My take on why indeed the study of consciousness may not be as simple

[westprog]

What is the simplest piece of consciousness a brain could have that we could simulate?

~~ Paul

We don't know whether it makes sense to talk about a "piece of consciousness". Consciousness may not be a divisible thing.

 

[westprog]

I'm saying that, in my opinion, it's in the same class of things that, if simulated, is also actualized.

The which class includes?

 

[Dancing David]

Hmm. If everyone else ignores him, I'll have to unignore him just to correct his errors.

Please, no.

It keeps me sane, many posters at different times. Just for a short period. that way I don't get all stupid and get suspended again.

 

[Dancing David]

Thanks for your response.


This is a public forum, not an academic one, so let's fill in the blanks, shall we?

Yeah sure, too bad that you fill it in without citations at all.

Imagine atoms in a bowl, with greatly magnified energy.
What Einstein's equations predicted was that at normal temperatures those atoms would be at many different levels.
However, at very low temperatures, a large number of the atoms would suddenly crash down to the very lowest energy level. The atoms piling up in the bottom of the 'bowl' is what is called a Bose-Einstein condensation (Bose was a brilliant Indian scientist who was studying what we now call photons, and asked Einstein to take a look at his ideas). No one quite realized how weird a material would be with all the atoms in one level like this. It means that all the atoms are absolutely identical. There is no possible measurement that can tell them apart.

In Bose-Einstein condensates, the quantum properties allow both a " fluid " order and a high degree of unity. Each particle in a Bose-Einstein condensate fills all the space and all the time in whatever container that holds the condensate. Many of their characteristics are correlated. They behave holistically as one. The condensate acts as one single particle. There is no " noise " or interference between separate parts. This is why super fluids and superconductors have their special frictionless qualities and laser becomes so coherent. Superconductors, super fluids and lasers are Bose-Einstein condensates. The photons of a laser beam overlap their boundaries and behave as one single photon, and the whole system can be described by a single equation. Okay, so here is where we make the jump to the brain.
Quantum coherence at body temperature in body cells was found by Herbert Frolich.

Sure, throw us a bone here, it is better if you cite teh sources because otherwise I may choose something less than complimentary.

One of the great pioneers in superstate physics, he described a model of a system of coupled molecular oscillators in a heat bath, supplied with energy at a constant rate. When this rate exceeds a certain threshold then a condensation of the whole system of oscillators takes place into one giant dipole mode, similar to Bose-Einstein condensation. A coherent, nonlocal order emerges.
Prior to that quantum physicist Fritz Popp discovered that biological tissue emits a weak glow when stimulated at the right energy levels .
Cell walls of biological tissue contain countless proteins and fat molecules which are electrical dipoles. When a cell is at rest these dipoles are out of phase and arrange themselves in a haphazard way. But when they are stimulated they begin to oscillate or jiggle intensely and broadcast a tiny microwave signal.

And how do you stimulate them, huh?

You need to cite your sources.

Frolich found that when the energy flowing through the cell reaches a certain critical level, all the cell wall molecular dipoles line up and come into phase. They oscillate in unison as though they are suddenly coordinated. This emergent quantum field mimics a Bose-Einstein condensate and has holistic properties common to any quantum field.

It has been suggested that these ion channel oscillations in neurons are quantum phenomena which generate a Frolich like coherent electric field.

By what, who when and how.

I can sugesst that angels exist as well. You need to use citations of material.

There are ion channels ( protein molecules ) lining the membrane walls of individual neurons, which open or close in response to electrical fluctuations resulting from stimulation. They act like gates to let Sodium , Potassium and other ions through.
They are of a size to be subject to quantum fluctuations and superposition.

Uh, huh. Sure they are, says who where, and how.

They are NOT subject to QM fluctuations because they are large protein structures, where did you get this information?

Each channel as it oscillates generates a tiny electric field. When a large number of ion channels open and close in unison, as they do when stimulated, the whole neuron fires or oscillates and a large scale electric field is generated across the neuron.

