ON ONTOLOGY

Dear Jeff and Mario,

I have some thoughts about ontology. They arose from
reflecting upon a recent query from John Searle about my ontological 
position, and upon your question, Mario, concerning the
origin of consciousness. Let me gather a few threads.

Searle said: I think that all conscious states are caused by brain 
processes. But my impression is that you think that consciousness is 
a primitive part of nature, not explained by brain process. And you 
think this because it is necessary to postulate consciousness in order 
to make sense out of quantum mechanical process. 
Am I right about this? 

The question asked by Mario was:

With regard to Neo-Darwinism (i.e., biological evolution): how does 
consciousness emerge? Where does it come from?

I told Searle that he had gotten it right. But I cautioned that my 
position of science was basically pragmatic, and it shied away from 
ontological commitments. Ontology is speculative, by its very nature

[On further reflection I find Searles statement of my position to be not 
quite right!]

My answer to Marios question was similar: data on prehuman 
consciousness is scant.

Yet I stressed to Mario that we had to answer his question because, 
unanswered, it was the principal objection to the von Neumann-based
neuropsychological theory we were promoting.

Also, Jeff raised the issue of the opposing Many-Worlds View, which  
is that the collapse idea had to be abandoned as nonsense, along 
with the subjectivist Copenhagen philosophy of science.  I pointed out 
that the Many-Worlds view was not a real problem. It not only has 
(seemingly irresolvable) technical difficulties, but is rejected by most 
physicists as too far removed from the validated practical theory that 
is the empirical base, and too over-populated with unobservable 
entities that have no effect on our actual experiences.

So where does that put us? 

We can stick to the pragmatic stance and say that we are interested 
in the neuropsychology of the human brain-mind connection. This is 
where data is available, and will soon be coming in torrents. We can 
simply reject ontological speculation and commitment.  This is the 
safe and sane approach, and it won the day in atomic physics, in 
spite of protestations about its subjective human-based  character. 

However, curious human minds want more than just a set of practical 
rules tied to human beings, even if that is all that can really be 
rationally supported by scientific evidence.

And *I* really want more, even if I know that it cannot be as 
scientifically solid as the pragmatic theory. Moreover, we must deliver 
more, to make the pragmatic theory more palatable and more broadly 
accepted. Even quantum theory, successful as it was, continued to 
have detractors. Many human minds demands more. However,
an ontological theory need only be plausible and reasonable: it can 
never be proved and certain.

The right starting point is the structure of the pragmatic theory that 
works. The ontology should arise from, and give a reasonable 
supporting structure for, the empirically successful practical theory, 
not from preconceived principles and categories, such as Descartes 
cleavage of mind and matter. 

To illuminate this principle, let me contrast what I shall do with what 
the Many-Worlders do. They looked at the pragmatic theory that 
worked, and rejected it because it did not fit their idea that mind is 
distinct from matter, and can do nothing to matter. They took the 
classical-physics Cartesian concepts as more primary than the theory 
that describes the phenomena. I shall do just the opposite: create
an ontology that fits and naturally imbeds the pragmatically 
successful theory, and gives plausible answers the questions of 
Searle and Beauregard.

The first step is technical: tie the collapses to the concepts of 
classical physics. Bohr often stressed that our individual experiences
are compatible with the concepts of classical physics: we see the 
(center of the) moon in one place, not smeared over the entire sky.
In a series of papers in the mid-eighties I developed an idea of how to
do this. [See: On the unification of quantum theory and classical 
physics in Symposium on the Foundations of Modern Physics 1985, 
eds, P. Lahti & P. Mittelstaedt, World Scientific, Singapore, pp.213-
221. Gauge Fields and Integrated Quantum-Classical Theory in 
Annals of the New York Academy of Science 480, New Techniques 
and Ideas in Quantum Measurement theory, ed. D. Greenberger, The 
New York Academy of Science, New York New York 1986. Light as 
Foundation of Being in Quantum Implications: Essays in Honor of D, 
David Bohm, eds, B.J. Hiley, and F. D. Peat, Routledge & Kegan 
Paul, London and New York,  pp. 255-266.]  

