Upvote because I have no idea what you've written, but believe it completely — T Clark

Hah! I’m deep in the weeds on this stuff as I’m catching up on the vast amount of the new biology that has emerged this past decade.

But the simple idea is that life needs some kind of foundation to justify its causal tricks, Life is all about top down information regulating bottom up physics. Genes and other kinds of signalling turn chemical and physical processes to their own selfish advantage by being able to control their rate and direction.

The surprising realisation is that life can only do this if that physics and chemistry is critical or unstable - poised on a knife edge.

So the usual physicalist presumption is that life - like any machinery - would want to be made out of stable, solid, stuff. You can’t build complicated structure from unstable material.

But the opposite is the case. For information to be able to impact on the physical realm, it must be working with a material that is right on the edge of being tipped. The material must be fundamentally uncertain - in the way that BOTH the randomness of classical thermodynamics and quantum mechanics suggests - so that life’s informational records and memories can make a specific difference and give some action its chosen direction.

Mr Quantum. I know you could decohere into a definite energy state at some random moment and place. But why not decohere over here in a few seconds in a way that feeds all that potential into this little game I’ve got going where I feed hot electrons through a chloroplast reaction centre and fix some carbon.

So the big woo story is about how quantum weirdness subverts classical physics so badly that maybe even consciousness might be - hands wave furiously - a kind of coherent state.

But life and mind are the products of a properly complex causality - one where management of instability is the general core principle. So life thrives on the edge of chaos. The more tippable the physics, the more profit there is for the information that can tip it.

But life and mind are the products of a properly complex causality - one where management of instability is the general core principle. So life thrives on the edge of chaos. The more tippable the physics, the more profit there is for the information that can tip it. — apokrisis

:up:

First of all, information is merely relations between physical entities viewed from our modeling perspective, a distinctly human formal causality. "Information" is a reifying of all the observed causal interactions between a given set of existents, and lacks independence from matter. The information a gene, quantum process etc. contains is not ontologically distinguishable from the structure of its components, so any realist account of biological occurrences must involve a substance, not a probability.

I'm not familiar with the mathematical deep structure of contemporary quantum mechanics, the complex calculations that would be performed by a computer for instance to figure quantum probabilities, though I comprehend the basic variables and their correlations from a lot of reading, but I've gathered that superpositions are modeled as a synthesis of infinite possible states called Eigenstates (perhaps you know more about this than me). Infinitude must be allowing these calculations to output the probabilities of a future moment from initial conditions with negligible error.

But in the real world, superpositions are not a combination of infinite states. Instead, they are the synthesis of a finite range of wavelengths. The simplest example is the visible spectrum: wavelengths of light hybridize in innumerable but constrained combinations to give the full complement of colors as detectable by the human eye. This hybridization is essentially waves blending to form new compound wavelengths.

My hypothesis is that the same process happens on a profound scale throughout Earth environments because all matter has entangled wavelength. In particular, electrons are in pervasive superposition or wave blending everywhere around us, both within and between molecules. From a realist perspective, the concept of a molecule may be convenient illusion: a metal post is about as entangled as matter can get.

My thinking is that while superposition is common, even perhaps intrinsic, due to various causes such as temperature, chemical structure etc. theses superpositions dissolve as quickly as they materialize in many cases. But in some situations, superpositions can be sustained for longer periods. This is particularly true of the brain and many biological systems which have been evolutionarily adapted for sustaining or generating superpositions. With enough emergent organization this gives rise to the substance of qualitative perception, obviously the core of functional experience.

Brain waves are emergent from the flow of electrical potential in billions of synchronized neurons, and biochemical superpositions in the soma and most likely elsewhere blend into this macroscopic wave field to create organwide coherence (superpositioned entanglement) states with many trillions of pockets of quantum activity. These microscale quantum pockets blended into the brain's EM field are qualia. It has not been discovered which classes of molecule participate in this neurological process, but it will be.

I also hypothesize that entangled superpositions amongst matter may extend beyond electrons, perhaps in fields which haven't been observed directly at this point (think dark matter, or neutrino interactions with the nucleus), and these nonelectromagnetic entanglements might be largely responsible for nonlocal causation. Reality is comprised of a more essential substrate than what has been detected so far, and this will be the key to comprehending nonlocality.

