Stuart Hameroff's ideas.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/materialism-philosophy

Doesn't this definition of materialism apply to Hameroff's beliefs?

My initial reaction would be to say No, but I will admit Hameroff's way of speaking does make it seem that way.

The fact he suggests Good (and maybe Evil) are found at the Planck Scale, that the Soul needs to be grounded in QM, or that the "Bing" of Consciousness is found in the Objective Collapse, does at least make it seem [that in his worldview] physics has to be included in any explanation.

OTOH I have heard him talk about Consciousness pervading the universe, which seems more Panpsychic. He's also written favorably about Bem's precognition experiments. And he did once talk about being the "skunk" at a predominantly atheist convention so he might be a Theist. His paper with Deepak Chopra argued for the possibility of Personal Survival via a "quantum soul".

So maybe the more accurate criticism is akin to the one I would [level at] Kastrup's Idealism in that while it isn't strictly Materialist it doesn't seem to offer much more than Materialist positions. However Edward Kelly has talked about an argument he had with Kastrup where Kelly felt Kastrup was ignoring all the evidence of Personal Survival in favor of the more "aesthetic" Absolute Idealism.

I've never heard any similar argument against Hameroff, so he may simply be "playing the game" and trying to open the doorway to academic acceptance of Psi and Survival by keeping his writings inline with at least some level of more accepted scientific studies. [It's possible Kastrup is doing the same, but at the very least he seems to reject Personal Survival.]

My initial reaction would be to say No, but I will admit Hameroff's way of speaking does make it seem that way.

The fact he suggests Good (and maybe Evil) are found at the Planck Scale, that the Soul needs to be grounded in QM, or that the "Bing" of Consciousness is found in the Objective Collapse, does at least make it seem [that in his worldview] physics has to be included in any explanation.

OTOH I have heard him talk about Consciousness pervading the universe, which seems more Panpsychic.

When Hameroff says consciousness is pervading the universe doesn't he mean it is pervading the universe because it is created by wave functions collapsing throughout the universe?

I think that is a materialist explanation for panpsychism.

From my point of view that isn't really helpful because to me it looks like an epi-cycle. It just makes it harder to get rid of a wrong paradigm.

That's why I am pointing out why I think he is a materialist or a physicalist. His theories are just epicycles (modifications to physics) not a paradigm shift.

In my view the physical universe is like a simulation running in consciousness. Consciousness is not created by quantum collapse. Consciousness is computing the wave function, the collapse of the wave function, and the physical laws that govern what happens after the result of the collapse.

Hameroff is stuck in the old paradigm trying to explain how the brain produces consciousness, with microtubules and collapsing wave functions, etc.
The brain does not produce consciousness.

Sorry I misread, the article Penrose got a Nobel for something else.

OMG I can't f'n believe they got a noble prize for that!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrat..._reduction

Einstein didn't get the Nobel for relativity because it hadn't been proven, how do they hand out a Nobel for Orch-OR?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrat...#Criticism

Orch OR has been criticized both by physicists[14][53][37][54][55] and neuroscientists[56][57][58] who consider it to be a poor model of brain physiology. Orch OR has also been criticized for lacking explanatory power; the philosopher Patricia Churchland wrote, "Pixie dust in the synapses is about as explanatorily powerful as quantum coherence in the microtubules."[59]

David Chalmers argues against quantum consciousness. He instead discusses how quantum mechanics may relate to dualistic consciousness.[60] Chalmers is skeptical that any new physics can resolve the hard problem of consciousness.[61][62][63] He argues that quantum theories of consciousness suffer from the same weakness as more conventional theories. Just as he argues that there is no particular reason why particular macroscopic physical features in the brain should give rise to consciousness, he also thinks that there is no particular reason why a particular quantum feature, such as the EM field in the brain, should give rise to consciousness either.[63]

Penrose got the Nobel for his physics work, not Orch-OR.

Churchland is a materialist fanatic, a philosopher who was even criticized by the actual (immaterialist) neuroscientist Raymond Tallis. She’s the one who got destroyed in her interview with Alex on Skeptiko, so badly IIRC she “ran away” by hanging up and then claimed she’d been sand-bagged.

I do see [value in] your argument that Orch-OR is an epicycle of sorts, as I also agree that nothing in the movement of physical stuff can produce consciousness. Nevertheless, there does seem to be a relationship between structure and consciousness, specifically the structure of our brains at minimum. 

Given the current prevailing materialist belief is that consciousness will be shown to be produced at the classical level, and this then can be used as an argument against Psi & Survival, I do think that even showing the correlates are “below” the neuronal and go down to the quantum would benefit proponents immensely.

When Hameroff says consciousness is pervading the universe doesn't he mean it is pervading the universe because it is created by wave functions collapsing throughout the universe?

Honestly not sure. I feel like the way he speaks about it gets a bit confusing if not contradictory.

Churchland is a materialist fanatic, a philosopher who was even criticized by the actual (immaterialist) neuroscientist Raymond Tallis. She’s the one who got destroyed in her interview with Alex on Skeptiko, so badly IIRC she “ran away” by hanging up and then claimed she’d been sand-bagged.

Okay, but does that refute her criticism that orch-or lacks explanatory power?

An ad hominem might counter an appeal to authority, but her criticism is very specific and stands on its own regardless of who she is.

Okay, but does that refute her criticism that orch-or lacks explanatory power?

In the sense that she is perfectly willing to accept materialist theories like that of “puppets are conscious” Graziano (her favorite theory last I checked) - Yes IMO it refutes her criticism because her materialist fundamentalism corrupts her judgement as to what “explanatory power” means.

In the sense that Chalmers says, how no physical correlates can ever explain why consciousness exists whether at the classical-neuronal or QM levels - that I think is a valid criticism. Arranging stuff that Physicalists define as lacking consciousness cannot produce consciousness as that’s a Something-from-Nothing logical contradiction.

So why even bother with Orch-OR and other quantum brain theories? The issue, as I see it, is that STEM academia is more amenable to findings that are replicable. While many of us have been convinced that consciousness exists at least after if not before this physical body’s lifetime, Survival research is not replicable in the way a discovery about quantum biology is. So while I do think the ideal road to travel for STEM would be to accept consciousness is irreducible and put more work/funding into Psi & Survival, it seems realistically the road will be through findings in quantum biology.

In the sense that she is perfectly willing to accept materialist theories like that of “puppets are conscious” Graziano (her favorite theory last I checked) - Yes IMO it refutes her criticism because her materialist fundamentalism corrupts her judgement as to what “explanatory power” means.

I'll make the comment myself. Orch-or lacks explanatory power. How does wave function collapse make blue look like blue or happy feel like happy? 

Hammerof is saying orch-or explains consciousness, but it doesn't explain consciousness. At the current time the best explanation for the evidence is that consciousness is fundamental - it can't be explained in terms of anything else. It seems to me that this is objectively true and people who disagree do so because of their personal opinion rather than empirical evidence. They are entitled to have opinions but they ought to be clear about it.

I might take Hammerof more seriously if I understood why he prefers orch-or to idealism. Does he explain it somewhere?

I'll make the comment myself. Orch-or lacks explanatory power. How does wave function collapse make blue look like blue or happy feel like happy? 

Hammerof is saying orch-or explains consciousness, but it doesn't explain consciousness. At the current time the best explanation for the evidence is that consciousness is fundamental - it can't be explained in terms of anything else. It seems to me that this is objectively true and people who disagree do so because of their personal opinion rather than empirical evidence. They are entitled to have opinions but they ought to be clear about it.

I might take Hammerof more seriously if I understood why he prefers orch-or to idealism. Does he explain it somewhere?
[/quote]

You seem to fail to realise that here is a scientist working together with a Nobel laureate on a problem which they thought could be solved by the strange features of QM - superpositions - but now SH at least seems to be thinking outside the box.

Almost all of us have gone through a transition of that sort at some point in our lives (didn't you?), and it takes time!

Quibbling over the fact that RP got his prize for something different, doesn't touch the fact that RP has what it takes to get a Nobel in physics, and he knows that consciousness is a deep mystery.

David

I'll make the comment myself. Orch-or lacks explanatory power. How does wave function collapse make blue look like blue or happy feel like happy? 

I might take Hammerof more seriously if I understood why he prefers orch-or to idealism. Does he explain it somewhere?

He does comment on what makes red. @ 21 minutes.

This is all about what an individual believes about what objects are real and how they work in a model of unfolding events.  Jim, do you think that qubits are real?

You will not "get" Orch-or if you don't see it as critical measurement tool to see how information evolves.
 
25 years ago when discussing Orch-or most responders made fun of qubits as important in reality.  Now we can build and control them, but I think that their role in science research is not understood.

I think Hammerof is on the forefront of thinking about mind works.