From stapp@thsrv.lbl.gov Fri Aug 28 15:56:24 1998 Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 15:39:02 -0700 (PDT) From: Henry Stapp To: quantum-mind Cc: kleinlist , bdj10@cam.ac.uk, brings@rpi.edu, brucero@cats.ucsc.edu, chalmers@paradox.ucsc.edu, ghrosenb@ai.uga.edu, hameroff@u.arizona.edu, hpstapp@lbl.gov, "jeffery m. schwartz" , keith@imprint.co.uk, klein@adage.berkeley.edu, patrickw@monash.edu.au, phayes@nuts.coginst.uwf.edu Subject: Physica Mind On Thu, 27 Aug 1998, Jan Pieter Verhey wrote: >Subject: [q-mind] Deeper Questions of Consciousness -- Jan Verhey >Subject: Note on:Stapp's "Realistic vs. Pragmatic-idealistic Theories > of Mind" (Q-mind: 24-25 Aug.) > > > I found this an intriguing post of Henry Stapp. What makes sense to me, >is that he chooses to work entirely within the context of experience, by >relating experiences with other experiences. I find this more realistic >then idealistic, since experience is THE reality for us. So that's >always a good starter. > > What is however not clear to me, is how Henry actually sees the >mind-brain relationship. What is "mind-brain research" ? Whereas Jack >Sarfatti is pretty clear about his mind-brain relationship, in Henry >Stapp's approach it is unclear what it could be in effect. How do brain >and mind relate? > What is it that relates? > > If ideas, or thought-like qualities, are the building-blocks of >reality, then there seems to be an in-built risk that at some point one >may attribute to reality whatever one thinks is real, [Stapp] I start from basic physical theory: from a commitment to the notion that, in accord with the basic idea of Newton and of Maxwell, nature is built out of interacting particles and fields that evolve in accordance with some mathematical laws that we scientists are in the process of trying to discover. But how do I recocile this completely physics-based position with what is, from a classical point of view, its exactly opposite, the pragmatic-idealistic position that I claim to be pursuing? The essence of what I, as a quantum physicist, am saying is these two views are not opposites, but are rather alternative descriptions the very same theory. This claim of the identity of what seems, from a classical standpoint, to be opposites is not some mystical incantation: it is clearly explainable. Quantum theory lays the whole situation out plainly for us to see, if one takes the trouble to look. To understand this clearly one can begin by accepting the physical Newton-Maxwell assumption that the world is built out of particles and fields that evolve according to fixed mathematical laws, which science is in the process of uncovering. No mysticism! No mysterious "emergent properties" at the basic level! All there is is the physical world, completely represented by mathematical quantities defined over spacetime, and evolving in accordance with mathematical laws. This does not mean that we scientists may not need to create new concepts to aid us in understanding complex (e.g., biological) phenomena: it only means accepting at the *basic level* the essential idea of physical theory that has reigned since the time of Issac Newton (or at least since the time of his immediate successors---Isaac himself allowed some tinkering by God, to keep things in good working order). Newton stressed that science was an ongoing process: he did not believe he was at the end of it all. The contemporary form of the Newton-Maxwell presumption is the vonNeumann/Wigner ontologicalization of the pragmatic Copenhagen formulation of quantum theory: the entire world of particles and fields is represented by the quantum mechanical generalization of the classical-physics concept of the state of the physical universe. According to this most direct and simple development of the Newton-Maxwell thesis, the universe is completely described by the deterministically evolving quantum state of the universe. But what is the nature of this beast? What about the quantum jumps? According to Heisenberg, what is really happening in quantum process are transitions from the `potential' to the `actual'. The actual things that are directly known to us are our experiences: our increases in knowledge. The central idea of the Copenhagen interpretation as it was laid down in the Solvay conference of 1927 is that the basic realities which the theory is about are increments in our knowledge. [See "Xth Max Born Symposium" or "Knowings" on my website for details and documentation, and also my 1972 Amer, J. Phys, article "The Copenhagen Interpretation", reprinted in my book]. This aspect is carried into the vonNeumann/Wigner ontologicalization, where each increment in knowledge is represented in mathematical form as a reduction S--> {P_e S P_e) of the prior state S [of the brain/body, and consequently of the entire universe] to the part of the prior state that is compatible with the knowledge contained in the experience e. But one thing must be made absolutely clear: When one takes the entire state of the universe to be represented by the physical state one does not squeeze experience out. Just the opposite! Mind is essentially an aspect of the body, and hence when von Neumann and Wigner bring the body/brain into the physical universe they bring experience INTO the physical universe: they do not squeeze it