And, ultimately we are a self organizing system. — Pop

Not so. Life is something extra in being able to apply the logic of machinery to the entropic world. Nature has no machines. Life began by being able to apply the mechanical trick of a Maxwellian demon. Life can build the gate and operate the switch that directs random dissipation towards its own existential goals.

We call it self organisation when it is physics being organised by its own boundary constraints, but there is no local selfhood involved. There is only local randomness and accident. Life adds mechanical order and that is another further trick which is quite novel.

We call it self organisation when it is physics being organised by its own boundary constraints, but there is no local selfhood involved. There is only local randomness and accident. Life adds mechanical order and that is another further trick which is quite novel. — apokrisis

Self organization entails self interest because a "self" is itself a body of information, trying to maintain its integrity in the face of a constant onslaught of disintegrative information.

I think you focus too much on entropy, when what is obvious is that self organization is progressing.

"It is now generally recognized that in many important fields of research a state of true thermodynamic equilibrium is only attained in exceptional conditions. Experiments with radioactive tracers, for example, have shown that the nucleic acids contained in living cells continuously exchange matter with their surroundings. It is also well known that the steady flow of energy which originates in the sun and the stars prevents the atmosphere of the earth or stars from reaching a state of thermodynamic equilibrium.
Obviously then, the majority of the phenomena studied in biology, meteorology, astrophysics and other subjects are irreversible processes which take place outside the equilibrium state.

These few examples may serve to illustrate the urgent need for an extension of the methods of thermodynamics so as to include irreversible processes."

Ilya Prigogine (Introduction to Thermodynamics of Irreversible Processes, 1955, p.v)

Nature has no machines. — apokrisis

Everything that exists, exists as an evolving self organizing system - a self in the process of accumulating / integrating information. This is the machine.

To paraphrase The Killer: there's a whole lotta pseudo-scientistic confusing maps with the territory going on! So much so, that @apokrisis' master class in actual sciences and science-respecting speculation are affecting the discussion like pearls cast before swine. This little piggie is, however, quite grateful for his/her further edification and clarification of a number of my own vague, even confused, notions and intuitions. Y'all (@Pop & @Enrique especially) need to lift those snouts out of your dogmatic troughs of ill-informed slop and learn to snort-sqeal less and listen-reconsider more. :sweat:

To paraphrase The Killer: there's a whole lotta pseudo-scientistic confusing maps with the territory going on! So much so, that apokrisis' master class in actual sciences and science-respecting speculation are affecting the discussion like pearls cast before swine. This little piggie is grateful for the his/her edification and clarification of a number of my own vague, even confused, notions and intuitions. Y'all (@Pop & @Enrique especially) need to lift those snouts out of your dogmatic troughs of ill-informed slop while you snort-sqeal less and listen-reconsider more. :sweat: — 180 Proof

This is the sort of cheap shot I would expect from somebody who does not have the wit to partake in the discussion.

For a theory to be possible it needs to not violate any of the laws of physics, and if it is also supported by some , then it is a valid possibility. ( David Deutsch). What is your criteria for a theory to be possible?
Do you even posses such a thing?

Don't try to make this about me, Pop, you're the one spouting that "integrating information" pseudo-science. No cheap shot, just calling you out on bullshit here as I have elsewhere. I know enough to know you don't know what you're talking about. Woo-of-your-gaps, just like the OP. QM is every half-baked idealist's hobby horse. What's with that? The most exact physical theory yet developed but "reduced" by you anti-realists to Felix the Cat's magic bag. I get a thrill from watching someone more learned and patient than I masterfully expose your "theory" for the nonsense it is. My criticism isn't founded on mere disagreement – I disagree with apokrisis' "semiotic top-down constraints/causality" too – but on what I recognize as another very smart, even well read, member's pseudo-philosophy cosplaying as pseudo-science. So this ain't about me, friend. Dismiss me all you like. :smirk:

So this ain't about me, friend. Dismiss me all you like. :smirk: — 180 Proof

This is your criteria for dismissing a theory? Consider yourself well and truly dismissed then. :cool:

I think you focus too much on entropy, when what is obvious is that self organization is progressing. — Pop

Well you can’t even be listening to what I’m saying then. I’m arguing the biosemiotic position that is now constructed on the basis of dissipative structure thinking.

Everything that exists, exists as an evolving self organizing system - a self in the process of accumulating / integrating information. This is the machine. — Pop

Life requires an epistemic cut between rate independent information and rate dependent dynamics (Pattee). Life is thus a modelling relation (Rosen).

Thus there are formal reasons for rejecting these assertions.

I found a useful quote from Howard Pattee on The Information Philosopher's website:

A description requires a symbol system or a language. Functionally, description and construction correspond to the biologists’ distinction between the genotype and phenotype. My biosemiotic view is that self-replication is also the origin of semiosis.

