[HN Gopher] New research on anesthesia and microtubules gives ne...
___________________________________________________________________
New research on anesthesia and microtubules gives new clues about
consciousness
Author : isaacfrond
Score : 131 points
Date : 2024-09-30 12:34 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.sciencedaily.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.sciencedaily.com)
| isaacfrond wrote:
| original paper:
| https://www.eneuro.org/content/11/8/ENEURO.0291-24.2024
|
| Popular write-up:
| https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a62373322/quantum-t...
| rbanffy wrote:
| This only shows the mechanism that impairs the brain enough for
| it to become unconscious is related to the microtubules.
|
| Absolutely everything in the real world is quantum-related
| because that's the very structure of reality.
| crispyambulance wrote:
| > Absolutely everything in the real world is quantum-related
| because that's the very structure of reality.
|
| Yes but AFAIK, reality is "quantum" in the sense that something
| like the scale of Avogadro's number (N=10^23) quantum processes
| interact and average out to typical classical behavior. It's
| only in limited situations where the actual quantum mechanical
| nature pops up in the macro world, right? (eg Bose-Einstein
| condensate, the ultraviolet catastrophe, energy bands of
| semiconductors, emission spectra, etc).
|
| The idea that Penrose posited is intrinsically HARD to measure.
| Moreover, consciousness itself is not well defined to begin
| with.
|
| If anything, it appears that neural networks are far further
| along than any quantum mechanism for approximating whatever
| "consciousness" actually is? And neural networks are absolutely
| not quantum mechanical.
| tsimionescu wrote:
| > Yes but AFAIK, reality is "quantum" in the sense that
| something like the scale of Avogadro's number (N=10^23)
| quantum processes interact and average out to typical
| classical behavior. It's only in limited situations where the
| actual quantum mechanical nature pops up in the macro world,
| right? (eg Bose-Einstein condensate, the ultraviolet
| catastrophe, energy bands of semiconductors, emission
| spectra, etc).
|
| This is not very clear at the moment. Of course, observations
| make it obvious that classical objects don't behave like
| quantum objects, and all quantum objects we know of are
| small, and all classical objects are big.
|
| We even know of one mechanism that prevents certain quantum
| effects from influencing large systems - decoherence.
| Decoherence explains why, when a quantum system that is all
| in the same phase interacts with a large system where
| everything is out of phase, the various parts of the quantum
| system also quickly go out of phase, and thus can't
| constructively or destructively interfere with each other any
| more. This explains for example why, if you repeat the
| double-slit experiment with ping pong balls instead of atoms,
| or if you repeat it in a dense gas at high temperature, you
| won't see the interference patterns form.
|
| However, we don't understand at a high level why it is that
| quantum experiments only have "a single result". Basically
| the schrodinger equation applied for the double slit
| experiment, even taking decoherence into account, still
| predicts that the particle-wave will move through both slits
| to some extent. And yet, with or without decoherence, we only
| ever see a single photon or tennis ball hit the screen, with
| some probability that can be deduced from the square of the
| amplitude of the Schrodinger function. And even worse, this
| single measurement outcome only happens if the quantum
| particle has hit a classical screen. If instead at the same
| distance we only have other quantum particles, then it can
| actually hit several of them, and change all of their
| positions and momenta. This despite the fact that, of course,
| even the classical wall itself is made of particles which
| should obey the same laws of quantum mechanics.
| tasty_freeze wrote:
| > all quantum objects we know of are small
|
| There are quantum effects that manifest at macroscopic
| scale. For instance, superconductivity and superfluidity
| occur on bulk volumes but are due to quantum effects.
| seanw444 wrote:
| One might even say _emergent_ behaviour.
| danhau wrote:
| > If anything, it appears that neural networks are far
| further along than any quantum mechanism for approximating
| whatever "consciousness" actually is? And neural networks are
| absolutely not quantum mechanical.
|
| I know next to nothing about either, but I wanna try to
| disagree with that.
|
| LLMs fool people into believing they're conscious, because
| they've been trained on extraordinary amounts of thoughts and
| data outputted by the world's top conscious creature. They
| appear conscious because consciousness is in the training
| data.
|
| To me, neural networks more closely mimic the brain in what I
| would (poorly) call ,,bodily functions". I include language
| processing and speech in this definition.
|
| There are people that don't have an inner monologue - which
| is totally fascinating to me - who are perfectly conscious
| like everyone else. Simon Roper, who doesn't, has fascinating
| YouTube videos on these topics.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > There are people that don't have an inner monologue -
|
| I think it's more likely they do and just don't 'hear' it
| or 'verbalize' it.
| mewpmewp2 wrote:
| How are people that do not have inner monologue able to
| write? And if they are capable of writing how does whatever
| they output as writing differ from inner monologue?
| dogprez wrote:
| > If anything, it appears that neural networks are far
| further along than any quantum mechanism for approximating
| whatever "consciousness" actually is? And neural networks are
| absolutely not quantum mechanical.
|
| Neural networks are also way less power efficient. Quantum
| computing allows us to calculate things that would take a lot
| of power or time to calculate (not calculate things that are
| impossible). If one could create consciousness with classical
| physics it wouldn't prove anything about how the human brain
| works. In fact if it was wildly less power efficient it might
| even suggest non-classical physics in the brain.
| Nasrudith wrote:
| Wouldn't the scaling of time be a more reliable tell of
| quantum computing? If humans can marginally solve problems
| with a slower increase over time than conventional
| algorithms that would hint at a quantum algorithm being in
| use. It certainly wouldn't be _faster_ compared to clocked
| silicon, and there would probably be a lot of noise and
| overhead involved.
| aeonik wrote:
| Thermodynamic analysis would actually be a really useful
| way to attack this problem, but unfortunately (though
| fortunately for stability) the brain and our computers are
| no where near the Landauer limit of computation.
|
| I actually wonder if the Landauer limit applies to quantum
| computing.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| The two great miracles of quantum entanglement are:
|
| (1) Solid matter. Solid matter is impossible in classical
| physics but possible in the real world because of
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi%E2%80%93Dirac_statistics
|
| (2) The laser. Unlike 1/2-spin particles that can't be in the
| same quantum state, spin 1 particles want to dogpile in the
| same state
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bose%E2%80%93Einstein_statisti...
|
| ---
|
| I could care less about EPR (real but not so profound) and
| speculations about quantum mechanics in consciousness. My first
| instinct is to think that quantum entanglement around black
| holes is the same kind of woo but I could be wrong about that.
| adrian_b wrote:
| While the behaviors of fermions and of bosons are indeed
| responsible for what you consider miracles, I fail to see
| which is the special relationship between the Fermi-Dirac and
| Bose-Einstein statistics and "quantum entanglement" that you
| have in mind.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Like so. Using the Schrodinger formulation it is invalid to
| talk about two particles having separate wavefunctions like
| ps(x1) and ps(x2) but rather you have a single wavefunction
| written ps(x1,x2) and in the case of Fermions you have
| ps(x1,x2) = -ps(x2,x1) and for Bosons you have ps(x1,x2) =
| ps(x2,x1).
|
| People get confused about EPR because they think the world
| is ps(x1) and ps(x2) when it is really ps(x1,x2).
| adrian_b wrote:
| Having a single wavefunction just corresponds to the
| normal rule for the probabilities of events that are not
| independent.
|
| I still do not see any connection with "quantum
| entanglement".
|
| Quantum entanglement is a very special case of the single
| wavefunction, not frequently encountered at large scales.
|
| In the general case that is valid for almost everything
| around us that single wavefunction differs only slightly
| from the product of many simpler wavefunctions that
| correspond to parts of the environment between which the
| interactions are non-existent or minimal.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| It would be just a probability of the wavefunction were
| real valued. Because it is complex valued it's a lot more
| than a probability, e.g., entanglement is possible.
| n4r9 wrote:
| This looks like it's related to the "Orchestrated objective
| reduction" theory of consciousness [0], which is a brainchild of
| physicist Roger Penrose and an anesthesiologist named Stuart
| Hameroff. After 30 years it continues to have very serious
| problems and is generally rejected by physicists, mathematicians,
| computer scientists, and philosophers.
|
| [0]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_reducti...
| PaulHoule wrote:
| If it wasn't too old to be the case I'd think that article was
| just A.I. Slop or charitably something like technobabble from
| the Sternbach and Okuda era of _Star Trek_. "I can do math
| because I'm a thetan" shows that emotionally true stories can
| beat out factually true stories in science as well as politics.
| halifaxbeard wrote:
| I recently explained my personal beliefs around how you square
| free-will and determinism (and subsequently consciousness) to
| GPT-4 and it told me this was the more formal name for it.
