b) specification, which starting from more abstract representations integrates information into them to produce more detailed representations; (c) decomposition, which separates representations in parts; (d) composition, which chunks representations into wholes. These operations allow conscious agents to build the knowledge they lack to face novel goals and conditions, or to improve their goalalignement to pursue familiar goals more effectively. The GARIM theory gives four major contributions to the study of consciousness. First, the theory represents a new functional view on consciousness that integrates multiple relevant aspects of it by linking them to goal-directed processes. In particular, the theory integrates the key elements of consciousness highlighted by relevant theories in the field, also specifying the computational and neuro-functional mechanisms underlying them. Second, the theory clarifies some aspects of the subjective experience of consciousness, proposing the novel concept of GARIM agency. This refers to the fact that conscious agents construct a simulated internal reality involving themselves, vividly perceive and emotionally feel this internal reality in a manner similar to the experiences of the external world, and have an intense sense of active control of the representation manipulations. The theory also provides a scale to measure the ‘GARIM agency levels’, usable to interpret typical and altered psychological phenomena. Third, the theory contributes to the experimental and clinical investigations on consciousness. In particular, it proposes new interpretations of some existing experimental and clinical evidence related to consciousness. Moreover it gives indications for building new experimental paradigms to test consciousness, pivoting on goal-directed manipulations and the GARIM agency. Finally, the theory gives initial indications for building neurocomputational models of consciousness and more flexible general-purpose AI and robotic architectures. The scope and neurocomputational foundation of the GARIM theory make it a framework that can be used to integrate important concepts and experiments proposed by relevant theories on consciousness. Moreover, due to its core principles grounded on the goal-aligning manipulations of representations, the theory closely links the concepts and phenomena related to consciousness to those related to flexible goal-directed behaviour—the two most sophisticated manifestations of the human brain and cognition. Acknowledgements This work has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program, project ‘GOAL-Robots – Goal-based Open-ended Autonomous Learning Robots’, Grant Agreement No 713010, and from the ‘HBP – Human Brain Project HBP SGA3’, Grant Agreement No 945539. We thank Emilio Cartoni and Andrea Mattera for the useful feedback on the first versions of the manuscript. References Aaronson, S. (2014). Why i am not an integrated information theorist (or, the unconscious expander). Shtetl Optimized: The Blog of Scott Aaronson. Aleksander, I. (1995). Artificial neuroconsciousness an update. In International workshop on artificial neural networks (pp. 566–583). Aleksander, I., & Dunmall, B. (2003). Axioms and tests for the presence of minimal consciousness in agents. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 10(4-5), 7–18. Alfieri, V., Mattera, A., & Baldassarre, G. (2022). Neural circuits underlying social fear in rodents: An integrative computational model. 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204 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Article The ‘Core’ Concept and the Mathematical Mind: Part II Chris King* ABSTRACT Pure mathematics is often seen as an ‘inverted pyramid’, in which algebra and analysis stand at the focal point, without which students could not possibly have a firm grounding for graduate studies. This paper examines a variety of evidence from brain studies of mathematical cognition, from mathematics in early child development, from studies of the gatherer-hunter mind, from a variety of puzzles, games and other human activities, from theories emerging from physical cosmology, and from burgeoning mathematical resources on the internet that suggest, to the contrary, that mathematics is a cultural language more akin to a maze than a focally-based hierarchy; that topology, geometry and dynamics are fundamental to the human mathematical mind; and that an exclusive focus on algebra and analysis may rather explain an increasing rift between modern mathematics and the ‘real world’ of the human population. Part II of this article includes: 4: Puzzles and Games as an Expression of Human Mathematical Imagination 5: State Space Graphs and Strategic Topologies 6: The Brain’s Eye View of Mathematics 7: The Fractal Topology of Cosmology Key Words: core concept, mathematical mind, brain, real world. 5: State Space Graphs and Strategic Topologies Virtually every puzzle, whether logical, conceptual, arithmetic, geometric, topological or strategic is navigated by a human subject in an abstract journey from beginning state to solution, through many possible cul-de-sacs in a journey which takes the form of a connected path along the nodes of a graph of states which constitutes a maze of intermediate positions. This is a process akin to a journey through the wilderness in which various conceptual attributes essential for solving the puzzle can point the way to the solution much as topographical signposts or at least sensibly reduce the huge space of possibilities to a feasible number of options. Although every solvable puzzle is path connected, the form and size of the state graphs can vary extremely. A regular graph with a standard set of moves, such as the Rubik revenge cube, can have a huge state space. By contrast state spaces in which the transitions are complex, irregular * Correspondence: Chris King http://www.dhushara.com E-Mail: chris@sexualparadox.org Note: This work was completed in February 2007. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 205 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 may have a much smaller state space, despite being of non-trivial difficulty. We now examine several different types of puzzle to investigate the common topological thread involved in navigating a connected path from starting point to solution. Example 5.1: Who Own the Zebra? This logical puzzle sometimes incorrectly attributed to Einstein consists of a series of logical statements associated with five colours of house, five nationalities, five drinks, five pets and five brands of cigarette. The solution to the puzzle is most easily performed by making a table of the items, and then analyzing the logical statements, to specify successive entries of the table, branching to deal with contingencies as little as possible. Given the statements listed below, we are asked: “Who owns the zebra?” and “Who drinks water? 1. 2. There are five houses. The Englishman lives in the red house. 3. The Spaniard owns the dog. 4. Coffee is drunk in the green house. 5. The Ukrainian drinks tea. 6. The green house is immediately to the right of the indigo house. 7. The Old Gold smoker owns snails. 8. Kools are smoked in the yellow house. 9. Milk is drunk in the middle house. 10. The Norwegian lives in the first house. 11. The man who smokes Chesterfields lives in the house next to the man with the fox. 12. Kools are smoked in the house next to the house where the horse is kept. 13. The Lucky Strike smoker drinks orange juice. 14. The Japanese smokes Parliaments. 15. The Norwegian lives next to the blue house. Figure 5.1: “Who Owns the Zebra?” portrayed as a strategic maze of puzzle states. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 206 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Figure 5.1 shows a decision-making tree maze for the puzzle, which is conveniently tabulated in the same way as the solution for ease of reading. Initially all but two of the statements are processed and incorporated into the table in terms of links between categories which determine the relative positions of the linked items. Although the puzzle is non-trivial its decision making state graph is a tree with only a few nodes once the logical statements, which can be processed simultaneously are grouped into one step. Because there are many ways of prioritizing the statements and in which order to deal with the categories, a human subject will frequently navigate a version of the tree, adding one or two extra assumptions, only to find they have reached an intractable position, returning to the trunk of the tree, or a variant of it, to try again, releasing some or all of the assumptions which led to intractability. In doing so, they are navigating a logical space, abstractly akin to making a path-connected journey in a topographical landscape. Figure 5.2: Maze Presentation of example 5.2 Example 5.2 The Five Peg Puzzle Figure 5.2 shows the maze for a puzzle in which one or two top rings can be moved, but only on to a ring, or empty peg of the same colour as the lower one. Again there are only a limited number of states because many moves rapidly lead to intractability. The graph now has trivial loops but is unidirectional upward because the moves are not reversible. Again the subject is traversing a conceptual territory, which can be described as a path-connected region. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 207 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Figure 5.4 Elementary Sudoku (left) has no numeric operations, being based only on each row, column and sub-square having distinct entries, as the colour-coded version (centre) shows. Black: initial puzzle. Blue: clues from horizontal and vertical lines. Purple: clues using subsquares. Red: final solution. This puzzle can be solved without contingencies and thus has a state space consisting of a meander maze - the unique path from start to solution (right). Similar colour codings are used to depict Cayley tables[24], which also have distinct entries in every row and column. Example 5.4 Elementary Sudoku Elementary Sudoku illustrates the ultimate simplicity of state space structure. Although it presents as a numeracy puzzle, it is simply a category-matching puzzle, as illustrated by colour coding, requiring only that every row, column and sub-square has nine distinct entries. Because all the numbers can be found simply by filling in numbers determined in sequence from the provided clues, the state graph is just a line, as in a meander maze figure 1.2, as illustrated right in figure 5.4. Advanced Sudoku however introduces fewer clues, requiring testing contingencies, and hence has a simply-connected tree maze as in example 5.1. Figure 5.5a: Four sequences of geometric moves in the Rubik 3-rings puzzle. Example 5.5 The Rubik Three Rings Puzzle The Rubik 3-rings puzzle consists of a set of eight diagonally grooved plates held together by nylon strings woven over three successive plates in a circuit in overlapping succession, so that the plates can be folded along certain axes joining the plates, changing the way the strings link the plates and creating new puzzle geometries. The aim of the puzzle is to fold the plates into a new arrangement where the three unlinked rings have seemingly impossibly become linked. This is possible because the reverse sides of the plates have pieces of a second image of the three rings linked through one another as shown in the heart shape in the centre of figure 5.5c, associated with an L-shaped geometry differing from the rectangular starting position. The puzzle presents an intriguing mix of geometrical and topological constraints, the weaving of the strings fixing the geometry of the hinged shapes, within the basic topology of a ring of plates ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 208 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 in which some, but never all, of the plates are able to be hinged out of the loop, at least temporarily. The weaving of the strings itself presents an interesting topological puzzle, which enables the eight rings in the rectangular configuration to be transformed in every possible way that retains their overall ring structure. There are 8 clockwise permutations of the plates, two directions of orientation around the ring and four orientations the square plates can adopt collectively. This gives 8 x 2 x 4 = 64 possible states of the rectangle, however we need to divide this figure by 2, since moving four steps round the ring rotates the whole rectangle through 180o, if the top row is coded abcd and the bottom row is an inverted efgh. The way the strings are woven enables all of the 32 possible states to be reached, although this might seem impossible from the way they are woven. Figure 5.5b Colour-coded weaving of the 8 closed loop string pairs holding the 8 3-ring puzzle plates in a loop. In figure 5.5b is shown the weaving of the 8 looped string pairs in a 4x2 arrangement, which remain unknotted throughout, although alternate plates have a double winding, with strings linking to 2 adjacent plates, spanning 3 in all. There are no vertical connections in the centre four plates, so the 8 plates form a ring. To solve the puzzle requires negotiating a series of geometrical transformations, some of which lead to cul-de-sacs, however there are four sequences of transformations illustrated in figure 5.5a, which lead to a rearrangement of the rectangular arrangement. In (a) the ring is folded and becomes a literal ring of 8 plates, which can be unfolded to form four rectangular states involving 3 transformations from the identity. In (b) the plates can be folded together above and then unfolded in the vertical direction from below, effectively rotating the plates through 90o. In (c) a sequence of moves takes the rectangle to a scrambled form of the L or heart-shape of the final solution, which can then be refolded from the other side of the L to gain a different transformation of the rectangle. There is a mirror image of this entire sequence, which forms an inverse transformation. Finally in (d) there is another move, which results in a new set of configurations, resulting in 7 transformations in all. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 209 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Figure 5.5c: The state space graph of the rectangular configurations presented as a noncommutative graph assembled on the 4-D hypercube of 32 states. Because the geometry of these moves is complex, we have a non-trivial puzzle which has a state space graph which has only 32 nodes corresponding to the 32 possible transformations of the 8 plates above, so we see another example of the trade off between individual transition complexity and state graph size. To analyze the state space graph, the seven possible transformations of the rectangular configuration, a Matlab simulation was made of each of the geometrical transformations and this was used to check the definition of each of the 7 transformations arising from each node. The result is shown in figure 5.5c. Although this is a richly interconnected graph with a large number of loops, navigating from one position to another is still difficult because several of the operations fail to commute in diverse ways, causing operations performed out of order to arrive at unfamiliar destinations. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 210 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 The seven transformations are colour-coded and the state of each node is illustrated and coded using the abcdefgh notation above. Each of the pairs of edges forming a parallelogram in the graph commute while the others do not. Each of the transformations are self-inverses, except for red-yellow shaded ones passing through the heart-shape intermediate, whose two forms are mutual inverses. There is a corresponding 32 node state graph for the heart-shapes, each of which is connected to two rectangles through inverse transformations, two of which emerge from each rectangle. Figure 5.5d Stages in disentangling the transformation group. (a) Graph of the 7 geometric operations t, o, p, v, r, l and op. (b) Reduced graph with 3 generators o, p, v and defining new generators n, q and e. (c) Rearrangement of vertices using the new generators results in a noncommutative hypercubic Cayley graph. To decode the actual 32-member group[25], first we eliminate redundant operations. Tracing the connections in figure 5.5d(a) we can see immediately that three of the key geometrical operations including the simplest (t) and the ones that pass through the heart solution (l and r) are composites of the others: t=opop, l=povp, r=opvp. Removing these yields the graph in (b) and a group with a presentation[26]: G o, p, v : o2 p2 v2 i, (op)4 (ov)4 (vp)4 i, opop ovov, ov opvp [5.5.1] In so doing, we have eliminated the very geometrical transformations that enabled us to get to the heart shaped solution. We should note that a similar description could be mounted of all the transformations of the 32 hearts. Examining the symmetries of the plates in figure 5.5c however, we can easily see that more natural operations are available which are composites of o, p, and v but represent fundamental symmetries of the rectangle. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 211 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 We define three new transformations of the rectangle (RH composition): 1. n=op Moves all the plates cyclically right by one step, rotating plates 180o when they move around the end of the ring. Four such moves rotate the rectangle through 180o leaving the puzzle unchanged. 2. q=pv Rotates alternate o plates 90 clockwise and anticlockwise. 3. e=pvpvo Reverses the orientation of the ring of 8 plates leaving the top left and bottom right plates unchanged. Given these generators, we can present the group G, with center[27] , i, nn t, qq, nnqq G n, e, q : n 4 q 4 e 2 i, qe eq, qn 1 nq , ne en C2 C2 as: 1 [5.5.2] We can then rearrange the vertices to reflect the symmetries and arrive at a non-commutative, hypercubic Cayley graph[28] for the transformation group as in figure 5.5d(c). If we use the 1 notation for a semi-direct product[29] action by inverting elements: ba ab , then, from the relations, G can be characterized by: G D4 qn 1 C4 C2 1 C4 1 C4 1 since eq qe qe and nq 1 , where D4 is the dihedral group of transformations of the square and C n is the cyclic group of order n (e.g. of integers modulo n under addition). Figure 5.6 A sample of die throws from “Petals Around the Rose” Example 5.6 Petals Around the Rose “Petals Around the Rose”[30] is a puzzle that is famous for its account of Paul Allen and Bill Gates introduction to it in a crowd returning from a computing conference in 1977, in which Bill was the last active player in the group to discover the rule. The game has only two clues. One is that the answers are all even, which becomes obvious after a few throws, and the other is “Petals around the Rose”, which is significant. No one is supposed to reveal anything more than the answer to a throw – never the rule itself. The problem to be solved, rather than one of deductive thinking as in the zebra puzzle is one of lateral thinking, faced with a seemingly irregular rule. The state space of the puzzle now consists of all the lateral shifts of thinking the subject might imagine, so it cannot be defined precisely in the way the previous examples were. There are a great variety of rules which could be applied, some involving adding or multiplying the values ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 on the faces, others counting how many die of a given value appear, others dealing with the geometry of the faces, the way the dice fall or the order of them in sequence, but each of these conjectures form part of the topography of the state space which the subject explores till they see a contradiction, until eventually they discover the rule, which for convenience I will print upside down in light grey below, so you can read it only if you can’t deduce it from the instances in figure 5.6. Critical to the irregularity is that the rule uses only partial information from the dice. This information is highlighted both by the high scores and the very low scores, which are overrepresented in the list in the figure in the interests of quick analysis. Figure 5.7a The unique simple perfect square of order 21 (the lowest possible order). Example 5.7 Squaring the square and Magic Squares Not all puzzles involve a state space. Some are better solved in one step, or a single defined process, e.g. by defining a system of equations. One such example is squaring the square[31] [32], where we are asked to find the relative dimensions of the tiled unequal squares fitting into a single large square in figure 5.7. This is an ideal candidate for using symbolic manipulation to take the boredom out of the algebra. We first investigate the geometry and compare a series of vertical and horizontal side lengths until we have generated enough equations for a unique solution, and set the smallest square to a suitable base number. The Matlab symbolic toolbox provides an ideal solution platform: syms a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u S=solve('l=k+u,f=k+l,g=f+l,h=g+i,c=h+i,b+g=c+h,o=p+u,o=j+n,a=d+e,b+c=f+g+h,s=m+r,t=r+s, q=p+t,a+b+c=d+e+f+g+h,a+b+c=s+t+q,a+b+c=m+n+o+p+q,a+d+m+s=a+e+j+n+t,a+d+m+s=c+ h+q,c+h+q=a+e+o+t,a+e+o=b+f+l+p,b+i=f+g,e+k=j+o+u,o+e=d+n,d+j=m+n'); C=struct2cell(S); u=2; for i=1:21 fprintf('%c=%2.0f ',char(96+i),eval(C{i})); end a=42 b=37 c=33 d=24 e=18 f=16 g=25 h=29 i=4 j=6 k=7 l=9 m=19 n=11 o=17 p=15 q=50 r= 8 s=27 t=35 u=2 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 213 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 However such puzzles are neither common, nor as popular as those which require a conceptual hunt through a space of possibilities, and in this case the problem is unique, being the only simple perfect square of order 21 (the lowest possible order), discovered in 1978 by A. J. W. Duijvestijn[33]. Figure 5.7b Lo Shu the unique 3x3 magic square is associative and generated by the Siamese method.. To explore the problem of puzzle generation in numeric puzzles we can explore the problem of magic squares[34]. A magic square is a square array of numbers, consisting of the distinct positive integers 1, 2, ..., arranged such that the sum of the numbers in any horizontal, vertical, or main diagonal line is always the same number, known as the magic constant . The unique 3x3 square was known to the ancient Chinese as Lo Shu. This is also associative if pairs of numbers symmetrically opposite the centre sum to . If all diagonals (including those obtained by wrapping around) of a magic square sum to the magic constant, the square is said to be a panmagic square also called a diabolic square. It is an unsolved problem to determine the number of magic squares of an arbitrary order, but the number of distinct magic squares (excluding those obtained by rotation and reflection) of order 1-5 are 1, 0, 1, 880, 275305224, and an estimate of order 6 is using Monte Carlo simulation and methods from statistical mechanics. The number of distinct diabolic squares of order 1-5 are 1, 0, 0, 48, 3600. Given the unbounded number of solutions one would expect there exists simple regular algorithms for generating magic squares and this is the case. The Siamese method consists of placing a 1 anywhere and placing 2, 3 etc. successively up the right hand diagonal (vector (1,1)) moving one down (break vector (0,-1) if we hit a filled square. Lo Shu in figure 5.7b can be seen to be generated in this way. The Siamese method will also generate diabolic magic squares of order 6k±1 with vector (2,-1) and break vector (1,1). Figure 5.7c A sample 4x4 square puzzle made by removing magic square entries, has a simple tree maze with two branch points, corresponding to contingencies in the bottom left and top right corners. Magic squares can be used to generate Sudoku-like puzzles with state space tree mazes of varying complexity. In figure 5.7c is shown a sample 4x4 diabolic magic square in which over half the entries have been omitted. The entries outside the square give the remainder when the existing entries are subtracted from the magic constant of 34. In the first stage the bottom- left entry is used to compare information from its row and column. This implies a corresponding set of contingencies in linked rows and columns leading to an impasse for one (the 9 in position ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 214 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 (1,2). This information can now be used to perform the same analysis for the top-right entry leading to the solution. Once again the numeric puzzle leads to a path-connected graph, in this case a tree with two branch points, giving the puzzle an underlying topological basis. Because the number of possible magic squares grows so rapidly, increasing the size of the square and reducing the number of given entries can rapidly lead to too many contingencies to make an interesting and ‘doable’ puzzle because of the load of multiplying contingences and the repetitious simple arithmetic involved. Example 5.8 2-D and 3-D Tiling with Polyminoes While some puzzles have one solution, which might be solved, like squaring the square, by a system of equations, an abstract proof, or a single algorithm, others have many possible solutions, often with their own internal irregularities, which require a brute force computational approach to find all the variations. One of the most persistent and intriguing types of puzzle to many people are geometrical tiling puzzles constructed out of systematic geometric variants, such as pentaminoes (all 12 configurations of 5 attached cubes in 2-D), the pieces of the soma cube (all 7 non-linear pieces of composed of 3 or 4 cubes in 3-D) and the Kwazy quilt made of all combinations of circles stellated with up to six regular apices. Figure 5.8a Anti-clockwise from top: 6 variants of the soma cube, viewed front and back, 6 variants of the ‘Lonpos Pyramid’, one of only 2 possible 3x20 pentamino solutions, ‘Kwazy Quilt’, and compound happy cube and hypercube illustrate tiling puzzles with multiple solutions. The soma cube was invented by Piet Hein[35] the scientist, artist, poet and inventor of games such as hex, during a lecture on quantum mechanics by Werner Heisenberg. There are 240 essentially distinct ways of doing so, as reputedly first enumerated one rainy afternoon in 1961 by John Conway and Mike Guy. However, if we count the internal symmetries of individual pieces within themselves, i.e. and the symmetries of the whole cube we arrive at . This might be compared with the maximum number of distinct, possibly non-tiling arrangements of the pieces in space . Because a subject assembles a cube using less tractable pieces first, it is relatively easy to find a solution, and to navigate in the maze of solution space ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 215 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 using geometrical intuition using as many back step as necessary to retreat from cul-de-sacs near completion. A variety of other geometrical shapes can also be made with the soma pieces, having varying degrees of constraint and hence difficulty. Likewise the ‘Lonpos Pyramid’ uses a subset of spherically-based 2-D polyminoes of sizes 3, 4 and 5 to build a pyramid, as well as rectangular solutions. Although the pieces are planar, the pyramidal solutions involve interlocking pieces aligned horizontally, vertically and obliquely. Since most are horizontal it is generally easier to solve from the apex of the pyramid, which places strong local constraints on the pieces to be used. The 12 2-D pentaminoes, known from the 19th century, are capable of tiling several rectangles of area 60 units, as well as other shapes, such as using 9 to tile versions of the individual pieces expanded 3 times in size (45 units area). The number of rectangular solutions are: . This might be compared with something like independent orderings and orientations of the 12 pieces. The rectangular puzzles each have similar difficulty, despite the varying number of solutions, because the narrower rectangles place more constraints on the feasible partial tilings. Figure 5.8b Four wooden interlocking puzzles. The popularity of such puzzles with both adults and children, including their variants in wood puzzles (left) that generally have only one way of being assembled, illustrates a strong theme involving the geometry of mental rotation, the topology of navigating a path in abstract solution space, and a preference for dealing with mathematical problems which have a strong sensory basis, are capable of direct manipulation and promote lateral thinking, to open unperceived avenues and avoid tunnel vision, as well as deductive reasoning. These themes all support a linkage between puzzles and gatherer hunter skills, which have evolved over long epochs and stand diametrically opposed to the dominance abstract linguistic-based axiomatic manipulations have in proofs in classical theoretical mathematics. The gulf between these perspectives becomes ever more acute in an era when pocket calculators and laptop computers are making redundant many of the arithmetic skills of mental calculation we have come to assume go hand in hand with civilization. Example 5.9 Peg Solitaire as a large State Space with Internal Symmetries ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 216 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Table 5.9 Successive board Tot positions in peg oles Moves Positions Winning Terminal Positions Dead Ends solitaire[36][37] 1 0 1 1 1 0 2 1 1 1 0 4 0 Peg solitaire has a long and 3 2 2 2 0 12 0 colourful history, being 4 3 8 8 0 60 0 spuriously attributed both to 5 4 39 38 0 296 0 native Americans and to a 6 5 171 164 0 1,338 0 French aristocrat 6 719 635 1 5,648 32 imprisoned in the Bastille, 7 8 7 2,757 2,089 0 21,842 0 but can be specifically 9 8 9,751 6,174 0 77,559 0 traced back to the court of 10 9 31,312 16,020 0 249,690 0 Louis XIV in 1697, from 11 10 89,927 35,749 1 717,788 280 when its repeated 12 11 229,614 68,326 1 1,834,379 31,920 representation in art shows it had wide popularity. In 13 12 517,854 112,788 0 4,138,302 0 the classical game, the 14 13 1,022,224 162,319 5 8,171,208 386,416 board is filled with pegs 15 14 1,753,737 204,992 10 14,020,166 1.82E+07 except for the central 16 15 2,598,215 230,230 7 20,773,236 5.24E+07 position, and the aim is by 17 16 3,312,423 230,230 27 26,482,824 5.69E+08 jumping over and removing 18 17 3,626,632 204,992 47 28,994,876 3.64E+10 successive pieces, to end 19 18 3,413,313 162,319 121 27,286,330 3.80E+11 with a single peg remaining 20 19 2,765,623 112,788 373 22,106,348 8.52E+12 in the centre. The English 21 20 1,930,324 68,326 925 15,425,572 1.96E+14 board forms a cross 22 21 1,160,977 35,749 1,972 9,274,496 3.72E+15 comprising 33 holes, as 23 22 600,372 16,020 3,346 4,792,664 5.31E+16 shown in figure 5.9 and 23 265,865 6,174 4,356 2,120,101 6.05E+17 admits multiple solutions, 24 25 24 100,565 2,089 4,256 800,152 4.41E+18 but the European version 26 25 32,250 635 3,054 255,544 2.16E+19 with four extra pegs does not admit a classical 27 26 8,688 164 1,715 68,236 8.25E+19 solution, so we shall 28 27 1,917 38 665 14,727 1.36E+20 consider the English game, 29 28 348 8 182 2,529 2.11E+20 although there are also 30 29 50 2 39 334 1.05E+20 many puzzle variants. 31 30 7 1 6 32 1.63E+19 32 31 2 1 2 5 8.17E+16 23475688 1679072 21111 187636299 5.77117E+20 A brute force attack on the possible number of positions in n moves gives the sequence in table 5.9. The total number of reachable board positions is the sum 23,475,688, while the total number of possible board positions is when symmetry is taken into account. So only about 2.2% of all possible board positions can be reached starting with the center vacant. ‘Tot Positions’ ignores the symmetries of board rotations and reflections which are factored out in ‘Positions’. Counting successive board positions into a cumulative set of plays, there are 577,116,156,815,309,849,672 or different complete game sequences, of which 40,861,647,040,079,968 or are solutions. Thus although there are theoretically a huge ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 217 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 number of solutions, the probability of finding one at random is about 1 in 10,000. Until a player finds a winning strategy, they tend to initially move in a haphazard way, hoping to arrive fortuitously at an end-game they can resolve more easily, and are thus unlikely to find a solution. Since any jump exchanges 2 pegs and a hole with 2 holes and a peg and the start position exchanges holes and pegs as well, there is a symmetry between start and finish, which means that exchanging pegs and holes and playing backwards from the finish will provide a complementary strategy to the original. This can be seen from the symmetry in the winning positions in table 5.9. One appealing winning sequence first collapses the cross to one move off a smaller central diamond game before closing in with a grand circuit. The complement to this game counter-intuitively removes the centre diamond before the arms of the cross arriving back at the centre. Figure 5.9 Five stages of a winning game of peg solitaire which first reduces the game to one move off a smaller diamond-shaped version of the game before making a grand tour leaving a single T which collapses to the solution. The reverse of this game with pegs exchanged for holes gives a second counter-intuitive solution in which the central diamond is first removed leaving the peripheral parts of the cross, finishing with a move to the centre. Other games win by an amorphous strategy. Figure 5.10 Cover maze from Supermazes[38] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 218 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Example 5.10 Mazes as Topological Puzzles Finally we return to mazes, which, in addition to underlying the solution space of every puzzle, constitute the most ancient and intrinsically topological form of puzzle known. The state space of the maze is precisely the set of positions negotiated in traversing it. Although, as in the example of figure 5.8 they may have a complex topology of overpasses and underpasses in the manner of knot theory, from the subjects point of view this is secondary to the path connecting the start and finish, so the structure of a maze is determined by its path-connected graph, which is trivially a line for a meander maze (figure 1.2), a tree for a simply-connected maze, which can then be traversed however laboriously by a systematic right hand rule following all cul-de-sacs to exhaustion, however in a maze with loops although there may be more than one path, the strategy needs to avoid becoming locked in cycles. While we are told Theseus had to follow Ariadne’s thread to return from slaying the Minotaur, this may have been merely to avoid becoming disoriented in the dark winding passage of the labyrinth, because the image of coins from Knossos from figure 1.2 suggests this, like Roman and floor mazes in many cathedrals was a simple meander maze requiring no choices, but just a long tortuous walk, in stark contrast to the duplicitous topological paths in the wilderness humanity has negotiated, since the dawn of history and the equally elaborate paths in state space we have discovered in analyzing the above puzzles. Some of theses state spaces like the Rubik revenge with and even Solitaire with are huge, but Go with board positions and Chess with an estimated possible games[39] and between and board positions at the 40th move surely take the breath away and make one realize the Machiavellian theory of the evolution of intelligence, based on social strategic bluffing for sexual favours and personal power in a complex human society of many players has an invincible and convincing ring to it! Example 5.11 Scissors-Paper-Stone Topological bifurcation as a basis for a complementary strategy space. Scissors-paper-stone is a game consisting of an apparently irresolvable cyclic transitive relationship of dominance. There is thus no specific winning set of moves and winning play depends on a bifurcation between two complementary strategies of defense and attack. The defensive strategy is to randomize your moves as completely as possible so the opponent has no pattern they can fix on to take advantage. The complementary attacking strategy is to deduce the opponent’s pattern and choose the move that will capture the move anticipated by the pattern. Various statistical deviations in human behavior can also be capitalized on. The choices are commonly skewed rock gaining 36% paper 30% and scissors 34% so a player can take advantage of the skew. Players also tend to pick moves that would have beaten their previous move, so ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 219 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 choosing a move which your opponent would have just defeated is a paradoxically winning strategy[40]. 6: The Brain’s Eye View of Mathematics Despite the strides of such techniques as the electro-encephalogram and functional magnetic resonance imaging, research into how mathematics is processed in the brain is still in its infancy. Evidence from cultural and development studies and the effects of brain injury, are rapidly being complemented by research to elucidate the localization in the brain of various aspects of mathematical reasoning, however these have so far dealt mainly with basic level mathematical skills such as raw numeracy – e.g. comparing numbers and tasks such as mental rotation, which are already the fare of psychological experiment. Figure 6.1 Sex differences in mathematical performance tests are not paralleled in verbal performance tests[41]. Views of the basis of mathematical reasoning in the brain vary widely. At one extreme is the notion that numeracy is a hard-wired genetically based trait[42] located in the left parietal lobe (related to finger counting) and even more basic than language. On a somewhat different tack, Stanislas Dehaene[43] the founder of the triple-code model discussed below, sees both hemispheres being involved in manipulating Arabic numerals and numerical quantities, but only the left hemisphere having access to the linguistic representation ofnumerals and to a verbal memory of arithmetic tables. There is some evidence for a genetic basis in mathematical ability, in subtle gender differences in performance at mathematical tasks[44], which is not reflected in language acquisition (figure 6.1) despite the significantly different degree of language lateralization in male and female brains (figure 6.2). Figure 6.2 Sexual differences in language processing[45]. These mathematics skill differences appear to be real and not just based on differences of educational opportunity. The most comprehensive study published in Science in 1995 found that in maths and science in the top ten percent, boys outnumbered girls three to one. In the top one percent there were seven boys to each girl. By contrast in language skills there were twice as ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 220 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 many boys at the bottom and twice as many girls at the top. In writing skills girls were so much better, boys were considered ‘at a rather profound disadvantage’[46]. Contrasting a biologically-based view of numeracy are studies which demonstrate cultural differences in the way the same numeracy problem is presented, such as those comparing Chinese and English speakers (figure 6.3). Whereas in both groups the inferior parietal cortex was activated by a task for numerical quantity comparison, such as a simple addition task, English speakers, largely employ a language process that relies on the left perisylvian cortices for mental calculation, while native Chinese speakers, instead, engage a visuo-premotor association network for the same task. Also raising doubts about the genetic basis of numeracy is the discovery of the Amazonian Pirahã [47] who live without any notions of numbers more specific than ‘some’ and cannot count. This is consistent with the fact that apart from some savant’s and geniuses such as Ramanujan[48], most people have a digit span of only seven, and a mental calculation capacity vastly inferior to a simple pocket calculator. Figure 6.3 Language-based differences in mathematical processing[49]. While some people from Noam Chomsky’s generative grammar[50] to Stephen Pinker’s “Language Instinct”[51] contend that language is a genetically based evolutionary trait, other models of language[52] see the genetic basis as more generalized and that spoken languages have ‘taken-over’, as increasingly efficient systems more in the manner of a computer virus through their cultural evolution by colloquial use. This view has support in the much more rapid evolution of languages and the fact that, while we do not know how long ago people first began speaking, written language has only a short human history, consistent with our reading skills being an adaption of more generalized visual pattern recognition systems. Since numeracy and mathematics depend prominently on Arabic numerals, although having a basis in analog comparison and finger counting, the visual symbolic basis of mathematics is likewise likely to be a cultural adaption. The brain consists of two hemispheres connected by a bunch of white matter called the Corpus callosum. Ever since split-brain experiments on monkeys there has been a fascination with the idea that the two hemispheres in humans may have different or complementary functions, stemming partly from the knowledge coming originally from war injuries and strokes that injury to the ‘dominant’ left hemisphere which is usually contra-laterally connected to the use of the right hand, is selectively devoted to language typified in Broca’s area of the frontal cortex which facilitates fluent speech and Wernike’s area of the temporal cortex, which mediates meaningful semantic constructions. Although this result came predominantly from men and brain scans on both sexes have subsequently showed that language acquisition in women is more bilateral than in men, the idea that the two hemispheres had complementary functions captured the imagination of neuroscientists. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 221 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 There is some evidence generally for this idea with music and creative language use having a partially complementary modularization to structured language. This in turn led to the idea that the more structured aspects of mathematics, such as algebra, and the more amorphous entangled aspects such as topology might be processed in different ways in complementary hemispheres. While this idea is appealing, there are few actual experiments that have tested the idea, and brain scan studies have tended to concentrate on elementary mathematical skills, which psychologists and neuroscientists can test on a wide variety of subjects researching basic brain skills, such as mental arithmetic and mental rotation, rather than complex abstract procedures. Theories about how mathematical reasoning is processed gravitate on common sense ideas linking specific sensory modalities, known linguistic capabilities and general principles of frontal cognitive processing to generate parallel processing models of brain-related modalities having a natural affinity with mathematical reasoning. Figure 6.4 Triple-code model[53] of numerical process in has support from independent component analysis of fMRI scans of mental addition and subtraction revealing four components. (a) bilateral inferior parietal component may reflect abstract representations of numerical quantity (analog code) (b) left perisylvian network including Broca’s and Wernike’s areas and basal ganglia reflecting language functions. (c) ventral occipitotemporal regions belonging to the ventral visual pathway and (d) secondary visual areas consistent with a visual Arabic code. For example the triple-code model[54] (figure 6.4) of numerical processing proposes that numbers are represented in three codes that serve different functions, have distinct functional neuroarchitectures, and are related to performance on specific tasks. The analog magnitude code represents numerical quantities on a mental number line, includes semantic knowledge regarding proximity (e.g., 5 is close to 6) and relative size (e.g., 5 is smaller than 6), is used in magnitude comparison and approximation tasks, among others, and is predicted to engage the bilateral inferior parietal regions. The auditory verbal code (or word frame) manipulates sequences of number words, is used for retrieving well-learned, rote, arithmetic facts such as addition and multiplication tables, and is predicted to engage general-purpose language modules, associated with memory and sequence execution. The visual Arabic code (or number form) represents and spatially manipulates numbers in Arabic format, is used for multi-digit calculation and parity judgments, and is predicted to engage bilateral inferior ventral occipito-temporal regions belonging to the ventral visual pathway, with the left used for visual identification of words and digits, and the right used only for simple Arabic numbers. In research focusing on the intra-parietal regions contrasting number comparison with other spatial tasks[55], number-specific activation was revealed in left IPS and right temporal regions, whereas when numbers were presented with other spatial stimuli the activation was bilateral[56]. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 222 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Figure 6.5 Unpracticed and learned tasks in multiplication and subtraction are contrasted[57]. Further support for the triple-code model comes from studies of learning complex arithmetic (multiplication)[58], where left hemispheric activations were dominant in the two contrasts between untrained and trained condition, suggesting that learning processes in arithmetic are predominantly supported by the left hemisphere. Activity in the left inferior frontal gyrus may accompany higher working memory demands in the untrained as compared to the trained condition. Contrasting trained versus untrained condition a significant focus of activation was found in the left angular gyrus. Following the triple-code model, the shift of activation within the parietal lobe from the intraparietal sulcus to the left angular gyrus suggests a modification from quantity-based processing to more automatic retrieval. A second study involving learning multiplication and subtraction supports similar conclusions (figure 6.5). This trend suggests that learned mathematical tasks of this kind become committed to linguistic memorization, once they are mastered. In contrast with this, an experiment where subjects were asked to analyze a simple mathematical relationship[59], e.g. x = A, B = A + 6, C = A+ 8 by either forming a number line picture, or constructing the left side of a solving equation e.g. , in both cases visual processing areas were activated and there were no significant differences in processing in language areas. This suggests visual processing areas are involved in forming equations, at least unfamiliar newly presented ones. An intriguing study, which has more implications for advanced mathematics, where real conjectures are examined and proved, or found false, examined brain areas activated when true and false equations were presented to the subject[60]. This study found greater activation to incorrect, compared to correct equations, in the left dorsolateral prefrontal left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, overlapping with brain areas known to be involved in working memory and interference processing. Figure 6.6 Prefrontal areas activated differentially when incorrect mathematical equations are presented. Extending this into the geometrical area and specifically with gifted adolescents is a study of mental rotation (figure 6.8) involving images such as 3-D polyminoes. In contrast to many neuroimaging studies, which have demonstrated mental rotation to be mediated primarily by the right parietal lobes, when performing 3-dimensional mental rotations, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 223 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 mathematically gifted male adolescents engage a qualitatively different brain network than those of average math ability, one that involves bilateral activation of the parietal lobes and frontal cortex, along with heightened activation of the anterior cingulate. Figure 6.7 Differential activation of the medial prefrontal cortex can predict a person’s intention to add or subtract two numbers[61]. It has also become possible to teach a computer to distinguish subjects’ intention to add or subtract two numbers, using analysis of detailed differential activation of the medial prefrontal cortex, giving predictions which are 70% accurate (figure 6.7). A brain imaging study of children learning algebra (simple linear equations)[62], shows that the same regions are active in children solving equations as are active in experienced adults solving equations, however practice has a more striking adaptive response in children. As with adults, practice in symbol manipulation produces a reduced activation in prefrontal cortex area. However, unlike adults, practice seems also to produce a decrease in a parietal area that is holding an image of the equation. This finding suggests that adolescents’ brain responses are more plastic and change more with practice. Figure 6.8 Mental rotation: Above average subjects, middle gifted subjects, below the difference in activation between the groups[63]. Other theorists have proposed differing models to the triplecode, in which there are modules for comprehension, calculation, and number production. The comprehension module translates word and Arabic numbers into abstract internal representations of numbers, calculations are performed on these representations, and then the abstract representations are converted to verbal or Arabic numbers using specific number production modules. Here amodal abstract internal representations of numbers are operated on, rather than numbers represented in specific codes (i.e., quantity, verbal, or Arabic). The differences between these models are great. For example damage in the first would give rise to failures of one modality of processing or another, while in the second particular abstract operations would be impaired. Functional activation would be different in the two cases when stimuli involving mathematical processing are presented to the subject. What do all these brain studies add up to and what bearing do they have on the sort of processes that go on in advanced mathematics? Although the subject trials rarely engage anything resembling the sort of advanced mathematics performed at the graduate level, they do suggest that a broad spectrum of brain areas are involved in mathematical reasoning, involving spatial ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 224 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 transformations, visual representation of closeness and relative position on the number line, recognition of numbers and algebraic expressions, making strategic and semantic decisions and transforming many of these processes into coded linguistic transformations as they become familiar and memorized. They also suggest that much of the basis for the richness of mathematics as a palpable reality come from sensory and spatial processes in contrast to the emphasis placed on formal linguistic logic in advanced mathematics. To ensure mathematics continues to be a real part of human culture and doesn’t suffer the same fate as classical languages such as Latin in a world of pocket calculators and laptop computers which obviate the need for mathematical expertise in much of the population, mathematicians need to stay in touch with the perceivable richness of science and artistry and imaginative challenge many directly perceivable areas of mathematics do provide without consigning all such problems to the trash can of triviality in an era when new classical results at the research level can only be produced in esoteric spaces through formal processes that stretch far beyond the rich landscapes human imagination into the ivory towers of formalism. 7: The Fractal Topology of Cosmology An acid test of abstract mathematics as a description of reality is how well it fits naturally with the emerging cosmological description of reality we are in the process of discovering. While physics had to face the demise of the classical paradigm forewarned in Kelvin’s two small dark clouds of quantum theory and relativity, classical mathematics has not yet come to terms with these changes to its singular foundations. Figure 7.1 Top: Quantum interference invokes wave-particle complementarity. Bottom: Wheeler delayed choice experiment. Quantum reality and cosmological relativity display troubling features which raise questions about the classical model of mathematics based on point-like singular elements in a space whose geometry is independent of its components. Rather than contrasting the discrete and continuous, quantum theory is indivisibly composed of complementary entities which posses both features through wave-particle complementarity, as illustrated in the interference experiment, figure 7.1, in which quanta released as localized ‘particles’ from individual atoms traverse a double slit as waves, only to be reabsorbed by individual atoms on a photographic plate in the interference fringes. Such complementarity arises from a feedback ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 225 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 process between dynamical energy and wave geometry, as expressed in Einstein’s law: [7.1] However the space-time properties of these quanta are counterintuitive, as can be seen from the Wheeler delayed-choice experiment, where changing the absorbing detector system, from interference detection to individual particle detection can change the apparent path taken by the quanta, long before they arrived. Worse still, in contrast to quantum theory, which is usually couched within space-time, general relativity applies a second feedback between energy and geometry, in the form of curvature of space-time, so that the geometry and topology of space is also a function of the dynamics. This makes integrating quantum theory and relativity a conceptual nightmare, because, in the event virtual black holes can be created by quantum uncertainty, space-time is locally a seething foam of wormholes, resulting in contradictory descriptions. Figure 7:2 The red-shifted cosmic fireball (a) has fluctuations consistent with being inflated quanta. Fractal inflation (b) provides a topological model of how the large-scale structure of the universe might expand forever. Whether or not it does is also a topological question between a closed and open manifold structure. An oracle for the fit of classical mathematics with reality is the elusive TOE, or theory of everything, which has remained just around the corner since Einstein made inroads into both quantum theory and relativity. In every respect, the search for a unified cosmological theory fundamentally brings topology into the picture and lays siege to classical notions such as point singularities. Inflation, as a key candidate theory of cosmic emergence, links events at the quantum and cosmological levels. Symmetry-breaking between the forces of nature at the quantum level is coupled to a switching from a phase of cosmic inflation in which an ‘anti-gravity’ causing an exponential decline in the curvature of the universe switches to attractive gravity, the kinetic energy thus equaling the gravitational potential energy, enabling the universe to be born out of almost nothing. At the quantum level, theories uniting gravity and the other forces are based on a variety of forms of symmetry-breaking, in which the differences between the two nuclear forces, electromagnetism and gravity arise from symmetry-breaking transformations of a super-force. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 226 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Figure 7.3 The standard model of physics involves a symmetry-breaking between electromagnetism and the weak and colour nuclear forces. A deeper symmetry-breaking is believed to unite gravity with the others. In the standard model of particle physics, the divergence, first of the weak force from electromagnetism, and then the color force of the quarks and strong nuclear force are mediated by forms of symmetry-breaking in which the bosons carrying the weak force take up a scalar Higgs’ particle and thus gain non-zero rest mass, at the same time quenching the inflationary anti-gravity effect of the Higgs’ field. The latent energy released by this process gives rise to the hot shower of particles in the big-bang’s aftermath. A similar but slightly different symmetrybreaking applies to the colour force that binds quarks, involving massless bound gluons. Figure 7.4 Feynman diagrams (a) 2nd order and (b) sample 4thorder terms in the infinite series determining the scattering interaction of two electrons. (c) The full set of 4th order terms. (d) The weak Wparticles act as heavy charged photons indicating symmetry-breaking. (e) Time-reversed electron scattering is positron-electron creation annihilation, showing virtual particles are time reversible[64]. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 227 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 Quantum field theories are fractal theories, because they define the force, say the electromagnetic scattering between two electrons, in terms of a power series of terms, mediated by virtual photons, summing every possible virtual particle interaction permitted by uncertainty, each of which corresponds to an increasingly elaborate Feynman space-time interaction diagram (figure 7.4 a-c). The series is convergent in the case of electromagnetism because the terms diminish by a factor [7.2] the so-called fine-structure constant. A major quest of all theories is such convergence, to avoid infinite energies or probabilities. Figure 7.5 Top: M-theory can unite several 10-D string theories and 11-D supergravity through dualities[65]. The holographic principle allows an n-D theory to be represented on an (n-1)-D surface. Lower left: dualities between theories can exchange vibration and topological winding modes of strings on the compactified dimensions[66]. The algebra of the groups may invoke the octonians, lower right. String excitations, bottom right, avoid point singularities, but result in topological connections when strings meet. Attempts to unite gravity with the other forces have proved more difficult, with a series of theories striving to hold the centre ground, from supergravity, through superstring[67] to higher dimensional (mem)brane M-theories[68]. All these theories have topological features attempting to get at the root of the singularities associated with the classical notion of point singularity and its infinite energy. They are broadly based on supersymmetry[69] – the idea that every force carrying boson of integer spin is matched by a matter-forming fermion of half-integer spin to ensure their independent contributions balance to give rise to a convergent theory. All string and brane theories are founded on removing the infinite energy of a point singularity by invoking the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 228 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 quantum vibrations of a topological loop or string, or membrane for small distance scales, resulting in a series of excited quantum states. Connecting several of these theories are principles of duality in which two theories with differing convergence properties can be seen to be dual, so that a non-convergent description in one corresponds to a convergent description in the other. This can result in dual descriptions of reality in which supposed fundamental particles, like quarks and neutrinos exchange roles with supposed composites of exotic particles like the magnetic monopole singularities of symmetry-breaking. These theories also share a basis in invoking a higher dimensional space, usually of 10 to 12 dimensions to make the theories convergent. This in turn raises the notorious compactification problem of how some of these dimensions can be topologically ‘rolled up’ into closed loops forming internal spaces representing the 10-12 internal symmetries of the twisted form of the forces of nature we experience as well as the four dimension of space-time. These theories involve topological orbifolds[70] – orbit generalizations of manifolds factored by a finite group of isometries, CalabiYau manifolds[71], topological bifurcations, and potentially up to candidate string [72] theories hypothetically representing multiverses with differing properties, only a vanishing few of which would support life and sentient observers, thus invoking the Anthropic principle[73], rather than cosmologically unique laws of symmetry and symmetry-breaking. Figure 7.6 How the lightest family of particles in the standard model appear as braids[74], [75], [76]. Each complete twist corresponds to a third unit of electric charge depending on the direction of the twist. (a) Electron neutrino and anti-neutrino correspond to mirror-image braidings. (b) Four states corresponding to the electron and positron with charge depending on the orientations of the twists. (c) Three colours of up quark and anti-down quark. An alternative to string and brane theory is loop quantum gravity[77] and topological quantum gravity based on braided preons (figure 7.6). Here again we have a topological basis, in which the fundamental particles are braids in space-time, consisting of more fundamental units called preons, three of which make up each quark and each lepton. The orientation of the twists in these ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 229 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 braids determine a fractional electric charge of which can sum in differing ways to the charge on the electron and positron or up and down quarks. The theory predicts many features of the standard model including the relationship between quarks and leptons, the charges of the two flavours of quark – up and down and the fact that each of these come in three colours corresponding to the combinations of one and two twist braids on the triplet and can model particle interactions through concatenation and splitting of braids. More recently Garrett Lisi’s “Exceptionally simple theory of Everything” [78], [79] attempts to integrate all the forces including gravity and interactions of both fermions and bosons in terms of the root vector system generating E8, with its subalgebras such as G2 and F4 representing subinteractions, such as the colour force. The connection he uses again represents the curvature and action on a four-dimensional topological manifold We thus find that all the candidate theories of reality have an intrinsic topological as well as an algebraic basis and all lead to situations in which the classical view of mathematical spaces is replaced by quantized versions, which fundamentally alter the founding assumptions. One can then ask whether the difficulty at arriving at a theory of everything results from the obtuseness of physicists, or the inadequacy of abstract mathematics as a cultural language of ideals to come to terms with the actual nature of the universe we find ourselves within. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 230 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 8: References In the interests of the maze-like nature of mathematics, these references have an emphasis on interlinked internet resources, particularly those from Mathworld and Wikipedia, which themselves provide direct access to the magical maze in the noosphere, which mathematics has become. References [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popperian_cosmology Andersen Johannes 1927 Maori String Figures, Steele Roberts Ltd., Wellington ISBN 1-877228-38-9 [3] Walker, Barbara 1971 A Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns, Pitman ISBN 0-273-36073-6 p139 [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travelling_salesman_problem [5] Dienes Zoltan, Holt Michael 1972 ZOO, Longman Group ISBN 0 582 18449 [6] Holt Michael 1973 Inner Ring Maths II, Ernest Benn ISBN 0 510 07872 9 [7] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/CollatzProblem.html [8] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collatz_conjecture [9] http://www.ericr.nl/wondrous/pathrecs.html [10] Stewart Ian1997 The Magical Maze: Seeing the world through the mathematical eye, Weidenfield & Nicholson, London [11] De Chardin Teilhard 1955 The Phenomenon of Man William Collins Sons & Coy. Ltd., London. [12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipschitz_continuity [13] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weierstrass_function [14] K. Falconer 1984 The Geometry of Fractal Sets, Oxford. [15] Barnsley, Michael 1988 Fractals Everywhere, Academic Press, New York. [16] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/WeierstrassFunction.html [17] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebesgue_measure [18] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitali_set [19] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreal_number [20] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_line_(topology) [21] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poincaré_conjecture [22] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Go.html [23] Schroeder M. 1993 Fractals, Chaos and Power Laws ISBN 0-7167-2136-8. [24] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/FiniteGroupT.html [25] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/FiniteGroup.html [26] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presentation_of_a_group [27] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_of_a_group [28] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cayley_graph [29] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semidirect_product [30] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petals_Around_the_Rose [31] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squaring_the_square [32] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/PerfectSquareDissection [33] Bouwkamp, C. J. and Duijvestijn, A. J. W. Catalogue of Simple Perfect Squared Squares of Orders 21 Through 25, Eindhoven Univ. Technology, Dept. Math, Report 92-WSK-03, Nov. 1992. [34] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/MagicSquare.html [35] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet_Hein_(Denmark) [36] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peg_solitaire [37] http://www.durangobill.com/Peg33.html [2] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 231 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 204-232 [38] Myers Bernard 1979 Supermazes No1, Fredrick Muller Ltd., London ISBN 0-584-10296-8 http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Chess.html [40] New Scientist 25 December 2007, 66-67 [41] Benbow Camilla 1988 Sex differences in mathematical reasoning ability in intellectually talented preadolescents: Their nature, effects and possible causes, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 11 169-232. [42] Butterworth, Brian 1999 What Counts: How every brain is hardwired for math, Free Press NY ISBN 0-684-85417-1 [43] Dehaene, Stanislas 1997 Number Sense: How the mind creates mathematics, Oxford University Press NY. [44] Kimura, Doreen 1992 Sex Differences in the Brain, Scientific American, Sept 81. [45] Shaywitz, B. and S. et. al. 1995 Sex differences in the functional organization of the brain for language. Nature 373, 607-9. [46] Blum Deborah 1997 Sex on the Brain, Penguin, N.Y. [47] von Bredow, Rafaela 2006 Living without Numbers or Time, Nature news May 3 [48] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan [49] Tang, Yiyuan et. al. 2006 Arithmetic processing in the brain shaped by cultures, Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. 103 10775-10780 [50] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generative_grammar [51] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Language_Instinct [52] Christiansen Morten, Kirby Simon (ed.) 2003 Language Evolution, Oxford University Press [53] Schmithorst VJ. Brown RD. 2004 Empirical validation of the triple-code model of numerical processing for complex math operations using functional MRI and group Independent Component Analysis of the mental addition and subtraction of fractions, Neuroimage 22(3) 1414-20. [54] Dehaene S et. al. 1999 Sources of Mathematical Thinking: Behavioral and Brain-Imaging Evidence Science 284 970-974. [55] Cohen Kadosh R et. al. 2005 Are numbers special? The comparison systems of the human brain investigated by fMRI Neuropsychologia 43 1238–1248. [56] Eger E et. al. 2003 A Supramodal Number Representation in Human Intraparietal Cortex Neuron, 37, 719–725. [57] Ischebeck A 2006 How specifically do we learn? Imaging the learning of multiplication and subtraction NeuroImage 30 1365–1375. [58] Delazer M et. al. 2003 Learning complex arithmetic—an fMRI study Cognitive Brain Research 18 7688. [59] Terao A et. al. An fMRI study of the Interplay of Symbolic and Visuo-spatial Systems in Mathematical Reasoning http://act-r.psy.cmu.edu/papers/679/paper507.pdf [60] Menon V et. al. 2002 Prefrontal Cortex Involvement in Processing Incorrect Arithmetic Equations: Evidence From Event-Related fMRI Human Brain Mapping 16:119–130. [61] Haynes, John Dylan 2007 Current Biology DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2006.11.072. [62] Qin Y et. al. 2004 The change of the brain activation patterns as children learn algebra equation solving Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. 101 5686 –5691. 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Jack Tuszynski 407456. http://www.math.auckland.ac.nz/~king/Preprints/pdf/tuz6.pdf [65] Hawking Stephen 2001 Universe in a Nutshell Bantam Books, NY [66] Duff, Michael 2003 The theory formerly known as strings (2nd ed.) in The Edge of Physics, Scientific American [67] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstring_theory [68] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-theory [69] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersymmetry [70] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbifold [71] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calabi-Yau [72] Brumfiel Geoff 2006 Outrageous Fortune Nature 439 5 Jan p10. [73] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle [74] Castelvecchi D 2006 You are made of space-time New Scientist 12 Aug. [75] Bilson-Thompson Sundance 2006 A topological model of composite preons http://www.arxiv.org/pdf/hep-ph/0503213 [76] Bilson-Thompson S, Markopoulou F, Smolin L 2006 Quantum Gravity and the Standard Model http://www.arxiv.org/pdf/hep-th/0603022 [77] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loop_quantum_gravity [78] http://arxiv.org/pdf/0711.0770 [79] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Exceptionally_Simple_Theory_of_Everything ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1006 Article Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness Lawrence C. Wile* ABSTRACT Reissner's fiber, a strategically located, glycoprotein, thread-like structure, consisting of 2-5 nanometer fibrils which runs through the center of the cerebral ventricles and central canal of the spinal cord is a unique site for investigating the interaction between quanta and consciousness. An intriguing possibility is that the degeneration of Reissner's fiber which is typically unconsciously perceived during the period of early separation and individuation of the ego, mirrors the primal origin of our religious and mystic and traditions which witnessed the destruction of the unity of man, God and the cosmos. The "subtle anatomy" from ancient Hindu, Jewish and Chinese mystical traditions, which describes a cosmic energy within a hollow tube in the spine, may not be merely a metaphor for man's quest for God, but a description based on introspection of the degenerating. The emerging fields of quantum biology and epigenetics now offer the possibility of rediscovering lost secrets and reawakening dormant potentials of human consciousness. Key Words: Reissner's fiber, degeneration, quanta, consciousness, quantum biology. 1. Introduction The ethereal properties of quantum superposition and non-locality have inspired new explorations of the perennial mind brain problem. One of the earliest solutions to the measurement problem of quantum mechanics was that consciousness collapses the wave function (London, 1939; Stapp, 1993). Neuroscientists have now joined physicists in the development of quantum biophysical models of the relationship between mind and matter. Sir John Eccles (Eccles, 1994) proposed a quantum mechanical model of free will based on the effects of conscious intention on the region of quantum uncertainty within the 5 nanometer membranes surrounding synaptic vesicles (Beck, 1996). Quantum tunneling between helices comprising neural ion channels has also been proposed as the site of action of the will. (Chauncey, 1992) Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose have developed a model of consciousness based on orchestrated objective collapses of quantum coherent electrons within hydrophobic pockets of tubulin proteins comprising microtubules operate at the interface between mind and matter. Quantum coherences involving nuclear spins (Hu, 2002) or phonons resulting from dipole oscillations (Frohlich, 1983) in neural membranes have also been proposed as correlates of consciousness. *Correspondence: Lawrence C. Wile, M.D., Chaikin-Wile Foundation. E-mail: chaikinwile@aol.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1007 David Bohm proposed that the holism of quantum field theory points toward an enfolded, holographic, implicate order which unfolds into our explicate world of mind and matter. Karl Pribram has linked Bohm's ideas with a holographic model of the brain organized around oscillations of dendritic fields. He believes that these new pathways will lead to a new convergence of science and spirit which could heal mankind's strife. During past forty years I have been investigating a little-known, constantly growing, thread-like glycoprotein complex consisting of 2-5 nanometer fibrils called Reissner's fiber as a site of quantum behaviors. I was first led to this enigmatic fiber through an exploration of the possibility that the parallels between esoteric traditions and modern physics are based on expanded states of consciousness produced by the activity of the "subtle body" described since the dawn of history. Yoga, kabbalah, and acupuncture as applied Taoism each describe a pycho/sexual/spiritual energy--kundalini, chi, and shekinah respectively-- which travels through a passageway through the center of the brain and spinal cord. This passageway corresponds to the central canal of the spinal cord and the third and fourth cerebral ventricles. The caudal end of the central canal is a triangular dilation called the terminal ventricle which is surrounded by hormone secreting and sensory cells. The cephalic end of the third ventricle is the pineal gland which has photosensory and hormone secreting properties. Based on this anatomical correspondence I explored the possibility that ordered water or liquid crystals within the central canal and cerebral ventricles are the substrate of quantum coherence and entanglement. As I was preparing to investigate this hypothesis using time-resolved fluorescent microscopy of the cerebrospinal fluid in the exposed fourth ventricle of a frog, I serendipitously came across an article about Reissner's fiber (Wile, 1991). Astounded that this remarkable, conspicuous, strategically located structure, which seemed to materialize from the reflections of ancients symbols and quantum biophysical speculations, was absent from textbooks, I explored its history. 2. History of Reissner’s fiber Reissner’s fiber was discovered in 1860 when Ernst Reissner observed a threadlike structure in the central canal of a lamprey. Three years later, in 1863, Karl Kutschin confirmed Reissner’s discovery, naming it “Reissner’s fiber.” In 1868, however, Ludwig Stieda asserted that the spinal fluid and the chemicals used to preserve specimens had coagulated, creating a viscous thread—which had been mistakenly identified as a biological structure. Although Reissner’s fiber is a small, sharply-defined thread in fresh specimens, anatomists at that time were quick to embrace Steida’s skepticism. Nothing could dissuade them—Viault in 1876, Rohon in 1877, Sanders in 1878 and 1894, and Gadow in 1891—from seeing Reissner’s fiber as anything more than an artifact. In 1876, a twenty-year-old neuroscientist, Sigmund Freud, just starting his career, brushed by the fiber. He was investigating another of Reissner’s discoveries--Reissner's cells. They are located ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1008 in the core of the spinal cord, millimeters away from the fiber. Freud used lampreys and corresponded with two scientists, Kutshcin and Steida, who were sparring over the nature of Reissner’s fiber. But none of Freud's writings refer to the fiber. In the spring of 1899, Porter Sargent, a twenty-seven-year-old Harvard doctoral candidate, examining lengthwise sections of the spinal cord of a lamprey, observed a glistening fiber in the central canal. Perplexed that Reissner's fiber was not mentioned in his texts, he wrote, "It is remarkable that so peculiar and conspicuous a structure as Reissner’s fiber, which is of such great importance in the nervous anatomy as to persist throughout the vertebrate series, should have remained so little known for forty years after its discovery.” In 1904, Sargent published his research, providing anatomical and experimental evidence to support the hypothesis that the fiber is a “highly specialized conduction path,” transmitting signals faster than “ordinary axis cylinders.” He concluded his paper by announcing that his next paper dealing with the fiber's "significance in higher vertebrates" was "well advanced." However, shortly after a contentious defense of his doctoral thesis, Sargent abandoned his research to become a "poet, educator and world traveler." Porter Sargent’s final publication in 1950 was titled, Is Poetry a Secretion? The title’s allusion to brain activity was as near as Sargent would come to divulging his youthful incarnation as a serious scientist. Although Sargent's hypothesis of high speed transmission of signals through Reissner's fiber was generally accepted, it competed with widely divergent views about its nature and function. While Sargent sometimes characterized the fiber as an axon, this term was still imprecise. Robert Albert von Kölliker himself, the discoverer of the axon, who coined the term in 1896, wasn’t able to decide if Reissner’s fiber was an axon, artifact, or a crystallization of biological secretions. In 1909, George Nicholls attempted to refute Sargent's hypothesis by showing the fiber isn't a nerve. With Sargent no longer competing in the scientific arena, Nicholls' false characterization of Sargent's ideas prevailed. Nicholls followed his faulty refutation of Sargent's hypothesis by mischaracterizing of the fiber as a coalescence of cilia and proposing the mistaken hypothesis that Reissner’s fiber is “a rubber band” regulating the flexure of the body. Nicholls also observed the fiber coils in the terminal ventricle. He dismissed this coiling as an artifact resulting from breakage. He referred to Reissner’s fiber’s coiled ending as the “terminal plug.” His later investigations of humans established the conclusion that both Reissner's fiber and its primary source, the subcommissural organ, regress during infancy. Sargent's hypothesis of novel, highly specialized, high speed conduction through Reissner's fiber drifted to the fringes after Nicholls falsely claimed to have refuted it by showing the fiber is not a nerve. As science's theoretical models and technologies focused on the electrochemical activity of neural membranes Reissner's fiber became disconnected from the new science of neurophysiology. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1009 As Reissner’s fiber faded into scientific oblivion, it was “rediscovered” by Theos Bernard, the first American ever initiated into Tantric Yoga practices by the highest lama in Tibet. In his memoir of his travels to India and Tibet, titled Heaven Lies Within Us, published in 1940, Bernard wrote, “Inside this central (Sushumna) nadi, the Yogi identifies an invisible nadi known in the West as the fibre of Reissner, but which is known here as Chittra (the Heavenly Passage, in Sanskrit).” Seven years later, at the age of thirty-nine, while searching for a “rare manuscript” in the hill of Spiti, India, Bernard was rumored to have been attacked by Lahouli tribesman. He was never seen again. His identification of Reissner’s fiber and the innermost nadi vanished with him. In 1954, Dr. Masashi Enami, a Japanese neuroendocrinologist at Gunma University made two important discoveries: a biologically active substance in the cells surrounding the terminal ventricle, and a new Reissner's fiber pathway. First, using extracts from cells surrounding the terminal ventricles of fish, Enami discovered a substance that influences sexual behavior and buoyancy. Ten years later, the substance Enami had discovered was isolated (Fridberg,1968). It was found to be a potent constrictor of blood vessels and named urtotensin (Ames, 1999). Second, examining the brains of eels, Enami found a new branch of Reissner’s fiber traveling above the floor of the third ventricle, from the hypothalamus to the subcommissural organ, just below the pineal gland. Shortly after his discovery of a new branch of Reissner's fiber, days before a scheduled presentation in San Francisco of a paper integrating Reissner's fiber, the terminal ventricle, the subcommissural organ and the hypothalamus, he died. In 1960, a North Korean scientist began investigating the possible neuroanatomical basis of acupuncture meridians. Injecting radioactive phosphorous (P32) into acupuncture points on a rabbit’s abdomen, Professor Kim Bong Han traced its flow along the meridians. Injections at other sites dispersed without any discernible difference between the meridians and the surrounding tissues. The most conspicuous and strategically located structure labeled by Bong Han’s injections was Reissner's fiber. Apparently unaware that Ernst Reissner had discovered it one hundred years earlier, Bong Han named his “discovery” the central Bong Han duct.. (Consistent with Bong Han’s characterization of the fiber as duct-like were the observations of G. Erbl-Roth. In 1951, this German researcher succeeded in collecting fresh specimens of the fiber from mammals. She found that the fiber was hollow, and developed techniques to make injections into the fiber’s core.) At the time, in 1964, the North Korean government praised Bong Han’s theory as a “monumental theory in global science.” Bong Han was an instant hero, rising to the fourth highest position in the North Korean government. But in 1965, North Korea purged Bong Han from the government, discrediting his work, claiming he’d withheld details of his methodology. They reported that his results were irreproducible. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1010 After decades of neglect, a group from Seoul National University (Kwang-Sup, 2009) has developed novel methods using modern technology to reexamine Bong Han's claims. Recently they reported a novel threadlike structures in the cerebral ventricles and central canal (Lee, 2008). In 1961, a group of Spanish pathologists (Gomez et. al.,1961) examined the brain of a recently deceased sixty-year-old victim of a car crash. Contrary to what they’d learned in the textbooks, the victim had a fully-developed subcommissural organ. Nevertheless, researchers continued to accept Dendy and Nicholls’ 1912 conclusions about the universal regression of the subcommissural organ in adult humans. In 1969, a Japanese neuroscientist, Kunio Kohno, turned up the magnification on Reissner’s fiber’s hitherto invisible internal structure with an electron microscope. He revealed a marvelously intricate network of five-nanometer fibrils and tiny spheres surrounded by threelayered membranes. Kohno dismissed the internal structures he’d discovered as “cell detritus.” In the 1970s, a group of German neuroscientists (Hess, J. 1972) showed that Reissner's fiber binds neurotransmitters. Curiously, while neurotransmitters play a vital role in the electrochemical activity of neural synapses, these scientists concluded, disparagingly, that Reissner's fiber's binding of them detoxifies the cerebrospinal fluid. In 1982 Dr. D. H. M. Woollam, neurosurgeon and Director of Studies in Medicine at Emmanuel College in Cambridge, England, proposed that Reissner’s fiber could be a possible site for future neurosurgical treatment of hydrocephalus. He proposed that the fiber "has an important function and that its presence is by no means for purely ornamental purposes," and that the significance of the surrounding cerebrospinal fluid "will return to the exalted position it occupied in the 1,700 years of Galenical medicine." Thirty years later, his vision is no closer to reality. During the past decade a group of substances associated with Reissner's fiber, spondins, have been discovered. They play a crucial role in the guidance and differentiation of developing nerve cells. Reissner's fiber has been observed in human embryos and fetuses (Dendy, 1910). While Reissner's fiber is currently thought to degenerate shortly after birth in humans, it is possible that is has merely eluded detection or exists as a rare anomaly. The fiber is very fragile and undergoes rapid post-mortem disintegration. It is too small to be detected by current imaging devices. Reissner's fiber's fragility, fineness, rapid post-mortem degeneration, inaccessibility, non-cellular structure, and apparent early degeneration in humans, combined with the vicissitudes of previous investigators, have made this spectacularly strategic structure an enigma for over 150 years. It remains largely outside the methods and theories of neurobiology. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1011 3. Recent Development During the past seven years I have assembled an interdisciplinary team of neuroscientists and physicists at Boston University to investigate Reissner's fiber. First we developed a transgenic zebrafish in which the expression of green fluorescent protein is under control of the promoter for F-spondin, an extra-cellular matrix protein associated with Reissner's fiber. This effective visual tool has allowed for detailed anatomical localization of F-spondin and helps us focus on Reissner's fiber in living animals. This tool has been incorporated into ongoing research on morphogenesis, biological clocks and temporal perception. Next we developed a new tool for studying ultra-weak optical fields potentially emitted by Reissner's fiber: a super-conducting single photon detectors providing input to a time-correlated single photon counting system with picosecond resolution. Specially designed nanopositioners and a confocal microscope allow us to focus on the fiber. Femtosecond pulsed infrared lasers can stimulate the fiber. Due to the reduced photobleaching and phototoxicity of infrared imaging, we will be able to investigate photon dynamics (relaxation and internal excitations) for extended periods, allowing us to document time-dependent oscillatory processes under natural conditions. The goal of our research is to find evidence of quantum coherence and entanglement associated with Reissner's fiber to establish the fiber as a site of the interaction between quantum mechanics and consciousness. Reissner's fiber could provide a new relationship with the quantum world. The fluid-filled cavities of the ventricles and their surface could function as a quantum feedback and control system analogous to a quantum cavity apparatus. Ordered water and liquid crystals within the ventricles could be a cavity resonator. The ventricular surface could be a detector for feedback loops to the brain. The triggerings of our external sense are generally assumed to be the sole generators of our perpetual experience. Neurobiological features of the Reissner's fiber apparatus suggest that it too may be capable of generating percepts. The ventricular surface and the external sensory organs share a common embryological origin. The cells on the inner surface form an inner directed sensory system while the cells on the outer the surface form our external senses. 1913, Daniel Tretjakov observed that cilia and nerve endings lining the ventricles come in contact with Reissner’s fiber. He claimed to have discovered a “central sense organ” attuned to the fiber it surrounded. In 1921, W. Kolmer proposed that the subcommissural organ (the main source of Reissner's fiber), Reissner’s fiber, and cilia and cerebrospinal fluid-contacting neurons located along the walls of the brain and central canal form an integrated sensory system that he named the sagittal organ. He compared Reissner’s fiber to the gel-like substance of the inner ear (tectorial membrane) which lies beneath a thin sheet of cells (Reissner’s membrane). Just as the vibrations of the hair cells and the tectorial membrane transmit signals to the auditory nerve to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1012 produce the sensation of sound, so, too, do vibrations of the cilia that touch Reissner’s fiber transit signals to the cerebrospinal fluid contacting neurons to produce sensory experiences. Competing with these hypotheses of an inner-directed sensory system attuned to Reissner’s fiber was Eric Agduhr. His 137-page manuscript dealing with the “central sensory organ in vertebrates” concluded that Reissner’s fiber and the cerebrospinal-fluid-contacting neurons aren’t part of an integrated system. Based on his dissections of 206 species of vertebrates, Agduhr proposed an “ependymal sensory organ” independent of Reissner’s fiber. Nine years after Agduhr published his criticisms, Kolmer countered with new research based on observation of lizards, snakes, and Rhesus monkeys. But it was too late. Science had already passed its judgment, and the hypothesis that a sensory system perceives Reissner’s fiber faded away. Recent research of a group of specialized circumventricular organs, (including the pineal gland, subcommissural organ, area postrema, organum vasculosum of the lamina terminalis, subfornical organ, median eminence, and the posterior pituitary), have revived interest in the sensory capabilities of the ventricular surface (Jurzak, 1999). Advances in molecular biology have revived the hypothesis that cilia and cerebrospinal fluid-contacting neurons have a sensory function. (Vigh, 1983,1998; Vigh-Teichmann, 1983). An interesting group of cerebrospinal fluid-contacting neurons are projected from the raphe nucleus. These serotonergic fibers are thought to play a key role in the mechanism of action of LSD (Agajanian,1978). Interestingly the psychoactive properties of LSD are correlated with the energy of its outermost electron orbitals, a quantum mechanical property, rather than its ability to bind to serotonin receptors (Snyder, 1968). 4. Possible Quantum Connections While the correspondences between the Reissner' fiber apparatus and the subtle anatomy, and the parallels between modern physics and ancient esoteric traditions bring us closer to a possible convergence between science and spirit, the demonstration that the Reissner's fiber apparatus functions as quantum feedback and control system would not prove it. The ultimate validation of the hypothesis that Reissner's fiber can realize the mystics' vision of direct experience of the Absolute would be direct, immediate experience of the fiber's uncollapsed wave function. Here we would have direct knowledge, an "immaculate perception" of reality in itself rather than reconstructed sensory reality. Quantum reality lies at the boundary of nothingness and infinity, time and eternity. It corresponds to what yogis, kabbalist and acupuncturists call Brahmin, EinSof and the Tao, respectively. Such knowledge is precluded by the current paradigm of modern physics. Quantum mechanics dismisses questions about the reality of quanta prior to a measurement as meaningless. Quanta collapse, decohere or split into parallel universes when they are observed. The equations of quantum mechanics do not directly correspond to reality. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1013 The limits of quantum uncertainty become more formidable when quantum mechanics encounters gravity at distances shorter than 10-33 cm. and durations less than 10-44 seconds, Planck units. Here quantum fluctuations churn the space-time continuum into a "quantum foam." Cosmologists extrapolating back to the origin of the Big Bang have rediscovered the mystics' understanding of eternity, not as time extending infinitely into the past, but as a "place" beyond space and time from which they were both created. An analysis of black holes has shown that a bit of information is equivalent to a square Planck unit, and that the three spatial dimensions of the universe can be holographically encoded on a two dimensional surface. String theorists hypothesize that at least six dimensions are compacted and thereby hidden in a region smaller than a radius of a Planck unit. "There is no quantum world. There is only an abstract quantum description,” said Bohr. Besides, added Heisenberg, “The use of classical concepts is finally a consequence of the general way of thinking. There is no use in discussing what could be done if we were other beings than we are.” Einstein disagreed. "It sounds like a system of delusions of an exceedingly intelligent paranoiac, concocted of incoherent elements of thought," replied Einstein. “The Bohr-Heisenberg tranquilizing philosophy—or religion?—is so delicately contrived that, for the time being, it provides a gentle pillow for the true believer from which he cannot very easily be aroused. So let him lie there…most of them simply do not see the risky game they’re playing with reality.” In 1935, Einstein, in collaboration with Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen, published an article, titled "Can Quantum Mechanical Descriptions of Reality Be Considered Complete?" It proposed a simple thought experiment: Two quanta interact, entering a state of quantum entanglement, then fly apart. If the predictions of quantum mechanics are correct, then the measurement of one quantum instantaneously determines the properties of the other. Neither quantum is real before it's measured. Quantum uncertainty can't be explained as a disturbance of a pre-existing reality. Rather is the random creation of a new reality. For thirty years the Einstein-Podolsky Rosen (EPR) experiment languished as physicists turned away from the philosophical conundrums of quantum theory. But in the late 1950s, a young Irish physics graduate student, J. S. Bell, began to rouse physicists from their dogmatic, metaphysical slumber. In 1964, using only simple algebra, Bell developed a way to analyze data from experiments using entangled quanta. In the early 1980s physicists carried out the experiments. They showed that it is impossible to get a more complete understanding of the results by adding signals traveling less than or equal to the speed of light, non-local hidden variables. Ironically, tragically, physicists used Bell's analysis of the EPR experiments to claim quantum mechanics draws the final boundary of human knowledge. They mistakenly believed that quantum mechanics could go beyond its boundaries only by adding something to it. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1014 Einstein and Bell, however wanted to complete quantum mechanics with revolutionary new idea, not by adding things to it.1,2 "Suppose," Bell wondered, "when formulation beyond all practical purposes is attempted, we find an unmovable finger obstinately pointing outside the subject, the mind of the observer, to the Hindu scriptures, to God.” “The new way of seeing things will involve an imaginative leap that’ll astonish us,” he exulted. 5. The Plausible Connections to the Mystical The imaginative leap created by Reissner's fiber would astound us. It would create a new circuit in the brain and open the doors of perception. Everything would appear as it is, infinite. According to esoteric traditions, mankind's dream-like oneness with God was broken thousands of years ago. The unity of language, ideas and experience fragmented. The secrets of the subtle body were lost. If the Reissner's fiber apparatus corresponds to the "subtle anatomy," then it probably degenerated during this evolutionary transition. The conjectured perceptions of the Reissner's fiber apparatus were witnessings of this degeneration. This evolutionary transition from our lost oneness with God was the commission of the" metaphysical original sin" of separating ideas and sensory experience (Einstein, 1949). We yearn to atone for this sin with the theoretic unifications of science. The spiritual teachings of esoteric tradition, developed from faded, fragments of our lost oneness, illuminate a parallel path. Both converge upon a union with God. Carl Jung proposed that our personal unconscious is attuned to that lost oneness which exists in the collective unconscious. This can be explained biologically by the ontogenic recapitulation of Reissner's fiber's phylogeny. During embryological development, Reissner's fiber regulates neurogenesis by its effects on the surrounding neural stem cells and the extra-cellular matrix (Monnerie, 1997). It guides the developing circuitry of the brain (Burstyn-Cohen, 1999). Its vibrations imprint the fields and molecules of memory (Naumann,1993). This imprinting of our unconscious resonates with the 1 “It is my opinion that the contemporary quantum theory of certain definitely laid down concepts, which on the whole are taken over from classical physics, constitute an optimum formulation of certain connections. I believe, however, that this theory offers no useful point of departure for future development. I think it is not possible to get rid of the statistical character of the present quantum theory by merely adding something to the latter, without changing the fundamental concepts about the whole structure.” 2 Nathan Rosen agreed. He wrote, "If quantum mechanics is replaced by another theory, this is likely to involve revolutionary changes in concepts and principles. . . It appears that such a theory won't be obtained from simple modifications, such as hidden variables." ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1015 collective unconscious. Prenatally we re-experience our lost oneness with God, our separation, and the yearning and vision of our way back. Further plausibility of the hypothesized connection between Reissner's fiber and God come from the life of Jesus. Reissner's fiber's endpoints at the preoptic region of the hypothalamus, subcommissural organ and terminal ventricle are the sites of the production and regulation of hormones--anti-diuretic hormone, aldosterone (Palkovits, 1965; Van der Wal, 1965) and urotensin, respectively--which control thirst, and salt and water balance (Gilbert, 1956, 1964; Severs, 1991). Reissner's fiber's control of these hormones might have allowed Jesus to survive for forty days fasting in the Judean desert. Moses, whose revelation of the Torah at Mt Sinai was proclaimed by Jesus to be unalterable by even a single one dot or iota (Matthew 5:18), and Elijah who was prophesized to herald the messiah, are the only other figures in the Bible to have survived for forty days fasting in the desert. Reissner's fiber's hypothesized quantum coherences might explain the image on the Shroud of Turin. Frank Tipler has proposed that quantum coherences coupled with electroweak tunneling can explain the miracles of Jesus, his resurrection, and the creation of the image on the Shroud by a burst of neutrinos. Orchestration of the highly improbable coherences required for these events could have been directed by Reissner's fiber. Using the emerging science of epigenetics we can reawaken our dormant Reissner's fiber genes. New generations of imaging devices can provide us with objective feedback of Reissners fiber and reconnect us to our inner directed feedback systems. We can take the last steps toward realizing the mystical quest for meaning, love and Truth, illuminated by the light of science. References Agajanian, G. F. 1978. "Raphe Origin of Serotonergic Nerve Terminals in the Cerebral Ventricles." Brain Research 88:221-31. Ames, R. et. al. 1991. "Human Urotensin II is a Potent Vasoconstrictor and Agonist for the Orphan Receptor GPR14." Nature Asia 410 (6750):282. Beck, F., 1996,."Can Quantum Processes Control Synaptic Emissions?," International Journal of Neural Systems, 7(4) 343-53. Bernard, T. 1940. Heaven Lies Within Us. London: Rider and Company. Bong Han, K. 1962. "Study on the Reality of Acupuncture Meridians." J Jo Sun Med 9: 5-13. Bohm, D. 1980. Wholeness and the Implicate Order. Routledge & Kegan Paul. Burstyn-Cohen, T. 1999 "F-Spondin is Required for Accurate Pathfinding of Commissural Axons at the Floorplate. Neuron 23,233-46. Chancey, C.C., George, S. 1992. "Calculations of Quantum Tunneling Between Closed and Open Sates of Sodium Channels." Journal of Biological Physics 18:307-21. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1016 Dendy, A. 1910. "On the Occurrence of a Mesocelic Recess in the Human Bain and its Relation to the Subcommissural Organ of Lower Vertebrates; with Special Reference to the Distribution of Reissner's fiber and its Possible Function. Z. Zellforsch U. Mikrosk. Anat. 37: 496-508. Eccles, J.C., 1994. How the Self Controls Its Brain, Berlin:Springer Verlag. Einstein, A. 1949. Albert Einstein: Philosopher Scientist Cambridge University Press. Enami, M. 1954."Preptico-Subcommissural Neurosecretory System in the Eel." Endocrinol. Japon. 1 (2) 133-45. Erbl-Roth, G. 1951. "Uber den Reissnerchen Faden der Wirbeltiere." Zeitscheiff Fur Mikr. Anat. Forsh. 57:180-95. Fridberg, G, Bern, H. 1968. "The Urophysis and the Caudal Neurosecretory System of Fishes." Biological Reviews 43:(2) 175-99. Frohlich, H. 1983. "Evidence for Coherent Excitations in Biological Systems." International Journal of Quantum Chemistry 23:1589-95. Gomez Bosque, P. S. et. al. 1961. "The Subcommissural Organ in the Grown-Up Man." Acta. Anat. 46:98-103. Hameroff, S. 1998. "The Penrose-Hameroff Orchestrated OR model of Consciousness." Philosophical Transactions Royal Society London (A) 356:186-96. Hess, J. 1972. "Studies of Concerning the Function of the Complex Subcommissural Organ-Liquor Contacting Fibre: The Binding of Pyrocatechin Derivatives and its Functional Aspects. Brain Research 58:303-12. Hu, H. 2002. "Spin Mediated Consciousness Theory." arXiv 2002: quant-ph/0208068 Jurzak, M. 1999. "Vasopressin and Sensory Circumventricular Organs." Progress in Brain Research 119:225-45. Kohno, K. 1969. "Electron Microscope Study of Reissner's fiber." Z. Zellforsch. 94:565- 373. Kwang-Sup, S. 2009. "Bong Han Circulatory System as an Extension of Acupuncture Meridians." J. Acupunct. Meridian Stud. 2:(2): 93-106. Lee, B.C., 2008. "Novel Anatomic Structures in the Brain and Spinal Cord of Rabbit that May Belong to the Bong Han System of Potential Acupuncture Meridians." J. Acupunct. Meridian Studies 1(1): 29-35. London, F. and Bauer, E. 1939. "The Theory of Observation in Quantum Mechanics," in Quantum Mechanics and Measurement, Princeton University Press. Monnierie, H. 1997 "Reissner's Fiber Promotes Neural Aggregation and Influences Neuritic Outgrowth in vitro." Cell and Tissue Research 287 (2): 285-965. Naumann, W. 1993. ." "The Subcommissural Organ and Ontogenetic Development of The Subcommissural Organ: An Ependymal Brain Gland Berlin:Springer Verlag. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. the Brain," in www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Volume 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1006-1017 Wile, L.C., Reissner's Fiber, Quanta & Consciousness 1017 Nicholls, G. 1917. "Some Experiments on the Nature of Reissner's Fiber." Journal of Comparative Neurology. 27 (2) 117-99. Palkovits, M. 1965. "Morphology and Function of the Subcommissural Organ." Studia Biologica Hungurica 4: 1-105. Penrose, R. 1994. Shadows of the Mind. New York: Oxford University Press. Pribram, K. 1997 "The Implicate Brain," in Quantum Implications: Essays in Honor of David Bohm Routledge. Sargent, P. 1905. "The Optic Reflex Apparatus of Vertebrates for Short Circuit Transmission of Motor Reflexes through Reissner's Fiber: Its Morphology, Ontogeny, Phylogeny and Function. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology. 45: 1-256. Severs, W. 1991. "Role of the Subcommissural Organ in the Control of Body Hydration," in Circumventricular Organs and Body Fluids Boca Raton: CRC Press Snyder, S. 1968. "Psychedelic Drugs: Steric Factors that Predict Psychotropic Activity." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 60, 206-13. Stapp, H. 1993. "A Quantum Theory of Mind Matter Interface," in Mind Matter and Quantum Mechanics, in Berlin:Springer Verlag. Tipler, F. 2007. The Physics of Christianity. Doubleday Wile, L. 1994. "Near-Death Experiences: A Speculative Neural Model." Journal of Near-Death Studies 12 (3) 133-42. Wile, L. 2002. "Reissner's Fiber and the Neurobiology of Mysticism. Winning essay in the John Templeton Foundation, Ideas for Creative Research in Neurobiology contest. Woolam, D. H. M. 1982. "The Circumventricular Organs of the Brain Their Possible Role as Sites for Future Neurosurgery." Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England 64:310-17. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

A LOGICAL AND TOPOLOGICAL PROOF OF THE IRREDUCIBILITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS TO PHYSICAL DATA Iegor Reznikoff Professor Emeritus, Département de Philosophie, Université de Paris Ouest, Nanterre, France E-mail: dominiqueleconte@yahoo.fr We show here that what we call ‘visual space of consciousness’, the space of what we see, is a specific space different from the purely physical one and that its properties imply that it cannot be reduced to or deduced from physical laws. Some biological points are also briefly considered. The arguments are of logical, mathematical and physical character, and although elementary they require a careful reading (A first shorter version of this paper appeared in a hardly accessible Journal [1], and presented at the International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Sciences, in Beijing, August 2007). There is no need to define consciousness; we only observe some of its properties, namely geometric and topological properties of visual consciousness, and show that these properties cannot be based on physics only. Now, if a part of consciousness cannot be grounded on physics only, it is the same for consciousness as a whole and we speak of the irreducibility of consciousness to physical data. We do not consider philosophical questions or issues; in a simple physical and mathematical frame we give a logical proof of this irreducibility. Elements for a formal mathematical, logical proof are mentioned at the end of the paper. I. INTRODUCTION The main purpose of this work is to give a proof of the non reducibility of consciousness to physical data. In order to treat the problem precisely and have clear definitions we essentially limit the question to the visual space i.e., to the space we see (when looking at something), so that we need not define consciousness. If a part – the visual one – of consciousness cannot be founded on physics only, it is the same for consciousness as a whole and we speak of the irreducibility of consciousness to physical data. In Sections II and III, notions of visual space and irreducibility are respectively defined; then we study two main properties of the visual space, namely its continuity (Section IV) and unity (Section VI). Since regarding unity the biological level is concerned, this point is briefly discussed (Section VII). The last Section gives elements for a formal mathematical and logical proof (which is out of the scope of this paper). Finally, we conclude with a short historical perspective. II. THE CONSCIOUSNESS SPACE For a given observer, let A be the space of ‘physical reality’ as known by physics, the ‘real’ space of matter with what is included in it: moving atoms, particles and waves; and let B be the observer’s brain regarded as a space, with its physiological and neuronal activity (of course B ⊂ A); then let C be the space of the observer’s perceptive consciousness: what he sees, hears, touches, etc. considered as a space. There are of course further levels of consciousness, in particular a witness consciousness: the one that sees, hears, etc (not to speak of the thinking one). But here we consider only perceptive consciousness, what is seen (heard, etc), and, more precisely, the visual space in the case of vision (resp. the spaces of what one hears, touches, etc. for the other senses). For simplicity and because of its obvious geometric appearance, we confine our remarks mostly to the visual space, but the same points can be made about other spaces of perception (For a very interesting approach of consciousness of sound, see [2] and [3] ). In what follows we will speak of A, B, and C also as being respectively the ‘real’ or physical space, the brain space and the consciousness space with its visual sub-space. Between a part of A – B (elements of A that are not in B) and B there is a map, say ƒ, which to physical events in this part of A – B, through the perceptive channels, associates reactions in the brain space B. For instance, a photon flux received by the eyes creates an activity in the optical nerve and then in the brain. To this activity at the level B corresponds in general a representation in C; let g be this correspondence between brain activity and its representation (image) in the consciousness space. There is, therefore, a correspondence from A to C defined by h= g [ƒ]. We have the following diagram (Figure 1). Figure 1. Spaces A, B, C as presented in the text. 1 If we limit C to perceptive consciousness – as we are doing here – we could expect to have g [ƒ(A – B)] = C, but this is not the case since we are going to show that there are properties of C which do not proceed from properties of A. Note that ƒ is not injective, since different points in A cannot always be distinguished in B, and even less in C. One might discuss, of course, the precise domains of definition of ƒ and g – since there are not, for all events in A or in B, corresponding reactions or representations in B or C, respectively, but this is of no importance here. Also we did not give a precise mathematical definition of the maps since it is not even clear what the elements in A, B and of course in C are; one should probably rather speak of a map between some subsets of A and subsets of C, or even better in the language of categories; for an approach of some properties of consciousness in terms of categories, see [4] (I am thankful to the mathematician G. Choquet who mentioned this remarkable work). For sake of simplicity, we keep the elementary formulation in the language of set theory, also because we shall have a logical approach referring to some axioms of set theory. The given correspondences f and g are however clear enough to say that h gives a representation or an image of the reality A in the consciousness space C. For instance: to a subset T of A – B, a subset of particles reflecting a flux of photons, is associated, through the brain space B, a representation h(T) of T, in C, say a table; this table is a representation of external physical data (the set of all particles, waves, etc. concentrated in the given space we call table). We are going to study some properties of the space of such representations, what we call the consciousness space C. Proposition 1. The space C is a specific space in itself, different from A and B. Proof. We have C ≠ A, since the representation of A – B in C depends on B (and g), whereas A – B does not. For example if B is disturbed or injured, clearly so will be C (for instance a person sees two tables or none), while A – B has not changed (there is still one table). But also C ≠ B. What we see is not the brain, nor the activity of the brain. The same arguments show, moreover, that C ∩ A =  and C ∩ B = . Stated otherwise, the proposition says that the consciousness space is different from the real physical space and from the brain space. Given an object X in A, we do not see X in itself but only the result in C of a physiological and neuronal activity in B created by photons coming from X. This is well known, but the unconscious identification of h(X) with X, of what we see with the material physical world, is so strong and so widespread – even for those who have read Kant – that it is necessary to restate clearly: there is a proper space of consciousness and the picture that one sees is not the physical world. It is merely a representation of a set of particles and waves in the consciousness space; it does not mean, however, that this space is itself a ‘set of particles’: this is the point, the visual space is a proper non discrete space (see below). An interesting question is that of the dimensionality of the consciousness space. For the visual space, one usually counts three spatial dimensions and three dimensions for colours. But we do not see a mixture of three colours; we see at least seven colours and their varieties and mixtures (For a topological approach of visual and colour spaces, see [5], [6], [7]). And what about the dimensions of the spaces of what we hear [3], smell or touch? Here, however we do not consider this question. III. ON IRREDUCIBLE PROPERTIES OF THE CONSCIOUSNESS SPACE It is clear that the consciousness space has properties that are not as such in the physical space: this is the case, for instance, for colours, which are indefinable without the direct experience of seeing them (a person blind from birth can have no idea of what green means, though he might associate other feelings with this word). However, although the qualities (qualias) of a colour cannot be given physically, they do correspond to physical data: a green object reflects the light waves with a frequency that we see as ‘green’. We say that this property of being green can be reduced to physical properties. The question then arises whether there are properties of the consciousness space that cannot be reduced to real physical ones. If so, we speak of irreducible properties. IV. CONTINUITY OF THE CONSCIOUSNESS SPACE A remarkable property of the visual space (but it is true also of other perceptions, although the matter is more difficult to formulate) is its continuity. We understand continuity in the mathematical sense, but the following elementary definition is sufficient here: in the visual space, there are no gaps or moving separate points; e.g., an ordinary white sheet of paper appears uniformly, permanently white and still, for at least a while. In contrast, physical reality at the atomic level is essentially discrete, non uniform, never motionless, and full of collisions; it doesn’t mean that there are holes of energy or whatever, but we number atoms, electrons and various particles. With modern laser and other technologies, an isolated electron can be observed [8], [9], and with the NV (Nitrogen Vacancy) nanotechnology it is possible to produce sources of isolated photons [10]. Moreover, particles and waves are in perpetual movement. Of course, at our macroscopic level, we can use a magnifying glass and discover other aspects of what our eyes and consciousness did not see before, but the image remains continuous; there are no holes in the space of visual consciousness. Thus we have the question: how can a discrete moving atomic reality be represented in a continuous way (both in space and time)? The usual explanations about such questions concern the macroscopic level of perception. A typical example is given by the continuous appearance of a discrete pile of stones seen from a distance: it seems to be a white continuous spot. The usual argument is that the discreteness is too subtle to be perceived. The question then arises: to be perceived by what? And where? Indeed this gives no explanation at the 2 atomic level, since the perceptions are transmitted and received (if we remain in a purely physical world) by discrete processes of particles and moving waves, particularly photons, and charges. How does this produce a continuous image, and where does this image appear? Certainly not in a physical space of particles, nor in the neuronal brain; the neurones transmit physical information up to consciousness which produces the continuous image we see; this is also a proof that C in no way belongs to the physical or brain space, and is a specific space of non-material, non-physical nature. Something to be perceived needs a perceiver and here the perceiver’s visual continuous space cannot be reduced to physics because of the argument above. If everything were created, transmitted and received by physical spaces, it would remain permanently moving and discrete. As we say in French, ‘the most beautiful girl in the world cannot give more than what she has’: physics gives no more than physics. Proposition 2. The property of continuity of the consciousness space C is not reducible to or even explainable in terms of physical reality. Against this statement, there is also the argument that if there were holes in the visual space we simply would not see them, since we obviously can’t see what we do not see (!). The discrete structure therefore cannot be perceived. However this argument again supposes that something is perceived and already presupposes a perceiver: who is the we in the sentence above and who or what is seeing? In such answers it is assumed that something (somebody) already sees or doesn’t see; and the question remains how, in the final analysis, a ‘continuous’ space of vision can exist and where it can be located. Since it cannot be based on physics only, the conclusion is straightforward: continuity is a creation of consciousness. And here we come to a purely mathematical and logical consideration: continuity is not definable from discreteness and finite considerations, and cannot exist in a finite numbered domain. But physical reality – in a bounded domain at least – is finite. The property of continuity is, therefore, indeed irreducible to any physical reality, unless the notion of continuous field be introduced, which is a very theoretical and problematic notion that we discuss below. A. Commentary One can discuss whether the property of continuity is needed to characterize the visual space; for instance, isn’t the property of density sufficient (as for the line of rational numbers)? Let us recall that density means that between two points there is always a third one. The above irreducibility argument remains in force even if we assume density; since density implies infinity, even in an interval or bounded space; indeed the fact that between two points there is a third one implies that between these two there is an infinity of points. An absolute proof of the continuity of the visual space in the strong mathematical meaning is certainly not possible because it requires high technical considerations of infinite character – let us recall that the continuity of a space implies that its infinity is not countable, which means that it is bigger than the infinity of the set of integers (it is said to have the power of the continuum). Such considerations are purely theoretical and certainly beyond any experience. But there is another strong epistemological argument for attributing continuity to the visual space. This argument comes from answering the question: how did the concepts of geometrical (Euclidian) space and precisely of continuity appear? How the geometrical line was and is understood to be continuous? The notions of geometrical space and line appear of course in and from our visual space and visual experience (connected with that of movement and touch for three-dimensional awareness). Moreover, all our intuition of space geometry in the plane comes essentially from our visual space which, as we know, until the discoveries of Relativity Theory, was considered in its Euclidian formulation to be absolute (from the physical point of view at least). The notion of continuity proceeds as well from our visual experience, the best notion of a continuous line or surface being probably given by a surface of water: there are no holes or separations. That a segment of a straight line has infinitely many points (because it is dense) is readily understood and has been understood since Antiquity as well as the (intuitive) continuity of the line. And it is most remarkable that children, from visual experience, easily understand the notion of a (straight) line as well as its potential infinity and its continuity as being with ‘points everywhere’ so that there are no holes left. Of course the notions of closeness, or of going through are also related to our experience of movement and touch, but, finally it is by reasoning on the geometric line, which belongs to and comes from our visual space (so that it can be drawn), that the theory of this geometric line has been worked out. Also let us note that in our visual space all (necessary macroscopic) movements are continuous: it is impossible to join two points without passing somewhere in-between, while this is not the case at the atomic quanta level. It is therefore quite reasonable to consider that our intuition and understanding of the visual space demonstrate it to be a continuous space. What we said about spatial continuity can be repeated concerning the continuity of the visual space in time (and, more generally, of perception in time). The visual space lasts in a continuous way as does a continuous movement; while at the atomic level, in duration, there is no continuity at all. However our perception of time is continuous and has led to a theoretical treatment of time which identifies it with the geometric line (for a study on time based on a distinction of physical and mind levels, see [11]). This continuity in time is closely related to what appears to be an even more remarkable property of consciousness and particularly of the visual space, namely its unity (see below, Section VI). B. The consciousness space as a field The only physical approach to continuity is given by the notion of field. For instance, an electromagnetic or gravitational field is assumed to be defined and active everywhere in the physical domain where it acts, and this everywhere is understood to be continuous since the space where the field is active is mathematically considered to be the three-dimensional space R3. 3 This is a purely mathematical and theoretical formulation: we can only verify that the field acts on every particle or object appearing in the domain, and experience can show no more. But to assume continuity and R3 allows us to use the mathematical infinitesimal calculus with all its tremendous power. However, we claim, after the discussion above, that this geometrical approach is a creation of consciousness and particularly of consciousness of the visual space, since there is no other evidence for such a geometrical and topological continuous conception. It is not and cannot be given by direct physical experience which is finite. For us, therefore, this geometry is not in A, but in C, and then induced from C to the theoretical, mathematical treatment by using the space R3 containing a theoretical model of A. But since this notion of continuous field actually exists in physics – be it created by and conceived from visual consciousness – we may say that consciousness is indeed a field. And just as a movement of electrons creates an electromagnetic field, we may conjecture that intense brain activity – of purely physical character at the atomic level of particles and waves – creates a field of consciousness: the greater the brain activity, the richer the field of consciousness. This field is, of course, not physical, since A ∩ C =  as we have seen, the space C being a specific one. Nor it is simply reducible to a known physical field, we certainly do not see an electromagnetic or gravitational field. Moreover, in visual consciousness, we can isolate forms, colours, objects, etc., while even if there are different wave lengths, etc. in physical fields, it is consciousness that extracts the mentioned forms, properties or elements from the visual consciousness space we see. There is nothing analogous or even expressible concerning physical fields. The property of seeing separate objects in the unity of the whole visual picture corresponds to the Comprehension Axiom of set theory: given a set E and a property P, the subset of elements of E verifying the property P, exists. It cannot be deduced from physics. It seems to be a fundamental property of consciousness related to the a priori capacity of consciousness to pay attention. Moreover, if we consider the whole perceptive consciousness, there is no homogeneity between visual pictures, acoustic perception or touch. If we consider the spaces of what we see, hear, smell, taste or touch, as different subspaces of the whole consciousness space, the non-homogeneity of these subspaces is a quite peculiar fact, bearing in mind that they are all produced by the same kind of neuronal activity, since there seems to be no difference between the neurones of different perception areas in the brain. How can the same kind of neuronal activity produce such different worlds of perception? This question could yield another proof of the irreducibility of the consciousness space to the physical one. Of course the scales of various physical data producing the perceptions are quite different e.g., the scales of light waves, molecules (for the smell) or sound waves, but this does not explain the complete non-homogeneity of the corresponding subspaces of consciousness, whereas they are held together in a remarkable unity: I smell the rose that I see. This is a specific property of consciousness. But since the emergence of space consciousness comes mostly from an intense brain activity of quantum electromagnetic nature, the relationship between such a field and the field of consciousness has to be investigated not only for isolated phenomena (for instance the fact that different frequencies of light produce different colours in the visual consciousness) but in the whole. Why would not a special intense physical activity – in the brain – create a field of different – non-physical – nature? Clearly, the intermediate biological level appears as an essential one. V. THE OBJECTIVITY OF THE CONSCIOUSNESS SPACE C A peculiarity of the consciousness space is that it can be studied essentially only from inside, by itself: only consciousness knows consciousness. And “if you want to know my consciousness, look in yours” sounds as a wise saying. Thus we come to this important statement: Proposition 3. The properties of C can be seen by everybody: its study is therefore perfectly objective. Note that here the word objective has the same meaning as in natural sciences, e.g., physics, since everything we know is known from our perceptive consciousness, and everything we look at – for instance the position of a needle in a measuring apparatus – is seen in our visual consciousness, that is in C. If two persons see the same object (the needle at a given position) it is because it is the ‘same’ object in their respective visual spaces. Although the meaning of the word same cannot be explained; this meaning is based on a universal understanding without which no communication would be possible. Here, appears the common but meaningless question whether we all really see the same colours or objects: is the red that I see the same as the one you see? The question is meaningless because it cannot be verified, but the simpler the hypothesis, the better it is, and the simplest is to consider that indeed we have essentially the same consciousness. But as mentioned above, philosophical discussions are not considered here. VI. UNITY OF THE V ISUAL CONSCIOUSNESS S PACE One of the most remarkable properties of consciousness space – and moreover difficult to understand – is its unity, that is the capacity that consciousness has to gather perceptions as a whole; from a multiplicity of independent nervous impulses and neuronal processes consciousness produces a unified whole. We do not have consciousness of separated elements, but always of a coherent whole, even when looking at an isolated object. This unity principle is the following: given separate elements x1, …, x n, it is the actual capacity to conceive their totality i.e. the set {x1, …, xn}. It is remarkable that this corresponds to an axiom of set theory; logically this property is not 4 reducible. It cannot be deduced simply from the existence of x 1, …, xn as separate elements. Therefore, it is not physically explicable, unless of course it is implicitly assumed (which is often the case, for instance when one assumes that things are somehow and somewhere ‘observed’ before any consciousness has been introduced). In particular, the argument that unity results simply from the simultaneity of neuronal processes in some centre of the brain is doubly inconsistent. First because the notion of simultaneity is meaningless without the notion of now or the notion of at the same time as, which presupposes a reference and a clock and therefore an observer, i.e. a consciousness that grasps this simultaneity, this very notion introduces already an observer, it is not an absolute notion. And the second inconsistency is that simultaneity presupposes certainly the comparison of at least two elements and hence the notion of totality, be it only of the set {x 1, x2} as a whole. Therefore, to have the notion of simultaneity we already need that of unity; it is impossible to avoid circularity. The simultaneity of physical events is perhaps necessary for consciousness of unity but not sufficient to explain it. But even if the notion of simultaneity is given, the probability that all the possible visible ‘dots’ of our visual neurology (e.g., retina) are grasped together in a coherent unity (their number can be estimated of the order of 10 7), this probability is of 7 order of 2 (10 ) (2 to the power of 10 to the power 7), which is well beyond any physical meaning even at the level of lightwave length. Unity cannot emerge ‘by chance’; moreover, it is permanent, continuous in time. The probability for this continuing unity is physically without meaning. This capacity of totalization, this gift of perceptive consciousness, is certainly one of its most important properties and unity may be the most characteristic property of consciousness. Consciousness unifies elements that otherwise are not related; from this comes what is called meaning. But we are not discussing this here any further. As we have seen, the unity principle has, of course, no equivalent in physics; theoretically, it has to be borrowed from logic. The property of unity, say of visual consciousness and of the space C, is thus irreducible. Proposition 4. The unity of consciousness is not reducible to physical properties. The question then arises how far logical arguments can be used in physics, biology and matters of consciousness. But if one looks at a deductive science, rigorously founded, the logical and mathematical arguments are hitherto unavoidable. Of course a science can be very rich as a descriptive one, but the claim is now: is it possible to ‘explain consciousness’ by neuronal and finally from purely physical processes? Since in our attempt, explain means deduce or reduce, the argument needs to avoid circularity, therefore a careful logical examination is needed, which we have attempted above: the unity of the visual space cannot be reduced to or explained by physics without circularity since a notion of unity is needed beforehand. VII. BIOLOGICAL UNITY If at some level the property of unity is needed and has to be introduced as such, then, it could be given already at a different level. It is natural to assume this unity, as we have seen, as one of the characteristic properties of consciousness, but it could be attributed already at the biological level. One often speaks of the ‘unity of the cell’. Is it not at this elementary biological level that a principle of irreducible unity has to appear? That such unity is necessary as a global principle in biology is simply shown by the same argument as the one given for the impossibility of a random unity of the visual space. Suppose a biological organism of about 10 9 (of about 10 to the power of 9) components (e.g., molecules); the probability that all these components should behave together in the right way in order 9 to constitute a biologically viable unity, this probability is at least of the order of 2 (10 ) (2 to the power of 10 to the power of 9), which is, as we have seen before, beyond any physical meaning even at the atomic level: the age of the universe would not be sufficient for even one cell to have a chance to exist, not to speak of a more complex organism. However, even if a biological property should normally appear and be stated before properties of consciousness (and moreover could explain some of its aspects), we have a knowledge of the visual space, of its continuity and unity, certainly clearer, at least in its immediacy, than an as yet unformulated principle of unity in biology. VIII. FORMAL APPROACH For a formal, strictly deductive logical approach, we need different levels of axioms, laws and data, so that the following levels have to be distinguished. 1. The Logical level needed for mathematics. This introduces axioms e.g., the Axiom of Totality: given x 1, …, xn the set {x1, …, xn} exists. The Comprehension Axiom: given a set E and a property P, the subset of elements of E verifying the property P, exists. And finally an Axiom of Infinity. 2. The Mathematical level: theory of Real Numbers and Analysis. Logical axioms are intended for mathematical notions and reasoning. 3. The Physical level with its proper axioms and laws. The notions of continuity etc. are borrowed from the level 2. 4. The Biological level (this level is not really needed here). 5. The Consciousness level. 5 It is important to stress that we need not define consciousness (which would be a big challenge since consciousness is irreducible to other levels); we only observe some properties of visual consciousness, i.e. of what we see. But for continuity, unity and consciousness of seeing various objects, we need axioms analogous to the axioms above; these axioms are necessary to explain the mentioned properties of the visual space, and necessary for a deductive construction showing rigorously the irreducibility of consciousness to other levels. Since these axioms are not given by physics, clearly the level of consciousness is not at the physical level and cannot be deduced from physics. IX. CONCLUSION That consciousness space is relatively independent from external physical reality is a classical statement. For Plato, Consciousness precedes Matter (as we learn from the Timaeus, 34c), the same for Indian classical religious philosophy; Kant’s thoughts on this topic are well known (Kritik der reinen Vernunft), but it is worth quoting Berkeley: “The proper objects of sight not without the mind; nor the images of anything without the mind” and also “Images in the eye are not pictures of external objects” [12]. Here, we have simply shown that this relative independence of the consciousness space and its specific nature can be proved convincingly. REFERENCES I. Reznikoff, “The consciousness space,” Bio-Math, tome XXXX (n° 158), Paris, pp. 1-7, 2003. R. Casati and J. Dokic, La Philosophie du Son, Nîmes (France), 1994. I. Reznikoff, “On primitive elements of musical meaning,” http://www.musicandmeaning.net/issues/showArticle.php?artID=3.2, 2005. A. Ehresmann, http://perso.wanadoo.fr/ vbm-ehr/. C. Pélissier, Aspects physico-mathématiques de la vision de la couleur, Thèse de Doctorat d’Etat, Université Paris VI, 1982. C. Pélissier, “Théorie unifiée de Young – Helmoltz – Hering, topologie induite, phénomènes d’adaptation, notion de temps et d’énergie” in Actes du 5e Congrès de l’Association Internationale de la Couleur, Mondial Couleur, Monte-Carlo, 1985. 7. C. Pélissier, Couleurs et Temps, de la Physique à la Phénoménologie, Paris, 2006. 8. D. Wineland et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 31, 1279, 1973. 9. A. Aspect et al., Phys. Rev. Lett, 49, 91, 1982. 10. S. Gleyzes, S. Kuhr, C. Guerlin, J. Bernu, S. Deleglise, U. Busk Hoff, M. Brune, J-M. Raimond, S. Haroche, “Quantum jumps of light recording birth and death of a photon in a cavity,” Nature, vol.446, pp. 297-300, 2007. 11. I. Reznikoff, “On a realistic and discrete approach to physical time,” HAL open archives, hal-03191083, v1, 2021. 12. G. Berkeley, Essay towards a New Theory of Vision, contents: 43 and 117, 1709. Related works: 13. J. Levine, “Materialism and qualia: the explanatory gap,” Pacific Philosophical Review, 64, pp. 354-361, 1983. 14. B. A. Wallace, The taboo of Subjectivity: Toward a New Science of Consciousness, Oxford: Oxford, 2000. 15. B. L. Lancaster, “On the relationship between cognitive models and spiritual maps,” Journal of Consciousness Studies, 7 (11-12), pp. 231-250, 2000. 16. J. Levine, Purple Haze: The Puzzle of Consciousness, Oxford: Oxford, 2001. 17. J. McFadden, “Synchronous firing and its influence on the brain’s electromagnetic field,” Journal of Consciousness Studies, 9, pp. 2350, 2002. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 6

