Is consciousness to be found in quantum processes in microtubules?

Discussion in 'Pseudoscience' started by Write4U, Sep 8, 2018.

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  1. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    You can say whatever you like. Since the fluorescent (not neon) bulbs are lighting up due to the E-field gradient caused by the power lines, it's not in fact natural. And since the artist did this very deliberately, it is not spontaneous.
    No clue what you are talking about here. You brought up religion.
     
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  3. C C Consular Corps - "the backbone of diplomacy" Valued Senior Member

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    I'd tend to prefer the interconnected disturbances within a mesh of fields (caused by components of a system) as privately manifesting to themselves as something, over the interacting parts of a clockwork mechanism collectively experiencing themselves as similar. (The latter seems weirder in a dualism context or more blatantly "magical" somehow.)

    But I do believe a crude, slow degree of intelligence could be instantiated by an elaborate clockwork mechanism design (Charles Babbage handiwork at a grander scale). Limited memory and understanding can fall out of a configuration of brute objects and their operational relationships and interactions occurring in space.

    Even the psychological presentation of an image, a noise, a feel of rough surface, an odor of rotten eggs, etc could be the result of the dynamic interconnections of "things". But what's missing is any acknowledged, basic properties that could be manipulated to relationally constitute the presentation. There isn't even a rudimentary starting point and explanation for matter having the capacity to "show" itself as anything.

    Obviously, memory and information processing are necessary to verify (cognize) that _X_ arrangement of qualia "are there" (manifesting themselves). IOW, a presentation of green mingled with sweetness could be displaying itself and yet not be acknowledged and identified if the former basics of intelligence are absent. (KANT: "Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind.")

    But that cognitive ability to verify that "_X_ is there" (in contrast to the usual not even nothingness of matter existence) does not explain the manifestation (i.e, intelligence does not explain the manifestation). It only generates a mechanistic response that recognizes _X_'s presence (or systematically admits that the usual "not even nothingness" of the universe at large is no longer the case).
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2022
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  5. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Humans can do things that are not natural, or create non-spontaneous natural phenomena, right.

    Therefore we can draw the conclusion that consciousness cannot spontaneously emerge from an E-field created by the brain, right?
     
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  7. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    You could, sure. Since consciousness is based on brain activity, and brain activity is not determined by E-fields, that conclusion doesn't mean much. It's like saying that since a jar of gray sand isn't conscious, gray matter has nothing to do with consciousness.
     
  8. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    No, you do not quite understand. Brain neural activity creates an E-field and it is that field that may create an emergent consciousness

    from post $ 2362
    from post #2410
    Does the analogy of the network of fluorescent bulbs being activated by an E-field begin to make sense?
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2022
  9. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    I truly believe that Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose are on the right track with identifying microtubules as that missing basic network able to process electrochemical data and be causal to an emergent holographic interpretation of that data. As Anil Seth posits; "the brain creates reality from the inside out as much as from the outside in".

    Note that microtubules are a common denominator in all cells of every Eukaryotic organisms where they perform a range of functions, including the control of accurate mitosis and processing and transport of action potentials in the entire neural network.

    The brain alone hosts some 100 billion dipolar microtubules connected by 100 trillion synapses, and connected to all other microtubules in every cell of the body. The numbers alone make microtubules the primary candidate for creating holographic pixilated images inside the brain.

    Microtubules in neurons as information carriers
    Erik W. Dent, PhD

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    1 and Peter W. Baas, PhD3

    The publisher's final edited version of this article is available free at J Neurochem
    See other articles in PMC that cite the published article.

    Abstract
    more......
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3979999/
     
  10. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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  11. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    What is the role of microtubules in neurons?
    Pyramidal neurons are suspected of being the memory storage facilities in the brain.
    The illustrations clearly demonstrate the scope of the network that numbers hundreds of billions of microtubules (with variable or fixed potentials) connected by 100 trillion synaptic connections.

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    Pyramidal neurons: dendritic structure and synaptic integration

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    • more....
    https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn2286
    and more....
    https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn2631

    The emerging picture of the brain is just breathtaking.
     
  12. C C Consular Corps - "the backbone of diplomacy" Valued Senior Member

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    This finding doesn't necessarily mean that the hidden or private presentations of brain consciousness disappear, only that the cognitive processes which validate those manifestations as "being there" are disrupted (which depend upon memory and sapient routines for identification and understanding of such).
    - - - - - -

    Anesthetic drastically diverts the travels of brain waves
    https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/04/220427100602.htm

    EXCERPTS: Imagine the conscious brain as a sea roiling with the collisions and dispersals of waves of different sizes and shapes, swirling around and flowing across in many different directions. Now imagine that an ocean liner lumbers through, flattening everything that trails behind with its powerful, parting wake. A new study finds that unconsciousness induced by the commonly used drug propofol has something like that metaphorical effect on higher frequency brain waves, appearing to sweep them aside and, as an apparent consequence, sweeping consciousness away as well.

