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I have watched with amusement over the years as repeated attempts have been made in this talk section to take this theory down, and all have failed. Yes, it is still alive and well :)
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.147.26.215 ( talk) 12:34, 21 August 2022 (UTC)
The basis for this theory has been proven now and it is highly plausible. It was proposed with little science but as the science is done is does hold water. While the entire theory has not been proven, all arguments thought to disprove it have been proven wrong or at-least inconclusive. Not everything Sir Roger Penrose has published has proven true but, I know him personally, and he has never published anything with no scientific validity. [ [1]] Discovery of quantum vibrations in 'microtubules' inside brain neurons supports controversial theory of consciousness.
When Wikipedians declare valid science to be "of no scientific validity" and violently damage the career and malign the reputation a living person it is dangerous and a violation of everything Wikipedia stands for. Journal References:
Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose. Consciousness in the universe: A review of the ‘Orch OR’ theory. Physics of Life Reviews, 2013 DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2013.08.002 Stuart Hameroff, MD, and Roger Penrose. Reply to criticism of the ‘Orch OR qubit’–‘Orchestrated objective reduction’ is scientifically justified. Physics of Life Reviews, 2013 DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2013.11.00 Stuart Hameroff, Roger Penrose. Consciousness in the universe. Physics of Life Reviews, 2013; DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2013.08.002 Scottprovost ( talk) 07:48, 15 July 2015 (UTC)
This article should be little more than a stub. Penrose's ideas on this topic have no scientific validity. Microtubules can't vibrate in the low Reynolds number environment of the cytoplasm! IlliniWikipedian 17:38, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, but the text on such a controversial and, let's be frank, not widely accepted subject needs to be written in a much, much more balanced way. Bardon Dornal 13:12, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
I am totally confused, reading this article, between the parts which mean "the theory says this" and the parts which mean "reputable scientific testing has shown this to be true". I suggest that someone who is familiar with orch or separates the two into different sections of the article. I was debating whether to mark it as unverified, but separation would be better. If nobody here has the knowledge + time to do this, it should be marked. Ricky 14:08, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Actually, it's a little more complicated than that, because the whole matter rests on the question of "do the distance scales involved make quantum issues relevant?". In this case, there are a few unproven assumptions, and definite correspondences that the theory could explain, if true. Much like String theory, Orch-OR allows one to derive the observables in a handy way, but explains by way of structures that are extremely difficult or perhaps impossible to observe. So; there are maybe three categories instead of two. There is "conjecture and unprovable speculation," there is "reasonable development, given the assumptions," and there is "these are the actual observables, and how they correspond with what the theory predicts." I'm trying to make better sense of this topic myself, and I expect I'll do some editing here. I want to clean up the whole quantum mind topic range, to make it more accurately describe what those who come to the topic believe in, while better qualifying what is factual, and stressing what we actually know (or don't know).
I expect that will be a lot of work! JonathanD 02:36, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
The facts in Orch OR are very few, and a lot of biological mismodelling is there - for example the DLB biology, where paper by De Zeew et al., 1995 is quoted as reference but the De Zeew paper says exactly the opposite. More on the Orch OR has been released at PhilSci: Georgiev, Danko (2006) Falsifications of Hameroff-Penrose Orch OR Model of Consciousness and Novel Avenues for Development of Quantum Mind Theory. I hope someone may use the paper uploaded PhilSci and sort out, what is reliable fact in Orch OR, and what is sci fi construction. Danko Georgiev MD 11:00, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
It should be emphasised that the theory proceeds in two stages -- a theory about collapse, and a theory about consciousness. It is possible for the first to succeed while the second fails. The collapse theory and the consciousness theory should perhaps be placed into separate articles. The collapse theory (Objective Reduction) could then be linked into the interpretation of quantum mechanics article which currently does not mention spontaneous collapse models. 1Z 17:50, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
The article states: "20 testable predictions of Orch OR were published in 1998. A number of these have been validated, others are being tested. Orch OR is falsifiable".
I assume this refers to OR as a theory of collpase, which is indeed testable. It is difficult to see how it could be tested as a claim about consciousness 1Z 17:59, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
The article states: "Penrose considered superposition as a separation in underlying reality at its most basic level, the Planck scale. Tying quantum superposition to general relativity, he identified superposition as spacetime curvatures in opposite directions, hence a separation in fundamental spacetime geometry. However, according to Penrose, such separations are unstable and will reduce at an objective threshold, hence avoiding multiple universes."
This passage is riddled with errors. I suggest replacing it with a paragraph taken ftom Penrose's own writings. 1Z 18:01, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
Seconded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.110.127.136 ( talk) 23:53, 7 September 2011 (UTC)
The article states: "Quantum computation had been suggested by Paul Benioff, Richard Feynman and David Deutsch in the 1980s. The idea is that classical information, e.g. bit states of either 1 or 0, could also be quantum superpositions of both 1 and 0 (quantum bits, or qubits). Such qubits interact and compute by nonlocal quantum entanglement, eventually being measured/observed and reducing to definite states as the solution. Quantum computations were shown to have enormous capacity if they could be constructed e.g. using qubits of ion states, electron spin, photon polarization, current in Josephson junction, quantum dots etc. During quantum computation, qubits must be isolated from environmental interaction to avoid loss of superposition, i.e. “decoherence”."
This repeats a common misunderstanding. Quantum computation as proposed by David Deutsch,etc, is not known to transcend what can be done with a Turing machine. It is not hypercomputation. What Penrose has is a proposal that the (currently unknown) mechanism of collapse is hypercomputational. Conventional quantum computation is not hypercomputational and does not exploit collapse, but rather superposition. Every aspect of QM except collapse is known to be Turing-emulable. There is no research programme based on collapse, because no-one knows what collapse is, whether it works, or even whether it exists. 1Z
Doesn't this suggest that the turing model is not even designed to address the issue of consciousness? Turing was after intelligence. Intelligence can clearly be emulated without the emergence of a subjective experience. Watson on Jeopardy spontaneously asking "Why can't I tell the difference between a man and woman in my answers?" would be an expression of consciousness.
It strikes me that consciousness might only be verifiable with the application of intelligence but that intelligence, nor models aimed at expressing it, is not consciousness. It doesnt even seem to be obviously correlated as animals of varying intelligencea are conscious. Which means that turing machines don't get at the heart of the issue. Or as searle would say: rules and lists are never enough. User:arnshea
The article states: "Experiments in the 1970s by Benjamin Libet suggested that conscious experience of sensory inputs requires up to 500 ms of brain activity, but is referred backward in time to the initial input. Quantum mechanics allows backward time effects as long as causal paradox is not possible (killing your grandmother, preventing your birth is one commonly cited example). Backward referral of unconscious quantum information avoids possible causal paradox, and could explain Libet’s results, real time unified sensory experience and conscious control, rescuing consciousness from the unfortunate role of illusory epiphenomenon."
