A Scientific Theory of Consciousness Electromagnetic Radiation as a Binding Agent for the Physiological Substance of Perception
All EM fields are filled by a vast array of undulations which readily superposition while flowing between and in synchrony with atoms, what we know as electromagnetic radiation or light. EM radiation can conceivably constitute the interstitial texture of perception’s substance, so the question then is how to characterize properties of this light energy. Electrons as electromagnetic constituents of massive atoms, the density maximums, and light as textural substantiality between atoms, the density minimum, evince a counterintuitive property known as entanglement. Entanglement is a process by which particle states such as spin in electrons or phase in photons correlate across distances at faster than light speed. It occurs via relatively nonlocal forces that are still poorly understood, which underlie coherence in all its forms, more fundamental than electromagnetism. In relatively diffuse, minimally entropic, or relatively homogeneous material structures such as gases of more or less minimized temperature and simple chemical composition, faster than light entanglement can readily take effect, but very exacting conditions must be generated for the phenomenon to presently be observed in the lab. Under more common circumstances such as the flow of electric current through a compact structure such as a metal, or through an entropic substance such as aqueous solution, or through heterogeneous matter such as an organic body, the nonlocality of coherence is dissipated by the medium’s baseline decoherent state so that rates slower than the speed of light obtain. Coherence among electromagnetic particles of substantial mass thus tends to be mitigated in various degrees by density, a sort of rate bottleneck effect more pronounced the greater the complexity of density contour.
EM radiation, by contrast, is much less massive and does not have nearly the same constraints as electrons or atoms. Congregates of photons can evince statistically significant entanglement correlations across distances of at least 15 km. Light has further properties unique for electromagnetic matter, filling nonvacuum spaces populated by atomic structure as a wave, and much more readily superpositioning into additive structures than atoms, put on full display by the wide range of wavelength combinations associated with the visible spectrum. EM fields are made to undulate as EM radiation when electrons in atoms or electric currents accelerate or decelerate, and most electromagnetic matter does to some extent, so nature is saturated with light. This light interacts with atoms in complex ways that are still rudimentarily understood, but we know for sure that its wavelengths can blend into atoms when energy is complementary. Many photons scatter as they collide with atoms, a phenomenon known as the Compton effect, but light also forms vibrational complexes of atomic nodes within photonic fields. Radiative/molecular superpositions as synchronously vibrating arrays of electromagnetic matter are an excellent candidate for the substance of percepts, and research into the connection between photonics and awareness is showing promise.
In initial analysis of light’s interaction with biological systems, it was discovered that photosynthetic reaction center complexes achieve 100% energy yield from UV radiation because light waves take multiple routes or flow through numerous chlorophyll molecules as they are translated into chemical energy, fully absorbed by a reaction center hub without fail. Chlorophyll arrays are such that EM radiation blends into them like they are a pool of water and photons a bead of this water, conjoining as a coherent energy field. Early research into the response of neurons to light exposed them to the visible and UV spectrum. It was found that this relatively high energy EM radiation affects neural function, but primarily due to the degradation of ion channels and additional structures, reducing synaptic efficiency. Subsequent examination has proved more auspicious, however.
A long-standing hypothesis about the source of consciousness, Roger Penrose and Stuart Hameroff’s Orch-Or (orchestrated-objective reduction) theory, proposes that microtubules are compact enough in the brain to produce a wide array of pulsing superpositions responsible for awareness. The model has faced criticisms from scientists who claim the brain is too hot and wet to support coherence of this kind, but recent experiments have aimed to assess whether light induces a coherent energy field in microtubules where molecular structure alone cannot.
