Dear Edwin,

I enjoyed reading your essay, courageously and mindfully challenging the mainstream dogmas. To your worldview, I have some questions. First, assuming it is correct, what or who may be responsible for the laws of nature, which are such highly specific things? Since your 'mind field' is just a part of nature, it cannot be responsible for the whole, can it? If it still can, what would be the difference between that mind field and transcendental Creator? I am giving you a high score. Your comments to my essay are very welcome.

All the best,

Alexey Burov.

    Hi Alexey Burov,

    The problem with Cartesian dualism, as you note, is the lack of interaction between material and mental. For a number of reasons I concluded that consciousness is best represented as a field, but it was only when I asked myself how the field interacts with my material body that I could start investigating possibilities. For example should the field interact with mass, with charge, or with some undiscovered attribute? Is the field undiscovered, or is it simply that this attribute of a known field was never imagined or tested. Local or universal?

    You discuss a young man who "takes it on faith that all that is called discovery is, in the end, just chemistry of his brain..." In other words, it is devalued upfront, a mere 'hiccup' in the atoms. After reading this I looked up my JBS Haldane quote to give you, then read to the end of the paragraph where you present the quote! However, I don't believe you quoted CS Lewis, so here goes:

    "Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning."

    [Having finished your paper, I see that you reference CS Lewis, but I don't believe you quoted him.] Anyway, you certainly put your finger on a big part of the problem. Meaninglessness is meaningless. As always, yer pays yer money and yer takes yer cherce, but who would choose meaninglessness? You label it "cognitive suicide", and you are right. Even people who claim to believe in such sterility, do not live as if they believe it.

    You claim that "every error should leave the thinker a possibility of correction." As you know, I discuss errors that have propagated through GR and QM for 100 years. The problem (for a young man) is that correcting such errors offends all those heavily invested in the errors [unknowingly, until you spill the beans] and this is not career enhancing. (Probably why the most productive people I know in this matter are retired.)

    You mentioned that Thomas Nagel pins his hopes on panpsychicism. Chalmers is agnostic but states "panpsychicism is not as unreasonable as is often supposed, and there is no knockdown argument against it."

    You ask, "if my 'mind field' is just a part of nature, it cannot be responsible for the whole, can it?" That depends on how far the field can be pushed, and I have pushed quite far [far beyond what an essay or short comments can relate.] However to be accepted, certain current interpretations [due to repeated errors] must be cleared up, so that is where my current efforts lie.

    Thanks for your excellent essay; very impressive.

    Edwin Eugene Klingman

    Quote

    The diagram shows the

    transformation of measurement data into best feature vectors, and the dynamical processes that produce

    eigenvalues, generally taken as representative of the object system. Feature extraction based on distances

    obtained from numbers is constructed from physical structures that can function as gates, implementing

    logic operations, which can be combined to count to produce integers and to add to produce distance

    maps and then compare distance maps to get difference maps (gradients) from measurements. The nature

    of the process of making math maps is thus rooted in the physical universe.

    end of quote

    A question your last sentence raises. Do you think that the processing generalized mathematical mappings mirrors reality? Seriously ?

    You are implying that the math mappings themselves are closedly linked to reality. Is this with respect to eignvalues and eignvectors ?

    Or do you mean maps in a more general sense ?

      Edwin,

      Thanks again. With you, I have a special option to discuss very delicate questions. One of those: I cannot agree with Chalmers that "panpsychicism is not as unreasonable as is often supposed, and there is no knockdown argument against it." The key question is one we stressed in our criticism of Thomas Nagel: "However, were mentality but a part of nature, by what means could this part be responsible for the laws of the whole? In what way could it install and maintain them through the Big Bang and up to now? Nagel does not see that such a powerful and unshakable authority over nature implies the transcendence of this power." Apparently, Chalmers does not see that either.

      Cheers,

      AB.

      Ha! Someone does read the endnotes!

      Thanks Andrew.

      The problem I addressed was how a robot, making raw data measurements, could build a theory of physics. It would begin with no preconceptions or categories ['baggage' in Tegmark's terminology] it would have eyes, force sensors, effectors (to kick a rock, say, and track it) but would not recognize any particular aspect of reality.