Much of that is speculative, but not at all farfetched Mr. Muddled Woo lol

Life is all about top down information regulating bottom up physics....For information to be able to impact on the physical realm, it must be working with a material that is right on the edge of being tipped. The material must be fundamentally uncertain. — apokrisis

'If you look at something mutable, you cannot grasp it either with the bodily senses or the consideration of the mind, unless it possesses some form…If this form is removed, the mutable dissolves into nothing… Through eternal Form every temporal thing can receive its form and, in accordance with its kind, can manifest and embody number in space and time…Everything that is changeable must also be formable…Nothing can give itself form, since nothing can give itself what it does not have.' ~ Augustine.

Much of that is speculative, but not at all farfetched — Enrique

It’s just quantum nonsense, an abuse of terminology rather than a concrete conjecture. Nothing to see here.

This is how the science of life and mind is actually going. — apokrisis

This is the statement of a priest.

The following is a description of what I think is the most valid framework for modeling consciousness that currently exists. Tell me what you think! — Enrique

I've never really understood it, but I haven't tried to study it in earnest. Whatever its merits, I don't think it can be a 'paradigm'. The field of consciousness studies is too fractured and divergent to have any paradigms as yet. A paradigm is a kind of wide reaching set of assumptions that is nearly universally accepted. We're nowhere near that with consciousness. Although many people seem to be convinced that biology is relevant.

@Apokrisis,

I read Pattee's Cell Phenomenology: The First Experience

It was interesting. Have you looked at that one?

But what problem does a theory of consciousness solve? If this theory is a solution, then what is the problem it is setting out to solve? — Wayfarer

I solves the problem of TPF being cluttered up with conversations about the nature of consciousness. :razz:

So far haven't hit a citation from Russell, but here in Standford's encyc, it refers to the term as Russellian
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/russellian-monism/
search ' the page for panprotopsychism
From other sources it might be a name of a position inspired by Russell's position.

It’s just quantum nonsense, an abuse of terminology rather than a concrete conjecture. Nothing to see here. — apokrisis

What, you can't admit defeat? j/k Its actually almost excessively concrete, not nonsense at all. You may not have the same conceptual background to my verbiage, but if not I suggest reading Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology by Johnjoe McFadden and Einstein's Unfinished Revolution: The Search for What Lies Beyond the Quantum by Lee Smolin. They're fairly easy reads and will stimulate a lot of productive thought about quantum mechanics.

I'm just not seeing how quantum scale can effect consciousness. A human DNA strand is estimated at 204 billion atoms. A small part of this would encode the structure of the brains neurons. I'm only aware of genetic code being capable of producing functioning structures on a scale larger than itself so if quantum effects are involved is DNA even relevant?
Edit: And I forgot to ask if you are proposing non-DNA based consciousness.
Second edit: Forgot to address it to Enrique and other quantum theorists.

It's something to do with nano tubules I think. Whatever they are.

EDIT: sorry, microtubules. I'm getting the wrong jargon.

I’ve read those books. I even argued the issues with McFadden when he was first pushing an EM field story in the 1990s. The sort of nonsense you are peddling was done to death back then. Meanwhile science has rolled on and found where biology actually does exploit quantum loopholes to allow hyper efficient semiotic control over the energetic basis of life.

So I contrast the two. The abuse and use of quantum physics. It is very easy to tell the difference.

I’ve read those books. I even argued the issues with McFadden when he was first pushing an EM field story in the 1990s. The sort of nonsense you are peddling was done to death back then. Meanwhile science has rolled on and found where biology actually does exploit quantum loopholes to allow hyper efficient semiotic control over the energetic basis of life. — apokrisis

If you've read Smolin's book I'm surprised you don't assign more weight to the phenomenon of wave and wavicle blending. As he says, "that is what waves do". Superposition seems fundamental to matter and should be expected as a primary dynamic in many situations. Of course I'm referring to the physical occurrence, not the mathematical techniques for modeling it.

It doesn't seem to me that my view much differs from your perspective, it is merely proposing one more type of semiotic/energetic mechanism which happens to explain the qualia of consciousness. Perhaps certain forms of contact between waves and wavicles are an additional tipping point where the classical gives way to the quantumlike.