253 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction Essay Views about Free Will & The Anatomy of State Function Reduction Matti Pitkanen* ABSTRACT Even some physicists have now accepted "free will" into their vocabulary. However, many writers remain unaware of the distinctions between experienced time and the geometric time of physics. Thus, many of them make the error of eliminating conscious mind from the picture in the process of trying to understand free will. The outcome is that free will is something effective and emergent or free will is resulting from deterministic but non-predictable/non-computable process. In Topological Geometrodynamics (“TGD”), zero energy ontology would realize blocks as causal diamonds (“CD”) and would extend free will from a mere choice between given alternatives to creation of new worlds. Key Words: free will, quantum state, measurment theory, state function reduction. Views about Free Will My humble question is: Why on earth something very complex or non-computable would generate sensation "I decide to do this"? A non-deterministic behavior serves as a correlate of free will, but non-predictable (yet possibly deterministic) behavior does not imply experience of free will. I am aware that understanding free will is as difficult as understanding of the nature of time. I have been trying to communicate my thoughts related to free will and the relationship between experienced time and the geometric time of physics for many years. Sabine Hossenfelder: Free Will function Sabine Hossenfelder has a blog piece entitled "Free will function". I agree with her that the idea about emergent free will is self-deception. Free will does not emerge from a deterministic microscopic dynamics. The believers in emergence say that free will is an effective concept. This is really not the case but useful. If the system in question is complex enough and behaves non-predictably as seen by outsider one can say that it has effective free will. But why the impossibility to predict a deterministic dynamics in practice would generate the experience "I will do this". There is absolutely no justification for this belief. A good objection against this identification comes from neuroscience and is described in the article The Brain on Trial by David Eagleman. People suffering Tourette's syndrome, split brain * Correspondence: Matti Pitkanen, PhD, Independent Researcher, Finland. E-Mail: matpitka@luukku.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 254 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction patients, persons with side personalities, and patients with choreic motions behave from the point of view of an outsider who would have free will. Using biblical language: they act as if being possessed. They do not experience free will. Who wills? Who uses the biological body of the patient? Are we merely our brains and bodies? Who uses my biological body? What is this "me"? Is this particular biological body used only by single intentional agent, by single "me" only? (Comment: Effective theories have become the basic norm of theoretical physics today. No one can seriously claim that string models say anything about the world of experimental physicists. But there is a loop hole. By postulating effective field theory approach one can build entire landscape of effective theories. This to me is nonsense but it works. The only honest reaction would be to admit that string models are nice theories but not theories about the world we live in.) Hossenfelder suggests as a solution something that she calls free will function. She considers a machine spitting out digits of π. This process is fully deterministic but outsider has no means of predicting what the next digit will be and what number the digit sequence represents unless he manages to get the program code. The proposal is that our brain has this kind of free will function. The strange assumption is that the inability to predict would in some mysterious manner generate experience of free will. But Hossenfelder as a physicist has learned that one must forget all subjective elements when doing science. In this mental framework the only conceivable goal of a theory of consciousness is to eliminate it. The fruitless searches of "consciousness modules" assumed to reside somewhere in the brain are fruits of similar "consciousness as function" thinking. Sean Carroll: Free will as real as baseball Sean Carroll has also written about free will in his blog piece "Free will as real as baseball". Carroll belongs to the effective theory camp and sees free will as a convenient tool of description just like baseball is seen by a reductionist as a convenient abstraction to describe the dynamics of a condensed matter system. Carroll makes two claims: 1. Free will is inconsistent with the laws of physics. This is the case only if the experienced time and geometric time of physics are the same but they are not as many realize. Experienced time is irreversible and there is no subjective future. Geometric time is reversible and future and past are in the same footing. In general relativity, 4-D spacetime region becomes the basic entity instead of time = constant snapshot which is the basic entity according to Newtonian thinking. All writers except Scott Aaronson seem to belong to the species of Newtonians as far as their views about time are considered. 2. Physics is completely understood in everyday realm. But do we really understand the physics underlying living matter? Interestingly, Carroll notices analogy of poorly understood notion of free will with the poorly understood notion of time. The arrow of time is in conflict with microscopic reversibility but, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 255 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction according to Carroll, physicists do not see this as a problem so that it is not a problem! The effective theory solution is simple: The arrow of time somehow emerges! This seems to me self-deception. One should admit this and really try to understand Second Law of thermodynamics. If one does this, the first observation is that Boltzmann's equations are deduced by assuming the occurrence of state function reductions in time scale much shorter than the time scale of observations. State function reduction is what makes quantum physics nondeterministic at the level of single quantum system. This is internally inconsistent: the determinism of Schrödinger equation is in conflict with state function reduction if one identifies experienced time with the geometric time of physics. One should be able to resolve this logical flaw by requiring that the two types of times are different. If we have two types of times, we also have two independent causalities: the causality of field equations and that of free will. This will be the first step towards the real solution. Carroll also presents what he calls the consequent argument: it begins with a statement that the past is fixed, so free will obeying field equation is impossible since it would change both future and past. I think that this is wrong: the assumption about fixed past in the geometric sense need not be true but the subjective/experienced past is. Indeed, in state function reduction the geometric past changes in Wheeler's delayed choice experiment. Maybe Wheeler's general relativistic background helped him to make this conceptual leap similar to the TGD view about quantum jump. In the TGD framework, quantum states are superpositions of classical histories and quantum jumps replace them with new ones and the average geometric past also changes. The finding of Libet - that in volitional act neural activity begins a fraction of second before the conscious decisions - supports the idea that we are replacing our geometric past with a new one in the subjective/experienced time. Carroll does notice the ethical aspect of the problem: If we really believe that free will is illusion, we have no justification for moral rules. The criminals would be doomed to perform their crimes at the moment of Big Bang. We experience free will as everyone can testify. We should accept this and then try to understand its physical correlates. In fact, neuroscience has led to quite concrete progress in the understanding of the correlations between biology and behavior. Scott Aaronson's view Scott Aaronson studied the idea of reducing free will to behavior observed from outside. Aaronson's thought experiment considers a Turing like test allowing you to decide whether you have free will. A computer model of you would be built using all available data about the initial state of your brain: this of course assumes determinism or at least quantum statistical determinism. If the computer is able to mimic your behavior faithfully, one can say that you have no free will. The proponent of effective free will might say that the longer the needed computer code is, the more you have effective free will. This kind of free-will-meter is of course not possible in practice. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 256 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction Aaronson presents the non-cloning theorem of quantum theory as a first principle objection against Turing test of free-will-meter. Even in principle it is not possible to construct complete copy of brain state to make a complete simulation possible. This kind of machine would be successful in what Aaronson calls Toddler test but this would be a fake success. Any toddler says completely predictably "No" to any question. We however know that the toddler expresses by behaving irrationally that he/she has discovered his/her free will. Aaronson brings in special relativity and notices that free will means also backward causation if it is to be consistent with the causality of field equations. From this it would be only a short step to the realization that the causality of free will could act in the space of quantum states defined as superposition of solutions of classical field equations consistent with holography in the sense that 3-D section determines the entire space - at least below certain scale! The problem would have been solved! Aaronson makes a near miss! To sum up, Aaronson dimly realizes that in general relativity - and in any 4-D Universe obeying general coordinate invariance - we live in a kind of block world consisting of 4-D blocks but the other writers continue in the good old Newtonian style. In TGD, zero energy ontology would realize blocks as causal diamonds (“CD”) and would extend free will from a mere choice between given alternatives to creation of new worlds. Hossenfelder realizes that emergence is self-deception. Carroll grasps the full meaning of the absence of free will at the level of moral issues. The Anatomy of State Function Reduction The proposal of Svetlichny The basic objection against assigning free will to state function reduction in the sense of wave mechanics is that state function reduction from the point of view of outsider is like playing dice. One can of course argue that for an outsider any form of free will looks like throwing a dice since causally effective experience of free will is accompanied by non-determinism. We simply do not know what is the experience possibly associated with the state function reduction. The lesson is that we must carefully distinguish between two levels: the single particle level and ensemble level. When we can say that something is random, we are talking about ensembles, not about single member of ensemble. Svetlichny takes the objection seriously and notices that quantum measurement means a division of system to three parts: measured system, measuring system and external world and argues that in some cases this division might not be unique. The choice of this division would have interpretation as an act of free will. I leave it to the reader to decide whether this proposal is plausible or not. TGD view about state function reduction What can one say about the situation in TGD framework? There are several differences as compared to the standard measurement theory which is just certain ad hoc rules combined with ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 257 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction the Born rule. This rule applies naturally in TGD framework and is not ad hoc in infinite-D context. I consider here the general anatomy of quantum jump in zero energy ontology (ZEO): 1. TGD ontology differs from the standard one. Space-time surfaces and quantum states as such are zombies in TGD Universe: consciousness is in the quantum jump. Conscious experience is in the change of the state of the brain, brain state as such is not conscious. Self means integration of quantum jumps to higher level quantum jumps and the hierarchy of quantum jumps and hierarchy of selves can be identified in ZEO. It has the hierarchy of causal diamonds (CDs) and space-time sheets as geometrical correlates. In TGD Universe brain and body are not conscious: rather, conscious experience is about brain and body and this leads to the illusion caused by the assimilation with the target of sensory input: I am what I perceive. 2. In TGD framework, one does not assume the division of the system to a product of measured system, measuring system, and external world before the measurement. Rather, this kind of divisions is the outcomes of state function reduction which is part of quantum jump involving also the unitary process. Note that standard measurement theory is not able to say anything about the dynamics giving rise to this kind of divisions. 3. State function reduction cascade as a part of quantum jump - this holistic view is one new element - proceeds in zero energy ontology (ZEO) from long to short length scales CD→sub-CDs→..., and stops when Negentropy Maximization Principle (NMP defining the variational principle of consciousness is also something new) does not allow to reduce entanglement entropy for any subsystem pair of subsystem un-entangled with the external world. This is the case if the sub-system in question is such that all divisions to two parts are negentropically entangled or form entangled bound state. For a given subsystem occurring in the cascade the splitting into an unentangled pair of measured and measuring system can take place if the entanglement between these subsystems is entropic. The splitting takes place for a pair with largest entanglement entropy and defines measuring and measured system. Who measures who? This seems to be a matter of taste and one should not talk about measuring system as conscious entity in TGD Universe, where consciousness is in quantum jump: 4. The factorization of integer to primes is a rather precise number theoretical analogy for what happens, and the analogy might actually have a deeper mathematical meaning since Hilbert spaces with prime dimension cannot be decomposed into tensor products. Any factorization of integer to a product of primes corresponds to a cascade of state function reductions. At the first step division takes place to two integers and several alternative divisions are possible. The pair for which the reduction of entanglement entropy is largest, is preferred. The resulting two integers can be further factorized to two integers, and the process continues and eventually stops when all factors are primes and no further factorization is possible. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 258 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction One could even assign to any decomposition n= rs the analogs of entanglement probabilities as p1= log(r)/log(n) and p2= log(s)/log(n). NMP would favor the divisions to factors r and s which are as near as possible to n/2. Negentropically entangled system is like prime. Note however that these systems can still make an analog of state function reduction which does not split them but increases the negentropy for all splittings of system to two parts. This would be possible only in the intersection of real and padic worlds, that is, for living matter. My cautious proposal is that just this kind of systems living systems - can experience free will: either in the analog of state function reduction process increasing their negentropy or in state function process reducing their entanglement with environment. 5. In standard measurement theory observer chooses the measured observables and the theory says nothing about this process. In TGD the measured observable is the density matrix for a pair formed by any two entangled parts of sub-system division for which negentropy gain is maximal in quantum measurement defines the pair. Therefore both the measurement axis and the pair representing the target of measurement and measurer are selected in quantum jump. 6. Quantum measurement theory assumes that measurement correlates classical long range degrees of freedom with quantal degrees of freedom. One could say that the direction of the pointer of the measurement apparatus correlates faithfully with the value of the measured microscopic observable. This requires that the entanglement is reduced between microscopic and macroscopic systems. I have identified the "classical" degrees of freedom in TGD framework as zero modes which by definition do not contribute to the line-element of WCW although the WCW metric depends on zero modes as external parameters. The induced Kähler field represents an infinite number of zero modes whereas the Hamiltonians of the boundaries of CD define quantum fluctuating degrees of freedom. The reduction of the entanglement between zero modes and quantum fluctuating degrees of freedom is an essential part of quantum measurement process. Also state function reductions between microscopic degrees of freedom are predicted to occur and this kind of reductions lead to decoherence so that one can apply quantum statistical description and derive Boltzmann equations. Also state function reductions between different values of zero modes are possible and one could perhaps assign "telepathic" effects with them. The differences from the standard quantum measurement theory are that several kinds of state function reductions are possible and that the division to classical and quantum fluctuating degrees of freedom has a purely geometric meaning in TGD framework: 7. One can even imagine quantum parallel state function reduction cascades. This would make possible quantum parallel dissipation, which would be something new. My original proposal was that in hadronic physics this could make possible a state function reduction cascade proceeding in quark scales while hadronic scales would remain entangled so that ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 259 Journal of Consciousness Exploraton & Research| February 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 2 | pp. 253-259 Pitkanen, M., Views about Free Will & the Anatomy of State Function Reduction one could apply statistical description to quarks as parts of a system, which is quantum coherent in hadronic length scale. Further questions There are many other interesting issues: 1. In ZEO the choice of the quantization axes and would fix the moduli of the causal diamond CD: the preferred time direction defined by the line connecting the tips of CD, the spin quantization axis, etc. This choice certainly occurs. Does it reduce to the measurement of a density matrix for some decomposition of some subsystem to a pair? Or should one simply assume state function reductions also at this level meaning localization to a sector of WCW corresponding to given CD. This would involve localization in the moduli space of CDs selecting some boost of a CD with fixed quantized proper time distance between it tips, fixed spin directions for positive and negative energy parts of zero energy states defined by light-like geodesics at its light-like boundary. Preferred complex coordinates for CP2, etc. 2. Zero energy states are characterized by arrow of geometric time in the sense that either positive or negative energy parts of states have well defined particles numbers and single particle numbers but not both. State function reduction is possible only for positive or negative energy part of the state but not both. This should relate very closely to the fact that our sensory percepts defined by state function reductions are mostly about the upper or lower boundary of CD. 3. In ZEO quantum jumps can also lead to generation of new sub-Universes, sub-CDs carrying zero energy states. Quantum jumps can also involve phase transitions changing p-adic space-time sheets to real ones and these could serve as quantum correlates for intentional actions. Also the reverse process changing matter to thoughts is possible. These possibilities are totally unimaginable in the quantum measurement theory for systems describable by wave mechanics. 4. There is also the notion of finite measurement resolution described in terms of inclusions of hyperfinite factors at quantum level and in terms of braids at space-time level. To summarize, a lot of theory building is needed in order to fuse all new elements to a coherent framework. In this framework standard quantum measurement theory is only a collection of ad hoc rules and can catch only a small part of what really happens. Certainly, standard quantum measurement theory is far from being enough for the purposes of consciousness theorist. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Dessalles, J-L. & Zalla T. (1998). On the evolution of phenomenal consciousness. Paris: Technical Report ENST-98-D-001. Available at: http://www.dessalles.fr/papers/Dessalles_98072405.pdf On the Evolution of Phenomenal Consciousness Evolution de la conscience phénoménale Jean-Louis Dessalles* and Tiziana Zalla** (1) ENST - Département Informatique & Réseaux 46 rue Barrault - 75013 Paris - France dessalles@enst.fr * CREA - Ecole Polytechnique 1 rue Descartes - 75005 Paris - France zalla@poly.polytechnique.fr ** A number of concepts are included in the term “consciousness”. We choose to concentrate here on phenomenal consciousness, the process through which we are able to experience aspects of our environment or of our physical state. We probably share this aspect of consciousness with many animals which, like us, feel pain or pleasure and experience colours, sounds, flavours, etc. Since phenomenal consciousness is a feature of some living species, we should be able to account for it in terms of natural selection. Does it have an adaptive function, or is it an epiphenomenon ? We shall give arguments to reject the second alternative. We propose that phenomenal properties of consciousness are involved in a labelling process that allows us to discriminate and to evaluate mental representations. We also discuss to what extent consciousness as such has been selected for this labelling function. Le terme de "conscience" recouvre plusieurs concepts. Nous parlons ici de conscience phénoménale, cet ensemble de processus par lesquels nous avons une expérience de certains aspects de notre environnement et de notre état physiologique. Nous partageons probablement cet aspect de la conscience avec de nombreuses espèces animales qui, comme nous, ressentent de la douleur et du plaisir, et font l’expérience des couleurs, des sons, des odeurs, etc. Comme la conscience phénoménale est une caractéristique de beaucoup d’espèces vivantes, nous devons l’expliquer en invoquant la sélection naturelle. A-t-elle une fonction adaptative, ou estelle un simple épiphénomène ? Nous donnons des arguments en faveur de la première option. Nous suggérons le fait que les propriétés phénoménales de la conscience sont impliquées dans un processus d’étiquetage qui nous permet de discriminer et d’évaluer les représentations mentales. Nous discutons ensuite l’hypothèse selon laquelle la conscience en tant que telle aurait été sélectionnée pour cette fonction d’étiquetage. keywords : phenomenal consciousness, evolution, modularity, labelling, binding, epiphenomenon. _______ 1 Authors’ names are listed alphabetically. oct. 1996 1 1. Introduction The term “consciousness” is merely a label for many separate phenomena. Whatever consciousness is, it is something that, far from being an undifferentiated stream of inner events, is instead a composite phenomenon which corresponds to the activity of functionally differentiated modular systems. We need to distinguish here phenomenal consciousness from other cognitive processes, from conceptual knowledge and from higher-order conscious states [Block 1995]. Phenomenal consciousness refers to qualitative properties of experience. The vividness of pain, pleasure, redness, the taste of red wine are examples of qualitative experiences1. We want to deal here with phenomenal consciousness for two main reasons. First, many non-human species may have qualitative experience (if we think of pain). We do not need to grant them other aspects of consciousness [Griffin 1981], just the ability to experience smell, colour or pleasure, even if their experience is qualitatively different from ours. An obvious question then arises : when, and why, did qualitative experience arise in phylogenetic history ? Our second motivation for considering phenomenal consciousness comes from the fact that its very existence, and the biological adaptive function it fulfils, remain highly mysterious. Is it a mere epiphenomenon, or worse : a non-scientific object, or does it play a precise, essential, biological role ? In our view, in order for the concept of consciousness to be of scientific interest, one has to show that it is a natural kind, i.e. a phenomenon which is useful and convenient to isolate as explanandum for a more advanced scientific theory. In this presentation, we take the existence of phenomenal consciousness as granted and we attempt to make this existence compatible with evolutionary principles. We shall study first what properties characterise qualitative experience, before looking for a possible adaptive function. We shall first consider the possibility that phenomenal consciousness is a mere fortuitous epiphenomenon, and that complex cognitive behaviour can take place in its absence. However we will reject this possibility. We will consider a possible account for phenomenal consciousness : it will be presented as a way to label experiences and mental states. Labelling is an essential feature of cognitive processing, though the most obvious way of labelling information, as used in computers, is not plausible in a neural implementation. Labelling through synchronous binding, and its qualitative correlate, will be presented as a solution which evolved to cope with environmental and behavioural complexity. Lastly, we will observe that this account, expressed first in terms of physical neural states, is insufficient to predict characteristic aspects of phenomenal consciousness. We will suggest that the ability to have experience is part of our phenotype and was retained as such by natural selection. 2. Properties and role of phenomenal consciousness 2.1 Is conscious experience nothing but an evolutionary epiphenomenon ? What use is the ability to experience mental states or events in the outer world ? Most of the complex processes going on in our body are achieved without involving any conscious component. We are not conscious of our immune system, we do not feel each contraction of our stomach, we are not aware of maintaining our equilibrium at each 2 moment. Many of our cognitive processes are performed without us being aware of them. We are even unable to monitor such processes. The way we analyse a visual scene, the way we recognise words in a complex acoustic signal, the way we adapt our walk on an uneven ground are good examples of such processes. In Fodor's terms [Fodor 1983], these processes are achieved by domain specific modules which are characterised by their encapsulation and their relative inaccessibility. Only the output, in the case of sensory modules, is experienced by the living being. Such unconscious processes may be quite complex, they may be context sensitive (for instance priming may affect word recognition) even if, according to Fodor, modules are encapsulated and thus receive little influence from other processes. If we think of complex unconscious tasks like shape and object recognition, we may wonder why cognition involves consciousness at all. Why are we sentient beings, why are we not unconscious like robots ? From a Darwinian perspective, this is a crucial question : what is the adaptive value of consciousness, and if consciousness has no such value, why do we happen to be conscious ? This question is even more vital from the functionalist perspective. Functionalism considers that what is relevant in cognition is the causal network of mental states which is involved in cognitive computations. Consciousness plays no role within these computations. The role of consciousness is so obscure that many authors doubt it, considering phenomenal consciousness as an epiphenomenon. Epiphenomena are known in evolutionary biology. Features which were not selected for, but result from the selection of other characteristics, are evolutionary epiphenomena. The most often mentioned example is the human chin, which appeared as a consequence of face and jaw reduction. The chin is not an organ shaped by evolution in the first place. Similarly, if consciousness is considered as a mere property accompanying some neural mechanisms, it is nothing more than a fortuitous by-product of brain evolution. Any evolutionary epiphenomenon has two basic properties : it is fortuitous and neutral. It could have been different or non-existent, and it has no effect on the survival of individuals. Is consciousness such a fortuitous, neutral feature ? In our view, the fact that phenomenal consciousness is systematically associated to sensory input analysis indicates that it is not incidental. Phenomenal consciousness may be considered as an epiphenomenon in another sense. It is sometimes said to be an emergent feature of complex functional organisations. This concept of consciousness emerging from complexity is however not operational. It does not explain why every brain region does not equally contribute to consciousness [Edelman 1989]. It does not explain either why brain damage may alter phenomenal experience selectively. A very serious claim is that phenomenal consciousness is systematically associated to a given physical neural state [Edelman 1989 ; Damasio 1989 ; Crick & Koch 1990] : Our basic hypothesis at the neural level is that it is useful to think of consciousness as being correlated with a special type of activity of perhaps a subset of neurones in the cortical system. Consciousness can undoubtedly take different forms, depending on which parts of the cortex are involved, but we hypothesize that there is one basic mechanism (or a few) underlying them all [Crick & Koch 1990, p. 266]. These authors consider consciousness as an authentic biological feature, but nothing prevents us from putting forward such a hypothesis to depict consciousness again as an 3 epiphenomenon : what was retained by selection would not be consciousness itself, but the underlying neural mechanism. In this kind of description, consciousness plays no causal role by itself in cognitive activity. It is not supposed to be a mere fortuitous sideeffect, it is the mental correlate, experienced from a personal point of view [Nagel 1974], of a special kind of brain activity. Our claim about the modular properties of qualitative experience will allow us to argue against epiphenomenon hypotheses and to put forward a possible role for phenomenal consciousness in evolution. 2.2 Modularity of qualitative experience The existence of conscious experience, which has recently become the object of many scientific and philosophical investigations, seems to deserve closer examination. The quality of sensory states at the phenomenal level – how things look, sound, how we feel them – appears to be modality-dependant. Mental disorders occurring after brain injuries sometimes reveal that some particular aspect of consciousness may be selectively impaired. For instance blind-sight patients declare to be blind in a certain area of their visual field. These patients suffer from brain damage, and their blind area corresponds precisely to the location of lesions in the primary visual cortex. However, it has been shown that they are still able to perform visual processing like localising simple visual stimuli, elementary patterns or movements [Weiskrantz 1980, 1987]. These patients are totally unaware of their residual visual capacity. They just claim they are “guessing” during visual tests. Their phenomenal experience is selectively impaired in the visual modality. Different types of neuropsychological syndromes (like amnesia, hemineglect, agnosia) that alter or suppress aspects of qualitative experience suggest the existence of dissociations within the sensory domain of information processing. As far as we can conclude from such neural deficits, each property of a given experience seems to be produced by a fixed and specialised neural architecture. These highly selective syndromes suggest that phenomenal consciousness is not globally distributed, but modular and that its modular properties mirror the organisation of sensory input modules. Qualitative aspects of experience originate at the output of sensory modules2. They are and remain separate (we never confuse the redness of an apple with its taste). Memory and perception are never experienced as a mixture of indistinct sensations. Qualitative experience is also mandatory : you can’t avoid experiencing redness when you look at a red screen, seeing a visual array as a three-dimensional objet, or hearing an utterance of a sentence (in a language one knows) as a sentence. These modular properties suggest that an adaptive role for phenomenal consciousness is to improve the ability to discriminate perceptual and mental states. 4 3. Qualitative labelling of experience 3.1 Cognitive labelling through phenomenal properties One of the most basic and important tasks a living creature has to perform in order to eat, move, mate and avoid predation is to extract relevant information from its sensory inputs and from its memory. This is what information processing is all about. The task is indeed not a trivial one. Biologically relevant information is indirectly defined by genes, possibly through learning, though genes can only give a rough indication. This is sometimes sufficient. For a frog, any small flying object is a priori edible. For learning to take place, however, situations must be distinguished. A frog is unable to learn anything about flies, since all flies look the same. With a specialised device for labelling experienced situations and a simple feed-back like edible / non-edible, a creature can learn a lot about things relevant to food. There are thus two basic labelling functions : (1) evaluation, in order to mark situations as positive or negative according to various scales (edible, dangerous, attractive, etc.) ; (2) perceptual labelling, which aims at individualising contexts for complex representational processing. Our claim is that phenomenal consciousness performs both functions, and that this is its main biological purpose, the reason for which it has been selected during phylogenetic history. The requirements are different for each label type. Perceptual labels are necessarily the result of a highly combinatory device, so that many distinct labels can be generated, while a “ value ” label must have a wide dynamic range, so that such labels can be accurately compared (the two requirements are not mutually exclusive). Our ability to simultaneously experience colour, shape, temperature, weight, sound features, distance and so on meets the first requirement. Any combination of all such parameters is likely to be unique. On the other hand, our experience of physical pain or pleasure, of sadness or joy, of pride, of nostalgia, etc. ranges from slight feeling to extreme intensity, and is thus suitable for comparative assessments of situation significance. The perceptual labelling role we give to phenomenal consciousness can be inferred from psychological studies on memory source monitoring. Johnson et al. [1988 ; 1993] claim that the phenomenal qualitative properties of mental experiences are the very source of a more general process of discrimination, judgement and attribution of mental events. They suggest that phenomenal properties of experience play a critical role in discriminating knowing from remembering, and thus, create a source for one's sense of personal past. When memory information without qualitative characteristics is recalled, it is experienced as mere knowledge or belief. Hence, phenomenal properties relating to perceptual and contextual information appear as important cues for discriminating representations, which is essential for assessing the reliability of information. Confusion about the nature and the source of different mental representations is likely to be the cause of misattribution in the confabulation syndromes where amnesiac patients actually mix up the imagined, perceptual and memory representations. From an engineering perspective, a modular labelling system appears to be rather odd. Labelling information is indeed a simple task in computer science and data transmission. All you have to do is to add unambiguous labels, e.g. as headers, to messages. When you receive data on your network navigator or when you open a file 5 with a word processor, objects received or read identify themselves as text, picture, table or whatever because they contain heading information giving their type. Labelling on a computer is thus easily performed by adding information to information. However, there is an obvious difference between computers and neural networks, so obvious that it remains implicit and is sometimes overlooked. This difference presumably prevented evolution from using headers as labels. To put it crudely, information is never merely transmitted in a neural network. Let us briefly clarify this point. By definition, in a digital communication context, a message becomes information only when appropriate operations have picked out its features. This definition fits in with what we know of sensory analysis in the mammal brain. Take the example of an image. When received on a retina, it is a mere matrix of pixels, bearing no information in terms of boundaries or outlines. This latter information appears after it has been detected by edge detectors. What is transmitted to a further processing level, e.g. an object recognition level, is expressed in terms of lines or edges, no longer in terms of pixels. In such a processing sequence, information is never transmitted as such, because at each stage, the symbol set changes. Things are different on a computer : you may mark out a piece of text to indicate the make-up and still have a text, mostly composed of the same characters with a few additional marks. In neural networks, this is impossible. Any processing changes the nature of information3. An edge detector is fed with pixels, but its output is of a different kind : it indicates the presence or absence of an edge with a given orientation at a given location. The engineering solution which consists in adding headers to a message in order to identify it unambiguously, as for instance in electronic mail, does not work with neural circuitry4, since such headers would be lost at each processing stage. One possibility is to consider that perceptive details have to be forgotten at higher levels of a hierarchical cognitive architecture. Detailed features play a role at the first stages of recognition, but are of no use afterwards when abstract features are processed. C. von der Malsburg [1986] shows in detail why such an organisation is not convincing at all, because of its lack of flexibility and parsimony. A purely hierarchical system necessitates the existence of dedicated units to represent high-level patterns. But whereas the number of combinations that have to be distinguished is virtually infinite, the number of such dedicated units in the brain are certainly limited. In other words, a purely hierarchical organisation lacks combinatorial power. Also, such dedicated units being separate, they cannot be the basis for generalisation : When I consider a particular scene, I absorb knowledge about the objects involved, by modifying the interactions within and between the corresponding mental symbols. I want to be able to have this knowledge at my disposal in other situations if they involve partly the same objects or aspects. This, however, is possible only through physical overlap between mental symbols. Avoiding this overlap destroys the basis for generalization. [von der Malsburg 1986] Von der Malsburg suggests that “mental symbols” are not limited to a given hierarchical processing level. What he calls the “natural representation” of an object simultaneously involves all its constituent elements. As a consequence, no information is lost in the integration process. 6 The symbols of communication [e.g. written words] are mere parsimonious tokens for the images they are to evoke in the reader’s mind. In contrast, the symbols of mind have to fully represent all aspects of our imaginations. [von der Malsburg 1986] If we accept this kind of description, phenomenal qualities, which appear at the output of modular sensory systems, are available for higher-level processes. In this context, the labelling role played by phenomenal consciousness becomes manifest. Processes like the justification and the revision of beliefs, especially perceptual beliefs, are sensitive to qualitative aspects that are only present at non-conceptual levels. For instance, in order for such operations to be accomplished, one should preserve the origin (e.g. external vs. internal) of the representations which are poised for use in reasoning and in the rational control of speech and action. The perceptual origin of the representation seems to be assessed from the abundance of phenomenal details. Kelly and Jacoby [1993] argue that the feeling of familiarity arises from attributions based on internal cues, such as the ease or relative fluency of perceptual operation, the quality of memories and the vividness of visual images. The experience of remembering is not the result of some intrinsic qualities of “memory trace”, but rather reflects the operation of a decision process that assigns ongoing mental events to particular sources. People normally use the presence of perceptual details in a mental state as a cue to infer that they are recalling, rather than imagining, and perceiving rather than remembering. Phenomenal and qualitative properties accompanying some kinds of mental states, e.g. perceptual or proprioceptual states and some episodic memory states, are important cues that enable us to ascribe them to ourselves5,6. Phenomenal qualities seem thus to strongly interfere with higher-order cognitive processes. As a consequence, we are always in hybrid mental states, partly conceptual and partly made of contextual qualitative information. The labelling of conceptual representations by qualitative properties is only possible if the latter may enter as constituents in cognitive representations, as suggested by von der Malsburg. Recent advances in brain modelling makes this requirement plausible, as described below. 3.2 Neural labelling implementation With phenomenal consciousness, natural selection seems to have discovered a way of labelling inputs which is compatible with neural implementation. But how is it implemented ? Edelman [1989] suggests that conscious perception relies on active categorisation. He explains that a set of several neural maps is responsible for the integrated conscious perception of scenes. This set of maps has been selected among other possible combinations of groups of neurones during ontogenesis. Perception itself results from the selection of a neural circuit among all possible combinations of connections between maps, through a process called reentry, which is a recurrent exchange of signals between maps. This is supposed to explain how sensory input analysis can be distributed over several locations in the brain and still produce a unified perception that is rich enough to be categorised. Thanks to reentry, perception is compared with memory traces through an active process that modifies both perception and memory. Primary consciousness results from these categorisation processes. Edelman, using the same principle, explains how such a unified, conscious, perception of a scene is connected to what he calls “values”. Reentry is supposed to occur between cortical maps and specific locations in the limbic system that implement values. The 7 latter connection accounts for the evaluation of the perceived situation. Areas responsible for evaluation (esp. limbic system, hypothalamus, brain stem) are phylogenetically older than those performing categorisation (thalamus and cortex). Both systems are necessary for consciousness. This account by Edelman is attractive, but it is far from being fully developed. For instance, Edelman’s theory does not help understand why some complex cognitive processes are performed unconsciously. Also, Edelman’s description is a purely neuronal account. There is no indication of any specific role that qualitative properties of experience could play, even if the author claims that consciousness is cognitively efficient and increases evolutionary adaptation of individuals. We shall now consider another neural account of phenomenal consciousness that may allow us to avoid these drawbacks. Our hypothesis is that phenomenal consciousness has an adaptive function which is to allow discrimination and labelling of perceptual and mental states. The issue of knowing how labelling is achieved is connected to a problem concerning perception itself, known as the binding problem. As Damasio puts it : It is not enough for the brain to analyze the world into its components parts : the brain must bind together those parts that make whole entities and events, both for recognition and recall. Consciousness must necessarily be based on the mechanisms that perform the binding. [Damasio 1989] In the brain, contrary to what happens in computers, different kinds of processing occur in different locations. For instance, colour analysis, shape recognition, movement and several other characteristics of visual scenes are detected in separate parts of the visual cortex. However, our brain constructs a single and global view of the scene. This integration requires a binding mechanism, so that we are able to simultaneously assign red colour, direction and form to a single object of the visual scene, that object moving toward us over there that we identified as a car. Objects exists as complex representations in our mind because we are able to link several phenomenal characteristics we could extract from our sensory processing and correlate them together as single objects. As we said, qualitative experience is not a general property of our mental states and mental processes. We claimed that different aspects of experience depend on different sensory modalities. However, qualitative properties experienced in a given situation are bound together across modalities and are unified into a single representation. Synchronous neural activity, since von der Malsburg [1986] and others, is often invoked to account for binding. It has been experimentally observed that neurones located in different cortical areas may function synchronously [Singer 1993]. Evidence from neurophysiology and from connectionist studies [von der Malsburg & Schneider 1986] suggested that frequency locking between neurone groups could account for the integration of different features of a given perceived situation. Binding through synchronous neural activity is temporary. This explains why its combinatory power is virtually infinite. As Singer [1993] puts it, “the essential advantage of assembly coding is that individual cells can participate at different times in the representation of different objects”. Hence every combination of extracted characteristics can be integrated into a single representation and possibly memorised as such. This combinatory power is what is needed for a perceptual labelling device. Our 8 suggestion is thus that (1) dynamic feature binding allows labelling of situations ; creatures with this ability can cope with much more complex environments ; (2) phenomenal consciousness was selected as a way to perform labelling through binding. At this point, we have an idea about the kind of adaptive role played by phenomenal consciousness. We also have plausible models of the way the labelling function may be implemented. We still need accounts for the role phenomenal consciousness played in its own evolutionary emergence. Was it directly selected, or is it an evolutionary epiphenomenon ? 4. An evolutionary role for phenomenal consciousness 4.1 Phenomenal variety and signal discrimination The claim that qualitative experience directly contributed to the ability of individuals to adapt to their environment during phylogenesis is equivalent to saying that qualitative experience is part of the phenotype. In evolutionary systems, we call phenotype the set of characteristics which are directly evaluated in the selection process [Dessalles 1992,1996]. Let us consider an analogy. Ethologists consider bird songs as adaptive : a mute song bird would not perform well, being unable to signal its territory properly. The ancestors of song birds were selected for their ability to sing. Should we consider that singing itself was selected, or rather that the syrinx (bird pharynx) was selected in order to allow territory signalling ? Perhaps we should look at the neural processes that are involved in singing and say they were also selected for territorial signalling purposes. What did selection retain after all, if not the genetic changes that make the difference between song birds and their non-singing ancestors ? From genes to neural processes, syrinx and song, there is a long chain of embryological events. Each of them is necessary for singing to occur. However, when ethologists study song birds, they are more prone to consider that the song itself was shaped by evolution to perform territory signalling, rather than syrinx or neural states. There are two reasons for this : first, actual songs seem to be optimal according to the way “fitness” (here efficient territory signalling) is assessed7 ; second, the fitness of the song can be assessed directly, whereas the fitness of syrinx is indirect and we must refer to the singing ability8. For the same reasons, we claim that from an evolutionary perspective we should include phenomenal consciousness into the phenotype of conscious beings rather than the neural states that underlie qualitative experiences. We indicated how phenomenal consciousness, through its labelling ability, could be assigned a fitness value. Now we want to show that qualitative properties of experience are, in a sense, optimal for the labelling ability. We should however be aware of two difficulties. Bird song can in no way be considered as an evolutionary epiphenomenon as phenomenal consciousness can. Also, even if song is a more abstract entity than physiological organs, it can be objectively measured, whereas qualitative experiences are not accessible : they are private to a single, subjective perspective [Nagel 1974]. We assume that phenomenal consciousness is a biological characteristic of living species, so we should be able to account for it in terms of natural selection. Any observed complex characteristic of living beings which is not a side-effect must have (or 9 have had) an adaptive value9. We suggested that phenomenal consciousness is associated with an adaptive function, which is to label experience at the output of perceptual systems, in such a way that representations do not necessarily become purely abstract when they reach central systems. However, we have no direct evidence showing that phenomenal consciousness was itself selected to perform this labelling function. We still have to discard the possibility that it is an evolutionary epiphenomenon : neural processes could have been selected directly to perform the labelling function, and they would happen to have phenomenal correlates. The question is thus to know whether qualitative experiences are phenotypic or not. Can we assess the optimality of neural processes performing labelling without making reference to qualitative experiences ? We want to suggest that there is a “mapping” between the physical input space and the qualitative space, and that such a mapping is not predicted by the epiphenomenon hypothesis. Consider an example from phonology. The three vowels [a], [i] and [u], present in words like apple, see, and fool10, are basic phonemes present in virtually all natural languages [Maddieson 1984]. Being able to distinguish them is thus essential for any human being. [a], [i] and [u] look indeed very different to a human ear. This qualitative contrasted appearance is consistent with the fact that the discrimination performance is maximum for these vocalic phonemes [Lindblom 1986]. It can be shown though spectral analysis that these three phonemes are objectively “distant” : by measuring basic spectral characteristics called “formants”, acousticians show that [a], [i] and [u] are located in opposite corners of the accessible space. These studies by acoustic engineers are generally considered as relevant because they establish an objective link between our intuition (the three vowels look different) and the requirements of robust communication (symbols used for communication should be maximally different to be easily distinguished). From another perspective, however, such an apparently plausible result should be regarded as quite unlikely. Why should our qualitative feeling about the dissimilarity of these phonemes be correlated with communication requirements ? If qualitative experience is nothing but an evolutionary epiphenomenon, we would expect no such dissimilarity between qualitative states corresponding to the perception of [a], [i] and [u]. This example reminds us that for some discrimination tasks11, it seems that we are fully aware of all the differences we are able to detect. In other words, in such cases, our discriminatory power is entirely due to the grain of qualitative conscious aspects of our experience. Our performance relies on the fact that all the qualities we are able to experience in a given modality are different and separate. We can take other examples involving colour or flavour discrimination. We are aware of all colour shades that we can discriminate. This good performance, compared to other mammal species, is due to the fact that normal human beings12 experience different wavelengths in a contrasted way. For instance, colours usually distinguished in English have quite contrasting qualitative appearances. We can even assess subjective distances by saying that blue is closer to violet than to yellow. Similarly, pineapple taste is not so far from lemon, but not at all like tomato. All the stimuli which are biologically relevant and that we effortlessly discriminate induce clearly distinct qualitative experiences. This is hard to explain if phenomenal consciousness was not involved in the evolutionary process. Why aren’t there colours (or tastes or sounds) that we would experience as identical but that we would still be able to discriminate ? If phenomenal experience was a mere by- 10 product of neural evolution, we could suppose that only neural processes are needed for detecting physical information without calling for the corresponding qualitative states. Phenomenal variety, the fact that qualitative experiences in a given modality are differentiated, may be given a technical explanation. It is well-known, from an engineering perspective, that signal discrimination is easier if signals are spread over a wide energy range and compared to maximally distinct patterns13. [a], [i] and [u] are acoustically the most distinctive vocalic sounds our vocal tract is able to emit. The fact that we experience phonemes like [a], [i] and [u] as clearly distinct suggest that phenomenal properties are involved in the discrimination process and that they carry information. The only possibility which is consistent with phenomenal variety is that qualitative experience is not an evolutionary epiphenomenon : it plays a direct role in discrimination and as a consequence was selected for its own sake. In other words, we perform discriminations on the basis of phenomenal qualities. First conscious species were selected according to this ability which requires a rich repertoire of phenomenal qualities in each modality. The fact that qualitative experience has a modular structure that systematically mirrors the organisation of perceptual systems, and the fact that it meets constraints of signal discrimination efficiency by keeping relevant qualitative properties scrupulously apart, suggest that phenomenal consciousness was itself involved in the evolution process. 4.2 Selection pressure on qualitative experience Our claim is that phenomenal consciousness is optimally designed to perform its function, which in our view is to label perceptual and mental states. It is associated with the output of each modal sensory processing where it makes relevant signals the most discernible. This is exactly what we expect from a perceptual labelling device designed by natural selection. If we accept this hypothesis and think that phenomenal consciousness has been directly produced by evolution to fulfil an adaptive function, then we may consider (1) that phenomenal consciousness is phenotypic and (2) that neural states underlying phenomenal states only exist because the latter have an adaptive function. In this sense, phenomenal consciousness is part of the phenotype, exactly as bird song in our example. Underlying neural devices are not themselves phenotypic, since they are just a link in the long chain going from genes to phenomenal consciousness. If we follow the analogy with bird song, optimality of qualitative experience can be directly understood, whereas the optimality of underlying neural states would only appear through a reference to phenomenal properties. From this perspective, phenomenal consciousness is what led the evolution of cognitive systems towards increasing discriminatory capacities. If phenomenal qualities were epiphenomenal, our perceptions would not give rise to such a variety of phenomenal states. The richness and the vividness of our phenomenal repertoire suggests that it is the direct product of natural selection. Under this hypothesis, qualitative experience has to be seen as a driving element in the evolutionary process which produced both our rich perception of the environment and our ability to discriminate mental states. It is thus indirectly responsible for our ability to learn efficiently. 11 5. Conclusion We presented phenomenal consciousness as modular. Qualitative properties of experience are associated with sensory modalities, they are and remain distinct even if they can be integrated into multimodal and conceptual representations of objects and events. According to the hypothesis presented here, an adaptive function of phenomenal consciousness is to be found in relation to this integration involving qualitative information. Qualitative properties play the role of labels. Through the combinatorial power of a binding mechanism based on synchronous firing of neurones, representations may be multimodal and yet preserve contextual and modally distinguished perceptual aspects. Conscious organisms are thus able to discriminate among their perceptual representations. They are neither highly specialised robots nor purely abstract general problem solvers. Phenomenal consciousness allow them to better cope with the wide range of situations found in a complex ecological environment. Higher-order cognitive processes have to be sensitive to qualitative properties of experience in order to determine the source of mental representations. According to our hypothesis, this is made possible by the fact that qualitative properties play the role of labels that carry information about the origin of representations. The structural features of phenomenal consciousness, its modularity and the variety of qualitative properties within each modality, are in accordance with what we expect from a labelling device. On the other hand, alternative accounts in terms of neural states that consider qualitative properties as epiphenomenal can hardly explain the richness and the vividness of the qualitative repertoire. Phenomenal consciousness should be considered as a proper phenotypic character. Phenomenal consciousness is what natural selection could act upon. Any increase in qualitative variety was likely to induce a more probable survival of individuals. This might explain why phenomenal properties of experience, which seem to be optimally designed for the labelling of representations, were selected and designed by evolution. 6. Notes 1 The feeling of being a single entity, the fact that some recalled events look familiar, the feeling of “ownership” about our mental states, the first-person point of view, the ability to observe aspects of our cognitive functioning are other important features of what is called consciousness. Nevertheless, all of them are different aspects of consciousness, each one might be related to different cognitive functions and may eventually call for different accounts [Zalla 1996]. 2 In the modular theory of consciousness put forward by R. Jackendoff [1987], only the intermediate level, where sensory information has been processed in a modality specific way but has not yet reached central representations, supports awareness. 3 The reader may object that topological information is transmitted as such, from map to map, in neural visual processing. But what is conveyed here is signal, not information. Neighbouring relations are present in the matrix for an external observer, but they do not exist as such for the brain until they are detected. And they are lost afterwards. An edge detector may use topology among pixels. At the output of this detector, topological relationships between pixels do not exist anymore, simply because at this stage pixels are no longer represented. Topology among edges is preserved in the signal, only because it has not yet been detected. 4 We speak here of biological plausible circuitry as we imagine it, since it is technically possible to perform anything with neurones, even compute square roots. 12 5 Suengas and Johnson's experiments [1988, p.388] also demonstrated that both emotion when recalling imaginary events and lack of clarity when recalling real events reduce qualitative differences between these two types of memories and thus tend to generate some kind of confabulation. 6 A syndrome associated with deep lesions in the right posterior, non-linguistic hemisphere is characterised by the patient's denial of “ownership” of his paralysed, left arm. Conversely, normal subjects experience the loss of a limb very much as a loss of “a part of themselves”. We can suppose that the lack of proprioceptual qualitative states is the cause of one’s misattribution of parts of the body. 7 For instance, characteristics of bird songs produced by different neighbouring species are very different. The male bird can thus be correctly identified by females of its species. 8 By contrast, a physiologist would not be interested in territory signalling. She would consider syrinx as phenotypic and the ability to produce a distinctive song as a way to assess syrinx fitness. 9 Strictly speaking, the adaptive value should be assessed at the gene level [Dawkins 1978]. Neutralists [Kimura 1983] have claimed that random shifts are an important aspect to explain evolution ; however the probability that complex functional characteristics emerge from random shift is virtually zero. 10 In French, these phonemes are present in words like plat, vie, roue. In English, apple starts with [æ]. Better examples for [a] would be words like lie and now in which the first part of the diphthong is considered. 11 According to the modular description that we adopted, this happens at a certain level of input analysis, at the output of sensory modules. 12 Colour blind subjects being of course excluded. 13 In digital communications, possible waveforms should be chosen so that the energy of their difference is maximal. 13 7. References Block, N. (1995). "On a confusion about a function of consciousness". Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18, 227-287. Crick, F. & Koch, C. (1990). "Towards a neurobiological theory of consciousness". The Neurosciences, 2, 263-275. Damasio, A.R. (1989). "The brain binds entities and events by multiregional activation from convergence zones". Neural Computation, 1, 123-132. Dawkins, R. (1982). The Extended Phenotype - The Gene as the Unit of Selection. Oxford : W.H. Freeman & Co. Dessalles, J-L. (1992). "Biomimetic Use of Genetic Algorithms". In R. Männer & B. Manderick (ed), Parallel Problem Solving from Nature, 2. Amsterdam : NorthHolland, 127-135. Dessalles, J-L. (1996). L'ordinateur génétique. Paris : Hermès. Edelman, G. M. (1989). The Remembered Present. A Biological Theory of consciousness. New York : Basic books. Fodor, J. A. (1983). La modularité de l'esprit. Paris : ed. de Minuit, ed. 1986. Griffin, D. R. (1981). The Question of Animal Awareness. California : W. Kaufmann. Jackendoff, R. (1987). Consciousness and the Comuputational Mind. Cambridge : Bradford Book, The MIT Press. Johnson, M. K., Foley, M. A. & Suengas, A. G. (1988). "Phenomenal characteristics of memories for perceived and imagined autobiographical events". Journal of Experimental psychology: General, 117(4), 371-376. Johnson, M. K., Hashtroudi, S. & Lindsay, D. S. (1993). "Source monitoring". Psychological Bulletin, 114(1), 3-28. Kelly, C. M. & Jacoby, L. L. (1993). "The Construction of Subjective Experience : Memory Attribution". In M. Davies & G. W. Humphreys (ed), Consciousness. Psychological and Philosophical Essays. Oxford : Basil Blackwell. Kimura, M. (1983). The neutral theory of molecular evolution. Cambridge, U.K. : Cambridge University Press. Lindblom, B. (1986). "Phonetic universals in vowel systems". Experimental Phonology, 13-44. Maddieson, I. (1984). Patterns of sounds. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press. Nagel, T. (1974). "What is it like to be a bat ?". Philosophical Review, 83, 435-450. Singer, W. (1993). "Synchronization of cortical activity and its putative role in information processing and learning". Annual Review of Physiology, 55, 349-374. 14 Suengas, A. G. & Johnson, M. K. (1988). "Qualitative effects of rehearsal on memories for perceived and imagined complex events". Journal of Experimental psychology: General, 117, 377-389. v. der Malsburg, C. & Schneider, W. (1986). "A Neural Cocktail-Party Processor". Biological Cybernetics, 54, 29-40. v. der Malsburg, C. (1986). "Am I Thinking Assemblies ?". In G. Palm & A. Aertsen (ed), Proceedings of the 1984 Trieste Meeting on Brain Theory. Heidelberg : Springer Verlag, 161-176. Weiskrantz, L. (1980). "Varieties of residual experience". The Experimental Psychology Society, 32, 305-380. Weiskrantz, L. (1987). "Residual vision in a scotoma. A follow-up study of 'form' discrimination". Brain, 110, 77-92. Zalla, T. (1996). Unité et multiplicité de la conscience : une étude critique des théories contemporaines à la lumière d'une hypothèse modulariste. PhD Dissertation. 15

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 35 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements Article Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements Ryan C. Burke, Melanie Y. Gauthier, Nicolas Rouleau & Michael A. Persinger* Consciousness Research Laboratory, Behavioural Neuroscience Program, Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ontario P3E 2C6 ABSTRACT In order to test the presence of excess correlation, or entanglement, pairs of subjects separated by 300 km were either exposed or not exposed to specific configurations of circular magnetic fields with changing angular velocities that dissociated the phase and group components. When one person in the pair was exposed to sound pulses but not to light flash frequencies within the classical electroencephalographic band, there were discrete changes in power within the cerebral space of the other person even though they were not aware of the stimulus times and separated by 300 km. The intracerebral changes that only occurred if the magnetic fields were activated around the two cerebrums simultaneously were discrete and involved about single, punctate volumes of about 0.13 cc (125 mm3). The potential energy from the applied magnetic field within this volume was calculated to be about 6∙10-14 J and with an average brain power frequency of 10 Hz would result in 6∙10-13 W. Assuming π∙10-2 m2 for the surface area of the cerebrum, this is equivalent to ~2∙10-11 W∙m-2. This power density is the same order of magnitude as that associated with photon emission during cognition. Given the average of 6∙106 neurons per 125 mm3, the induced energy is equivalent to about 10-20 J per neuron. This value can be considered a quantum of universal energy and would be congruent with a condition that could promote non-locality. Key Words: entanglement; brain; s_LORETA; transcerebral magnetic field stimulation; 10-20 J 1. Introduction For many decades the operation of non-locality was assumed to be restricted to the quantum level of space-time reactions. However experimental demonstrations of this phenomenon within macroscopic objects have been reported. Julsgaard, et al (2001) found the maintenance of spin states for about 0.5 msec for two volumes of caesium gas each containing about 1012 molecules. Dotta and Persinger (2012) exposed simultaneous reactions that generated photon emission to *Corresponding author: Dr. M. A. Persinger, mpersinger@laurentian.ca ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 36 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements shared rotating magnetic fields whose angular velocities and phase velocities were dissociated. This condition would arise if the photon displayed a non-zero mass as argued by Tu et al (2005). Dotta and Persinger reported clear experimental evidence of entanglement, defined as the doubling of photon emissions from the spatially separated reactions when both shared the same magnetic field configurations. The functional number of molecules involved with the reactions, ~1018, would have been expected to produce entanglement about a million times longer than the Julsgaard et al (2001) effects. As predicted the duration of the “entanglement” was about 500 s (about 8 min). Entanglement between two cultures of cells separated by non-traditional distances but sharing specific types of circularly rotating magnetic fields with changing angular velocities was demonstrated by Dotta et al (2011). They found that exposure of one population of cells to bright flashing light was temporally contiguous with increased photon emissions from the population of cells housed in the dark several meters away. The increased photon emission from these cells, when cells sharing the same magnetic field configurations were receiving light stimulation in another room, was about 10-11 W∙m-2 or when accommodating the width of the cell culture dish and the numbers of cells, about 10-20 J∙s-1. When pairs of subjects were exposed to these magnetic field configurations while one of the pair was exposed to flashing light significant increases in photon emissions from the right hemisphere of the other person in the pair, sitting in the dark in another room, was clearly measured; this effect did not occur when the fields were not operating or when the light was not presented. These studies were systematic replications of a previous paradigm (Persinger, et al, 2010) when correlated electroencephalographic cerebral events between physically and sensory isolated pairs of subjects were observed over the right parietal regions when the other member of the pair was exposed to different frequencies of light flashes but only if both were yoked to the same circumcerebral magnetic fields. In unpublished experiments Dotta and Persinger demonstrated that the “double photon” emission, when injections of the same amount of reactant occurred simultaneously and both chemical reactions were exposed to the changing angular velocity circular magnetic fields, was still clearly evident when the separating distance was about 3 km. In this instance two different computers operated the rotating magnetic field equipment, thus minimizing the potential role of instrumental artefact. In order to test the potential distance by which entanglement between human brains might be demonstrated, the following experiment was designed to discern if there was potential proof for this principle. We reasoned that the effects should be sufficiently strong to be discerned by the most sensitive complex measure of intracerebral activity. This measure, s_LORETA, or standardized Low Resolution Electromagnetic Tomography, reveals the power of different incremental frequencies within regions of the cerebral volume. Although the spatial resolution is 5 mm, the patterns of activation have shown strong validity and concordance with measurements by fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging). The basic procedure was to expose one of a pair of subjects for brief periods to various frequencies of sound or flashes of light while the other member of the pair was unaware of these presentations. Quantitative EEG measurements required for the s_LORETA analyses would be taken from that second member, approximately 300 km away, continuously. Both members of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 37 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements the pair would be exposed to a rotating, circular magnetic field whose frequency modulation would also undergo changing angular rotation (velocity). If entanglement, that is excess correlation, occurred between the two brains that when one person was being exposed to the stimulus there should be a discrete change in power within the brain of the other person, 300 km away, but only if the fields were activated. We report here data that support this effect. 2. Methods and Materials In order to investigate macroscopic entanglement between pairs of strangers separated by 300 km, four adult participants between 20 and 25 years of age were recruited (3 male, 1 female). Two participants were located in Sudbury, ON while the other two were situated in Timmins, ON. Participants located in Timmins were designated as stimulus persons while those residing in Sudbury were considered response persons. Consequently there were two pairs of stimulusresponse persons. Stimulus persons were seated in a dark and quiet room. They were exposed to alternating audio and photo stimulation for periods of 30 seconds. Each interval was followed by 30 seconds during which time no stimulus was presented. There were three audio stimuli (6Hz, 8Hz, 15Hz), and three photo stimuli (7Hz, 10Hz, 40Hz) which were selected because they represent frequencies that can be measured using quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG). Audio and photo stimuli were presented with an Apple iPhone 4 using Nature Scenes v3.2 (audio) and Flashlight v2.0.3(photo) applications. Response persons were situated in a similar environment. Their brain activity was monitored using a 19-channel cap with electrodes (Mitsar-201) placed according to the 10-20 monopolar system throughout the experiment. The data were recorded with a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop (Intel Core i3 CPU M 380@2.53GHz, 2 Cores, 4 Logical Processors). Communication was maintained by cell phone between experimenters in order to ensure accuracy of time stamps on the EEG data. To reduce experimenter bias, the investigators in Sudbury were instructed when to mark the EEG output, but were not aware of the type of stimulus being presented in Timmins. The response persons were not aware of what was occurring but sat quietly in the room. Both the stimulus and response persons wore a toroidal magnetic field device (“the halo”) on their heads such that the rostral-caudal plane was just above the dorsal ear. The device is shown in Figure 1. Each toroid consisted of 225 turns of 16 gauge stereo wire wrapped around a 10 inch plastic ring. The shape of the magnetic field was modulated using an Arduino Uno microcontroller. The specific field was a frequency-modulated pattern, similar to the one employed by Dotta and Persinger (2012) to create entanglement between photon emissions from chemical reactions. Effectively this contained 230 amplitude-modulated points (333 Hz, 1.45 Hz cycle), with an average strength of approximately 1 µT, that was phase modulated in 2 ms increments (20 ms delay to 8 ms delay) such that an increase in angular velocity occurred within the circular device worn on the heads by the pairs of subjects. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 38 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements The experimental procedure was repeated two times. During one sequence of 6 stimulus trains (3 visual, 3 auditory) both participants in a pair received the complex, physiologically-patterned magnetic field. During the other sequence, the participants did not receive any field but received the same 6 stimuli in a different order. One pair of subjects received the no field condition first while the other pair received the field condition first. Figure 1- Halo system consisting of 225 turns of 16 gauge stereo wire around a ten inch diameter plastic ring. The toroids were placed around the heads of the stimulus person and the response person who were separated by 300 km. The QEEG data was exported for the 15 second segments for each stimulus and the comparable time immediately preceding each stimulus. The data were analyzed by classical sLORETA software. This software displays 3-dimensional, sagittal, horizontal, and coronal representations (resolution 5 mm) of the cerebral volume for 1 Hz frequency increments between 1 Hz and about 30 Hz. The analyses examined the significant changes in brain activity in the response person while the stimulus person was being presented with the sound or visual stimuli compared to the 15 seconds immediately prior to the presentation. All analyses involved SPSS PC software. 3. Results The results were very conspicuous qualitatively. There was a significant change in very focal cerebral activity only during the magnetic field condition for only the auditory stimuli for both pairs of participants. There was no significant change in activity within the cerebrums of the response persons between the stimulus periods compared to the previous interval when there was no field in operation. There was also no significant change for any of the periods involving visual stimulation. As can be seen in Table 1, the changes occurred within the cerebrum of the response persons at the same time the stimulus persons were being presented with the auditory sequences. In Table 1, F refers to the presence of the shared field pattern, NF indicates no shared field pattern, BA ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 39 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements refers to Brodman areas of the cerebrum, and the various Greek letters refer to classic frequency bands, such as beta (13-20 Hz), theta (4-7 Hz), delta (1-4 Hz) and alpha (8-13 Hz). The most obvious pattern noted for both pairs of subjects is the involvement of sensory integration (secondary projection) areas of the cerebral cortices. Table 1- Significant differences in brain activity of the response person when audio stimuli were presented to the stimulus person, compared to the 15 seconds immediately preceding the stimuli, were observed for all stimuli only during the field conditions. (A= audio stimulus, PA=pre-audio stimulus, F= field, NF= no field, SUB= subject pair) SUBJECT/CONDITION SUB1 A-PAθ (F) A-PAθ (NF) A-PAα (F) A-PAα (NF) A-PAβ (F) A-PAβ (NF) RESULTS Increased β3 over left BA9 (p<0.001) n.s. Decreased α2 over right BA19 (p<0.001) n.s. Increased β1 over left BA7 (p<0.001) n.s. SUB2 A-PAθ (F) A-PAθ (NF) A-PAα (F) A-PAα (NF) A-PAβ (F) A-PAβ (NF) Increased β2 over the right BA47 (p<0.001) n.s. Increased δ over the left BA22 (p<.001) n.s. Decreased δ over the left BA3 (p<0.001) n.s. Table 2- Results from the light stimulation were not consistent to those observed for the audio stimulation. From the 12 conditions (6 field, 6 no field), only 1 reached significance with the field and 1 without the field. (P= photo stimulus, PP=pre-photo stimulus, F= field, NF= no field) SUBJECT/CONDITION SUB1 P-PPθ (F) P-PPθ (NF) P-PPα (F) P-PPα (NF) P-PPγ (F) P-PPγ (NF) n.s. n.s. n.s. Increased δ over the right BA10 n.s. n.s. SUB2 P-PPθ (F) P-PPθ (NF) n.s. n.s. ISSN: 2153-8212 RESULTS Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 40 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements P-PPα (F) P-PPα (NF) P-PPγ (F) P-PPγ (NF) n.s. n.s. Decreased γ over the right BA8 n.s. The second major observation for all of the periods in which there was a significant change in activity within the space of the response person’s brain at the same time the stimulus person was hearing stimuli 300 km away when both shared the same magnetic field configuration was the extremely focal nature of the effect. S_LORETA analyses for all cases displayed a punctate change in power within specific frequency bands in one voxel whose resolution width is about 5 mm. An example of this phenomena that was noted in both response persons from the two pairs is shown in Figure 1. Figure 1. Punctate activation of theta power within the right frontal region of response person 1 while the stimulus person listened to sounds 300 km away but both were exposed to the same circular magnetic field with changing angular velocity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 41 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements Figure 2. Punctate activation of theta power within the right frontal region (different area than response person 1) of a second response person while the stimulus person listened to sounds 300 km away but both were exposed to the same circular magnetic field with changing angular velocity. 4. Discussion To our knowledge this is the first demonstration of experimentally-induced, “excess correlation” or entanglement between two macroscopic objects, in this case human brains, over a distance of approximately 300 km. The effect was sufficiently robust to be evident in two different pairs of participants. That change in power within the brain of the response persons was evident only when the magnetic fields were present but not when they were absent and for the auditory stimuli but not for the visual stimuli indicates the effects were not spurious but specific to the condition. Because even the experimenters attending to the response persons were not aware of which conditions were being conducted by other experimenters with the stimulus persons the role of subtle cueing appears minimal. The effect within the response person’s brain during the “entanglement” when the stimulus subject was being exposed to the sound stimuli and when both the stimulus and response persons were exposed to the magnetic field configuration was very focal. This change in power from the previous reference period occurred, for the most part, in only one voxel as shown in Figures 1 and 2. The resolution of s_LORETA is about 5 mm. Such single “pixel” effects are not common during cerebral responses to various physical stimuli or cognitive tasks when dozens of proximal pixels share the same activation or clusters of pixels, with each cluster containing dozens of pixels, are clearly discernable. However such discrete and singular changes would be more congruent with entanglement. The magnetic energy within a volume can be calculated as J=B2∙(2∙4π∙10-7 NA-2)-1m3, where B is field strength, the second unit is µ, and m3 is volume. For a cubic volume with a width of 5 mm, the magnetic energy is (10-12 T2) ∙(2∙10-6 NA-2)-1 ∙1.25∙10-7 m3 or 6.25∙10-14 J. Assuming the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 42 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements average of 48 neurons per .001 mm3 (Blinkov and Glezer, 1968), then there would be 6∙6∙106 cells per 125 mm3 or one voxel. This would be equivalent to ~10-20 J per neuron associated with the entanglement effect. This is a fundamental neuroquantum associated with the action potential as well as the resting membrane potential (Persinger, 2010). If we assume that the average frequency of neurons within the voxel was 10 Hz, then the power would be 6.25 ∙10-13 W. The equivalent power density, assuming a surface area of the cerebrum to be π∙10-2 m2, would be 2∙10-11 W∙m-2. This value is within the same order of magnitude and within error measurement of the coefficient for the energy associated with photon emission from the right hemisphere during specific types of imagining (Dotta et al, 2012). The congruence between the energy intensity associated with the strength of the simultaneously applied magnetic fields at the two separate distances, the specific number of neurons occupying the voxel that is matched with the 10-20 J solution, and the equivalent power density to photon emission during cognition indicates the importance of this quantum. The 10-20 J quantum may have universal prevalence and significance. As calculated by Persinger et al (2008), one solution for the total force within the universe is 10164 N which is derived from the product of its mass (~1052 kg) width (~1026 m) and intrinsic vibration (zitterbewegung) squared (1086 Hz2). The equivalent numbers of Planck’s length volumes within the volume of the universe (assuming it’s a cube) would be 1078 m3 and when divided by 10-105 m3 would be 10183. Consequently there would be 10-19 N per Planck’s voxel. If this force within the domain of zero point potential oscillations were distributed over the wavelength of the precession for neutral hydrogen (10.8 cm), the equivalent energy would be ~10-20 J. Such convergence obviously does not prove that the entanglement we observed involved a universal energy. However the solution that an average of 10-20 J per functional unit may exist throughout the universe in specific geometric domains may be useful for pursuing procedures that could allow the isolation of mechanisms. We were surprised that visual stimulation did not produce the excess correlation over 300 km. Persinger et al (2010) had found that different light-flash frequencies applied to stimulus persons were reflected in the coherence of quantitative EEG values in response persons sitting in the dark in another room. However in that study the optimal coherence occurred when the rates of change of the angular velocity for the yoked circumcerebral magnetic field conditions were different than those employed in the current study. In the yoked study there were increases in power over the right parietal region for frequencies that were similar to the ones to which the stimulus person was being exposed at the same time. In the present study, the “excess correlation” was noted when sounds or beat frequencies were presented to the stimulus person. Sound stimuli affect more central components of the temporal lobes and may convey more emotive information because of the contributions from the amygdala and hippocampal formation. The involvement of the latter would require the engagement of the entorhinal cortices and parahippocampal region which are the major loci for the afferent and efferent information for these mesiobasal structures. The parahippocampal gyrus is a multimodal integrator that exhibits pervasive connections to and from the entire neocortices. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 43 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements If we assume a holographic like organization of the electromagnetic patterns that are manifested within the cerebral volume then information from the central integrator (the parahippocampal cortices) could be represented any where within the volume at any given time depending upon as yet unknown algorithms. Consequently “excess correlation” could occur within different punctate regions but would maintain the same quantum of energy and power. This was observed in the present experiments. There are clearly other interpretations. One major question is at what critical mass would a person be aware that “something” is occurring within conscious awareness? There is convincing evidence that a critical mass of neurons is required for awareness of events to be reported. For example, in the phenomenon of “psychic blindness”, whereby the person with a caudal cerebral injury is technically blind but avoids objects within his or her walking path, there are still residual neurons operating. At some critical number “awareness” of what is registered by sensory systems occurs. Berns et al (1997), employing positron emission tomography (PET), showed that brain regions are responsive to novelty in the absence of awareness. Subtle changes in grammar during a reading task were associated with decreased blood flow within the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortices (Brodman area 45/46), the inferior parietal lobule, and, the superior temporal gyrus. The duration of the right prefrontal changes was consistent with the maintenance of contextual information, without awareness. It may be relevant that in many studies the right prefrontal region, particularly when activated, is associated with the reconstruction of memories including autobiographical references. The spatial regions involved with Berns et al (1997) were more extensive than the single voxel effects we measured and also included increased blood flow in the left premotor region, left anterior cingulate, and right ventral striatum. Based upon our experience with s_LORETA, the typical numbers of voxels that are activated during normal daily experiences of thinking, solving neuropsychological tasks, or even relaxation that engages in the Default Mode Networks, several tens of voxels within a cluster or sometimes several clusters with these numbers of voxels display either increased or decreased power within specific frequency bands. The single voxel effect reported here would appear to be negligible in comparison and would be obscured by background activity or the “analytical overlay” of consciousness to employ a phrase from the protocol of Ingo Swann. We suggest that this single voxel is non-trivial. Experimental evidence by Li et al (2009) has shown that repetitive high-frequency burst firing of a single neuron within the rat cortices can trigger the switch between cortical states as distinct as slow wave sleep and rapid eye movement (“dream”) sleep. The energy associated with a single action potential is ~10-20 J (Persinger, 2010) and with burst firing of ~100 Hz, this would be equivalent to 10-18 J. Li et al (2009) found that repeated burst spiking at 50 Hz for about 3 min resulted in a switch in state that could persist for more than 20 minutes. If a comparable process occurred in the human brain, this would indicate that only (1.8 ∙102 s) ∙(5∙10-19 J∙s-1) or ~10-16 J would be required to shift the global cerebral state. Even if we assumed some recondite mass effect because the human brain is about 103 greater in volume than the rat brain, the equivalent energy would still be well within the magnitude of energy that we infer was associated with the single voxel changes in the response persons. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 35-44 44 Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleau, N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental Demonstration of Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Circular Rotating, Angular Accelerating Magnetic Fields: Verification by s_LORETA, QEEG Measurements References Berns, G. S., Cohen, J. D. and Mintun, M. A. Brain regions responsive to novelty in the absence of awareness. Science, 1997; 276: 1272-1275. Blinkov, S. M. and Glezer, I. I. The human brain in figures and tables: a quantitative handbook. Basic Books: Plenum Press: N.Y., 1968. Dotta, B. T., Buckner, C. A., Lafrenie, R. M. and Persinger, M A. Photon emissions from the human brain and cell culture exposed to distal rotating magnetic fields shared by separate light stimulated brains and cells. Brain Research, 2011; 1388: 77-88. Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S. and Persinger, M. A. Increased photon emission from the head while imaging light in the dark is correlated with changes in electroencephalographic power: support for Bokkon’s biophoton hypothesis. Neuroscience Letters, 2012; 513: 151-154. Dotta, B. T. and Persinger, M. A. “Doubling” of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatially-separated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. Journal of Biophysical Chemistry, 2012; 3: 72-80. Julsgaard, B., Kozhekin, A. and Polzik, E. S. Experimental long-lived entanglement of two macroscopic objects. Nature, 2001; 413: 400-403. Li, C-y.T., Poo, M-m. and Dan, Y. Burst spiking of a single cortical neurons modifies global brain state. Science, 2009; 324:643-645. Persinger, M. A. 10-20 Joules as a neuromolecular quantum in medicinal chemistry: An alternative approach to myriad molecular pathways? Current Medicinal Chemistry, 2010; 17: 3094-3098. Persinger, M. A., Koren, S. A. and Lafreniere, G. F. A neuroQuantologic approach to how human thought might affect the universe. NeuroQuanology, 2008; 6: 262-271. Persinger, M. A., Saroka, K. S., Lavallee, C. F., Booth, J. N., Hunter, M. D., Mulligan, B.P., Koren, S. A., Wu, H-P., and Gang, G. Correlated cerebral events between physically and sensory isolated pairs of subjects exposed to yoked circumcerebral magnetic fields. Neuroscience Letters, 2010; 486: 231-234. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 260 Article The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science Iona Miller* ABSTRACT There is a pre-physical, unobservable domain of potentiality in quantum theory. It is the basis of fundamental interconnectedness and wholeness of Reality. Nonlocal consciousness is not confined to specific points in space, including brains or bodies nor the present moment. It is an ordering principle that can inject information into disorganized or random systems. It can operate beyond mere awareness, unconsciously, drawing on individual and collective consciousness, as well as the world or environment. Coherence or resonance may be expressed as compassion, empathy, love, unity, oneness, and connectedness. Consciousness affects or informs human and nonhuman or inanimate forms alike. Consciousness is present everywhere in spacetime, so has no need to “go” or “be sent” via a medium or carrier. Synchronous events, including intentional or directed healing, may work via coherence, an entanglement or resonance effect, but we should be careful not to mistake this field effect for the mind itself, which permeates and undergirds all. Still none of us has any idea how anything material could be conscious, so we must simply stand in that Mystery. We share its essential nature; it is the cosmos within us. We are that. Key Words: nonlocal, mind, mind-body, consciousness, pre-physical, interconnectedness, wholeness, synchronicity. “This feeling for the infinite…can be attained only if we are bounded to the utmost. In knowing ourselves to be…ultimately limited – we possess also the capacity for becoming conscious of the infinite. But only then!” ~ C. G. Jung * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com Note: This work was completed in August, 2004 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 261 "By applying Ockham's razor to the basic epistemological question 'What is reality?' the Buddhist idealists reach the conclusion that belief in an external reality is a 'superfluous hypothesis'" ~ Philip K Dick, in the introduction to "The Golden Man" "There are no conditions to fulfill. There is nothing to be done, nothing to be given up. Just look and remember, whatever you perceive is not you, nor yours. It is there in the field of consciousness, but you are not the field and its contents, nor even the knower of the field. It is your idea that you have to do things that entangle you in the results of your efforts - the motive, the desire, the failure to achieve, the sense of frustration - all this holds you back. Simply look at whatever happens and know that you are beyond it." ~ Nisargadatta Maharaj Unbound Consciousness: Beyond the Mind/Body Model The universe is infinite, and so is the mind, not in the individual personalistic sense, but in terms of consciousness. ‘Nous’ is an ancient word for what we now call nonlocal mind or consciousness. Many philosophers and modern physicists consider ‘consciousness’ as the fundamental basis of all that is. Alchemy, as the search for godhead in matter, argues that “there is one stone, one medicine to which nothing from outside is added, nor is it diminished, save that the superfluities are removed”…as above, so below; as within, so without. Alchemists sought the Unus Mundus, the One World analogous to the modern search for a Grand Unified Theory in physics, or the Theory of Everything uniting all known forces. The Greeks conceived of the mind as both limited and infinite, human and divine. The root of this notion comes from Hermetic and occult sciences, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. The mind is not localized nor confined to the body but extends outside it. This notion lies at the root of sympathetic magic. The Persians were even bolder in their view that the mind could escape the confines of the physical body and create effects in the outside world. Their physician Avicenna declared, “The imagination of man can act not only on his own body but even on others and very distant bodies. It can fascinate and modify them, make them ill, or restore them to health.” These notions were superseded by later causal and mechanistic views that came to dominate Western science and medicine, separating mind and body. The nonlocal mind paradigm suggests we can effectively operate with the realization that consciousness can free itself from the body and can act not only on our own bodies, but nonlocally on distant things, events, and people, even if they are unconscious of the intentionality. But it is a holistic viewpoint that doesn’t split mind from body. It also suggests a new emergent healing paradigm (Miller, 2003). This nonlocal model is perhaps the basis of such phenomena as psychosomatics, remote healing, remote viewing, and dream initiations. Physicists use the term nonlocal to describe the distant interactions of subatomic particles such as electrons. We can experience nonlocal mind ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 262 spontaneously, paradoxically, without losing our individuality. A creator can live in many universes instead of simply adhering to a prescribed worldview such as the outmoded causal paradigm or unscientific New Age beliefs. It has been proven that human minds display similar interactions at a distance (Krippner; Mishlove; Radin; Dossey; May; Stanford; Germine; Nelson; Motoyama; Sidorov; Swanson; Miller & Miller). These anomalies include therapeutic rapport, telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, visions, prophetic dreams, breakthroughs, creativity, prayer, synchronicity, medical intuition, nonlocal diagnosis, spontaneous remission, and intent mediated or paradoxical healing. Nonlocal mind erupts spontaneously, surprising, even shocking us with startling effects. The mind has ultra-dimensional qualities seemingly unlimited by physical constraints. Psi phenomena concern organism-environment interactions in which it appears that information or influence has occurred that cannot be explained through current models of sensory-motor channels. They are outside current scientific concepts of time, space, and force. We have hypotheses but little idea how organism-environment and organism-organism information and influence interface and flow. “Emergence” is the process by which order appears spontaneously within a system. It is essential to understanding functional consciousness, the mind/body, subjective experience, and the healing process. When many elements of a system mingle, they form patterns among themselves as they interact. Fundamental physics is about observable and verifiable anticipation of possible relatively evolving quantities and/or qualities, including complementary wave/particle descriptions. Quantum mechanical equations of motion yield open systems and work out their consequences for the flow of information. We have tremendous empirical evidence that quantum mechanics is part of such a physics. And so are we when we seem to make “quantum leaps” in awareness. When the mind lets go of its rational order, lets the old form die, and enters into a bifurcation or unstructured chaos, the whole person emerges with a new form, embodied as a creative expression, an intuition, or as healing. The deepest effects result in a new self image Most often it is characterized by an element of novelty and surprise, since it apparently does not originate in what came before. Both healing and medical intuition are examples of emergence. It is a spontaneous solution to a problem. The healing arts, from conventional medicine to alternative/complementary medicine (CAM), and from psychology to pastoral counseling are undergoing a shift from a mechanistic to a holistic paradigm. Science is actually an experimental philosophy whose highest value is empiricism, and conventional healing shares this philosophy. All new scientific theories require some unifying idea, and that idea is, by definition, metaphysical – essentially untestable. Today’s heresies are tomorrow’s dogmas. In any metaphysical dispute, strong non-scientific arguments can propose new theories, which may become scientific. Speculative ideas have contributed heavily to the growth of knowledge. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 263 Rather than discouraging exploration of fringe areas of knowledge, this awareness makes it mandatory we explore all possible modalities and anomalies without prejudice, no matter how unconventional. Even extraordinary subjects may be approached with rigorous protocols. Though subjectivity is unwelcome in science, we can study the subjective nature of experience (qualia) in various ways. The process of healing is one such subjective experience. The alchemists, who were students of consciousness in matter, created an elixir of life, a “medicine of philosophers”, a cure-all or panacea. What the modern world yearns for is a “meta-syn,” or visionary synthesis rooted not in a mechanistic model but one using nature’s own organic forms of self-organization. This model is based on the peculiar characteristics of nonlocality and probability of quantum physics, rather than classical Newtonian mechanics. QM doesn't explain gravity, but the fact that the world “ever” appears classical is just a simplification due to our inability to sense quantum states directly. There is no such thing as a classical world. Hopefully, the new model has the power to resonate with our whole being and propel us into a more effective healing paradigm. Emergent healing is actually a treatment philosophy, rooted in a worldview born from our current understanding of the nature of Reality as described in chaos theory, quantum mechanics, and the holographic concept. Health is the natural outcome of a meaningful life, not just absence of symptoms. It means a comprehension of the complexities of life that is deeper than the conventional worldview of cause and effect. It proposes that consciousness is the foundation of reality. We do not exist independently from the universe, but the exact nature of that seamless connection is unknown. Rooted in relativity, quantum, holographic and chaos theories, a nonlocal metaphysical context suggests such a paradigm shift from the purely causal healing model. The interactive field (psychodynamic field) present in healing situations can be amplified intentionally through therapeutic entrainment, or resonant feedback playing off the unified field (universal field). Synchronicity In 1948 psychologist Carl Jung and physicist Wolfgang Pauli began talking about an acausal yet meaningful connecting principle that Jung dubbed synchronicity. Jung used over 1,400 of Pauli’s incredibly rich dreams to write his books on alchemy, a modern version of the search for godhead in matter. Pauli’s professional work validated quantum mechanics; energy appears in ‘bundles’ which appear as various subatomic particles that are manifestations of different types of fields. The two theoreticians were on complementary vectors. They cross-fertilized one another with concepts from their respective fields, a psychophysical merger. Pauli discovered an abstract pattern hidden beneath the surface of atomic matter that determines its behavior in a noncausal ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 264 way. Jung argued certain patterns are linked in nonmechanical ways forming a causeless but meaningful order mirrored in mind and matter. Modern physics literally realized the transmutative dream of the alchemists when it learned to manipulate and exploit the atom. Transmutation is changing the number of protons in the atomic nucleus of the basic elements. Matter is now viewed as a process not a thing. Mind is a special kind of process depending on arrangements of matter. Likewise, embedded process. Metaphysically, even “God is a verb” as is everything else. When Wolfgang Pauli collaborated with Jung, he encouraged us to find “a neutral, or unitarian language in which every concept we use is applicable as well to the unconscious as to matter, in order to overcome this wrong view that the unconscious psyche and matter are two things.” Psyche and soma are indissolubly wed in nature and our nature, and must be considered in an adequate account of reality. However, now there is no consensus in physics, so all contemporary models -- Transactional (quantum handshake), Many-Worlds (decoherence), M-Theory (strings), Copenhagen (wavefunction collapse), Holographic (frequency domain; resolution), Implicate (hidden information), etc. -- are essentially philosophical, or colored by the psyche and philosophy of their originators. Imagination has to cross the boundaries of disciplines to somehow find links between the observable and unknowable. Both matter and psyche are in a constant state of redefinition. Psychology describes psychic contents with psychic means. Psyche is subject and object, medium and message. Models, questions and proofs all originate in the human mind. And even in physics there is no objective observer outside the universe to experiment on it. Jung contended the common background of physics and depth psychology was psychic as much as physical. This essential third element is transcendental. Both disciplines engage in a reflective interior search for hidden connections along with the outward gaze of scientific inquiry. The presence of the observer has an effect on what is observed, both in terms of interpreting that experience (projection, archetypes, assumed truths; worldview) and literally at the physical level. This is embodied in the Uncertainty Principle, where we cannot know a particle’s position and momentum simultaneously. There is no objectivity possible as relativity and quantum mechanics have demonstrated. Synchronicity explores the borderland between meaning and spacetime, where chance meets necessity, when external and internal circumstances align in meaningful coincidence. It links the observable and unknowable, the effect of the particular and specific with the universal. In this nonlocal effect, certain qualities manifest relatively simultaneously in different or proximate places. It is a parallelism that cannot be explained causally. Is it an invisible field effect linking multidimensional spaces? Synchronistic phenomena coincide and are amplified in space and time. It manifests as psychic phenomena when the connection is psyche to psyche, including empathic psychophysical manifestations. When it is between psyche and the outside physical world it creates other ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 265 phenomena such as anomalous cognition (A.C.) or psychokinesis, or perhaps lucky shopping – finding what you want! Pauli seemed so prone to generating weird phenomena around him that Jung called it the ‘Pauli Effect.’ Machinery broke, fires started, equipment exploded or fell apart, and other strange things manifested in his presence. Powerful activations of the unconscious are associated with such effects. Inner psychological images meet outer facts in physical knowledge. Complementary or parallel psychological and physical explanations can be argued. But Jung and Pauli agreed there is an unknowable structuring element in the collective unconscious that arranges the registering of acausal events. Synchronicity is a psychic equation: this equals that though the energy is manifested in dual relationship in the spacetime continuum. There is a constant connection through effect, not causation. What is simply is…and, it is meaningful. Synchronicity can be metaphorical or symbolic, or quite literal. It is a structurally accurate relationship connection. Synchronicity embodies a psychophysical unity. It illumines us, reminding us of the uncanny and unknowable side of life. It is spirit in matter, an animating principle. It emerges from a level where psyche and matter originate, where religion and science originate. It takes us by surprise from out of the blue when it lacks directed intentionality. There is a tale about the Venus de Milo which embodies very dramatic synchronicity. Before it was sold to the Louvre, the statue was in the hands of a Venetian art dealer, who found it more profitable to sell pieces of the statue to the superstitious. It was said it had the power of make women who touched it beautiful. Realizing the potential for profit, the art dealer arranged to make a plaster cast and have the original statue smashed to bits and parsed out. When the art dealer raised his arm to give the signal to destroy the statue, his arm was severed from his body as if by an invisible sword. Simultaneously the opposite arm of the Venus de Milo was also severed. Both arms fell to the floor, one of flesh and one of stone. They fell in the form of a cross, which the workers took as a divine sign to cease their vandalism. But when we imagine that we have intentionally conjured a desired result, our puny personalities cannot call it anything but magic and stand in awe of the Mystery. This doesn’t mean the result is caused by our will, but perhaps through a certain intuitive alignment or resonance with the flow of all that is. As in Pauli’s physics discovery, the underlying pattern of the whole dance has a profound effect on the behavior of each individual particle. Every occurrence is a unique synchronous act of creation in time. Jung implied that the unconscious or fundamental consciousness is the animating power of all matter. He defined a psychoid realm where mind/matter melded subjective and objective into a unity. He viewed mind-matter as a continuum of the unconscious, or primordial consciousness. Jung also postulated a transconscious or unintegratable realm of archetypal forces. There is some evidence that the groundstate of the vacuum potential or ZPE provides a model for a subquantal field effect that influences matter/energy through chaotic virtual photon fluctuation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 266 Quantum Biophysics and Healing Our contemporary task is to move beyond the apparent mind/body dichotomy of western mechanistic thought. This cannot remain a mere concept but must become part of our essence, a belief lived from our very core. Living from a holistic perspective is an experiential process, a Way of life. "Consciousness" encompasses the potentially integrated healing aspects of brain, mind, emotions, and spirit, together with physiological and environmental influences that produce unique patterns. Healing is a physical or biological form of creativity. Nonlocal healing is a synchronistic event, which takes place in the presence of intentionality to share a common field of influence. The "consciousness of healing" may be a pattern, or patterns, that can be identified in the anomalous energies associated with sensitive persons. Anomalous energies are one highly meaningful constellation of factors. Recurrent, complex, interrelated patterns, processes and temporal variations, influenced by the environment, are inherent in states of consciousness for better or worse. Selected aspects of consciousness provide more reliable experimental replication and active integration of holistic investigations into the sources and processes of healing, other associated non-local phenomena, environmental effects and biophysical interactions of body, mind, emotions and spirit. New developments on the frontier of science start with (1) observations of phenomenological effects, (2) collection of anecdotal information, (3) organizing the data into useful patterns and relationships from the experiential data, (4) developing a subsequent taxonomy for defining discrete phenomena and their various aspects, (5) forming research protocols and designs to test hypotheses and maximize successful and reproducible results, and (6) utilizing the research results in development of individual and group healing applications and expanding knowledge about the bioenergetic aspects of healing.. It has been suggested (Dossey; Krippner; Gowan; Motoyama; Beal and Gilula, 2004) that some individuals possess unusual capabilities and processes of consciousness. They are often considered intuitive about past, present or future events, and highly sensitive to body, mind, spirit and environmental influences, in and around other persons, as well other living and nonliving systems. They may be admired, imitated, ignored, feared, suppressed or judged as "handicapped" or "mentally afflicted", depending on how they use their "gifts". Associated with an individual’s abilities, there are aspects of, (1) emotional events, both lifechanging (epiphany or tragedy), and sequelae, (2) and/or an inherited component, (3) a health issue, which may also serve to influence their unusual capabilities, and, (4) an environmental influence, positive or negative. Please note that these people, by inheritance, accident, illness, discipline, or environmental influence manifest an incredible range of sensitivity, down to quantum energy levels. Many ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 267 persons involved in healing processes are hypersensitive to chemical, electromagnetic, and electrical factors, whether acquired either naturally or artificially induced. Strong psychosomatic overtones are related to electrical and electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) as well as to multiple chemical sensitivities (MCS). This type of adaptation and sensitivity may be one of the characteristics important to possess or develop in the healing process. There are many answers to "unexplained phenomena." We are developing more sensitive instruments to measure, internally and externally, the electrochemical nature of living systems and the interacting variables of the environment. Every day we watch the impossible or nonsensical become useful and applicable through technological and conceptual quantum leaps in awareness. The complex interactions of all these energy factors (holographic, quantum, electromagnetic and chemical) that shape life processes must be considered, along with genetic, biochemical, age, gender and health processes. All of these factors must be addressed in any exploration of unusual states of consciousness whether they occur in individuals or in groups. There is comparatively very little human perspective/awareness anywhere about our long-term relationship interactions with the earth and all other living systems. We are a product of our natural earth environment and respond to some subtle degree (and sometimes not so subtle) to the same geoelectromagnetic, chemical and atmospheric factors which affect all other living things. We can, and are, affecting the balance of nature, which in the long-term affects us. This is a true form of biological feedback. The field of healing sources and processes requires the development of taxonomy and protocols for analyzing and exploring inherited, spontaneous, controlled and stressful patterns of consciousness, and relating these patterns to potential environmental influences. Areas of concern, which can respond to investigation, are the recurrent, complex, interrelated patterns of brain activity (before, during, and after healing events) related to 1) the consciousness of the healer (what psychophysiological patterns are required to produce optimal and repeatable healing, 2) environmental influences supporting the healing objectives, and 3) consciousness of the subject. When both the patient and healer are co-equals in the process and on a “level playing field,” patient safety is optimized, but so is healer safety. This type of setting also maximizes the possibilities of bioentrainment of physiological signals belonging to both patient and healer. A level playing field also allows patient and healer to co-create the process of healing from a position of mutual empathy, respect, and trust. Such a level field is created by an environment, which maximizes those traits. Interrelated patterns of consciousness are reflected in brainwave (EEG) frequency distribution, psychophysiological states, and environmental conditions, which affect the clinical healing setting (Gilula). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 268 Unusual states of consciousness, controlled or spontaneous may occur due to: (1) external sensory induction, sensory deprivation or sensory over-stimulation, (by environmental influences); (2) internal changes that are self-induced by body and mind disciplines, (3) ill health, (psychophysiological aspects of electrical and chemical sensitivity), accident, injury or near-death trauma, (4) inherited CNS influences, for example, familial periodic paralysis (FPP) and recurring spontaneous psychokinesis (RSPK), or (5) interactive combinations of the previous factors. Research suggests that RSPK incidents tend to occur under unusual emotional stress and on days of above average geomagnetic fields, modulated by EMFs from the agent and focused by the agent onto significant other objects. Krippner and Persinger also report anomalies and amplification of psi reports associated with periods of exposure to tectonic strain. The RSPK process is similar to the electro-acoustic effect of movement induced in the diaphragm of a loudspeaker by an electric current. But, in RSPK, the EMF energy moves through space-time without the benefit of electrical wiring, presumably because it is highly focused. Roll brings up Puthoff’s theory that the central person affects the zero-point energy (ZPE) that fills space and thereby the gravity/inertia that usually keep things in place. If the ZPE is affected during RSPK, this may suggest that the ZPE has a consciousness component. Meditative or yogic practices would add a dimension of personal exploration to any investigation of the zero-point energy. Recent research studies of the nature of consciousness and the relationship to "quantum holography", requires a new perspective regarding time, space and energy interactions. Persons who exhibit strong allergic responses, who are often chemically and/or electrically sensitive, may inadvertently affect tape recorders, computers, lights, TVs and other sensitive electronic equipment during their reactive episodes. This is strongly reminiscent of the “Pauli Effect.” Robert Morris has reported that some individuals are affecting electronic equipment when they are in an intense or traumatized emotional state. Effects on magnetometers, electrical, magnetic, and electromagnetic field detectors have been noted from persons who claim non-local energy projection abilities. Pathological sensitivities can be either inherited or accidentally acquired. Spontaneous, nonlocal events may occasionally occur around FPP or EHS-afflicted individuals. The events seem causally related to RSPK, and include lights going on and off (usually solar-activated types), computers crashing, individual components burning up, and other similar effects on sensitive solid-state electronic devices. Stressful events that may be psychophysiological or environmental seem to help initiate both FPP and ESH reactions, with RSPK occurring sometimes as a side-effect. New methodologies and taxonomies may provide more consistent replication, control, amplification, and exploration of the subtle energies associated with healing and other states of consciousness. In the efforts to understand the interrelated patterns of body, brain, emotions, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 269 mind and environment involved in healing processes, we may describe some sources of healing within the blend of consciousness and quantum cosmology. Nonlocal Creative Source AHA! All true creativity springs from the unknown, from a deep wellspring of flowing forth. Creativity involves a sense of discovery and epiphany, of realization as well as shaping of media. Musicians often speak of an uncanny ESP that takes them to new heights of creativity developed among players. The same deep knowing develops among fellow artists in other media as well. If we follow some natural laws we can become more effective creators. You cannot create your life, per se, but through adopting certain attitudes and exercising certain principles you can enhance your life experiences one creative act at a time. We saw this in considering the emergence of a special form of creativity -- healing. An open Way facilitates creativity, opens the creative space, limits resistance, increases flow. We can learn through shaping, rather than through thinking, doing, feeling, undertaking, experiencing, or being. It is different from cognitive learning, behavioral learning, emotional learning, action learning, experiential learning and ontological learning. Most of our learning systems are cognitive, about thinking and writing, rather than shaping and making. Artificer learning (Wildman and Miller, 2003) is learning by shaping. Shaping with a clear telos or intentionality allows fluidity in the process of formation to suit the particular situation, optimizes the flow state (Csikszentmihalyi). We can increase our effectiveness as creators by the following (Fritz): Allowing our driving force to be desire, loving the creation enough to bring it into being; Recognizing that when we master the creative process, the unusual becomes usual; Realizing form is not a formula, which can actually work against the creative process; Being process-oriented, focusing on how to create, rather than results or goal oriented; Knowing what you don’t or can’t know and refraining from speculation that distorts reality; Remaining a learner, rather than performer with a fixed level of capacity; Working with an attitude of choice, rather than obligation to manipulate or motivate yourself; Stretching toward the new and unfamiliar and consolidating by repetition; Maintaining some separation for engagement and relationship between creator and creation; Focusing on the creation, not yourself, from a first-person to third-person orientation away from your identity to the actual creation and reality; Idealism can set you up for ideal-reality conflict which is irrelevant to creation or your ability to create it; ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 270 A specific prescribed worldview is less important than the ability to live flexibly within many universes; Creative process deals with relative not absolute truth; Consider your life a blessing to bring into being creations you simply want but don’t need; Make individual creations in your life to shape it through deep involvement; Practice objectively observing current reality and how to close the gap toward your vision; Simple plans help develop effectiveness and efficiency; The more you create, the more you can create; Deadlines help you focus your creative process; Always have a place to go in the open-ended creative process. Creativity is a process, not a product. Art transcends logic, and even when planned is not calculated nor thought out. Art springs from a creative cauldron stirred by one’s psyche into a magical brew. We can be creative in a variety of ways at whatever we do. Even when we speak, we should remember we are using our vocal instrument which plays the music of our soul. Qualities of the voice – tone, meter, pitch, rhythm, volume, attack, etc. – reveal more than the words we use. If you speak in a flat tone no passion or soothing is communicated. A melodic voice implies emotional range. Charisma is energy which flows from the heart. Charisma can be created when the speaker’s feelings are transferred in their purest form to the listener. Raw feelings convey the passion of pure energy. If your reservoir of pure feelings is full you can transfer that to your audience via sound and rhythm, and animation of the whole body that conveys emotional energy to the audience. Let it come bursting forth from the soul like a work of art. Feel the passion; feel the fervor; feel the feelings no matter how you intend to express them. Let it flow forth like song. Make your arguments with a variety of colors and strokes, and know when to stop! Embrace and cherish your feelings as you and they express themselves. Feel the spectrum of pain and joy evoking the most exquisite affirmation of life (Spence). Truth is a revelation of what we already know but haven’t heard in words before. In truth we discover what we already know but haven’t confronted. Truth as a judgment is the product of our experience. In our belief systems, truth is what we accept of our history, what we accept as truth. We choose truth, which is revealed in direct proportion to our abilitiy to discard all we were previously told is true – presumptions, assumed truths, limited self image. Neurologist Ramachandran has summarized 10 artistic universals which constitute10% of the content of art to 90% of the endless cultural variations represented by art history. This 10% represents the visual primitives of human perception that we respond to emotionally and aesthetically: neuroaesthetics. In addition to other sensory modalities, thirty visual centers are linked to the emotional part of the brain. They please our neural circuits and mesmerize us. They include: Peak shift (amplification of traits; ultranormal stimuli, or charicature) Grouping (Aha! arousal vision evolved to discover objects and defeat camoflage) Contrast (visual peekaboo; the act of searching is pleasing) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 271 Isolation (understatement; less is more; attentional focus) Perception problem solving Symmetry Abhorrence of coincidence/generic viewpoint (novelty-seeking) Repetition, rhythm and orderliness Balance Metaphor (layers of meaning ‘Know Brow’ art is the product of new media – ars electronica -- that transcends the dichotomies of high and low brow with its own technoshamanic ecstasis. It implies the knowledge, attitudes and skill sets necessary to produce art with highly technical processes, but also the visionary capacity to see multiple layers of meaning through direct experience. This knowing is a discovery process, and immersion, a seeking, a gnosis that cuts a path through the mindscape of the ‘now’ toward the future that remains perpetually undefined. We commune with the past to inform our present, not just as a homage, but to gain initiation to that transtemporal way of knowing and honoring our cultural roots. ‘Know brow’ art, as a movement toward more and more fully immersive multidimensional experiences, encourages the active, constructivist acquisition of artistic knowledge and openness to new forms and media, as well as technical capacities. We want to inspire more than digital “factory workers” or proficient craftspeople. We want to enable the student to make, shape or organize with a telos, a meaningful purpose that has deep psychic rootedness: one who invents, not adopts; who shapes not copys; who builds not assembles; who is capable not merely competent; who is efficacious not just efficient; who experiments not just conceptualizes. There is a bliss that comes from within us that energizes, even enflames the human desire to enact, to enable, to engage, to outwork it, i.e. to transform ourselves and the world (bizarre and grandiose as this may sound). Discussion Quantum mechanics, chaos theory and complexity have superseded both the pre-scientific and mechanistic worldviews. The new paradigm is an organic model – Nature’s Way of fractalscale, spontaneous self-organization, self-assembly, regeneration, and transmutation of energy/matter. Chaos prevails from the infinitely small to cosmic levels. Dynamic processes are deterministic though unpredictable. All experience is subjective. Intuition is an informational source that is non-linear and therefore can create quantum leaps in consciousness. Using imagination, we can ‘see through’ to a deeper level of reality. The Universe is a fractal manifestation of the interaction or interdependence of chaos and order. Nature and evolution are complimentary systems evolving at the edge of chaos – the source of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 272 the genesis of new forms. Like a fractal, the individual embodies the whole, to a greater or lesser degree. We are neither exclusively biological nor psychospiritual beings – we are both/and psychobiological. Archetypes are rooted in or emerge from the “Demiurgic field” as attractors, chaotic systems having fractal or reiterative structuresthat repeat at all levels of observation. They never settle into equilibrium, periodicity, or resonance. Transpersonal experience creates a new interpretation, or perspective on reality. Systems arise from positive feedback and amplification. Thus, archetypes introduce erratic behavior that leads to the emergence of new situations, including creative insight. Both perception and cognition can be modeled as a transition from a state of chaos representing the unrecognized condition, or the unresolved problem, to a state of order. Creativity or learning can emerge spontaneously, from exploring states of confusion, to the instantaneous insight of a “Eureka” moment, or knowing state through bifurcation to a new attractor, to chaotic resolution. Art and artfulness embody the imagination expressed as a living form. An expressive form manifests human feelings and values, a concept of life (exoteric) and inward reality (esoteric) – the logic of consciousness itself. Other examples are sudden illumination, aesthetic appreciation or arrest, opening to nature (nature-mystic experience), simple recognition to dramatic realization, or awe. An experience, innovation, discovery or realization always has aesthetic appeal. It contains mythological, metaphorical and epistemological dimensions. When we have a creative, therapeutic or transformative experience, it involves a degree of ‘what it is like’ to be shaped, to apprehend this given, to undergo this process or happening. Chaos theory shows us we actually need to cooperate with chaotic dynamics, to enter a less-rigid process of flow, submitting outworn aspects of the ego to dissolution. This increases our adaptability helping us evolve. At supercritical junctions (crises, crossroads, bifurcations) we either breakdown (emergency) or increase adaptation (emergence) with more creative solutions. Creativity is an excited-exalted state of arousal with a characteristic increase in both informational content and the rate of information processing. Creative holistic repatterning is introduced into the human system through the psyche as nonmanifest yet phenomenological images, symbols, and patterning information. Imagination is embodied, objectified, expressed in the creative process. It is knowing through living through, distinctionally different from knowing about. It carries a sense of immediacy. Imagination is the voice of creativity. It is the primary way we experience soul; imagination embodies it’s own reality. It is self-revelatory. Meaning dwells in the image like consciousness dwells in the body. We live in a chaotic universe to which we are seamlessly wed. We are a chaotic system ourselves, and chaotic systems exhibit holistic behavior. Holism sees the world in all its ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 273 diversity as connected. A global wave of information (consciousness) is responsible for the extraordinary coherence that expresses as self-organization. It’s not a case of ‘we are the world’; we are one with the whole universe of phenomena and being in the deepest sense. The unifying force is consciousness. Beauty is a state of consciousness described in Kabbalah and Hermetic philosophy as related to self-actualization. In psychological terms it implies transcendence of the realm of personality and intimate knowledge of the transpersonal self, self-actualization. It corresponds with creativity, healing, genius and bliss states or unitive experience. The bottom-up creative dynamic runs from personality to Self, to Demiurgic Field. Chaos theory provides a comprehensive metaphor for uniting physical, emotional, mental and spiritual realities. Supreme insights are always metaphorical in expression. The empirical connection may lie in the mystery of the true nature of consciousness, healing, and creativity. Knowledge about natural phenomena, the way nature and ourselves work, can help us attune to deeper resources. The same essential dynamics that gave rise to the birth of the universe govern human creativity and learning. Conclusions There is a pre-physical, unobservable domain of potentiality in quantum theory. It is the basis of fundamental interconnectedness and wholeness of Reality. There is a dynamic creative boundary of infinite reiteration, creating order from disorder, in chaos theory. This cosmos is, indeed, greater than the Whole SUM of its parts. Somehow each particle always seems to know what the other is doing. How does that work? It seems to violate Einstein's long-held tenet that no communication can travel faster than the speed of light. But under certain circumstances subatomic particles such as electrons can instantaneously communicate with each other regardless of the distance separating them, whether they are 10 feet or 10 billion miles apart. Wormholes and tunneling aside, how does every point in space connect to every other point in the Universe? In a Holographic Universe, even Time and Space can no longer be viewed as fundamentals, because concepts such as location break down in a universe where nothing is truly separate. The apparently concrete world is a multidimensional projection. Experimental findings by Aspect (1982) seem to imply that objective reality does not really exist. Despite its apparent solidity, the quintessence of the universe is a gigantic and splendidly detailed hologram. While this hologram implies an objective reality, it is not directly perceivable. This is where the essence of the “mystery” lies. It is the inherently non-observable and therefore metaphysical part of objective reality. A hologram suggests that some things in the universe do not lend themselves to this empirical approach. If we try to deconstruct something constructed holographically, we only get smaller ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 274 wholes, with fuzzier resolution. In this sense, the part contains the whole. If the apparent separateness of subatomic particles is illusory, it means that at a deeper level of reality all things in the universe are infinitely interconnected. The reason subatomic particles are able to remain in contact with one another regardless of the distance separating them is not because they are sending some sort of mysterious signal back and forth, but because their separateness is an illusion. At some deeper level of reality such particles are not individual entities, but are actually extensions of the same fundamental something. Quantum mechanics determined the primacy of the inseparable whole. Holism is intrinsic to any quantum theory for biology. Descriptions of isolated systems are permissible only under experimental conditions. Holistic properties imply fundamental interconnectedness within the organism, between organisms, and with the environment. The vacuum potential appears to be much more than a metaphor. It is the most fundamental phenomenon we are currently capable of perceiving. It provides us with a new paradigm for our very existence – one that recognizes wholeness, connectedness, integration, and participation in the universal scheme. Every ‘thing’ – from concepts to objects -- including the universal waveform originates from the fertile and “whole sum” womb of spacetime. This is also the domain of nonlocal mind. Most scientists will tell you that wavefunctions, universal or otherwise, do not really exist, except on paper. But it may be that wavefunctions really exist and are akin to the mind of God. If the wavefunction is consciousness and our personal wavefunction is connected with it in a constrained or limited fashion, too much information appears as noise. But the connection suggests a relationship between intelligence and spacetime. In a holographic universe even random events must be revisioned as based on holographic principles and therefore determined. Synchronicities or meaningful coincidences suddenly makes sense, and everything in reality would have to be seen as a metaphor, for even the most haphazard events would express some underlying symmetry and meaning within the whole. Nonlocal events, like synchronistic events are apparently 1) unmediated, requiring no gobetween signal; 2) unmitigated, with no diminishing of effect with distance; 3) immediate, apparently outside of time and space as we commonly understand them. In this acausal process, consciousness is fundamental, not derivative and unexplainable in terms of anything more basic. However, it is unlikely we will ever be able to demonstrate that consciousness is a logically necessary accompaniment to any material process, however complex. But we can show that emprical processes of a certain kind and complexity appear to have it. It may even be an intrinsic “quality” of matter, like mass, or maybe more closely related to the foundational nature of “information.” Nonlocal consciousness is not confined to specific points in space, including brains or bodies, nor to the present moment. It is an ordering principle that can inject information into disorganized or random systems. It can operate beyond mere awareness, unconsciously, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 275 drawing on individual and collective consciousness, as well as the world or environment. Coherence or resonance may be expressed as compassion, empathy, love, unity, oneness, and connectedness. Consciousness affects or informs human and nonhuman or inanimate forms alike. But it is not simply a matter of philosophically or conceptually embracing a new paradigm that can change ourselves or the arc of our stewardship of the planet Earth. We can rhapsodize in a self-congratulatory way all we want about holism, the web of life and our place in the cosmos. But to change things we have to change ourselves, be willing to trasform utterly in our essence and impliment what we have learned about the deep nature of reality. Simply mastering QM and complexity theory won’t help us evolve morally, emotionally or spiritually. We have to tranform our inner consciousness to truly embrace global consciousness as our legacy. “The ecological crises – or Gaia’s main problem is not pollution, toxic dumping, or ozone, depletion,…but that not enough human beings have developed to the postconventional, worldcentric, global levels of consciousness…by going through at least a half-dozen major interior transformations, ranging from egocentric to ethnocentric to worldcentric, at which point, and not before, they can awaken to a deep and authentic concern for Gaia. The primary cure for the ecological crisis is not learning that Gaia is a Web of Life, however true that may be, but learning a way to foster these many arduous waves of interior growth, none of which have been addressed in most of the new-paradigm approaches.” (Wilber, 2000) Consciousness is present everywhere in spacetime, so has no need to “go” or “be sent” via a medium or carrier. Synchronous events, including intentional or directed healing, may work via coherence, an entanglement or resonance effect, but we should be careful not to mistake this field effect for the mind itself, which permeates and undergirds all. Still none of us has any idea how anything material could be conscious, so we must simply stand in that Mystery. We share its essential nature; it is the cosmos within us. We are that. "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick. References Aspect, 1982a: A. Aspect et al., Experimental Realization of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm Gedankenexperiment: A New Violation of Bell's Inequalities, Phys. Rev. Lett. 49, 91 (1982), Aspect, 1982b: A. Aspect et al., Experimental Test of Bell's Inequalities Using Time-Varying Analyzers, Phys. Rev. Lett. 49, 1804 (1982), Beal, James and Gilula, Marshall (2004). “Anomalous Psychophysiological and Environmental Mechanisms Affecting Patient Safety and Healing.” Fourteenth Annual ISSSEEM Conference, 6/246/30/2004, Colorado Springs, CO. Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly (1990). FLOW: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science 276 Dossey, Larry (1999). Reinventing Medicine: Beyond the Mind-Body to New Era of Healing. Harper San Francisco. Fritz, Robert (1991). Creating. New York: Fawcett Columbine. Gowan, John Curtis (1975). Trance, Art and Creativity. privately printed for the Creative Education Foundation, Buffalo, New York. Krippner, Stanley and Ullman, Montague (1973). Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP. New York: Macmillon Publishing Co. Meier, C.A. (1992 – 2001). Atom and Archetype: the Pauli/Jung Letters. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Miller, Iona (2003). “The Emergent Healing Paradigm”. Chaosophy 2003. Grants Pass, Oregon: O.A.K. Miller, Iona (2004a). “Hunting the Future in ‘Know Brow’ Art and Ars Electronica”. Miller, Iona and Wildman, Paul (2004b). “The Demiurgic Field: Its Patterning Role in Chaos, Creation, and Creativity.” Chaosophy 2004, O.A.K. Miller, Iona (2004c). “The Whole SUM Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics”. Chaosophy 2004, O.A.K. Miller, Iona and Miller, Richard Alan (2003). “New Millennium Psi Research”. Future Science. Grants Pass: O.A.K. Mishlove, Jeffrey (1975-1993). The Roots of Consciousness. Tulsa: Council Oaks Books. Motoyama, Hiroshi, Toward a Superconsciousness: Meditational Theory and Practice, Asian Humanities Press; 1st edition (January 1990). Puthoff, H. E. (2002). "Searching for the Universal Matrix in Metaphysics". Research News and Opportunities in Science and Theology 2: 22. Puthoff, Harold E. (2002). "Polarizable Vacuum (PV) Approach to General Relativity". Foundations of Physics 32 (6): 927–943. Puthoff, H. E.; Little, S. R.; and Ibison, M. (2002). "Engineering the Zero-Point Field and Polarizable Vacuum for Interstellar Flight". J. British Interplanetary Society 55: 137–144. Radin, Dean, Entangled Minds: Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality, Paraview Pocket Books (April 25, 2006). Roffey-Line, leanne, “The Bioelectronic Basis for Healing Energies: Charge and Field Effects as a Basis for Complementary Medical Techniques”, JNLRMI, Vol. 4, No. 1 April 2006. Spence, Gerry (1995). How to Argue and Win Every Time. New York: St. Martin’s Press. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 260-277 Miller, I., The Nonlocal Mind Paradigm: A Transdisciplinary Revision of Mind-Body in Philosophy, Art & Science Swanson, Claude (2003). The Synchronized Universe. Tucson, Arizona: Poseidia Press. Wilber, Ken (2000). Integral Psychology. Boston: Shambhalla. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 277

