Does it make sense to speak of "Universal Consciousness" or "Universal Intelligence"?

[pocaracas]

Philosophy of physics... what an oxymoron...

Yeah ... it's also called the problem of interpretation of QM, something which, among others, Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein, among others, were deeply interested in. What non-sense! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretat..._mechanics

Oh, now you change the terms to mean something else... ok.
You can have the cake...

Let me see is my QM is still up to notch: what do you think this collapse of wave function is? Which wave function?

So you have not understood the very idea of the theory ... Of the Schrödinger equation of the brain state "orhestrated" by the micro-tubular processes.

Do you mind writing down that equation?
Somehow, I don't think that Shrödinger's equation will have what you think it does... but I need to see it, first.

Correlation does not imply causation...
oh well...

Of course it does not.
But I never claimed anything like that; this has nothing to do with anything I said. I showed you made the inductionist fallacy.

You're arguing for a theory that's far... very far... from demonstrated... if it will ever be.
And the major piece of evidence the proponents of the theory have to show is the effect of anesthetics on some structures within the neurons. This is what I mean that correlation does not imply causation: the effect of the anesthetic does not mean that the theory is correct...
But you highly developed "philosophy of physics" brain must have been way ahead of my tiny observation and went right over it... -.-'

Indeed it is far from obvious. Still, it's to be expected that an alteration of the nerve cell should lead to an impairment (or improvement) of the neural impulse emission.

Yeah, but why does it impair the mind to the degree of making it loose consciousness? There is nothing obvious in this, and that ruins your whole point.

All I saw was that it impaired movement of tadpoles...
My reading skillz must be a bit off, I am getting a bit old!

This reminds me of the model of the Solar System, where the Earth is at the center... So many correct p's and yet....

Gosh .Seriously, you should study the basics of philosophy of science if you want to avoid such fallacies as these.
You CAN FALSIFY this theory. That's what Copernicus did, for Christ's sake.

But before Copernicus, no one falsified it... Concerning Penrose's theory we are in the pre-Copernicus era... We'll see how it develops.

Ok, manifestly, we're not there yet, but I see no bright future for this theory... I wish all their proponents well and a breath of nice results, but I anticipate no such thing.

I respect your gifts as a soothsayer.

Thank you. They are quite well developed, however they have utterly failed in guessing the Euromillions numbers!

OH OH OH... like I didn't quote what the damn theorem says.... -.-'

Look, my knowledge is not some parrott-references from Wiki, I UNDERSTAND it. You're talking about a theory you don't understand.

Ok, let me explain. Gödel's incompleteness proof and Turing's solution to the halting problem are analogous applications of the diagonal lemma first applied by Cantor in context of transfinite sets. As applied in context of halting problem, it applies obviously to mind as understood as computer, and the Penrose argument is easy to formulate both in context of Gödel's proof and that of Turing-machines.

Why Penrose first applied it in the context of Gödel-proof , is because he wanted to show that mathematician's mind is not simply algorithmic.

So, if you can't see how this is related to mind and is some sort of wooh wooh, you are simply making a complete jerk of your self.

OK, let me see you wiggle out of this, oh great and high connoisseur of the Turing's solution to the halting problem in Turing machines.
Turing machines are sequential machines, like all computer CPUs up to the 90's. At best, one can claim that current parallel CPUs can do the same as a single CPU, it just takes longer. The brain, it seems, has different areas dedicated to different tasks, meaning that one of those areas could not perform the tasks of the other areas, so it is a parallel machine not reducible to a sequential one.
Thus any analogy between the brain and a Turing machine, like what Penrose is trying to accomplish, is faulty.
The theory fails at the most basic level.... and no one notices, because Penrose has worked with such great minds as Stephen Hawkins... -.-'

I could be wrong, the brain may be reducible to a sequential machine... if that is ever proven, then I'll have to revise my position. Until then, it seems this theory is not the best candidate to solve the problem of consciousness.

Yes, smart argument, yes...
I can't see how Gödel's theorem is related to the mind?... right... because it's not.

Sure. But perhaps you should first understand a little about logic and how logic is related to mind...

Oh ,[fun time] you should meet the female half of the world's population!

So, how does that apply to the physical mind?

It applies to the mind of hard AI which conceives mind as a ******Turing machine!

Ah.... ok.... enjoy that. That's not the problem at hand, remember?

Sometimes, you don't need to understand something completely, to intuit that it maybe BS.

Sure. Like nazis "intuited" relativity was part of Jewish plot.
Ignorance rationalized.

I think this discussion has gone on long enough.

It's starting to feel like I'm arguing with a creationist... A very small amount of papers which made it into reputable publications, always authored by the same people... enjoy!