Arkhipov Anton
MindScope Program, Allen Institute, Seattle, WA 98109, USA.
Entropy (Basel). 2022 Oct 26;24(11):1539. doi: 10.3390/e24111539.
A hypothesis is presented that non-separability of degrees of freedom is the fundamental property underlying consciousness in physical systems. The amount of consciousness in a system is determined by the extent of non-separability and the number of degrees of freedom involved. Non-interacting and feedforward systems have zero consciousness, whereas most systems of interacting particles appear to have low non-separability and consciousness. By contrast, brain circuits exhibit high complexity and weak but tightly coordinated interactions, which appear to support high non-separability and therefore high amount of consciousness. The hypothesis applies to both classical and quantum cases, and we highlight the formalism employing the Wigner function (which in the classical limit becomes the Liouville density function) as a potentially fruitful framework for characterizing non-separability and, thus, the amount of consciousness in a system. The hypothesis appears to be consistent with both the Integrated Information Theory and the Orchestrated Objective Reduction Theory and may help reconcile the two. It offers a natural explanation for the physical properties underlying the amount of consciousness and points to methods of estimating the amount of non-separability as promising ways of characterizing the amount of consciousness.
本文提出一个假说，即自由度的不可分离性是物理系统中意识的基本属性。系统中的意识量由不可分离性的程度和所涉及的自由度数量决定。非相互作用和前馈系统的意识为零，而大多数相互作用粒子系统的不可分离性和意识似乎较低。相比之下，脑回路表现出高度复杂性和微弱但紧密协调的相互作用，这似乎支持高度的不可分离性，进而具有大量的意识。该假说适用于经典和量子情况，我们强调采用维格纳函数（在经典极限下变为刘维尔密度函数）的形式体系，作为表征不可分离性以及系统中意识量的一个可能富有成果的框架。该假说似乎与整合信息理论和精心策划的客观还原理论都一致，并且可能有助于调和这两种理论。它为意识量背后的物理属性提供了自然的解释，并指出估计不可分离性程度的方法是表征意识量的有前景的方式。
