The Glial-Orchestrated Cognition (GOC) Model with Cellular Consciousness: A New Biological Framework for Consciousness, Information, and Cognition
Ramesh Lal Dharamdass
PhilPapers (PhilPapers Foundation) February 21, 2026 preprint DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.18727133 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key points | Proposes that consciousness is an intrinsic property of all living cells, information is a specialized neuronal function, and cognition emerges from glial coordination across distributed neural modules, yielding a five-layer model of human conscious experience that the author argues resolves contradictions in neuroscience and generates falsifiable predictions. |
Abstract
The Glial-Orchestrated Cognition (GOC) Model proposes a new biological architecture that separates consciousness, information, and cognition into distinct layers. Consciousness is defined as an intrinsic property of all living cells; information is a specialized neuronal function; and cognition emerges from glial coordination across distributed neural modules. This framework resolves long-standing contradictions in neuroscience, explains the dissociation between consciousness and cognition, and provides a biologically grounded, experimentally testable model of human conscious experience. The manuscript outlines the five-layer structure (cellular consciousness, neuronal information, glial orchestration, emergent cognition, and composite human consciousness), presents falsifiable predictions, and situates the model relative to IIT, GWT, Predictive Processing, and panpsychism.