These are posts from a discussion group (JBAS) and therefore reflect off-the-top-of-thehead musing without much attention to proper grammar or other niceties. Topics often
relate to a book review.
Conversations on Consciousness
Susan Blackmore has a little book out called Conversations on Consciousness. She interviews
many of the leading researchers in the field of consciousness study- Baars, Block, Francis Crick,
the Churchlands, Daniel Dennet (Consciousness Explained), and other materialists with their
usual dreary dismissal of anything that doesn’t fit materialist dogma. But she also includes
interviews with others like David Chalmers (the Aussie hippie genius who shook the
consciousness research world in 1994 at an early conference with his brilliant insight into the
‘hard question’- why brain processes should be accompanied by conscious experiencesomething no one has been able to even remotely begin to answer), Roger Penrose, and Stuart
Hameroff, among others.
Chalmers is good as usual on the key issue of this most central thing about being a human beingand that this is left out of most consciousness research- that we have sensations, thoughts, and
feelings. This is central to being human but for some reason many researchers have ignored it
over the past century. Chalmers asks how do brain neurons produce the experience of conscious
mind? How are brain functions accompanied by subjective experience? He also makes the odd
claim that we have been able to explain life biologically but can not yet explain consciousness.
But according to cell expert Franklin Harold- we have not been able to even begin to explain life
biologically.
Nonetheless, he is good on holding everyone’s feet to the fire on this central hard question- how
is it that the brain can support subjective experiences? This can not be reduced to brain
processes or some emergence of a new feature out of the complexity of all the other processes.
He then argues that consciousness is something fundamental and cannot be derived from the
fundamental physical properties we already have. It is a fundamental feature of the world in its
own right, just like space and time. It is a deeper property of the world than anything physical.
Why couldn’t all these brain processes just have occurred without consciousness, he asks? This
raises the question of what is consciousness for? It gives our lives meaning, he says. It makes life
comprehensible and a locus of value.
Penrose is good also in showing consciousness is something more than just computational
complexity giving rise to consciousness. It cannot be generated by a machine or algorithm. And
he is now working with Stuart Hameroff on a new theory of where consciousness arises
(correlates, is mediated, or whatever one prefers) in terms of microtubules in cells. This has to do
with quantum mechanics and is actually quite fascinating, though Penrose admits they could be
entirely wrong. We just don’t know enough about these realms, he admits.
Hameroff, in his interview, denies emergence theory, that complex processes in the brain
generate consciousness at a higher level in the hierarchical system. That a complex new property
just emerges at some higher level.
He, with Chalmers, argues that consciousness is fundamental to the universe. Its just part of
reality, like mass or charge. It is irreducible. It is just there. It is intrinsic to the universe. At the
lowest level of reality. The Planck level which is fundamental to space-time. This is the level of
the weird- where particles may exist in multiple places simultaneously and be connected over
great distances instantaneously and time is reversible. If time exists. He says the big questions in
physics now have to do with consciousness. Along the way, he dismisses Dennet’s and
Churchland’s simplification of consciousness to a chemical basis in neuron synapse. Why should
these chemical responses cause consciousness, he asks? There is no answer.
And he admits he may be guilty of the charge of believing in a vital force (élan vital) which has
been vilified by materialists for quite a while now. Recent evidence suggests that quantum
coherence and entanglement may be an essential feature of life. So he admits to being a
quantum vitalist. The unity and internal communication of the cell is unexplainable any other way.
His insightful moment in research- when under a microscope he saw microtubules pulling
chromosomes apart in dividing cells. He became fascinated by the fact these little devices
seemed to know where to go and what to do- what was their intelligence and what was running
the show at this cytoplasmic level? Neurons were full of these microtubules with some magical
power of organization and information processing. So he began to think that consciousness must
go all the way down inside the neuron to the level of microtubules. Interesting stuff.
And in response to Susan’s question about life after death, he adds- “When the quantum
coherence in the microtubules is lost as in death, the Planck scale quantum information in our
heads dissipates or leaks out to the Planck scale in the universe as a whole. The quantum
information which had comprised our conscious and subconscious minds during life doesn’t
completely dissipate, but hangs together because of quantum entanglement. Because it stays in
quantum superposition and doesn’t undergo quantum state reduction or collapse, its more like
our subconscious mind, like our dreams. And because the universe at the Planck scale is nonlocal, it exists holographically, indefinitely. Is this the soul? Why not?”
Interesting debate from a broad array of viewpoints on the difficult issues of mystery in life and
meaning.
On the issue I mentioned about where consciousness arise (correlates, is mediated, etc.). This
use of terminology expresses ones philosophical or ideological viewpoint. Materialists will use
“arise” as they believe consciousness is nothing more than a product of chemical activity or brain
processes (emergence). Others who see consciousness as a reality all on its own will use terms
like “correlates” (consciousness correlates with certain processes or activities or functions). Is
‘mediated by’ would be another one.
