The concepts of complementarity and entanglement are considered with respect to their significance in and beyond physics. A formally generalized, weak version of quantum theory, more general than ordinary quantum theory of physical systems, is outlined and tentatively applied to two examples.

Quantum cognition research applies abstract, mathematical principles of quantum theory to inquiries in cognitive science. It differs fundamentally from alternative speculations about quantum brain processes. This topic presents new developments within this research program. In the introduction to this topic, we try to answer three questions: Why apply quantum concepts to human cognition? How is quantum cognitive modeling different from traditional cognitive modeling? What cognitive processes have been modeled using a quantum account? In addition, a brief introduction to quantum probability (...) theory and a concrete example is provided to illustrate how a quantum cognitive model can be developed to explain paradoxical empirical findings in psychological literature. (shrink)

The paper reviews the current situation regarding a new theory of brain dynamics put forward by the authors in an earlier publication. Motivation for the theory is discussed in terms of two issues: the long-standing problem of accounting for the stability and nonlocal properties of memory, and the experimental and theoretical evidence against the classical theory of brain action. It is shown that the new theory provides an explanation and a conceptually unifying framework for phenomena of brain action that resist (...) classical explanation. Further independent experiments provide strong additional support for the theory. The fact that this theory incorporates quantum mechanisms in an essential way is considered to be of wide scientific interest in view of the unique status of the brain in relation to the physical, biological, and mental orders in nature. (shrink)

(1) Materialists hold that every real, concrete phenomenon in the universe is a wholly physical phenomenon. (2) Consciousness ('what-it's-likeness', etc.) is the most certainly existing real, concrete phenomenon there is. It follows that (3) all serious materialists must grant that consciousness is a wholly physical phenomenon. ‘How can consciousness possibly be physical, given what we know about the physical?’ To ask this question is already to have gone wrong. We have no good reason (as Priestley, Eddington, Russell and others observe) (...) to think that we know anything about the physical that gives us any reason to find any problem in the idea that consciousness is wholly physical. (shrink)

Schelling’s masterpiece investigating evil and freedom.

We use the system of p-adic numbers for the description of information processes. Basic objects of our models are so-called transformers of information, basic processes are information processes and statistics are information statistics (thus we present a model of information reality). The classical and quantum mechanical formalisms on information p-adic spaces are developed. It seems that classical and quantum mechanical models on p-adic information spaces can be applied for the investigation of flows of information in cognitive and social systems, since (...) a p-adic metric gives a quite natural description of the ability to form associations. (shrink)

We show that three fundamental information-theoretic constraints -- the impossibility of superluminal information transfer between two physical systems by performing measurements on one of them, the impossibility of broadcasting the information contained in an unknown physical state, and the impossibility of unconditionally secure bit commitment -- suffice to entail that the observables and state space of a physical theory are quantum-mechanical. We demonstrate the converse derivation in part, and consider the implications of alternative answers to a remaining open question about (...) nonlocality and bit commitment. (shrink)

A novel conceptual framework for theoretical psychology is presented and illustrated for the example of bistable perception. A basic formal feature of this framework is the non-commutativity of operations acting on mental states. A corresponding model for the bistable perception of ambiguous stimuli, the Necker–Zeno model, is sketched and some empirical evidence for it so far is described. It is discussed how a temporal non-locality of mental states, predicted by the model, can be understood and tested.

This book investigates the metaphysical position of dual-aspect monism, with particular emphasis on the concept of meaning as a fundamental feature of the fabric of reality.

We present a new approach to the old problem of how to incorporate the role of the observer in statistics. We show classical probability theory to be inadequate for this task and take refuge in the epsilon-model, which is the only model known to us caapble of handling situations between quantum and classical statistics. An example is worked out and some problems are discussed as to the new viewpoint that emanates from our approach.

This book, based on Jaegwon Kim's 1996 Townsend Lectures, presents the philosopher's current views on a variety of issues in the metaphysics of the mind...