      I showed that, given realistic distributions of numbers (raw data such as reflectance or illumination, but derivatives also, such as velocity or acceleration) the measurement numbers, (in the plane at left) can be clustered via 'inter-set' and 'intra-set' distances [described in my reference 5] which reduce the N numbers to n clusters. Then a minimum-error Karhunen-Loeve or a maximum-entropy mapping can reduce the n features to m 'best' features, where m is less than n. This yields a feature vector or 'eigenvector', which is "generally taken to be representative of the system."

      I made no assumptions other than that the measurement numbers were not uniformly distributed (which would defeat the 'clustering' operations.)

      The robot, his sensors and effectors and computers that process the numbers, were real, the measured phenomena were assumed real, so every aspect of the system was rooted in the physical universe. I taught the robot how to treat the measurement numbers, but I did not teach it categories, features, etc. These are derived automatically by the process I describe. Of course if one limits oneself to, say, atomic spectra, then the 'eigenvectors' will be more easily mapped to our current concepts, but the process works with any measurements, including those randomly (but repeatedly) performed.

      Yes, the mappings represent reality. They don't represent it as well as thousands of conscious physicists, working over generations and building on previous work, can represent reality, but, for a stupid robot, they yield a primordial "theory" of physics.

      Thanks for reading the endnotes and asking excellent questions.

      My best regards,

      Edwin Eugene Klingman

      Alexey/Lev,

      Chalmers is not a physicist, I don't recall what Nagel is. As a physicist I began with a Self-interaction Principle, from which the operative laws [Newton, Klein-Gordon, etc.] are derived. It is the 'Master law' that generates the laws you are concerned about. But we have terminology issues. In my terminology "mentality" is consciousness plus the logic circuits [typically the brain]. This is not what is responsible for the laws of the whole. The self-interaction of the field does not "install and maintain them", it just self-interacts, at all scales.

      Best regards,

      Edwin Eugene Klingman

      Klingman throughout the essay seems to hold a regularist point of view about the nature of physical law that we share. For instance:

      "Math maps projected on the physical territory form the substance of physics.

      I have awareness of only one physical universe, but I have many maps of the universe, and I use experience of the physical universe to qualify the maps."

        Dear Rudolfo Gambini,

        Thank you for reading and commenting on my essay.

        You discuss an event ontology and the possibility that events in the brain can be accessed physically in a third person sense, but also mentally in a first-person sense as perceptions. Is this 'mental' access occasioned by the neural network itself, or by physical field, or what? As you know, I postulate a physical field that possesses the attribute of awareness: awareness of itself (hence Yang-Mills type non-linearity) and awareness of momentum/energy density. This postulate actually takes one quite far in a physical world that includes consciousness and intelligence in myriad entities.

        As you note, I am 'regularist' in the sense that I believe we project structure onto regularities of nature. The 'necessitarian' interprets the structural projections in terms of 'laws' governing system evolution, despite that QM is only a statistical bookkeeping system that depends from the evident universality of the partition function.

        One would think that the underdetermination that is obvious from the existence of five or more 'interpretations' of quantum mechanics, would give pause to Quantum Credo-ists, but this is met head-on with "shut up and calculate". As a means of solving specific problems, this may be good advice. As a means of determining ontological reality, not so good.

        You note that in a universe that is life-friendly and phenomenic in character one can always find purpose in its inhabitants, and this may imply "a universe capable of observing itself". With a consciousness field it is almost a foregone conclusion that local observations of self will evolve. If, instead, only a possibility exists that life and neural networks will evolve, given sufficient time, the possibility would also seem to exist that such would never happen, leading to absurdity and nihilism.

        Best regards,

        Edwin Eugene Klingman

        Edwin,

        If you have not already done so, I recommend that you read the essay by Ronald Racicot.

        Best Regards and Good Luck,

        Gary Simpson

          Ed

          Underlying this work is the implicit realist credo of separate observer holding a (more or less) accurate reflection of the actual external reality. No doubt this has worked well to effect technology and we may like to extend this scope to the big ontological questions posed by the essay theme. However, consensus we have not and the divide between fact and opinion bears witness to something more. In this important work you allude to the properties of the mind essential to extending the correlation of experience and maps to the ontological scope. Thank you.

          Vik

          P.S. I note no mention here of Rupert Sheldrake's Morphic Resonance theory.