I have made the case over many years (e.g., Pattee, 1969,1982, 2001, 2015) that self-replication provides the threshold level of complication where the clear existence of a self or a subject gives functional concepts such as symbol, interpreter, autonomous agent, memory, control, teleology, and intentionality empirically decidable meanings. The conceptual problem for physics is that none of these concepts enter into physical theories of inanimate nature.

Self-replication requires an epistemic cut between self and non-self, and between subject and object.

Self-replication requires a distinction between the self that is replicated and the non-self that is not replicated. The self is an individual subject that lives in an environment that is often called objective, but which is more accurately viewed biosemiotically as the subject’s Umwelt or world image. This epistemic cut is also required by the semiotic distinction between the interpreter and what is interpreted, like a sign or a symbol. In physics this is the distinction between the result of a measurement – a symbol – and what is being measured – a material object.

I call this the symbol-matter problem, but this is just a narrower case of the classic 2500-year-old epistemic problem of what our world image actually tells us about what we call the real world. — Howard Pattee, last quotation on page

I don't see how this is not a form of dualism. How I would put it is that living things represent 'the intentional domain', or the domain where intentional action transcend physical laws (precisely because 'none of these concepts enter into physical theories of inanimate nature'.) In human form, that organic process then reaches the further stage of self-reflection, namely, the ability of life to reflect on and understand itself.

:eyes: :lol:

Life requires an epistemic cut between rate independent information and rate dependent dynamics (Pattee). Life is thus a modelling relation (Rosen). — apokrisis

It does not require a cut, if the information flows from one system to another.

"Information always travels over a substrate" - Shannon.

Information in the form of vibrations and frequency flows from matter to human consciousness via the substance between them. There is no need for a cut, as there is a substance connecting matter and human consciousness, over which information can flow. If I am understanding you correctly.

Systems evolve interrelationally. It makes no sense to think an organism could survive without the system it evolved in. A system's self organization is entirely relative to its environment. A system and it's environment evolve together.

In physics this is the distinction between the result of a measurement – a symbol – and what is being measured – a material object.

I call this the symbol-matter problem, but this is just a narrower case of the classic 2500-year-old epistemic problem of what our world image actually tells us about what we call the real world. — Howard Pattee, last quotation on page

If the person is conceived as an energetic body and the matter is also, then information flows from like to like. No cut necessary.

If the person is conceived as an energetic body and the matter is also, then information flows from like to like. No cut necessary. — Pop

An entirely science-free response,

Well you can’t even be listening to what I’m saying then. — apokrisis

Listening =/= comprehending. The former is our responsibility. That latter is mostly yours.

I guess my pet theory is that waves and wavicles throughout nature combine as readily as a body of water whether we directly witness this or not, and these hybrids comprise both image qualia (dimensional) and nonimage qualia (feeling). But this matter is also extremely quantized, at least on the microscopic scale, which significantly disassociates it, so only specific, very complex and hyperorganized arrangements can give rise to complex qualitative experience, yet the possibilities are vast and far exceed the bounds of biological taxonomy as we currently define it. So that is why my view is a version of panprotopsychism: the actual substance of perception is present at the nano and micro scale, much more fundamental to matter than the level of organization that gives rise to either biological form or humanlike sentience. I regard human sentience as the somewhat arbitrary standard for what is conscious, just as the visible spectrum is our standard for what light is, corresponding to the brain and eye respectively. — Enrique

This is is the closest you've come in this thread to giving a theory, as far as I can tell. It's far too unclear for me to engage with. I originally thought you were talking about the Penrose-Hameroff stuff about microtubules, which I don't understand, as that's the only well-known theory of consciousness involving quantum stuff I know of. But that's not what you are talking about is it? And even that can hardly be called a paradigm, it's just one theory among many.

In very general terms I'm always somewhat sympathetic to field theries of consciousness as these intuitively feel faithful to the phenomenology of consciousness and attention. Our attention seems stretchy, and spread over and through many things at once, like a field. And I think that's important evidence.

I'll ask you the same question I ask any reductive theorist: why can't all the stuff you talk about happen in the dark? Why does that necessitate consciousness?

Is any of what Apo said relevant to your theory? I am in no position to judge that at all (as I understand neither of you), but you may be able to tell.

Consciousness is a state of integrated information - is the most coherent definition that I have come across. — Pop

That's really not a definition. Definitions are about what people mean and how words are used. People don't mean "I'm in a state of integrated information about this rose" when they say "I'm conscious of this rose". (Not that normal people would even say that to be fair.) The IIT is a theory, NOT a definition!

If the person is conceived as an energetic body and the matter is also, then information flows from like to like. No cut necessary.
— Pop

An entirely science-free response, — apokrisis

E=mc2, QM, Rutherford's experiments. String Theory.

