> A new study suggests that consciousness may be rooted in quantum processes, as researchers found that a drug binding to microtubules delayed unconsciousness in rats under anesthesia. This discovery supports the idea that anesthesia acts on microtubules, potentially lending weight to the quantum theory of consciousness.
> For decades, one of the most fundamental and vexing questions in neuroscience has been: What is the physical basis of consciousness in the brain?
> Most researchers favor classical models, based on classical physics, while a minority have argued that consciousness must be quantum in nature, and that its brain basis is a collective quantum vibration of “microtubule” proteins inside neurons.
> Wiest and his research team found that when they gave rats a drug that binds to microtubules, it took the rats significantly longer to fall unconscious under an anesthetic gas.
> The research team’s microtubule-binding drug interfered with the anesthetic action, thus supporting the idea that the anesthetic acts on microtubules to cause unconsciousness.
> “Since we don’t know of another (i.e., classical) way that anesthetic binding to microtubules would generally reduce brain activity and cause unconsciousness,” Wiest says, “this finding supports the quantum model of consciousness.”
> “When it becomes accepted that the mind is a quantum phenomenon, we will have entered a new era in our understanding of what we are,” he says.
> The new approach “would lead to improved understanding of how anesthesia works, and it would shape our thinking about a wide variety of related questions, such as whether coma patients or non-human animals are conscious, how mysterious drugs like lithium modulate conscious experience to stabilize mood, how diseases like Alzheimer’s or schizophrenia affect perception and memory, and so on.”
resjudicata2 on
Does anyone have a summary of Penrose/ Hameroff’s Orchestrated Objective Reduction Theory, and all of the findings we have over the past year that tends to show it’s possible?
PMzyox on
If this is true it’s not necessarily good news for those people hoping for AGI.
Feefifiddlyeyeoh on
In my head, sometimes I substitute the word “magic,” in place of the word “quantum.”
SatoshiReport on
“Since we don’t know of another (i.e., classical) way that anesthetic binding to microtubules would generally reduce brain activity and cause unconsciousness,” Wiest says, “this finding supports the quantum model of consciousness.”
That is a logical leap. They can’t explain it so it is quantum related? It just means they can’t explain it yet but jumping to it must be quantum based is not a given.
BRUISE_WILLIS on
Sapolsky’s book “determined” is a great counterpoint to this theory.
PassiveF1st on
I don’t have a fancy education, someone ELI5 Quantum Basis of Consciousness in the Brain please.
corvus7corax on
“Quantum” sounds dumb – Try conciousness is the music of tiny wind-chimes in your brain.
8 Comments
> A new study suggests that consciousness may be rooted in quantum processes, as researchers found that a drug binding to microtubules delayed unconsciousness in rats under anesthesia. This discovery supports the idea that anesthesia acts on microtubules, potentially lending weight to the quantum theory of consciousness.
> For decades, one of the most fundamental and vexing questions in neuroscience has been: What is the physical basis of consciousness in the brain?
> Most researchers favor classical models, based on classical physics, while a minority have argued that consciousness must be quantum in nature, and that its brain basis is a collective quantum vibration of “microtubule” proteins inside neurons.
> Wiest and his research team found that when they gave rats a drug that binds to microtubules, it took the rats significantly longer to fall unconscious under an anesthetic gas.
> The research team’s microtubule-binding drug interfered with the anesthetic action, thus supporting the idea that the anesthetic acts on microtubules to cause unconsciousness.
> “Since we don’t know of another (i.e., classical) way that anesthetic binding to microtubules would generally reduce brain activity and cause unconsciousness,” Wiest says, “this finding supports the quantum model of consciousness.”
> “When it becomes accepted that the mind is a quantum phenomenon, we will have entered a new era in our understanding of what we are,” he says.
> The new approach “would lead to improved understanding of how anesthesia works, and it would shape our thinking about a wide variety of related questions, such as whether coma patients or non-human animals are conscious, how mysterious drugs like lithium modulate conscious experience to stabilize mood, how diseases like Alzheimer’s or schizophrenia affect perception and memory, and so on.”
Does anyone have a summary of Penrose/ Hameroff’s Orchestrated Objective Reduction Theory, and all of the findings we have over the past year that tends to show it’s possible?
If this is true it’s not necessarily good news for those people hoping for AGI.
In my head, sometimes I substitute the word “magic,” in place of the word “quantum.”
“Since we don’t know of another (i.e., classical) way that anesthetic binding to microtubules would generally reduce brain activity and cause unconsciousness,” Wiest says, “this finding supports the quantum model of consciousness.”
That is a logical leap. They can’t explain it so it is quantum related? It just means they can’t explain it yet but jumping to it must be quantum based is not a given.
Sapolsky’s book “determined” is a great counterpoint to this theory.
I don’t have a fancy education, someone ELI5 Quantum Basis of Consciousness in the Brain please.
“Quantum” sounds dumb – Try conciousness is the music of tiny wind-chimes in your brain.