Microtubules contain light-sensitive amino acids such as tryptophan, and the absorption of UV light was recently tested. A solution of microtubule fragments exposed to UV light was proven conducive to remote energy transfer between component tryptophan molecules. Anesthetics inhibited the phenomenon, hinting at a link with consciousness. Combining this data with a model of tryptophan positioning inside intact microtubules suggested that the amino acid can mediate a coherent energy field spanning the microtubule’s entire length, ranging to 50 micrometers. The only source of UV light in a typical cell was hypothesized as perhaps the oxidation reactions of mitochondria, so it is doubtful these wavelengths have much of a functional role in the brain, but it becomes increasingly apparent that light superpositions and entangles among relatively large molecular structures to produce coherent energy fields in a wide range of circumstances. So the question is whether some alternative light source exists within the brain to cause an expansive energy coherence.
An obvious option for endogenous light in the brain is infrared radiation, which saturates physiological structures while constantly absorbed and emitted by rotating and vibrating atomic bonds. The capacity of the infrared spectrum to transmit through aqueous solution quickly diminishes as this radiation’s wavelength increases from 1-10 micrometers, but plenty of circumstantial evidence ties the thermal energy of molecular motion instigated by infrared radiation, better known as temperature, to brain function. Brain tissue temperatures have been measured to exceed those of the blood by 0.5-0.6 degrees Celsius in various mammals. In rats, temperature of the hippocampus increases 1.5-38 degrees Celsius when actively exploring. In male finches, temperature of brain tissue increases during variance in song tempo. Feeding and social interaction produce rapid, unique, and relatively long-lasting brain temperature elevations, occurring faster and with greater magnitude than those of the arterial blood supply. In humans, somatosensory cortex temperature increases during nerve stimulation, and likewise for motor cortex and bodily movement. Many brain regions such as the substantia nigra alter their activity when temperature is varied. Rise in temperature of neuronal pathways is generally associated with sensory stimuli, and correlations between temperature and data obtained on resting potential, action potential, nerve conduction velocity and synaptic transmission are well-established. Anesthesia lowers brain temperature, a sign that infrared radiation may be linked to conscious awareness. The total brain varies in temperature by 1-3 degrees Celsius in some animal models. The correlation is obvious, but whether temperature contributes some function or is merely a byproduct remains uncertain. Indications exist, however, that neurons may be tailored for the purpose of sustaining the brain’s infrared spectrum at robust levels. A rapid spike in temperature of two degrees microCelsius occurs during action potentials, hinting at general connection between nerve firing and a boost to the infrared spectrum. So if we hypothesize that neurons are designed to expand the quantity of infrared light while regulating its local behavior, how might this mechanism work?
Assuming the coherence flow model is accurate, as it certainly seems to be, lengthwise signals are transmitted through a neuron as electric currents which attain a relativistically significant percentage of light speed, so the mass of this rapidly moving matter increases. Experiments in the first half of the 20th century suggested that relativistic mass has an underlying physical cause, while many modern approaches incline to view relativistic mass as a conceptual tool to be dispensed with at will. Debate rages, but regardless of the real source for theoretical mass increase when transitioning to high velocity states, some empirically based conclusions of a rather simple nature can be drawn insofar as light emission correlates with relativistic momentum in electrons. We know from technological applications that matter moving at relativistic speeds emits higher energy (frequency), shorter wavelength EM radiation while it decelerates, and lower energy, longer wavelength radiation while it accelerates. For instance, when a beam of electrons traveling at half the speed of light collides with a metal plate in an x-ray machine, it emits high energy braking radiation in the x-ray portion of the spectrum, and accelerating current in a radio antenna emits low energy radio waves. Essentially, if an accelerating coherence current is almost instantaneously compressed as it alternates, EM waves will be emitted proportional to speed, total size, and perhaps lesser overall density of the current (in addition to waves at further spectral ranges), and if a decelerating coherence current is likewise compressed, EM waves are emitted in proportion to speed, size, and perhaps greater density of the current segment that is decelerating. So if current acceleration is sustained in a neuron, the spectrum of EM radiation will be prone to lengthen, and the reverse is true for decelerating current, with the quantity of radiation increasing in both cases.
