The integrated information theory (IIT) is an ambitious theory of consciousness that aims to provide both a neuroscientific and a metaphysical account of consciousness by identifying consciousness with integrated information. In the philosophical literature, IIT is often associated with a panpsychist worldview. In this paper, I show that IIT can be considered, instead, as a form of emergentism that is incompatible with panpsychism. First, I show that the panpsychist interpretation of IIT is based on two properties of integrated information: intrinsicality (...) and fundamentality. I show that the way IIT deals with these two properties, however, aligns better with emergentism than panpsychism. Then, after plugging some anti-panpsychist assumptions into IIT’s structure, I analyse different philosophical options for interpreting the formal result of causal emergence of integrated information in terms of dependence on and autonomy from its physical substrate. The upshot is that integrated information can be seen as dependent upon the fusion of the cause-effect powers of a physical substrate, and as autonomous in virtue of global-to-local determination. According to this interpretation, consciousness is the constraining power of the system as a whole upon itself, when this power emerges from the fusion on the cause-effect powers of the system’s components. (shrink)

In this paper, we take a meta-theoretical stance and aim to compare and assess two conceptual frameworks that endeavor to explain phenomenal experience. In particular, we compare Feinberg & Mallatt’s Neurobiological Naturalism (NN) and Tononi’s and colleagues' Integrated Information Theory (IIT), given that the former pointed out some similarities between the two theories (Feinberg & Mallatt 2016c-d). To probe their similarity, we first give a general introduction to both frameworks. Next, we expound a ground plan for carrying out our analysis. (...) We move on to articulate a philosophical profile of NN and IIT, addressing their ontological commitments and epistemological foundations. Finally, we compare the two point-by-point, also discussing how they stand on the issue of artificial consciousness. (shrink)

Evidence-Based Medicine has little consideration for mechanisms and philosophers of science and medicine have recently made pleas to increase the place of mechanisms in the medical evidence hierarchy. However, in this debate the notions of mechanisms seem to be limited to 'mechanistic processes' and 'complex-systems mechanisms,' understood as 'componential causal systems'. I believe that this will not do full justice to how mechanisms are used in biological, psychological and social sciences and, consequently, in a more biopsychosocial approach to medicine. Here, (...) I propose, following (Kuorikoski, 2009), to pay more attention to 'abstract forms of interaction' mechanisms. The present work scrutinized review articles on depression and medically unexplained pain, which are considered to be of multifactorial pathogenesis, for their use of mechanisms. In review articles on these disorders there seemed to be a range of uses between more 'abstract forms of interaction' and 'componential causal system' mechanisms. I therefore propose to expand the notions of mechanisms considered in medicine to include that of more 'abstract forms of interaction' to better explain and manage biopsychosocial disorders. (shrink)

In a recent work (Grasso et al., 2021 ), practitioners of the Integrated Information Theory (IIT) claim to have overcome the weaknesses of causal reductionism in producing a coherent account of causation, as causal reductionism would blatantly conflate causation with prediction and could not answer the question of ‘what caused what.’ In this paper, I reject such a dismissal of causal reductionism since IIT anti-reductionists misunderstand the reductionist stance. The reductionists can still invoke a causal account stemming from the causal (...) power of the universe’s basic units and interactions that, eventually, may lead to structures supporting integrated information. Additionally, I claim that the IIT-inspired misunderstanding of causal reductionism originates from the former’s metaphysical deficit, conflating information with causation. However, as a possible way out, if IIT is complemented with a deeper metaphysical ground, such as nested hylomorphism, an improved argument against causal reductionism can be made to work by invoking formal causality as the ultimate cause of integration in natural systems. (shrink)

This paper deals with a foundational aspect of Integrated Information Theory of consciousness: the nature of the relation between the axioms of phenomenology and the postulates of cause-effect power. There has been a lack of clarity in the literature regarding this crucial issue, for which IIT has received much criticism of its axiomatic method and basic tenets. The present contribution elucidates the problem by means of a categorial analysis of the theory’s foundations. Its main results are that: IIT has a (...) set of nine fundamental concepts of reason, called categories, which constitute its categorial lexicon and through which it formulates a system of principles incorporating the axioms, the postulates, and the central identity; and the connection between the axioms and postulates is grounded by their common root in this categorial lexicon, the categories of which find their justification by means of a phenomenological and transcendental deduction. Some further results are the unique origin of axioms and postulates in the categories; the distinction between conceptual and formalized postulates; a clarification of the uniqueness problem of categorial lexica in general; and an IIT account of objectivity by explicating how the physical is defined by means of categories. All of this is put to use against various criticism targeting IIT’s theoretical core. If successful, the proposed interpretation illuminates a central issue in the contemporary study of consciousness and contributes to an environment of mutual understanding between defenders and critics of the theory. (shrink)