Quantum Conception of the Mind-Brain Connection

Our Scientific Understandings of Nature Have Two Different Kinds Of Elements: Empirical/Mental/Subjective Realities Theoretical/Physical/Objective Properties

Each mental aspect is embedded in the mind, or stream of conscious experiences, of some observing subject.

Each physical aspect is specified by ascribing mathematical properties to space-time points. The physical aspects are considered to be “Objective”: i.e., to exist independently of being witnessed by observers.

There Are Two Different Scientific Physical Theories: Classical Mechanics (CM) Quantum Mechanics (QM)

The Aim Of This Talk Is To Contrast The Conception Of The Mind/Brain Connection That Underlies Classical Mechanics With The Conception That Underlies Quantum Mechanics!

The Core Precept of CM: Only physically described properties enter into the causal dynamics!

Fact Classical Mechanics (CM) was believed to be correct from the time of Isaac Newton (Principia, 1687) until ~ 1900.

Fact During the first half of the twentieth century Classical Mechanics was found to be incompatible with vast amounts of empirical data, and it was replaced by Quantum Mechanics as our basic physical theory!

The Most Radical Change Wrought By The Switch From CM To Orthodox QM Is This: Mental realities enter into the quantum dynamics!

Question: Why did the founder’s of quantum mechanics introduce mental realities into the physical dynamics?

Answer! The evolving quantum state of a system consists almost always of a mixture of many alternative components corresponding to many alternative possible human experiences ---not to some single human experience!

Within classical mechanics, in which only physically described properties appear, one can rationally maintain that mentally described things are just physically described things described in a different language!

But within quantum mechanics the huge disparity between the evolving physical state and any actual human experiences rules out the possibility of identifying mental states with evolving physical states: Mental realities must be conceptually distinct from the physical, yet causally related to the physical!

Reconciling Theory with Experience: Introduce Quantum Jumps! Allow the continuous evolution of the quantum state, governed by the Schroedinger Equation to be interrupted by abrupt changes called “Quantum Jumps”! Each subjective experience occurs in conjunction with a “Jump” of the quantum state to a state, S, that is compatible with that experience!

Each conscious human experience is associated with a PAIR of choices ! Initially the quantum state of the system being examined is incompatible with any experience of the observing subject. Next the subject chooses a quantum state S that is compatible with such a possible experience. Then nature chooses either that state S, or some state S’ that is “perpendicular” to S. If nature chooses S, then the associated experience appears in the subject’s stream of consciousness

Simplification I shall, for didactic reasons, now simplify the description, relative to the full quantum mechanical machinery. This simplification retains the essence of quantum mechanics. In this vastly oversimplified model, the observed evolving macroscopic state is represented by a single point moving continuously on a circle of radius r=1.

S V Fig.1 Diagram indicating the evolution of the unit-length state vector that represents an evolving macroscopic physical state that is being observed by a subject. The vertical and horizontal lines from the center of the circle are S and S’, respectively, and the sloping line from the center of the circle is the state vector when it is rotated by an angle θ away from vertical. The vector V represents the velocity at θ = 0 of the tip of the state vector. Θ SʹSʹ

In this model there is only one state that corresponds to a possible experience in the stream of consciousness of the subject. That state is the one represented by the vertical vector S, specified by the angle θ = 0. The only freedom of choice on the part of the subject is the time, hence the θ, of the jump. This jump must be to either S or S’.

The Quantum Rules. The subject’s choice of the vector S, and of the time of the jump, is not governed by, or contrained by, any known rule, either deterministic or statistical. In this very specific sense, the subject’s choices can be called “free choices”. But nature’s choice IS conditioned by a statistical rule: if the position of the vector before the jump is specified by θ, then the probability that it will jump to S is the square of Cosine θ.

