Science, Culture and Integral Yoga :: Quantum Consciousness and the "Mind" of the Cells

I just received an email from Rod Hempsell, author of "Essays for the New Millennium," suggesting a dialogue about "Why should we asume that there is a direct relationship between quantum effects, dissipative structures, microtubules, etc. and consciousness?" I suggested we conduct the conversation here on SCIY and offered to post an article to which we can respond via comments.

Here's the article, a slightly edited version of my previously posted article on "Quantum Consciousness."

~ ron
_______________

Quantum Consciousness and the "Mind" of the Cells

The quantum realm is the space of magic in modern physics. At the infinitesimal Planck scale, virtual particles flash in and out of existence with no apparent cause, yet are apparently the first cause of the subatomic particles which eventually concatenate up to all of material reality.

But modern science has no room for non-deterministic actors in its world view. Chaos theory admits that the sensitivity of complex systems to tiny initial fluctuations allows only probabilistic analysis of initial causes, but its ontology still claims that everything we see about us is nothing more than an ongoing chain of effect-effect-effect. It claims that everything that has been, is now, or will be flows deterministically from the earliest conceivable moment after the Big Bang when its unimaginably dense plasma expanded and cooled enough to allow the first virtual quantum particles to begin their mysterious dance. The prevailing scientific belief is that the tiny quantum effects simply cancel themselves out when averaged over their vast numbers occurring at human scale and larger.

The eschatology of modern science is that the continuing (and accelerating according to the latest data) expansion of of the cosmos will lead inexorably to the final death of all life and matter in the frigid cold and darkness of ultimate dispersal. Using the poetic language of Sri Aurobindo's epic story "Savitri," this dismal paradigm predicts the final victory of "The Lord of Death."

The majority of modern scientists believe human beings are also subject to the deterministic laws of ordinary physics, that free will and even consciousness itself are mere illusions. Most scientists confidently believe that the human brain is too "wet and noisy" for quantum fluctuations to impact neural processes. And the scale of the quantum realm is so many orders of magnitude smaller than human neurons that most neuroscientists dismissed the rash of books with titles like "Quantum Brain," "Quantum Mind," etc., as just another wave of New Age wishful thinking. Mystically oriented neurophysiologists like Nobelist Sir John Eccles searched in vain for the "quantum-box," human neural structures at the nanometer scale that might be able to respond to quantum fluctuations.

A few years ago a new level of neural structure began to appear under increasingly powerful microscopes. Most living cells contained a filigree of tiny solid rods which were named the "cytoskeleton," since it was assumed they served to maintain the structural shape of cells, sort of like the "bones of the cell." And they were micrometers in diameter, still 1000 times too big for quantum effects.

But something strange and wondrous has begun to appear in new investigations of neural cells. By the mid-90's, using a new generation of magnifying devices like tunneling electron microscopes, the cytoskeletal "rods" were being revealed to be hollow tubes, interconnected in a myriad of junctions within each cell. Within some human neural cellular structures, the complexity of these "microtubules" appeared to rival that of the entire human brain! And the tubulin proteins which form the skin of these microtubules are at the nanometer scale; Sir Eccles quantum box had been found.

The very latest experiments on advanced Tibetan Buddhist meditators (by a team including one of my former Ph.D. thesis advisors), are revealing high frequency coherent "gamma wave" EEG fluctuations in the range of 30 to 90 cycles per second (several times faster than the well-known "alpha" waves of novice meditators of approximately 10 cycles/sec.). There are now indications that in the brains of these Buddhist adepts, thousands of neurons at widely spaced locations are firing in coherent synchronization too perfectly timed to be controlled by normal relatively slow neural processes. Some researchers are now suggesting that these coherent oscillations can only be coordinated by strange "non-local" quantum effects. And the most recent results indicate that in the most advanced meditative states, hundreds of thousands of normally separate neurons appear to act as if they were one giant "hyper-neuron," interlinked by microtubules which leap through quantum-mediated "gap junctions."

So what's the meaning of all this and how does it possibly relate to Auroville? There's the obvious possibility that these experiments are revealing the physical basis of the Mother's work reported in Satprem's book "Mind of the Cells," and therefore have an intimate relationship to both the integral yoga and a possible new stage of evolution. Some world-class physicists, including Roger Penrose, the Oxford University polymath working on Unified Field Theory, are noting the possible relevance of quantum consciousness to the reports of Yogis of many traditions about their experience of an objectively real stratum of reality, of Satchitananda, or supramental Truth, Consciousness and Divine Bliss. Roger Penrose is now hypothesizing that many, perhaps all, creative leaps in human culture are the result of these quantum hyperneuronal states.

