Introducing the brain: a consciousness region? (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, May 27, 2021, 21:02 (1274 days ago) @ David Turell

A wacky materialistic approach:

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/372/6545/911?utm_campaign=toc_sci-mag_2021-05-27...

"A comprehensive and agreed-upon theory of consciousness is necessary to answer the question of which systems—biologically evolved or artificially designed—experience anything and to define the ethical boundaries of our actions toward them. The research projects described here will hopefully point the way and indicate whether some of today's major theories hold water or not.

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"So far, several theories of consciousness are being evaluated in this manner to test competing explanations for where and when neural activity gives rise to subjective experience.

"The global neuronal workspace theory (GNWT) (4) claims that consciousness is instantiated by the global broadcasting and amplification of information across an interconnected network of prefrontal-parietal areas and many high-level sensory cortical areas. The sensory areas carry out different functions that range from feature processing to object or word recognition. Information in those sensory areas is processed in encapsulated modules, remaining unconscious. The frontal-parietal networks support integrative and executive functions, including selective attention and working memory. According to the GNWT, a stimulus must be attended to trigger activity that helps distribute this sensory information to many parts of the brain for further processing and report. It is this global broadcasting across many modules of specialized subsystems that constitutes consciousness. Conversely, the integrated information theory (IIT) (5) holds that consciousness should be understood in terms of cause-effect “power” that reflects the amount of maximally irreducible integrated information generated by certain neuronal architectures. On the basis of mathematical and neuroanatomical considerations, the IIT holds that the posterior cortex is ideally situated for generating a maximum of integrated information. In this theory, consciousness is not input-output information processing but the intrinsic ability or power of a neuronal network to influence itself. That is, the neuronal substrate of consciousness perpetuates itself for as long as the experience exists. The more cause-effect power a system has, the more conscious it is. For the IIT, the content of an experience is a structure of causes and effects (integrated information), whereas for the GNWT, it is a message that is broadcast globally.

"Another controversy occurs between first-order and higher-order theories of consciousness. The former claims that reverberating activity in sensory areas suffices for consciousness, whereas the latter claims that a second, higher-order brain state must represent or “point at” these first-order sensory activations for them to be consciously experienced.

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"With this series of adversarial collaborations, neuroscientists will get closer to understanding consciousness and how it fits into the physical world while improving scientific practices along the way. As for the initial theories undergoing this approach, it may be that neither the GNWT nor the IIT are quite correct. No matter the outcome, the field can use the results to make progress in framing new thinking about consciousness and testing other potential theories in the same way. The problem of consciousness will surely remain difficult, but understanding the ancient mind-body problem will become a little bit easier."

Comment: Egnor demolishes this foolishness by pointing to split brain folks with one consciousness. And also with folks who are single-conscious after large areas areas removed to stop severe epilepsy. Consciousness is immaterial.