This is a unique volume by a unique scientist, which combines conceptual, formal, and engineering approaches in a way that is rarely seen. Its core is the relation between ways of learning and knowing on the one hand and different modes of time on the other. Partial Boolean logic and the associated notion of complementarity are used to express this relation, and mathematical tools of fundamental physics are used to formalize it. Along the way many central philosophical problems are touched (...) and addressed, above all the mind-body problem. Completed only shortly before the death of the author, the text has been edited and annotated by the author's close collaborator Harald Atmanspacher. (shrink)

Recent advances in the field of quantum cognition suggest a puzzling connection between fundamental physics and the mind. Many researchers see quantum ideas and formalisms merely as useful pragmatic tools, and do not look for deeper underlying explanations for why they work. However, others are tempted to seek for an intelligible explanation for why quantum ideas work to model cognition. This paper first draws attention to how the physicist David Bohm already in 1951 suggested that thought and quantum processes are (...) analogous, adding that this could be explained if some neural processes underlying thought involved non-negligible quantum effects. The paper next points out that the idea that there is a connection between fundamental physics and the mind is not unique to quantum theory, but was there already when Newtonian physics was assumed to be fundamental physics, advocated most notably by Kant. Kant emphasized the unique intelligibility of a Newtonian notion of experience, and this historical background prompts us to ask in the final part of the paper whether we can really make sense of any quantum-like experience. It is proposed that intelligibility is a relative notion and that, regardless of initial difficulties, quantum approaches to cognition and consciousness are likely to provide valuable new ways of understanding the mind. (shrink)

Fundamental Theory has been called an "unfinished symphony" and "a challenge to the musicians among natural philosophers of the future". This book, written in 1944 but left unfinished because Eddington died too soon, proved to be his final effort at a vision for harmonization of quantum physics and relativity. The work is less connected and internally integrated than 'Protons and Electrons' while representing a later point in the author's thought arc. The really interested student should read both books together.The physical (...) and mathematical reasoning are very deep, but it is possible to enjoy much of the flavor of the book even without following everything. The tidbits given below illustrate Eddington's beautiful and mellifluous English style. This edition contains a clickable table of contents and some interesting illustrations.WARNING: Due to the complexity of the mathematical typesetting, the only way to reproduce this book has been as a series of scanned page images. We believe this work is scientifically and culturally important, and despite a few imperfections and the inevitably small print, have brought it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of Eddington's work. On a portable electronic reader the pages come out pretty small, but they are legible. On a desktop computer running the Amazon app, they are perfectly fine. We appreciate your understanding, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.TIDBITS:The number of protons and electrons in the universe would, in itself, be merely a matter of idle curiosity. But N has a more general significance as a fundamental constant which enters into many physical formulae. Its special interpretation as the number of particles in the universe arises in the following way. If we consider a distribution of hydrogen in equilibrium at zero temperature, the presence of the matter produces a curvature of space, and the curvature causes the space to close when the number of particles contained in it reaches a certain total; that number is N. The present investigation seeks to determine N directly from the principles of measurement. We have to show, not that there are N particles in the universe, but that anyone who accepts certain elementary principles of measurement must, if he is consistent, think there are. We have to express in mathematical symbolism what we think we are doing when we measure things; for if we had no conception of what we were doing, the results of the measurements would not persuade us to believe anything in particular. All our results are derived from the condition that the conceptual interpretation which we place on the results of measurement must be consistent with our conceptual interpretation of the process of measurement.If we play about with a pin and a meter standard, we do not become aware of any number in particular unless the standard has been graduated, or unless we use a process of displacement which we interpret as adding pin-extensions. The fact is that, although measurement is primarily a process involving four entities, the conceptual interpretation of measurement postulates in addition the existence (in the structure contemplated) as something referred to as Z. The existence of Z is the condition that makes graduation an exact concept. In the actual universe there exists a basis which is uniform to a very high approximation, and this serves for almost all purposes; but to the much higher approximation required in the calculation of N the ideal exact basis of uniformity does not exist. The finitude of N is, in fact, the cause of the failure of the approximation.It must be remembered that we are now working to what would ordinarily be considered a fantastically high approximation. For ordinary purposes a measurable has 16 eigenvalues; but under the super-magnification here employed (which is not content to overlook 1 part in 10E39) there is a fine structure which splits each of them into 16 components. (shrink)

Much of our understanding of human thinking is based on probabilistic models. This innovative book by Jerome R. Busemeyer and Peter D. Bruza argues that, actually, the underlying mathematical structures from quantum theory provide a much better account of human thinking than traditional models. They introduce the foundations for modelling probabilistic-dynamic systems using two aspects of quantum theory. The first, 'contextuality', is a way to understand interference effects found with inferences and decisions under conditions of uncertainty. The second, 'quantum entanglement', (...) allows cognitive phenomena to be modeled in non-reductionist ways. Employing these principles drawn from quantum theory allows us to view human cognition and decision in a totally new light. Introducing the basic principles in an easy-to-follow way, this book does not assume a physics background or a quantum brain and comes complete with a tutorial and fully worked-out applications in important areas of cognition and decision. (shrink)