Repeated Probing Action. Suppose a probing action is made, and the state jumps to the state S. The tip of the vector in Fig. 1 will then immediately start moving, say to the right, around the circle of radius one: θ will begin to increase, say at a constant rate. Suppose when the tip reaches the point specified by the value θ the same probing action is again made. Then the vector will jump either back to position S with probability equal to the square of cosine θ, or to S’ with probability “1 minus the square of cosine θ”.

Quantum Zeno Effect Given those statistical rules, it is easy to show that if repeated probing actions corresponding to S occur at a constant rate of n per second, then the probability that, after one second, every one of the n jumps will be to S, hence none to S’, tends to unity as n tends to infinity. Thus both the subject’s experiences of the observed physical system, and that physical system itself, will tend to be held in place by the subject’s rapid sequence of observations of that system.

Connection to “Attention”. Assuming that intensity of attention to an experience correlates with the repetition rate of observations associated with that experience, the QZE entails that : If a human observer/actor, by his “free choice”, focuses sufficient attention on a possible experience, then the physical correlate of that experience will tend to be held in place.

Mind-Brain Connection The physical correlate of a thought can be a macroscopic pattern of neurological activity in the observer’s own brain. (von Neumann) Then the patient’s “free choice” of what thoughts to attend to, and the intensity of those attentions, can affect the longevity of the neural correlates of those thoughts.

A Prevalent Misunderstanding. It is often asserted that Quantum Mechanics is not relevant to consciousness, because the neural correlates of our conscious thoughts are macroscopic brain processes, and macroscopic processes are said to be described by Classical Mechanics.

The Correct Understanding: In both classical and quantum mechanics big things are built out of smaller things. The underlying dynamics is therefore the quantum dynamics, which governs the evolution of the microscopic aspects, and consequently also the macroscopic aspects, except at the quantum jumps.

A Placebo Experiment. Price et.al. (Pain 127,63-72,2007) conducted a placebo experiment in which the patients were subjected to a procedure that produced a heightened level of pain In a first session the patients were told that they would receive no treatment. In a subsequent second (placebo) session, which adhered to the same physical procedures, the doctor told the patient: “The agent you have just received is known to powerfully reduce pain in some patients.”

Empirical Results The ‘reported pain’ in the second session was significantly less than in the first. An fMRI study showed that the neural activity in identified pain centers in the thalamus, somatosensory cortices, and insula, is significantly less in session two than in session one. Thus the spoken words influence not just the subsequent verbal reports, but also basic pain centers in the brain.

How Can A Physician Or Neuroscientist Best Understand The Effect Of The Spoken Words On The Pain Centers In The Brain? Is an Understanding Based on Classical Mechanics or on Quantum Mechanics likely to be more useful?

Given that classical mechanics: 1.Is inapplicable to the mind-body problem, because it does not correctly describe the underlying micro-causal brain dynamics, and 2.Fails to incorporate the complex interplay between mind and body that is a crucial to the switch from false classical mechanics to never-known-to fail orthodox quantum mechanics, and

3. Demands, a priori, that any scientific explanation of behavior be exclusively in terms of physically described properties alone, which, A. Precludes, a priori, the possibility that the patient’s conscious understanding of spoken words can influence his behavior. but, B. Requires that the causal effects of the spoken words be deduced purely from the mechanical effects of the physical vibrations that constitute the physical description of the spoken words.

One may ask: Is there any good reason for a rational scientist or physician to restrict his theorizing, a priori, about mind-brain connection by imposing these highly restrictive conditions imposed by the known-to-be-false classical physics, Instead of basing his theorizing on the empirically validated quantum psycho-physical dynamics, which allows a person’s mental processes to influence his neural processes in a rationally coherent and understandable way?

Conclusion: The ultimate origin of the observer’s “free choice” of what to attend to does remain a mystery. But from a practical scientific standpoint the ultimate origin of the observer’s “free choice” is irrelevant, because in practice the observer’s choices of what to attend to are under the effective control of his volitions, which depend on his expectations, his interests, and his understandings of the meaning of words. These are all described in mental terms, and are incorporated in QM.