This is a complete misrepresentation of Benjamin Libet's work. He nowhere invokes literal time travel. His "backwards referral" is no more time travel than manipulating the timestamps of files on a computer. 1Z 18:05, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
It should be made clearer that the "problem of consciousness" Penrose (rather than Hameroff) is addressing is not the standard one as understood by philosophers, ie the hard problem. Penrose introduces his own version of the problem of consciousness with the controversial argument that human mathematicians can do things that no computer can. (Argument originated by John Lucas). AFAIK, it was Hameroff who suggested that . "Precursors of conscious experience (proto-conscious qualia) are postulated to exist as fundamental, irreducible components of the universe like mass, spin or charge embedded at the Planck scale since the Big Bang." Despite the phraseology, this is an essentially metaphysical claim, and not an uncommon one. It could be bolted on to any other physical theory. Thus, the Penrose-Hameroff theory does not come to a *physical* resolution of the *standard* problem of consciousness. It has a physical proposal to sole the idiosyncratic Lucas-Penrose problem of super-Turing mathematicians, and a metaphysical solution (not original) to the hard problem of consciousness as widely understood. 1Z 18:15, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
1Z, please respond at the bottom of the thread, it's hard to follow your posts otherwise. Anyway we're all quite aware of the different approaches to the measurement problem, which should have been clear from the following discussion. The issue that we're trying to understand is why he would go on to develop a theory of consciousness based on it, something that is so completely different that there doesn't appear to be any connection. Oh, I'm perfectly aware that they attempted to link the two, but given the fragile basis for the claim it seems odd anyone even bothered. As one reviewer put it, the basic line of reasoning is "quantum is weird, consciousness is weird too, they must be related!". And you definitely seem to re-enforce my opinion that OR should be split out. Maury 22:59, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
It seems a pity that the dispute over the neutrality has not been resolved despite more than a year of discussion recorded above. Reading the article again, the main problem seems to be in the questions section that forms the second half of the paper. This tends to read as if it were dispatching the arguments against quantum consciousness once and for all. In particular the discussion about possible screening of the microtubules needs to make it clear that there is no definite evidence that such screening would prove effective. I think the problem could be resolved by integrating the answers to the questions into the main part of the text, where some of the points are already touched on. I will attempt this soon if no one's going to have a stab at achieving neutrality. This would be an editorial exercise leaving as little as possible of the actual material changed. Persephone19 19:42, 23 August 2007 (UTC) d a
I have as promised in previous postings undertaken a substantial editing of the Orch OR article, with the aim of eventually getting rid of the disputed neutrality tag at the top. At the same time, I have left almost all of the original material. The main change has been to get rid of the 'Questions' section, which has been criticised as propaganda. However, most of the material from this has been integrated into the main part of the article. I have also sprinkled in more neutrality tags in the form of conditional verbs or 'the theory suggests' etc. I have brought in a small amount of new material, mainly a para on research suggesting the need for quantum computing in the brain, reports of some experiments relevant to quantum coherence in the brain and a list of the 20 tests proposed by asically Hameroff, which was already mentioned in the old form of the article. Lastly there are a lot more references. The hope is that we can use the new version of the article and changes to it to move towards a consensus on neutrality. Persephone19 18:02, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
There is dispute on the netrality of this article. However, this article isn't about whether Orch-OR is TRUE, it's just a description of orch-OR as a hypothesis. As such, a verbatim description of the hypothesis is, pretty much by definition, undisputable: whether or not it is TRUE, it IS what it is.
Personally, I would suggets that stating the hypothesis in a one-sided fashion, with just a subsection describing disputation, is a fair representation of teh topic, as long as it is clear in the introduction that it is only a hypothesis. 81.132.76.139 17:57, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
The article has been given a second re-edit primarily aimed at ending the neutrality dispute. After the first re-edit there was only one comment on 4th October which I take as broadly supportive of a neutrality rating. I suggest giving it three weeks, and if there are no comments critical of neutrality by the end of that, the tag should be removed. Persephone19 19:52, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
The version of this article which existed until 4th October could be argued to have overstepped the limits of neutrality, particularly in the question and answer section in the second half of the article, which tended to convey the impression of the theory as fact rather than speculative hypothesis.
The first revision of the article on 4th October mainly edited the question and answer section, attempting to retain relevant material in a form that stressed the element of speculation.
The second revision on 22nd October simplified the article by removing or reducing discussion of some non-core aspects of the theory.
Discussion has been invited so as to achieve consensus. Two postings appear favourable and there have been no negative postings. I accept that a wider discussion would have been desirable in arriving at a consensus. However, it seems desirable to move on given the substantial changes in the article.
If you still feel that the article is not neutral, please make the criticism specific so that the editors can try and rectify any problems. Persephone19 11:03, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
EDIT: Technical tag removed - see below - Guy Macon 23:04, 1 March 2011 (UTC) (Tag was added by) 69.140.152.55 ( talk) 21:46, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
I have had a first shot at a major re-edit, with a view to improving the accessibility for the general reader. Perhaps others would like to improve on this or make suggestions for improvements. Persephone19 ( talk) 14:53, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
How about some external links? e.g., Penrose's replies to various criticisms [2]
A lecture with a general overview Sir Roger Penrose's view on 'Science And The Mind'. [3]
Ufoolme ( talk) 20:31, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Hi all. I have just released in Nature precedings one recent manuscript, which actually destroys the whole Orch OR by pointing to a goof, which presumably is done by Hameroff in 1996 when he and Roger Penrose calculated the first estimates about the number of tubulins involved and Orch OR and respectively the number of "conscious neurons". The estimate by Hameroff of for the number of tubulin dimers per neuron is two orders of magnitude less compared to the calculated by me number of . Hameroff and many other people following Hameroff have cited Yu and Baas (1994) article for the number , however what actually Yu and Baas have measured is the total microtubule length in a single axonal projection being 56 micrometers long. If someone wants to use the figure from my manuscript, please feel free to do so. see Georgiev, Danko. Remarks on the number of tubulin dimers per neuron and implications for Hameroff-Penrose Orch OR. Available from Nature Precedings < http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/npre.2009.3860.1> (2009) Regards, Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 10:43, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
This is actually the correct list of the papers, and so is evident that most of the titles are completely different, and moreover are irrelevant to Orch OR. Also, the fMRI or other methods of brain imaging cited have no effects on consciousness, so these are evidence against Q-mind, not support for it!
I have reworked the first para on Godel's theorem as a paraphrase of Kleene (1967) which is in the linked Wikipedia article.
The point about the philosophers is not that they are notable as philosophers, but that they tend to be extolled and referred to in consciousness studies. Hence, Susan Blackmore says that Churchland answers Penrose 'point by point'. I have, however, rephrased their bit to try and make that more apparent. Feferman is a bit of a problem as far as making the article more neutral is concerned, as he seems to be closer to Penrose than to mainstream consciousness studies. He says on p. 2 of his paper that he is convinced 'of the extreme implausibility of a computational model of the mind', and on p. 11, he describes how mathematicians proceed by insight and inspiration, and says that 'understanding' is 'just this aspect of mathematical thought that machines can never share with us.' He does however think that Penrose takes his argument too far, and he rejects Penrose's platonism. He is not convinced by Hameroff's neuroscience, but admits that he is not an expert on that side of the theory. In suggesting how consciousness might arise, he is well out of the mainstream in including micro-physics in his list of factors. I have tried to convey this as the gist in a bit inserted into the Objections to Orch OR section.
The point of most of the papers listed above is not that they show that brain imaging has or has no effect on consciousness,but that they relate to the possibility or not of sustained quantum coherence in the brain, the core argument relative to the plausibility of the theory. The Kanade and Bialek papers relate to whether classical computing is adequate as a basis for animal/human perception. This article has accumulated over a number of years, and in present day terms the Engel et al paper on quantum coherence in photosynthetic protein, published in Nature in 2007 and a series of papers on related areas also published in the last few years might be more interesting. However, it should be stressed that Engel etc were not researching consciousness, and there has been little apparent discussion of the papers in consciousness studies. I have tried to insert the correct titles for the references mentioned in your posting.
Hopefully, it might be possible to agree on the neutrality of the article as altered. Persephone19 ( talk) 23:46, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Anyway, let me remark on the "other relevant papers". Neither the origami paper, nor any other paper has anything to say about quantum mind. As I said, on the contrary the imaging papers are disproof of the Q-mind, because these coherences do not lead to effect upon consciousness or experience. I have published also various ideas about why Q-mind might be better compared to classical theories, but I would like to make clear the distinction between science and pseudoscience. Particularly Orch OR is the latter category, and I have published a dozen of mistakes in PhilSci article that has been later published in NeuroQuantology. If there are people interested in science they can read and decide for themselves, most of my friends cannot even believe that Hameroff did the mistake to confuse between embryonic hippocampal axon, and adult differentiated neuron. p.s. There is much more that can be said on Orch OR compared to what Hameroff thinks is appearing in literature. Apparently he missed not only my work, but also this paper: McKemmish, L. K., J. R. Reimers, R. H. McKenzie, A. E. Mark, and N. S. Hush (2009), Penrose-Hameroff orchestrated objective-reduction proposal for human consciousness is not biologically feasible, Physical Review E (Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics), 80(2), 021912-021916. Regards, Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 10:58, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Quantum theories of consciousness are rather like the Hydra. Despite stout-hearted efforts to slay the beast, it continues to sprout fresh heads in a frenzied fashion ... It is pretty clear that the Q-beast has now become self-propagating and impervious to common-sense contradiction. So, perhaps it is best just to erect warning signs around its corner of the scientific swamp and leave it be. From: McCrone, J. (2003), Quantum mind, The Lancet Neurology, 2, 450
My point is, normally science evolves by finding and resolving contradictions, Q-mind (and Orch OR) seems at present to avoid found problems by simply ignoring them. Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 11:35, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Surprisingly, the quantum beating lasts for 660 fs. This observation contrasts with the general assumption that the coherences responsible for such oscillations are destroyed very rapidly, and that population relaxation proceeds with complete destruction of coherence (so that the transfer of electronic coherence between excitons during relaxation is usually ignored). From: Engel, G. S., T. R. Calhoun, E. L. Read, T.-K. Ahn, T. Mancal, Y.-C. Cheng, R. E. Blankenship, and G. R. Fleming (2007), Evidence for wavelike energy transfer through quantum coherence in photosynthetic systems, Nature, 446(7137), 782-786.