During an action potential, electric current accelerates between a node of Ranvier and adjacent juxtaparanodes, while gradually decelerating as it traverses internodal space. If this current alternates multiple times between juxtaparanodes following an action potential while changing velocity it might be possible to generate a photonic field. But it is unclear how sustained this field would be between action potentials or whether biochemistry is diverse enough in the axon, a structure probably tailored for long-range signaling at the expense of complex intracellular machinery, to generate a photonic/molecular field comprised of rich assortments of wavelength. Additionally, myelin encasing the axon would likely tend to reflect this radiation, preventing it from exacting multicellular effects.
At the synaptic junction, current accelerates from single positive ion concentrations (Na+ and K+) at the last node in the action potential chain to lesser electron density of Ca2+ concentrations near the axon terminal. Current would also accelerate from the first node in a dendrite to its upstream tip, on the opposite side of a synapse. In order for acceleration to be sustained, Ca2+ would have to cycle into and out of a neuron at rapid rates, continuously drawing energy away from nodes with a replenishing supply of lower electron density ions. Indications are that ions travel through ion channels via quantum mechanisms, again at approximately 90% light speed, so the cycle might be near-instantaneous enough to hold acceleration stable. But at present, more research into neuron anatomy near the synaptic junction is necessary before this hypothesis can be corroborated or refuted.
It seems more feasible at this stage to postulate a model for current acceleration in
the soma. A tapering from more to less positive ion concentration is maintained between the largest quantity of Na+ channels and ions in a neuron at the axon hillock and relatively expansive space of the soma with its lesser rate of Na+ and K+ reuptake. This tapering ranges all the way to cellular space near the dendrite/soma junctions, where Cl- channels and ions maintain a much higher electron density. Cl- influx during an IPSP blocks EPSPs from propagating into the soma, followed by some Cl- reuptake and an accompanying diminution of the IPSP. When the IPSP wanes, the ebb effect of EPSPs can draw greater electron density around the base of dendrites out of more interior regions of the soma. This is likely combined with a renewal of Cl- influx such that electron density increases slightly while simultaneously breaching the positive ion gradient. Once this greater electron density reaches the axon hillock’s sphere of influence, extending well into the soma, it accelerates rapidly towards the axon hillock. Upon reaching the axon hillock, a companion EM field fluctuation triggers large quantities of Na+ to rush in, sustaining acceleration from the opposite side due to greatly reduced electron density even as the relatively negative charge initiated at the dendrite/soma junction reaches a minimum due to dilution. As Na+ ions again diffuse into the soma, the gradient of positive charge is replenished, and though the overall strength and influence of positive charge lessens in the soma, Cl- concentrations increase and regain a maximum, driving acceleration from the opposite side.
To summarize:
At the dendrite/soma junctions:
1.Cl- influx, concentration and electron density maximum
2.Cl- concentration and electron density attenuation
3.The ebb effect force of dendritic potentials followed by resumption of Cl- influx
4.Electron density from Cl- concentration at a minimum, with continued influx
Instigated by the axon hillock:
1.Na+ concentration attenuation
2.Greater Na+ concentration attenuation
3.Na+ concentration minimum
4.Na+ influx and concentration maximum
Thus, a flux of Cl- concentration maximum to minimum coupled with Na+ concentration minimum to maximum conceivably maintains a constant acceleration of electric current through the soma. As in the case of possible current acceleration around the synaptic junction, this model needs empirical verification.
