Skip to content

Like this? Share it!

  • Share on Facebook
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on LinkedIn
  • Share on Email
Closer To Truth
  • Watch
    • Seasons & EpisodesWatch complete episodes as aired on public television
    • Curated PlaylistsExplore collections of videos curated by our team
    • ProjectsDiscover collaborations with leading institutions
    • ContributorsMeet the greatest thinkers exploring the deepest questions
    • CTT ChatsWatch candid conversations with the brightest minds on the boldest ideas
    • Roundtable ArchivesView roundtable discussions from our early years
  • Topics
    • Cosmos, Consciousness, Meaning: Explore the fundamental questions of existence.Topic Guide
    • All Topics
      • CosmosExplore cosmology, physics, and the fundamentals of existence
        • Back
        • All Cosmos
        • Deep Laws of Nature
          • Back
          • All Deep Laws of Nature
          • Cosmic Fundamentals
          • Time and Space-Time
          • Quantum Theory
          • Complexity and Emergence
          • Mathematics as Fundamental?
          • Information as Fundamental?
          • Universe as Simulation?
          • Deep Discovery in Science
        • Vast Cosmos
          • Back
          • All Vast Cosmos
          • Cosmic Immensity
          • Cosmic Beginnings
          • Cosmic Structure
          • Multiple Universes (Multiverse)
          • Black Holes, Dark Energy, Dark Matter
        • Our Special Universe
          • Back
          • All Our Special Universe
          • Fine-Tuning of the Universe?
          • Fine-Tuning the Universe for Life & Mind?
          • Breathtaking Universe
          • Where Are All the Aliens?
          • Far Future of the Universe
        • Breakthroughs
          • Back
          • All Breakthroughs
          • Breakthroughs in Science
          • Breakthroughs in Mathematics
        • Science and Religion
          • Back
          • All Science and Religion
          • Science vs. Religion?
          • Science and God
          • How Science and Religion Think
          • The New Atheism
          • Limits of Science
        • Mystery of Existence
          • Back
          • All Mystery of Existence
          • The Mystery of Existence
          • The Mystery of Laws & Cosmos
          • Metaphysics of Cosmos
          • Why Anything at All?
      • ConsciousnessSearch mysteries of mind and individual awareness
        • Back
        • All Consciousness
        • Mind-Body Problems
          • Back
          • All Mind-Body Problems
          • The Mind-Body Problem
          • Brain Structure and Function
          • Brain Explains Mind?
          • Elements of Mind
        • Consciousness
          • Back
          • All Consciousness
          • Mystery of Consciousness
          • Consciousness as Emergent
          • Consciousness as All Physical?
          • States of Consciousness
          • Sleep and Dreams
          • Purpose of Consciousness?
          • Metaphysics of Consciousness
        • Persons
          • Back
          • All Persons
          • Persons and Selves
          • Personal Identity
          • Life After Death?
          • Souls?
          • Human Uniqueness
          • Creativity
          • Music
          • Epistemology
          • Belief Systems
          • Mind and Society
          • People and Society
        • Free Will
          • Back
          • All Free Will
          • Mystery of Free Will
          • Philosophy of Free Will
          • Free Will and Consciousness
          • Science of Free Will
          • Free Will and Morality
          • Theology of Free Will
        • Philosophy of Biology
          • Back
          • All Philosophy of Biology
          • Why Philosophy of Biology?
          • What is Life?
          • Life in the Cosmos
          • Deception
        • Extrasensory Perception
          • Back
          • All Extrasensory Perception
          • ESP and New Realities?
          • ESP and the Nonphysical?
        • Art Seeking Understanding
          • Back
          • All Art Seeking Understanding
          • Aesthetic Cognitivism
          • Art and Philosophy
          • Neuroscience/Cognitive Science of Art
          • Neuroscience/Cognitive Science of Music
          • Art and God
          • Art and Religion
          • Art and Culture
      • MeaningSeek whether God exists through diverse perspectives
        • Back
        • All Meaning
        • Philosophy of Religion
          • Back
          • All Philosophy of Religion
          • Concepts of God
          • Alternative Concepts of God
          • Faith and Belief
          • Conflict Among Religions
          • Theology
          • How Philosophy Informs Religion
          • Religion Without God
        • Existence of God
          • Back
          • All Existence of God
          • Arguing God's Existence
          • Philosophical Arguments For God
          • Experiential Arguments For God
          • Arguments Against God
        • Attributes of God
          • Back
          • All Attributes of God
          • God's Nature?
          • God's Essence?
          • God's Powers?
          • God and Time?
        • God as Creator
          • Back
          • All God as Creator
          • God The Creator?
          • God's World?
          • God's Interactions?
        • Ultimate Destinies
          • Back
          • All Ultimate Destinies
          • God's Knowledge and Future Events?
          • Judgment (Heaven, Hell)?
          • Resurrection?
          • Eschatology (End Times)?
          • Eternal Life?
          • Search for Meaning
  • News
    • All NewsStay up-to-date with the latest from Closer To Truth
    • Book ExcerptsExplore recently authored books from our contributors
    • PerspectivesRead essays and articles from our community
  • About
    • About Closer To TruthWe are a digital-media nonprofit and TV series
    • The TV SeriesWhere to watch on PBS stations nationwide
    • Meet the TeamMeet the host and team behind Closer To Truth
    • PartnershipsLearn about our partners and collaborators
    • Support Closer To TruthWays to engage with and support our work
    • PodcastListen on your favorite podcast player
    • StoreBuy official Closer To Truth merchandise
    • YouTubeSubscribe to Closer To Truth on YouTube
Search
  • Login
  • Join
  • Watch
    • EpisodesWatch complete episodes as aired on public television
    • Curated PlaylistsExplore collections of videos curated by our team
    • ProjectsDiscover collaborations with leading institutions
    • ContributorsMeet the greatest thinkers exploring the deepest questions
    • CTT ChatsWatch chats with the brightest minds on the boldest ideas
    • RoundtablesView roundtable discussions from our early years
  • Topics
    • Topic GuideCosmos, Consciousness, Meaning: Join us as we explore the fundamental questions of existence.
    • CosmosExplore cosmology, physics, and the fundamentals of existence
    • ConsciousnessSearch mysteries of mind and individual awareness
    • MeaningSeek whether God exists through diverse perspectives
  • News
    • The Latest
  • About
    • About Closer to TruthWe are a digital-media nonprofit and TV series
    • TV SeriesWhere to watch on PBS stations nationwide
    • Meet the TeamMeet our host and our team
    • PartnershipsLearn about CTT’s partners and collaborators
    • Support Closer to TruthWays to engage with and support our work
    • PodcastListen on your favorite podcast player
    • StoreBuy official Closer To Truth merchandise
    • YouTubeSubscribe to Closer To Truth on YouTube
    • FAQLearn about Closer to Truth membership
  • Login
  • Join

