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Conscious states (states that there is something it is like to be in) seem both rich or full of detail, and ineffable or hard to fully describe or recall. The problem of ineffability, in particular, is a longstanding issue in philosophy…
Local realism has been superseded by recent theoretical and experimental developments in quantum physics which show a synchronic connection between the parts. In contrast to the principle of local realism, which is the basis of classical…
Contrary to an oft-made claim, there can be observational distinctions (say for the expansion of the universe or the cosmological constant) between "single-history" quantum theories and "many-worlds" quantum theories. The distinctions occur…
To make nature mathematically tractable, the scientific model of the world omits qualia--colors, sounds, tastes, sensations--leaving only what admits of numerical characterization. The "hard problem" of consciousness--the enigma of why and…
According to our current conception of physics, any valid physical theory is supposed to describe the objective evolution of a unique external world. However, this condition is challenged by quantum theory, which suggests that physical…
This paper elaborates on four previously proposed rules of engagement between conscious states and physiological states. A new rule is proposed that applies to a continuous model of conscious brain states that cannot precisely resolve…
We show that the modern quantum mechanics, and particularly the theory of decoherence, allows formulating a sort of a physical metatheory of consciousness. Particularly, the analysis of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of…
We show that the modern quantum mechanics, and particularly the theory of decoherence, allows for formulating a sort of a physical metatheory of consciousness. Particularly, the analysis of the necessary conditions for the occurrence of…
A century ago, discoveries of a serious kind of logical error made separately by several leading mathematicians led to acceptance of a sharply enhanced standard for rigor within what ultimately became the foundation for Computer Science. By…
We here analyse the question of developing artificial consciousness from an evolutionary perspective, taking the evolution of the human brain and its relation with consciousness as a reference model. This kind of analysis reveals several…
Both deterministic and indeterministic physical laws are incompatible with control by genuine (non-illusory) free will. We propose that an indeterministic dynamics can be $weakly$ compatible with free will (FW), whereby the latter acts by…
This article presents a heuristic view that shows that the inner states of consciousness experienced by every human being have a physical but imaginary hypercomplex basis. The hypercomplex description is necessary because certain processes…
Panpsychism is a solution to the mind-body problem that presumes that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of reality instead of a product or consequence of physical processes (i.e., brain activity). Panpsychism is an elegant solution to…
On broadly Copernican grounds, we are entitled to assume that apparently behaviorally sophisticated extraterrestrial entities ("aliens") would be conscious. Otherwise, we humans would be inexplicably, implausibly lucky to have…
We tackle the problem of consciousness by taking the naturally selected, embodied organism as our starting point. We provide a formalism describing how biological systems such as human bodies self-organize to hierarchically interpret…
In the standard quantum theory, one can measure precisely only a subset of the incompatible observables. It results in lack of a formal joint probability defining objective realism even if we accept nonlocal or certain faster-than-light…
Ever since the creation of the first artificial intelligence (AI) machinery built on machine learning (ML), public society has entertained the idea that eventually computers could become sentient and develop a consciousness of their own. As…
The physics of matter in the condensed state is concerned with problems in which the number of constituent particles is vastly greater than can be easily comprehended. The inherent physical limitations of the human mind are fundamental and…
The Gemini theorem asserts that, given certain reasonable assumptions, no physical system can be certainly aware of its own existence. The theorem can be proved algorithmically, but the proof of this theorem is somewhat obscure, and there…
Frauchiger and Renner have recently claimed to prove that "Single-world interpretations of quantum theory cannot be self-consistent". This is contradicted by a construction due to Bell, inspired by Bohmian mechanics, which shows that any…