On a Heuristic Approach to the Description of Consciousness as a Hypercomplex System State and the Realistic Possibility of Machine Consciousness

Consciousness may be a physical process with an imaginary, hypercomplex basis, not requiring unknown vital properties. Standard quantum-physical descriptions fail because their energy eigenvalues are real, whereas consciousness processes likely involve non-real values. A new algebra is introduced to formalize such physical processes that encode information yet elude measurability. If accepted, specially prepared machines could develop rudimentary forms of consciousness, termed hypercomplex system states, distinct from human consciousness. The hypothesis is supported by the performance of complex AI systems but lacks experimental proof; dedicated tests are deferred to future articles.

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Abstract

This theoretical article presents a heuristic viewpoint that shows that the inner states of consciousness experienced by every human being may have a physical, but imaginary, hypercomplex basis. The central idea is that human consciousness is fundamentally based on physical processes and does not require any chemical, biological or other properties of an unknown type of vitality. However, previous descriptions are not sufficient to account for the physical characteristics of consciousness. It is not even sufficient to understand consciousness, especially so-called phenomenal consciousness, as a quantum-physical process, since the energy eigenvalues of quantum-physical processes are real-valued, whereas those of consciousness processes most likely are not. Therefore, the article introduces a new algebra in order to formalize physical processes in the future, which elude any measurability, although - and this is what matters - they can encode information. Once one accepts the hypothesis that consciousness is a physical process (even a strange one), one can assume that specially prepared technical machines could also develop rudimentary forms of consciousness. Such forms of consciousness would of course be completely different from human consciousness, which is why they would also have to be linguistically differentiated. One possibility would be to describe such characteristics, if they exist, as machine consciousness or, more precisely, as so-called hypercomplex system states. The last is because a hypercomplex algebra is required for formalization. The mathematical results presented in the paper predict new physical phenomena. Whether these phenomena (consciousness phenomena) really exist, can only be decided experimentally. The description of dedicated experimental tests will be discussed in another article in this journal. The hypothesis of the existence of hypercomplex system states on technical machines is already supported by the performance of highly complex AI systems. However, this has yet to be proven. In particular, there is a lack of experimental data that distinguishes systems with hypercomplex system states from other systems, which is why this question will be addressed in subsequent articles.