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My personal theory of what consciousness is that it is a feedback loop. I have major issues explaining why i think that but somehow it fits my model. When thi

My personal theory of what consciousness is that it is a feedback loop. I have major issues explaining why i think that but somehow it fits my model. When thinking of consciousness as a feedback loop, stuff sort of makes sense. I have been unable to poke holes in the theory but also unable to add strength to it.

0x100000 10y ago
You might be interested in reading Douglas Hofstadter's book I Am A Strange Loop.
- ccvannorman 10y ago
  Godel Escher Bach also touches on this as well as the relationship between the impossibility of absolute formal logic reductionism v holism, and consciousness.
- callesgg 10y ago
  Ordered a copy, thank you.
  - carapace 10y ago
    FWIW, this book gave me the idea that consciousness could be some sort of feedback loop involving the whole Universe (including you and me and everybody else) possibly via quantum entanglement. I know that's terribly hand-wavey and soupy, sorry about that, just felt I should mention it. Related: meditation (at least some kinds) seems to operate by turning the subjective awareness back onto itself, becoming aware of becoming aware of... etc... A little like a camera hooked up to a monitor that it's pointed at, you get an infinite regression. In the camera-monitor system there is a physical loop of information from the lens-to-screen-to-lens-to... When you do it with you awareness, there must be something looping somewhere, regardless of the physicality or otherwise of consciousness, eh?
    - roywiggins 10y ago
      I'm not sure you need entanglement. Embedded/embodied cognition runs with the argument that a brain isn't intelligent without a universe, and brains-in-vats models are missing something fundamental, which is all the useful stuff we offload to the body and world around us.
    - wyager 10y ago
      > FWIW, this book gave me the idea that consciousness could be some sort of feedback loop involving the whole Universe (including you and me and everybody else) possibly via quantum entanglement Then this book sounds like it's not worth reading. There is absolutely no need to invoke pseudo-quantum mumbo-jumbo to investigate consciousness. We don't understand the chemical operation of neurons well enough to say whether quantum effects are necessary for neural functioning (although they probably aren't). Most "quantum-looking" (i.e. obviously non-classical) processes happen at much smaller space and energy scales than the chemical processes we know are involved in cognition. Quantum entanglement almost certainly isn't involved because it can't be used to transmit information and it requires high degrees of precision to make use of in the first place. The brain's thermal noise floor is vastly larger than the scale of most "interesting" quantum effects.
      - carapace 10y ago
        Don't pan G.E.B. due to my wild-eyed speculation. I'm the one saying "quantum!" and waving my hands here, not Hofstadter. ;-)
kowdermeister 10y ago
I have come to the same conclusion, but I have some ideas how to back it up. My only concern with packaging it up as a theory is that probably few would take me seriously because I don't have any neuroscience and psychology background.
RivieraKid 10y ago
Feedback loop is a very abstract concept and I honestly do not see any connection to consciousness.
- oscilloscope 10y ago
  Feedback loops aren't that abstract. There are many examples in the physical world, especially in the brain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feedback#Applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feedback#Applications
  - RivieraKid 10y ago
    Yes, I know that there are many examples, including the brain, it's a very general concept. What's the connection to consciousness though?
- callesgg 10y ago
  If thoughts that you have can go back in the beginning of the thought cycle, you remember that you have had them you don't actually need to be "conscious" to think you are "conscious". Well technically you will be conscious, but the meaning/description of conscious in your head wont fit what it actually is.

0x100000 10y ago

You might be interested in reading Douglas Hofstadter's book I Am A Strange Loop.

ccvannorman 10y ago
Godel Escher Bach also touches on this as well as the relationship between the impossibility of absolute formal logic reductionism v holism, and consciousness.
callesgg 10y ago
Ordered a copy, thank you.
- carapace 10y ago
  FWIW, this book gave me the idea that consciousness could be some sort of feedback loop involving the whole Universe (including you and me and everybody else) possibly via quantum entanglement. I know that's terribly hand-wavey and soupy, sorry about that, just felt I should mention it. Related: meditation (at least some kinds) seems to operate by turning the subjective awareness back onto itself, becoming aware of becoming aware of... etc... A little like a camera hooked up to a monitor that it's pointed at, you get an infinite regression. In the camera-monitor system there is a physical loop of information from the lens-to-screen-to-lens-to... When you do it with you awareness, there must be something looping somewhere, regardless of the physicality or otherwise of consciousness, eh?
  - roywiggins 10y ago
    I'm not sure you need entanglement. Embedded/embodied cognition runs with the argument that a brain isn't intelligent without a universe, and brains-in-vats models are missing something fundamental, which is all the useful stuff we offload to the body and world around us.
  - wyager 10y ago
    > FWIW, this book gave me the idea that consciousness could be some sort of feedback loop involving the whole Universe (including you and me and everybody else) possibly via quantum entanglement Then this book sounds like it's not worth reading. There is absolutely no need to invoke pseudo-quantum mumbo-jumbo to investigate consciousness. We don't understand the chemical operation of neurons well enough to say whether quantum effects are necessary for neural functioning (although they probably aren't). Most "quantum-looking" (i.e. obviously non-classical) processes happen at much smaller space and energy scales than the chemical processes we know are involved in cognition. Quantum entanglement almost certainly isn't involved because it can't be used to transmit information and it requires high degrees of precision to make use of in the first place. The brain's thermal noise floor is vastly larger than the scale of most "interesting" quantum effects.
    - carapace 10y ago
      Don't pan G.E.B. due to my wild-eyed speculation. I'm the one saying "quantum!" and waving my hands here, not Hofstadter. ;-)

kowdermeister 10y ago

I have come to the same conclusion, but I have some ideas how to back it up. My only concern with packaging it up as a theory is that probably few would take me seriously because I don't have any neuroscience and psychology background.

RivieraKid 10y ago

Feedback loop is a very abstract concept and I honestly do not see any connection to consciousness.

oscilloscope 10y ago
Feedback loops aren't that abstract. There are many examples in the physical world, especially in the brain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feedback#Applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feedback#Applications
- RivieraKid 10y ago
  Yes, I know that there are many examples, including the brain, it's a very general concept. What's the connection to consciousness though?
callesgg 10y ago
If thoughts that you have can go back in the beginning of the thought cycle, you remember that you have had them you don't actually need to be "conscious" to think you are "conscious". Well technically you will be conscious, but the meaning/description of conscious in your head wont fit what it actually is.