<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Dear Pedro, <br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">I have not previously contributed to
this thread, but thought that you and your terrific readership
might be interested in this article. <br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">
<div tabindex="0" class="gs_citr">Miller Jr, W.B., Torday, J.S.
and Baluška, F., 2018. Biological evolution as defense of'self'.
<i>Progress in biophysics and molecular biology</i>.</div>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Based within the conclusions defended
in that article, there should be no surprise about the
experimental findings you mention below. Every cell has
self-referential consciousness, within its basal limits, and
assesses and deploys information as communication to
problem-solve. Hence, the researchers are not close to a
pre-emergence of consciousness, since it exists as the definition
of life and they are experimenting with living cells. In my
opinion, the researchers nicely substantiate the arguments within
the above paper. The pre-emergence you mention below would then
be prior to its instantiation in the living cell, which would be
somewhere along the trajectory of the molecular attachment to
information space-time that changes physical data to biological
information. <br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Best regards, <br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Bill <br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br>
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 1/29/2019 11:28 AM, Pedro C.
Marijuan wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:17479ead-81a5-8245-ee65-b1504271d1f5@aragon.es">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Dear FIS Colleagues,<br>
<br>
An interesting twist on what could be the minimal requirements
for consciousness has recently arisen (Nature News, 15 Nov.
2018). Lab-grown mini-brains, or better, brain organoids
obtained from stem cells and coaxed to form cortical tissue,
show amazing properties of structure, connectivity, and
synchronicity of their neural discharges. Up to the point that
ethical questions have been raised. The neural types, the genes
expressed, and the "EEG records" are surprisingly similar to
those seen in real human brains of preterm babies. The organoids
themselves have been in culture for 10 months. How close could
they be to a primary form or say to a pre-emergence of
consciousness? Although grown for medical purposes, if these
organoids, or more complex ones, are hooked to organoid forms of
sensory organs (eye, hear) what would happen? Would these
sensory organoids open real windows to these mini-brains towards
the external world? Could they be sort of an instantiation of
Putnam's "brain in a bat"? Too many questions one can
formulate...<br>
<br>
Best--Pedro<br>
<br>
<br>
El 22/01/2019 a las 13:25, GUEVARA ERRA RAMON MARIANO escribió:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAHVHHJUwjUyNDRd8XOq-H3=ayj=QXVgTR78smNhF-U8boEqRRw@mail.gmail.com">
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;
charset=UTF-8">
<div dir="ltr">
<div dir="ltr">
<div>Dear colleagues,</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>I have some comments on the question by Krassimir. In
our paper we talked about consciousness but I think the
results can also be interpreted in a wider sense.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Indeed, with open or closed eyes, a person is not more
or less conscious than with closed eyes, also seems to me.
There is simply more sensory input with eyes opened, and
presumably more information processing. <br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>So, going back to our paper, we measured the
information content in the brain network, and see that in
some states there is more information content than in
others. Now, if you are unconscious, in a medical sense,
say you fainted or you are in coma, the information
content is very low. But also if you switch off part of
the sensory input. In both cases what you measure is
information processing. <br>
</div>
<div>In other words, our measure is good at revealing the
amount of information processing in large scale brain
networks. Incidentally, it serves to contrast conscious
and unconscious states as consciousness is related to
information processing. But not only, it also serves to
contrast states with different sensory input, as in the
eyes opened/ eyes closed case, even when both seem to be
conscious states. <br>
</div>
<div>It would be interesting to see results from an
experiment where subjects have sensory deprivation.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Regarding consciousness, I don't know of a method to
quantify it behaviorally. Actually, even the definition is
elusive. Without a behavioral quantification, all we can
do is to rely on an empirical, medical use of the concept
and say "this state is more conscious than that state". <br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div>I agree with Karl , this question is very important,
weather something is alive or not, and is perhaps related
to the question of begin conscious or not. They may be
examples of "major evolutionary transitions" (Maynard
Smith and Szathmary). In this sense I have a comment.
There seems to be a believe in certain communities that
intelligence and /or consciousness would appear as a
result of the accumulation of processing units, with
networks of sufficient complexity. So, an artificial
intelligence could appear if we have a very complex and
large set of artificial neurons (it could even be a
simulation, it doesn't have to be physical). I disagree
with this optimism on historical grounds. There was a
similar wave of optimism after the Miller - Urey
experiment on the origin of life, long time ago, and look
where we are now. As long as I know, a self-replicating
artificial cell cannot be created from inorganic
molecules. I think this is the case because, of the large
amount of possibilities that gives molecular combinations,
chemical reactions, etc, only a few can be qualified as
"alive". And the more the system is complex, the more
there are combinations. Is the selection of the correct
combinations that is difficult. One could say the same
about the brain, where in this case the units are neurons.
There is a nice argument in one of Penrose's books about
this. The cerebellum and the cerebral cortex have the same
order of magnitude neurons. However, we don't tend to
believe that the cerebellum is the material basis of
consciousness. <br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Best,</div>
<div>Ramon<br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
</div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote"><br>
</div>
</div>
<br>
<fieldset class="mimeAttachmentHeader"></fieldset>
<br>
<pre wrap="">_______________________________________________
Fis mailing list
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:Fis@listas.unizar.es" moz-do-not-send="true">Fis@listas.unizar.es</a>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis" moz-do-not-send="true">http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis</a>
</pre>
</blockquote>
<p><br>
</p>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
-------------------------------------------------
Pedro C. Marijuán
Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:pcmarijuan.iacs@aragon.es" moz-do-not-send="true">pcmarijuan.iacs@aragon.es</a>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://sites.google.com/site/pedrocmarijuan/" moz-do-not-send="true">http://sites.google.com/site/pedrocmarijuan/</a>
------------------------------------------------- </pre>
<div id="DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2"><br>
<table style="border-top: 1px solid #D3D4DE;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="width: 55px; padding-top: 18px;"><a
href="https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=emailclient"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"><img
src="https://ipmcdn.avast.com/images/icons/icon-envelope-tick-round-orange-animated-no-repeat-v1.gif"
alt="" style="width: 46px; height: 29px;"
moz-do-not-send="true" width="46" height="29"></a></td>
<td style="width: 470px; padding-top: 17px; color:
#41424e; font-size: 13px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica,
sans-serif; line-height: 18px;">Libre de virus. <a
href="https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=emailclient"
target="_blank" style="color: #4453ea;"
moz-do-not-send="true">www.avast.com</a> </td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<a href="#DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2" width="1"
height="1" moz-do-not-send="true"> </a></div>
<br>
<fieldset class="mimeAttachmentHeader"></fieldset>
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">_______________________________________________
Fis mailing list
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:Fis@listas.unizar.es">Fis@listas.unizar.es</a>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis">http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis</a>
</pre>
</blockquote>
<p><br>
</p>
</body>
</html>