    Put more prosaically, the study in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience by MIT scientists at The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory shows that propofol substantially alters how different frequencies of brain waves travel across the brain's surface, or cortex. Whereas conscious brains exhibit a mixture of waves of various frequencies rotating or traveling straight in various directions, brains under propofol anesthesia became dominated by powerful, very low frequency "delta" waves that roll straight outward in opposite directions instead of slowly rotating around central points as they do during consciousness. Higher frequency "beta" waves, meanwhile, became fewer and more erratically structured, traveling only in directions not dominated by the surging delta waves.

    Traveling waves are hypothesized to perform many important functions as they coordinate the activity of brain cells over the areas of the brain they cover. These include reading information out from memory and holding it there while it waits to be used in cognition. They may also aid in perception and act as a means of time keeping in the brain. The findings therefore illustrate how profoundly anesthesia alters the state of the state of the brain as it induces and maintains unconsciousness, said senior author Earl K. Miller, Picower Professor of Neuroscience in MIT's Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences.

    [...] After the animals regained consciousness, their wave patterns all returned to where they were before propofol administration. The clear association between these two regimes (unfettered beta before or after anesthesia vs. delta dominance during anesthesia) and the state of consciousness strongly suggests a connection, Bhattacharya said.

    "We hypothesize that the drastic breakdown of beta traveling waves and their redirection could contribute to loss of consciousness under propofol anesthesia," he said... (MORE - missing details)
     
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  13. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Perfect.....

    Thanks for pushing me to explain what and how. I think I have found something that may be of interest.
    This site talks about Action Potentials. In this discussion, microtubules are not mentioned by name, but we have already established elsewhere that microtubules in neurons are responsible for "action potential transmission".

    So, everything that is discussed in this article confirms the fundamental role microtubules play in this brain activity.

    Chapter 1: Resting Potentials and Action Potentials
    John H. Byrne, Ph.D., Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, McGovern Medical School
    Revised 01 July 2021
    https://nba.uth.tmc.edu/neuroscience/m/s1/chapter01.html
    Video of lecture


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    Figure 1.1 Tap the colored buttons (light stimulus) to activate.
    (You'll need to go to the site for the working model)


    This excellent site has much more detail and true scientific "discovery" as to the function of neurons and why the presence of microtubules is essential in the processing of variable "action potentials" that may well be responsible for the emergent phenomenon of "conscious thought" and holographic "mental imaging".

    https://nba.uth.tmc.edu/neuroscience/m/s1/chapter01.html
     
  14. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    This is where Stuart Hameroff's knowledge and practical expertise is critically important. As a practising anesthesiologist, it is his job to exactly control the administrating of anaesthetics, so as to leave the homeostatic processes undisturbed, while rendering the patient's conscious brain oblivious to the warning signals produced by the brain's homeostatic control mechanism.
    As Anil Seth recalls after a surgery: "I simply wasn't there, I could have been out for 5 minutes, 5 hours, 5 years, 50 years".
    "One is rendered into an object and later restored back to a human".
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2022
  15. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    If you say so. There is no proof of that, any more than the claim that the noise of the blood flowing through your brain creates an emergent consciousness. Even though your brain definitely does create that noise.

    To put it another way, just because your brain creates electrical (or acoustic, or thermal) energy does not mean that that energy "creates an emergent consciousness." It is far more likely to be an interesting side effect of other activities (like depolarizaion, blood flow or metabolic activity) than anything causing consciousness.
    Nope. I know you are trying to make some kind of a clever point, but it's not working.
     
  16. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    No it's your ear that "senses" the noise of blood turbulence. Your brain interprets what the ear tells via sensory neurons.
    As Sherlock Holmes famously observed:
    What have you not yet eliminated as impossible?
    No clever "invented solutions". My confidence stems from the fact that there is no other suitable candidate but microtubules, however improbable you may find it.

    All else is impossible, for the lack of sharing a "common denominator" alone.
    When taking evolutionary processes as fact, there can be only a single conclusion. All Eukaryotic organisms have learned to utilize microtubules in some fashion that benefitted their survival skills and allowed for greater use of exteroception and interoception data processes that benefitted "every" extant organism in some way.
     
    Last edited: Apr 28, 2022
  17. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Nope. Acoustic noise, infrared radiation and E-fields are all things that have a physical reality. They are present whether or not you sense them. A woman who is deaf generates exactly the same acoustic noise due to the bloodflow through her brain.
    Nope. Again, you have not proven anything - other than you do not understand what consciousness is.
     