Compare this result of 0.66 picoseconds with Tegmark's estimate of 0.1 picosecond for Orch OR. These are in the same order of magnitude of 10^-13. Hameroff at many places shows complete lack of understanding of physics, and citing Engel paper is equivalent to cite tegmark's paper as evidence for Orch OR. The logic is: quantum coherence exists and tegmark proves it. The correct question is: yes, quantum coherence exists but for how long? So from 2002 I was thinking that Hameroff might be wrong only in matter concerning physics, but later I have noticed that he cited neuroscience papers without reading them, and making amazing errors. The examples are the Yu and Baas 1994 article, misquoted dozens of times, as well as De Zeeuw, C. I., E. L. Hertzberg, and E. Mugnaini (1995), The dendritic lamellar body: a new neuronal organelle putatively associated with dendrodendritic gap junctions, J. Neurosci., Feb 1995; 15: 1587-1604. Reading only the title you will be misled like Hameroff that DLB has something to do with dendro-dendritic gap junctions. But reading the paper and the caption of Figure 14 says it all: "The bulbous appendage with the DLB does not contain a gap junction while the dendritic spine originating from that dendrite does. Note also that the appendage with the DLB does not contain any microtubules or neurofilaments, whereas the dendrite that gives rise to this appendage does contain these neuronal elements." From: De Zeeuw et al., 1995. These are far from trivial biological mistakes - they are gross forgery. Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 01:34, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Dear Persephone, please take a few minutes to study how to properly edit citations in Wikipedia. I think the good and professional outlook of the artile depends on its formating and it reveals the competence of the editor also. If you cannot provide even a correct citation to necessary reference it usually reveals that you have no idea about the reference itself, but you have just copy-pasted from somewhere else. No offenses here, I try to help, and if you think my post is irrelevant, just ignore it!!! Anyway, the citations and reference section is NOT locked. Each citation appears as a code in its relevant section. To identify where is the first appearance of a citation you can click on the small blue arrow (triangle) in the Reference section (when the page is viewed from the browser). THEN YOU CLICK > EDIT THE SECTION. THEN SEE THE SOURCE CODE. The source code of a reference it looks like this (check also Wikipedia:Citation templates)
<ref name="xxx">
{{cite journal
| author =
| title =
| journal =
| volume =
| issue =
| pages =
| year =
| url =
| doi =
}}</ref>
When you cite the same citation for second time in the text you usually do not have to write it again, but use only the ref name
<ref name="xxx"></ref>
In my examples you substitute xxx in "xxx" with the name of reference e.g. authoryear. That is all you have to know, the References are then generated by the code and you cannot edit the References section. To change a reference you should edit the reference template itself at the place where it appears for first place. Also do not damage the template outlook. In the source code it is easy to find a template if it is structured on several lines, as shown here. If you do it on a single line, you just mess up the template and it is not easily recognizable by human editor where is the year, where is the title etc. Also the source code is not what one sees in the browser - so you should not have to make the source code look nice. It must be easily editable, that is why I advice you not to collapse the template into single line, but it keep it as it is. Please copy paste the empty template and then paste the relevant fields for each reference after the = signs. Regards, p.s. I had to turn off the Wiki code conversion with nowiki tags that is why I had so many revisions of my post Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 15:35, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
"These pockets contain atoms with electrons called π electrons, which are electrons in the reactive outer shell of the atom that are not bonded to other atoms" is wrong! Particularly pi electrons are bonded to other atoms, because they participate in pi-bonds. As in my previous edits, I will provide wiki-link to pi electrons, and delete popular and misleading explanation, which is chemically wrong. By the way, I checked Hameroff's chapter "That is life!" and i could not find claim that these are not bonded. The description of Van der Waals forces is something different and explains how one can induce dipole. Also the taxol-binding hydrophobic pockets were actually 8 nm away, and the tryptophans that are separated 2 nm away do not form pockets, just represent nonpolar region within the tubulin. These are not small details, especially for someone who cares about chemistry. Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 00:21, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Hameroff has answered some of the more recent criticism about Orch-or reported in the article: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXFFbxoHp3s (from 13:40)— Preceding unsigned comment added by Ngherappa ( talk • contribs) 18:11, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
Reference: Hameroff, S.R. (1998). "Quantum Computation In Brain Microtubules? The Penrose-Hameroff "Orch OR" model of consciousness". Philosophical Transactions Royal Society London (A) 356: 1869–1896.
Appendix 2. Testable predictions of the Orch OR model
[Comment, D. G., again - the "strong condensate" prediction! Reimers et al. did with one bullet two birds - no.4 and no.9]
Persephone and Danko: Thanks for your relentless work from an appreciative (and highly entertained!) reader. Gwideman ( talk) 12:51, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
WingGundam, this issue is more complicated than you think, and neither of us have any final say in it. That said, I think you're misrepresenting the state of affairs right now because of your own views on the subject.
For one, the Gödel-Turing argument has some things going for it. Gödel himself gave a version of it in the Gibbs Lecture, prior to John Lucas, and the argument has been retooled by Selmer Bringsjord and others over the issue of hypercomputation (though Bringsjord's refutation of Penrose's argument is a rather hand-wavy rebuttal to both the Halting Problem and Gödel's Theorems themselves...): http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.91.5786&rep=rep1&type=pdf.
Penrose has addressed many of the criticisms in the essays "Beyond the Doubting of a Shadow" and "What Gaps? Reply to Grush and Churchland". This is significant because the criticisms of the arguments (Whiteley sentence, unsound system, unknowably huge algorithm for humans) have been amply addressed (in Penrose's writings and those of others: http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3751287?uid=3739728&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21102539778617, http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3751512?uid=3739728&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21102539778617) and mostly ignored.
I've received note that Hameroff has admitted his errors, but it must be said that the model was open-ended and prone to more discoveries being made as time went on. And the Journal of Cosmology was not his response to Reimers and McKemmish. The actual response was presented at the TSC 2010 convention: http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/PNAS.htm.
Your citation of Georgiev is rather misleading, since it seems he has his own version of OR as the basis of consciousness in the brain: http://cogprints.org/4463/2/tucson_2003.pdf. On the Quantum Mind talk page, you can find his critique of Hameroff's proposal as well as his critique of Tegmark!
Here's a good summary of the state of the hypothesis, complete with citations of articles that back up the idea: http://www.quantumbionet.org/admin/files/Massimo%20Pregnolato%20-%20Rita%20Pizzi%202011.pdf.
Either give the groups involved a fair shake or delete the article altogether. 24.192.195.236 ( talk) 17:35, 9 August 2013 (UTC)
Even though some have small requests such as making the Orch-OR article sound more positive, I believe the Orch-OR article misses important content on the so called Orch-OR "updates" done in the past couple of years. I personally would be happy to see a special section on the Hameroff-Chopra collaboration, on the quantum soul diffusing out in the Universe through entanglements after the death, and other such revolutionary insights some of which were reported in Morgan Freeman's Through the Wormhole. Danko Georgiev ( talk) 13:06, 13 August 2013 (UTC)
A note that the section concerning this theory in the Quantum_mind page is marked as slightly troubled reference-wise, and that that section might be going into too much detail considering this page exists for those that want details. Also see that page/section for a link to news about a renewed initiative in 2013/2014 by the theory's authors. ( 140.232.0.70 ( talk) 19:06, 17 January 2014 (UTC))
Well, Hameroff&Penrose have been at it again recently and published a review of their theory including rebuttals by their critics: Discovery of Quantum Vibrations in 'Microtubules' Inside Brain Neurons Supports Controversial Theory of Consciousness How much of this news has already been integrated into the article? I am especially interested in these "20 predictions". As written in the wikipedia article here, most of these predictions have already been refuted. However, according to the news article it is claimed that none of the 20 predictions have been refuted, and that, in fact, several of them have been confirmed. I haven't been looking at the bottom of this, but perhaps it would be interesting to list each prediction in table form including the alleged confirmation and refutation. How about that? Fedor ( talk) 13:08, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Of course it is related to the university and residency of Hamerrof, Arizona, but nevertheless, Mr Mani Bhaumik, a UCLA physicist, would certainly have other bushiness to attend to than to award prizes to Englishmen with brain-dead theories.