            Vik,

            The best essays cannot be fully appreciated in one reading. In response to your enthusiastic appreciation of my essay, I have re-read your own, and realized again that yours is a masterpiece. Thank you for reading my essay, but thanks most for writing your own. I felt that our essays support each other on my first reading; I'm glad you feel the same. You have picked worthwhile goals for your retirement.

            My best wishes for you,

            Edwin Eugene Klingman

            Gary, Thanks. I shall read Racicot's essay. Edwin Eugene Klingman

            Did enjoy your essay from the dissident side, Edwin... It must be that great minds think alike...or else de gustibus non disputandum... Anything that gets my mind in gear is worthwhile.

            My comments on your ideas follows:

            ...The Darwinian Credo holds that consciousness emerges from increasing complexity. .......

            My essay did not deal with consciousness...the perception of a goal seemed to be less important than separating physical/material from immaterial causes.

            ...The essential belief of Darwin: complexity grows until, presto-chango - dead matter becomes aware.....

            ...If consciousness emerges from physical reality, one should explain how

            ....Despite the Darwinian assumption that consciousness arises from mindless matter .....there is absolutely no factual proof of this.

            ....belief that we can obtain physical reality from math symbolism. It doesn't work that way.

            All these violate the axiom of sufficient causality.... Nothing in the effect that is not potentially in the cause. Modern materialists are asking us to believe in their secular miracle.. deaf and dumb objects self-organize -by physical means - and achieve a state of being (alive) impossible to explain with the capability of the starting matter

            Transubstantiation of math: Mindful purpose from mindless math?

            Aha - a religious code word and well-placed here. Immaterial entity assumes the appearance of matter

            Do numbers exist or have meaning without mind?

            Mind doesn't use number in abstracting reality, but uses the existential concept of 'oneness', 'twoness'.... to classify reality by categories. This explains how the same objects can be one or more, as in 1 family but 2 persons - husband and wife.

            .....Quantum mechanics is useful and correct yet some key interpretations of quantum mechanics are in error,

            QM has strong support in a realist philosophy. The variational principles of Lagrange and Maupertuis give physical matter the ability to determine the actual path of an object between two points by finding the extremal path among all possible ones, using the Lagrange action integral. How does the mindless particle sniff out the real path based on a math model ? How does the math abstraction of reality produce the correct result? It's as if there were a invisible intelligence instantly considering all possible paths and immediately selecting the one that makes the action max or min!

            The realist school says that this IS what happens, however improbable to materialist sensibilities ; an immaterial program(the substantial form of the object) performs the math operations(which are themselves immaterial) instantly. This occurs for the motion of all objects, in the universe, at all times. The visible result of this immaterial control....the laws of physics!

            Another QM enigma is the double slit..... how does a photon wave/electron particle know the past history of testing, so that the same diffraction pattern is always produced(but in different sequences) ? ...Seems to be an immaterial memory. Hmm.

            How do entangled particles communicate info immediately when measured?....Seems like it travels at infinite speed...as if the info is under immaterial control!

            The facts of QM are valid; interpretation is misguided/incomplete.

            If you introduced realism/scholasticism into your epistemology...you would benefit...as would others.

            Feynman noted, "no one understands quantum mechanics"

            No philosophy of materialism does!

            Dirac's equation implies particle speed of 1.732c , greater than the speed of light. !!

            An interesting new fact...Why has this been suppressed in the textbooks?

            Standard Model and General Relativity parameters that must be put in 'by hand' form links in a narrative chain, linking basic principles to observed data.

            Standard model has 19 tunable variables ; the lambda CDM model has 12 fixed or independent parameters.

            "Give me enough parameters and a suitable function of them and I will model the world."

            Encounter a new anomaly?? No problem - just add another parameter. Physics is now reduced to curve fitting.

            the mind projects mathematical structure onto physical reality.

            A form of Idealism

            Re Godel's theorem - proves that no axiomatic system is complete; there are always unproven assumptions. BUT: the theorem is itself based on unproven assertions ...which means the incompleteness theorem itself is logically incomplete! ...and could be inconsistent.

            The proof by contradiction is another stumper. Assume the opposite of what you want to prove is true

            Then prove that the premise leads to a contradiction, implying the premise thought to be T is F. Again, syllogistic argumentation declares as invalid and argument based on false premises...

