Tag Archives: panpsychism

What is it like to be an electron?

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In 1974 philosopher Thomas Nagel famously asked, “What is it like to be a bat?”.[1] His question was meant to illustrate a point about consciousness, namely that a living thing is conscious only if there is something that it is like to be that living thing from the perspective of the thing itself. He said that humans cannot understand what it is like to be a bat because we can describe the bat externally, and we can imagine being a bat, but we can never describe the experience of a bat from the perspective of the bat. That is in large part what many philosophers call the “hard problem” of consciousness. In this view, consciousness is the subjective experience of “what it is like to be” something, whether a human or another living entity.[2] Consciousness requires a sense of self, something that creates a perspective on what it is like to be that particular thing. And that something—subjective experience—cannot be fully described from any external or objective perspective. Therefore, since humans cannot share the subjective experience of a bat, it is impossible to fully describe a bat’s consciousness.

Yet we have much in common with a bat. We are both carbon-based life forms that breathe air and consume organic material. We are both mammals. We both experience life and death as physical creatures seeking to survive, mate, and persist. More fundamentally, we are both composed of molecules, atoms, and smaller quantum particles or waves that emerge from quantum fields. Our momentary existence owes itself entirely to the ability of superpositioned quantum fields to generate discrete macroscopic events through a physical process known as quantum reduction. Humans, bats, and all the seemingly discrete things in the universe manifest temporarily as separate and distinct, but exist permanently as vibrations of infinitely connected and constantly interacting quantum fields. In other words, our objective physical existence is shared almost entirely with a bat. And the core of it is shared even with an electron.

Why do we define consciousness only by subjective experience?

We take pride, of course, in that sliver of identity that we consider distinctive. We relish being different, unique, or even superior to the rest of the universe. But is that veneer of difference the sole pillar of our consciousness? Should our understanding of consciousness be founded on subjective experience alone? Given the physical realities of existence and our profound connections to literally everything in the universe, is it realistic or even intellectually honest to suppose that consciousness is based solely on what separates us? Should we instead savor our temporary distinctiveness, without denying the reality that we are not truly separate, and the subjective experience we prize, our fragile sense of self, may be an illusion?

Is consciousness grounded on subjective experience an illusion?

That is precisely what many of our most prominent philosophers and scientists believe. They disagree with Nagel that consciousness is ineffable and “hard”. They offer objective, physicalist explanations for our sense of self, explanations that directly link consciousness to the physical substrate from which we emerge. They argue that consciousness and self are illusions, useful illusions perhaps, but nonetheless illusions. All that really exists is what lies beneath the illusion—the objective physical substrate of existence. Our consciousness and sense of self equate to the completely physical biological factors that create brain states, perceptions, and ideas, i.e., neurons, neuronal networks, and all the neural behavior that has evolved in living things over millions of years of natural selection.

Yet despite disagreeing with Nagel about the ability to describe consciousness objectively, physicalists almost invariably accept subjective experience as a defining characteristic of consciousness. They assume that subjective experience, as illusory or delusional as it is, is an essential element of consciousness. So, if the subjective self is an illusion, then consciousness also is an illusion. Consciousness cannot be real or objective because it arises from a subjective illusion. The obvious corollary is that objective experience is not sufficient for consciousness. Natural selection operating on the physical substrate can give rise to the illusion of consciousness but cannot give rise to actual consciousness.

Does objective consciousness exist?

The conclusion that consciousness does not exist, however, both begs the question and is inconsistent with physical explanations for the evolution of consciousness. It relies on an assumption that subjective experience defines consciousness, but if consciousness equates to the physical and biological factors that create brain states, then those physical factors and brain states are consciousness. It is not the illusion of the subjective self that comprises consciousness, but the physical factors and processes engineered by natural selection.[3] Those natural processes drive organisms to become aware of their physical existence and the biological facts that inform that existence. Millions of years of evolution give organisms the empirical experience of self-awareness and self-directedness. A biological organism, therefore, has an objective experience of something like consciousness, whether or not it experiences the illusion of subjective self.

That natural objective experience of consciousness aligns well with the ideas of many religious philosophers.[4] We humans have a long history of understanding consciousness as something other than subjective experience alone. Religious philosophers often agree with physicalists that the subjective self is an illusion. They argue that reality lies beneath the subjective experience of thoughts and desires. But beneath the illusion they see more than the absence of self and the presence of physical factors creating brain states. They also see an awareness that is deeper than the self and subjective experience. They see what some call “pure consciousness”.

Is there such a thing as pure consciousness?