Its quite interesting to read all the contributors to Blackmore’s book and the way they approach
consciousness. The materialists automatically limit themselves to reductionist answers- it must be
explained only in terms of brain parts, the smallest physical units or material units or the activities
between these bits and pieces. And yes, this is all a materialist can encompass or explain with.
There can be no ‘mystery stuff’ and everything will eventually be explained naturally. This then
shapes their conclusions on the larger metaphysical/philosophical issues. Interesting here is the
blurring of any boundaries and refusal to maintain any separation of science from metaphysical
speculation. The answers on the larger questions are given with great conviction and finality. It
reminds me of Franklin Harold noting “how much wholesale returns of conjecture science extracts
from its trifling investment of fact”.
Some materialists like Susan Greenfield castigate the more fundamentalist types, like Dennet, for
being overly dogmatic and urge caution as we know so little yet.
Who was it that said that in discovering something about the bits and pieces and how they appear
to work, we fool ourselves into thinking we actually know what its all about. The more we explore
even material reality the weirder it gets. We find out we know less and less. Martin Rees again“its embarrassing to admit that after 400 years of science we still don’t know what the universe is
made of”.
Blackmore asks all her interviewees the same set of questions. She starts with the hard questionwhat is consciousness? Greenfield answers: “It’s a subjective phenomenon that we can’t really
define properly…therefore its very hard to know how to even frame the question as to how a
subjective inner state is associated with something physical?” She moves on to castigate the
conviction and zeal against people who believe or have faith. She argues a true scientist must
remain open to all ideas. Just because she can not see a point doesn’t mean it is wrong. This is a
more moderated materialism amongst the other more fundamentalist types.
Richard Gregory: “How the hell does physics produce something which is so totally unphysical?”
He then does some interesting material on the fact that consciousness is about living in the
present moment- vividness. This in comparison to perceiving which is spread out in time. The
present moment is tagged by consciousness. It gives this extraordinary sense of vividness in the
present moment. And this is necessary to survival (is the light red or green?).
Christof Koch says, “Its possible that there are things that, as Chalmers has argued, are forever
beyond us. At this point I have no idea…for the past 2300 years we have not made any progress
on the philosophical aspects of consciousness”.
Most of these materialists go on to conclude, as Thomas Metzinger does, that “it is simply
mindless, merciless self-organization” and the self and personhood are just illusions.
Other materialists make some interesting observations- Vilayanur Ramachandran says that
animals don’t have consciousness. He argues that humans are a quantum leap above animal
minds. Unique and special. But the rest don’t agree with him. Consciousness, they claim, may go
right down to insects and plants.
Susan Greenfield made some of the most perceptive comments in the entire book by Blackmore.
She said about all this consciousness discussion, “Its like arguing angels on the head of a pin…I
get impatient with what I call science accountancy, and the i-dotting and t-crossing, and the
almost anal attitude to some ways of doing science, when life is so short; its like rearranging the
deck chairs on the Titanic when the big questions are sliding past, while people are fretting over a
receptor sub-type”.
And that is what I feel in reading all this horrendously detailed disputation. Oh, some of it is
useful, no doubt.
But too much of it misses the overall issue of what is consciousness fundamentally for. What is it
to be about? This is similar to the question of what is life and the universe for? People like
Campbell got more to the core of it all in stating that life is a journey, a quest. It is about individual
stories. Each human life a hero’s quest. And the essence of any story, said Campbell, was this
quest to overcome the animal and to live as human. At least that’s my paraphrase. It is the
journey to live as human. To understand this and live it. Paul said of his mom, Valerie, to love and
to be loved. That too is a good summary. It makes the same point.
It is about learning, discovering and growth and progress. And all the failure mixed in along the
way. All the pain, sorrow, tears, desire, longing, hope, fulfillment, ecstasy, joy, love and all the
rest that is human experience. This is the point of knowledge, understanding, faith, and all the
rest of varied facets of the human spirit and consciousness.
And some of these guys are right and helpful in saying such things as that consciousness is only
real in relation to our immediate surroundings and the three dimensions we perceive in our
immediate surroundings and the vividness consciousness grants of this now moment, in that it
makes us aware of our being here now and alive. So we can live our story, our quest here and
now. Sheehan also spoke to this- how consciousness rebounds us back to our reality and to
explore our human potential here and now. And Campbell said the mind is a limiting mechanism
to keep all the rest out (the 26 dimensions, the vast spectrum of light, God) so that we can focus
on the here and now.
They are all right. Its all about the focus on love.
Wendell Krossa