937 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Article The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Iona Miller* & Paul Henrickson ABSTRACT Power lies with convention and truth with the punished individualist. Control of perception is the essence of power. This scenario denies the joy, the real joy, expressed in immediate aesthetic responses. Research results suggest battle lines seem to have been drawn between those who tolerate creative thinking and those who do not. These authors were influenced by the mentorship of creativity experts E. Paul Torrance for Henrickson and John C. Gowan for Miller. They conclude, while the achievements of creative efforts are often very rewarding, indeed, the process of arriving there can be disturbing and painful. Research by Henrickson in Iowa indicated the non-creative personality is content with having achieved a conventional image and as for anything else couldn't care less. Yet, those iconoclasts who have unique creative gifts can make a significant difference to society, science and art. Their relationship to their life's work is often deeply spiritual or driven by a sense of destiny and mission which is revealed in their works. Creativity is an emergent property of extraordinary human development. This article explores the works of creativity experts, promoting deep understanding of the complex territory of human expression, including perception, metaphor, narrative, praxis and theory. Creativity reveals the deep connection between mind and matter that modern physicists are just beginning to explore. The crisis of a global turning point demands something extraordinary from the best and brightest of us. A new model of research must not only include but encourage divergent or "Out of the Schrödinger's Box" thinking. It is often the artist not the academic that the public listens to, along with their own observations of changing thoughts and attitudes. This creates new environments and restructures the cultural ambiance. Part I of this article contains: The Minority Report; Double-Edged Gifts; Awesome Beauty; Self Regulatory Process; and Perceptive & Silenced Minorities. Key Words: Creativity, emergence, adult development, creative modalities, imagination, consciousness, extraordinary human development, psi, John C. Gowan, E. Paul Torrance, Stanley Krippner, Abraham Maslow, C.G. Jung. * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com Paul Henrickson, PhD. http://www.tcp.com.mt/henrickson.htm E-mail: prh@tcp.com.mt ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 938 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Paul Henrickson, Watercolor, London "It is useful to know that the members of the young tribal horde are not the victims of a conspiracy nor are they prompted by any theories…their organs of perception have been altered by the electronic environment". McLuhan, "Tribal warfare in the 1970's" – manuscript. "In a sense, artists are creators of counter-environments. They provide society with analogical models which enable them to escape from their unconscious immersion in their environment. So also with critics. They are the last frontiersmen." Eugene McNamara, Editor's Introduction to The Interior Landscape: The Literary Criticism of Marshall McLuhan 1943-1962, p.182 "I noticed an almost universal trait among Super Achievers, and it was what I call Sensory Goal Vision. These people knew what they wanted out of life, and they could sense it multidimensionally before they ever had it. They could not only see it, but also taste it, smell it, and imagine the sounds and emotions associated with it. They pre-lived it before they had it. And the sharp, sensory vision became a powerful driving force in their lives." Stephen Devore "I hope to stress that man as a part of nature is an entity of its’ processes, processes that in the acts of creativity are unique.... Man has more and more come to admire in his works the feature of self definition as it resembles nature, employing an appearance of it as judgment criteria ...As the productions of mankind come to bear life, the flows and processes, if not life and its’ components tapped to reform the environment, relying on distant abstracted perspectives that are removed from immediate experience, embedded with principle notions involving a conceptual stationery aspect, voluntarily remove the first person from the actual perspective, and are not, though self created (excuse the pun as they neither contain themselves or refer to a locus that can be defined as the perspective of mankind), self belonging-i. e. belong to the same set that contains ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 939 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art themselves;. ..In contrast, physical and conceptual spaces, proposed to both be ultimately of a physical nature related to physical spaces, a priorily belong to both themselves and the self as they define both the self and themselves, are self belonging. The world’s energy is embodied to the existence and complexity of 3-D form rather than to lines of cause and effect...Two conditions are present to the experience of nature, energy bound to form as well as form bound to energy." Marvin Kirsh (2010) The Minority Report Each of us is our own greatest creation, a frameless work of art. What doesn’t inspire the artistic eye that doesn’t merely “look at”, but “sees through” to the imaginal depth of any given perception or experience? The soul informs the multisensory experience of being. Inspiration means life, the opposite of death: purpose, direction, meaning, ecstasy, creativity. Groundbreaking creativity is an equally important vector in the arts, life sciences, and physical science. It is the root of innovation. It is difficult to separate spirituality and creativity, as both are tied to the notion of self actualization, stepping beyond oneself, and transcendence. Creativity has a universal meaning that extends beyond time and self. (Gowan; Maslow; Jung) Charles Laughlin defines transpersonal experiences as "experiences that bring the cognized-self into question". Artists are the chaotic attractors of the social field. In an era of visual data-glut, while conventional artists may enjoy great favor, the ‘strange attractors,’ including leading edge and extreme artists have a special role as catalysts in contemporary life. Artists have always drawn others beyond the limits of their ordinary awareness, confronting them with another reality, initiating them into a world of profound meaning without conventional boundaries. The emergence of art was and continues to be an unparalleled innovation. Art confronts our psyches with a giant leap in human evolution whose transformative influence continues opening and exploring brave new worlds to this day. Art remains a driving force and living thread woven into the fabric of society from the beginning. The 35,000 year old art of Chauvet cave, showcased in Werner Herzog's dazzling film, "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" is an uncannily modern testament to the awakening of the human soul and spirit. Art was the portal to the spirit world. Originally, artists were shamans, healers, and magicians. Their art revealed the compelling dreamscape of primal man, his beliefs about himself, this world, life and death, and hope for an afterlife. Some might argue ironically that artists are a ‘species’ of their own. We might poetically call them the first negentropic humans, Homo Negentrop. They created order and meaning from the chaos of existential life, the inferno of passions. Negentropy is the generative force of the universe. Negentropy (emergent order from chaos) is a nonlinear higher order system, a dynamically creative ordering information. Thinking, science, and art are therefore negentropic. Negentropy, like art, is ‘in-form-ative.’ It is related to mutual information exchange. Information is embodied in the fractal nature of imagery and symbols, which compress the informational content of the whole. Creativity is an emergent phenomenon patterned by strange attractors, which govern the complexity of information in dynamic flow. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 940 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Art facilitates negentropy by expanding our general field of experience. Negentropy facilitates artistic realization by creating something from nothing. The creative act is one of uniting the unmanifest with the manifest world in a meaningful, often symbolic, way. Such conception is relevant to consciousness, organization, structure, faith, subconsciousness, emotion, even spirituality. Above all, creativity means trusting the process. Investigation of the negentropic criterion helps us move toward a truly transdisciplinary doctrine for the artistic field of influence. Throughout history the insightful vision of artists expressing in symbolic form the ‘as-yetunknown’ has been at the cutting edge of social change. It preceded rational and intellectual social ordering. Artists intuitively extract the gold of their unique vision from creative chaos and manifest it for others to see. Yet a great divide remains. Research results suggest battle lines seem drawn between those who tolerate creative thinking and those who do not. A creative mind tends to create its own parameters and discards those set by others. Several high-profile academics (such as Therese Amabile of the Harvard Business School, Mark Runco head of Torrance Creativity Center at The University of Georgia, and Edward de Bono of The University of Malta) have missed important vectors of the creative process. They all appear to trivialize the character of the creative person and downplay the very real struggle for self identity that the creative personality endures. Such a coercive convention, control of perception, information, and disinformation in the academic arena is the essence of institutional power. It also promotes cognitive dissonance and rationalization. Jung revealed a bit of his own struggle with the deeper power of the unconscious in his statement, “Art is a kind of innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument. To perform this difficult office it is sometimes necessary for him to sacrifice happiness and everything that makes life worth living for the ordinary human being.” Marie-Louise von Franz contends, "the creative process is often accompanied by anxiety, depression, loneliness, and fear of the unknown." Creativity means confronting the powers and creativity of the archetypes and other unconscious forces. Dr. Paul Henrickson's research reveals that conventional academia encourages conformity and even lying, self-delusion, or deceptive practice. Philosophy of science as well as psychology can reveal such lacuna in our developmental processes and modelling of creativity. Each creative artist or scientist is “creative” precisely because he or she is in the process of inventing something unknown to themselves. He or she is devising marks (whatever they happen to be) which, at least temporarily, represent a movement in the direction of a solution to a question. Each psychological type has creative expressions, but intuitive thinkers are innovators as well as organizers or re-organizers. By typology, scientific intuitives (INTJ) and intuitive thinkers (INTP) comprise only 1% each of the total population (far lower for women), and are often grossly misunderstood due to differences in existential style, focus, worldview, and orientation (see Appendix). Psychic abilities are most likely to be expressed when one is relaxed, meditative, and open to new experiences and oriented towards creativity. Family or other support is helpful, as ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 941 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art with any talent. Whether psi is a trait or not, creativity correlates with both pattern recognition and intuitive functioning. According to Sargeant (1999), “Scientists search for a ‘real’ and hidden, internal visibility (invisible to the naked eye) which will confirm the limits of identity. . .This is an act of limitation which inverts its own criteria by relying on a ‘depth’ model of identity, which is invisible, but gives visibility through microscopic magnification. Yet this search for an invisible core of identity remains open to a visible transgression via artists who are constantly exposing these new certainties as constructs.” Scientists are more typically viewed as killers of myth, not its creators. Yet, Einstein, his more visionary contemporaries, and the priesthood of quantum physics sound as esoteric as any of yesterday’s mystics. Quantum states are the key mathematical objects in quantum theory. Yet physicists have been unable to agree on what a quantum state represents. A pure quantum state may correspond directly to reality. But there is a long history of suggestions that even a pure quantum state represents only knowledge or information of some kind. Once accepted, theories can become dogmatic and they have become the new mythology, suggesting who we are, where we come from, and where we are going. Physics has moved from a hard-core materialistic perspective to one that honors consciousness as a primary factor in our concept of reality. A viable theory of consciousness must lie beyond the supernatural and mechanical. Entanglement (nonlocality) has been suggested as one such framework. Einstein framed the value of theory: “A theory is more impressive the greater is the simplicity of its premise, the more different are the kinds of things it relates and the more extended its range of applicability…” Frontier science is the multi-disciplinary cutting edge of theoretical and practical research. The leading edge is often the source of breakthroughs, revisioning data and observations in novel ways that open new possibilities. Domains include the mind/body relationship, consciousness studies, complementary medicine, parapsychology, bioelectromagnetics and a growing number of approaches to quantum physics and cosmological questions. In some cases, experimental evidence is strong and theories are weak, or conversely some robust or coherent theories still lack the predictions, experimental proofs, and falsifiability that make for good science. Creativity means being at the point of arising phenomena, inner and outer. Systems biology describes an approach applied to biomedical and biological scientific research, discovering emergent properties of cells, tissues and organisms functioning as a system. Systems biology is a biology-based inter-disciplinary field of study that focuses on complex interactions within biological systems, using a more holistic perspective (holism instead of the more traditional reductionism) approach to biological and biomedical research. But the science-artists of the future will be using not only molecular but subatomic assembly, creating designer bodies and beings -- new forms of existence -- using the building blocks of nature herself as their medium. The prospects of H+ technology and "radical evolution" compete directly with humanity as we have known it. We're becoming "cyborgs" before fully cultivating our humanity. Full-immersion environments seem to make reality temporarily irrelevant. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 942 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art The “Human Enhancement Revolution” (“HER”), is a technological, cultural, and metaphysical shift dominated by a new species of unrecognizably superior humans--those born of HER. The term “transhumanism” has been given to explain how HER emerging fields of science, including genetics, robotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and synthetic biology, will radically redesign our minds, our memories, our physiology, our offspring, our physical appearance, and even perhaps our very souls. Frontier physics and biophysics investigates nonlocal phenomenon rooted in the notion that in the quantum world everything is fundamentally interconnected. It includes interpretations of orthodox theories and a wide span of plausible to fringe theories that may or may not bear fruit beyond their metaphorical appeal. Mind and consciousness seem to share that property, remaining largely unexplained by simple neurology. Therefore, anomalous effects probably have the most to teach us, and may dethrone even popular theories. Experimental evidence has been accumulating in almost all areas of science that non-local and mind-directed effects upon the physical world are more ubiquitous than we previously admitted. As institutional research becomes more open, a theoretical framework is emerging. Double-Edged Gifts Jung wrote about two types of thinking -- directed and imaginal thinking -- left brain analytical thinking with words, numbers and structure, and right brain thinking in images, symbols, stories and dynamic cycles. The brain works differently in each mode, with different active areas and chemicals suffusing the neurons. Jung’s two types combine right and left hemispheric brain activity while awake and dream thinking while we are asleep or inspired. In the creative process, the artist or visionary dreams out loud. Art helps us assimilate contents that were previously unconscious, and provides us courage to progress consciously and unconsciously. The process of executing an idea can happen in a brilliant flash or as a chain reaction of multiple tiny sparks. Psyche intrudes on our scientific hypotheses. We can imagine Infinite Space as the Goddess whose womb gives us our very existence. For medieval alchemists, the Earth was the center of it all, and what little they knew of the heavens revolved around it. In a relatively short time we have discovered our own galaxy, countless others and expanded our understanding of the immensity of space and deep time. Space is vast and her awesome mysteries are deeper than the Hubble Deep Field photos which allow us to peer back aeons to the birth of proto-galaxies. Everywhere we look there are hundreds of thousands of galaxies in even a portion of seemingly "empty" space. Maybe perception equals reality, but reality in real-time may not equal truth. The cyclic nature of creative work means breaking things down, cleaning things up, and putting them back together in aesthetically pleasing ways – again and again, refining theory and practice beyond physical ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 943 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art objectives. The same pattern works for playing with ideas, and is echoed in the ancient alchemical axiom, "Solve et Coagula". Jung said, "The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct acting from inner necessity. The creative mind plays with the object it loves." Creative people holistically use both introversion and extroversion during their process. They use both mind and feelings often simultaneously in concert, and are certainly intuitive and artistic, often sensual virtuosos. They illustrate that the “opposites” do not exclude, but compliment, each other. For example, they may be introverted in the incubation stage while extraverted in the performance or presentational phase. All creative people are flexible in their mental processes, paradoxically wielding the opposites. The introvert's attitude toward his collective images is that of the extravert toward the outside world. He lives through them as in a romance or adventure. The extravert responds to unconscious material in an introverted way, that is, with extreme caution, including personal rituals to exorcise the intrinsic power of the object. In our studies on creativity the characteristics that have interested us have been flexibility, fluency, elaboration, manipulations, in short, evidence of the subject’s involvement with the task. In identifying the person with the creative mind set and subsequently assisting that person to bring into form the product of his imagination, it is helpful to take notice of how the person responds to experiences. This is very different from evaluating a person’s performance on a test where the correct answers are pre-determined. It is important to remember that the one predetermining the correct answer is not the subject but some exterior unit. This means, in effect, that the subject’s value in whatever quality or characteristic is being tested is in terms of an application of alien values upon the subject. This is precisely the approach used in the vast majority of school systems and it underscores the difference between being a teacher and being an educator. The teacher teaches a process and evaluates his own and the student’s success by the number of predetermined correct responses. The educator carefully evaluates the behavior of the subject and attempts to coach the subject in appropriate elaborations of the behavior. Different approaches to looking, when viewed in an unbiased way, enable the viewer to considerably enlarge, however temporarily, the stockpile of available interpretations of whatever it is that is being viewed and judged. That is why one of our major aims is to assist in the process of education, that is, that is, the drawing out of one’s perception. Whenever this approach is used to look at the reality of our environment, the process of making a decision is drawn out like a fine thread more sensitive to breezes, a final decision is delayed and a greater richness in the components of that decision assured. Creative activity combines the energies of feelings, imagination and thought. Some believe that the approach of one’s end of life actually stimulates creativity with increased urgency, intensity and energy. The evolution of the authentic self in adulthood is a dynamic process which is part of the lifelong shaping of identity and self-image. The attainment of authenticity is a central, dynamic task of adulthood achieved through restructuring of the self. (Miller, 2000) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 944 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Awesome Beauty Aldous Huxley contended, "A child-like man is not a man whose development has been arrested; on the contrary, he is a man who has given himself a chance of continuing to develop long after most adults have muffled themselves in the cocoon of middle-aged habit and convention." Many factors emerge from and shine through this permissive orientation, including ambition and awe. Ambition carries the process, while awe fixates it. A study by Rudd (2012) et al concludes that, "Experiences of awe bring people into the present moment, which underlies awe’s capacity to adjust time perception, influence decisions, and make life feel more satisfying than it would otherwise." The experience of artistic awe is aesthetic arrest. Art is a human construct, but beauty is primarily a product of nature. Joseph Campbell, in his lectures on Joyce, clarifies, "The aesthetic experience is a simple beholding of the object....you experience a radiance. You are held in aesthetic arrest." It is the corollary of a primitive trance, or the mystic's ecstasy. This radiance, the perception of shocking beauty, is a resonance with the hidden power behind the world, shining through some physical form. We are stunned, stopped dead in our tracks, and enraptured with a sense of the divine. Joyce, himself, explained: "The esthetic emotion...is static. The mind is arrested and raised above desire and loathing." "The object...becomes fascinating in itself. One is held, struck still, absorbed, with everything else wiped away." Ambition undergirds exceptional success. Goal-oriented vision is an almost universal trait among high achievers. Personal vision guides and determines actions to be taken toward goals and dreams. A sense of mission includes overall objectives and philosophy of life (worldview). It is a way of becoming. Ambition is a set of guiding principles that explain who you are. Personal ambitions link with the target, accomplishment, emotional fulfillment, and self-respect. The exceptional are unique, sometimes phenomenal. Particularly in childhood, the gifted are in many ways different from the non-gifted. They have abilities that the non-gifted don't have, and some non-gifted people are resentful particularly of the intellectually gifted. The gifted sometimes try to hide who they are in an attempt to fit in. (Silverman). Gifted children in school, for example, "dumb down," purposely not doing as well as they could, but young wizards are not always successful at hiding "the magic" of who they are. Sometimes there are power struggles with teachers and authority figures because they trust their own framing and evaluations. Gifted kids tend to want reasons and they can be quite vocal and persistent in trying to get them. Will power comes with intellectual strength. But the gifted aren't just smart; they are distinct. Gifted children are sensitive, alert and have many perceptual 'antennae.' (Alice Miller) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 945 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Self Regulatory Process Creativity has frequently been treated as a form of self-expression or a way of understanding or coping with life that is intimately connected with personal dignity, expression of one's inner being, self-actualization, and the like (e.g., Maslow, 1973; May, 1976; Rogers, 1961). Moustakis (1977) summarized the individualistic approach to creativity by seeing it as the pathway to living your own life your own way. The creative life has mythic overtones tied into the artist's presence, transformation and primal self-image or core sense of self. In a talk entitled, "A Neuromythological Approach to Working with Dreams", Stanley Krippner summarizes: Carl Jung brought the topic of mythology into psychotherapy, and he wrote about his own “personal myth.” One approach to dreamwork is the identification of the functional or dysfunctional personal myth (or belief system) embedded in the dream. This personal myth usually is implicit or explicit in the “central image” of the dream. In addition, it typically serves as the “chaotic attractor” that self-organizes material drawn to it by the sleeping brain’s neural networks. Jung’s perspective on dreams is remarkably congruent with many findings in neuroscience as well as the self-regulatory processes that typify contemporary dream theory and research. Barton (1969) concluded that creativity actually requires resistance to socialization and Burkhardt (1985) took the theme of the individual against society further by arguing that the creative individual must fight against society's pathological desire for sameness. Sternberg and Lubart (1995) called this fight "defying the crowd," and labeled the tendency of certain creative individuals to resist society's pressure to conform "contrarianism." However, they are more autonomously self-directed than oppositional for the sake of rebellion. Autarch is an ancient Greek term for self-governing, which Jung might contend comes from the Self -- the unified consciousness of a person. Even in the ultra-conformist 1950s Bronowski declared, "We expect artists as well as scientists to be forward-looking, to fly in the face of what is established, and to create not what is acceptable but what will become acceptable . . . a theory is the creation of unity in what is diverse by the discovery of unexpected likenesses. In all of them innovation is pictured as an act of imagination, a seeing of what others do not see". . . “creative observation”. Sometimes artistic ability and mental acuity combine. There has been debate in psychological literature about whether intelligence and creativity are part of the same process (the conjoint hypothesis) or represent distinct mental processes (the disjoint hypothesis). Evidence from attempts to look at correlations between intelligence and creativity from the 1950s onwards, by authors such as Barron, Guilford or Wallach and Kogan, regularly suggested that correlations between these concepts were low enough to justify treating them as distinct concepts. Some researchers believe that creativity is the outcome of the same cognitive processes as ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 946 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art intelligence, and is only judged as creativity in terms of its consequences, i.e., when the outcome of cognitive processes happens to produce something novel, a view which Perkins termed the "nothing special" hypothesis. A very popular model, proposed by Torrance, known as "the threshold hypothesis", contends that a high degree of intelligence appears to be a necessary but not sufficient condition for high creativity. This means that, in a general sample, there will be a positive correlation between creativity and intelligence, but this correlation will not be found if only a sample of the most highly intelligent people are assessed. Creativity is a combination of drive and flow and this thesis is embodied in creative behavior and professional performance. Art is an emergent flow state, welling up from deep within. Maps of consciousness, creative typology, ontological and epistemological notions of creativity help us model the process. From first causes to root metaphors, we can reflect on cosmic creativity and personal creativity, including "how we know what we know" and how to use that distinctive perceptual awareness. Krippner suggests including healing as a high form of creativity. Consciousness is a dynamic field that has the dual aspect of primordial process and appearance. Process is conscious dynamic energy. Process and perception lead to an understanding of appearance. Our consciousness oscillates at the fundamental level between the inherent drive for change and our attempt to maintain identity and stability. We are creative beings and that creativity is an emergent process from cradle to grave. The developmental process continues throughout adult life. We provide a context for nurturing creativity and honor the multitude of creative experiences, forms and media. The domains of Trance, Art, and Creativity span the genius of expression of human potential (Gowan). First we get hints of emerging talents which are later stabilized into a creative steady-state through integration and mastery. Genius can potentially be awakened in everyone. Higher art must be intensely personal while being universal and universally accessible. It must show refined knowledge, understanding and respect for the art that has come before to enrich those around us. Much the same can be said for an artfully and heartfully lived life. "Seeking" is the common root of science and spirituality. We can apply a similar strategy to our spirituality, drawing on the best of what the past offers while keeping our practice and service contemporary and relevant. Our lives become multidimensional artful expressions without frames, embodied in living Light. Process-oriented spirituality is eclectic and intensely personal. The connection we have with the inspirational Source that nourishes creative life is the same source that sustains our spirits and funds our compassion. It is a deep well from which we can drink at will of the abundant life-springs of our essential being. The Romantics, arguably beginning with Blake, turned art into a kind of substitute for religion. The East emphasizes a mystical-magical orientation, the West a humanist-rationalist POV. Romanticism is an essentially gnostic spirituality, a Mystery religion. But now there is no intergenerational priesthood to have our visions for us; we have them for ourselves. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 947 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Rather than anti-scientifically considering cognition and technofacility an anti-artistic dirty little secret, digital art and multimedia, for example, embrace the fusion. There is no Romantic terror of human cognition nor need for anti-technical transcendence with direct interface on the horizon. Knowledge is power -- over yourself, controlled with self-awareness and self-responsibility. There is no artificial distinction between the pursuit of knowledge and self-knowledge and aesthetics. Beauty is an affair of the heart but speaks to our whole being, rooted in Cosmos. Perceptive & Silenced Minorities One aim of Henrickson and Miller's respective life-long studies has been an attempt to reach an understanding of the artist’s generative power, or absence of it, as well as how their personalities project their essences through their work. The meta-gifted have more than one talent or translatable expressive outlet. They also tend to learn early that they will never arrive at selfacceptance by doing things to impress other people or conforming to societal expectation. Some, including gifted children, discover creativity is independent of producing useful products, and they become more interested in the creative process and lifestyle, facilitating an energetic felt-sense of "flow", possibly related to neurohormonal reward systems. Privileges and prejudice come to the meta-gifted because of their naturally turbocharged inquisitiveness. Being psychically gifted doesn't mean you talk to dead people, but that the mindscape of your psyche is as palpably real as the external world. Most notably, there is a drive to seek meaning and meaningful self-expression. Jung’s maternal family “had a predeliction for the paranormal”, according to biographer Hayman. Four of his uncles had “second sight”, while his grandfather had dramatic visionary experiences. He was convinced his mother was “in touch with spirits.” Spiritual, mystical, and at times schizoid, he brought us archetypes, the collective unconscious, introversion and extraversion, and anima, shadow, and transcendent function, as well as the Self. Based on a lifetime of research and creative experience, Henrickson concludes, "Many pursue IQ as the Holy Grail indicator of Intelligence. In my experience, this is an unfortunate blind alley, up which most people go, perhaps never to return. I suggest to you the real indicator is not IQ, but CQ, the Creativity Quotient. CQ trumps IQ every time, as indicator of an individual's capability, usefulness and probable future success, fulfillment and self-satisfaction. IQ is important, yes, but it is only a subset of CQ, part of the story, so to speak." Curiously, his research showed that the most assured way of getting an appointment is to lie about who you are. His unpopular conclusion was that universities were, in fact, providing teachers for the field who were uncreative and liars. Henrickson's 1970 study, "Lying, Dogmatic, and Creative Persons", in the Department of Art, University of Northern Iowa, suggests 4% of the untrained, uneducated and unsophisticated judging population may be as perceptive as experts in a field. It is not unreasonable to expect a small percentage of any population to be more perceptive than the rest. In what other way might we account for the germination of so many kinds of interests, pursuits and mental activities? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 948 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Someone, somewhere, at some time had to be more perceptive than others in some manner or other, or leaders in any field could not have been identified. Nor, indeed, could the field itself exist for the existence of different fields presupposes divergent points of view and assumed truths. Consider the idea that this 4% of the population might be the number appropriately destined to lead a society out of the sterile contentment toward the edge of awareness -- the frontiers of the mindscape and social development. Recently, Henrickson encountered this quote from Dan Ariely's The Honest Truth About Dishonesty: “When it comes to money, creative people are more likely to cheat to get it than the less-imaginative crowd”. This startling announcement shocked him into reviewing what he thought he knew about the way creative people think. Henrickson adds, “but only because creative thinkers are creative thinkers regardless of the subject area." The goal of Ariely's study was to determine the differences, if any, between creative-types and non-creative types on the stated goal of gaining credits (money, as it were). If the value were consistently “profit” as measured monetarily, this behavior seems rational, but, in truth, where creative personalities are concerned it is not money which motivates them, but something closer to intense curiosity and a compulsion to discover and these behaviors may be as subject to innovation and intuition as we find in ordinary day dreaming which appears to lack readily identifiable motivation. Where Ariely alleges, "We are going to take things from each other if we have a chance . . . many people need controls around them", Henrickson sees subversion. "It seems Ariely’s point may be emerging...we need more effective policing...another way of reducing true creative behavior. The creative personality resents rules, not because he wants to behave badly, but because he resists pressures to conform which bind intuition and discovery." Henrickson concludes that "the distinguishing characteristic of a creative thinker is that his or her motivations for thinking in this fashion are not related to a reward presented or offered by another. The inherent reward is in the doing." "Just how does being creative decrease honesty? The creative personality cannot but be honest in his responses to his medium of creative behavior." It is statistically unlikely that the more creative the product the smaller their audience and, therefore, no reward established by another. Since it had been known, scientifically, for several decades before the Ariely study was performed, that creative minds think more broadly, more variably, and more productively than non-creative minds the outcomes of the Ariely study could easily have been predicted without the study having been made. This, in turn, raises the question as to why then was the study made? Was it intended only as a form of a common-place replication or was it, after all, an excuse to discredit the behavior of creative thinkers and to encourage a form of back-lash to inhibit projected changes in the status quo? If the latter, it might explain why it appears that the anti-creative forces, in the guise of “creativity experts” such as Mark Runko urge that the creative mind be trained in discretion. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 949 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art Does it explain why Amabile urges the acceptance of “cooperation” as a virtue in creative production? Shouldn't she know that the nature of the truly creative mind is to work alone, and certainly, and additionally, that “cooperation” implies negotiation, compromise and acquiescence to the ideas of others...all of which would diminish the probable creativity of the product.? Wouldn’t this make “common” whatever achievement there might be? Henrickson contends that if ballet dancers such as Mikhail Baryshnikov, Alexander Godunov, and Natalia Marakova under the Soviet regime can dance their way to excellence, a few creative minds might be able to identify escape passages from this current effort at repression. What valuable consciousness this present situation does bring to the fore is what appears to be a fundamental difference between the creative mind which pays attention to its own business and thus is probably apolitical, and the non-creative mind which pays attention to everyone else’s business and is very political. Even creative thinkers can play games as well as non-creative thinkers and can, when called upon, shift their imagination gears to fit the circumstances. It should be noted that playing games is not the area in which creative thinking has generally been analyzed, but the effort here, by these researchers, seems to be to discredit the moral structure of creative thinkers. However, Henrickson's research indicates quite the opposite: the creative thinker, when involved does not lie, misdirect, or accept false evidence but his or her efforts get put down, down-graded and ostracized all because that perception differs from those of the consensus. On the one hand, the perceptive individual is capable of responding, intuitively perhaps, but still effectively, and with insight, on a level of excellence comparable to the specialist. On the other hand, he is, in most academic situations, required to respond on a level of excellence set by nonspecialists (teachers) operating on assumptions they may not care to test, while ignoring the pertinence and sophistication of unscheduled data. Sensitive to the pressures of conformity he might not assert the superiority of his perceptions. By not asserting their pertinancy he could retain some of the security offered by agreement with the majority. It could be hypothesized that a significant percentage of persons who are perceptive in specialized ways are correspondingly unaware of what is required to protect themselves from the actions of the mindless majority. We might vainly wish that the majority was not so sensitive about differences, but, that is why they are the majority. The balance sought between openness of expression about sensual perception on the one hand and blind sensual exclusivity on the other and formal hierarchical expression on the other could well describe a situation in which anxiety about the validity of one’s perceptions comes into conflict with the need for companionship and the reassurances obtained through agreement. We are not involved here with the psychotic expressions of a personal “otherness” but only with the milder forms of difference in perception to which “non-abnormal” persons are subject. These persons may also be aware of the differences in which they perceive things from the way others perceive them. They may be able to live with this knowledge either by sublimating their responses ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 950 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 937-950 Miller, I., The Creative & Persecuted Minority I: An Artful Look at Science & a Scientific Look at Art to their environment and by agreeing, superficially at any rate, to see the world as others see it, or they may decide to let their more sensitive perceptions be examined in greater isolation. Henrickson restated his earlier conclusions in 2000: "In summary, then, we not only have a segment of the population that is more creative than the majority but we have as well, a small group who have not been professionally trained who demonstrate the ability to make professional level judgments and that this more perceptive group consistently achieve a grade–point average one grade point lower than the majority, that they are denied access to the teacher preparation program, that they tell fewer lies than the majority and that they are the ones, one might suppose, consistently over-looked for advancements within the field. This is a society, then, that is ruled by the non-creative lying conformist." In 1988, divergent thinker Buckminster Fuller prophetically claimed, "American education has evolved in such a way that it will be the undoing of the society…” Fuller was twice expelled from Harvard University and never completed his formal education. “Bucky,” was a designer, architect, poet, educator, engineer, philosopher, environmentalist, and, foremost, humanitarian. He hoped for an age of "omni-successful education and sustenance of all humanity." [References at end of Part II] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 123 Article The Value of Dream Work Iona Miller* ABSTRACT Dreams are a form of gnosis, knowledge through direct experience, making them of interest in both consciousness studies and physics. Process work integrates concepts from physics, psychology, anthropology, shamanism, and spirituality into a paradigm and methodology with applications in many fields. Some say consciousness has a cosmic origin, with roots in the preconsciousness ingrained directly from the Planck time. Process work helps us discover this fundamental awareness and build deeper relationships with our dreams and unconscious. New myths grow in our dreams. As part of the dreamer's psyche, dreams are subjective, but the images in the dreams originate in archetypally informed objective experiences. Key Words: dreams, REM, dream work, Asklepios, dream healing, shamanism, initiation, psi, visions, holographic brain, energy fields, collective unconscious, nightmares, mythic body, levels of consciousness. The Value of Dream Work The archetypes to be discovered and assimilated are precisely those which have inspired the basic images of ritual and mythology. These eternal ones of the dream are not to be confused with the personality modified symbolic figures that appear in nightmares or madness to the tormented individual. Dream is the personalized myth. Myth is the depersonalized dream. -Joseph Campbell No one who does not know himself can know others. And in each of us there is another whom we do not know. He speaks to us in dream and tells us how differently he sees us from the way we see ourselves. When, therefore, we find ourselves in a different situation to which there is no solution, he can sometimes kindle a light that radically alters our attitude; the very attitude that led us into the difficult situation. -- C. G. Jung As we spend a large proportion of our lives in a dream state, a fuller understanding of their implications may prove valuable. Today, there are several prevailing theories concerning the significance and value of dreams. No final statement about dream may be made. There are several approaches to each perspective which is assumed a priori. There are many alternatives to choose from. Our choice of style in dream work will be determined by the mythemes, memes, or fads we currently embrace. The characteristic attitudes associated with the archetypes will motivate and *Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher. Email: iona_m@yahoo.com Note: This work was completed in 2006 and updated in 2013. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 124 influence our approach to the dream world. Strephon K. Williams (Jungian-Senoi Institute) is one of the foremost proponents of dream work. He outlines a six-point program for continued use: 1. Dialogue with the dream characters, asking questions and recording answers. 2. Re-experience of the dream through imagination, art projects, and creativity. 3. Examination of unresolved aspects of the dream, and contemplation of solutions. 4. Actualization of insights in daily life, where relevant. 5. Meditation on the source of dreams and insight from the Self. 6. Synthesize the essence of dreamlife and its meaning in a journal and apply them in one's life journey. To offer a variety of other approaches, we will cover theories on dreams and dreaming from Jung's original work, the analytical psychology school, parapsychology, and archetypal or imaginal psychology. Knowledge of the antiquated Freudian system is so wide-spread that no further comment here seems necessary. Jung was the first to depart from Freud's "sexualityfraught" perception of dreams. Where Freud saw one complex, Jung saw many. He saw in dreams a gamut of archetypes overseen by the transcendent function, or Self. Analytical psychology amplified and clarified his original material. Most of this work is concerned with the fantasy of the process of individuation. It reflects an ego with a heroic attitude, and proceeds by stages of development. Consciousness, at this stage, is generally monotheistic. It has a tendency to seek the center of meaning, as if there were only One. Parapsychological work done with dreams also seems to reflect this attitude of searching, influencing, and controlling. In Re-Visioning Psychology, post-Jungian James Hillman differs from the traditional analytical viewpoint by stating: Dreams are important to the Soul--not for the message the ego takes from them, not for the recovered memories or the revelations; what does seem to matter to the soul is the nightly encounter with a plurality of shades in an underworld...the freeing of the soul from its identity with the ego and the waking state...What we learn from dreams is what psychic nature really is-the nature of psychic reality; not I, but we...not monotheistic consciousness looking down from its mountain, but polytheistic consciousness wandering all over the place. In Jung's model, one major function of dreams is to provide the unconscious with a means of exercising its regulative activity. Conscious attitudes tend to become one-sided. Through their postulated compensatory effect, dreams present different data and varying points of view. Individuation is the psyche's goal; it tries to bring this about through an internal adjustment procedure. There is an admonition in Magick to "balance each thought against its opposite." Dreams, according to Jung, do this for us automatically. However, there must be a conscious striving toward incorporation of the balancing attitudes presented through dreams (this applies equally to fantasies and visions). Another apparent function for a dream state is to take old information, contained in long-term memory, incorporate it with those experiences, and integrate ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 125 them with new experiences. This creates new attitudes. Since the dream conjoins current and past experiences to form new attitudes, the dream contains possible information about the future. There is a causal relationship between our attitudes and the events which manifest from our many possible futures. In studies at Maimonides Dream Labs, Stanley Krippner and Montague Ullman were trying to impress certain information on an individual's dream. They found that an individual, being monitored for dream states, could incorporate a mandala, which was being concentrated on by another subject, into his dream. This led to their famous theory on dream telepathy. Dream symbols appear to allow repressed impulses to be expressed in disguised forms. Dream symbols are essential message-carriers from the instinctive-archetypal continuum to the rational part of the human mind. Their incorporation enriches consciousness, so that it learns to understand the forgotten language of the pre-conscious mind. The dream language presents symbols from which you can gain value through dream monitoring. You can use these dream symbols directly to facilitate communication with this other aspect of yourself. Should you choose later to re-program yourself out of old habit patterns, you're going to want an accurate conception of what dream symbols really mean. A symbol always stands for something that is unknown. It contains more than its obvious or immediate meaning. The symbolic function bridges man's inner and outer world. Symbolism represents a continuity of consciousness and preconscious mental activity, in which the preconscious extends beyond the boundaries of the individual. These primitive processes of prelogical thinking continue throughout life and do not indicate a regressive mode of thought. Dream symbols are independent of time, space, and causality. The meaning of unconscious contents varies with the specific internal and external situation of the dreamer. Some dreams originate in a personal or conscious context. These dreams usually reflect personal conflicts, or fragmentary impressions left over from the day. Some dreams, on the other hand, are rooted in the contents of the collective unconscious. Their appearance is spontaneous and may be due to some conscious experience, which causes specific archetypes to constellate. It is often difficult to distinguish personal contents from collective contents. In dreams, archetypes often appear in contemporary dress, especially as persons vitally connected with us. In this case, both their personal aspect (or objective level) and their significance as projections or partial aspects of the psyche (subjective level) may be brought into consciousness. A dream is never merely a repetition of preceding events, except in the case of past psychic trauma. There is specific value in the symbols and context the psyche utilizes. It may produce any; why is it sending just this dream and not another? Dreams rich in pictorial detail usually relate to individual problems. Universal contexts are revealed in simple, vivid images with scant detail. No attempt to interpret a single dream, or even the sequence dreams fall in, is fruitful. In fact, later research by Asklepia Foundation researchers asserts it is more important to journey using dreams as experiential springboards for therapeutic outcomes. In interpreting a group of dreams, we seek to discover the 'center of meaning' which all the dreams express in varied form. When this 'center' is discovered by consciousness and its lesson assimilated, the dreams begin to ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 126 spring from a new center. Recurring dreams generally indicate an unresolved conflict trying to break into consciousness. There are three types of significance a dream may carry: 1) It may stem from a definite impression of the immediate past. As a reaction, it supplements or compliments the impressions of the day. 2) Here there is balance between the conscious and unconsciousness components. The dream contents are independent of the conscious situation, and are so different from it they present conflict. 3) When this contrary position of the unconscious is stronger, we have spontaneous dreams with no relation to consciousness. These dreams are archetypal in origin, and consequently are overpowering, strange and often oracular. These dreams are not necessarily most desirable to the student, as they may be extremely dangerous if the dreamer's ego is still too narrow to recognize and assimilate their meaning. We can never empirically determine the meaning of a dream. We cannot accept a meaning merely because it fits in with what we expected. Dreams can exert a reductive as well as prospective function. In other words, if our conscious attitude is inflated, dreams may compensate negatively, and show us our human frailty and dependence. They also may act positively by providing a 'guiding image' which corrects a self-devaluing attitude, re-establishing balance. The unconscious, by anticipating future conscious achievements, provides a rough plan for progress. Each life, says Jung, is guided by a private myth. Each individual has a great store of DNA information. It is generally mediated by the archetypes which are deployed by both myth and dream. As you create this individual or private myth, it attracts, if you will, an archetypal pattern and molds itself in a characteristic way (or visa versa). The archetype precipitates compulsive action. It is the motivating factor which may become externalized in the physical world. Jung notes: "The dreamer's unconscious is communicating with the dreamer alone. And it is selecting symbols which have meaning to the dreamer and no one else. They also involve the collective unconscious whose expression may be social rather than personal." We may discover hidden meaning in our dreams and fantasies through the following procedure: 1) Determine the present situation of consciousness. What significant events surround the dream? 2) With the lowering of the threshold of consciousness, unconscious contents arise through dream, vision, and fantasy. 3) After perceiving the contents, record them so they are not lost (the Hermetic seal). 4) Investigate, clarify, and elaborate by amplification with personal meanings, and collective meaning, gleaned from similar motifs in myth and fairy tale. 5) Integrate this meaning with your general psychic situation. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 127 Instincts are the best guide; if you are obtaining "value" from your interpretation, it will "feel" correct. Complexes and their attendant archetypes draw attention to themselves but are difficult to pinpoint. We may use conscious amplification of the symbolism presented in dream form. All the elements of the dream may be examined in a limited, controlled, and directed association process, which enlarges and expands the dream material through analogy. The nucleus of meaning contained in the analogy is identical with that of the dream content. When a dream is falsely interpreted, others follow to correct the error. Preconscious contents are on the verge of being remembered. Just as language skills facilitate new conceptualization, knowledge of the vocabulary of dream symbolism allows closer rapport with the preconscious. Dreaming is one of the easiest methods of contact with the numinous element, or unknown. To illustrate how archetypes may affect perspective, we will now examine another of the methods for working with dreams and other images. If Freud's view on dreams can be seen as Aphroditic/sexual, and Jung's as heroic/developmental (Yesod and Tiphareth, respectively in QBL), then Hillman's newer "Verbal Technique" might be seen as associated with Hades, Lord of the Underworld or deep subconscious, (DAATH in QBL). This relationship to the image is seeking value, depth, and volume. This method stresses keeping to the image as presented rather than analyzing symbols. We apply this method to recapture the unknown element because we are thoroughly acquainted with symbols and their. The dream image expresses this if the symbols are not dissected from their "specific context, mood, and scene." An image presents symbols with their particularity and peculiarness intact. Dream presents a variety of images which are all intra-related. Time and sequence are distorted in dream. Hillman prefers to view dream images with all parts as co-relative and co-temporaneous. This approach to the dream is a sort of metaphorical word-play. The elements of the dream are chanted or interwoven. Repeat the dream while playfully rearranging the sequence of events. Remain alert to analogies which form themselves during this word play. Ruminate on any puns which may occur. As the play unfolds, deeper significance emerges as a resonance. By allowing the dream to speak for itself, interpretations appear indirectly. This is a method of communicating with the psyche which is in harmony with its inherent structure. In alchemy, it is known as an iteratio of the prima materia. Its value is evident, according to Hillman. "We do not want to prejudice the phenomenal experience of their unknowness and our unconsciousness by knowing in advance that they are messages, dramas, compensations, prospective indications, transcendent function. We want to get at the image without the defense of symbols.” (1) The archetypal content in an image unfolds during participation with it. We have found that an archetypal quality emerges through a) precise portrayal of the image (including any confusion or vagueness presented with the image); b) sticking to the image while hearing it metaphorically; c) discovering the necessity within the image (the fact that all the symbols an images presented are required in this context); d) experiencing the unfathomable analogical richness of the image. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 128 (2) In this context, 'archetypal' is seen as a function of making. The adjective may be applied to any image upon which the operations are performed. This means that no single image is inherently more meaningful than another. Value may be extracted from them all. This coincides with the alchemical conception of the Opus as work. Here the Opus is carried by the dreamwork technique. Archetypal psychology contends that the value of dreams has little application to practical affairs. In Re-Visioning Psychology, Hillman postulates that: Dream's value and emotion is in relation with soul and how life is lived in relation with soul. When we move the soul insights of the dream into life for problem-solving and people-relating, we rob the dream and impoverish the soul. The more we get out of a dream for human affairs the more we prevent its psychological work, what it is doing and building night after night, interiorly, away from life in a nonhuman world. The dream is already valuable without having any literalizations or personalistic interpretations tacked on to it. Hillman ends his "Inquiry Into Image" by stating that the final meaning of a dream cannot be found, no matter how it seems to "click." Analogizing is like my fantasy of Zen, where the dream is the teacher. Each time you say what the image means, you get your face slapped. The dream becomes a Koan when we approach it by means of analogy. If you can literalize a meaning, "interpret" a dream, you are off the track, lost your Koan. (For the dream is the thing, not what it means.) Then you must be slapped to bring you back to the image. A good dream analysis is one in which one gets more and more slaps, more and more analogies, the dream exposing your entire unconscious, the basic matters of your psychic life. This type of analysis seems consistent with the origins of the word. Originally, it had to do with "loosening." This type of dream analysis loosens our soul from its identity with day-to-day life. It reminds us that styles of consciousness other than that of the ego have validity. The soul experiences these styles nightly. No paper on dreams would be complete without some mention of nightmares. Even though dream is an easy method of contacting the unconscious, it is not always pleasant. Occult literature speaks of a figure called "the Dweller on the Threshold." In Eastern philosophies there are the wrathful deities. This figure corresponds with Trump XV, The Devil, in Tarot. This seems consistent with Hillman's (1972) attribution of the dream as Hades' realm. The healthy person learns easily to cooperate on his descents into the psyche. The uninformed or neurotic personality is likely to encounter hindrances. These hindrances often take the form of frightening, monstrous, overpowering forces. Ego-consciousness is not able to comprehend them. When the subconscious is highly activated these images may occur during waking hours and in sleep. This dread and oppression form the basis for nightmares. Pan and his attendant phenomena (such as panic) are archetypal representations of the nightmare. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 129 Pan also corresponds with Trump XV. In the heroic model, as consciousness develops, there is a marked difference in both the content of dream and the dreamer. He gains increased ability to assimilate the charges of energy associated with the dream. The more conscious the experience of the numinous, the less fraught with irrationality and fear the experience is. This holds true in waking and sleeping hours. John Gowan, in Trance, Art, and Creativity , states, "It is this gentling, humanizing process exerted on the preconscious by creative function of the individual which is the only proper preparation for the psychedelic graces." These graces include an immersion of the ego in the expanded context of the subconscious. The ego is then able to return from its experience enriched by the contact. Contents which might formerly have been considered nightmarish are more fully understood, and the monsters become transformed into butterflies. This attitude toward nightmare is not consistent with Hillman's approach. He does not advocate changing or controlling the psyche. This is, in fact, neither possible nor desirable. He asserts that to enter dream is to enter the underworld, Hades' realm. Psychic images are metaphorical. All underworld figures are shades or shadow souls. There is no reason for them to conform to the constraints of the ego's dayworld. Soul is the background of dream-work. Underworld is psyche. This relates, therefore, to a metaphorical perception of death. Dreams present us with that different reality, in which pathology and distortion are inherent aspects. We needn't control them, but rather acknowledge their value and depth. Assuming it is necessary or desirable to control any aspect of dream life, there is a further development of consciousness which enables one to consistently experience what is known as the "lucid dream" or "high dream." (Williams) In a lucid state, there is an overlapping of normal waking consciousness coupled with the dream state. At this stage, one is able to progressively acquire and exercise will in dream states. In the lucid dream, one "witnesses" the fact that one is dreaming, and may take an active role in the unfolding of the dream. This optional ability is generally associated with the heart-center, or Tiphareth. The heart-center has to do with developing consciousness of the imaginal realm. Rather than control or meddle with dreams, it is more effective to exercise creative expression in waking hours. Many persons pursuing their fantasy of individuation have an outlet through active imagination. Active imagination is, in itself, an art form. It is generally practiced through a discipline, such as psychology, alchemy, or Magick. It may be dramatic, dialectic, visual, acoustic, or in some form of dancing, painting, drawing, modeling, etc. People who give free rein to fantasy in some form of creative imagination often dream less. All psycho-active drugs also tend to diminish dreaming. In other words, there seems to be a variable ratio between creativity and dream. Jung made the discovery that "this method often diminished to a considerable degree, the frequency and intensity of dreams, thus reducing the inexplicable pressure exerted by the unconscious." There need be no conscious desire to control or interfere in the actual dream. The ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 130 ego learns to meet the subconscious on a middle ground, the vale of soul making. The activities and intent of both are harmonized. Staying close to the original image is fundamental. Chaotic Consciousness & Ego Formation Enter a space with us. There are fields. Electric. Magnetic. All undefined pure energy-stuff in motion, existing beyond space and time. In fact, time itself is a field--a dispersion of time-stuff, undifferentiated and evenly dispersed. All these fields occupy all space simultaneously. There is another field of stuff -- consciousness -- within these fields. In certain places in the chaos of intermingling energy-stuff, the consciousness begins to concentrate. As it does, it interacts with other fields and begins to create order (i.e. strange attractors). Fields begin to interact to create matter and time flow. For example, energy plus mass plus electromagnetism is the basis of Einstein's equation E = MC2. The bit of chaosconsciousness that is us begins to form a structure. Consciousness always strive to take on form. It is still connected to the timeless/spaceless whole, but limits are being imposed on the structure being created. Consciousness is becoming "frozen," concentrated in a limited form. This coming together of fields is the same energy that we call love (cosmological Eros), a primal attracting force. This represents not only the formation of the human individual, but all other matter in our reality. The interaction of fields, and the formation of a vortex of energy, the attractor, represents the beginning of our consciousness structure. This process culminates in the formation of separate identity, the ego. We can conjecture that in the intermingling energy, somewhere and sometime the beginnings of awareness arise synergistically. If we trust the dream and consciousness journeys, awareness begins at about this point. It is the first emergence of individual essence from source. In one sense the strange attractors may be the genetic materials, the DNA spirals that come together in an animate condition. It may also have something to do with the inanimate portion which comes together to create the material part of our bodies and beings. Awareness, perception, and sensing are discrete faculties. Perception is ‘seeing through’, like the glasses or lenses we put on to see the world. The senses are far more basic than that. We can feel heat in our finger, but the way we perceive that may have many different impacts, based on circumstances and attitudes. Consciousness is base to our awareness. Dream journeys back to the beginnings of awareness reflect this initial description. Ego arises from this ground state over time through interaction with the environment. Ego is that part of us that is an "I", distinct from a "Not-I". The ego develops a more and more rigid structure over time, as habits and behaviors become "frozen" in the personality. For healing, parts of the ego need to let go and dissolve the old structure. If you can say there is an "I" or a "Not-I", somehow the ego is involved. This even comes in when you are speaking of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 131 the soul. There is soul and there is something that is not this soul. That is really just an egomodel of the soul. One of the problems with many psychological models of the ego is that they do not take into account what exists beyond the ego very well if at all. Freud's view of the personality includes the ego, the id, and the superego. His view of the superego depicted it as functioning essentially like an authoritarian conscience for us. The id was considered a mass of unresolved psychic energies (in many cases self-defeating or self-destructive), which nevertheless run us. Freud gleaned some understanding about the id and its effects on the ego through the process of free association. But his conceptual maps were rough. Words are, after all, only symbols. Like a map, they can only provide second-hand information about the complex energy dynamics of the psyche. We can reclaim from Freud his emphasis on the mythological dynamics of Eros and Thanatos. Eros or love is the essence of the prime attractor, the principle or energy that draws from chaos to create the structure and form which we are. Thanatos is the entropic tendency, the tendency of what is structured to break down into chaotic forms of energy. It works on both our thought processes and physical matter itself. Most people who consider Freud's Thanatos concept see it as negative--perhaps it touches their own mortality complex. In reality, it is not only negative, but probably one of the more important aspects of healing -- this tendency toward "death." For an ego to change, the old ego must die. Not much attention has been paid in conventional psychological science to that. Most attention is paid to strengthening the ego, to building it up. Jung revisioned Freud's idea of the ego and the imagery of the "Not-I." He came up with the idea of archetypal images from the collective unconscious. Dreamhealing In terms of dreamhealing work, one of the most important aspects to come out of Jung's work is his emphasis on the image, and remaining true to the unique presentation of the image in therapy. Jung investigated the transpersonal dimension to understand what existed beyond personality or beyond the self-concept. He stressed the primacy of the archetypal image. The image may be visual or it may be a multi-sensory image. A simple gut-feeling is also an image. It may combine many sensual aspects. If you can find what the image of the self is, you find that the person's physical and mental make-up takes on the contours of that image. If a person's image of themselves, their very deep primal image is somehow a faulty thing with deformations in it, then the personality will reflect that, and so will the body. It will be disease-ridden and so will the mind, perhaps twisting even the soul. In the Creative Consciousness Process and dreamhealing work, we have discovered that dreams are shaped by these existential images much like they also shape our lives and destinies. Thus, the surface presentation of the dreams, its symbols and story lines, are doorways that open to a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 132 multi-sensory experience of these states. In turn those states of frozen or "differentiated" consciousness can be released or dissolved into the even more primal and base state of "undifferentiated" or Chaotic Consciousness. As chaos theory predicts, a new primal existential image (or attractor) emerges, but one more evolved and more in a state of ease with the flow of natural order. These new, more easeful states provide a new model, a new base for healing the entire organism. One of the powers of dreams is that they lead us to the image of the self, and that is where the healing generally takes place. Things transform at that level. Observing a series of consciousness states, and mapping these states, we have noticed over time that there appear to be distinct areas of depth that are identified by characteristic imagery experiences. Dreams can be used in a lot of ways. Examples include using dreams for stepping outside of space and time, to see the future and the past, to visit future lives, to visit futures in this life, because dreams come from outside of time and space. In terms of therapy, dreams can be used as an evolutionary force to take people from a small sense of self and expand them toward a larger image. To use dreams in a healing sense it is necessary to have an orientation within the dreamscape, to recognize which depth you are dealing with. As interesting as the other uses of dreams are, such as lucid dreaming and interpretation, they do not necessarily lead to healing. They may not even access the state of dis-ease that is troubling the individual, much less be able to re-link essence to source. In dealing with specific illness there is always a specific image that underlies the ailment. And that is what you look for when guiding a dream journey. And when you find it, you guide the self that this state represents into that state of chaos and dissolution--into a death and subsequent rebirth. From this chaos, a new image of self emerges. You can go deep in dreams into transpersonal places where there is no sense of self, into true connection with the universal consciousness field. This is the place of chaos, of all and no structure. It is the source of creativity. It is the ultimate source of healing. It is the universal solvent, the panacea. It is the heart of the dream – there and back again. For orientation within the dreamscape, we use a model which is simply termed an ego map. With it you can find out where you are within the creative consciousness process. It helps you keep your bearings as you guide someone deeper into their journey. It provides clues to help determine if someone is stuck in a fantasy about their belief system or personal mythology. As a map of consciousness this model evolved from our shared consciousness journeys with people as they descend into the depths of their being--their personal underworlds--using dreams as a doorway. The creative consciousness process flows through the underworld like a powerful river of consciousness, welling up from the subterranean depths. This model is not really specific in terms of psychological theory, but it does help identify the level of imagery you are ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 133 experiencing. These levels or zones identify levels of ego functioning and development. They are characterized by a quality of imagery and sensory experiences. We can journey imaginally, yet experientially, through the layers of the psyche with this map. This virtual experience affects self-image, emotions, attitudes, thoughts, etc. creating real-life natural consequences. First we will look at the model from the outside in. Beginning with that which is known, overt behavior, we will move deeper and deeper into the unknown. Moving from the superficial to the transpersonal depths, we notice layer after layer of distortions, and perturbations of psychic energy. These include faulty thought patterns, negative attitudes, and self-limiting belief systems. These are the symptoms of the dis-ease. This whole process of going deep into the psyche parallels the shaman’s journey into the underworkd to find and retrieve the lost soul. It is the natural cure for "loss of self." We seek the lost soul primarily because of the intense degree of wounding in modern culture--alienation. This very wounding has "opened" us to transformation--to healing. The levels of this consciousness map are not firm-boundaried. They are more like landmarks, familiar zones we have noticed on the journeys. The journey to the underworld, or "the center of the earth," is a metaphor for the depths of the psyche and the wonders we find there. What we find there, experientially, certainly qualifies both as a "treasure hard to attain" and as the retrieval of that which was previously lost or unavailable. It is a process of re-membering. By repeatedly diving deep and then re-surfacing, we bring into the daylight world very important experiential material focused around the very core of our being. This promotes healing through the imagination. It is a form of meditation, like the alchemical meditatio, in which psyche "matters." The descent and subsequent ascent, going deep into the dream journey and emerging transformed, is a form of death/rebirth, a powerful archetypal theme which is initiatory in character. Before the core, (or soul), is found there are many adventures in the labyrinthine caverns of the deep psyche. There spirit and soul merge in the union of opposites. Behavioral Zone How do you judge a person's personality? The first thing you notice is their behavior. You notice how they behave. Whether it is listening to what is said, noticing what is done, personality is revealed. This is the outer manifestation of self, that being shown and acted out in the social world. It is the level of acting out our scripts and games, the patterns of behavior that reflect the dis-eased primal image. We can use these behavioral impressions to help identify the diseased primal image at its various levels. Sometimes what a person does and what they say are inconsistent. Right away that tells you about a dis-ease. Generally, you can trust the behaviors more than the words. Watch for incongruent behavior and body language. Body language will tell you the basics of adjustment ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 134 to life and the situation in terms of openness or closedness, approach or avoidance. From this arise issues of safety, security, acceptance, and therefore self-esteem. Scripts, games, ego states, and emotional rackets are the foundation of Transactional Analysis. T.A. looks at the behavior patterns and provides a sense of order about them. The basic behavioral patterns are self-reinforcing. People seem to find a way to reinforce their particular pattern whether it is healthy or not. For example, an ego that has come to believe, think, and feel that it will be rejected by others will engage in behaviors which make that a self-fulfilling prophecy. That helps maintain the (distorted) ego structure. The client's standard games are bound to come up in therapeutic interaction. That is how they relate, cope, and assimilate their experience. You know they are bound to wind up playing the same games in therapy that they play everywhere else. They are going to try to prove the same thing. This is what Freud referred to as the transference, a projection of either/both positive or negative parent. When the energy flows toward the client, it is called countertransference. It is an unconscious, automatic process. For example, clients might come saying, "Well, you can't prove to me that this therapy works." If you respond, you have fallen into their game. As soon as this happens, both become involved in a power struggle. Clients who try this game essentially use it in most of their lives. This skeptical, confrontive, challenging attitude creates problems in all areas of relationship, but can generally be managed in short business exchanges. In this example, just asking the question is the expressed behavior. And it will reflect, however abstractly, the basic dis-eased primal image. Within the symptom is the shape of the disease. In the dream, this level often shows up in the interpretive level in dream work. In Gestalt experiential dream work, in the experience of being the parts of the dreams, one often notes how well the dream parts and their interactions reflect the dreamer's outer maneuvers. Behavioral psychology tries to deal with change at that level, as do many other superficial psychotherapies. In dreamhealing and creative consciousness work, however, it is merely noticed as providing information about the shape of the diseased consciousness state that we will eventually encounter in the depths of the psyche. It acts as a map to identify the shape of the personality, to help us guide the dreamer beyond this level. Transactional Analysis provides an excellent means of conceptually understanding this level of the personality. It provides structure to help identify the repeating patterns that are the behavioral level, reflecting the dis-ease within. These are probably just symptoms of the dis-ease you will encounter. The literature of T.A. covers behavior patterns quite well. Perhaps the best single source is BORN TO WIN by Muriel James and Dorothy Jongeward. Conditioned behaviors are cataloged ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 135 in behavioral psychology which concerns itself with basic instincts like fight/flight, how habits get formed and broken, and manipulation of behavior through punishment/reward systems. Thinking-feeling Zone How we behave is largely shaped by how we think and feel about what is happening in the environment. This means "feel" in the emotional sense as well as in the opinion sense. It is a deeper zone than the behavior, which is mostly acted outside the self. This zone lies beneath the surface, a zone of thoughts and emotions, competing and dancing with each other to create patterns that shape our behaviors, but are themselves merely reflecting the even deeper patterns of dis-ease. In this aspect the dream journey reflects the experience of delving deep into the structure of a fractal image, where each layer repeats the basic structure of the levels above it and below it. The probing of the structure of dreams and personality is probing the nature of chaos itself. Cognitive-emotive therapies, such as T.A. and Gestalt, most of the psychoanalytic and Humanistic therapies, and techniques such as affirmations work within this level. They often try to produce changes at this level. Models to explain the structure and function of this zone proliferate, and often contradict one another. But in the creative consciousness process, it just provides the dream guide with another clue, another perspective on the shape of the deeper dis-eased primal image. It adds another sensory configuration to the patterns and shape that will eventually identify the primal dis-eased state to be encountered further on in the journey. It is rate that the seeds of disease originate at this level. This level is encountered and revealed in dream again at the surface presentation level, and slightly below that. It is revealed in the emotional content, plot lines and first levels of symbol experience, as for example, encountered in Gestalt work. The imagery is discreet, that is this dance of emotions and thoughts is experience with easily recognized patterns of imagery--cognitive and emotional process. The first step in a dream journey is to re-experience the dream. In that re-experiencing, these emotional, cognitive and action sequences are experienced by both the guide and the dreamer. These sequences usually reflect the behavioral and script game patterns noticed prior to the journey, and round out as well as reinforce the emerging sensory image the dream guide is developing out of the state of disease. Dream interpretation deals with this level of the dream and is a well-developed art. Surface symbol manipulation, as practiced in techniques such as Gestalt, or dream psychodrama also explore this level and promote change at this level of personality. But in the creative consciousness process, the dream guide only notices this level of experience and these dynamics. The patterns experienced at this level are models that will help identify deeper patterns and eventually the "source." Let us present an example, an illustration of a typical journey: In the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 136 dreamer's dream, he is continually frustrated as helplessly he is drawn into an impending disaster that it seems cannot be averted. At this level of presentation, the dream is reflective of the dreamer's outer emotional-thinking dynamics and patterns. In outer life he feels like a helpless loser who is constantly beset by crisis and disaster. He is constantly in no-win situations. Most dream therapies, analytical, interpretive, etc., would attempt to deal with changing these patterns and dynamics at this level by whatever therapeutic techniques they espouse. Even experiential Gestalt would seldom venture any deeper than exploring this level of dream experientially. But in the creative consciousness process, the dream guide instead co-experiences these patterns and energies. If the mind is involved at all, we may speculate that the deeper experiences and patterns of disease may exhibit a sense of "stuckness" or something like that. Having noticed, and speculated, the guide then lets go to journey even deeper into the dream and the psyche. Belief Systems Zone The next zone we encounter in our journey into the ego, and what is the same thing, into a dream, is the belief system zone. The answer to "What shapes the thinking-feeling patterns?" is what we believe about self and the world. This is still a somewhat intellectual zone in that most beliefs can be succinctly stated with a few words or sentences. But beliefs arise also from much deeper levels of sensations. Deep feelings, senses of credulity, rightness, wrongness, all help identify the boundaries and shapes of our beliefs. Of course, in the dynamics of life, experience of this zone is a dance with the emotionalcognitive level. That is how it affects the pattern of the dance. But functionally it can be justified as a discrete zone. Again, many conventional therapies from T.A. to Freud deal at this level of ego functioning. Indeed, changes in belief systems are an integral part of depth therapy healing. In T.A. this is the level at which deeper script and existential patterns are revealed and re-decided. But seldom does the diseased state originate at this level. However, most therapies attempt to deal with the disease at this still somewhat symptomatic level. The creative consciousness-dream guide again just notices these sensory patterns. They provide yet another, deeper and new way of identifying the essence of the primal dis-eased image that will eventually be encountered. At this level the imagery as we approach the boundaries of the beliefs, or the area of the known often takes the shape of dangerous paths, or other fear-filled images. At this deeper sensory level, images appear such as walls felt as solid barriers, or ugly sensations and colors, or perhaps odors or sounds, monsters or evil creatures of cold and dark. These are energies that keep us in bounds, and trapped in our belief systems. At this level the dream journey is indeed the hero's journey. The dream guide must lead the dreamer through fears to even deeper levels. It is often sensed as a journey into death or worse. For example, the frustration in the dreamer's dream might suggest a deep red color, which when experienced takes on the feeling of sticky pools of blood on a cold ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 137 tiled floor. In essence, the message and belief is that it is death in a cold sterile place to go beyond this point. In essence the outer message is that it is better to be a failure and be stuck than to die. On this outer level the dream guide might speculate about a child having these deep feelings and deciding in essence to never surpass their father because...well, it doesn't really matter why. The point is that it is an experiential memory of a reaction to something that happened once. What that is does not matter to the dream guide. What is important is that this represents the energy or psychic boundary that keeps this person trapped in their belief system of helplessness and failure. We are getting closer to the primal image now--to the state of disease. There is an essence of woundedness and death in it, maybe even a sense of drying up and becoming sticky. But again, to the creative consciousness-dream guide, it is only speculation what this all means. In fact that is often far from mind, as the quest is to push on ever-deeper to the source of this pattern-form. If anything, it is now stored in the guide's deeper senses to emerge later to support the intuitive feeling of "fit" that identifies the deepest level of the diseased primal image, when it is reached. Personal Mythology Zone The next zone can be best characterized as the "Personal Mythology" or Archetypes Zone. This is the level from which our belief systems are formed. To the ego, there is still some slight component of rational process. For example, this level is often revealed by the fairy tales (personal mythology) that underlie the scripts (belief patterns) in T.A. The imagery in this zone is, in most cases, significantly more superficial than the archetypal images suggested in Jungian psychology. In a sense they are distorted versions of the archetypes (complexes). These are the distortions caused by the organism's very early interactions and experiences with its environment. In some cases they are direct representations of archetypal energy patterns (remember the strange attractors we discussed earlier). We are very close now to what forms us out of chaos. The archetypal patterns or myths adopted are the ones which most closely reflect the organism's shaping experiences. Stanley Krippner and David Feinstein have described this level of consciousness and its impact and role in the human condition in their book, Personal Mythology. It does not conflict with what we find in dreamhealing experiences in any important way. They speak of five stages in the process of integration with one's evolving mythology. Their work is one of the first serious forays of traditional psychotherapy into the mystical realms, other than anecdotal reports. They are actively working at the mythic level with therapeutic interventions. The five stages include the following: 1). Identifying areas of conflict in the person's underlying mythology. 2). Bringing the roots of mythic conflict into focus. 3). Conceiving a unifying mythic vision. 4). From vision to commitment. 5). Weaving a renewed mythology into daily life. Krippner and Feinstein have used Graywolf's life story to illustrate their model on many occasions, including Krippner's Dreamtime and Dreamwork (1991). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 138 It is probably no coincidence that this closely resembles the four stations of the Medicine Wheel: identifying the problem, letting go, new vision, and empowerment or actualization. This is the archetypal healing model operating at the mythic level, no matter how it is stated. We don't seem to automatically jump into a belief system from an experience. It has to go through a mythologizing process, and thereby become entrenched as an image. That is an important part of how the image gets in there. We turn an experience into a belief through the process of mythologizing. The mythological layers form a sort of border between the ego and the personality, separating it from the deeper collective psyche. The mythological layer is the boundary layer between the personal and transpersonal. That is why the archetypes are so clear there, yet they are also in a logical context, story, or drama. It is the melding of rational and irrational. Mythology is a precursor of evolution. New guiding myths are arising today, such as the new myth that "personal power arises within." We follow an image or myth of who or what we expect ourselves to become. This is our existential myth. Identity crisis follows if it doesn't work, creating an evolutionary crisis. This level of consciousness is profound and indeed at this level the guide may encounter the primal diseased state itself. Most often one must forage deeper, but sometimes it rests in this level. These consciousness states/images are frozen into form very early in life, within the first year or so. They manifest as deep sensation and sensation patterns and are a level of memory experienced pre-verbally, or at barely verbal levels of cognition and experience. In a way they can be viewed as the time when the organism is beginning to shape its "self." The organism has rudimentary experience at the sensory level, but no cognitive-emotive existence. It seeks the archetypal energy forms rising from its chaotic origin, and selects the ones which most accurately match its experience so far. It modifies those archetypes to match its experience and this provides a strange attractor that becomes the nucleus of personality. This zone holds very little "mind" content and is purely sensual in nature. The visual imagery (if there at all) is simple, perhaps surrealistic -- disembodied eyes or faces, frozen statues, pools of molten red lava, animal faces, jaws full of sharp teeth, etc. Archetypal Zone But still deeper strata exist--a deeper zone of psychic energies and patterns that represent memories of even more primal levels of consciousness and experience. When we reconnect with them experientially, we re-member our deepest self and heal our fragmentation. Here we find experiences of the Womb, back even to the dance of energy, matter, and consciousness at Conception. These images are close to the stuff of our creation, the primal chaos or consciousness field that seems to underlie all matter. This zone is one of archetypal energy waves and patterns, existing on the edges of infinite creation. In this zone the imagery is beyond surreal. It is psychedelic or mystically sensual, much as described by individuals in the deepest of L.S.D. experiences, or during moments of ecstatic healing, or religious experiences. These strata are cataloged extensively by Stan Grof in his works on LSD therapy and Holotropic Healing. Here are revealed shifting, dancing energy ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 139 patterns that sometimes only suggest forms, or may assault the senses -- deep whorls that suck one down in spinning spirals, black holes in black space, gray clouds of nothingness. Senses are extraordinary and seemingly infinite in variation (including the controversial psi phenomena such as extrasensory perception (ESP) and the sensory melding of synesthesia). If this zone is clear, the dis-ease exists at more superficial levels. It is a zone of great ease, and an experience of timeless flowing creation. It resonates as deep rightness and peace, ageless antiquity. If the dis-ease exists at this deep level, the experience is similar to the above, but somewhat modified. For example, a deep red stab wound with a black center might become a swirling vortex pulling the dreamer and guide into a blackness. It is cold and empty, and the spinning of the vortex has dismembered the dreamer. In fact, he has experienced a sense of being disintegrated. In this state of nothingness a throbbing sensation of pulsating red becomes a sphere of softness surrounded by a shell of resistance. At the same time spikes are puncturing the shell. Becoming both the punctured and the puncturer leads to a deep-felt sense of flowing togetherness and peace. There is acceptance of conception and creation as deep-felt senses adjust to this yielding. Chaotic (or Creative) Consciousness The zone of chaotic consciousness underlies all of the foregoing. Within our theory this is the level at which all structure dissolves and from which all structure comes. It is the "universal solvent" of alchemy, the liquid form of the Philosopher's Stone. It could, in fact, has been called by many other names. It is a sea of universal consciousness, timeless and infinite. It is chaotic consciousness, a level of being and energy that is virtually random and unformed. It is a state of pure creative energy with infinite possibilities. It is the Tao. It is the timeless, spaceless quantum leap. It is a higher order dimension of self-existing in hyperdimensions or virtual realities. It is the healing, creative HEART OF THE DREAM. It is the selfless Self. What is the imagery? To borrow from Taoism, "the Tao which can be described is not the Tao." It is remembered on returning as being all that has ever been, all that is now, and all that is yet to be. Here lie buried memories of conception, the instant we begin to develop a "consciousness" of the self from the collective consciousness. In so many of the conceptions we hear about in dream healing, the energy is wrong. For instance the mother is being raped, or nobody cares, or it is an accident, or father was drunk, etc. Conventional psychology has not dealt with this phase as an experience of trauma very much. Even the alternative therapies focus more on the birthing experience. Eric Berne, founder of T.A. used to pose the question, "Make up a story about your conception." That was part of the script questionnaire. You can discover a lot from that simple exercise. We are only beginning to realize just how much of a person's form and structure, not only genetically, but also psychologically, comes out of that initial experience. The dreamhealing method has a big advantage in that it views memory differently than most people view it. It is more than the conscious process of recall. "I ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 140 remember this happened," is usually a visual or auditory memory. When you begin to leave that perspective, you can perceive that the deep memories come to you in other forms. Genetic memories come to you in different forms. They are not discrete memories. They are sensory imagery, and structural characteristics. Then memory expands to include a lot of recorded experience you just cannot get at in other ways. Just to process, re-experience, and reorder those memories is therapeutic. It means going into primal chaos to begin the process of reformation from the most fundamental beginning. The process of conception parallels chaos theory in that these initial conditions are very critical, and slight changes in those conditions can bring on the exponential disruptions of the "butterfly effect." Chaos theory uses the metaphor of a butterfly in the orient flapping its wings thereby causing a gigantic storm on a far-away part of the globe. During conception, we have the initial chaotic conditions which begin forming the initial structure. The slightest things that are wrong here may have horrendous effects down the line. Having descended to the formative depths, we can now begin to ascend through the consciousness map through the typical stages of development. LEVEL 0: THE SPACE/TIME CONTINUUM AT CONCEPTION Conception occurs with the interaction of the space/time continuum with collective or universal consciousness. The ephemeral soul enters real-time experience as a tangible entity. Yet we are still totally immersed in the unified web of awareness. Direct experience of this level is a true sense of oneness with all. It is not just a metaphysical idea, but a real field that exists -- a permeation of space/time with consciousness. The collective or universal consciousness may be seen as an all-pervasive consciousness that exists through all of space and time. Each one of us is a part of that, and connects intimately with that. Jean Houston has called this the I AM experience. Our consciousness is only a manifestation of this larger consciousness. It is spoken of as a union of opposites, or God, Unity or the Tao, etc. It exists in stars, in ourselves, in all things. It is also totally undifferentiated. In it there is no sense of separation of self, or anything else. LEVEL 1: COLLECTIVE OR UNIVERSAL CONSCIOUSNESS AWARENESS This level where we are ALL ONE is a very healing state of consciousness. Consider the idea of the space/time continuum, with the three spatial dimensions plus the fourth dimension of time. If our consciousness is trapped in space and time, we essentially live a Newtonian cause/effect life. This happens which inevitably results in that happening. At surface levels we experience a causal world. At deeper levels of the psyche we can make the quantum leap in consciousness to a seemingly timeless/spaceless realm where we can experience ourselves differently. In this acausal awareness we are reconnecting our essence with our Source. Consciousness exists like an ocean. Jung spoke of it. The mystics call it the Father (or Mother), the Source, Great Spirit, etc. Communing with this energy, experiencing this state of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 141 consciousness, was the practice of shamans from the beginning of human history. They developed many techniques for "getting there." Consciousness always strives to take on form, and spirit urges us to cast off gross form and return to primordial unity. What creates the space/time continuum may be the interaction of consciousness with the other fields that exist, such as the time field, EM fields, gravitational fields, and the "strong" and "weak" force within our atoms. These fields are virtually inseparable; they nest within one another. At the level of the still-elusive unified field theory they are one -- and we are that. In fact, Jean Houston terms this experiential level, WE ARE. No matter how we define it, this is the core or source from which we come. What happens is that as we enter four-dimensional space, we develop increasingly complex dynamic form and structure over time. These energies crystallize around the nucleus of consciousness interacting with the space/time continuum, and perhaps other (hyperdimensional) dimensions. If you can consider a dimension beyond that of space/time, it is without form -- a vast non-linear, pregeometric ocean of disintegrated virtual energy -- pure potential. It is chaotic – a chaotic dimension – a chaotic consciousness. Everything is de-structured here, disassembled. It is hard to envision form or structure existing beyond that. From this infinitely vast ocean of potential arises a wave. It differentiates like a wave on the ocean -- a "standing wave" in four-space. As this consciousness differentiates and begins to enter local reality, we can call it the soul, if you like. We are not solid matter at all, as the materialistic view teaches us. Rather, we are dynamic wave fronts in the ocean of the continuum. At the moment of conception, the organism begins to exist in the space/time continuum, in the physical world. It begins to be trapped by the deterministic laws of cause and effect, and is still subject to the bizarre-yet-deterministic laws of chaos. Within these parameters, the entity begins to have experiences which develop awareness. The organism somehow stores this "pre-experience." LEVEL 2: ENTRY INTO SPACE AND TIME With entry into space and time, the unconsciousness wave enters the realm of material reality, and hence duality. The genders merge in act of love (or merely sex). The dynamic interaction creates an attraction (an attractor) or agitation in the virtual energy of the collective consciousness, which becomes a "wave" in the ocean of consciousness. Conception takes place as the wave finally enters into material reality--sperm meets egg. The wave might be considered an individual soul, but the embryonic soul has the dual nature of being purely collective at this point yet invested with the potential for individuality through ego and personality. The divine collective interacts with material reality and begins the process of forming the physical and psychic self. Since at this point, we don't have much of a body, or mind, or form, or structure, this early experience cannot really take on much of a sensory memory. We can't remember much of how it felt, or how it sounded. But we can remember it in terms of energy itself. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 142 So memories of the very early images and impressions are stored in terms of energy. With this conception we envision a metaphorical rebirth, a rising from the depths of the underworld. We have found the lost soul – the lost self. This process of remembering the deep self, the core self, heals dismemberment. By re-membering, we re-create, and re-new ourselves. Conception takes place when the attraction of love draws a wave of consciousness into interaction with space/time, as the sperm symbolically pierces the egg. "Love" in this sense is the power of primal attraction, mythologically the cosmic Eros, not necessarily love of the partners in the sex act. Love is a creator, healer, and unifying force in all human experience, spanning both scientific and mystical reality. Love energy is "sex-red," similar to the red of Buddhist reincarnation theory. LEVEL 3: PRE-SENSORY, GENETIC CONSCIOUSNESS Conception is the awakening of genetic consciousness. Its dynamic mandate is set in motion at that point. At this instant of creation, prenatal awareness begins and memories begin at the molecular or cellular level. The collective consciousness is given the material with which to create its body, but it is now restricted by the laws of material reality. At the same time, energy experiences (the situation in the womb) begin to form the psychic body or the ego. At the moment of conception, the collective consciousness begins to exert its influence and create a body and an energy, and/or psychic shield to give it both protection and to allow for the perception of and interaction with material reality. Thus, two "bodies," physical and psychic are now forming in the womb. There are pre-sensory images. These appear at the deepest levels of dreamwork as a totally expanded sense of self -no boundaries or limits. Another way to say it is that consciousness first intrudes and then limits part of itself to the constraints of space/time. Input to the fetus is very basic at this point. Nutrient input yields a sense of getting or not getting. Emotional input from basic chemicals borrowed from mother and mother's body sensations are stored as pre-sensory images. If mother's chemistry is toxic it sends the message that the physical world may not be a safe place to be. If mother is an alcoholic, the fetus is exposed to poisonous blood. It damages self, causing it to see the world as poisonous. It is a sensory image based on the whole environment being poisonous. Or, if the moment of conception is a moment of hate, violence, or rape there is going to be a lot of energy attached to that moment of conception. The very creation of self, the very act of formation of self is based on that, whether or not these circumstances of conception are later made conscious or not. The process of personality formation covering soul is like an oyster forming a pearl around an irritant. The subsequent layers of personality that overlay on top of that take on these very early shapes. Early hormonal reactions of both mother and child are also experienced at this level. If you guide a person to this level so they are experiencing it directly, they can actually affect their hormonal balance. If you start with dreams, they sometimes heal physical problems, too. When their awareness enters this level, you can help them to change some of these images. They ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 143 reenter this state of consciousness and come back out to build a new sense of self, a new personality, even a new body and chemistry. If you penetrate to the primal level, you touch back into the collective matrix. In the womb there are experiences which leave imprints, such as chemical memories. As the fetus grows, it develops early sensory apparatus -- nerves -- so that these memories are stored now as basic sensations. These are pre-visual sensations. This is usually a very basic visceral or gut-level perception. It signals the awareness of comfort/discomfort. This awareness provides the earliest sense of value for physical existence. Is it nurturing and friendly, or does it abandon and reject the well-being of the fetus? Is initial sensory experience comfortable or uncomfortable? During the time in the womb, sensory abilities become more and more complex. So, the pre-sensory level takes on the form of colors and heat, without any visual form or imagery. The impression is of drifting things, maybe a void. Very subtle sensations, color, and elusive impressions characterize this level. Some clients have trouble describing what they are experiencing in the dreamwork when they reach this deep level. It is based on very early experience. It is a conceptual experience, a womb-like experience. It is so basic it comes before the brain is even formed, so it is totally raw. The genetic consciousness is acting on the genetic material supplied by the mother and father. Following the laws of genetics, it creates a physical being which can sense and interact with material reality. As the embryo grows new senses are added to visceral awareness including sound, sense of color, and images, etc. Memories of space/time consciousness are stored in this way. It is still an undifferentiated sense of being. The psychic consciousness is creating the various aspects of the energy body. They are connected to the physical body through such structures as the ego, the astral body, and the meridian system. Our conscious awareness is usually limited to just a segment of the ego, but the ego reacts with material reality also. Around the second or third month of life, we develop nervous systems which exhibit some discrimination. Then the pre-sensory images evolve toward sensory images. A new way of storing experience is developed. In process work, people can explain their experience more in terms of the known senses, excluding vision. These sensory images still have a lot to do with throbbing, pulsations or sounds, and colors like pure red and black. This is very often the fetal heart or placenta beating rhythm. Experiences of this phase can impact how a person forms or builds a personality in a very profound way. LEVEL 4: BIRTH AND SENSORY IMAGES Birth occurs during this phase and the sense images increase in complexity. The undifferentiated slowly becomes differentiated into images of self-world as shapes, colors, tastes, motions, feelings, emotions, sounds, and acts. This is how memories are stored. Birth imagery includes tunnels and caves, feeling pushed or expelled. As the differentiation sense grows, the perception of I and Not-I, and sense drives come into awareness. Comfort/discomfort perception continues and becomes even more acute. Another impression becomes perceivable which we will term empathy. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 144 Images begin to take definite shape via sound, taste, odor, etc. The birth experience may be stored deep in the subconscious, and sometimes becomes the subject of a dream. Frequently these dreams come up in midlife when psychological re-birth becomes an inner urge or drive of personal evolution. The original birth experience can characterize or color the rebirth experience, whether it comes through dreams or process work. For example, one client who was delivered by Caesarian section had the following dream, which for her amalgamated the images of both birth and rebirth. "CRAWL-AWAY": I'm with a group outside looking at a house. We watch a person struggling to get through a hole or opening in the foundation. There are lots of comments about WHY he's having such a hard time. We go inside and look around (apparently there's some problem). For some reason the men in the group are going somewhere, in or out of the house, to do something. Something happens (explosion or earthquake or something) and the problem is much worse, and there is little or no light. I tell them that I will go and look for the/a way out, the problem or something. I go down a hallway (with another female, closely, quietly and apprehensively behind me)… for some safety reasons or something. I/we have some kind of illumination (not very bright). The hall changes into a smaller passageway and then very small, like the crawl-way beneath a house, and it gets smaller all the time. The one behind me gets more frightened and pushes closer making it a lot harder for me to move along at all. I come to a slight turn on my right and find that the regular way out is blocked by cement blocks and rubble. Passage through there is impossible, and there is absolutely no way to turn around and go back!!! The one behind me is so close and won't move back at all. We remember that WE, the group, have something to do with blocking it for some safety reasons or something. The passage is so very small at this point. I noticed that there is a small crack in the foundation to my left and behind my shoulder, but I've passed it a little and it's sooo small I'm not sure that my head will even fit through it! For the first time I'm scared! The one behind me crowds even closer if that's possible, and makes it even more difficult! WE CAN'T GO BACK...OR FORWARD!!! There is no more illumination...our only chance is to go through the crack. I squirm around and maneuver so that I can try to squeeze out. I manage to get my head near the crack and put it up to it...and all of a sudden I'm in the bright light on the outside. I look back at the crack and remember the other having a hard time getting out. The first thing that came to my mind and feelings was that I had just been born, again? I was in an adult body all the time even when I got back into the light, on the outside. LEVEL 5: THE DEVELOPING SENSES During the first months of life, the eyes and ears develop completely, and the brain discriminates more and more. As time goes on, we get more and more from the senses, learning how to use them more in the outer world. We then begin to form sensory imagery. These images begin to put things together, to create associations and natural metaphors. The organism strives to define self. Primal images of world-self begin to form. Body ego and much of personality ego will reflect this shape, (perhaps contour is a better image). The edges may be softened by later experiences but it still will determine the base shape of the personality/body. This level is the basis of physical disease and susceptibility. It is the level of predisposition. At this time using a combination of genes, even basic body chemistry, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 145 processes are set in motion which may result later in cancer, heart disease, etc. Here it becomes established and becomes a strong potential. At this stage of development, material reality is filtered through both body and ego-mind. At first, it is mostly just impressions of images of the immediate environment. It forms a layer of sensory images of the world, a base range, against which all future ones are checked. Clients often describe imagery of this level as a paradoxical union of opposites, such as a full/empty or hot/cold feeling. There are also many extrasensory impressions from this level, which are often contradictory. Language is virtually inadequate to describe these dichotomies. More structuring of the original chaotic consciousness of pre-conception orders a personal reality as the baby develops. Senses become discrete perceptions. Sight, taste, and odor become differentiated rather than melded in synesthesia. There is finally a glimmering of the separation of mother and self. This takes place at the pre-intellectual, pre-conceptual stage, but the awareness comes into being and is the seed of ego development. Some people's entire basis for a fear of the world is the image of an angry face. When they go back, they eventually discover it is usually a parent's angry face, maybe just impatiently telling the child to go back to sleep. But the child sees that annoyance, senses that, and internalizes that anger. A small child stores that impression, as a physical and psychological (psychophysical) gestalt. It becomes encapsulated in that vision of the angry face, which seems to reappear in later situations, creating the same automatic response of disproportionate fear. All angry authority figures somehow become that angry parent. Each repetition reinforces the image. Later, the person walks in to see the boss, and he's got an angry face, so immediately the individual folds. Psychology is good at sometimes reaching down to this level to resolve those issues by helping the person realize there are alternatives. There is usually an image that is stored in the mind that is a complete image that has emotions attached to it. These are olfactory, visual, auditory, and kinesthetic sensations that encode its essence. It involves more aspects of your total sensory being, or sense of being. These images can be processed with NLP techniques such as the "re-frame" and "change history," but the results are limited and sometimes do not "stick." Changing imagery at this level is not necessarily the whole answer, because it is just a reinforcement of more primary belief systems. LEVEL 6: MYTHOLOGICAL LAYER Underlying the ego layers of personality is the mythological phase of development. It directly underlies the personal belief system, and is instrumental in its formation. The other component is experiential--the interaction of the personal and transpersonal. Much of the appeal in myth derives from the fears and fantasies every child experiences as part of the way he defines himself. This is also the level of fairy tales and heroic epics. Our role models and cultural heroes glean their appeal from their identity with the mythic characters. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 146 The structure of the heroic, upwardly-striving ego also resonates with this imagery which is influential in its formation. One of the realizations we need as modern people is that this heroic, perfectionistic, overachieving ego model may rob us of our humanness. There are many other, gentler archetypal tales. A favorite fairy tale can condition an entire life. Many a Cinderella laments that, "one day my prince will come." This is the old rescue fantasy. Our youth-oriented society asserts it will "never grow up," and rejects wholeness by disowning its shadow like Peter Pan. Another example of the mythological layer is the tale of the “Emperor's New Clothes”. Embarrassment might be encoded something like this: "Somebody pulled a fast one on me. Here I am walking about naked, and someone pulled a fast one on me." And that is how we store it; as a child that is how we experience that. This is why fairy tales enchant children through identification with the metaphors behind the story. The identification begins with personal experience and is validated in the story -- "Hey, that's what I felt, thought, imagined, believed." For example, this embarrassment ("bare-ass" ment) might have its precedence in earlier childhood when parents insisted a child perform. They may want something simple, like saying DaDa, but the child can become the object of derision. When he can't perform, and receives ridicule instead of praise, the small child may feel betrayed, exposed, and abandoned emotionally. Many incidents repeat the essence of the experience, basically confirming the more basic existential beliefs. How many adults today would freeze with fear asked to speak before a small group of people, because of shaming in school? These levels tend to be stages of memory stored in images of the senses we pay the most attention to. As we get deeper and deeper in the mythic script, we begin to get into other senses than the normal five we use to deal with the outer world. This is the psychic aspect of psyche, and involves phenomena like telepathy, clairvoyance, and synchronicity. In dreamhealing practice, these are spontaneous aspects of the co-consciousness journey. They arise within a noboundaries or no limiting expectations condition. LEVEL 7: BELIEF SYSTEMS AND INTELLECT In the more surface level of belief systems, beliefs are stored in the form of actual memories, stories which are almost mythologies. They become mythologized over time much like our real culture heroes become the stuff of legends. To continue our previous example, the memory of being laughed at in class can develop into a memory of the world as a place that is always going to ask me to do things and then laughs at me for doing them. This embarrassment can lead to introversion or avoidant behavior, and negative self-talk about self-esteem. Images stored around that memory become a whole belief system about "who I am" and "what the world is," and "how I behave." At the sensory level colors, sounds of throbbing, warmth/cold, comfort/discomfort are typical experiences we hear about in session. As we continue to grow we add intellect to this imagery and begin to form belief systems. They are our minds' way of making sense and putting things into a structure. A desire for order is basic to our survival instinct. Structure gives us an easier way of dealing with things. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 147 Belief systems form as we begin to make a structure with basic existential beliefs and later fairy tale beliefs. As abstracting ability begins (programmed genetically), the images take on aspects of a dynamic story with interactions. These are fairy tales and basic personal mythology-archetypal shapes and sequences. This is the level of Freud's id. Identity is a key issue here. The sense of who one is leads directly to emotions, thought patterns, and behaviors. Of course, behaviors always feedback and reinforce the beliefs, which reinforce the behaviors, ad infinitum unless there is intervention. As perception sharpens and words and ideas are processed by the brain to add to sensory impressions, word images are formulated and create the very first and most basic belief system against which all future experiences are compared. In later life the touchstone of familiarity is generally chosen over well-being, so this imprint is extremely important. In T.A. this layer of beliefs is known as life scripts. This thinking activity later becomes a resource for the adult self. Conceptualization and generalization begins and images of experience form the foundation of belief systems. As the brain begins to develop abstract ability, it tries to organize experiences. First comes the level of personal image, the mythology of infinite self-god, a solid world relationship. As the intellect develops still further ability to abstract, there is emergence of a belief structure about self. This is the earliest form of Script decision. This level summarizes all experiences of self-world interactions. It may take on attributes eventually of several "intellectual" belief systems as intellect cannot describe the entire sensory gestalt by a single belief. Belief systems give rise to how we react (feel, think, and emote). As we perceive what is around us we compare it to our stored impression of what reality is, what is I and Not-I. We determine its nature, make a judgment, and this determines how we think-feel, and this in turn determines how we behave. These games and patterns manifest on the ego level. LEVEL 8: EMOTIONS The unique emotional reactions of the individual are directly based in the belief system. It gives rise to certain emotional patterns which are coupled with or complexed around each belief. For example, a "mother-complex" conditions all other relationships and keeps the inner child infantile. A "father-complex" may inspire a rebellious attitude which also creates dysfunction in other areas of life. Each belief generates an emotional response that surrounds it. This forms the core layer of the ego. We can speculate that all experiences that separate us from universal self are uncomfortable, chaotic, painful, and fearsome to some extent. Sorrow, pain, and suffering are inherent in the nature of a self-reflective consciousness. Both psychologists and mystics share this notion. This pain of alienation leads us to question, wonder, and experience awe. Fear "freezes" us rather than allowing our energy to flow in a balanced manner. In fear, the I is hurt by the Not-I, even at the earliest ontological point. Pain helps us define I and Not-I; a hot stove lets us know right away. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 148 Circumstantial pain may not be useful at the time. But pain can lead to fear, which leads to a belief which complexes as a fear of pain. In dreamhealing the remedy is to go through the fear and pain to get to the heart of the multi-sensory image. Past the fear and chaos is a peaceful, calm center, a special place, a transcendent state which is naturally healing. In Transactional Analysis this layer is represented in the racket system and emotional aspects of games. LEVEL 9: THOUGHT PATTERNS Almost back to superficial reality, we find that emotions in turn give rise to the thought patterns that cluster around these emotions -- belief clusters (complexes). This is the next ego layer of thinking, which may not be an entirely separate layer from emotions. They interact in lock-step. For example: Through the senses I trigger 'belief system A' which triggers the set emotional response. At the same time, by my intellect, I give myself the thoughts that rationalize the belief which is also combined with the emotional trigger or particular behavior response. The body tells the mind it is not safe, and the mind iterates to the body that it is not safe. Through this mutual negative feedback the whole individual is destabilized. According to Transactional Analysis., the adult self uses the game patterns and the script patterns. The organizational activity is the parent self. At a higher level of organization this results in individual complexes. So, levels 7-10 are script-game-racket patterns. We can further speculate that when we experience self as "I/Not-I" we are into the above. LEVEL 10: BEHAVIORS This level gives rise to behaviors and the use of the body. Behavior is the interface of the organism with the world. So are the senses, but they are inwardly directed. Behavior is an outwardly directed dynamic. This creates a reaction in the outer world which the senses can perceive and then back to re-evolve belief systems. If this feedback system is flawed or closed, or based on false assumptions, negative beliefs about the self become self-reinforcing. In this manner we create a solid reality that is familiar, predictable, and one with which we can cope. And we find ourselves now back at the surface, having dived deep and discovered experientially the nature of the pure soul and chaotic consciousness. Changes at these deepest levels effect even the surface layer of behavior in a sure and profound way which unfolds over time. The source of dreams in this model is the most primal or rudimentary level of the psyche. They are a pure spontaneous phenomenon of the brain's experience of itself, turning itself on and off during sleep, sorting and processing input from without and within. They originate in the collective consciousness level as pure consciousness which, as it passes through the layers of self, picks up shapes and plot at all levels to create the dream as we experience it (symbols and plot). Dreams may be the leakage, or extrusion, of this consciousness to the surface level. Conclusions ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 149 This basic, healthy, undifferentiated, collective God-force within percolates into the upper levels of consciousness. And as the dream images filter through each of the levels, they take on shapes which become the images and the plot you see at the surface of the dream. The strength of dream healing is that it gives us the shapes of the dis-ease, the discomforts, the shapes of fears, and of pathology. Playing with just the images of a dream tells us a whole lot about different aspects of the ego, such as how we get along and adapt. The dream symbols are portals which you can follow back down into deeper levels. Awareness which has made this journey gains a self-transformative power which can be applied to recreating the personality and changing behavior. Then awareness is changed fundamentally. The lost soul is found, and retrieved, and restored. A new sense of wholeness emerges, which is reflected in the personality. Dream healing takes the sense of self (-awareness) back into symbols to its root levels without interpretation. The interpretation has led in the past to distortion of the information or message from the primal source. The surface level of dream is reflected by plot and symbols. Freud and Jung tended to interpret and intellectualize about dream reality. Fritz Perls approached the dream experientially, with the goal of unifying the elements. Perls remained at the ego levels in his dream work. But now the dreamer can learn directly, experientially that (s)he is all parts of the dream. References Gowan, John Curtis, (1975), Trance, Art and Creativity, California State University. Grof, Stanislaus, Holotropic (2010) Holotropic Breathwork: A New Approach to Self-Exploration and Therapy, SUNY. Hillman, James, (1977), Revisioning Psychology, William Morrow Paperbacks; First Thus edition. Hillman, James (1977), “Inquiry into the image,” Spring 1977, p. 82 coming 2015:From Types to Images, Uniform Edition Vol. 4, "An Inquiry into Image, Further Notes on Images, Image Sense". Hillman, James, (1972), Pan and the Nightmare, Spring Pubns, James, Muriel, and Dorothy Jongeward, (1977), Born to Win, (Addison-Wesley Pub., Philippines). Jung, Carl, (2010), Dreams: (From Volumes 4, 8, 12, and 16 of the Collected Works of C. G. Jung), Princeton University Press; Reprint edition. Krippner, Stanley and David Feinstein, (1991), Personal Mythology, St Martins Pr. Krippner, Stanley, (1991), Dreamtime and Dreamwork, Tarcher. Miller, Iona and Graywolf Swinney, (1992), Dreamhealing, Asklepia Foundation, Wilderville. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 2 | pp. 123-150 Miller, I., The Value of Dream Work 150 Miller, Iona (1992), “Chaos as the Universal Solvent”: Re-Creational Ego Death in Psychedelic Consciousness. Perls, Fritz, (1992), Gestalt Therapy Verbatim, The Gestalt Journal Press; Revised edition. Swinney, Graywolf, (1999), Holographic Healing: Dreams, Consciousness Restructuring, Chaos and the Placebo Effect, Asklepia Publishing. Williams, Strephon K. (1980), Jungian-Senoi Dreamwork Manual, Journey Press; Revised edition. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

