The Collective Placebo Effect? Collective Belief & Disbelief?

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Tor

So when science explain things, it eventually faces it's own assumptions. These assumptions limit how far an explanation can go, and eventually a change in perspective is needed. And that is why science is so fun where the assumptions start to crack (although I understand the unease some feel when this happens).

Yup, I agree. Love to watch those cracks widen and deepen and then the current dogma crumbles to dust.

I said that I would classify presentiment as physicalist if science could explain it. If you'll allow me to call it physicalist even without an explanation, great!

~~ Paul

[Tor]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Okay. Let's see what he comes up with. Got a link to a description of his current model?

Is he defining choice to be the selection of a particular collapse from among all possibilities?

~~ Paul

It's more a choice of what to focus on amongst the random feedback that nature provides when an observation occurs. Look up his description of Process 1, 2, 3 and Process Zero along with his description of the Zeno effect.

If you go to his publications page you can find many of his recent articles. Didn't you read some of these?

I'd suggest to scroll down and read the following:

1. Quantum Mechanical Theories of Consciousness

2. The Basis Problem in Many-Worlds Theories

3. A model of the Quantum-Classical and Mind-Brain Connections, and of the Role of the Quantum Zeno Effect in the Physical Implementation of Conscious Intent.

There are many other articles to read, some aimed at those with a physics background, and some at other disciplines. Stapp has a tendency to write rather verbose as David said, but given some time it is possible to understand what he tries to explain. The best way to get an understanding about his theory without drowning in equations is by reading his book Mindful Universe.

Be aware that this is a theory in development. I think it is still worth paying attention to as one of the more promising ones though.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Tor

Be aware that this is a theory in development. I think it is still worth paying attention to as one of the more promising ones though.

I'll read some more of those articles you suggested. I've read a couple.

Seems to me, though, that he's using the QZE backward. The QZE supposedly prevents decay, for example, by freezing a system in a collapsed state using repeated measurement. He seems to be using it to keep a system from collapsing.

Also, I still don't understand what is making the "choice" among these superposed brain states. Where does the intention come from? Sounds like some sort of spooky libertarian free will.

~~ Paul

[Tor]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

I'll read some more of those articles you suggested. I've read a couple.

Seems to me, though, that he's using the QZE backward. The QZE supposedly prevents decay, for example, by freezing a system in a collapsed state using repeated measurement. He seems to be using it to keep a system from collapsing.
It may be that there is some spooky libertarian free will in this model yes
That has to do with the causal closure of the physical, and the proposed process zero wich controls process 1.
Also, I still don't understand what is making the "choice" among these superposed brain states. Where does the intention come from? Sounds like some sort of spooky libertarian free will.

~~ Paul

No, he is right about the QZE. Nature provides feedback from a measurement/observation, and if this feedback is what you are after then the QZE kicks in by what he calls repeated process 1 actions (measurements) and freezes the current state. In the brain this would be the activity needed to execute an intended action (like raising one arm if that was your intention).

Process Zero (which is linked to process 1 that is used to activate the Zeno effect) is what introduces what you think of as spooky
It has to do with the physical not being causally closed. Process Zero ties it all together.

I'm much to simplistic here. It's much better you read it yourself. It takes some time to digest (it's not a 1 hour task), and it's easier to understand by reading his book where he gives a coherent overview. His articles are a bit fragmented and you need to piece it together yourself.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Tor

No, he is right about the QZE. Nature provides feedback from a measurement/observation, and if this feedback is what you are after then the QZE kicks in by what he calls repeated process 1 actions (measurements) and freezes the current state. In the brain this would be the activity needed to execute an intended action (like raising one arm if that was your intention).

Huh? You mean he's using all this complexity to explain carrying out the action? I thought he was using it to explain the original choice. I really don't think we need quantum mechanics to explain carrying out an action. And if we do, we need it all over the damn place.

Really, can't classical mechanics explain how a neural net can keep a particular decision alive long enough to carry it out?

~~ Paul

[Tor]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

And if we do, we need it all over the damn place.

