Where is your mind right now, and why can no one find it, even with the best brain scanners on Earth? This short, accessible paper walks you through five deceptively simple questions that modern neuroscience still cannot answer about consciousness, from what it is to whether it can exist without a working brain, to whether your mind is sculpting your brain as much as your brain is shaping your...
This work proposes a unified, multimodal framework for understanding near-death experiences (NDEs) as structured transformations of the human world-model under extreme physiological stress. Drawing on findings from neuroscience, cognitive psychology, phenomenology, and developmental research, the paper argues that core NDE features—such as tunnel-like vision, out-of-body experiences, altered...
This paper identifies and analyzes a pervasive but underexamined assumption in religious discussions of artificial intelligence: that consciousness and the soul are identical. I argue that this "Great Conflation" is neither theologically required nor consistent with actual practice, and that distinguishing the two concepts reframes current debates about artificial consciousness. With the...
General anesthesia produces reversible loss of consciousness characterized by abrupt state transitions, nonlinear dose-response relationships, inter-individual variability in transition thresholds, and occasional dissociations between behavioral responsiveness and reported experience. Global workspace theories provide a well-validated account of how conscious access is disrupted under...
Multiple lines of neuroscientific evidence have converged on a set of closely related findings: the mammalian brain endogenously synthesizes N,N-dimethyltryptamine (DMT) at neurotransmitter-comparable concentrations (Dean et al., 2019); psychedelic compounds suppress the default mode network (DMN) and dissolve ego boundaries (Carhart-Harris et al., 2012; Tagliazucchi et al., 2016); the brain...
Consciousness, qualia, and free will are standardly treated as three separate problems requiring distinct explanatory frameworks. This paper proposes that they are, instead, three aspects of a single phenomenon: computationally irreducible processing in self-modeling systems. Building on Wolfram's classification of computational systems, Azadi's formal proof connecting autonomy to computational...
This work proposes a layered methodological framework for the study of consciousness, explicitly separating definitional, mechanistic, and operational levels of analysis. Rather than introducing a new empirical theory, the paper provides a conceptual and methodological structure intended to clarify ongoing debates in consciousness research and to facilitate integration across philosophical,...
When Time Stops: Inside the Mind’s Clock is a theoretical preprint monograph exploring how subjective time perception may relate to brain dynamics, informational complexity, and cytoskeletal processes. The work introduces the Scalar Clock Model, in which subjective duration is represented by a scalar variable (φ) whose accumulation rate may be influenced by large-scale neural activity and...
Psychedelic compounds, particularly psilocybin, have demonstrated remarkable therapeutic potential for mental health disorders through mechanisms involving structural neural plasticity. This comprehensive review examines recent breakthrough research revealing how psilocybin triggers activity-dependent rewiring of large-scale cortical networks. Using monosynaptic rabies viral tracing,...
This paper develops a constraint-first model of consciousness (CFMC) in which subjecthood is defined by structural constraints rather than by computation, representation, or optimization. Consciousness is formalized as requiring continuity of identity over time, intrinsic constraint closure, irreversible state evolution, structural opacity to external control, and a viability condition linking...
There is a growing body of literature on the therapeutic applications of psychedelics, particularly within Psychedelic Assisted Psychotherapy (PAP). PAP is strongly shaped by set and setting, both of which are influenced by cultural factors. To explore Chinese American mental health providers’ attitudes toward psychedelics and the effect of educational training, we conducted an online survey...
The Problem of Perspectival Ownership: A Philosophical Framework for Conscious Individuality Consciousness research has focused predominantly on the "Hard Problem" of subjective experience, yet a more foundational issue persists: the Problem of Perspectival Ownership. Why does a given stream of experience belong to this particular first-person perspective (“mine”) and not another? This paper...