- end -

Keywords: QuantumConsciousness

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Re: Quantum Consciousness and the "Mind" of the Cells - a discussion

by Rich on Mon 13 Mar 2006 08:11 AM PST | Profile | Permanent Link

I just watched two excellent film interviews about this subject, listed below.

Interestingly the microtubules also enable the division of cells as they are linked with chromosomes, and are a hot subject among cancer researchers too.

I like Hammeroff/ Penrose theory as an explanatory mechanism of the physical manifestation of consciousness,
e,g a 3rd person account dealing with correlation of physical and mental processes.

Their theory basically states that consciousness is a result of the collapse of the wave function. (There is also a theory out there which is opposite this which states that it is consciousness itself which collapses the wave function,
e.g. consciousness is not a result of the collapse.) These theories however do not answer the "hard problem" or 1st person account of consciousness.

However these theories of quantum states of consciousness have enormous experimental hurdles to overcome before they can be demonstrated as actually taking place. Why?

1) You need extremely cold temperatures to have quantum effects, and the temperature of the brain and body are much too high and fluctuate too much for any quantum effects to occur.

2) It is estimated that quantum states only last for as time period 10 to the -17 of a second, and if consciousness arose from a quantum state would require the state endure at least .25 milliseconds which has not been demonstrated.
although Hammerof believes these states can last 100 milliseconds.

In fact the process of even attempting to measure states in the body is wrought with problems However there are a loyal group of consciousness researchers attempting to solve the problem.

rc

This disc includes interviews with Dr. Stuart Hameroff, M.D. Professor, Anesthesiology and Psychology, Associate Director, Center for Consciousness Studies, University of Arizona, David Chalmers, Ph.D. Professor, Department of Philosophy; Director, Center For Consciousness Studies, University of Arizona, Nancy J. Woolf, Ph.D. Professor, Laboratory of NanoNeuroscience, Department of Psychology, UCLA and Willoughby Britton, University of Arizona, Tucson.

This disc includes interviews with Dick Bierman, Ph.D. Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Utrecht University, Jack A. Tuszynski, Ph.D. Professor of Biophysics, Condensed Matter Physics, University of Alberta, Canada, Dr. Andrew B. Newberg, M.D. Professor, Dept. of Radiology, Division of Nuclear Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, co-author of "The Mystical Mind" and Chester Wildey, M.Sc. The University of Texas at Arlington.

Re: QC&MoC, Re: Is the brain too "hot and noisy" for quantum processes?

by ronjon on Fri 17 Mar 2006 02:55 AM PST | Profile | Permanent Link

Hi Rich,

Can you please post here any url or other reference info you have re the film interviews you reference? I'd like to watch/purchase them myself, and if possible post a transcript here.

Your comment that "You need extremely cold temperatures to have quantum effects, and the temperature of the brain and body are much too high and fluctuate too much for any quantum effects to occur" is certainly the current belief amongst most physicists. They insist that the "hot and noisy" conditions within living cells would cause almost instantaneous decoherence of any quantum superposition.

However, there are some indications that quantum effects may in fact occur under certain special conditions within the microtubules of the dendritric portions of the human brain. Stuart Hameroff describes these conditions in a recent article he wrote for Wikipedia:

"... How would microtubule quantum superpositions avoid environmental decoherence? Cell interiors are known to alternate between liquid phases (solution: “sol”) and quasi-solid (gelatinous: “gel”) phases due to polymerization states of the ubiquitous protein actin. In the actin-polymerized gel phase, cell water and ions are ordered on actin surfaces, so microtubules are embedded in a highly structured (i.e. non-random) medium. Tubulins are also known to have C termini “tails”, negatively charged peptide sequences extending string-like from the tubulin body into the cytoplasm, attracting positive ions and forming a plasma-like Debye layer which can also shield microtubule quantum states. Finally, tubulins in microtubules were suggested to be coherently pumped laser-like into quantum states by biochemical energy (as proposed by Herbert Frohlich).