video

Topic Series

Max Tegmark

  • Watch Next
Cover image for How to Decipher Deception in Evolution?

How to Decipher Deception in Evolution?

Cover image for How Do Breakthroughs Happen in Biology?

How Do Breakthroughs Happen in Biology?

Cover image for How do Breakthroughs Happen in Physics?

How do Breakthroughs Happen in Physics?

Cover image for Noam Chomsky on Theories of Linguistics (Part 2)

Noam Chomsky on Theories of Linguistics (Part 2)

Cover image for Noam Chomsky’s Reflections on Philosophy and Linguistics (Part 1)

Noam Chomsky’s Reflections on Philosophy and Linguistics (Part 1)

Cover image for What is Philosophy of the Breakthrough Process?

What is Philosophy of the Breakthrough Process?

  • Details
  • Transcripts
  • Formats
    • Share
Featured In

  • Physics of Consciousness
Contributors

Max Tegmark

Max Tegmark works in cosmology, physics of intelligence (AI-physics-AI), mathematical...
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
Max, for the last half century, I’ve been focusing on consciousness. I did my doctorate in neuroscience and the assumption was that physics, sure, was the underpinning of the chemistry and the biochemistry and the cellular structure, but we didn’t have to worry about that or even think about it to understand the nature of consciousness. That has changed recently. Why so? Why is the physics of consciousness particularly important?
Max Tegmark
I feel that it’s changed because we’ve come to realize that a large fraction of the things we’re stuck on in physics, of unsolved mysteries, actually have to do with what it means to be an observer. If you take, for example, the biggest embarrassment of all, that we can’t unify general relativity, the theory of the big, with quantum mechanics, the theory of the small. These two theories have the exact opposite definition of observer. General relativity says an observer is this infinitesimally tiny thing with no mass and having no effect on its environment.
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
A point, yeah.
Max Tegmark
Yeah, whereas quantum mechanics says that the observer has an effect on that which is observed, so no wonder we can’t unify them. There are a lot of other problems too, where if you trace back, in my opinion, where the rub lies. It’s the fact that we’ve tried to avoid talking about what an observer is, even though physics is supposed to be the subject of observation, which is ridiculous. There’s been this kind of prejudice that consciousness is just a bunch of flaky hooey that physicists shouldn’t talk about and that we can somehow get away with not talking about it. And I think we have to face up to the face that, no, especially if you believe that I am made of quarks and electrons and physical things, I can’t sweep under the rug the fact that I am an observer and if I want to know what observers see, I have to understand the relationship between quarks and electrons and this subjective …
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
So it’s one thing to say that something about consciousness has to be imply…imbued in our physics to understand in one way or another. It’s quite another to say that the physics, therefore, then helps us to understand what consciousness, this phenomenal inner experience that we have that, you know, I know I have and I think you have, but I can’t be quite sure…
Max Tegmark
Are you calling me a zombie?
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
This inner feeling that we have, which seems so remarkable. So how can physics then recursively explain consciousness?.
Max Tegmark
Because it forces us into making the question a little bit easier. If you take the famous hard problem of consciousness you articulated, namely why is it that this quark blob has a subjective experience, that feels very hard. but if you take a starting point that some quark blobs, like this one, have this subjective experience and other ones, like this table, don’t, then this transforms this hard problem into this hard fact that some quark blobs are conscious, some aren’t, so there must be some physical principle, some equation which tells you which things are conscious and which aren’t, and this becomes now an experimental question. You can put me in our magnetoencephalography scanner at MIT and measure information processing in my head, and I can have a computer program that shows me in real time whether I’m thinking about a strawberry or a chair on a computer screen and I also know subjectively what I’m thinking, so I can check if that’s correct or not and then I can start to say, well, okay, the computer has this particular part of the information processing membrane that I’m conscious of, the computer sees, but the computer also sees some information processing that I’m not conscious about, like my heartbeat regulation. So what principle is it that distinguishes consciousness from unconscious information processing? I am convinced…this is a radical…this is a controversial point of view, but I’m convinced that there is some principle, some equation that determines which kinds of information processing are conscious and which aren’t, and I would love to find it.