Consciousness is a state of integrated information - is the most coherent definition that I have come across.
— Pop

That's really not a definition. Definitions are about what people mean and how words are used. People don't mean "I'm in a state of integrated information about this rose" when they say "I'm conscious of this rose". (Not that normal people would even say that to be fair.) The IIT is a theory, NOT a definition! — bert1

That consciousness is a state of integrated information is an idea that precedes IIT. It is the most coherent definition that I have encountered, as it brings home the idea that all the information in one's possession, body and mind and environment, is integrated to create any moment of consciousness.
All of one's historical information, all bodily sensations, and all environmental information, converges to a point in any moment of consciousness, thus creating it.

So in what way is a brain wave the same thing as a quantum wave? And what way is either like a ripple on a pond? — apokrisis

How a wavicle is turned into a symbol by neurobiology may be explained by simple neural networks. — Pop

Is any of what Apo said relevant to your theory? — bert1

I concede that the readout on an EEG machine isn't of course what brain waves actually look like, but the readout is representing a real wave oscillation generated in the brain by neurons which synapse in unison on the order of billions. The actual brain wave is a flux in matter caused by periodic flow of electrical potential, a current like a battery's that courses through the organ. This flow within neurons creates an oscillating field extending throughout the entire brain.

As in magnetoreception, pockets of quantum behavior in the soma and perhaps elsewhere have probably adapted for very specific sensitivity to the brain's EM field, and these wavicle assemblies superposition or blend into the global current as the particularate yet integrated substance of qualitative perception.

So neural networks produce the integrated field that is consciousness, and quantum biochemical pathways produce the particulars of sensation. Consciousness is exacted as a steady state holism because of the integrating EM field, but we partially sense and feel the world as dispersed in space due to the quantum processes.

Does that make sense yet to you guys?

So neural networks produce the integrated field that is consciousness, and quantum biochemical pathways produce the particulars of sensation. Consciousness is exacted as a steady state holism because of the integrating EM field, but we partially sense and feel the world as dispersed in space due to the quantum processes. — Enrique

Neuroplasticity tells us that established information is memorized in physical structure somehow. This is consistent with Constructivism, which suggests information accumulation is how knowledge is built. The way we thought about things yesterday, determines how we think about them today, which determines how we think about them tomorrow, more or less. So there is a construction going on - a building onto established knowledge, which is memorized in physical structure - this past knowledge is also integrated in a moment of consciousness. See my reply to Bert1 above. Any idea how this might occur from your perspective?

Neuroplasticity tells us that established information is memorized in physical structure somehow. This is consistent with Constructivism, which suggests information accumulation is how knowledge is built. The way we thought about things yesterday, determines how we think about them today, which determines how we think about them tomorrow, more or less. So there is a construction going on - a building onto established knowledge, which is memorized in physical structure - this past knowledge is also integrated in a moment of consciousness. See my reply to Bert1 above. Any idea how this might occur from your perspective? — Pop

I think memory is an at least partially separate mechanism from the stream of consciousness I was talking about. Memory basically consists of a record of perceptual experiences etched into brain chemistry and neuronal connections, much like a hard drive, which then participates in projecting or organizing stream of consciousness by virtue of the stored information's structure. So for instance axons and dendrites might, because of the way they are linked in a network, generate a specific collective response in the quantum biochemistry of adjacent soma, perturbing the brain's electromagnetic field and prompting it to self-directedly change its behavior (current flow) at the more generalized level (this process is not deterministic in a single direction, from holism to particularity or vice versa).

So its like a feedback between EM field perceptual holism, the perceptual particularity of quantum wavicle assemblages, and whatever mechanisms sustain a representation of previous states which are then built upon and modified by further experience. Different parts of the mind can proceed in contrasting directions at a given moment, from holism to particularity, from particularity to holism, or between representational memory and either. Perhaps the quantum wavicle assemblages are a mediator between memory and the EM field. I'm not sure what the mechanisms of representational memory are exactly, but neural networking surely plays a major role.

I'm actually publishing a paper in a scientific journal next month that explains perception in a much more organized and thorough way, looking forward to finally getting my ideas some serious exposure!

This flow within neurons creates an oscillating field extending throughout the entire brain. — Enrique

It is still the case that you are talking about the noise made by the process. So the material aspect of neural firing - the dissipation involved in moving ions across membranes by ATP powered pumps - does produce measurable voltage fluctuations. And given coordinated spike timing is one aspect of neural coding, the same synchrony will appear in terms of the material dissipation - like the heat and noise coming off a lot of cars all revving up to take off from the same traffic light signal.

But your argument is that the causal element of this dissipative story is the material waste produced rather than the informational work done. You are mistaking the material index of the informational activity for the meaningful activity itself.

