Why Consciousness Cannot Simply Be Explained As A Preservation Mechanism
How Psychophysiology Proves This To Be A Fundamental Misunderstanding
Why Consciousness Cannot Simply Be Explained As A Preservation Mechanism
How Psychophysiology Proves This To Be A Fundamental Misunderstanding
Written by a human, for humans, always.
One of the things that has mystified generations...
Is human consciousness.
It has perplexed theologians...
Philosophers...
And today we continue to ask this more deeply as some individuals and organizations attempt to mimic consciousness in AI...
So far, unsuccessfully.
As I have said before, there is a “lot” of marketing around “sentience” and “conscious” machines...
But I have not seen a true example of it as of yet.
The best phrase I have heard to describe today’s AI is...
Pretend Intelligence.
But the question remains...
What is consciousness?
It becomes an important question to ask...
Because if you want to make AI into a truly conscious machine...
We need to actually comprehend what “conscious” means.
So, there have been more and more people who have sought to answer this question...
And there has been one version that I have been seeing more often.
Their claim...
Is that Consciousness is simply a preservation mechanism...
It is a form of “side effect” of the brain attempting to reduce entropy...
Aka disorder...
So that it can preserve itself.
I have seen different people go into different models of understanding the world...
From looking at Newtonian and Quantum Physics...
To going into the Free Energy Principle of neuroscience.
All of which are relevant to understanding aspects of consciousness...
All of which fail to explain what consciousness is...
Especially when you actually understand psychophysiology as a fuller picture.
How do I mean?
Well, a lot of these theories come from reductionist thinking...
Primarily focused on the brain and cause-and-effect functioning.
However...
This leads people, first, into the Brain Trap.
This is the challenge of falsely believing that all cognition exists solely in the brain.
Is the brain important?
Absolutely.
But it is only one of four cognition systems that we have in the body.
Yes, you heard this correctly.
We have “four” separate, but interdependent, systems in the body...
That all think.
They have individual goals...
They communicate back and forth...
But importantly...
They can supersede each other.
Yes...
The other cognition systems can, and frequently do, supersede what the brain desires...
And can actually pressure the brain to pursue their goals instead of the brain’s goals.
So if you are reducing your concept of “consciousness” to solely the functioning of the brain...
Then you will fail to understand consciousness.
Do things like the Free Energy Principle and Quantum Physics still apply and have relevance in understanding?
Yes.
But it is only a slice of the overall picture...
And if we go deeper still into psychophysiology...
We can also say, for a fact, that consciousness is not solely a Preservation Mechanism.
How?
When we look at what causes us to feel our absolute best as human beings.
See...
If consciousness was even “primarily” a preservation mechanism...
We would discover that when we meet the goal of preservation...
We would feel our best.
The better our preservation feels...
The better we would feel.
The problem?
This does not pan out in reality.
Is self-preservation a function of our consciousness?
Yes.
Is it important?
Yes.
But we do not feel our best “solely” by being successful at self-preservation.
In fact...
We have discovered that in many cases...
When we become “too good” at self-preservation...
It actually has detrimental health effects.
We could lock ourselves inside a room...
With 0% opportunities for harm...
Filled with all the food, drink, and supplies we would ever need to survive...
And do you know what would happen?
We would quickly become miserable.
We are surviving perfectly successfully...
But it does not feel good to us consciously.
We end up with problems like depression caused by loneliness...
As well as mental and physiological deterioration from boredom.
This is why animals in captivity actually require enrichment to survive.
Animals in captivity tend to live longer than animals in the wild...
If...
And only if...
They are not bored.
Even when they are perfectly tended to...
If they do not have engagement in their environment...
They will end up dying faster than animals in the wild.
The same is true for humans.
Then...
When we look at where we feel “best” as humans from a psychophysiological perspective...
We discover that we discover it in what is called Flow States.
But here is what is critical to understand...
Flow States...
Are not found...
In most preservation behavior.
In fact...
When you actually look at Flow States...
One of the behaviors that can cause us as humans to enter into them...
Is actually “anti-preservation”.
Putting ourselves, purposefully, into situations where we knowingly could perish.
If consciousness is purely a preservation mechanism...
Why would it reward purposefully going out of our way to put ourselves into life-threatening situations?
The answer...
Is that there is more to consciousness than preservation.
We can also see this in another behavior that we seek out as humans...
Creating different forms of art.
What does art have to do with preservation?
Nothing.
Yet, we still believe, inherently, that there is an importance to art.
We seek to create art.
We admire art.
We want to find deeper meaning in art.
Here, too...
People will go into artistic careers...
Knowing...
That it may be extremely difficult to survive doing in...
And...
People will utilize resources that are important for self-preservation...
But will utilize those resources toward artistic endeavors...
Knowing...
That they may, and in some cases, they are 100% sure, that they will not get “anything” back for their efforts that can be used toward preservation.
This is how, when you understand psychophysiology, we can be absolutely positive that consciousness is not “solely” a preservation mechanism.
There is a function of consciousness that seeks self-preservation...
But it does not explain the totality of consciousness.
Believing this is a fundamental misunderstanding of overly reductionistic thinking.
It is important to understand these aspects of consciousness...
They can help us see the overall picture more clearly...
But do not mistake the part for the whole.
There is a reason that consciousness has been a topic of fascination, debate, and wonder for millennia...
There are aspects that are difficult to understand.
Pieces that we see clearly...
Yet seem opposed to each other.
We may have a function...
That is important...
But does not satisfy what we seek and need as humans.
If we are going to solve the consciousness question...
We need to use reductionistic thinking to understand the pieces...
But then we need to expand outward from there to put the pieces together to get the full picture.
To Your Sageship,
Cody
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