|
| I posited that if you can observe and reconstruct the entire
| state of a complex system then you can predict future states-
| score one for determinism and no free will. But, we know there
| exists places that we cannot directly observe or perceive, aka
| quantum uncertainty, represented by sxsp >= /2 [1].
|
| So based completely in theory, I figure the only way we square
| FW & determinism, is that free will exists somewhere/in a form
| we cannot directly observe, and it manifests as tiny influences
| that add up, in the complex system that is a brain.
|
| This is the way more speculative part and it's more fun than
| anything to think about- it doesn't change the way I live my
| life buuuut-
|
| Folded brains dramatically increase the influence a given
| region in space-time can have, simply due to the increased
| number of neurons. So our brains double as an antenna for some
| unseen influence that manifests through quantum uncertainty.
|
| So when I explained this to ChatGPT it told me that OORT was
| very similar to this, but even the mechanism they use for it
| seems to be a stretch for me.
|
| edit: But I do think that in order for neural networks to
| become anything other than outwardly really really good
| approximations of human minds, there needs to be a way to
| introduce a small amount of genuine randomness into their
| calculations, without utterly breaking them. I could see early
| attempts at doing this causing a form of LLM schizophrenia
| because the neural network wasn't resilient enough to the
| induced error.
|
| [1] the standard deviation of position sx and the standard
| deviation of momentum sp is greater than or equal to half the
| reduced planck's constant
| im3w1l wrote:
| We don't actually know if quantum physics has real randomness
| or not. Quantum collapse is an unsolved problem.
|
| > I could see early attempts at [introducing randomness]
| causing a form of LLM schizophrenia because the neural
| network wasn't resilient enough to the induced error.
|
| 1. This is actually already done. Temperature parameter
| controls amount of randomness.
|
| 2. Neural networks are quite noise resistant.
| Filligree wrote:
| The temperature parameter doesn't introduce any noise into
| the network evaluation.
|
| Typically, what happens is that the network outputs a set
| of possible tokens with different probabilities, and a
| sampler picks from the top possibilities. Temperature
| determines how spiky its pick is; at zero it'll always pick
| the top option.
| ted_dunning wrote:
| You can get to this conclusion more directly by noting that
| computational complexity of any Turing simulator of anything
| more than a trivial system increases very fast as the
| precision of the initial conditions for the simulation
| increases. Even the shift map exhibits this phenomenon.
|
| This can be an even more severe boundary for prediction than
| the actual measurement accuracy.
|
| In the discussion about determinism vs free will, this leaves
| us with the situation that we can predict what somebody will
| do even if we assume perfect measurements, but will only be
| able to produce this prediction after the fact except for
| very short term predictions.
| dist-epoch wrote:
| Stephen Wolfram calls this computational irreducibility.
| bbor wrote:
| Why would "my decisions are determined by sub-nuclear divine
| dice rolls" be any closer to free will than "my decisions are
| determined by algorithms operating on my sensory inputs and
| memories"? What's more "free" about introducing that factor?
| maxerickson wrote:
| What does it matter why you can't predict the future state of
| a brain?
| Bloedcoins wrote:
| If you can't, we have free will. If we can, we don't have
| free will.
| maxerickson wrote:
| I didn't say "whether", I said "why".
|
| At the moment, you can't predict the future state of my
| brain for more than one reason, one of which is that you
| don't have much information about the current state
| (precise information anyway, you may have an opinion
| about the average state).
| r2_pilot wrote:
| >At the moment, you can't predict the future state of my
| brain for more than one reason, one of which is that you
| don't have much information about the current state
|
| Do we not literally predicate our friendships and
| relationships on being able to predict the future states
| of minds? How long do you stay friends with the person
| who randomly shows up or doesn't, to any event you invite
| them to? Or whose tastes vary unpredictably from day to
| day, giving you no framework to contextualize them?
| maxerickson wrote:
| It's always very entertaining to nitpick a statement that
| has a caveat by quoting it without the caveat.
|
| (No it isn't)
| Bloedcoins wrote:
| If why means because there is a real randomness: we have
| free will. If its just because of current complexlity, we
| don't have free will.
|
| It also implies that we might life this life over and
| over forever.
| jerf wrote:
| This is a very common error people make when considering
| "free will". They mix in "predictability" to the concept.
| But predictability is not "free will".
|
| If I give you a choice between a million dollars or a
| painful lingering tortuous death, you will with for-the-
| sake-of-argument 100% choose the million dollars, of your
| own free will. It is no less what you will for the fact
| that anybody can predict it; it is certainly what you
| will. Will you deny that is what you will?
|
| Predictability also brings in a lot of contingency that
| people do not generally realize they are bringing in. If
| the universe is entirely material and there is no
| external reality, then good news! Your actions are
| already unpredictable. No conceivable machine built
| within the real physical universe could possibly fully
| predict your actions; you can prove this with some
| information theory considerations (the amount of
| information your actions leak about your internal state
| is not sufficient to nail down that internal state
| fully). So you have free will! Yet... if the universe is
| entirely material and there is no external reality, the
| universe _may_ still be fully deterministic. Contrary to
| somewhat popular opinion, quantum mechanics is not
| intrinsically nondeterministic. It means you can 't
| determine the outcome of certain events with any process
| we know from the inside, but the entire universe can
| absolutely have some sort of PRNG or something to
| determine everything that is going on and it could all be
| deterministic in ways that still work for QM. In which
| case, oops, no free will for you. So by this definition,
| the question is unanswerable from the inside.
|
| Unpredictability is not free will either. If by some
| amazing, but physically possible, set of circumstances,
| the decision about whether to turn left or right came
| down to one 50/50 outcome decided by a quantum waveform
| collapse, that still doesn't give you "free will" about
| the outcome. You don't get to pick the outcome. It was
| undecided and unpredictable, but it wasn't decided by
| your "will" either.
|
| If you're still not having enough fun yet, suppose
| "quantum" does "solve" free will. _Which_ quantum
| outcomes make the difference? Suppose I build a
| perfectly-feasible quantum device[1] to flip a random
| coin, quantumly. Compare to a supposed quantum decision
| made "in" my "brain". How exactly is it that the latter
| is my "quantum free will" whereas the former is just a
| random decision made out in the universe?
|
| Just labeling a process "quantum" doesn't do anything.
| It's just wordplay in the end, substituting one
| undefinable term for another and calling it progress.
| There's still a _crapton_ of work to show that the
| "quantum" provides the mechanism for "something else" to
| _meaningfully_ interact with the world[2]. My "will" is
| not "randomness". And boy-oh-boy is that "something else"
| a can of worms of its own.
|
| [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwIGnATzBTg
|
| [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41079700
| ruthmarx wrote:
| We have free will in either case. Whether or not our
| choices can be predicated is irrelevant.
| king_magic wrote:
| are we really citing ChatGPT in comments now
| XorNot wrote:
| There is a damn army of people doing this and I have no
| idea what they think they're contributing.
|
| My personal conspiracy theory is it's ground work to set
| conditions for disinformation campaigns: the "I used an
| LLM/I used ChatGPT" people are there to make you look less
| critically at the other comments by giving a small queue
| that since they don't include those terms they just be more
| genuine.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > I have no idea what they think they're contributing.
|
| I assume they are just young and see no harm in sharing
| something they thought was interesting.
|
| This fad will die out eventually since it's redundant and
| provides no real value.
| y-c-o-m-b wrote:
| Sorry, I must be missing something, what's the problem
| here? I don't see OP citing ChatGPT, just that they were
| explaining their own belief system to GPT-4 and it
| responded by "simplifying" OP's beliefs into "orchestrated
| objective reduction". This is exactly the type of usage I
| would expect from an LLM; OP didn't use it to inform their
| decision, but to further examine the belief from another
| perspective or broaden their questioning around it.
| tsimionescu wrote:
| > But, we know there exists places that we cannot directly
| observe or perceive, aka quantum uncertainty, represented by
| sxsp >= /2 [1].
|
| > So based completely in theory, I figure the only way we
| square FW & determinism, is that free will exists
| somewhere/in a form we cannot directly observe, and it
| manifests as tiny influences that add up, in the complex
| system that is a brain.
|
| These two things not only don't follow from each other, the
| first one actually all but refutes the second.
|
| First of all, Heisenberg uncertainty affects all physical
| systems, but clearly not all physical systems are conscious.
|
| Second of all, there is no pattern allowed to exist below
| Heisenberg uncertainty. That is, if you could determine
| exactly the momentum of a particle, the particle could
| literally be anywhere in the universe, with equal
| probability: there is no bias, it wouldn't be more likely to
| be here or there. So this is pure randomness, there is no
| "consciousness signal" you could extract from it.
