New Study Favors Quantum Mind

More evidence to support the Quantum Mind. This comes on the heels of another successful prediction from Hameroff and Penrose.

Discovery of quantum vibrations in 'microtubules' corroborates theory of consciousness

Orch OR was harshly criticized from its inception, as the brain was considered too "warm, wet, and noisy" for seemingly delicate quantum processes. However, evidence has now shown warm quantum coherence in plant photosynthesis, bird brain navigation, our sense of smell, and brain microtubules. The recent discovery of warm temperature quantum vibrations in microtubules inside brain neurons by the research group led by Anirban Bandyopadhyay, PhD, at the National Institute of Material Sciences in Tsukuba, Japan (and now at MIT), corroborates the pair's theory and suggests that EEG rhythms also derive from deeper level microtubule vibrations. In addition, work from the laboratory of Roderick G. Eckenhoff, MD, at the University of Pennsylvania, suggests that anesthesia, which selectively erases consciousness while sparing non-conscious brain activities, acts via microtubules in brain neurons.

phys.org...

This brings us to the latest discovery.

New Study Favors Quantum Mind

Quantum coherence in brain protein resembles plant photosynthesis

It turns out that the collected photon energy is first converted to electronic excitations in distinct intra-protein ‘chromophores’, each an array of ‘pi’ electron resonance clouds, and then transported as electronic excitations (‘excitons’), dipole couplings or ‘resonance energy transfers’ which ‘hop’, or spread through the protein, not just from one chromophore to another, but among all chromophores at the same time in quantum coherent superposition! Heat in the form of thermal vibrations pumps, rather than disrupts, quantum coherence, the end result being highly efficient conversion of sunlight to food, extremely important to life on earth.

Back in the brain, microtubules are components of the cytoskeleton inside neurons, cylindrical lattice polymers of the protein ‘tubulin’. Microtubules are theorized to encode memory, regulate synapses and act as quantum computers generating consciousness. The latter claim has been criticized, but now it appears quantum mechanisms eerily similar to those in photosynthesis may operate in tubulins within microtubules.

In an article published September 17 by the Journal of the Royal Society – Interface a team of scientists from Nova Southeastern University and the University of Arizona in the US, and the University of Alberta in Canada used computer simulation and theoretical quantum biophysics to analyze quantum coherence among tryptophan pi resonance rings in tubulin, the component protein in microtubules.

Professor Travis Craddock of Nova Southeastern University and colleagues mapped locations of the tryptophan pi electron resonance clouds in tubulin, and found them analogous to chromophores in photosynthesis proteins.

www.newswise.com...

A quantum mind is a huge discovery and I hope more tests are done. A quantum mind will explain everything from near death experiences to ESP with three words. SUPERPOSITION, ENTANGLEMENT AND NON-LOCALITY.

Here's a short video on the Quantum Mind.

a reply to: neoholographic

Unfortunately, this is being promoted by the same pair who started the ball rolling twenty years ago: Penrose and Hameroff.

I would wait until these results are independently replicated before getting too excited.

I wonder how the show went:

Penrose, Hameroff and Bandyopadhyay will explore their theories during a session on “Microtubules and the Big Consciousness Debate” at the Brainstorm Sessions, a public three-day event at the Brakke Grond in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, January 16-18, 2014.

They will engage skeptics in a debate on the nature of consciousness, and Bandyopadhyay and his team will couple microtubule vibrations from active neurons to play Indian musical instruments. “Consciousness depends on anharmonic vibrations of microtubules inside neurons, similar to certain kinds of Indian music, but unlike Western music, which is harmonic,” Hameroff explains.

www.kurzweilai.net... ousness

Reply to Phage

I wonder how the show went.

Not so well.

Science starts with a question that the answer to is "I do not know", though the trouble with any hypothesis that cannot be practically tested or simulated with a reasonable margin of certainty is that it is just an idea.

Although I do personally subscribe to the concept that consciousness is received by the brain in much the same way radio waves are received by a radio.... As a scientist I cannot state that to be true.

Korg.

a reply to: neoholographic

I felt that I should reply to your thread with a thread in another section: LINK

I really enjoyed this. Thank you.

Matthew 10:42
I can guarantee this truth: Whoever gives any of my humble followers a cup of cold water because that person is my disciple will certainly never lose his reward.”

This thread is a nice tall glass. Enjoy.

Here is a wiki source to the English "father " of the science "Penrose".
Typical English sounding name like "Hawking" actually won a prize with Hawking.

en.wikipedia.org...

The major problem with the theory is that as temperature rises and heat energy increases the quantum decoherence time decreases. "On the time scale of neuron firing and excitations in microtubules is slower than the decoherence time by a factor of at least 10,000,000,000."