            It all seems related to the impossibility of (human) logical certainty, possibly related to Russell's analysis of self-referencing statements...like "There's no absolute truth".

            Physics has the Heisenberg uncertainty principle; does math logic have an uncertainty principle too?

            Experiment-based practice is preferred to speculation-based theorizing

            The crux of the scientific method...more observed today in the breach than in its execution.

            ....any errors in general relativity and quantum theory that have been repeated for 100 years are now viewed as truth. Hence the Quantum Credo is generally treated as religious truth, not subject to argument.

            Objective comparison of modern science with religious dogmatic beliefs reveals that science is governed by subjective ideology; students of both are held to rigorous belief in unquestioned authority...(actually, less true in religion than science).

            After learning hundreds of times the various quantum narratives, inconsistent and conflicting as they may be, the mind accepts the quantum narratives, errors and all.

            Like Nazi propaganda? The first step is to separate quantum facts from quantum theories...

            Survival-wise, it's too expensive to question every new data point when one already 'knows' the 'truth'.

            Birth of ideology and intransigence??

            Darwinian evolution of function leading to consciousness and purpose is compatible with this model of neural architecture as learning network...

            ? The insufficiency of matter to perform higher order immaterial operations will always derail any form of Darwinian evilution.

            Thus pathways in the brain, learned from interfacing to the physical world, 'map' the territory, and the mind, represented here by the consciousness field, reads the dynamic local map.

            I like the metaphor of map and territory...as if the mind were exploring new areas.

            Realism would say that sensory images from the neural network are interpreted by the mind , using past images(maps) stored in memory, creating new images(maps) if needed.

            the math is a formal byproduct, having nothing to do with giving rise to awareness, volition, or purpose.

            Math is the immaterial abstraction of quantity; abstraction of qualities/attributes/characteristics requires intellect and will.

            I have awareness of only one physical universe, but I have many maps of the universe, and I use experience of the physical universe to qualify the maps.

            The mind contains many possible worlds. The senses report images of the real world to the mind; when the sense images match the mental constructs , then voila!....logical truth!

            All the best,

            Robert

              Hello Edwin,

              Thank you for a stimulating essay. Let me see how close I can come to understanding your main ideas. In my interpretation of what you have to say, the consciousness field is a primordial reality. A single universal consciousness field is prior to separate and distinct individual consciousnesses. The later are perhaps derivative from the universal consciousness field, or perhaps they are mistaken representations of the consciousness field. I am not quite clear about that. The physical world is, like the consciousness field, a primordial reality. It is hard to know what physical reality in itself is like. What we think of as physical theories, such as quantum theory, are not physical reality itself, but maps of parts of physical reality. Mathematical structures are not inherent in physical reality, but are projected onto physical reality by consciousness. So, asking how mindless mathematics gives rise to mental intentions and purposes is to ask the question from the wrong direction. Mathematics does not produce mind. Rather, mind produces mathematics and projects some of mathematics onto nature. I hope that this is at least somewhat close to what you are saying.

              Laurence Hitterdale

                Hi Laurence,

                Why write a nine page essay when you captured it so well in a paragraph?

                Yes, I postulate the consciousness field as primordial, embodying the attributes of consciousness: awareness plus volition. The field in and of itself, while physical, would seem to harbor nothing but a vague self-awareness, certainly no 'thoughts' or logic. After investigating possible dynamics, I've concluded that the most feasible interaction with matter is through sensing momentum density, and applying force to matter in motion. With this simple capability dead rocks remain dead rocks; the field is effectively unaware of dead matter. But the myriad flows inside living cells are sensed by the local field and potentially 'guided'. Thus, while extensive awareness of the details of molecular biology of the cell, embryo-genesis, and the immune system convince many that evolution is exceedingly unlikely to produce life as we know it, the locally self-aware 'organism-plus-field' has a thumb on the scales, so to speak. Thoughts and memories, etc are bound to the brain, but awareness of thinking, and of all else we associate with consciousness is effectively attributed to the field, which 'reads' the dynamic 'map' of reality that is the brain.