|
| Or, to put it another way, if our consciousness was a result
| of Heisenberg uncertainty, that would mean it's a purely
| random phenomenon, and every human at every time would be
| exactly as likely to type the next word in this comment,
| start running in a random direction, gouge out one eye, or
| any other thing they are capable of doing. There is, in a
| very fundamental sense, no way to get patterns or intention
| out of Heisenberg uncertainty.
|
| Besides, the best way to square "free will" with determinism
| is Compatibilism. Every human is an automaton whose behavior
| is fully determined by genetic and epigenetic make-up and by
| everything they've ever learned and otherwise experienced. In
| a fundamental sense, my whole life's course was determined
| the moment I was conceived; but still, in any given
| situation, what I will do is different from someone else
| might do, because they have a different history and thus
| different values and biases. There is no magic that allows
| some "fundamental me" to "choose" how some electro-chemical
| processes will fire in my brain, any more than I could
| "choose" to emit electrons from the tips of my fingers. But
| that doesn't mean that I (the adult I am today) would do the
| same things Hitler did if I were somehow catapulted into his
| shoes today.
| n4r9 wrote:
| You've outlined what I reckon is the appeal of "quantum
| consciousness". I personally feel that randomness doesn't
| help to explain free will any more than determinism. I'm more
| inclined to believe that free will (in the strictest sense)
| is an illusion.
| carlmr wrote:
| The problem with this approach is that even if you say that
| our thinking is non-deterministic because of true random
| effects on the quantum level, you still have to explain how
| deterministic calculations on random values make for free
| will.
|
| You still have no influence on it, even if there is
| randomness involved.
| cogman10 wrote:
| You also have to explain why will is changed when the
| brain is damaged.
|
| Really hard to justify free will (IMO) when a person's
| entire personality can be fundamentally altered by a bash
| to the head. What does "free will" mean if everything
| that makes you you can be changed with, say, a lobotomy.
|
| It is, at best, an illusion and nothing more.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| There is no illusion, and brain damage has no bearing on
| free will.
|
| Free will is simply you making a choice, that's it.
|
| If you want to argue about what 'you' means, feel free,
| but it doesn't really change anything here.
| n4r9 wrote:
| What is "choice"? Is it simply executing one of a set of
| possibilities? If you take such a general definition of
| free will, then a slot machine is manifesting it's free
| will to deny you a payout.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| Making a decision either on impulse, intuition, or
| rational preferences.
|
| > Is it simply executing one of a set of possibilities?
| If you take such a general definition of free will, then
| a slot machine is manifesting it's free will to deny you
| a payout.
|
| Sure, or even just a dice. Except that's a rather silly
| definition of free will since it omits the 'will' part,
| i.e. thought.
| The_Colonel wrote:
| > free will (in the strictest sense)
|
| In what sense? Can you produce a strict definition, what is
| "free will", what is "illusion"?
|
| This is a battle of definitions. Pick the definitions you
| like, and you can prove what you set out to prove.
| n4r9 wrote:
| The "strictest sense" is something like:
|
| 1. We have control over our decisions
|
| 2. Our decisions are independent of past events
|
| I agree that this is pretty hand-wavey and open to
| semantics. But I don't think that there is any realistic,
| coherent way to interpret and reconcile the above two
| statements [edit - without resorting to some kind of non-
| physicalism e.g. God, spirit planes... ].
| Filligree wrote:
| Not even a six-year-old would believe #2. It's endlessly
| fascinating that there are people who do, but most people
| realise their past affects their future decisions.
| The_Colonel wrote:
| > We have control over our decisions
|
| That begs the question - what is "me"?
|
| If I take "me" as the configuration of atoms in my brain,
| or simply the information if you will, then "me" is
| determining my future actions, therefore "me" is in
| control of my decisions.
|
| Alternatively, I could define "me" as the whole system -
| the configuration (electrical signals), the hardware
| (brain, neurons), the physics. I think most "free will
| deniers" will say that physics is not part of "me", but I
| disagree - physics is not separable from matter and
| information, physical laws permeate everything, they are
| necessarily part of "me". You don't need any God here,
| this definition is as physical as it gets.
|
| > Our decisions are independent of past events
|
| Doesn't this require essentially random behavior? Sounds
| somewhat absurd ...
| n4r9 wrote:
| > I could define "me" as the whole system - the
| configuration (electrical signals), the hardware (brain,
| neurons), the physics.
|
| I think that's fine. But imagine an outside observer who
| is privy to the current state of the system plus future
| environmental inputs. In principle, that observer is able
| to calculate the system's evolution exactly, and
| therefore predict all future decisions of the person-
| system. For many people this is contrary to the idea of
| free will. For how can something be "free" if it is bound
| by the laws of physics and is known in advance to any
| sufficiently sophisticated observer.
| digging wrote:
| #2 is obviously false - and #1 is obviously true, to me.
| Whether or not you wrote this comment was a decision you
| made. The only way "free will" is even an open question
| is if you can't decide what "you" are.
|
| If you only allow yourself to identify with the highest-
| level, most rational aspects of the decision engine you
| live inside, then that's a mistake which will haunt you
| with questions like "am I really in control?" forever. If
| you identify with a broader sense of your self, it's
| pretty obvious that you are making decisions, for both
| rational and irrational reasons. Your conscious
| experience is part of what it feels like for a human to
| make decisions.
| Spacecosmonaut wrote:
| Randomness just introduces branch points into the linear flow
| of deterministic states. Since you do not control the branch
| points or create them, this does not give you free will.
| MattPalmer1086 wrote:
| Randomness does not give you free will, any more than
| determinism does.
|
| What do you mean by free will?
| lupusreal wrote:
| Exactly. If determinism is incompatible with somebody's
| personal meaning of free will, quantum dice rolls are
| hardly a solution. What they really need is to either find
| a religion or just shrug off philosophy and get on with
| their life, behaving as if they have free will even if they
| can't rationally justify it.
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| Quantum dice roll is _the free will_ in this context. So
| your free will is what sets the dice; as it is
| extraphysical, it will look like randomness in the
| physical world.
| lupusreal wrote:
| That's not quantum physics, that's just some sort of new-
| age religion. A new variation on the "brains are antenna
| for the soul" idea.
| jmcqk6 wrote:
| This is possibly one way to solve it, but I think there is a
| simpler way, following causal chains and the laws of
| thermodynamics.
|
| We clearly have systems that can absorb energy for later use
| - creating a natural "pause" in the causal chain. Each of
| these pauses create a possible future that is not yet
| realized. The longer this energy is held, the larger this
| possibility space becomes.
|
| Free will becomes that ability to hold the pause with
| intention, and then select from the different possible
| futures that have been created.
|
| Determinism does not interfere with this in any way. The
| causal chains all follow the basic deterministic laws of
| physics. There is space for choice created by holding energy
| instead of immediately dissipating it.
|
| No quantum mechanics required at all.
| samatman wrote:
| > _free will exists somewhere /in a form we cannot directly
| observe_
|
| John Conway has a rather neat explanation of this in the
| Strong Free Will Theorem.
|
| https://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200226p.pdf
|
| Being neat doesn't necessarily mean it's correct, but it's
| compatible with what we know about physical reality, and
| solves some otherwise rather tough and paradoxical facts
| about experienced reality, so I'm a fan.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > how you square free-will and determinism (and subsequently
| consciousness)
|
| I've never seen this as an issue. Even if something is fated,
| it's still you making that choice.
|
| You ate whatever you ate for lunch yesterday. It's already
| happened. You still made the choice.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Rejected by other experts who also have no idea how to explain
| consciousness.
| XorNot wrote:
| Your theory having serious problems but no competitors does
| not actually solve the serious problems with it.
|
| If I can't tell you why the sky is blue, it doesn't make your
| theory that it's green more likely to be right.
| morbicer wrote:
| Funny example. There are languages where sky is kinda
| green.
|
| Vietnamese: The word "xanh" can refer to both blue and
| green.
|
| Japanese: Historically, "ao" (Qing ) could refer to both
| blue and green.
|
| Welsh: "Glas" can mean blue, green, or gray
| n4r9 wrote:
| We're talking about people like Marvin Minsky or Hilary
| Putnam, who have made very significant contributions to the
| discourse. And if _Max Tegmark_ thinks your claims are a bit
| too far out, you 've got your work cut out.
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| Marvin Minsky, Tegmark and Putnam have nothing to do with
| neuroscience, and have no authority to speak about the
| nature of consciousness.
| hshshshsvsv wrote:
| Why neuroscience has a monopoly on Consciousness?