So this phenomena would have to occur on a very small size scale with some sort of cascading amplification.

Now if Penrose had claimed that the human brain uses Chaos theory attractors in superposition to parallel process I could agree.

Probably a troll...

originally posted by: Korg Trinity
...Although I do personally subscribe to the concept that consciousness is received by the brain in much the same way radio waves are received by a radio.... As a scientist I cannot state that to be true.

Korg.

Yeah, but the idea of the brain receiving consciousness like a radio receiver raises all sorts of other questions...


-- Do all organisms' brains receive consciousness like this? If they don't, then why not?

-- If not all brains, but just human brains, then when did the human animal begin to receive this consciousness? When they became homo sapiens? Before that? Did our early primate ancestors receive this consciousness? If our primate ancestors could not receive it, then what is special about homo sapiens' brains that allows us to receive it? Were Neanderthals' brains equipped to do so?

-- If it is all brains (all organisms with brains) that can receive this transmitted consciousness, then prior to there being life on earth (or any Earth at all), where did the "transmitted" consciousness go if there was nothing on earth around to receive it? If it was just always there, permeating space waiting to be picked up by a receiver-brain, then where is it coming from?

a reply to: Cauliflower

This makes no sense. All you have to do is read further in your Wikipedia article. This has been asked and answered.

In their reply to Tegmark's paper, also published in Physical Review E, the physicists Scott Hagan, Jack Tuszynski and Hameroff[20][21] claimed that Tegmark did not address the Orch-OR model, but instead a model of his own construction. This involved superpositions of quanta separated by 24 nm rather than the much smaller separations stipulated for Orch-OR. As a result, Hameroff's group claimed a decoherence time seven orders of magnitude greater than Tegmark's, but still well short of the 25 ms required if the quantum processing in the theory was to be linked to the 40 Hz gamma synchrony, as Orch-OR suggested. To bridge this gap, the group made a series of proposals. It was supposed that the interiors of neurons could alternate between liquid and gel states. In the gel state, it was further hypothesized that the water electrical dipoles are oriented in the same direction, along the outer edge of the microtubule tubulin subunits. Hameroff et al. proposed that this ordered water could screen any quantum coherence within the tubulin of the microtubules from the environment of the rest of the brain. Each tubulin also has a tail extending out from the microtubules, which is negatively charged, and therefore attracts positively charged ions. It is suggested that this could provide further screening. Further to this, there was a suggestion that the microtubules could be pumped into a coherent state by biochemical energy.

Finally, it is suggested that the configuration of the microtubule lattice might be suitable for quantum error correction, a means of holding together quantum coherence in the face of environmental interaction. In the last decade, some researchers who are sympathetic to Penrose's ideas have proposed an alternative scheme for quantum processing in microtubules based on the interaction of tubulin tails with microtubule-associated proteins, motor proteins and presynaptic scaffold proteins. These proposed alternative processes have the advantage of taking place within Tegmark's time to decoherence.

As Hameroff has stated since the start. He's talking about proteins within microtubules and Tegmark made the mistake of calculating decoherence that wasn't even associated with the Orch-Or Model.

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

We can dismiss the receiver hypothesis using Occam's Razor. The expected results of testing such a hypothesis are functionally identical to the emergent property hypothesis, except it takes the extra untestable step of saying "but its actually a receiver" for absolutely no logical reason. It doesn't explain anything more, it doesn't offer any deeper insight, it's just a more philosophically pleasing stance for some people. Every "if consciousness is an emergent property of the brain, then we would expect to see..." question that has been empirically tested lines up with the hypothesis that consciousness is indeed an emergent property of the brain.

a reply to: Astyanax


The article you posted actually supports Penrose/Hameroff and shows the silly, strange thinking of materialist who have blind faith in the miracles of materialism.

In the article, it talks about how the source of EEG rhythms are a mystery in one breath but in the next breath it says how Hameroff and Penrose can't have the answer.

This is the problem with materialism. They don't have any answers but anyone who looks for these answers outside of the materialist paradigm is just engaging in pseudoscience.

So far, Penrose/Hameroff are asking questions and building theories whose predictions are being confirmed in experiments. THIS IS SCIENCE!

All the materialist has to offer is blind ridicule and faith to anyone that dares ask questions that doesn't fit their materialist belief system.

So again, the source of EEG rhythms are a mystery that materialism hasn't solved. Scientist then build a theory to explain the source of these EEG rhythms and then their predictions are confirmed in experiments but because their theory doesn't fit into a materialist paradigm, it's just blindly dismissed.

Another brick wall materialist will run into is evolution.

Materialist tell us that evolution can do all things. Just give natural selection enough time and it will blindly produce a super computer. This is kooky talk, but this is an intelligent design debate and I want to stay on the subject.

