Is our universe tuned for maximal consciousness?

[SteveA]

Here's a link I read a bit ago.

http://home.earthlink.net/~dolascetta/MetaFrameSet.html

(I've been having some fun with the ideas of consciousness and quantum uncertainty)

I'm going to make some wild guesses and see how much of this is true for various people out there. I'm going to guess most of you:

1) Live in areas of moderate to high population
2) Have at least one other sibling.
3) Are not representative of a very small minority in your area.
4) Would find life more difficult if relocated 100 miles north of where you live.
5) Have an internet connection

Ok, maybe I missed one of those - my mind reading skills are a bit rusty.

The point is that all of these tend to be true for anyone reading this because they are based on sampling bias. The audience isn't truly randomly selected and these seem easy to demonstrate:

1) Live in areas of moderate to high population
(Few people live in low population areas)

2) Have at least one other sibling.
(Larger families create a larger representation in the population than small families)

3) Are not representative of a very small minority in your area.
(By definition, minorities don't represent most people)

4) Would find life more difficult if relocated 100 miles north of where you live.
(Most random locations on the Earth are likely harder to live in than where you are now - and that's not even including up or down but simply on the surface of the Earth)

5) Have an internet connection
(If anyone needs this explained, don't bother reading the rest )

Now this can be expanded upon - I'll presume everyone here is conscious, so I'm not talking to unconscious beings, and we can safely assume the planet we live on supports life and the solar system we're in was also capable of this, and that we don't live in a solar system incapable of supporting consciousness. Also, given two random solar systems, one supporting a single consciousness, while another that supports a billion, if we are a random selected consciousness between these two, then we'd very likely be one of the billion, instead of the 1 chance in a billion and one, of being a lone consciousness in the other.

If quantum mechanics, selects single events to become true out of random possible universes, which could be either more supportive or less supportive of conscious beings, it would seem likely our conscious selves are represented in a universe out of many possible random ones, that happens to support a large number of conscious beings.

So, as an example of how this could be tested, if the coefficient of gravity could randomly fluctuate some through quantum mechanical "decisions" being made, it would seem very likely that gravity is currently at a value (relative to other characteristics of the universe) close to optimal in supporting consciousness. This isn't an original thought of mine, and others have done some calculations along these lines that tend to imply this is true.

Or if an atom could randomly be positioned somewhere through quantum uncertainty, it would likely ultimately come to be positioned at a location that supports maximum consciousness - any universe or evolution of it that fell away from this would be unlikely to be observed, because by definition, there would be few conscious beings to observe such a state.

Another way of looking at it could be to say that the universe we live in likely represents one of the most likely universes to be observed, and that events that occur in it are possibly events that are most likely to be consciously observed. Something that seems to be a trend is ever increasing information complexity, or sensitivity and connectedness in information processing. Life needs senses to detect its state and complexity in order to make intellegent decisions and survive. History seems to be a record of ever increasingly more sensitive and complex/interconnected systems (from the big-bang a point of energy and sub-atomic particles, to atoms, to molecules, to single celled organisms, to animals and humans, then societies and the internet ... to ???). The trend of the universe may not be toward entrophy, but life, with entrophy being simply the cost of creating it.

Now I have my doubts, because it seems like the universe could be filled with a lot more conscious minds, but things aren't usually as simple as they appear. There could be consciousness we don't recognize (like dark matter), or just as we don't typically see ants as intelligent, they likely don't see us as intelligent either and because of limitations imposed by the speed of light, we can't truly see most the universe as it is now, only how it was. There's also the possibility that there's always a fixed amount of consciousness so selection of universes doesn't affect the likelihood of it being observed, or that selection of conscious observation isn't random, but anyway I thought this might be something interesting to people.

P.S. This could also possibly explain why we don't see many aliens around - ignoring that we likely wouldn't recognize them, and the fact that such encounters might be short lived - consciousness is most likely found in areas of the universe where it is most present.

[SteveA]

I realize this subject is rather existential and might not have any real applications or provide any useful insight into how the universe works, but here's a bit of other interesting thoughts along these lines, if it interests anyone:

1) We tend to think of a computer as not conscious - it simply runs a predetermined program and effectively repeats back information given to it. Though we can make this complex enough that it's very difficult to predict what it "says" back, most everything it does could, with enough prior analysis be predicted. It has little of any way to do anything novel and unforeseen except with 99.9999+% probability "crash". Oftentimes even crashing is a product of bad programming and not something "novel" or unpredictable in any sense.

2) The difference between the human mind and a computer is that we see our thoughts in an evolutionary sense - 99+% plus of our physical actions and senses can be predicted rather accurately simply by physically looking at the "hardware" and creating a duplicate system to simulate what it would do.

3) Observations from quantum mechanics seem to indicate the universe isn't 100% predictable as scientists have imagined for a long time. There's some "noise" coming from somewhere that we can't see.

4) Most quantum actions are limited in scope and there's little way to have these minute perterbations revealed on any large sense, though there are some large scale observations that can be made (the dual particle/wave nature of light) of these effects in limited settings.

5) If a system is delicate and sensitive enough to amplify quantum information from some point, that information can be seen on a larger scale and this quantum energy can be used to control larger scale events. A salt crystal is very rigid and insensitve to small amounts of energy - a crystal of salt, with a high probably, would be unaffected on any large scale by any quantum information in it. But organic systems, as human bodies are composed of, contain much more flexible, complex and sensitive chemical bonds that could with a much greater chance be affected by quantum energy/noise/information. We have 'non-linearities' that can focus, direct and amplify small chemical actions into large motions - the movement of your arm can be initiated by levels of power much much smaller inside the brain and amplified into a larger powerful motion - we've extended upon this to where this motion can then be in turn effected as the motion of a car or airplane or even entire societies in some cases. So in a sense, the flight of an entire aircraft is directed by energies that are at least billions of times smaller. Though the aircraft itself might not be "alive" in any sense, as 99%+ of it isn't directly controlled by these energies but are simply "along for the ride".