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| Because it studies the only known vehicle of
| consciousness - neurons and their networks.
| hshshshsvsv wrote:
| It's not known. It's a belief hold among some scientists.
|
| It also assumes materialisam is true.
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| Ahaha. No, I am a neural network, and I am conscious.
| Destroying my network will destroy my consciousness.
| mtarnovan wrote:
| Not necessarily, there are plenty of rigorously
| documented cases of people being conscious without any
| brain activity.
|
| This article is also pretty interesting: https://www.fron
| tiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.9555...
| dekhn wrote:
| I am not aware of rigorously documented cases of people
| being conscious without any brain activity. Can you point
| me to some?
| hshshshsvsv wrote:
| Are you aware of any documented cases of observing brain
| activity without using consciousness?
| dekhn wrote:
| Yes- that's a widely done thing. In particular, brain
| activity is evaluated using EEG, MRI, reflex response,
| and many other physiological methods.
| hshshshsvsv wrote:
| Consciousness is a primary requirement to see, operate,
| read results from all of that.
| dekhn wrote:
| Stop trolling.
| etiam wrote:
| If that's equivocation as a wisecrack, it's particularly
| unhelpful in discussion about a pseudodiscipline whose
| proponents do no small part of their bullshitting by
| conflating the everyday psychological sense of
| "observation" with the sense of physical measurement.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > It also assumes materialisam is true.
|
| As it should until we have a better theory we can test.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Looking at neurons doesn't explain the plane of
| consciousness.
| tivert wrote:
| > Marvin Minsky, Tegmark and Putnam have nothing to do
| with neuroscience, and have no authority to speak about
| the nature of consciousness.
|
| Oh come on. Computer scientists and physicists are the
| pinnacles of humanity, who can speak with authority on
| absolutely everything, and have status that trumps _every
| other kind_ of expert.
| etiam wrote:
| That's probably mostly fair, but then would you also
| agree that a hand-wavy piece of bloviation about
| purported quantum effects in a ubiquitous cytoskeleton
| component really doesn't have anything to contribute to
| the matter either?
| n4r9 wrote:
| Firstly, I would argue that it is very much in
| philosophy's remit until we can agree on a definition of
| "consciousness".
|
| Secondly, if a misapplication of Godel's Theorem is used
| as evidence for the legitimacy of a hypothesis about
| consciousness, then it is perfectly valid for a
| philosopher to point out that misapplication.
| dekhn wrote:
| Marvin's work in neuroscience, in his own words: https://
| web.mit.edu/dxh/www/marvin/web.media.mit.edu/~minsky...
| He invented a very successful sub-area of microscopy
| specifically to probe brains.
|
| I care about Minksy's opinions in a wide range of science
| since he demonstrated himself as a capable general
| intelligence.
| WhitneyLand wrote:
| The ability to invalidate or critique a solution does not
| require knowing any part of the solution.
| bondarchuk wrote:
| Understanding unconsciousness is quite different from
| understanding consciousness...
| ryandvm wrote:
| Not as long as you only define consciousness as the opposite of
| unconsciousness. /s
| johndunne wrote:
| Can anyone recommend a good book on the subject of microtubules
| and consciousness?
| crispyambulance wrote:
| It's a highly speculative subject, but one source is Roger
| Penrose's book from the early 90's: "The Emperor's New Mind".
| Not sure if that's where the hypothesis originated about
| quantum mechanics and microtubules... I think there's another
| work by Bohm and the guy who invented holograms that predates
| Penrose's thinking (but doesn't mention microtubules).
| kordlessagain wrote:
| Penrose speculated about the source, but was Stuart Hameroff
| that brought the idea it could be the tubules to Penrose's
| attention. Hameroff thought anesthesia nerfed the tubules
| properties, which then caused loss of consciousness.
|
| Then there's the recent articles on how the tubes might be
| able to entangle signals, which was from experimental
| research on meta materials.
|
| I realize all of this is speculative at this point, and
| nobody is trying to say YES this is how it works. It's simply
| exploring one possibility, in a positive way, that allows us
| to think further outside the box.
| johndunne wrote:
| It's a very interesting hypothesis. And I guess research is
| difficult given the size of these structures and lack of
| tools available to monitor them with a high level of
| granularity.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Makes me think of this discussion which is going on right
| now
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41694025
| jugg1es wrote:
| This is all very new science. No one has written the kind of
| book you are talking about yet. There have been theories about
| the quantum nature of of consciousness for a while but the
| microtubule theory is pretty new.
| vixen99 wrote:
| As suggested in another comment: _Shadows of the Mind " by
| Roger Penrose in his chapter _Quantum theory and the brain*.
| bccdee wrote:
| Since it's not a good idea, I'd dispute the idea that there are
| any properly good books about it. It's Roger Penrose's idea,
| though--he calls it "orchestrated objective reduction" [1]--and
| his main book about it is called _Shadows of the Mind._
|
| [1]:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_reducti...
| projektfu wrote:
| "Since we don't know of another (i.e,. classical) way that
| anesthetic binding to microtubules would generally reduce brain
| activity and cause unconsciousness," Wiest says, "this finding
| supports the quantum model of consciousness."
|
| This is an incredible leap of reasoning. Flumazenil binds to GABA
| receptors and blocks diazepam. So since we don't know of another
| (i.e. mechatronic) way that binding to GABA would cause sedation,
| it must be the frobbles.
| jackyinger wrote:
| Yeah, that quote stuck me as well. What an irresponsible way to
| jump to conclusions.
| dist-epoch wrote:
| Like that Venus phosphine gas story, "the only synthesis route
| we know is biological, thus it's presence must mean life if
| there"
| digging wrote:
| > thus it's presence must mean life if there
|
| Nobody said that. It's on you for making the leap, whether
| out of hope or misguided combativeness, to the assertion that
| _it must mean life_ , which I don't recall ever being stated
| by any of the researchers involved or any reputable articles.
| nickpsecurity wrote:
| A quantum leap of reasoning.
| itishappy wrote:
| Discrete conclusions with no continuous path connecting them?
| Apt!
| authorfly wrote:
| Yeah it's abduction/induction over deduction.
|
| Part of the reason why we misunderstand other processes in the
| brain and have since the Lobotomy times enshrined that
| approach.
| InSteady wrote:
| Reading a brief quote given to a journalist and assuming you
| fully understand the scientific reasoning that went into that
| snippet intended for lay audiences is also a remarkable
| assumption. There is an incredible amount of context missing
| from the article, the quote, and of course discussion in this
| thread. But my main issue is that you jump from phrasing in the
| quote, 'supports the model,' to 'must be' which is an
| underhanded way to make the researcher seem ridiculous.
|
| "We can't come up with anything better, and have ruled out
| everything we reasonably can at this point in our inquiry, so
| therefore the findings support the only remaining plausible
| mechanism" is literally how science works a lot of the time.
| It's why the researcher specifically said 'supports the model'
| not 'must be quantum consciousness,' because this researcher
| knows and is implicitly acknolwedging there is a whole lot more
| work to be done.
| Sakos wrote:
| Agree. It's incredibly frustrating seeing takes on science by
| engineers on HN. It's as bad as, if not worse than, the takes
| I see about politics around here.
|
| For context, this is what the paper itself says:
|
| > In order to experimentally assess the contribution of MTs
| as functionally relevant targets of volatile anesthetics, we
| measured latencies to loss of righting reflex (LORR) under 4%
| isoflurane in male rats injected subcutaneously with vehicle
| or 0.75 mg/kg of the brain- penetrant MT-stabilizing drug
| epothilone B (epoB). EpoB-treated rats took an average of 69
| s longer to become unconscious as measured by latency to
| LORR. This was a statistically significant difference
| corresponding to a standardized mean difference (Cohen's d)
| of 1.9, indicating a "large" normalized effect size. The
| effect could not be accounted for by tolerance from repeated
| exposure to isoflurane. Our results suggest that binding of
| the anesthetic gas isoflurane to MTs causes unconsciousness
| and loss of purpose-ful behavior in rats (and presumably
| humans and other animals). This finding is predicted by
| models that posit consciousness as a property of a quantum
| physical state of neural MTs.
|
| > Our study establishes that action on intracellular
| microtubules (MTs) is the mechanism, or one of the
| mechanisms, by which the inhalational anesthetic gas
| isoflurane induces unconsciousness in rats. This finding has
| potential clinical implications for understanding how taxane
| chemotherapy interferes with anesthesia in humans and more
| broadly for avoiding anesthesia failures during surgery. Our
| results are also theoretically important because they provide
| support for MT-based theories of anesthetic action and
| consciousness.
|
| Let me emphasize:
|
| > This finding is predicted by models that posit
| consciousness as a property of a quantum physical state of
| neural MTs.
|
| If people here want to criticize the paper, I want to see
| some citations of passages from the fucking paper, and not
| some hur-dur quote from a popular science article meant to
| convey the paper to a lay audience. But you know, 99% of the
| paper would be indecipherable to most people here, so all we
| get is these surface level takes that wastes everybody's
| time.
|
| The intellectual laziness in these comments is galling.
| pulvinar wrote:
| I'll bite.
|
| This paper doesn't show anything beyond an anesthetic's
| possible effect on microtubules, assuming it's
| reproducible. I see nothing about ruling out other pathways
| that may also affect consciousness. That big leap from MT
| to consciousness is still there, for which there are plenty
| of solid criticisms [0] by other respected scientists.