"Actin gelation cycling with 40 Hz events permits input to, and output from isolated microtubule quantum states. Thus during classical, liquid phases of actin depolymerization, inputs from membrane/synaptic inputs could “orchestrate” microtubule states. When actin gelation occurs, quantum isolation and computation ensues until OR threshold is reached, and actin depolymerizes. The result of each OR event (in terms of patterns of tubulin states) would proceed to organize intraneuronal activities including axonal firing and synaptic modulation/learning. Each OR event (e.g. 40 per second) is proposed to be a conscious event, equivalent in philosophical terms to what philosopher Alfred North Whitehead called 'occasions of experience'."

http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/wiki.htm

As I understand it, the primary laboratory evidence that quantum effects may in fact be occuring in the brain, is the recent finding that non-local effects may be occuring in the brains of advanced Tibetan Buddhist meditators comtemplating the 'qualia' of compassion:

"Richard Davidson, 54, is at once a distinguished scientist and an avid spiritual seeker. He became fascinated with meditation in the '60s. As a graduate student at Harvard, he channeled that interest into the study of psychology and neuroscience. In his spare time, he hung out with Ram Dass, Timothy Leary's former LSD research partner turned mystic. Davidson traveled to India for a meditation retreat, then finished his doctorate in biological psychology and headed to the University of Wisconsin, where he now directs the Waisman Laboratory for Brain Imaging and Behavior.

The Dalai Lama learned of Davidson's work from other scientists and in 1992 invited him to Dharamsala, India, to interview monks with extensive meditation experience about their mental and emotional lives. Davidson recalls the "extraordinary power of compassion" he experienced in the Dalai Lama's presence.

A decade later, he got a chance to examine Tibetan Buddhists in his own lab. In June 2002, Davidson's associate Antoine Lutz positioned 128 electrodes on the head of Mattieu Ricard. A French-born monk from the Shechen Monastery in Katmandu, Ricard had racked up more than of 10,000 hours of meditation.

Lutz asked Ricard to meditate on "unconditional loving-kindness and compassion." He immediately noticed powerful gamma activity - brain waves oscillating at roughly 40 cycles per second - indicating intensely focused thought. Gamma waves are usually weak and difficult to see. Those emanating from Ricard were easily visible, even in the raw EEG output. Moreover, oscillations from various parts of the cortex were synchronized - a phenomenon that sometimes occurs in patients under anesthesia.

The researchers had never seen anything like it. Worried that something might be wrong with their equipment or methods, they brought in more monks, as well as a control group of college students inexperienced in meditation. The monks produced gamma waves that were 30 times as strong as the students'. In addition, larger areas of the meditators' brains were active, particularly in the left prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for positive emotions.

Davidson realized that the results had important implications for ongoing research into the ability to change brain function through training. In the traditional view, the brain becomes frozen with the onset of adulthood, after which few new connections form. In the past 20 years, though, scientists have discovered that intensive training can make a difference. For instance, the portion of the brain that corresponds to a string musician's fingering hand grows larger than the part that governs the bow hand - even in musicians who start playing as adults. Davidson's work suggested this potential might extend to emotional centers.

But Davidson saw something more. The monks had responded to the request to meditate on compassion by generating remarkable brain waves. Perhaps these signals indicated that the meditators had attained an intensely compassionate state of mind. If so, then maybe compassion could be exercised like a muscle; with the right training, people could bulk up their empathy. And if meditation could enhance the brain's ability to produce "attention and affective processes" - emotions, in the technical language of Davidson's study - it might also be used to modify maladaptive emotional responses like depression.

Davidson and his team published their findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in November 2004. The research made The Wall Street Journal, and Davidson instantly became a celebrity scientist. ..."

From:

"Buddha on the Brain," Wired Magazine, Feb. 2006

As mentioned in the quote above, these findings are still controversial, although many of the most vociferous critics are from mainland China and may have political motivations to undermine the Dali Lama's reputation.

There are now related experiments at many prestigious labs around the world, utilizing the increased funding becoming available for (neuro)physiological consciousness studies. - Within the next few years the question of whether neurological quantum effects occur and if so, their relation to human consciousness, may become definitively answered.

If the answer is 'Yes,' we will almost certainly see a dramatic and rapidly growing impact on physics, psychology, and even philosophy, which will in turn profoundly impact the fundamental materialistic and deterministic ontologies and epistemologies of modernity.