There just is no evidence that the brain does anything with all the local voltage potentials or magnetic field fluctuations which happen to be generated in doing neural work. There is no global integration (or differentiation) that organises all that noise into some usefully coherent pattern that thus might explain something about consciousness, or rather, how neural networks stand as running models of a self in meaningful interaction with a world.

And this is even before we get into the way you slide from a classical description of a brain wave (an EEG trace with a temporal resolution of milliseconds and spatial resolution of centimetres) and the wild claim that this statistical binning of decohered voltage fluctuations had some kind of magical hidden quantum coherence that is also - hands waving still more furiously - a panpsychic conscious glow to it.

Your story has no support in evidence or theory. Brain-wide quantum superposition would be the most fragile of states. Every ion moving through a membrane channel is a decoherent measurement, let alone the gross measurement of tapping a bunch of EEG electrodes to the scalp.

You are pinning all your hopes on some kind of coherent electromagnetic flux but what brain waves measure is the incoherent entropy of the dissipative physics of neurons - the incoherence production that pays for the useful thing of their informational signalling. And again, that is like saying a bunch of cars all moved off from the lights at the same moment because all their heat and noise suddenly became correlated in a state of quantum superposition. They all began to throb and vibrate in a magical synchrony that resulted in a sudden collective quantum leap down the street.

So thermodynamics is against you as much as the rest of physics. For the brain to do the work of constructing states of integrated-differentiated information, it must create even more entropic waste. There is a reason why the brain is 2% of our body weight but consumes 20% of our energy.

You are pinning all your hopes on some kind of coherent electromagnetic flux but what brain waves measure is the incoherent entropy of the dissipative physics of neurons... — apokrisis

The electrical energy of brain waves is not dissipative like heat, it is in large measure contained within neural networks to produce an ultracoordinated pattern. The readout of an EEG varies in a nuanced way as you move the sensitivity around to different portions of the brain, so much so that a neurologist can deduce the patient's cognitive profile, indicating that brain waves, unlike light and heat, are intimately correlated with specific behavior of the matter in that location.

A certain synchrony characterizes healthy conscious states, an emergent property of relatively macroscale current flows. When the mind encounters a novel or startling stimulus, this synchrony temporarily breaks down some, indicating that portions of the brain are processing more independently on a smaller scale, then resumes once the stimulus has been integrated. In mental illness, the brain's default condition is to be in a less synchronous state. This is the principle behind neurofeedback treatment: the patient looks at a screen while wearing an EEG style headset during multiple sessions, and using their mind to win the video game, visual feedback recalibrates brain waves to synchrony, commonly curing the ailment.

Brain waves are closely related to states of awareness, reducible to increasingly local behaviors of brain matter which produce unique signatures that blend into the emergent patterns current EEG technology observes. Brain waves are not chaotic noise, they are a functional component of consciousness that varies in a systematic way depending on degree of emergence, but we don't at this point have a model of exactly how they interact with brain matter to generate percepts. That is a research angle my theory is motivated to pursue.

Brain waves are closely related to states of awareness — Enrique

In humans, no doubt. But not in rocks, because rocks don't have brains.

In humans, no doubt. But not in rocks, because rocks don't have brains. — bert1

That's actually a somewhat complicated issue from the perspective of panprotopsychism lol

You are mistaking the material index of the informational activity for the meaningful activity itself. — apokrisis

:up:

That is the problem I see with this:

Imagine being able to draw a diagram in a textbook that represents the chemistry of qualitative perception — Enrique

"Information always travels over a substrate" - Shannon. — Pop

Bearing in mind that Shannon was an electrical engineer, and that his work was specifically about transmission of data across a medium.

I think you're making a good point that perhaps relates to higher levels of intentionality, but could you be more specific? Don't mean to put you on the spot necessarily, be as concise as you like, or just ignore me lol

"Information always travels over a substrate" - Shannon.
— Pop

Bearing in mind that Shannon was an electrical engineer, and that his work was specifically about transmission of data across a medium. — Wayfarer

Shannon's information theory is vey focused to that end, however that information always travels over a substrate is obvious. Information is the perturbations of a substrate. The patterns in materials. The arrangement of these words and letters.

In humans, no doubt. But not in rocks, because rocks don't have brains. — bert1

Nevertheless, they posses a state of integrated information!

The electrical energy of brain waves is not dissipative like heat, — Enrique

That would be why nothing is leaking through the scalp to disturb the EEG coils then.

In a dissipative structure, you can tell which half is the entropy of waste matter, which half is the negentropy of conserved structure, by what gets exported to the environmental heat sink.

And what we can say is the brain is very concerned about shuttling ions to build up local mechanical gradients across membranes regulated by pores. And it shows no concern for the (very weak) electrical and magnetic fields that might be generated by that tightly orchestrated activity. The fields are just random noise - fluctuations in a general equilbrium balance - that is part of the necessary second law contribution to the greater entropification of the world.

It is neither contained nor correlated. More unsupported bunkum.