'Making up shit' (woo-of-the-gaps) is always easier than ... reasoning to the best explanation (science) ... or admitting you/we just don't know (philosophy). Law of the least mental effort.

'Making up shit' (woo-of-the-gaps) is always easier than ... reasoning to the best explanation (science) ... or admitting you/we just don't know (philosophy). Law of the least mental effort. — 180 Proof

ga ga goo goo lol

lol

First of all, information is merely relations between physical entities viewed from our modeling perspective, a distinctly human formal causality. "Information" is a reifying of all the observed causal interactions between a given set of existents, and lacks independence from matter. The information a gene, quantum process etc. contains is not ontologically distinguishable from the structure of its components, so any realist account of biological occurrences must involve a substance, not a probability. — Enrique

Correct, but this also means your QM stuff has to ultimately resolve to physical structure - so has to interact and integrate with physical structure. How does it do that? How does a wavicle create biological structure and why?

Your theory lacks a definition of consciousness, and an overall plot. Simply stating QM is at the heart of consciousness in the brain is not enough. Are you describing a dualism? It seems to me you would need a monism / panpschism for your theory to be coherent?

My hypothesis is that the same process happens on a profound scale throughout Earth environments because all matter has entangled wavelength. — Enrique

I would say all matter "is" entangled wavelengths. But I would emphasize that it is informational structure that is evolving and becoming more complex, not necessarily the wave structure, in this I'm bearing in mind that consciousness is still receiving its information from the frequencies and vibrations that caused structure fundamentally.

In a sense, it is a situation of informational structure ( us ) integrating more informational structure ( wavicle ), so it is a like with like interaction, and a process of evolving and accumulating information.

But life and mind are the products of a properly complex causality - one where management of instability is the general core principle. So life thrives on the edge of chaos. The more tippable the physics, the more profit there is for the information that can tip it. — apokrisis

The things you're writing about pinged my memory, so I went back looking through the archives. There were two previous threads I really enjoyed. One, "What is life?", started by @Samuel Lacrampe about four years ago, included your discussion of information's role in biology. The other, "Networks, Evolution, and the Question of Life," started by @StreetlightX, also about four years ago, included a back and forth among SLX, @fdrake, and you about gene networks. I think I'm going to go back and reread them.

The surprising realisation is that life can only do this if that physics and chemistry is critical or unstable - poised on a knife edge. — apokrisis

Are you referring to the "fine tuning" of the universe - that forces all systems in ordered pockets of the universe to self organize by integrating information?

Correct, but this also means your QM stuff has to ultimately resolve to physical structure - so has to interact and integrate with physical structure. How does it do that? How does a wavicle create biological structure and why?

Your theory lacks a definition of consciousness, and an overall plot. Simply stating QM is at the heart of consciousness in the brain is not enough. Are you describing a dualism? It seems to me you would need a monism / panpschism for your theory to be coherent? — Pop

Probably what I'm in the process of trying to figure out. In general, I think various types of motion exist in physics - linear, oscillating, interactive, perhaps you can think of more - and the properties of these motions vary, most foundationally as a function of differentials in the concentration of a single substance, so my view is a form of monism.

The wavelength/frequency properties of matter are of course a type of oscillating motion, with these oscillations combining (interactive) and flowing (linear) as well.

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.

That's my rough and ready idea of how to define physical structure's relationship to consciousness. Interesting to ponder how nonlocal causation might fit with this.

Of course I'm referring to the physical phenomenon, not the mathematical techniques for modeling it. — Enrique

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?

A brain wave is a general way to talk about patterns of excitation~inhibition in neural circuitry. The circuitry is presumed to be doing the functional task of the integration and differentiation of information so as to meaningfully model a self in a pragmatic relation with its world. And so a global measure of changes in voltages at the scalp says something about the general statistical degree of coordination versus isolation in relation to types of brain task.

In other words, the brain is being modelled as some kind of computer. Waves - as various degrees of EEG signal choppiness - are an attempt to glean some kind of insight about the nature of the software routines from the crackling sounds the hardware happens to be making. And even then, waves - as a measure of coherent dynamical simplicity – don't tell the story. A sine wave makes a clean theoretical baseline for measuring an EEG recording's departures from such a state of ultimate mathematical simplicity. At the other end of the spectrum is the chaos of 1/f white noise - a mathematical model of incoherence of wavelet fluctuations occurring over all spatiotemporal scales.