This article explores the tension between classical psychoanalytic interpretations of dreams and contemporary physiological measurements of sleep. By integrating Freudian theory with data obtained from wearable sleep-tracking technology, the study demonstrates that REM sleep can occur without subjective dream recall. Introducing the concept of the digital unconscious, the article proposes a new...
This preprint presents The Last Dream, a theoretical model aimed at interpreting the subjective experience that may occur in the seconds immediately following cardiac arrest and preceding irreversible neuronal failure. Drawing on convergent evidence from physics of time, neuroscience, neurochemistry, and psychedelic research, the model explores the plausibility of a transient terminal state...
As early as the mid-nineteenth century, scientists hypothesized that psychedelics could serve as models for understanding psychosis. By the early twentieth century, this theory began to be tested experimentally. Since different types of psychotomimetic drugs induce qualitatively distinct forms of psychosis, there has been ongoing debate about whether there exist specifically ‘schizophrenogenic’...
The concept of the self is often treated either as a metaphysical primitive or as a uniquely human phenomenon inseparable from consciousness. Both approaches generate deep and persistent confusion. In this paper, I offer a clarification not a new metaphysical theory of the concept of self by grounding it firmly in physical reality and in actual scientific practice. The central claim is simple...
Abstract: This essay presents a phenomenological catalog of non-ordinary human experiences reported across cultures and historical periods. It documents what has been reported—from near-death experiences to meditative states to apparent psychic phenomena—without adjudicating what should be believed. The goal is descriptive completeness rather than evaluative closure. Part of the Return to...
This preprint proposes a thermodynamic framework for phenomenal consciousness, addressing the "hard problem" of why certain physical processes are accompanied by subjective experience (qualia). Consciousness is hypothesized to emerge in predictive, self-organizing systems that actively sustain steep, localized informational entropy gradients. These gradients are maintained by dynamic...
This review examines the therapeutic efficacy of psilocybin for major depressive disorder by integrating findings from clinical trials, meta-analyses, and mechanistic research. A comprehensive literature search across major scientific databases identified empirical studies evaluating psilocybin’s effects on depressive symptomatology, safety, and underlying neurobiological mechanisms....
Human beings tend to assume that what they experience is real, stable, and reliable. We trust our senses, our memories, and our waking awareness, rarely questioning whether these tools truly provide an accurate picture of reality. Sleep and dreaming are usually placed outside the domain of serious knowledge, treated as private, subjective, or secondary experiences with little relevance to...
This study examines the faith-healing practices of Nasrul-Haqq, a religious community operating within Mëranaw Muslim communities in Lanao del Sur, Philippines. Drawing on qualitative ethnographic research, including semi-structured interviews and participant observation, the study documents how Nasrul-Haqq practitioners engage in devotional practices (amalan), healing rituals, and collective...
This paper proposes a radically new theory of phenomenal qualities (qualia): they are not intrinsic properties of sensory states but individualized signatures created by neural reinforcement learning history. The phenomenal character of experiencing red, sweet, or pain emerges from integrating current sensory input with an organism's unique history of reward associations, punishment...
Öz. Geleneksel olarak bir bireyin bireyliğini kazanması belli bir sosyo-kültürel çevreye doğmuş bebeğin dil gelişimine paralel olarak bilincinin ve zihninin doğadan ayrışmaya başlamasıyla mümkün olduğu düşünülmüştür. Bu süreç teknik terimlerle ifade edilirse bilinç öncesinden subjektif bilince, subjektiften ise objektif bilince, oradan refleksif bilince ve onun da ötesine ahlaki normatif...
Researcher-as-phenomenon investigations—where investigators study phenomena accessed through their own lived experience—face a structural validation problem that traditional epistemological mechanisms cannot resolve. Replication fails because others cannot replicate the researcher's phenomenology. Bracketing fails because one cannot bracket oneself from oneself. This circularity deepens at the...
Psilocybin therapy shows potential benefits for mental health conditions such as depression and substance use disorders, though further research is needed to confirm long-term safety and efficacy.