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_r
| educti...
| RaftPeople wrote:
| > _I see nothing about ruling out other pathways that may
| also affect consciousness._
|
| Especially given how many things are simply not
| understood about the neuron and other cells in the brain.
|
| The discovered complexity continues to expand every year
| and each new discovery (e.g. dynamic tunneling nanotubes
| in vivo) takes a lot of effort to try to figure out the
| impact on computation.
| astrobe_ wrote:
| OP's criticism was useful, because there is indeed a gap
| that needed to be filled and you did just that, thanks.
|
| Conversely it would have been bad to take what the article
| says at face value - that's how you end up believing in
| astrology. Even Nobel prize winners can go terribly wrong,
| after all [1]. But as you said, not everyone has the
| knowledge or time to dig the connection between the two
| statements out of the paper.
|
| I can only suggest to ask questions when one does not
| understand something; sarcasm in particular can backfire
| hard when you're wrong.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_disease
| kurthr wrote:
| I'm all for a rant on how computer science isn't, but this
| attack on only the comments seems a bit over the top. Why
| not attack the posting of the pop-sci article with quotes
| so bad in the first place?
|
| My issue with the ScienceDaily and even the original eNeuro
| article isn't with individual quotes, but with the apparent
| motivated reasoning of the papers. I'm generally aware of
| the field quantum-consciousness, Orch OR, and with
| Penrose's theories. I'm also aware of the
| funding/publishing methods in science and this looks a bit
| weak. The evidence is, we didn't find another mechanism.
| That there had to be corrections on supporting research,
| which included the names of additional funders (Templeton
| Foundation) is also not a wonderful sign (if you know you
| know).
|
| The actual article research covers the effect of epoB on
| tolerance and latency of anesthesia in rats, which support
| the action of isoflurane on microtubules (MT) as at least
| one mechanism. There is a bunch of other stuff about
| quantum consciousness that reads like a review paper.
| Quantum is mentioned 58 times and plays no role in their
| actual measurement or results.
|
| https://www.eneuro.org/content/11/8/ENEURO.0291-24.2024
|
| I actually didn't find the paper that hard to read, it's
| mostly basic science and huge review of Orch OR. I don't
| consider it a big prestigious journal, and I don't
| recognize names on it, but the actual results (limited as
| they are) don't seem outrageous or unsupported. I'm also
| not sure they're that interesting unless you already have a
| fringe theory to support.
| roamerz wrote:
| >> It's incredibly frustrating seeing takes on science by
| engineers on HN.
|
| That's crazy talk. I personally find the various takes on
| topics here on HN valuable and insightful and sometimes
| it's the out of the box thinking that you get when an
| engineer talks about science - especially when it's broken
| down to levels I can start to understand.
| dartharva wrote:
| Your appeal is staunch but your own quotes from the paper
| fail to give a convincing argument for the jump to quantum
| physics.
| vinceguidry wrote:
| The abstract itself didn't assert such a thing. Just that
| it 'lends support' for that explanation.
| mewpmewp2 wrote:
| How does it "support" or "lend support", wouldn't it be
| more correct to say "it doesn't rule out" and which
| likely seems a bit pointless statement so why bring it
| in, in the first place?
|
| Support seems like an active statement kind of like if we
| realize that 2 + 2 != 5 it lends support to 2 + 2 = 6.
| echelon wrote:
| The microtubule "quantum consciousness" hooey has been around
| since the 90's. It was paid lip service in my biochemistry
| and molecular biology classes almost as a joke when covering
| dynamic instability and transport.
|
| While it wouldn't be strictly impossible to test, it's very
| much cut in the same cloth as string theory.
| ljsprague wrote:
| Roger Penrose pushing hooey?
| pas wrote:
| he wouldn't be the first (won't be the last) celebrated
| hard science guy to have very bad takes on human biology
| (and consciousness).
|
| at least they have some kind of falsifiable model:
| https://physicsworld.com/a/quantum-theory-of-
| consciousness-p...
| bccdee wrote:
| > We can't come up with anything better, and have ruled out
| everything we reasonably can at this point in our inquiry, so
| therefore the findings support the only remaining plausible
| mechanism.
|
| No, quite the opposite. As the top-level comment pointed out,
| this is god-of-the-gaps reasoning. If you fail to find
| discrete evidence of consciousness anywhere in the brain, the
| natural conclusion is not "it must be an inscrutable quantum
| phenomenon that we have been unable to investigate thus far."
| The natural conclusion is that consciousness is _simply not a
| discrete phenomenon._
|
| We have zero scientific evidence that a mechanism for
| consciousness is hiding in some part of the brain, waiting to
| be found. Rather, there exists a popular intuitive dualism
| that suggests our own consciousness must be more than an
| emergent neurological phenomenon--that it must be a discrete
| thing caused by an exotic mechanism with non-computable
| properties. Ideas like quantum microtubule consciousness (or
| "orchestrated objective reduction") are the product of
| motivated reasoning: They exist only to keep dualism on life
| support, in the face of adverse evidence.
|
| I don't have a methodological problem with this study in
| particular. If we take quantum microtubule consciousness
| seriously, it's a perfectly good study. But we _shouldn 't_
| take it seriously--it's a ridiculous ad-hoc hypothesis that
| mashes together various cutting-edge fields of science with a
| hefty dose of quantum mysticism in order inject doubt and
| escape the potentially upsetting conclusion that
| consciousness is not a "real" phenomenon in the way that we
| perceive it to be.
| digging wrote:
| Once again, you've converted "this supports [alternate
| theory]" into "it must be [alternate theory]." At least
| address the argument being made instead of a strawman.
| tarsinge wrote:
| > Rather, there exists a popular intuitive dualism that
| suggests our own consciousness must be more than an
| emergent neurological phenomenon
|
| I don't get a challenge of consciousness as something else
| than an emergent neurological phenomenon. The problem is by
| what mechanism does it emerge. Animals without language
| show sign of consciousness (even if more limited form), and
| conversely high level computation does not especially in
| the light of the capabilities of LLMs (computers are
| crushing numbers identically no matter if the matrix
| multiplications are for rendering a scene or LLM inference,
| otherwise it would mean that some arbitrary sequences of
| numbers lead to consciousness like magic formulas). That
| leaves only something physical/biological to explain the
| emerging phenomenon, which is what the research is trying
| to do.
| EnergyAmy wrote:
| Why does high level computation not show signs of
| consciousness? I'm not sure what crushing numbers
| identically has to do with anything.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Kind of like the "God of the Gaps" concept, where anything
| science can't currently explain is taken as proof of the
| existence of God.
| alfiopuglisi wrote:
| It's not so uncommon in science to come to a strange conclusion
| by excluding all "reasonable" alternatives. For example, black
| holes have a similar status: no one has conclusively seen one,
| but we know of no mechanism for matter to support itself beyond
| a certain density, so black hole it is.
| fallingsquirrel wrote:
| Have we not pointed telescopes into space and seen the way
| light bends around a black hole? I guess in a way it's true
| that nobody has conclusively "seen" one (since they don't
| emit light), but by that logic nobody has conclusively seen
| the hole in the middle of a donut either.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > but by that logic nobody has conclusively seen the hole
| in the middle of a donut either.
|
| Not quite..we can see the donut hole very clearly, put
| things through it, measure it, interact with it. We can
| measure and observe and test it however we like.
|
| Not so with a black hole. Yet.
| jawilson2 wrote:
| I guess I don't understand...what is going on here?
| https://eventhorizontelescope.org/
| davorak wrote:
| > It's not so uncommon in science to come to a strange
| conclusion by excluding all "reasonable" alternatives.
|
| That is not what happen in the article, or to my
| understanding in this field of research.
|
| > For example, black holes have a similar status: no one has
| conclusively seen one, but we know of no mechanism for matter
| to support itself beyond a certain density, so black hole it
| is.