Both secular and religious philosophers talk about learning to live without the reification of subjective experience. They talk about life without illusion, the acceptance of who and what we are as physical beings. Is that the deeper experience described by religious philosophers? Is it a state of calm and acceptance in which random thoughts and desires are quieted in the brain? Or is it more? Does it encompass awareness not based on the subjective self, but on direct objective experience? Is that “pure consciousness”?

Can humans experience objective consciousness?

Natural selection has given even simple organisms an objective, physical experience of self-awareness and self-directedness, even without the illusion of a subjective self. Is it possible, therefore, to know what it is like to exist without subjective experience? Is human consciousness, which we attribute solely to subjective self, also based partly on objective, physical experience? Does our complex consciousness incorporate the rudimentary consciousness common to all forms of biological existence?

Perhaps more fundamentally, if the rudimentary experience of consciousness is shared by even the simplest organism, is it a biological version of something more essential still? At its most basic level, is the objective experience of consciousness simply the experience of being a physical thing?

What is it like to be a physical thing?

We and all biological organisms are first and foremost physical things. We experience being a physical object every moment of our existence. It is what we are. It is all we ever are. If our consciousness incorporates the objective experience of consciousness shared by every organism, does it also incorporate the experience of being a physical object or mechanism? Does some part of us know what it is like to be a physical thing without subjective experience? Is it even possible for us not to know what it is like to be what we in fact are?

Is consciousness the opposite of a purely subjective experience?

There are both secular and religious philosophers who believe that matter in its most basic form consists of consciousness. That even electrons, as part of the core fabric of existence, contain a germ of consciousness. Should we view a theory such as panpsychism as an acknowledgement and affirmation that we are physical beings? That our consciousness is the consciousness of physical things?

If what it is like to be a physical thing is objective consciousness, that experience would encompass being a collection atoms, cells, and neurons, whether or not they generate an illusion of subjective experience. It would encompass what it is like to be a mechanism or a robot, with or without subjective sentience. It would include what it is like to be a stone, a molecule, or an atom. It would encompass even what it is like to be an electron.

What if Thomas Nagel and so many others are wrong about subjective experience and consciousness? Perhaps consciousness is not unique to our subjective point of view but the experience of something physically universal. Maybe the pure consciousness lying beneath our subjective selves is the simple experience of what it is like to be.

[1] Nagel (1974).

[2] Nagel’s article assumes, without discussion, that only living things have subjective experience of “what it is like to be” something. From that perspective, there is nothing that “it is like to be” an electron, because an electron is not an organism and has no subjective experience of itself as a living thing. Other than animists, pantheists, and panpsychists, most philosophers and scientists today likely would agree that an electron, or any other non-living thing, does not have consciousness.

[3] What exactly has been happening over millions of years of natural selection, if not the evolution of some objective sense of consciousness with its basis in physical biological existence?

[4] Of course, many religious conclusions are dualist and supernatural in nature. But that is not the path that interests us here. And it is not the path taken by all our most prominent religious philosophers. See, e.g., the non-dualism of Advaita Vedanta.

A different kind of panpsychism

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“Panpsychism is the view that mentality is fundamental and ubiquitous in the natural world.”[1]

The panpsychism of physical entities

Panpsychism asserts that mind, i.e., mentality and consciousness, is a fundamental property of all physical existence. It holds that all physical entities, even rocks and atoms, have some level of micro-mentality. It does not hold that all physical entities have human-like consciousness, but it “entails that at least some kinds of micro-level entities have mentality, and that instances of those kinds are found in all things throughout the material universe.”[2]

Panpsychism does not explain how physical entities acquire consciousness, but rather posits that mentality is an inherent quality of matter itself. At its essence, panpsychism overcomes the problem of mind-body dualism by unifying mind and body in one physical substance and asserting that some level of mentality is a fundamental property of physical existence. Consequently, rather than a rare occurrence among advanced species, consciousness is ubiquitous and exists everywhere in the universe where matter exists.

The panpsychism of quantum state reduction

We have hypothesized that consciousness is associated with quantum state reduction rather than with matter itself. If that is so, then consciousness is associated with a physical process, not directly with physical entities themselves. It is not an inherent quality of all matter, but instead arises when matter undergoes a specific physical process. That physical process is the common constituent element and foundation of consciousness.

Quantum state reduction (aka wave function collapse or state vector reduction) is the process of transforming the complex-number-weighted amplitudes of quantum wave functions at the micro level into real-number probabilities and unique outcomes in the macro level classical world. The process occurs in response to interaction between the macrocosmic classical world and the microcosmic quantum world, resulting in the multiple superposed possibilities of the quantum state resolving into one outcome from a range of alternatives with different probabilities.