This paper presents Integrated Information Theory of consciousness 3.0, which incorporates several advances over previous formulations. IIT starts from phenomenological axioms: information says that each experience is specific a sh it is what it is by how it differs from alternative experiences; integration says that it is unified a sh irreducible to non-interdependent components; exclusion says that it has unique borders and a particular spatio-temporal grain. These axioms are formalized into postulates that prescribe how physical mechanisms, such as neurons or (...) logic gates, must be configured to generate experience. The postulates are used to define intrinsic information as “differences that make a difference‘ within a system, and integrated information as information specified by a whole that cannot be reduced to that specified by its parts. By applying the postulates both at the level of individual mechanisms and at the level of systems of mechanisms, IIT arrives at an identity: an experience is a maximally irreducible conceptual structure, and the set of elements that generates it constitutes a complex. According to IIT, a MICS specifies the quality of an experience and integrated information Φ Max its quantity. From the theory follow several results, including: a system of mechanisms may condense into a major complex and non-overlapping minor complexes; the concepts that specify the quality of an experience are always about the complex itself and relate only indirectly to the external environment; anatomical connectivity influences complexes and associated MICS; a complex can generate a MICS even if its elements are inactive; simple systems can be minimally conscious; complicated systems can be unconscious; there can be true “zombies‘ a sh unconscious feed-forward systems that are functionally equivalent to conscious complexes. (shrink)

In daily life we take it for granted that our minds have conscious control of our actions, at least for most of the time. But many scientists and philosophers deny that this is really the case, because there is no generally accepted theory of how the mind interacts with the body. Max Velmans presents a non-reductive solution to the problem, in which ‘conscious mental control’ includes ‘voluntary’ operations of the preconscious mind. On this account, biological determinism is compatible with experienced (...) free will. Velmans’ theory is put to the test by nine critics: Ron Chrisley, Todd Feinberg, Jeffrey Gray, John Kihlstrom, Sam Rakover, Ramakrishna Rao, Aaron Sloman, Steve Torrance andRobert Van Gulick, followed by Velmans' reply. (shrink)

Panpsychism is the view that consciousness a sh the most puzzling and strangest phenomenon in the entire universe a sh is a fundamental and ubiquitous feature of the.

'Thanks to sound methodology and fidelity to the orignal text, this will be an invaluable asset to the scholar.' Bulletin SpinozisteSpinoza's Ethics is a classic philosophy text but it is also one of the most difficult to understand. This latest text in the Oxford Philosophical Texts series includes a new, lucid translation of Ethics in which Parkinson provides a comprehensive guide to the understanding of Spinoza's work. An extensive introduction includes a short biography of Spinoza himself; the form of his (...) writing including his own particular uses of definitions; an introductory guide through the philosophy of Ethics; and a summary of the contents of Ethics itself. Further aids include a glossary of terms, notes to the text, and notes to the translation. (shrink)

There is an underlying assumption in the social sciences that consciousness and social life are ultimately classical physical/material phenomena. In this ground-breaking book, Alexander Wendt challenges this assumption by proposing that consciousness is, in fact, a macroscopic quantum mechanical phenomenon. In the first half of the book, Wendt justifies the insertion of quantum theory into social scientific debates, introduces social scientists to quantum theory and the philosophical controversy about its interpretation, and then defends the quantum consciousness hypothesis against the orthodox, (...) classical approach to the mind-body problem. In the second half, he develops the implications of this metaphysical perspective for the nature of language and the agent-structure problem in social ontology. Wendt's argument is a revolutionary development which raises fundamental questions about the nature of social life and the work of those who study it. (shrink)

In 1932, Wolfgang Pauli was a world-renowned physicist and had already done the work that would win him the 1945 Nobel Prize. He was also in pain. His mother had poisoned herself after his father's involvement in an affair. Emerging from a brief marriage with a cabaret performer, Pauli drank heavily, quarreled frequently and sometimes publicly, and was disturbed by powerful dreams. He turned for help to C. G. Jung, setting a standing appointment for Mondays at noon. Thus bloomed an (...) extraordinary intellectual conjunction not just between a physicist and a psychologist but between physics and psychology. Eighty letters, written over twenty-six years, record that friendship. This artful translation presents them in English for the first time. Though Jung never analyzed Pauli formally, he interpreted more than 400 of his dreams--work that bore fruit later in Psychology and Alchemy and The Analysis of Dreams. As their acquaintance developed, Jung and Pauli exchanged views on the content of their work and the ideas of the day. They discussed the nature of dreams and their relation to reality, finding surprising common ground between depth psychology and quantum physics. Their collaboration resulted in the combined publication of Jung's treatise on synchronicity and Pauli's essay on archetypal ideas influencing Kepler's writings in The Interpretation of Nature and the Psyche. Over time, their correspondence shaped and reshaped their understanding of the principle they called synchronicity, a term Jung had suggested earlier. Through the association of these two pioneering thinkers, developments in physics profoundly influenced the evolution of Jungian psychology. And many of Jung's abiding themes shaped how Pauli--and, through him, other physicists--understood the physical world. Of clear appeal to historians of science and anyone investigating the life and work of Pauli or Jung, this portrait of an incredible friendship will also draw readers interested in human creativity as well as those who merely like to be present when great minds meet. (shrink)

