From: rjon@vzavenue.net
Subject: Quantum Evolution
Date: August 15, 2005 8:42:38 PM EDT
To: postaum2005@sriaurobindocenter-la.com

Hi Folks,

I
just came across a message which I thought I posted nearly a month ago,
but when I checked the website, it doesn't seem to be there. I may have
somehow accidently deleted it.

Oh well, better late than never.
I think some of the ideas covered are still relevant to our
conversation. Sorry for any inconvenience ...

Here it is:
______________

From: Ron (rjon@vzavenue.net)
Date: July 20, 2005 5:10:08 PM EDT
To: postaum2005@sriaurobindocenter-la.com
Subject: Quantum Evolution & Quantum Consciousness

The
idea that quantum phenomena may have been crucial to the evolution of
both life and consciousness on Earth is gaining increasing interest. (A
Google search today for articles containing both the words "quantum"
and "evolution" returned over three million hits.)

Two of the
most frequently cited references are the work of Professor Stuart
Hameroff, a research anesthesiologist and Director of the Center for
Consciousness Studies at the University of Arizona, Tucson and the book
*Quantum Evolution* by Johnjoe McFadden, Professor of Molecular
Genetics at the University of Surrey in England.

1) In my
previous posts I've referenced Hameroff and Oxford's Sir Roger
Penrose's work on possible quantum effects in human neural processes in
the brain and their hypothesis that these quantum actions are a crucial
component of moments of conscious experience. Their most controversial
claim, based on advanced mathematical work by Penrose, is that these
quantum processes access "Platonic qualia" that are fundamental
properties of reality, located everywhere and everywhen at the
omnipresent Planck scale of spacetime. - <
http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/ >

Hameroff has extended
these ideas to include possible quantum effects in the evolution of
consciousness on Earth; e.g., in his paper "Did Consciousness Cause the
Cambrian Evolutionary Explosion?"

Hameroff's conclusion is:

-
"The place of consciousness in evolution is unknown, but the actual
course of evolution itself may offer a clue. Fossil records indicate
that animal species as we know them today, including conscious humans,
all arose from a burst of evolutionary activity some 540 million years
ago (the "Cambrian explosion"). " - "Occurrence of consciousness was
likely to have accelerated the course of evolution." - "Small worms,
urchins and comparable creatures reached critical biological complexity
for emergence of primitive consciousness at the early Cambrian period
540 million years ago." - "Cooperative dynamics of microtubules, cilia,
centrioles and axonemes were the critical biological factors for
consciousness." - "Cytoskeletal complexity available in early Cambrian
animals closely matches criteria for the Penrose-Hameroff Orch-OR model
of consciousness." - "Orch-OR caused the Cambrian explosion."

For
those interested in these ideas, I suggest reading Hameroff's paper. -
http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/penrose-hameroff/cambrian.html

2)
McFadden's "Quantum Evolution" is a widely read book published in the
United States in 2002. He proposes that quantum effects can act on the
positions of protons in the structure of DNA. Through a quantum
computing process via the "multiverse," optimized adaptive mutations
may occur.

- For more on the fascinating concept of the
multiverse, see:
http://www.qubit.org/people/david/index.php?path=Parallel%20Universes

A few McFadden quotes to give the feeling of his ideas:

-
"Cells may enter quantum states when they are unable to divide and
replicate ?" perhaps they can’t utilise a particular substrate in their
environment. They may collapse out of those quantum states when their
DNA superposition includes a mutation that allows them to grow and
replicate once more. In this way the environment interacts with, and
performs a quantum measurement on the cell, to precipitate advantageous
mutations. From our viewpoint, inhabiting only one universe, the cell
appears to "choose" certain mutations."
- "The problem with
adaptive mutations is that no one can figure a way that information can
travel backwards from the environment to DNA, to mutate certain genes.
Myself and a physicist colleague, Jim Al-Khalili, recently proposed a
novel solution: that DNA may exist in quantum states that are able to
sample multiple mutational states simultaneously."
- "...
According to [old style] Newtonian mechanics, future events are
entirely determined by what happened before. We may believe we make
decisions but classical deterministic science tells us that we are
fooling ourselves. Our destiny and every action we make are determined
by a series of previous events whose ultimate source is the Big Bang."
-
[But] "Quantum mechanics allows an escape from this gloomy outlook
because quantum systems are not entirely deterministic. Although
bacteria are certainly not conscious and do not know that they are
making a decision, I believe those same quantum dynamics ?" though
involving electromagnetic fields rather than DNA ?" are responsible for
what we call our ‘free will’." [But McFadden does believe that the
behavior and evolution of even bacteria are (unconsciously) influenced
by these quantum fields.]
- I recommend reading the following link
for McFadden's summary of his book, with illustrations and references
to technical papers, including supporting quantum field theory
equations by Al-Khalili.

http://www.surrey.ac.uk/qe/quantumevolution.htm


3)
Obviously, some of these ideas relate to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother"s
ideas re the evolution of consciousness and the psychic personality. To
keep this post from getting absurdly long, I"ll talk about some of my
conjectures re all this in a later posting.

Namaste,

~ ron