clark (clark@netsites.net)
Thu, 27 Nov 1997 06:45:37 +0100
The New Manhattan Project
by Jack Sarfatti
The following quotes are by Stuart Hameroff
"The role of consciousness in science has had its ups and downs over the
past century. After dominating the stage throughout William James' era, the
concept was banned from polite discussion for many decades by the
behaviorists. Even after the emergence of cognitive science in the sixties
and seventies---which undermined behaviorism by demonstrating the objective
reality of inner states---the "C-word" remained slightly off-color in
polite scientific discourse. Why discuss something that can't be measured?
In the past few years much of this has changed. Scientists with
unimpeachable credentials in a wide range of fields, from psychology to
molecular biology to mathematical physics, have begun to assert that
understanding the nature of consciousness is an important scientific goal,
perhaps the most important question that science faces at the present time.
But how to begin? We take the view that the problem of consciousness
transcends the traditional boundaries of scientific organization. Clearly,
psychologists and psychiatrists have important contributions to make, but
so do biochemists who study the various actions of mood altering chemicals.
In addition to philosophers, who have thought about the nature of
consciousness for many centuries, computer scientists are now entering the
discussion, as are neural network analysts, electrophysiologists, quantum
physicists and ethnologists. From such a description, some might suppose
that the discussion is spinning out of control, but we are more optimistic.
It is a time of great intellectual excitement; old perspectives are
changing and new concepts are emerging in this vast interdisciplinary area.
Perhaps the most central issue concerned the ontological basis for a theory
of consciousness. Is consciousness based upon a nonphysical aspect of
reality?"
No, I would say that consciousness is entirely a physical phenomenon.
"Or does it emerge from the electrochemical interactions of tens of
billions of neurons as is assumed in the field of cognitive neuroscience?"
Yes, in the precise sense, that consciousness is a universal property of
all quantum wavefunctions of sufficiently complex organizations of matter
held far from thermal equilbrium, and able to sustain these wavefunctions
against disruptive decoherence by the environment. This requires a direct
back-action of all living matter on its own wavefunction. The notion of
back-action appears in Bohm's hidden variable version of quantum mechanics.
It is not readily apparent in Bohr's Copenhagen Interpretation, though
Stapp recently stumbled upon it using Bohr's approach. The back-action
provides a feed-back control loop between matter and mind in a new quantum
mechanics in which uncontrollable randomness is replaced by intentional
coherent order. There is a general consistency in this new approach with
ideas of Josephson and Chalmers.
"Is classical neuroscience up to the task of explaining consciousness?"
No.
"or must one appeal to the mysteries of quantum mechanics to capture its
essence? "
That's a loaded question like "How often did you beat your wife, Mr.
Simpson?" :-) I would withdraw the word "mysterious". True, quantum
mechanics is mysterious if you use Bohr's "Copenhagen Interpretation" in
which there is a linear unitary evolution of isolated systems between
nonunitary measurements that "collapse" the wavefunction. First of all,
living systems are never isolated. To isolate them is to kill them. Living
systems are inherently nonunitary not conserving their internal probability
currents because of entropy-energy flows with the rest of the universe. It
is the non-conservation of probability currents within the living system
which permits creative evolution of genes, soma, and cultural memes. Second
of all, Bohm's way of doing low energy nonrelativistic quantum mechanics
takes away all the mysteries inherent in Bohr's fuzzy thinking. While there
are problems with relativity, these problems persist, one way or the other,
in whatever version of quantum theory, Bohr's or Bohm's, one uses.
Relativity is not relevant to the low energy biological phenomena we are
interested in.
"Is a new, and yet to be discovered, element of reality at the base of
consciousness?"
Yes, actually it was discovered by Bohm in 1952. It's called back-action of
matter on its quantum mind-stuff. The words "mind-stuff" (Sir James Jeans)
and "quantum wavefunction" will be used interchangeably, to emphasize, as
in Chalmer's thesis, that the potential for qualia is a fundamental
structural element of physical reality. Bohm's work was generally ignored
because all working physicists paid lip service to Bohr's mysticism, while
politely ignoring it in daily practise. Even Bohm did not realize the
greatness of his own discovery, but lapsed into a vague popular New Age
jargon of "implicate order". His thoughts on the dangers of "fragmentation"
are, of course, socially and morally correct and important, but have little
practical value in developing a hard physics of consciousness with new
psychotronic technology that will record dreams, thoughts, feelings and
intentions like a video camera records the material world. The work of
Hameroff suggests to me that such nano-scale technology will enable the
transference of conscious qualia between brains and will ensure effective
personal immortality in the near future. We do not have to wait for
Tipler's computer-simulated resurrection at the Omega Point at the End
Time. What I am talking about may only be decades away from now if venture
captialists start a new Manhattan Project. Here is a good way for Bill
Gates to spend some of his 15 billion dollars.:-)
"How do traditional neuroscience and cognitive science address the 'hard
problem' of qualia or the nature of subjective experience?"
