Superposition really is just a mathematical notation to predict how the qubits will behave. It’s arguably nomological not ontological. No one has ever in history measured or detected or observed a qubit to be in this “third state.” It’s always found to just have a bit value of 0 or 1. The mathematical book keeping is just a way to predict that 0 or 1 and doesn’t describe a third state.
It is only a 0 or 1. A qubit has never been observed to be anything else.
No they are binary. Qubits only contain 1 bit of information.
“Consciousness” is kind of a loaded phrase, which includes concepts of the self, self-awareness, intelligence, thought, etc. “Something exists” doesn’t imply a huge loaded phrase like consciousness, even if I were to grant that it implies “something exists.” Which, I’m not even sure if that does, because you still need a lot more structure to explain why “doubt” requires “something that does the doubting.” And, again, even if I grant that for the sake of argument, “something that does the doubting” could easily be another person other than yourself, which would not be an “I”.
That is, again, circular, and it is exactly the syllogism you said it’s not. You are still starting with the premise of “the very act of doubting whether or not ‘I’ exist”. Of course, we both agree that people exist, but that’s not the point, the point of the statement is to show that this belief is specifically a priori, meaning it can be derived without referencing any experiential data, but the syllogism itself is circular and shows nothing, and your reconstruction of it is circular in literally the identical way, as you are beginning with the assumption you are supposed to prove. You stated twice, quite clearly, that your premise in both cases is that the one doing the doubting/denial is “I,” and so you’ve already assumed “I” from the get-go, and so it is circular.
I could easily say, you are not a human but a magical alien. Don’t believe me? Well, the one doing the doubting is a magical alien, so you’ve implicitly conceded my point! It’s blatantly circular. “Doubting,” in terms of pure formal, does not automatically imply an “I” that is doing the doubting. You can justify it physically, by pointing out that doubting is a thing that requires an intelligent mind capable of judging things, but this is a physical argument, which is justified based upon knowledge of how these concepts relate in relation to what we have observed in the real world. The connection between “doubting” and “I” cannot be established a priori, only a posteriori.
Never bought into that statement because it’s obviously circular: “I” exists in both the conclusion and the premise, “I therefore I,” so it’s silly as a supposed proof that the self is a priori.
Genuine question: why should I even believe consciousness exists? This whole endeavor seems pointless without that justification.
Since the 1980s everyone called him crazy because obviously quantum entanglement can’t exist in a brain… We recently found out that’s not difficult, and even superposition is possible.
You speak of entanglement and superposition like two separate things. Every entangled state is a superposition of states.
And “possible” is all that has been put on the table. There’s nothing that shows “actual.”
We know that anesthesia breaks up those microtubules and breaks superposition…
Microtubules are structures that hold cells together, and exist throughout the body, not just the brain. If you broke them up then your brain would fall apart and you’d die.
And we know that anesthesia stops consciousness…
Correlation doesn’t mean causation. Even if you are right that anesthesia “breaks up those microtubules,” it wouldn’t demonstrate any causal role.
But we don’t “know” the actual method of action of anesthesia because it’s not proven.
Yes, it’s not known, but it seems more likely that it is just due to injecting noise into the brain, which would imply that you don’t actually stop experiencing things under anesthesia. The brain doesn’t shut down, in fact, it has heightened activity. There is just so much noise that you cannot think about anything you’re experiencing or form coherent memories of any of it.
But you’re right, no proof, but that definitely seems at least more likely as an explanation to me than some strange connection to microtubules.
People constantly say anesthesia “turns off consciousness” and then focus on it for “consciousness” studies. But there is no evidence of that. If you watch a film, hit your head, and then forget what you watched, does that prove that the film never entered your conscious awareness? No, that’s silly, because that would mean any time you forget something, you retroactively rewrite the past.
All we can say for certain is that people who come out of anesthesia don’t report remembering anything. It is a complete guess to claim that they therefore didn’t actually experience anything at all, and it seems a bit dubious given that brain activity is not only still there but often even increased under anesthesia.
Like, I understand what kind of rigors you’re trying to apply here, but if everyone did what you’re doing wed have to pretend gravity isn’t real too.
You can observe gravity. You cannot observe “consciousness.”
What even is your alternative?
For the reason I said before, I have no good reason to even believe “consciousness” exists.
Interrupting superposition interrupts consciousness
“Interrupting superposition” doesn’t even make sense as a phrase. You’re just stringing words together.
too late i just scanned my whole body into club penguin