scholarly journals Why Quantum Correlates of Consciousness Are Fine, But Not Enough

1969 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rüdiger Vaas
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Quantum Physics ◽  
Measurement Problem ◽  
Conscious Experience ◽  
Neural Correlates ◽  
Explanatory Gap ◽  
Naturalistic Theory ◽  
Quantum Phenomena ◽  
The Mind

The existence of quantum correlates of consciousness (QCC) is doubtful from a scientific perspective. But even if their existence were verified, philosophical problems would remain. On the other hand, there could be more to QCC than meets the sceptic's eye: • QCC might be useful or even necessary for a better understanding of conscious experience or quantum physics or both. The main reasons for this are: the measurement problem (the nature of observation, the mysterious collapse of the wave function, etc.), ostensibly shared features of quantum phenomena and conscious phenomena (e.g., complementarity, nonspatiality, acausality, spontaneity, and holism) and connections (ontology, causation, and knowledge), the qualia problem (subjectivity, explanatory gap etc.). But there are many problems, especially questions regarding realism and the nature and role of conscious observers; • QCC are conceptually challenging, because there are definitory problems and some crucial ontological and epistemological shortcomings. It is instructive to compare them with recent proposals for understanding neural correlates of consciousness (NCC). QCC are not sufficient for a quantum theory of mind, nor might they be necessary except perhaps in a very broad sense; • QCC are also empirically challenging. Nevertheless, QCC could be relevant and important for the mindbody problem: QCC might reveal features that are necessary at least for behavioral manifestations of human consciousness. But QCC are compatible with very different proposals for a solution of the mind-body problem. This seems to be both advantageous and detrimental. QCC restrict accounts of nomological identity. The discovery of QCC cannot establish a naturalistic theory of mind alone. But there are also problems with QCC in the framework of other ontologies.

PROCESSES OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND DREAMING IN THE MIND

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 477-491
Author(s):  
Mark Germine
Keyword(s):  
Conscious Experience ◽  
Classical Equation ◽  
Irreversible Processes ◽  
Brain State ◽  
Subjective Time ◽  
Quantum Processes ◽  
Repeated Observation ◽  
The Mind ◽  
State Experience

The Mind is described in terms of our individual and collective experiences. The role of observation by Mind is supported by empirical data that quantum states can be created and changed by the process of repeated observation, and is described by a classical equation, which defines the genesis of information from reduction of uncertainty. This uncertainty is then generalized to the uncertainty of quantum processes. The state of consciousness is always “now,” with a unitary movement forward of Mind in time. This movement involves irreversible processes, which produce mixture of states, such that choices of states are enabled to occur. Such processes appear nowhere in physics, but rather reflect the role of the observer. Within the duration of the mental state, experience arises by repeated observation of the mind/brain state. The processes of conscious experience involve movement from the uncertain unconscious to the certain consciousness, the outgoing process, and vice-versa in dreaming, the inward-going process. Psychopathology is the result of an imbalance and/or dysfunction of one or both processes. In dreaming, in the absence of consciousness, subjective time moves equitably forward and backward in time. This kind of temporal movement is discussed in relation to the Dreamtime of the Australian Aborigines.

scholarly journals Evidence for an Active Role of Inferior Frontal Cortex in Conscious Experience

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Veith Weilnhammer ◽  
Merve Fritsch ◽  
Meera Chikermane ◽  
Anna-Lena Eckert ◽  
Katharina Kanthak ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Prefrontal Cortex ◽  
Frontal Cortex ◽  
Conscious Experience ◽  
Sensory Information ◽  
Active Role ◽  
Neural Correlates ◽  
Functional Magnetic Resonance ◽  
Bistable Perception ◽  
Inferior Frontal Cortex

2AbstractIn the search for the neural correlates of consciousness, it has remained controversial whether prefrontal cortex determines what is consciously experienced or, alternatively, serves only complementary functions such as introspection or action.Here, we provide converging evidence from computational modeling and two functional magnetic resonance imaging experiments for a key role of inferior frontal cortex in detecting perceptual conflicts that emerge from ambiguous sensory information. Crucially, the detection of perceptual conflicts by prefrontal cortex turned out to be critical in the process of transforming ambiguous sensory information into unambiguous conscious experiences: In a third experiment, disruption of neural activity in inferior frontal cortex through transcranial magnetic stimulation slowed down the updating of conscious experience that occurs in response to perceptual conflicts.These findings show that inferior frontal cortex actively contributes to the resolution of perceptual ambiguities. Prefrontal cortex is thus causally involved in determining the contents of conscious experience.3One-sentence SummaryInferior frontal cortex detects and resolves perceptual conflict during bistable perception.

Philosophy of Physics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anouk Barberousse
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Mechanics ◽  
Computer Simulations ◽  
Quantum Physics ◽  
Special Science ◽  
Philosophy Of Physics ◽  
Emerging Issues ◽  
Scientific Terms ◽  
Quantum Phenomena ◽  
Main Thread

Philosophical reflections on physics and its theories have been shaping the agenda of general philosophy of science, including issues such as the nature of scientific theories, the meaning of scientific terms, and scientific modeling. But physics is also well worth being considered a special science of its own, whose methods and tools raised specific questions for philosophers of science: this is the approach followed in this chapter, which has as its main thread the role of mathematics in physical theories. It tackles classical issues concerning measurement and determinism and long-standing controversies in the philosophy of statistical mechanics (how may the reversible laws of mechanics account for the irreversible principles of thermodynamics?) and in the philosophy of quantum physics (does quantum mechanics provide us a with a complete description of quantum phenomena?). It also addresses emerging issues in the field, such as computer simulations and their role between theory and observation.