They don't, and cannot in principle, because of the argument by Chalmers in
the Sept 1995 Scientific American. Nevertheless that kind or work (e.g.,
Francis Crick's The Astonishing Hypothesis) is valuable and essential in
developing the above advanced psychotronic supertechnology to manipulate
and transmit consciousness between separated brains. That is the road ahead
and nothing can stop it. Like any major breakthrough this one can be
misused.
"If the brain is but a mechanism, why does it need an inner life?"
Because the inner life is a potential inherent in the quantum wave
properties of matter which is actualized by the emergence of back-action of
matter on wavefunction in sufficiently complex open systems. The degree of
complexity and the degree of back-action are evidently linked to each
other.
"Could it not operate just as well without such a subjective phenomenon? "
No.
"What are the neural correlates of consciousness? How precisely can they be
determined?"
That's Crick's et-al job - and they seem to be doing well at it.
"What is the relation between consciousness and time? "
Good question to which I do not have a good answer.
"How does the brain provide simultaneity of events,"
This binding problem is inherent in the nonlocality and context-dependence
of Bohm's quantum potential transformed by back-action from its matter into
a very powerful conscious quantum biocomputer beyond the classical Turing
machine as in Penrose's thesis.
"and a flow of time?"
Well it is tied to expansion of the universe, the initial low entropy of
the big bang singularity etc. Penrose seems to have the best ideas on that
one.
"How might quantum theory contribute? In what sense is this theory more
than merely another reductive mechanism? "
I have answered this one above. My theory, which is an extension of Bohm's
hidden variable theory, has consciousness, enabled by back-action, as part
of the "fundamental furniture of the world". It implies a major rethinking
of the approaches of Stapp and Penrose which use the idea of "collapse".
However, whatever is done correctly in Bohr's approach can be re-visualized
in Bohm's. Bohm's theory includes Bohr's but has more in it than Bohr's.
The important idea, due to Josephson, is to realize that life, in its
essence, violates the Born probability algorithm. Intent is not possible in
classical mechanics nor in quantum mechanics. Intent and consciousness are
beyond orthodox quantum mechanics in the post-modern physics of the 21st
Century.
"Is there any experimental evidence to indicate that quantum effects play a
role in the processes of the mind?"
Yes, the microtubule observations of Hameroff et-al.
"Are the physics of space-time and general relativity important for
consciousness?"
Perhaps, we don't know yet. That's Penrose's problem. In Bohm's theory,
even the empty branches of the wavefunction have an objective stress-energy
tensor which will couple to the metric geometry. So that certainly is an
interesting line of inquiry.
"Are there experimental observations that might help to decide among any of
the various theories of mind? Can such experiments be suggested?
" Benjamin Libet's experiments are of particular interest since they seem
to suggest that if we do have free will over times less than a second or
so, then, our inner conscious act of intention is a future cause whose past
effect is our motor behavior. This is precisely what can happen in quantum
delayed choice with back-action. Back-action is a strong violation of the
statistical predictions of orthodox quantum mechanics. It is this violation
of quantum mechanics in the limited way we understand it today that is the
key to the mystery of life. To repeat, it was Brian Josephson who first saw
this clearly. My own synthesis came from mulling over the ideas of Bohm,
Josephson, Stapp and Penrose. It was Stapp's July 1994 paper in Physical
Review A that triggered the phase-transition in the macroscopic quantum
order parameter of my brain that led to this new back-action conjecture.
"What can we learn about the nature of consciousness from experiments in
parapsychology? "
If remote-viewing can be demonstrated, then it is strong evidence for
back-action. One can say that remote-viewing is not possible in principle
without a post-modern physics beyond quantum mechanics.
"Are the data statistically reliable?"
I am not qualified to judge that. "What is truth?"
-- post message - mailto:skwok@spark.net.hk unsubscribe/queries - mailto:diana@asiantravel.com homepage - http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/4670
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Thu May 13 1999 - 16:42:15 CEST