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Is Consciousness Bound by Quantum Physics? We're Getting Closer to Finding Out

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
jbotz 5y ago
Pre-print for the paywalled Nature article she links to here: https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.13385 https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.13385
Nevermark 5y ago
Functional, behavioral definitions of consciousness tend to be straightforward, and notably don't obviously have any connection with quantum physics: You conclude that an entity is conscious because it demonstrates a rich understanding of itself, enough to communicate meta thoughts about itself and its own self-awareness. From functional definitions like that, it would seem that a theory of consciousness (that could result in designing systems with consciousness) would be about designing systems with a rich interactive understanding of themselves and their environment. I.e. senses, motor control, decision making ability, theory making ability (i.e. the "understanding") and memory of the external and internal operations of all that (i.e. "self-awareness"), and ability to communicate about all that. -- The other side of consciousness, the experiential side, presents greater difficulty in analysis. Nobody but you truly knows how you experience your awareness of self. Nobody but you knows what red "looks" like to you in your mind. I think this is an important topic, but a lot of the mystery comes from the fact that we currently can't actually experiment on our experiences with any subtlety. We have roughly 100 billion neurons in our brain. If that were 100 billion neurons in computer hardware we could easily selectively deactivate all kinds of pathways, or cohorts of neurons, reducing a brain to its simplest form while retaining consciousness. We could integrate in all kinds of monitoring logs at any point. And if we were self-aware computers ourselves, we could integrate directly between our own minds and that of our experiments in various ways. In other words, we would have tools to scientifically explore conscious systems directly. Instead we have only the grossest of options: drugging our 100 billion neurons, etc. -- The difficulty in experimentation maintains a high wall of mystery around consciousness for all practical purposes. For some reason, humans seem to like conjecturing that different mysteries are causally linked, simply because they are both mysteries. I.e. the mystery of consciousness, the mysteries (real or perceived) of quantum mechanics, the mystery of where the universe came from, mysteries of interpreting dreams, perceived mysteries of living things, etc. But I don't think quantum mechanics is linked to any general understanding of consciousness. In particular, I predict that the consciousness of any artificial minds we produce in the future won't be hampered by being digital, i.e. internally classical, in function.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Pre-print for the paywalled Nature article she links to here: https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.13385 https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.13385

Nevermark 5y ago

Functional, behavioral definitions of consciousness tend to be straightforward, and notably don't obviously have any connection with quantum physics: You conclude that an entity is conscious because it demonstrates a rich understanding of itself, enough to communicate meta thoughts about itself and its own self-awareness. From functional definitions like that, it would seem that a theory of consciousness (that could result in designing systems with consciousness) would be about designing systems with a rich interactive understanding of themselves and their environment. I.e. senses, motor control, decision making ability, theory making ability (i.e. the "understanding") and memory of the external and internal operations of all that (i.e. "self-awareness"), and ability to communicate about all that. -- The other side of consciousness, the experiential side, presents greater difficulty in analysis. Nobody but you truly knows how you experience your awareness of self. Nobody but you knows what red "looks" like to you in your mind. I think this is an important topic, but a lot of the mystery comes from the fact that we currently can't actually experiment on our experiences with any subtlety. We have roughly 100 billion neurons in our brain. If that were 100 billion neurons in computer hardware we could easily selectively deactivate all kinds of pathways, or cohorts of neurons, reducing a brain to its simplest form while retaining consciousness. We could integrate in all kinds of monitoring logs at any point. And if we were self-aware computers ourselves, we could integrate directly between our own minds and that of our experiments in various ways. In other words, we would have tools to scientifically explore conscious systems directly. Instead we have only the grossest of options: drugging our 100 billion neurons, etc. -- The difficulty in experimentation maintains a high wall of mystery around consciousness for all practical purposes. For some reason, humans seem to like conjecturing that different mysteries are causally linked, simply because they are both mysteries. I.e. the mystery of consciousness, the mysteries (real or perceived) of quantum mechanics, the mystery of where the universe came from, mysteries of interpreting dreams, perceived mysteries of living things, etc. But I don't think quantum mechanics is linked to any general understanding of consciousness. In particular, I predict that the consciousness of any artificial minds we produce in the future won't be hampered by being digital, i.e. internally classical, in function.