Now consider a computer not built but hard wires and fixed binary states, but instead a computer of jello with nebulous states and weak chemical actions, that were very sensitive to minute levels of energy - something not unlike a brain.

This system would likely exhibit a lot of random noise and be unpredictable. It could in many ways be viewed as writing its own programming. It would be affected by quantum energies and as such it would be impossible for us to predict exactly how it would evolve. If at some point it learned to protect itself and survive ... I think it could be seen as alive - with likely a consciousness of itself. Though it would seem likely its thoughts and values would be something alien to us but it might be a matter of faith, I think it would be something "alive" in the same sense as humans are. Our free will isn't part of the hardware or operating system our minds run on, it's the ability we have to place pressure the evolution of our thoughts and our values - I think our bodies are similar to computers that sort of run a program with an "operating system", and we are the programmers that use high level programming tools to adjust the operation of these.

Another way of looking at it could be that our free will can only affect the motion of a few atoms - it takes consciousness and an "amplifier" for us to control more in this world, via our bodies. So the brain and body could be something similar to a television set tuned to a specific channel and the amplifier picking up a minute amount of quantum energy. We have to learn how to correlate the small amount of energy controlled by our conscious free will to make things happen - this is part of learning and growing from a child. In a sense when people have a child then you could view it as them creating another delicately balanced system that can amplify someone elses conscious mind, so thay can "live" also. We're in this world, opening doors for other people, in a sense.

But then again, I'm always open to other ideas.

[SteveA]

Assuming the above is true, we might wonder how a person can remain alive or conscious when atoms in their body are cycled through "the system", but quantum mechanics has demonstrated that quantum characteristics can be shared between two physically separate objects - I believe it's called superposition, where the spin properties of an electron can be tied to the spin of another electron. So quantum energies aren't tied to any specific physical object but can be shared, or possibly even shift from one to the next.

So this energy could likely remain stable and localized as long as it exposed to any outside energy source, stonger than it, which could destroy this coherency. In other words, as long as nothing drastic occured in the brain, this energy could likely be used to pass control from one atom/particle to another one, and remain stable.

We see something very similar in quantum experiments, where the main problem encountered is called "entanglement" - outside quantum energies from the environment tend to leak in and disturb the operation of the system. This is what keeps large scale quantum computers from being created. The brain may be an amplifier for a small quantum computer :) and those quantum characteristics are conscious and have a "will"/energy independent of the universe we typically see.

I apologize for the long/strange post , but I'm thinking it might spark some creative insights in someone else. Maybe from a religious viewpoint, quantum energies are the will/thoughts of God, and we might be a small part of it/him. For computer "geeks" - we're allowed to timeshare on the mainframe.

[SoccerfreakAB2]

Don't lose hope in this thread Steve, I just need time to read it and contemplate my opinions on the subject, then make a good post.

[SteveA]

I'm happy it might have sparked your creative tastebuds, Soccer. Yes, add what other insights you might have and who knows if maybe this stuff might actually be "provable" as true to some extent (at least demonstratable to people individually, if not provable in the typical sense that we can all see the same thing and agree on it ... this type of thing seems to require a first person perspective to verify, you wouldn't be able to simply read it in a book and know for certain whether or not it's true).

[SteveA]

Here's an article I found that seems to say the same thing. I must admit to not having a good background in organic chemistry, nor detailed knowledge of quantum mechanics, nor a lab to test things, so I'm at the mercy of the findings and (mis)interpretations of other researchers but this one seems very promising:

http://www.informatics.sussex.ac.uk/...emmet/qm3.html

"...

I completely agree with Spier and Thomas that protein molecules "act as the basic computational elements in living cells", but simply add that proteins may act as quantum computational elements. Proteins are dynamical¿their state a delicate balance among various countervailing forces. However strong forces cancel out so that dynamical protein conformation and function are determined by weak quantum-level dipole interactions called London (van der Waals) forces [10]. These forces largely occur in intra-protein hydrophobic pockets, water-excluding regions at which anesthetic molecules act [11]. If proteins are quantum switches, then an interactive protein lattice (e.g. microtubules) could constitute a quantum computer.

Spier and Thomas also argue that "microtubules are too unstable to account for consciousness". While this is true of non-neuronal dividing cells whose microtubules radiate from centrioles and are (as Spier and Thomas describe) dynamically unstable, neurons in the brain don*t divide, their microtubules do not radiate from centrioles, and they do not manifest dynamic instability [12]. Brain microtubules are quite stable and interlinked in complex cytoskeletal networks.

..."

Also, if quantum energies aren't simply random, but instead manifestations of a focused intent, then there's even less likelihood of instabilities being a problem, and though we might have a difficult time sorting quantum energies from among other background energies, that doesn't mean a conscious mind can't focus itself on a task and ignore distractions. I also found it interesting that anesthetics affected these weak forces, which would seem to be the most likely conduits through which consciousness was communicated, as they're the ones most likely to detect quantum events.

Think about this. If evolution has pressured animals to become intelligent and resourceful to survive, how much of an advantage would a quantum computer (conscious mind?) provide? So it would seem likely that if brains could have evolved sensitivies enough to use quantum computations to their advantage, they would have. If that's true, it would seem ironic that it was not strong claws, or large and powerful bones etc. that ultimately has proven to be the most beneficial, but instead one of the weakest organic chemical bonds that's so far proven most resiliant.

And, if anesthetics simply affect a small number of chemical forces in the brain, and that removes (most?) all consciousness, then would it be possible to increase the number of these weak chemical forces to somehow increase consciousness?