Massimo on consciousness: no illusion, but also no spookiness

Massimo Pigliucci has a good article on consciousness at Aeon.  In it, he takes aim both at illusionists as well as those who claim consciousness is outside the purview of science.  Although I'd say he's more worked up about the illusionists. However, rather than taking the typical path of strawmanning the claim, he deals with … Continue reading Massimo on consciousness: no illusion, but also no spookiness →

Is entanglement decoherence from the outside, and decoherence entanglement from the inside?

A recent tweet by Sean Carroll has me thinking. https://twitter.com/seanmcarroll/status/1204128666273271808 Quantum decoherence is said to occur when a particular quantum system becomes entangled with its environment, that is to say, as information about the quantum system spreads throughout the environment, that system undergoes at least an apparent wave function collapse.  It stops behaving like a … Continue reading Is entanglement decoherence from the outside, and decoherence entanglement from the inside? →

The information generation theory of consciousness

James of Seattle called my attention to an interesting paper in the Neuroscience of Consciousness journal: Information generation as a functional basis of consciousness: Drawing upon empirical research into consciousness, we propose a hypothesis that a function of consciousness is to internally generate counterfactual representations detached from the current sensory events. Interactions with generated representations … Continue reading The information generation theory of consciousness →

Recommendation: Silver (Inverted Frontier Book 2)

I just finished reading Linda Nagata's new book, Silver, which is the second book of her new Inverted Frontier series.  It's a sequel to the first book, Edges, which I recommended earlier this year, and Memory, which I described and recommended a few weeks ago.  Characters from both books feature heavily in the new story. … Continue reading Recommendation: Silver (Inverted Frontier Book 2) →

Conscious visual perception happens in the frontal lobes

(warning: neuroscience weeds) Okay, switching back to the other major debate in neuroscience: whether conscious perception happens in the back or front of the brain.  A new study presents evidence that seems to bolster the frontal view: Neural Correlates of the Conscious Perception of Visual Location Lie Outside Visual Cortex (warning: paywall): When perception differs … Continue reading Conscious visual perception happens in the frontal lobes →