Nope, that is not what depolarization of teh cell membrane is at all, what is your source of this data.

It is easier if you give citations.

Certain neurons act as pacemakers. When a pacemaker neuron oscillates in response to a stimulation, whole bundles of neurons oscillate with it.
Neurobiologists have found that when a person sees an object all neurons in the cerebral cortex associated with the perceived object oscillate in unison regardless of their location in the brain.

I doubt it, you misinterpreted what is going on, try citing teh paper.

It has been suggested that the original ion channel oscillations are quantum phenomena which, as in the Frolich system above, generate a coherent quantum electric field.

And I suggest you cite stuff.

It is essentially a Bose-Einstein condensate.

Wow, that is so off it is not even wrong.

Existence of such large scale coherent electrical fields across the brain may explain how a large number of disparate and distant neurons can integrate their information to produce a holistic picture. The proof fairly recently that nonlocal ( instantaneous or faster than light ) quantum correlations exists between particles apparently separated in space and time has helped researchers to understand these effects.

Where, what , when and how?

The distinguishing and interesting feature of a Bose-Einstein condensate is that many parts which go to make up the ordered system not only behave as a whole , but they become whole.

Using sugegstions from 1968 is not a good way to make a case, first hit on Google for 'Herbert Frohlich quantum coherence at body temperatures' gives this

http://www.physorg.com/news155904395.html

The researchers showed that extremely high energies and temperatures are required to form coherent Fröhlich condensates and hence they cannot exist in biological systems, as proposed by the Orch OR theory. Still, Fröhlich condensates could exist outside a biological environment, such as in terahertz radiation, which could have medical applications, and in microwave reactors used in “green” chemistry applications.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

If you are using "more powerful" in the very limited and specific realm of algorithmic computation then it's reasonable to say that the brain is no more powerful than a Turing machine, to which one might add "so what?" and "duh". If you mean that a brain can do things that a Turing machine cannot, that is trivially true already.

Okay, I'll bite. What does it mean for something to be Turing machine equivalent but able to do more than a Turing machine?

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

We don't know whether it makes sense to talk about a "piece of consciousness". Consciousness may not be a divisible thing.

I didn't mean piece literally. What is the simplest conscious thing that people do? Put another way, what is the evolutionarily oldest conscious brain function?

If you can't break it down, I daresay you can't define it. And if you can't define it, what are we arguing about?

~~ Paul

 

[AkuManiMani]

You need to cite your sources.

If SnidelyW cited sources you considered authoritative, would you accept the claims he made as being valid?

 

[AkuManiMani]

I actually gave the single distinguishing characteristic of consciousness: subjective experience. Like I mentioned in many previous posts, our entire physiology computes information but the only time consciousness [again, the active capacity for subjective experience] is produced is when the brain is in a particular range of physiological states. This indicates that consciousness is a physical effect distinct from merely processing information.

I don't see why.

~~ Paul

M'kay. What reason makes you suspect that conscious experience is a computational function carried out by the brain rather than a physical effect of brain activity?

 

[AkuManiMani]

I didn't mean piece literally. What is the simplest conscious thing that people do? Put another way, what is the evolutionarily oldest conscious brain function?

If you can't break it down, I daresay you can't define it. And if you can't define it, what are we arguing about?

~~ Paul

I think its more appropriate to speak of consciousness in terms of a state people -experience-, rather than something that people -do-. With that said, I think its an appropriate question to ask what the most most basic element of consciousness is.

Anyway, the simplest conscious thing that "people do" is to experience sense-data or feelings as having distinctive qualities. All other cognitive processes are variations and elaborations of this basic capacity.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

M'kay. What reason makes you suspect that conscious experience is a computational function carried out by the brain rather than a physical effect of brain activity?

For starters, I don't know what you mean by a physical effect. Do you mean like generating heat? If so, then there is a whole new physics going on here, or some sort of dualistic process.