Quantum reduction occurs constantly—in every nanosecond of existence—everywhere in the material universe. As a process for resolving probabilities into unique outcomes in the macrocosmic world, it is fundamental and ubiquitous and has been going on since at least the Big Bang. Without quantum reduction, there is no macrocosm; there is only the microcosm of quantum superposition where all possibilities remain open and where there are no unique outcomes, no unique moments in history, and therefore no time as we experience it.

We have hypothesized that the quantum process of resolving probabilities into outcomes is the physical origin of consciousness in the universe. That suggests a form of panpsychism in which consciousness and mentality remain fundamental and ubiquitous, but not in the sense of being an attribute of all matter. Instead, consciousness arises from a process that is fundamental and ubiquitous, a process underlying all macrocosmic reality.

Implications of panpsychism based on quantum reduction

First, this variation on panpsychism explains “how” consciousness is associated with micro-level events and entities. As usually presented, panpsychism asserts that mentality is associated with all matter, but does not assert a mechanism for explaining the association. By contrast, quantum state reduction explains how consciousness arises in macrocosmic entities based on fundamental quantum dynamics. In other words, it provides not only a theory of consciousness as an intrinsic quality of matter, but also a specific mechanism for how matter acquires consciousness.

Second, quantum state reduction gives panpsychism a physical foundation with profound philosophical meaning. At a purely physical level quantum reduction is the process of resolving quantum probabilities into unique outcomes. It is a physical mechanism enabling a single choice among a range of quantum alternatives. It transforms reality from an abstract calculation of all possibilities into a tangible world in which only one possibility occurs. The resulting string of selected alternatives becomes time and reality as we know it. It is difficult to imagine a physically richer soil for cultivation of philosophies of time, free will, and consciousness.

Third, the theory matches our intuitive understanding of consciousness as an abstraction, not a thing. Life is temporary, a phenomenon which we experience for a while before we die. Consciousness is how we experience it. We do not think of consciousness as a material thing. Even when we believe that consciousness is eternal, as in spirit or soul, we conceive of that eternal “thing” as separate from our physical existence, something spiritual or intangible. Thinking of consciousness as founded on a process is closer to that intuitive conception. Even if we recognize that all substance is built on process and interaction, consciousness still seems more process than substance, not permanent even in the way that matter is seemingly permanent.

Finally, panpsychism based on quantum reduction aligns with current theories on quantum consciousness and the search for quantum interaction in the brain. There is a developing body of research around the possibility of quantum interactions in biological structures such as neurons and brain cells. The Orchestrated Objective Reduction (Orch OR) theory of Penrose and Hameroff suggests that the process of quantum state reduction results in events of proto-consciousness that are the rudimentary components of more advanced forms of consciousness ultimately orchestrated through the evolution of complex brain function.[3] These events of proto-consciousness are both fundamental and ubiquitous in the macrocosmic world. The theory is consistent with a form of panpsychism based on quantum state reduction. It is also consistent with the view that we should not expect to find consciousness based on quantum interaction only in neurons or brain cells. Consciousness is more basic than that. In at least a rudimentary form, it is fundamental to the core process of quantum state reduction that occurs constantly in the macrocosmic universe; it is everything everywhere all at once.[4] It may be true that complex neural interactions occur as a result of additional quantum interactions in the brain, which may explain the level of orchestrated complexity found in human consciousness. But quantum interactions in brain cells are not a requirement for the existence of raw consciousness in the universe.

The one and the many

Since at least the Greeks and likely long before, humans have sought to reconcile the extreme diversity of existence with the concept of unity in the universe. We look for the one reality that underlies the divergent world. We search for the single theory, the single entity, the universal consciousness. Is it possible that this search finds its roots in the reality of quantum existence?

We and all other physical things exist in a reality founded on a quantum world of superpositioned possibilities, a world that somehow transforms into a macrocosm of unique moments in time. It is a macrocosm of one outcome founded on a microcosm of many, one possibility arising from all possibilities in superposition. Beneath the surface of the world of one lies the world of the many, where all possibilities still exist.

Or is reality just the opposite? Is the entangled world of superpositioned possibilities the true world of universal unity, the single world without distinction and differentiation? Is our world of infinite unique outcomes the world of diversity, where the many overwhelms and obscures the one, the divided world from which we search for the ultimate unity, the ultimate theory, the ultimate single universal consciousness?

[1] Goff, Seager, and Allen-Hermanson (2022), Introduction.

[2] Goff, Seager, and Allen-Hermanson (2022), Section 2.1.

[3] See Hameroff and Penrose (2014).

[4] With apologies and attribution to the 2023 winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture.