VII. Our Earthuman Ascent: A Major Evolutionary Transition in Twindividuality

4. Conscious Integrated Information Knowledge

Feinberg, Todd and Jon Mallatt. The Evolutionary and Genetic Origins of Consciousness in the Cambrian Period Over 500 Million Years Ago. Frontiers in Psychology. 4/667, 2013. Along with Ann Butler, Giuilo Tononi, Christof Koch, others herein, and across brain, behavior, and cognizance sections, a convergence confluence such as this paper are affirming an episodic ramification of “complex, integrated isomorphic representations” associated with neural acumen. Through progressive “sensory imagery” life quickens in cognitive content and resultant self-awareness. As if a single encephalization, brains are composed of a “hierarchical system of isomorphically organized, reciprocally communicating sensory-integration nuclei and centers with conscious images emerging through higher-level processing.” For a similar take, see Brain Rhythms Reveal a Hierarchical Network Organization by Karl Steinke and Roberto Galan in PLoS Computational Biology (7/10, 2011).

Vertebrates evolved in the Cambrian Period before 520 million years ago, but we do not know when or how consciousness arose in the history of the vertebrate brain. Here we propose multiple levels of isomorphic or somatotopic neural representations as an objective marker for sensory consciousness. All extant vertebrates have these, so we deduce that consciousness extends back to the group's origin. The first conscious sense may have been vision. Then vision, coupled with additional sensory systems derived from ectodermal placodes and neural crest, transformed primitive reflexive systems into image forming brains that map and perceive the external world and the body's interior.

This brain must also have (1) hierarchical systems of intercommunicating, isomorphically organized, processing nuclei that extensively integrate the different senses into representations that emerge in upper levels of the neural hierarchy; and (2) a widespread reticular formation that integrates the sensory inputs and contributes to attention, awareness, and neural synchronization. We propose a two-step evolutionary history, in which the optic tectum was the original center of multi-sensory conscious perception (as in fish and amphibians: step 1), followed by a gradual shift of this center to the dorsal pallium or its cerebral cortex (in mammals, reptiles, birds, step 2). (Abstract)

Conclusion This is the first hypothesis that dates the origin of consciousness, explains its neural architecture, explores its genetics, identifies the most basal animal that has it, and accommodates its neurobiology with the “hard problem” of consciousness and subjectivity, all knitted together in one model. We hypothesize that primary or sensory consciousness stems from a confluence of neurological features common to all vertebrates, especially from multiple, reciprocally connected, isomorphic representations at different hierarchical levels within the nervous system. These features co-emerged, probably in a rather short interval of time, between 560 and 520 mya. (19)

Ferrante, Oscar, et al. Adversarial testing of global neuronal workspace and integrated information theories of consciousness.. Nature. April 30, 2025. integrated information theories of consciousness. Nature. April 30, 2025. This section has sought since circa 2010 to report a philosophical, theoretic and empirical endeavors to ground our actual human aware, informed sentience in a conducive reality. By 2025 two main but competitive models have come forth as the excerpt notes to an extent that their proponents describe a thought-off” so to move toward a conscious consilience. Some 41 coauthors including David Chalmers, Melanie Boly, Stanislas Dehaene, Christof Koch and Giulio Tononi herein contribute to this overdue, nonbiased resolve.

Different theories now seek to explain how subjective experience arises from brain activity. Here we present an open science adversarial collaboration which juxtaposes integrated information theory (IIT) and global neuronal workspace theory (GNWT) via a neutral Cogitate Consortium. Human participants viewed suprathreshold stimuli for variable durations while neural activity was measured with MRI imaging, magneto- encephalography and electro- encephalography. We found conscious content in the visual, ventro- temporal and frontal cortex. These results align with some predictions of IIT and GNWT, but also belie key tenets of both theories. In regard we present an alternative approach through principled, collaborative research and the need for a systematic theory evaluation. (Excerpts)

Findlay, Graham, et al. Dissociating Artificial Intelligence from Artificial Consciousness. arXiv:2412.04571. A premier array of neuroscientists at the University of Wisconsin, Brock University, Ontario and Allen Institute, Seattle including Larissa Albantakis, Christof Koch and Giulio Tononi post a most considered surmise to date on this increasingly possible concern. While this edition goes on within a broad context of Integrated Information Theory, it discusses current schools of thought, definitions, how to detect and evaluate, what would a relative stirring mean and imply, and so on. See also Shannon information and integrated information: message and meaning by Alireza Zaeemzadeh and Giulio Tononi at arXiv:2412.10626 and Towards a principled account of temporal experience by Renzo Comolatti, et al at arXiv:2412.13198 for more.

Developments in machine learning and computing power suggest that artificial general intelligence is within reach. This raises the factor of artificial consciousness whose occasion would require of a theoretical basis grounded in phenomenology to support subjective experience. Here we employ Integrated Information Theory (IIT), which provides such a principled approach as to whether a system is conscious. We demonstrate that it is possible for a digital computer to simulate our behavior without replicating our experience. This contrasts sharply with computational functionalism, the thesis that computations of the right kind are necessary and sufficient for consciousness. (Abstract)

On the basis of IIT, we argue that what matters for consciousness, its presence, quality, and quantity, is a system’s intrinsic causal structure—what the system is—rather than its extrinsic functions—what the system does. Because internal organization cannot generally be inferred from overall system dynamics or input–output behavior, functions are not reliable proxies for the properties of consciousness. In short, consciousness is about being, not doing. (10)

Freeman, Walter. Indirect Biological Measures of Consciousness from Field Studies of Brains as Dynamic Systems. Neural Networks. 20/9, 2007. The University of California at Berkeley research neuroscientist has long pioneered novel understandings of neural activity in terms of intrinsic nonlinear networks. By this significant advance, human and universe gain a 21st century spatial and temporal affinity, psychogenesis and cosmogenesis become one and the same. This is a dispensational discovery we have just begun to appreciate. See also his 2007 paper: Scale-free Neocortical Dynamics online at: http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Scale-free_neocortical_dynamics.

Dynamic systems are collections of entities that organize themselves into continually changing groups by exchanging matter and energy. Examples range in scale from molecules of air and water creating hurricanes to citizens creating committees. Dynamic brains likewise range from quantum excitations of receptors to molecules that organize into DNA, proteins, and membranes to people collectively creating tribes and teams. (1021)

Gabora, Liane. Amplifying Phenomenal Information. Journal of Consciousness Studies. 9/8, 2002. Drawing on the work of David Chalmers and others, the proposal is made that consciousness, as a property of the universe, has an informational component. The degree to which an entity is conscious depends on its ability to amplify and enhance this quality. If brains are understood as a self-organized web of autopoietic systems, this emergence is achieved by a process of conceptual closure. What results is an evolution which possesses a central axis and arrow of informed sentience.

The basic idea is that biological and cognitive systems accomplish this (amplification) by trapping information through autocatalytic closure, and maintaining the dynamics at the edge of chaos through simultaneous processes of divergence and convergence. (5)

Gennaro, Rocco, ed. Higher-Order Theories of Consciousness. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2004. Pro and con discussion about the view that a mental state becomes conscious when it is the object of a higher-order representation.

Ginsburg, Simona and Eva Jablonka. The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul: Learning and the Origins of Consciousness. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2019. Veteran scholars (search) Simona G., an Open University of Israel psychologist and Eva J., a Tel Aviv University geneticist and historian of science achieve a lucid exposition of the ascent of sentient knowing from its earliest flicker to our human integrated information. As worked out in prior papers, a continuum can be traced from limited rudiments to an unlimited learning process. EJ and Marion Lamb were the authors of Evolution in Four Dimensions (2005, 2014) whose stages are here joined with the major evolutionary transitions model (Maynard Smith & Szathmary) so as to fill in an oriented, sequential scale. By 2019 life’s long development can be well realized (as we try to report) as a deeply homologous, teleological, quickening by way of an epigenetic knowledge gain in social groupings from minimal microbes to our linguistic florescence. A “rational” soul is seen to rise in tandem, as if (though not formally put) a meaningful holistic complement to an analytic detail mode. Self-organizing, goal-directed systems are thus at work to engender an emergent, autopoietic self-making. Altogether again, a universal gestation which (whom) is trying to come to her/his own senses, witness and discovery becomes evident.

What marked the evolutionary transition from organisms that lacked consciousness to those with minimal subjective experiencing, or, as Aristotle described it, “the sensitive soul”? In this book, Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jablonka propose a new theory that finds learning to be the driving force in the transition to basic consciousness. Using a method that helped identify the transition from non-life to life then allows biological, psychological, and philosophical aspects to be considered. Along with historical, neurobiological, and philosophical foundations, the authors propose an evolutionary marker of basic consciousness as a complex form of associative learning, which is then seen as the driver of the Cambrian explosion and its diversification of organisms. Finally, symbolic language as a similar type is proposed as a marker for the evolutionary transition to human rationality.

I read The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul with an immense interest. It is the best synthesis I know about consciousness. It includes a fascinating history of the concepts and discoveries about consciousness together with an outstanding presentation of the most recent scientific data, theories and philosophical speculations. The evolution of consciousness from the 'Cambrian explosion' up to the Golem predicament is one among the many original aspects of the book. A book that must be read and meditated on. (Jean-Pierre Changeux)

Goerner, Sally and Allan Combs. Consciousness as a Self-Organizing Process. BioSystems. 46/123, 1998. Systems philosophers find an affinity between dynamic streams of awareness and nonlinear dynamics.

From this perspective consciousness is viewed as an ecological system in which streams of cognitive, perceptual and emotional information form a rich complex of interactions, analogous to the interactive metabolism of a living cell. The result is an organic, self-generating or ‘autopoietic’ system continuously in the act of creating itself. (123)

Grindrod, Peter. On Human Consciousness. Network Neuroscience. 2/1, 2018. The Oxford University mathematician is an authoritative contributor to frontier explanations about why and how we individual and collective human beings are graced with a sentient, informed awareness. If such mindful imaginaries are indeed possible, they must somehow be associated with and arise from a similarly endowed cerebral cosmos.

We consider implications of the mathematical modeling and analysis of large modular neuron-to-neuron networks. We explain how the dynamical behavior of relatively small-scale strongly connected networks leads to nonbinary information processing and thus to multiple hypothesis decision-making. In turn we address some aspects of the hard problem of consciousness, We discuss how a proposed “dual hierarchy model,” made up from externally perceived, physical elements of increasing complexity, and internally experienced, mental elements (feelings), may support a learning and evolving consciousness. We argue that, within our model, the mental elements and thus internal modes (feelings) play a role akin to latent variables in processing and decision-making, and thus confer an evolutionary “fast-thinking” advantage. (Abstract excerpt)

Hafemann, Annika, et al. Intrinsic Timescales of Spiking Activity in Humans during Wakefullness and Sleep. arXiv:2205.10308. An eight person team at the MPI Dynamics and Self-Organization, and Universities of Bonn, Georg-August, and Gottingen including Viola Priesemann proceed to accord and bolster this information integrity hypothesis with an array of finely-finessed neurological measurements.

Information processing in the brain requires an integration of information over time. This ability can be achieved if signals are kept for a required period. While short timescales are beneficial for fast responses to stimuli, longer stays aid information storage and integration. We found extended and diverse durations ranging from tens to hundreds of milliseconds. Notably, timescales differed between sleep stages and were longest during slow wave sleep. This supports the view that these moments are a central mechanism that tune networks to the requirements of different tasks and cognitive states (Abstract)

Hameroff, Stuart, et al, eds. Toward a Science of Consciousness. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996. A large book from the first Tuscon, Arizona international conference on the subject as an indication of the growing philosophical and scientific interest in the phenomena of consciousness.

Hameroff, Stuart, et al, eds. Toward a Science of Consciousness II. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1998. A compendium of papers from the second meeting on the many facets of mind science. In general, evolution is perceived most of all as a learning process.

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