|
| Comparing the equation based methods of physics, often called
| a "hard" science, to neurology or biology, often called a a
| "soft" science, is not going to be an apples to apples
| comparison.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > neurology or biology, often called a a "soft" science,
|
| Neurology and biology are absolutely hard sciences, just as
| hard as physics.
| 77pt77 wrote:
| > Neurology and biology are absolutely hard sciences
|
| Sometimes.
|
| > just as hard as physics.
|
| No. Not even close.
| anthk wrote:
| Neurology maybe, specially with the book "The Rhythms of
| The Brain". Still far from pure Physics.
|
| Biology it's more about classification/sorting than Math.
| dekhn wrote:
| No, absolutely not.
|
| (my phd is in biophysics; I've worked across many
| different fields)
| drowsspa wrote:
| This sounds like the whole "we've never seen a species
| evolving". Much like fossils, radioactive dating, geology
| come together to give us a picture of evolution, we have tons
| of real evidence for black holes. But we even have two actual
| pictures now.
| dekhn wrote:
| yes, but in this case, nobody has excluded all the more
| probable alternatives.
| BiteCode_dev wrote:
| "Therefor Zeus must be producing the thunder"
| bbor wrote:
| "Since we don't know of another (i.e,. classical) way that
| anesthetic binding to microtubules would generally reduce brain
| activity and cause unconsciousness," Wiest says, "this finding
| supports the quantum model of consciousness."... "When it becomes
| accepted that the mind is a quantum phenomenon, we will have
| entered a new era in our understanding of what we are," he says.
|
| Wow, that's absurdly biased. Talk about jumping to conclusions!
| Here's the actual paper:
| https://www.eneuro.org/content/11/8/ENEURO.0291-24.2024
|
| Take this summary, for example: Cytoskeletal
| microtubules (MTs) have been considered as a candidate target of
| anesthetic action for over 50 years (Allison and Nunn, 1968; S.
| Hameroff, 1998). Other membrane receptor and ion channel proteins
| were ruled out as possible unitary targets by exhaustive studies
| culminating in Eger et al. (2008). However, MTs (composed of
| tubulin subunits) were not ruled out and remain a candidate for a
| unitary site of anesthetic action.
|
| But if you actually click the paper: The essay
| continues with an examination of the potential contributions of
| specific ligand-gated channels, concluding that one or two such
| channels (e.g., glycine) might play a role, but that present
| evidence suggests that no one channel can explain more than a
| portion of anesthetic-induced immobility. Voltage-gated potassium
| channels seem unable to explain the production of immobility, but
| the voltage-gated sodium channels remain a plausible candidate.
| How inhaled anesthetics act to block this and other sites remains
| a mystery, but some new concepts are proposed.
|
| Sure, it could be microtubules, it's not ruled out by that paper
| - they also don't rule out witchcraft or god or little tiny
| ratmen that run the brain. I don't understand how that absurdly
| misleading citation usage got through peer review; it makes it
| seem like MTs are one of the few remaining answers, which is very
| far from the truth.
|
| The other big paper in the intro is this one from Hammerhoff n
| co: We found that these gases alter collective
| terahertz dipole oscillations in a manner that is correlated with
| their anesthetic potency.
|
| It doesn't take a neuroscientist to see that "anesthetics impede
| one kind of electrical (atom? Quantum?) activity in the brain" is
| far from proving "that activity is essential for consciousness".
| To adapt the old SMBC joke: a bullet would impede terahertz
| dipole oscillations in the brain, too!
|
| I would consider this study -- and today's, really - as
| confirming that we can't say for sure that it's _not_ related to
| microtubules. Which, hey, that's useful science! But the way they
| described it to this science journalist is just intellectually
| disrespectful, and incredibly misleading. IMO, as someone with a
| PhD in DoingMyOwnResearch ;)
|
| They casually drop this then move on never to mention it again,
| which I feel like is a fantastical example of scientific bias via
| burying the lede: Isoflurane directly activates
| sleep-promoting neurons of the hypothalamic ventrolateral
| preoptic nucleus, and this contributes to causing
| unconsciousness.
|
| And this: It is conceivable that binding to MTs
| by volatile anesthetics could impair intracellular transport,
| which might disrupt synaptic transmission, which might reduce
| neural activity generally.
|
| Yeah... yeah that does sound conceivable. "Anesthetics inhibit
| neurons" seems a LOT more likely than "anesthetics inhibit the
| unimaginably tiny + completely unexplained quantum entanglements
| that control neurons".
|
| They then, briefly, repeat my exact criticism from above. Somehow
| this didnt seem important enough for the journalist to quote,
| tho? Namely: Our results are potentially
| consistent with classical models of consciousness, but they
| represent a more stringent test of these MT-based models
|
| Where "test" means "doesn't yet rule out".
| Overall the Orch OR theory, in which MTs mediate anesthetic
| action, has more explanatory power, biological connection, and
| experimental validation than the classical theories.
|
| That is an absurd summary of the available evidence. Just absurd.
| Even if you restrict it just to the papers they cite here.
|
| And then, wow, it ends. I really really want to support these
| folks as a fellow brain/consciousness crank, but they make it
| hard. If you're on the fence on whether they're fairly framing
| the results of this (n=8!!) study or not, just read the last
| sentence: These recent technical developments
| support the hope that "some who are standing here will not taste
| death before they see" conclusive experimental tests of the
| quantum consciousness hypothesis.
| dekhn wrote:
| You're absolutely right to point out all the methological
| errors their chain of thought shows.
|
| Honestly after many years, I've learned it's best to simply
| ignore the entire "brains run on quantum woo" crowd. It's
| unlikely they will be able to conjure up a convincing
| experiment that shows anything stupendous. You will just
| exhaust yourself arguing with folks who want to believe in
| quantum woo.
|
| To me the biggest issue is the obsessive focus on a mechanism;
| instead, any experiments should be focused on demonstrating
| that some QM property is necessary (through association),
| _then_ looking for mechanistic causality.
| lupusreal wrote:
| The whole microtubules hypothesis is based on flimsy reasoning.
| Correct me if I've gotten any of this terribly wrong:
|
| The premise of Godel's incompleteness theorems applying to his
| own brain hurt Penrose's feelings, so he decided there must be a
| way around that. Quantum woo was such a way, a least he believes,
| so he decided that must be what's going on. Later, microtubules
| were determined to be the most plausible quantum woo found in
| brains so far. The reason microtubules being a keystone of
| consciousness is considered in the first place is because people
| are fishing for quantum stuff to protect their egos from the
| implications of brains being having classical computation
| equivalence.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Your first sentence is wrong...
| lupusreal wrote:
| You sure showed me.
| rrock wrote:
| Surprising that anyone still thinks the Penrose model could work.
| Microtubules do not exhibit harmonic motion like violin strings.
| The reason is that all motion at the length scale of cells or
| smaller is heavily overdamped.
|
| The environment within a cell is nonintuitive. To find out more
| about this, read "Life at low Reynolds number" or "Mechanics of
| Motor Proteins and the Cytoskeleton" by Joe Howard.
| vixen99 wrote:
| For Penrose on microtubules see _Shadows of the Mind_ - Quantum
| theory of the Mind.
| fredgrott wrote:
| Warning.......conclusion wrong....microtubyles cannot do quantum
| anything as they do not hold a state long enough to do so due to
| the temp of human body....given that basic fact is questionable
| how such a clear conclusion mistake could be made in such a lab
| based research paper..
|
| Now, no one has asked the question about the field effect outside
| the microtubule, hint its a brief magnetic field perpendicular to
| the microtubule....
| teekert wrote:
| I'm a molecular biologist and this reads like pseudo science to
| me. Be incredibly sceptical whenever you read quantum and
| consciousness in one abstract. It's all Deepak Chopra style
| mysticism.
| tucnak wrote:
| Thank God we have scientists rallying against Wolfram, Penrose,
| et al. It would be great if next-up, you guys actually had the
| guts to challenge your _actual_ peers, who are turning tricks
| of mainstream scientific literature at the highest levels of
| academia. Bread and butter. Western blot party for everyone!