                By the time neural nets, with inherent logic ability and pattern recognition ability, have evolved, the local field, always aware of Now, is coupled to flows which are coupled through sense organs to the environment, and hence the field, inherently self-aware, is aware of the local individual and his/her environment. The awareness is associated with the field, but the intelligence (thinking) depends on the logical network the field is coupled to, and specifically to the 'paths' that have been learned by the brain through repetition. There are far more details supporting this theory than can be included in a comment, and the essay had to deal with so many other issues. A key detail is that momentum density stimulates or enhances the field, essentially inducing greater self-awareness, thus associating the local field with the local brain, so that the effect is an individual conscious of himself, and 'anchoring' the enhanced local field density to the same individual over time.

                There are un-countable 'aware' organisms on earth, from gnats to mankind. This would argue that, if consciousness 'emerges' from matter, it must be a fairly simple phenomenon, since it's everywhere. But sophisticated searches for such "minimal mechanisms" have come up empty. A primordial field solves this problem, and also means that consciousness is inherent in the universe, not an artifact or an after-thought. And it jives with the experience of consciousness reported by many thousands of individuals, as related in the essay.

                Thanks for a close reading and an excellent summarization.

                My best regards

                Edwin Eugene Klingman

                Dear Robert Bennett,

                Clearly it got your mind in gear, which is the best part of these FQXi contests.

                Thanks for your extended comment. I will study the various ideas you've put forth here, but won't try to respond point by point. Between our essays and our extensive comments to each other, we know that our ideas are pretty simpatico. I very much enjoyed reading your essay and interacting with you.

                Best regards

                Edwin Eugene Klingman

                Dear Edwin,

                Good to meet again here on FQXi.

                Congratulations with your essay. I was certainly touched by the LSD quotes you mentioned because in my student time (1968) I also experienced these reality insight intensivating and changing realities.

                It is as you mention : "The observer feels GRAVITY", but trying to explain gravity is just another thing. I did not reach the explanation either, but one thing is true it is part of our "REALITY"

                You mention :"Maps from fundamental particles to self-aware humans are too complex for us to distinguish abstraction from physical reality." This bottom-up approach is very usefull just to try to understand the essence of our reality, but not to find the essence of consciousness.

                My approach is the search for a theory of REALITY, is a try to add a fourth "belief system", another "mental onstruct projected onto reality" (like math).

                The Darwinian approach that consciousness arises from mindless matter is not mine, it reminds me of searching for the announcer in a radio. I agree with what you are calling the consciousness field, the radio is just an agent able to receive and reform it into awareness. However I am trying to find the transmittor...

                So dear Edwin, I hope that you will find some time to read/comment and rate my essay "The Purpose of Life".

                For the real good understanding of the working of our minds I rated you an 8.

                best regards

                Wilhelmus

                  Dear Wilhelmus de Wilde,

                  It's been obvious for years that you are extremely focused on consciousness, so I'm not surprised.

                  I very much like "searching for the announcer in the radio".

                  When I first read your essay I started to give you 10, but everyone I pushed to the top so they would receive more visibility immediately got shot down by whatever troll lurks beneath the FQXi bridge biting passersby with 1's.

                  Also, I wanted more time to digest the meaning of your essay. While I think your scheme is magnificent, I was unsure how literally you meant it. For me experience of physical reality is key, but current projections of structure on physical reality are confused at best. Essays on consciousness seek to gain 'respectability' (the coin of the realm) by tying their systems to physics (the holy word of the realm). If the physics is mistaken (as much today is) it can take a perfectly good understanding of metaphysics in the wrong direction.

                  You work your way through various physical concepts and introduce 'limits', the speed of light and Planck time and length, then concede that Planck units do not exist in reality as we experience it. I would instead choose the speed of light and Planck's minimum interaction, h, both of which do exist. The Planck time and length are derived units, which, as you say, are unreal. My argument is for a physical continuum, not captured by mathematics, but closely approximated.

                  So I see the Planck Wall as a mathematical projection, having no physical reality. [In fact, you compare it to an abstract mathematical structure: Hilbert space.] You then construct an abstract 'space' called Total Simultaneity, based on the conception of Eternal Now Moments. I tend to view our universe as existing in one ENM, and all local consciousness partakes of this Now.

