Simulating visual qualia in the CERA-CRANIUM cognitive architecture.
Advances in experimental medicine and biology January 1, 2011 Raúl Arrabales, Agapito Ledezma, Araceli Sanchis
Qualia, the subjective qualities of conscious experience, are difficult to study even in humans, but they can be investigated using artificial cognitive architectures. This work defines and models 'artificial qualia' within such systems and partially applies the model to generate visual qualia using the CERA-CRANIUM architecture, which is based on the global workspace theory of consciousness. Simple apparent motion effects serve as a testbed for simulating and analyzing synthetic visual experience. Unlike biological brains, the architecture's inner states can be directly inspected, enabling detailed analysis of percepts generated during visual stimulation. The observed states are used to discuss possible analogous mechanisms in human cognition.