Claim | Refutation | Alleged confirmation |
---|---|---|
Neuronal microtubules are directly necessary for consciousness | ||
1. Synaptic sensitivity and plasticity correlate with cytoskeletal architecture/activities in both presynaptic and postsynaptic neuronal cytoplasm. | Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Fusce quis malesuada massa, id scelerisque magna. Pellentesque elementum sodales tortor. [1] | Nulla sed lorem sit amet metus lobortis tristique sed in quam. Ut pretium neque eu turpis tempus, sed porttitor odio bibendum. Phasellus auctor sollicitudin faucibus. [2] |
2. Actions of psychoactive drugs including antidepressants involve neuronal microtubules. | ||
3. Neuronal microtubulestabilizing/protecting drugs may prove useful in Alzheimer's disease, ischemia, and other conditions. | ||
Microtubules communicate by cooperative dynamics of tubulin subunits | ||
4. Laser spectroscopy (e.g. Vos et al, 1993) will demonstrate coherent gigaHz Frhlich excitations in microtubules. | ||
5. Dynamic vibrational states in microtubule networks correlate with cellular activity. | ||
6. Stable patterns of microtubulecytoskeletal networks (including neurofilaments) and intramicrotubule diversity of tubulin states correlate with memory and neural behavior. | ||
7. Cortical dendrites contain largely "Alattice" microtubules (compared to "Blattice" microtubule, Alattice microtubules are preferable for information processingTuszynski et al., 1995) | ||
Quantum coherence occurs in microtubules | ||
8. Studies similar to the famous "Aspect experiment" in physics (which verified nonlocal quantum correlationsAspect et al., 1982) will demonstrate quantum correlations between spatially separated microtubule subunit states a) on the same microtubule, b) on different microtubules in the same neuron, c) on microtubules in different neurons connected by gap junctions. | ||
9. Experiments with SQUIDs (Superconducting Quantum Interference Device) such as those suggested by Leggett (1984) will detect phases of quantum coherence in microtubules. | ||
10. Coherent photons will be detected from microtubules. | ||
Microtubule quantum coherence requires isolation by cycles of surrounding actingelation | ||
11. Neuronal microtubules in cortical dendrites and other brain areas are intermittently surrounded by tightly cross-linked actin gels. | ||
12. Cycles of gelation and dissolution in neuronal cytoplasm occur concomitantly with membrane electrical activity (e.g. synchronized 40 Hz activities in dendrites). | ||
13. The solgel cycles surrounding microtubules are regulated by calcium ions released and reabsorbed by calmodulin associated with microtubules. | ||
Macroscopic quantum coherence occurs among MT in hundreds/thousands of distributed neurons and glia linked by gap junctions | ||
14. Electrotonic gap junctions link synchronously firing networks of cortical neurons, and thalamocortical networks | ||
15. Quantum tunneling occurs across gap junctions. | ||
16. Quantum correlation occurs between microtubule subunit states in different neurons connected by gap junctions (the microtubule "Aspect experiment" in different neurons) | ||
The amount of neural tissue involved in a conscious event is inversely proportional to the event time by E=hbar/T | ||
17. The amount of neural mass involved in a particular cognitive task or conscious event (as measurable by nearfuture advances in brain imaging techniques) is inversely proportional to the preconscious time (e.g. visual perception, reaction times). | ||
An isolated, unperturbed quantum system selfcollapses according to E=hbar/T | ||
18. Isolated technological quantum superpositions will selfcollapse according to E=/T. (Preliminary discussions of such experiments involving superposition of crystals have begun between Roger Penrose and Anton Zeilinger.) | ||
Microtubulebased cilia/centriole structures are quantum optical devices | ||
19. Microtubulebased cilia in rods and cones directly detect visual photons and connect with retinal glial cell microtubule via gap junctions. |
Dear User:109.153.177.43, you recently tagged this article for Cleanup-tagging due to: highly biased, not up-to-date on valid rebuttals from theorists". Would you mind listing the references missing from the rebuttals? Sperxios ( talk) 21:08, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Also dear User:86.155.32.46, see the same sentence for your tagging on 1st Feb 2015 edit (oldid=645146501).
Please, refrain from applying invasive edits when not logged-in. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.191.4.14 ( talk) 17:05, 26 March 2015 (UTC)
Hello, across the internet many people seem very opposed to this topic. I have only read Emperor's New Mind and seen a documentary about the same book by Penrose. However from what I know, Penrose puts forth so many arguments that I am not sure exactly which one/ones people disagree with. From what I understand, Penrose's main point can be surmised this way. Let A be a turing machine, for every decision a person makes throughout their life machine A enumerates said decision and prints it as the decimal expansion of a real number. Penrose argues that no such machine can exist or else we could use it to solve Turing's famous halting problem. Also, according to Penrose, This speaks nothing of approximating the behavior of a human arbitrarily close, only of predicting with certainty the way any specific human will behave arbitrarily far into the future. Because of this, Penrose claims that this implies that some of human thinking must inherently be non-algorithmic. The arguments that Penrose stitches together, to my knowledge, no one would dispute on their own, eg. Turing's proof that the halting problem is unsolvable in the general case, or Cantor's proof that more numbers exist between zero and one than integers. Is it controversial in that these arguments cannot be applied the way that Penrose applies them? It seems to me that most rebuttal's are against his theories of quantum gravity. Quantum Gravity however is a field difficult to be taken seriously in anyway, since, to my knowledge, most physicists believe that nothing can be known at that scale. Most theories I've encountered about quantum gravity make little sense to begin with, so I guess Penrose isn't any different that way. I just wonder if anybody has addressed the other points?? 2602:304:5964:8F39:18E:C2D3:46AF:FE57 ( talk) 20:07, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
I am sure that the editor who inserted the following text had good intentions, but as I will explain it is completely wrong, so it would be best if editors without degree in molecular biology restrain themselves from editing topics that they do not understand. The text is: "However, the recent research by Anirban Bandyopadhyay showed that microtubules can change their structure from B-lattice to A-lattice as part of the processing of information, and tubulin in microtubules exists in multiple states" So let me explain what is wrong: experiments IN VITRO have clearly shown that B-lattice microtubules can exist, and that microtubles can flip from one lattice to another. Also numerous in vitro studies have shown that microtubules with 12, 14, 15 etc protofilaments (PFs) can form (all in vivo microtubules have 13). Hameroff and Tuszynski were aware of all that published literature and made a guess that what happens in vitro, should happen in vivo as well. It is very difficult to design an experiment to check the status of microtubules IN VIVO, but Kikkawa and colleagues were able to do exactly that - they performed Quick-Freeze Deep-Etching technique, which allowed to check what the structure of microtubules in the brain looks like. If the microtubules were undergoing transitions from A- to B-lattice in vivo, it would be expected that at any given moment in time, there will be some percentage of A-lattice microtubules and some percentage of B-lattice microtubules. After the freezing, the microtubules cannot undergo further transitions, and the ratio of A- to B-lattice microtubules could be determined. What Kikkawa found is that 100% of IN VIVO microtubles have B-lattice. Citing more and more in vitro experiments, done by Anirban Bandyopadhyay or others, is IRRELEVANT. Orch OR prediction has been found to be false in 1994 and the result has been published in one of the premier journals on molecular and cell biology, namely the Journal of Cell Biology. If Hameroff was actually more carefully reading what others published, he would not have done his wrong prediction four years later in 1998! Danko Georgiev ( talk) 21:15, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
It seems that quote is still in the article three years after your objection... 137.101.94.106 ( talk) 00:06, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Forgive me, but the text isn't clear how this is suppose to work. Non-computable algorithm? What is that? Microtubules and connective proteins influence or orchestrate the state reduction of the qubits by modifying the spacetime-separation of their superimposed states. Is there a step by step description of what Penrose is talking about? I know a little of quantum physics and quite a bit of inorganic + organic chemistry. For now, the article looks like a lot of quantum jargon. Vmelkon ( talk) 20:56, 14 January 2015 (UTC)
Another critic, Charles Seife, has said, "Penrose, the Oxford mathematician famous for his work on tiling the plane with various shapes, is one of a handful of scientists who believe that the ephemeral nature of consciousness suggests a quantum process."
I'm not sure what this quote brings at all, so I removed it altogether. What it can bring to the article completely eludes me. If someone finds it insightful, feel free to put it back. 217.13.235.58 ( talk) 12:55, 12 June 2015 (UTC)
[ [7]] Quantum Cognition: The possibility of processing with nuclear spins in the brain 1Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106
Matthew P. A. Fisher
(Dated: September 1, 2015)
The possibility that quantum processing with nuclear spins might be operative in the brain is explored. Phos- phorus is identified as the unique biological element with a nuclear spin that can serve as a qubit for such
putative quantum processing - a neural qubit - while the phosphate ion is the only possible qubit-transporter.
