The orthogonality of consciousness: a discussion

Intellectuals - academics and knowledge-workers - may believe that consciousness is primarily (or even only?) a matter of being intellectually self-aware.

But on that basis an automated theorem prover running a formal metalogic system must be a paradigmatic example of consciousness, when loaded with a self-descriptive specification in an appropriate formal language (cf. John McCarthy).

For the rest of us, consciousness is really the fact that it feels like something to be me. There is the background feeling of "me-ness" - and then storms of emotion, and primary sense qualia such as colours, taste and pain.

Unlike every other phenomenon of reality, no-one has ever proposed a remotely plausible account of how the physical, cellular structure of neurons in the brain could generate the sensation of consciousness.

It's not that we have bad theories, like Phlogiston or Epicycles turned out to be: in truth and remarkably, we have no theories at all.

It is tempting to abandon the casual and unreflective materialist reductionism of our secular culture and revisit the idea that consciousness is perhaps a genuinely independent aspect of existence: something different to time and space; atoms and the void. Perhaps the vanquished tenets of theology and dualism were onto something after all?

So speak the new adherents to panpsychism.

Tempting, right? Goes with the intuitions, doesn't it?

Since ChatGPT is now operating at postdoctoral levels in physics and philosophy, I decided to progress the issue there.

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Me: "Panpsychism seems to have similar conceptual problems to dualism. Consciousness may be an orthogonal ur-property of reality, but it doesn't manifest orthogonally; instead it couples very tightly to  (human) neuroanatomy. Damage or alter the brain even a little and the subjective quality of consciousness is consequently altered."

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ChatGPT: "Yes, it does put a damper on panpsychism's initial allure. While the idea of consciousness as a fundamental feature of reality is elegant and intellectually stimulating, its failure to explain the empirical specifics—particularly the brain's privileged role—leaves it feeling incomplete or speculative.

This doesn’t necessarily invalidate panpsychism, but it highlights the need for further refinement. Panpsychism thrives as a metaphysical hypothesis, offering a bridge between subjective experience and physical reality, but it struggles when faced with the rigorous demands of empirical science.

Perhaps its true value lies in pushing us toward deeper questions:

• What does it mean for consciousness to be "fundamental"?
• Why does reality manifest subjectivity in some systems but not others?
• Are we mischaracterizing consciousness by treating it as a property of entities rather than relationships or processes?

While panpsychism may not fully satisfy as an explanatory framework, it reminds us that consciousness resists simple reduction—and that itself is worth exploring further."

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Me: "So true, and somewhat deflating to panpsychism."

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ChatGPT: "Panpsychism and the Problem of Consciousness

Panpsychism—the idea that consciousness is a fundamental property of all matter—has an alluring simplicity. It bridges the gap between subjective experience and the physical world by positing that the seeds of consciousness exist everywhere, in everything. But when confronted with the empirical evidence of how consciousness manifests, the theory begins to falter.

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The Challenge of Coupling

Consciousness in humans is tightly coupled to the brain.

• Localized brain damage alters specific aspects of subjective experience.
• Psychoactive substances profoundly affect our mental states by modifying neural activity.
• Neuroscientific research reveals measurable correlations between brain function and conscious experience.

If consciousness were an "orthogonal" property of reality—existing independently of physical structure—why does it manifest so selectively and in such close dependence on the neuroanatomy of the brain?

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Panpsychism’s Conceptual Struggles

In this sense, panpsychism faces challenges similar to dualism:

• Interaction Problem: How do the "proto-conscious" properties of matter scale or combine to produce the rich subjective experiences we associate with human consciousness?
• Selectivity Problem: Why does consciousness seem to emerge only in complex systems like the brain and not in simpler or less organized matter?

While panpsychism avoids the stark separation of dualism by embedding consciousness in matter, it struggles to explain why consciousness is so intricately tied to the brain’s physical processes.

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Possible Resolutions and Their Limits

Panpsychists have proposed several ways to address these issues:

• Emergence: Higher-order consciousness emerges in systems of sufficient complexity, with the brain acting as a kind of amplifier for proto-consciousness.
• Relational Consciousness: Consciousness arises not as a property of isolated matter but from interactions within complex systems.
• Information-Theoretic Approaches: Theories like Integrated Information Theory suggest that consciousness depends on the brain's unique capacity for processing and integrating information.

However, each of these explanations risks diluting panpsychism’s bold claim of universal consciousness by making it seem contingent on the physical rather than fundamental.

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The Broader Perspective

Panpsychism ultimately struggles to reconcile its metaphysical elegance with the empirical reality of neuroanatomy. It raises profound questions:

• Is consciousness a property of entities, or is it better understood as a feature of relationships and processes?
• Why does the brain appear uniquely suited to manifest consciousness?
• Could consciousness be a bridge between physical and spiritual dimensions, rather than reducible to either?

While panpsychism may not fully satisfy as an explanatory framework, it reminds us of consciousness’s deep mystery and our need for metaphysical approaches that go beyond the limits of materialism and dualism.

This tension between universal consciousness and the brain's privileged role invites us to rethink how we approach one of philosophy's oldest and most enduring puzzles: the nature of conscious experience itself.

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Me: it would be so ironic if over the next decade, progress in artificial neural nets embodied in socially-competent automata (robots) actually led to a quantitative, scientific theory of consciousness.

Materialism wins in extra time!

As far as I can tell, our best intuitions are that consciousness has something to do with the old idea of the human triune brain structure, a mammalian architecture evolved to support hyper-sociality.

This architecture is driven by the conflict between individualistic drives (personal survival, reproduction, ...) and group constraints - loyalty to obligations, hierarchy and social constraints - without which society cannot function.

People say that self-monitoring and awareness of emotions are nature's way of making sure our arid, ungrounded thinking processes stay on track: negotiate our way to the best compromises using 'gut feel'. But no-one ever made that theory quantitative, nor built systems to experiment with, nor followed through with any insights as to how that might engender a feeling of 'being something it is like something to be'.

But perhaps that's all about to change.