So, natural selection is almighty and can produce anything but now it may have produced a quantum mind, materialist want to say this can't happen. WHICH IS IT??

WHY WOULDN'T NATURE SELECT QUANTUM EFFECTS TO GIVE A SPECIES LIKE OURS AN ADVANTAGE???

With the emerging field of Quantum Biology, we're finding quantum effects in everything from the sense of smell, bird navigation, DNA and photosynthesis.

So why are we prohibited from having these effects selected to give our species a huge advantage?

Again, the hypocrisy from materialist.

The reason they're scared of a quantum mind because it explains Psi and everything labeled paranormal with these three words. SUPERPOSITION, ENTANGLEMENT AND NON-LOCALITY.

Again, on one side you have materialist pouting with no answers and on the other side you have scientist building theories, making predictions and then having those predictions confirmed in experiments.

originally posted by: Soylent Green Is People

originally posted by: Korg Trinity
...Although I do personally subscribe to the concept that consciousness is received by the brain in much the same way radio waves are received by a radio.... As a scientist I cannot state that to be true.

Korg.

Yeah, but the idea of the brain receiving consciousness like a radio receiver raises all sorts of other questions...


-- Do all organisms' brains receive consciousness like this? If they don't, then why not?

-- If not all brains, but just human brains, then when did the human animal begin to receive this consciousness? When they became homo sapiens? Before that? Did our early primate ancestors receive this consciousness? If our primate ancestors could not receive it, then what is special about homo sapiens' brains that allows us to receive it? Were Neanderthals' brains equipped to do so?

-- If it is all brains (all organisms with brains) that can receive this transmitted consciousness, then prior to there being life on earth (or any Earth at all), where did the "transmitted" consciousness go if there was nothing on earth around to receive it? If it was just always there, permeating space waiting to be picked up by a receiver-brain, then where is it coming from?

Is there a difference between consciousness and intelligence? I think there is.

I think it is a safe bet to say that Animals poses consciousness, but are not sufficiently intelligent to override instinct.

Korg.

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

originally posted by: Soylent Green Is People

originally posted by: Korg Trinity
...Although I do personally subscribe to the concept that consciousness is received by the brain in much the same way radio waves are received by a radio.... As a scientist I cannot state that to be true.

Korg.

Yeah, but the idea of the brain receiving consciousness like a radio receiver raises all sorts of other questions...


-- Do all organisms' brains receive consciousness like this? If they don't, then why not?

-- If not all brains, but just human brains, then when did the human animal begin to receive this consciousness? When they became homo sapiens? Before that? Did our early primate ancestors receive this consciousness? If our primate ancestors could not receive it, then what is special about homo sapiens' brains that allows us to receive it? Were Neanderthals' brains equipped to do so?

-- If it is all brains (all organisms with brains) that can receive this transmitted consciousness, then prior to there being life on earth (or any Earth at all), where did the "transmitted" consciousness go if there was nothing on earth around to receive it? If it was just always there, permeating space waiting to be picked up by a receiver-brain, then where is it coming from?

Is there a difference between consciousness and intelligence? I think there is.

I think it is a safe bet to say that Animals poses consciousness, but are not sufficiently intelligent to override instinct.

Korg.

I don't feel that consciousness can exist separately from a brain, and that's because I think consciousness is an emergent by-product of a brain (i.e., it is created by the brain). The more complex the brain, the greater the the feeling of consciousness being a separate entity.

I think some animals with relatively advanced brains may feel a sense of self-awareness to a degree, although not to the degree that humans feel self-aware.

a reply to: neoholographic

I understand. You are an advocate of faith-based science.

Me, not so much.

a reply to: Astyanax

DOUBLE POST

a reply to: Astyanax

Nope, I just give more weight to scientist coming up with theories, making predictions and then having those predictions confirmed by experiments vs. a blind materialist that has no answers and any answers that don't agree with their materialist belief system is dismissed as pseudoscience.

One is called THINKING and the materialist view is called IGNORANCE.

a reply to: neoholographic

But they haven't been confirmed by any experiments. That's the whole point.

Look:

Hameroff's group claimed a decoherence time seven orders of magnitude greater than Tegmark's, but still well short of the 25 ms required if the quantum processing in the theory was to be linked to the 40 Hz gamma synchrony, as Orch-OR suggested.

In other words, the experiment did not produce the results that would be expected if Hameroff et al. were correct.