295 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Article The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Iona Miller* ABSTRACT We all have our own metaphysics – a worldview – whether we are aware of it or not. Science can and should contribute to that worldview of how things are and work, but should not monopolize it. We should locate scientific understanding within a wider view of knowledge that gives equally serious consideration to other metanarratives and forms of human insight and experience. Perhaps we must learn to respect both domains to understand fully the world in which we live. We can conveniently call the scientific perspective “physics” and the stereoscopic view “metaphysics,” which goes beyond (“meta”) the purview of science alone. Both provide what we can call a meaningful “working” knowledge of reality for getting things done, whether they are an entirely accurate reflection of Reality, or not, until science solves the final riddles of existence. Key Words: metaphysics, worldview, science, spirituality, biophysics, quantum psychology. * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com Note: This work was completed in August 2004. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 296 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics “We can assert with certainty that the Universe is all center, or that the center of the Universe is everywhere and the circumference nowhere.” –Giordano Bruno “If we knew what we were doing, it would not be called research would it?” --Albert Einstein “Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge in the field of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the Gods.”—Albert Einstein Heavy Meta There is no unique way to go from physics to metaphysics. Although the reductionist scientific view does not determine the full nature of the existential field, it imposes certain requirements and restrictions on it. Both systems function as socially-structured language games. But even the most reliable map reveals virtually nothing about the detail of the terrain. Both scientific and metaphysical theories or models must be beautiful, elegant, economical, and coherent, despite any application of their criteria. Metaphysics must explain the entire set of phenomena fundamental to human experience.This can be done, as in physics, from a top-down or bottom-up approach. In science, top-down means from the cosmological to the subquantal level of observation.In metaphysics, we work from the biological/emotional/mental to transpersonal or archetypal levels of experience and expression. In physics, matter/energy is foundational, while metaphysics considers consciousness even more fundamental. Quantum or nonlocal mind models also reflect the later. We can examine a wide or narrow view of the nature of Reality and our own nature, in both scope and detail. Full Circle Is physics coming around full circle back to Natural Philosophy after only 500 years? The socalled new physics is described even by its practitioners as “mystical”. Sir Isaac Newton, godfather of modern science, wasn’t merely a scientist, but also an experimental alchemist. Alchemy was the search for the Godhead in matter. Einstein lauded Newton, saying “Nature to him was an open book…In one person he combined the experimenter, the theorist, the mechanic, and not least, the artist in exposition.” Newton presumed that matter and energy were animated from and infused by a more fundamental dynamic that was behind them both – a negentropic source perhaps too fine to observe that fed the fires of the universal engine. Newton hypothesized that any body can be transformed into another of some kind, including its intermediate grades of qualities. Buckminster Fuller proposed much the same in Synergetics I ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 297 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics and II, demonstrating it geometrically in a series of dynamic subatomic transformations, beginning and ending with what he poetically called “Cosmic Zero”. Today we refer to that negentropic source as the vacuum potential, vacuum fluctuation, zeropoint energy, or synergetically (Fuller) as Vector Equilibrium Matrix. Quantum electrodynamics is a powerfully predictive theory developed by Nobel prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman and others. It proposes that virtual particles, electrons and photons appear and disappear from a zero-point field, the quantum vacuum that pervades the universe. Other phyics models share similar conclusions on the vacuum potential. It is the dream of many that mankind can tap this ocean of potential as a free energy source that increases our survival potential. Metaphysicians suggest harmonizing or resonating psychobiologically with this low amplitude resonance enhances spirituality. It is the groundstate of consciousness. ‘Nous’ is an ancient word for what we now call nonlocal mind or consciousness.Many philosophers and modern physicists consider ‘consciousness’ as the fundamental basis of all that is. Nous is, curiously, the French term for ‘we’ or ‘us’. And, indeed, we are That. This metaphysical Source of all that exists lies at the threshold where Nothing becomes something – where the universal becomes the particular. Normally, it would be considered philosophical at best and solipsistic at worst to attempt in this modern era to illuminate our understanding of the nature of the microcosm with such an archaic non-scientific term. We might expand our philosophical concepts using physics or science models, but can we gain as much by illuminating our scientific paradigms with ancient or modern philosophy? Perhaps we can because throughout history, we have all struggled to find words and concepts for our phenomenal experience, common human perceptions and apprehensions of Truth. Such is not the usual realm of science, but that of Transpersonal, Jungian or archetypal psychology, which examines the deeper meanings of concepts which are metaphors of our existence – an artistic or aesthetic as well as deductive method. Aristotle considered ‘nous’ a faculty of the human soul. Today, soul is studied in the domain of these sacred psychologies and in “noetics”. Through metaphysics we contemplate both exterior and interior perceptions of the underlying structure of the universe. When Wolfgang Pauli collaborated with Jung, he encouraged us to find “a neutral, or unitarian language in which every concept we use is applicable as well to the unconscious as to matter, in order to overcome this wrong view that the unconscious psyche and matter are two things.” Psyche and soma are indissolubly wed in nature and our nature, and must be considered in an adequate account of reality. Can we be scientifically conservative and metaphysically bold, simultaneously? It means walking the narrow edge of Occam’s Razor. Often metaphysical ideas are metaphorical and burden us with false assumptions and irrational quantum leaps of logic. It is not that our subject should be rational and linear, but these arguments are constructed such that if you believe this ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 298 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics underlying premise, it is assumed certain outcomes result. At best this is the old mechanistic model of causal or classical physics, not the counterintuitive quantum world. But the vacuum potential appears to be much more than a metaphor. It is the most fundamental phenomenon we are currently capable of perceiving. It provides us with a new paradigm for our very existence – one that recognizes wholeness, connectedness, integration, and participation in the universal scheme. Every ‘thing’ – from concepts to objects -- including the universal waveform originates from the fertile and “whole sum” womb of spacetime. This is also the domain of nonlocal mind. Most scientists will tell you that wavefunctions, universal or otherwise, do not really exist, except on paper. But it may be that wavefunctions really exist and are akin to the mind of God. If the wavefunction is consciousness and our personal wavefunction is connected with it in a constrained or limited fashion, too much information appears as noise. But the connection suggests a relationship between intelligence and spacetime. Let’s Do the Spacetime Warp Again Andrei Linde of Stanford has suggested the expanding fractal universe generates emergent information that could be poetically considered an evolving universal intelligence. If so, it is an emergent property of spacetime as is every thing. But seemingly-separate things are a construction of our minds [maya, illusion], an overlay of what is essentially one unbroken movement – a dynamic verb, not a group of nouns. The largest component of our corporeal existence is the vacuous space between the atoms that make up our physical bodies which are far from solid from the quantum perspective. We are undergird and literally in-formed by that pervasive infnite informational flow. Could this be the ancient Greek’s “universal harmonious wisdom” resonating as human consciousness? If so, are we listening to its integrative message? …in terms of our paradigms, our technology, our ecology, our ethics? The bottom line is that tapping this soulful source, both through aesthetic and technological means may be the key to our survival as a species. Commonly translated as ’mind’ or ‘intellect’, the Greek word ‘nous’ is a key term in the philosophies of Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus. What gives nous its special significance there is not primarily its dictionary meaning - other nouns in Greek can also signify the mind - but the value attributed to its activity and to the metaphysical status of things that are ’noetic’ (intelligible and incorporeal) as distinct from being perceptible and corporeal. In Plato’s later dialogues, and more systematically in Aristotle and Plotinus, nous is not only the highest activity of the human soul but also the divine and transcendent principle of cosmic order. In a notoriously obscure chapter (III 5) of his work “On the Soul”, Aristotle distinguishes nous as ’a capacity to become everything’ from nous as ’a capacity to make everything’, in the way that light makes potential colours actual. This ’active’ nous, called ’immortal’, has often been identified with the Aristotelian Unmoved Mover, whose life is ’a thinking of thinking’ (see ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 299 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Aristotle §16). But Aristotle probably regarded human thought as being godlike rather than as being a product of the Unmoved Mover, who exists as an eternally transcendent thinker. For Plotinus (§4), nous comprises ’primary reality’, the domain of intelligence and intelligible beings. He construes this domain as an ’emanation’ from the ineffable One, the ultimate principle of everything. Taken universally, nous corresponds more or less to a syncretism of Plato’s Forms with Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover. Everlastingly contemplating the One, nous is construed as an equivalence between thought thinking itself and intelligible beings as the only true thinkables. The activity of nous ’overflows’ into ’soul’, the principle of embodied life. As a lower level of reality, soul can only think things by treating them successively and separately. Human beings live primarily at the level of ’soul’, but they also, by virtue of their immortal and ’undescended’ self, have access to identification with nous and thereby to a mode of being in which thinker and thought are completely unified. In this transcendent condition, the mind is reality itself. (Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Buckminster Fuller had his own notions of the morphing dynamics of energy/matter in the womb of spacetime. Fuller re-discovered nature’s own pulsating flux and means of selfassembly. He lamented that classical science is based on Cartesian coordinates and the structurally incoherent cube, rather than nature’s tetrahedral forms and structural tensegrity. He taught us that energy has shape…and that shape emerges from the vacuum potential. As the Heart Sutra implies, “form is not other than void and void is not other than form”. The special-case geometrical shape chosen arbitrarily by the engineering-structures-eschewing pure scientists for their energy-measurement accommodation, that of the cube, is structurally unstable; so much so as to be too unstable to be classified as a structure. Unwitting of this mensural shortcoming, Planck's constant inadvertently refers to the cube, implicit to the gram, as originally adopted to provide an integrated unit of weight-to-volume mensuration, as was the “knot” adopted by navigators as a velocity unit which integrates incremental time-space values. Spacetime for scientific philosopher Fuller meant: 526.01 There is no universal space or static space in Universe. The word space is conceptually meaningless except in reference to intervals between high-frequency events momentarily "constellar" in specific local systems. There is no shape of Universe. There is only omnidirectional, nonconceptual "out" and the specifically directioned, conceptual "in." We have time relationships but not static-space relationships. Time and space are simply functions of velocity. You can examine the time increment or the space increment separately, but they are never independent of one another. Space is the absence of events, metaphysically. Space is the absence of energy events, physically.Space is the antithesis of solid. Both are misnomers. Solidmass) refers to locals of too high an event frequency for our physical members to penetrate or conceivably tune in. Space refers to locals of an event frequency per volume too low for our apprehending equipment to tune in.Space is all the observer's untuned-in information.Space is finite as a complementary of finite Scenario Universe. As a co- occurrent, complementary function of finite but non-unitarily-conceptual and non- unitarily-tune-in-able Scenario Universe, space is finite. Space does not have definable ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 300 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics properties. Only systems have definable characteristics.The cognitive awareness of space derives from definition of system characteristics whose topological interrelationships inherently and coherently divide Universe into insideness microcosmic space and outsideness macrocosmic space. Systems have 32 topological characteristics. Space is the integral of all the frequencies that are too low for tune-in-ability. Space is the aggregate of all the vector equilibrium nulls of all magnitudes and frequencies of all isotropic vector matrixes always potentially articulatable in all directions from any point of origin.Space is never linear.Physics finds that Universe has no solid things surrounded by, and interspersed with, space. Life is an inventory of tuning-ins and tuning-outs of experience. Birth is the first tuning in; death may not be the last.Systems divide all of Universe. Thought divides all of Universe. Thought is inherently systemic...whose inherency always has its coherency of space. Only systems can communicate space. Space is systems-defined-and-deferred awareness of potentially tunable otherness. Fuller considered humanity a micro Universe; unfolding eventuation is physically irreversible yet eternally integrated with Universe.Our experience of time is relative to our mesocosmic size: Local variability within total order synergetically explains and defines the experience ``time," which is relative size experience. The magnitude of the event characteristics is always accounted in respect to other time cycles of experiences. The cosmically permitted and experientially accommodated actuality of the individual's unique variety of sensorially differentiated local in time-space experiences also accommodates the experienceability in pure principle of individually unique physical life in concert with the only metaphysically operative, cosmically liaisoned, weightless, abstractly conceptual mind, by means of all of which physically and metaphysically coordinate experienceable principles it is experimentally discoverable how genetic programming accomplishes the ``instinctive" conditioning of subconscious, brainmonitored, relative pulsation aberration and transformation controls, which are all reliably referenced entirely subconsciously to the eternally undisturbed, cosmic-coordination regularities unbeknownst to the individual biological organism "experience." The only instantaneity is eternity. All temporal (temporary) equilibrium life- time-space phenomena are sequential, complementary, and orderly disequilibrious intertransformations of space-nothingness to time-somethingness, and vice versa. Both space realizations and time realizations are always of orderly asymmetric degrees of discrete magnitudes.Physics thought it had found only two kinds of acceleration: linear and angular. Accelerations are all angular, however, as we have already discovered.But physics has not been able to coordinate its mathematical models with the omnidirectional complexity of the angular acceleration, so it has used only the linear, three-dimensional, XYZ, tic-tac-toe grid in measuring and analyzing its experiments. Trying to analyze the angular accelerations exclusively with straight lines, 90degree central angles, and no chords involves pi and other irrational constants to correct its computations, deprived as they are of conceptual models. Nonlocal Mind Paradigm The model of nonlocal time helps us supersede mechanistic notions of space and time. The universe is infinite, and so is the mind, not in the individual personalistic sense, but in terms of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 301 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics consciousness. The Greeks conceived of the mind as both limited and infinite, human and divine. The root of this notion comes from Hermetic and occult sciences, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. The mind is not localized nor confined to the body but extends outside it. This notion lies at the root of sympathetic magic. The Persians were even bolder in their view that the mind could escape the confines of the physical body and create effects in the outside world. Their physician Avicenna declared, “The imagination of man can act not only on his own body but even on others and very distant bodies.It can fascinate and modify them, make them ill, or restore them to health.” These notions were superseded by later causal and mechanistic views that came to dominate Western science and medicine. The nonlocal mind paradigm suggests we can effectively operate with the realization that consciousness can free itself from the body and can act not only on our own bodies, but nonlocally on distant things, events, and people, even if they are unconscious of the intentionality.It also suggests a new emergent healing paradigm. This nonlocal model is perhaps the basis of such phenomena as psychosomatics, remote healing, remote viewing, and dream initiations. Physicists use the term nonlocal to describe the distant interactions of subatmoic particles such as electrons. We can experience nonlocal mind spontaneously paradoxically, without losing our individuality. It has been proven that human minds display similar interactions at a distance (Krippner, Mishlove, Radin, May, Motoyama, Sidorov). These anomalies include therapeutic rapport, telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, visions, prophetic dreams, breakthroughs, creativity, prayer, synchronicity, medical intuition, nonlocal diagnosis, spontaneous remission, and intent mediated or paradoxical healing. Nonlocal mind erupts spontaneously, surprising, even shocking us. The mind has ultradimensional qualities unlimited by physical constraints. “Emergence” is the process by which order appears spontaneously within a system. It is essential to understanding functional consciousness, the mind/body, subjective experience, and the healing process. When many elements of a system mingle, they form patterns among themselves as they interact. When the mind lets go of its rational order, the old form dies and enters into unstructured chaos. The whole person emerges with a new form, embodied as a creative expression, an intuition, or as healing. Most often it is characterized by an element of novelty and surprise, since it apparently does not originate in what came before. Both healing and medical intuition are examples of emergence. It is a spontaneous solution to a problem. (Miller, 1993a) The healing arts, from conventional medicine to alternative/complementary medicine, and from psychology to pastoral counseling are undergoing a shift from a mechanistic to a holistic paradigm. Science is actually an experimental philosophy whose highest value is empiricism, and conventional healing shares this philosophy. All new scientific theories require some unifying idea, and that idea is, by definition, metaphysical – essentially untestable. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 302 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Today’s heresies are tomorrow’s dogmas. In any metaphysical dispute, strong non-scientific arguments can propose new theories, which may become scientific. Speculative ideas have contributed heavily to the growth of knowledge. Rather than discouraging exploration of fringe areas of knowledge, this awareness makes it mandatory we explore all possible modalities and anomalies without prejudice, no matter how unconventional. Even extraordinary subjects may be approached with rigorous protocols. Though subjectivity is unwelcome in science, we can study the subjective nature of experience (qualia) in various ways. The process of healing is one such subjective experience. The alchemists, who were students of consciousness in matter, created an elixir of life, a “medicine of philosophers”, a cure-all or panacea. What the modern world yearns for is a “metasyn,” or visionary synthesis rooted not in a mechanistic model but one using nature’s own forms of self-organization. This model is based on the peculiar characteristics of nonlocality and probability of quantum physics, rather than classical Newtonian mechanics. Hopefully, the new model has the power to resonate with our whole being and propel us into a more effective healing paradigm. Emergent healing is actually a treatment philosophy, rooted in a worldview born from our current understanding of the nature of Reality. Health is the natural outcome of a meaningful life, not just absence of symptoms.It means a comprehension of the complexities of life that is deeper than the conventional worldview of cause and effect. It proposes that consciousness is the foundation of reality. We do not exist independently from the universe, but the exact nature of that seamless connection is unknown. Rooted in relativity, quantum, holographic and chaos theories, a nonlocal metaphysical context suggests such a paradigm shift from the purely causal healing model. The interactive field (psychodynamic field) present in healing situations can be amplified intentionally through therapeutic entrainment, or resonant feedback playing off the unified field (universal field). Nonlocal mind operates at the most fundamental level. The Whole Sum Cosmos There is a pre-physical, unobservable domain of potentiality in quantum theory. It is the basis of fundamental interconnectedness and wholeness of Reality.This cosmos is, indeed, greater than the Whole SUM of its parts. Theories of the physical vacuum will eventually prove useful in understanding life. For example, it may link biology and consciousness. Rather than an inconsequential epiphenomenon, consciousness is a causal factor in biology. The body is a colloidal suspension that can act like an amorphous liquid crystal, resonating and superconducting in a variety of ways. Biophysics contends that more in terms of conceptual integration may be learned from the study of life than from the study of nonliving matter. More than molecular biology or bioengineering ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 303 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics technology, it is its own field of fundamental research in physics. Its own epistemological and philosophical understanding aims at understanding not just mastering life Quantum mechanics determined the primacy of the inseparable whole. Holism is intrinsic to any quantum theory for biology. Descriptions of isolated systems are permissible only under experimental conditions. Holistic properties are defined mathematically in EPR [EinsteinPodolsky-Rosen] correlations.It implies fundamental interconnectedness within the organism, between organisms, and with the environment. Holistic biophysics is therefore an integrative subject, a specialized but transdisciplinary pursuit. Quantum biology must refer to non-equilibrium thermodynamics, since organisms are open systems best described by complexity. Issues include coherence, macroscopic quantum states, nonlocal interactions, nonlinearity, communication networks, self-organization and regulation, field models, interconnectedness, and consciousness. Field-thinking and field-models are central to bioelectromagnetics. The Nature of Nothing The vacuum is filled with virtual photons whose motion constitutes the “zero-point energy”. This “cosmic zero” may be related to consciousness in some as-yet-unknown way. ZPE fluctuates because this fundamental domain is not smooth but consists of virtual particles boiling into and evaporating out of existence. But where did all these photons in the vacuum originate from? They originated on all the other particles throughout the universe, according to physicist Claude Swanson (2003). All the charged particles in the cosmos are doing the same jitterbug dance that causes electrons to radiate and absorb photons like crazy. Zero-point energy is made up of photons created by all those electrons in distant stars. Virtual photons in space are created by the motions of other electrons, mainly by “distant matter,” Each zigzag of a local electron is actually a communication between it and distant matter. The local forces of physics have their origin in the distant matter of space. This amount of matter increases as the square of the distance away. There are enough electrons in cosmos to create the vacuum energy we measure, and to absorb all the photons produced by local particles. We are connected to the distant matter and forces that arise from this connection. The distant matter of the universe can be displaced or disturbed in different patterns, called “modes”. They resemble the vibrational modes of a bell when it vibrates after it is struck. These fundamental vibrational modes can be excited and can resonate. These modes have symmetry and can interact with geometric shapes. It is possible for every local, nearby electron (or any other particle) to interact with the distant matter virtually instantaneously. Radiation can travel backward in time as well as forwards. Photons which travel backwards in time are called “advanced waves.” Photons which travel forward in time are called “retarded waves.” ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 304 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics As we look further away in space, we are also looking backward through time into deep time. Feynman-Wheeler suggested as electrons zig zag, they create photons which radiate away traveling forward in time. Later, it is absorbed by electrons in the distant matter which accelerate and in turn radiate a photon which travels backward in time [actually spacetime], converging back at the original electron’s location almost simultaneously with the first photon’s radiation. Instant coupling, the concept of photons traveling backward in time equally balanced by those going forward in time, is deeply embedded in contemporary physics. When electrons point toward one another, their velocities create an interaction over huge distances that is narrow and intense. They push one another backwards at near the speed of light. Mutual interaction leads to a finite exchange of energy and momentum in the form of a very sharply spiked photon, a photon “pulse”. It is these photons that make up the “zero-point energy” of space. The coupled photons produce a very, sharp, short pulse or spike of electromagnetic energy at the smallest unit of energy exchange. Every interaction between electrons consists of one or more photon pulses. At the Planck scale, space-time structure of the universe begins to break up. Smaller scales than this make inertia and position meaningless. Synchronizing the phases of the photon pulse combines them into “wave trains” or “quantum wave packets”, actually made up of many photon pulses from elementary exchanges between electrons. Interestingly, this means the electrons are communicating both forward and backward in time, much like in the quantum handshake of Cramer’s transactional model of QM. They send and receive signals across the universe virtually instantly. Each quantum photon consists of many photon pulses, which are collectively the ZPE of the vacuum of space (Swanson). Electrons can synchronize together in a collective effect and undergo a “phase transition.” Random motions are then superimposed on synchronized motions and collective oscillation occurs, which is a long range temporal order. Quantum Jitterbug Each particle sees itself in the center, surrounded by distant matter.The central electron only sees an electron out at the edge when their velocities line up and this only occurs when they are “in sync.” The key is when their periodic motions remain in step with each other.In this “phase locking” all electrons in the coupled system orbit around their average position at the same frequency. This is the womb of quantum mechanics, but we don’t see the inner workings, just the “fuzzy ball” of probability on the outside. The phase conditions for stable orbits [Higgs’ Phase] will only be right at certain spots. The places at which stable orbits can occur will form a regular array resembling“crystal structure” at very small scales in space, so electrons actually “jump” from one such point to another. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 305 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Frequency has a very definite physical meaning.It is the rate at which the electrons (or any particles) orbit their center of mass location. Electrons are either in phase and able to see and interact with each other, or out of phase and therefore effectively invisible and unable to exert force on one another. Unsynchronized particles appear as “quantum noise.” Other nearby parallel dimensions normally only interact with ours through quantum noise.However, consciousness appears to interact across these parallel dimensions. Coherence between parallel realities can be thought of as hyperdimensional structure which crosses dimensions.It is nonphysical yet has physical manifestations. Higher dimensional structures can be designed which, by their shape and topology, are stable. Such forms may be a possible model for consciousness and the soul. The hypercube is one such hyperdimensional structure that has a long mystical tradition (Merkabah; Cube of Space, Flower of Life, Star Tetrahedron). The key is to understand what makes up these higher dimensional geometrical structures. The answer is phase variation in spacetime. Normal space is “in phase” from point to point at this deep level, but it experiences small departures from the common resonant phase of all particles. These departures can become systematic. When mapped in spacetime they can form threedimensional and higher dimensional geometric structures. These “phase structures” can cross several parallel universes, and become the physical basis for “subtle energy” and paranormal phenomena. Electromagnetic waves are a collection of synchronized photons of different frequency and amplitude. Radiation is constantly pouring in and flowing out, balancing on average. The electron goes forward and backward in a seemingly random pattern in space and time, in order to balance all the radiation coming in and flowing out. This balanced radiation pattern is analogous to the interference pattern of a hologram. A 3-D pattern of energy created by regions of interference is what we see as an image. There is creative and destructive interference. An electron and every particle is a “hologram,” produced as the result of the actions of the electron to preserve the balance of energy (Miller et al, 1973). To be more than ethereal like a technologically produced hologram, it must have mass created by including the photons traveling backwards in time from the future. This is a 4-Dimensional hologram, which is an integral aspect of every particle and real physical object. Biophoton Emission If we want to manipulate the particle, electron or whatever, all we need to do is manipulate its 4D hologram. The brain is a holographic structure which makes an ideal antenna for receiving holographic wave patterns. The brain processes information holographically. This supports the idea that the brain may be a sender and receiver of holographic signals. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 306 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics “Bose particles” are photons which like to be in the same state; they become entangled or entrained, sharing a frequency. The body creates coherent light.In the cell structure of the body there are membranes which act as conductors of microwave, infrared and visible light. These structures store coherent photons [biophotons] which play a fundamental role in life processes. Our bodies use light and coherent vibrations to carry out many life processes. The stored coherent photons can be shaped and controlled to affect external photons and external vibrational patterns. The Bose principle extends the idea of entrainment to our own hyperdimensional being. Because of Bose statistics, these patterns or structures of energy simulate other “mirror” structures in the distant matter. Brainwaves show that the brain becomes more synchronized and coherent in mediation. Based on our 4-D holographic model, the mind has enormous power to affect reality. 4-D type holographic signals are primary communications, “in-formation”. The DNA in our cells can naturally produce coherent waves, which contain both forward-time traveling waves and matching backward-time traveling waves in phase conjugation. They generate coupled photons which radiate out along the axis of the double helix in both directions [biophoton emission]. What is DNA; where did it come from; how does it function to create life, to create us? We have some of the biochemical answers, but we can look deeper into biophysics for our models. We propose that DNA functions in a way that correlates with holographic projection. DNA projects a blueprint for the organism that is translated from the electrodynamic to the molecular level. Further, research strongly suggests DNA functions as a biocomputer. This DNA-wave biocomputer reads and writes genetic code and forms holographic pre-images of biostructures. We are more fundamentally electromagnetic, rather than chemical beings. Each cell is a tiny radio transmitter capable of sending phase conjugate waves into the past and into the future. The real power of DNA and the use of phase-conjugate waves is just a matching pattern of advanced and retarded waves transmitted in phase by billions of cells. The strength of the pattern increases as the square of the number of cells acting in unison. A million cells transmitting a desired visualization in unison will have a thousand billion times more power than a single cell. A million DNA cells broadcasting at random just produces noise. All the signals cancel out.But a million DNA cells broadcasting coherently and in unison generates a paranormal power, such as that exhibited by adepts with mindbody control. DNA molecules of each cell can be brought into coherence by emitted light and sound (Gariaev). This enables the brain, when quiet and coherent, to combine together the signals of many DNA molecules so the desired image or visualization can be brought into being. At the core of this model is synchronous interaction of particles across great distances and time, which may explain ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 307 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics many paranormal effects as changes in quantum noise. This model offers a way to understand consciousness, which is much more than the physical body. Integrative Biophysics of DNA For the time being, the twisted staircase of DNA is explored in the realms of molecular biology and biochemistry. Based on opening this world of biological organization, we can conjecture what mysteries an even deeper look at the functional basis of living matter might reveal. This is the domain of biophysics, realm of both particle and wave interactions -- fields. It has been demonstrated that DNA is electrically conductive; much like copper wire it can carry a charge. It is believed this live-wire vital capacity may have been the charge transfer that gave life a jump-start. DNA’s ability to transport charge helps minimize genetic damage from oxidation (Lawton, 2003). The same fundamental physical laws that govern matter and the Universe also govern living organisms. Even a sound biochemical theory can be replaced by an even better, more fundamental, biophysical theory. It is still important to study properties at their own levels, not just as consequences of more fundamental scientific disciplines. Where are we going? Who knows how future generations of man may be engineered from the 3.3 billion “letters” of the human genome? We have been looking to the genetic code for the secret of life. Perhaps we should be listening to the “genetic ode”, the EM song of life that reverberates throughout our being – the audible life stream. DNA as a Holographic Projector We are more fundamentally electromagnetic, rather than chemical beings. DNA is not only the driver of evolution but even more fundamental quantum mechanical symmetry-breaking forces (King, 2003). In a hologram, wave fields interfere with one another to lay the foundations for the reconstruction of the image of an object.But how are the wave fields produced? The term holography comes from the Greek roots meaning “entire” and “to write”. In holography, the image is projected by a coherent light source split into both an object wave and the reference wave background. This dichotomous nature is reflected in the particle/wave nature of the DNA molecule, which can be “read out” with biophotons from chromosomes to set up a holographically produced wave field. This superposition of wave fields (object wave and reference wave) creates a wave guide for the formation of biological structure. The image is constructed according to the reference information contained in the genes. The reconstructed object wave is identical with the object ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 308 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics wave field. The reconstructed wave fields reproduce exactly the recorded ones (the DNA with genetic code). Russian research in genetics led scientists to begin looking experimentally at the helical structure of DNA as a possible holographic “projector” of the DNA code. Thus, the existential blueprint described by the spiral staircase of DNA is translated into a complex EM field that guides the molecular growth of the organism. Miller, et al, suggested as much three decades ago, and outlined possible mechanisms of this quantum biohologram at both the cellular and whole organism level. This process emerges from a domain more fundamental than the standard genetic code triplet model. Biophysics can now describe how our form emerges directly from the void, the vacuum substructure.In essence, we emerge from the cosmic void -- pre-geometrically structured nothingness. DNA is the projector of that field which sets up the stress gradients in the vacuum substructure to initiate dynamic unfolding.Genes function as holographic memories of the existential blueprint. At the moment of ovulation there is a definite shift in the electrical fields of the body of a woman. The membrane in the follicle bursts and the egg passes down the fallopian tube. The sperm is negative with respect to the egg. When the sperm and egg unite, the membrane around the egg becomes hyperpolarized, shutting out other sperm. It is at this moment that the electromagnetic entity is formed. The fertilized egg cell contains all the holistic information necessary to create a complete operational human being. The biohologram begins to function at conception and ceases only at death. Our contention is that the DNA at the center of each cell creates the multi-cellular creature hologram by expressing and projecting the DNA in the center of the cells The biohologram projected by the embryonic nervous system forms a three-dimensional pattern of resonant structures. These structures behave as acoustic waves, acting as field guides for flowing matter and energy. The holograms are “read” by electromagnetic or acoustic fields that carry the gene-wave information beyond the limits of the chromosome structure. In this new understanding, DNA and the chromosome apparatus is the recording, storing, transducing, and transmitting system for genetic information at both material and physical field levels. If we drop down another whole domain of observation from the juicy “wetware” described by chemistry and atomic structure, we enter the subatomic realm of quantum physics. At this level the behavior of matter, both organic and inorganic, is governed not by classical notions of cause and effect or even complex dynamics, but by those of quantum probability. “Something” appears to emerge from virtually “nothing” which physicists have come to describe as a sea of infinite potential. They first called it quantum foam, then vacuum potential, or zeropoint energy. We can call it the vacuum substructure. Subatomic particles wink in and out of existence on a continuous basis, like some subatomic froth.This “something” appears paradoxically in wave/particle form. This world is not transcendent to matter, but underlies it as a coherent unity, much like ecology underlies biology. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 309 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Within this context, some physicists (Miller, 1975; Bohm, 1980) have strongly suggested that the nature of reality is fundamentally analogous to that of a holographic projection. The optical process called holography uses interference patterns. Holography describes transformations of light and optical information mathematically in wave mechanical terms. The superposition of a split beam of laser light led to the laboratory development of holograms, or recordable holographic images demonstrated by Dennis Gabor beginning in 1949. In 1971, Karl Pribram applied this metaphor to neuropsychology, suggesting it was more than analogy, that the brain actually encodes information as holograms. The pattern holds the form. Holograms contain all the information needed to reconstruct a whole image. Holograms contain many dimensions of information in far less space, like a compressed file. They hold that information in a subtle network of interacting frequencies. Thus, shining a coherent light (reference beam) or laser through the fuzzy-looking overlapping waves of a 2-dimensional hologram can create a virtual image of a 3-dimensional figure. The gist of the holographic paradigm is that there is a more fundamental reality. There is an invisible flux not comprised of parts, but an inseparable interconnectedness. The holographic paradigm is one of reciprocal enfolding and unfolding of patterns of information. All potential information about the universe is holographically encoded in the spectrum of frequency patterns constantly bombarding us. In this dynamic model there are no “things”, just energetic events. This “holoflux” includes the ultimately flowing nature of what is, and all possible forms. All the objects of our world are three-dimensional images formed of standing and moving waves by electromagnetic and nuclear processes. This is the guiding matrix for self-assembly, and manipulating and organizing physical reality. Criss-crossing patterns occur when two or more waves ripple through each other. In the transactional interpretation of quantum physics, waves of probability originate in the past, present, and future. Events manifest when waves from past and future interfere with each other in the present. That pattern creates matter and energy. The universe emerges from the rippling effects of immense numbers of criss-crossing interference waves. The geometry of the fields is more fundamental than the fields or emergent particles themselves. Our brains mathematically construct ‘concrete’ reality by interpreting frequencies from another dimension. This information realm of meaningful, patterned primary reality transcends time and space. Thus, the brain is an embedded hologram, interpreting a holographic universe. All existence consists of embedded holograms within holograms and their interrelatedness somehow gives rise to our existence and sensory images. Interference patterns of waves can be visualized interacting like ripples on a pond. At the quantum level they create matter and energy as we perceive them – lifelike 3-dimenional effects. Consciousness and matter share the same essence, differing by degrees of subtlety or density. There is a strong correlation between modulations of the brain’s EM field and consciousness ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 310 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics (Persinger,1987; McFadden, 2002). The universe is a continuously evolving, interactively dynamic hologram. This “Holographic Concept of Reality” was first suggested by Miller, Webb, and Dickson in 1973, and later touted by David Bohm (1980), Ken Wilber (1982), Karl Pribram (1991), Michael Talbot (1991), and others. In this holistic theory, the Universe is considered as one dynamic holomovement – a grand Unity. The part is not only contained within the whole, the whole is contained in every part, only in lower resolution. So, following the axiom of “As Above; So Below” we can expect biology to be based on the same physical foundation of creation. Miller and Webb hypothesized precisely this in “Embryonic Holography,” also in 1973. At the time, of course, such notions were untestable. But, with continuing revolutions in technology, now we are closer to modeling and demonstrating this creative process. DNA Wave Biocomputer The Gariaev group (1994) proposed a theory of the DNA-wave Biocomputer. They suggest (1) that there are genetic “texts”, similar to the context-dependent texts in human language. (2) The chromosome apparatus acts simultaneously both as a source and receiver of these genetic texts, respectively decoding and encoding them.(3) The chromosome continuum acts like a dynamical holographic grating, which displays or transduces weak laser light and solitonic electro-acoustic field.In other words, the code is transformed into physical matter guided by light and sound signals. Complex information can be encoded in EM fields, as we all know from coding and decoding of television and radio signals. Even more complex information can be encoded in holographic images. DNA acts as a holographic projector of acoustic and EM information that contains the informational quintessence of the biohologram. Quantum non-locality of genetic information is fundamental. The nervous system acts as a coordination mechanism that integrates DNA projection of the rest of the cells in the system, aligning these cellular holograms. The biohologram, projected by the brain, creates standing and moving electromagnetic wave patterns at different frequencies of the spectrum in order to effect different biochemical transformations. There may be specific electrostatic fields, or there may be electrodynamic field varying at various frequencies, from low (radio waves) all the way up the spectrum into visible light (biophotons) and beyond. Genes are located on chromosomes in a linear order within the cell nucleus. Chromosomes have the ability to transform their own genetic-sign laser radiation into broadband genetic-sign radio waves (the encoded signal transforms from light to sound). The polarization of chromosome laser photons is connected non-locally and coherently to polarizations of radio waves. Through this mechanism a new field structure is excited from the physical vacuum by an intrinsic creativity that emerges through DNA. The genome genetic and other regulatory wave ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 311 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics information is recorded at the polarization level of its photons and is non-locally transferred or played out through the entire biosystem by the polarization code parameter. Only 3% of the 3 billion base pair genome encodes the physical body. The four-letter alphabet of genetic elements includes Adenine (A), Cytosine (C), Guanine (G), and Thymine (T) or Uracil (U) components of DNA, arranged in three-letter “words” that tell the cell what proteins to manufacture. These genetic characters are distributed in the genetic text in a fractal distribution, i.e., reiterated.So, the nucleotides of DNA molecules are able to form holographic pre-images of biostructures. This process of “reading and writing” the very matter of our being manifests from the genome’s associative holographic aspect in conjunction with its quantum nonlocality. Rapid transmission of genetic information and gene-expression unite the organism as a holistic entity embedded in the larger Whole. Gene-expression is the mechanism by which new patterns are called into being. The system works as a biocomputer – a wave biocomputer. This biogenesis mirrors the cosmic process of creation. The holographic dynamic underlies both processes of cosmological creation and biogenesis. Chemical bonding is a consequence of the non-linear inverse square law of electromagnetic charge interaction in spacetime. Charge interaction precedes quantum chemistry perturbations of bonding energetics. Despite being genetically coded, molecules form fractal structures both in their geometry and dynamics. Generating core biochemical pathways gives rise to the fractal structures of proteins, nucleic acids and tissues. Theories of biogenesis, such as Panspermia, are strongly supported by the fact that organic molecules and amino acids, as well as the nucleotides A, U, G, and C have been detected in meteorites. It is a fecund universe, at both the cosmic and human scale. Quantum Bioholography The organization of any biological system is established by a complex electrodynamical field that is, in part, determined by its atomic physiochemical components. These, in part, determine the behavior and orientation of these components. This dynamic is mediated through wave-based genomes wherein DNA functions as the holographic projector of the psychophysical system – a quantum biohologram. In the mid-1980s, physicist Peter Gariaev first noted a DNA phantom effect in his experiments. DNA was bombarded with laser light. When removed physically from the scattering chamber, its electromagnetic signature, a ghostly holographic after-image apparently remained. What is measured is light scattering from the DNA phantom fields. No other substance has been found to emulate the effects of the DNA molecule. As long as the chamber is not disturbed, the effect is measurable for long periods of time. Evidence suggests a relationship to the phenomena of endogenous bioluminescence, liquid crystals, and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 312 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics superconductivity. Bioluminescence is the emission of photons of light produced when certain energized electrons drop into a lower or ground state. Humans emit a variety of electromagnetic radiations across the emission spectrum, indicative of the energy state of the organism. In the nuclei of each cell of the human body, the DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) carries the structure of our whole body.It is the blueprint not only of our physical form, but also of the processes that our form undergoes in terms of survival. The primal vacuum is the matrix of our existence and proportionately our most fundamental reality. In essence, we emerge from pregeometrically structured nothingness. DNA is the projector of that field which sets up the stress gradients in the vacuum or quantum foam to initiate the process of embryonic holography. DNA Phantom The Gariaev group has discovered a wave-based genome and DNA phantom effect that strongly supports the holographic concept of reality. This main information channel of DNA is the same for both photons and radio waves. Superposed coherent waves of different types in the cells interact to form diffraction patterns. First, they emerge in the acoustic domain, secondly in the electromagnetic domain. DNA seems to embody the capacity to produce a field experienced by other DNA in the body, linking all holistically together. This dynamic is linked to the cellular level via mechanisms of RNA transfer and enzymatic action in the cell.DNA and RNA are likely to be in non-local communication, possible because DNA molecules in chromosomes are in a state of substancewave duality. So, DNA codes an organism both through DNA matter and by DNA wave sign functions at the laser radiation level. Wave information is recorded at the polarization level of photons and is non-local. It is transferred throughout the biosystem by the polarization code parameter, eliciting holistic response patterns Gariaev claims to have demonstrated subtle fields emerging from the quantum foam or vacuum potential, making the effect quantifiable and measurable – objective. He found the phantom effect by irradiating DNA with a target UV wavelength of 338 nm.Poponin (1995) went on to suggest that some new field structure is being excited from the physical vacuum by an intrinsic ability that emerges through DNA. Gariaev discovered the DNA Phantom Effect in 1985 when he worked in correlation spectroscopy of DNA, ribosomes and collagen in the Institute of Physics, in the Academy of Science of the USSR. He was first able to publish his results in 1991, leading to a book in 1994, Wave Based Genome. He demonstrated a dynamic new field in the vacuum substructure by bombarding it with coherent laser light and coupling it to conventional electromagnetic fields. The experimental protocols for this procedure have been reproduced in Moscow from ideas developed at Stanford, and are currently in another replication by experimental physicist Louis Malklaka. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 313 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics You Turn Me on: I’m a Radio In analyzing any complex adapative system, we follow what happens to the information; in this case the genetic information. The quantum hologram is a dynamical translation process between acoustical and optical holograms. DNA and the genome have been identified as active “laserlike” environments. Roughly speaking, DNA can be considered a liquid crystal gel-like state that acts on the incoming light in the manner of a solitonic lattice. A soliton is an ultra stable wave train that arises in the context of non-linear wave oscillation. Oscillations are set up when DNA acts as a rotary pendulum kindling other oscillations. Chromosomes can transform their own genetic-sign laser radiations into broadband genetic-sign radio waves. This is the main information channel of DNA, the same for both photons and radio waves. Superposed coherent waves of different types in the cells interact to form diffraction patterns, first in the acoustic domain, then in the electromagnetic domain. The quantum hologram is the matrix of the translations between acoustical and optical holograms. The human biocomputer can be modeled through the marriage of quantum mechanical and complex dynamics. Other researchers soon obtained similar results, and not only based on photons.Multi-frequency physical fields are now teleported.Based on this data, it’s possible to suppose that photon fields, emitted by chromosomes as sign fields, can be teleported within or even outside the organism’s space. The same is true for wave photon fronts, which were read from the chromosome continuum similar to reading from a multiplex hologram. If photons are transformed into radio waves through the EPR-mechanism, then this phenomenon is vital.In fact, the importance of quantum non-locality existence for a genome is hard to overestimate (Gariaev, et al, 2001). Basic assumptions of Gariaev, et al included the following: The genome has a capacity for quasi-consciousness so that DNA “words” produce and help in the recognition of ‘semantically meaningful phrases.” The DNA of chromosomes control fundamental programs of life in a dual way: as chemical matrixes and as a source of wave function and holographic memory. Processes in the substance-wave structures of the genome can be observed and registered through the dispersion and absorption of a bipolar laser beam. Quantum Teleportation The polarizations of chromosome laser photons are connected non-locally and coherently to polarizations of radio waves. The signal can be “read out” without any loss of the essential ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 314 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics information in the form of polarized radio waves. The genome is a quasi-hologram of light and radio waves that create the background necessary for the appropriate expression of genetic material. Gariaev argues that the genome emits light and radio-waves whose delocalized interference patterns create calibration fields or “blueprints” for a system or organism’s spacetime organization, in a coordinated response typical of living systems. Gariaev asserts that quantum non-locality and holography is indispensable to properly explaining such realtime dynamics. Other research suggests the fundamental interaction of internal and external fields is the right track. Joseph Jacobson (2002) at MIT, found a way to switch cells off and on with radio waves. His team also "unzipped" and manipulated DNA with a radio-frequency pulse. The same approach worked on proteins as well, and proteins orchestrate nearly all cellular chemical processes. Thus, genes can act as quantum objects exhibiting the phenomenon of quantum nonlocality/teleportation. This robust dynamic assures information super redundancy, cohesion and the organism’s integrity, and thus viability. Gariaev’s experiments suggest that DNA does indeed behave like a single quantum, which induces a “hole” temporarily in the vacuum when the DNA sample is physically removed from the vacuum chamber. Quantum Bioholography says that DNA satisfies the principle of computer construction. It carries a copy of itself, its own blueprint, while the mechanism engineering the DNA replication is the biophotonic electromagnetic field. The “letters” of the genetic texts A, G, C, U are held invariant. The existence of the genetic text constitutes the classical signal process of quantum teleportation. It facilitates the quantum mechanical signal processes of both the copying of the DNA as its own blueprint, and of the construction and homeostasis of the organism in a massively parallel way by means of quantum teleportation. So, the marriage of the 50 year old study of DNA with the 50 year old science of holography has given birth to the model we call the quantum biohologram. The discovery of Gariaev of the phantom DNA and the DNA-wave biocomputer strongly suggests that this is more than a model but actually the physical mechanism for our appearance from virtually nothing. In one way you could say we “came out of nowhere.” But here we are, nevertheless. It is solely because of our DNA’s ability to transform its genetic blueprint into a physical reality – embodying simultaneously our inherited past and our future. Sure, we can now create ersatz life, but we cannot create the fundamental elements from which it arises, which are the gift of the universe, cooked in giant supernovae aeons ago. It’s like that old joke where the scientist says to God, “We can now make an Adam out of clay” – and God says, “No, first you have to make your own dirt!” ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 315 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics References Gariaev, Peter, Boris Birshtein, Alexander Iarochenko et al. (2002), "The DNA-wave Biocomputer", MS, Institute for the Control of Sciences, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia, and Wave Genetics, Inc., Toronto, Canada; also see http://www.emergentmind.org . Gariaev, P.P. (1994), Wave Genome, Public Profit, Moscow, 279 pages [in Russian]. Gariaev, P.P. (1993) Wave based genome, Depp. VINITI 15:12. 1993, N 3092?93, 278pp. [in Russian]. Jacobson, Joseph et al. (2002), "Remote electronic control of DNA hybridisation through inductive coupling to an attached metal nanocrystal antenna", Nature (2002) 415:15-155. Kelleher, Colm A. (1999), “Retrotransposons as Engines of Human Bodily Transformation,” Journal of Scientific Exploration, 13, no 1, Spring 1999, pp. 9-24. King, Chris (1999). “Fractal Neurodynamics and Quantum Chaos: Resolving the Mind-Brain Paradox Though Novel Biophysics,” Fractals of Brain; Fractals of Mind, Advances in Consciousness Research 7.http://www.dhushara.com/book/paps/consc/brcons1.htm#anchor217145 Marcer, P. and Schempp, W. (1996). “A Mathematically Specified Template for DNA and the Genetic Code, in Terms of the Physically Realizable Processes of Quantum Holography” Proceedings of the Greenwich Symposium on Living Computers, editors Fedorec, A. and Marcer, P., 45-62. Miller, R.A., Webb, B. Dickson, D. (1975), “A Holographic Concept of Reality,” Psychoenergetic Systems Journal Vol. 1, 1975.55-62.Gordon & Breach Science Publishers Ltd., Great Britain; reprinted in the hardback book Psychoenergetic Systems, Stanley Krippner, editor.1979. 231-237.Gordon & Breach, New York, London, Paris; again in the journal Psychedelic Monographs and Essays, Vol. 5, 1992.93111.Boynton Beach, FL, Tom Lyttle, Editor.Also in JNLRMI 2002 at emergentmind.org Miller, R. A., Webb. B., “Embryonic Holography,” Psychoenergetic Systems, Stanley Krippner, Ed. Presented at the Omniversal Symposium, California State College at Sonoma, Saturday, September 29, 1973.Reprinted in Lyttle's journal Psychedelic Monographs and Essays, Vol. 6, 1993. 137-156.Also in JNLRMI 2003 at emergentmind.org Miller, R.A. (1974), "Bioluminescence, Kirlian Photography and Medical Diagnostics"; Mankind Research Unlimited, a formerly unpublished, proprietary paper. Miller, R. A., Iona Miller, and Burt Webb (2002).Quantum Bioholography: A Review of the Field from 1973-2002. JNLRMI, Oct. 2002. Miller, Iona (1993a), Chaosophy ’93, Asklepia Press, Wilderville, Oregon. Miller, Iona (1993), “The Holographic Paradigm and the Consciousness Restructuring Process,” Chaosophy ‘93, O.A.K., Grants Pass. Miller, Iona (2011), Quantum Bioholography, DNA Decipher Journal, Vol. 1, Issue 2 Miller, Iona, Holographic Paradigm, http://holographicarchetypes.weebly.com/holographic-paradigm.html ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 316 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 295-316 Miller, I., The Whole Sum Infinity: Merging Spirituality and Integrative Biophysics Miller, Iona, Emergent Healing Paradigm, http://ionamillersubjects.weebly.com/emergent-healing.html Patel, A. (2000), Quantum Algorithms and the Genetic Code, Proceedings of the Winter Institute of Quantum Theory and Quantum Optics, 1-13 January, S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, Calcutta, India. Poponin, Vladimir, “The DNA Phantom Effect: Direct Measurement of A New Field in the Vacuum Substructure.” Presman (1970), Electromagnetic Fields and Life. New York: Plenum. Pribram, Karl (1971), Languages of the Brain, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs: New Jersey. Pribram, Karl (1991), Brain and Perception: Holonomy and Structure in Figural Processing, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers, Hilldale: New Jersey. Pullman and Pullman (1963), Quantum Biochemistry, New York: Interscience, 1963. Swanson, Claude (2003).The Synchronized Universe. Poseidia Press: Tucson, Arizona. Swanson,, Claude (2009), Life Force, the Scientific Basis: Volume 2 of the Synchronized Universe, Poseidia Press, Inc.; 2nd edition (2009) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

965 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I Article A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I Iona Miller* ABSTRACT We can hark back for more than nostaligia to the classic chronicles of the psychedelic revolution. In 1974, creativity expert John C. Gowan published “Development of the Psychedelic Individual: A Psychological Analysis of the Psychedelic State and Its attendant Psychic Powers.” Gowan extracts the philosophical gold from such X-Events or "extreme events". This article is not about drug-induced psychedelia, but about the natural psychedelic state of consciousness, as accessed through the process of self-actualization. Gowan's orientation is summarized, including his concepts of escalation and developmental dysplasia, and the creation of the Northridge Developmental Scale, a test for self-actualization. Gowan's work and taxonomies remain useful to the transdisciplinary community, including the fields of parapsychology, paranthropology, consciousness studies, psychotherapeutics, neurobiology, psychology of religion, neurotheology, child development, and more. In developing creative talent, imagery is more fluid and malleable to processing than language. He collates research from several then-new fields and provides valuable bibliographies of foundational works. While not widely known and applied, Gowan's work remains a vital resource, deserving curation within the literature of all sciences researching psi, nonordinary, and exceptional experiences (anomalous, transpersonal; neither or both). Gowan's work is invaluable for navigating the universe of meanings. Symbols are the currency of consciousness. They open the way for "ultraculture", wherein we become conscious co-creators of reality. Part I of this article contains: A Prospective Retrospective; Gowan’s Orientation; The Psychedelic Stage in Experiential Therapy; and The Tree of Life: An Ancient Model of Escalation. Key Words: John C. Gowan, psychedelic, developmental dysplasia, states of consciousness, Piaget, Erickson, Maslow, Krippner, self-actualization, immersion, emergence, nature-mystic, personality traits, developmental theory, human potential, Northridge Developmental Scale, symbolism, alchemy, physics, psyche, ascent motifs. "This book is for the Twenty-First Century. It will speak across time to those who come after, as Thoreau's Walden speaks across the Nineteenth Century to us. Happy is he who understands it now for he can set his house in order to welcome the Zeitgeist of that day and era." "Psychedelic experiences are characterized by a sudden, spasmodic, transitory nature, and off-again on-again type of episodes which leave the individual enthralled, but somewhat let down when it is over. Illumination, however, is a steady state where the art of controlling the experience has been * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 966 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I mastered. But like the display of adventitious psychic powers, "natural" psychedelia is not valuable unless followed up by action and development; it represents potentiality, not accomplishment." John C. Gowan, 1974 "There is in all things a pattern that is part of our universe. It has symmetry, elegance, and grace - those qualities you find always in that which the true artist captures. You can find it in the turning of the seasons, in the way sand trails along a ridge, in the branch clusters of the creosote bush or the pattern of its leaves. We try to copy these patterns in our lives and our society, seeking the rhythms, the dances, the forms that comfort. Yet, it is possible to see peril in the finding of ultimate perfection. It is clear that the ultimate pattern contains its own fixity. In such perfection, all things move toward death." Collected Sayings of Muad'Dib by the Princess Irulan, Dune "To live on a day-to-day basis is insufficient for human beings; we need to transcend, transport, escape; we need meaning, understanding, and explanation; we need to see over-all patterns in our lives. We need hope, the sense of a future. And we need freedom (or, at least, the illusion of freedom) to get beyond ourselves, whether with telescopes and microscopes and our everburgeoning technology, or in states of mind that allow us to travel to other worlds, to rise above our immediate surroundings. We may seek, too, a relaxing of inhibitions that makes it easier to bond with each other, or transports that make our consciousness of time and mortality easier to bear. We seek a holiday from our inner and outer restrictions, a more intense sense of the here and now, the beauty and value of the world we live in. Many of us find Wordsworthian “intimations of immortality” in nature, art, creative thinking, or religion; some people can reach transcendent states through meditation or similar trance-inducing techniques, or through prayer and spiritual exercises." Oliver Sacks A Prospective Retrospective Almost 40 years ago, this classic work in interdisciplinary consciousness studies was printed for the Creative Education Foundation for the 20th Annual Creative Problem-Solving Institute, Buffalo, N.Y., June, 1974. It outlines the emergent traits and experiences possible in the course of extraordinary human development, particularly for gifted children and gifted adults. It traces developmental stages of integrative growth in the relationship between the individual ego and the collective preconscious, which underlies creativity and psychedelic or mind-expansion functions. The work is based in the idea that the preconscious is involved in a developmental process which starts with anxiety and ranges to creativity through well-known stations on the continuum of mental health. In the 1980s, therapists were hearing mostly about "dysfunctionality", as the public discovered the recovery movement. It was refreshing to hark back to the idealistic notion of optimizing human growth potential. When public interest centered around the "Inner Child", some therapists were saying "Yes, but what about the Adult?" Today we might ask, "What about becoming more 'fully human' before humanity veers off into transhumanism?" ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 967 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I While Gowan may have had some pretensions to being creative, he made no claims of psychedelic experience. His work suffers only from this objectivity. Most of today's psychedelic literature describes subjective immersive entheogenic experience, or therapeutic research with drug use. Gowan's nonordinary research remains objective, well-cited and less-concerned with the drug experience than extraordinary emergent potential. It provides answers to the question, "How do you do it without drugs?" Gowan expanded the human-cosmic continuum of the developmental process outlined by humanistic psychologists (Erikson, Maslow, Rogers, Piaget). He included mystical / transpersonal states of consciousness and their attendant phenomena, including those occurring naturally, through meditation, and as the result of drug ingestion. Gowan's use of "psychedelic" is not synonymous with "drug related or induced". His overview on practices and technologies for accelerated psychological and spiritual development. includes the work of James, Kubie, Sullivan, Tart, Masters and Houston, De Ropp, and Krippner, among others. He addresses topics including trance, dreams, art, myth, coincidence, telepathy, precognition, psychokinesis, healing, apparitions, reincarnation, out-ofbody experiences, creativity, and extraordinary states of consciousness. Before "self esteem" became a buzz-word for the 90s, he defined a developmental continuum with equally vital dimensions of cognition and affect, rational and emotional development. He emphasized that development stabilized when cognitive and emotional development kept pace with one another, even if they emerge in an asynchronous manner. Perhaps even more importantly, he surveys the positive and negative effects of natural escalation compared with developmental forcing on subsequent emergence of creativity and personality change. Further, he constructed a psychological test measuring the process/goal of self-actualization. In 1972, the Northridge Developmental Scale (http://www.csun.edu/edpsy/Gowan/northp.html) was bootstrapped from the Personal Orientation Inventory (Shostrum, 1966) and other measures of self-concept, emotional morale and psychological well-being. Gowan proposed three modes of cognition: prototaxic, parataxic, and syntaxic, which he amplified under the popular terms of trance, art, and creativity. He embedded markers for such development into his test. They indicate the styles and degree of immersion or cooperation between the ego and the preconscious. The three functional and perceptual modalities range in effects from dissociation, to propitiation, to conscious contact with the irrational and numinous element -- from unconscious instinctual response, to (usually symbolic) self-conscious ego processes, to inner, paranormal "uncanny" aspects. Thus, he defined a full spectrum of human functionality and paranormal states, extrasensory interactions, or nonordinary experiences. But the meaning needs to arise within the event, not the category of the event. A truly metaphysical experience in every sense of the word, introduces the bodymind into a new state. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 968 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I Gowan’s Orientation Gowan's major works, including “The Development of the Creative Individual” (1972), “Development of the Psychedelic Individual” (1974), “Trance, Art, and Creativity” (1975), and “Operations of Increasing Order” (1980) express his continued interest in the spectrum of human consciousness potential and the defining of a relative taxonomy of such states. Though excellent, these works were not widely circulated and they remained somewhat difficult to find, particularly outside of academic circles. Thankfully, his son J. A. Gowan. published them online, so they are available for researchers. Gowan's lifework led him to the notion of a developmental order within states of consciousness. This order (see Chart 1) includes three cycles (latency, identity, creativity) revolving around issues of trust, autonomy, initiative, industry, identity, intimacy, and generativity. Breeches of this order lead to a relative displacement of emotional and mental well-being which can inhibit or prevent integration. Chart 1, Gowan, Psychedelic Individual Gowan used the work of Piaget to define the rational development of the mind, and that of Erikson to chart emotional development. Usually the cognitive level lags a stage or two behind the emotional; but others are emotionally stunted or frozen in their development. Our modern society calls this condition dysfunctionality, inability to consistently function in an ageappropriate manner. It is a dissonance between rational and emotional dynamics resulting in selfdefeating or self-destructive tendencies. Gowan called it dysplasia, developmental arrest which holds back self-actualizing potential. Escalation implies raising the level of action by acceleration or discrete jumps-ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 969 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I quantum leaps in consciousness. Accessing latent energy resources escalates development from one level to the next. Discontinuity is a requisite for change. Gowan defined developmental forcing as trying to escalate or accelerate from a given stage to more than one stage higher through mechanical or artificial means. He likened this forcing to developmental abuse: trying to use characteristic powers or fruits of a given stage for display purposes when the individual is actually engaged in tasks of an earlier stage. Relative dysplasia results from not keeping up with developmental tasks--failure to escalate. But in developmental forcing an individual is exposed to experiences or tasks for which they are developmentally unprepared, and forced to attempt or react to them. Conversely, those who are well-adapted for their age can become stuck at any level of particular success. He notes that most mature adults become emotionally arrested at the level of vocational fulfillment, financial success, and happy marriage. Another stall may occur as the psychedelic nature-mystic experience where nature is enjoyed for its own sake. Success at any stage of development may promote the desire to continue at play rather than integrating the lessons learned into the task of the next stage. Further development is an evolutionary task/opportunity. This notion fit well in the psychological context of its time -- the human potential movement with its accent on growth and linear movement toward perfection or some other process of ever-elusive "salvation." It is consistent with classical Jungian psychology and humanistic psychology, and the general scientific paradigm of its time. Current notions in new generation Jungian thought (archetypal and imaginal psychology), experiential process work, and even process theology, are less focused on the developmental perspective of the coping heroic ego -- becoming -- and more focused on the ground state of Being, the dynamic Void or naked reality. The older view seems to under-emphasize the initiatory capacity of these breakthrough experiences, expressed in our cultural history by 50,000 years of shamanic art and accident. A course-correction here in conceptualization could include what we have subsequently learned over the years about complexity, chaos theory, and the nonlinear dynamical field. The difference is one of ego control compared with "letting go" and trusting the natural process: ego strength or flow/fluidity. The new paradigm--which embraces chaos--is expressed in science and psychology in such notions as complex non-linear dynamics, punctuated equilibrium, emergent creativity, and self-organization. Operations of increasing order automatically lead to entropy, which facilitates the breakdown of old forms including outworn personality traits and states of consciousness. Experiences of the complex interplay of chaos and order are the instrument of all development as well as that of the "psychedelic individual." Self-initiation through the inner guide (happenstance or intent) often leads, in a person with latent shamanic tendencies, to self-induced "shock-treatment," the results of which the person is subsequently forced to confront in daily life. Two commonly employed mechanical means are drug use and marathon meditation, either of which can force dissociation and/or escalation beyond normal social developmental ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 970 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I stages. Even in those with a poor social foundation, this "forcing" may crystallize a spiritual or inner-directed behavior which conditions or balances the individual in the short- or long-run. Thus, a dynamic if chaotic "path" or direction of development is chosen. The more definitive the commitment the clearer the emergent non-linear path and creativity. Gowan did allude perhaps to a dynamic interplay within the transformative process. Within each transition, he identifies certain components of change: succession, discontinuity (discontinuous equilibration), emergence or budding, differentiation or metamorphosis, and integration or creative repatterning. Together they define phases of developmental escalation, or shifting to a higher gear for more efficient use of available energy. The objective of escalation is creativity. Integration in the developmental process includes five aspects: (1) confrontation of differences, (2) integration, (3) a yielding up or giving up of the old for a new reorganization, (4) a process of differentiation and (5) a positive directionality. In summary, Gowan piggybacks on the notions of Erikson and Piaget to create a developmental stage theory, which asserts four ideas: • • • • that the developmental chart has a periodicity of three, and that the last three cognitive stages are creativity, psychedelia, and illumination; that developmental stages are characterized by escalation, and when that does not occur, open to developmental lags or dysplasia; that creativity is a characteristic of the third and sixth developmental stages; that the stabilization and mental health of the preconscious is the key factor in creative output and developmental progress. Gradually, the traumatic impact of the encounter between conscious and unconscious diminishes as the individual develops. The person learns how to handle issues of identity, love or intimacy, and finally death. Encounters with the "not-me" symbolize and express death of the ego, and prepare one for physical death by de-emphasizing sensory input. Rather than becoming traumatically overwhelmed, the personal identity expands to experience full emotional and cognitive acceptance of both freedom and responsibility. Pushing on our boundaries, we run the risk of rupturing our sense of identity. This is why the concept of a free creativity is always associated with the genuine danger of a "treasure hard to attain." Peak experiences of creative possibility can lead to self-fulfillment or selfdestruction. Mystic atonement crowns the quest after lower developmental needs have been satisfied. Gowan, seemingly a humanist, asserts that the proper use of the awesome power of the psychedelic stage is "to protect and preserve those objects of individual man's self-concept ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 971 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I starting with the health and welfare of his body image, and then extending outward to his invironmental self and its possessions, his loved ones, his associations and interests, his concerns and finally his total environment and his creations, thus embracing all of his natural world." The small ego diffuses through cosmic expansion of the hierarchy of needs toward an enlarged sense of Self. According to Gowan, "man's highest purpose is not to experience the world of the senses as a reactive being but to design it...to become part of the noumenon of the universe ... co-creator...co-designer." He quotes Troward on how this can be done: • • • • • • • • The concrete result is manifested and becomes perceptible. There is some emotion, which gives rise to a desire. Judgment determines if we shall externalize this desire, if approved, The will directs the imagination to form the necessary spiritual prototype, The imagination thus centered creates the spiritual nucleus, This prototype acts as a center around which the forces of attraction begin to work, and continue until The concrete result is manifested and becomes perceptible. This creative visualization cycle has become one of the foundation principles of New Age thought. Essentially, this same process is echoed in the transformational realities of experiential psychotherapy. The Psychedelic Stage in Experiential Therapy Self-transcendence has been characterized as peak-experiences, flow, mystical experiences, depersonalization, and psychedelic experiences. From a sociological perspective, selftranscendence includes a set of affective social values, including universalism, compassion, and benevolence, emphasizing the wellbeing of others. Though it is arguable that there is no classical shamanism without mind-altering plants, therapy provides a perhaps more accessible form of "drug-free shamanism" as a socially-sanctioned alternative. This sanction and external guidance do little to muffle the profound effect on participants in experiential journeys into the depths and heights of their souls. The dangers are still real, for our fears and taboos are rooted in our personal belief systems, within our deep existential core. The navigational help of an experienced guide mitigates the fears and defenses which prevent us from plunging into these depths on our own. A primary value of consciousness journeys or soul journeys is the recapitulation and symbolic reiteration in an almost fractal-like manner of our entire evolutionary and developmental history. Multisensory imagery is the language of discovery. Deep imagery approaches to therapy may provide a means for greater theoretical integration within integrative healthcare. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 972 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I Symbolic Modeling We can produce organically-arising metaphors from within that function as healing devices. We give meaning to the most important and complex aspects of our lives through metaphor. Metaphors work within a person's own symbolic representation of their problem or issue. It mediates the interface between the conscious and unconscious mind. As George Lakoff and Mark Johnson conclude, in Metaphors We Live By: "Metaphors are not mere poetical or rhetorical embellishments ... [they] affect the ways in which we perceive, think and act. Reality itself is defined by metaphor." Thus any journey can reorganize symbolic perceptions, incorporate and modify imagery from all the developmental stages, depending on a wide variety of states of identification and dissociation. Through this means interior processes are deepened, and psychedelic consciousness naturally emerges with its attendant features. As the process unfolds, symptoms are healed in the metaphorical mindscape when new information becomes available to the client, enabling them to unstick stuck states, make new choices and change behaviors. Such methods are emergent, systemic, and iterative ways of facilitating the therapeutic process. It is often felt during the resolution or healing phase of the session as profound serenity and a sense of enlargement and communion. As healing continues (the physical form of creativity), the emergent psychedelia of the sessions becomes more generalized throughout daily life. Each developmental advance involves the increased cognitive confluence with an understanding of this deepening interior process. By closing the gap between unconscious emotions and "acting out" with rational understanding of the roots of attitudinal and behavioral patterns, therapy facilitates healing of dysplasia and existential, mental, and emotional faculties. Cognitive dissonance is healed when our selfconcept stands up to consensus reality checks and our thinking and feeling are in harmony; our existential reality matches our perception. Head and heart cooperate, rather than tearing us in two. As most therapists will testify, we usually know what is "right" to do, but we tend to do what we feel like doing, even when it is self-defeating. Phenomenology When we consciously will our attention inward in a safe, therapeutic setting, experiences emerge through process work which are virtually identical to natural psychedelic experiences. Their common elements can be summarized in seven points, as defined by Gowan: 1) The attention of the subject is gripped, and his perception narrowed or focused on a single event or sensation; 2) which appears to be an experience of surpassing beauty or worth; 3) in which values or relationships never before realized are instantaneously or very suddenly ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 973 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I emphasized; 4) resulting in the sudden emergence of great joy and an orgiastic experience of ecstasy; 5) in which individual barriers separating the self from others or nature are broken down; 6) resulting in a release of love, confidence, or power; and 7) some kind of change in the subsequent personality, behavior or artistic product after the rapture is over. There are phenomena common to the psychedelic experience, mystical states, and process work. They are typically the same, because the process/goal is the same no matter what means we use to facilitate expansion of consciousness. As the ego goes through its symbolic death throes images of dismemberment and dissolution prevail. The corresponding physical unstressing manifests as completely involuntary, unintended, spontaneous muscular-skeletal movements and proprioceptive sensations: momentary or repeated twitches, spasms, tingling, tics, jerking, swaying, pains, shaking, aches, internal pressures, headaches, weeping, laughter, etc. Visceral experiences range from extreme pleasure to acute distress. They may include bristling of the hair, perspiration, and burning sensations. Developmental forcing is felt as a shock, psychic jolt, or jerk. On the other hand, mystic ecstasy brings feelings of serene delight, sensations of the remoteness of physical surroundings, and transpersonal ecstatic exaltation beyond words. Cosmic expansion brings psychic phenomena in its wake. Yogis caution that these siddhis are epiphenomena--powers which are actually obstacles to further enlightenment. Beneficial contact comes through interpenetration of the preconscious and conscious mind. Mead (1993) reports that meditation has a definite down side for some individuals. Rather than promoting relaxation, it leads to stress, anxiety, depression, and even panic attack. "Relaxation induced panic" manifests as muscular tension, racing heart, head pain, and perspiration. Schizophrenic breakdown has been triggered by meditation, as well as psychogenic illness, and suicidal tendencies. Typical side effects include sore throats, muscular cramps, tingling or stinging sensations (localized or general), feelings of heaviness or weightlessness, floating sensations, outbursts of laughter or crying, mood swings, involuntary sighing, sweating, trembling, and shivering. All of these manifestations appear in experiential journeys. When the sensations are validated and deepened they transform, and the journeyer is transformed with them. Experiential therapy, like meditation is not a form of relaxation, but actually an activity of attention and concentration, which raises our innate level of spiritual energy (chi, kundalini, Shekinah, "the Force," etc.) with a body/mind altering effect. Once this force is aroused, it is unpredictable just how it will effect the mental, physical, and emotional states. This is the hero's journey into consciousness transformation, the age-old quest. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 974 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I Gowan Chart 2, Psychedelic Individual The Tree of Life: An Ancient Model of Escalation Gowan himself decried the use of drugs, and likewise considered magic and the occult as developmental forcing and considered both highly dangerous pursuits, so he excluded them from his anecdotal reports of expanded states of consciousness. Because of this attitude, he was unfamiliar with Qabala, yet his descriptions of certain stages of development fit the key elements and essence of the Spheres on the "Path of Return", as this article describes. We have examined some conceptual advances which emerged after Gowan's publication. However, even though he didn't explore this particular mystical path or Way, much of his creative thought in developmental stage theory is echoed in or corresponds with the ancient glyph of transformation of consciousness -- the Tree of Life, as it appears in ancient Qabala and modern metaphysics. Jewish mystics employ this glyph from the Sephir Yetzirah, or The Book of Formation, for meditation. These kabbalistic practices have generalized into the Western mystery tradition as the practice of magic. The Tree of Life is a consciousness map and fountain-head of most occult arts. Theurgic magic, which aspires toward greater and greater union with Self and Divinity, is a system of exaltive meditation and creative visualization which employs ritual to alter states of consciousness at will in harmony with the cycles of Nature. The Tree of Life depicts the interactive elements of the psyche as well as the archetypal forces of the universe. The 10 Spheres or vortices of this circuit represent the dynamic, interactive balance of archetypal energetic forces within the universe and each psyche, and their corresponding qualities. They are analogous to the chakras of yoga in some ways. The 22 paths of "concealed glory" on the Tree (see glyph below) reveal the holistic feedback patterns, the means of transition and interaction between them. They represent transitional states of consciousness. Gowan's styles of cognition -- prototaxic, parataxic, syntaxic, and unitive states -- correspond with planes of consciousness: physical, astral, causal, and unitive. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 975 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I This Tree is a "ladder of consciousness" which each aspirant may climb toward higher mystic states. The physical biochemical basis of experience is symbolized by the bottom two vortices, which (ala Gowan) we shall call Succession and Emergence. There is a vertical symbolic journey from the ordinary sensory consciousness of physical life (succession) toward the emergent psychic capacities encountered in the trance state (emergence). Traditionally, the bottom sphere represents the Element of Earth, while the trance state is linked through symbolism with the Moon, psychism, and surrealistic "astral" perception which is often bizarre or uncanny. "Trance" is achieved in therapy and ritual by interrupting ordinary awareness -- by creating a discontinuity, disruption, temporary chaos. At this prototaxic level, the ego is overwhelmed, and transformations manifest as sensations at the psychophysical and psychosexual level. Selfimage, perceptions, and sense of time may be temporarily lost or distorted. The ego dissolves in unconscious communion with the primal preconscious. Further development leads not only to a change in planes, but a change in the style of cognition to "Art," the parataxic mode, as expressed through gesture, body language, art, myth, ritual, dream, and archetypes. In this plane, the accent is on affect (emotional response). On the glyph of the Tree of Life, the polarities are depicted as horizontally balanced centers of force, yoked opposites of Cognition and Affect (Hod / Netzach). With greater experience and understanding of the inner world, a relationship develops which allows the ego to glimpse and participate with transpersonal forces. Recent advances in neuroscience provide intriguing evidence of the mechanisms underlying incubation effects, particularly those that occur during sleep. This research reveals that people’s experiences while awake can be consolidated into memory and result in enhanced performance the next day without any additional practice or engagement in the task. Moreover, there is mounting evidence that sleep can facilitate the types of memory and learning processes, such as associative memory, that contribute to creative problem solving. In one relevant experiment, researchers demonstrated that problem-solving insight can be dramatically enhanced by a period of sleep following initial work on a problem. (Wikipedia on Incubation) In the traditional correspondences Cognition is linked with Mercury (Differentiation) and balanced by Affect which is associated with Venus (Metamorphosis). They are akin to Will and Imagination, or perhaps the Jungian functions of Thinking and Feeling. One gains not only theoretical knowledge of Self, but also experiential awareness of the imaginal realms--a "virtual reality"-- perceived through the vision of the soul. The dissonance of dysplasia is replaced by a resonating congruence or confluence of both developmental forces. The top-down process meets the bottom-up process at the creative edge. This creates a positive directionality or momentum, an impetus, a facilitation of ecstatic higher states in their emergent or bud form. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 976 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I We can summarize the correspondences of Gowan's components of escalation with the Spheres of the lower portion of the Tree of Life as follows: SUCCESSION = MALKUTH, Sphere 10. It implies the perception of the aspirant that there is a fixed hierarchical order among the developmental processes. There is a continual rise in awareness at each level, and the order of succession is invariant. At this level of awareness (Malkuth), it seems as if the track of development is fixed although there is flexibility in rate and extent of progress. The main degree of freedom lies in the speed at which one chooses to escalate or accelerate along the "path" of development. DISCONTINUITY = YESOD, Sphere 9. It postulates a series of discrete changes in levels of consciousness, much like the locks of a canal. Movement is from pre-rational to rational to transrational. Developmental escalation comes from strategically balancing or equilibrating the forces at each discrete jump, much as a clutch does when we shift gears. Additional energy is freed up for the aspirant through increased efficiency. EMERGENCE = HOD, Sphere 8. It shows the debut of new powers characteristic of access to the Astral Plane. They are the prototype of latter abilities which can be relied upon to function at will. First powers appear in tenuous form, and later they are permanent. Pathworking becomes ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 977 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I more defined. One no longer follows a dim trail, but a clearly marked Way. Each stage is revealing the characteristics of the next phase in bud-form. DIFFERENTIATION = NETZACH, Sphere 7. Refers to the enhanced focusing and clarifying of concept formation accessible at the Hod-Netzach level of experience; emotional intelligence. Lest we become fixated in habits which prevent further development, a metamorphosis occurs in which there is a sudden switch in emphasis from one stage to another. It is much like an adolescent longing for childhood irresponsibility which transforms into facing the future with a mature, methodical preparation. When we have been successful in one phase of life, the temptation is that we will desire to remain on that level. In other words, we get stuck, and need to transform our hang ups to flow with the grain of natural processes. INTEGRATION = TIPHARETH, Sphere 6. We can finally put it all together in an integrated whole. This transrational synthesis creates new degrees of insight, freedom, and creativity. All previous stages are united in a holistic viewpoint, greater than the sum of its parts. According to Gowan, the road to high well-being and creativity has five milestones: "1). confrontation of differences, 2). integration, 3). a yielding up or giving up of the old for a new reorganization, 4). a process of differentiation and 5). a positive directionality." Whole Brain Creativity can be linked to Wallis's Iterative Model (Hermann) http://members.optusnet.com.au/charles57/Creative/Brain/wallis.htm PSYCHEDELIA = DAATH, The Invisible Sphere. Here we find direct experiential contact with the numinous or divine element, multi-sensory "visionary" state, perceptual synesthesia; complementary images of fullness and void; temporary but profound communion with Nature, God, and Mankind; oceanic and peak experiences. ILLUMINATION = KETHER, Sphere 1. The Unitive state of consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 978 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I Rising through the planes on the Tree of Life, "climbing" the tree, is a meditational exercise in consciousness-raising. Emergence is an operative principle throughout the vertical "climb" up the Tree of Life. Emergent abilities are first glimpsed, and later stabilized. This aspiration is an instinctual urge to experience higher states of consciousness, and the magical analog of natural escalation and development forcing. We should note that aspirants to this path were always cautioned to have their earthly lives in order before attempting to scale the heights. Just as Jung recommended the path of individuation only for those approaching midlife, masters of the Qabala preferred well-grounded mature students, rarely accepting those under age 30 for advanced training. Further, Rabbi Kaplan (1990) notes, "a person would not attempt to climb a dangerous mountain without the proper training and equipment. Any novice who would attempt a climb without an experienced guide would be courting disaster. Climbing spiritual heights can be equally dangerous. One needs the proper training and mental equipment, as well as an experienced spiritual guide." When climbing the "mystic mountain," balancing the Cognitive and Affective energy centers opens a Middle Way, a transitional mode of consciousness referred to as Art or Temperance. This path leads directly to the central sphere of "Creativity," which radiates integration and magnetically draws us toward individualized consciousness, self-actualization or fulfillment of our unique potential. Such genius has traditionally been called "divine". The emergence of this state as a creative impulse is glimpsed in the parataxic mode, but its fruition comes through the stabilization of syntaxic awareness -- the qabalistic form of Selfrealization, which brings a new sense of equilibrium and transmutation. According to Fortune (1935/1984), "consciousness ceases to work in symbolic subconscious representations but apprehends by means of emotional reactions." Mysticism itself is one of the greatest arts, melding aspiration and artistic expression. This well-spring of creativity is the source of Intuition which balances instinct and proprioceptive sensation. In THE TREE OF LIFE, Regardie (1969) states in no uncertain terms that "Genius in itself is caused by or proceeds concomitantly with a spiritual experience of the highest intuitional order." He considered self-discovery and spiritual attainment an evolutionary mandate. Aspiration leads up the Middle Way into the state of Psychedelia or mystic rapture, which includes the possibility of mystic rupture of the protective covering of the ego if forced too far, too soon (Daath, the psychedelic sphere of Knowledge). Again, Rabbi Kaplan notes that, "The further one climbs, however, the more rarefied the atmosphere, and the greater the spiritual danger. By a simple permutation, the word Kether (Crown) becomes Karet, the Hebrew word for excision, where a person is completely cut off spiritually." The dangers alluded to include mental, emotional, moral, and spiritual chaos. In Jewish or occult meditation, when a qabalist enters the mysteries, he or she must parallel the sequence of ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 979 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 965-979 Miller, I., A Retrospective Commentary on the Consciousness Mapping of John C. Gowan Part I creation. We first enter the Universe of Chaos with its confusion of transient images; even the Spheres are perceived as disconnected images. But by meditating on and experiencing the traditional paths, relationships become apparent and a sense of integration develops as we realize we are that gestalt of the Tree of Life. This "creation pattern" echoes what we find in experiential therapy sessions where notions of the old self break down in chaos prior to connection with holistic repatterning that heals and reveals an expanded sense of self. The stabilization of the Creative stage ("Beauty," Sphere 6) leads to the ascension of transpersonal values in personality and behavior. So-called normal consciousness can proceed no further, and ego (through this insight) diffuses into an expanded sense of superconsciousness. Though Gowan is vague on this point, the Qabala hints that access to higher mystical states involves the balancing of the qualities of Judgment or Severity (strength, fear, discrimination) with those of Mercy, Love, or Compassion, corresponding respectively with Mars and Jupiter. On a higher octave, it involves the downflowing of grace, a marriage of Understanding (Saturn) and Wisdom (Uranus). This psychedelic state, Daath, is a contact with the macrocosm, the numinous element which results from the twin blessings of Wisdom and Understanding wherein the psychophysical self is "contained", yet expanded and diffused in pure consciousness containing no sensory imagery. It holds the secret of generation and regeneration and the manifestation of all things from No Thing. Psychic energy transcends normal time, space and force constraints. In Qabala, the developmental process culminates in complete absorption in the Unitive state of Kether, the uppermost vortex -- Illumination. Gowan, Psychedelic Individual [References at end of Part II] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 347 Exploration Robotics & System 4 Robert Campbell * ABSTRACT With some simplifying assumptions System 4 can be applied to program a robot to walk in such a way that it can simulate anticipated modifications to reactionary behavioral responses to direct sensory input. In this way alternating regenerative and expressive modes can allow a hexapod robot to navigate a smooth course through obstacles identified in its path. A degree of learning is possible that can improve the robots performance with experience. This learning process implies a degree of intelligent, spanning and integrating events in space and time. It can find application to artificial intelligence in general. Key Words: System 4, artificial intelligence, robotics, simulated behaviour, cosmic order. The following demonstrates the value of System 4 as it may be applied to robotics and computer generated Artificial Intelligence (AI). Introduction 1. It is not necessary to see deeply into the dynamics of each of the nine Terms of System 4 to apply it to Artificial Intelligence. The System can be understood in more superficial levels of abstraction if the meanings of the System Terms are simply accepted as valid. The overall pattern can more readily be applied to computer programming in directly practical ways. 2. For a robot that can navigate irregular terrain a hexapod robot has obvious advantages for applications such as a Mars rover. Moreover there is a mechanical linkage system that can be used for each pair of legs, so that a single motor can activate each pair to walk. The spine of the hexapod can be articulated to make turns by two additional motors operating spinal joints between each pair of legs thus enabling the robot to avoid obstacles. 3. System 4 allows for simulated strides that alternate with strides that react directly to sensory input. The simulated strides are called Regenerative and involve an anticipated plan over a series of strides. The reactionary strides are called Expressive and respond to immediate sensory input one stride at a time. These Regenerative and Expressive strides must be mutually reconciled in an ongoing fashion. The same principles can be applied to grasping and manipulating articles, such as a baby learning to grasp articles. * Correspondence: Robert Campbell, P.O. Box 182, Karon Post Office, Phuket, 83100, Thailand. Website: http://www.cosmic-mindreach.com E-Mail: bob@cosmic-mindreach.com Note: This article is based on author’s work of 2006. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 348 4. Elements of experience are learned piecemeal and gradually assimilated into more coherent complex actions. Each element of experience can be considered a unit memory. For a baby, grasping with the fingers is one of the first things we learn. We are born much more helpless than other animals and must learn nearly everything through conscious effort even before we have language to assist us. Proprioceptive simulation, as in the regenerative mode, is indispensable to this learning process. The proprioceptive nervous system tells us the body’s position oriented in space and proprioceptive neuromuscular spindles, the tiny sensory organs located throughout the muscles of the body are structured to allow simulation of anticipated actions. Learning is more than just a causal process of successive responses to external stimuli. It also involves anticipation of a future desired result and a process of simulation to achieve it. Language greatly enhances our abilities to simulate experience in abstraction and formulate far reaching plans that nevertheless require continual adjustment. 5. Practical applications of AI in robots can be one of several avenues through which we may become more conscious of how the cosmic order works. At this time in human history, with so much potential conflict looming ahead, we need to expand our horizons beyond vested interests. We need a more universal context within which to constructively express our many diverse concerns. 6. What is called the involutionary variant of the cosmic order leads inexorably to fragmentation and conflicts of interest, to the ultimate benefit of no one and to the detriment of all. Whatever one’s sentiments in this regard there is no need to attach any idealistic override to this offering of ideas freely given. In carefully studying what follows, patient reference to System 4 on the www.cosmicmindreach.com website will facilitate an initial overall grasp of System 4 and how it works. System 4 and Robotics The following simplifies the essence of System 4 as much as possible as it relates to a virtual robot. Keep in mind that language is limited in the degree to which it can describe how the System works, so that meanings must be interpreted contextually. The description that follows relates quite directly to the task of generating AI in a robot. It helps if we have simple mechanical linkages established for legs to begin with. We do not have to explore the evolution of legs as the invertebrates did before evolution settled on a quadruped limb structure for all vertebrates. We can assume a hexapod for walking stability and the simplest linkages to make it easy. Any linkage method may be used of course but others necessitate proprioceptive organs and make the simple act of walking more complex. As explained on the website there is a System 4 hierarchy involving 4 active Centers(C) that implicitly give direction to one another as follows: (C1)Idea -> (C2)Knowledge -> (C3)Routine -> (C4)Form ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 349 (C1) IDEA can be regarded as electronic activity in a computing program in a specific instance. (C2) KNOWLEGE is manifest in the program itself as it relates to the hardware. (C3) ROUTINE is the specific virtual routines that are being animated. (C4) FORM is how the above Routines determine the orientation of the Form of virtual concepts, such as the change in position of a robot with respect to the environment (whether it is a virtual robotic movement or a virtual perceptual idea derived from the environment.) The hierarchy above is specified by the Primary Universal Term (Term 9) but for simplicity we can initially set the Universal Terms aside for the purposes here, and consider only the Six Particular Terms that relate directly to six specific structural elements that occur in every creative activity. These six Terms consist of 6 of the 9 ways that four active Centers can relate to one another with respect to their inside and outside, but we shouldn’t need this for now also. Each Term has a meaning implicit within it and we will take this meaning for granted. The six Terms transform into one another in a specific repeating sequence that we will also take for granted as follows: T1->T4->T2->T8->T5->T7->T1->T4-> etc. (the six step sequence keeps repeating) The meaning implicit within each of the Terms is as follows: 1.-T1 - Perception of need in relation to response capacity. 2.-T4 - Ordered sensory input alternately from the environment & simulated. 3.-T2 - Creation of idea as a potential action response or creative concept. 4.-T8 - Balanced response to sensory stimuli as a motor output (eg to muscles or robot motors) 5.-T5 - Action sequence (eg muscular or motor driven) with proprioceptive feedback 6.-T7 - Sequence encoded as a unit memory for recall to T1 and another sequence. The above Term transformations alternately go through an Expressive and then a Regenerative sequence, so there are 12 transformations, each called a Step. In the human nervous system each Step coincides precisely with a synapse in the way the nervous system is structured to work. So we have a means to follow initial sensory inputs through the sequence synapse by synapse for any process of integrated sensory perception, conceptual thought, or resultant action. In the case of integrating visual sensory images Systems higher than System 4 are involved, since virtual images begin with System 5. We will focus here only on System 4. We should also be able to follow the same sequence in constructing a virtual robot. There are three Particular Sets simultaneously transforming through each pathway through the nervous system, each Set being one Step apart. The regenerative sequence in each case concerns a proprioceptive simulation of an anticipated future act, whereas the expressive sequence is a programmed active response driven causally as a reaction to direct sensory input. Since the three Sets are out of step in the sequence there is always an anticipated future that must be reconciled with a casually driven input from the past. In this way System 4 spans and integrates past and future. The two modes are mutually related and so must be mutually reconciled with one another. This process can integrate history in the broadest sense. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 350 We can list the 12 Steps for each of the 3 Sets as follows so as to easily see which Terms in the Expressive and Regenerative Modes interact in each Step: Step 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Set 1 T8E T5E T7E T1E T4E T2E T8E T5R T7R T1R T4R T2R Set 2 T7R T1R T4R T2R T8E T5E T7E T1E T4E T2E T8E T5R Set 3 T4E T2E T8E T5R T7R T1R T4R T2R T8E T5E T7E T1E New sensory input from the environment comes via T4E in Set 3 in Step 1. Sensory input T4E is always tensionally coupled to memory recall T7R to begin a related simulation sequence that will anticipate an appropriate response. Memory recall must always be coupled to sensory input in order for our thoughts, feelings, and actions to be relevant to ongoing circumstantial input. This must also be reconciled with the previous action sequence T8E (simultaneous motor instructions to muscles or motors) in order for there to be a smooth transition from sequence to sequence. Sequence illustrations in the article Nervous System-Part 1-Spinal Cord provide more detailed information on this, albeit very condensed. It takes a lot of study to understand this fully as it relates to human experience, but most of this can be set aside for a robot. So let us see how this will relate to a virtual robot so far. It has 3 paired sets of legs that move in symmetrically mirrored strides. Let us consider paired movements one Step at a time according to how the linkages of legs are designed. 1. Front and rear pairs: As the leg on one side raises to step forward the leg on the other side pushes down and moves backward to move the robot forward. Since this can be accomplished by mechanical linkage with a single motor for each pair of legs we do not have to compute motions for each joint segment in each leg. But we do need to set the distance that each step involves, so that the feet that follow will not trip into the feet ahead. 2. Middle pair: At the same time the middle leg on the opposite side raises to step forward with the leg on the other side pushing down and back. 3. The next step is the mirror image of the first. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 351 4. So the front and back motors would work in identical patterns and the middle motor would work in synch but in a mirrored pattern. This can be easily programmed as a transmitted motor pattern T8E in Step 1 above. It keeps repeating and operating switching to activate motors to move limbs accordingly as in T5E in Step 2. Every other Step has a T8E term and alternate Steps have either a T5E or a T5R term. 5. Let us assume that the robot has a scanning device to identify obstacles ahead that it must avoid in order to walk to a preprogrammed destination that is given by certain coordinates. In Step 1 the scanning device provides sensory input T4E for obstacles a number of estimated strides ahead. For example it may be that the way ahead is clear in Step 1 for seven more strides but probably not for eight more strides. So a memory term T7R is recalled in Step 1 that begins a motor simulation T1R in the CPU in Step 2. Let us say that the scanning device identifies that size of the obstacle to be circumvented, so the T7R will have to recall synchronous motor patterns for all of the motors involved in such a way that they are integrated into a turning maneuver of so many degrees per stride. This turning maneuver is a programmed memory of previous turning maneuvers taken and which may or may not be adequate to avoid the obstacle within eight strides, or it may be too sharp of a turn. 6. Let us assume that the robot has two articulated joints in its spine, one between each pair of legs. There is a motor that regulates the alignment of each spinal joint laterally but not vertically and which keeps the spine longitudinally straight when the robot is walking straight. The robots feet (and/or joint segments) also have a certain amount of flexibility built into them to allow turns up to a maximum amount per stride. So the program recalled to enact a simulation will have taken this into account and not exceed a certain turning radius that could cause feet to drag or conflict, but it could be a lesser turning radius. We don’t want the robot going out of its way unnecessarily. 7. So in Step 2, T1R is doing a motor simulation that will redirect the robot over several strides in the future, while T2E is also generating a turning idea in the CPU from direct external sensory input provided in T4E. But this latter turning idea is simply a reactionary response to the obstacle ahead without benefit of a simulation to see if the turn is sufficient or too much. There may also be a second obstacle further ahead to avoid so the robot has to pick a course through. The reactionary or expressive idea T2E generated by direct sensory input may indicate a turn that is too fast. It can only try to make the turn in one stride according to the perceived angle it needs to turn, and cannot simulate the turn stride by stride over a planned future course. It is also limited by the maximum turn that can be taken in one stride. So in Step 2 the motor simulation T1R may exchange inputs to and from T2E. Both are executed in the CPU. The motor simulation only relates to the adjustments to spinal alignments with possible necessary adjustments to length of stride. The T2E term thus relates to a more simplistic motor pattern that will tend to get the turn over with as quickly as possible but it can be modified by some input from the simulation. 8. The motor simulation T1R is not the actual simulation however. It only indicates a tentative motor pattern that will hopefully be adequate over several strides. The actual ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 352 simulation takes place in T4R in Step 3 where the next few stride positions are simulated in relation to the obstacle with simulated sensory feedback as to projected Step positions in relation to the obstacle. The perspective of the obsatcle changes with the robot's position. A future path is charted that should be adequate but that will require Step by Step adjustments as the path opens around obstacles. 9. This simulated sensory feedback in T4R is tensionally coupled to a new memory term T7E which incorporates motor patterns in the element of stride technique recalled that will be consistent with the simulation. It is a programmed automatic response from the computer memory that will fall within the parameters prescribed by the simulated sensory feedback. At the same time a consistent pattern of motor instructions T8E in Set 3 will be sent to operate switches and regulators for motors to perform a stride in T5R in Step 4. 10. In Step 4 the motor programs have been selected from previous related experience that also falls within current simulated parameters, so Knowledge (C2) directs Idea (C1) in a Regenerative T5R term rather than an Expressive T5E term where C1 and C2 exchange places. So the switch from Expressive to Regenerative modes takes place here. When completed this action pattern becomes stored as a T7R memory in Step 5. In Step 5 a related action pattern memory will be recalled simultaneously. In other words a memory is being stored at the same time that a new but related memory is being recalled. The recalled pattern may differ from the pattern being stored in some aspects since the recalled pattern is coupled to new sensory input T4E in Set 2 that is synchronous with it in Step 5. Memory recall is always tensionally linked to sensory input. 11. T7E in Step 3 transforms into T1E in Step 4. T1E readies the necessary elements of the robot to receive new input from the environment. The scanning device must be readied, pointed and focused to take another “snap shot” of obstacles ahead in T4E in Step 5. 12. At the same time T2R in Step 4 is the new simulated idea as a planned sequence of strides consistent with the simulation in T4R in Step 3 that anticipates avoiding the obstacle. This planned sequence of strides translates into a specific motor pattern T8E in Step 5. In this case T8E is the next stride in the planned sequence of strides. Subsequent planned motor pattern turning strides will require revision with respect to both circumventing the obstacle from a new perspective and getting back on course to the intended destination, because T2R terms alternate with T2E terms and the perspective from which sensory input comes keeps changing. Five Steps is sufficient to illustrate how System 4 can be used to guide the robot. (In Step 5 new sensory input comes via T4E in Set 1.) This has obvious advantages over methods that attempt to preprogram the robot’s path from start to finish. Any number of contingent obstacles that may crop up can be accommodated Step by Step and stride by stride. This process is greatly facilitated by the mechanical linkages of the hexapod that eliminate the need for proprioceptive ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 3| pp. 347-353 Campbell, R., Robotics & System 4 353 organs in order to simulate and compute leg joint segment by joint segment movements in the simple process of walking. When it comes to grasping and carrying things the robot would have to be fitted with arms and hands. Guiding these to specifically grasp identified objects and manipulating or moving them in desired ways could be done in a couple of ways, both of which amount to dependence on proprioceptive feedback. Proprioceptive devices can be fitted to provide sensory feedback to a second scanning device in the “eyes” of the robot, like little transmitters to a scanning receiver. The System 4 Steps would then follow as above for walking, but with more complex simulations and movements involved. In humans Expressive modes and Regenerative modes are mutually influenced and become automated over time (at the spinal level for behavioral patterns), if they are suitable behaviors of practical value. This 12 Step sequence thus forms the basis of the learning cycle spanning past and future. It works synchronously through any number of parallel pathways through the body at once, as in moving both hands synchronously to perform an integrated task. All parallel pathways have the same number of System 4 Steps and the nervous system has evolved this way synapse by synapse in all vertebrate quadrupeds, with the same number of corresponding synapses in each pathway, from reptiles to humans. All of these parallel pathways must be integrated by the unique Universal Sets associated with each species and each human being. It can work in a similar way in a robot. Regenerative simulated action patterns reconciled with Expressive action patterns, and vice versa, can be stored as unit memories of action sequences as they happen. In humans we learn to do things piecemeal, little by little, putting the pieces together into integrated sequences that span space and time. It can work the same way in robot within the more limited context of an electronic memory. This represents a basic level of learning for the robot, including some limited degree of creative expression. When it comes to using the hands and fingers for doing tasks, then a second level of simulation along the lines of how the cerebellum and cerebral hemispheres work would be valuable if not indispensable, involving interacting CPUs in a robot. It would still follow along the same lines of System 4 Step by Step. We do not need to physically act to think of course, so all of the above can relate equally well to generating conceptual Forms rather than behavioral Forms in a human being. At the conscious level this happens in the cerebral hemispheres with emotional input from the ancient limbic system. Memory recall is in fact most fundamentally dependent upon the reptilian part of the cerebral hemispheres. (We remain biologically anchored to our biospheric roots and we can draw upon ancient emotional patterns of behavior that require appropriate tailoring to suit the needs of social circumstance. We must restrain and modify our most primal appetites in socially acceptable ways.) It should be possible to include and program some such analogous second order CPU operating in a robot, albeit limited in its creative abilities by the limitations implicit in electronic memories. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

354 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Article Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Iona Miller* ABSTRACT Like pandisciplinarian research, natural philosophy explores the cosmos by any means necessary to understand the universe. A strategic model retains usefulness for comprehending our own nature in the environment, beyond yet integrated with the models of science. Transgressing the fortified boundary between natural science and the humanities, the hidden language of the archetypes of nature helps us translate the dynamics of our Being and Becoming. A multidisciplinary approach can present and explore a variety of theories without advocating them, ideally leading toward best practice. Complexity demonstrates a science of surprise that supersedes the boundaries of nature and culture, transcendental theorizing or unreflexive presumption. How can we understand the various cooperative effects of systems, whether they belong to physics, physiology, psychology, biology, etc.? In contrast to the analytic reductionism of classical science, systems philosophy integrates theory and philosophy to foster reorganization of thinking and knowing perceived reality. Rather than explaining what things are, we explore and describe how things work. Meta-narratives bind society and cultures together, integrating events and actions into meaningful patterns. The world of experience remains one of perceived reality and worldview. Key Words: natural philosophy, undulant, quiescence, archetypes, multidisciplinary, reductionism, system philosophy, reality, worldview. Introduction Philosophy, Integrated Science (Biology, Chemistry, and Physics), and Depth Psychology are ways of realization involving a transformation in our deep experience of the world. We are liberated from attributing reality to the plurality of objects in the universe of experience. Traditionally, we tend to answer big questions through stories as much as theories. Today we read sacred texts for archetypal insight and we can view our theories in the same way as the construction of powerful symbols and shared meanings, worthy of serious philosophical and empirical reflection on shared reality. Chalmers points out that, “the epistemological gap between physical processes and consciousness goes along with an epistemic gap between physical processes and the self.” Consciousness Studies is not a single, integrated body of knowledge, so it demands that we transcend individual professional knowledge bases. Topical areas include neuroscience, philosophy, psychology, biology, biophysics. In the new model consciousness becomes as * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 355 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence fundamental to the cosmos as space, time, energy and matter -- in some respects even more fundamental. In a nutshell, physics is not beyond you. Natural philosophy returns in the “new” concept of mind, life and matter emerging from the nature of the quantum vacuum, the energy sea that underlies all of spacetime. Space is no longer secondary to matter. Absolute space of the vacuum is the primary reality. The things we know as matter (mass, with properties of inertia and gravitation) appear as the consequence of interactions in the depth of this universal field. Our “essential nature” must be here, now. An In the emerging concept there is no "absolute matter," only an absolute matter-generating energy field. The Luminous Gospels encourage us in this direction. "From this moment onward, I go forward into the Aion, and there, where time rests in stillness in the eternity of time, I will repose in silence." The key point is that Aion is not an afterlife, another form of temporality that begins after we die, but end (or "fullness") of time itself as a structuring dimension of reality. Eternity Within Theories of the origins and nature of life are foundational to our self-understanding. They have been there since the beginning. The mystery of the nature of reality remains an unsolved paradoxical puzzle, or enigma, despite interdisciplinary progress on several fronts. No single scientific or spiritual view is complete. No consensus model for either life or physics has emerged (Andrulis). Our search continues to find oneness, congruent with our awareness, embodied in our phenomenological reality. Yet Deleuze & Guattari argued that attempting to jam everything into one overarching model of classification erases difference (and distance) and fixes them into a static, universal schema, proceeding from a singular point of origin. Quantum theory may be true but its interpretations remain baffling. Hard science continues to deny the notion that experience is data yet still has not described the fundamental nature of matter, but merely measured and attempted to interpret it. Meaning needs context. There is both a philosophy of physics and a philosophy of psychology, which must be taken into account. The self, space and time are metaphysical manifestations. There is also the philosophy of cognitive science, which deals with the traditional issues of cognition and transcendence. Phenomenology and philosophy provide constitutive explanations that describe the structural conditions of possibility of phenomena. Scientific models provide enabling accounts of the theoretical mechanisms required to generate and explain these phenomena. Although science does not directly provide constitutive explanation of transcendental foundations it can provide ground for revising philosophical theories about them. Both phenomenology and transcendental philosophy answer to naturalistic epistemological constraints. (Wheeler) Anscombe contends, "We have a kind of spontaneous knowledge – knowledge that does not rest on observation or inference – not only of our own mental states, but of what we are doing, what ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 356 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence is actually happening out there in the world. Another is that intentional action and its explanation by reasons resist assimilation to explanation by efficient causes or natural laws, the only kinds that are countenanced by natural science. There is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in the reductive naturalist’s philosophy." Kieran Setiya (Reasons Without Rationalism) feels, "If psychology needs to be reduced, it can be; if it can’t be, I am much more confident that it is real than that it needs to be reduced." Can we fathom the nature and depth of consciousness by direct experience? Noetics refers to the cognitive faculty that apprehends non-sensuous phenomena. Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell experienced the phenomenon dubbed the “Overview Effect” in February, 1971. He describes being completely engulfed by a profound sense of universal connectedness, overwhelming feelings of bliss, timelessness, and connectedness. He became instantly and profoundly aware that each of his constituent atoms was connected to the fragile planet he saw in the window and to every other atom in the Universe. He described experiencing an intense awareness that Earth, with its humans, other animal species, and systems were all one synergistic whole. He says the feeling rushed over him as a sense of interconnected euphoria. Other astronauts report the same “cosmic connection”, or acute awareness of all matter as synergistically connected. Rusty Schweikart experienced it (March 6, 1969) during a spacewalk outside his Apollo 9 vehicle: “When you go around the Earth in an hour and a half, you begin to recognize that your identity is with that whole thing. That makes a change…it comes through to you so powerfully that you’re the sensing element for Man.” Schweikart also describes intuitively sensing that everything is profoundly connected. These and other reports intrigued scientists who study the brain. Shaky Ground Such unitive experiences are reported from deep meditation also. The experienced phenomenon of meditative quiescence include the “ground of becoming,” characterized as a relative vacuum state of consciousness, voided of all manner of mental activity. Perceptual systems able to symbolize themselves -- self-referential minds -- can’t be explained just by understanding the parts that compose them. Viewed as a symbol, consciousness is very much like many of the other grand ideas of science. Often we do not know what we are talking about, parroting old interpretations and memes. An atom is not so much a thing as an idea, a symbol for matter’s ultimate constituents. But even our ideas of the nature of an atom may be faulty, according to physicist Alan Forrester, who argues that atoms are not mostly empty vacuum space. "That is a misconception based on a false view of what atoms are like. People imagine that atoms are like mini solar systems: the protons are like the sun and the electrons are like planets. This is completely false, as illustrated by the fact that atoms cannot penetrate one another. In addition, if an atom resembled a mini solar system, the electron would radiate away all its energy and fall into the nucleus in a fraction of a second, so no atoms would exist." ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 357 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence He continues in FOR Digest, March 16, 2012: "So what's actually going on? Each electron exists in multiple instances that interact with one another and those instances are spread out over a region of space. The shape of the cloud of instances is determined by the other systems acting on it, mainly the nucleus, and its tendency to spread out in space if left on its own. No two electrons can have the same state, that's why atoms can't penetrate one another." Elsewhere, he alleges, "Reality is both digital and analog". I argue that both digital and analog information are important in the foundations of quantum physics. If it is possible for information present in one system to become present in others without being erased in the original system I will say that this information can be copied. I argue that copying is important for understanding issues like causality and that all information that can be copied is digital. I then explain that analog information that cannot be copied can be understood in terms of decision theoretic probability." (arxiv.org/abs/1102.2988) Gödel’s proof emerged from deep insights into the self-referential nature of mathematical statements. He showed how a system referring to itself creates paradoxes that cannot be logically resolved — and so certain questions cannot in principle be answered. At its core, consciousness is self-referential awareness, the self’s sense of its own existence. It is consciousness itself that is trying to explain consciousness. Primordial consciousness may be regarded as an ultimate ground state of consciousness, ascertained non-dually through the cultivation of contemplative insight. The vacuum serves as the nondual source of creation of each person’s experienced-world-and-its-experiencer. Nonduality is philosophical, spiritual, and scientific understanding of intrinsic oneness, awareness, or consciousness. Reality is inherently free of the dualistic opposites, such as mind/matter, subject/object, reality/appearance, self/other, substance/attribute, essentialism/nihilism, past/future, here/there, truth/falsity, good/evil, and other pairs of opposites. Pandisciplinary science is converging on the nondual, which unifies many models at the root of being. Cosmologists seek a first cause for the universe. Physicists look for the ultimate constituent of matter. Neurophysiologists attempt to correlate physiological observables with reported experiences of nonduality. Transpersonal psychologists investigate the effects of these experiences on human mental health. Deep ecologists explore the potential consequences of global health. Even mathematical insight has been likened to sacred communion. Psychologically, nonduality is the all-encompassing numinous archetype of Self, much as Jung described it. "The nature of the Self" is explored from the perspective of modern science, ancient traditions, cosmology, neuroscience, metaphysics, cultural context, philosophy, phenomenology and direct experience. Common wisdom suggests this self-generated symbol of the self operates only on the level of symbols. It has no access to the workings of nerve cells and neurotransmitters, the microscopic electrochemical machinery of neurobiological life. But psychology demonstrates that activated symbols affect our attitudes and when attitudes change so do neurotransmitters and the feelings and behaviors associated with them, including immunological response. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 358 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence The symbols that consciousness contemplates don’t look much like the real thing. Awareness shifts from the activities of mind to the eternal presence of being. Quantum Field theory, complexity and emergence can model microcosmic dynamics emerging at the macroscopic scale in the form of very mysterious and spectacular phenomena. In science, nonduality is an exploration of the nature of awareness, the essence of life from which all arises and subsides. Modern physics describes the world as a self-moving, selfdesigning pattern, an undivided wholeness. Such ultimate vacuum states of consciousness correlate with the relative and absolute vacuum states of space presented in contemporary physics (Wallace). The vacuum potential is a virtual background energy that exists throughout space, even when no matter is present. Lore & Order Nonduality is traditionally associated with meditative states. Recently meditation has been correlated with a positive thickening of the cerebral cortex and increased cortical gyrification, convolutions on the exterior of the brain. "Folding" of the cortex facilitates faster information processing. The brain changes to create narrow furrows and folds called sulci and gyri, which enhance neural processing. Luders (2012) found a direct correlation between the amount of regional insular gyrification and the number of meditation practice years, highlighting the brain's neuroplasticity, or ability to adapt to environmental changes. Presumably, the more folding that occurs, the better the brain is at processing information, making decisions, forming memories, etc. Heightened levels of gyrification predominated across a wide swath of the cortex, including the left precentral gyrus, the left and right anterior dorsal insula, the right fusiform gyrus and the right cuneus. "The insula has been suggested to function as a hub for autonomic, affective and cognitive integration," said Luders. "Meditators are known to be masters in introspection and awareness as well as emotional control and self-regulation, so the findings make sense that the longer someone has meditated, the higher the degree of folding in the insula." Concentration leads to absorption of various depths in which desire, anxiety, pain, and trauma of temporal uncertainty are attenuated. Orderly global harmonic cascades of alpha and theta waves cover the cortex, modulating beta-endorphin. Brain entrainment links the meditator with the Schumann Resonance (quasi-standing electromagnetic waves, resonating at about 7.83 Hz), Earth's universal driving signal of the biosphere (Miller). Brain wave frequencies are not confined to the brain, but cascade via harmonic wave motion into every cell and atom in the body (Oschmann). Energy and information embedded in the zero point field transfer their potential through this primal language of frequencies, including wave genetics (Gariaev). Stuart Hammeroff suggests a fractal nature for human consciousness. The brain constitutes not only networks of neurons, but also hierarchical layers, with self-similar information patterns ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 359 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence represented at various different scales, i.e. fractal-like organization. The brain has fractal-like structure, known as small-world networks, with a very few large, and very many small, hubs. Pribram, Bieberich, Bohm, and others have said for many years that memory and content of consciousness may be fractal, or holographic, and many have described altered states of consciousness as fractal, or scale-free. A study in the journal Science (1990) suggested that genes may contribute as much as 50 percent to individual differences in religiosity. Lars Farde found that the number of receptors for the nerve transmitter serotonin in the brain correlates with "spirituality", (Nov. 2003, American Journal of Psychiatry). The serotonin system helps regulate our perception and the variety of stimuli reaching our awareness. The investigators found that the number of serotonin receptors correlated significantly and inversely with subjects’ scores for self-transcendence -- the higher the score on self-transcendence, the fewer the number of receptors in all brain areas scrutinized, indicating a genetically "weak sensory filter". Neurotheology describes how calming the chatter of the higher functions turns some areas of the brain offline in meditation. The parietal lobes are associated with the orientation of the body in space and processing information about time and space (Persinger). More specifically, the left superior parietal lobe creates the perception of the physical body boundaries. The right superior parietal lobe creates the perception of the physical space outside of the body. Blocked off from neuronal activity, the parietal lobe cannot create a sensation of boundary between the physical body and the outside world, which may explain a meditator's sense of oneness with the Universe. Since the parietal lobes are also unable to perform their usual task of creating linear perception of time, meditators achieve a sensation of infinity and timelessness. In the journal Nature, Dr. Olaf Blanke implicates the angular gyrus, (an area on the surface of the brain involved in perception of our own bodies and metaphorical perception) in out of body experiences. Ramachandran suggests OBEs are metaphors that can be taken literally and so 'feed' the concept of being able to 'escape' the body. The angular gyrus is thought to play a role in the way the brain analyzes sensory information that allow us to perceive our bodies. When it misfires, they suggest, the result can be a sense of floating, and seeing the world from outside of the body. There may be a widely-distributed set of pathways, including oxygen deprivation and pain-reducing endorphin production. Like a switchboard operator, after gathering information from particular senses, the thalamus shoots the signals along specific nerve fibers, connecting the right signal to the right part of the brain’s wrinkly cortex and the cortex signals back. The thalamus receives information directly from the outside world, and information from other parts of the brain. Instead of being a driver, the thalamus may be a consciousness gauge, perhaps modulating overloads of synchrony. Absorption in the Light By witnessing our thoughts through the attenuating process of thought, neural and emotional response, we witness the entire stream of the thinking process. All thoughts pass. Absorption ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 360 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence reaches its culmination when the mind is free even of thoughtlessness, of all seeds of potential thought, beyond meditations on no-thingness and non-perception. With nothing to cognize, pure luminous awareness ceases to be "embodied", and ceases to be mind. The myriad universe drops away, time stands still, and individual consciousness merges in the Self, the Universal Consciousness. The process of meditation and attenuation of habitual feedback loops deliberately cultivates a single thought-wave, which intensified through repeated practice, takes the form of the whole mind. Swallowing all other distracting thought-waves, it itself becomes quelled -- beyond the undulant quiescence of vacuum fluctuation. Innate radiance, crystal clear Light arises. Light is energy, information, transformation and creation. Wallace describes the relative vacuum or ground state of consciousness: "All phenomena appearing to sensory and mental perception are imbued with the clarity of this substrate consciousness. Like the reflections of the planets and stars in a pool of limpid, clear water, so do the appearances of the entire phenomenal world appear within this empty, clear substrate consciousness. Contemplatives who have penetrated to this state of consciousness describe it as “an unfluctuating state, in which one experiences bliss like the warmth of a fire, luminosity like the dawn, and nonconceptuality like an ocean unmoved by waves.” He suggests, "The experiential realization of [absolute space] by primordial consciousness transcends all distinctions of subject and object, mind and matter, indeed, all words and concepts. Such insight does not entail the meeting of a subjective mode of consciousness with an objective space, but rather the nondual realization of the intrinsic unity of absolute space and primordial consciousness." Absolute space and primordial consciousness are coterminous, nonlocal, and atemporal. Pure potential of absolute space is the fundamental nature of the experienced world. Primordial consciousness is the fundamental nature of the mind. This absolute vacuum is fathomed while letting consciousness come to rest in a state of nonduality, open to the entire universe. Devoid of all internal structure, it embodies a unique, absolute symmetry that transcends relative space, time, mind, and matter. The vacuum in itself is shapeless, but it may assume specific shapes. In doing so, it becomes a physical reality, a "real world". Essentially, matter is "frozen" light, manifest light essence. Organisms are formed and regulated by biophotons. In physics, the energy of a photon is taken up by matter (electrons) through the absorption of electromagnetic radiation. The electromagnetic energy is transformed to other forms of energy, for example, to heat. The absorption of light during wave propagation is called attenuation, loss of signal over distance. Usually, the absorption of waves does not depend on their intensity (linear absorption), although in certain conditions (usually, in optics), the medium changes its transparency dependently on the intensity of waves going through, and the saturable absorption (or nonlinear absorption) occurs. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 361 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Fractal Vortex Potential Promising geometric models of fractal vortex potential, founded on the archetypal gyre, vortex, spiral, whorl, rotation, vector equilibrium, or spin have been proposed for the origins of life and the physical universe (Anrulis; Hu & Wu; Maurer, Haramein & Rauscher, Kozyrov, Fuller, etc.). Vortex theory is an appealing notion with a long theoretical pedigree, including Democritus, Copernicus, Descartes, and Maxwell. It is an archetype of the core dynamical process. Vortex crystal is one name in use for the subject of vortex patterns that move without change of shape or size. The vortex is a perennial theme and broadly applicable model, as M.-L. von Franz suggests in Projection and Recollection in Jungian Psychology. "The old way of picturing energy lived on in the alchemistic tradition in the idea of Mercurius as a "hidden fire" or fiery life-breath or a kind of life-spirit inherent in all things...This fire-spirit imagines everything in nature; he is a creation spirit who contains in himself "the image of all creatures." In the alchemical opus he must be liberated from his imprisonment in matter and then he begins to rotate in himself, vortex-fashion; at the same time he reveals himself as an immortal component of the alchemist's psyche. By way of the different stages of the so-called phlogiston theory this archetypal image gradually developed into the energy concept of modern physics. There is therefore no concept fundamental to modern physics that is not in one degree or another a differentiated form of some primordial archetypal idea." Natural philosophy or the philosophy of nature was the study of nature and the physical universe predominant before the development of modern science. It is considered the precursor of natural sciences such as physics, optics and mathematics. Forms of science historically developed out of philosophy or, more specifically, natural philosophy. At older universities, long-established Chairs of Natural Philosophy are now occupied mainly by physics professors. But the aesthetic paradigms of philosophy, psychology and physics still feed into our explanations and understanding of Nature and Reality. All worldviews are based on certain metaphysical assumptions about existence. Myths were the first explanations of the universe, which then became allegories for philosophical or spiritual concepts as we disenchanted nature. Culture deviated from nature. Religion takes mythology literally, whereas psychology sees the interior domain metaphorically or even regressively (romanticism, "back to nature"). First philosophy criticized mythology; now it critiques science. Once our relationship with nature was sacred, but we lost awareness of our primordial symbiotic relatedness to materialism. We conceptually erased interiority. The brain is constantly sensing external vibrational energies which is how we have evolved our five senses over time. Throughout evolution the brain led the body to form organs to amplify these external frequencies (waveforms). Externally viewed, the natural world is analyzed as "its" with externally observable functions. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 362 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Interiority, Perception and Imagination Is it possible that regaining our own interiority correlates with rediscovering infolded dimensions of nature and time? Interiority and exteriority are basic components in philosophy. Reflection is a metaphor for the continuum of the subject-object in the mirror-of-the-mind and the interiority of perception and its illusion of projected exteriority. Interior domains include naturalism's aesthetics, intersubjectivity, and consciousness (Zimmerman). Psychology is the discipline of interiority. Identity includes both psychological interiority and physical expression. An intensification of interest in psychological interiority, particularly the nature of consciousness, and its relation to the body occurred in the nineteenth century. But empiricism, idealism, pure physiology, or pure psychology have provided adequate explanations. Understanding of the dualistic constraints and continuity of inner and psychological life (interiority) and the material world (exteriority) has broad implications for philosophy, the physical and human sciences. The inner self refers to an interiority that is not spatial but a psychological realism -- our impressions, inner feelings, thoughts or states. But it also refers to our physical interiority, the primordial psychophysical ground of our being that we share with cosmos. As Derrida argued, that excluded middle predates all binary terms. A symbolical image from alchemy, the uroboros is exquisitely figurative of psychological interiority -- what we elsewhere call "the zero with a thousand faces". When we try to observe our own consciousness we never find a mere interiority, or just "our self". We never find consciousness but only what we are conscious of. Consciousness precisely consists of its myriad contents or forms; something ubiquitous is there. Consequently, “inner” and “outer” phenomena do not exist side by side but the so-called inner phenomena are nothing but the phenomenal manifestation (the phenomenality) of the outer. Not all objects that manifest themselves in consciousness are “really there”. Many are “only subjective,” and in this sense we can of course distinguish between inner and outer phenomena. This is not a distinction between consciousness and outer object but one within the realm of objects;. "Objectivity" is coordinated by intraphenomenal relations (a coordination of “inner” experiences). In this way there are “inner” and “outer” phenomena. However, consciousness is not an inner phenomenon but the "being-there" -- the arising of phenomena, whether inner or outer. Therefore, phenomenology does not view consciousness as an inner region in contrast to an external world. They are not distinct realms of being but two inseparable aspects of one and the same. The phenomenological distinction between immanence and transcendence actually means the difference between ... that which appears and its coming to appearance, or between what is present and its being-present (its presence). With regard to this immanence the subject in the sense of an innerworldly thing (the only sense contemporary philosophy of mind knows) is already something transcendent, as a subject ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 363 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence substantialized in this way is no less something apperceptively constituted than any outer object, and thereby owes itself to the taking-place of manifestation as such that hence is prior to itself. Phenomenological immanence is nothing other than the opening-up of exteriority as such, which, in a certain sense, is more “interior” to consciousness in the phenomenological sense than the “psychological” interiority of a substantialized subject. Thus the phenomenologically understood consciousness is no interiority, and for this reason exactly has no exteriority. That is why Husserl claims against Descartes that the true question is not how to infer the external world from my interiority but “whether with regard to the egological sphere an ‘outside’ has any meaning at all.” With this denial of an outside of consciousness, phenomenology can be labeled as an “idealism.” It is a phenomenological idealism that does not deny that there are things outside of the subject (there is no substantial “inside” of transcendental subjectivity at all) yet can be seen as the reflection on the fact that any reality we ever refer to is a reality that appears in one way or another. (Fasching) Fields within Fields Empty space seethes with the creation and destruction of virtual matter. All space contains fluctuating fields and particles, whose energy levels are never sharply defined. We are just beginning to recover the experimental values that describe how vacuum fluctuation perturbs statistical neutrino oscillation which gives rise to the cosmological constant (Goldfane). We exist only because matter outweighs antimatter. Neutrino oscillations are vacuum fluctuations on a cosmic scale. Neutrinos are the lightest known leptons in the Universe and their oscillations are the sole detectable evidence for vacuum fluctuations on the cosmic scale. Vacuum fluctuations have been measured experimentally as the ‘Casimir Effect’. The vacuum fluctuations create a pressure, the force of empty space itself, that pushes the plates together. Neutrinos come in three types, or flavors: electron, muon and tau. Each has an antimatter partner particle (the electron, muon, and tau antineutrinos) with equal mass but opposite charge (Moskowitz). The faster-than-light neutrinos debate remains unsettled, but is beyond the scope of our discussion. In quantum gravity, the spacetime manifold ceases to exist as an objective physical reality. Geometry becomes relational and contextual. Foundational conceptual categories of science, including the nature of existence itself, become problematical and relativized. Space and time themselves are contextual, and meaning is relative to the mode of observation. Sheldrake’s morphogenetic field theory is closely related to the quantum gravitational field. Mathematically, it is a “symmetric second-rate tensor”, permeating all space and interacting with all matter and energy. Defying materialism as measure and reaching beyond metaphoric conceptualization (strings, weaves, membranes), Sheldrake suggests “actual invisible connections” are the substance of the connectedness between patterned and patented memories. A resonance is inherent in the socioISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 364 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence biological nature of the Universe, of our biology, psychology and sociology. Resonance is "dynamic similarity". Sheldrake, therefore, gravitates to Jung’s concept of the collective unconscious, Kuhn’s changeable paradigms of reality in time and history, and Gestalt psychology. He attempts to demonstrate to science that communications produce sustainable, duplicative patterns. Shapes and designs do occur with and/or without any sensory avenues as patterns of information (Malek). In The Science Delusion (2012), Sheldrake extends his critique of scientific dogma, orthodoxy, and assumptions -- the belief that science already understands the nature of reality. Are the fundamental questions answered, leaving only the details to be filled in? The 'scientific worldview' has become a belief system in which all reality is material or physical. But the world is not a machine, made up of dead matter. Nature may or may not be purposeless, but it is selforganizing. Consciousness may conceal mysteries beyond the physical activity of the brain. But Shekdrake's ideas are colored by his own mysticism. Several scientists have explored the possibility of a connection between physics and transcendence (Capra; Zukov; Bohm; Muses; Wolf; McTaggert). Quantum science has revealed the presence of the zero point field, with all its virtual subatomic particles and photons that jump into existence from apparently nowhere to return to oblivion nanoseconds later. Virtual particles may travel faster than light, but macroscopically these fluctuations average out to the speed of light. Therefore, this does not imply the possibility of superluminal information transmission. Virtual photons are common, partly because a photon is its own antiparticle. But there is still is no reasonable explanation as to how and why particles and photons can appear and disappear just like that. In Heisenberg's uncertainty principle we find that the lifetime of a given zero-point photon, viewed as a wave, corresponds to an average distance traveled of only a fraction of its wavelength. Such a “wave fragment” is somewhat different than an ordinary plane wave and it is difficult to know how to interpret this. As we search for "meaning," "pattern," and "cause," in the swirling vortices of quantum field theory and vibrating string theory, we encounter scientists who borrow the language of philosophy, psychology and theology to talk about the physical universe. Myth, religion, and philosophy compete with physics for our belief. There are four classic definitions of existence: Experiential, Empirical, Material and Mathematical. Physicists including Newton, Einstein and Pauli expressed lifelong interest in the nuances of alchemy, looking toward the ancient intuitive science for inspiration. Some ideas have universal reach, while other guiding theories do not. David Deutsch suggests that judging the reach of an explanation does not involve conjecturing a second theory. The reach of an explanation is an inherent property of it. It is determined by the fact that the explanation becomes a bad explanation if its domain of applicability were restricted or extended outside a certain range. Moreover, the better the explanation, the narrower that range is, as discussed in The Beginning of Infinity, (pp26-29). According to Deutsch, we are subject only to the laws of physics, and they impose no upper boundary to what we can eventually ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 365 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence understand, control, and achieve. A good explanation is universal when assuming any smaller domain of applicability would make it a bad explanation. Creative Observer Our "view" is crucial to questions of ontology and epistemology -- the nature of being and how we know what we know. Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with the origins, structure, methods, and validity of knowledge. Epistemological metaphors and analogies are used to discuss the structure and validity of knowledge. Even while informing us, both physics and psychology have fostered alienation from nature. Popper suggested the empirical basis of objective science has nothing 'absolute' about it. Science does not rest upon rock-bottom foundations. Natural science was based strictly on cognition, observation and knowledge, whereas science uses experimental control, isolating and measuring things. But the "pure" science of theoretical physics is still considered philosophy. The philosophy of physics studies the fundamental philosophical questions underlying modern physics, the study of matter and energy and how they interact. The philosophy of physics begins by reflecting on the basic metaphysical and epistemological questions posed by physics: causality, determinism, and the nature of physical law. Centuries ago, the study of causality, the fundamental nature of space, time, matter, and the universe were part of metaphysics. Today the philosophy of physics is essentially a part of the philosophy of science. Physicists use the scientific method to delineate the universals and constants governing physical phenomena, and the philosophy of physics reflects on the results of this empirical research. Quantum mechanics describes two kinds of reality. One of the regular properties of particles is that they have a fixed position in space, while waves can occupy more than one place as they are vibrations not things. When relativity combines these two ideas we get the Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. Physicists treat an unobserved object not as a real thing but as a probability wave, not as an actual happening but only as a bundle of vibratory possibilities. Yet, when an object is observed (measured), it always manifests at one particular place, with one particular spin and velocity, instead of a smeared-out range of physical properties. All other potentials evaporate. With that mysterious quantum jump, "things" became an artifact of reality-nostalgia. QM left the crude materialism of the clockwork universe behind for the potential of a variety of philosophical roots, including Idealist Panpsychism, focusing on such issues as consciousness, quantum mind, free will, and the mindbody link, reflecting the holistic spirit of the age and its relatively sensuous cosmos. Since no measurement can explain what the unmeasured world is like, the world of mind and consciousness remains a conceptual black hole. Nick Herbert suggests, "Mind is not a rare ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 366 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence phenomenon associated with certain complex biological systems but is everywhere, universal in nature, a fundamental quantum effect more akin to superconductors and laser tubes than to computer circuitry." "Quantum animism" implies consciousness is an integral part of the physical world, not an emergent property of special biological or computational systems. "As the cornerstone of holistic physics, I [Herbert] assume that every quantum system has both an "inside" and an "outside", and that consciousness in humans as well as in other sentient beings is identical to the inner experience of some quantum system. A quantum system's outside behavior is described by quantum theory, its inside experience is the subject matter of a new "inner physics" yet to be developed." "This quantum model of mind offers a new perspective on conscious experience, which could lead to a new "quantum psychology" linking our internal experiences in a testable way to the objective external behavior of certain (so far unidentified) brain-resident quantum systems. The problems of human perception, emotion and personality as well as the mysterious extra-physical origin of quantum jumps may well yield to a disciplined marriage of keen introspection and quantum biology. Moving beyond quantum psychology, the realization that behind every visible quantum process lies an invisible psychic extension will result in a new kind of physics." Herbert calls it "quantum tantra", in which human awareness becomes an essential component of every experiment. Persistent Unity of Organization Panpsychism argues that the fundamental level of reality undergirds even completed physics, and is entirely experiential and self-organizing. Therefore, physics can't deal with the ultimate nature of reality. Under this hypothesis we must accept the closest approach we can make in any epoch. A scientific revolution occurs, according to Kuhn, when scientists encounter anomalies unexplainable by the universally accepted paradigm. The paradigm, in Kuhn's view, is not simply the current theory, but the entire worldview in which it exists, and all of the implications which come with it. "Solid ground" foundations have yielded to coherence metaphors, braiding many belief threads together. What matters is not the strength of a particular proposition, but its connections with numerous other propositions, as if the number and interconnection of beliefs justifies them. In physics, metaphors come and go often in relation to our technological perspective. Scientific revolutions and paradigms shift. Thus we've seen eras of the hydraulic, computer, emergence and holographic models Each has been applied to both universe and psyche. Panpsychism points to flaws in quantum theory that suggest it is out of synch with reality even while making successful predictions useful for "work". Not all theories of quantum mind are panpsychic but many are. Such arguments around assumed truths and disharmony among theories are usually ignored by popular physics enthusiasts or New Age proponents. Is quantum spirituality more of a quest for meaning beyond the search for absolutes? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 367 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Can a less true model predict better than a truer one? The Humanities adopts an array of stances, and so does physics. It calls them theories, which explain basic facts yet remain open to interpretation. But a theory can always be made to fit with the available empirical data. Confirmation holism, developed by W.V. Quine, states that empirical data are not sufficient to make a judgment between theories. Panpsychism is the view that all things, living and nonliving possess some mind like quality. Ellis lists six predictions of panpsychism characterizing fundamental physics: 1. The behavior of an elementary entity depends on the detailed configuration of all other entities in its environment. 2. Fundamental physics is information-theoretical in character. 3. Elemental entities can amalgamate to form indecomposable compound entities. 4. Fundamental physics is likely inextricably bound up with consciousness. 5. Fundamental physics will have difficulty describing a coherent ontology. Copenhagen is an epistemology; the mystery of QM is lack of an ontology. 6. In any given environment, elementary entities show an irreducible spontaneity of behavior. According to Kuhn, a paradigm shift occurs when a significant number of observational anomalies in the old paradigm have made the new paradigm more useful. That is, the choice of a new paradigm is based on observations, even though those observations are made against the background of the old paradigm. A new paradigm is chosen because it does a better job of solving scientific problems than the old one. Mental and Fundamental Physicalists argue that mind emerges from synchronous activity of cerebral-cortical-pyramidal cells that give rise to consciousness, emotion and memory. The processing cascade includes cognition (understanding) and decision-making that initiates behaviors and generation of speech content. Emergent mind produces consciousness, emotion, cognition and decision making. Research suggests mind emerges from synchronous activity of cerebral-cortical- pyramidal cells that give rise to consciousness, emotion and memory. We can separate hard-wired brain reflexes and programmed behaviors from volitional actions. Qualities of mind include 1) consciousness / memory 2) emotion generation / associated memories, 3) cognition / understanding, and 4) decision-making. Together, they form our personalities and define our intellects. It can be argued that physicalism, which fails to account for nonlocality, entails panpsychism. Is physical reality being constantly computed or is time an illusion? We don't know what kind of consciousness "goes all the way down." We have to participate in a "participative cosmos" even to research it fully. Although the omnipresence of the mental is a hallmark feature of panpsychism, some versions of the doctrine make mind a relatively rare and exceptional feature of the universe. The ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 368 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence recalcitrance of the mind and consciousness to fit smoothly into the scientific picture suggests we at least consider panpsychism among other possibilities. Arguments for it are made in terms of metaphor, analogy, genetics, and intrinsic nature. Psyche in Nature From the beginning, psychology was concerned with the questions and problems of consciousness. Carl Jung, known for his idea of collective unconscious, wrote that "psyche and matter are contained in one and the same world, and moreover are in continuous contact with one another", and it is probable that "psyche and matter are two different aspects of one and the same thing". Is that the same as "universal consciousness"? Is it panpsychism of the neutral monism type? Such science-philosophers tend to be pandisciplinarian. Jung, a vocal protagonist of universal interconnectedness through his concepts of the collective unconscious and archetypes, predicted this synthesis. In Aion (1951), he prophetically states that "sooner or later nuclear physics and the psychology of the unconscious will draw closer together as both of them, independently of one another and from opposite directions, push forward into transcendental territory, the one with the concept of the atom, the other with that of the archetype" (9: Part II: 412). As an ultimate mental structure, the Self resists ordinary articulation so completely that, according to Jung, it is the primary object of mysticism. An experience of the Self also constitutes one of Reality. The two reflect each other, providing para-psychological knowledge of and influence over Reality. Jung considers the Self as repository of all archetypes -- a metaarchetype. Archetypal psychologist James Hillman suggested a “return of psychological subjectivity to the outer, non-human world, including the world of nature." All psyche, all living soul-qualities, must be withdrawn from nature in order for the modern self, psychology's self, Jung's self, our selves, to subsist. A relationship that was once a sacred one, an animistic interaction through which soul was "in" the natural world as well as "in" the subjective self, could not continue. Animistic projections on nature were withdrawn and the world lost soul - Anima Mundi. The post-Jungians encourage an ensouled approach in which we imaginally reside in her, rather than she in us. Psyche is manifesting itself once more in the outer world. There is no psyche in nature without projection and animation. The process for re-enchanting the world is though a return of sacredness and the recognition of the survival value of animism as a way of nurturing the human soul and protecting the soul of the world. Hillman removed the Jungian concept of the archetype as objective inherited pattern and replaced this with the archetypal image as existent within the natural world. Hillman (1982) says “that cataclysm, that pathologized image of the world destroyed, is awakening again a recognition of the soul in the world. The anima mundi stirs our hearts to respond: we are at last, in extremis, concerned about the world; love for it arising, material things again lovable. For where there is pathology there is psyche, and where psyche, eros. The things ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 369 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence of the world again become precious, desirable, even pitiable, in their millennial suffering from Western humanity's hubristic insult to material things. He emphasizes, for one thing, that "the more we confine interiority to within the individual, the more we lose the sense of soul as a psychic reality . . . within all things." Such approaches come down to choosing what quality of consciousness you experience. Which existential experience you perceive depends on the filters of your options (environment), beliefs and values. Belief systems are like reality wormholes into the past. Part of us can live in the 14th, 17th, or 19th century, depending on eclectic spiritual ideas we have embraced or gotten stuck in. The same individual, such as a religious scientist, can embrace conflicting beliefs from different centuries. Compartmentalization is the only way to deny this cognitive dissonance. Each researcher takes a different approach to the concept of universal consciousness, rather like the different types of pantheism. Some are world-denying, others are world-affirming, suggesting that a shared consciousness forms and changes our phenomenal world. Defenses of panpsychism have redefined the supposed 'hard problem' of how to reconcile the 'qualia' of experience with the physicality of the brain, placing the real debate on which is the underlying causative factor. The gulf between neural tissue and phenomenology remains (Gumble). Panpsychism and emergentism are alternative ways to bridge extreme reductionism and crude holism. Panpsychism has developed in nearly every camp. Panpsychism differs from emergentism. In panpsychism even the smallest physical particles have mental characteristics. Emergentism claims that some systems formed by mindless particles do possess mental attributes. The human brain is a case in point. Nagel explicitly links panpsychism to a necessary failure of emergentism, which cannot rise to the status of a metaphysical relation. Nagel says: “there are no truly emergent properties of complex systems. All properties of complex systems that are not relations between it and something else derive from the properties of its constituents and their effects on each other when so combined.” Thus an emergent epistemological doctrine is about the limits of our understanding of the behavior of complex systems. Nagel's denies of reductionism identifying mental properties with complex physical properties. Mind is associated with matter in general and in its most fundamental forms, which brings us back to the holographic theories. The Holographic paradigm brings new meaning to the term whole, one hinted at by the world's religions, the schools of mysticism, various philosophies and a broad range of sciences. From this holistic perspective, the universe is a living, conscious entity, and every aspect of it is inseparable. This concept can be observed in miniature on earth. The Light of Nature Multidisciplinary studies herald the return of the natural philosopher. Jungian psychology is an exemplar, with its alchemical metaphors and dynamics provides comprehensive models for ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 370 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence uniting psyche and physics, psyche and matter, and demonstrating the indissoluble weld that binds them. It radically revisions the mind/body split, healing that which should never have been torn asunder. In our inquiries when we go beyond a certain depth in psychology or physics, we enter the realm of the ultimate mysteries of life. The mystic veil of the starry firmament parts revealing the underlying matrix of creation, the luminous ground of the virtual vacuum -- the void created by the zero point radiative fluctuation of matter and antimatter, the void that gives birth to all images and form. With limited knowledge of mind and matter, science and humanity keep searching for ultimate truth. Ultimate truth is not matter nor is it material -- it is closer to the quintessence, formerly called Spirit. Archetypes help us understand our complex dynamics. Quantum mechanics reveals stunning secrets of nature, but it is a science of frozen frames, snapshots of measurement. Processoriented science reveals their common essence as the living light of the virtual vacuum, described by natural philosophers throughout the ages. References Anrulis, Erik D., Theory of the origin, evolution and nature of life, Life 2012 , 2 , 1-105; doi:10.3390/life2010001 http://www.scribd.com/doc/79411076/Theory-of-the-Origin-Evolution-AndNature-of-Life Anscombe, http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/what-anscombe-intended-other-puzzles/ Bauman, Lynn C., Ward Bauman & Cynthia Bourgeault, The Luminous Gospels, Praxis (2008) Blamauer, Michael, The Mental as Fundamental: New Perspectives on Panpsychism, The Mental as Fundamental: New Perspectives on Panpsychism, Ontos, 2011, 172pp. http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/28297the-mental-as-fundamental-new-perspectives-on-panpsychism/ Cassaniti, Julia and T.M. Luhrmann, “Encountering the supernatural: A phenomenological account of mind.” Religion and Society Cassaniti, J. 2011: “Hallucinations and sensory overrides.” Annual Review of Anthropology. Vol. 40. https://www.stanford.edu/dept/anthropology/cgi-bin/web/?q=system/files/hallucinationspdfproof.pdf Cassaniti, J. 2005 "The Art of Hearing God: Absorption, Dissociation, and Contemporary American Spirituality." Spiritus, vol. 5: 133-157. Chalmers, David, (2012) The Singularity: A Philosophical Analysis, JCS, Vol.19 No.1-2 (2012) Chomsky, N (1972) Language and Mind, enlarged edition, Harcourt Brace, Orlando, Florida Dawkins, R (1989) The Selfish Gene, OUP, Oxford (new edition; first published 1976) Deleuze, Gilles. Clair Parnet Dialogues II (Columbia University Press, revised edn 2007). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 371 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Donald, M (1991) Origins of the Modern Mind, Harvard University Press, USA Descartes, R (1988) Reply to Objections, V, in The Philosophical Writings Of Descartes in 3 vols, eds. Cottingham, J, Stoothoff, R, Kenny, A, and Murdoch, D, Cambridge University Press (originally published in French in 1641) Ellis, Peter, Panpsychism, the Philosophy of the Sensuous Cosmos, O Books http://books.google.com/books/about/Panpsychism.html?id=bzX6twT3cTAC Fasching, Maxwell, Phenomenology as a Transcendental Theory of Consciousness, http://www.newschool.edu/nssr/husserl/future/part%20two/fasching.html Fortes, M The Structure of Unilinear Descent Groups, American Anthropologist, 55:17:41 Germine, Mark, The Holographic Principle of Mind and the Evolution of Consciousness www.cejournal.org/GRD/Holo.pdf Goldfane, Ervin, Dynamics of Dynamics of Neutrino Oscillations and the Cosmological Constant, vixra.org/pdf/0910.0050v1.pdf Granrose, John Ph.D., The Archetype of the Magician. http://www.voidspace.org.uk/psychology/wizard_archetype.shtml Gray, R M (1996) Archetypal Explorations, Routledge, London. Grof, Archetypes, Mythic Imagination, and Modern Society, http://www.stanislavgrof.com/pdf/ITA_Palm_Springs-archetypes_rev.pdf Gumble, Maureen, Universal Consciousness: An Historical and Scientific Perspective http://www.lightouch.com/conscious.htm Haramein, N. and Raucher, E.A., (2004) The Origin of Spin: A Consideration of Torque and Coriolis Forces in Einstein’s Field Equations and Grand Unification Theory. http://theresonanceproject.org/pdf/torque_paper.pdf Haule, John Ryan, Jung in the 21st Century: Synchronicity and science http://books.google.com/books?id=A3MUJJ0Gcu0C&pg=PA167&lpg=PA167&dq=holographic+archety pe&source=bl&ots=qjU_WehKXb&sig=2N93sc2wO_cBbBFCk7dpO5psgKI&hl=en&ei=a7ynTuGsGay GsALezsi_Dw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAjgU#v=onepage&q& f=false Hawkins, M (1997) Social Darwinism in European and American Thought, 1860 – 1945, CUP, Cambridge, UK Herbert, Nick, Holistic Physics – or – An Introduction to Quantum Tantra, http://www.southerncrossreview.org/16/herbert.essay.htm Hogenson, G B (1998) Response to Pitikainen and Stevens, Journal of Analytical Psychology, 43(3) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 372 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Hu, Huping and Wu, M. Spin-Mediated Consciousness Theory http://quantumbrain.org/SpinMindSlides.pdf Jung, C G (1958). The Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious, Princeton University Press, USA Koch, C (2004). The Quest For Consciousness; A Neurobiological Approach, Roberts and Company, Englewood, Colorado. Kowall, James, What is Reality in a Holographic World? Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2011 | Vol. 2 | Issue 8 | pp. 1192-1282 http://jcer.com/index.php/jcj/article/view/180/190 Kozyrev, Nikolai, Torsion Physics, http://blog.hasslberger.com/2007/05/kozyrev_aether_time_and_torsio.html Luders, Eileen, (2012) Meditation and Gyrification, online edition of the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/03/120314170647.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_mediu m=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News%29 Luhrmann, Tanya Marie - Professor, "Magic", http://freq.uenci.es/2011/10/27/magic/ Lumsden, C J and Wilson, E O (1981) Genes, Mind and Culture: The Coevolutionary Process, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. Malek, George, (2006), Sheldrake’s Morphic Resonance: A Spiritual Paradigm Shift For Healing and Wholeness: Biology Revisited.http://www.sheldrake.org/Articles&Papers/articles/Malek_morphic.html Maurer, Leon, How Unconditioned Consciousness, Infinite Information, Potential Energy, and Time Created Our Universe, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, July 2010, Vol. 1, Issue 5, pp. 610-624 McDowell, M J (2001) The Three Gorillas: An Archetype Orders A Dynamic System, The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 46(4) Miller, Iona and Richard Alan Miller, The Schumann’s Resonances & Human Psychobiology, Nexus Magazine, Volume 10, Number 3 (April-May 2003) http://www.earthpulse.net/entrainment.htm Mitroff, I I and Bennis, W (1989) The Unreality Industry, Carol Publishing Group, New York Moskowitz, Clara. Exotic antimatter caught in disappearing act, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46681972/ns/technology_and_science-science/#.T2kXsoL-vMT Nagel, Thomas, (1979). “Panpsychism”. In Thomas Nagel (ed.), Mortal Questions. Cambridge University Press. Negediev. Pitkanin, Matti. Puthoff, Hal (1987), Ground state of hydrogen as a zero point fluctuation determined state, Physical Review, Vol. 35, No. 10, May 1987. Neumann, E (1956) Amor and Psyche: The Psychic Development of the Feminine, tr Ralph Manheim, Bollingen Foundation, New York (originally published in German in 1954) ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 373 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | March 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 3 | pp. 354-373 Miller, I., Natural Philosophy: Beyond The Undulant Quiescence Neumann, E (1954) The Origins and History of Consciousness, tr R F C Hull, Routledge & Kegan Paul, UK (originally published in German in 1949) Noel, Daniel C., The Necessity of an Ecopsychology of/as "Nature Religion", http://www.chasclifton.com/friends/noel.html Oschmann, James, (2000) Energy Medicine, The Scientific Basis, http://www.ussdiscovery.com/SchumanEntrainment.htm Overview Institute, www.overviewinstitute.org Piaget, J (1973) The Child and Reality; Problems of Genetic Psychology, tr. by A Rosin, Viking Press, USA (originally published in French in 1972) Rail, David, MD, A Model of Language Development Based on Self-Organization of Gestalts and Metaphor, Neurologist, Campbelltown, Sydney, Australia. Ramachandran, V S, and Blakeslee, S (1998) Phantoms in the Brain: Human Nature and the Architecture of the Mind, Fourth Estate Limited, London Ridley, M (2003) Nature Via Nurture, Fourth Estate, London Sokol, Alan D., Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity, 1994, http://www.physics.nyu.edu/sokal/transgress_v2_noafterword.pdf von Franz, M-L (1972) Creation Myths, Spring, Dallas von Franz, M-L (1980) Projection and Recollection, Open Court, La Salle, IL Wallace, B. Alan, “Vacuum States of Consciousness: A Tibetan Buddhist View” http://www.alanwallace.org/Vacuum%20States%20Essay.pdf Wheeler, Mike, Mike Wheeler on Heidegger, Cognition and the Transcendental, http://enemyindustry.net/blog/?p=2837 Zimmerman, Michael, (2006), Interiority Regained: Integral Ecology and Environmental Ethics, http://www.hds.harvard.edu/cswr/resources/eve/zimmerman.html ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

392 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution Article On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution Rui Freire Lucas* Abstract The present paper constitutes an effort to integrate the knowledge of two distinct scientific disciplines: psychology and quantum physics. This intention will be fuelled by the current need of clarification on what concerns quantum measurement problem, consciousness and respective relationship. For this matter, we choose to use the concept of consciousness described by Jean Paul Sartre in his work. After a brief review of the main presuppositions of quantum theory and Sartre’s ontology, we will proceed with the establishment of proper correspondences between these models eventually defining an isomorphism between its correspondent systems. Keywords: consciousness, isomorphism. quantum measurement problem, quantum system, Sartre, I. INTRODUCTION Quantum theory is the most accurate scientific theory of today with none of its predictions having ever been wrong. It assumes a major role in a large spectrum of researches, ranging from cosmology to biophysics, replacing “classic” physics as the regulatory mechanics of our world. However, despite its explicative supremacy, quantum theory hasn’t been able to superimpose on our classical worldview which remains dominated by Newtonian premises. Even in the scientific field only with great effort can we escape its influence. The main reason for this incongruence is the quantum theory’s incapacity to provide an explicative model of the world that doesn’t collide with our everyday experience. If we must accept quantum mechanics we must necessarily reevaluate some of our most obvious intuitions such as: a single object cannot occupy two distinct locations at the same time; the world has a real existence independently of its observation; time has an exclusively anterograde progression; two objects, with no physical connections between them, cannot instantaneously affect themselves, etc. Recognized the practical applicability of quantum theory, the efforts of the physicists’ community were therefore deviated to a blind profiteering of its predictions for all practical purposes, leaving the meaning of quantum theory as a taboo issue over most of the last century. From Jauch we read that, * Correspondence: Rui Freire Lucas. ruifreirelucas@gmail.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 393 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution “The interpretation [of quantum mechanics] has remained a source of conflict from its inception. . . . For many thoughtful physicists, it has remained a kind of “skeleton in the closet.” 1 Despite the orthodox Copenhagen’s interpretation, assuming that science should not give explanations of the world but instead be used as a tool of measuring and predicting, there were still some unresigned physicists which persisted in the study of this enigma. Soon, these investigators established an inextricable link between quantum mechanics and consciousness eventually leading to an increasing interest in epistemological and psychological issues. Wigner commented on this matter stating that, “When the province of physical theory was extended to encompass microscopic phenomena through the creation of quantum mechanics, the concept of consciousness came to the fore again: It was not possible to formulate the laws of quantum mechanics in a fully consistent way without reference to the consciousness.”2 At the same time, challenging current deterministic and rationalist conceptions, also Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) founds a new theory. Unsatisfied with the dominant psychological theories, he reviews the psychology’s foundations, as well as the basilar aspects of occidental rationality, eventually elaborating a new ontology able to provide a solid ground for a new psychology. In his project he clashes with some dominant conceptions, namely the notion of consciousness. Previously to Sartre, the study of consciousness remained throughout centuries a theme of strong debates and controversies varying between philosophical and psychological streams. For this reason, a unanimous and consensual notion of consciousness was never achieved. In his work, Sartre proposes a reformulation of psychology (re)introducing a valid concept of consciousness while discussing some dilemmas and misconceptions which compromise its development: “For most philosophers the ego is an "inhabitant" of consciousness. Some affirm its formal presence at the heart of Erlebnisse, as an empty principle of unification. Others—psychologists for the most part—claim to discover its material presence, as the center of desires and acts, in each moment of our psychic life. We should like to show here that the ego is neither formally nor materially in consciousness: it is outside, in the world. It is a being of the world, like the ego of another.”3 Quantum enigma and consciousness have been considered the two major mysteries of contemporaneous science. As David Chalmers says: “when there are two mysteries, it is tempting to suppose that they have a common source”4. Is consciousness a quantum phenomenon? This approach has been strongly debated by the scientific community in the last three decades. Nevertheless, this question remains an empirical one, lacking a precise formulation and philosophical support on what concerns the notions of “consciousness” and “quantum phenomenon”. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 394 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution With this paper we attempt to contribute for the development of a response for these mysteries. After a brief review of the presuppositions of quantum theory and Sartre’s ontology, we should adopt Sartre’s notion of consciousness and establish a set of correspondences between quantum and conscious mechanisms eventually defining an isomorphism between correspondent systems. II. QUANTUM MECHANICS A. Superposition Principle, Wavefunction Collapse and the Quantum Measurement Problem “[The two-slit experiment] contains the only mystery. We cannot make the mystery go away by “explaining” how it works . . . In telling you how it works we will have told you about the basic peculiarities of all quantum mechanics.”5 Feynman One of the basilar aspects of quantum physics is the superposition principle, mathematically determined in the linearity of the Hilbert state space. If |1> and |2> are two states, then this property tells us that any linear combination α|1> +β|2> also correspond to a possible state. This superposition of states is fundamentally different from a classic grouping of states where the system is already in an a priori defined state although unknown to us. Contrary to this classical probability of discovering the actual state, in quantum mechanics probability is all there is. This can be shown experimentally, especially on a microscopic level, through the direct observation of interference patterns using, for example, an experimental setup where electrons pass individually (one at a time) through a double slit. Accordingly, the electron must not be described by none of the wavefunctions which illustrate the individual crossing through a particular slit but only by the superposition of these wavefunctions. How can we integrate the superposition principle in our everyday experience of the world? What happens in the borderland between quantum and classical world? We know that wavefunctions evolve deterministically, according to the Schrödinger equation, in a linear superposition of different states; however a real measurement always finds the physical system in a definite state which will constitute the starting point for further evolution. This means that the measurement has “done something” to the previous superposed system, arbitrarily collapsing wavefunctions and interleaving indeterminism in the process. These questions constitute the basis of the unresolved problem of quantum measurement, which is nothing more than the problem of how (or if) the wavefunction’s collapse occurs. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 395 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution B. Quantum Entanglement "It's getting even spookier out there. Particles can be strangely connected … the measurement of one particle will instantaneously determine the state of the other."6 Einstein Another fundamental aspect inherent to quantum mechanics, designated by Einstein as “a spooky action at distance”6, is “entanglement”. It constitutes one of the main qualities of quantum theory, specifically non-locality – the technical designation for an instantaneous action at distance, free of interconnecting physical forces. According to this principle, any objects that have ever interacted will forever remain entangled and therefore what happens to one of them will necessarily affect the other(s) in an instantaneous way. This interaction between one system’s entities will thus define their transition from being in a superposed state to an entangled state. C. (Un)Observed (Un)Reality “In the experiments about atomic events we have to do with things and facts, the phenomena that are just as real as any phenomena in daily life. But the atoms or elementary particles themselves are not real; they form a world of potentialities or possibilities rather than one of things or facts.”7 Heisenberg In 1927, Heisenberg formulates the uncertainty principle, which assumes the impossibility of simultaneously defining position and speed for a particle. More broadly, the complementarity principle of Niels Bohr assumes that the ascertainment of a determinate aspect of a system (of atomic proportions) annihilates any further possibility of knowledge of a complementary aspect of the same system. Altogether, these principles suggest that, in microscopic terms, there isn’t a defined subjacent reality since, as Wheeler puts it, "no elementary phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is a registered phenomenon”8. As we saw above, physical systems exist in a superposed state of potentialities with the reduction of these possibilities to a defined state being dependent on how the observer chooses to know them. It is the “free choice” of the observer that will determine the previous physical situation transforming it into a defined and real state. Macroscopic objects are real because they are always under observation and therefore cannot be isolated. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 396 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution D. Inversion of Temporal Progression “We have a strange inversion of the normal temporal order…an unavoidable effect on what we have a right to say about the already past history of that photon”.9 Wheeler By affirming itself as the regulatory equation of all micro and macroscopic phenomena, Schrödinger’s equation presents us with another implication which collides with our basic intuition of temporal progression. In the story told by Schrödinger we have a cat in a “mixed” state, containing “equal parts of living and dead cat”10, until an observation of it eventually causes its definite state of deadness or aliveness. This reduction of states was already described above, however, what the Schrödinger equation also tells us is that, after the observation, what follows is a construction of a real past compatible with the measured state; this will happen on a retrograde temporal progression. Observing a dead cat determines the history of its development of rigor mortis; finding it alive determines the history of its developing hunger: the observation not only creates reality but also creates a history consistent with that same reality III. SARTREAN’S CONSCIOUSNESS After the exposure of some of the principles and dilemmas of quantum theory, we follow with the description of some key-aspects of the Sartrean ontology. Special attention will be given to the notion of consciousness so that a subsequent clarification of its relationship with quantum mechanics may be facilitated. A. The Problem of Solipsism "The impossibility of distinguishing in our customary way between physical phenomena and their observation places us, indeed, in a position quite similar to that which is so familiar in psychology where we are continually reminded of the difficulty of distinguishing between subject and object.''11 Bohr The problem of human reality and necessarily the problem of the existence of the Other have always been themes of reflection for many philosophers along the history of mankind. This question was typically translated in an effort to refute solipsism. Sartre develops an ontology which seeks precisely a solution to these questions, justifying the importance and necessity of the Other as a fundamental aspect in the existence of the subject and of his consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 397 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution B. (Non-Reflexive) Consciousness Sartre subverts the dominant Cartesian concept of consciousness abandoning the primacy of reflection over consciousness; instead, Sartre justifies the existence of a non-reflexive consciousness which in its turn allows the emergence of reflection. Contemporaneously to Sartre, consciousness was already considered as an escape from itself: from there comes the Heideggerian’s concept of transcendence; also Husserl and Brentano’s intentionality have, in more than one way, the character of detachment from itself. Nevertheless, Sartre innovates by adding: “…every positional consciousness of an object is at the same time a non-positional consciousness of itself.”12 In this citation we find a reference to the Sartrean cogito. Accordingly, there is an assumption of a non-thetic consciousness where the subject is present in his totality to himself. Contrary to what happens in reflexion where the Ego is grasped directly as an object, consciousness doesn’t collect the person directly or as its subject – the person is present to consciousness while being an object to the Other. Therefore, consciousness is not the product of a reflexive ego, as a voluntary choice of an abstract possibility, but instead appears in the very kernel of being, constituting an adequate milieu for the appearance and support of its essence: in Sartre’s words, “to the synthetic order of its possibilities.”12. In this way, and contrary to previous philosophical analyses which endeavoured to drain the consciousness’s contents, the author of “Being and Nothingness” refuses the substantial character of consciousness, affirming it as pure appearance. Assuming a phenomenological tradition, Sartre assumes the existence of two distinct kinds of being: the being of phenomena and the (true) being of consciousness. These modes of being correspond to two distinct and not superimposable ways of being: respectively, the in-itself and the for-itself. While the former is subject to the principle of identity, affirming itself as being what it is, “the being of for-itself is defined, on the contrary, as being what it is not and not being what it is”12. In this way, the for-itself finds a lack between itself and the world of phenomena. Sartre calls this lack “nothingness” affirming the act of being conscious as a nihilating one. Accordingly, every consciousness is positional because it transcends itself in order to reach an object eventually annihilating itself in that position. Thus seen, consciousness, separated from the world of things by nothingness, may be considered as a total emptiness. However, because of its conjoined identity of existing appearance, Sartrean consciousness may also be regarded as a non-substantial absolute: “A pure consciousness is an absolute quite simply because it is consciousness of itself.”3 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 398 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution At this time, we hope to have eliminated the obscuring transcendental ego from pure unreflective consciousness and shown that ipseity, the true fundament of personal existence, is completely different from an ego or from a remission of the ego to itself. Consciousness’ existence does not depend on the Other because the being of consciousness is independent of knowledge and preexists to its ascertainment: “The World has not created the me: the me has not created the World. These are two objects for absolute, impersonal consciousness, and it is by virtue of this consciousness that they are connected. This absolute consciousness, when it is purified of the I, no longer has anything of the subject. It is no longer a collection of representations. It is quite simply a first condition and an absolute source of existence.”3 C. The World of the Other “The Other is no longer first a particular existence which I encounter in the world and which could not be indispensable to my own existence since I existed before encountering it. The Other is the ex-centric limit which contributes to the constitution of my being. He is the test of my being inasmuch as he throws me outside of myself toward structures which at once both escape me and define me; it is this test which originally reveals the Other to me.”12 Following Hegel’s postulates, Sartre develops his theory using the Other as its propellent. In this way, he stresses that consciousness and the Other are mutually implicating elements, existing one for the other. Accordingly, in a world where the subject finds himself immersed in the Other, he sees his subjectivity inevitably compromised by it. The ego is nothing more than his own conscious existence caught up by another from whom he depends to recognize himself as he is. His existence will be marked by consciousness (of) existing, which will be constantly escaping and being petrified into an ego that will constitute an object to the Other: “I grasp the Other's look at the very center of my act as the solidification and alienation of my own possibilities...of the world which I organize” 12 Nevertheless, the conscious being refuses to be the in-itself that the Other coagulates and proclaims its subjectivity knowing that its existence is ipseity, is consciousness (of) existing. Seeking to occupy this lack between itself and the world of phenomena, the for-itself perpetually projects itself towards one of its possibilities aspiring to become an everlasting in-itself-for-itself. However, this desire will be necessarily condemned to failure since there will always be a nothingness between them that will never wane. The world emerges in this circuit of ipseity revealing itself as a choice of potentialities, as an indication of acts, ensuring its unity and sense of the world. It humanizes the subject through the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 399 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution attribution of an existence-defining situation and, at the same time, is humanized by him since the subject will constantly transcend what is given to him organizing it in a structure with individual meaning. In Sartre’s words: “The individual claims his achievement as an individual, the recognition of his concrete being, and of the objective specification of a universal structure ... the universal in this case could have no meaning if it did not exist for the purpose of the individual.” 12 D. Freedom Sartre’s philosophy escapes the classical model which establishes freedom over the domain of reason and translates into a carelessly individuality with no rules. Assuming its incompleteness, consciousness is determined to desire, to act upon the world, to be free. Possessing its own structure, consciousness bestows upon itself its own purposes, projects towards its possibilities, and detaches its motives from the world. Motives, far from determining action, only appear through its project. Consequently, voluntary deliberation is always illusory: when the will gets involved not only the ends are set but also its whole interpretation system. The role of reflection will be simply to choose the way to achieve an already positioned end. This elaboration will be done by a transcendental ego which is, “… an object apprehended, but also an object constituted by reflective consciousness. The ego is a virtual locus of unity, and consciousness constitutes it in a direction contrary to that actually taken by the production: really, consciousnesses are first; through these are constituted states; and then, through the latter, the ego is constituted.”3 IV. QUANTUM - CONSCIOUSNESS ISOMORPHISM “When there are two mysteries, it is tempting to suppose that they have a common source. This temptation is magnified by the fact that the problems in quantum mechanics seem to be deeply tied to the notion of observership, crucially involving the relation between a subject’s experience and the rest of the world.”4 David Chalmers An isomorphism exists when common characteristics, structures, formulas and form of organization are in agreement in different systems. That is, when formally similar laws governing the functioning of different phenomena exist. The establishment of isomorphisms has been used in the acquisition of predictive knowledge concerning phenomena’s behaviour in the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 400 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution world. Because these systems are governed by identical laws, it is predictable that through one system’s behaviour we may be able to map the intrinsic structure of the other(s). Through the analysis of the presuppositions of consciousness and quantum theories we find some aspects which, because of their similarities, lead inevitably to the establishment of a parallelism between these two models. We saw that consciousness is defined by nothingness because all objects, truths and values are found outside it. On the other side, nothingness is everything since it is non-thetically conscious of all those objects. This is analogous to what happens in superposed quantum systems which despite being isolated from the world, find themselves constituted by a plenitude of potentialities of eventual worldly objects. When extended to composite systems, with more than one particle, the superposition principle conveys a situation of entanglement between these particles with the establishment of an instantaneous reciprocity in their behaviours. Also consciousness is arranged with its possibles being perpetually and instantaneously affected by each other thus guaranteeing its action in the world as a whole. Here, the particular mode consciousness has of holding to its possibles is affectivity. Both systems are dependent on an observation by an external spectator in order to become real. It is the gaze of the Other that coagulates the consciousness’ possibilities into a defined object; also in quantum experiments, the transition from a quantum to a classical state depends on an external measurement which will select one of the superposed possibilities (at the expense of all the others) and objectify it. This measurement will typically introduce an indeterminism alien to both previous and posterior states which will be the responsibility of the observer. After the measurement of a quantum system, quantum theory tells us that the construction of a suitable past will occur backwards in time in order to validate the measured state. Wheeler puts it in these terms: “Thus one decides the photon shall have come by one route or by both routes after it has already done its travel”9. In Sartre’s perspective, existence precedes essence: consciousness pre-exists its knowledge guaranteeing a pre-judicious and pre-reflexive evidence of the subject which inevitably condemns him to be free in relation to the Other. In this way, the task of the reflexive ego will be the announcement of the path to reach a certain end which, nevertheless, has already been defined by consciousness. When it does so, it also does it in a retrograde temporal progression, announcing itself from the end. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 401 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution Table 1. Correspondences between quantum system and consciousness Quantum System Consciousness Superposed state For-itself (Non-reflexive consciousness) Entanglement Affectivity Wavefunction Collapse Nihilation Measurement The gaze of the Other History of the measured state Reflection V. CONCLUDING REMARKS Almost one century after quantum theory’s conception, and despite all the proposed attempts of interpretation, physicists’ still haven’t been able to provide a consensual clarification on how an observation hic et nunc changes one system’s state in a manner not translated in any known mathematically formulated principle. The difficulty associated with the resolution of this problem seems to reside in a concept which, after all, seems not to be as remote from physics as originally thought – consciousness. Confronted with this insurmountable link many physicists eventually relegated this question to psychology. Psychology, on its hand, has seen its evolution trespassed by methodological, epistemological and ideological impasses which posed serious obstacles in the definition of its object. These restraints have seriously compromised its development inevitably leading to a dispersion of knowledge and leaving consciousness as an elusive concept with no defined place in psychology. One of the most compelling applications in the isomorphic research has been the comparison of artificial models of a natural system with the same system’s real existence in nature. In this article we attempted to demonstrate that quantum experimental systems may constitute artificial models of consciousness, therefore permitting not only an increasing comprehension of quantum theory’s meaning but also the indirect study of consciousness through the study of quantum phenomena. Despite our reduction of conscious functioning to quantum mechanics, we don’t necessarily affirm the opposite, i.e. that all quantum systems are conscious. For that to happen, the quantum system would require a proper transducer device similar to the human brain. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 402 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution We reject a mechanicist view of human condition, stressing the importance of the Other in the construction of the subject. Because, as Giles Deleuze poses it: “in the Other’s absence, consciousness and its object are one”13. Quantum theory woke us up from the Laplacean dream of a mechanical world independent of the observer and no more will a system remain unchanged after its measurement. Instead every observation must now be seen as a unique individual act derived from a specific perspective on reality. If we accept a quantum mechanics for consciousness, a new scientific approach is inaugurated with totally new ways of exploring and studying the human mind. Therefore, there is a call for an interdisciplinary approach, integrating knowledge and expertises from quantum physics, psychology and even philosophy. It is time to take Russell Ackoff’s advice and “stop acting as though nature is organized into disciplines in the same way that universities are”14. The topic of this paper is a very wide one and only a brief presentation like this couldn’t possibly cover all the prospects that could be derived from the establishment of a quantum-consciousness isomorphism. We hope to have raised the reader’s curiosity on this matter, fostering additional reading and researching on this matter, because as Bohr concludes, "...the analogies with some fundamental features of the quantum theory, exhibited by the laws of psychology, may not merely make it easier for us to adjust ourselves to the new situation in physics, but it is perhaps not too ambitious to hope that the lessons we have learned from the very much simpler physical problems will also prove of value in our endeavours to obtain a comprehensive survey of the more subtle psychological questions....it is clear to the writer that for the time being we must be content with more or less appropriate analogies. Yet it may well be that behind these analogies there lies not only a kinship with regard to the epistemological aspects, but that a more profound relationship is hidden behind the fundamental biological problems which are directly connected to both sides. ''15 References 1. Jauch, J.M. (1964) The Problem of Measurement in Quantum Mechanics, Helvetica Physica Acta 37, pp. 293-316. 2. Wigner, E. (1961) Remarks on the Mind-Body Problem, The Scientist Speculates, London: Heinemann, pp. 284-302. 3. Sartre, J.P. (1960) The transcendence of the ego – an existentialist theory of consciousness, New York: Hill and Wang. 4. Rosenblum B, Kuttner F (2011) Quantum Enigma – physics encounters consciousness, 2nd ed, Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 403 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 392-403 Freire Lucas, R., On the Quantum Mechanics of Consciousness: Sartre’s Contribution 5. Feynman, R. P. (2005) The principle of least action in quantum mechanics, Singapore: World Scientific. 6. Born, M. (1971) The Born-Einstein Letters, New York: Walker. 7. Heisenberg, W. (1958) Physics and philosophy, London: George Allen and Unwin. 8. Bell, J.S. (1987) Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics, Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press. 9. Wheeler J.A. (1984) Quantum Theory and Measurement, Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, pp. 182– 213. 10. Schrödinger, E. (1980) The present situation in quantum mechanics: a translation of Schrödinger’s “cat paradox” paper. Proc. of the Am. Philosophical Soc. 124: 323-338. 11. Bohr, N. (1985) Foundations of Quantum Physics I, Amsterdam: Elsevier, p. 15. 12. Sartre, J.P. (1957) Being and nothingness: an essay in phenomenological ontology, London: Methuen & Co Ltd. 13. Deleuze, G. (2004) The Logic of Sense, London: Continuum, p. 350. 14. Ackoff, R. (1960) Systems, Organizations and Interdisciplinary Research, General Systems Yearbook. 15. Bohr, N. (1961) Atomic Theory and the Description of Nature, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 20-21. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory e-Print Archive lanl.arXiv.org Biological Physics January 23, 2002 A Classical Probabilistic Computer Model of Consciousness* By Stephen Blaha** * ** Excerpted from the book Cosmos and Consciousness by Stephen Blaha (1stBooks Library, Bloomington, IN, 2000) available from amazon.com and bn.com. Associate of the Harvard University Physics Department. ABSTRACT We show that human consciousness can be modeled as a classical (not quantum) probabilistic computer. A quantum computer representation does not appear to be indicated because no known feature of consciousness depends on Planck’s constant h, the telltale sign of quantum phenomena. It is argued that the facets of consciousness are describable by an object-oriented design with dynamically defined classes and objects. A comparison to economic theory is also made. We argue consciousness may also have redundant, protective mechanisms. ii COPYRIGHT NOTICE Copyright © 1998-2002 Stephen Blaha. All rights reserved. This material from the book Cosmos and Consciousness is protected under copyright laws and international copyright conventions. No part of this material may be reproduced by any means in any form without express prior written permission. Excerpts from this material can be made for the purpose of review or comment in journals and magazines as long as appropriate credits are given. Quantum Probabilistic Grammar, Probabilistic Grammar, Probabilistic Computer Grammar, Quantum Grammar, Continuum Quantum Computer, Polycephalic Quantum Computer, Quantum Assembly Language, Bit-Level Quantum Computer Language, Quantum C Language are trademarks or registered trademarks of Janus Associates Inc. Scientific publications may use these trademarks if they include a statement attributing ownership of the marks to Janus Associates Inc. and attach a ™ superscript to the mark in the text of the document. The statement attributing ownership should say “____ is a trademark of Janus Associates Inc. ” iii CONTENTS A VIEW OF CONSCIOUSNESS 1 CONSCIOUSNESS: QUANTUM OR CLASSICAL PROBABILISTIC 2 THE PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS – THE LESSON OF THE CONCH 2 3 THE CURRENT THEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS A SIMILARITY BETWEEN THEORIES OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND ECONOMIC THEORY 4 A PROBABILISTIC COMPUTER (PC) MODEL OF CONSCIOUSNESS 5 This article is an excerpt from the book Cosmos and Consciousness by this author. It was felt that this material merited presentation as a paper as well. The book covers additional topics that may be of interest. of chips and computer circuitry. By only looking at the innards of the PC we have no concept of what this electronic menagerie can generate. Then we turn on the PC and see the fabulous graphics of a modern computer operating system: lots of windows containing exciting graphics. We can manipulate these windows causing them to change, disappear, reappear with new content, and so on using a mouse, the keyboard or a joystick. We can run captivating multimedia games and simulations with the click of a mouse or the movement of a joystick. We can access and manipulate external information from around the world using the Internet. A View of Consciousness There are numerous views of Consciousness. Some of these views attempt to make distinctions between consciousness, the mind, and the brain (body). The mind is the nebulous thing we associate with consciousness, feeling and thought. The body – in particular the brain – is obviously connected to the mind and supports the mind’s activity. Yet Consciousness seems endowed with miraculous abilities that many find hard to base entirely on the properties of the brain. Does the computer screen look in any way like the innards of the computer? Does the unity, sophistication and flexibility of the display relate to the odd collection of electronics inside the computer? Obviously not. The human brain is in a sense an electromagnetic illusion. The brain is just as insubstantial as consciousness in reality. There is a general lack of appreciation of the power of electromagnetic circuits to create illusions. We see the brain as a hodge-podge of electromagnetic circuitry based on neurons and other brain structures. We then view the mind, and its unity, clarity, powers of logic and analysis, and other features composing one great entity. It is difficult to reconcile the unity of consciousness of the mind with the brain that implements it. Yet it is more difficult to deny that the mind is based entirely on the brain. Modern research1 clearly shows the dependence of the properties of the mind on the features of the brain. Consider the effect on the mind of brain diseases or of injuries to the brain. Figure. The ubiquitous PC. Modern computer technology actually offers a very clear analogy to the relation of Consciousness and the brain. Consider a modern Personal Computer, a PC. If we open it up we see an ugly hodgepodge This example is directly analogous to the relation of Consciousness and the brain. The thoughts, unity and activity of Consciousness (the “screen”) have no obvious connection to the details of brain (the “computer innards”) activity. Yet the mind is a construct of the electrical activity in the brain. 1 Gerald M. Edelman and Giulio Tononi, A Universe of Consciousness, (Basic Books, New York, 2000). There are many other excellent books on consciousness. See the references in Edelman and Tononi or search the Web. 1 The Consciousness of the mind is the combined result of the electrical activity of the brain. output will appear in the set of outputs with a frequency proportional to its probability of occurrence. Consciousness: Quantum or Classical Probabilistic Our studies of space, time, and matter – the Cosmos – have led us to nothingness. Consciousness itself is not material. It is also nothingness. Both Consciousness and the Cosmos are given shape by laws. The laws structure the “nothingness” and provide the “nothingness” with features and properties. In the case of the Cosmos we have made a case for a Quantum Computer formulation of the fundamental theories of Physics. The reason for suggesting that Consciousness be modeled as a Classical Probabilistic Computer is based on the following thoughts: 1. Consciousness appears to be a classical phenomenon. If we consider the properties of the mind there is no convincing evidence for significant quantum effects. Even if Science should find isolated quantum phenomena surfacing in experiments on Consciousness the overwhelming bulk of the phenomena of Consciousness is still not quantum but classical in nature. In the case of Consciousness we propose that Consciousness be best viewed within the framework of Classical Probabilistic Computers. 2. Conscious activity evolves in time through a series of states. At any given moment Consciousness has billions upon billions of states that it can evolve into (see reference 32 for graphic descriptions of the time evolution of conscious states). Given this vast number of possible states we must treat the evolution of consciousness with time as a statistical probabilistic phenomenon. A Classical Probabilistic Computer is a purely classical computer (no quantum effects) that produces a variety of different outputs from a given input to the computer. Each possible output has a certain probability of occurring. The probabilities are all strictly classical – they are not of quantum mechanical origin. A Classical Probabilistic Computer can be viewed as: So we conclude that we must treat Consciousness as a classical, probabilistic phenomena in principle. input Classical Probabilistic Computer The Problem of Consciousness – The Lesson of the Conch After determining that Consciousness is classical physics and chemistry and best treated as a statistical probabilistic phenomenon we confront the overwhelming complexity of Consciousness. output We also confront Nature’s protective mechanisms that may obscure our understanding of Consciousness. Consider the conch Strombas gigas. Figure. A Classical Probabilistic Computer produces one output from a given input. The output is one of a number of possibilities. If the same program is run over and over again in a Classical Probabilistic computer then a variety of outputs will occur. Each 2 loud noise. When it fires it causes the release of neuromodulator chemicals that appear to influence the resulting neural response to the event. The projecting value system may be a way of protecting the brain against over-reacting to major disturbing events. The Current Theory of Consciousness Realizing the complexity of the phenomena of Consciousness and the added complexity of protective mechanisms that Nature might have built into the structure of Consciousness it is no surprise that we do not have a satisfactory Theory of Consciousness. Figure. The conch Strombas gigas. This situation is not without precedent. Similar situations have occurred in the “hard” sciences and in the social sciences. For example, George Uhlenbeck, the co-discoverer of electron spin and one of the outstanding physicists of the mid-twentieth century, spent many years trying to develop a satisfactory theoretical framework for understanding Statistical Mechanics from a microscopic point of view. He told this author (about 1970) that he felt he did not succeed. Uhlenbeck had the advantage of a completely known theory of microscopic particles and a well-known theory of the Statistical Mechanics of large numbers of particles. Despite these advantages he was not able to relate the microscopic theory with the theory of the Statistical Mechanics of a large number of microscopic particles. Relating different levels of theories such as a microscopic theory and a macroscopic theory is difficult. Ninety-nine per cent of this giant pink conch is made of a mineral called aragonite that is a form of calcium carbonate that breaks like chalk. Yet the shell of the conch resists fractures a hundred to a thousand times better than the mineral of which it is formed. Nature has developed a microscopic structure for the conch that surrounds each aragonite crystal in its shell with a protein that changes the toughness of the shell by enabling fractures to spread without breaking the material. In addition the shell has three layers with the “grain” of each layer perpendicular to the grain of adjacent layers. This composite cross-grained material gives the conch shell extraordinary strength. If Nature expended such effort during evolution to protect the humble conch, then what effort must have been expended to protect the workings of the Consciousness of Man? The situation of theories of Consciousness and theories of the brain is much less favorable. We know the overall neuroanatomy (structure) of the brain. We have a pretty good idea of how some features such as vision map to specific brain areas. We have a decent understanding of brain neurochemistry. We have a lot of data on features of Consciousness and some ideas on how these features map to brain features. But we do not have a detailed understanding of the brain. And we do not have a complete understanding of Consciousness. In particular we can usually only make qualitative statements about Consciousness. We don’t even know what the relevant variables are Coincidentally the brain has three main neuroanatomical arrangements. First there is the thalamocortical system that networks the thalamus, the cortex and cortical regions. Secondly, there is a network of long polysynaptic loops that extend between the cortex and the cortical appendages. Thirdly, there is the diffuse network of projecting value systems (the noradrenergic locus coeruleus) that extends over the entire brain. The projecting value systems network appears to fire (react) whenever an important event happens such as a 3 These statements had some predictive power. Then in the Twentieth Century a host of Economists developed quantitative theories for economic phenomena. Economics became semi-quantitative – but there were still many unanswered questions. There is still a problem relating the microscopic picture of individual transactions and the “Big Picture” view of the economy. The predictive power of Economic Theory is still spotty. for conscious phenomena. Who can say how to quantify emotions such as fear or anger? We need at least a Richter scale for emotion. Given this state of affairs a detailed theory of Consciousness similar to a theory of Physics or Chemistry is no where in sight. We can only expect qualitative descriptions and rules for most phenomena of Consciousness. We can only expect general relationships between brain activity and phenomena of Consciousness. We can expect certain specialized (simple) phenomena of Consciousness to be based on detailed brain activity. Compare the development of Economic Theory with the Theory of Consciousness. The microscopic theory is the theory of the brain. The “Big Picture” is Consciousness. We can only make quantitative statements about Consciousness. Our microscopic picture is still incomplete. Clearly the state the development of Consciousness Theory is comparable to the state of Economic Theory in the Nineteenth Century. On the positive side the rate at which our knowledge of Consciousness and the brain is developing is much faster than the development of Economics. A Similarity between Theories of Consciousness and Economic Theory The study of Consciousness is plagued by the lack of a quantitative framework to describe phenomena. We don’t know the relevant variables that describe a phenomenon of Consciousness. We usually don’t know what to measure, and, in the cases where we do find something to measure, we don’t know how to measure it or how to interpret it or how to relate it to brain activity quantitatively. The development of Economics offers a paradigm for the development of our understanding of Consciousness. It also suggests a way of picturing the relation between Consciousness and the brain. We can view the brain as a vast interconnected network of electrical activity with connections to the Consciousness. We will view Consciousness as a separate level that is conceptually unified and connected by “channels” or communications paths to the brain. This is a theoretical framework that reflects strategies used in economic analysis. One can view stock or commodity prices from two perspectives: one perspective views price changes as reactions to external events; another perspective views price changes from a “technical” perspective based on trends in charts of historical price data. This state of affairs is reminiscent of the situation of the Economics of a country. At the microscopic level we can in principle trace every transaction, aggregate all the transactions in the country’s economy and thus obtain a complete view of the economy. We can also trace the evolution of the economy in time. However we do not have a detailed complete quantitative theory of Economics. As a result we can only make predictions based on extrapolations of trends. If we change the pattern of financial transactions in the country we cannot unambiguously predict the effects on the economy. We can only create models based on assumptions. Some models are quite good. But they are no replacement for a complete theory of Economics. We suggest that one should view Consciousness as a thing in itself developing a self-contained theory of Consciousness (a “technical” approach). This theory can then be related to the underlying dynamics and processes of the brain. The modern theory of Economics was born in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries in the work of Adam Smith and others. It started with general qualitative statements based on simple observations. 4 brain. The human brain is a source of inputs and outputs for the computer. Many writers argue that human Consciousness cannot be described by a computer model (see reference 32 for an example). Then they sometimes proceed to use a computer model to simulate some feature of Consciousness. Since human Consciousness is based on a finite human brain that in principle can be simulated by a sufficiently large and complex computer it seems reasonable to think that Consciousness can be modeled on a computer with appropriate features and capabilities. CONSCIOUSNESS BRAIN Does Consciousness “run” like a computer program? No, a better view of Consciousness is to view it as a set of capabilities and features that interconnect to constitute Consciousness. Each of these entities (They may map to groups of neurons in the brain.) has a set of capabilities or features. One can think of each of them as an “object” that has a specific set of capabilities and features. These objects have a “mini-program” inside them that specifies their behavior and how they hook up with other objects to perform tasks and to constitute the Consciousness. The hooks are variable and dynamic. Figure. Consciousness as a separate conceptual entity. By separating Consciousness from the brain and establishing a structured interface between the brain and Consciousness one can hope to develop a provisional model of Consciousness. The time evolution of the Consciousness from state to state is a result of the execution of these “mini-programs” in a dynamic ever-changing way. There is no overall program but instead there is an ever changing, dynamic, unfolding of states of Consciousness in response to external inputs and based on the previous state of Consciousness plus random effects within Consciousness. A Probabilistic Computer (PC) Model of Consciousness Although human Consciousness is large and complex it must be finite since it is derived from the human brain which is finite. We have seen that Consciousness is overwhelmingly classical (not quantum) in nature and that it must be treated probabilistically because of the billions upon billions of states of Consciousness. The description of Consciousness as a collection of objects with features, an internal “mini-program” describing the object’s behavior and interaction with other objects can be called an Object-Oriented definition. The concept of Object-Oriented Programming is currently the preferred way to program amongst computer software developers. It meshes well with the observed features of Consciousness. One These considerations lead us to suggest a Classical Probabilistic Computer Model for Consciousness with strict interfaces to the human 5 major difference is the dynamic nature of the grouping of neurons in response to external inputs. The Object-Oriented programming parallel would be to have class definitions dynamically reforming in response to the evolution of a program. 1. Consciousness can marshal its resources to allocate more resources to important tasks that it faces. 2. Consciousness can be “rewired” to adapt to meet short-term needs and to meet long-term needs. These features tell us about the computer mechanisms or miniprograms driving the time development of Consciousness (the way in which a Consciousness evolves from state to state in time). Vision Smell The first point tells us that a correct Probabilistic Computer model of Consciousness must be able to dynamically reallocate its resources in response to inputs. Hearing The second point tells us that the mini-programs that describe the changes in time of the state of Consciousness must be able to change itself. The LISP programming language is an example of a language whose programs are capable of changing themselves as they execute (evolve). Another way of implementing this feature at the hardware level is to say the computer can rewire itself to meet new needs. In fact this process is known to happen in the human brain. Human brains can rewire themselves over time if a brain is damaged or in response to stimuli. Figure. An Object-Oriented view of Consciousness. Thus Consciousness does not have a program in the old fashioned sense of the word. It has a dynamically changing, event driven program with program fragments in each of the parts of Consciousness. These program fragments can dynamically link together in response to events to take Consciousness from one state to another. The pattern of linkings is driven by a complex set of interconnections between the parts of Consciousness. Dynamic Linking is the preferred way of creating a computer program (a .EXE program) in modern computing. These additional features make the Probabilistic Computer a suitable model for Consciousness. There are two major features of Consciousness that are of crucial importance in defining a computer representation of Consciousness at this level of discussion: 6

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 52 Perspective Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness Huping Hu* & Maoxin Wu ABSTRACT In this article, we address the nature and substrates of human Consciousness, the nature and attributes of Universal Consciousness and the relationship between the two in light of the groundbreaking new results obtained by Persinger’s group. These new results together with what have already been achieved by herein authors, Persinger’s group and some of the other researchers shed important light on these fundamental issues of life and existence. Key Words: human Consciousness, Universal Consciousness, spin-mediated consciousness, mind-pixel, nonlocality, quantum entanglement, God Helmet, photon emission, biophoton, brain. All things by immortal power, Near and Far, Hiddenly, To each other linked are, That thou canst not stir a flower Without troubling of a star. Francis Thompson 1. Introduction Our search on the nature and substrates of human Consciousness lead us to the spin-mediated consciousness theory, spin being the mind-pixel and its further developments put forward in Refs. [1-4, 7-9]. To test this theory experimentally, we conducted experiments and discovered photon and magnetic pulse induced non-local effects of general anesthetics on the brain [5] and nonlocal thermal, chemical and gravitational effects in simple physical systems [6]. Recently, we also found new nonlocal biological effect of a substance on human heart [15]. Experimental supports of spin-mediated consciousness theory from various sources, especially the results of Persinger’s group, were discussed in Ref. [10]. Current landscape and future direction of theoretical & experimental quantum brain research were reviewed in Ref. [11]. The research reported in Refs. [1-9] further lead us to the search on the nature and attributes of Universal Consciousness and the discoveries of the Principle of Existence and its further developments put forward in Refs. [12-14]. According to this fundamental Principle, in the beginning there was Universal Consciousness by itself e0i =1 materially empty and spiritually restless; and it began to imagine through primordial self-referential spin 1=e0=eiM-iM=eiMe-iM=eiM -iM / e = eiM/ eiM… such that it created the external object to be observed and internal object as observed, separated them into external world and internal world, caused them to interact through self-referential Matrix Law and thus gave birth to the Universe which it has since passionately loved, sustained and made to evolve. Persinger has been a pioneer in the field of experimental studies of mystical experiences and is known together with his research team for the "God Helmet” [e.g., 16-17]. Recently, Persinger Correspondence: Huping Hu, Ph.D., J.D., QuantumDream Inc., P. O. Box 267, Stony Brook,, NY 11790. E-mail: editor@prespacetime.com ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 53 and his team have also obtained important results in the field of quantum brain & nonlocality research [16-24]. Now, he and his team have obtained groundbreaking new results in the latter areas published in this Special Issue[25-27]. These new results together with what have already been achieved by the herein authors [1-15], Persinger’s team [16-24] and some of the other researchers (e.g., 28-47, some of which were scorned and/or alleged to be pseudoscientific or unreproducible) have very important implications for further advancements of these and related fields and shed important light on the fundamental issues of life and existence. 2. Brief Analysis of Persinger Group’s Recent & New Results (1) Biophoton emissions while imagining white light Persinger’s group first reported significant increases in biophoton emissions along the right side brain but not the left when subjects imagined white light in a dark environment in Ref. [18]. The group reported that the increased biophoton emissions did not occur when the same subjects thought about mundane experiences [18]. This fascinating phenomenon has been further studies in Ref. [25] published in this Special Issue. In the new study [25], Persinger and his team found that during brief periods of imagining white light the power density of photon emissions from the right hemisphere was about 10-11 W∙m-2 that was congruent with magnetic energy within the volume associated with a diminishment of ~7 nT. Their spectral analyses showed maxima in power from electroencephalographic activity within the parahippocampal region and photon emissions from the right hemisphere with shared phase modulations equivalent to about 20 ms. They further found that beat frequencies (6 Hz) between peak power in photon (17 Hz) and brain (11 Hz) amplitude fluctuations during imagining light were equivalent to energy differences within the visible wavelength that were identical to the intrinsic 8 Hz rhythmic variations of neurons within the parahippocampal gyrus. According to Persinger and his team, these quantitative measurements plus quantitative analysis strongly suggest that spin energies similar to what was discussed by the herein authors in Ref. [3] can accommodate the interactions between protons, electrons, and photons and the action potentials associated with intention, consciousness and entanglement [25]. We point out here that mind-matter interactions have been widely studies but little specifics are known scientifically. It is well known that the placebo effect is produced by the mind and different thoughts and/or intentions are associated with different brain electrical activities. Further, it is apparent that we carry out our intentions through our physical body at will. The fascinating aspects of Persinger’s group’s findings are that a particular thought/imagination produces corresponding physical entities in the thought/imagination and other measurable and quantitative parameters such as decreased geomagnetic field around the brain and location specific EEGs associated with the particular brain activity. However, there are several plausible causes for the increased biophoton emissions in the right brain when imagining white light: (1) increased blood flow and oxygenation; (2) increased cell metabolism; (3) electric discharge across neural membranes; (4) spin-mediated consciousness ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 54 functions and dynamics coupled to action potentials; (5) direct photon creation by intention or imagination in apparent but not real violation of energy conservation according to the Principle of Existence [see 14-16]; and (6) certain mixture or combinations of (1)-(5). Causes (1)-(3) are coincidental causes non-specific to imagination of white light and can be confirmed or eliminated through additional control studies. Indeed, these coincidental causes are already disfavored by the finding of Persinger’s group that the increased biophoton emissions did not occur when the same subjects thought about mundane experiences. If the observed biophoton emissions are intention/imagination specific, imagination of different colors of light may produce different profiles of increased biophoton emissions and imagination of other intense non-light experience should not produce increased biophoton emissions. Cause (4) is favored by the currently available data of Persinger’s group [25] and theoretically supported by spin-mediated consciousness theory and its further developments in Refs. [1-4, 79]. Both causes (4) and (5) are theoretically supported by the Principle of Existence and its further developments put forward in Refs. [12-14]. Cause (6) is not a separate cause. (2) Nonlocal doubling of local photon emissions In Ref. [19], Dotta and Persinger first reported their finding of the doubling of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatially separated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. In the new experimental study reported in Ref. [26] in this Special Issue, Persinger and his team applied same magnetic field configurations in Ref. [19] to photons from light-emitting diodes (LEDs). They found a significant but weaker enhancement of photon emissions as measured by photomultiplier tubes occurred when the two LEDs were activated simultaneously within two loci separated by several meters. If alternative explanations can be excluded, the observed effect suggest that under optimal conditions photons emitted from two, magnetic field congruent, loci become macroscopically entangled and that the two loci display properties of a single space as proposed by Persinger’s group [26]. We point out here that the natural targets of these magnetic field configurations are the unpaired nuclear spins and electron spins in the test materials [10], and, if alternative explanations are excluded, the finding of Persinger’s group indicates that the nonlocal property is even deeper and stronger than previously realized. Plausible alternative explanations include: (1) Pre-existing quantum entanglement (contamination) between the instruments used to produce the two congruent magnetic field configurations due to common material source and builder of the instruments, etc.; (2) Preexisting quantum entanglement (contamination) between the test materials and/or experimenters; (3) Direct quantum entanglement or electromagnetic influence due to the short distance of several meters between the two loci; and (4) Certain combinations of (1)-(3). ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 55 Indeed, the finding by Persinger’s group that only a specific magnetic field configuration could produce the observed effect have already reduced the plausibility of these alternative explanations. However, by avoiding using common materials and builder, increasing the distance between the two loci and employing test materials of different sources and non-acquaintance experimenters, these alternative explanations can be eliminated more thoroughly. (3) Potential entanglement of brain activity over 300 Km In Ref. [20], Persinger and his team first reported that light flashes delivered to one aggregate of cells evoked increased photon emission in another aggregate of cells maintained in the dark in another room if both aggregates shared the same temporal and spatial configuration of changing magnetic fields. They also reported that increased photon emissions occurred beside the heads of human volunteers if others in another room saw light flashes during the presentation of the same shared circumcerebral magnetic fields. They further reported that when the shared magnetic fields were not present, both cellular and human photon emissions during the light flashes did not occur. In the new experimental study reported in Ref. [27] of this Special Issue, pairs of subjects separated by 300 km were either exposed or not exposed to specific configurations of circular magnetic fields. Persinger and his team found that when one person in the pair was exposed to sound pulses within the classical electroencephalographic band, there were discrete changes in power within the cerebral space of the other person even though they were not aware of the stimulus times and separated by 300 km. However, the intracerebral changes that only occurred if the magnetic fields were activated around the two cerebrums simultaneously were discrete and involved about single, punctate volumes of about 0.13 cc (125 mm3). We point out here again that the natural targets of these magnetic field configurations are the unpaired nuclear spins and electron spins in the test cells or brain [10], and, if alternative explanations are excluded, the finding of Persinger’s group indicate that the nonlocal property is even deeper and stronger than previously realized and achievable over very large distances. Plausible alternative explanations include: (1) Pre-existing quantum entanglement (contamination) between the instruments used to produce the two congruent magnetic field configurations due to common material source and builder of the instruments, etc.; (2) Preexisting quantum entanglement (contamination) between test cells/subjects and/or the experimenters; and (3) combinations of (1) and (2). Indeed, the finding by Persinger’s group that only a specific magnetic field configuration could produce the observed effect have already reduced the plausibility of these alternative explanations. However, by avoiding using common materials and builder and employing independent test cells and non-acquaintance test subjects and experimenters, these alternative explanations can be eliminated more thoroughly. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 56 3. Omnipotence of Universal Consciousness: How GOD Creates Light & Its Governing Law? In Genesis of the Old Testament, “God said ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.” However, Genesis does not tell us how this was done scientifically. One scientific solution is given in the Principle of Existence [12-14, also see 49]. This Principle further endows humans with the limited power to create through intentions/imagination [12-14]. In the source-free vacuum, light as electromagnetic field (photon) is governed by the following Maxwell equations (c=1): Scientifically, the question then becomes how Universal Consciousness created the electromagnetic field (photon) and the governing law as manifested by the Maxwell equations. We have already answered this question in Ref. 49 and will answer this question here in accordance to the Principle of Existence [12-14]. It turns out that Universal Consciousness created both the light and the governing law through imagination and matrixization of Its etheric body. Based on the Principle of Existence [12-14], before creation, Universal Consciousness was alone in a singular (primal) state of Being – Oneness and Unity of Existence: where “e” is the body of Universal Consciousness, ether, the foundation of existence; “i” is the imagination of Universal Consciousness, the source of creativity; and “0” is initial state of Universal Consciousness’s mind; emptiness, nothingness. To create light and the governing law, Universal Consciousness imagined and matrixized Its etheric body as follows: ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 57 where S is photon spin (spin operator). The last equation is one form of the wave equation of a photon in relativistic quantum mechanics. It is plausible that the above process of creation is enabled in the human brain through spinmediated consciousness functions and dynamics with further coupling to action potentials [1-9]. The experiments of Persinger’s group [18, 25] may support this proposition if coincidental causes can be eliminated. 4. Omnipresence & Omniscience of Universal Consciousness It is often said that Universal Consciousness has three Attributes: Omnipotence, Omniscience and Omnipresence. The latter two Attributes require Universal Consciousness to be everywhere at the same time within Its Creation. The question we have asked then is: Is there any experimental evidence/proof of a process or force which allows Universal Consciousness to be everywhere at the same time? [50] The answer is "yes" and it is nonlocal cause such as quantum entanglement mediated process as experimentally shown in our own experiments [5, 6, 15]. The Experiments of Persinger’s group [19-27] and perhaps some of other researchers [see, e.g., 28-47] also seem to support the Omnipresence and Omniscience of Universal Consciousness. According to the Principle of Existence [12-14], such process or force is no other than the manifested universal force of gravitation. The idea of instantaneous gravity is nothing new. Newton’s law of universal gravitation implies instantaneous “action at a distance” which he felt deeply uncomfortable with, but Newton was not able to find a cause of gravity [52]. Later Mach suggested that "[t]he investigator must feel the need of...knowledge of the immediate ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 58 connections, say, of the masses of the universe…[t]here will hover before him as an ideal insight into the principles of the whole matter, from which accelerated and inertial motions will result in the same way" [53]. Ontologically, Mach’s above suggestion is a form of holism and implies that gravity is relational and instantaneous. It was Einstein who fulfilled Mach’s “relational” suggestion of gravity by inventing general relativity [54]. However, such fulfillment may be at the sacrifice of Mach’s “immediate connections” by assuming that the speed of gravity is the speed of light. However, gravity wave of linearized Einstein's field equation has not been detected. On the other hand, we theorized in [8] that gravity originates from the primordial spin processes in non-spatial and non-temporal prespacetime, is the manifestation of quantum entanglement, and implies genuine instantaneous interconnectedness of all matters in the universe. Thus, the principle of non-local action is advocated. To certain degree, this view is a reductionist expression of Newton’s instantaneous universal gravity and Mach’s Principle with important consequences. Importantly, we found experimentally that the weight of water in a detecting reservoir quantumentangled with water in a remote reservoir can change against the gravity of its local environment when the latter was remotely manipulated [6]. If independently verified, these experiments demonstrated Newton's instantaneous gravity and Mach's instantaneous connection conjecture and the relationship between gravity and quantum entanglement. In turn, instantaneous gravity as quantum entanglement provides scientific evidence in support of Universal Consciousness’ Attributes of Omnipresence and Omniscience. 5. Michael Persinger and His Team’s “God Helmet” Wired Magazine published an article in 1999 entitled "This Is Your Brain on God" in which the author, Jack Hitt stated that "Michael Persinger has a vision - the Almighty isn't dead, he's an energy field. And your mind is an electromagnetic map to your soul" [56]. Persinger states at his website [55] that "[a]s a human being, I am concerned about the illusionary explanations for human consciousness and the future of human existence. Consequently after writing the Neuropsychological Base of God Beliefs (1987), I began the systematic application of complex electromagnetic fields to discern the patterns that will induce experiences (sensed presence) that are attributed to the myriad of ego-alien intrusions which range from gods to aliens. The research is not to demean anyone's religious/mystical experience but instead to determine which portions of the brain or its electromagnetic patterns generate the experience. Two thousand years of philosophy have taught us that attempting to prove or disprove realities may never have discrete verbal (linguistic) solutions because of the limitation of this measurement. The research has been encouraged by the historical fact that most wars and group degradations are coupled implicitly to god beliefs and to the presumption that those who do not believe the same as the experient are somehow less human and hence expendable. Although these egocentric propensities may have had adaptive significance, their utility for the species' future may be questionable." ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 59 Our own theoretical and experimental studies [1-15] have shown that: (1) human Consciousness is non-spatial and non-temporal and not in the brain but in prespacetime; (2) brain is an interface between human Consciousness and the external world; (3) quantum spin is the mind-pixel; (4) magnetic field is manifestation of the internal world based on the Principle of Existence [12-14]. Therefore, altered states of consciousness such as sensed presence and out-of-body experience whether they are produced by magnetic, electric or other stimulations or circumstances can be most effectively explained as the changes of the relative contents and/or intensities of the test subjects’ neural quantum entanglement with their surroundings etc. (including possibly spiritual environments or information) [51]. Thus, interpreted from the perspectives of our own findings [1-15], Persinger's "God Helmet experiments" might not have proven that mystical experiences are a mere phenomenon localized in the material brain but can be explained as the non-spatial and non-temporal human Consciousness through the brain quantum-entangles with his/her environments possibly including the spiritual environment, thus, experiencing sensed presence, out-of-body etc. In Ref. [17], Persinger and his team summarize their results as follows: Quantitative EEG data indicate that a sequence of stimulation by between 1 and 5 uT fields at the scalp’s surface with as little as 10% greater intensity over the right hemisphere compared to the left is associated with greater convergence of theta activity between the left temporal and right prefrontal region. Subsequent bilateral stimulation is associated with greater right-to-left temporal coherence. These two experimental conditions and quantitative EEG patterns are associated with reports of out-of-body experiences and the sensed presence, respectively. .... The results and approaches of our research and those of Olaf Blanke both show that out-of-body-experiences and the sensed presence can be generated experimentally by stimulating either one or the other of the hemispheres within specific regions. The quality of the experiences, although direct comparisons have not been made, appears to be similar and the quantitative or meaningful intensity reveal similar values for individual salience. .... [We] reviewed and re-analyzed the approximately 20 experiments involving 407 subjects that have demonstrated the experimental elicitation of either the sensed presence or out of body experience. [Our] re-analyses clearly showed the specific magnetic configurations and not the subjects’ exotic beliefs or suggestibility was responsible for the increased incidence of sensed presences. The subjects’ histories of spontaneous sensed presences before the experiment (and exposure to the magnetic fields) were moderately correlated with exotic beliefs and temporal lobe sensitivity. The side attributed to the presence at the time of the experience was affected by the parameters of the fields, the hemisphere to which they were maximized, and the person’s a priori beliefs. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 60 In vivid terms one test subject in Persinger’s experiment reported “I felt a presence behind me and then along the left side. When I tried to focus on the position, the presence moved. Every time I tried to sense where it was, it moved around. When it moved to the right side, I experienced a deep sense of security like I have not experienced before. I started to cry when I felt it slowly fade away ([Persinger] had changed the field patterns)” [17]. Also in vivid terms, another test subject reported an out-of-body experience stating “I feel as if there was a bright white light in front of me. I saw a black spot that became a funnel....no tunnel that I felt drawn into. I felt moving, like spinning forward through it. I began to feel the presence of people, but I could not see them. They were along my sides. They were colorless and grey looking. I know I was in the chamber but it was very real. I suddenly felt intense fear and felt ice cold” [17]. Persinger and his team reasoned that: "Our primary assumption is that consciousness and its variants of mystical states can be expressed as quantum phenomena. If consciousness and thought are coupled to electron movements, then a macroscopic manifestation should be congruent with the magnetic field strengths associated with neurocognitive activities. Access to the information within the movements of an electron, its fundamental charge, and the photon emissions associated with changes in electron movements, would allow mystical states and the information with which they are associated to have alternative interpretations that recruit the fundamental properties of space-time and matter" [17]. The above experimental results of Persinger and his team can be best explained by the spinmediated consciousness theory [1-9] for the reasons stated below [10]: (1) The primary targets of interactions for the weak pulsed magnetic field used by Persinger’s Group are the nuclear and/or electron spins associated with the neural membranes, protein and water, etc. Indeed, neural membranes and proteins contain vast numbers of nuclear spins such as 1H, 13C, 31P and 15N. (2) As we have experimentally demonstrated, pulsed electromagnetic field (photons) carries information through quantum entanglement from external substance (and environment) which they interacted with. (3) Nuclear spins in the brain form complex intra- and inter-molecular networks through various intra-molecular J- and dipolar couplings and both short- and long-range intermolecular dipolar couplings. Further, nuclear spins have relatively long relaxation times after excitations. (4) Quantum spin is a fundamental quantum process with intrinsic connection to the structure of space-time and was shown to be responsible for the quantum effects in both Hestenes and Bohmian quantum mechanics. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 61 6. Human Consciousness As stated earlier, our own theoretical and experimental studies [1-15] have shown that: (1) human Consciousness is non-spatial and non-temporal and not in the brain but in prespacetime; (2) brain is an interface between human Consciousness and the external world; (3) quantum spin is the mind-pixel; (4) magnetic field is manifested by the internal world based on the Principle of Existence [12-14]. So, what is human consciousness in the big scheme of things? Our answer is that human consciousness is a limited or individualized version of Universal Consciousness such that we have limited free will and limited observation/experience which is mostly classical at macroscopic levels but quantum at microscopic levels [12-14, 48]. For example, as a limited Universal Consciousness, we have through free will the choice of what measurement to do in a quantum experiment but not the ability to control the result of measurement (at least not until we can harness more abilities of our Universal Consciousness). That is, the result appears to us as random. On the other hand, at the macroscopic level, we also have the choice through free will of what to do but the outcome, depending on context, is sometimes certain and at other times uncertain. Further, we can only observe the measurement result in a quantum experiment that we conduct and experience the macroscopic environment surrounding us as the classical world [48]. Next, we focus on some of the details of how our experience is produced through the brain and how human free-will may operate through the brain [see 14-16]. Figure 1 Interaction between an object and the brain (body) in the dual-world As illustrated in Figure 1, according to the Principle of Existence, there are two kinds of interactions between an object (entity) outside the brain (body) and the brain (body). The first and commonly known kind is the direct physical and/or chemical interactions such as sensory input through the eyes. The second and lesser-known but experimentally proven to be true kind ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 62 is the instantaneous interactions through quantum entanglement. The entire world outside our brain (body) is associated with our brain (body) through quantum entanglement thus influencing and/or generating not only our feelings, emotions and dreams but also the physical, chemical and physiological states of our brain and body. Importantly, quantum entanglement may participate in sensory experience such as vision, for example, as follows (keep in mind that an interaction with the external world is accompanied by its counterpart interaction with the internal world): (1) A light ray reflected and/or emitted from an object outside the brain enters the eye, gets absorbed, converted and amplified in the retina as propagating action potentials which travel to the central nervous system (CNS); (2) In the CNS, the action potentials drive and influence the mind pixels which according our theory is the nuclei such as protons with net nuclear spins and/or electrons with unpaired spins; and (3) Either the driven or influenced dynamic patterns of the mind-pixels in the internal world form the experience of the object, or more likely our visual experience of the object is the direct experience of the object in the external world through quantum entanglement established by the physical interactions. In the latter case, there is no image of the outside world in the brain. Further, in the case in which the object outside the brain is an image such as a photograph, there also exists the possibility that our visual experience is not only the experience of the photograph as such through quantum entanglement but also the experience of the object within the photograph through additional quantum entanglement. We hope that through careful experiments, we can find out which mechanism is actually true or whether both are true in reality. The action potentials in the retina, the neural pathways and the CNS are driven by voltage-gated ion channels on neural membranes as embodied by the Hodgkin-Huxley model: ∂ tVm = −  1   ∑ (Vm − Ei )gi  Cm  i  (1) where Vm is the electric potential across the neural membranes, Cm is the capacitance of the membranes, gi is the ith voltage-gated or constant-leak ion channel (also see, Hu & Wu, 2004c & 2004d). The overall effect of the action potentials and other surrounding factors, especially the magnetic dipoles carried by oxygen molecules due to their two unpaired electrons, is that inside the neural membranes and proteins, there exist varying strong electric field E and fluctuating magnetic field B that are also governed by the Maxwell equation:  E  - σ ⋅p  ∂tE = ∇ × B     ∂ t B = −∇ × E   ∇⋅E = 0  - σ ⋅ p  σ ⋅ E      = 0  ∇⋅B = 0  E  iσ ⋅ B   or  (2) µ j = ( ρ , j ) = 0 inside where we have set the classical (macroscopic) electric density and current the neural membranes. Further, for simplicity, we have not considered the medium effect of the membranes, that is, we have treated the membranes as a vacuum. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 63 Microscopically, electromagnetic fields E and B or their electromagnetic potential representation A = (φ , A ): µ  E = −∇φ − ∂ t A     B = ∇×A  (3) interact with proton of charge e and unpaired electron of charge –e respectively as the following Dirac-Maxwell systems:   E −eφ − m −σ⋅(p −eA ) ψ e, −    = LM ψ = 0        −σ⋅(p −eA ) E −eφ + m ψ i , +  p (4) - σ ⋅ p  σ ⋅ E   − iσ ⋅ (ψ β αψ )   E     =  † σ p σ B ⋅ E i ⋅ − i ( ψ ββψ )     p (5)   E + eφ − m − σ ⋅(p + eA ) ψ e, +    =L M ψ = 0       − σ ⋅(p + eA ) E + eφ + m ψ i , −  e (6) † and - σ ⋅ p  σ ⋅ E   − iσ ⋅ (ψ β αψ )   E    = E  iσ ⋅ B   − i (ψ † ββψ )  e - σ ⋅p where β and α are Dirac matrices. † (7) In equations (4) and (6), the interactions (couplings) of E and/or B with proton and/or electron spin operator (σ)p and (σ)e are hidden. But they are due to the self-referential Matrix Law which causes mixing of the external and internal wave functions and can be made explicit in the determinant view as follows. For Dirac form, we have:   E −eφ − m −σ⋅(p −eA ) ψ e, −    = LM ψ = 0        −σ⋅(p −eA ) E −eφ + m ψ i , +  p (8)   (E − eφ − m)(E − eφ + m) −      ∗ →   I 2ψ e, −ψ i , + = 0    (− σ ⋅ (p − eA ))(− σ ⋅ (p − eA ))    p (( 2 2 ) ) → (E − eφ ) − m 2 − (p − eA ) + eσ ⋅ B I 2ψ e, −ψ i∗, + = 0 p ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 64 For Weyl (chiral) form, we have: −m   E − eφ −σ⋅(p − eA )  ψ e,r   = 0     E −eφ +σ⋅(p − eA ) ψ i ,l  −m  p → (((E − eφ − σ ⋅ (p − eA ))(E − eφ + σ ⋅ (p − eA)) − m )I ψ ψ = 0) 2 2 (( 2 2 ) e,r ∗ i ,l (9) p ) → (E − eφ ) − m − (p − eA ) + eσ ⋅ B-ieσ ⋅ E I 2ψ e,rψ = 0 p 2 ∗ i ,l These two couplings are also explicitly shown in Dirac-Hestenes formulism or during the process of non-relativistic approximation of the Dirac equation in the present of external electromagnetic potential Aμ. We can carry out the same procedures for an electron to show the explicit couplings of (σ)e with E and B. One effect of the couplings is that the action potentials through E and B (or Aμ) input information into the mind-pixels in the brain [3, 7-9]. Judging from the above Dirac-Maxwell systems, we are inclined to think that said information is likely carried in the temporal and spatial variations of E and B (frequencies and timing of neural electric spikes and their spatial distributions in the CNS). Another possible effect of the couplings is that they allow the transcendental aspect of Consciousness through wave functions (the self-field) of the proton and/or electron to backinfluence E and B (or Aμ) which in turn back-affect the action potentials through the HodgkinHuxley neural circuits in the CNS [see, 7-9]. We have speculated about how human free-will as a macroscopic quality of limited Universal Consciousness may originate microscopically under the particular high electric voltage environment inside the neural membranes [7-9, 12-14]. For example, one possibility is that the human free will as thought or imagination produces changes in the phase of external and internal wave functions: ei 0 = e−i ( ∆Et −∆p⋅x)+i ( ∆Et −∆p⋅x) = (e−i ( ∆Et−∆p⋅x) )e (e+i ( ∆Et−∆p⋅x) )i (10) where ( )e and ( )i respectively indicate external and internal wave functions, which in turn back-affect E and B (or Aμ) in the high electric voltage neural membranes through the Dirac Maxwell systems illustrated above. References 1. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Spin-mediated consciousness theory. arXiv 2002; quant-ph/0208068. Also see Med. Hypotheses, 2004; 63: 633-646. 2. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Spin as primordial self-referential process driving quantum mechanics, spacetime dynamics and consciousness. NeuroQuantology, 2004; 2:41-49. Also see Cogprints: ID2827 2003. 3. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Action potential modulation of neural spin networks suggests possible role of spin in memory and consciousness. NeuroQuantology, 2004; 2:309-316. Also see Cogprints: ID3458 2004d. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 65 4. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Thinking outside the box: the essence and implications of quantum entanglement. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 4: 5-16. 5. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Photon induced non-local effect of general anesthetics on the brain. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 4: 17-31. Also see Progress in Physics, 2006; v3: 20-26. 6. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Evidence of non-local physical, chemical and biological effects supports quantum brain. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 4: 291-306. Also see Progress in Physics 2007; v2: 17-24. 7. Hu, H. & Wu, M., How mind influences brain through "proactive" spin, NeuroQuantology, 2007; 5(2): 205-213. 8. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Thinking outside the box II: The origin, implications and applications of gravity and its role in consciousness. NeuroQuantology, 2007; 5(2): 190-196. 9. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Concerning spin as mind-pixel: How mind interacts with the brain through electric spin effects, NeuroQuantology, 2008; 6(1): 26-31. 10. Hu, H. & Wu, Experimental support of spin-mediated consciousness theory from various sources, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(8): 907-936. 11. Hu, H. & Wu, Current landscape and future direction of theoretical & experimental quantum brain/mind/consciousness research, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(8): 888897. 12. Hu, H. & Wu, The Principle of Existence: Towards a science of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(1): 50-119. 13. Hu, H. & Wu, Consciousness-mediated spin theory: The transcendental ground of quantum reality', Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(8): 937-970. 14. Hu, H. & Wu, The Principle of Existence II: Genesis of matrix law & mathematics of ether, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 1(9): 1149-1178. 15. Hu, H. & Wu, M., New nonlocal biological effect: a preliminary research. NeuroQuantology, 2012; 10(3): 462-467. 16. Persinger, M. A., Vectorial cerebral hemisphericity as differential sources for the sensed presence, mystical experiences and religious conversions. Psychological Reports, 1993; 76: 915-930. 17. Persinger, M. A. & Lavallee, C. F., The electromagnetic induction of Mystical and Altered States within the Laboratory. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(7): 785-807. 18. Dotta, B. T., Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2011; 2(10): 1538-1548. 19. Dotta, B. T, Persinger, M. A, Doubling of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatiallyseparated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. Journal of Biophysical Chemistry, 2012; 3(1). ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 66 20. Dotta, B. T, Buckner, C. A, Lafrenie, R. M., Persinger, M. A., Photon emissions from human brain and cell culture exposed to distally rotating magnetic fields shared by separate light-stimulated brains and cells. Brain Research, 2011; 1388: 77-88. 21. Persinger, M.A., Koren, S.A. & Tsang, E.W. Enhanced power within a specific band of theta activity in one person while another receives circumcerebral pulsed magnetic fields: a mechanism for cognitive influence at a distance? Perceptual and Motor Skills, 2003; 97: 877-894. 22. Persinger, MA, Tsang, EW, Booth, JN and Koren, SA, Enhanced power within a predicted narrow band of theta activity during stimulation of another by circumcerebral weak magnetic fields after weekly spatial proximity: evidence for macroscopic entanglement? NeuroQuantology 2008; 6(1): 7-21. 23. Persinger, M. A. et.al. Theoretical and experimental evidence of macroscopic entanglement between Human Brain Activity and Photon Emissions: Implications for Quantum Consciousness and Future Applications. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(7): 808-830. 24. Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Temporal Patterns of Photon Emissions Can Be Stored and Retrieved Several Days Later From the “Same Space”: Experimental and Quantitative Evidence. NeuroQuantology, 2011;9(4): 605-613. 25. Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S., & Scott, M. A., Congruence of energies for cerebral photon emissions, quantitative EEG activities and ~5 nT changes in the proximal geomagnetic field support spin-based hypothesis of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2013; 4(1): 1-24. 26. Dotta, B. T., Koren, S. A. & Persinger, M. A., Demonstration of entanglement of “pure” photon emissions at two locations that share specific configurations of magnetic fields: implications for translocation of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2013; 4(1): 25-34. 27. Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleaum,N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental demonstration of potential entanglement of brain activity over 300 Km for pairs of subjects sharing the same circular rotating, angular accelerating Magnetic fields: verification by s_LORETA, QEEG measurements. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2013; 4(1): 35-44. 28. Grinberg-Zylberbaum, J. & Ramos, J., Patterns of interhemispheric correlation during human communication. International Journal of Neuroscience, 1987; 36: 41–53. 29. Reid, B. L. On the nature of growth and new growth based on experiments designed to reveal a structure and function for laboratory space. Medical Hypotheses, 1989; 29: 105-127. 30. Gariaev, P.P., et. al., Holographic Associative Memory of Biological Systems, Proceedings SPIE, Optical Memory and Neural Networks, 1991; 1621: 280- 291. 31. Radin, D., Entangled Minds: Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality, 2006, Paraview Pocket Books. 32. Sheldrake, R., Morphic Resonance: The Nature of Formative Causation, 2009, Park Street Press. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 67 33. Davenas E, Beauvais F, Amara J, et al. Human basophil degranulation triggered by very dilute antiserum against IgE, Nature, 1988; 333 (6176): 816–8. 34. Jahn, R. G., Dunne, B. J., Margins of Reality: The Role of Consciousness in the Physical World, 2009, ICRL Press. 35. Achterberg, J. et. al., Evidence for correlations between distant intentionality and brain function in recipients: A functional magnetic resonance imaging analysis. J. Altertaive & Complimentary Med., 2005; 11 (6): 965–971. 36. Pizzi, R, Fantasia, A, Gelain, F and Rosetti, D, Vdscovi, A. Nonlocal correlations between separated neural networks. Quantum Information and Computation II. Proceedings of SPIE 2004; 5436: 107. 37. Conte, E. et. al. A Preliminary Experimental Verification of Violation of Bell Enequality in a Quantum Model of Jung Theory of Personality. JCER, 2010: 1(7): 831-849. 38. Emoto, M., The Hidden Messages in Water, 2005, Atria. 39. Josephson, B.D., Pallikari-Viras, F., Biological utilisation of quantum nonlocality, Foundations of Physics, 1991, 21: 197-207. 40. Stapp, H. P., Mind Matter and Quantum Mechanics, 1993, Springer-Verlag, Berlin. 41. Tiller, W. A., Psychoenergetic Science, 2007, Pavior. 42. Standish, L, Johnson, L, Kozak, L and Richards, T, EEG evidence of correlated event related signals between the brains of spatially and sensorily isolated human subjects. J. Alter. Compl. Med. 2004; 10, 307. 43. Wackermanna,J, Seiterb,C, Keibel,H and Walach, H, Correlations between brain electrical activities of two spatially separated human subjects, Neuroscience Letters 2003; 336(1): 60–64. 44. Wackermann, J., Dyadic correlations between brain functional states: present facts and future perspectives. Mind and Matter, 2004; 2(1): 105–122. 45. Montagnier, L et al., DNA waves and water, 2010; arXiv:1012.5166. 46. Lee, K.C. et. al., Entangling macroscopic diamonds at room temperature, Science 2011, 334 (6060): 1253-1256. 47. Sarovar, M, Ishizaki, A, Fleming, G R and Whaley, KB, Quantum entanglement in photosynthetic light harvesting complexes, Nature Physics 2012; 6: 462–467. 48. Hu, H, Quantum enigma - physics encounters consciousness (book review). Psyche, 2009; 15: 1-4. 49. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Scientific GOD: How GOD created light & its governing law, Scientific GOD Journal, 2012; 3(10): 912-914. 50. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Scientific GOD: Footprints of omnipresence & omniscience, Scientific GOD Journal, 2012; 3(10): 915-917. ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 52-68 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Human Consciousness as Limited Version of Universal Consciousness 68 51. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Scientific GOD: Michael Persinger & the GOD experiments, Scientific GOD Journal, 2012; 3(10): 918-921. 52. Newton I. The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy. Translated by I.Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman. Preceded by A Guide to Newton's Principia, by I.Bernard Cohen. University of California Press ISBN 0-520-08816-6, 1999. 53. Mach E. The Science of Mechanics; a Critical and Historical Account of its Development. LaSalle, IL: Open Court Pub. Co. LCCN 60010179, 1960. 54. Einstein A. Die Feldgleichungun der Gravitation. Sitzungsberichte der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin Nov. 1915; 844-847. 55. http://cce.laurentian.ca/Laurentian/Home/Departments/Behavioural+Neuroscience/People/Persinger.htm?Laurentian_Lang=en-CA 56. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.11/persinger_pr.html ISSN: 2153-8212 :Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 411 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker Article Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker Matti Pitkänen 1 1 Introduction Robert Becker [5] proposed on basis of his experimental work that living matter behaves as a semiconductor in a wide range of length scales ranging from brain scale to the scale of entire body. Direct currents flowing only in preferred direction would be essential for the functioning of living manner in this framework. One of the basic ideas of TGD inspired theory of living matter is that various currents, even ionic currents, are quantal currents. The first possibility is that they are Josephson currents associated with Josephson junctions but already this assumption more or less implies also quantal versions of direct currents. TGD inspired model for nerve pulse [2] assumed that ionic currents through the cell membrane are probably Josephson currents. If this is the case, the situation is automatically stationary and dissipation is small as various anomalies suggest. One can criticize this assumption since the Compton length of ions for the ordinary value of Planck constant is so small that magnetic flux tubes carrying the current through the membrane look rather long in this length scale. Therefore either Planck constant should be rather large or one should have a non-ohmic quantum counterpart of a direct current in the case of ions and perhaps also protons in the case of neuronal membrane: electronic and perhaps also protonic currents could be still Josephson currents. This would conform with the low dissipation rate. In the following the results related to laser induced healing, acupuncture, and DC currents are discussed first. The obvious question is whether these direct currents are actually currents and whether they could be universal in living matter. A TGD inspired model for quantal direct currents is proposed and its possible implications for the model of nerve pulse are discussed. Whether the model for quantum direct currents is consistent with the proposed vacuum extremal property of the cell membrane [2] remains an open question but both options explain the special role of Ca++ currents and current of N a+ Cooper pairs in the generation of nerve pulse as in would take place in TGD Universe. In fact, it is not clear what one exactly means with the vacuum extremal property of cell membrane. Many-sheeted space-time allows to consider space-time sheets which can be both almost vacuum extremals and far from vacuum extremals. Also space-time sheets for which Planck constant is so large that both electronic and protonic Josephson currents become possible. Various pumps and channels could actually correspond to magnetic flux tubes along which various ionic supra currents or even Josephson currents can flow. The condition that both electronic and protonic supra currents are possible in same length scale leads to the hierarchy of Planck constants coming approximately as powers of mp /me ' 211 proposed originally as a general truth. Radiation at Josephson frequency serves as a signature for Josephson currents. In the following a TGD inspired quantum model for the direct currents of Becker as direct quantum currents is developed and shown to be consistent with what is known about nerve pulse generation. The model of nerve pulse based on this model is discussed in [2]. 1 Correspondence: Matti Pitkänen http://tgdtheory.com/. Address: Köydenpunojankatu 2 D 11 10940, Hanko, Finland. Email: matpitka@luukku.com. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 412 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker 2 Connection between laser induced healing, acupuncture, and association of DC currents with the healing of wounds The findings of Robert Becker (the book ”Electromagnetism and Life” by Becker and Marino can be found from web [5] ) meant a breakthrough in the development of bioelectromagnetics. One aspect of bioelectromagnetic phenomena was the discovery of Becker that DC currents and voltages play a pivotal role in various regeneration processes. Why this is the case is still poorly understood and Becker’s book is a treasure trove for anyone ready to challenge existing dogmas. The general vision guiding Becker can be summarized by a citation from the introduction of the book. Growth effects include the alteration of bone growth by electromagnetic energy, the restoration of partial limb regeneration in mammals by small direct currents, the inhibition of growth of implanted tumors by currents and fields, the effect upon cephalocaudal axis development in the regenerating flatworm in a polarity-dependent fashion by applied direct currents, and the production of morphological alterations in embryonic development by manipulation of the electrochemical species present in the environment. This partial list illustrates the great variety of known bioelectromagnetic phenomena. The reported biological effects involve basic functions of living material that are under remarkably precise control by mechanisms which have, to date, escaped description in terms of solution biochemistry. This suggests that bioelectromagnetic phenomena are fundamental attributes of living things ones that must have been present in the first living things. The traditional approach to biogenesis postulates that life began in an aqueous environment, with the development of complex molecules and their subsequent sequestration from the environment by membranous structures. The solid-state approach proposes an origin in complex crystalline structures that possess such properties as semiconductivity, photoconductivity, and piezoelectricity. All of the reported effects of electromagnetic forces seem to lend support to the latter hypothesis. 2.1 Observations relating to CNS The following more quantitative findings, many of them due to Becker, are of special interest as one tries to understand the role of DC currents in TGD framework. 1. CNS and the rest of perineural tissue (tissue surrounding neurons including also glial cells) form a dipole like structure with neural system in positive potential and perineural tissue in negative potential. There is also an electric field along neuron in the direction of nerve pulse propagation (dendrites correspond to - and axon to +) (note that motor nerves and sensory nerves form a closed loop). Also microtubules within axon carry electric field and these fields are probably closely related by the many-sheeted variants of Gauss’s and Faraday’s laws implying that voltages along two different space-time sheets in contact at two points are same in a static situation. 2. A longitudinal potential along front to back in brain with frontal lobes in negative potential with respect to occipital lobes and with magnitude of few mV was discovered. The strength of the electric field correlates with the level of consciousness. As the potential becomes weaker and changes sign, consciousness is lost. Libet and Gerard observed traveling waves of potentials across the cortical layers (with speeds of about 6 m/s: TGD inspired model of nerve pulse predicts this kind of waves [2] ). Propagating potentials were discovered also in glial cells. The interpretation was in terms of electrical currents. 3. It was found that brain injury generated positive polarization so that the neurons ceased to function in an area much larger than the area of injury. Negative shifts of neuronal potentials were associated with incoming sensory stimuli and motor activity whereas sleep was associated with a positive shift. Very small voltages and currents could modulate the firing of neurons without affecting the resting potential. The ”generating” potentials in sensory receptors inducing nerve pulse were found to ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 413 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker be graded and non-propagating and the sign of the generating potential correlated with sensory input (say increase/reduction of pressure). Standard wisdom about cell membrane has difficulties in explaining these findings. 4. The natural hypothesis was that these electric fields are accompanied by DC currents. There are several experimental demonstrations for this. For instance, the deflection of assumed DC currents by external magnetic field (Hall effect) was shown to lead to a loss of consciousness. 2.2 Observations relating to regeneration The second class of experiments used artificial electrical currents to enhance regeneration of body parts. These currents are nowadays used in clinical practice to induce healing or retard tumor growth. Note that tissue regeneration is a genuine regeneration of an entire part of organism rather than mere simple cell replication. Salamander limb generation is one of the most studied examples. Spontaneous regeneration becomes rare at higher evolutionary levels and for humans it occurs spontaneously only in the fractures of long bones. 1. An interesting series of experiments on Planaria, a species of simple flatworm with a primitive nervous system and simple head-to-tail axis of organization, was carried out. Electrical measurements indicated a simple head-tail dipole field. The animal had remarkable regenerative powers; it could be cut transversely into a number of segments, all of which would regenerate a new total organism. The original head-tail axis was preserved in each regenerate, with that portion nearest the original head end becoming the head of the new organism. The hypothesis was that the original head-tail electrical vector persisted in the cut segments and provided the morphological information for the regenerate. The prediction was that the reversal of the electrical gradient by exposing the cut surface to an external current source of proper orientation should produce some reversal of the head-tail gradient in the regenerate. While performing the experiment it was found found that as the current levels were increased the first response was to form a head at each end of the regenerating segment. With still further increases in the current the expected reversal of the head-tail gradient did occur, indicating that the electrical gradient which naturally existed in these animals was capable of transmitting morphological information. 2. Tissue regeneration occurs only if some minimum amount of neural tissue is present suggesting that CNS plays a role in the process although the usual neural activity is absent. The repeated needling of the stump had positive effect on regeneration and the DC current was found to be proportional to innervation. Hence needling seems to stimulate innervation or at least inducing formation of DC currents. Something like this might occur also in the case of acupuncture. 