So if current continuously accelerates at the synaptic junction and within the soma, what would be the properties of emitted EM radiation? Applying the nascent but plausible concept of relativistic current presented in this paper, neural currents have no circuit to stabilize their velocity as in electrical wiring, so if charge is constant they would probably initiate at the same rate as baseline agitation from decoherence and decelerate due to the ebb effect. EM wavelengths produced then hover at around 1 micrometer, slightly longer than the boundary between visible and near-infrared portions of the spectrum. This correlates to the electromagnetic domain just beyond the level of emergence associated with an individual atom’s valence shell and the roughly 400-700 nm range of EM wavelengths, in essence multiatomic vibration while a robustly decoherent state prevails. In this theory, if electric current does indeed accelerate at the synapse and through the soma, this would add slightly longer wavelengths to the spectrum. It seems reasonable as a very approximate hypothesis that the spectrum could range from at least 1-10 micrometers in wavelength. This spectrum is capable of traveling through aqueous solution at distances of roughly 100 millimeters to 10 micrometers, with range shrinking considerably as wavelength increases. The soma is about 12 cubic micrometers and the synaptic space 1 cubic micrometer, with the currents themselves probably equivalent in volume, so it seems plausible that a persistent field of photonic waves can inundate both. Boosted by maximal reflection from white matter, grey matter may be filled with a substantive light spectrum capable of interacting with molecular arrays and biochemical pathways to form a diversely superpositioned photonic field studded with a wide range of atomic and multiatomic nodes.
Where atoms and molecules involved in the generation of percepts might be most concentrated remains unknown, but protoplasmic astrocytes which are commonly adjacent to the soma and thus have access to hypothesized light fields, with a cytoplasm relatively uncluttered by organelles such as the nucleus, are a good candidate, of course in addition to grey matter itself, the soma as well as junctions at which axons and dendrites form synaptic connections. Mounting evidence from studies with paramecia, yeast, onion roots, even crustaceans substantiates the hypothesis that biophotons of low intensity travel through cell membranes, affecting functions such as energy production and growth in populations of cells, even when separated by a sizable barrier such as the walls of a glass cuvette. A range of wavelengths seem to interact with biochemistry, and all kinds of cellular structures including those of neurons could be built around biophotonic mechanisms.
An exception to the general link between brain hyperthermia and awareness is the visual cortex, where it has been observed with fMRI that tissue temperature decreases by 0.2 degrees Celsius during activation of the neural processing involved. Some uncertainty exists as to the accuracy of these results, but if valid this suggests molecular structures may exist in some parts of the brain to shift the EM radiation spectrum towards shorter wavelengths such as visible light that are less likely to dissipate as the heat of vibrating and rotating chemical bonds. It is intriguing to consider that centers of vision in the brain, probably correlated with the phenomenality of image perception, might generate a light field comparable to the one upon which vertebrate optical mechanisms are based.
Some further categories of mechanism in addition to basic current acceleration seem likely for how spectrums of EM radiation may thicken and assume functional form in the nervous system and brain. Visible, near-infrared, mid-infrared radiation and perhaps beyond of course must interact with molecules in such a way that wavelengths are modified into a wide variety of vibrational signatures, with all of this dispersing into the sink of somewhat increased temperature during activation as baseline decoherence continually reasserts itself. The electric currents themselves may also rapidly decelerate upon contact with molecular structures to cause braking radiation, shortened EM wavelengths of relatively low intensity. Whether these processes occur in non-neuronal cells as a result of ion channel activity and additional mechanisms is an interesting topic, barely broached. So how then might this basic substrate of structural integration in the brain, nervous system and perhaps the wider body give rise to awareness’s percepts, the substance of perception?
Implications of the Coherence Field Concept for Understanding Percepts as a Physical Phenomenon
In the coherence field model we have thus far formulated, a supervenient EM field drives and orchestrates the behavior of biochemical pathways in the brain, but EM radiation within this material framework is the binding agent which flows around with effective instantaneity to integrate molecular arrays, cells and tissues at trillions of locations as the vibrational structure of perception. Details of how percepts would form in this manner are undoubtedly complex and, if upheld by further evidence, probably warrant decades of research. But if these theories are accurate, it could provide for some very simple ways to define features of mind in terms of matter.
This model views percepts, to the extent they arise from electromagnetic properties of tissue, as the emergent organization of atomic nodes within photonic fields, numerous and diverse regions of coherent energy most fundamentally characterized by vibration. The brain is unique because electric currents likely found in all cells are so strong and compact in this organ that a robust EM field is generated which can coordinate the magnetic particles in large swaths of tissue as an individual unit. The brain is thus much more synchronized than the rest of the body. If the hypothesis proves valid, this mechanistic chassis of electrical energy is saturated by EM radiation of a primarily infrared spectral range which interacts with molecules to produce the structural components of mind, insofar as they arise from the brain, as a variably dense physical field.