~ ron

Re: Re: QC&MoC, Re: Is the brain too "hot and noisy" for quantum processes?

by Rich on Sun 19 Mar 2006 11:33 AM PST | Profile | Permanent Link

Ron

Although as I said I like Penrose/Hameroff model and want to believe most of it as a non-reductive mechanism
which can be correlated to consciousness , it is still that a model and needs to be verified through rigorous experiment. And I would add that it is not the only model for quantum effects on consciousness. In fact, in that regards I would prefer Henry Stepp’s notion that consciousness is what collapses the wave function, in contrast to Penrose who believes that it is quantum gravity which collapses the wave and that gives rise to consciousness. Of course both of these models are almost impossible to measure, because no one knows at which point in the quantum process the wave function collapses.

Penrose and Hameroff are both theoretical people and as such are attached to their models. In fact they, themselves as I have heard don’t want to hear too much about Stepps model (which renown scientist like Von Neumann and Wegner thought possible)

On my urging Sid wrote a paper on Penrose for his Cognitive Science class at Amherst and the paper was pretty much dismissed as hokum. In fact, it seems the whole facility in neuroscience and /or cognitive science at Amherst (many of whom come from MIT) dismiss the theory out of hand. Because as you mentioned, the brain is a classical structure (and even micro tubules are classical structures), and the environmental de-coherence (warm, wet, noisy) prevents quantum effects.
(this could just be a matter of the difficulties with accepting
paradigm shifts as Kuhn has detailed, however in terms of getting through a neuro-science major at Amherst is another story)

However, if this is of hope, superconductivity above 18 degrees Kelvin was once dismissed as non-sense and now we have super conductivity in the high 100 degree Kelvin range, which is far below room temperature but is closer than 18 K or -427F. So science changes radically in what it conceives as possible in just a few decades, and just think nature has billions of years to enable conceive her intentions, so the possibility is certainly there.

The experiment you site is very interesting indeed, however, the one I heard about which could prove or disprove whether quantum states in the brain are even possible, involves shooting a photon into the retina, followed by another photon a micro-second later. If a super-position occurs with the first particle, the next particle will not be absorbed by the retina, but rather ejected. This experiment has not been properly done yet, because of the problems associated with setting it up (e.g. the noise in the eye) but a guy named Bierman at the University of Amsterdam is attempting to do it. (he was one of the people interviewed in the DVD the Science of Consciousness which I mentioned)

If this experiment is successful this would prove that quantum states are possible in the brain, however, it still would not prove or disprove the particular Penrose/Hameroff model. Albeit, it would be a good start.