So - unlike the way you are using the term - neurobiology has some maths in mind. The kind of maths that can ground experimental measurements. It is saying that if the system in question is extracting meaningful work from patterns of neural excitation and inhibition – a hypothesis amply supported by the structural anatomy - then we can use the opposing extremes of noise, monotonous sine wave vs 1/f chaos, as the contrasting bookends for a global statistical measure of the brain's activity at some sampling window in time.

EEG recordings were great back in the 1950s when there wasn't anything better. But the popular understanding got stuck at the alpha/beta/theta brainwave level of classification. The hippy dippy shit. It wasn't interested enough to follow along to the P300s and N400s that could be used to impute something about the real dynamics of the brain's information integration.

Classical waves are a similar story. In this case, the mathematical bookends were the mechanics of classical waves vs the mechanics of classical particles. If you had some classical phenomenon like a ripple on a pond, you could imagine it as an atomistic collection of points that was to some extent or other glued together by a pattern of attractive-repulsive forces. There was enough viscosity in the system to produce a collective behaviour that again varied somewhere between the Platonic ideals of the simplest symmetry of a sine wave and the maximum complexity of chaotic turbulent disorder.

So the world at a classical level of observation and modelling became measurable because the wave concept was reciprocal to the particle concept. You could place physical systems like ocean surfaces or even desert sand dunes somewhere on a spectrum between collective coherence and individual independence in terms of classical measures of mass and force.

Then you have talk about waves - and their lack - in yet another setting. Quantum mechanics. Discrete particles also seemed to act like continuous waves, and vice versa. An electron was like a wave. A photon was also like a particle.

This observational surprise was formalised by quantum field theory where the 'waviness' of a wave function was built into a calculus of evolving probabilities. This created its own mess about how the following of "every possible path" then actually got collapsed or decohered to result in a classically defined state.

So the wave function description of fundamental nature ended up being both fantastically successful and radically incomplete in a way science wasn't exactly used to. I could go on. But my essential point is that we talk about waves for a particular reason, just as we talk about atomic points. They are meaningful to the degree they are Platonic mathematical objects we can drop into our theoretical frameworks and start making bookended measurements.

So we have a sine wave in mind as the simplest combination of a translation and rotation - the cannonical symmetries (or energetic symmetry breakings) of classically-imagined spacetime. The generator of a sine wave - as a continuous trajectory - is a point marked on the edge of a rolling wheel.
Then from this useful model of greatest vibrational or resonant simplicity, we can look to the "other" that anchors the other end of the business of scientific measurement.

That is all there is to the "magic" of a wave. It is a shape so simple that nature can't help but start from that geometric motif, just as the notion of a zero-D point is also the conception of an ultimate state of discreteness or incoherent discontinuity. The idealised fluctuation.

And this is why EEG studies and quantum theory can both be talking about waves without thinking of those waves as some kind of concrete material substance. They are just one end of a useful modelling dichotomy. A logical foundation from which to mount the experimental assault.

So you say you are referring to the physical phenomenon here. Brain waves = quantum waves = somehow or bloody other, consciousness. And that is why I say you just freely abuse these concepts to create a hand-waving charade of explanation.

Are you referring to the "fine tuning" of the universe - that forces all systems in ordered pockets of the universe to self organize by integrating information? — Pop

I don't know exactly what you mean by that. But criticality and spontaneous symmetry breaking are concepts used to show that fine tuning is not such a big deal. If the direction of symmetry breaking is essentially random, then the appearance of being a particular choice is explained away by it being a meaningless accident.

Self organisation as a result of entropic force is another related thing - dissipative structure theory.

My point is that life is certainly founded in dissipative structure. Biology pays for its negentropic existence by constructing channels for accelerating the entropification of the universe.

And then to be able to do that construction using information, the flows it directs must already be on the point of physically tipping.

It would take too much energy as a farmer to move a herd of dead cows from one paddock to another. But very little energy to stand at the gate and shut it behind a herd of live cows as they eventually wander through.

So the contrast is between a world of static objects that somehow gets organised by the stored information of genes, neurons and words, and a world that is already in random motion and so all that is required is the intelligence of a Maxwell demon slamming the door shut on any fluctuations in the right direction.