CHAPTER Structure and function In physical systems made by a large number of basic constituents one can observe collective properties which find their ...

The mysteries of consciousness have gripped the human imagination for over 2,500 years. At the dawn of the new millennium, Understanding Consciousness provides new solutions to some of the deepest puzzles surrounding its nature and function. Drawing on recent scientific discoveries, Max Velmans challenges conventional reductionist thought, providing an understanding of how consciousness relates to the brain and physical world that is neither dualist, nor reductionist. Understanding Consciousness will be of great interest to psychologists, philosophers, neuroscientists and other professionals concerned (...) with mind/body relationships, and all who care deeply about this subject. (shrink)

The book explores philosophical issues such as idealism and free will and speculates on the relationship of consciousness to quantum mechanics.

Presenting a look at the human mind's capacity while criticizing artificial intelligence, the author makes suggestions about classical and quantum physics and ..

The book is the first to give a systematic account, founded in fundamental quantum physical principles, of how the brain functions as a unified system.

The principle of energy conservation is widely taken to be a se- rious difficulty for interactionist dualism (whether property or sub- stance). Interactionists often have therefore tried to make it satisfy energy conservation. This paper examines several such attempts, especially including E. J. Lowe’s varying constants proposal, show- ing how they all miss their goal due to lack of engagement with the physico-mathematical roots of energy conservation physics: the first Noether theorem (that symmetries imply conservation laws), its converse (that conservation (...) laws imply symmetries), and the locality of continuum/field physics. Thus the “conditionality re- sponse”, which sees conservation as (bi)conditional upon symme- tries and simply accepts energy non-conservation as an aspect of interactionist dualism, is seen to be, perhaps surprisingly, the one most in accord with contemporary physics (apart from quantum mechanics) by not conflicting with mathematical theorems basic to physics. A decent objection to interactionism should be a posteri- ori, based on empirically studying the brain. (shrink)

Neuropsychological research on the neural basis of behaviour generally posits that brain mechanisms will ultimately suffice to explain all psychologically described phenomena. This assumption stems from the idea that the brain is made up entirely of material particles and fields, and that all causal mechanisms relevant to neuroscience can therefore be formulated solely in terms of properties of these elements. Thus, terms having intrinsic mentalistic and/or experiential content (e.g. ‘feeling’, ‘knowing’ and ‘effort’) are not included as primary causal factors. This (...) theoretical restriction is motivated primarily by ideas about the natural world that have been known to be fundamentally incorrect for more than three-quarters of a century. Contemporary basic physical theory differs profoundly from classic physics on the important matter of how the consciousness of human agents enters into the structure of empirical phenomena. The new principles contradict the older idea that local mechanical processes alone can account for the structure of all observed empirical data. Contemporary physical theory brings directly and irreducibly into the overall causal structure certain psychologically described choices made by human agents about how they will act. This key development in basic physical theory is applicable to neuroscience, and it provides neuroscientists and psychologists with an alternative conceptual framework for describing neural processes. Indeed, owing to certain structural features of ion channels critical to synaptic function, contemporary physical theory must in principle be used when analysing human brain dynamics. The new framework, unlike its classic-physics-based predecessor, is erected directly upon, and is compatible with, the prevailing principles of physics. It is able to represent more adequately than classic concepts the neuroplastic mechanisms relevant to the growing number of empirical studies of the capacity of directed attention and mental effort to systematically alter brain function.. (shrink)