Experience and Reason in Perception

1998 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
pp. 203-227
Author(s):  
Bill Brewer
Keyword(s):  
Conscious Experience ◽  
The World ◽  
Correct Account ◽  
Basic Source ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Do So ◽  
The Way

The question I am interested in is this. What exactly is the role of conscious experience in the acquisition of knowledge on the basis of perception? The problem here, as I see it, is to solve simultaneously for the nature of this experience, and its role in acquiring and sustaining the relevant beliefs, in such a way as to vindicate what I regard as an undeniable datum, that perception is a basic source of knowledge about the mind-independent world, in a sense of ‘basic’ which is also to be elucidated. I shall sketch the way in which I think that this should be done. In section I, I argue that perceptual experiences must provide reasons for empirical beliefs. In section II, I explain how they do so. My thesis is that a correct account of the sense in which perceptual experiences are experiences of mind-independent things is itself an account of the way in which they provide peculiarly basic reasons for beliefs about the world around the perceiver.

Mind and Psychology in Descartes

2019 ◽  
pp. 105-123
Author(s):  
Gary Hatfield
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Sensory Perception ◽  
Active Role ◽  
The Body ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Functional Aspects ◽  
Natural Geometry ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Brain

This chapter reviews the basic tenets of Descartes’s mind–body dualism and its context, including the epistemological role of mind in its capacity as a pure intellect and as part of a being with sensory perception. Then, putting aside the metaphysics of dualism, it focuses on the functional aspects of mind and its relation to body, and on the role of the bodily machine in Descartes’s psychology. Within this large territory, it examines mind and psychology as categories applicable to Descartes’s writings before turning to the active role of the brain in Descartes’s theory of mind and machine psychology, including his “natural geometry”, his theory of the passions, and the machine psychology of mindless non-human animals—and of human beings, when the body acts without direction from the mind.

scholarly journals The illusion of matter, energy, environmental issues

2021 ◽  
pp. 15-30
Author(s):  
Sergei Petrovich Myakinnikov
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Physics ◽  
Environmental Issues ◽  
Physical World ◽  
Multiple Quantum ◽  
Quantum Field ◽  
Foreign Matter ◽  
Planetary Model ◽  
The World ◽  
Quantum Phenomena

  The subject of this research is the establishment of correlation between the illusion of the world of matter and environmental issues. The object of this research is the concepts of “illusion”, “matter”, and “energy”. The author traces the evolution of representations of the illusion of the world and its perception. The author dwells on the philosophical aspects of quantum physics, questioning the postulates of materialism on the primacy of matter, and acknowledgement of its esthesis by human as the criterion of the only true being. Special attention is given to the role of consciousness in the illusory distortion of matter and quantum field reality, which is substantiated by the complexity of comprehension of multiple quantum phenomena. The author underlines the need for studying the correlation between environmental issues and the processes in quantum field reality. The main conclusion consists in explication of the fact that the material world is perceived delusively by imperfect human sensory receptors, and its very being is somewhat an illusion. For denoting a single substance, the author employs the term “foreign matter”, which implies the imperceptible reality of energy waves of different frequency. A hypothesis of the continual-energy model of atom, which complements the Rutherford discrete-corpuscular planetary model of atom is advanced. The author’s special contribution lies in the statement that the actual causes of many environmental issues should be sought for not in the world of matter, but in the foreign matter of quantum field reality. The novelty consists in the proposal to develop the consciousness of anthropocentrism, naturecentrism, and theocentrism, which prompt the reduction to part (merism), to the whole (holism) or uniform (henotheism) respectively; and the consciousness of post-holism, where the uniform (i.e. energy) is within the whole and each part of the physical world, considering its unique characteristics. It is noted that the worldview of ecocentrism, and ecological version of post-holism form the true environmental picture of the world.  

Relational and affective neuroscience: a quiet revolution in psychiatric and psychotherapeutic practice

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 356-366
Author(s):  
C. Susan Mizen ◽  
John Hook
Keyword(s):  
Neural Correlates ◽  
Affective Neuroscience ◽  
Quiet Revolution ◽  
Self And Other ◽  
Psychotherapeutic Practice ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Predictive Processes ◽  
The Brain

SUMMARYWe consider some advances in relational and affective neuroscience and related disciplines that attempt to resolve some fundamental aspects of the mind–brain problem. We consider the key role of affect in generating consciousness and in meeting our essential survival needs; the neural correlates of relating; how self and other are represented in the brain and awareness of self and other is generated through interoceptive predictive processes. We describe some leading models of the generation and purpose of consciousness, linking theories of affective and cognitive consciousness. We discuss psychiatric and psychotherapeutic innovations arising from this research, new integrated biopsychosocial interventions and the obstacles to be overcome in applying these models in practice.

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