Own Consciousness Can Interact with the Universe, Scientists Believe | Hacker News Reader

Own Consciousness Can Interact with the Universe, Scientists Believe

popularmechanics.com

38 pointsSirLJ29 comments

Highly relevant webcomic: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3

(Particularly the last three panels.)

Consciousness being quantum would at least explain qualia. It would be easy to say feeling is simply a new quantum field unbeknownst to us instead of an (as of yet unexplained) emergent property of the currently known fields and their fluctuations.

We haven't come to an agreement on the meaning or interpretation of quantum effects, so I'm not sure it would explain much at this stage of physics.

And many doubts about qualia. A mystery if you insist, but to someone like Dennett it is not a conundrum worth anymore than the concept of ether is in modern physics.

I don't buy it. Quantum fields aren't magical, they follow rules the same as EM fields and chemical interactions. If N physical domains aren't sufficient to explain qualia, how will N+1 change things?

Make the science complicated enough that it could be confused for another complicated thing that we don’t fully understand.

If the new field is the one that creates feeling than it would indeed be a better explanation. To prove this, you would have to create a physical process that could excite the 'feeling field', use that process to create a region of non zero charge in the feeling field and then determine if humans placed in this area of elevated feeling charge felt different. If they did, then that's proof of some kind of feeling charge.

As for the 'why would n+1 explain it'.. it's the same reason we invented the strong force... To explain things that cannot be explained. Qualia is inexplicable, thus it would seem to be a straightforwards application of the same principle

We can already induce various feelings and qualia through the use of chemicals (drugs) and EM fields (tDCS). There's no evidence or proof that these physical domains are insufficient to explain qualia. Likewise, demonstrating that feelings and qualia can be induced via quantum interactions doesn't reveal anything deeper about their nature than does the fact that we can induce happiness or hallucinations with drugs.

> There's no evidence or proof that these physical domains are insufficient to explain qualia

Law of excluded middle does not apply in general, only in certain systems. The real world is not one of them. There is also no evidence that physical domains are sufficient to explain qualia. To do that you would have to show that you can make an inanimate / non-living object feel something. Qualia has a very different sensation than simple observation. Do you claim, for example, that a Camera feels red? How? Why? This is a very valid question, for which we have no physical explanation.

How would that explain that?

It would make feeling an intrinsic property of the universe rather than an emergent phenomenon.

The problem with these stories is they end up with Gwyneth Paltrow and other wellness grifters selling a magic quantum consciousness powder.

I want this to be true way too much for it to really be true.

Why?

I reckon that if consciousness is a quantum process happening at room temperature, it can probably be replicated in other systems at room temperature.

The popular science that has been coming out about the origins of consciousness has been really interesting to follow. Quantum nanotubules seems a dark horse in the lineup against the frontrunners, Integrated Information Theory and Global Workspace Theory.

When I was in high school, I was always very interested in the history of science and how scientific advances played out over time, quite dramatically. In my lifetime, I've had the pleasure to watch quite a few of them play out in such a fashion. There seem to be multiple big ones looming large on the horizon these days, the origins of consciousness among them. I suppose I'm rooting for Penrose, because he has a lot riding on this and he seems like a genuinely brilliant person. Maybe I'm a romantic?

Thanks for asking.

Everything everyone does interacts with the universe…

Certainly what you think about alters what you will then do in the future so even thought is not isolated from reality.

Those microtubules don't necessarily contain consciousness. They may as well be antennas that connect consciousness with the brain.

Why are these scientists so desperate for a Magical Quantum Solution to consciousness? Shouldn't they first disprove the much more likely hypothesis that consciousness is an emergent property of the (macro level) structure and operation of the brain?

People realized long ago you can't wave around the word 'emergent' to solve this problem.

Emergent can be the first step; something emerges. Then you have to explain why/how. Emergent alone is never enough but it’s the first step. Consciousness is emergent until we explain how it comes to be and then it’s just an understood process.

Oh really? Who, and when - and with what proof?

I'm just referencing the existing debates on the topic. It doesn't appear we are at a stage to prove or disprove subjective experience.

One hint we will know our understanding is solved is when others can enter the plane of our mind and add or subject imaginative objects.

Scientists are people too. These efforts have always struck me as a desperate attempt to cling to conventionally intuitive views of what humanity and sapience actually means, in the face of physical laws which don't seem to treat "personhood" as anything special (aside from the "observer-interaction" of quantum physics, which some claim involves impact on the universe being observed rather than just what parts of reality the sensor/observer can perceive).

EDIT: Though to be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if neurons just so happen to use quantum decoherence in their computations. I just don't think it has any relevance to the macro-level phenomenon we call "consciousness".

Because we're on the brink of creating machines whose observable behavior is indistinguishable from consciousness, and whose macro structure mirrors that of our own brains, yet it is tantalizingly tempting for many to cling to the belief that humans are in some way special.

(My bet: within 5 years someone has glued together the in-retrospect obvious macro components of what we call "consciousness" into a technological golem which causes a mass crisis of faith in those who haven't made peace with the idea that consciousness is neither magical nor unique to humans. Personally I believe it's likely someone already has.)

Have you considered it's more likely that mere subjective macro-level observations are becoming obsolete?

I think you're giving way too much credit to LLMs.

He didn't say anything about LLMs, I too think someone will do a real thinking machine, but more like in 10 years. LLMs maybe will be a part of such creation, but only a part.

Sibling is correct. LLMs are missing most of the macro structure that known existing consciousnesses have (memory, emotion, desire, self-observation of internal and external processes, etc.) They do however provide an important stepping stone towards creation of an artificial consciousness and recognition thereof, as a mechanism by which an artificial consciousness can integrate qualia into action, and as a bonus, communicate in a language which us humans understand.

The intelligent design crowd knows it needs more than Ark Encounter to sell religion by using science against itself to "find" the ghost in the machine.

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