What exactlyis consciousness and how it is generated? How and why it exists and what’s theultimate cause of consciousness?
These are some major question that scientistsare looking for their answers. In today’s world the mystery of consciousness isa challenge for physicists, cognitive scientists, and neuro-scientists.
There arefew theories that try to explain the consciousness. One of the most acceptedtheory is materialism. This theory says that consciousness is generated by matter i.e. by the firing of neurons inside the brain.
The secondtheory is mind-body duality. This is probably more often known as religion orspirituality. Here, consciousness is distinct from matter. It is a part ofalternative characteristic of the individual, which in religious expression wemight call the soul. Then there’s a third option which is gaining ground insome scientific society, Panpsychism. According to this theory, the entireuniverse is occupied by consciousness. Panpsychism is currently a matter ofgreat debate among physicists, neuroscientists and other researchers.
One mustcome to the understanding at some point during this debate that everything weexperience is strained through and interpreted by our mind. Without it, thecosmos doesn’t exist at all or at least, not without some type of consciousnesswitnessing it. In some physics circles, the dominant theory is some kind ofproto-consciousness field.
So let’s getscientific here and move towards quantum mechanics. In quantum mechanics,particles don’t have a certain shape or precise location, until they areobserved or measured. Is this a system of proto-consciousness at play?
According tothe late physicist and philosopher, John Archibald Wheeler, it might. He’swell-known for inventing the term, “black hole.” In his opinion,every part of matter comprises a bit of consciousness, which it rivets fromthis proto-consciousness field.
He calledhis theory the “participatory anthropic principle,” which posits1 that a humanobserver is key to the process.
Of this Wheeler said:
Of this Wheeler said:
“We areparticipators in bringing into being not only the near and here but the faraway and long ago.”
In his view,much like the Buddhist one, nothing exists unless there is a consciousness toapprehend it. Neuroscientist Christof Koch of the Allen Insтιтute for BrainScience, is another supporter of panpsychism. Koch says that the only theory wehave to date about consciousness is, it’s a level of awareness about one’s selfand the world. Biological organisms are conscious because when they approach anew situation, they can change their behavior in order to navigate it, in thisview. Dr. Koch is attempting to see if he can measure the level ofconsciousness an organism contains.
He’ll berunning some animal experiments. In one, he plans to wire the brains of twomice together. Will information eventually flow between the two? Will theirconsciousness at some point become one fused, integrated system? If theseexperiments are successful, he may wire up the brains of two humans.
UK physicistSir Roger Penrose is yet another supporter of panpsychism. Penrose in the 80’sproposed that consciousness is present at the quantum level and resides in thesynapses of the brain. He is famous for linking consciousness with some of thegoings on in quantum mechanics.
Dr. Penrosedoesn’t go so far as to call himself a panpsychist. In his view:
“The laws ofphysics produce complex systems, and these complex systems lead toconsciousness, which then produces mathematics, which can then encode in asuccinct and inspiring way the very underlying laws of physics that gave riseto it.”
Veteranphysicist Gregory Matloff of the New York City College of Technology, says hehas some preliminary evidence showing that, at the very least, panpsychismisn’t impossible. Hey, it’s a start.
Dr. Matloff told NBC News:
Dr. Matloff told NBC News:
“It’s allvery speculative, but it’s something we can check and either validate orfalsify.”
Theoreticalphysicist Bernard Haisch, in 2006, suggested that consciousness is produced andtransmitted through the quantum vacuum, or empty space. Any system that hᴀssufficient complexity and creates a certain level of energy, could generate orbroadcast consciousness. Dr. Matloff got in touch with the unorthodox, Germanphysicist and proposed an observational study, to test it.
What theyexamined was Parenago’s Discontinuity. This is the observation that coolerstars, like our own sun, revolve around the center of the Milky Way faster thanH๏τter ones. Some scientists attribute this to interactions with gas clouds.Matloff took a different view. He elaborated in a recently published piece, inthe Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research.
Unlike theirH๏τter sisters, cooler stars may move faster due to “the emission of auni-directional jet.” Such stars emit a jet early on in their creation. Matloffsuggests that this could be an instance of the star consciously manipulatingitself, in order to gain speed.
Observationaldata shows a reliable pattern anywhere Parenago’s Discontinuity is witnessed.If it were a matter of interacting with gas clouds, as is the current theory,each cloud should have a different chemical makeup, and so cause the star tooperate differently. So why do all of them act in exactly the same way?
Though itisn’t much to go on, the unveiling of the European Space Agency’s Gaia spacetelescope, whose mission it is to map stars, may provide more data to furthersupport or weaken this view. On another front, Dr. Matloff posits that thepresence of a proto-consciousness field could serve as a replacement for darkmatter.
Dark mattersupposedly makes up around 95% of the universe, although, scientists can’t seemto find any. So, for the sake of argument, if consciousness is a property thatarises on the subatomic level with a confluence of particles, how do these tinylittle bits of consciousness coalesce?
Neuroscientistand psychiatrist Giulio Tononi, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison,proposes a slightly different take on panpsychism, called integratedinformation theory. Here, consciousness is a manifestation with a real,physical location, somewhere in the universe. We just haven’t found it yet.Perhaps this heavenly body radiates out consciousness as our sun radiates lightand heat.
Dr. Tononihas actually puts forth a metric for measuring how much consciousness a thinghas. The unit is called phi. This translates into how much control a being canenact over itself or objects around it. The theory separates intelligence fromconsciousness, which some people ᴀssume are one in the same.
Take AI forexample. It can already beat humans in all kinds of tasks. But it has no willof its own. A supercomputer which can enact change in the world outside of aprogrammer’s commands, would therefore be conscious. Many futurists from RayKurzweil to Elon Musk believe that day is coming, perhaps in the next decade orso, and that we should prepare.