To bridge this gap, the group made a series of proposals. It was supposed that the interiors of neurons could alternate between liquid and gel states. In the gel state, it was further hypothesized that the water electrical dipoles are oriented in the same direction, along the outer edge of the microtubule tubulin subunits. Hameroff et al. proposed that this ordered water could screen any quantum coherence within the tubulin of the microtubules from the environment of the rest of the brain. Each tubulin also has a tail extending out from the microtubules, which is negatively charged, and therefore attracts positively charged ions. It is suggested that this could provide further screening. Further to this, there was a suggestion that the microtubules could be pumped into a coherent state by biochemical energy.

So: when the experiment leaves them with egg on their faces, Hameroff & Co. come up with a bunch of guesses about why they must be right after all, even though they've just been proved wrong.

As I said, faith-based science.

a reply to: Astyanax

Of course it has and the list keeps growing.

Orch OR was harshly criticized from its inception, as the brain was considered too “warm, wet, and noisy” for seemingly delicate quantum processes. However, evidence has now shown warm quantum coherence in plant photosynthesis, bird brain navigation, our sense of smell, and brain microtubules.

The recent discovery of warm-temperature quantum vibrations in microtubules inside brain neurons by the research group led by Anirban Bandyopadhyay, PhD, at the National Institute of Material Sciences in Tsukuba, Japan (and now at MIT), corroborates the pair’s theory and suggests that EEG rhythms also derive from deeper level microtubule vibrations.

Link

New Study Favors Quantum Mind

Quantum coherence in brain protein resembles plant photosynthesis

In an article published September 17 by the Journal of the Royal Society – Interface a team of scientists from Nova Southeastern University and the University of Arizona in the US, and the University of Alberta in Canada used computer simulation and theoretical quantum biophysics to analyze quantum coherence among tryptophan pi resonance rings in tubulin, the component protein in microtubules.

www.newswise.com...

Here's a more extensive list of publications and studies associated with research into the quantum mind.

www.quantumconsciousness.org...

These are just some of the things listed.

'The conscious pilot - dendritic synchrony moves through the brain to mediate consciousness Journal of Biological Physics, Volume 36, Number 1 / January, 2010

The Brain is Both Neurocomputer and Quantum Computer Cognitive Science 31:1035-1045 (2007)

Orchestrated Reduction Of Quantum Coherence In Brain Microtubules: A Model For Consciousness?
Stuart Hameroff & Roger Penrose, In: Toward a Science of Consciousness - The First Tucson Discussions and Debates, eds. Hameroff, S.R., Kaszniak, A.W. and Scott, A.C., Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 507-540 (1996)

Conscious Events As Orchestrated Space-Time Selections.
Journal of Consciousness Studies, 3(1):36-53 (1996)

Quantum Computation In Brain Microtubules?
The Penrose-Hameroff "Orch OR" model of consciousness. Philosophical Transactions Royal Society London (A) 356:1869-1896 (1998)

Funda-Mentality: Is The Conscious Mind Subtly Linked To A Basic Level Of The Universe?
Trends in Cognitive Sciences 2(4):119-127 (1998)

Consciousness, The Brain And Spacetime Geometry (PDF)

From The Annals of the NewYork Academy of Sciences special issue Cajal and consciousness
A Quantum Approach To Visual Consciousness (PDF)

Nancy J. Woolf, Stuart R Hameroff, Trends in Cognitive Science
Quantum Computation in Brain Microtubules? Decoherence and Biological Feasibility Scott Hagan, Stuart Hameroff and Jack Tuszynski, , Physical Reviews E, 2002 65:061901.

Time, Consciousness and Quantum Events in Fundamental Spacetime Geometry In: The nature of time: Physics, geometry and perception - Proceedings of a NATO Advanced Research Workshop, ed R Buccheri and M Saniga (2003)

Whitehead and Quantum Computation in the Brain: Panprotopsychism Meets the Physics of Fundamental Spacetime Geometry S Hameroff, in Whitehead Process Network Compendium, ed M Weber (2003)

Consciousness, Neurobiology and Quantum Mechanics: The Case for a Connection, In: The Emerging Physics of Consciousness, edited by Jack Tuszynski, Springer-Verlag, 2007

Like I said, these are scientist looking into these areas and building theories where predictions are being tested. This is vs. the blind materialist who has no answers but they tell everyone what the answers can't be. SILLINESS!!

a reply to: neoholographic

Your first link is to a news item concerning a review of Penrose and Hameroff's original article. It's basically the same thing you posted in your OP. Nothing new there, apart from a few fans of P & H expressing their agreement with their hypothesis. Certainly no new experimental work, despite your claim.

Your second link was also posted in the OP. It is to a news item about a paper of which Stuart Hameroff is one of the authors. That is not independent confirmation through research.

You third link is to Hameroff's own web site.

I get it. You're a believer. You believe in Stuart Hameroff and what he tells the world.

There really is nothing like faith-based science, is there?