We identify the “Posner molecule”, Ca9(PO4)6, as the unique molecule that can protect the neural qubits on very
long times and thereby serve as a (working) quantum-memory. A central requirement for quantum-processing
is quantum entanglement. It is argued that the enzyme catalyzed chemical reaction which breaks a pyrophos- phate ion into two phosphate ions can quantum entangle pairs of qubits. Posner molecules, formed by binding
such phosphate pairs with extracellular calcium ions, will inherit the nuclear spin entanglement. A mechanism
for transporting Posner molecules into presynaptic neurons during vesicle endocytosis is proposed. Quantum
measurements can occur when a pair of Posner molecules chemically bind and subsequently melt, releasing a
shower of intra-cellular calcium ions that can trigger further neurotransmitter release and enhance the probability
of post-synaptic neuron firing. Multiple entangled Posner molecules, triggering non-local quantum correlations
of neuron firing rates, would provide the key mechanism for neural quantum processing. Implications, both in
vitro and in vivo, are briefly mentioned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.47.37.101 ( talk) 20:01, 10 September 2015 (UTC)
In 2014 and 2015, very important developments of the theory took place and many aspects of it were proven by experiments. The article stops only in 2013 and criticisms dating back to that year. In the meantime, I find it necessary to inform the reader with a warning, and then, update the page. Even the pages dedicated only to the 2 scientists speak, in a very vague way, of the research that took place in 2014 and 2015. In detail I saw that the Evidences section talks about it, albeit in a vague way. But the criticism section has remained dated and does not incorporate this new data. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.163.248.1 ( talk) 17:06, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi, have to be careful but I think there's evidence for semi classical interaction in graphics cards. My research clearly shows that certain components are able to show inter-processor electron leakage under specific conditions, though not normally used in this way people who overclock cards often get strange effects. As this (used to be) TS SCI I only mention it as better technologies already exist. It was discovered independently here 88.81.156.140 ( talk) 07:52, 26 March 2021 (UTC) and as yet hasn't been replicated. The really strange thing is that it only happens on old cards that have seen some use, under specific conditions that I discovered its possible to make one use a machine version of intuition to "guess" a normally impossible AES key that would require an absurd amount of processor time if certain aspects like the file content and offset are known.
Thanks for the additions here. I found a second citation which I've added even though it's not great - there is no paywall. There is also a paper in 'Nature' https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-10068-4 maybe primary source. Appears to be a different experiment further substantiating the hypothesis. Thelisteninghand ( talk) 17:23, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
The Criticism section is unusual for Wiki, in that it seems to be constructed not to add to the topic but to try to tear it down without exposing the authors to counter-argument. This is particularly obvious in the 'Neuroscience' section, which seems to be authored purely to attack Penrose et al without allowing counterpoints, e.g. it claims there are no gap junctions in microglia etc but it is not up to date and offers none of the large number of references to the opposite - i.e. pushing an argument without allowing dissent. Not very Wiki? 60.226.145.226 ( talk) 03:12, 22 May 2023 (UTC)
I think there should be a section with studies that confirm that microtubules can deliver quantum processes. As this is one of the most disputed topics ( is it possible for Quantum processes to happen in warm & wet environment of microtubules. https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jpcb.3c07936 176.0.203.52 ( talk) 06:59, 13 May 2024 (UTC)
![]() | This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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![]() | Arbitration Ruling on the Treatment of Pseudoscience In December of 2006 the Arbitration Committee ruled on guidelines for the presentation of topics as pseudoscience in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience. The final decision was as follows:
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I have watched with amusement over the years as repeated attempts have been made in this talk section to take this theory down, and all have failed. Yes, it is still alive and well :)
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.147.26.215 ( talk) 12:34, 21 August 2022 (UTC)
The basis for this theory has been proven now and it is highly plausible. It was proposed with little science but as the science is done is does hold water. While the entire theory has not been proven, all arguments thought to disprove it have been proven wrong or at-least inconclusive. Not everything Sir Roger Penrose has published has proven true but, I know him personally, and he has never published anything with no scientific validity. [ [1]] Discovery of quantum vibrations in 'microtubules' inside brain neurons supports controversial theory of consciousness.
When Wikipedians declare valid science to be "of no scientific validity" and violently damage the career and malign the reputation a living person it is dangerous and a violation of everything Wikipedia stands for. Journal References:
Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose. Consciousness in the universe: A review of the ‘Orch OR’ theory. Physics of Life Reviews, 2013 DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2013.08.002 Stuart Hameroff, MD, and Roger Penrose. Reply to criticism of the ‘Orch OR qubit’–‘Orchestrated objective reduction’ is scientifically justified. Physics of Life Reviews, 2013 DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2013.11.00 Stuart Hameroff, Roger Penrose. Consciousness in the universe. Physics of Life Reviews, 2013; DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2013.08.002 Scottprovost ( talk) 07:48, 15 July 2015 (UTC)
This article should be little more than a stub. Penrose's ideas on this topic have no scientific validity. Microtubules can't vibrate in the low Reynolds number environment of the cytoplasm! IlliniWikipedian 17:38, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, but the text on such a controversial and, let's be frank, not widely accepted subject needs to be written in a much, much more balanced way. Bardon Dornal 13:12, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
I am totally confused, reading this article, between the parts which mean "the theory says this" and the parts which mean "reputable scientific testing has shown this to be true". I suggest that someone who is familiar with orch or separates the two into different sections of the article. I was debating whether to mark it as unverified, but separation would be better. If nobody here has the knowledge + time to do this, it should be marked. Ricky 14:08, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Actually, it's a little more complicated than that, because the whole matter rests on the question of "do the distance scales involved make quantum issues relevant?". In this case, there are a few unproven assumptions, and definite correspondences that the theory could explain, if true. Much like String theory, Orch-OR allows one to derive the observables in a handy way, but explains by way of structures that are extremely difficult or perhaps impossible to observe. So; there are maybe three categories instead of two. There is "conjecture and unprovable speculation," there is "reasonable development, given the assumptions," and there is "these are the actual observables, and how they correspond with what the theory predicts." I'm trying to make better sense of this topic myself, and I expect I'll do some editing here. I want to clean up the whole quantum mind topic range, to make it more accurately describe what those who come to the topic believe in, while better qualifying what is factual, and stressing what we actually know (or don't know).
I expect that will be a lot of work! JonathanD 02:36, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
The facts in Orch OR are very few, and a lot of biological mismodelling is there - for example the DLB biology, where paper by De Zeew et al., 1995 is quoted as reference but the De Zeew paper says exactly the opposite. More on the Orch OR has been released at PhilSci: Georgiev, Danko (2006) Falsifications of Hameroff-Penrose Orch OR Model of Consciousness and Novel Avenues for Development of Quantum Mind Theory. I hope someone may use the paper uploaded PhilSci and sort out, what is reliable fact in Orch OR, and what is sci fi construction. Danko Georgiev MD 11:00, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
It should be emphasised that the theory proceeds in two stages -- a theory about collapse, and a theory about consciousness. It is possible for the first to succeed while the second fails. The collapse theory and the consciousness theory should perhaps be placed into separate articles. The collapse theory (Objective Reduction) could then be linked into the interpretation of quantum mechanics article which currently does not mention spontaneous collapse models. 1Z 17:50, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
The article states: "20 testable predictions of Orch OR were published in 1998. A number of these have been validated, others are being tested. Orch OR is falsifiable".
I assume this refers to OR as a theory of collpase, which is indeed testable. It is difficult to see how it could be tested as a claim about consciousness 1Z 17:59, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
The article states: "Penrose considered superposition as a separation in underlying reality at its most basic level, the Planck scale. Tying quantum superposition to general relativity, he identified superposition as spacetime curvatures in opposite directions, hence a separation in fundamental spacetime geometry. However, according to Penrose, such separations are unstable and will reduce at an objective threshold, hence avoiding multiple universes."
This passage is riddled with errors. I suggest replacing it with a paragraph taken ftom Penrose's own writings. 1Z 18:01, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
Seconded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.110.127.136 ( talk) 23:53, 7 September 2011 (UTC)
The article states: "Quantum computation had been suggested by Paul Benioff, Richard Feynman and David Deutsch in the 1980s. The idea is that classical information, e.g. bit states of either 1 or 0, could also be quantum superpositions of both 1 and 0 (quantum bits, or qubits). Such qubits interact and compute by nonlocal quantum entanglement, eventually being measured/observed and reducing to definite states as the solution. Quantum computations were shown to have enormous capacity if they could be constructed e.g. using qubits of ion states, electron spin, photon polarization, current in Josephson junction, quantum dots etc. During quantum computation, qubits must be isolated from environmental interaction to avoid loss of superposition, i.e. “decoherence”."