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I think its more appropriate to speak of consciousness in terms of a state people -experience-, rather than something that people -do-. With that said, I think its an appropriate question to ask what the most most basic element of consciousness is.

People experience it in some sort of epiphenomenal way? If it isn't epiphenomenal, then it has to be some sort of specific brain process, in which case it is something that people do.

If there is a basic element of consciousness, then we do have some physics to discover.

Anyway, the simplest conscious thing that "people do" is to experience sense-data or feelings as having distinctive qualities. All other cognitive processes are variations and elaborations of this basic capacity.

Then we have the old indivisible quale-unit. I very much doubt that's the lowest-level thing involved in consciousness. But let's say it is. What's the simplest quale involved in the experience of redness?

~~ Paul

 

[AkuManiMani]

M'kay. What reason makes you suspect that conscious experience is a computational function carried out by the brain rather than a physical effect of brain activity?

For starters, I don't know what you mean by a physical effect. Do you mean like generating heat?

Thats about the gist. By physical effect I mean something along the lines of producing heat, generating current, gravitation pull, etc.

If so, then there is a whole new physics going on here, or some sort of dualistic process.

~~ Paul

It could very well be an unknown feature of a known physical process. I don't think this necessarily implies dualism but yea, it could very well be a feature of some currently unknown physics. If it is then that just mean that there's a lot of interesting new science to be done

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Thats about the gist. By physical effect I mean something along the lines of producing heat, generating current, gravitation pull, etc.

And is this heat-production-like consciousness epiphenomenal?

It could very well be an unknown feature of a known physical process. I don't think this necessarily implies dualism but yea, it could very well be a feature of some currently unknown physics. If it is then that just mean that there's a lot of interesting new science to be done.

Not to mention discovered in the first place. Lots of peering at neurons doesn't seem to have done the trick so far.

So what are the attributes of this physical effect that makes us conscious? Why does this make you feel any more enlightened than thinking of conscious as a conventional brain function?

~~ Paul

 

[AkuManiMani]

People experience it in some sort of epiphenomenal way? If it isn't epiphenomenal, then it has to be some sort of specific brain process, in which case it is something that people do.

If there is a basic element of consciousness, then we do have some physics to discover.

I don't think consciousness is epiphenomenal since our mental states and dispositions have physical consequences.

Then we have the old indivisible quale-unit. I very much doubt that's the lowest-level thing involved in consciousness. But let's say it is. What's the simplest quale involved in the experience of redness?

~~ Paul

Hmm..I suppose that's like asking whats the simplest unit of light. The best answer we have right now is a quanta we call the photon; if its broken down any further it's no longer light. It seems to me that qualia are comparable to quanta in that they are elementary.

 

[Belz...]

Please don't offer up straight lines like that.

I'm being serious.

 

[Belz...]

The which class includes?

Intelligence. I said so explicitly.

 

[PixyMisa]

Thats pretty much the gist of the debate right now. I've already presented all the arguments that I deem sufficient to establish that conscious experience is a physical effect produced by the brain as opposed to simply being a computational function. Its up to you whether you consider them convincing or not.

(a) No, and more importantly (b) even if we did, it wouldn't change things one iota, you can still produce real consciousness on a simulated brain.

 

[AkuManiMani]

(a) No, and more importantly (b) even if we did, it wouldn't change things one iota, you can still produce real consciousness on a simulated brain.

I notice you've been responding to posts I've made that haven't been quote bubbled, Pixy. Care to deal with points I've directly addressed to you or are you going to continue to hide behind the "Ignore" button?

 

[westprog]

Uh-huh. But so do humans. One could argue that we are tools, too. Intelligence is infered from behaviour.



Of course you do, since this is a circular definition for you.

There's no shortage of those.

 

[westprog]

Okay, I'll bite. What does it mean for something to be Turing machine equivalent but able to do more than a Turing machine?

~~ Paul

Any implementation of a Turing machine can do more than a Turing machine, since it exists in the real world. The only thing a Turing machine can do is make marks on tape. Even a digital watch does more than that.