  18. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    First, acoustic noise stimulates cilia in the ear. Cilia are made from microtubules. The brain has no cilia. It doesn't need them.
    Second, a woman who is deaf lives in absolute silence. Same as when you are under anesthesia you are in a state of total oblivion, an "object". I am afraid you do not understand the hard problem of consciousness.

    Excessively loud noise or prolonged exposure to loud noise can cause permanent damage and death to the cells in the inner ear and lead to hearing loss.
    https://www.froedtert.com/stories/protect-your-ears-you-might-not-realize-whats-hurting-them#

    The brain is a "free standing" computer. It relies completely on incoming sensory data, from both external sources (exteroception) and internal sources (interoception).

    The brain has no sensory neurons at all . All experiences of the brain are from incoming data, translated from secondary neural data processing and transportation.

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    Descartes.
     
    Last edited: Apr 28, 2022
  19. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    So you believe that if you measured the noise that bloodflow made in a deaf woman's brain, there would be none because she is deaf.

    Sadly I think you really may be that confused. No wonder you can't understand even basic logical arguments.
     
  20. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Correct. The brain does not hear or see or smell. It receives electrical signals that it "translates" as sound. A "deaf" person does not perceive sound.

    How does the brain hear sound?

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    https://www.hear-it.org/The-brain-plays-an-important-role-in-our-hearing

    Note that the preception of sound involves the transmission from ear to brain via the "auditory nerve", which of course means it uses microtubules bundled inside the auditory nerve to transport the EM data to the brain which then must decipher the 'incoming" data into recognizable signals. And that is one of the processes of emergent consciousness.
    Apparently, you do not know the definition of the term "deaf". Allow me to refresh your memory.
    https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/deaf

    Hearing loss and deafness
    https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/deafness-and-hearing-loss

    So when we speak of "deaf" we are not talking about partial or confused hearing. We are talking about "not hearing", due to absence of auditory stimulus from the ear.

    When the auditory senses (cilia) in the ear are damaged and can no longer respond to sound waves, the brain has no data that it can interpret and remains silent.

    A broken string on a guitar is unable to generate or respond to stimulation by soundwaves. The cilia in the ear are the strings of brain. When they are broken, the brain cannot perceive auditory data.

    This is exactly why I consider MT as the most important foundational organelle that receives, translates, and sends the data to the brain via the neural network in the form of "action potentials", which the brain interprets and compares against "data" stored in memory.

    How Does Echoic Memory Work?
    https://www.webmd.com/brain/what-is-echoic-memory

    Deafness is usually not a brain defect. It is an auditory defect in the ear. This is why implants of a cochlear device can restore hearing.

    Cochlear implants
    Overview

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    How cochlear implants workOpen pop-up dialog box
    A cochlear implant is an electronic device that partially restores hearing. It can be an option for people who have severe hearing loss from inner-ear damage who are no longer helped by using hearing aids.
    https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/cochlear-implants/about/pac-20385021#
     
    Last edited: Apr 28, 2022
  21. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    This is an example of a damaged auditory nerve and bypassing the ear, directly inserting a microchip implant into the brain


    and this beautiful moment


    Elsewhere I presented a video series of colorblind people who saw color for the first time with the help of special color filtering glasses.
    To watch people enter a new world they never experienced is truly wonderful to behold.
     
    Last edited: Apr 28, 2022
  22. exchemist Valued Senior Member

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    You have missed billvon's point.

    The noise of the blood flow is still there and can be picked up by a suitable detector. What the subject hears is irrelevant to the fact there is noise (sound) made by blood flowing through a living brain.

    The point is that the E field generated by the electrical activity of neurons, and detected by electrodes monitoring brain activity, is electrical noise. There is no reason whatsoever to imagine that this electrical noise has some magic role in consciousness. That is pure woo, worthy of Deepak Chopra.
     
  23. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    No, I haven't. Billvon and now you are missing the point.
    The only relevant issue is what the brain hears. But the brain does not hear anything directly, it has no "suitable detector". It translates neural auditory data, just like a computer requires a microphone to supply the computer with digitized soundwave data, the brain requires the ear and auditory neurons to receive digitized soundwave data.
    "Does a falling tree make a sound when there is no one to hear it?"
    But that is exactly what the brain does, it "imagines" everything. That phenomenon is called "consciousness"

    Somehow you must have missed the role of the auditory cilia and auditory (cochlear) neurons in the process of converting sound waves into electrical action potentials that the brain can translate.
    Well, actually I do know why you have missed that. You don't read any of the scientific literature that I quote.

    Tell me how a computer stores a "soundwave" on the HD. Then tell me how the brain stores a "soundwave" in memory. Getting the picture?

    If I am wrong, enlighten me about the hard question of emergent consciousness. But you can't, can you?
    So far you are not talking woo.
    Problem is, you are just not saying anything at all, except "impossible". That's an easy out.
     
    Last edited: Apr 28, 2022
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