This repeats a common misunderstanding. Quantum computation as proposed by David Deutsch,etc, is not known to transcend what can be done with a Turing machine. It is not hypercomputation. What Penrose has is a proposal that the (currently unknown) mechanism of collapse is hypercomputational. Conventional quantum computation is not hypercomputational and does not exploit collapse, but rather superposition. Every aspect of QM except collapse is known to be Turing-emulable. There is no research programme based on collapse, because no-one knows what collapse is, whether it works, or even whether it exists. 1Z
Doesn't this suggest that the turing model is not even designed to address the issue of consciousness? Turing was after intelligence. Intelligence can clearly be emulated without the emergence of a subjective experience. Watson on Jeopardy spontaneously asking "Why can't I tell the difference between a man and woman in my answers?" would be an expression of consciousness.
It strikes me that consciousness might only be verifiable with the application of intelligence but that intelligence, nor models aimed at expressing it, is not consciousness. It doesnt even seem to be obviously correlated as animals of varying intelligencea are conscious. Which means that turing machines don't get at the heart of the issue. Or as searle would say: rules and lists are never enough. User:arnshea
The article states: "Experiments in the 1970s by Benjamin Libet suggested that conscious experience of sensory inputs requires up to 500 ms of brain activity, but is referred backward in time to the initial input. Quantum mechanics allows backward time effects as long as causal paradox is not possible (killing your grandmother, preventing your birth is one commonly cited example). Backward referral of unconscious quantum information avoids possible causal paradox, and could explain Libet’s results, real time unified sensory experience and conscious control, rescuing consciousness from the unfortunate role of illusory epiphenomenon."
This is a complete misrepresentation of Benjamin Libet's work. He nowhere invokes literal time travel. His "backwards referral" is no more time travel than manipulating the timestamps of files on a computer. 1Z 18:05, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
It should be made clearer that the "problem of consciousness" Penrose (rather than Hameroff) is addressing is not the standard one as understood by philosophers, ie the hard problem. Penrose introduces his own version of the problem of consciousness with the controversial argument that human mathematicians can do things that no computer can. (Argument originated by John Lucas). AFAIK, it was Hameroff who suggested that . "Precursors of conscious experience (proto-conscious qualia) are postulated to exist as fundamental, irreducible components of the universe like mass, spin or charge embedded at the Planck scale since the Big Bang." Despite the phraseology, this is an essentially metaphysical claim, and not an uncommon one. It could be bolted on to any other physical theory. Thus, the Penrose-Hameroff theory does not come to a *physical* resolution of the *standard* problem of consciousness. It has a physical proposal to sole the idiosyncratic Lucas-Penrose problem of super-Turing mathematicians, and a metaphysical solution (not original) to the hard problem of consciousness as widely understood. 1Z 18:15, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
1Z, please respond at the bottom of the thread, it's hard to follow your posts otherwise. Anyway we're all quite aware of the different approaches to the measurement problem, which should have been clear from the following discussion. The issue that we're trying to understand is why he would go on to develop a theory of consciousness based on it, something that is so completely different that there doesn't appear to be any connection. Oh, I'm perfectly aware that they attempted to link the two, but given the fragile basis for the claim it seems odd anyone even bothered. As one reviewer put it, the basic line of reasoning is "quantum is weird, consciousness is weird too, they must be related!". And you definitely seem to re-enforce my opinion that OR should be split out. Maury 22:59, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
It seems a pity that the dispute over the neutrality has not been resolved despite more than a year of discussion recorded above. Reading the article again, the main problem seems to be in the questions section that forms the second half of the paper. This tends to read as if it were dispatching the arguments against quantum consciousness once and for all. In particular the discussion about possible screening of the microtubules needs to make it clear that there is no definite evidence that such screening would prove effective. I think the problem could be resolved by integrating the answers to the questions into the main part of the text, where some of the points are already touched on. I will attempt this soon if no one's going to have a stab at achieving neutrality. This would be an editorial exercise leaving as little as possible of the actual material changed. Persephone19 19:42, 23 August 2007 (UTC) d a
I have as promised in previous postings undertaken a substantial editing of the Orch OR article, with the aim of eventually getting rid of the disputed neutrality tag at the top. At the same time, I have left almost all of the original material. The main change has been to get rid of the 'Questions' section, which has been criticised as propaganda. However, most of the material from this has been integrated into the main part of the article. I have also sprinkled in more neutrality tags in the form of conditional verbs or 'the theory suggests' etc. I have brought in a small amount of new material, mainly a para on research suggesting the need for quantum computing in the brain, reports of some experiments relevant to quantum coherence in the brain and a list of the 20 tests proposed by asically Hameroff, which was already mentioned in the old form of the article. Lastly there are a lot more references. The hope is that we can use the new version of the article and changes to it to move towards a consensus on neutrality. Persephone19 18:02, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
There is dispute on the netrality of this article. However, this article isn't about whether Orch-OR is TRUE, it's just a description of orch-OR as a hypothesis. As such, a verbatim description of the hypothesis is, pretty much by definition, undisputable: whether or not it is TRUE, it IS what it is.
Personally, I would suggets that stating the hypothesis in a one-sided fashion, with just a subsection describing disputation, is a fair representation of teh topic, as long as it is clear in the introduction that it is only a hypothesis. 81.132.76.139 17:57, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
The article has been given a second re-edit primarily aimed at ending the neutrality dispute. After the first re-edit there was only one comment on 4th October which I take as broadly supportive of a neutrality rating. I suggest giving it three weeks, and if there are no comments critical of neutrality by the end of that, the tag should be removed. Persephone19 19:52, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
The version of this article which existed until 4th October could be argued to have overstepped the limits of neutrality, particularly in the question and answer section in the second half of the article, which tended to convey the impression of the theory as fact rather than speculative hypothesis.
The first revision of the article on 4th October mainly edited the question and answer section, attempting to retain relevant material in a form that stressed the element of speculation.
The second revision on 22nd October simplified the article by removing or reducing discussion of some non-core aspects of the theory.
Discussion has been invited so as to achieve consensus. Two postings appear favourable and there have been no negative postings. I accept that a wider discussion would have been desirable in arriving at a consensus. However, it seems desirable to move on given the substantial changes in the article.
If you still feel that the article is not neutral, please make the criticism specific so that the editors can try and rectify any problems. Persephone19 11:03, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
EDIT: Technical tag removed - see below - Guy Macon 23:04, 1 March 2011 (UTC) (Tag was added by) 69.140.152.55 ( talk) 21:46, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
I have had a first shot at a major re-edit, with a view to improving the accessibility for the general reader. Perhaps others would like to improve on this or make suggestions for improvements. Persephone19 ( talk) 14:53, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
How about some external links? e.g., Penrose's replies to various criticisms [2]
A lecture with a general overview Sir Roger Penrose's view on 'Science And The Mind'. [3]
Ufoolme ( talk) 20:31, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Hi all. I have just released in Nature precedings one recent manuscript, which actually destroys the whole Orch OR by pointing to a goof, which presumably is done by Hameroff in 1996 when he and Roger Penrose calculated the first estimates about the number of tubulins involved and Orch OR and respectively the number of "conscious neurons". The estimate by Hameroff of for the number of tubulin dimers per neuron is two orders of magnitude less compared to the calculated by me number of . Hameroff and many other people following Hameroff have cited Yu and Baas (1994) article for the number , however what actually Yu and Baas have measured is the total microtubule length in a single axonal projection being 56 micrometers long. If someone wants to use the figure from my manuscript, please feel free to do so. see Georgiev, Danko. Remarks on the number of tubulin dimers per neuron and implications for Hameroff-Penrose Orch OR. Available from Nature Precedings < http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/npre.2009.3860.1> (2009) Regards, Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 10:43, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
This is actually the correct list of the papers, and so is evident that most of the titles are completely different, and moreover are irrelevant to Orch OR. Also, the fMRI or other methods of brain imaging cited have no effects on consciousness, so these are evidence against Q-mind, not support for it!
I have reworked the first para on Godel's theorem as a paraphrase of Kleene (1967) which is in the linked Wikipedia article.