The emergence of mental states from neural states by partitioning the neural phase space is analyzed in terms of symbolic dynamics. Well-defined mental states provide contexts inducing a criterion of structural stability for the neurodynamics that can be implemented by particular partitions. This leads to distinguished subshifts of finite type that are either cyclic or irreducible. Cyclic shifts correspond to asymptotically stable fixed points or limit tori whereas irreducible shifts are obtained from generating partitions of mixing hyperbolic systems. These stability (...) criteria are applied to the discussion of neural correlates of consiousness, to the definition of macroscopic neural states, and to aspects of the symbol grounding problem. In particular, it is shown that compatible mental descriptions, topologically equivalent to the neurodynamical description, emerge if the partition of the neural phase space is generating. If this is not the case, mental descriptions are incompatible or complementary. Consequences of this result for an integration or unification of cognitive science or psychology, respectively, will be indicated. (shrink)

During sensory stimulation, visual cortical neurons undergo massive synaptic bombardment. This increases their input conductance, and action potentials mainly result from membrane potential fluctuations. To understand the response properties of neurons operating in this regime, we studied a model neuron with synaptic inputs represented by transient membrane conductance changes. We show that with a simultaneous increase of excitation and inhibition, the firing rate first increases, reaches a maximum, and then decreases at higher input rates. Comodulation of excitation and inhibition, therefore, (...) does not provide a straightforward way of controlling the neuronal firing rate, in contrast to coding mechanisms postulated previously. The synaptically induced conductance increase plays a key role in this effect: it decreases firing rate by shunting membrane potential fluctuations, and increases it by reducing the membrane time constant, allowing for faster membrane potential transients. These findings do not depend on details of the model and, hence, are relevant to cells of other cortical areas as well. (shrink)

A framework for the mind-matter problem in a holistic universe which has no parts is outlined. The conceptual structure of modern quantum theory suggests to use complementary Boolean descriptions as elements for a more comprehensive non-Boolean description of a world without an a priori mind-matter distinction. Such a description in terms of a locally Boolean but globally non-Boolean structure makes allowance for the fact that Boolean descriptions play a privileged role in science. If we accept the insight that there are (...) no ultimate building blocks, the existence of holistic correlations between contextually chosen parts is a natural consequence. The main problem of a genuinely non-Boolean description is to find an appropriate partition of the universe of discourse. If we adopt the idea that all fundamental laws of physics are invariant under time translations, then we can consider a partition of the world into a tenseless and a tensed domain.In the sense of a regulative principle, the material domain is defined as the tenseless domain with its homogeneous time. The tensed domain contains the mental domain with a tensed time characterized by a privileged position, the Now. Since this partition refers to two complementary descriptions which are not given a priori we have to expect correlations between these two domains. In physics it corresponds to Newton 's separation of universal laws of nature and contingent initial conditions Both descriptions have a non-Boolean structure and can be encompassed into a single non-Boolean description. Tensed and tenseless time can be synchronized by holistic correlations. (shrink)

We outline the rationale and preliminary results of using the State Context Property (SCOP) formalism, originally developed as a generalization of quantum mechanics, to describe the contextual manner in which concepts are evoked, used, and combined to generate meaning. The quantum formalism was developed to cope with problems arising in the description of (1) the measurement process, and (2) the generation of new states with new properties when particles become entangled. Similar problems arising with concepts motivated the formal treatment introduced (...) here. Concepts are viewed not as fixed representations, but entities existing in states of potentiality that require interaction with a context---a stimulus or another concept---to `collapse' to observable form as an exemplar, prototype, or other (possibly imaginary) instance. The stimulus situation plays the role of the measurement in physics, acting as context that induces a change of the cognitive state from superposition state to collapsed state. The collapsed state is more likely to consist of a conjunction of concepts for associative than analytic thought because more stimulus or concept properties take part in the collapse. We provide two contextual measures of conceptual distance---one using collapse probabilities and the other weighted properties---and show how they can be applied to conjunctions using the pet fish problem. (shrink)

Uncovering the neural basis of consciousness is a major challenge to neuroscience. In this Perspective, Tononi and colleagues describe the integrated information theory of consciousness and how it might be used to answer outstanding questions about the nature of consciousness.

I survey some of the connections between the metaphysics of the relation between mind and matter, and quantum theory’s measurement problem. After discussing the metaphysics, especially the correct formulation of physicalism, I argue that two state-reduction approaches to quantum theory’s measurement problem hold some surprises for philosophers’ discussions of physicalism. Though both approaches are compatible with physicalism, they involve a very different conception of the physical, and of how the physical underpins the mental, from what most philosophers expect. And one (...) approach exemplifies a a problem in the definition of physicalism which the metaphysical literature has discussed only in the abstract. A version of the paper has appeared in Consciousness and Human Identity, ed. John Cornwell, OUP 1998. (shrink)