~~ Paul

That's right! We need it all over the place. This is why a quantum mechanical universe is so different from a classical one. A true picture of the world (as far as we know today) is quantum mechanical. That includes our bodies too.
I would suggest that you read one of his papers on Physicalism Versus Quantum Mechanics.

The physicalist world view is not the Newtonian world view. The QM world view is the correct one. Stapp only tries to show where that leads and including us in the process.

Is it really so complicated? Maybe to grasp at first. But what he says is that everything is a combination of four processes. They give rise to it all.

[David Bailey]

I have always understood Stapp's scheme to be that the mind influences the brain by observing the state of some quantum variables. Say you measure something and find it is in a particular eigenstate: |1>. Since the system is not completely isolated (being in a blood-temperature brain!), this state will drift over time by interactions. However, if you keep observing the variable often enough, you can make the probability of a drift as small as possible. Say the state gets slightly mixed: (|1>+a|2>)/Sqrt(1+a^2) where a would increase roughly linearly with time. If you measure the state again you have a probability 1/Sqrt(1+a^2) which is approx 1-(a^2)/2 that it will still be in state |1>. This means that by choosing to measure it over and over again, you can make the probability of drift to another state as small as you like.

Thus, according to Stapp, observation can affect the system because you decide what to measure and how often.

I may be talking total BS here, but that has always been my understanding.

David

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Tor

That's right! We need it all over the place. This is why a quantum mechanical universe is so different from a classical one. A true picture of the world (as far as we know today) is quantum mechanical. That includes our bodies too.
I would suggest that you read one of his papers on Physicalism Versus Quantum Mechanics.

I did.

But we'll need it all over the place. Not just with humans. Not just with other animals. And not just with the ion channels in a brain.

The physicalist world view is not the Newtonian world view. The QM world view is the correct one. Stapp only tries to show where that leads and including us in the process.

Do you think that the quantum worldview inexorably leads to our needing quantum mechanics to explain how I move my arm?

Is it really so complicated? Maybe to grasp at first. But what he says is that everything is a combination of four processes. They give rise to it all.

Except the free will part. That's still incoherent. But if everything else can be explained by four fundamental processes, that would be cool.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I think Thomas Clark explains the dilemma well in this paper: Fear of Mechanism

Nevertheless, there is a general point to be made relevant to Stapp and others engaged in the quantum quest for consciousness and free will: when you finally pin it down, will it still be what you want? Stapp wants a ‘pragmatic theory of the mind/brain that allows our thoughts to be causally efficacious yet not controlled by local-mechanistic laws combined with random chance.’ But any good scientific theory of thought will of necessity show how thoughts themselves arise within a context, not merely how they cause behavior. That is, such a theory will place thought, consciousness, the will, mental agency, what have you, within a general, law-invoking explanation in which there are predictable antecedents as well as consequents. But libertarian free will is precisely that which by definition can’t have law-like or predictable antecedents, otherwise it wouldn’t be free in the required sense. So to find it within nature is to destroy it. Since knowledge explodes the causa sui self, its defenders tend to occupy the penumbra of science and psychology, where the light of explanation has yet to penetrate.

~~ Paul

[Tor]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

I did.

But we'll need it all over the place. Not just with humans. Not just with other animals. And not just with the ion channels in a brain.

~~ Paul

Yes, that is true. And that is what Stapp claims (and so did von Neumann before him). The ion channels is just one example of where in the body QM is relevant.

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

I did.
Do you think that the quantum worldview inexorably leads to our needing quantum mechanics to explain how I move my arm?

Yes, how it is that your intention of moving your arm ends up with your arm actually moving in the intended direction, and not your body doing something else.

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Except the free will part. That's still incoherent. But if everything else can be explained by four fundamental processes, that would be cool.

~~ Paul

You always end up with something at the bottom that is just there and currently is hard to explain (but maybe not so in the future). To Stapp this is Process Zero. I agree that free will is tricky, and this part of his theory is where he postulates something to make it all add up (since physics is not causally closed something is needed).

What I have always found most fascinating is that the lines between what we call physical and mental gets totally blurry when look a the universe (including us) through the QM lens. I like to think of it all as two sides of the same coin. Maybe someday we'll discover something deeper that we don't have fitting concepts to describe today.