The point about the philosophers is not that they are notable as philosophers, but that they tend to be extolled and referred to in consciousness studies. Hence, Susan Blackmore says that Churchland answers Penrose 'point by point'. I have, however, rephrased their bit to try and make that more apparent. Feferman is a bit of a problem as far as making the article more neutral is concerned, as he seems to be closer to Penrose than to mainstream consciousness studies. He says on p. 2 of his paper that he is convinced 'of the extreme implausibility of a computational model of the mind', and on p. 11, he describes how mathematicians proceed by insight and inspiration, and says that 'understanding' is 'just this aspect of mathematical thought that machines can never share with us.' He does however think that Penrose takes his argument too far, and he rejects Penrose's platonism. He is not convinced by Hameroff's neuroscience, but admits that he is not an expert on that side of the theory. In suggesting how consciousness might arise, he is well out of the mainstream in including micro-physics in his list of factors. I have tried to convey this as the gist in a bit inserted into the Objections to Orch OR section.
The point of most of the papers listed above is not that they show that brain imaging has or has no effect on consciousness,but that they relate to the possibility or not of sustained quantum coherence in the brain, the core argument relative to the plausibility of the theory. The Kanade and Bialek papers relate to whether classical computing is adequate as a basis for animal/human perception. This article has accumulated over a number of years, and in present day terms the Engel et al paper on quantum coherence in photosynthetic protein, published in Nature in 2007 and a series of papers on related areas also published in the last few years might be more interesting. However, it should be stressed that Engel etc were not researching consciousness, and there has been little apparent discussion of the papers in consciousness studies. I have tried to insert the correct titles for the references mentioned in your posting.
Hopefully, it might be possible to agree on the neutrality of the article as altered. Persephone19 ( talk) 23:46, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Anyway, let me remark on the "other relevant papers". Neither the origami paper, nor any other paper has anything to say about quantum mind. As I said, on the contrary the imaging papers are disproof of the Q-mind, because these coherences do not lead to effect upon consciousness or experience. I have published also various ideas about why Q-mind might be better compared to classical theories, but I would like to make clear the distinction between science and pseudoscience. Particularly Orch OR is the latter category, and I have published a dozen of mistakes in PhilSci article that has been later published in NeuroQuantology. If there are people interested in science they can read and decide for themselves, most of my friends cannot even believe that Hameroff did the mistake to confuse between embryonic hippocampal axon, and adult differentiated neuron. p.s. There is much more that can be said on Orch OR compared to what Hameroff thinks is appearing in literature. Apparently he missed not only my work, but also this paper: McKemmish, L. K., J. R. Reimers, R. H. McKenzie, A. E. Mark, and N. S. Hush (2009), Penrose-Hameroff orchestrated objective-reduction proposal for human consciousness is not biologically feasible, Physical Review E (Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics), 80(2), 021912-021916. Regards, Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 10:58, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Quantum theories of consciousness are rather like the Hydra. Despite stout-hearted efforts to slay the beast, it continues to sprout fresh heads in a frenzied fashion ... It is pretty clear that the Q-beast has now become self-propagating and impervious to common-sense contradiction. So, perhaps it is best just to erect warning signs around its corner of the scientific swamp and leave it be. From: McCrone, J. (2003), Quantum mind, The Lancet Neurology, 2, 450
My point is, normally science evolves by finding and resolving contradictions, Q-mind (and Orch OR) seems at present to avoid found problems by simply ignoring them. Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 11:35, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Surprisingly, the quantum beating lasts for 660 fs. This observation contrasts with the general assumption that the coherences responsible for such oscillations are destroyed very rapidly, and that population relaxation proceeds with complete destruction of coherence (so that the transfer of electronic coherence between excitons during relaxation is usually ignored). From: Engel, G. S., T. R. Calhoun, E. L. Read, T.-K. Ahn, T. Mancal, Y.-C. Cheng, R. E. Blankenship, and G. R. Fleming (2007), Evidence for wavelike energy transfer through quantum coherence in photosynthetic systems, Nature, 446(7137), 782-786.
Compare this result of 0.66 picoseconds with Tegmark's estimate of 0.1 picosecond for Orch OR. These are in the same order of magnitude of 10^-13. Hameroff at many places shows complete lack of understanding of physics, and citing Engel paper is equivalent to cite tegmark's paper as evidence for Orch OR. The logic is: quantum coherence exists and tegmark proves it. The correct question is: yes, quantum coherence exists but for how long? So from 2002 I was thinking that Hameroff might be wrong only in matter concerning physics, but later I have noticed that he cited neuroscience papers without reading them, and making amazing errors. The examples are the Yu and Baas 1994 article, misquoted dozens of times, as well as De Zeeuw, C. I., E. L. Hertzberg, and E. Mugnaini (1995), The dendritic lamellar body: a new neuronal organelle putatively associated with dendrodendritic gap junctions, J. Neurosci., Feb 1995; 15: 1587-1604. Reading only the title you will be misled like Hameroff that DLB has something to do with dendro-dendritic gap junctions. But reading the paper and the caption of Figure 14 says it all: "The bulbous appendage with the DLB does not contain a gap junction while the dendritic spine originating from that dendrite does. Note also that the appendage with the DLB does not contain any microtubules or neurofilaments, whereas the dendrite that gives rise to this appendage does contain these neuronal elements." From: De Zeeuw et al., 1995. These are far from trivial biological mistakes - they are gross forgery. Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 01:34, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Dear Persephone, please take a few minutes to study how to properly edit citations in Wikipedia. I think the good and professional outlook of the artile depends on its formating and it reveals the competence of the editor also. If you cannot provide even a correct citation to necessary reference it usually reveals that you have no idea about the reference itself, but you have just copy-pasted from somewhere else. No offenses here, I try to help, and if you think my post is irrelevant, just ignore it!!! Anyway, the citations and reference section is NOT locked. Each citation appears as a code in its relevant section. To identify where is the first appearance of a citation you can click on the small blue arrow (triangle) in the Reference section (when the page is viewed from the browser). THEN YOU CLICK > EDIT THE SECTION. THEN SEE THE SOURCE CODE. The source code of a reference it looks like this (check also Wikipedia:Citation templates)
<ref name="xxx">
{{cite journal
| author =
| title =
| journal =
| volume =
| issue =
| pages =
| year =
| url =
| doi =
}}</ref>
When you cite the same citation for second time in the text you usually do not have to write it again, but use only the ref name
<ref name="xxx"></ref>
In my examples you substitute xxx in "xxx" with the name of reference e.g. authoryear. That is all you have to know, the References are then generated by the code and you cannot edit the References section. To change a reference you should edit the reference template itself at the place where it appears for first place. Also do not damage the template outlook. In the source code it is easy to find a template if it is structured on several lines, as shown here. If you do it on a single line, you just mess up the template and it is not easily recognizable by human editor where is the year, where is the title etc. Also the source code is not what one sees in the browser - so you should not have to make the source code look nice. It must be easily editable, that is why I advice you not to collapse the template into single line, but it keep it as it is. Please copy paste the empty template and then paste the relevant fields for each reference after the = signs. Regards, p.s. I had to turn off the Wiki code conversion with nowiki tags that is why I had so many revisions of my post Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 15:35, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
"These pockets contain atoms with electrons called π electrons, which are electrons in the reactive outer shell of the atom that are not bonded to other atoms" is wrong! Particularly pi electrons are bonded to other atoms, because they participate in pi-bonds. As in my previous edits, I will provide wiki-link to pi electrons, and delete popular and misleading explanation, which is chemically wrong. By the way, I checked Hameroff's chapter "That is life!" and i could not find claim that these are not bonded. The description of Van der Waals forces is something different and explains how one can induce dipole. Also the taxol-binding hydrophobic pockets were actually 8 nm away, and the tryptophans that are separated 2 nm away do not form pockets, just represent nonpolar region within the tubulin. These are not small details, especially for someone who cares about chemistry. Danko Georgiev MD ( talk) 00:21, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Hameroff has answered some of the more recent criticism about Orch-or reported in the article: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXFFbxoHp3s (from 13:40)— Preceding unsigned comment added by Ngherappa ( talk • contribs) 18:11, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
Reference: Hameroff, S.R. (1998). "Quantum Computation In Brain Microtubules? The Penrose-Hameroff "Orch OR" model of consciousness". Philosophical Transactions Royal Society London (A) 356: 1869–1896.
Appendix 2. Testable predictions of the Orch OR model
[Comment, D. G., again - the "strong condensate" prediction! Reimers et al. did with one bullet two birds - no.4 and no.9]
Persephone and Danko: Thanks for your relentless work from an appreciative (and highly entertained!) reader. Gwideman ( talk) 12:51, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
WingGundam, this issue is more complicated than you think, and neither of us have any final say in it. That said, I think you're misrepresenting the state of affairs right now because of your own views on the subject.