The idea is to express the projection operators P of von Neumanns
rules in terms of the coherent states of the quantum electromagnetic 
field.  This has many nice features, which I shall not go into here. The 
important thing, here, is that it allows the projection operators P to be 
described in terms of the concepts of classical physics. Then there 
needs to be some physical criteria, described in terms of these 
classical variables, for when a Process I event occurs, and what the 
associated operator P is. These objective rules, expressed in terms of 
physical variables, can govern Process I before consciousness 
appears, or when and where consciousness is not present.

Now, one can take an antiseptic view of these happenings: when the 
conditions are satisfied the Process I question just pops up, and the 
Process 3 collapse then occurs. Nothing makes these things 
happen:  it is simply in the nature of things that when the conditions 
are satisfied these things occur. But from an ontological perspective 
there is something odd about this huge collapse simply happening by 
itself, without something making it happen. Remember, we are 
seeking not just practically useful rules here, but a *conception* of 
what is really going on. I suggest that something is making these 
things happen, and that what is needed to satisfy our curious minds is 
a rationally coherent conception of what that something is. What are 
its properties.

We are not totally in the dark about this! What we have to go on is the 
detailed structure of a complex theory that works! What we want is 
the simplest most natural conception of what it is that makes that 
work.

We have a lot to go on. We have the form of von Neumanns three 
Processes. What I propose is that Nature be conceived of as a 
Process that encompasses von Neumanns three processes, but that 
can work when human consciousness is not around.

What is the nature or character of The Process? The answer is not 
trivial. The Process has four important features:
1)	It is: it has physical features described by the quantum state 
vector.
2)	It knows: it has epistemological/experiential features actualized 
by certain collapse events. 
3)	It feels: it evaluates, in order to trigger collapse events. 
4)	It does: it restructures itself at each collapse event.

The Cartesian dichotomy of mind and matter is dissolved. The 
quantum state vector generalizes the mathematical description of 
classical physics, but is supposed to represent not material 
substance, but knowledge, potentiality, probability, propensity and 
information, which all have idea-like aspects. These properties can 
exist objectively, as features of The Process, but not apart from the 
reality represented by the evolving state vector. These idea-like 
p0roperties are married to the evolving state.

Accordingly, the missing law, the one that evaluates, in order to 
trigger the Process I, need not be formulated wholly or exclusively in 
terms of physically described aspects: the triggering law could very 
well be a complex law that involves all of these aspects of reality.

The answer to Marios question is that although consciousness as we 
know it probably depends on the complexities of our brains, The 
Process does not. As brains developed the aspect of reality that 
triggered Process 1 events in animate life came to be aspects more
usefully, and perhaps ncessarily, described in psychological terms 
than physical terms. The mental aspects would not be there if they 
were not actually doing something. But before they came into being 
they were not needed: other features made the evaluations in simpler 
systems.

Searles question was:
: my  impression is that you think that consciousness is a primitive 
part of nature, not explained by brain process. And you think this 
because it is necessary to postulate consciousness in order to make 
sense out of quantum mechanical process. 
Am I right about this?

What I claim is that orthodox contemporary quantum theory does not
specify when a Process 1 event will occur, or exactly what it will be 
(what the projection operator P will be). Some further rule is needed. 
At the practical level what determines these things is often a 
conscious choice on the part of the observer/experimenter, and this 
choice is not fixed by the contemporary laws of physics, even when 
the entire physical universe is included in the physical world. Some 
other process is needed, and there is no reason why this process 
cannot draw upon both the physical and mental aspects of reality. 

The physical need not determine (or cause) the mental; collaboration 
is probably the general rule.

It does not follow from this that consciousness is more primitive, or 
prior to, brains. Human consciousness probably requires human 
brains. And anything resembling human consciousness probably 
requires something resembling a human brain. 

So I do not hold that consciousness is more primitive than brains.
Mind and brain are partners, or two inseparable aspects of a whole 
that is more than either alone.

Consciousness is not more primitive than brains. They co-exist. 
Brains are necessary for consciousness, and cannot function 
optimally without consciousness. That is, at present, what I think.