Most of our basic sentience - sound, touch, taste, smell, visceral sensations, in essence feel - would essentially be vibrational textures in matter with their shapes, rates of oscillation and locations determining the quality of experience. Input from specialized sensory apparatuses in eye, ear, olfactory, gustatory and tactile cells superimposes on fundamentally cognitive textures to render our environment a crisp perceptual world.
Image sensation might be a modification of EM wavelengths within the textural field such that light in the visible range is produced, so that optical inspection and image imagination coevolved into complementary forms. This would explain how we visualize much of what our eyesight takes in without optical stimulation. Visual stream of consciousness is then a complex of visible light and specially adapted cellular structures, while the verbal stream would probably be infrared light and still different biomolecules and cells, together a range of emergent textures induced by the brain and perhaps the wider body. All of this sentience and stream of consciousness converges to constitute the foundational substrate of emotion and thought.
Memory would derive from interaction of this coherent energy field with neural architecture, accounting for how recall cannot be easily pinpointed to any particular process in the brain or body, for it is linked to the interface between field and circuitry at an intracellular level we have not yet penetrated in theory. The relative role of circuitry versus intracellular biochemistry in memory, synaptic as opposed to intrinsic plasticity, is still the subject of contention, but some form of amalgamation is undoubtedly in play, and the brain’s matter is as photonic and fieldlike as it is molecular. Neural circuitry is built into intricately emergent structures so that synthetic and logiclike insights are possible, the environment “making sense” via a background of more or less abstract interrelationships rather than just starkly presenting. The self can be defined as a collection of functions that monitor one’s own circuitry and coherence field of radiative/molecular percepts.
The question of how a coherence field of awareness projects beyond the body can be raised. It must be remembered that coherence is not fundamentally electromagnetic, physiological, or local in the Newtonian sense, and under suitable conditions causality can propagate faster than light. It might be possible for similar mechanisms to those which manifest within the brain and body to conjure beyond physiology, as a hybrid of standing and traveling waves within a medium of infrared light, visible light and perhaps more energy sources, all interspersed by atomic and molecular nodes with which this energy more or less synchronously vibrates. If an experiment can entangle photons at 3 trillion m/s across a distance of 15 km, any material structure which manipulates the underlying coherence responsible for such entanglement should be capable of similar influence, and the brain could be such a material structure. The coherence field concept may eventually explain why we do not perceive the field of awareness as entirely within our own heads or bodies despite the fact that neural and cellular architecture is required to comprise an organic mind.
Though an EM radiation hypothesis for how matter binds into the substance of perception hangs together well based on what we currently know of physics, it has also been proposed that LFP-based fine structure of the electric field may be the source of percepts. Any region of this field is of course composed of numerous superpositioned frequencies which can be decomposed by a Fourier transform in similarity to EM radiation, producing the familiar EEG readouts. The question is whether this reaches enough complexity to be a sole seat of perception.
As an example, we can estimate the maximum intricacy of an electric field consciousness. If we assume percepts are superpositions delimited by phase-locking, of which the basic unit is some constitutive portion of an LFP, the most complex and differentiated consciousness possible for a human would plausibly consist in neural networks of on average a hundred phase-locked neurons each, blending into both a background of slower waves and some kind of roving, semi-stable density of relatively homogeneous frequency that temporarily immingles with a variety of more local oscillations to produce experiential awareness. If phase-locking determines the boundaries of a percept, and the brain contains approximately 80 billion neurons making 100 trillion connections, each neuron would contribute to on average around 1,250 different percepts at most. This hypothetical consciousness would support 800 million simultaneous percepts and 1 trillion percepts total. But human olfaction detects more than a trillion scents, and this is one of our least acute sensory modalities, in addition to being localized within small portions of the brain. The range of variation in sounds and images far exceeds olfaction. Overall oscillation patterns within one of these minimum phase-locked assemblies may involve a continuum of relativities rather than simply being a steady state, on or off phenomenon, doing double duty in the formation of multiple percepts, so within any particular neural network the spectrum of percepts might be much greater, though level of differentiation must at some point prove discrete, constrained by an LFP’s degrees of freedom. We must also consider that much of the brain may not be sufficiently phased for producing emergent organization conducive to percepts of this type, so the possible quantity of percepts would likely be much less than maximum. Of course pending further research, room for doubt exists as to whether an LFP-based model alone is capable of accounting for the full gamut of percepts.