3. Regeneration involves de-differentiation of cells to form a blastema from which the regenerated tissue is formed. Quite early it was learned that carcinogens induce de-differentiation of cells because of their steric properties and by making electron transfer possible and that denervation induces tumor formation. From these findings Becker concluded that the formation of blastema could be a relatively simple process analogous to tumor growth whereas the regeneration proper is a complex self-organization process during which the control by signals from CNS are necessary and possibly realized in terms of potential waves. 4. Regeneration is possible in salamander but not in frog. This motivated Becker and collaborators to compare these situations. In an amputated leg of both salamander and frog the original negative potential of or order -1 mV went first positive value of order +10 mV. In frog it returned smoothly to its original value without regeneration. In salamander it returned during three days to the original base line and then went to a much higher negative value around -20 mV (resting potential is around -70 mV) followed by a return to the original value as regeneration had occurred. Thus the large ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 414 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker negative potential is necessary for the regeneration and responsible for the formation of blastema. Furthermore, artificial electron current induced regeneration also in the case of frog and in even in the denervated situation. Thus the flow of electrons to the stump is necessary for the formation of blastema and the difference between salamander and frog is that frog is not able to provide the needed electronic current although positive potential is present. 5. It was also learned that a so called neural epidermic junction (NEJ) formed in the healing process of salamander stump was responsible for the regeneration in the presence of nervation. The conclusion was that the DC voltage and electronic current relevant for regeneration can be assigned the interface between CNS and tissue rather than with the entire nerve and regeneration seems to be a local process, perhaps a feed of metabolic energy driving self-organization. Furthermore, NEJ seems to make possible the flow of electrons from CNS to the stump. 6. The red blood cells of animals other than mammals are complete and possess thus nuclei. Becker and collaborators observed that also red blood cells dedifferentiated to form blastema. Being normally in a quiescent state, they are ideal for studying de-differentiation. It was found that electric current acted as a trigger at the level of cell membrane inducing de-differentiation reflected as an increased amount of mRNA serving as signal for gene expression. Also pulsed magnetic field was found to trigger the de-differentiation, perhaps via induced electric field. By the way, the role of the cell membrane fits nicely with the view about DNA-cell membrane system as topological quantum computer with magnetic flux tubes connecting DNA and cell membrane serving as braids. 7. The experiments of Becker and collaborators support the identification of the charge carriers of DC currents responsible for the formation of large negative potential of stump as electrons. The test was based on the different temperature dependence of electronic and protonic conductivities. Electronic conductivity increases with temperature and protonic conductivity decreases and an increase was observed. In TGD based model also super-conducting charge carriers are possible and this finding does not tell anything about them. 2.3 Gene activation by electrostatic fields? The basic question concerns the method of activation. The discovery of chemists Guido Ebner and Guido Schuerch [4] raises the hope that these ideas might be more than over-active imagination and their work also provides a concrete proposal for the activation mechanism. Ebner and Schuerch studied the effect of electrostatic fields on the growth and morphogenesis of various organisms. Germ, seeds, or eggs were placed between conducting plates creating an electric field in the range .5-2 kV/m: note that the Earth’s electric field is in the range .1 − 4 kV/m and of the same order of magnitude. The outcome was rather surprising and in the year 1989 their employer Ciba Geigy (now Novaris) applied for a patent ”Method of enhanced fish breeding” [4] for what is called Ciba Geigy effect. The researchers describe how fishes (trouts) develop and grow much better, if their eggs have been conditioned in an electrostatic field. The researchers report [4] that also the morphology of the fishes was altered to what seems to represent an ancient evolutionary form: this was not mentioned in the patent. The chemists founded their own Institute of Pharmaceutical Research near Basel, where Guido Ebner applied for another very detailed patent, which was never granted (it is not difficult to guess the reasons why!). In the patent he describes the effect of electrostatic fields on several life forms (cress, wheat, corn, fern, micro-organisms, bacteria) in their early stage of development. A clear change in the morphogenesis was observed. For instance, in one example fern had all sort of leaves in single plant apparently providing a series of snapshots about the evolution of the plant. The evolutionary age of the first leaf appeared to be about 300 million years whereas the last grown-up leaf looked close to its recent form. If one takes these finding seriously, one must consider the possibility that the exposure to an electrostatic field can activate passive genes and change the gene expression so that older morphologies are ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 415 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker expressed. The activation of not yet existing morphologies is probably more difficult since strong consistency conditions must be satisfied (activation of program requires activation of a proper hardware). This would suggest that genome is a kind of archive containing also older genomes even potential genomes or that topological quantum computer programs [1] determine the morphology to certain extent and that external conditions such as electric field determine the self-organization patters characterizing these programs. It is known that the developing embryo has an electric field along the head-tail axis and that this field plays an important role in the control of growth. These fields are much weaker than the fields used in the experiment. p-Adic length scale hierarchy however predicts an entire hierarchy of electric fields and living matter is indeed known to be full of electret structures. The strength of the electric field in some p-adic length scale related to DNA might somehow serve as the selector of the evolutionary age. The recapitulation of phylogeny during the ontogeny could mean a gradual shift of the activated part of the memone, perhaps assignable to tqc programs, and be controlled by the gradually evolving electric field strength. The finding that led Ebner to his discovery was that it was possible to ”wake up” ancient bacteria by an exposure to an electrostatic field. The interpretation would be in terms of loading of metabolic batteries. This would also suggest that in the case of primitive life forms like bacteria the electric field of Earth has served as metabolic energy source whereas in higher life forms endogenous electric fields have taken the role of Earth’s electric field. 2.4 A TGD based model for the situation On basis of these observations one can try to develop a unified view about the effects of laser light, acupuncture, and DC currents. It is perhaps appropriate to start with the following - somewhat leading - questions inspired by a strong background prejudice that the healing process - with control signals from CNS included - utilizes the loading of many-sheeted metabolic batteries by supra currents as a basic mechanism. In the case of control signals the energy would go to the ”moving of the control knob”. 1. Becker assigns to the system involved with DC currents an effective semiconductor property. Could the effective semiconductor property be due the fact that the transfer of charge carriers to a smaller space-time sheet by first accelerating them in electric field is analogous to the transfer of electrons between conduction bands in semiconductor junction? If so, semiconductor property would be a direct signature of the realization of the metabolic energy quanta as zero point kinetic energies. 2. Supra currents flowing along magnetic flux tubes would make possible dissipation free loading of metabolic energy batteries. This even when oscillating Josephson currents are in question since the transformation to ohmic currents in semiconductor junction makes possible energy transfer only during second half of oscillation period. Could this be a completely general mechanism applying in various states of regeneration process. This might be the case. In quantal situation the metabolic energy quanta have very precise values as indeed required. For ohmic currents at room temperature the thermal energies are considerably higher than those corresponding to the voltage involved so that they seem to be excluded. The temperature at magnetic flux tubes should be however lower than the physiological temperature by a factor of order 10−2 at least for the voltage of -1 mV. This would suggest high Tc super-conductivity is only effective at the magnetic flux tubes involved. The finding that nerve pulse involves a slight cooling of the axonal membrane proposed in the TGD based model of nerve pulse [2] to be caused by a convective cooling due the return flow of ionic Josephson currents would conform with this picture. 3. What meridians are and what kind of currents flow along them? Could these currents be supra currents making possible dissipation-free energy transfer in the healthy situation? Does the negative potential of order -1 mV make possible flow of protonic supra currents and loading of metabolic ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 416 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker batteries by kicking protons to smaller space-time sheets? Could electronic supra currents in opposite direct induce similar loading of metabolic batteries? Could these tow miniature metabolisms realize control signals (protons) and feedback (electrons)? The model answering these questions relies on following picture. Consider first meridians. 1. The direct feed of metabolic energy as universal metabolic currencies realized as a transfer of charge carriers to smaller space-time sheets is assumed to underly all the phenomena involving healing aspect. Meridian system would make possible a lossless metabolic energy feed - transfer of ”Chi” - besides the transfer of chemically stored energy via blood flow. The metabolic energy currencies involved are very small as compared to .5 eV and might be responsible only for ”turning control knobs”. The correlation of the level of consciousness with the overall strength of DC electric fields would reduce to the level of remote metabolic energy transfer. 2. The model should explain why meridians have not been observed. Dark currents along magnetic flux tubes are ideal for the energy transfer. If the length of the superconducting ”wire” is long in the scale defined by the appropriate quantum scale proportional to ~, classical picture makes sense and charge carriers can be said to accelerate and gain energy ZeV . For large values of ~ an oscillating Josephson current would be in question. The semiconductor like structure at the end of meridian -possibly realized in terms of pair of space-time sheets with different sizes- makes possible a net transfer of metabolic energy even in this case as pulses at each half period of oscillation. The transfer of energy with minimal dissipation would thus explain why semiconductor like property is needed and why acupuncture points have high value of conductivity. The identification of meridians as invisible magnetic flux tubes carrying dark matter would explain the failure to observe them: one further direct demonstration for the presence of dark matter in biological systems. 3. In the case of regeneration process NEJs would be accompanied by a scaled down version of meridian with magnetic flux tubes mediating the electronic Josephson current during blastema generation and protonic supra current during the regeneration proper. Space-time sheets of proton resp. electron correspond to kp and ke = kp + 11. In a static situation many-sheeted Gauss law in static situation would guarantee that voltages over NJE are same. 4. One can of course worry about the smallness of electrostatic energies ZeV as compared to the thermal energy. Zero point kinetic energy could correspond also to the magnetic energy of the charged particle. For sufficiently large values of Planck constant magnetic energy scale is higher than the thermal energy and the function of voltage could be only to drive the charged particles along the flux tubes to the target: and perhaps act as a control knob with electrostatic energy compensating for the small lacking energy. Suppose for definiteness magnetic field strength of B = .2 Gauss explaining the effects of ELF em fields on brain and appearing in the model of EEG. Assume that charged particle is in minimum energy state with cyclotron quantum number n = 1 and spin direction giving negative interaction energy between spin and magnetic field so that the energy is (g − 2)~eB/2mp . Assume that the favored values of hbar correspond to number theoretically simple ones expressible as a product of distinct Fermat primes and power of 2. In the case of proton with g ' 2.7927 the standard metabolic energy quantum E0 = .5 eV would require roughly ~/~0 = 17 × 234 . For electron g − 2 ' α/π ' .002328 gives ~/~0 = 5 × 17 × 230 . Consider next NEJs and semiconductor like behavior and charging of metabolic batteries. 1. Since NEJ seems resembles cell membrane in some respects, the wisdom gained from the model of cell membrane and DNA as tqc can be used. The model for nerve pulse and the model for DNA as topological quantum computer suggest that dark ionic currents flowing along magnetic flux tubes characterized by a large value of Planck constant are involved with both meridians and NJEs and might even dominate. Magnetic flux tubes act as Josephson junctions generating oscillatory supra ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 417 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker currents of ions and electrons. For large values of ~ also meridians are short in the relevant dark length scale and act as Josephson junctions carrying oscillatory Josephson currents. 2. The findings of Becker suggest that acu points correspond to sensory receptors which are normally in a negative potential. The model for the effects of laser light favors (but only slightly) the assumption that in a healthy situation it is protons arriving along magnetic flux tubes which are kicked to the smaller space-time sheets and that negative charge density at acu point attracts protons to the acu point. Electrons could of course flow in reverse direction along their own magnetic flux tubes and be kicked to the smaller space-time sheets at the positive end of the circuit. In the case of brain, protonic end would correspond to the frontal lobes and electronic end to the occipital lobes. This kind of structure could appear as fractally scaled variants. For instance, glial cells and neurons could form this kind of pair with neurons in negative potential and glial cells in positive potential as suggested by the fact that neuronal damage generates positive local potential. 3. Classically the charge carriers would gain energy E = ZeV as they travel along the magnetic flux tube to NJE. If this energy is higher than the metabolic energy quantum involved, it allows the transfer of charge carrier to a smaller space-time sheet so that metabolic resources are regenerated. Several metabolic quanta could be involved and the value of V (t) would determine, which quantum is activated. The reduction of the V below critical value would lead to a starvation of the cell or at least to the failure of control signals to ”turn the control knob”. This should relate to various symptoms like pain at acupuncture points. In a situation requiring acupuncture the voltage along flux tubes would be so small that the transfer of protons to the smaller space-time sheets becomes impossible. As a consequence, the positive charge carriers would accumulate to the acu point and cause a further reduction of the voltage. Acupuncture needle would create a ”wound” stimulating large positive potential and the situation would be very much like in regeneration process and de-differentiation induced by acupuncture could be understood. Many questions remain to be answered. 1. What causes the de-differentiation of the cells? The mere charging of metabolic energy batteries perhaps? If so then the amount of metabolic energy- ”chi”- possessed by cell would serve as a measure for the biological age of cell and meridian system feeding ”chi” identified as dark metabolic energy would serve as a rejuvenating agent also with respect to gene expression. Or does the electric field define an external energy feed to a self-organizing system and create an electromagnetic environment similar to that prevailing during morphogenesis inducing a transition of cells to a dedifferentiated state? Or could DNA as tqc allow to understand the modification of gene expression as being due to the necessity to use tqc programs appropriate for regeneration? Or should cells and wounded body part be seen as intentional agents doing their best to survive rather than as passive parts of biochemical system? 2. Acupuncture and DC current generation are known to induce generation of endorphins. Do endorphins contribute to welfare by reducing the pain or do they give a conscious expression for the fact that situation has improved as a result of recharging of the metabolic energy batteries? 3. Could the continual charging of metabolic energy batteries by DC currents occur also in the case of cell membrane? The metabolic energy quantum would be around .07 eV in this case and correspond to p-adic length scale k = 140 for proton (the quantum is roughly a fraction 1/8 of the fundamental metabolic energy quantum .5 eV corresponding to k = 137). 3 Quantum model for effective semiconductor property Becker [5] summarizes his findings by stating that living matter is effective semiconductor. There are pairs of structures in positive and negative potential in various scales and the current between the plates ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 418 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker of this effective capacitor flows when above some minimum potential difference. The current flows from positive to negative pole and could be electron current. Also proton current in opposite direction can be considered but electron current is experimentally favored. For instance consciousness is lost when magnetic field is used to deflect the current. In TGD framework natural carriers of these currents would be magnetic flux tubes carrying also electric fields. A very simple deformation of the imbeddings of constant longitudinal magnetic fields gives also longitudinal electric field. With a slight generalization one obtains helical electric and magnetic fields. A crucial difference is that these currents would be quantal rather than ohmic currents even in the length scale of biological body and even longer scales assignable to the magnetic body. The following argument allows to understand the physical situation. 1. A precise everyday analogy is vertical motion in the gravitational field of Earth between surface and some target at given height h. If the kinetic energy is high enough, the particle reaches the target. If not, the particle falls back. In quantum case one expects that the latter situation corresponds to very small probability amplitude at the target (tunneling to classically forbidden kinematic region). 2. Now electric field replaces gravitational field. Suppose that the classical electric force experienced by the particle is towards the capacitor plate taking the role of the surface of Earth. Below critical field strength the charged particle cannot reach the target classically and quantum mechanically this occurs only by tunneling with vanishingly small probability. 3. Particles with opposite value of charge experience force which accelerates them and classically they certainly reach the second plate. What happens in quantum situation? It seems that this situation is essentially identical with the first one: one has linear potential in finite interval and wave functions are localized in this range. One can equivalently regard these states as localize near the second capacitor plate. 4. A good analogy is provided by atoms: classically electron would end down to the nucleus but quantization prevents this. Also now one can imagine stationary solutions for which the electric currents for individual charges vanish at the plates although classically there would be a current in another direction. Also quantum mechanically non-vanishing conserved current is possible: all depends on boundary conditions. 3.1 Basic model Consider now the situation at more quantitative level. 1. One can assign complex order parameters Ψk to various Bose-Einstein condensates of supra phases and obey Schrödinger equation i∂t Ψk = (− ~2 2 ∂ + qk Ez)Ψk . 2mk z (3.1) Here it is assumed that the situation is effectively one-dimensional. E is the value of constant electric field. 2. The Schrödinger equation becomes non-linear, when one expresses the electric field in terms of the total surface charge density associated with the plates of effective capacitor. In absence of external electric field it is natural to assume that the net surface charge densities σ at the plates are of opposite sign so that the electric field inside the capacitor is proportional to ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 419 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker σ = E= X σi = X qi Ψi Ψi . (3.2) i This gives rise to a non-linear term completely analogous to that in non-linear Schrödinger equation. A more general situation corresponds to a situation in which the region interval [a, b] bounded by capacitor plates a and b belongs to a flux longer tube like structure [A, B]: [a, b] ⊂ [A, B]. In this case one has Etot = E + E0 . (3.3) This option is needed to explain the observations of Becker that the local strengthening of electric field increases the electron current: this would be the case in the model to be discussed if this field has a direct opposite to the background field E0 . One could also interpret E as quantized part of the electric field and E0 as classical contribution. 3. The electric currents are given by jk i~qk Ψk ∂z↔ Ψk . 2mk = (3.4) In stationary situation the net current must vanish: X jk = 0 . (3.5) k A stronger condition is that individual currents vanish at the plates: jk = 0 . (3.6) It must be emphasized that this condition does not make sense classically. 3.2 Explicit form of Schrödinger equation Consider now the explicit form of Schrödinger equation in given electric field. 1. The equation is easy to solve by writing the solution ansatz in polar form (the index k labelling the charge particle species will be dropped for notational convenience). Ψ = R(aexp(iU ) + bexp(−iU ))exp(−iEn t) (3.7) For real solutions current vanishes identically and this is something which is not possible classically. It is convenient to restrict the consideration to stationary solutions, which are energy eigen states with energy value En and express the general solution in terms of these. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 420 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker 2. The Schrödinger equation reduces with the change of variable z → z0 = (z − z0 ) ≡x , z1 En ~2 1/3 , z1 = ( ) . qE 2mqE (3.8) to (∂x2 + x)Ψ = 0 . (3.9) The range [0, z0 ] for z is mapped to the range [−z0 /z1 , 0]. z0 /z1 has positive sign as is easy to verify. The value range of x is therefore negative irrespective of the sign of qE. This is equation for Airy functions [3]. Airy functions are encounterd in WKB approximation in the approximation that potential function is linear. These functions appear also in the model of rainbow. The change of variable leads automatically to solutions restricted near the plate where the situation is completely analogous to that in gravitational field of Earth. For stationary solutions test charge in a given background field would be localized near capacitor plate with opposite sign of charge. A strong background field could be created by charges which do not correspond to the ionic charges defining ionic currents. Electrons and protons could define this field possibly associated with flux tubes considerably longer than the distance between capacitor plates. 3. Using the polar representation Ψ = Rexp(iU ) Schrödinger equation reduces to two equations  (∂x2 − Ux2 + x)R cos(U ) +  2  (∂x − Ux2 + x)R sin(U ) −  [Uxx + 2∂x R∂x U ] sin(U ) = 0 , [Uxx − 2∂x R∂x U ] cos(U ) = 0 . (3.10) Note that both (R, U ) and (R, −U ) represent solutions for given value of energy so that the solution can be chosen to be proportional to cos(U ) or sin(U ). The electric current j is conserved and equal to the current at x = 0 and given by j = ~ ~ Ux 2 R , z1 = ( )1/3 . 2m z1 2mqE (3.11) The current vanishes if either Uz is zero or if the solution is of form Ψ = Rsin(U ). 3.3 Semiclassical treatment In semiclassical approximation potential is regarded as so slowly varying that it can be regarded as a constant. In this situation one can write the solution of form Rexp(iU ) as Ψ = R0 exp  Z z   Z x  √ p i 2m E − qEzdz = R0 exp i x1/2 dx . ~ 0 0 (3.12) The plate at which the initial values are given can be chosen so that the electric force is analogous to gravitation at the surface of Earth. This requires only to replaced coordinate z with a new one vanishing at the plate in question and gives to the energies a positive shift E0 = qE0 h. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 421 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker 1. The semiclassical treatment of the equation leads to Bohr rules H pz dz ~ = 2 ~ Z h pz dz = n . (3.13) 0 This gives H pz dz ~ = √ Z Z x0 2 2m h p 4 3/2 En − qEzdz = 2 x1/2 = x0 = n . ~ 3 0 0 (3.14) Note that the turning point for classical orbit corresponds to zmax = En /qE. 2. One obtains En = 1 nqE~2 2/3 , r= ( √ ) 2 r m Z 1 (1 − u)1/2 du = 0 2 . 3 (3.15) The value of zmax is zmax = En n2/3 ~2 1/3 = 2/3 ( ) . qE qEm 2r (3.16) 3. The approximation R = R0 = constant can make sense only if the position of the second plate is below zmax . This is possible if the value of n is large enough (n2/3 proportionality), if the mass m of the charged particle is small enough (m−1/3 proportionality raising electron and also proton to special position, or if the strength of electric field is small enough (E −1/3 proportionality). The value zmax is proportional to ~2/3 so that a phase transition increasing Planck constant can induce current flow. 3.4 Possible quantum biological applications The proposed model for quantum currents could provide quantum explanation for the effective semiconductor property of DC currents of Becker. 1. The original situation would be stationary with no currents flowing. The application of external electric field in correct direction would reduce the voltage below the critical value and currents would start to flow. This is consistent with Becker’s findings if there is background electric field E0 so that the applied field has direction opposite to E0 so that the field strength experienced by charged particles is reduced and it is easier for them to reach the second plate. This is of course a possible objection against the proposal. 2. Becker’s DC currents appear in several scales. They are assigned with the pairs formed by CNS and perineural tissue (this includes also glia cells) and by frontal and occipital lobes. Acupuncture could involve the generation of a DC supra current. The mechanism would be essential in the healing. Also the mechanism generating qualia could involve generation of supra currents and dielectric breakdown for them. The role of the magnetic flux tubes in TGD inspired biology suggests that the mechanism could be universal. If this were the case one might even speak about Golden Road to the understanding of living matter at basic level. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 422 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker Even the generation of nerve pulse might be understood in terms of this mechanism. One can argue that neurons have higher evolutionary level than the system pairs to which only electron currents or electron and proton currents can be assigned. This because the value of Planck constant is higher for the magnetic flux tubes carrying the quantal ionic currents. 1. For Bose-Einstein condensate the simplest choice is n = 1 at both plates. The energy eigenvalues would naturally differ by the shift E0 = qE0 h at the two plates for given particle type. Under these assumptions the current can flow appreciably only if the voltage is below the minimum value. This is certainly a surprising conclusion but brings in mind what happens in the case of neuronal membrane. Indeed, hyper-polarization has a stabilizing - something difficult to understand classically but natural quantum mechanically. 2. The reduction of membrane potential slightly below the resting potential generates nerve pulse. Also a phase transition increasing the value of Planck constant might give rise to quantal direct currents and generate flow of ionic currents giving rise to nerve pulse. Stationary solutions are located near either capacitor plate. What comes in mind is that nerve pulse involves a temporary change of the capacitor plate with this property. 3. If electron and proton currents flow as direct currents, one encounters a problem. Nerve pulse should begin with direct electronic currents and followed by direct protonic currents and only later ions should enter the game if at all. The existing model for nerve pulse however assumes that at least electrons flow as oscillating Josephson currents rather than direct quantal currents. This is quite possible and makes sense if the cell membrane thickness small - that is comparable to electron Compton length as assumed in large ~ model for the nerve pulse. This assumption might be necessary also for proton and would make sense if the Planck constant for protonic flux tubes is large enough. For ions the Compton length would be much smaller than the thickness of cell membrane and direct currents would be natural. If the Planck constant is same for biologically important ions, direct quantum currents would be generated in definite order since in h < zmax one has zmax ∝ m−1/3 ∝ A−1/3 . The lightest ions would start to flow first. (a) Nerve pulses can generated by voltage gated channels for potassium and calcium. Voltage gated channels would correspond to magnetic flux tubes carrying electric field. For voltage gated channels Na+ ions with atomic weight A = 23 and nuclear charge Z = 11 start to flow first, then K + ions with atomic weight A = 39 and Z = 19 follow. This conforms with the prediction that lightest ions flow first. The nerve pulse duration is of order 1 millisecond at most. (b) Nerve pulses can be also generated by voltage gated Ca+2 channels. In this case the duration can be 100 ms and even longer. Ca has A = 40 and Z = 20. The proper parameter is x = r2 /qA, r = ~/~0 . One has r(Ca++ 2 23 x(Ca++ ) = ( ) × . x(N a+ ) r( N a+ ) 2 × 40 (3.17) r2 (Ca++ ) ∼ 2r2 (N a+ ) would allow to compensate for the increased weight and charge of Ca++ ions. 4. The objection is that N a+ and K + are not bosons and therefore cannot form Bose-Einstein condensates. The first possibility is that one has Cooper pairs of these ions. This would imply x(Ca++ ) r(Ca++ 2 23 =( ) × . + x(2N a ) r( N a+ ) 20 ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 423 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker Ca++ and N a+ pair would be in very similar position for a given value of Planck constant. This is a highly satisfactory prediction. Another manner to circumvent the problem is more science fictive and assumes that the N a+ ions are exotic nuclei behaving chemically as N a+ but having one charged color bond between nucleons. It remains to be seen whether this model is consistent with the model of cell membrane as almost vacuum extremal or whether the vacuum extremal based model could be modified by treating ionic currents as direct currents. In the vacuum extremal model classical Z 0 gauge potential is present and would give a contribution to the counterpart of Schrödinger equation. The ratio x(Ca+ +)/x(2N a+ ) for the parameter x = r2 /q(A − Z)A (em charge q is replaced with neutron number in good approximation) equals to 1.38 and is not therefore very far from unity. The many-sheetedness of space-time is expected to play a key role and one should precisely specify which sheets are almost vacuum extremals and which sheets are far from vacuum extremals. One expects that magnetic flux tubes are far from vacuum extremals and if voltage gated ionic channels are magnetic flux tubes, the proposed model might be consistent with the model of cell membrane as almost vacuum extremal. 4 The effects of ELF em fields on vertebrate brain The effects of ELF em fields on vertebrate brain [6] occur both in frequency and amplitude windows. Frequency windows can be understood if the effect occur at cyclotron frequencies and correspond to absorption of large ~ photons. A finite variation width for the strength of magnetic field gives rise to a frequency window. The observed quantal character of these effects occurring at harmonics of fundamental frequencies leads to the idea about cyclotron Bose-Einstein condensates as macroscopic quantum phases. The above considerations support the assumption that fermionic ions form Cooper pairs. I have tried to understand also the amplitude windows but with no convincing results. The above model for the quantum currents however suggests a new approach to the problem. Since ELF em fields are in question they can be practically constant in the time scale of the dynamics involved. Suppose that the massless extremal representing ELF em field is orthogonal to the flux tube so that the ions flowing along flux tube experience an electric force parallel to flux tube. What would happen that the ions at the flux tube would topologically condensed at both the flux tube and massless extremal simultaneously and experience the sum of two forces. This situation is very much analogous to that defined by magnetic flux tube with longitudinal electric field and also now quantum currents could set on. Suppose that semiconductor property means that ions must gain large enough energy in the electric field so that they can leak to a smaller space-time sheet and gain one metabolic quantum characterized by the p-adic length scale in question. If the electric field is above the critical value, the quantum current does not however reach the second capacitor plate as already found: classically this is of course very weird. If the electric field is too weak, the energy gain is too small to allow the transfer of ions to smaller space-time sheet and no effect takes place. Hence one would have an amplitude window. References [1] M. Pitkänen. DNA as Topological Quantum Computer. In Genes and Memes. Onlinebook. http: //tgdtheory.com/public_html/genememe/genememe.html#dnatqc, 2006. [2] M. Pitkänen. Quantum Model for Nerve Pulse. In TGD and EEG. Onlinebook. http://tgdtheory. com/public_html//tgdeeg/tgdeeg/tgdeeg.html#pulse, 2006. [3] Airy functions. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airy_function. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research| May 2012| Vol 3.| Issue 4| pp. 411-424 424 Pitkänen, M., Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker [4] Pflanzenwachstum durch Elektrofeld. http://www.s-line.de/homepages/keppler/elektrofeld. htm. [5] R. O. Becker and G. Selden. The Body Electric: Electromagnetism and the Foundation of Life. William Morrow & Company, Inc., New York, 1990. [6] C. F. Blackman, J. A. Elder, C. M. Weil, S. G. Benane. Induction of calsium-ion efflux from brain tissue by radio-frequency radiation: effects of modulation frequency and field strength. Radio Sci., Vol. 14, 1979. ISBN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration &Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 997 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm Article Extension of the Physical Realm Elemér E. Rosinger 1 Department of Mathematics & Applied Mathematics, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, 0002 South Africa Abstract This is a two part paper. The first part, written somewhat earlier, presented standard processes which cannot so easily be accommodated within what are presently considered as physical type realms. The second part further elaborates on that fact. In particular, it is argued that quantum superposition and entanglement may better be understood in extensions of what we usually consider as physical type realms, realms which, as it happens, have so far never been defined precisely enough. Part I Summary It has for ages been a rather constant feature of thinking in science to take it for granted that the respective thinking happens in realms which are totally outside and independent of all the other phenomena that constitute the objects of such thinking. The imposition of this divide on two levels may conflict with basic assumptions of Newtonian and Einsteinian mechanics, as well as with those in Quantum Mechanics. It also raises the question whether the realms in which thinking happens have no any other connection with the realms science deals with, except to host and allow scientific thinking. 0. The Yet Undefined Physical Realms ... In the sequel, based on rather obvious and simple, even if so far seldom considered facts within, or related to Physics, we shall argue that what are usually assumed to be the Physical Realms may have to be extended. Such possible additional realms, however, are not along those infinitely many of Everett’s ”many-worlds” view of Quantum Mechanics. Instead, they are suggesting a finite number of further physical type realms, thus they can be seen as a development of the classical Cartesian realm of ”res extensa”. As for what Physical Realms may actually mean, or rather, Physics itself, here is a recent and quite appropriate view on that never yet clarified issue, [8, pp. 153,154] : ”Physics is the study of those phenomena that are successfully treatable with well-specified and testable models. For example, Physics treats atoms and simple molecules. Chemistry, on the other hand, deals with all molecules, most of whose electron distributions cannot be well specified. A physicist might study a well specified biological system, but the functioning of a complex organism lies in the domain of biologists. Anything not successfully treatable with a well-specified and testable model is rather quickly defined out of Physics.” 1 Correspondence: Elemér E. Rosinger Email: eerosinger@hotmail.com. Note: This work was completed in 2007 and adopted from arXiv:physics/0505041v3 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 998 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm It is quite clear in this spirit that, even if no one seems to care much about a more precise definition of Physics, and thus, of Physical Realms, phenomena such as human thinking, let alone, human consciousness or awareness, are not expected to concern Physics any time soon. Consequently, what for Descartes constituted ”res cogitans”, that is, the realms of thinking, are supposed to remain in the splendour of their undisturbed solitude, as far as Physics is concerned. And then, anything that may be seen as remotely acceptable from a physical point of view, may be but a refinement, or rather, a structural enrichment of the Cartesian ”res extensa”, that is, of the realms which, at least intuitively, are supposed to have to do with Physics. And yet, as seen in the sequel, the story is not quite that simple, not even from a strictly physical point of view ... 1. Conflict with Newtonian Mechanics Instant action at arbitrary distance, such as in the case of gravitation, is one of the basic assumptions of Newtonian mechanics. This certainly does not appear to conflict with the fact that we can think instantly and simultaneously about phenomena which are no matter how far apart from one another in space or in time. However, absolute space is also a basic assumption of Newtonian Mechanics. And it is supposed to contain absolutely everything that may exist in Creation, be it in the past, present or future. Consequently, it is supposed to contain, among others, the physical body of the thinking scientist as well. Yet it is not equally clear whether it also contains scientific thinking itself which, traditionally, is assumed to be totally outside and independent of all phenomena under its consideration, therefore in particular, of the Newtonian absolute space, and also, of absolute time. And then the question arises : Where and how does such a scientific thinking take place or happen ? 2. A difference with Mathematics Mathematical thinking, especially in its modern and abstract variants, does not appear to need the assumption of any absolute space, or for that matter, absolute time. Such thinking may appear to unfold during appropriate local time intervals. However, when seen all in itself, and unrelated to the physical body of the respective mathematician, it is quite likely that such thinking has no location in any space, be it relative or absolute. 3. Conflict with Einsteinian Mechanics In Einsteinian Mechanics a basic assumption is that there cannot be any propagation of action faster than light. Yet just like in the case we happen to think in terms of Newtonian Mechanics, our thinking in terms of Einsteinian Mechanics can again instantly and simultaneously be about phenomena no matter how far apart from one another in space or time. Consequently, the question arises : Given the mentioned relativistic limitation, how and where does such a thinking happen ? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 999 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm 4. Conflict with Quantum Mechanics Let us consider the classical EPR, or Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen entanglement phenomenon, and for simplicity, do so in the terms N of quantum computation. For that purpose it suffices to consider double qubits, that is, elements of C2 C2 , such as for instance the EPR pair | ω00 > = | 0, 0 > + | 1, 1 > = (4.1) = |0> N |0> + |1> N | 1 > ∈ C2 N C2 which is well known to be entangled, in other words, | ω00 > is not of the form (α| 0 > + β| 1 >) N (γ| 0 > + δ| 1 >) ∈ C2 N C2 for any α, β, γ, δ ∈ C2 . Here we can turn to the usual and rather picturesque description used in quantum computation, where two fictitious personages, Alice and Bob, are supposed to exchange information, be it of classical or quantum type. Alice and Bob can each take their respective qubit from the entangled, or EPR pair of qubits | ω00 >, and then go away with it no matter how far apart from one another. And the two qubits thus separated in space will remain entangled, unless of course one or both of them get involved in further classical or quantum interactions. For clarity, however, we should note that the single qubits which, respectively, Alice and Bob take away with them from the EPR pair | ω00 > are neither one of the terms | 0, 0 > or | 1, 1 > in (4.1), since both these are themselves already pairs of qubits, thus they cannot be taken away as mere single qubits, either by Alice, or by Bob. Consequently, the single qubits which Alice and Bob take away with them cannot be described in any other form, except that which is implicit in (4.1). Now, after that short detour into the language of quantum computation, we can note that, according to Quantum Mechanics, the entanglement in the EPR double qubit | ω00 > implies that the states of the two qubits which compose it are correlated, no matter how far from one another Alice and Bob would be with them. Consequently, knowing the state of one of these two qubits can give information about the state of the other qubit. On the other hand, in view of General, or even Special Relativity, such a knowledge, say by Alice, cannot be communicated to Bob faster than the velocity of light. And yet, anybody who is familiar enough with Quantum Mechanics, can instantly know and understand all of the above, no matter how far away from one another Alice and Bob may be with their respective single but entangled qubits. So that, again, the question arises : How and where does such a thinking happen ? 5. Two, Among Other Possible Alternatives Let us first assume that scientific thinking does indeed happen in realms outside and independent of all the realms in which the variety of phenomena studied by scientific thinking takes place. Then the very existence of scientific thinking proves the existence of realms transcendental to those which at present are customarily the object of that scientific thinking. In this case, one may ask whether the realms in which scientific thinking happens have, indeed, no any ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 1000 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm other connection whatsoever with the realms which are the object of study of science, except to host and allow such scientific thinking. A cautious answer is of course not one of categorical negation. Furthermore, any answer, including a categorically negative one, may need some supporting evidence, and possibly of experimental or empirical kind as well. If alternatively, we assume that, after all, there is only one overall realm in which everything happens, then quite likely we may have to extend rather significantly, if not in fact dramatically, the list of entities, phenomena, or processes which are, or can be relevant in Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and so on. Certainly, in such a case it can no longer be taken for granted - and done so without any supporting evidence - that the whole range of entities and their interactions which form the object of science are isolated in some subdomain of that unique overall realm. And very much isolated they appear to be, since usual scientific thinking itself is assumed to be outside and independent of them, plus we deal with all those entities and their interactions as if they were perfectly self-contained. 6. Conclusions It may be useful to ask the following four questions : 1. Do we believe that whatever in Creation which may be relevant to science is already accessible to our awareness ? 2. And if not - which is most likely the case - then do we believe that it may become accessible during the lifetime of our own generation ? 3. And if not - which again is most likely the case - then do we believe that we should nevertheless try some sort of two way interactions with all that which may never ever become accessible to the awareness of our generation, yet may nevertheless be relevant to science even in our own days ? 4. And if yes - which most likely is the minimally wise approach - then how do we intend to get into a two way interaction with all those realms about which our only awareness can be that they shall never ever be within our awareness, or perhaps, not even of human awareness as such, no matter how long our species may live ? Part II Summary It is further argued that quantum superposition and entanglement may better be understood in extensions of what we usually consider to be physical type realms, realms which in fact have never been defined precisely enough. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 1001 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm 1. Superposition : a Typically Quantum Fundamental Phenomenon In the non-relativistic Quantum Mechanics of a finite system S described by states in a Hilbert space H, if for instance ψ1 , ψ2 ∈ H are two possible orthogonal states of the system S, then further states of S are given by the arbitrary linear combinations (1.1) ψ = c1 ψ1 + c2 ψ2 , c1 , c2 ∈ C where the usual normalizing conditions are assumed (1.2) ||ψ1 || = ||ψ2 || = 1, |c1 |2 + |c2 |2 = 1 hence resulting as well in (1.3) ||ψ|| = 1 So far, in no other theory of Physics is such a property present. As for the importance of that property in Quantum Mechanics it suffices to recall two facts : it leads to yet unsolved foundational controversies, as in the celebrated argument in Schrödinger’s Cat, and it is considered to be one of the basic resources of quantum computers, a resource which allows them unprecedented computational power, a power not possible to attain with usual electronic computers. 2. Realms Physical, and Other Ones Less So ? It is nowadays a fundamental assumption that the Physical Realms do surely contain all there is, or at least, all there is of interest to Physics. And as with many a fundamental assumption, this one is so deeply ingrained that hardly anyone finds any reason at all to make it explicit to any extent. One of the amusing aspects of such an approach is the convenient circularity of the argument, a circularity which, however, does not seem to concern in the least its proponents ... Another amusing aspect is the recently emerging credo, according to which ”information is physical” ... This credo does, of course, reflect an awareness that what earlier were perceived, mostly tacitly, as the possible boundaries of the Physical Realms should now be extended in order not to leave out such an entity of fast growing importance like information. And needless to say, such a move to encompass information within the Physical Realms is rather easy to accomplish, since the latter remains as undefined as it has always been ... Indeed, there is here a significant mismatch between the rather clear definition of information in present day science and technology, and on the other hand, the actual, and quite convenient vagueness of what the Physical Realms are supposed to be about. Not to mention that, in spite of the insistent propagation of that newly emerged credo, the concept of information is in fact treated as a second class one at best in most of the present day fundamental theories of Physics, including in Quantum Mechanics. On the other hand, and despite of the above, it is quite clear that the so called Physical Realms, even in their ever vague and latest extended sense, do not contain all that is of interest. And on top of it, they happen to fail to do so precisely on their own terms. Several such instances were discussed in Part I, and here we recall one of them : Anybody, and even more so a physicist, can at the same time think about two arbitrarily far away places in the universe, for instance, two galaxies. On the other hand, according to Relativity Theory, no physical interaction can take place ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 1002 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm with arbitrary velocity. Thus such a thinking, so easily and so commonly available to quite everybody, cannot be of a physical nature. And then, the question arises : Where and how does such a thinking happen, if not within the Physical Realms, and definitely not there, in view of Physics itself ? And while such a question remains unanswered, and in fact, not even considered by present day Physics, perhaps one may as well compound the issue with the following. It was Descartes in the early 1600s, who suggested the existence of two distinct realms. His ”res extensa” was more or less what has been meant by the Physical Realms. On the other hand, his ”res cogitans” was a realm beyond and outside of ”res extensa”, and it encompassed thinking. As a consequence, Descartes has for long been ridiculed as being a dualist ... Such a judgment misses, however, the fundamental fact that, as so many major European scientists of his time, Descartes himself was a deeply religious person in the Christian tradition. Consequently, he could not possibly be less removed from dualism than anybody else, since he saw God as underlying all Creation, and thus in particular, both ”res extensa” and ”res cogitans”. Now of course, Descartes himself did not advocate the study of ”res cogitans” by the means of Physics, whatever the latter may mean under reasonable conditions. And Classical Physics, that is, prior to the 20th century, did not in any way seem to require a more direct involvement of ”res cogitans” than it would usually happen in the customary thinking process of normal humans, among them, physicists. Relativity Theory, in spite of the above question, has not changed that classical situation, and it did not appear to need to do so. What it does instead, and even if not yet seriously considered, is to point quite sharply to the existence of at least two very different realms. And for the lack of better terms, as well as a homage to Descartes, we can still call those two realms as ”res extensa” and ”res cogitans”, respectively. 3. Does Superposition Need a Third Realm ? This may not be such an easy to answer question as one would like it. Indeed, Schrödinger’s Cat already shows that it is not trivial. Therefore, let us consider it with some care. What is obvious from (1.1) - (1.3) is that superposition takes place in the Hilbert space H, that is, within the mathematical model of the quantum system S. And as mathematical models go, they may hopefully reflect their respective system which, of course, is supposed to be situated in ”res extensa”, but on the other hand, as mere models, are not supposed to be identical with such a system. This failure to distinguish between a physical system and its model is precisely one of the reasons one ends up with the controversy about Schrödinger’s Cat. And then, the question arises : Are superpositions (1.1) - (1.3) bona fide physical phenomena, or on the contrary, they are merely convenient features of the respective mathematical model ? ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 1003 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm Well, as far as one can understand, this question does not have a clear enough answer in present day Quantum Mechanics. However, as it may happen with not a few physicists, in case one tends to consider superpositions as genuine physical phenomena, then the foundational controversy around Schrödinger’s Cat may simply be set aside by considering a third realm which we may call ”res super-extensa”, and in which such superpositions take place. This realm contains the usual ”res extensa”, in the sense that ψ in (1.1), as a superposition of ψ1 and ψ2 , belongs to it, without however belonging to ”res extensa”, while ψ1 and ψ2 belong to the latter. Clearly, just as with ”res extensa”, there is no need for any overlapping between ”res super-extensa” and ”res cogitans”. Here, however, one should note that the mathematical model (1.1) - (1.3), assumed to be in ”res cogitans”, need not always distinguish between ”res extensa” and ”res super-extensa”. Indeed, ψ in (1.1), as an element of the Hilbert space H, can in itself belong to ”res extensa”, as long as it is not seen as being constituted as a superposition. The point to note with the above is that it is precisely the preference to see superpositions as physically real, that is, as having genuine physical existence, and not merely being representations in a mathematical model, which, when considered together with conundrums such as Schrödinger’s Cat, can suggest the consideration of a third realm, such as that of ”res super-extensa”. 4. And How About Entanglements ? As seen in Part I, entanglement also raises a question as to where and how it happens, given what appears to be its instantaneous nonlocal manifestation. And yet, it may appear that entanglement, even more than superposition, is seen by physicists as a genuine physical phenomenon, and not merely as some occurrence in the mathematical model. In this regard, no less than superpositions, entanglements are typical quantum phenomena, as well as unprecedented resources in quantum computation. As for their foundational importance, it suffices to recall the celebrated EPR paper, with all the related subsequent developments. Thus a fundamental and still controversial issue which entanglements bring up is that of nonlocality. This fact, as is well known, was brought forward most starkly with the celebrated Bell Inequalities. Here however, once one may consider the possibility of a third realm, like for instance, the above ”res super-extensa”, which is in fact but a larger instance of the customary ”res extensa”, the very issue of nonlocality may benefit from a new view and understanding. Indeed, it may simply happen that in ”res super-extensa” the dichotomy ”local - nonlocal” is meaningless. And here we should recall that such a possibility is not at all strange, since in a bounded system modelled mathematically by a compact space, the very concept of ”nonlocal” loses much of its usual difficulties, if not in fact, its meaning. And in this regard we can recall that, so far, the very question whether the whole of the universe itself is in fact bounded is still open. But then, and as if to complicate the issues, entanglements need not necessarily happen in the same extension of ”res extensa” in which superposition may happen. Consequently, we may yet have to consider another, namely, third physical type realm as well. A further possible consequence of considering physical extensions of the usual ”res extensa” is that the foundational controversy related to the so called ”hidden variables” in Quantum Mechanics may give ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 1004 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm way in favour of whole physical realms which, so far, were themselves hidden. In other words, it may well happen that what has been missing were not some hidden variables within this or that quantum entity, but rather whole physical type realms within which the very quantum processes as a whole may actually take place. And with the acceptance in String Theory of the fact that the so called Physical Realms may have highly counterintuitive large finite dimensions, some of them so contracted as to make the dichotomy ”local - nonlocal” quite meaningless, there is no longer any particular reason to be so parsimonious when considering the possible realms, beyond the usual ”res extensa”, that may be relevant to Physics. 5. Conclusions Several extensions of what usually is meant by the otherwise undefined concept of Physical Realms were argued, based on rather obvious, simple, as well as fundamental physical considerations. In section 2, such an extension is motivated by the limitation of velocity of physical interactions, as follows from Relativity. In section 3, it was argued that, precisely to the extent that quantum superposition is not a mere feature of a mathematical model, but a genuine physical phenomenon, an extension of the customary concept of Physical Realms may be needed. In section 4, it was argued that quantum entanglement may need yet another such extension. And as suggested, such possible extensions of the concept of Physical Realms need not necessarily be given by one and the same additional realm. In case such a multiplicity of realms, beyond the two classical Cartesian ones, may raise certain concerns, one can always remember that, as thinking humans, thus in particular, physicists, our basic realm is in fact the ”res cogitans”. No wonder that Descartes insisted on what he considered as the fundamental ontological fact for us humans, namely, ”cogito, ergo sum” ... And therefore, without much further intellectual effort, we may at a certain stage subsume all other possible realms to that one. In other words, we may as well consider that everything is but a model, including what for so long we considered as having ”objective” existence, whatever ”objective” may happen to mean, namely, the Physical Realms. The only major difference such a subsummation may imply is that we should redefine accordingly what we mean by ”experimental evidence”, and in particular, by ”falsifiability”. References [1] Angel, R B : Relativity, The Theory and its Philosophy. Pergamon, New York, 1980 [2] Auletta, G : Foundations and Interpretation of Qunatum Mechanics. World Scientific, Singapore, 2000 [3] Dirac, P A M : Lectures on Quantum Mechanics. Dover, New York, 2001 [4] Einstein, A : Relativity. Routledge, London, 2003 [5] Greenstein G, Zajonc A G : The Quantum Challenge, Modern Research on the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics (second edition). Jones & Bartlett, Boston, 2006 [6] Hirvensalo, M : Quantum Computing. Springer, New York, 2001 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| August 2012| Volume 3| Issue 8| pp. 997-1005 1005 Rosinger, E. E., Extension of the Physical Realm [7] Isham, C J : Quantum Theory, Mathematical and Structural Foundations. Imperial College Press, London, 1997 [8] Rosenblum B, Kuttner F : Quantum Enigma, Physics Encounters Consciuousness. Oxford Univ. Press, 2006 [9] Rosinger E E : Mathematics and ”The Trouble with Physics”, How Deep We Have to Go ? arXiv:0707.1163 [10] Silagadze Z K : Realtivity without Tears. arXiv:0708.0929 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.scigod.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 69-74 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research 69 News Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research Huping Hu* & Maoxin Wu ABSTRACT Michael Persinger’s Group at Laurentian University, Canada, have obtained groundbreaking new results in consciousness, quantum brain & nonlocality research which are published in this Special Issue. These new results together with what have already been achieved in these fields in the past such as the results of Hu & Wu, Persinger’s team and some of other researchers have important implications for further advancements of these fields. Key Words: photon emission, biophoton, brain, magnetic field, nonlocality, potential entanglement. The above photograph shows most people in Professor Michael Persinger's Neuroscience Research Group involved with consciousness research on site at Laurentian University: Top row (left to right): Joey Caswell, Brendan Lehaman, David Vares, Blake Dotta, Andrew Lapointe; Second row (left to right): Nirosha Murugan, Lukasz Karbowski, Kevin Saroka, Mandy Scott; Bottom row (left to right): Lucas Tessaro, Michael Persinger, Paula Corradini, Constance Reed, Lyndon Juden-Kelly; Absent: Ryan Burke, Mark Collins, Linda St-Pierre, Stanley Koren, Rob Lafrenie, Trevor Carniello. Michael Persinger has been a pioneer in the field of experimental studies of mystical experiences and is known together with his research team for the "God Helmet” [e.g., 1-2]. Now Persinger Correspondence: Huping Hu, Ph.D., J.D., QuantumDream Inc., P. O. Box 267, Stony Brook,, NY 11790. E-mail: editor@prespacetime.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 69-74 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research 70 and his team have obtained groundbreaking new results in consciousness, quantum brain & nonlocality research which are published in this Special Issue of Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research [3-5]. These new results together with what have already been achieved in these fields in the past by Hu & Wu [6-12], Persnger’s team [13-19] and some of the other researchers in these or related fields (e.g., 20-39, some of which were scorned and/or alleged to be pseudoscientific or unreproducible) have very important implications for further advancements of these and related fields. Congruence of Energies of Several Quantitative Measurements in the Brain Supports SpinBased Consciousness Persinger’s Group first reported in this journal in December 2011 significant increases in biophoton emissions along the right side but not the left when subjects imagined white light in a dark environment [13]. The Group reported that the increased biophoton emissions did not occur when the same subjects thought about mundane experiences [13]. In the first new experimental study published in this Special Issue [3], Persinger and his team have explored the hypothesis by Hu & Wu that networks of nuclear spins in neural membranes could be modulated by action potentials by measurements of the quantitative changes in photon emissions, electroencephalographic activity, and alterations in the proximal geomagnetic field during successive periods when a subject sitting in the dark imagined white light or did not. Persinger and his team found that during brief periods of imagining white light the power density of photon emissions from the right hemisphere was about 10-11 W∙m-2 that was congruent with magnetic energy within the volume associated with a diminishment of ~7 nT. Their spectral analyses showed maxima in power from electroencephalographic activity within the parahippocampal region and photon emissions from the right hemisphere with shared phase modulations equivalent to about 20 ms. They further found that beat frequencies (6 Hz) between peak power in photon (17 Hz) and brain (11 Hz) amplitude fluctuations during imagining light were equivalent to energy differences within the visible wavelength that were identical to the intrinsic 8 Hz rhythmic variations of neurons within the parahippocampal gyrus. These quantitative measuements plus quantitative analysis by Persinger and his team strongly suggest that spin energies similar to what was discussed by Hu & Wu [6-8] can accommodate the interactions between protons, electrons, and photons and the action potentials associated with intention, consciousness and entanglement. Demonstration of Entanglement of “Pure” Photon Emissions at Two Locations That Share Specific Configurations of Magnetic Fields Have Important Implications for Translocation of Consciousness In the Journal of Biophysical Chemistry [14], Dotta and Persinger first reported their finding of the doubling of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatially separated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. As demonstrated by ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 69-74 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research 71 Persinger and his team, the experimental demonstration of non-locality for photon emissions has become relevant because biophotons are coupled to conscious activity and cognition. In the second new experimental study published in this Special Issue [4], Persinger and his team applied the experimental condition that produces doubling of photon emissions from two loci during simultaneous chemical reactions when exposed to a sequence of circular rotating magnetic fields with differential phase and group angular velocities to photons from lightemitting diodes (LEDs). They found a significant but weaker enhancement of photon emissions as measured by photomultiplier tubes occurred when the two LEDs were activated simultaneously within two loci separated by several meters. If alternative explanations can be excluded, the observed effect suggest that under optimal conditions photons emitted from two, magnetic field congruent, loci become macroscopically entangled and that the two loci display properties of a single space. This effect in turn may have implications for the transposition of consciousness over large distances as suggested by Persinger’s team. Potential Entanglement of Brain Activity Over 300 Km for Pairs of Subjects Sharing the Same Specific Configuration of Magnetic Fields Is Demonstrated as Measured by s_LORETA and QEEG In Brain Research [15], Persinger and his team first reported that light flashes delivered to one aggregate of cells evoked increased photon emission in another aggregate of cells maintained in the dark in another room if both aggregates shared the same temporal and spatial configuration of changing rate, circular magnetic fields. They also reported that increased photon emissions occurred beside the heads of human volunteers if others in another room saw light flashes during the presentation of the same shared circumcerebral magnetic fields. They further reported that when the shared magnetic fields were not present, both cellular and human photon emissions during the light flashes did not occur. In the third new experimental study published in this issue [5], pairs of subjects separated by 300 km were either exposed or not exposed to specific configurations of circular magnetic fields. Persinger and his team found that when one person in the pair was exposed to sound pulses within the classical electroencephalographic band, there were discrete changes in power within the cerebral space of the other person even though they were not aware of the stimulus times and separated by 300 km. However, the intracerebral changes that only occurred if the magnetic fields were activated around the two cerebrums simultaneously were discrete and involved about single, punctate volumes of about 0.13 cc (125 mm3). Their calculations show that the potential energy from the applied magnetic field within this volume was about 6∙10-14 J and with an average brain power frequency of 10 Hz would result in 6∙10-13 W. Further assuming π∙102 m2 for the surface area of the cerebrum, this is equivalent to ~2∙10-11 W∙m-2 which is in the same order of magnitude as that associated with photon emission during cognition. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 69-74 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research 72 References 1. Persinger, M. A., Vectorial cerebral hemisphericity as differential sources for the sensed presence, mystical experiences and religious conversions. Psychological Reports, 1993; 76: 915-930. 2. Persinger, M. A. & Lavallee, C. F., The electromagnetic induction of Mystical and Altered States within the Laboratory. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(7): 785-807. 3. Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Saroka, K. S., & Scott, M. A., Congruence of energies for cerebral photon emissions, quantitative EEG activities and ~5 nT changes in the proximal geomagnetic field support spin-based hypothesis of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2013; 4(1): 1-24. 4. Dotta, B. T., Koren, S. A. & Persinger, M. A., Demonstration of entanglement of “pure” photon emissions at two locations that share specific configurations of magnetic fields: implications for translocation of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2013; 4(1): 25-34. 5. Burke, R. C., Gauthier, M. Y., Rouleaum,N. & Persinger, M. A., Experimental demonstration of potential entanglement of brain activity over 300 Km for pairs of subjects sharing the same circular rotating, angular accelerating Magnetic fields: verification by s_LORETA, QEEG measurements. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2013; 4(1): 35-44. 6. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Spin-mediated consciousness theory. arXiv 2002; quant-ph/0208068. Also see Med. Hypotheses, 2004; 63: 633-646. 7. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Spin as primordial self-referential process driving quantum mechanics, spacetime dynamics and consciousness. NeuroQuantology, 2004; 2:41-49. Also see Cogprints: ID2827 2003. 8. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Action potential modulation of neural spin networks suggests possible role of spin in memory and consciousness. NeuroQuantology, 2004; 2:309-316. Also see Cogprints: ID3458 2004d. 9. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Thinking outside the box: the essence and implications of quantum entanglement. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 4: 5-16. 10. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Photon induced non-local effect of general anesthetics on the brain. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 4: 17-31. Also see Progress in Physics, 2006; v3: 20-26. 11. Hu, H. & Wu, M., Evidence of non-local physical, chemical and biological effects supports quantum brain. NeuroQuantology, 2006; 4: 291-306. Also see Progress in Physics 2007; v2: 17-24. 12. Hu, H. & Wu, M., New nonlocal biological effect: a preliminary research. NeuroQuantology, 2012; 10(3): 462-467. 13. Dotta, B. T., Persinger, M. A., Increased Photon Emissions from the Right But Not the Left Hemisphere While Imagining White Light in the Dark: The Potential Connection Between Consciousness and Cerebral Light. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2011; 2(10): 1538-1548. 14. Dotta, B. T, Persinger, M. A, Doubling of local photon emissions when two simultaneous, spatiallyseparated, chemiluminescent reactions share the same magnetic field configurations. Journal of Biophysical Chemistry, 2012; 3(1). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 69-74 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research 73 15. Dotta, B. T, Buckner, C. A, Lafrenie, R. M., Persinger, M. A., Photon emissions from human brain and cell culture exposed to distally rotating magnetic fields shared b separate light-stimulated brains and cells. Brain Research, 2011; 1388: 77-88. 16. Persinger, M.A., Koren, S.A. & Tsang, E.W. Enhanced power within a specific band of theta activity in one person while another receives circumcerebral pulsed magnetic fields: a mechanism for cognitive influence at a distance? Perceptual and Motor Skills, 2003; 97: 877-894. 17. Persinger, MA, Tsang, EW, Booth, JN and Koren, SA, Enhanced power within a predicted narrow band of theta activity during stimulation of another by circumcerebral weak magnetic fields after weekly spatial proximity: evidence for macroscopic entanglement? NeuroQuantology 2008; 6(1): 7-21. 18. Persinger, M. A. et.al. Theoretical and experimental evidence of macroscopic entanglement between Human Brain Activity and Photon Emissions: Implications for Quantum Consciousness and Future Applications. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, 2010; 1(7): 808-830. 19. Persinger, M. A., Dotta, B. T., Temporal Patterns of Photon Emissions Can Be Stored and Retrieved Several Days Later From the “Same Space”: Experimental and Quantitative Evidence. NeuroQuantology, 2011;9(4): 605-613. 20. Grinberg-Zylberbaum, J. & Ramos, J., Patterns of interhemispheric correlation during human communication. International Journal of Neuroscience, 1987; 36: 41–53. 21. Reid, B. L. On the nature of growth and new growth based on experiments designed to reveal a structure and function for laboratory space. Medical Hypotheses, 1989; 29: 105-127. 22. Gariaev, P.P., et. al., Holographic Associative Memory of Biological Systems, Proceedings SPIE, Optical Memory and Neural Networks, 1991; 1621: 280- 291. 23. Radin, D., Entangled Minds: Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality, 2006, Paraview Pocket Books. 24. Sheldrake, R., Morphic Resonance: The Nature of Formative Causation, 2009, Park Street Press. 25. Davenas E, Beauvais F, Amara J, et al. Human basophil degranulation triggered by very dilute antiserum against IgE, Nature, 1988; 333 (6176): 816–8. 26. Jahn, R. G., Dunne, B. J., Margins of Reality: The Role of Consciousness in the Physical World, 2009, ICRL Press. 27. Achterberg, J. et. al., Evidence for correlations between distant intentionality and brain function in recipients: A functional magnetic resonance imaging analysis. J. Altertaive & Complimentary Med., 2005; 11 (6): 965–971. 28. Pizzi, R, Fantasia, A, Gelain, F and Rosetti, D, Vdscovi, A. Nonlocal correlations between separated neural networks. Quantum Information and Computation II. Proceedings of SPIE 2004; 5436: 107. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research| February 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 1 | pp. 69-74 Hu, H. & Wu, M., Groundbreaking New Results in Consciousness, Quantum Brain & Nonlocality Research 74 29. Conte, E. et. al. A Preliminary Experimental Verification of Violation of Bell Enequality in a Quantum Model of Jung Theory of Personality. JCER, 2010: 1(7): 831-849. 30. Emoto, M., The Hidden Messages in Water, 2005, Atria. 31. Josephson, B.D., Pallikari-Viras, F., Biological utilisation of quantum nonlocality, Foundations of Physics, 1991, 21: 197-207. 32. Stapp, H. P., Mind Matter and Quantum Mechanics, 1993, Springer-Verlag, Berlin. 33. Tiller, W. A., Psychoenergetic Science, 2007, Pavior. 34. Standish, L, Johnson, L, Kozak, L and Richards, T, EEG evidence of correlated event related signals between the brains of spatially and sensorily isolated human subjects. J. Alter. Compl. Med. 2004; 10, 307. 35. Wackermanna,J, Seiterb,C, Keibel,H and Walach, H, Correlations between brain electrical activities of two spatially separated human subjects, Neuroscience Letters 2003; 336(1): 60–64. 36. Wackermann, J., Dyadic correlations between brain functional states: present facts and future perspectives. Mind and Matter, 2004; 2(1): 105–122. 37. Montagnier, L et al., DNA waves and water, 2010; arXiv:1012.5166. 38. Lee, K.C. et. al., Entangling macroscopic diamonds at room temperature, Science 2011, 334 (6060): 1253-1256. 39. Sarovar, M, Ishizaki, A, Fleming, G R and Whaley, KB, Quantum entanglement in photosynthetic light harvesting complexes, Nature Physics 2012; 6: 462–467. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

432 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Conference Report The Explosion of Consciousness: TSC Conference Tucson Arizona 2012 John K. Grandy* ABSTRACT It may be said that TSC conference 2012 was an explosion of consciousness with a wide variety of presentations related to consciousness. The war of the worldviews was an interesting introduction to the conflict between the spiritual and material accounts of consciousness, but in the end there was a sense that more effort should be placed on establishing some common ground. There was a great deal of focus on neurology and NCC. This is likely due to the advances in the field of neuroimaging that allow the localization of brain function and the effects of connectivity. This conference also featured a new marriage between consciousness and fractals. New modalities of consciousness were also seen. There was also interesting research on precognition. In addition, there were many new and exciting topics in the poster presentations which ranged from quantum physics to plant sensitivity to human emotion. So overall, this was a well organized conference with many excellent presentations from many different areas that are moving toward a science of consciousness. Key Words: TSC 2012, science of consciousness, worldview, spiritual, material, NCC, fractal, new modality, precognition, quantum physics. Introduction This year’s 2012 Toward a Science of Consciousness (TSC) biennial conference was held in Tucson Arizona at the fabulous and beautiful Loew’s Ventana Canyon Resort. I also attended last year’s TSC 2011 conference in Stockholm Sweden, so the concept of this type of multiinterdisciplinary conference that focuses purely on this thing called consciousness is not foreign to me. This conference is held annually- alternating one year at Tucson and the other year somewhere else. It was pioneered by Dr. Stuart Hameroff, who has been putting on the TSC conferences for 20 years, and still going strong! Much of the work and organization for this type of conference falls on conference secretary Abi Behar Montefiore, who by all means deserves honorable mention. In fact, Stuart referred to her as “superwoman” during the conference opening. I did attempt to cover as many different types of presentations as possible in order to keep this article balanced, but with so many plenary sessions and several concurrent sessions taking place throughout the week (not to mention that I had a presentation of my own to do), this was indeed * Correspondence: John K. Grandy. E-Mail: khyber_john@yahoo.com ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 433 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 difficult. In addition, I also tried to mention some of the poster presentations as I feel that these presentations are important as well and typically are overlooked in most conference reviews that are published. I did not attend any of the preconference workshops as it is against my religion to pay additional fees after already paying a conference fee. I wanted to be comprehensive but I did not want to go to hell in the process. Finally, I was not able to stay until Saturday, April the 14th due to work obligations, so I apologize in advance for the presentations not mentioned on that day. War of the World Views: An Ongoing Affair This is a continuation of a debate that began between spiritualist Deepak Chopra and scientist Leonard Mlodinow. These two gentlemen coauthored the book War of the World Views, which initiated this debate and some of the readers may remember their debate from the TSC 2011 conference in Stockholm Sweden. However, this year there would be two additional speakers added to the debate- another spiritualist Menas Kafatos and another scientist Susan Blackmore, thus increasing the number of axis and allies. During the introduction, moderator David Chalmers said jokingly that this is not so much a “war” per se, but perhaps a “tennis match” of the world views and he then made some other cheerful analogies, which received a good response from the audience. This lighten up the mood for the debate. The first speaker up was Deepak Chopra. He opened up with an account of how this war of the world views began and then stated “I am a lover, not a fighter”. Evidently, the consciousness of the spirit of Michael Jackson is still alive and well. He then went on to state that science builds and organizes facts and measurements, but there is still no scientifically testable theory of consciousness to which someone yelled out “Hameroff might be upset about that”! He then discussed the yoga paths of unified consciousness and the seven states of consciousness, which are topics in some of his books. The second speaker was Leonard Mlodinow as one of the scientist and/or materialist. He opened up with a retort to Deepak that “scientists are not embarrassed about not having a theory of consciousness”. Then he discussed how from the dawn of time that man has tried to explain, from explaining eclipses by dancing wolves up to the ancient Greek atomist explaining that if everything is broken down into smaller parts that the result would be atoms. It was made clear that scientists do not try to prove their theory but rather they try to disprove it using the scientific method because scientists want to explain. Menas Kafatos took the stage next by opening up “I do not like being placed in a category” because “you can’t go too much to one side”. This was a commendable statement but strange at the same time as the debate was suppose to have two materialists and two spiritualists. Either way, he began by stating that classic physics allows direct observation, whereas quantum physics has opened the door to consciousness. However, the quantum world allows complementary aspects of a reality that the human mind rejects e.g. “maybe the atoms don’t exist”. The ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 434 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 possibility that the atoms may not exist is based on the possibility that particles may be strings (as in string theory) and even “super string theory”. Menas closed by stating “do not reject science, revise it, we have always been revising it”. Last, but certainly not least, was Susan Blackmore, who opened up by stating “In six years so much has been learned about the brain”. She stated that the problem [with consciousness] is duality and the answer is “I DON’T KNOW”, which she yelled humorously. Susan then revisited Daniel Dennett’s teachings and that he proposed that one should give up their intuition because it is usually wrong. She also discussed her journey to becoming a materialist/reductionist, which began, ironically, as a researcher of paranormal activity for several decades. After all that time of researching paranormal activity Susan stated that she found no proof of paranormal activity and that spiritualists may want to keep an open mind because “they may be wrong”. She ended by throwing a dagger directly at the heart of Deepak about a statement that he made in regards to his book on money, “Deepak, you may be happy to call that spirituality but I am not”, and the crowd went wild! After the four speakers were finished there was a “discussion” of sorts that ensued. This consisted of three of the speakers sitting, which was the procedure that was involved in all the other discussions during the conference; however Deepak felt the need to stand up and move toward the front of the stage. This was perhaps an attempt to elevate himself in the eyes of the audience or perhaps he believes that he is that much more important. Either way, the general perception was that he was not so much a part of the conversation but rather the intentional crux of the discussion. The conversation volleyed back and forth between Deepak and Susan for most of the discussion, with Deepak playing some word games e.g. “what do you mean by I?” when there was a disagreement. Susan had astutely pointed out some glaring contradictions on Deepak’s concept of dualism, which he maintained was not dualism at all. Many of us in the audience were confused about were Deepak actually stood and some folks sitting next to me were shaking their heads during Deepak’s unduly expostulation. The war of the world views was an interesting display of different perspectives on consciousness. However, I would have liked to see the four of them focus on what they all have in common in an attempt to establish a core or nexus and then dispute the differences. It was obvious that some common ground was sorely lacking in all of this and that with all of these world views we have a lot of books, but no answers. Science of Meditation: Concurrent Session April 10, 2012 I attended a few presentations from this concurrent session as the topic caught my attention. The one that really stood out was “Meditation-Induced Bliss Viewed as Release from Conditioned Neural (Thought) Patterns which Block Reward Signals in the Brain Pleasure Center” which was given by Patricia Sharpe from Bowling Green State University, Ohio. This presentation began by proposing that half of all human thought is considered daydreaming and that this maybe a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 435 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 compulsive behavior. However, Buddhism attempts to clear the mind of discurssive thought with meditation and this leads to bliss. Patricia then gave a very in-depth discussion of what she calls “the correlates of bliss”. This involves primarily the nucleus accumbens, its connection to dopamine release, the release of endogenous opioids, and a two way feedback loop with the medial prefrontal cortex. Dopamine release is strongly associated with reward learning and is released while doing drugs, gambling, or having sex. However, this release decreases over repeated exposure and this leads to discontent. She then reviewed a study that showed that meditation-induced bliss involves dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens and that a decrease in this type of release does not take place over repeated mediation sessions. This was a very interesting presentation, but there were some questions about the research methodology. One of the audience members asked about different forms of meditation and how this can be delineated with the results that were presented. Also there were questions as to how meditation serves to breakup repetitive grasping thought patterns. There were no definite answers at this point in the research, but this did appear to be a great introduction to some of the neural correlates of mediation. Searching for Consciousness in Sleep, Coma, and Anesthesia This was the first part of Wednesday’s plenary presentations. The first presentation “Brain Connectivity in Disorders of Consciousness” was given by Melanie Boly from the Belgian National Fund of Scientific Research. She presented some very interesting research on the functional neuroimaging of disorders of consciousness e.g. coma patients, vegetative states, and minimally conscious state. Melanie had made it clear that there has been an evolution in the field of study with patients with disorders of consciousness. This has transformed from measuring resting cerebral blood flow or electrical activity to studying an actual functional response to stimuli and to active paradigms, which can be accomplished utilizing connectivity approaches that are based on newer technology e.g. PET scan and functional MRI (fMRI). She began by pointing out that the clinical definition of consciousness focuses on wakefulness and alertness. However, 40% of patients in a minimally conscious state and vegetative state are misdiagnosed. Her approach is that with decrease or loss of consciousness the focus is on the functional connectivity of the brain, which focus on evaluating global cerebral functions. This involves looking at a global workspace which has two components: awareness of self and awareness of the environment. She also mentions a second method, called the perturbational approach, which utilizes TMS-EEG (transcranial magnetic stimulation and electroencephalography). Her research and approach concludes that decrease in consciousness e.g. in a coma patient, correlate with decrease in brain connectivity and decrease in cerebral integration, which can be demonstrated with PET scan and fMRI. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 436 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 The second speaker was Antonio Zadra from the Centre for Advanced Research in Sleep Medicine, at the University of Montreal. His presentation “Sleep Mentation and Sleep EEG During Adult Somnambulism”, focused on sleep walking (somnambulism). He pointed out that behavioral episodes during somnambulism can vary, in where these patients actually get up and do things as if they were conscious. These events are typically accompanied by visual and/or auditory hallucinations; in many cases the event is remembered by the patient upon awakening. This brings up the question- are sleep walkers asleep or dreaming? Antonio provided some very interesting clinical case studies on this topic. One patient was a woman, who during a somnambulism episode would get up and scratch at the wall because she could hear children crying behind it. Another patient believed that his dog, sleeping at the foot of the bed, was on fire and he got up in his sleep and threw the dog in the shower, dousing the animal with water. Antonio provided a few other examples, but his point was that these patients would get up and do activities as if they were awake, as if they were conscious and not asleep. Antonio also presented laboratory findings on sleep EEG that were recorded during actual episodes. The patterns of brain activity were consistent with the idea that sleepwalking is a dissociative state with some parts of the sleepwalkers’ brains being asleep while others reflect wakefulness. He ended by concluding that, perceptual, cognitive, and affective dimensions play a role in the subjective experience of somnambulism. Hameroff asked the question “are they conscious or just zombies on autopilot?” to which there was no definitive answer, but Antonio did add that there is a strong genetic component to this disorder. The third presentation in this series was given by George Mashour, an anesthesiologist from the University of Michigan. His presentation on “Consciousness in the Operating Room” focused on the phenomenon of intraoperative awareness. This is a clinical description of a patient’s experience and explicit recall of a surgical procedure despite being under anesthesia, which is associated with a high incidence of post-traumatic stress. George proposes that the problem with intraoperative awareness is linked to the problem of consciousness in terms of measuring anesthetic effects in the brain. The network of the frontoparietal portion of the brain was discussed in response to different types of anesthesia e.g. Propofol, Sevoflurane, and Ketamine. This network consists of a cortical feedback connection that is “preferentially inhibited” during general anesthesia, although feed forward connection seems to persist during general anesthesia. His conclusion was that general anesthesia is a “higher order” phenomenon that may be rooted in top-down signals from the frontal cortex to important areas of integration such as the posterior parietal cortex. George also gave honorable mention to lodestar anesthesiologist Henry Beecher, who proposed in the 1940s that anesthesia could help unravel the problem of consciousness. Additionally, there was an excellent question at the end of the presentation about the effect of polypharmacy in the patient undergoing anesthesia. George responded that “the effect of anesthesia is so profound, that it usually does not matter”. He emphasized that general anesthesia—at some dose—is able to suppress consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 437 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Overall this plenary session was outstanding because there were some very tangible objectives met about consciousness from a medical stand point. This highlights the growing amount of scientific acumen that is establishing definable NCC. Fractal Consciousness This was one of the other three sections of Wednesday’s plenary presentations and was being telecasted to India, which is where the 2013 TSC conference will be held!! I remember about six months before this conference when I was watching a PBS special “Fractals: Hunting the Hidden Dimension”; I said to myself “wow, there are some correlations to consciousness here”. Perhaps I am a tad bit psychic as there was an entire plenary session dedicated to “fractal consciousness” at the 2012 TSC. The first presentation was “Scale-Free Brain Activity” given by Biyu Jade He from NIH/NINDS, Bethesda, Maryland. She opened with a somber disclaimer “I am not claiming fractal consciousness”. An introduction was given on brain oscillations and fractals. However, I will not discuss the equations or the math here. She proposed that we must go beyond the power-law distribution and to explore the fine spatiotemporal patterns and scale-free brain activity (SFBA). A part of SFBA is the slow cortical potential (SCP). This was studied with intracranial EEG and fMRI to observe scale-free dynamics and oscillations. He’s research maintained that task modulation of SFBA results in a decrease in exponent that correlates well with the fractal signal obtained by fMRI or intracranial EEG. She concluded that SCP is not too slow for consciousness. However, it appears that conscious awareness under these experimental conditions is at this point inconclusive. The second presentation was “Rapid Sampling of Brainwaves Clarifies Fractal Nature of EEG”, which was given by Peter Walling from Baylor University Medical Center, Anesthesiology and Pain Management. He opened with discussing attractors in phase space and how sine waves are important in consciousness as they carry information and are themselves attractors. In physics, an attractor is typically a point in ideal multidimensional phase space that is used to describe a system toward which the system tends to evolve. This is irrelevant to the starting conditions of the system. In addition, he mentioned four types of attractors, classical pathways toward chaos, and fractals. He presented an intriguing graph of attractor dimensions plotted verse time. This graph had many different animals plotted against their appearance in the fossil record. He then proposed that attractor dimensions increased with the appearance of newer species, which may be important to evolution, but also stated “this is not proof but [rather] a clue”. The third presentation was given by Stuart Hameroff. His topic was “Fractal Brain Hierarchy, Consciousness and Orch OR”. He began by defining scale-invariant brain processes which have 1/f fractal-like conformations. The grid cells in the entorhinal cortex were provided as an example as they represent the spatial environment at different fractal scales, “like zooming in and out on a Google map”. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 438 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Stuart then proposed that we need to go deeper into finer scales inside neurons that underlie neuron and synaptic functions, specifically cytoskeletal microtubules. He then jokingly announced “I have been obsessed with microtubules for 40 years, so you knew that was coming”! He also proposed that the fractal nature of microtubules, for example recently discovered coherent microtubule dynamics at kilohertz, megahertz and gigahertz frequency ranges, may provide sub-neuronal layers in a fractal brain hierarchy. As to what process might occur at these various levels to provide consciousness, PenroseHameroff Orch OR was then discussed as the only theory proposing a specific process that results in consciousness. According to Orch OR, quantum computations in the microtubules are terminated by a mode of quantum state reduction due to an objective threshold (or objective reduction) which was proposed by Roger Penrose. This is represented by the equation E = Ђ/t, connecting conscious moments to self-organizing processes in fundamental space-time geometry, the most basic level of the universe, which itself may be scale-invariant according to Stuart. Stuart also addressed criticisms of Orch OR, specifically from two Australian groups from both the University of Sydney and the University of Queensland that pointed to problems due to the nature of microtubule coherence which is ascribed for the most part to the nature of Frohlich condensation. Stuart’s replied by referring to recent experimental evidence from the group of Anirban Bandyopadhyay in Japan, who offer feasibility of the Orch OR from research using nanotechnology to study electronic conductance properties of single microtubules assembled from porcine brain tubulin. Anirban Bandyopadhyay is also an invited speaker to the TSC 2013 in India. I think it would be an outstanding idea to have a representative from the Australian groups there as well- a war of the Orch OR worldviews if you will. Stuart concluded that consciousness, occurring by E = Ђ/t, can move among layers in a fractal hierarchy, like music changing scales and octaves. One such layer is gamma synchrony EEG at 40 Hz, with high intensity altered states occurring at deeper, finer scale levels. I found this to be an extremely intriguing plenary session. The application of fractals to consciousness is very appealing. Additionally, these three presentations served as a starting point to this potential merger and by all accounts did a very good job at explaining the basics. It will be interesting to see where this goes in the near future. HOT/NOT: Higher Order Theories of Consciousness This was the first plenary session of Thursday’s portion of the conference. The higher-order thought (HOT) theory of consciousness proposes that a mental state is conscious when a subject is aware of itself as being in that state. This awareness is explained by the presence of higherorder thought, which is a thought about another of the subject’s mental states. HOT comes in two categories- Actualist and Dispositionalist. The actualist HOT theory, which was addressed in this session, maintains that a phenomenally conscious mental state is a ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 439 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 particular state in where the object of a HOT that causes that thought. However, the subject is not aware of the HOT as being due to any inference. In simple terms the HOT is about the firstorder state. The first speaker was David Rosenthal, from CUNY Graduate Center New York, NY. He is well known as the engineer of the HOT theory. His presentation was “Conscious Awareness, Higher-Order Theories, and Overflow”. He proposes that a mental state’s having or being conscious would require having a suitable higher-order awareness of that state. David maintains that a good marker of this higher-order awareness is the fact that we can report what we are aware of. However, higher-order awareness is not the same as being globally accessible. In fact, states with mental qualities can occur without being conscious, which occurs in unconscious perceiving or subliminal perceiving. He also dealt with a large number of objections that have been raised by Ned Block and other thinkers in this field. David concludes that higher-order awareness represents a state and that it need not capture all the mental properties of that state, only some of them. The target first-order state is conscious only in respect of the features that the higher-order awareness actually captures. Thus, the first-order mental properties overflow what we are consciously aware of but phenomenal consciousness, on the other hand does not overflow what is represented by the higher-order awareness, as Ned Block argues. So the aspects of perception that are conscious do not overflow reportability. He ended by saying “thank you for your conscious attention”, which the audience really seemed to enjoy. The second presentation was “Two Forms of Higher-order Theories of Consciousness” given by Ned Block from New York University, New York, NY. He discussed some of the criticisms of the HOT theory of consciousness and pointed out that most of the criticism derives from the notion that versions of this view are duplicative theories. Ned proposes that a conscious perception of something, which he uses red as an example, requires a first order representation of that something, in this case red. Thus, the higher state attributes that content of red to the first-order state and that higher-order state is a thought that is the effect that one perceives red. He concludes that a non-duplicative HOT of consciousness would be where the higher-order state is a pointer to a first order state that does not have its own content. The third presentation was “A Higher-order Statistical Decision View Accounts for Apparent Phenomenological Overflow” which was given by Hakwan Lau from Columbia University New York, NY. Hakwan proposes that conscious visual phenomenology is determined mainly by how first order signals e.g. early visual signals, are interpreted by a higher-order system which is in the prefrontal cortex. Thus, according to this, the prefrontal cortex reports awareness. He points out that Ned Block disagrees with this model. Hakwan also states that higher-order systems establish what he terms- decision criterion in order to determine if the early visual signals should contribute to the conscious visual phenomenology. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 440 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 He concludes that during decreased states of attention that these systems interpret unreliable information, but the brain beliefs that the information is reliable. The HOT/NOT session was interesting, but a lot of higher-order this and higher-order that came across as confusing, at least to me and some of the other attendees in the audience. It does seem natural that a system that is aware of its own consciousness would require higher-order functions. However, this was a very good introduction to the HOT theory. Keynote Speaker: Thursday April 12, 2012 The first of the two keynote speakers at the TSC conference was Steven Laureys, who also hosted a preconference workshop “Functional Neuroimaging the (Un) Consciousness?” and his keynote presentation was “Identifying the Brain’s Awareness System: Lessons from Coma and Related States”. Steven is from the University of Liege, Coma Science Group, Cyclotron Research Center, Department of Neurology, Liege, Belgium. www.comascience.org Steven reviewed modern neuroimaging and also electrophysiological research that demonstrates a relationship that exist between awareness and brain function in patients with disorders of consciousness e.g. minimally conscious state (MCS) and unresponsive wakefulness syndrome (previously called persistent vegetative state). His clinical approach is that you must be awake to be aware. The research that was presented suggested that awareness is an emergent property of the collective behavior of the frontoparietal connectivity, which Steven applied the term “top-down connectivity”. This connectivity establishes a network with two components: external sensory awareness and internal self awareness. Steven explained that the function of external sensory awareness derives from the lateral prefrontal/parietal cortices and that the internal self awareness is associated with the precuneal/mesiofrontal midline activity. It was also reiterated that consciousness is an emergent property of the collective widespread connectivity, and that connectivity of the thalamo-cortical regions are critical for the emergence of consciousness. Steven supports this with similar work done in collaboration with Melanie Boly (from the searching for consciousness plenary session and is also from the Coma Science Group) on minimally responsive consciousness. In fact, she also mentioned the components of awareness of self and awareness of the environment in her work. The clinical relevance was also discussed. Steven maintains that this research will improve the diagnosis of patients with disorders of consciousness. He also discussed treatment with the drug Amantadine, which works as an antidyskinetic by increasing dopamine in the brain; incidentally it also works as an antiviral agent against influenza A. In coma patients this drug increases metabolic brain activity and improves consciousness. Overall, the conclusion was that the neural correlates of conscious awareness are derived from wide spread frontal-parietal connectivity. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 441 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 I thought that Steven Laureys keynote presentation was phenomenal. As was seen in the other neuroscience type of presentations that were given the day before, Steven’s work demonstrated tangible correlates e.g. frontal-parietal connectivity that can be researched objectively. Echolocation and Consciousness The title of this plenary session was intriguing from the start and the introduction was given by David Chalmers, who opened up with Nagle’s famous query “what is it like to be a bat” and then jokingly stated that what Nagle meant was “what is it like to echolocate”. That David Chalmers is such a witty guy! The star of the show in this plenary session was Daniel Kish from the World Access for the Blind and his presentation was “Sound Vision: The Consciousness of Seeing with Sound”. Daniel was born blind and developed the ability to utilize echolocation. He opened up with his own response to the question “what is it like to be a bat” that was asked evidently by a non-blind person, to which “what is it like to be a hawk” was his retort. Daniel stated that echolocation can be used to obtain an image of an individual’s surroundings. He demonstrated this by generating click sounds with his tongue and the top of his mouth. Then he showed how the basic principles of echolocation worked by holding a laptop in front of his face, while making a “shhhhh” sound. During this demonstration he would move the laptop farther away from his face and then closer, which caused an audible change in frequency and pitch. After the demonstration with the laptop, Daniel discussed how using this technique enables him to “visualize” an acoustic flow field and edge detection (also called edge geometry of an object) in order to determine objects in his surroundings. He also discussed how this technique can help detect the depth or density of a structure. All of this takes training and practice. Daniel teaches this technique to other blind people. He played a video demonstration of one of his former students Juan Ruiz using this technique of echolocation. Juan, who was born blind, set the Guinness Book of World Records by riding a bicycle while using echolocation on an obstacle course and navigating around columns without touching them or knocking them over. Mind you, Juan was not allowed the opportunity to familiarize himself with the obstacle course prior to performing this amazing feat. Here is a link to this demonstration: http://www.worldaccessfortheblind.org/node/299 This was a really fascinating presentation. The fact that Daniel can generate sound to make a map of his environment and navigate in it without vision is truly outstanding! I actually had the opportunity to watch Daniel do this off stage in the hotel lobby. I can not express here how impressed I am that he as taken a disability like being blind and in turn evolved a new modality of sensory perception and consciousness. In addition, he is able to teach other blind people how to do this. Again, I can not possibly express how much admiration that I have for this man. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 442 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Keynote Speaker: Friday April 13, 2012 The second keynote speaker for the TSC 2012 conference was Daryl Bem from Cornell University. His presentation was “Feeling the Future: Recent Experimental Evidence for the Anomalous Anticipation of Future Events”. Daryl began by discussing that PSI is a term that represents anomalous processes of information retrieval or energy transfer that cannot be explained by any known physical or biological mechanisms. PSI replaces the older term ESP. Examples of anomalous processes of energy transfer are telepathy, clairvoyance (also called remote viewing), psychokinesis, and precognition (also called premonition). During this presentation Daryl reviewed recent laboratory experiments that demonstrated physiological and behavioral responses to random future stimuli. This featured showing a subject slides that contained calm, scary, or erotic pictures that were randomly selected by a computer. The results were that there was a slight representation of what he terms “timereversing”, a retroactive influence, in where a putatively causal stimulus event occur prior to the computer deciding what picture to show. He then discussed the five different effects that were observed in these studies: precognitive detection of erotic stimuli, precognitive avoidance of negative (scary) stimuli, retroactive priming, retroactive habituation, and retroactive facilitation of recall. Individual-difference variable of stimulus seeking, which is a component of extraversion, was also factored in as to how it correlates with PSI performance. The conclusion was that memory works both ways, forward and backwards and that PSI involves retroactive facilitation of recall. Daryl also pointed out some of the challenges to this type of research. First is an empirical challenge, which is providing well controlled demonstrations of PSI that can be replicated by other researchers. The second is a theoretical challenge, which is providing an explanatory theory for the proposed phenomena of PSI that can be compatible with physical and biological principles. Poster Presentations at the TSC 2012 I decided to do a small write up on the poster presentations at the TSC conference in Tucson Arizona 2012 for two main reasons. First, I feel that this is an area that is often overlooked at most conferences. This is probably because of the large amount of verbal presentations- keynote speakers, plenary and concurrent sessions, which are ongoing throughout the duration of the conference. The second reason is that this is an interesting opportunity to walk into a bullpen that is chalk full of new ideas and research. There were two poster presentations held one on the evening of Wednesday April 11th and the second one on the evening of Friday April 13th. I did do a poster presentation on both days “Neurogenetics and DNA Consciousness”. This is a short summary of a few of the poster presentations that really stood out at the TSC conference 2012. In an attempt to be balanced I did try to highlight different areas and topics of consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 443 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Wolfgang Baer: The Cognitive Force in the Hierarchy of the Quantum Brain. Wolfgang is a research associate professor of information sciences at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey California. This presentation is an expansion of his 2010 article “An Introduction to the Physics of Consciousness”, which was published in The Journal of Consciousness Studies. Here he presented a process flow diagram of a generalized thought process in where consciousness is represented in a cognitive process loop. In this loop the equations represent a process that converts a “description of phenomenological experience” into a “description of the model of the physical world [that] we believe”, and then back again. He also proposes that qualia are the energy contained in the charge-mass separation field that balances external gravito-electric influences from the past, present, and future. The main conclusion of this poster presentation was that consciousness must be incorporated into the cognitive loop of our current model of the physical (quantum or classic), which must be expanded to include a force that holds charge and mass together. Ingrid Fredriksson: Does Consciousness Exist in Water? Ingrid is the editor of the book Aspects of Consciousness: Essays on Physics, Death, and the Mind, which features writers such as Anthony Freedman and Susan Blackmore; and she will be the editor for the forthcoming Aspects of Consciousness II. Her presentation proposes that water has components that are similar to consciousness e.g. memory, which she references the works of Luc Montagnier and Jaques Benveniste. According to her proposal this degree of consciousness is found with in the hydrogen bonds linking the water molecules. Based on this proposal, Ingrid also speculates that there is a similar degree of consciousness that is found in the hydrogen bonds that hold the DNA molecule together. Her poster supports this proposal with the vibrant and various forms of life that are all around us which contains both water and DNA. Ling-Fang (Terry) Kuo: Is Experience of Conscious Will Just an Illusion? Terry is a philosophy student at the National Yang Ming University in Taiwan. His presentation argues against the theory of apparent mental causation, which is a proposal that was made by Daniel M. Wegner (“The Illusion of Conscious Will”). The focus of Terry’s argument is that an acceptable theory of consciousness must have neural correlates. His presentation evaluates the results in a study review by Patrick Haggard “Human volition: towards a neuroscience of freewill” which demonstrates that the pre-supplementary motor areas in the human brain show connections between action and thought. Therefore, this poster presentation proposes, freewill does have causal power, which has neural correlates. Consequently, according to this presentation, the theory of apparent mental causation must be rejected. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 444 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Ben Bendig: Plant Sensitivity to Spontaneous Human Emotion. Ben is a doctoral candidate at UCLA. His poster presentation discussed electrical activity in plants in response to human activity. This was unique as there were no other posters or verbal presentations that discussed this type of topic. His research involved attaching galvanic skin response (GSR) sensors to the leaf of a plant and then recording the electrical changes in response to human emotional responses or setting e.g. talking or playing music. Some of the human activities elicited electrical changes from the plant and some did not. The results suggest that the plants may be sensitive to human emotion or activity, which can be detected in electrical changes from the leaves of a plant. Edward Close: The Triadic Dimensional Distinction Vortical Paradigm (TDVP): A Consciousness, Infinity, and Dimensionality Paradigm Shift. Edward is no stranger to the TSC conferences and he is the author of Transcendental Physics. This poster was coauthored with Vernon Neppe who was unable to attend the conference. Edward stated that “Physics talks about a theory of everything, but you can not have a theory of everything if consciousness is not factored in”. Essentially, consciousness must be included in order to accurately describe reality. To accomplish this goal his poster presentation proposes that “the calculus of distinctions”, which is based on the work of George Spencer Brown, should be factored in order to bring consciousness into the equations and create a real theory of everything. Mark McMahon: Sound, Voice, and Awareness of Awareness. Mark has a doctorate in dentistry but he also spent two and a half years traveling Central and South America. He is the author of Driving to the end of the world. This presentation illustrated his methodology in where he attempts to get people to heal themselves using the sound of their own voice. He states that this is similar to chanting but is focused more on targeting on a specific frequency that feels good on a specific injury or aliment. Meaning that a different frequency may work for a shoulder injury and another frequency may work for neck discomfort. In addition to having a poster presentation to look at, Mark also did several demonstrations for conference attendees and displayed how to actually apply this method. It can clearly be seen by this small sample of poster presentations that there were many very good presentations from several different areas in the field of consciousness studies at the TSC conference 2012. The other advantage that I found to attending the poster presentations is that you receive the unique experience of a one-on-one with the presenter. A personal touch! ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 445 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | May 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 4 | pp. 432-445 Concluding Remarks Overall the TSC conference 2012 was an explosion of consciousness with a wide variety of presentations related to consciousness. The war of the worldviews was an interesting introduction to the conflict mounting between the spiritual and material accounts of consciousness, but in the end there was a sense that more effort should be placed on establishing some common ground. Deepak has made many statements that science has no testable theory of consciousness (bold statements from the former endocrinologist) but yet the title of his preconference was “Eastern Philosophy and the Science of Consciousness”. If science has no testable theory then how can you call the second half of a presentation the science of consciousness? I am not trying to be hypercritical but I also believe some of the conflicting statements need to be reevaluated as well. There was a great deal of focus on neurology and NCC. This is likely due to the advances in the field of neuroimaging that allow the localization of brain function and the effects of connectivity. These concepts were seen in Melanie Boly’s work on patients with disorders of consciousness, George Mashour’s work on anesthesia, and Steven Laureys’s keynote presentation and his clinical correlations, which was superb. This conference also featured a new marriage between consciousness and fractals. Researchers such as Biyu He showed that SCP and SFBA can possibly account for dimensions of consciousness that may have correlates that can be studied with fMRI and intracranial EEG. Others, like Peter Walling discussed the fractal nature of EEG and how attractor dimensions may be important to evolution. Stuart Hameroff discussed how microtubules may have fractal-like properties that underlay sub-neural functioning during consciousness. New modalities of consciousness were also seen by Daniel Kish and others in the echolocation plenary session. There was also interesting research presented by Daryl Bem on precognition. In addition, there were many new and exciting topics in the poster presentations which ranged from quantum physics to plant sensitivity to human emotion. So overall, this was a well organized conference with many excellent presentations from many different areas that are moving toward a science of consciousness. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