Life is going to set up its informational camp where the living is easiest. And that is why physical criticality - chemistry just itching to happen in some random direction - is a natural foundation for biology. Any reaction that is poised and tippable is obviously in want of a good tipping. And that is what tossing an enzyme into the mix does.

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, — Enrique

You would then also be saying that information integrates on its own? This is a significant obstacle, as what we most deeply identify with is that which integrates the information.

In fact, pockets of the universe are fine tuned to integrate information, imo.

so my view is a form of monism. — Enrique

Good, so when you develop a theory of consciousness you also develop a theory of everything.

In monism, consciousness is the accumulation and evolution of a body of information. In Dualism, consciousness emerges coincidentally with the emergence of a self concept ( self awareness ), so is a psychological entity dependent on a self concept. Hence can logically be all sorts of weird stuff. Monism is more of an attempt to try to describe everything with a single concept, so less room for weird stuff.

This is what makes consciousness research so interesting. It is only possible to construct a coherent framework of understanding for a monist. It is impossible for a dualist, as understanding would entail a destruction of their emergent self concept.

Consciousness is a state of integrated information - is the most coherent definition that I have come across. QM at some stage created physical structure through a process of information integration. When one wavicle interacts with another wavicle, they integrate their information in the form of a resultant wavicle. This is the foundation of consciousness, imo. This being fundamental is present in everything subsequent to it, as it's only basis. Eventually the information density increases to form physical structure ( a fundamental particle ), and continues from there.

How a wavicle is turned into a symbol by neurobiology may be explained by simple neural networks. Have you considered this?

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/can-integrated-information-theory-explain-consciousness/

My point is that life is certainly founded in dissipative structure. Biology pays for its negentropic existence by constructing channels for accelerating the entropification of the universe. — apokrisis

There is so much misinformation and as a result confusion about entropy, when all natural systems are dissipative systems: dissipation is a necessary element of their self organization.

The rate of space creation in the universe is greater than the rate of entropy creation, so as a percentage of the total space, entropy is decreasing. This permits "order", where order is created by self organization, which relies on information integration.

https://www.informationphilosopher.com/introduction/information/entropy-expansion.gif

https://youtu.be/vSgPRj207uE

There is so much misinformation and as a result confusion about entropy, when all natural systems are dissipative systems: dissipation is a necessary element of their self organization. — Pop

Yes. The argument is that open and “far from equilibrium” thermodynamics is the generic case, a closed and gone to equilibrium system is the particular case. The Cosmos itself is a dissipative structure.

But then life adds something further in being able harness dissipative flows to its own advantage. The physicochemical realm self organises to produce entropy. But that flow is often blocked. Sunlight falling on bare rock reflects back into space cooled considerably, but still about 50 degrees C. Life can add itself to that gradient and cool the radiation to 20 degrees on average.

So it makes a small contribution to cosmic dissipation. Yet the slight edge still supports the Gaian splendour of life as we know it.

The rate of space creation in the universe is greater then the rate of entropy creation, so as a percentage of the total space, entropy is decreasing. This permits "order", where order is created by self organization, which relies on information integration. — Pop

The adibiatic account fell out of equilbrium with the electroweak symmetry breaking and left some catching up to do. But Lineweaver paints a nice picture of the balance being restored by the Heat Death when all matter is swept up in evaporating black holes and returned to radiation. The final state is a de Sitter universe composed of its holographic boundaries radiating virtual photons with a temperature within Planck distance of absolute zero.

So all levels of this dissipative structure story can be aligned. The bit I am focused on is how life inserts itself into the story as self interested information as opposed to the disinterested information that is holographically organising the whole show.

The bit I am focused on is how life inserts itself into the story as self interested information as opposed to the disinterested information that is holographically organising the whole show. — apokrisis

"Self organization" inserts life into the scene. Due to the fine tuning of the universe, in select pockets, order arises due to every point in such universal pockets, undertaking a process of self organization.

Hence everything that exists, exists as a self organizing system. And, ultimately we are a self organizing system. We posses a consciousness who's sole function is to integrate information for the purpose of our self organization.

Information integration ( consciousness ), both creates our physical structure, and mental structure ( how we think ). We are not able to perform a function outside the purpose of self organization.

Self organization entails self interest.