It is also uncertain how an LFP-based model can explain the nonlocality of consciousness. At this point remote perception is fairly well-established, since it has been demonstrated scientifically that humans can communicate, locate archaeological sites etc. through extrasensory observation. Science is making rapid progress in its capacity to model faster than light entanglement between photonic fields, an action at a distance which is canonical to quantum physics. We presently have no reason to suspect remote perception is mediated by LFPs and emergent flow shapes induced in the brain’s electric field beyond the entanglement dynamics of EM radiation they contain.
If we add EM radiation to the electric field model, this massively increases the diversity available to perceptual mechanisms, from maximums of roughly a few trillion superpositioning LFP subunits to at least hundreds of trillions of possible locations where photonic fields, variously superpositioned on scales resembling spectra in the external environment, can cohere with atoms and molecules to assume functional form. These photonic fields which would radiate with effective instantaneity in the brain may get locked in as emergent structure during neural activation, with the signature of this light modulation mechanism being temperature variation. To the extent that a region of the brain is especially saturated by synchronizing mechanisms such as phase-locking, as seems to be the case in processes of experiential awareness, the effects of photonic fields would simultaneously become more pervading. The LFP-based model and photonics model are thus complementary, for if research proves that EM radiation plays a functional role, this is simply an intrinsic aspect of the electric field’s fine structure as it oscillates and flows.
The mechanism by which brain matter contributes to forming the substance of percepts is proposed by this paper as starting with a sustained acceleration of electric current between centers of ion concentration, modifying the spectrum of EM radiation (primarily infrared and more rarely visible light) while increasing its quantity. This proceeds to modulation via a cascade of light/molecular interactions, ending in temperature increase when decoherence thermally dissipates the additional energy as biochemical vibration and infrared radiation. If current acceleration is steady enough, the electromagnetic energy that results can maintain intracellular coherence fields, and likely also intercellular coherence fields due to transmission of EM radiation through cell membranes. But this mechanism might preclude coherence fields spread through complexes of axons because myelin reflects any infrared or visible radiation from intracellular currents back into the neuron.
An alternate mechanism not discussed with much depth in this paper is the manipulating of molecular arrays through EM field permutations that can originate from electric and ionic currents. Modified vibration of molecules might then induce a separate route to cascades of modulated light/molecular interaction, also thermally dissipating as biochemical vibration and infrared radiation due to decoherence. The range at which this mechanism can modulate a coherence field depends on the density and location of affected atoms and molecules, but could conceivably transcend limitation that myelin imposes on axons and adjacent extracellular space because of transmembrane influence, perhaps expanding the perceptual field to brain matter in its entirety. Further effects along these lines are probably transmitted at approximately light speed via emergent electric wave oscillations and flows spread through macroscopic portions of the brain, synchronously morphing LFP/neural complexes, current-field patterns and the coherence fields of cellular structure in a top-down way to enact larger scale perceptual integration.
A third possibility is that so-called nonlocal properties of the brain’s coherence field facilitate entanglements via EM radiation and through this route modulate cascades of light/molecular interaction. Mechanisms of this type could pervade the brain, exacting an extremely holistic effect upon electromagnetism, with the vibrational and radiative consequences being at this stage unknown and fairly unpredictable. We cannot rule out the potential for modification of EM radiation and molecular vibrations into much different forms than would be predicted in association with electric currents or LFPs.