An affective computational model for machine consciousness Rohitash Chandra Artificial Intelligence and Cybernetics Research Group, Software Foundation, Nausori, Fiji arXiv:1701.00349v1 [cs.AI] 2 Jan 2017 Abstract In the past, several models of consciousness have become popular and have led to the development of models for machine consciousness with varying degrees of success and challenges for simulation and implementations. Moreover, affective computing attributes that involve emotions, behavior and personality have not been the focus of models of consciousness as they lacked motivation for deployment in software applications and robots. The affective attributes are important factors for the future of machine consciousness with the rise of technologies that can assist humans. Personality and affection hence can give an additional flavor for the computational model of consciousness in humanoid robotics. Recent advances in areas of machine learning with a focus on deep learning can further help in developing aspects of machine consciousness in areas that can better replicate human sensory perceptions such as speech recognition and vision. With such advancements, one encounters further challenges in developing models that can synchronize different aspects of affective computing. In this paper, we review some existing models of consciousnesses and present an affective computational model that would enable the human touch and feel for robotic systems. Keywords: Machine consciousness, cognitive systems, affective computing, consciousness, machine learning 1. Introduction The definition of consciousness has been a major challenge for simulating or modelling human consciousness [1, 2]. Howsoever, a broad definition of consciousness is the state or quality of awareness which features sentience, subjectivity, the ability to experience through sensory perceptions, the state of wakefulness, the sense of ego, and the control of the mind with awareness of thought processes [3, 4, 5, 6, 7]. The challenges in the definition and models of consciousness affects the implementation or simulation study of consciousness. In the past, simulation study has been presented for certain models of consciousnesses, such as the model of information flow from global workspace theory[3]. Shanahan presented a study where cognitive functions such as anticipation and planning were realised through internal simulation of interaction with the environment. An implementation based on weightless neurons was used to control a simulated robot [8]. Further attempts were made to model specific forms of intelligence through brute-force search heuristics to reproduce features of human perception and cognition, including emotions [7]. Moreover, small scale implementations can consider models based from consciousness in animals that are needed for their survival. Although intelligence demonstrated in solving the tasks vary [9, 10], limiting definitions of consciousness to humans is speculative as all living beings tend to have certain attributes that overlap with human consciousness. Some of the undomesticated animals such as rodents have a history of survival in challenging and wide range of climate and environments [11]. There are some studies that show that animals such as rats seem to express some aspects of consciousnesses, Preprint submitted to that is not merely for survival. They feature social attributes such as empathy which is similar to humans [12, 13]. High level of curiosity and creativity are major attributes of consciousness which could be a factor that distinguishes humans from rest of the animals [14, 15, 16]. While intelligence is also an underlying aspect of consciousness, it has been shown that intelligence is a necessary, however, not sufficient condition for creativity [17]. Howsoever, apart from humans, other animals also show certain levels of creativity [18]. There has been attempts to enhance existing models in unconventional ways through means to incorporate non-materialistic aspects of consciousnesses through studies of near-death experiences [19]. Furthermore, ideas from psychology and quantum mechanics have also been integrated in a study that challenge the materialistic view of consciousness [20]. In an attempt to empirically study consciousness, Tononi proposed the information integrated theory of consciousness to quantify the amount of integrated information an entity possesses which determines its level of consciousness [21]. The theory depends exclusively on the ability of a system to integrate information, regardless of having a strong sense of self, language, emotion, body, or an environment. Furthermore, it attempts to explain why consciousness requires neither sensory input nor behavioural output in cases such as during the sleeping state. Further work was done with application of integrated information to discrete networks as a function of their dynamics and causal architecture [22]. Information integrated theory 3.0 further refined the properties of consciousness with phenomenological axioms and postulates to lay out a system of mechanisms to satisfy those axioms and thus generate consciousness [23]. It was suggested that systems with January 3, 2017 a purely feed-forward architecture cannot generate consciousness, whereas feed-back or recursion of some nature could be an essential ingredient of consciousness. This was based on a previous study, where it was established that the presence or absence of feed-back could be directly equated with the presence or absence of consciousness [24]. David Chalmers highlighted the explanatory gap in defining consciousness and indicated that the hard problem of consciousness emerge from attempts that try to explain it in purely physical terms [1]. Integrated information theory is based on phenomenological axioms which begins with consciousness and indicates that complex systems with some feedback states could have varying levels of consciousness [23]. Howsoever, this does not fully support the motivations for consciousness experience as defined by Chalmers that look at conscious experience or qualia from first and third person perspectives and the relationship between them [25]. The field of affective computing focuses on the development of systems that can simulate, recognize, and process human affects which essentially is the experience of feeling or emotion [26, 27, 28]. Affective computing could provide better communication between humans and artificial systems that can lead to elements of trust and connectivity with artificial systems [29]. The motivation to have affective models in artificial consciousness would be towards the future of mobile technologies and robotic systems that guide in everyday human activities. For instance, a robotic system which is part of the household kitchen could further feature communication that builds and connectivity from features of affective computing [30]. In the near future, there will also be a growing demand for sex robots, therapeutic and nursing robots which would need affective computing features [31, 32]. Moreover, the emergence of smart toys and robotic pets could be helpful in raising children and also assist the elderly [32]. Although mobile application-based support and learning systems have been successfully deployed, they are often criticized for having less physical interactions [33]. In such areas, affects in robots could lead to further help such as stress management and counselling. Personality is an integral part of consciousness [34]. However, in the past, the proposed models of consciousness have not tackled the feature of personality [35]. In the past, a study presented the influence of different types of personality on work performance for selection, training and development, and performance appraisal of workers [34]. Nazir et. al further presented culture-personality based affective model that included the five dimensions of personality [36]. Carver and Scheier used control theory as a conceptual framework for personality which provides an understanding of social, clinical and health psychology [37]. Although these studies have been very popular in areas of psychology, there has not been much work done to incorporate understanding of personality in models of machine consciousness. We note that element of hunger and pain are some of the leading biological attributes for survival which contributes to human personality and affects. Starzyk et. al presented motivated learning for the development of autonomous systems based on competition between dynamically-changing pain signals which provided an interplay of externally driven and internally generated control signals [38]. The use of abstract notion of pain as a motivational behaviour for a goal such as food can lead to features in affective model for machine consciousnesses. Although several prominent models of machine consciousness have been present, their limitations exist in terms of addressing the features of human affects that could lead future implementations in robot systems and other related emerging technologies. In such systems with human affects, there would be a wider impact in terms of social acceptance, trust and reliability. However, the limitations that exist in humans could also pose a threat. We limit our focus on the development of affects that could lead to personality in artificial consciousness without much emphasis for implications or social acceptable of such systems. In this paper, we review some existing models of consciousnesses and present an affective computational model of machine consciousness with the motivation to incorporate human affects and personality. We promote a discussion of using emerging technologies and advances in machine learning for developing the affective computational model. The rest of the paper is organised as follows. Section II provides a background on consciousness and existing models. Section III presents the proposed model and Section IV provides a discussion with further research directions while Section V concludes the paper. 2. Background and Related Work 2.1. Studies of consciousnesses Although certain foundations in the definition of consciousness have emerged [3, 4, 6], there has been the need for a definition that can fulfill the needs from the perspective of various fields that include neuroscience, psychology and philosophy. Historically, the study of consciousnesses has been the subject of various groups and phases in ancient and modern history that include those both from Eastern [39, 40] and Western philosophical traditions [41]. There are some difficulties in defining consciousness that led to identifying areas known as the easy and the hard problems of consciousness [42, 43] from perspectives of neurobiology and neurophilosophy. Chalmers introduced the hard problem which highlights the explanatory gap of defining the conscious experience, though which sensations acquire characteristics, such as colors and taste [1]. The rest of the problems are the ’easy problems’ that generally refer to the functions such as accessibility and reportability, howsoever, they are also unsolved problems in cognitive science [1, 25]. The easy problems of consciousness constitute of the ability to discriminate, integrate information, report mental states, and focus attention. These could be deduced and modeled through advances in artificial intelligence [44]. Chalmers also proposed a pathway towards the science of understanding consciousness experience through the integration of third-person data about behavior and brain processes with first-person data about conscious experience [25]. Moreover, the easy problems in consciousness could be tackled by constructs in weak artificial intelligence (AI) [45]. Note that 2 strong AI refers to the notion that machines can think similar to humans and possess some level of consciousness and sentience, while weak AI refers to machines that can be made to act as if they are intelligent [45]. 2.2. Existing models for machine consciousness Over the last few decades, various attempts have been made to use studies of consciousnesses for models or development of machine consciousness. While there are various models with certain strengths and limitations, in general, there lacks simulation study for these models. Gamez initially presented a review of the progress in machine consciousness where the literature was divided into four groups that considered of the external behavior, cognitive characteristics, architecture that correlates with human consciousness, and phenomenally conscious machines [59]. Reggia later presented a review where machine consciousness was classified into five categories based on recurring themes on the fundamental issues that are most central to consciousness [60]. These included a global workspace, information integration, an internal self-model, higher-level representation, and attention mechanisms. With a number of challenges related to definition and understanding of consciousness, it was highlighted that the way forward to examine the interrelationships between the five approaches. Hence, it will remain very difficult to create artifacts that truly model or support analogous artificial conscious states. Although various models have been discussed in detail in the reviews, we limit our discussion to some of the recent models that closely relative to this paper. Starzyk and Prasad presented a computational model of machine consciousness which was driven by competing motivations, goals, and attention switching through the concept of mental saccades [61]. Reggia argued that the efforts to create a phenomenally conscious machine have not been much less successful due to the computational explanatory gap which refers to the inability to explain the implementation of high-level cognitive algorithms in terms of neuro-computational processing [62]. It was highlighted at the present time, machine consciousness has not presented a compelling demonstration of phenomenal consciousness and further has not given any indications for it to emerge in the future. The social and cognitive aspects that deal with attention and awareness can be helpful in further understanding certain aspects of consciousnesses [63]. Graziano and Kastner presented a hypothesis where they viewed awareness as a perceptual reconstruction of the attentional state. They proposed that the machinery that computes information about other peoples awareness is the same machinery that computes information about our own awareness [64]. They proposed that attention and the attention schema co-evolved over the past half-billion years and may have taken on additional functions such as promoting the integration of information across diverse domains and promoting social cognition. Their hypothesis further leads to a mechanistic theory of consciousness that outlined how a brain with an attention schema may conclude that it has subjective awareness [65]. In the attention schema theory, consciousness is viewed beyond philosophy, towards developing basic properties can be engineered into machines. It is seen as a fundamental part of the data processing machinery of the brain where awareness is an internal model of attention. They further argued that the attention schema theory provides a possible answer to the puzzle of subjective experience whereby the brain computes a simplified There have been also been concerns about the ability of neuroscience to explain properties of consciousness [46, 1, 47]. Chalmers argued that neuroscience is good in explaining easy problems of consciousness and faces major challenges in the hard problems [1]. The mind-body problem is one of the historical challenges about the nature of consciousness [48]. In this problem, there is dilemma about the relationship of the mind with the brain since mental states and processes such as thinking are non-physical while the human body is a physical entity [49, 50]. Uncertainties in definitions of consciousness [2] have been also promoting views of consciousness that have been more metaphysical and spiritual [51, 52]. There has also been evidence of consciousness related abnormalities in physical systems suggesting that consciousness can alter the outcome of certain physical processes such as random-number generators [53]. Although these topics are interesting, certain restrictions need to be placed in the development of machine consciousness that can lead to the development of robotics and other related intelligent systems that can assist in human decision making and also carry out everyday tasks. We, therefore, limit out definition of consciousness merely to that which can help in the formulation of problem-solving techniques, which may restrict to models relation to information theory of consciousness [54] that could lead to software systems or models that to replicate consciousness to a certain degree. One of the issues of the mind-body problem has been in the explanation of the links that govern the physical (brain) with the non-physical (mind). This can be seen as analogous to the relationship between hardware and software systems. Wang presented a study with a comprehensive set of informatics and semantic properties and laws of software as well as their mathematical models [55]. In order to provide a rigorous mathematical treatment of both the abstract and concrete semantics of software, a new type of formal semantics known as the deductive semantics was developed. Later, a theoretical framework of cognitive informatics that was shown to be a trans-disciplinary inquiry of the internal information processing mechanisms and processes of the brain and natural intelligence [56]. Furthermore, Wang et. al presented an architecture, theoretical foundations, and engineering paradigms of contemporary cybernetics with a link to computational intelligence has been introduced in the cybernetic context and the compatibility between natural and cybernetic intelligence was analyzed[57]. Moreover, Wang presented a formal model and a cognitive process of consciousness in order to explain how abstract consciousness is generated. The hierarchical levels of consciousness were explored from the facets of neurology, physiology, and computational intelligence. A rigorous mathematical model of consciousness was created and the cognitive process of consciousness is formally described using denotational mathematics [58] 3 model of the process and the current state of attention which is the basis of subjective reports [66]. Moreover, the theory was partially based on the logic of model-based control motivated by how the brain computes a model of the body through the body schema and uses it in the control of the body. Hence, they suggested that a simplified model of attention through an attention schema would be useful in controlling attention. Lamme presented definitions of visual attention and awareness that distinguished between them and also explained why they are intricately related. It was suggested that there was overlap between mechanisms of memory and awareness than between those of attention and awareness. Moreover, it was also highlighted that phenomenal experience origin from the recurrent interaction between groups of neurons [24]. medical and life sciences with a further focus on Big Data challenges . Hence, it was shown that Watson can accelerate the identification of novel drug candidates and novel drug targets by harnessing the potential of big data [84]. With such a breakthrough for development of Watson for cognitive computing, there remains deep philosophical questions from perspective of natural and artificial consciousness [85]. Koch evaluated Watson’s level of consciousnesses from perspective of integrated information theory of consciousnesses [86, 22] that views the level of consciousness based on complexity and how integrated the forms of information are in the system. Watsons capabilities motivated to further study the philosophy, theory, and future of artificial intelligence based upon Leibnizs computational formal logic that inspired a ’scorecard’ approach to assessing cognitive systems [87]. Metacognition refers to a higher order thinking skills that includes knowledge about when and how to use particular strategies for learning or for problem solving [88]. In relation to metacognition, Watson relied on a skill very similar to human self-knowledge as it not only came up with answers but also generated a confidence rating for them. Therefore, Watson possessed elements of metacognition similar to the human counterparts in the game of Jeopardy [89]. More recently, AlphaGo was developed by Google to play the board game Go which became the first program to beat a professional human player without handicaps on a full-sized 19 × 19 board [90]. It used deep learning and learned abstract information from visual board data given by experts. Then it played against itself across multiple computers through reinforcement learning. Although AlphaGo has been very successful, one can argue that it demonstrated a very constrained aspect of human intelligence that may not necessarily display consciousness. 2.3. Simulation of aspects of consciousness Throughout modern digital history, there have been a number of developments in areas of artificial intelligence that mimic aspects or attributes of cognition and consciousness. These developments have been made with the hope to replicate and automate some of the tasks that are undertaken by humans given the industrial demand and constraints of humans on carrying out demanding tasks in limited time. The replication of some of the biological attributes include the feature of learning with machine learning [67] and the attribute of reasoning and planning with automated reasoning [68]. The attribute which deals with sensory perceptions includes the sense of hearing with speech recognition which covers areas such as voice and speaker identification [69]. Moreover, visual perception is covered through computer vision [70] with specific cases such as face [71], facial expression [72], and object recognition [73] . The attributes of biological motor control have been covered by autonomous movement in humanoid robots [74], while learning to drive has been covered through autonomous driving systems [75]. Although these fields have emerged, there are a number of challenges that include those in computer vision and speech recognition, especially in dealing with noisy and dynamic environments in real-world applications [76, 77]. The field of natural language processing aims to make computer systems understand and manipulate natural languages to perform the desired tasks [78]. It has been one of the major attributes of cognition and consciousness [79]. One of the major breakthroughs that used natural language processing for cognitive computing has been the design of Watson, which is a system capable of answering questions posed in natural language developed by David Ferrucci [80, 81]. Watson won the game of Jeopardy against human players [82]. It had access to 200 million pages of structured and unstructured content including the full text of Wikipedia. Moreover, IBM Watson was not connected to the Internet during the game. There are a number of applications of Watson technology that includes various forms of search that have semantic properties. Specially, Watson has a high potential for health care for an evidence-based clinical decision support system that affords exploration of a broad range of hypotheses and their associated evidence [83]. Furthermore, it can help in developing breakthrough research in Furthermore, ethics and morality are considered as one of the fundamental aspects of human consciousness. Hence, one of the future challenges will be to feature attributes of morality in artificial consciousness. There have been questions about the moral aspects of the rise of robotic or digital systems that will have a certain level of consciousness [91, 92, 93]. Colin et. al proposed moral Turing test with the hope to attain moral perfection in computational systems [91]. Parthemore and Whitby questioned the requirements of a moral agent has been also presented a number of conceptual pre-conditions for being a moral agent [92]. Arnold and Scheutz argued against moral Turing test and proposed system of verification which demands the design of transparent, accountable processes of reasoning for the performance of autonomous systems [93]. The issues related to morality would need to be integrated with systems that feature artificial consciousness as it could have a wide range of implications in cases when the system is given tasks, or in charge of making decisions that pose a danger to living systems. This raises further philosophical questions on the implications of artificial consciousness. 4 3. An affective computational model was not addressed as in the past due to the limited motivation for software systems and robotics which mostly was aimed to address problems without taking into account of the human feel or touch which is recently being addressed through the field of affective computing. However, affective computing has yet not fully addressed its implications on machine consciousness. Further challenge is to address the hard problem which refers to the explanatory gap of describing conscious experience [106, 107]. We begin with the proposition where we view the human brain as hardware and mind as computational software [108]. The computational software can also be viewed as an operating system that consists several layers and components that work coherently as a control system [109]. We note that states in consciousnesses are perturbed though emotional experiences [110]. There has been a study on the links between emotion with consciousness where it was suggested that emotional processing is important for maintaining a sense of ownership necessary for any conscious experience [111]. The state or health of the brain has direct implications for consciousness. For instance, in an extreme case, someone being injured with brain damage can become unconscious and enter a vegetative state [112]. Such natural defective states of consciousness resemble damages of a computer hardware components such as memory and storage devices or even one of the processors. Figure 1 highlights the difference in physical (hardware) and metaphysical components (computational software) that form consciousness. Although the metaphysical features such as creativity and thought processes could be classified as software, simulating them is difficult. For instance, the input for a visionbased robotic system would be information in terms of videos or images. The software would be the machine learning and data processing components that carry out tasks such as face or facial expression recognition. Creativity, on the other hand, would be seen as a philosophical attribute or feature of consciousness. Creativity is not just about artistic expressions such as fine arts or music, but about the ability to tackle problems from “out of the box”. Stimulating creativity would be a very challenging aspect of any models of consciousness and hence we limit our current affective model which views creativity as a black-box. Moving on, we revisit the natural states of consciousness and incorporate components that fall between physical and metaphysical states in order to address the hard problems such as conscious experience as shown in Figure 1. In our proposed affective model, we view the conscious experience as a state that enables management of all the states. In doing so, it can change states depending on the “present” and “future” goal as shown in Figure 4. Furthermore, the affective model is developed with the following propositions. 3.1. Preliminaries Humans have long desired a future when advances in robotics will help solve some of the challenges facing humanity. It is well-known that advances in robotics and artificial intelligence provide potential for advances in health and agriculture. There is hope for addressing some of the most challenging problems such as the need for food, water, and shelter. One would be glad to have a humanoid robot that can plant for the entire household and also help in preparation of food and household actives. However, this will also give rise to philosophical and ethical issues. The implementation of machine consciousness in technological systems will affect human workforce, social behaviour and culture. The rapid advances in emerging technologies such as Internet of Things (IoT) [94] is leading to increasingly large collection of data. IoT has the potential to improve the health, transportation, education, agriculture and other related industries. Apart from the dimensionality of the data, there are other challenging factors that include complexity and heterogeneous datasets [95] which makes the area of big data challenging [96, 97]. Recent success in the area of deep learning [98, 99] for computer vision and speech recognition tasks have given motivation for the future implementation of conscious machines. Howsoever, this raises deeper questions on the nature of consciousness and if deep learning with big data can lead to features that contribute or form some level of consciousness. Through the perspective of integrated information theory (IIT) [21, 23], complex structures in the model with feedback loops could lead to certain degrees of consciousness. Therefore, from the deep learning perspective, conventional convolutional networks do not fall into this category as they do not have feedback connections. However, if we consider recurrent neural networks [100], some of the architectures with additional information processing would fall in the category of consciousness from the perspective of IIT. The challenge remains in incorporating them as components form part of a larger model for machine consciousness [101]. In such model, deep learning, IoT, and big data would replicate sensory perception. Once the simulation of input sensor organs is addressed (speech and vision), the challenge of an effective model of machine consciousness would be to make sense of the data and also provide higher level organization of knowledge obtained from data in which resembles thought processes and reasoning. The field of the semantic web has faced a similar challenge that tries to make sense of data from web content using resource description framework (RDF) which is a set of specifications originally designed as a metadata data model [102]. It incorporates machine learning and optimization through so-called web intelligence [103]. They have been implemented in social networks and search engines [104] and also further enhanced by cognitive computing technologies such as Watson [105]. • Proposition 1 : Being conscious and unconscious are states of the whole phenomenon of consciousness. The model views the sleep versus waking states and the major states of consciousness. • Proposition 2: While being conscious, there is awareness. On the other hand, while being unconsciousness, there is a certain level of awareness and attention which are given or used in dream states. 3.2. Affective model with simulation of natural properties There has not much been done to incorporate emotional states and personality in models of machine consciousness. It 5 Figure 2: An illustration of animal versus machine consciousness in addressing some of the elements such as ’pain’, ’hunger’ and ’tiredness’. Figure 1: Overlap in states with difference in physical (hardware) and meta-physical components (software). It is through one’s personality, that they have a certain view of life that also related to moral behaviour and ethical constructs for behaviour. Current models of machine consciousness are not addressing these aspects even though they may not address the hard problems, some elements of affective behaviour could be replicated. Personality could be seen as an attribute of consciousness that grows with time and experience. It determines how one approaches a problem as the behaviour and intrinsic qualities of the person. Although the changes in our emotions makes mood that contributes to the state of consciousness, the core identity of consciousness remains the same, i.e we feel the same consciousness as a child or and adult although we have gone through varied learning experiences. This is an important aspect of the hard problem. In developing machine consciousness or implementing in it humanoid robotics, one can acknowledge the hard problem but to solve it is not necessary for attaining systems that have some level of affective consciousness. Hence, such systems would have similar principle as a parrot trying to replicate the conscious behaviour - which may be just repeating some words without understanding it. In our analogy of humanoid robotic with affective consciousness, it would be carrying out a task and display behaviour that generate some emotion or has the human spirit or touch, but whether it is conscious about it would be a philosophical discussion. Since the proposed model has not addressed the hard problem with any definition or discussion but just acknowledged its presence of conscious experience with an identity - i.e some state that is “the observer” or the “one which experiences”. We are not modelling the observer as its nature has yet not fully been grasped the the respective scientific fields. However, in the section to follow, we will provide a means for management of attributes of consciousness through an artificial qualia which aids the “observer” as the goal is to have future implementations of affective computational model for robotics. There are some intrinsic and extrinsic motivations that lead to the desire to reach our goals. Once a goal is established, every- • Proposition 3: A thinking mind is generation or information which can be viewed as random walks in a network of information where there is an certain level priority to that information with attention based on certain goals or emotional states. The thinking mind generates different types of thoughts depending on the problem at hand, the level of intelligence, depth of knowledge and experience. Hence, the difference of wakeful and sleep states (conscious versus unconsciousness) is merely the participation of the body using motor control [113]. In dreaming state, one has a virtual body which exhibits various actions, that are possible and also not possible (walking and flying) [114, 115, 116]. Hence, during dream states, there is conscious awareness. Moreover, the person in a dream state cannot distinguish the difference whether the events are happening in real-life or in a dream. In several levels of dream states, one may think that the situation is real which asks further raises questions of the difference between a dream and awake states. We limit our affective model from such philosophical interpretations, while at the same time, acknowledge them. We note that there is a hypothesis about the simulated universe and whether humans are subject to a grand simulation experiment [117]. The elements of pain and pleasure are central driving and features of consciousness [118]. In any artificial conscious system, their existence would influence in the overall emotional state of the artificial conscious system. The literature has the interest has been largely in trying to replicate a level of consciousness, without much interest in the future of robotics with an affective or emotive features that make robots look and feel more human or natural. The demand of humanoid robotics as services to humans, the needs for the human touch in robots will grow. Personality is an attribute of consciousness that defines the way one expresses their affections or emotions and also handles everyday problems and situations that range in a wide range of settings which includes family, work and community. 6 day challenges such as the state of pain, hunger, and tiredness remain. These states could be catered in the affective model of machine consciousness which could be helpful in addressing some of the software and hardware requirements. Currently, there are challenges in mobile computing, where at times, the battery life is running low or too many processes slow down the system. These could be seen analogous to challenges in animal consciousness such as pain and tiredness. Figure 2 provides an illustration of the elements that form a major part in making a close link of animal and machine consciousness. It shows how the challenges could be addressed while making certain actions to achieve the goal. We present the following definitions for developing the affective computational model of machine consciousness. Property Quality State Instinct Implication Personality Intelligence Creativity Knowledge Memory Extra-Sensory Percep. Emotions Expression Motor Control Pain Hunger Bodily functions x x x x x x - x x x x x x - x x x D, B, and M D, and B D, and B D, B and M D, B, and M D D, andB B B M, and B M, and B M, and B Table 1: Properties of the affective computational model. D refers to decision making, B refers to behaviour, and M refers to motivation. x marks the presence of the attributes (Quality, State and Instinct) • Definition 1: Any phenomenal observation is viewed as information. Computational software processes the information with knowledge which is either inbuilt or gained through learning from experience or a combination of them. • Definition 2: Consciousness is based on attributes that have qualities, states, and instincts. controlling their emotions while in others, one does not react in haste. A conscious decision is made depending on the type of personality, depth of knowledge (machine learning models) from past experience (audio, visual and other data). Figure 4 shows an over overview of the affective model of consciousness that is inter-related with Figure 3. The states in Figure 4 shown in blue represent the metaphysical while those in black are the physical states. Note that by physical, it implies that they do have metaphysical (computational software) properties but the physical nature influences these states. We provide accounts of situations that require problemsolving skills which feature different states of consciousness. We first give the description of the scenario and then show how it will be tackled by the proposed affective model. We provide three distinct scenarios as follows. Scenario 1: Raman is traveling on a flight from India to Japan and has a connecting flight from Shanghai, China. His flight lands in Shanghai and he is required to make it to the connecting flight gate. Raman’s boarding pass has gate information missing and since his flight landed about and hour late, he needs to rush to the connecting gate. Raman is not sure if he will pass through the immigration authority. His major goal is to reach a connecting flight gate. In doing so, he is required to gather information about his gate and whether he will go through the immigration processing counter. He encounters a series of emotions which includes fear of losing the connecting flight and hence exhibits a number of actions that show his emotive psycho-physical states which include sweating, exaggerating while speaking and even shivering due to fear. In order for Raman to successfully make it to the connecting flight on time, he will undergo a series of states in consciousnesses which is described in detail with state references from Figure 4 as follows. • Definition 3: The quality of consciousness are those that are inbuilt, inherited or born qualities such as personality, intelligence and creativity. • Definition 4: The states of consciousness are those that mostly change with phenomenal experience such as emotions, expressions and motor control. • Definition 5: The instinctive property of consciousness are those that have minimum conscious control such as body processes such as ageing, hunger and pain. With the above definitions, we address affective notions that include emotional states, behaviour, and expressions [110] while taking into account the personality, knowledge and instincts as shown in Table 1. Note that the table forms basis for propositions based on observations only. Moreover, some of the identified qualities such as personality is a more rigid quality which may or may not change over time depending on its influence from birth. The property that make the quality are merely those that we are born with or gained naturally, although some may change over time such as knowledge and creativity. 3.3. Problem scenarios Based on the prepositions in previous section 3.2, we provide the details of the affective model and then present few problem scenarios that are intended to demonstrate its effectiveness. Figure 3 shows a general view of state-based information processing based on experience which acts as input or action while the response acts as the reaction given by behavior or expression. Depending on the experience, there is an expression which would be involuntarily stored as either long or short-term memory depending on the nature of the experience. Moreover, there is also conceptual understanding of implications to the observer and how it changes their long and short-time goals. The output in terms of action or expression could also be either voluntary or involuntary. In some situations, one reacts without 1. Exit flight and find the way to transfer desk. (a) Search for information regarding “transfers and arrivals” through vision recognition system (State 2 and then State 6). 7 Figure 3: Output response from input after processing through features that contribute to consciousness Figure 4: Note that consciousness observer is defined as the root of consciousness. Conscious experience is the core, which can enter different states while also having the property to exist within two states, i.e it can self-replicate as a process, gather knowledge and update long and short-term memories, and then merge into the root conscious observer. The blue states are metaphysical and black states are physical. 8 (b) Process information and make decision to move to the area of “transfers” (State 2 and State 5). 2. Since information that no baggage needs to be collected was already given, check boarding pass for baggage tag sticker. (a) Process visual information by checking boarding pass (State 2 and 6) 3. Confirm with the officer at transfer desk if need to go through migration. (a) Find and walk to transfer desk (State 2, 6, and 5) (b) Communicate with the officer at transfer desk (State 2 and 6) (c) Fear and emotions during communication (State 2, 5, 8, and 10) 4. Information was given by the officer that there is a need to go through immigration booth, hence, prepare boarding pass and passport. (a) Rush to the immigration processing section (State 5 and 6). (b) Wait in queue and go through a number of emotions such as fear of losing flight and also sweat (State 5, 6, 8, and 10). Figure 5: The journey of reaching a goal from audio visual data. 5. After immigration processing, find gate information and move to gate and board connecting flight. (a) Rush to the gate. In the process breath heavily and also sweat (State 2, 5, and 6). (b) Wait at the gate with some random thoughts and then board when called (State 7, 8, 6, 2 and 5). 3.4. Artificial Qualia Manager We have presented affective computational model of machine consciousness with the motivation to replicate elements of human consciousness. This can exhibit characteristics with human touch with emotive states through synergy with affective computing. There is a need for management of components in the affective model which would help the property of consciousness experience. Hence, there is a need for a manager for qualia. This could be seen as a root algorithm that manages the states with features that can assign the states based on the goal and the needs (instincts) and qualities (such as personality and knowledge). The artificial qualia manager could be modelled with the underlying principle of a security guard that monitors a number of video feedbacks from security cameras and also has radio communication with other security guards and needs to follow a channel of communication strategies if any risks or security impeachment occurs. Figure 5 shows an example that include processing through machine learning for semantic information which is used by the artificial qualia manager to assign the list of states needed for the goal. Similarly, the artificial qualia manager would be overseeing all the status of the states and assigning jobs for reaching the goal through automated reasoning in machine consciousness as given in Algorithm 1. In Algorithm 1, the goal and data from audio and visual inputs are used to determine and effectively manage the sequence of states of affective model of consciousness presented in Figure 4. Once the goal is reached, a series of states can be used for expression which can include a set of emotions. Note that audio and visual data needs to undergo through processing with machine learning tools which would then output some information. For instance, if the goal is regarding finding date information for a boarding pass, then the task would be to be first Scenario 2: Thomas is in a mall in Singapore for his regular Saturday movies and shopping with friends. Suddenly, he realizes that he can’t locate his phone. He brainstorms about the last few moments when he used his phone. He goes through a series of intense emotive states that includes fear. In order for Thomas to successfully find his phone, he will undergo a series of states in consciousnesses with reference from Figure 4 as follows. 1. Thomas first informed his friends and began checking all his pockets and carry bag. (a) Check all pockets (State 5 and 6). (b) Inform friends and also check in carry bag (State 6, 8, 10, and 5) 2. Brainstorm where was last time phone was used. (a) Ask friends when they last saw him using the phone (State 6, 8, and 10). (b) Try to remember when phone was last used (State 2 and 9). (c) Finally, take a moment of a deep breath and relax in order to remember (State 2, 9, and 3). 3. Recalled information that phone was last used in cinema and then rush there to check. (a) Recalled that phone was last used in cinema (State 1, 3, 7, and 9). (b) Inform friends with emotive expression of hope and achievement (State 6 and 8). (c) Rush to the cinema and talk to the attendant with emotive state of hope and fear (State 5, 6 and 8). (d) Attendant locates the phone and informs (State 6). (e) Emotive state of joy and achievement (State 8). 9 Data: Data from sensory perception (video, audio, and sensor data) Result: States for consciousness Initialization ( knowledge and personality) ; statelist[] ← list of states; goal ← gaol to reach ; means[] ← list of actions with reference to statelist[] required to reach goal; while alive do traversestates(goal, statelist[]); while goal not reached do if challenge then nominate a state; attend to challenge (injury, pain, emotion) ; store short-term and long-term memory; end if goal reached (success) then output through expression (action, gesture, emotion); store short-term and long-term memory; end if goal not reached (failure) then output through expression (action, gesture, emotion); store short-term and long-term memory; end end 1. Generate random thoughts based on problem and emotion ; 2. Automated reasoning and planning for states needed for future goal(s) ; 3. Address the requirements to revisit failed goals ; end Figure 6: Affective computational model states for the Artificial Qualia Manager to translate this higher level task into a sequence of lower level tasks that would execute machine learning components. After these components are triggered, they would return information which will be used by the algorithm to make further decision of states needed to reach the goal. This is illustrated in Figure 6 There needs to a be a property of states for tasks based on their importance. For instance, we give priority to emergency situations while trying to fill a goal. While fulfilling a goal, we would give priority to aspects such as safety and security. The goal could be similar to those given in Scenario 1 and Scenario 2 where Raman boards connecting flight and Thomas locates his phone, respectively. 3.5. Implementation strategies The affective computational model can feature multi-task learning for replicating sensory perception through recognition task that includes vision, sensory input for touch and smell and auditory tasks such as speech verification, speech recognition, and speaker verification. Shared knowledge representation would further be used for recognition of objects, faces or facial expression where visual and auditory signals would be used in conjunction to make a decision. Multi-task learning is motivated by cognitive behavior where the underlying knowledge from one task is helpful to one or several other tasks. Hence, multi-task learning employs sharing of fundamental knowledge across tasks [119, 120]. In the identification of objects, we learn through the experience of different senses that can be seen as a modular input to biological neural system [121]. Modular learning would help in decision making in cases where one of the signals is not available [122]. For instance, a humanoid robot is required to recognize someone in the dark when no visual signal is available, it would be able to make a decision based on the auditory signal. Ensemble learning could take advantage of several machine learning models which can also include deep learning for visual or auditory based recognition systems [98]. Ensemble learning can also be used to address multi-label learning where Algorithm 1: Artificial Qualia Manager 10 consciousness or conscious experience [43]. The spiritual literature views non-thinking or meditative state as the highest state of consciousness [128]. In this state, one can evaluate their own behavior and responses to problems and situations which can also be seen as the ability to have introspection and metacognition [129, 89, 88] . The challenges in machine consciousness is to incorporate features with fundamental models that replicate different states of consciousness which align with information processing from sense organs. Furthermore, intuition and creativity are also major features of consciousness and it could be argued that they form the truly metaphysical properties of consciousness. By metaphysical, we refer to the aspects that transcendent thoughts or notions that cannot be defined through language but have an impact on emotions or a certain sense of perception [130]. It is difficult to determine whether other animals, who are less intelligent have conscious experience. Howsoever, they do have levels of cognitive problem solving, perception, navigation, planning, and affections. All of these attributes are also present in humans, and therefore, any artificial conscious system that exhibits these properties will face the same challenges or philosophical questions if animals have consciousness or conscious experience. It is important to realise the potential of animal consciousness as it can motivate models for consciousness that full the gaps in models for human consciousness. In simulation or the need to implant certain level of consciousnesses to robotic systems, it would be reasonable to begin with animal level where certain tasks can be achieved. For instance, a robotic system that can replicate cognitive abilities and level of consciousness for rats can be used for some tasks such as burrowing holes, navigation in unconstrained areas for feedback of videos or information, in disasters such as earthquakes and exploration of remote places, and evacuation sites. Deep learning, data science and analytics can further help in contribution towards certain or very limited areas of machine consciousness. This is primary to artificially replicate areas of sensory input such as artificial speech recognition and artificial vision or perception. Howsoever, with such advancements in artificially replicating sensory perceptions, one encounters further challenges in developing software systems that oversee or synchronise different aspects of perceptions that lead to a consciousness state. Howsoever, to reach a state of natural consciousness will be difficult for machines as creativity and selfawareness is not just biological, but also considered spiritual which is challenging to define. With the rise of technologies such as IoT, sensors could be used to replicate biological attributes such as pain, emotions, feeling of strength and tiredness. However, modelling these attributes and attaining same behaviour in humans may not necessarily mean that the affective model of consciousness would solve hard problem that enables conscious experience. However, at least the model would be seen to exhibit conscious experience that will be similar to humans and other animals. Such an affective model, with future implementations could give rise to household robotic pets that would have or could develop emotional relationship with humans. We must be careful about affective model when in giving autonomous control or Figure 7: Use of machine learning and artificial intelligence concepts for implementation of machine consciousness instances have multiple labels which is different from multiclass learning [123]. The visual recognition process also relies on information from the peripheral vision which is a part of the vision that occurs outside the very center of gaze to make decision[124, 125, 126]. Mostly, we focus our attention or gaze to the frontal visual system. Similar ways of attention and focus can be used for auditory systems and would be helpful for advanced speech recognition systems. This is especially when one needs to give attention to the specific voice in a noise and dynamic environment. We naturally adjust our hearing to everyday situations when some parts of sensory inputs are either unavailable or are too noisy as trying to understand what someone is saying in environments with sudden background noise. The feature of modularity will be very helpful in the development of cognitive systems for machine consciousness that need to be dynamic and robust. Figure 7 gives an overview of implementation strategies where machine learning methodologies are used for replicating sensory input through audio and visual recognition systems. 4. Discussion Although the feature of creativity, reasoning, self-awareness are the essential component of consciousness, modeling them for aspects of machine consciousness will become the greatest challenges in the near future. The absence of these features will highly differentiate artificial systems or humanoid robots from humans and will give special qualities to the human workforce and hence some would argue against simulating them [127]. We note that self-awareness is a critical component of consciousness which has not been fully addressed by the proposed affective model which views conscious experience (observer) as awareness. Howsoever, these could have different philosophical interpretations as in the spiritual literature [39], self-awareness is known to emerge at higher states of 11 decision making through simulated emotional behaviour. Humans are well known to be poor decision makers when in emotional states which also resort to level of aggression and violence. Therefore, simulation of affective states need to take into account of safety and security for any future robotic implementations that assist humans. The proposed affective model has not considered any difference between conscious experience during sleep and waking state from the perspective of awareness [24]. This is due to the difference in the definition of awareness from the sleep and waking state [131]. 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Conclusions and Future Work The paper presented an affective computational model for machine consciousness with the motivation to feature the emotive attributes which give a more human-like experience for artificial systems. The affective model can become the foundation for developing artificial systems that can assist humans while appearing as natural as possible. The challenges lie in further refining specific features such as personality and creativity which are psycho-physically challenging to study and hence pose limitations to the affective model of consciousness. Howsoever, the proposed effective model can be a baseline and motivate the coming decade of simulation and implementation of machine consciousness for artificial systems such as humanoid robots. The simulation for affective model of consciousness with the features of artificial qualia manager can also be implemented with the use of robotics hardware. 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Universal Grammar and Consciousness Daegene Song arXiv:0706.4180v2 [physics.gen-ph] 7 Jan 2019 Department of Management Information Systems, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju, Chungbuk 28644, Korea (Dated: January 8, 2019) The orthodox interpretation of quantum theory treats the subject and the object on an equal footing. It has been suggested that the cyclical-time process, which resolves self-reference in consciousness, interconnects the observed universe and the mind of the subject. Based on the analogy between cryptography and language, the concept of the common innate structure of language, also known as universal grammar, may be associated with the continuity in consciousness. Extending this connection, Lévi-Strauss’s proposal on universal culture may be considered as a shared structure of continuity among the consciousness of multiple subjects. I. INTRODUCTION In his theory of Forms, Plato argued that the continuously changing physical world may not be reliable. Instead, he maintained that there must be a world with idealistic and unchanging forms, such as a perfect right triangle or a perfect circle. In particular, he viewed this imperfect physical world as a representation of the perfect world. Plato argued that it is important to understand this ideal world in order to obtain useful knowledge. This process often happens in modern science where theoretical modeling is often done based on ideal situations, which may approximate the actual imperfect phenomena. While there are a variety of ideas involving the interpretation of quantum theory, most physicists agree that the standard quantum theory provides a precise description of what happens. Nevertheless, the quantum world is different from the physical world and resides in imaginary space composed of imaginary numbers (Figure 1). Werner Heisenberg succinctly put this into I think that modern physics has definitely decided in favor of Plato (Heisenberg, 1981). Moreover, Heisenberg went on to state, In fact the smallest units of matter are not physical objects in the ordinary sense; they are forms, ideas which can be expressed unambiguously only in mathematical language. For instance, why is it possible for humans to easily imagine perfect or ideal forms when nobody has ever seen any? A similar case can be found with infinite real numbers that exist in the line connecting the natural numbers, such as 0 and 1 - that is, continuous real numbers are not observable in a physical space. The continuity exists only in thought. On the other hand, Niels Bohr discussed physics to be associated with a posteriori type of knowledge associated with an empirical experience rather than an a priori one. However, he also tried to outline how objectivity may also be related to human language, as in the following (Bohr, 1960), In this respect our task must be to account for such experience in a manner independent of individual Subject Object Observables State Vectors FIG. 1: The Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum theory taken to the limit implies the object (i.e., the whole observed universe) to be represented by the state vector and the consciousness of the subject with observables. subjective judgement and therefore objective in the sense that it can be unambiguously communicated in ordinary human language. II. PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHTS Karl Popper, a philosopher of science, also mentioned the limited or subjective access science could provide. Indeed, Popper pointed out that science is developed based on moving from observation to developing theory. Popper described an episode with his students in Vienna in which the students had difficulty to simply write down what they observed. Thus, for Popper, observation is subjective and depends on personal background, tendency, and interests. The twentieth-century analytic philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein presented a theory that compares the picture with reality where both the picture and reality are composed of individual elements such that they share the same logical structure: The logical structure of the picture, whether in thought or in language, is isomorphic with the logical structure of the state of affairs which it pictures (Wittgenstein, 1922). As Wittgenstein discussed, language and the world may share the same logical structure. Popper also pointed out the role that language plays in this selective observation such that there exist various presuppositions in language and consciousness which may depend on personal history, social interests, or genetic tendency. Describing the fundamental limit of scientific reasoning, Popper described the following: Science may be 2 Language A Language B (i) Subject Object Universal Grammar (ii) Language D Language C FIG. 2: Universal grammar suggests different languages share a common and an innate structure. described as the art of systematic oversimplification (Popper, 1992). Gottlob Frege, the founder of modern logic, was interested in finding a structure that is independent of psychology or human thought, as the following quote of his indicates, Being true is different from being taken to be true, I understand by ‘laws of logic’not psychological laws of takings-to-be-true (Frege, 1964). Indeed, Frege wanted to develop logical laws for truth as stones set in an eternal foundation that human thought could not replace. In his book The Critique of Pure Reason, Immanuel Kant explained the combination of empiricism and rationalism as follows: All our knowledge begins with the senses, proceeds then to the understanding, and ends with reason. On the other hand, Karl Popper was critical of the inductive reasoning employed in science. Instead, he viewed science as the continuous effort to get to the truth through testing (Popper, 1972): Induction is logically invalid; but refutation or falsification is a logically valid way of arguing from a single counterinstance to ‘or, rather, against’the corresponding law. III. LANGUAGE AND CULTURE Anyone who has tried to learn a foreign language understands how difficult it is, and almost always, the second language does not become as comfortable as the first native language. Why is this the case? The difficulty is only magnified when one attempts to learn the second language by understanding its sophisticated grammatical rules. On the other hand, children who learn the language at early age acquire the capacity to speak a native language. The more puzzling part is that this process of native language acquisition is often done without learning any grammar of the language. The linguist Noam Chomsky made the bold proposal that one is born with a capacity to speak a language, which became known as the universal grammar (Chomsky, 1959; 1980). Indeed, Subject (=Object) FIG. 3: (i) Ordinary case where the observer is observing the object. (ii) In the case of self-referential consciousness, the object being observed is the subject. in the latter part of the twentieth-century, the method of generative grammar prevailed. In particular, Chomsky expanded and analyzed that all human language may have a common grammatical structure (Figure 2). In (Song, 2017a), the interconnection between mind and matter were proposed based on the cyclical-time approach. Although the usual phenomenon corresponds to the subject observing the object (Fig 3 (i)), in the case of self-referential consciousness, the object is also the subject (Fig 3 (ii)). In order to resolve the paradox resulting from self-reference, the cyclical-time model was employed to explain the apparent discrepancy between the physical and quantum vacuums associated with the cosmological constant problem (Figure 4). Since one of the motivations for introducing a new model of the universe was the question surrounding the fundamental nature of humans (Song, 2017a; 2017b), it is reasonable to ask if the new model can explain the special phenomena involving language. Indeed, the new model suggested the discrete classical phenomena are linked with continuous semantics. This resembles the surprising aspect of language in the sense that finite and discrete symbols can carry infinite, ideal, or continuous meanings. To solve this strange situation, the subjects ought to share continuity or infinity beforehand - similar to shared secret keys in cryptography (Song, 2018). Moreover, this innate, or pre-shared, aspect of language should correspond to the universal grammar. One of the suggestions involving the structural aspect of universal grammar is the recursive aspect, which is similar to the liar’s paradox: • This sentence is false. • This sentence (which refers to ‘this sentence is false’) is false. • This sentence (which refers to ‘this sentence [which refers to ‘this sentence is false’] is false’) is false. 3 1 0 physical vacuum Alice 0 1 1 0 Bob time Charlie quantum vacuum FIG. 4: The cyclical-time model of the universe suggests the time forward physical vacuum is filled with the subject’s conscious quantum vacuum, which is going backwards in time. The capacity to generate a sentence with a recursive nature is seen in natural language. This is equivalent to the following self-referential aspect of consciousness: • The observer observes the observer. • The observer observes the observer (who observes the observer). • The observer observes the observer (who observes the observer [who observes the observer]). In anthropology, structuralism was developed by the French scholar Claude Lévi-Strauss to analyze human culture in terms of its structural connections. In particular, Lévi-Strauss’ approach was that there are sophisticated universal structures present in any human culture system (Lévi-Strauss, 1955). He particularly attempted to associate innate aspects of the human mind with this universal cultural pattern. The argument connecting the subject model of interwoven matter and mind through cyclical time with universal grammar in linguistics may be extended to consider multiple subjects (Figure 5). That is, the continuity of consciousness in the universe model may be associated with the structure of universal culture as discussed by Lévi-Strauss. The existentialist philosopher Husserl also discussed the interconnectivity between different consciousness, which may enter as empathy. IV. PIONEERS The inseparability between the subject and the object, or matter and mind, has also been considered in science. In particular, two prominent physicists presented similar bold conjectures. The first, David Bohm, was born in 1917 in USA, the son of Jewish immigrants. Bohm obtained his doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley and started to teach at Princeton University. However, due to his involvement in a radical political movement, he was unable to continue to work at Z FIG. 5: The cryptographic analysis of language suggests that people share a common capacity to understand continuity, or infinity, while discrete and finite languages are exchanged. the university. He moved to Brazil and became a physics professor at the University of Sao Paulo and eventually settled at Berbeck College in London. In his book Wholeness and Implicate Order, Bohm emphasized the inseparable wholeness. Indeed, Bohm discussed a similar idea to the proposal of the inseparability of subject and object in terms of universal flux, which is considered as an essential element that unites mind and matter (Bohm, 1980): a universal flux that cannot be defined explicitly but which can be known only implicitly In this flow, mind and matter are not separate substances. The second scientist and one of the important pioneers in the field of physics was John Archibold Wheeler, who was born in 1911. Not only was he a great researcher with deep intuition, but he also had numerous students who later became well-known physicists, including the Nobel laureate Richard Feynman and Hugh Everett, who proposed many world interpretations of quantum theory. Wheeler obtained his doctorate from John Hopkins University and also participated in the Manhattan Project during World War II. He proposed the concept of a participatory universe and it from bit that the existence of physical reality derives from information: It from bit symbolizes the idea that every item of the physical world as at bottom an immaterial source (Wheeler, 1990). In particular, three concepts within Wheeler’s discussion in developing the new insight into the structure of the universe bear resemblance to the proposal the of cyclical-time subject model. First, Wheeler discussed the importance of considering the existence of the universe and the observer with consciousnessthat is, the very existence of physical reality may be related to observership. It has been argued that due to the paradox resulting from the self-referential consciousness, the subject and the object are inseparable (Song, 2007; 2017a). 4 particle Wheeler pointed out, time, particularly cyclical time, is an essential element in describing a new perspective of the universe, as indicated in (Song, 2017a). duality V. wave FIG. 6: The wave-particle duality may also be considered in terms of the cyclical-time process interweaving matter (particle) and mental (wave) parts. Second, with his well-known phrase it from bit, Wheeler outlined his idea about the connection between the physical world and the metaphysical elements of an immaterial source and explanation, which would be connected through information, and he called it the participatory universe (Wheeler, 1990). Indeed, the proposal in (Song, 2017b) discussed how information, or language, plays a central role in connecting the physical reality and consciousness. Thirdly, Wheeler noted the importance of time in explaining existence itself where he said Of all obstacles to a thoroughly penetrating account of existence, none looms up more dismayingly than ‘time’ (Wheeler, 1986). As [1] Bohm D. Wholeness and the implicate order. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980. [2] Bohr N. The unity of human knowledge. Address at the Congress in Copenhagen, October 1960. [3] Chomsky N. Review of B.F. Skinners’s verbal behavior, Language 1959; 35: 26-58. [4] Chomsky N. Rules and representations, New York: Columbia University Press, 1980. [5] Frege, G. The basic laws of arithmetic: exposition of the system, ed. and trans. Montgomery Furth (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1964). [6] Heisenberg W. Natural law and the structure of matter. Warm Wind Books, 1981 [7] Lévi-Strauss C. The structural study of myth. The journal of American folklore 1955; 68(270): 428-44. [8] Popper K. The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Hutchinson; Revised edition, 1972. [9] Popper K. The open universe: an argument for indeterminism. Routledge, 1992. [10] Song D. Non-computability of consciousness. Neuro- REMARKS Karl Popper outlined both the strengths and the weaknesses of science. Although science is often based on oversimplifying induction, its tendency to previous errors allows it to continually make progress. Notable physicists, such as Wheeler and Bohm, have suggested the radical idea that the subject and the object may not be separable. Indeed, this inseparability may correspond to the physical universe being filled with the observer’s consciousness through cyclical time. In fact, one of the puzzling aspects of quantum theory is that the wave-particle duality may be understood better in the new model. While the particle corresponds to the physical matter in a time-forward manner, the wave aspect corresponds to the subject’s conscious awareness that is going backwards in time (Figure 6). In this paper, it was discussed that the continuity in the subject’s consciousness may be a shared one, which would correspond to universal grammar in linguistics and to universal culture, as proposed by Lévi-Strauss. This also explains how people can better communicate concepts involving continuity or infinity with only discrete and finite bits. Quant 2007; 5: 382-391. arXiv:0705.1617 [quant-ph]. [11] Song D. Decision-Making Process and Information. NeuroQuant 2017a; 15: 31-36. arXiv:1701.08641 [physics.gen-ph]. [12] Song D. Semantics of Information. NeuroQuant 2017b; 15: 88-92. arXiv:1611.02980 [physics.gen-ph]. [13] Song D. Encryption and information network. NeuroQuant 2018; 16: 1-6. [14] Wheerler JA. Hermann Weyl and the unity of knowledge. American Scientist (July-August 1986) Vol. 74, pp. 366375. [15] Wheeler JA. Information, physics, quantum: the search for links. In Zurek ed., Complexity, entropy, and the physics of information. Redwood City, California: Addison-Wesley, 1990. [16] Wittgenstein L. Tractatus logico-philosophicus, International Library of Psychology, Philosophy, and Scientific Method. Trans. CK Ogden, 8th impr. London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1922.

446 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I Article Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I Iona Miller* ABSTRACT The most deconstructed archetypal forms are vortexes, toroids, solitons, gyres, and singularities. The most fundamental archetype of process is the Field. To claim the wave is unphysical and the particle is physical is a dated idea of the relation between mind and body. The quantum vacuum is a dynamic massless scalar field. Scalars are just active information; a hologram is pure information. Entanglement is a property of nonlocal quantum information exchange. The central spiral vortex crossover point (all adjoining toroidal fractal involved fields) is what physicists call a “twistor” or a “wormhole”. The underlying structure of the torus is the Vector Equilibrium, or “VE”. Buckminster Fuller called it the blueprint by which nature forms energy into matter. In a vortex "outer" coexists with "inner" in a dimensional morphing contorsion-continuum. This vortex energy modality of the fractal universes -- this fractal -- repeats in every manifestation, including the Earth (the Body), the Psyche, the Soul, the Spirit that are manifested in the 4 Elements of Earth / Water / Air / Fire and their Torus-Vortex interactions. Fuller's search for a geometry of vectors led him to the isotropic vector matrix. Vectors produce conceptual structural models of energy events. Scalar space is "multi-" rather than "three-dimensional." Vectors are directed in every possible direction, while deliberately maintaining equivalent lengths and angles. This equivalence is necessarily determined by the symmetry of space. Vector Equilibrium is the "zerophase" of energetic manifestation. Part I of this article addresses the topics of Seeds of Being, Metaphorms, Holographic Archetypes, Psychoid Field, The Archetypal Field, Scientific Archetypes, Psychological Archetypes, Resonant Filters, Metamorphosis, and Holographic Spiral Vortex. Key Words: vortex, quantum vacuum, field and form, vector equilibrium, torus, archetypes, absolute space, DNA, syncretism, templates, vacuum physics, zero point, entanglement, chaos, consciousness, resonant filters. From a subjective point of view, both wave and particle are abstract concepts we subjectively apply to phenomena we personally experience, from the rainbow on a CD (wave) to the ticking of a Geiger counter (particle). Most of the subjective evidence for either comes from the wave aspect, as manifest in particle statistics, although we physically detect light as particles in the rhodopsin of our retinas. --Chris King * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com Note: This work was completed in August, 2004 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 447 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I Seeds of Being There are two complementary descriptions of reality, subjective and objective. Wave and particle are mental concepts in the subjective description and complementary objective features in the physical description. It is a fallacious spiritual-physicalism to claim the particle aspect is physical and the wave is not. The physical evidence for the wave aspect is as precisely manifest as the particle aspect. Every rainbow verifies this. We only know the particulate electron energy levels of the hydrogen atom from looking at a wave spectrograph and finding some frequencies are missing corresponding to the energies of electron orbit transitions in the hydrogen in space. This in turn is how we know the universe is expanding, from the red shift of these lines. No quantum particle can exist with an energy and momentum without manifesting the wave aspects of frequency and wavelength. Some confuse the EM field and the wave aspect. The field is not the wave. The field can be described as a sea of virtual photons emerging from uncertainty, a few of which also briefly become virtual electron-positron pairs. If we feed energy into the EM field some of the virtual particles become real, as in a radio transmission. Quantum electrodynamics describes the field in terms of an uncountable infinity of virtual particles propagated by a wave-theoretic Green's function, so although the field is described by particles, they propagate through wave spreading, resulting in a complementary description. To identify the field with electrons is a clunker showing how little physics the person actually understands. Electrons and all charged particles have the capacity to emit and absorb photons thus generating the EM field through the charge distribution. They are thus not the natural constituents (carriers) of the field. The photons, being uncharged, are likewise not generators. The weak force behaves a little differently because the carriers can also be generators. The most deconstructed archetypal forms are vortexes, toroids, solitons, and singularities. The most fundamental archetype of process is the Field. The quantum vacuum is a dynamic massless scalar field. Scalars are just active information; a hologram is pure information. Entanglement is a property of nonlocal quantum information exchange. The central spiral vortex crossover point (all adjoining toroidal fractal involved fields) is what physicists call a “twistor” or “wormhole”. The underlying structure of the torus is the Vector Equilibrium, or “VE”. Fuller called it the blueprint by which nature forms energy into matter – essentially an energy pump or transducer. Fuller's search for the geometry of vectors led him to the isotropic vector matrix. Vectors produce conceptual structural models of energy events. Scalar space is "multi-" rather than "three-dimensional." Vectors are directed in every possible direction, while deliberately maintaining equivalent lengths and angles. This equivalence is necessarily determined by the symmetry of space. Vector Equilibrium is the "zerophase" of energetic manifestation – the zerophase of the unified field. The vacuum, the source of organization, feeds all matter. The geometry of absolute equilibrium correlates with the vacuum in invisible flux. The Vector Equilibrium Matrix (VEM) is the archetypal seed of Being. Absolute space structures matter through the geometry of space. Patterns in the vacuum substructure hold the form. In a vortex "outer" coexists with "inner" in a dimensional morphing contorsion-continuum. This vortex energy modality of the fractal universes, this fractal, repeats ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 448 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I in every manifestation, including the Earth (the Body), the Psyche, the Soul, the Spirit. Space looks like nothing but is infinitely dense. The virtual lattice matrix can be visualized as the transmission medium of light. Light does not travel as waves or particles from an emitter; rather, the lattice is vibrated by information emitted from hyperspace. This in-formation generates and carries the local ‘light’ signal through the four dimensional medium of timespace just as waves are transmitted through water molecules (or any other compressible fluid). Within the ‘zero point’ virtual field all potential particles are packed solid and ‘empty space’ resonates with vibrations. Timespace is filled with virtual vortices – nebulous ‘vorticles’ of twisting timespace, not discrete particles – in a fluid crystal ‘luminiferous aether’. This is the zero-point field. The underlying information field’s transmission frequency within 4D realms (light speed) varies from location to location according to the energy density of the surrounding timespace lattice. The ’speed of light’ is not a fixed value, but varies according to the density of ‘matter’ or energy field through which it propagates. The local frequency of timespace – and the local propagation speed of light – is determined by the spin rate (and relative diameters) of the vorticles themselves as they are compressed or expanded via the local field density, which is ultimately derived from hyperspatial fields. Light as we perceive it manifests only at the surface of material bodies, where standing waves interrupt and transduce a perpetual flow of multidimensional forms in formation. Information is continually travelling throughout the cosmos at superluminal speeds but can only be physically viewed or measured using a yardstick made from local material. Light manifests to this yardstick at a specific frequency relative to its own density and that of the field which contains it, whether planetary, stellar or galactic. This yardstick will vary in length depending upon whether we are within the overarching fields of planet Earth, of another planet with differing field density, within the Sun’s atmosphere (the solar bubble which extends far beyond the orbit of Neptune/Pluto) or in interstellar timespace. The relative speed of light varies constantly, as do rates of time in relation to each other across the length and breadth of the lattice fabric. (Hermetic) A signal is basically some information somehow encoded as a wave. Everything travels as a wave. Amplitude represents its strength or energy as it traverses time or distance. Frequency is the period at which waves cycle. The wavelength is basically the distance occupied by the wave period. Interacting waves can be added together in either the time or frequency domain. Universe is a self-generating Superhologram of infinite potential. Holographic systems can generate threedimensional virtual images. The mathematical formulations that describe the harmonic curve resulting from the interference pattern of waves are called Fourier transformations. Projecting from a frequency domain of interfering waves, the holographic canvas plays patterns of light and transformation. Crisscrossing patterns occur when two or more waves ripple through each other. In the transactional interpretation of quantum physics, waves of probability originate in the past, present and future. Events manifest when waves from past and future interfere with each other in the present. That pattern creates matter and energy. Universe emerges from the rippling effects ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 449 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I of immense numbers of crisscrossing interference waves. The geometry of the fields is more fundamental than the fields or emergent particles themselves. DNA functions in a way that correlates with holographic projection, translated from the electrodynamic to the molecular level. The virtual biohologram projected by the embryonic nervous system forms a three-dimensional pattern of resonant structures. These structures behave as acoustic waves, acting as field guides for flowing matter and energy. The holograms are “read” by an electromagnetic or acoustic field that carries the gene-wave information beyond the limits of the chromosome structure. The brain feeds on a field of cosmic noise. The Philosopher’s Stone of infinite density condenses into visible space. All potential information about the Universe is holographically encoded in the spectrum of frequency patterns constantly bombarding us. There are no “things”, just energetic events – an electromagnetic universe, mind, and body, inseparable from wave upon waves in a veritable sea of panoramic noise. Noise correlates with movement and plays a cymatic role. Timelessness is the default mode of massively parallel noise. The sea of noise diffuses awareness across the entire vista. Pribram’s neural wave equation, describing holographic neural network processing, is similar to the Schrödinger wave equation of quantum theory with the addition of the de Broglie-Bohm Quantum Potential. This is not coincidental and opens the possibility of holographic interaction between receptive fields in the cortex with the holographic quantum universe described by David Bohm. Thus, the brain is a “time machine”. Fluctuating states are a “sequence to noise ratio”. While removed from empirical fact, a thought experiment is a means of employing useful imagination to uncover possible hidden mechanisms, to assemble a working model as a virtual reality visualization tool. In such an experiment with imagination instead of a test tube, we “downshift the quantum gear-box,” gathering intuitive possibilities, yielding insight into paradoxical timeless moments. Carrier waves take shape inside and outside the brain, body and environment. Coherent signals are modulated from a sort of noisy electromagnetic fog. Feeding back such signals from the web of currents arising between the vacuum and our DNA produces serial sequence and standing waves, deepening continuous self-awareness. We are the source’s apprentice. Vorticles appear to spin. Mass is manifested when vortexial structures appear from the matrix, slowed by a factor of local light speed and rotated into being by the presence of a standing wave to ‘create’ matter (in-phase rotating fields). Stroboscopic oscillations between nodes of these interlaced fields make up our material substance – ‘protons’, ‘electrons’, ‘neutrons’ – which are all really interlacing wave patterns, creating vorticles which oscillate in and out of phase with their surrounds. In-phase fields produce apparent, regular 3D structures constructed of spinning vorticles of zero point aether. All of these transient or persistent shapes which underlie the apparent patterns of atoms can be inscribed within a sphere; a sphere is the geometrical inverse of a vortex. Those formations of vorticles which are internally symmetrical manifest as stable standing waves – ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 450 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I matter. Others flip back into the infinite sea of potential, rotating back through other realms and dimensions. Oscillating 3D structures with insufficient internal symmetry (parity) appear charged. Those which are internally symmetrical appear neutral. There are only five internally symmetrical solids but other non-Pythagorean arrangements also come into play in the manifestation of matter. The only possible arrangement that a sufficiently complex cluster of spinning vorticles or spheres can take without ‘grinding gears’ is located at the fourteen points of a virtual cubeoctahedron – an arrangement that automatically arises from the underlying virtual tetrahedron field of timespace. Rotations of potential (hyperspatial) fields through three dimensions at 45 degree angles stabilise 8-beat structures – cubes and octahedrons, which are the geometric inverse of each other. 36 degree rotations produce dodecahedrons and icosahedrons, another pair of geometrical complements. All 14 vorticles in a dodecahedron or cube-octahedron (Vector Equilibrium) are aligned around a common field center. The dodecahedron’s 12 faces are centred on the 12 vertices of a truncated cube-octahedron. This perfect ’shot pattern’ – the optimal arrangement for spherical storage – includes an inner 13th sphere, or vorticle. A corresponding 13th vorticle – an ‘electron’ – orbits the dodecahedral proton (basic hydrogen). When stripped of their orbiting vorticle, dodecahedra lose parity and cohesion, and within a packed vorticle field they commonly form hydrogen plasma. Their 13th & 14th (inner & orbiting) vorticles rotate perpendicularly to the polar field alignment facets (vectors derived from the primacy of spin) and manifest in situ as two of the fourteen vorticles that turn together in a mutually reinforcing circuit to form a neutron. The interlacing of parity (in the cube-octahedral formation) and charge (in the dodecahedral formation) manifest material structures as they oscillate around the ‘ideal’ 13-sphere shot pattern of the truncated cube-octahedron. The dodecahedral pole of this standing wave pattern is the ‘proton’ and the cube-octahedral pole is the ‘neutron’. The vorticles are all aligned to the centre of their virtual dodecahedral and cube-octahedral structures by virtue of simple geometrical constraints. The vorticles that comprise these shapes continuously flash from one arrangement to the other, forming interlaced protons and neutrons that are the nodes of a standing wave – matter. This affects the spins of all in-phase surrounding structures; thus matter is a self-referencing standing wave locked into the holographic medium of one local in-phase universe among infinitude parallel realms, all perpetually spinning into, through, and out of each other in a multiverse of probabilities. (Hermetic) ‘Electron flow’ – electricity – is another product of vorticle resonance; the transmission of information through a multidimensional fractal fluid hologram interfacing with resonating 4D standing waves. Magnetism is an effect of vorticle resonance on surrounding timespace flow – another artefact of symmetrical structures manifesting as alignments within an aether field. These alignments also produce ‘gravity’ (See Magic Net). Virtual particles continually wink in ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 451 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I and out of local existence. Within material fields – matter – it’s far easier for a virtual vorticle to manifest within a stable geometrical arrangement of other vortices and remain in the local timespace field. A vorticle is induced by simple geometrical constraints to move towards the greatest aggregation of other vorticles and find a stable place to occupy within their structure. Each potential vorticle is drawn into being and pulled through field-lines of progressively increasing interlacing as the common strongest local field centre is approached. Virtual particles are continually manifesting and disappearing in our reality as adjacent realities twist through each other. Progressively more dense elements manifest more ‘matter’ within themselves than lighter elements or surrounding ‘space’ does. Gravity is a simple consequence of geometrical interactions that make it easier for energy/matter to condense from the aether in places where interlaced arrangements of atoms already exist – where ‘energy’ or ‘matter’ exists. This explains the observation that the planet Earth is expanding at a rate of about an inch a year, and alters all premillennial conceptions of stellar formation and evolution. The interwoven harmonies of vibrating spheres at microcosmic and macrocosmic levels are the matrix of ‘reality. (Hermetic) Metaphorms Paradoxically when we look into the depths of matter, we look into the depths of ourselves and find the universe mirrored within. The world we live in lives in us. Scientists and mystics report similar phenomena in their models and phenomenology. Source feeds information into the brain's cortex through a variety of channels (genetic and memetic 'intraspecies' information transfers, then through interspecies' transfers under specified conditions (mirror neuron activation, intentional behavior, etc). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 452 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I Religion and spirituality are largely about trying to understand the nature of consciousness in relation to the cosmos, so it is completely logical and natural to expect that we might actually come to understand the religious aspect of existence by following the conscious mind into its source nature. Changes in brain dynamics are relevant to the discovery process. What appears to happen during an active quest in science or mysticism is that this filtering process is slightly loosened without seriously disrupting brain function, so that, in addition to witnessing the real world, we also have a degree of added perceptual information which is resonant to the brain state and probably consists of mild patterns of additional natural brain excitation traveling across the cortex. Arguably, such activity is patterned by archetypes. This tends to be witnessed as a kaleidoscopic addition to everyday experience which one can look at and which is responsive to the person's state of focus so that they can selectively enter a kind of visionary state in which the brain is looking into its own processes to a greater degree than usual. Whether this reflects the divine is anyone's guess; it does reflect what has been attributed in the past to the "divine". But, those without a religious worldview also have experiences of similar nature to formative religious or spiritual dimensions – that is experience of the numinous element. Spiritual technologies, the software of sacred penetration and amplification, virtually predicted the fine nature of matter as nothing but a complex illusion - what we have come to understand as a hologram. Though the map is not the territory, it is good for orientation purposes, and to compare amongst practitioners with different jargon. Mystics have also always emphasized the primal nature of Light, and claim that we are in fact made of light itself. Science has confirmed this in numerous ways. Both science and mystics claim the primacy of Light. Nanoscale symmetry is reflected in both matter and the natural number sequence and is the tuning system of resonant nodes. The magnetic field tunes chains of spin. Tension comes from the interaction between spins causing them to magnetically resonate. Their frequencies are in Phi ratios. In the quantum world, everything is in self-organizing flux, including the subquantal virtual photons popping in and out of existence. The foamy Zero Point fluctuation of subspace perturbs and determines the behavior of quantum systems theoretically through radiant EM fields. Radiation is absorbed from the zero-point background. The stability of matter itself is mediated by the zero point fluctuation phenomena. Obviously, physical reality is not absolute. The gist of the holographic paradigm is that there is a fundamental reality that is an invisible flux not comprised of parts, but an inseparable interconnectedness. The holographic paradigm is one of reciprocal enfolding and unfolding of patterns of information. All potential information about the universe is holographically encoded in the spectrum of frequency patterns constantly bombarding us. The esoteric glossary is being superseded by scientific fact. Buckminster Fuller correctly discerned that One is not a number. His notion of the primacy of the Vector Equilibrium Matrix of twelve-around-one closest packed spheres models a cosmic pulsation at the smallest scale, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 453 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I revealing that unity or singularity is plural and at minimum sixfold. Such a notion is mirrored in sacred geometry and ancient systems of application such as the Merkabah, Diamond Body, and Golden Mean as engines of transformation. Those trapped in old superstitious emotional thinking (reality wormholes) exist trapped in an eddy in a stream, unable to imagine the flow of the current. Zero-summed EM force vector systems stress the vacuum. A patterned system of opposite forces forms a stress in the vacuum medium. It is the alchemical "holding the tension of the opposites." This stress is oscillation. This oscillation which we call a scalar electromagnetic wave is a Gravitational Wave, since the local curvature of spacetime is being oscillated. This internal stress in the medium has several characteristics which identify it as chaotic in essential nature. 1) it has a deterministic pattern or substructure; 2) it patterns or "polarizes" the vacuum; 3) it constitutes local curvature of spacetime 4) it deterministically engineers the virtual state and local spacetime; 5) it affects the Schroedinger wave and the probabilities of the states propagated forward, leading to the possibility of engineering the emergence of quantum change; 6) the scalar wave can accomplish direct and localized change of the rate of flow of time (even to its reversal) and variation of mass and inertia without translation of matter; 7) since excess negative time flow may be locally produced, negentropy may be locally produced. (Bearden) When the vectorially zeroing components are dynamic, the scalar resultant is dynamic. The dynamic scalar term is the scalar EM wave. (Miller, "Anatomy of the Star Goddess", 1992). This is a revolution of resolution and resonance. Structure arises out of chaos in resonance with the existing environment. Each form eventually becomes morphogenetically dissonant as the dynamic environment surrounding it changes. The changed surroundings stress the form and begin a process of its dissolution back into chaos. Spacetime is a mirror of Spirit. Each selfaware image dissolves back into the primordial singularity, endlessly recycling its virtual energy in a kaleidoscope of holofractal forms. Degrees of resonance contexualize and memorialize experience at the informational level. Holographic Archetypes There is a pre-physical, unobservable domain of potentiality in quantum theory. It is the basis of fundamental interconnectedness and wholeness of Reality. The human body is not an object in ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 454 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I space, but seamlessly welded to spacetime. We are not merely a phenomenal body of flesh, but one of awareness, of consciousness, a living interface of inner and outer field phenomena. The brain is not confined to our skull, but permeates our whole being through the intracellular matrix and sensory system, as well as the strong toroidal EM fields generated by the beating heart. Our molecular system extends beyond the nervous system and is the bedrock of felt-sense, intuitive, subconscious and unconscious processes. The body has a mind of its own and speaks that mind in gut reactions, body language, dreams, psychosomatics, and literal symptoms. Jung suggested the gods have become diseases. That is, in our unconsciousness of them they have resorted to subverting our bodies in order to be responded to and heard. For example, our collective environmental issues become cancers. Like psychic DNA, the collective unconscious contains "inherited" psychic material that links us not only to other humans in the present but also to our ancestors from the past. According to Jung's theory, though each of us appears to function independently, in actuality we're all tapped into the same global mind. Symbols interact with and condition our biohologram. Holographic archetypes are embedded in the very fabric of our being and that of our environment. Archetypes are rooted in or emerge from the holographic source field as attractors, chaotic systems having fractal or reiterative structures that repeat at all levels of observation. They never settle into equilibrium, periodicity, or resonance. Transpersonal experience creates a new interpretation, or perspective on reality. Systems arise from positive feedback and amplification. Thus, archetypes introduce erratic behavior that leads to the emergence of new situations, including creative insight. All the objects of our world are three-dimensional images formed of standing and moving waves by electromagnetic and nuclear processes. This is the guiding matrix for self-assembly, and manipulating and organizing physical reality. It is how our DNA creates and projects our psychophysical structure. Holograms contain many dimensions of “compressed” information in a subtle network of interacting frequencies. The gist of the holographic paradigm is that there is a more fundamental reality. There is an invisible flux not comprised of parts, but an inseparable interconnectedness. The holographic paradigm is one of reciprocal enfolding and unfolding of patterns of information. All potential information about the universe is holographically encoded in the spectrum of frequency patterns constantly bombarding us. Thus, the brain is an embedded hologram, interpreting a holographic universe. (Miller, Webb, Dickson, 1973) All existence consists of embedded holograms within holograms and their interrelatedness somehow gives rise to our existence and sensory images. (Bohm, 1980) When we consciously embody this intimate wisdom our bodies become temples of the living spirit. We supercharge our potential. DNA functions in a way that correlates with holographic projection. The code is transformed into physical matter guided by light and sound signals. DNA projects a blueprint for the organism that is translated from the electrodynamic to the molecular level. Further, research strongly suggests DNA functions as a biocomputer. Gariaev described how this DNA-wave ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 455 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I biocomputer reads and writes genetic code and forms holographic pre-images of biostructures. We are more fundamentally electromagnetic, rather than chemical beings. DNA is also influenced by the environment, so genetic plasticity is expressed in epigenetics and metagenetics that turn certain gene sequences on and off. The Collective Unconscious is essentially a hologram. Nonlocal consciousness is not confined to specific points in space, including brains or bodies, nor to the present moment. It is an ordering principle that can inject information into disorganized or random systems. It can operate beyond mere awareness, unconsciously, drawing on individual and collective consciousness, as well as the world or environment. Symbols arise from and are embedded in the environment as holographic fields of energy. They are morphogenic veils of primal forces. If your brain acts like a self-contained hologram, it is possible your consciousness is actually a piece of a much larger hologram of overall human consciousness. Jung noticed that patterns spontaneously appear over and over around the world. They also appear as our Ancestral Memories or holographic wisdom field. In the archetypal world, everyone is the same, all around the world... we are all Gods, and our emotional addictions to pain and suffering, contempt, insecurities, doubt, failure, is holographically-recorded and can be holographically healed. All archetypes are a form of human expression that is both holographic and physical. Physical formations of archetypal sequences cause humans to behave in parallel manners to each ancestor that is associated. Integration is a function of intentionality -- conscious and unconsciously maintained, or incorporated. Integration occurs both without effort, as a redesign of the central processor of our minds, and voluntarily as a deliberate effort to understand, find meaning, and as rectification of our behavior towards others and towards ourselves. Imagination is structured by the archetypal potentials of the unconscious. Archetypes structure the possibility to generate and entertain such ideas. The archetype itself cannot be known but structures everything we come to know. Their totality functions as a psychic organ. Universal themes appear in distinct cultural garb. Over millennia, all the archetypes emerged and recycled in stories, deities and cultural forms. One of the striking points of religious faith is that they aren't true. In early history people didn't know the ‘real' reasons things happened, so it's no surprise that their explanations were wrong. But then, why would we want to retrieve such superstitions? Kuhn reminds us that even the most absurd or confused explanation of a phenomenon can find acceptance in the absence of a competing idea. Social networking feeds us stupefyingly moronic ideas. Once any explanation is offered for a phenomenon, many take that as an explanation from that time on. Succeeding speculations might be able to explain the relevant phenomena better than its predecessors. Deities, as archetypal role models, are the opening gambit in the drama of understanding human subjectivity. Folk tales and fads function the same way. Deities or archetypes may have evolved to smooth interpersonal relations by including an understanding of human types, along with rules for helping the different types relate with one ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 456 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I another. They are reflections of ancient evolutionary pressures, with a dash of neuroanatomy. We still have the same pressures today so the ancient archetypes still "work", regardless of objective existence of gods and goddesses. (Miller, Pantheon) Burke (2003) describes how the underlying pattern or strange attraction between transference and holography extends to other processes both within and outside the field of psychology. Such processes include projection, projective identification, splitting, memory, biology, creative discovery, theology, synchronicity, chaos, and nonlocality. Identifying the similar patterns of these processes demonstrates the existence of an underlying holographic archetype in which essential qualities of the whole are present in each of the parts of the whole. The autonomy of the overall human is present in each conscious and unconscious component part of the human psyche. Synchronicity explores the borderland between meaning and spacetime, where chance meets necessity, when external and internal circumstances align in meaningful coincidence. It links the observable and unknowable, the effect of the particular and specific with the universal. In this nonlocal effect, certain qualities manifest relatively simultaneously in different or proximate places. It is a parallelism that cannot be explained causally. Is it an invisible field effect linking multidimensional spaces? Cognition, itself is a holographic archetype. Many essential qualities of the whole are reflected or contained in each of the parts that make up that whole. It is a subtle net of metaphor, analogy and simile. Holographic archetypes effectively echo their resonant patterns through literal and symbolic reflectaphors. The passing forms of the holographic archetype include the hologram, psychic structure, synchronicity, wisdom traditions, memory, the process of scientific discovery, chaos in physics, nonlocality and virtuality in physics. As unconscious structuring principle, the archetype lies beyond normal consciousness and emerges suddenly and dynamically from the (holographic) psychoid field, with a powerful emotional charge that invests it with significance. Everything that happens is conditioned by the moment in which it happens. The universal field imposes the conditions. Matter is not inert but receptive to holistic patterning. If the mythic world taught our ancestors how to manipulate the empirical world, it also taught them to manipulate that mythic narrative itself for control purposes. Socioeconomic power enforces its mythic narrative. Psychoid Field Consciousness rests upon and is organized by its archetypal forms and foundations. Dig far enough into an intense inner experience and you eventually come to the mythological, ageless themes that indicate an activated archetype. Just as an instinct is activated by a certain situation it bears an image of, so is an archetype. Also, its psychoid base puts it beyond both matter and psyche, though it has qualities of both. Although archetypes are energic power sources, they need libido from the ego for their images to rise into consciousness. The psychoid field imposes holistic function. Autonomous inner forces arouse compelling opportunities to enact archetypal behaviors. They guide our perceptions and behavior, usually ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 457 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I without our awareness. Limbic action of complexes is a big part of the holistic dynamics of the psyche. Dreams report what goes on beneath the veil of conscious awareness. To the consciousness of the 'thinker', knowledge is thought -- period. Without thought, the consciousness of the 'thinker' collapses into psychosis. With archetypes come the potential for wisdom, relatedness, sociality, ambiguity, paranoia, projection, identification, denial, inflation, subpersonalities (fragmentation), defensiveness, obsession, hypnotic dissociation, the contagion of participation mystique, mythologizing, complexes, compensation, phobias, prejudices, complexes (interference by an archetype or group of archetypes with the conscious personality), our runaway ego-trips, and self-delusion. Compensation may calm or disturb consciousness. There is no imperative for the ego to integrate these alternative perspectives, private and public myths. They continually play through us, stimulating beliefs, ideas, emotions and behavior. The unconscious can produce deep wisdom and utter nonsense. It is up to the ego to discriminate. The value of myths is purely heuristic, not pragmatic. Mythological consciousness has a persona, cultural and archetypal dimension that manifests in dreams, fantasies, delusion and visions. Truth is a revelation of what we already know but haven’t heard in words before. In truth we discover what we already know but haven’t confronted. Truth as a judgment is the product of our experience. In our belief systems, truth is what we accept of our history, what we accept as truth. We choose truth, which is revealed in direct proportion to our ability to discard all we were previously told is true - presumptions, assumed truths, limited self image. The Archetypal Field The closer we come to the deep core of any archetypal experience the more the numinous effect increases, as a confrontation with a power not of this world. The fusional field is invisible to normal perception but contains a roiling unprocessed information. The fusional complex is an archetypal pattern that organizes life between the known and the unknown. We rarely attend to the deep experiential field we experience with another person in our bodies. Often, we tend to avoid it as the dreaded traumatic state of fear of the void, a nothingness, a bottomless pit, or demonic force -- the instabilities in ourself or another or the boundless inchoate flux of impossible opposites. Cultures are also susceptible to it at the collective level. It is a constant companion in the creative as well as spiritual transformative life. The embodiment of any new form of consciousness and its associated self image comes in this challenging manner. But such powerlessness and nothingness is the anxiety-provoking inexorable pull of the void, which leads to dissociation as a defense against letting go. Attempts to meet the chaos, rather than dissociate lead to change. Even when the numinous is negative it carries the sacredness of the archetype. We learn to lean into the field and feel its chaos without imposing premature order. The field is a paradox of fusion and distance, an impossible simultaneity that brings anxiety. We need to practice seeing the field, as well as seeing into and through it. It is never conveyed by ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 458 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I interpretation, but only by experiential perception. Non-ordinary perception evolves through kinesthetic perception. It calms the chaos of the transition and allows the new self to emerge as a living reality. We have to maintain faith in the process. Movement from the timeless into temporal existence is a creative passage. With a sense of containment within a higher dimensional field, the opposites reconcile and new potential is created. The field becomes the focus. Scientific Archetypes Generic mathematical models, such as those of general systems, dissipative structures, bifurcation, fractals, chaos, and singularity can be applied in many contexts, and can be considered high level archetypes. This means that they have considerable abstraction. It spans a large rather than small portion of space-time, and that incorporates many rather than few dimensions of existence. It follows that a truly unified theory across all realms would incorporate high-level archetypes. This might occur within the realm of physics and then be generalized, or it could come from the search for unities across disciplines. Mind, consciousness, and awareness are so central to the process of reality, perhaps they are the very reason for reality. Concepts of matter, life, and mind have undergone major changes. Consciousness is not a material system and neither is Quantum Mechanics (QM), which reduces all information and energy down to its fundamental holographic nature. As energy flows, information is coherently organized into animated forms of information. Though we have assumptions and beliefs, we remain unsure of the primordial nature of reality. Simply stated, it is impossible to take the 'meta' out of physics since it is impossible to take the observer out of physics. It is impossible to take the knower out of knowledge. All metaphysical discussions are inherently about the nature of the observer and the knower. There is no physical theory of the observer because consciousness cannot be explained physically. Everything our physical theories of the observable world describe is some physical thing observed by an observer. (Kowall) Kowall explains that he observer is inherent in our most basic scientific principles, like the principle of equivalence. All the scientific debate about the correct interpretation of quantum theory is about the nature of observation. Both physics and metaphysics place the observer at the center of this discussion. That hyper-physical world of images demands of us that we inquire into the nature of the consciousness of the observer present at that focal point of perception. The holographic nature of the world describes at the most fundamental level possible how all information and energy is encoded in the world. But what does that fundamental description of the world tell us about the fundamental nature of consciousness? The nature of the consciousness perceiving that holographic world remains a mystery. The key insight of the holographic principle is that an accelerating frame of reference, with an observer present at the central point of view, can arise even within empty space. As the observer arises, an event horizon also arises, which is a far as the observer can see things in space due to the constancy of the speed of light (Penrose 2005). Where does the point of view of the observer ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 459 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I arise? Where does the two dimensional surface of the event horizon arise? They both arise in empty space. (Kowall) Scientists have shown that the brain runs largely on autopilot; it acts first and asks questions later, often explaining behavior after the fact. If much of behavior is automatic, then how responsible are people for their actions? These are among the concerns of neuroscientist Dr. Michael S. Gazzaniga in his new book, Who’s in Charge? Free Will and the Science of the Brain. The brain is a cacophony of competing voices. “The question, ultimately, was why?” Dr. Gazzaniga said. “Why, if we have these separate systems, is it that the brain has a sense of unity?” Brain images are snapshots, for one thing; they capture a brain state at only one moment in time and say nothing about its function before or after. For another, the images vary widely among people with healthy brains -- that is, a “high” level of activity in one person may be normal in another. Can brain science tell exactly where automatic processes end and self-directed “responsible” ones end? Not now and not likely ever, Dr. Gazzaniga argues in his book. Social constructs like good judgment and free will are even further removed, and trying to define them in terms of biological processes is, in the end, a fool’s game. Science has its own archetypal fascinations, expressed in theories and models. There is no consensus in physics. The Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics (QM) competes with Quantum Electrodynamics (QED), Holographic, Monistic Idealism, Transactional, PostQuantum, Scalar, Many Worlds (MWI), Topological Geometrodynamics (TGD), String and MTheory, among others. The secret of Reality may lie in the reconciliation of quantum cosmology, aligning micro-and macroverses. Quantum chaos plays a crucial role in cosmology as choas theory and complexity do in biological systems. The idea of many worlds, many realities, many dreams appears already in Chinese and Indian texts. Everett cites the well known "garden of forking path" from Borges. It is an ancestral theme of humanity, which comes easily to the mind when you remember your dreams. To really know how the brain works, neuroanatomy is the best guide. Psychological descriptions got us started, but a fundamental map and understanding require a deeper biological foundation and questioning our assumed truths. We remain immersed within the interface of psyche and matter -- that point where psyche matters. As in chaos theory, all the creative action is at the boundary of any field, the creative threshold, the leading edge. All contemporary models [Transactional (quantum handshake), Many-Worlds (decoherence), M-Theory (strings), Copenhagen (wave-function collapse), Holographic (frequency domain; resolution), Implicate (hidden information), etc], E8, and Torsion Physics (Kozyrov) are essentially philosophical, or colored by the psyche and philosophy of their originators. Imagination has to cross the boundaries of disciplines to somehow find links between the observable and unknowable. With gravity, time and spin, matter and psyche are in a constant state of redefinition. String theory is facing a high noon with the absence of evidence for supersymmetry in the LHC, where none of the expected evidence for it has been forthcoming to date. String theories began bosonic and then included fermions by citing supersymmetry. Thus all fermionic string theories ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 460 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I appear to be supersymmetric. Supersymmetry perfectly balances the energy infinity of the bosons against the negative energy infinity of the fermions by claiming a fermion partner for each boson, but the standard model doesn't look anything like supersymmetric. An alternative is that there are different numbers and arrangements of fermions that still balance the numbers and arrangements of the bosons, but this is right outside the string theory orbit at present. (King, 2011) Physicist Brian Greene, in a PBS show "The Fabric of the Cosmos" on the nature of space, recently let us in on a secret: We've all been deceived. Our perceptions of time and space have led us astray. Much of what we thought we knew about our universe—that the past has already happened and the future is yet to be, that space is just an empty void, that our universe is the only universe that exists -- just might be wrong. Greene reveals space as a dynamic fabric that can stretch, twist, warp, and ripple under the influence of gravity. Space, far from being empty, is filled with some of the deepest mysteries of our time. The unexplored microcosm of the Ground-state, the universe of the subquantal domain, may be the key to higher consciousness. The vacuum of Absolute Space is the central ingredient of 21stcentury physics. It is the space between particles, inside and outside the atom. You breathe air that carries the vacuum between its molecules. It is technically metaphysical (nonobservable) -beyond the realm of physics because it is virtual, rather than manifest. Paradoxically, the vacuum is both the absence of matter and the universal substance. We still don't know where consciousness fits in the big picture. There is no consensus among theories of what constitutes FIGURE and what constitutes the most fundamental GROUND, and it seems they share the same essential nature. Our perceived ‘content’ is not distinct from the ‘context’ in which it arises. It is one whole cloth of bubbling space-time. Nothing more, nor less. We have looked into the Abyss of spacetime and found it laughing back. The core task is answering "What is consciousness? ", and having that answer also fit with and support questions and developed answers (descriptions) on "What is matter?" and "What is energy?". Clearly, the task is to settle on a new common denominator that unites the other aspects and elements. There is the subject that is conscious and then there is the object of consciousness. If there were no object of consciousness, would there be a consciousness? A consciousness of nothing? Arthur Kornberg discusses DNA in his book "DNA Replication" (pg.13). "The most important feature of the duplex model for DNA structure is the introduction of the principle of complimentarity. It provided the explanation for accurate replication of a very long chain. This inherent feature of DNA is the basis not only of its replication but also of its capacity to transmit information. Complementarity has come to explain transcription and translation and thus the entire sequence of events in the expression of genetic functions. It is also the basis for exchange of DNA segments between chromosomes in several forms of recombination." Does the rest of the body follows DNA? As a matter of fact is there anything which combines with anything without an entity bringing the pair together". Archetypes are similar to the genetic code, in that they initially create a structural outline (as in morphogenetic fields and other attractors). The influences of environment and consciousness can then create considerable variation and coloring to the essential structure. Our desires become our ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 461 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I talents, our thoughts become our direction, and the power of our purposeful will become our destiny. The spiritual ideal is always there, becoming clearer to us in the later stages of development. Pitkanin & Gariaev suggest, frequency coding would be natural for quantum antenna interactions between ordinary DNA and its dark variant and also between dark variants of DNA, RNA, tRNA, and amino-acids. The reason is that dark nucleons represent the genetic code by entanglement and it is not possible to reduce the codon to a sequence of letters. Ervin Laszlo points out regarding the finest level of observation, that because of “the quantum vacuum, the energy sea that underlies all of spacetime, it is no longer warranted to view matter as primary and space as secondary. It is to space or rather, to the cosmically extended "Diracsea" of the vacuum that we should grant primary reality.” Virtual particles pop in and out of existence like quantum foam. Mass is the consequence of interactions in the depth of this universal field. There is only this absolute matter-generating subquantal field. Physicist, David Bohm believed all matter is unfolded out of what he eventually described as a holomovement, which meant that matter could also enfold and so return into the holomovement. Bohm considered quantum mechanics to be a process of unfolding and enfolding. He imagined the universe as an infinite sea of space and energy out of which matter could be unfolded, which he called explicating, and enfolded which he called implicating, which, in Bohm’s words, “together are a flowing, undivided wholeness". The whole universe of space and time is enfolded into each part. A fundamental order of potential energy enfolds space and time. There is hidden energy in these enfolded dimensions -a unity of space, time and meaning potential. Scalars are time-reversed waves. The infolded (negative) time dimension of virtual photon flux (hyperspace) is zero-point. Time in physics can be interpreted as an archetype for all material objects. You can not grab a piece of time and hold it; it is everywhere but nowhere. Materiality in the physical world eventually unfolds and enfolds at all scales. Archetypes share this holographic enfolding and unfolding nature. At least, they can be modelled as such. Psychological Archetypes Jung's collective unconscious consists of archetypal infolded EM structures acting in common in an overall bio-quantum-potential for the entire species. The bio-potential in a single body is an overall quantum potential that links and joins all the atoms and cells of the body. The "spirit" of the biosystem, if you will, is its "living biopotential" - its living quantum potential. We already know that a potential is everywhere nonzero all the way out to infinity. So the spirit of the living system is - in the virtual state - everywhere and everywhen in the universe. The superhologram of spacetime means the entire universe is everywhere alive, with everything. Archetypal forces operate under their own laws in various phases of human life and endeavors. The archetypes provide the potential form for experiences that are given individual content by the person’s actual experiences. They influence us on biochemical, personal, social, national and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 462 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I universal levels. They come in the ever-changing guises of phobias and Irrational fears, prejudices, complexes (interference by an archetype or group of archetypes with the conscious personality), and our runaway ego-trips. Complexes can be pathological, archetypes cannot, as entirely healthy expressions of nature The complex may form around any archetypal, that is, structurally important, component of the psyche. Archetypes play through our self-narratives, culture in art, literature, and the movies we so frequently view and in the stories we love. Our souls are attuned to listening for the multiplicity of viewpoints that comprise situations and events, bridging unconscious and consciousness. Complexes need not be pathological. They are merely collections of psychological material that function most efficiently when they are together. They usually group together because they all relate to a single archetype. When seen objectively in stories, we can identify with or despise them, but when their effects are subjective, we are entirely "carried away," "beside ourselves". Sometimes, we choose them to feel special and create drama or novelty in our otherwise listless lives - we mistake them for love, for destiny, for the voice of God, for supernatural "signs" in an unenlightened, even superstitious manner. They lie behind religiosity, pathology, and romantic vs. mature love. Archetypes also lie behind fascinations, crusades, and enchantments of individuals and nations. They produce the phenomena of "love at first sight" and create fads and set trends or styles in the recreation and fashion worlds. They can be contagious as in the case of cults, or political and religious movements. The great attraction of sports is also archetypal in nature. People will go to war and fight to the death as fanatical "true believers" to defend some political or religious principle. The belief system is influenced by the myth behind it. Charismatic leaders capture the projections of leadership through expressing the subconscious desires of the crown, or herd consciousness (like Adolph Hitler or Jim Jones). Activation of these archetypal powers opens the door for both good and evil, and creates an arena for the emergence of ethics and morals. Irrational superstitious behavior goes hand in glove with errors of judgment and in some cases involves dissociation or personality disorders, including schizotypal, toxic narcissistic, and borderline personalities. Dissociation can be desirable, as in the case of flow, or pathological, as in dissociative identity disorder. Deeper reality is not remote in the physical sense but in a psychological sense. It is concealed by the very trance states and memes that compose it. Often, we only recognize the trance state when it breaks, when the projection ends and we reassimilate that energy. The archetypal content should be respected and perhaps seen through various lenses, but it should never be dismissed as delusion or mere projection. If this happens then the whole cascade of chemistry that packs enormous energies and psychic forces can be prematurely deflated and turn into a self-destructive bomb in the bodymind of the awakener. Psychic life depends on an unconscious infrastructure. Jung helped differentiate the inscape with his concept of archetypes which express the innate potentials of all dynamics beyond specific forms. Many of his ideas are central to understanding the human psyche or soul, and apply ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 463 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I universally to all of mankind. What is of archetypal—that is, organizational and structural— importance to the personality will emerge. Jung suggests the existence of a 3-layered psyche consisting of 1) the conscious (active part of the mind), 2) the personal unconscious (thinking over which we have little or no control), and 3) the collective unconscious (unevolved, animal-instinctive mental activity). Jung sees archetypes as unconscious regulators of psychic life that attempt to redress psychic imbalances. The unconscious interacts with consciousness in a compensatory way, which leads to intrapsychic self-regulation (Jung, 1966). In Myth and the Body, Keleman states: "Our creation myth is also the myth of our biological evolution...there is another aspect to the creation and evolution myth..myth is about the birth and evolution of the body's inner subjectivity... embyrogenesis is cosmogenesis; the birth of the body is the birth of the inner emotional cosmos...from the moment of our conception, the organizing of past somatic images is available to us as a guide for being in the world of the present....The different bodies of our history-personal and impersonal-are in our dreams. Myth presents us ...with the body images of various ages and eons. The complex of somatic images gives our present somatic image an organization and dimension, a structure that has duration...Mostly we are in touch with the surface body, because perception is mostly a surface phenomenon. That doesn't mean that the other bodies aren't there.” Resonant Filters Psyche is the unified field of material and immaterial dynamics, the physical and metaphysical. There are as many archetypes as there are situations in life and nature. A constant non-perceptual pattern remains concealed behind archetypal variants. Originating in the collective unconscious, archetypes are experiential catalysts, often likened to psychodynamic Platonic Forms or "spiritual" DNA. They are constraint-based domains. They are the forces of history. They are life's filters. Archetypes, according to Jung, are "active living dispositions, ideas in the Platonic sense that preform and continually influence our thoughts and feelings and actions." They are not inherited ideas, but rather, as Jung says elsewhere, "inherited possibilities of ideas." The exact nature of these archetypes has been much discussed both within and outside of Jungian circles. What matters for our present purposes is just that the underlying archetypes (which by definition are beyond or beneath consciousness) are expressed in powerful, fascinating and numinous conscious images called "archetypal images". What needs to be insisted on, however, it that there is something still deeper behind archetypal images, something itself unknown, which expresses itself in the psyche. (Granrose) Archetype-figures also appear in the personal unconscious as "complexes". Archetypes tend to personify themselves, through the cooperation of the active imagination, in order to penetrate personal consciousness. The unconscious, form-determining (archetypal) components of the personality, and the complexes of ideation and affect that form around them seem to act like ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 464 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I inductive magnets for certain events and affects to which they correspond, according to Jung. Like strange attractors in chaos theory, they are self-organizing intrapsychic principles. Archetypes express innate psychological dispositions, fundamental morphogenetic laws, which govern perception, and affective experience. They influence the formation of complexes, which develop around a particular archetypal (core) issue. The archetypes are the individual components or manifestations of the self; they determine particular intrapsychic structures. They manifest in the instinctual life of the body, its attractions, repulsions, fragmentations, and impasses, as well as ideas, "head trips," and spiritual urges. Archetypes give form to fertile chaos which functions as a multi-reined holographic control system. All of our experience is filtered through these conditioning "lenses." Nevertheless we aren't reducible to simple determinants. We are embedded in a hologram of psychic dimensions. Interactive archetypal energies are embedded in and live through us, as biopsychosocial events. They represent our potentialities beyond time. But we think we are autonomous. In these state-specific altered realities we experience a qualitative range and subtlety of interconnectedness that would be frightening and crazy-making to our normal socio-conditioned repressed mode of being. We find the ground of being and interrelationship with mystery through mythic engagement. Normally, we project our inner states out into the world. The mystic becomes emancipated from the persuasions of psychic content, while the schizophrenic becomes lost in them. Images arise from energy flux like biochemical resonant filters and harmonic levels of arousal, elevated energetic activation. Then we find synchronous information and events in the outer world to reinforce the energetic power of the archetypes we are preoccupied with. The shamanic journey consists of acute neurological events that evoke heavens and hells that lead to emergent selforganization. To avoid spiraling into prolonged metabolic and cognitive chaos we must accept these new levels of awareness and physiological condition as coming from “us” and not from an alien entity or God. We must claim responsibility for our Self as it incarnates at an accelerated pace and not project the cause of our condition onto external people, entities or events. As an integrated human we can still "have" our story, but we must keep it in its place by running it through a progressively rational interpretation. This rationalizing process integrates the archetypal imaginal world (reptilian/old mammalian brain) into the 21st Century prefrontal lobes. Consensus reality is a conditioned trance state. To be "normal", when this violates our inner nature, is itself a form of pathology. Disruption of ego's metaprogramming (habituated dissociation) is not regression, but merely the removal of adaptive/repressive functioning in the present. This creates an entirely new consciousness that does share features with primordial states. This loss of the sense of the known self (ego) is a desirable effect of transformation processes. By differentiating from the images, symbols, myths, stories and personal identity that we were so involved in before, consciousness becomes separated from its contents. We deepen our own healing by remembering our own experience of trauma is simultaneously a microcosmic, personalized fractal reflecting the greater trauma resonating throughout the collective field. This ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 465 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I realization allows us to not personalize the moment of feeling the trauma, or concretize ourselves as being traumatized, but allows us to give over to and embrace particularized experience. Unless we are “affected” by the symbols, myths and archetypes that we use to give “story” to our lives, no psychic tension would arise to propel us out of “normal” consciousness. The foundations of myth arose in the trance states of early shamans and yogis, exploring the selfarising activity of the Central Nervous System. Intense concentration on the resting voltage of the CNS can lead to spontaneous realization of the meaning that pervades one's own biology. (Sansonese, The Body of Myth, p. 34-35). Since these ZPE-originated fields are located everywhere (in the Planck false vacuum) and their ultimate radial extension is infinite — they interpenetrate each other in the vast sea of pulsating cosmic spacetime… And, together, constitute the basis of our holographic universe... Note that all radiant electrodynamic fields, within any frequency spectrum phase order, must have a series of fractal harmonics extending throughout its entire spectral range, which also resonates with all other (higher and lower) phase order fields — and that all information is carried on such fields as modulated wave interference patterns — so that, once recorded, no information is ever lost. Since all structural information is contained in the infinite spin-momentum (singularity) source of all (harmonic) fractal involved cosmic fields, along with all particle standing waves (as well as all their formative combination's and permutations) at different frequency phase orders... And since all information is transformed from field to field by phase conjugate adaptive resonance... The entire physical universe we experience (at the fourth lowest phase order of the third fractal involution of the cosmos) — is a hologram. On our physical/material level or plane — this fundamental octave enfolded hyperspherical (toroidal) harmonic structure of all hyperspace and metric space/energy field/forms in total physical/material spacetime (originating from its own “singularity”--ref: General Relativity) — is the basis of all generation of ZPE fields radiating from the center of origin of all physical forms — beginning with the smallest sub-quantum particle and extending to the largest galaxy, as well as each human being. All such fields are also electrodynamic in nature (Ref: Maxwell, Coulomb, Faraday, Ampere equations), Consequently all structural, memory and mental information is carried as holographically encoded wave interference patterns on the surface of such fields. And are transmitted, through descending hyperspace field phase orders to their common zero-point center of consciousness, by phase conjugate adaptive resonance processes. Thus, Mind itself (in the case of human thought) is one of those hyperspace fields linked coenergetically (resonantly) with the brain’s radiant EM fields… With long term, archetypal, and species memory stored in adjacent higher order coenergetic hyperspace fields (ref: string theory). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 466 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I At the first moment of cosmogenesis (“big bang” as science sees it) — the initial highest frequency/energy phase order (spiritual) triune fields of spacetime, fractally involve, and descend in orderly frequency-energy phase orders, stepping down from near infinite frequency spectrum’s to near zero — after emanating from the *singularity* of general relativity… Whose dual inherent qualities, at its zero-point center of origin (absolute space) — are both, *potential* subjective consciousness and *potential* objective *matter*. (Maurer) This source of everything in our physical-phenomenal hyperspace and metric space-time is the timeless and dimensionless zero-point center and surrounding infinite spin momentum, (G-force or “spinergy*) of unconditioned and eternal Absolute SPACE. This primal space remains, ubiquitously, in our lower order physical/material spacetime, as the zero-point center of “spinergy” at the origin (singularity) of every radiant field, fundamental particle and physical form — up to the largest galaxy, quasar, black hole, etc. Einstein labeled this ubiquitous source of ZPE, “Aether” or ” total space.” Maurer describes this Absolute SPACE as both the creative force (conscious will) and the receptive womb (infinite spin momentum on triple perpendicular sets of infinite spherical axes) that constitutes the “cosmic eggs” out of which all subsequent universes, with their metaphysical hyperspace and physical metric space fields, fractal involve… And, after descending to the lowest order physical space (at the third fractal iteration) — subsequently evolve, simply and directly (by natural selection, possibly guided by morphogenetic fields (ref: Sheldrake) linked to fundamental consciousness along with stored memory of previous life forms)… With our cosmos being only one of those infinite “parallel” universes… With the same fundamental cyclic and electrodynamic laws, rooted in primal spin momentum, governing each of them. Thus, everything (including all multidimensional space-time fields and all matter-energy forms) throughout all spherically manifest SPACE-TIME universes, are cyclic in nature, appear and disappear periodically, and their harmonic field involutions are essentially analogous and corresponding — in accord with holographic principles and the universal laws of electrodynamics… All, based on the ubiquitous fractal topological geometry and the fundamental spin momentum of every-zero-point “singularity” throughout “total space” (including “hyperspace” of string theory and metric spacetime of general relativity [GRT])… Therefore, since consciousness is the fundamental quality of the zero-point center of spin momentum in absolute space — each such “singularity” is potentially conscious as is every zeropoint center of all fractal involved information/energy fields radiating from it, ad infinitum. Metamorphosis Chaos theory demonstrates the unfolding of creative process itself, the emergence of form or structure from formlessness and chaos. A fractal (chaos) reveals in its depths, hidden degrees of order and structure that resonates with the soul and reveals the familiar forms of nature. The entire Universe is a web of intercommunication in which all particles and fields constantly exchange information with all others across the universe. They are influenced by and influence ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 467 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I each other no matter how far apart they are and join in a dance of infinite creation to produce the moment we call reality, and the structure we call the universe. Vision lives in our hearts, dreams and imagination. Dreams, too are fractals, so we can enter any part of their essential nature, because the part contains the whole. Nature itself is our greatest teacher. In this dynamic model there are no “things”, just energetic events. Light and sound (acoustic cymatics) modulate all matter. This “holoflux” includes the ultimately flowing nature of what is, and all possible forms. All the objects of our world are three-dimensional images formed of standing and moving waves by electromagnetic and nuclear processes. This is the guiding matrix for self-assembly, and manipulating and organizing physical reality. It is how our DNA creates and projects our psychophysical structure. Our brains mathematically construct ‘concrete’ reality by interpreting frequencies from another dimension. This information realm of meaningful, patterned primary reality transcends time and space. Thus, the brain is an embedded hologram, interpreting a holographic universe. All existence consists of embedded holograms within holograms and their interrelatedness somehow gives rise to our existence and sensory images, as it does the Cosmos. What happens in the Aether has a deterministic effect on us. This is the Mystery of Nothing becoming Something, a continuous Creation. Holographic Spiral Vortex The singularity archetype (a chaotic attractor of toroidal topology) is a ubiquitous hologram, and the cosmic hologram is likewise a singularity. Spin is a quality explaining space-time geometry as well as the genesis of energetic and sub-energetic phenomena. Energy includes both its vectorial and scalar components. Quasi-virtual objects may function as holographic strange attractors that may likewise fuel archetypal emergence. In the time horizon, the ability to generate interference (phase coupling) belonging to chaotic attractor of toroidal topology. Coherence vortices are the phase singularities of a complex. Such complex dynamics may very well be correlated someday with both the formation of matter and consciousness states. Can we dig below the quantum noise floor? If so, what will we find? The interaction between spatial and temporal horizon contextualizes in the form of indeterministic, differentiated, temporal flows of images. This is the psycho-perceptual matrix which continues and will continue to nourish the psychic life of humanity, with a surplus of meaning. At all levels, the chaotic part (immeasurable and unpredictable) of the reality we are part of, is always found in inter-time and in inter-space, sub-quantal and subconscious, in the gaps. A Strange Attractor is a deterministic representation of chaos to the internal order (deterministic chaos), and as such is the most suitable object to represent the ambivalence of the reality we are part of. The strange attractor is an indivisible whole which reflects itself in the strange attractor, where, as in a game of mirrors, the part projects itself by its self-similarity in the whole and the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 468 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I whole in the part, with different degrees of resolution and angles of perspective. (Messori). Archetypal motifs cycle and recycle in self-reiterating fractal-like patterns. We now presume the fundamental unity of all things, but still struggle to make it more than a concept in our lives. This paradigm takes a transdisciplinary approach. Integrating scientific, social, cultural, psychological and spiritual concepts and ideas helps us wrap our minds around such ultraholism. Artist Roy Ascott distinguishes the syncretic process from synthesis, in which disparate things meld into a homogenous whole, thereby loosing their individual distinction. Nor is it mere eclecticism, which usually signals a wavering course of thought of only probable worth. In the syncretic context, extreme differences are upheld but aligned so likeness is found among unlike things. The power of each element enriches the power of all others within the array of their differences. This is a viable approach to archetypes. More than binary opposition, syncretism is a process between different elements, the in-between condition of 'being both'. In describing syncretism, it is useful to bring into play the "both both/and, nor/nand, and either/or" formulation, meaning "mixing together". In present day cultural terms the enemy is habit – the passive, uncritical repetition or acceptance of behaviors, opinions, perceptions and values, and the enshrining as verities, metaphors that have passed their sell-by date. Habit is the enemy of art and science, impeding the search for new ways of being. The intangible ground of Being is primarily active. Each and every wave has zero point energy of virtually infinite potential, due to infinite interpenetrating waves. Only recently have we begun seriously entertaining this vast ocean of dark light -- the energy of empty space -- as a primordial reality. An archetype is a primordial vortex, node, nexus, value, or strange attractor. Value is defined as any flow within a given flow. The attractor is the explicate order, a complex manifold of vortices of nonlinear information explication that modulates the vitality of archetypal dimensions. Archetypes are the source of cognition, concepts and misconceptions, theories and metatheories, emotional stability and instability, wisdom and folly. When we "connect the dots" it is often between archetypal elements and motifs as much as among facts or actual events. Our interpretations, right or wrong, are archetypally colored by these distorting or clarifying lenses, indexing patterns or phase information. Templates of being, archetypes are there, operating just beyond consciousness structuring the formation of our view of reality. Fractal holographic principle, archetype spiral vortex, and archetype branching networks emerge or emanate from toroidal structures. They are the hidden (occult, "divine") variables that control seemingly random quantum events. Certain combinations of qualities inherently possess greater importance/ significance/ reality/ stability/ commonality than other combinations. These archetypes are usually given names that amplify the tendency to consider them real/ normal/ unchangeable/ fixed/ defined and as a norm that carries its own/ independent driving force and intelligence. Simultaneous reverberations interpenetrate consciousness and we perceive it directly. The whole meaning of particular enfolded resonant structures may be activated. Meaning is derived from its ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 469 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 446-469 Miller, I., Metaphorms: Physics Is Not Beyond You and You Make It Matter Part I relationship to the context -- the ground. The cosmic dimension of some archetypal symbols is the sure guarantee of their universality. This storehouse of knowledge is both an asset and hindrance, but more importantly it points to a deeper, implied domain.The image stream or imaginal process is our primary experience and permeates and conditions all facets of human life. We tend to take the background noise of the constant imaginal flux of the stream of consciousness for granted. We rarely focus our conscious awareness on this imaginal wellspring, but sometimes it intrudes on consciousness during our gaps in normal awareness – day dreaming, fantasies, reverie, lacunae, meditation, inspiration, discovery. Psycho-perceptual imagery emerges from a capacity for internal representation of external reality and reproject it in modified forms. Consciousness, like creativity, is an emergent phenomenon patterned by strange attractors which govern the complexity of information in dynamic flow. Our consciousness appears cotemporaneously with our embodiment, creating the imaginal flux of representational and nonrepresentational perception - the stream of consciousness. Does magic reprogram the hologram? [References at end of Part II] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1018 Review Article A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration Iona Miller* ABSTRACT Paranthropology: Anthropological Approaches to the Paranormal collects the best articles from the first two years of Paranthropology journal's publication. It describes a quiet yet relentless revolution going on within the life and social sciences and arts. While physicists, biologists, medical doctors, and psychologists have commented for years on anomalous experience, anthropologists maintained a largely conventional observer attitude within their field. Most avoided the risks of "going native" by suspending professional orientation and experimentally entering a participatory mindset to describe their host cultures from the inside out. If researchers inadvertently experienced anomalous events in the field they were often as reluctant to admit them, for example, as professional pilots are to report UFOs. Even the most successful and well-respected "parapsychologists" have been reluctant to assume such a title. Perhaps their struggle was viewed as a cautionary tale by anthropologists thrown into the boiling pot of traditional shamanic practices, such as shamanic flight, paradoxical healing, warring sorcerers, and disturbing supernatural occurrences in field work. Such overdue efforts should be heartily welcomed by the transdisciplinary community. Anthropology has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. So does paranthropology, which focuses on the persistence and reproduction of anomalies with correlated myths, ideology, cultural grammar, and social logic. In the words of its editors, "Paranthropology: Journal of Anthropological Approaches to the Paranormal is a free on-line journal devoted to the promotion of social-scientific approaches to the study of paranormal experiences, beliefs and phenomena in all of their varied guises. The journal aims to promote an interdisciplinary dialogue on issues of the paranormal, so as to move beyond the skeptic vs. advocate impasse which has settled over the current debate, and to open new avenues for inquiry and understanding." Key Words: paranormal, parapsychology, anomalous experience, treatment philosophy, shamanism, transpersonal anthropology, clinical paranthropology, taxonamy of consciousness, neurophenomenology, temporal lobe lability, neuromythology, hypnosis, mutual hypnosis, physics, neurotheology, trance, dissociation, anomalistic psychology, cultural grammar. * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com . ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1019 Multi-disciplinary Orientation The 2012 anthology, Paranthropology: Anthropological Approaches to the Paranormal celebrates pioneering exploration and attempts to lay down some basic principles for research, theory and practice, fusing humanities and science. The journal PARANTHROPOLOGY has broken through the wall of silence and dared to subjectively and objectively examine experiences formerly considered "supernatural" -- unexplainable personal and cultural phenomena. Rather than approaching the mechanics of psi, ethnographical studies describe correlations of the narrative logic of myths, ideology, investments, and modes of social thinking. Ultimately, the central theme here is that we should ‘get inside’ the narrative tradition of our subject matter without self-delusional abandonment. A global, pre-modern, spiritual healing phenomenon known as shamanism may be one of the most significant discoveries expressing the nature of the transpersonal. Winkelman points out, "The universals of shamans, and other shamanistic healers, reflect something fundamental about human nature. The universals of alterations of consciousness and crosscultural manifestations of soul flight experiences, spirit and animal identities, healing and divination practices, and other aspects of shamanistic healers, reflect a biological basis." In Chapter 2 of the anthology, “Reflecting on Paranthropology”, Mark A. Schroll defines paranthropology as, "our investigation into humankind's primordial practices for exploring alternate states, stations, and domains of awareness known as the anthropology of consciousness". Early anthropology had a disconfirmatory agenda toward anomalous experiences, even though informants reported stories concerning so-called psychic phenomena such as telepathic communication or out-of-body experiences. But anthropologists generally don't take such stories seriously, instead viewing them functionally or semiotically rather than as parapsychological "evidence", according to David Young in his chapter “Dreams and Telepathic Communication”. In Chapter 3, Charles Laughlin tells us, "In the 1970s, concern with more existential issues such as experience, cognition, consciousness and symbolism began to shift from the wings to center stage. Concerns which were once considered marginal in interest, like performance, myth, healing, trance states, etc., became phenomena of prime concern to anthropologists, both in fieldwork and in theory construction. And it was in the midst of this reorientation that the transpersonal movement began to make some slight headway in anthropology. . .Transpersonal anthropology is simply the cross-cultural study of the psychological and sociocultural significance of transpersonal experiences.” Editor Jack Hunter gives us a useful orientation on “Anthropology and the Paranormal”: "Charles Laughlin defines transpersonal experiences as ‘those experiences that bring the cognized-self into question’ and transpersonal anthropology as ‘the cross-cultural study of the psychological and sociocultural aspects of transpersonal experience’ (Laughlin 1994:5). A transpersonal anthropologist is, therefore, ‘one that is capable of participating in transpersonal experience; that is, capable of both attaining whatever extraordinary experiences and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1020 phases of consciousness enrich the religious system, and relating these experiences to invariant patterns of symbolism, cognition and practice found in religions and cosmologies all over the planet’ (Laughlin 1997). Through participating fully in the host culture, to the extent of accessing culturally relevant experiences, the transpersonal anthropologist is able to gain a perspective on a particular culture that could not be attained through any normal means of objective observation." Indigenous people don't consider such phenomena supernatural as non-ordinary experiences are part of their natural world. They perceive nothing abnormal about the underlying nature of reality, a world occupied by spiritual beings, non-physical intelligences and paranormal powers. Such distinctions are cultural constructs that help us discern and see through our own constructs about life, death, and the afterlife. Polyphasic cultures recognize the importance and value of other states of consciousness for their individual and community psychological wellbeing and connection with their habitat. Anthropology has shifted its focus from attempting to explain away supernatural beliefs to an approach that accepts the significance of subjective anomalous experience in the development of such beliefs without applying a reductive interpretation, Hunter says. The contention is that immersive anthropology facilitates cognitive empathic engagement so one "sees what the natives see". Scientists exploring consciousness risk being transformed in the process of exploration. Some report they need "to participate in the cultures they study in an effort to understand the processes through which transpersonal experiences arise, and are interpreted, in their natural setting." "The magico-religious practices and beliefs of a society do more than simply maintain its structure and are actually directed towards psi-conducive goals, which may perform significant social functions in themselves." (Hunter) Regardless of nomenclature, supernatural, paranormal, extraordinary or anomalous experiences are assigned the umbrella term, 'psi' phenomena which includes various types of "inner power". Social psychologist and parapsychological researcher Daryl Bem defines psi as ‘anomalous processes of information or energy transfer that are currently unexplained in terms of known physical or biological mechanisms'. Whatever they represent, such experiences are intrinsic aspects of the natural world. Whether we acknowledge psi or not, new generations of anthropologists will continue to encounter instances of psi / spirit during their field research. Schroll cites psi-pioneer Dr. Stanley Krippner in the "Physics of Psi": "My feelings about psi phenomena are that they're alleged interactions between organisms and other organisms, or organisms and their environment that appear to violate mainstream science’s concepts of space, time, and energy. Furthermore psi phenomena apparently exist, but they are not supernatural, they are natural; they are not paranormal, they are normal. They're anomalies; we just haven't figured out how they fit into the scheme of things. . ." (Schroll, 2010b:4) Schroll elaborates in a Special Issue of Rhine Online: Psi-News Magazine, 2011, and in two additional articles in late 2011 published in a Special Topics Section, International Journal of Transpersonal Psychology: ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1021 "Thus it [psi] is a transformative, ecstatic, or transpersonal encounter within us and our relationship and/or co-evolution with planet Earth and all its creatures. Including (to the extent it is possible) an awareness of our co-evolution with the universe, space-time, matter and consciousness (Krippner and Schroll, 2011). Of potential interest to paranthropologists is Cohn's study (1999), which suggests the following: "[S}econd sight [is] a psychic ability that has for centuries been believed, in Scotland and other traditions, to be hereditary. The ability manifests itself through the person having spontaneous vivid imagery through different senses which apparently gives information about a spatially or temporally distant event. A total of 130 family histories were constructed and examined using segregation analysis. Second sight seems to be consistent with an autosomal dominant mode of inheritance, particularly for small family sizes. People with the trait were also evenly distributed with respect to their birth order position, in line with the expectations of a genetic model. It is argued that if other studies find a similar mode of inheritance in other cultures, then second sight could be a creative mental ability where the hereditary aspect lies in the sensitivity of the sensory systems which convey the experiences." All cultures have their taboos, and this scientific taboo has long separated the investigator from the very object of his or her observation. Transparency, rather than objectivity becomes the goal. Immersive or participatory excursions are balanced by critical thinking and systematic comparisons with the spectrum of possible interpretations. Hopefully, the participation of a few well-respected individuals from a variety of fields will inspire future generations of anthropologists to courageously open their minds and psychic boundaries. Paranthropology faces many of the same challenges encountered in "blue sky" parapsychology and paraphysics before such subjects were tentatively "re-admitted" to the conventional study and literature of their respective fields. Military interests drove much of the work in the former disciplines, but anthropology and sociology do not share in that funding or clandestine development. Because the content of these "fringe" areas is controversial is no reason to banish its investigators to the margins of serious inquiry. In fact, such explanatory gaps have the most to teach us about the deep nature of reality and our being. In the anthology’s Afterword, Winkelman proposes two paradigms that help us understand anomalous phenomena: 1) the shamanic paradigm; and 2) and the integrative mode of consciousness as a clarification of the concept of altered states of consciousness (ASC). They are based on cross-cultural methodology and a neurophenomenological perspective. Shamanic altered states inevitably incorporated dream processes by engaging in overnight rituals that first prevent sleep by hours of dancing, drumming and singing; after exhaustion, the participants then collapse into vivid dreamlike states. Ritual has the potential to produce an activation of lucid dreams. Lucid dreams engage an interaction between waking and dream consciousness that can produce cognitive integration and therapeutic outcomes, reflecting a greater awareness of the information-processing capacities of the unconscious, involving preegoic and prelinguistic levels of symbolization (Laughlin, McManus & d’Aquili 1992). ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1022 Cultural Contagion In the past, each science functioned like a reality tunnel, directing what could and could not be looked at without peer approval and consensus. Each had little to do with other specialties or departments. Every science also comes with its own mythologies as well as models. Science likes to call them "assumed truths," but unconscious aspects can be as or more influential. Neuromythologies support the new materialism which may or may not be able to allocate certain functions and behaviors to particular areas of the densely interconnected brain or genetic structure. Myths express deep existential concerns that have consequences for human behavior. They have imaginal and philosophical elements and interpretations which may contain some objective truth. The pejorative term is normally applied to numerous woo woo ideas surrounding the brain, psychology, and neuroscience. But it can be equally applied to those fields themselves, each of which functions as a culture with subcultures within the system. Where is the anthropology of science being done, with the possible exception of philosophy of science? Cultural practices essentially generate and embody group trance states (consensus) in primitive and sophisticated societies. Cognition constrains culture in producing science. Mythologizing also arises in the popularization of scientific findings, which are misconstrued and misapplied by the public. In this view, brain-based approaches require the same scrutiny as those experiences traditionally allocated to the "supernatural". More specific framing doesn't necessarily lead to a better evidential basis. Educational practices which claim to be concomitant with the workings of the brain may or may not be so. No science or even the arts can continue to exist in isolation from the others with which it is holistically related and informed. Progress in other fields can be shared with good effect in a free exchange of information. Luminaries and lesser-known authors can shortcut their process by assimilating relevant results from the entire landscape of academic studies, while recontextualizing their observations and conclusions in light of such information. Such readilyavailable specialty journals facilitate the free exchange of information by filtering and condensing the available material. Anthropology cannot objectively examine cultures without taking the worldview, including supernatural beliefs and spiritual technologies of such cultures into consideration, and they must do so in a multi-disciplinary fashion. That is, the postmodern nuances of consciousness and culture can be described from several different frames of reference, some of which lie beyond the normal scope of practice in anthropology. But a comprehensive study of man and consciousness is in no way limited to that. Consciousness in its many forms remains the conundrum that unites physics, biology, and cultural studies. Some time ago, Bateson called for a theory of consciousness that is neither supernatural nor mechanistic. Current models of consciousness which depend upon coherence do not explain possession, dissociation, out-of-body experiences near-death experiences, and addictions, for ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1023 example. Consciousness, thought, and culture are irreducibly welded together and form the basis of human adaptive skills. Consciousness studies spans a repertoire of specialties from neuroscience, to neurotheology, to creativity, to quantum mind, dreaming, transpersonal studies, and more. While psychologists have long examined parapsychological events with a cross-cultural eye, anthropologists themselves, with a few exceptions, have been ill-trained and reluctant to do so. In the vacuum, other experts and paraprofessionals have conducted their own investigations of anomalous phenomena in a wide variety of ethnic cultures. Winkelman describes typical shamanic transactions: Parallels between shamanic and hypnotic phenomena include: fantasy-prone and dissociative characteristics; family tendencies in susceptibility suggestive of genetic contributions; developmental paths involving injury, illness, and trauma; a tendency for artistic production and cognitive flexibility; spontaneous out-of-body experiences; and the use of monotonous procedures that focus attention and limit conscious awareness. Dissociative experiences involving a separation of the body from the environment are a key aspect of hypnosis that promotes an engagement with an alternate reality. This reality is generally interpreted in premodern cultures as a spirit world in which these powerful others can act upon our well-being through emotional impacts that can produce notable biological responses. Exploring the Frontier While it used to be found in a horizontal geographical direction, in a global society, the frontier is found at the leading edge of all fields -- in frontier science. While that term used to be a pejorative, it now offers a valid arena for the unfettered growth of ideas, which may be critiqued and honed without risk of professional censure. Thus, Paranthropology Journal represents a real breakthrough for the field, providing leaders in this trend a peer-reviewed outlet for their innovative findings and a place to share methodology on how to proceed further. A revisioning of the psychophysical roles of ritual, symbol, experience and brain function offers a more well-informed basis for field observations of cultures and subcultures. Intelligent voices provide rigorous arguments that open new territory for investigations, as well as new ways of investigating old ground. Physics has shown us that at the most profound level, all experience is ultimately subjective. It therefore colors our observations, framing and reporting, particularly when it relates to models of human behavior. Biology has discovered that there are quantum and electromagnetic effects that condition our essential being. Neurotheology shows how such parameters modulate our beliefs and internal perceptions and interpretations of our experience of "reality". There is a relationship between symbols and the ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1024 structure of the brain, a symbolic organ. The symbol-making potential of the pre-frontal cortex enabled extended family and social bonds. The symbolic function operates in cognition by symbolic penetration. This process amplifies the activation of a relatively limited sensory event. It comes to communicate with, evoke, and become associated with a more ramified, complex, and far less limited set of cognitive structures operating within the nervous system. (Laughlin) "Bootstrapping" accelerates this process. Genetics, epigenetics, and meta-genetics are not irrelevant and the same must be said for neuroplasticity, neurophenomenology, memes, and selfawareness. Rewriting the brain's potential means rewriting our own, including how we study and view the world and humanity around us. Extended Consciousness Gifted environments provide “a rich variety of representations”, “stimulating learning environments”, and "empowering environments" that foster specific paths of development in protective attentive envelopes. The whole arena of open-source online journals encourages such environments, allowing scholars from several fields to actively come together and explore the ideas of one another without academic boundaries. Humans live in social groups that split and reform. Social and personal bonding also derive from the set-points of physiological systems which produce defining behaviors, including mirror neurons, the limbic system, and the anterior cingulate, to name a few. Affect, such as guilt, shame, pride, pain, conscience, memory, identity, social- and self-consciousness eventually shape societies. We are learning to understand mindsets though we are unable to effectively describe the consciousness that underlies and makes them possible. Psyche is not separate from society. Disorders of the self share much in common with disorders of culture. Societies act out the same sort of functional and dysfunctional patterns we find in individuals at a grander scale. It relates to our understanding of affect, beliefs, narrative, mythopoetics, cognition, the unconscious, imagination, wisdom, healing, etc. as they apply to all "ways of being" in the world. The questions of who and what humans are requires open-minded exploration in terms of the history of the universe, life and humankind. Mar and Peterson describe how "good stories" reduce the entropy of traumatic events, by integrating it back into a functional, low-entropy person/world/goal system: Integrating the information contained in the traumatic event allows for the functional reformulation of basic axioms (constants). “The world is a safe place,” violated, becomes “the world is not always a safe place, but when it is unsafe I can still cope.” “My self is predictable” becomes “my physical and mental self may vary, but I have the proper support to bring them back into a familiar state when necessary.” The reduction of uncertainty associated with the narrative update process reduces felt anxiety and psychophysiological stress. It is the cascade of beneficial psychological and physiological processes accompanying this reduction in anxiety and stress that ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1025 accounts for the well-documented health benefits and increases in productivity attendant upon the construction of coherent self-relevant stories. Discussion In Chapter 1, Lee Wilson summarizes his arguments against over-zealous empiricism as follows: "As a particular mode of critical thinking about the world and our place in it the remit of anthropology is not to reduce one form of life to another. Veena Das remarks that ‘anthropological knowledge is precisely about letting the knowledge of the other happen to me’ (1998:192). It is the interplay between forms of knowledge and diverse perspectives that holds my attention, the possibility of disclosure, discrepancy and insight generated from juxtaposition and reflection. The critical space for this engagement might be generated by the sceptical practice that I have attempted to outline here, an appetite for enquiry sharpened by the withholding of assent. A sceptical anthropology thus draws into question the grounds for all knowledge leaving only the play of ‘fluxes of knowledge’ (Deleuze 2006:50) and the acceptance of incessant enquiry as the only means of stabilisation in epistemic free-fall. The notion of sceptic, as the Spanish poet philosopher Miguel de Unamuno points out, ‘does not mean him who doubts, but him who investigates or researches as opposed to him who asserts and thinks that he has found’ (de Unamuno 1924)." Laughlin concludes his chapter with a rather obvious suggestion: However, no one should ever be forced into such explorations, for such work often requires years of preparation, arduous self-confrontation, and advanced spiritual maturity (usually requiring a slow developmental seasoning), to say nothing of possibly dangerous ordeals, encounter with fearful ‘supernatural’ entities, radical loss of ego boundaries, and the like. The very best we can hope for, we believe, is to sensitize the discipline to the existence and legitimacy of transpersonal experiences, and the significance of an understanding of such experiences to an explanation of alien symbolic and religious systems. Those wishing to pursue paranthropology more deeply might enjoy The Trickster and the Paranormal, by George P. Hansen (2001), which covers psychic and deceptive practices of shamans and other magico-religious practitioners from both a field and laboratory perspective. A foundational work on the structures of consciousness and symbolic process, the classic by Laughlin, McManus & d'Aquili, Brain, Symbol & Experience: Toward a Neurophenomenology of Human Consciousness, is a must-read. Also of value to anthropologists and other researchers are taxonomies of consciousness, which function as orienting maps of inner experience and transpersonal consciousness. They systematically cover exotic cognitive factors and unusual powers and abilities, including the effects of trance, drugs, yoga, self-hypnosis, mutual hypnosis, meditation, brainwave feedback, dream consciousness, pathologizing, and more. Among the best are those by John Curtis Gowan (Trance, Art & Creativity), Charles Tart (Altered States of Consciousness), Michael Washburn (Ego & the Dynamic Ground), and Stan Grof (The Adventure of Self Discovery). Anthropologists ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1026 have observed that taxonomies are generally embedded in local cultural and social systems, and serve various social functions. Altered States of Consciousness (ASC) lose their irrational character seen as alternative ways of gaining knowledge or framing reality that relate to ego dissolution or transpersonal development. They comparatively specify the amount of awareness and arousal involved, including combinations of self-awareness, environmental awareness, and spiritual awareness (Fischer). Paranthropology studies whether these states, including spiritual intelligence, are internally consistent or dependent on social or cultural factors. Transcendental awareness may be passive while conscious state expansion is active. Edinger, Fischer, and Washburn address transpersonal issues in social, psychological, and biological terms. Another necessary tool for paranthopologists is knowledge of the spectrum of pychophysical manifestations and pathologies that modulate perception. Some maladies and head injuries are relevant, in addition to the usual range of personality disorders, psychoses and pathologies. Problems in either or both temporal lobes create troubles with memories, fears, confusion, anxiety, abnormal sensory perceptions, visual and auditory hallucinations, spaciness or amnesia, déjà vu and jamais vu, unusual abdominal pain or headaches, religious or moral preoccupation, excessive writing, overemphasis on trivia, and of course seizures. (Miller, 2003). Dr. Daniel Amen sums up the symptomology with ten defining points: 1). Disturbance of auditory sensation and perception; 2). Disturbance of selective attention of auditory and visual input; 3). Disorders of visual perception; 4). Impaired organization and categorization of verbal material; 5). Disturbance of language comprehension; 6). Decreased long term memory; 7). Altered personality and affective development; 8). Altered sexual behavior; 9). Inability to perceive or remember events; 10). Damage to the inferior aspect of the temporal lobe – decreased memory in proportion to tissue damaged. Persinger and others have assembled Inventories and Questionnaires potentially valuable in establishing certain parameters in fieldwork (see Appendix A and Appendix B, this article). Such lists can help researchers target specific vectors by devising their own screenings. Conclusions In conclusion, we hope to see many more provocative and insightful articles from Paranthropology, including theoretical and methodological contributions to the developing anthropology of the paranormal. Basic human energies and motivations drive our pursuits. While treatment philosophies and counseling are beyond the practice of most anthropologists, Clinical Paranthropology fosters awareness of how anomalous experiences may be related to or contribute to various health related issues. Anomalistic Psychology means working with people in the clinical setting who claim to have had strange experiences and/or abilities that they could not explain. In paranthropology, the process of the experience is just as important as the exploration of the reported phenomena. Psi is an inherent ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1027 part of the whole pattern of life. Perhaps we need to ask what it tells us about life together on planet Earth. Even myths that no longer work in articulate social worlds continue to create effects from the subarticulate level. Mythic logic works at the level of the given. Despite our rationales, neither naïve acceptance nor denial keeps psi experiences at bay. They condition the natural and social worlds with transcendent worldviews. Paranthropologists should continue examining their own cultural and mythic grammar about such phenomena to broaden the data base that could potentially answer our questions. Intellectual critique mostly serves the interests of intellectuals. Meanwhile, we can speculate on what kind of "work" would constitute "years of preparation" befitting a paranthropologist. Issues might include realizing our own changing vocabularies and facile levels of rationalization as well as mythically-based “romantic” visions of holism and “spiritual worlds” (this world/other world) or other mythic grammars of our own cultures. There are likely as many answers and avenues as there are seekers. This is the essence of selfactualization and individuation. With a spirit of social experimentation, Charles Tart suggests, "In point of fact, most spiritual systems have many ways in which they could be improved and have areas in which they have no answers or the wrong answers. Thus they need more research, they need an enlightened kind of science to broaden their horizons and make them more effective." Psi phenomena transcend ethnic and national identities and can instantly transport us to a “foreign land” even when we are at “home”. Appendix A “Personal Philosophy Inventory” (Makarec and Persinger, 1990) Makarec, K., & Persinger, M. A. (1985). Temporal lobe signs: Electroencephalographic validity and enhanced scores in special populations. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 60, 831842. Makarec, K., & Persinger, M. A. (1990). Electroencephalographic validation of a temporal lobe signs inventory in a normal population. Journal of Research in Personality, 24, 323-337. (Sample items indicating complex partial epileptic temporal lobe signs.) While sitting quietly, I have had uplifting sensations as if I were driving over a rolling road. I often feel as if things are not real. At least once, before falling down, I had an intense smell from childhood, apparently for no reason. Once, in a crowded place, I suddenly could not recognize where I was. I have had a vision. People tell me I "blank out" sometimes when we're talking. When relaxed or before falling asleep I sometimes feel pleasant vibrations moving through my body. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1028 Sometimes in the very early morning hours I have meaningful experiences. I have heard an inner voice call my name. I use hunches more than simple learning to solve new problems. Sometimes an event occurs that has special significance for me only. I have had experiences where I felt as if I were somewhere else. There have been brief times when I felt very close to a Universal Consciousness. I have had dreams of floating or flying through the air. At least once in my life I have felt the presence of another being. (Sample items indicating Psi experiences or exotic beliefs) I have been taken aboard a space ship. I would like to time travel. When I have a tough decision a sign will be given and I will know what to do. If God told me to kill, I would do it in His name. I think there is a good possibility that I have lived a previous life. Telepathy is a real phenomenon. An inner voice has told me where to find something and it was there. Alien intelligence is probably responsible for UFOs. I have felt as if I have left my body. Appendix B “Subjective Experiences Questionnaire” (Ruttan, Persinger and Koren, 1990) {exit survey} Ruttan, L. A., Persinger, M. A. & Koren, S. A. (1990). Enhancement of temporal lobe-related experiences during brief exposures to milligauss intensity extremely low frequency magnetic fields. Journal of Bioelectricity, 9(1), 33-54. (Sample items indicating targeted experiences test for vestibular, depersonalization, and imaginings.) I felt dizzy or odd. I felt the presence of someone or something near me. There were tingling sensations. I saw vivid images. There were pleasant vibrations moving through my body. I heard an inner voice call my name or speak to me. I experienced anger. I experienced sadness. The experience did not come from my own mind. I heard a ticking sound. There were odd smells. I experienced terror or fear. There were odd tastes in my mouth. I felt as if I were somewhere else. I experienced thoughts from childhood. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1029 The same idea kept occurring. I felt as if I were spinning around. There were images from dreams I've had. The red light became brighter or darker. References Amen, Daniel C. (1999). Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, Three Rivers Press; Reprint edition. Amen, Daniel C. (2008). Healing the Hardware of the Soul: How Making the Brain-Soul Connection Can Optimize Your Life, Love and Spiritual Growth, Free Press; Reprint edition. Cohn, Shari A. (1999), Second Sight and Family History: Pedigree and Segregation Analyses, Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 13, No. 3, pp. 351– 372. http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_13_3_cohn.pdf Edinger, Edward F., ANATOMY OF THE PSYCHE, Open Court; LaSalle, Illinois, 1985. Edinger, Edward F., EGO AND ARCHETYPE, Penguin Books Inc., Baltimore, 1973. Fischer, Roland, A Cartography of the Ecstatic and Meditative States, SCIENCE Vol 174 No. 4012; 26 November 1971.http://wisebrain.org/papers/MapofMedEcstaticStates.pdf Gloor, P. (1982-1986). “Role of the Human Limbic System in Perception, Memory, and Affect: Lessons from Temporal Lobe Epilepsy,” Annals of Neurology, 12, 1982, pp, 129-144. Also in The Limbic System, Doane and Livingston (eds.). New York: Raven (1986). Grof, Stanislav; THE ADVENTURE OF SELF-DISCOVERY; SUNY Press, Albany, 1988. Gowan, John Curtis, TRANCE, ART & CREATIVITY, 1975. http://www.csun.edu/edpsy/Gowan/ Gowan, John Curtis, OPERATIONS OF INCREASING ORDER, 1980. http://www.csun.edu/edpsy/Gowan/ Hansen, George P., The Trickster and the Paranormal, 2001. Henry, Jane, Parapsychology, Research on Exceptional Experiences, Taylor and Francis (Routledge), 2004. Horgan, John (2003). Rational Mysticism. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. Hunter, Jack (Ed), Paranthropology: Anthropological Approaches to the Paranormal, 2012. http://paranthropologyjournal.weebly.com/anthology.html Contents Foreword - Robert Van de Castle Introduction - Anthropology and the Paranormal - Jack Hunter Chapter 1, The Anthropology of the Possible: The Ethnographer as Sceptical Enquirer - Lee Wilson Chapter 2, Reflecting on Paranthropology - Mark A. Schroll Chapter 3, Transpersonal Anthropology: What is it, and What are the Problems we Face in Doing it? - Charles D. Laughlin ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1030 Chapter 4, Devising Methods for the Ethnographic Study of the Afterlife: Cognition, Empathy and Engagement - Fiona Bowie Chapter 5, Anthropology, Evolution and Anomalous Experience - James McClenon Chapter 6, Money God Cults in Taiwan: A Paranthropological Approach - Fabian Graham Chapter 7, The Effect of Meditation Attainment on Psychic Awareness: Research With Yogis and Tibetan Buddhists Serena Roney-Dougal Chapter 8, Dreams and Telepathic Communication - David E. Young Chapter 9, Experiential Reclamation and First-Person Parapsychology - David Luke Afterword, Paradigms and Methodologies for Anomalous Research - Michael Winkelman Kramer, Wim, Eberhard Bauer, and Gerd Hövelmann (Eds.), Perspectives of Clinical Parapsychology: An Introductory Reader, Stichting Het Johan Borgman Fonds. Laughlin, Charles, John McManus & Eugene d'Aquili: Brain, Symbol & Experience: Toward a Neurophenomenology of Human Consciousness (1992, Columbia University Press). Mar, Raymond A. and Petersen, Jordan B., Good stories reduce the stressful entropy of traumatic experiences, (Department of Psychology, Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 179. http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/abstracts.htm McKinney, Laurence O., (1994). Neurotheology: Virtual Religion in the 21st Century. Cambridge, Mass.: American Institute for Mindfulness. Miller, Iona, Emotional Alchemy of our Ecstatic and Transcendent Natures, 1993. http://ionamiller.weebly.com/emotional-alchemy.html Miller, Iona, Fear & Loathing in the Temporal Lobes, 2003. http://neurotheology.50megs.com/whats_new_9.html Persinger, M. A. (1975). “ELF Waves and ESP”; New Horizons, I(5), January 1975, pp.232-235. Persinger, M. A. , (1983). Religious and mystical experiences as artifacts of temporal lobe function. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 57, 1255-1262. Persinger, M. A., & Valliant, P. M. (1985). Temporal lobe signs and reports of subjective paranormal experiences in a normal population: A replication. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 60, 903-909. Persinger, Michael A. (1987). Neuropsychological Bases of God Beliefs. New York: Praeger Publishers. Persinger, M. A. and Makarec, K. (1987). “Temporal Lobe Epilsepsy Signs and Correlative Behaviors Displayed by Normal Populations,” Journal of General Psychology, 114, 1987, pp. 179-185. Persinger, M. A., (1988). Temporal lobe signs and personality characteristics. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 66, 49-50. Persinger, Michael (1989). “Psi Phenomena and Temporal Lobe Activity: The Geomagnetic Factor,” in L.A. Henkel and R. E. Berger (eds.), Research in Parapsychology 1988; Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1989. Tart, Charles; States of Consciousness; E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc., New York, 1975. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | August 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 8 | pp. 1018-1031 Miller, I., A Transdisciplinary Look at Paranthropology: An Emerging Field of Exploration 1031 Vaitl, D. et al, Psychobiology of Altered States of Consciousness, Psychological Bulletin, American Psychological Association, 2005, Vol. 131, No. 1, 98–127. http://www.mp.uni-tuebingen.de/mp/fileadmin/user_upload/Kotchoubey/Vaitl-2005-ASC.pdf Walach, Harald, Stefan Schmidt, & Wayne B. Jonas (Eds) Neuroscience, Consciousness and Spirituality, Springer; 2011. Washburn, Michael; The Ego and the Dynamic Ground; SUNY Press, New York, 1988. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com

Consciousness and the structuring property of typical data Jonathan W. D. Mason, jwmason@jwmason.net, See Published OnlineOpen Complexity, doi: 10.1002/cplx.21431, Copyright c 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Abstract The theoretical base for consciousness, in particular an explanation of how consciousness is defined by the brain, has arXiv:1203.3113v2 [q-bio.NC] 31 Dec 2012 long been sought by science. We propose a partial theory of consciousness as relations defined by typical data. The theory is based on the idea that a brain state on its own is almost meaningless but in the context of the typical brain states, defined by the brain’s structure, a particular brain state is highly structured by relations. The proposed theory can be applied and tested both theoretically and experimentally. Precisely how typical data determines relations is fully established using discrete mathematics. 1 Introduction In neuroscience the neural correlates of consciousness provide an important empirical base for consciousness but not a theoretical one. To clarify, a theoretical base is a predictive theory that is free from empirical methodology whilst usually appealing to, and revealing aspects of, the innate mathematical properties of what is being studied. In contrast the neural correlates of consciousness at some stage rely on obtaining information about a person’s experience by asking them or by considering their sensory input. Subsequently a given experience can be associated with the aspects of a person’s neurological state that are always observed for that experience. To exemplify the difference, compare Newtonian mechanics with astronomical predictions based on astronomical tables. Importantly it is expected that the neural correlates of consciousness alone cannot provide a satisfactory explanation of consciousness since this would invoke some unknown agency that can discover the external cause of a particular neurological state within the brain so as to associate that state with an appropriate experience. Hence an important requirement of a theoretical base for consciousness is that it should avoid the use of any prior knowledge of what stimulates the senses. We should expect the brain itself to fully define conscious experience all be it having been stimulated by the senses. To assess whether a particular theory meets this requirement we also need a clear notion of what consciousness is. Whilst consensus in this regard will be hard to come by, it can be argued that one fundamental aspect of consciousness is the role played by relations such as those that define geometric content or the individuality of objects, their relationships and type such as visual or auditory. We therefore postulate that our conscious experience could largely be a mathematical structure defined by relations. In this case the principle underlying how the brain simultaneously defines all the required relations is needed. For example, since the part of conscious experience that correlates with the state of the primary visual cortex is of a metric space viewed from a particular position, we expect that the primary visual cortex ought to define relations between neurons, or other identifiable nodes, that result in a metric space. This paper proposes a theory that may satisfy these requirements whilst being theoretically and experimentally amenable to the scientific method. Of course the scientific literature does already include important contributions towards establishing a theoretical base for 1 consciousness. Perhaps the most prominent of these is the theory of consciousness as integrated information proposed by Giulio Tononi in 2008, see [1]. Tononi had previously worked with Gerald Edelman the Nobel Prize-winning immunologist and subsequent neuroscientist. Together they wrote a book entitled A Universe of Consciousness, see [2], which provides significant scientific insight towards an account of consciousness. However, whilst the importance of relations is evident in their work, their emphasis does not suggest how the content of consciousness might be defined by the brain. A review of the book by Giorgio Ascoli, see [3], points out that the authors focus on the properties of the neural process such as integrated activity in the highly reentrant dynamic core, where the dynamic core is a large part of the thalamocortical system, and also on the properties of consciousness such as unity, privateness, coherence and informativeness. In Ascoli’s view the book does not address the question of why a sensation corresponds to a specific state of the dynamic core as opposed to another one. In this respect I support the view that the relations defined by the brain are important. It can be seen from [4] that the brain defines relationships between certain patterns of activity occurring in various sensory regions of the brain. For example, for a given pattern of activity in the visual cortex we can ask whether it is typical for another particular pattern of activity to be present at the same time in the auditory cortex. If so then the given pattern is related to the latter pattern. Consider how such a relationship might be contributing to the experience of seeing a picture of Albert Einstein whilst hearing the name Albert as opposed to hearing the noun apple. For now the experience associated with a particular pattern of activity may be known from the neural correlates of consciousness. However the relationships that the brain defines between patterns allows more to be derived about a person’s experience than that associated to the patterns in the sensory regions of the brain alone. Hence we should try to move down from this higher semantic level replacing neural correlates of consciousness with derivations involving relations as we go if possible. I do not however doubt the enduring relevance and importance of Edelman and Tononi’s work such is the knowledge and insight it provides. The mathematics in this paper is straightforward involving binary relations, matrix tables and a small amount of graph theory. The relevance of such mathematics for the brain has been noticed before particularly in the study of anatomical and functional connectivity, see [5], which is a different, and yet associated, purpose to that of this paper concerning consciousness. We will start by considering the following properties of the brain that are available for consciousness, noting that the list is not intended to be exhaustive,: (i) the brain has a large number of identifiable nodes by which we mean neurons in this paper, but more generally possibly cortical columns; (ii) the brain is capable of a large number of states where a brain state is a possible and probable aggregate state of all the brain’s nodes; (iii) to some extent there is some type of ordering on the collection of brain states since the brain has some of the properties of an endofunction, all be it under perturbation by the senses. 2 In this paper we will mainly be considering (i) and (ii) of the above. In this respect Definition 1.1 will be useful where, when applied to the brain, the elements of S are the neurons. Merely to keep things simple we will mainly restrict our selves to nodes that have a two state repertoire. Definition 1.1. Let S be a nonempty finite set, n := #S. Then a set, for an arbitrary index label i, Si := {(a, fi (a)) : a ∈ S, fi : S → {0, 1}}, where fi is a map, (1) will be called a data element for S. The set of all data elements for S is denoted ΩS so that #ΩS = 2n . If a particular subset T ⊆ ΩS has been associated with S then we will call T the typical data for S. Further in such cases we will refer to S as the carrier set. An element Si ∈ T will be called a typical data element. Before we consider the brain the following motivating example will be useful. Example 1.1. We will consider what could appropriately be called: The definitive player problem. The purpose of this simple example is to introduce the idea that typical data can define a structure on a carrier set which in tern gives an interpretation of each typical data element. Consider a library of compact discs and suppose that these discs have all been made to a generic template in the sense that the locations of the bits, either 0 or 1, are the same for all discs. Further suppose that the discs all produce highly structured output on some standard player which always reads off the bits in the same order relative to the generic template. In the language of Definition 1.1 the generic template is the carrier set S and the library is the typical data T . Now suppose we have two of these discs S1 , S2 ∈ T where, on the standard player, S1 is Beethoven and S2 is Elgar. On some nonstandard player where the order in which the bits are read is different to the standard player it could be that S1 is Mozart and S2 is something else, possibly white noise, depending on the reading order. Therefore a single disk on its own is almost meaningless. However, by requiring highly structured output, each disc Si in the library defines a subset of the set of all players. By taking the intersection of all these subsets we will be left with relatively few players including the standard player. If the library is large enough and we could measure how structured an output is then the typical data might determine a definitive player and hence, in the context of the library, S1 is Beethoven and S2 is Elgar. The definitive player in this example is essentially a relation between the bits on the generic disc template, i.e. the carrier set, such that almost every bit is related to two other bits so as to form a sequence up to a choice of direction. When a disc from the library is played on the definitive player the output has relatively few abrupt transitions in output frequency and so there is some similarity between the relation on the carrier set and what is written on the discs. We finish this example by mentioning that there are plenty of different choices of typical data, i.e. libraries, available and in particular many more than there are players. If there are n bit locations on the generic disc template, so that #S = n, then there are n! different players by which we mean n! different sequences of these bit locations. Further the number of different discs n that can be written is 2n , that is #ΩS = 2n . Therefore the number of different subsets of ΩS is 22 and it is straightforward to n show by induction that 22 > n! for all n ∈ N. 3 In the next section we will see that the appropriate relation to put on the carrier set, if unique, is explicitly determined by the typical data itself. Suppose in Example 1.1 that instead of the data points on the discs having a two state repertoire, bits, there were as many states as output frequencies or that the nodes on the generic disc template are the bytes instead of the bits. Then the theory in the next section would apply to Example 1.1 and there would not be a problem concerning how to measure the quantity of structure of an output. Moreover towards the end of this paper we will argue that the theory presented solves what is known as the binding problem. 2 Relations defined by typical data We will refer to Table 1 below several times in this section. In Table 1 the carrier set has four elements, S = {a, b, c, d}. There are 24 different sequences, i.e. one dimensional arrangements, of the elements of S and these appear in the column headings of the table. There are 16 different binary data elements for S and each row of Table 1 gives a particular data element under the 24 different one dimensional arrangements. Now let T := {S5 , S10 , S13 } be the set of typical data for S. Let us try to arrange the elements of S in a way that achieves something similar to that exemplified by the definitive player problem. We can consider which sequence, or other arrangement, of the elements of the carrier set gives the most structured, transition free, interpretation of the typical data elements. The sequence acdb and its reverse bdca satisfy this requirement since under these arrangements, for each typical data element, the zeros and ones are unmixed. In the sequel we introduce relations to show how the typical data determines the structure on the carrier set. Since this structure is given by a symmetric relation, as opposed to an antisymmetric relation in the case of total orders, the problem of whether T gives acdb or bdca as the definitive arrangement of the carrier set will be solved. We begin with the following standard definitions which will be particularly useful here. Definition 2.1. Let S be a nonempty set. A binary relation on S is a subset R ⊆ S2 where S2 := {(a, b) : a ∈ S, b ∈ S}. For a, b ∈ S we say that a is R-related to b, and write aRb, precisely when (a, b) ∈ R. We say that R is: (i) reflexive if (a, a) ∈ R for all a ∈ S; (ii) symmetric if for every (a, b) ∈ R we also have (b, a) ∈ R; (iii) antisymmetric if for every pair of distinct elements a, b ∈ S at most one of (a, b) and (b, a) is an element of R; (iv) transitive if for every triple of elements a, b, c ∈ S with (a, b) ∈ R and (b, c) ∈ R we also have (a, c) ∈ R; (v) an equivalence relation if R is reflexive, symmetric and transitive. There is a strong connection between the theory of relations on a set and graph theory. In the following definition we use some graph theory terminology. 4 Table 1: One dimensional arrangements of four bit data elements. a b c d a b d c a c b d a c d b a d b c a d c b b a c d b a d c b c a d b c d a b d a c b d c a c a b d c a d b c b a d c b d a c d a b c d b a d a b c d a c b d b a c d b c a d c a b d c b a 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 S10 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 1 S11 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 S12 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 S13 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 S14 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 S15 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 S16 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 S1 S2 S3 S4 S5 S6 S7 S8 S9 5 Definition 2.2. Let S be a nonempty finite set and R ⊆ S2 a symmetric relation on S. For a, b ∈ S a walk from a to b, if one exists, is a finite sequence (ki )i∈{1,···,n} , n ∈ N is odd, such that: (w1) k1 = a and kn = b; (w2) we have ki ∈ S if i is odd and ki ∈ R if i is even; (w3) for i even we have ki = (ki−1 , ki+1 ). For a, b ∈ S let Ka,b denote the set of all walks from a to b. The R-distance between two elements a, b ∈ S is dR (a, b) :=    min{ n−1 : (ki ) i∈{1,··· ,n} ∈ Ka,b } 2   ∞ if Ka,b is nonempty if Ka,b = 0. / (2) Lemma 2.1. Since R is symmetric, the R-distance dR defined in Definition 2.2 is either a metric or an extended metric on S. By extended metric we mean a metric that takes non-negative values on the extended real line, [−∞, ∞]. Proof. One checks the four standard metric axioms. Remark 2.1. Let S be a nonempty finite set and n := #S. Then S2 is the equivalence relation on S with just one equivalence class. Whilst the graph diagram of a graph need not be unique, by applying uniformity principals for the lengths of edges and angles between adjacent edges, many graph diagrams are unique. For example, the graph diagram of S with the relation S2 is given by the edges and vertices, nodes, of the n − 1 dimensional regular simplex e.g. for n = 4 the simplex is a tetrahedron. In the sequel the following metric will also be useful. 2 Lemma 2.2. Let S be a nonempty finite set and let 2S be the set of all binary relations on S, noting that this is the power set of S2 . Then d∆ (R, R′ ) := #(R∆R′ ), 2 R, R′ ∈ 2S , (3) 2 is a metric on 2S where R∆R′ := (R ∪ R′ )\(R ∩ R′ ) is the symmetric difference of R and R′ . We call d∆ the symmetric 2 difference metric on 2S . Proof. Standard for S2 finite. The following example shows how typical data determines a structure on the carrier set. Example 2.1. With reference to Table 1, again let T = {S5, S10 , S13 } be the set of typical data for S = {a, b, c, d}. With reference to Definition 1.1, we note that each typical data element Si = {(a, fi (a)) : a ∈ S, fi : S → {0, 1}} defines an equivalence relation on S of the form R(Si ) := {(a, b) : a, b ∈ S, 6 fi (a) = fi (b)}. (4) Hence from T we obtain the relation tables in Figure 1. Note that for numerical cell values use 1 − | fi (a) − fi (b)| for a, b ∈ S. Now we aggregate the relation tables in Figure 1 into a single weighted relation table RT by calculating the mean number of a b c d a b c d a a a a b b b c c c d d d R(S5 ) b R(S10 ) c d R(S13 ) Figure 1: The relation tables defined by the elements of T . dots per table cell. Hence for a, b ∈ S, RT shows the proportion of equivalence relations defined by the elements of T that have a related to b. The table RT is shown in Figure 2. Now, for a threshold value of 0.5, we round the cell values of RT such a b c d a 1 0 1 2 3 1 3 1 3 2 3 1 1 3 2 3 2 3 a b 0 2 3 1 3 2 3 1 d c d a b c b d a c c d b GS RT RS Figure 2: The structure on the carrier set S determined by T . that values greater than 0.5 are rounded up to 1 and values less than or equal to 0.5 are rounded down to 0. This results in the relation RS . We note that a relation obtained in this way will always be symmetric but in general it need not be transitive. In particular RS is not transitive but since it is symmetric it defines a metric or an extended metric on S by Lemma 2.1. Hence we will refer to S with RS , defined by T , as the carrier space. The graph diagram of S with the relation RS is given by GS in Figure 2. Arguable GS is one dimensional and we note that it agrees with our discussion at the beginning of Section 2 since being a non-directed graph. We note that as theory develops it might be useful to retain the weighted relation RT instead of only working with RS . In particular one can obtain a hierarchy of relations from RT by varying the rounding threshold. However there are good reasons for choosing a rounding threshold of 0.5. In particular RS is such that the mean of the distances between RS and the elements R(Si ) obtained from T is minimized, that is 1 d∆ (RS , R(Si )) = min #T S∑ i ∈T ( ) 1 d∆ (R, R(Si )) : R is a relation on S . #T S∑ i ∈T (5) In general RS need not be unique in this respect if the value 0.5 appears in the relation table for RT . We will shortly relate RS 7 to something we will call float entropy which also supports a rounding threshold of 0.5. The following example uses typical data which defines a structure on the carrier set that is not one dimensional. Example 2.2. With reference to Table 1, let T ′ = {S6 , S9 , S16 } be the set of typical data for S′ := S where S is the carrier set of Example 2.1. Following the theory introduced in Example 2.1 gives the results presented in Figure 3. a b c d a 1 2 3 1 1 2 3 1 3 2 3 a 2 3 1 3 2 3 1 3 2 3 2 3 1 d b c d 2 3 1 3 a b c d a d b c b RT ′ GS ′ c RS ′ Figure 3: The structure on the carrier set S′ determined by T ′ . 2.1 Float entropy In this short subsection we will discuss the notion of float entropy. Let S be a carrier set, T ⊆ ΩS the typical data of S and R a relation on S. Suppose we consider T to be the set of possible messages that can be sent to a receiver. In standard information theory the receiver would also have a copy of T so that sending a message only involves sending enough information to identify the intended element. Instead of this suppose that the receiver only has a copy of S and R. For Si ∈ T if the relation R(Si ) is relatively close to R with respect to d∆ then the number of bits that need to be sent to the receiver in order to specify Si will be relatively small. In this case Si is highly compressible, carries little information and is highly structured relative to R. We summarize this situation by saying that Si has low float entropy relative to R. The extreme case of minimum float entropy occurs when R(Si ) = R which is possible if R is an equivalence relation. With reference to Definition 1.1 we can quantify float entropy relative to a given relation R as follows, fe(R, Si ) := log2 (#{S j ∈ ΩS : d∆ (R, R(S j )) ≤ d∆ (R, R(Si ))}). (6) This is a measure in bits of the amount of information required to specify Si under the assumption that what is being specified ought to be highly structured relative to R. We can consider some values for examples 2.1 and 2.2. Recall that in Example 2.1 we have T = {S5 , S10 , S13 } and in Example 2.2 T ′ = {S6 , S9 , S16 }. For RS from Example 2.1 we have fe(RS , S10 ) = 1 and fe(RS , S5 ) = fe(RS , S13 ) = 2.58 to two decimal places whereas in contrast fe(RS , S9 ) = 4. We will denote the mean of the float entropies for the elements of T with respect to RS by fe(RS , T ) and extend this notation to T ′ and RS′ from Example 2.2 accordingly. Working to 2dp throughout gives fe(RS , T ) = 2.06 and fe(RS′ , T ′ ) = 2.58 whereas fe(RS , T ′ ) = 3.55 and fe(RS′ , T ) = 3.87. Hence we see that the relations obtained by the method shown in the examples are, relative to their 8 respective typical data, a good choice in order to minimize the mean float entropy. Now let S be the set of neurons of a brain and T the set of brain states where a brain state is a possible and probable aggregate state of all the brain’s neurons. If we are trying to approximate T then ideally T will be selected such that, as a random variable restricted to T , the brain has a uniform distribution over T . Further ideally T should be large enough so that the probability of the brain being in a state that is close to at least one of the elements of T is high. Under these conditions we note, by Equation 5, that setting R := RS is a good choice in order to minimize the expected float entropy. In the next section we will to some extent consider the possible relevance of the theory in Section 2 to the brain. We will also extend the theory to what we will call objects. 3 The brain and relations between objects defined by typical data Although our theory is to be considered for typical data elements of the state of the whole brain, we begin this section by considering the relevance of the theory to the primary visual cortex, V1. Associating the retina with the unit disc of the complex plain and similarly embedding the flattened cortical sheet of V1 into the complex plain, we note that the retinocortical mapping to V1 on a given side of the brain is approximately logarithmic and is therefore far from being an isometry, see [6] and [7]. Hence the geometry of V1 cannot account for the perceived geometry of monocular vision. Furthermore, the right side of each retina is mapped to the right side of the brain whereas the left side of each retina is mapped to the left side of the brain. Hence the signals from a given retina go to two different brain areas. Despite this the perceived geometry produces a seamless isometric version of the image on the retina. Such facts underline the need for a theory such as that initiated in this paper since we need to explain how perceived geometry is defined by the brain. Let S be the set of neurons in V1. Further let a′ and b′ be two distinct points that are fixed relative to the eye in a person’s field of view as depicted in Figure 4. Let a be a neuron in V1 that is stimulated by the retina when there is stimulation of the a′ l b′ b′ a′ d Figure 4: Two fixed points in a person’s field of view. retina from a′ . Similarly let b be a neuron in V1 that has the same relationship with b′ . Consider the typical data T for V1. We note that abrupt transition lines between light and dark or regions of different color are relatively sparse in the field of view. In a somewhat simplified analysis, suppose that there are usually no more than n abrupt transition lines in the field of 9 view. As depicted in Figure 4, let l be the length of the line through a′ and b′ crossing the field of view and d the viewable distance between a′ and b′ . Suppose that all n transition lines intersect the line through a′ and b′ . Then the probability Pn that there is one or more transition lines between a′ and b′ is   d n . Pn = 1 − 1 − l (7) We note that limd→0 Pn = 0. Hence if d is small then a will be in the same state as b in the majority of the typical data elements of T. On the other hand if d is large then arguably a and b will rarely be in the same state. Therefore the relation RS on S defined by T ought to correspond well with the structure of the field of view. This claim is supported below by the results of a study using digital photographs to test how well the theory establishes relative pixel positions. First though we note that evidence has been found for V1 that supports the BCM version of Hebbian theory, see [8] and [9]. Hebbian theory implies that if a′ and b′ are close together then stimulation of a and stimulation of b from within V1 ought to usually happen together. Therefore the typical data is typical of the states that V1 can internally generate by itself. Hence V1 defines RS and by doing so it defines the interpretation of the current state of V1. Whilst this is the case in theory further investigation is required when the full complexity of the visual system is considered. Now a study was conducted using 105 digital photographs taken of everyday scenes using the same seven megapixel digital camera. A computer program centered a 5 × 5 grid of sampling points over each photograph and recorded to which brightness class each point belonged. Here the grid points are the elements of S whereas an element of T is given by the values obtained for one of the photographs so that #T = 105. Two parameters are involved the first being the grid point spacing in pixels of adjacent grid points and the second being the number of brightness classes used. The second parameter is therefore the node repertoire and, apart from the fact that the repertoire was not restricted to two, everything proceeded as per examples 2.1 and 2.2. Results showed that RS was close, with respect to d∆ , to the relation for the grid provided that the parameters used corresponded to a point on the curve in Figure 5. Now suppose we numerate the elements of T from 1 to 105 and calculate Number of brightness classes 50 25 p 0 0 25 Grid point spacing, pixels 50 Figure 5: Established parameter options. 10 RS after the first n elements for n ∈ {1, 5, 10, 15, · · · , 105}. Figure 6 shows how the acquired relation converged toward the relation for the grid as n increased. The parameters used for Figure 6 are indicated by the point p in Figure 5. Further Figure 7, Distance given by 21 d∆ between the acquired relation and the relation of the grid. 100 Number of edges in the acquired graph diagram omitted by the grid. Number of grid edges omitted in the acquired graph diagram. 50 0 0 50 100 Number of digital photographs used Figure 6: Convergence to the relation for the grid. left, shows the graph diagram of the relation for the grid and, right, the edges given by the relation RS for n = 105. Clearly convergence would be obtained for large enough #T . This works because whilst the content of the world around us is very Figure 7: The grid edges compared with the edges given by RS . varied it is nevertheless highly structured relative to the underlying geometry of the space. Brightness classes were used in the study so that the nodes, the grid points, would represent neurons in V1 that respond to rod cells in the retina. We should note that the rod cells are arranged more in the form of a hexagonal lattice than a grid. Further it would be interesting to repeat this study with each grid point split into three separate nodes giving one for each cone cell type so that #S = 75. The cone cells respond either to red, green or blue. The resulting relation RS may suggest a solution to the binding problem for color perception. Finally we should consider what might determine the repertoire of a neuron. The brain itself should define this. For example, if a small change in the output frequency of a neuron has no affect on the system then with respect to the system the neuron’s state is the same. Similarly if switching over the outputs of two different neurons would have no affect on the system then with respect to the system the neurons are in the same state. This last point is just a suggestion. Note 11 that such a definition of relative node state may result in the relation R(Si ) for Si ∈ T no longer being transitive. We will now move onto our discussion concerning objects. 3.1 Relations between objects defined by typical data We start this subsection with a definition. Definition 3.1. Let S be a nonempty finite set with typical data T and the relation RS defined on S by T . Let X be some other finite set with #X ≤ #S. We say that X j := {(a, x j (a)) : a ∈ X, x j : X → {0, 1}}, with a relation RX j on X j , is an object of S if there is some Si ∈ T , Si = {(a, fi (a)) : a ∈ S, (8) fi : S → {0, 1}} with relation RSi := {((a, fi (a)), (b, fi (b))) : (a, b) ∈ RS }, (9) and an injective map Λ ji : X j → Si , given by Λ ji ((a, x j (a))) := (λ ji (a), fi (λ ji (a))) where λ ji (a) ∈ S, such that for all (a, x j (a)), (b, x j (b)) ∈ X j we have: (i) x j (a) = fi (λ ji (a)); (ii) ((a, x j (a)), (b, x j (b))) ∈ RX j if and only if (Λ ji ((a, x j (a))), Λ ji ((b, x j (b)))) ∈ RSi . We say that the object X j embeds into Si and denote the set of all objects of S by O. We will now show that typical data T defines a relation RO on the set of objects of S as follows. For X j ∈ O let TX j := {Si : X j embeds into Si where Si ∈ T }. Note, by Definition 3.1, that TX j is not empty. Now the relation RO is given by RO := ) #(TX j ∩ TYk ) (X j ,Yk ) : > 0.5 where (X j ,Yk ) ∈ O 2 . #TX j ( (10) We note that in general RO need not be symmetric or transitive and that it is the relation obtained by applying a rounding threshold of 0.5 to the weighted relation RT given in Figure 8. Similar to the situation in Example 2.1, one can obtain a totally ordered hierarchy of relations on O by varying the rounding threshold applied to RT . Turning our attention to the topic of float entropy that we began in Subsection 2.1, we note that if the receiver not only has a copy of S and RS but also has a copy of RO then the elements of T should be even more compressible and are even more structured relative to the relations available to the receiver. Finally we note that the theory in this paper easily generalises to cases where the neurons, or other nodes, have more than a two state repertoire, that is we can allow fi to take more than two values in the definition of a data element Si given in Definition 1.1. In this case one also makes a similar adjustment to the definition of an object X j of S. 12 Yk Xj #(TX j ∩TYk ) #TX j Figure 8: The weighted relation table for RT on O determined by T . 4 Development, testing and conclusion There are different ways in which this theory can be developed. From a purely theoretical perspective it is interesting to establish the range of structures that can be defined by typical data comprised of comparable nodes noting for example that functions can be defined by relations. This general theory can then be applied to any dynamical system comprised of comparable nodes, e.g. networks. More practically the wealth of established knowledge concerning brain function offers an interdisciplinary approach to theoretical development. Furthermore the theory needs to be tested. In this respect functional MRI with high spatial resolution and other brain imaging technologies could be used. For example FMRI has already been used as a way of obtaining information about the state of V1 that is sufficient for image reconstruction, see [10]. However due to spatial distortion of the retino-cortical mapping and restricted FMRI voxel resolution, and perhaps other factors, it is not possible to recognize viewed stimulus from FMRI images directly. Reconstruction often uses methods from linear mathematics and probability where knowledge of the visual stimulus used is necessary during the setup stage. Taking the elements of S to be the voxels covering V1 it is interesting to know whether typical data would give rise to a geometric relationship between the voxels, differing from their FMRI image positions, such that the viewed stimulus would be recognizable from the repositioned voxels. Two methods could be tried when establishing the geometry on S. The first would follow the theory as presented in Section 3. For the second the distances between the voxels could be obtained from the map d : S2 → [0, 1], d(a, b) := 1 − RT (a, b). In both cases each relation R(Si ) should have numerical cell values since the similarity of voxel states can be quantified in the range 0 to 1. One type of visual stimulus to try would have a single transition line placed at random in the field of view. 4.1 Conclusion We have already mentioned in Section 3 that the BCM version of Hebbian theory provides evidence of how the brain itself defines typical data. We mentioned the evidence in the case of the primary visual cortex V1 but there is also evidence for the relevance of BCM theory regarding the hippocampus, see [11]. In particular the typical data that V1 defines should be typical of the states induced by signals from the retina. In Section 3 it is shown, at least in theory and up to a good analogy using a digital camera, that for appropriate parameters such typical data defines a relation on the set of neurons of V1 that gives 13 the perceived geometry for monocular vision. The relation is defined by the typical data by being special in the sense that it minimizes the expectation of the float entropy of the system. However our theory is intended to be applied to typical data for the whole brain so that such a relation also determines how the states of other sensory regions are perceived. For example the relation on the auditory cortex might define how we perceive the relationship between the pitches of the chromatic scale. Of course more work is required in order to determine the extent to which this theory can account for how the brain defines the various aspects of consciousness. However at the higher semantic level it is fairly clear that the typical data for the brain defines relationships between objects in the way described in Subsection 3.1. For example a good impressionist painting provides V1 with just enough of a particular stimulus such that V1 produces the same state as that induced by a photograph of the same subject. This ability of the brain is widely known as filling-in and shows that typical data defined by the brain will determine a strong relationship between certain objects. Furthermore it is well known that certain parts of the thalamus act as a relay between different parts of the cortex including different sensory regions. This and other connections can arguably result in the brain defining typical data that determines relationships between objects arising from different sensory regions of the cortex, [4] is of relevance here. Further the states of the brain during dreaming, visualization with the eyes closed and inner sound are all instances of typical data produced by the brain itself independent of the senses at the time. We will now turn our attention to what is known as the binding problem. In short the binding problem can be summarized by the following observation and question. The visual content of our conscious experience correlates with the state of the visual cortex, whereas the sound content of out conscious experience correlates with the state of the auditory cortex. How therefore can the state of two quite distinct and spatially separated brain regions give rise to a single unified conscious experience? If the theory presented in this paper is correct then the answer is quite straightforward. The content of consciousness is defined by the state of the brain interpreted in the context of the relations, such as those discussed above, defined by the brain’s typical data. The typical data is determined by the brain’s structure. Hence consciousness is a property of the brain as opposed to being an output of some algorithmic procedure or relying on some homunculus concept. A compact disc on its own is almost meaningless but in the context of a sufficiently large CD library it is a specific piece of music, Beethoven for example or Mozart perhaps. Similarly a brain state on its own is almost meaningless but in the context of the brain’s typical data it is a moment of consciousness by which we mean the brain state with the relations defined on it by the typical data and this is for example the view of the coffee cup with the sound of the radio and the taste of the coffee all together. Finally this paper if correct still leaves many questions unanswered and the lack of an attempt to answer them in the context of this initial proposition of the theory is rightful cause for some criticism. Here are a few of these questions: (i) Can the theory explain the conscious experience of the color red or does the theory need to be extended? (ii) What are the other relations that typical data define? (iii) What connections are there, if any, between our theory and the theory of consciousness as integrated information as 14 proposed by Giulio Tononi, see [1],? (iv) Even though the neurons are an obvious candidate for the elements of the carrier set S are they the right candidate? (v) Let Si be the data element for a given brain state. Is all of the relation RO contributing to consciousness regarding Si or is only a subset RO (Si ) := {(X j ,Yk ) : (X j ,Yk ) ∈ RO where both X j and Yk embed in to Si }? (11) (vi) Is it useful to also consider a carrier set where the elements are time dependent neurons over a short time interval or some discrete version of the same involving short finite sequences? Acknowledgements: I would like to thank the School of Mathematical Sciences, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK for providing continued access to facilities during the period after my PhD whilst I was still registered as a student and writing this paper. References [1] Giulio Tononi. Consciousness as Integrated Information: a Provisional Manifesto. Biological Bulletin, 215(3):216–242, DEC 2008. [2] G M Edelman and G Tononi. A Universe of Consciousness: How Matter Becomes Imagination. Basic Books, 2000. [3] G A Ascoli. The complex link between neuroanatomy and consciousness. Complexity, 6(1):20–26, Sep 2000. [4] Svetlana V. Shinkareva, Vicente L. Malave, Robert A. Mason, Tom M. Mitchell, and Marcel Adam Just. Commonality of neural representations of words and pictures. Neuroimage, 54(3):2418–2425, FEB 1 2011. [5] O Sporns. Network analysis, complexity, and brain function. Complexity, 8(1):56–60, Sep 2002. [6] M Balasubramanian, J Polimeni, and E L Schwartz. The V1-V2-V3 complex: quasiconformal dipole maps in primate striate and extra-striate cortex. Neural Networks, 15(10):1157–1163, Dec 2002. [7] E L Schwartz. Spatial mapping in primate sensory projection - analytic structure and relevance to perception. Biological Cybernetics, 25(4):181–194, 1977. [8] E L Bienenstock, L N Cooper, and P W Munro. Theory for the development of neuron selectivity - orientation specificity and binocular interaction in visual-cortex. Journal of Neuroscience, 2(1):32–48, 1982. [9] A Kirkwood, M G Rioult, and M F Bear. Experience-dependent modification of synaptic plasticity in visual cortex. Nature, 381(6582):526–528, JUN 6 1996. 15 [10] Yoichi Miyawaki, Hajime Uchida, Okito Yamashita, Masa-aki Sato, Yusuke Morito, Hiroki C. Tanabe, Norihiro Sadato, and Yukiyasu Kamitani. Visual Image Reconstruction from Human Brain Activity using a Combination of Multiscale Local Image Decoders. Neuron, 60(5):915–929, Dec 11 2008. [11] S M Dudek and M F Bear. Homosynaptic Long-Term Depression in Area CA1 of Hippocampus and Effects of NMethyl-D-Aspartate Receptor Blockade. Proceedings of The National Academy of Sciences of The United States of America, 89(10):4363–4367, MAY 15 1992. 16

498 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I Article A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I Iona Miller* ABSTRACT Jung's first mention of the term archetype was in the 1919 text Instinct and the Unconscious. We've had nearly a hundred years of archetypes, as such. However, ancient cultures, such as the Gnostics knew them under other names, such as the Archons. And we have our own modern concepts, frames, and terminology for nature's dynamics. We don't need to parrot Jung, or congratulate ourselves for climbing over the fence of his theories. When we face naked reality, we know “Nothing.” We need to extend these notions in a way that is relevant to our current experience, nomenclature, and ethos. Perhaps, with the right terms we can begin asking the right questions that open the way for a thriving humanity. Part I of this article addresses the topics of Coherence, Decoherence & Resolution; The Light of Nature; Virtual Holograms & Network Theory; Holographic Memory; Source Intelligence; A Hundred Years of Archetypes; What the Flux? Light in the Darkness; Seeds of Light; Holographic Hyperchannel; Archetypes, Holoarchy & Meta-Genetics; In Synch; Resonant Filters; Remodeling Process. Key Words: coherence, decoherence, resolution, virtual holograms, archetypes, holographic archetypes, liquid crystals, superposition, consciousness, quantum flux, zero point. INTRODUCTION Coherence, Decoherence & Resolution Not for a moment dare we succumb to the illusion that an archetype can be finally explained and disposed of. Even the best attempts at explanation are only more or less successful translations into another metaphorical language. (Indeed, language itself is only an image.) The most we can do is dream the myth onwards and give it a modern dress. --Jung People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubborn, persistent illusion. --Albert Einstein First, what is an archetype? Archetypes can be understood and described in many ways, and in fact much of the history of Western thought from Plato and Aristotle onward has been concerned * Correspondence: Iona Miller, Independent Researcher http://ionamiller.weebly.com E-Mail: iona_m@yahoo.com Note: This work was completed in August, 2004 ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 499 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I with this very question. But for our present purposes, we can define an archetype as a universal principle or force that affects--impels, structures, permeates--the human psyche and human behavior on many levels. One can think of them as primordial instincts, as Freud did, or as transcendent first principles as Plato did, or as gods of the psyche as James Hillman does. Archetypes (for example, Venus or Mars) seem to have a transcendent, mythic quality, yet they also have very specific psychological expressions--as in the desire for love and the experience of beauty (Venus), or the impulse toward forceful activity and aggression (Mars). Moreover, archetypes seem to work from both within and without, for they can express themselves as impulses and images from the interior psyche, yet also as events and situations in the external world. Jung thought of archetypes as the basic constituents of the human psyche, shared crossculturally by all human beings, and he regarded them as universal expressions of a collective unconscious. Much earlier, the Platonic tradition considered archetypes to be not only psychological but also cosmic and objective, as primordial forms of a Universal Mind that transcended the human psyche. Astrology would appear to support the Platonic view as well as the Jungian, since it gives evidence that Jungian archetypes are not only visible in human psychology, in human experience and behavior, but are also linked to the macrocosm itself- -- to the planets and their movements in the heavens. Astrology thus supports the ancient idea of an anima mundi, or world soul, in which the human psyche participates. From this perspective, what Jung called the collective unconscious can be viewed as being ultimately embedded within the cosmos itself. --Richard Tarnas The Light of Nature By moving to a field model, Jung’s view of the archetypes of the collective unconscious can be reformulated. Each archetype can be seen as a node embedded within the larger context of a polycentric whole, with sets of links or connections weaving the archetypes into a network that has scale-free properties. – Joseph Cambray, Synchronicity. Virtual Holograms & Network Theory Bootstrapping from Pribram and Bohm that both matter and consciousness are a single field of reality, we can revision archetypes as holographic projections of consciousness, fractal involved series of harmonic radiant energy fields -- holographic self-organizing nets, electrodynamic patterning. Everything responds to a consciousness field by becoming more ordered. The stronger or more coherent the consciousness field, the more the order is evident. Such entities have no independent existence as such. Rather, they are abstracted from the flowing movement, arising and vanishing in the total process of the flow. Every archetype is a hologram of all that exists. The whole reflects back to us ageless, collective wisdom grounded in countless individual experiences, as an unrelenting imaginal kaleidoscope of images. Hub theory developed in network science but provides a viable metaphor for the psychic field ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 500 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I and archetypes. Network theorists have discovered a new and unsuspected order within highly linked networks, one that displays an uncommon beauty and coherence. Arising as a complex network, such connections are not random. If they grow large enough each node has roughly the same number of links as any other node over time. Highly linked nodes, or hubs, are the defining characteristic of the network, not just an anomaly but an organizing principle for engineered and natural systems alike. The strongest connections (among symbols) are hubs, with less-connected nodes clustering around them like planets gather around a star. The new model reflects the existence of hubs in real-world networks, creating a tool for scientists to map and explore all manner of complex systems in ways they had never thought to before. Mapping a system, with its patterns and details, helps us understand its behavior and degrees of randomness or uncertainty in a system. (Barabási). Engineers use control theory to predict how systems will respond to various inputs. Similar equations are used to map networks. Like prediction, control requires evaluating an object as a system with nodes of varying importance. If we can look at any network, not just engineered ones, we can find those control nodes. Among the thousands of proteins operating in a cell, researchers found the steering wheel, the gas pedal and the brake: Control nodes take instructions or signals from outside the network (for example, a foot on the gas pedal) and transmit them to nodes within the network (the fuel-injection system). To find them, Liu borrowed an algorithm, developed by Erdös and Rényi five decades prior, that acts as a signal moving through the network. It starts at one node and follows a random edge to another node, at which point it “erases” every other edge but the one it came in on and the one it will go out on. The algorithm runs through the entire network over and over until it finds the minimum set of starting points needed to reach every node in the system. Control these starting points, and you control the entire network. (Mone) They found that denser, more interconnected networks tended to have fewer control nodes per capita. For instance, the brain or network of genes control the system through such nodes. A small percent of connections control the network. The more data scientists feed into the model, the better they can map connections in the network and the fewer control nodes they might need to operate the system. Theory applies to total control of a network. Scientists who want partial control—say, to elicit a particular protein expression within a cell—would need to master far fewer nodes. As in the case of archetypes, finding the points of control is one thing. Actually exerting influence over a given network is an entirely different challenge. The first breakthroughs will most likely take place in medicine. By identifying control nodes in cell growth systems, scientists could return mature cells to their embryonic state, creating a new source of stem cells. “Some diseases are all about lack of control,” Barabási says. “If you were able to gain control over them at the cellular or neuronal level, you might be able to cure the disease.” Jung claimed the gods have become diseases, so interventions at this level tap into the archetypal control system. Whether that is 'good' for us or not remains to be seen. Understanding how we operate probably is. Hermes encourages and inspires us to do so. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 501 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I Holographic Memory We retain memories as superpositions of possibilities. Both we and the entire universe also retain memory as dynamic structure. The whole body is memory. The principle of superposition governs how waves interact. Coherent superpositions of optical wave fields include holography. Superposition of wave fronts and entanglement may be the holographic blur of potentials, a superposition of elemental holograms. We can learn to interpret the internally sensed holographic image data involving the so-called empathic and psychic capabilities. We all have and use that capacity, but usually without being conscious of it, let alone accessing it in an organized and consistent fashion. How do receptive fields at the microdendritic processing level decode such information? An elementary form of perception is implicit in this field, due to its indivisible motion and holographic properties, when taken at the null scale of time. The hierarchical dynamics of the brain imposes the scale of time on this field. Scale implies quality. We can conceive of the brain as a reconstructive wave within a holographic field (Robbins, 2002). The brain processes information in wave-frequency patterns suggesting human memory could hold amazing amounts of information “in storage,” and, using the same holographic model, be able to access and recall a memory as a three-dimensional image. Geneticist Mae-Won Ho says the memory of our body, inhering in the liquid crystalline continuum, exists in a quantum holographic form, distributed over the entire liquid crystalline medium -- the whole body. This brain-supported wave is specific to the past, i.e., to a composite of past "states" of the field taken at a certain scale of time. It is simultaneously a specification of the subset of the field relatable to the body’s action. Memory is delocalized not only across the entire brain, but throughout the entire body. The liquid crystalline continuum may function as a quantum holographic medium, recording the interference patterns arising from interactions between local activities and a globally coherent field. Laszlo (1995) suggested that the "zero-point field" of the universe functions as a universal holographic medium, recording the experiences of all the particles, each of which is subject to influences from the rest of the universe as well as feedback from the particle's own activities on the universal medium. If the organism is coherent, then the conditions are there for a quantum holographic (distributed) memory stored in the liquid crystalline continuum of the body itself. During this writing (Nov. 2011), Tamar Levin. in Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research, Vol. 2, No 9 (2012), proposes an integrative framework for conceptualizing human consciousness and compliments it with existing research data. The framework is based on the holographic and trans-disciplinary worldviews and their implied implicate-explicate order and the holographic knowing-becoming-experiencing-valuing human being who interacts interdependently with/within different levels of reality. The implicate order is a domain of reality characterized by flux and potentiality, whereas explicate order is the order of stable phenomena and actuality. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 502 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I The framework conceptualizes universal consciousness as a fundamental part of reality/universe that complements physical potentialities and brings them to actual physical states. It regards human consciousness as both structure and system, state and process, means and end, experience, information and energy, having a metaphysical /spiritual /implicit /implicate layer and a physical/ material /explicit and / explicate layer expressed via biological, chemical, and physical processes. (Levin) It also considers human consciousness as incorporating inward-outward 'space' processes and a backward-forward 'time' system's view expressing/influencing different modes of thinking, feeling, and behaving, and personal and transpersonal elements. The framework focuses on the unique functions, and interactions in heart-soul and brain-mind relations and their effects on states of consciousness. The subjective nature of consciousness is conceptualized in terms of the essence of individuality manifested by the root of the soul, the genetic spiritual-DNA code, and the individual's historic evolution through different life-cycles. Source Intelligence Memory may also store in a nonlocal ambient collective quantum holographic field, accessible but delocalized from the individual in the virtual vacuum. A vacuum is not empty, but full of “virtual particles” that are continuously fluctuating in and out of existence. Lit up with coherence, the world appears as the infinite realm accessed by mystics, clairvoyants, and artists. Stanislav Grof, a psychiatrist, links non-ordinary states of consciousness and archetypal experiences with the holographic model. The semi-permeable membranes of our cells exchange information with the interstitial spaces around them. In much the same way, the body as a unified and holographic structure exchanges information with its surrounding environment. An image is encoded as the superposition of one main approximation. Holographic reconstruction results from the superposition of the spatial coherence wavelets that carry the marginal power spectrum. All fields of consciousness emanating and radiating from any zeropoint singularity interpenetrate each other. Thus, they are essentially in the same place everywhere. The electron is not a particle that exists continuously but is something coming in and going out and then coming in again. The electron itself can never be separated from the whole of space, which is its ground. Since consciousness is the fundamental quality of the zero-point center of spin momentum in absolute space, each such “singularity” is potentially conscious as is every zero-point center of all fractal involved information/energy fields radiating from it, ad infinitum. Spin creates interference in the form of spectral holographic projections of compressed energy in time, which manifest in the form of images. This image dimension underlies and supports the volume dimension. Different levels of reality correspond to different proportions and combinations of images and volumes. The central spiral vortex crossover point (all adjoining toroidal fractal involved fields) is what physicists call a “twistor” or a “wormhole”. This conceptual synthesis unites psyche and matter ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 503 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I in a dynamic holographic concept of archetypes and archetypal images as we move through the 21st Century. A Hundred Years of Archetypes The year 2012 marks the hundredth anniversary of "archetypes" as an evolving psychological model of the qualities and dynamics of our core existence. As early as 1912, Jung referred to 'primordial images' to describe motifs of myths, legends, and fairy tales that have a universal character and appear as images or perceptual patterns. Many myths are religions we no longer believe. In 1917 he wrote of 'dominants of the collective unconscious' which he characterized as 'nodal points' of psychic energy. Jung compared psyche's luminous experiences with the light impressions described by the alchemists. Rather than looking to heaven, the alchemists searched for the divine in the earth, matter, their bodies, the feminine and sexuality. Light itself is an archetype. The photon is a measure of mass because the observer is made of light. The photonic field is the attractor that cannot be destroyed because its function is to continually decay zero point into matter or change - nothing into something by evolving form through linear time. Psyche is world; psyche is cosmos. It is the crucible in which we live. Archetypes are not separated or isolated from existence and being (like disincarnated souls or distant Olympians). They are deathless yet evolving. Archetypes are constellations that psyche and cosmos have in common, that inform our relationship to the whole. These archetypes then shape our common dreams, religious feelings and experiences with "godlike" forces in our life. Jung's notions of a heroic, striving Self have been transcended with imaginal, nonlinear models of consciousness, archetypes as holographic strange attractors and healing fictions. Jungians have explored monist and polytheistic approaches to the psyche, becoming less interested in "heroic" control and conquering and more desirous of deepening interrelationship and finding soulful meaning. When Jung began discussing archetypes, there was no neurology or DNA science. Brain physiology was unknown and quantum mechanics was just emerging, so he groped for words like 'heritability' and 'neural substrate' to describe his observations of pervasive patterns in both psyche and matter, intuitively recognizing them as different facets of the same phenomena. His collaboration with physicist Wolfgang Pauli linked his theory with those of quantum physics, and suggests we continue to mine that vein for its psychological gold. In The Neurobiology of the Gods, Goodwyn asks, "Can 'spiritual' images and feelings be understood on a neurobiological level without dismissing their power and mystery?" His multicisciplinary approach includes, research in evolutionary psychology, neuroanatomy, cognitive science, neuroscience, anthropology, mental imagery, dream research, and metaphor theory, but lacks a necessary root or basis in physics -- particularly the vacuum physics of subspace or absolute space. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 504 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I What the Flux? This Quantum Vacuum is more aptly named the unmanifest Plenum, whose vast energy density some consider the source of sentient Being. The dynamic discovered to be the very substance of the Plenum of space is light itself, the spectrum of fluctuating electromagnetism called the Zero Point Energy (ZPE). The "Quantum Vacuum" points to the fact that it is not a vacuum - an emptiness pure and simple, but rather is saturated with vibrant potential energy and is in fact a highly energetic medium, an absolute fullness of potential energy, the dynamic modification of which actually "emanates" what we call mass, matter or material form. The flow of mass, and our own mass, through time is generated by the ubiquitous interaction of photons with the mass. This is so for both virtual and observable photons. Mass moves through time by integrating virtual photons, and absorption/emission of observable photons/biophotons. The internal dynamic flow of time has infolded sublevels and engines that pump up the quantum field effects to breech the mystic threshold of observability. The infolded nature of unconditioned space itself, the vacuum potential with its Zero Point Energy (ZPE) is the root metaphor of the 21st Century. ZPE fields radiate from the center of origin of all physical forms, beginning with the smallest sub-quantum particle and extending to the largest galaxy, as well as each human being. All such fields are also electrodynamic in nature. Consequently, all structural, memory and mental information is carried as holographically encoded wave interference patterns on the surface of such fields. They are transmitted through descending hyperspace field phase orders to their common zero-point center of consciousness by phase conjugate adaptive resonance processes. Jung may have intuitively foreseen as much when he called the gnostic void a Plenum of infinite potential. Subquantum ZPE fields surrounding the spin (angular) momentum causes quantum particles to oscillate in and out of the ZP foam at their positive and negative phase of their standing waves or solitons. Such waves have resonant fractal harmonics that extend all the way through the compacted hyperspace fields in the quantum foam down to the zero-point spinergy, as well as outward to the furthest extent of the spacetime continuum. All fields are in constant oscillation between spacetime and the zero-point at their natural frequencies between zero and infinite. Energy fields are continuously expanding and contracting through their zero point singularity on every spiral vortex spin cycle of their individual radiant particle-standing waves. This accounts for the entanglement (or action at a distance) of split particles along any ray path, as well as the entanglement of consciousness. The universal center is everywhere and its circumference nowhere. The cosmos and every manifest form within it is a hologram, composed of infinite holograms within each other, ad infinitum, with all the structural information of the whole and all its parts (forms in each fractal involved harmonic field in total cosmic spacetime) existing at every zero-point singularity at their centers of origin — with all such fields interconnected (on the informational level) by ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 505 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I phase conjugate adaptive resonance. Since these ZPE fields are everywhere (in the Plack vacuum) and their ultimate extension, infinite — they interpenetrate each other in the vast sea of pulsating cosmic spacetime. Together, they constitute the basis of our holographic universe. The universe is composed of an infinite number of frequencies. Some are macroscopically large and some microscopically small. All exist in uncountable phase relationships with one another. The colors of light, the sound of music, the smell of flowers, the touch of velvet, all are made of combined frequencies. Some are in phase and adding to, some are out of phase and cancel from, a multitude of vibrations. Our five senses are capable of interpreting these particular waves and making them tangible to our perception. It takes subtle sensing to perceive the archetypes behind phenomena. We are each 'called' to express the inexhaustible richness of the collective unconscious, each in our own individual way, with certain themes selected through our predilections and our consciousness of it -- a novel creative synthesis. That is co-creativity. Deep within comes this holy source-level urge to co-create in novel ways that makes each of us irreplaceably unique. Light in the Darkness Often long before scientific discoveries and explanations, we have intuitive precursors, ideas rooted in symbols, which indicate the content remains just beyond the threshold of conscious understanding. The pseudoscience, metaphysics, and superstition of human history and culture is in this category, and examples are numerous. We live in an era when so much of what was formerly hidden is being revealed by drawing back Nature's veil. We've peered back into the Creation to our inception. We find that light is a measure of mass not velocity. We've discovered the deep time of the Cosmos, the developmental history of our planet, and our entire species. We've learned that without radical cultural transformation, our species may be doomed. Our mandate, therefore, is to look deeply within ourselves, fearlessly, to find the next new way on, not by relying on or retrieving the atavistic past, but by extending our potential for living in new, emergent ways that light our future. The photonic field is a harmonic of the negentropy attractor. New discoveries are changing the face of science and impact cultural dynamics. One of our greatest challenges is the move toward altering and augmenting our genetics and bodies with technology. It is already rewiring our brains in unknown ways when we haven't as yet become "fully human". Avatars, designer bodies and immersive realities highlight just how plastic our ideas of being have become. Yet, the archetypes remain as eternal patterns playing out through the “nows” of our lives. What was formerly limited to the psychological domain is being experimentally demonstrated by physics. As I write this today (Nov. 17, 2011) Forbes runs a story, which I include to demonstrate its immediate relevance to our quest and to Jung's notion of scintillating light in the darkness beyond the threshold of the unconscious: "Physicists Create Light from Nothingness". In the beginning, the vacuum was without form, and void. Then the physicists said, 'Let there be ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 506 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I light!', and nothing happened. Then the physicists built a superconducting quantum interference device. And then there was light. (Forbes) In quantum physics, the vast emptiness of space isn’t actually that empty. In fact, what we think of as a “vacuum” is actually teeming with virtual particles – particles that flit in and out of existence constantly, existing for only tiny periods of time before they go back to nothingness. This constant cycle of creation and destruction is the consequence of the mathematics of quantum mechanics and the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, and creates what is known as vacuum energy – a background energy that exists throughout space, even when there is no matter present. Its existence has been indirectly observed through experimentation, such as those which demonstrate the Lamb shift – a slight fluctuation of the energy of electrons in a hydrogen atom. Over forty years ago, physicist Gerald Moore predicted that if you were able to spin a mirror at speeds close to the speed of light, then the mirror would convert virtual photons into actual photons (the particles that make up light and other electromagnetic radiation). Unfortunately, it’s close to physically impossible to spin a mirror at near-relativistic speeds, and so this effect had not been observed. Until now, that is. In a paper published in Nature, a team of physicists has demonstrated the creation of photons from vacuum fluctuations. To do this, they constructed a superconducting circuit, which they’ve dubbed the superconducting quantum interference device, or SQUID for short. SQUID is a superconductor that’s capable of oscillating at extraordinarily high frequencies – over 11 GHz. The SQUID is designed to effectively act as a mirror in order to replicate the theorized experiment. Once the SQUID was ready, the team then passed a magnetic field through it, causing it to rotate at a speed of about five percent of the speed of light – fast enough to see the predicted results. And those results were obtained. After rotating the SQUID at those high speeds, the team were able to detect several real photons that were essentially created from nothing. These were the virtual transformed to the real. The photons that were created weren’t actually visible to humans – they were in the microwave range of the EM spectrum. However, there is a possibility that a similar technique could be used to create actual visible light. Seeds of Light Everything is made of Light. Only light matters. Nothing arises but standing waves from the seething zero-point field created by cosmic beings like ourselves. How we do so is a mystery to ourselves. But we are getting closer to non-religious descriptions of reality that curiously have profound mystical overtones. The properties of mass, inertia, charge and gravity -- and those who observe them -- are the result of space resonances produced by zero-point scalar waves. At zero-point, waves pass through waves without interference. We come from, are sustained by, and are returning to to the radiant light of our mass. All electromagnetic force is mediated by virtual photons. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 507 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I The generally accepted theory of light up until the mid 1800's, was Newton's assertion of light to be a stream of tiny particles. However, in the late 1800's, the particle picture was replaced by the wave theory of light due to the phenomena associated with light: refraction, diffraction and interference, which could only be explained using the wave picture. This electromagnetic radiation, or light, may be viewed in one of two complementary ways: as a wave in an abstract electromagnetic field or as a stream of massless particles called photons. This is known as the wave-particle duality and is true for all particles. This duality is the basis of a indisputable quantum law in which it is a thread that runs throughout the micro and macrocosm. Light as a wave, has a wavelength associated with it, much like an ocean wave with crests and troughs. The frequency of light is measured by counting the number of waves passing one point at a given time. The energy is merely the strength or force the wave carries. Since all things have an energetic duality we can convert and apply this to the DNA and RNA molecules which they in fact emit their own light/energy. Science shows this and mystics spanning many beliefs and philosophies throughout history speak of this wisdom in terms of The Language of Light. The root of the soul is characterized as a sacred spark or central source of individual light/energy that helps regulate human consciousness and connects and unites human consciousness with universal mind. It connects human consciousness to the universe through its deeper subconsciousness component -- soul, our deepest nature and essence. A background sea of [virtual or "dark"] light is the zero-point field of the quantum vacuum. The solid, stable world of matter is sustained every scintillating instant by this underlying sea of quantum light. The primordial infrastructure of existence is light. Holograms are a manifestation of the properties of light, the production and transmission of light, and the interaction of light with itself. Considering the primordial nature of the psyche, Jung reflected on the 'seeds of light broadcast in the chaos' (Khunrath) , of the 'scintillae' (Dorn), soul sparks (Eckhart), of fish-eyes at the bottom of the sea, or images of luminous serpent eyes. He spoke of the virtual light of such luminous nodal points emerging from the abyssal depths, eventually including dynamical processes and all types of universally recurring patterns of behavior in the psyche. Jung did not begin to use the term archetype until 1919. At first he interchanged it with 'primordial image' and 'dominant'. Preconscious archetypes are formative principles and structural elements, as well as typical modes of apprehension and action. Frey-Rohn characterized them as, "...not only the focal point of ancient pathways but also the center from which new creative endeavors emanated. "The archetypes, then being inherent in the life process, represented forces and tendencies which not only repeated experiences but also formed creative centers of numinous effect." ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 508 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I The numinous arises from the autonomous level of the psyche. The experience of the numinous also lies at the heart of Jungian therapeutic practice. Without it no transformation takes place. Jung (1973) asserts, “But the fact is that the approach to the numinous is the real therapy and inasmuch as you attain to the numinous experiences you are released from the curse of pathology” (p. 377). (Jacobi) Archetypal images designate patterns, typical basic forms, prefigurative determinants, and the tendency to repeat the same psychic experiences. They conceal the unborn eternal archetype (unconscious nucleus of meaning) while they reveal particularized meaning and form. Such ‘oculi piscium’ (fishes eyes)” are fiery soulsparks of the World-Soul, the light of nature, divine sparks of the spirit. Paracelsus perceived scintilla or sparks of this new light, calling it the Lumen Naturae. We might liken them to a quanta of the pleroma or void - a glimmer of the divine within. Holographically, each level of emanated creation contains within it a "spark" or "scintilla" of the divine, making it "like" the divine. Jung termed the nondual "Pleroma," where nothingness is the same as fullness"...an Absolute in which there is no division between subject and object. Jung intuited this nondual Pleroma to be a collective transpersonal reservoir, an ocean of collective unconscious. From this omnipotent universal Pleroma our individual psyches coalesce around "attractor archetypes." In this sense Jung echoed the axiom: "Emptiness is Form, Form is Emptiness." The spark, or scintilla, which is placed in the human soul, represents the possibility of the psyche's reunification with the unconscious -- unification of a conscious, individuated personality with the full range of oppositions and archetypes in the unconscious mind. "Our aim," Jung tells us, "is to create a wider personality whose center of gravity does not necessarily coincide with the ego," but rather "in the hypothetical point between conscious and unconscious" (Jung, 1929/1968, p. 45). It harks back to a deep connection to the fundamental rhythm of nature, to the death and rebirth of divine nature, and to the wonder of our own being which partakes of the same energy. Correspondingly, in the Western mandala, the scintilla or soul-spark, the innermost divine essence of man, is characterized by symbols which can just as well express a God-image unfolding in the world, in nature, and in man. (CG Jung:1972:p 5) This 'solar' aspect of the Self is the centrum, the indwelling scintilla animae. Shekhinah descends to raise up the collective lights of the whole created world. Jung called this light the lumen naturae which illuminates consciousness, the light of the darkness itself. Consciousness has always been described in terms derived from the behavior of light, so Jung assumed that these multiple luminosities correspond to tiny conscious phenomena. Jung interpreted this imagery as symbolizing the emergence of consciousness. Jung noted, "Alchemy too has its doctrine of the Scintilla, the little soul-spark. In the first place it is the fiery ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 509 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I center of the earth. For all things have their origin in this source." At the common root, matter, energy, light and consciousness share a metaphysical essence -- information. Light does not always behave like a continuous wave. It is grainy because energy can be transferred only in quantum packages. Therefore, light has a dual character. Under certain circumstances, it displays wavelike aspects. In other circumstances, it may have the characteristics of particles. Referring to quantum theory, Bohm's basic assumption is that "elementary particles are actually systems of extremely complicated internal structure, acting essentially as amplifiers of *information* contained in a quantum wave." Light is a form of transition from three-dimensional space, the aether, to the space with four dimensions. All forms of energy originate as light. We're beginning to understand what nature has been hiding beneath her mystic veil of non-observability. The zero-point field is a blinding light. Since it is everywhere, inside and outside of us, permeating every atom in our bodies, we are effectively blind to virtual photon flux. It blinds us by its presence. The world of light that we do see is all the rest of the light that is over and above the zero-point field. We cannot eliminate the zero-point field from our eyes. The vacuum remains the simplest state of nature. Life takes refuge in a single space - absolute space - the luminous core of meaning itself. Metaphysical space is the unconscious. Each form that is in each human mind is, in some sense, an archetype -- some more common than others. A self-replicating archetype that is kindled from the collective unconscious is kindled through a mechanism of unconscious levels of tuning. Repetition pushes the human psyche toward a bifurcation. Psyche has the possibility of using repetition as a chaotic attractor. The progressive is suddenly punctuated by what is novel, and thrown into chaos. Archetypes also shape collective consciousness. They are coherent, complex, intelligible patterns of meaning and improvisational creativity, shaped by the multilevel unconscious tuning, caused by an unresolved conflict in the deeper unconscious layers. The Philosopher's Stone equates with Jung's notion of the mandala as a unifying symbol and the elusive Unified Field of physics. Meaning is not an entity, not a creed, a doctrine, a worldview, also not something like the fairytale treasure hard to attain. It is not semantic, not a content. Meaning, where it indeed exists, is first of all an implicit or a priori fact of existence. It can never be the answer to a question. It is, conversely, an unquestioned and unquestionable certainty that predates any possible questioning. It is the groundedness of existence, a sense of embeddedness in life, of containment in the world. Creativity is the principle of novelty. Unity with cosmos and the groundstate of Being reveals what IS. Everything pulses with the same luminosity - a magnificent light of unparalleled brilliance. The "holographic experience" is one of being simultaneously cosmos and individual self. Archetypes act as the fundamental dynamical patterns characterizing all processes, whether mental or physical. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 510 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I The luminous consciousness of the worked on soul arises, self-existing unlimited awareness, or self-existing awareness, unlimited, unconditioned, unborn. – • • • luminescent nature luminescent natural awareness luminous vision The holographic paradigm suggests the brain is like a television receiver and we're receiving things through it. If something happens to the receiver your image is going to get blurred. But it won't hurt the program. Anyone with a good set can still receive it, as you could if you got a new television set. So the real you (the operator who is using the neurons in the brain to come through) is like a television program and the body is like a set that receives it, and has static (noise), a refresh rate, and coherent signals of varying resolution. Our DNA functions as a projector of the quantum biohologram, our existential blueprint. Mind is emergent sparkling awareness, an existential hologram interpreting a holographic universe. Twinkle is evidence of the "filling in" process. The luminosity is the radiance of our own minds. Archetypes' numinous luminosity attracts and holds us like a gravity well. Archetypes function like strange attractors. Not archetypal in strictly the same sense as used by Jung; the term refers to principles so primordial that they underlie the fundamental shaping of all structures. Attractors bring coherence to various signs and symbols. Symbols themselves -words, pictures -- point to the deeper structure of things, including the deeper structure of time. Numinous experience is the urgent emergence of Mystery. Light is the archetype of the revelation of ultimate reality. This source effect is the root of the religious drive. Due to religious undertow, mankind never ceases trying to personalize the awe-inspiring and fascinating numinous element. Jung called the "numinous element" the collective unconscious and Clear Light of the Void. The numinous experience can lead to belief in deities, the supernatural, the sacred, the holy, and/or the transcendent. But it is a phenomenon, not contact with a "separate" "divinity", per se. Activated archetypes are often compensatory in nature, and associated with trance, art, and creativity. Trance (awe and dread of the uncanny) is a dissociative way of escape; art is a way of personal expression; creativity brings cognition, universality, and compassion into the process. There is above the celestial fire an incorruptible flame, always sparkling; the spring of life, the fountain of all being. Holographic Hyperchannel In 1994, the Gariaev (Garyaev) group proposed a theory of the Wave-based Genome where the DNA-wave functions as a Biocomputer. They suggest (1) that there are genetic "texts", similar to natural context-dependent texts in human language; (2) that the chromosome apparatus acts simultaneously both as a source and receiver of these genetic texts, respectively decoding and encoding them; (3) that the chromosome continuum acts like a dynamical holographic grating, which displays or transduces weak laser light and solitonic electro-acoustic fields. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 511 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I The distribution of the character frequency in genetic texts is fractal, so the nucleotides of DNA molecules are able to form holographic pre-images of biostructures. This process of "reading and writing" the very matter of our being manifests from the genome's associative holographic memory in conjunction with its quantum nonlocality. Rapid transmission of genetic information and gene-expression unite the organism as holistic entity embedded in the larger Whole. The system works as a biocomputer -- a wave biocomputer. Are there holographic hyperchannels? Information in a field is holographic and the propagation of holographic interference patterns is quasi-instantaneous. Every part of the field contains the whole informational content, just in lower resolution. “Each particle of mass in our bodies represents one closure of the entire universe yielding a holographic reality and deeper communication with ourselves is identical to communication with the universe, including any part of it, at any distance. Furthermore, in hyperspace the future and the past are all present. Leon Maurer proposed a model he called Astro Biological Coenergetics. ABC is a scientifically philosophical holographic, fractal involved field theory of cosmogenesis, mind, memory, information and consciousness—based on the fundamental propositions that subjective consciousness (awareness, will) is an a priori quality of the underlying, unconditioned absolute space—located everywhere in relative space-time. And that the entire cosmos is a hologram— with all structural information contained in every absolute zero-point "singularity" (infinite absolute space) at the origin of all fields and forms in finite relative spacetime... Where all such fields' fractal harmonics steps down octavally in frequency phase orders ranging between zero and infinite. This theory further postulates that total relative gravitational/electrodynamic spacetime, including the higher orders of fractal involved cosmic hyperspacetime fields and all their mass/energy fields (em & gravitational radiation) and forms (particle-standing waves)—both in sub-quantum hyperspacetime and in our lowest frequency phase order physical/material quantum spacetime—are generated from the spin momentum (ZPE) of the “singularity” surrounding each proto-conscious zero-point of primal or absolute space located everywhere throughout total hyperspherical spacetime. This holistic theoretical framework (physics, biology, philosophy) includes the idea that we are light-enabled technology, Photonic Humans. The mass of the physical body exists because there is some informational code of access to an unlimited source of energy mediated by Light. Light comes from the subspace holographic blueprint, a subtle field that allows the flux of virtual photons to spontaneously appear and disappear in the vacuum so quickly they cannot be individually observed. All mass is interaction but in the vacuum waves pass through waves in superposition without interference. Virtual photons are literally clear light. The fundamental nature of the energy body is clear light.. Related photic phenomena are described using the informational, material and energetic characteristics of existence, plus the complexity and entropy characteristics of dynamic development. Technically, quantum fields have an infinite number of possible energy states, all of which should contribute virtual particles to the vacuum. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 512 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I Holography stabilizes the vacuum energy. The foundations of fields overlap and reverberate in a holographic frequency domain. Matter is induced by resonant holographic resolution. In holography, three-dimensional illusion results from a dense network of interference patterns. These patterns reflect the wave character of light. A small piece of the hologram can be used to reconstruct the whole three-dimensional image, but the resolution can be fuzzy. With selective tuning and kindling, any part of this holographic reality is accessible. However, because of the smallness of a single selective signal in the midst of the totality, the channel is quite noisy. Are standing waves picked up and carried by the Schumann Resonance, or transmitted by scalar waves or a gradient in the vacuum potential? Are brains entrained on a resonant frequency? Does DNA function as a multi-mode antenna regulating growth, evolution, and perhaps psi? Mind is a dynamic function of the entire organism at all levels of self-organization. Constantly fluctuating local parameters are embodied and amplified through the body’s electromagnetic control hologram. Mind/body modulates our sensitivity to external and internal information. The organization of any biological system is established by a complex electrodynamic field which is, in part, determined by its subquantal components. This field, in turn, determines the behavior and orientation of psychophysical being. DNA is our antenna. This dynamic is mediated initially through wave-based genomes where DNA functions as the holographic projector of the psychophysical system, a quantum biohologram. Supersymmetry points to a deep link between the quantum realm of particle physics and the quasi-classical realm of protein assembly. Science now understands no objectivity is possible because of uncertainty, indeterminacy. Absolute space beyond the subatomic threshold of dynamic vacuum fluctuation is unobservable or measurable, and therefore metaphysical, beyond physics. Infinite energy density pervades the whole universe. The emergent paradigm of self-organization permits the elaboration of a vision based on the interconnectedness of natural dynamics at all levels of evolving micro- and macrosystems. A new sense of meaning springs from such interconnectedness of the human world with overall evolution. It is leading us toward complex quantum biology and quantum medicine. This theoretical framework includes the idea that we are light-enabled technology. The mass of the physical body exists because there is some informational code of access to an unlimited source of energy mediated by Light (subspace). Related photic phenomena are informational, material and energetic characteristics of existence, plus the complexity (chaos theory) and entropy characteristics of dynamic development. Paradigms serve important integrative psychological and social functions. They help us read the sacred pages in the Book of Nature. The previous page of pre-scientific wisdom traditions explored the same territory with spiritual technologies. Virtual photons and photons are the key ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 513 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I to biology. Photons bridge the gap between physics, biology and philosophy. Such sparks of virtual light are the glimmerings of consciousness itself. DISCUSSION Archetypes, Holoarchy & Meta-Genetics We suggest extending Jung's argument. Self-organizing holographic archetypes, excited manifolds in the psychoid field, exert both top-down and bottom-up control of phenomenology. There are as many approaches to archetypes and phenomenology as there are people. We intensify our efforts when we find what doesn't fit. Old definitions, speculation on heritability, static snapshots, extracted symbols, stereotypes, qualitative correspondences, and galleries of gods and goddesses fall short of full descriptions of nonlinear dynamic process. As ever, the map is not the territory. "Mental illness" is only a medical model of the archetypes. Philosophical, theoretical, and spiritual assumptions are colored by archetypes. We are all touched by archetypes. The only question is how much of our lives is consumed by them. We may readily see that language, number, geometry, grammar, and DNA are basic patterning forces of human life and culture. But we have new archetypes, aka Old Wine In New Bottles, to deal with in the 21st Century, some disguised as trends or memes, such as holography, "Ascension", conspiracy, quantum mind, "Occupy", catastrophe, sustainability, global warming, NWO, "transcendent man," and other tropes of our current era alongside the old -- Ouroboros, apocalypse, changing Ages, plutocracy, death/rebirth, Great Goddess. We can identify whole clusters of the old gods and goddesses moving through such new forms: Hermes, Gaia, Zeus, and the rest of our usual suspects. But we need to enlarge our capacity to think in terms broader than these old forms. An over-arching theme is the Android Meme: “…the ability of human-invented technology…to acquire the intimacy of speech and intuition.” (Dobbs) In other words, the Android Meme is technology that has the qualities of “being alive”. The Android Meme joins with us in an unholy alliance of archetypal technology and human organism, as a cacophony of all media, all technology and all ideas of particular times, anthropomorphized, trying to make itself human. Since Jung's era, the public has become passingly familiar with the terms of quantum physics, the fractals of chaos theory, and the holographic paradigm. Science is formulated with metaphor as well as models. Any small piece of imaginal material may contain the total configuration, both past and future. It is the resonance or expansion and re-expansion of this awareness over time that leads to change rather than particularized insight itself. Insight does not result from learning but results from a subsequent phenomenological shift in the holographic template called insight. Insight results from expansion and overload rather than from a specific, focused understanding. Within the process model, the total patterns of experiencing within the organismic whole which ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 514 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I have remained unattended became the holographic blur. In other words, this part of the unconscious is not regarded as a preexisting form. When we are presented with a sensation, feeling, thought or intuition, it takes millions of cooperating brain cells, orchestrating together, for these perceptions to reach consciousness. Approximately 97% of what happens in our socalled "consciousness" remains unconscious. Although subjectivity is present at the level of photons, it requires brain systems to generate ordered patterns that are the basis of actual conscious experience. Drive manifestations in thought, repressed memories, archetypal themes, and so on are particularized meanings, cognitively derived from the holographic "frequency domain"-- the stage of transforming sensory data across the entire brain. Mark Germine describes the Holographic Principle: "Layers of the holographic, universal “now” go from the inception of the universe to the present. Universal Consciousness is the timeless source of actuality and mentality. Information is experience, and the expansion of the “now” leads to higher and higher orders of experience in the Universe, with various levels of consciousness emerging from experience. The brain consists of a nested hierarchy of surfaces which range from the most elementary field though the neuron, neural group, and the whole brain. Evidence from the evolution and structure of the brain shows that optimal surface areas in a variety of structures are conserved with respect to underlying surfaces. Microgenesis, the becoming of the mental state through a process of recapitulation of development and evolution, is in full accord with the Holographic Principle. Evidence from a wide variety of contexts indicates the capacity of the mind for total recall of past life events and for access to universal information, indicating connection with the holographic surfaces of prior “nows” and with the Universal holographic boundary. In summation, the Holographic Principle can help us explain the unity and mechanisms of perception, experience, memory, and consciousness." He also notes, "There have been a number of propositions regarding the relationship of consciousness and time. Sigmund Freud held that the unconscious is timeless, and that time only arises in consciousness. Carl Jung, with the apparent endorsement of Wolfgang Pauli, held that there is a collective unconscious, composed of archetypes, which are timeless, and also worked with Pauli on his theory of synchronicity, or meaningful experiences outside of normal causality. What Freud and Jung would call timeless, we call temporally non-local. We have also hardly touched open the role of dynamical systems or chaos theory, with the brain state fundamentally evolving under the conditions of self-organized criticality." Laszlo (2004) contends, "The universe is a system of holographic surfaces within surfaces, or what we may call a nested hierarchy of surfaces, with each surface containing its own “world” of information. The most basic order of information is the fundamental quantum of spatial volume, the Planck space, which has a variable energy, called the vacuum energy. In 1930 Dirac developed a model of the vacuum as an infinite sea of particles having negative energy, which was dubbed the Dirac sea. There is a fundamental relationship between the Holographic Principle and the vacuum energy (Mongan, 2007), which can account for a variety of non-local phenomena." ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 515 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I Because the frequency domain deals with the density of events, time and space are collapsed in it. Not until these mathematical transforms are reversed does the object or image reappear as concrete, three-dimensional reality "out there." In the frequency domain itself there is no out there (Pribram, 1982). Pribram's "frequency domain" is Bohm's "implicate order" while the image domain is "explicate order." Countless enfolding and unfoldings between orders is the Bohm's holomovement. The transformative process may be holographic. Chaos only appears as such because the underlying order is of such indefinitely high degree. It is meaningless to view the universe as arbitrary parts. Many understand that it relates to consciousness, synchronicity, and their holistic experience of reality. Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events, unlikely to occur together by chance, being observed to occur together in a meaningful manner. It represents the meaningful unfoldment of potential. We are wrapping our minds around paradoxical notions such as multiverse, non-locality, superposition, coherence, entanglement, and torsion fields. Non-locality is the quantum phenomenon of instantaneous action at a distance in spacetime. Sometimes our mental representations are dominated by form, especially that initiated by past experiences. Other times, consciousness is dominated more by formlessness, uncommitted attention, receptivity to new ideas. Between frames, or states of consciousness are transitive or "empty" moments in which vague, unformulated experience occurs. The metaphor is superseded by the holographic blur of a possibility of form -- form overcome by formlessness -- finally free from groping around using inadequate analogies. Simulations can run through the past and future, trying different scenarios and responding in advance to probable future environments. In Synch Jung believed that synchronicity phenomena underlie his hypothesis of “collective unconscious”, with “archetypes”. Synchronicity cannot be considered in isolation from the nonlocal structure of “collective unconscious”. The phenomena of coincidence or synchronicity are modulated by archetypes. Influenced by Jung's concept of synchronicity, Arthur Koestler wrote The Roots of Coincidence (1972), an accessible introduction to theories of parapsychology, including extrasensory perception and psychokinesis. It postulates links between elements of quantum mechanics, including the behavior of neutrinos and their interaction with time, and these paranormal phenomena. It is influenced by Carl Jung's concept of synchronicity. Peat calls synchronicity a bridge between matter and mind. Living by synchronicity -paradoxical but seemingly meaningful coincidences -- isn't just about getting messages or reading 'signs'. It is about immersion in the flow state, being at one with the cosmos. It is about nurturing the poetic consciousness that allows us to taste and touch what rhymes and resonates in the world we inhabit. ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 516 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I Harmonizing and balancing the inner world of spirit and mind is achieved through archetypes and their symbols and images. Chaotic periods punctuate creative periods. The dynamic is from external to internal world as meaning unfolds. Through opening ourselves, we learn how the world-behind-the-world reveals itself by fluttering the veils of our consensual reality. We learn how to live with one foot rooted in the inner and outer symbolic world, revealing the transcendence hidden in a particular life. Even a partial understanding of the neurological substrate of the archetypes will improve our understanding of them. Archetypes aren't limited to myth, dream, paranormal puzzles, and the hermeneutic interpretations of the consulting room. Archetypes transcend the individual psyche, permeating our experience. Jung called the non-psychic aspect of the archetype 'psychoid', forming a bridge to matter in general, extending beyond a neurophysiological basis into the general dynamical patterns of all matter and energy. Archetypal pre-conditions describe the transcendent, unitary existence that underlies the duality of the mind (psyche) and matter (physis). They impact all situations, experiences, and images. When we are gripped by archetypal images and experiences, our conscious life and attitudes are swept away by pre-subjective schemas. Beyond judgment, such autonomous appetites demand to be fed. The experiential spectrum ranges from unconscious identification to feeling overwhelmed by it. Complexes behave like independent beings, subpersonalities with their own qualitative agenda with new and hidden meanings. Ego is punctuated by archetypal interference, repression and suppression. Meta-genetics is a separate field at the very heart of genetics -- the study of how inheritance itself evolves, even while it mediates all evolution. It attempts to interpret or explain the organization, structure and dynamics of genetic material -- the master program of the archetypal creative "programmer". The meta-genetic program is the inherent intelligence of the life-force itself. Meta-genetics encompasses a group of related fields including quantum bioholography, genetic linguistics, and wave-genetics. Whether or not genetics is evolving, our view certainly is. The discovery of gene-expression transcends the nature/nurture dichotomy. DNA is the replicable archetype of our species. Achetypes have both neurological and environmental correlates. Genes, templates, enzymes, catalysts, hromones and pheromones have 'archetypal' qualities. Archetypes are probably somatically based in the right cerebral hemisphere, which is visual-spatial. The tripartate brain and limbic system suggest more primitive archetypes reside in the drives and structures of the "reptilian" brain. Recent studies of empathy find a genetic base for the psychosocial response: scientists identified couples’ gene types as GG, AG, or AA through tests. The first type marks people with two copies of a gene variant called G; the second, those with one copy of the G and one copy of the A variant; and so forth. According to previous research, GG people tend to act in a more caring way, whereas the other two types tend to have a higher risk of autism and self-reported lower levels of positive emotions, empathy and parental sensitivity. Oxytocin is linked with social affiliation and reduction in stress, social recognition, pair bonding, ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 517 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I dampening negative emotional responses, trust and love. GG carriers rate highest for trustworthiness. Carriers of the A version of the gene were viewed as less kind, trustworthy and caring toward their partners. What’s unknown is precisely how the gene affects the behavior. The variant does lead to differences in receptors, or molecular structures, involved in oxytocin transmission. But people can and do overcome their genes to some extent. (Oregon State University) Due to the nature of the limbic system, you cannot will your feelings, emotions, falling in love, or staying in love, anymore than you can will your heart to beat, or yourself to digest a meal or sleep. Archetypes correlate with simultaneous activation and deactivation of discrete parts of the limbic system. For every biological event in your body, there is a biological cause. In this case, the cause is neurochemicals—and the pathways they turn on and off. The genetic code operates by epigenetics, turning certain genes on or off. According to metagenetics, potential DNA is anything but “junk.” Potential DNA plays the primary role of interfacing “ener-genetically” with our bioenergy blueprint in the consciousness field. In this way, potential DNA regulates cellular expression -- and even the origin and evolution of species -- in a manner that genetics cannot begin to account for and epigenetics cannot come close to matching. If the genome is the hardware, epigenetics is the software of genetic expression, telling it when to work, how to work and how much. The epigenome tells cells what kind of cells to be, whereas archetypes are primordial reaction formations. While some epigenetic changes are heritable through the germ line, many are not and necessarily so. You wouldn't want the epigenome of a heart cell or kidney cell or, more relevantly, a gonad cell to find its way unchanged into the fertilized egg. The slate upon which all the developmental processes of the adult have been written needs to be wiped clean in order to clear a space for the next generation. Relatively clean heritable epigenetic marks are somehow preserved. As part of this slate-cleaning, a wave of demethylation passes along each chromosome shortly after fertilization and is completed by the time of implantation in the uterus. Immediately following this, a new methylation occurs, appropriate for the embryo and giving it a fresh epigenetic start. In explaining the role potential DNA plays in the origin and evolution of species, meta-genetics reveals that genetics and epigenetics alike control our lives only relatively, compared to the underlying spiritual energy that engenders, supports and develops life: consciousness. Potential DNA’s ongoing dialogue with the consciousness field allows for a constant, simultaneous exchange of information, in the form of sound and light waves, between time-space and spacetime, while bypassing any so-called tight restrictions on the flow of genetic information. Potential DNA, far from being inactive, constitutes the hyperdimensional interface between the sound and light domains. The genetic sound-light translation mechanism indicates the process by which chromosomes assemble themselves into different configurations designed to “translate” standing waves of sound into light (and vice versa). The existence of the genetic sound-light translation mechanism indicates that the flow of information, or conscious bioenergy, through DNA is a two-way street. Light becomes sound, and sound becomes light. Though other alternative models will naturally arise, by choosing a scope of analysis and ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 518 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I approaching cognitive dynamics and characteristics on their own terms we can actually get something done. We have to wrap our minds around the notion that our "living region" is indissolubly welded to the vastness of unknowable reality. Jung suggested as much in the language of his day in his concept of the Collective Unconscious and its archetypal dynamics, which he constantly sought to update. Nearly a century later, we should consider doing the same. It can be useful to relinquish or recontextualize old reality assertions. A 21st Century inquiry into reality explodes the normative of space, time and matter, and thus destroys the context in which something like an evolutionary narrative makes sense to us. Yet, by choice or by wearing intentional blinders, the evolutionary narrative continues to inform very useful analyses of our condition. That is also a useful point in consciousness studies (since there is actually no other alternative) . We have to construct and build upon useful analyses of consciousness, and not divert ourselves with unverifiable speculations about the true nature of all of reality. Our notions of 'consciousness' exist independent of that reality, which is the lens through which we encounter our experiences. Cognition, itself is a holographic archetype. So are language and natural numbers. Many essential qualities of the whole are reflected or contained in each of the parts that make up that whole. Whatever else it may be, the holographic domain is also a subtle yet dynamic net of preferential metaphors, analogies and similes which characterize our experience of our experiences. Just as we are not constrained by retrievals of our ancestors beliefs, rituals, superstitions and faulty theories, we are not constrained from rewriting psychological theory from best practices to clear a Golden Path to our future. Resonant Filters Holographic archetypes effectively echo their nested-structure and resonant patterns throughout the field as phenomenological, biophysical, literal and symbolic "reflectaphors" -- fractal expressions, fractal scaling, and reiterations of psychic life. Archetypal morphogenetic fields (or attractors) emerge harmonically within nested domains. The interweaving transient forms of the holographic archetype include the hologram, psychic structure, wave-genetics, and synchronicity. We can and must recontextualize Jung's intuitive notion of archetypes in terms of today's science, pursuing his dream of a unified language that unites psyche and matter. Psyche and Cosmos is a unified matrix of being, pregnant with intelligence and intimately coextensive with human affairs. The life-wave is best understood as a potentially infinite series of waves. The ocean in our analogy is the “torsion,” Source Field or hyperdimensional sound domain of timespace, where individual waves act as sonic carrier waves for the genetic blueprints of past, present and future species. Archetypes are more than just metaphors of chaos theory, holographic strange attractors, and dark energy -- they are the eternal sources of such notions and perceptions. It's as if these supersensible realities are enfolded potentials in the scalar field of the virtual vacuum, awaiting ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 519 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I their synchronistic moment of unfolding. Holographic Strange Attractors are also fractal, looking like patterns we recognize but without clear boundaries and never quite repeating themselves at various scales and domains. They allow unpredictable change while providing structure. Remodeling Process Jung's collective unconscious consists of archetypal infolded EM structures acting in common in an overall bio-quantum-potential for the entire species. Gaia, the living earth/biosphere, really does scientifically exist as a common bio-quantum-potential with infolded living EM structures for the entire earth biosphere. The bio-potential in a single body is an overall quantum potential that links and joins all the atoms and cells of the body. The "spirit" of the biosystem is its "living biopotential" - its living quantum potential. We already know that a potential is everywhere nonzero all the way out to infinity. So the spirit of the living system is - in the virtual state - everywhere in the universe - and everywhen as well. It's all a giant hologram, not only in space, but in spacetime. The entire universe is everywhere alive, with everything. (Bearden) The body's master cellular control system is holographic—the pattern (substructured potential with its dynamic, oscillating components) is in each component (each atomic nucleus, hence in each cell.) Every structural level of the body larger than the cell also has its own correlated pattern, or modulation, on the overall. Arthur Koestler called holarchy a connection between holons – as both a part and a whole, across scales and domains. The universe as a whole is an example of a holarchical system, in which every holarchy is part of a larger holarchy. Holarchy is commonly considered a form of hierarchy, however, hierarchy implies both an absolute top and bottom. For a holon, this is not logically possible, as it is both a whole and a part. Like a fractal, the top can be a bottom, and a bottom can be a top. An advantage of the holarchy model is that it may be easily mapped to hierarchy of agents (or archetypes) in which an agent is composed of agents and may have its own ecological behavior as a partial consequence of these part's behaviors. Functioning like "psychic DNA", archetypes are the holographic strange attractors organizing the psyche. The psychoid level of archetypes is analogous to the heritable DNA biohologram, whereas their expressive nature can be likened to epigenetics. Epigenetics is typically defined as the study of heritable changes in gene expression that are not due to changes in DNA sequence. Every cell in the body has the same genetic information. What makes cells, tissues and organs different is that different sets of genes are turned on or expressed. Environmental factors and our choices alter the way genes and archetypes are expressed and characterize our being. Jung claimed that "the gods have become diseases." The field of epigenetics is now revealing a molecular basis for how heritable information other than DNA sequence can influence gene function, morphology, and plasticity. These advances also add to our understanding of transcriptional regulation, nuclear organization, development and disease. Archetypes characterize and particularize perennial wisdom, language, images and ideas (theories), and emotion-laden complexes. Sometimes, such complex expression looks like ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 520 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | June 2012 | Vol. 3 | Issue 5 | pp. 498-520 Miller, I., A Hundred Years of Archetypes: When You Face Reality, You Know “Nothing” Part I pathology or pathologizing but psyche is trying to tell its perennial story in particularized form. We exist in relation to ourselves, to others, to myths, to images, or to archetypes. Their expression is the essence of our being. [Note: References are at end of Part II] ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research Published by QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com