Stuart Hameroff. Quantum Consciousness.

[Maddogkull]

http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/views.html

Has anyone ever heard of this guy? How microtubules might have quantum effects. He was stating this might explain why during anaesthesia why we don’t remember anything, is because of how the microtubules processing in the neurons sort of shut down. I do not understand his theory full. Hopefully someone on here knows more. BTW he is an anaesthesiologist.

[Nostradamus]

I took a look at this material and my initial thoughts are that the ideas are based on the information being encoded in quantum states rather than as chemical changes or electrical potentials. Basically, quantum effects are things where we see that energy comes out in fixed 'lumps'. Common items that use quantum effects are lasers and MRIs. The laser shines with one 'color' of light. Each 'lump' of energy comes out the same.

Apparently, the idea here is that effects that are observed because energy moves from place to place in fixed 'lumps' are important in consciousness. It also appears that so far all of this is conjecture and not a theory.

[NinjaPuppy]

For me, once the word "quantum" comes into play, y'all start sounding like Charlie Brown's teacher to me.

Here is an appropriate YouTube video to accompany my comment:

[Nostradamus]

Not sure if it is true, but there seem to be no peer reviewed articles on this. That means that no one appears to be doing experiments to verify this.

[Maddogkull]

He has challenged a lot of skeptics Either way, to go to a atheist convention and present a model to say consciousness exists after death, and then challenge every question a skeptic lays on him, gives me the greatest respect for his work.

[ciscop]

[Nostradamus]

[Maddogkull]

I know but his credentials are amazing. Do you know how much schooling it takes to be an anaesthesiologist? Way more then any B.A degree or masters. You have to e extremely good in chemistry and math and also biology. This guy is smart. Just goes to show you if you’re a scientist dosen't mean you have to be an atheist.

[Nostradamus]

It is my understanding that most scientists are not atheists. On a separate issue, being smart in some ways does not mean being smart in all ways. What stands out though is that no papers have been published on this idea. I'd like to know if even poster presentations have been done on this subject matter.

[NucleicAcid]

I think Stuart Hameroff's work is profound and will hopefully pave the way for a new understanding of consciousness. I love this stuff. However, I don't think microtubules are the only cellular structure that engages in quantum coherence. (Teacher: wah woh wah wooh wahh wohhh)

- They've already shown enzymes of photosynthesis and electron transport chain show some sort of quantum coherence. (wah waah woohh wahh)

I think that electronic resonance of the neurotransmitters Serotonin and Dopamine in the active site of their respective receptors plays a big role in Quantum Consciousness, and could explain where psi information transference can slip into the brain. It's also the most likely place for free will (I mean, where else would it occur? Apart from signal transduction and some random occurrence due to brownian motion, the brain is basically deterministic. Wahh wooh wah wuh. Naturalists already argue there is no free will.). I have a theory that free will is actually a form of micro-PK on your brain. Or rather, consciousness and matter interact in a non-trivial way, with some information transfer between the two modalities.

As for the no peer review/no way of experimenting this, aside from psi experiments, there is no way to test for consciousness. We can test the mechanism (see above), but we can't test the consciousness. Empirically, there is no difference between a and a person with consciousness. This has led some (idiot) skeptics (no one on this forum, I'm not calling names at anyone here ) to conclude that subjective consciousness doesn't actually exist. Clearly, they're wrong, to me at least. I can't prove to any of you guys I'm experience subjective consciousness, but I know I am. Reductionists HATE these sort paradoxes. I revel in them, because I think this train of thought is going to go down the road that it'll make it so that psi is seen as a necessary consequence of consciousness, just how entanglement arose as a necessary consequence of Quantum Mechanics, and was later demonstrated to be true.

Otherwise, we're all meat computers, there is no free will, the universe is a pointless accidental quantum bloop (technically the occurrence of a virtual particle in a 0-dimensional space due to uncertainty, resulting in an energetic feedback loop that instantaneously created all the matter and energy in the universe, along with the spatial dimensions), there is no meaning of life, I'm only here right now because these are the only conditions that favored life, evolution, and sentience, and there isn't any point to anything, ever. Did I mention there isn't a point to anything under the reductionist paradigm?

[absinthe_minded]

I made a video outlining Hameroff's theory of consciousness and then critiquing it, here it is if anyone wants to take a look: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krIo9uSnuu8

[Paradox]

I don't think consciousness itself has anything to do with the quantum level of 'reality'. Quantum theory already shows that matter is mostly made up of empty space just like the insides of most atoms are made up of mostly empty space. Everything that our consciousness perceives as 'real' is made up of quantum particles and waves. Consciouness is forced to function through the limitations of a brain-mind which consists of a conscious and subconscious. According to this grid theory of consciousness to prevent information overload all universal information would penetrate into the subconscious part of the brain but through some type of information filter barrier programmed by the i-ther would seperate the subconscious and conscious part of the brain. This way only the reality meant to be experienced through our absract senses would be experienced by our i-theric mind through the conscious part of our brain. Perhaps this explains why any psi phenomena could occur as well such as in the case of telepathy or mediumship. A leak in the information filter barrier itself. Perhaps this also explains the common 'life reviews' reported by many people with near death experiences. Information of everything that has ever happened is stored in the i-theric grid.

I think Ron Pearson's grid theory of the supermind of outerspace may have some truth in it. Information of everything that is happening in the entire universe is already available to this 'supermind' aka God. Quantum entanglement experiments already show that quantum waves can react to a change faster than light speed. Information then (telepathy, thought, etc) could move almost instantaneously (near infinite speed) as well. If consiousness was required to create matter (all matter is made of quantum waves/particles) then consciouness would have to precede the existance of anything quantum related. Consciouness would then have to exist on an even deeper level than that of the quantum level. Perhaps this so-called dark energy believed responsible for the increased acceleration of the universe is really the intelligent aether or i-ther (short for the latter). Perhaps the 'big bang' was really put in motion for the sole purpose by the supermind made up of this (supposed) subquantum level of reality known as i-ther aka dark energy to create the matter systems which our brain-minds perceive as reality. A disembodied single consciouness aka supermind/god consisting of this i-ther would have pre-existed the big bang. Just a thought.