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
Well, that would certainly be a remarkable achievement, but what you’re assuming when you see correlations in the brain with, with phenomenal experience, is certainly a correlation, but the question is causation and what is called identity theory. Are you saying that those electrical activity, whatever they are, that equation is, is exactly the same thing as the phenomenal experience? Like you say Venus is the morning star and the evening star, I mean, using two different terms for exactly the same object. Is that what you’re saying, that the equation you want to find is? Because if you’re saying that, that seems like a category mistake, because how can you say an equation is this feeling that I have?
Max Tegmark
My guess is that the subjective experience that we call consciousness is the way information feels when being processed in certain complex ways, and I feel I’m kind of forced into guessing this from the starting point that I think it’s all physics. I’m not allowed to have any extra secret sauce to add to it. And that makes it much harder for me, but at the same time, it limits it down to this very concrete problem that I have to ask. There is clearly some additional principle about information processing in nature that distinguishes between the conscious kind and the unconscious kind, and I would love to find it. This isn’t just philosophically fascinating, but it’s important too. You know, suppose you are an emergency room doctor and you have an unresponsive patient there. Wouldn’t it be great if you could somehow have a machine that told you whether that patient was conscious? In the future, suppose we build extremely advanced artificial intelligence that we can have conversations with. Wouldn’t we like to know if the thing is just a zombie pretending to have emotions, without feeling like anything, or whether it’s actually conscious and we should feel guilty about switching it off?
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
And do you feel that is possible in principle? Because I’m really a skeptic on that.
Max Tegmark
Well, if my guess is right, that there’s a unity in the sense that physics ultimately applies to everything, then there is such an answer out there and we don’t know that we’re smart enough to find it, but the safest way to fail in this is to convince ourselves that it’s impossible and not to try, so that’s why I’m trying so hard.
  • Short Video
  • Long Video

Watch Next

Members Only

Please login or join to view

Cover image for How to Decipher Deception in Evolution?

What can we learn when people deceive? There are all kinds of deception: from lying, duplicity, and disguises, to propaganda, disinformation, and deep fakes. Self-deception,...

video

How to Decipher Deception in Evolution?

Episode 09

Season 21

26:47

Watch

Members Only

Please login or join to view

Cover image for How Do Breakthroughs Happen in Biology?

Biologists work in different worlds than do physicists, separated by vast orders of magnitude, numbers of variables, and levels of complexity. Does the process of...

video

How Do Breakthroughs Happen in Biology?

Episode 07

Season 21

26:47

Watch

Members Only

Please login or join to view

Cover image for How do Breakthroughs Happen in Physics?

The nature of scientific Breakthroughs is one approach; the process of scientific Breakthroughs is quite another. When physicists reflect on how they do physics, when...

video

How do Breakthroughs Happen in Physics?

Episode 06

Season 21

26:47

Watch

Cover image for Noam Chomsky on Theories of Linguistics (Part 2)

Closer To Truth is proud to present this four-part miniseries with distinguished theoretical linguist, analytic philosopher, and cognitive scientist Noam Chomsky. In Part 2,...

video

Noam Chomsky on Theories of Linguistics (Part 2)

CTT Chat

42:32

Watch

Cover image for Noam Chomsky’s Reflections on Philosophy and Linguistics (Part 1)

Closer To Truth is proud to present this four-part miniseries with distinguished theoretical linguist, analytic philosopher, and cognitive scientist Noam Chomsky. In Part 1,...

video

Noam Chomsky’s Reflections on Philosophy and Linguistics (Part 1)

CTT Chat

27:17

Watch

Members Only

Please login or join to view

Cover image for What is Philosophy of the Breakthrough Process?

Scientific Breakthroughs are discoveries or theories that are milestones and touchstones, signposts and short-cuts, surprises and revelations. How to get at the nature or...

video

What is Philosophy of the Breakthrough Process?

Episode 08

Season 21

26:47

Watch


Become a Member

Get free access to exclusive content and more.

  • facebook
  • twitter
  • instagram
  • youtube
  • Find us on PBS
  • Watch on YouTube
  • Contact Us

Policies Terms © Closer To Truth. All rights reserved Website by Visceral