Xiaoyang Yu
preprint
Humans are limited in what they know by the technical limitation of their cortical language network. A reality is a situation model. The universe is a collection of self-driven mathematical entities. If we are happy to accept randomness, it’s obviously possible that all other so-called “worlds” in the many-worlds interpretation don’t exist objectively. The so-called “physical interaction” (aka...
Enrico Facco, Fabio Fracas, Patrizio Tressoldi
Aim of this theoretical paper is to review the ontological status of so-called altered states of consciousness, suggesting a revision of their common interpretation as abnormal, or anyway less-than-normal conditions. The term Non-Ordinary Mental Expressions (NOMEs), is described and emphasized as a new conceptual tool allowing a more comprehensive interpretation of the varieties of the normal...
Adam Safron
preprint
What do we mean when we talk of “free will?” What are the “varieties of free will worth having” (Dennett, 2003), and to what extent can we be said to possess such capabilities? While preferred definitions may vary across individuals and situations, we may perhaps find broad agreement that free will indicates a capacity for conscious intentions to meaningfully cause actions, which could be...
Diego Gonzalez-Rodriguez, Marta Perez-Carmona
preprint
This research aims to unravel the intricate dynamics between psychedelic experiences and mental health by synergizing advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technologies with phenomenological methodologies. We have crafted an approach that leverages AI to scrutinize the narratives of those who have embarked on psychedelic journeys, aiming to shed light on the potential implications of specific...
Jianghao Liu
preprint
Mental imagery refers to one’s quasi-perceptual experience in the absence of direct external input. Yet around 4% of individuals with “aphantasia” report an inability to voluntarily generate such experiences. This phenomenon provides a natural experiment that challenges current theories of imagery, which typically assume that reactivation of the visual cortex in imagery generation is sufficient...
Philippe Guillemant, Alice Guyon
On the question of time, there is a growing consensus in physics that a good theory of space-time should reconcile the presentism of quantum mechanics with the eternalism of general relativity, through a model that preserves both the creativity of time and the presence of the future. In previous papers (Guillemant _et al., _2018; Guillemant and Medale, 2019), we have proposed such a model...
Ramin Bidari
preprint
Emotions are one of the fundamental aspects of human experience, influencing behavior, decision-making, and overall quality of life. This study examines how emotions are encoded in the brain through hormonal processes and whether consciousness can modify these hormonal effects. Scientific research indicates that neurotransmitters such as dopamine, serotonin, cortisol, and oxytocin play crucial...
Tom Froese, Matthieu Koroma
preprint
In this interview, Tom Froese and Matthieu Koroma address the irruption theory, an account of how mental actions manifest themselves as unexplained variability in brain and bodily activity. We discuss how this approach can be applied to trace back consciousness in (neuro)physiological signatures such as scale free activity and informational complexity. We highlight the study of altered states...
Hakan Saka
preprint
The hard problem of consciousness may be, in part, a problem of conceptual conflation: we treat multiple distinct layers of mind as a single phenomenon, and then wonder why it seems impossible to explain. This paper proposes a framework designed to disaggregate those layers — not to solve the hard problem, but to relocate it into the most precise domain to which it genuinely applies. Central to...
Arthur Stewart
preprint
Consciousness depends on a specific set of neural circuits whose joint operation constitutes its substrate. We propose a four-loop architecture as that substrate: (1) Layer 5 pyramidal recurrent loops gating signal entry to conscious access via apical-basal coincidence detection, where somatic burst firing requires the ascending thalamocortical signal at the basal dendrites and the previous...