                  I do not buy the Copenhagen interpretation (or any other current interpretation) of quantum mechanics so I don't see observers as 'collapsing' a superposition of wave functions, and "creating" reality. QM is a statistical theory that describes averages when particles with always-associated-wave properties experience different paths. The idea that they experience this all-at-once as a superposition of probabilities is a projection I do not buy into. As I said in my essay: the statistics work, it is the interpretations that are in error. As you note, most experiments have been performed with photons, not particles, and certain aspects of photons have been unclear since Planck. I will not be able to resolve these in the comments. Nevertheless, I do not accept 'retrogression' as an acceptable way around built-in errors. Neither is this the place to argue entanglement. For more info, see:

                  The Nature of Quantum Gravity

                  Spin: Newton, Maxwell, Einstein, Dirac, Bell

                  I do believe in a physically real universe, but GR and QM have confused the issue via erroneous projections that are (at the moment) given credence. The universe will not simply vanish when these errors are corrected, but certain mystical and unphysical conceptions will vanish.

                  In short, I think you've developed a powerful way of describing the experience of local conscious beings in a unified reality existing Now. I think you should not try to tie it too closely to mystical elements of current physics which will not survive the century. Hopefully, not the next decade. As metaphor I buy your beautiful system. As physics I do not buy it. Clearly, over the sequence of FQXi essays, you are getting closer to the truth. I am sure you will continue to do so. By the way, I chose your figure 1 as the cover for my first book on consciousness, Gene Man's World, ISBN-13:978-0979176555.

                  My very best regards; keep up the excellent work.

                  Edwin Eugene Klingman

                  Dear Dr. Klingman,

                  I read your essay with great interest. This has some similarities with my essay, 'No Ghost in the Machine,' but also some important differences.

                  Similarities: Brain as learning neural network

                  Differences: While you see LSD-induced altered consciousness as an insight into an underlying "consciousness field", I see dreams as an insight into an agent-generating virtual reality construction that constitutes consciousness. No special field is needed, and I suggest that a similar structure may be implemented in an electronic system (although this has yet to be demonstrated). Also, I do not see any need for a quantum basis for consciousness.

                  I would be interested in your comments on my essay.

                  Alan Kadin

                    Dear Alan Kadin,

                    We have, in past essays, agreed in general but differed in the details. For example, the wave aspect of fundamental particles reflects internal rotating vector fields while the external motion follows classical particle trajectories. Entanglement is rejected.

                    Similarly, we do not believe mind and consciousness to be related to quantum effects on the atomic level. [Or 'large' molecules, such as micro-tubules.]

                    You discuss consciousness and intelligence, but is not clear to me that you define them exactly as I do. The key point is that you find it feasible that consciousness is a virtual reality simulation, rising from biological neural nets, perhaps from the dynamics of classical nonlinear systems.

                    I believe that we have enough similarity in our theories of fundamental particles and associated physics, and in molecular biology of the cell and neural networks that I do understand your model. I've designed robotic systems and hold robot patents and I've thought for decades on the issues involved, and I'm simply unable to believe that mechanisms become aware through added complexity. Of course, given awareness, they become more 'intelligent' with increased neural capabilities. It is an enticing narrative for reductionist thinking, but not susceptible to proof. Therefore it is truly a choice. You choose to believe that evolved structures lead to self-awareness. I do not believe this. AI has been hyped since ELIZA in the 60s or 70s and we're still no closer as far as I can tell. Like quantum computing, AI will fund endless papers, while robots will become increasingly effective for working in controlled environments, but "emulating" consciousness does not yield consciousness. Nor do I conceive of an agent-generating virtual-reality structure that "constitutes consciousness". I believe these are projections and extrapolations. You believe no field is needed. As neither of us can demonstrate proof of concept, it remains personal choice as to what's deemed more feasible.

                    I fully agree with you there is no need for a quantum basis for consciousness. If by this you are referring to Penrose, Hameroff, et al. If you are referring to my 'qubit model' in my endnotes, my primary reason for including that was to demonstrate how easy it is to project qubits onto physical reality, potentially obscuring everything but the 'two states'. It really has nothing to do with explaining consciousness. Finally, as I propose a real physical field, not an immaterial field, I too avoid the "ghost in the machine".

                    Thanks for reading my essay and commenting. I always enjoy reading yours.

                    Edwin Eugene Klingman