rc

Re: (from Rod) Quantum Consciousness and the "Mind" of the Cells - a discussion

by Rich on Wed 15 Mar 2006 08:52 AM PST | Profile | Permanent Link

It seems to me that “noting the possible relevance of
quantum consciousness to the experience of an
objectively real Satchidananda, etc.” is a
statement/hypothesis fraught with problems.
One would be that even if such “hyperneuronal states”
had been around since Vedic times, and before, and had
supported “all creative leaps in human culture” this
would not be substantially different from saying that
bursts of adrenalin accompanying states of duress have
led to a person lifting a car off of a crushed friend,
or that the sudden rays of sunlight filtering through
the clouds at sunset stimulated in the poet an
identification of inspired words with solar light, and
the imagination that from below the plane of day there
emerged rays of inspiration from the subconscient. The
physical is constantly present, along with
consciousness, it supports the conscious self, and it
provides some of the material of conscious activity in
the form of sensory impressions. This is the subject
of much of empirical philosophy. However, the supposed
correlation between neuronal states and moments of
inspiration or stress, or feelings of anxiety,
remorse, euphoria, doesn’t “explain” our ability to
form concepts, metaphors, and to write psychological
or mystical poetry.
Another problem is that presumably non-local quantum
effects have always been around, as have local
electromagnetic and gravitational effects, etc.
Presumably there are microtubules in the cells of
monkeys, dolphins and elephants. But the emergence of
species within the complexity of their ecological
niches, the leap from simple primates to hominids, the
recurrence of Platonic solids and fibbonacci numbers
in nature are “emergent phenomena” of both physical
subatomic substance and conscious vital-mental
structure – not structure of which we are conscious,
but structure that is itself of the nature of
consciousness. How can a mathematical description of
subatomic effects account for any of that?
Thirdly, there seems to be an implication of priority
in the attempt to explain consciousness (even mental
thought) in terms of “quantum consciousness” - meaning
“non-local quantum effects.” In most theories of
evolution and consciousness there is this tendency to
assume that the quantum effect produces the
consciousness effect, that what emerges in the world
of macrocosmic form is the result of spontaneous
bifurcations far from equilibrium, or chance mutations
in the DNA, or the development of spear throwing
muscles in the wrist. But Sri Aurobindo’s theory is
that consciousness is prior to material formation. All
emergent phenomena from the most immaterial physical
to the most immaterial spiritual proceed from
consciousness-force into manifest force of
consciousness at whatever level – physical, vital,
mental, psychic, spiritual. The force that we feel
emanating from “the other side” where SA and the
Mother reside, and which is the non-material physical,
not even yet the consciousness of the cells, is
bringing about the transformation, speeding up and
slowing down, ie. Expanding the parameters of being.
That consciousness-force, chit-tapas, precedes quantum
effects in this view; they are merely “effects.”
So, my question is, what is the basis for assuming a
direct relationship between quantum effects and
consciousness, and further, what level of
consciousness do we expect to correlate with what type
of subatomic phenomenon?
The “mind of the cells” is a consciousness operating
below the range of mental awareness – shall we call it
the “unconscious” which somehow remembers its program
and reproduces itself perpetually, thus supporting the
conduct of the organism at its vital-mental level of
“conscious” organization and function. Even at that
level most of our activity, thought, choice, will
behaviors are automatic; we participate
semi-consciously in the repetition of our life habits
with some idea of goals, values, purpose though not a
very precise awareness (conscious reflection) of how
this works. According to SA, we can see all of that
clearly and transparently when we draw back from the
sense mind and self-will, and attune to a wider
inner-outer ‘seeing-knowing-being.’ From this
perspective, all the levels of energy from the
subtlest physical to our rational mental =
consciousness, plus a few more layers of love, light,
power, delight. This is yogic knowledge-experience.
The idea that this transparent seeing self can channel
a new Force into the material level and raise its
vibration, leading to new level of functioning, new
organs, new levels of efficient beauty, is a new idea
and a new energetic in yoga. It may be that
microbiology will be able to monitor the process. But
it’s the process of a consciousness-force, just as is
the caring of whale schools for their beached
comrades. The caring is found in the mammalian
organization of energy fields; it is not the result of
those fields.

Re: Quantum Consciousness and mirror neurons(rich y rod)

by Rich on Fri 17 Mar 2006 07:25 PM PST | Profile | Permanent Link

ok,.... that's cool but, what about those mirror
neurons?

...................................

Rod Hemsell wrote:

What do they see?

Richard wrote:

they see "the other" or rather they seem to be a mechanism in the brain which correlates with identification with another. But lets be clear, I mean these are all materialistic renditions of consciousness, and at most may be able to correlate different experiences with what is happening in the brain, and do nothing to "explain consciousness" and in my opinion are akin to just so stories of consciousness, but they can be valuable in their own way in enabling bridges to be built between the world of spiritual understanding and and the world of materialist understanding e.g. science. So in looking at them we have to keep it in that context. However, if thus far there are two acknowledged ways to explain consciousness (scientifically that is)

1) a 3rd person account which is purely descriptive (e.g. the scientific method) and describes correlations of the physical mechanisms with conscious states. one would place the quantum model here as well (which is one of the few that in non-reductionistic)

2) a 1st person account (e.g. a phenomenological narrative) and describes our subjective feelings, and sense of the world (e.g. as in psycho-analysis, literature)

3) the science behind mirror neurons IMO verifies a 2nd person account of consciousness, in other words the physical mechanism which correlates with empathy and the ability to feel and imitate others, a rudimentary knowledge by identity.

here is an article from Ramachandran about them ( behind the materialistic scientist from a cultural background Ramachandran seems loyal to Sankara)

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran/ramachandran_p1.html

rc

Re: Re: Quantum Consciousnsss and mirror neurons(rich y rod II)

by Rich on Fri 17 Mar 2006 07:28 PM PST | Profile | Permanent Link

rod wrote:

The integral "account" needs to combine those three,
then abandon them and take a giant step forward.
BTW if I couldn't get into sci-y and you couldn't get
me in, then perhaps that's the reason why no one else
gets in, apparently, besides you three.

rcarlson@olympus.net wrote:
agreed, and such a synthesis would still be just
small steps or stumblings toward verition, however, didn't Sri Aurobindo say something about our: stumbling toward perfection.

> > ahh those Giant Steps, the 4ths spiraling infinitly

and gadzooks! you maybe right on about sciy! and
that is why I,ve been feeling like we were alinenated or just out to lunch, the technology may have us imprisoned in the virtuality of our own conversation.

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