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Penrose is a scientist gone crackpot in the tradition of
| Josephson. His "I can do math because I am a thetan" shtick
| is based on a ridiculous misunderstanding of Godel since
| Godel's theorems don't apply to a piece of wetware which is
| by no means consistent or complete. (e.g. if he does math by
| being a thetan why can't he solve Collatz?)
|
| Wolfram is something else. _A New Kind of Science_ isn 't
| really wrong yet it's not really right. It's sad to see him
| spend decades looking for more systems like Rule 30 and
| finding systems that are similar but not so simple, not so
| pretty, and he never gets an insight out of it that really
| applies to anything else. He's like a crackpot in that he
| works tirelessly on a research program that's unconnected to
| anything else anyone else is working on, however. Maybe that
| comes out of being rich and not having to apply for grants.
| On the other hand, there are major fields of physics, such as
| string theory, which very well be based on a delusion, yet in
| that case it is a shared delusion.
|
| In the pandemic he went on a vainglorious and grandiose quest
| for a "theory of everything" yet he has the good judgement to
| base it on causal networks which I think is one of the best
| grounded approaches to quantum gravity (e.g. given two points
| in space-time aren't they spacelike or timelike or lightlike
| and in the last two cases isn't one of them in the future or
| past of the other?)
| tucnak wrote:
| I'm sure Wolfram is for real; it's just funny how supposed
| scientists would jump out of their trousers to criticise
| him, all the while happily ignoring fraud in their
| immediately field, their own faculties, etc. Talk
| spineless. Then the next big fraud is revealed, and they
| suddenly go back to the usual pikachu face routine.
|
| Surprise!
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Yeah, but talking about grand unification of any kind in
| 2024 seems to be besides the point.
|
| Newton postulated a relationship between physics on Earth
| and the cosmos, specifically that a single theory of
| gravity explains objects falling here and the moon
| orbiting around the Earth, planets going around the Sun,
| etc.
|
| Astronomical measurements show quite clearly that there
| either (1) there is a sector of hidden particles and
| fields responsible for most of the mass of the universe
| or (2) gravity and/or inertia (two sides of the same
| coin?) don't behave the same way at the galaxy scale as
| the solar system scale.
|
| Either way Newton's connection has broken down, so the
| physics we know is not the physics of the real world. The
| microphysics of MOND are baffling; it's not hard to
| imagine some particles and fields that explain dark
| matter but impossible to prove that any of them are for
| real unless we get a breakthrough in experiment that can
| rule some of them out.
| tucnak wrote:
| Thank you, it's always interesting to hear physicists
| talk about this stuff :-)
| teekert wrote:
| You're downvoted but Penrose has really deteriorated
| indeed, he's way out of his field of expertise nowadays.
| It's not science, the people downvoting you are probably
| not scientists and need to think again about who they
| trust.
|
| The original article makes huge leaps from quantum effects
| in Microtubuli to consciousness with no real science in
| between.
|
| Here is a real scientist on this mumbo jumbo [0]. Please
| don't take any of that "medicine should interact with your
| body on a quantum vibration level, a rock can be
| medicine"-crap, which is the category that TFA we are
| discussing falls into.
|
| [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1wqUCATYUA
|
| "My brain tells me my brain is special, and my brain is an
| excellent measurement device of specialness! Now all we
| need is science to prove my brain was right about my brain!
| After all: Quantum mechanics is weird. Consciousness is
| weird. There must be a relation!"
| bbor wrote:
| If you find the time, could you clarify what you mean by
| the "thetan" comment? Isn't that the Scientology demon
| analogue? If you Kagi "penrose thetan" the only real result
| is _this thread_ (the internet is amazing...) and neither
| "thetan" nor "scientolog" appear on his Wikipedia page.
|
| EDIT: I think the comment is discussing this weird take on
| Godel, but I'm not sure on the "thetan" reference, still: h
| ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penrose%E2%80%93Lucas_argument
| teekert wrote:
| Those scandals are an absolute disgrace indeed, but please
| remember it's a very small percentage of scientists involved
| (I hope!).
|
| I have to say it makes me feel bad that as soon as I identify
| as a biologist, I get smacked in the face with western blot
| scandals. My god, the damage these frauds have done to our
| reputation. I'm so sorry for it.
| vixen99 wrote:
| So it's a case of 'Take it from me, I'm an expert and it's
| nonsense' is it? Presumably no one needs to read any further on
| this topic. A relief to many no doubt.
| teekert wrote:
| Basically... yes.
|
| I mean I have an internal model in the making since I started
| my biochemistry bachelor in 1999, I moved through a molecular
| biology master into a biophysics PhD (where I also disrupted
| microtubules to investigate molecular processes of GPCRs),
| then into a professional career as a bioinformatician in the
| genomics field.
|
| And when I read this:
|
| "Wiest and his research team found that when they gave rats a
| drug that binds to microtubules, it took the rats
| significantly longer to fall unconscious under an anesthetic
| gas. The research team's microtubule-binding drug interfered
| with the anesthetic action, thus supporting the idea that the
| anesthetic acts on microtubules to cause unconsciousness."
|
| It certainly sounds probable microtubule disruption would do
| that but there are so insanely many ways that this could be
| explained using classical, non-quantum hypotheses (that need
| testing!), and microtubules serve so many different functions
| in cells, that the quantum theory falls completely outside of
| the possibilities of my internal models. I have no need of
| such an outlandish hypothesis.
|
| Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and this
| paper is not it. Sure there is a small chance I'm going to be
| wrong but Bayes would agree with me it's an exceedingly small
| chance given all priors.
|
| Just the scale difference between microtubules and whatever
| gives our brain that sense of consciousness is so
| unimaginably vast and complex that simple statements such as
| in TFA are really hinting at (feigned for attention?)
| ignorance.
|
| Trust me.
| aeonik wrote:
| I like your take here, but I just want to say, that I'm not
| sure claiming that consciousness has a quantum basia is
| that extraordinary.
|
| We deal with lots of things that are quantum in nature on a
| daily basis. Once you get down to a certain size, it's
| essentially a guarantee, and nature has taken advantage of
| quantum effects before, like photo synthesis.
|
| My take is that there isn't good evidence yet. One result
| doesn't make it.
|
| Once I can plug my brain into a super conscious-net like
| the matrix with technology engineered on top of the theory,
| THAT'S when we have it figured out.
| foundart wrote:
| > Wiest and his research team found that when they gave rats a
| drug that binds to microtubules, it took the rats significantly
| longer to fall unconscious under an anesthetic gas.
|
| This seems to be confounding wakefulness and consciousness.
|
| While we do use the term unconscious to refer to the state
| induced by general anesthesia, and conscious to its opposite, to
| me that is different from and much less interesting than the
| experience of consciousness.
| binarno_sp wrote:
| "If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't
| understand quantum mechanics", Richard Feynman.
|
| Quantum indeterminism is negative free will: if free will is
| based on random events then it's not free will.
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| It is not "negative free will". Quantum Randomness allows us to
| move the force behind the outcomes into non-physical world; you
| can call it soul, if you inclined so.
| Aqueous wrote:
| What's odd about the current moment is that in the very same era
| in which it seems there is conclusive evidence (LLMs) that
| quantum explanations are _not necessary_ to explain at the very
| least linguistic intelligence as advanced linguistic intelligence
| is possible in a purely classical computing domain, there is at
| the same time an insistence elsewhere that consciousness _must_
| be a quantum phenemonon. Frankly I am increasingly skeptical that
| this is the case. LLMs show that intelligence is at least mostly
| algorithmic, and the brain is far too warm and wet for quantum
| effects to dominate. Why should intelligence be purely classical
| but consciousness (another brain phenemenon) be quantum? It lacks
| parsimony.
| mrbgty wrote:
| > it seems there is conclusive evidence (LLMs) that quantum
| explanations are not necessary to explain at the very least
| linguistic intelligence as advanced linguistic intelligence is
| possible in a purely classical computing domain
|
| Any reference explaining this? It isn't clear to me that LLMs
| have proven advanced linguistic intelligence
| xg15 wrote:
| Have you used one?
| Aqueous wrote:
| In just 2-3 years we've gone from primitive LLMs to LLMs
| reaching Graduate PhD-level knowledge and intelligence in
| multiple domains. LLMs can complete almost any code I write
| with high accuracy given sufficient context. I can have a
| naturalistic dialog with an LLM that goes on for hours in
| multiple languages. Frankly (and humblingly, and
| frighteningly) they have already surpassed my own knowledge
| and intelligence in many, probably most, domains. Obviously
| they aren't perfect and make a lot of errors - but so do most
| humans.