out! This is exactly opposite to what the Copenhagen formulation does! The Copenhagen approach pushes mind out of the physically described universe, onto the "other side of the Heisenberg Cut". The Copenhagen formulation enshrines Descartes' separation of mind from matter, and makes a quantum theory of mind unattainable. The glory of the full quantum theory, as expressed by the vonNeumann/Wigner ontologicalization, is that the acceptance of the thesis that the entire physical world should be represented in terms of the concepts of physics brings mind back INTO the physical universe, thereby resolving the dilemma posed by classical physical theory, which excluded mind from the physical universe from the outset, and had no rational way to bring it back. It all comes down to understanding the nature of this beast: what IS the physical universe, as it is represented in the vonNeumann/Wigner ontology. How is this physical state to be conceived. We know its mathematical properties, or at least enough of them to make practical computations possible in many cases. But what words do we use to allow us to "understand" what this physical universe is? Heisenberg put his finger right on it when he said that what is really happening is transitions from the potential to the actual. The evolution of the physical state is punctuated by actual events, some of which are experiential increments in human knowledge. The whole process of the unfolding of reality is expressed in terms of the evolution of the quantum state, which is the representation of all the particles and fields in the universe, as they are represented in quantum theory. But the laws governing this unfolding constitute the laws that govern the generation of a sequence of actual events. Some of which these actual events are of special importance to us: they are the experienced increments in human human knowledge that are the basis of Bohr's epistemological considerations, and also the basis of our entire endeavor to create an understanding of the universe of which these experiences are some small part. The key point is that the physical state constitutes a potentiality for an experiential event to occur. The experiential aspect is not some alien form. It is the foundational element, in the sense that what the potentiality IS is the potentiality for an experience to occur. A potentiality makes sense only as a potentiality for something. And that something, according to the vonNeumann/Wigner ontology, is an experiential event. Of course, most events are not high-level human-type experiences. We must work out, from the knowledge supplied by those those special events, the form of the general rule that specifies the conditions on physical systems, as they are represented in the physical state of the universe, under which events occur. Newton and Maxwell did not try to explain "why" there were particle and fields: those elements were taken as given, at that stage in the development of science. Nor does the vonNeumann/Wigner ontology try to explain "why" the physical state should evolve in accordance with the particular laws that it does: that is taken as empirically given. Von Neumann did not know why the fine structure constant is "1/137", nor do physicists yet know. So I am not at all suggesting that we now know the exact form of the laws, or why these laws are just what they are and not something else. But the vonNeumann/Wigner ontology does specify the form of the mathematical structure, firmly rooted in physics, that describes the evolving universe as an evolving set of potentialities for the occurrence of a sequence of events, some small subsequence of which consists of experiential increments in human knowledge. [Verhey continues] > A side-farce: another fundamental problem that is not met in Stapp's >theoretical thinking, >..... >is that it leaves out the whole question of self, i.e. of >*individual* self-consciousness. Not the homunculus regression enigma >(another non-problem imo), ... >There is a much deeper and fundamental mystery >to consciousness-and-self, and so far the scientific and philosophical >thinking about the issue has just started. ... >The "view from no-where >and no-when", the Utmost Objective Scientific Theory of Everything, is a >suicide-theory in terms of consciousness. [Stapp] I deal extensively with "self" in my book: it is the basis of my model of how the mind/brain system functions. Examination of the twenty-six references to William James would be a good starting point for a study of what I say about "self". That theory of the functioning of mind/brain systems lays heavy stress on the intentional and attentional aspects of the conscious thought: of how these aspects arise out of the interplay between the efficacious aspects of our thoughts, as they are represented in this quantum theory, and the feed back that the thoughts elicit from the body and its environment. All of that development relating to self, intention, attention, representation, mental models, and interactive interplay between the experiential and ``material" aspects of the mind/body complexlies at the base of everything I am saying here I would certainly not claim that all these issues have been settled in my theoretical thinking, but it is inaccurate to say that they are "not met". Henry P. Stapp