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Date Posted: 22:25:21 07/30/04 Fri
Author: One-eyed Jack, bored this evening
Subject: About chaotic and emergent phenomena...
In reply to: One-eyed Jack 's message, "Mario, your hypothesis is an unphysical oversimplification." on 17:23:43 07/29/04 Thu

As I understand it, Mario's argument for the supernatural origin of consciousness, plainly put, claims that because there is no particle interaction which contains 'consciousness' then there is no way any sum of particle interactions could give rise to consciousness. More precisely, Mario claims that the Schroedinger equation for molecular systems is incapable of obtaining "...consciousness, emotions, feelings, etc." He claims that "These are not possible outputs of a first-principle calculation."

An easy refutation from chaotic complexity: It is not possible to model any truly chaotic system from first principles. Proofs from chaos theory show, for instance, that it is impossible, even theoretically, to model the Earth's weather systems from first principles. Therefore the fact that we cannot derive consciousness from first principles tells us nothing new; it only affirms that the electrochemical activity of the brain is one among many systems which are intractable to first-principle analysis. Such systems can only be modelled phenomenologically. This should not surprise us.

Another refutation, from emergent phenomena: Systems in the universe are known to give rise to unexpected behaviors when they are very complex. The stability of a tropical rainforest ecosystem is such a behavior, an emergent pheneomenon: it cannot be predicted from analysis of isolated lifeforms from the ecosystem; it only exists as a property of the whole. The remarkable stability of the ecosystem only emerges as a property of the entire system; it is not inherent in any one of the species or any isolated subset of interspecific interactions.

Now, the human brain contains roughly 100 billion neurons, and each of these can interact with other neurons through up to 15,000 synapses per neuron. It's more complex than the Amazon jungle. It's quite likely that the phenomenon of consciousness is an emergent property of this immensely complex entity. One would not EXPECT to find the property of 'consciousness' in a particle interaction, in a single neuron, or in an isolated subset of neurons. The property of 'consciousness' would emerge only as a property of the whole--therefore Mario's attempt to locate it in particle interactions is quite nonsensical. It is like looking at the leg of a single leafcutter ant and expecting it to reveal the ecological stability of a tropical rainforest.

----

There is an obvious class of evidence which would support the existence of the supernatural--of God, souls, spirits, etc: miracles. By definition miracles contravene natural law, and are therefore evidence of supernatural causation.

If glaciers burst into flame and boulders began to recite Shakespeare with a Dutch accent, then one would suspect that there is indeed more to the universe than natural law. Such miracles seem undirected and purposless, and therefore one might infer that the supernatural order behind them is also undirected and purposeless--though with a sense of the ridiculous, perhaps!

If all the plutonium in the world's nuclear warheads suddenly transmuted into lead, the explosives in soldiers' weapons turned to charcoal, and mutilated Congolese children miraculously regained their amputated arms, then one might suspect that there exists a purposeful and benevolent supernatural order in the universe.

But of course our most careful and precise observations have so far failed to reveal the existence of indisputable miracles. So far obvious and undeniable evidence for the supernatural is most conspicuous in its absence.

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