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| You are delusional. Each and every LLM (by design) is
| uncapable of having arbitrary long conversation as it has
| finite context window, and hallucinate left and right. But
| that is all irrelevant, as Penroses point is not about
| that.
|
| In fact what Penrose saying is that LLMs are Searles
| Chinese rooms, as they lack qualia, and he offers quantum
| processes as basis for the qualia, however vagues it
| sounds.
|
| So the point is not intelligence, not consciosness; cats
| arguably has less intelligence than LLM, but they clearly
| have emotions and are conscious.
| Aqueous wrote:
| Anyone who thinks LLMs have not come a long way in
| approximating human linguistic capabilities (and
| associated thinking) are in fact, engaging in
| (delusional) wishful thinking regarding human
| exceptionalism.
|
| With respect to consciousness, you are doing nothing more
| than asserting a special domain inside the brain that,
| unlike the rest of the mechanisms of the brain, has
| special "magic" that creates qualia where classical
| mechanisms cannot. You are saying that there is possibly
| a different explanation for intelligence as
| consciousness, when it would be much simpler to say the
| same mechanisms explain both. Furthermore, you have no
| explanation for why this quantum "magic", even if it was
| there, would solve the hard problem of consciousness -
| you are just saying that it does. Why should quanta lend
| themselves anymore to the possibility of subjective
| experience/qualia than classical systems? Finally, a
| brain operates at 98.6deg and we can't even create
| verifiable quantum computing effects at near absolute
| zero, the only place where theory and experiment both
| agree is the place quantum effects start to dominate. The
| burden of proof is on you and Penrose as what you are
| both saying is wildly at odds with both physics,
| experimental and theoretical, and recent advancements in
| computing. Penrose is a very smart guy but I fear on
| these questions he's gone pretty rogue scientifically.
| IWeldMelons wrote:
| Very verbose, could you please tldr?
| jfoster wrote:
| How about starting with a decent objective definition?
|
| So far, there doesn't seem to be any good definitions that
| include humans, don't include ChatGPT, and offer clear boundaries
| on which animals, insects, and bacteria experience
| "consciousness".
| ruthmarx wrote:
| Well, that's because consciousness is an overloaded general
| term, we just need to use more specifics words.
|
| For example:
|
| > there doesn't seem to be any good definitions that include
| humans,
|
| Self-awareness with a theory of mind. The opening paragraph on
| the wiki page for self-awareness is pretty much perfect.
|
| > don't include ChatGPT,
|
| LLMs are not aware in any sense, just intelligent in the same
| way a slime mold or plant can be.
|
| > and offer clear boundaries on which animals, insects, and
| bacteria experience "consciousness".
|
| Bacteria are likely just cellular automata, but animals (which
| includes insects btw) are all sentient due to having the
| ability to sense, due to having at a minimum body self-
| awareness.
| bccdee wrote:
| "Self-awareness with a theory of mind" doesn't account for
| qualia, which IMO are the most important part of
| consciousness discourse. What people mean when they say
| "consciousness" has more to do with a certain ineffable sense
| of _here_ -ness and _me_ -ness that I think is closely tied
| with qualia. If you limit your definition to "self-awareness
| with a theory of mind," I think you're going to mostly talk
| past people who are trying to engage with the so-called "hard
| problem" of consciousness.
| ruthmarx wrote:
| > "Self-awareness with a theory of mind" doesn't account
| for qualia,
|
| Sure it does. "Self-awareness with a theory of mind" has
| sentience, i.e. the ability to process external stimuli via
| senses, as a base prerequisite.
|
| > which IMO are the most important part of consciousness
| discourse.
|
| I've never understood why some people think so. I think
| it's the least interesting. It's basic biological
| machinery.
|
| The only difference between how you, a worm, and in the not
| too distant future a successor to the robot that implements
| the 300 neuron connectome of that same worm experience
| qualia, is that you have self-awareness. You have the
| ability to reflect on your experiences. That's what's
| special and interesting IMO.
|
| > a certain ineffable sense of here-ness and me-ness that I
| think is closely tied with qualia.
|
| I don't think it's tied to qualia at all. I think it's
| basically irrelevant aside from sentience being a necessary
| prerequisite.
|
| The here-ness and me-ness you refer to is a function of
| self-awareness, not qualia. "I think, therefore I am".
|
| > I think you're going to mostly talk past people who are
| trying to engage with the so-called "hard problem" of
| consciousness.
|
| One of the problems in discussing this stuff is agreeing on
| terms so everyone can be sure to understand everyone else's
| point, but personally I don't think the so called "hard
| problem" of consciousness is the _hard_ problem at all.
| bccdee wrote:
| It's remarkable how far consciousness discourse can progress
| without a substantive definition.
|
| The closest we can really get to an objective definition is to
| point at a certain set of feelings relating to the perceived
| "realness" of our sensations. "Consciousness is what makes red
| objects _be red_ to me, rather than my eyes simply informing my
| brain _that_ they emit a certain wavelength of light.
|
| But by putting it so plainly, we raise a much more urgent
| question: Is consciousness even real, or is it just a feeling?
| And I've never heard a satisfactory argument that it is real.
| So I can't help but roll my eyes when I see an article arguing
| that "maybe quantum effects in neuronal microtubules do it." Do
| what? Give you a feeling? You don't need quantum anything for
| that.
| adrian_b wrote:
| The actual research paper:
|
| https://www.eneuro.org/content/11/8/ENEURO.0291-24.2024
|
| The language of the research paper is much better than that of
| the parent article, but it still uses the word "quantum"
| spuriously, without defining what they mean by that.
|
| As others posters have also noticed, the only experimental result
| is a confirmation of the older hypothesis that the microtubules
| must have some role in the normal operation of a neuron and when
| that role is impaired consciousness is lost.
|
| The mechanism of how the microtubules work is determined by
| quantum physics as for anything else of molecular sizes and it is
| neither more quantum nor less quantum than how other cellular
| organelles work.
|
| The research paper appears to use "quantum" with a special
| meaning, which however is not explained clearly. The protein
| molecules that compose a microtubule have various vibrational
| states, like any other molecules.
|
| Normally, the vibrational state of a certain molecule is one of
| the possible vibrational states, chosen at random with a
| probability distribution that is a function of temperature.
|
| What the authors appear to believe is that the vibrational states
| of the microtubules are not random, but many microtubules,
| including from different neurons, might be in the same
| vibrational state.
|
| However any such theory needs to be described with a great amount
| of detail, in order to be falsifiable.
|
| A microtubule is composed from many molecules of proteins, of
| several different kinds of proteins. The different protein
| molecules have different kinds of vibrational states. They do not
| say if in their theory all the protein molecules of a microtubule
| must be in the same state and which will be the correspondence
| between the vibrational states of different protein molecules,
| which cannot be the same.
|
| Normally, any molecule remains in a given vibrational state only
| for an extremely short duration, because at normal temperatures
| it interacts with the neighboring molecules, exchanging energy
| with them and transitioning to a different vibrational state,
| chosen at random.
|
| The paper does not give any explanation about what would prevent
| a microtubule to transition to another vibrational state, or if
| the transitions are acknowledged to happen, what would make any
| other microtubule to transition in the same way.
|
| Even supposing that the vibrational states of distant
| microtubules would somehow be synchronized at a given time
| moment, the paper does not mention any mechanism by which such a
| synchronization could affect in any way the functions of the
| neurons.
|
| So all the references to "quantum" in the paper are just some
| kind of mumbo-jumbo that does not provide any information about
| what they mean by it.
|
| What remains is that the microtubules must indeed have a crucial
| role inside a neuron, which is not yet understood.
|
| The paper itself mentions the most plausible role of the
| microtubules. The microtubules, which are molecular motors
| capable of contraction, are normally used for the transport
| inside a cell of various cell components. They might be involved
| in the transport towards the synapses of the neurotransmitters.
| NotYourLawyer wrote:
| Interesting result, but it seems doubtful that we'll ever
| understand consciousness without some huge new theoretical
| framework.
|
| https://dynomight.net/consciousness/
| mannanj wrote:
| pan psychism tells you a lot about consciousness that our self
| obsessed grandiosity numbs ourselves to seeing.
| fatliverfreddy wrote:
| Shocking
| WhitneyLand wrote:
| I sometimes wonder what's more likely, that a towering intellect
| like Penrose is really advocating such weak conjectures or that
| he's messing with us.
| bondarchuk wrote:
| Fear of mortality is a really strong motivator even for
| towering intellects.
| arde wrote:
| For anyone interested in the phenomenon of consciousness who
| finds this microtubules idea suspiciously impenetrable like I do,
| I suggest to look into the Reticular Activation System in the
| human brain, which acts as its on-off switch and could well be
| its seat too.
| monkeycantype wrote:
| I like the perspective shift that consciousness is the only thing
| that we know, from direct experience is real, the existence of
| the physical world is something we only infer via conscious
| experience. what I like about this is that when trying to
| understand how consciousness arises from matter, we need to keep
| in mind we don't really know what matter is, we only know some
| things about how it behaves, we have a mental model of matter, we
| only know that model. So ideas that seem woo woo nonsense, is a
| rock conscious?, does matter arise from consciousness not the
| other way around, are in-fact no less woo woo than the bold
| assumption that consciousness must arise from matter
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