For one, the Gödel-Turing argument has some things going for it. Gödel himself gave a version of it in the Gibbs Lecture, prior to John Lucas, and the argument has been retooled by Selmer Bringsjord and others over the issue of hypercomputation (though Bringsjord's refutation of Penrose's argument is a rather hand-wavy rebuttal to both the Halting Problem and Gödel's Theorems themselves...): http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.91.5786&rep=rep1&type=pdf.
Penrose has addressed many of the criticisms in the essays "Beyond the Doubting of a Shadow" and "What Gaps? Reply to Grush and Churchland". This is significant because the criticisms of the arguments (Whiteley sentence, unsound system, unknowably huge algorithm for humans) have been amply addressed (in Penrose's writings and those of others: http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3751287?uid=3739728&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21102539778617, http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3751512?uid=3739728&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21102539778617) and mostly ignored.
I've received note that Hameroff has admitted his errors, but it must be said that the model was open-ended and prone to more discoveries being made as time went on. And the Journal of Cosmology was not his response to Reimers and McKemmish. The actual response was presented at the TSC 2010 convention: http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/PNAS.htm.
Your citation of Georgiev is rather misleading, since it seems he has his own version of OR as the basis of consciousness in the brain: http://cogprints.org/4463/2/tucson_2003.pdf. On the Quantum Mind talk page, you can find his critique of Hameroff's proposal as well as his critique of Tegmark!
Here's a good summary of the state of the hypothesis, complete with citations of articles that back up the idea: http://www.quantumbionet.org/admin/files/Massimo%20Pregnolato%20-%20Rita%20Pizzi%202011.pdf.
Either give the groups involved a fair shake or delete the article altogether. 24.192.195.236 ( talk) 17:35, 9 August 2013 (UTC)
Even though some have small requests such as making the Orch-OR article sound more positive, I believe the Orch-OR article misses important content on the so called Orch-OR "updates" done in the past couple of years. I personally would be happy to see a special section on the Hameroff-Chopra collaboration, on the quantum soul diffusing out in the Universe through entanglements after the death, and other such revolutionary insights some of which were reported in Morgan Freeman's Through the Wormhole. Danko Georgiev ( talk) 13:06, 13 August 2013 (UTC)
A note that the section concerning this theory in the Quantum_mind page is marked as slightly troubled reference-wise, and that that section might be going into too much detail considering this page exists for those that want details. Also see that page/section for a link to news about a renewed initiative in 2013/2014 by the theory's authors. ( 140.232.0.70 ( talk) 19:06, 17 January 2014 (UTC))
Well, Hameroff&Penrose have been at it again recently and published a review of their theory including rebuttals by their critics: Discovery of Quantum Vibrations in 'Microtubules' Inside Brain Neurons Supports Controversial Theory of Consciousness How much of this news has already been integrated into the article? I am especially interested in these "20 predictions". As written in the wikipedia article here, most of these predictions have already been refuted. However, according to the news article it is claimed that none of the 20 predictions have been refuted, and that, in fact, several of them have been confirmed. I haven't been looking at the bottom of this, but perhaps it would be interesting to list each prediction in table form including the alleged confirmation and refutation. How about that? Fedor ( talk) 13:08, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Of course it is related to the university and residency of Hamerrof, Arizona, but nevertheless, Mr Mani Bhaumik, a UCLA physicist, would certainly have other bushiness to attend to than to award prizes to Englishmen with brain-dead theories.
Claim | Refutation | Alleged confirmation |
---|---|---|
Neuronal microtubules are directly necessary for consciousness | ||
1. Synaptic sensitivity and plasticity correlate with cytoskeletal architecture/activities in both presynaptic and postsynaptic neuronal cytoplasm. | Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Fusce quis malesuada massa, id scelerisque magna. Pellentesque elementum sodales tortor. [1] | Nulla sed lorem sit amet metus lobortis tristique sed in quam. Ut pretium neque eu turpis tempus, sed porttitor odio bibendum. Phasellus auctor sollicitudin faucibus. [2] |
2. Actions of psychoactive drugs including antidepressants involve neuronal microtubules. | ||
3. Neuronal microtubulestabilizing/protecting drugs may prove useful in Alzheimer's disease, ischemia, and other conditions. | ||
Microtubules communicate by cooperative dynamics of tubulin subunits | ||
4. Laser spectroscopy (e.g. Vos et al, 1993) will demonstrate coherent gigaHz Frhlich excitations in microtubules. | ||
5. Dynamic vibrational states in microtubule networks correlate with cellular activity. | ||
6. Stable patterns of microtubulecytoskeletal networks (including neurofilaments) and intramicrotubule diversity of tubulin states correlate with memory and neural behavior. | ||
7. Cortical dendrites contain largely "Alattice" microtubules (compared to "Blattice" microtubule, Alattice microtubules are preferable for information processingTuszynski et al., 1995) | ||
Quantum coherence occurs in microtubules | ||
8. Studies similar to the famous "Aspect experiment" in physics (which verified nonlocal quantum correlationsAspect et al., 1982) will demonstrate quantum correlations between spatially separated microtubule subunit states a) on the same microtubule, b) on different microtubules in the same neuron, c) on microtubules in different neurons connected by gap junctions. | ||
9. Experiments with SQUIDs (Superconducting Quantum Interference Device) such as those suggested by Leggett (1984) will detect phases of quantum coherence in microtubules. | ||
10. Coherent photons will be detected from microtubules. | ||
Microtubule quantum coherence requires isolation by cycles of surrounding actingelation | ||
11. Neuronal microtubules in cortical dendrites and other brain areas are intermittently surrounded by tightly cross-linked actin gels. | ||
12. Cycles of gelation and dissolution in neuronal cytoplasm occur concomitantly with membrane electrical activity (e.g. synchronized 40 Hz activities in dendrites). | ||
13. The solgel cycles surrounding microtubules are regulated by calcium ions released and reabsorbed by calmodulin associated with microtubules. | ||
Macroscopic quantum coherence occurs among MT in hundreds/thousands of distributed neurons and glia linked by gap junctions | ||
14. Electrotonic gap junctions link synchronously firing networks of cortical neurons, and thalamocortical networks | ||
15. Quantum tunneling occurs across gap junctions. | ||
16. Quantum correlation occurs between microtubule subunit states in different neurons connected by gap junctions (the microtubule "Aspect experiment" in different neurons) | ||
The amount of neural tissue involved in a conscious event is inversely proportional to the event time by E=hbar/T | ||
17. The amount of neural mass involved in a particular cognitive task or conscious event (as measurable by nearfuture advances in brain imaging techniques) is inversely proportional to the preconscious time (e.g. visual perception, reaction times). | ||
An isolated, unperturbed quantum system selfcollapses according to E=hbar/T | ||
18. Isolated technological quantum superpositions will selfcollapse according to E=/T. (Preliminary discussions of such experiments involving superposition of crystals have begun between Roger Penrose and Anton Zeilinger.) | ||
Microtubulebased cilia/centriole structures are quantum optical devices | ||
19. Microtubulebased cilia in rods and cones directly detect visual photons and connect with retinal glial cell microtubule via gap junctions. |
Dear User:109.153.177.43, you recently tagged this article for Cleanup-tagging due to: highly biased, not up-to-date on valid rebuttals from theorists". Would you mind listing the references missing from the rebuttals? Sperxios ( talk) 21:08, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Also dear User:86.155.32.46, see the same sentence for your tagging on 1st Feb 2015 edit (oldid=645146501).
Please, refrain from applying invasive edits when not logged-in. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.191.4.14 ( talk) 17:05, 26 March 2015 (UTC)
Hello, across the internet many people seem very opposed to this topic. I have only read Emperor's New Mind and seen a documentary about the same book by Penrose. However from what I know, Penrose puts forth so many arguments that I am not sure exactly which one/ones people disagree with. From what I understand, Penrose's main point can be surmised this way. Let A be a turing machine, for every decision a person makes throughout their life machine A enumerates said decision and prints it as the decimal expansion of a real number. Penrose argues that no such machine can exist or else we could use it to solve Turing's famous halting problem. Also, according to Penrose, This speaks nothing of approximating the behavior of a human arbitrarily close, only of predicting with certainty the way any specific human will behave arbitrarily far into the future. Because of this, Penrose claims that this implies that some of human thinking must inherently be non-algorithmic. The arguments that Penrose stitches together, to my knowledge, no one would dispute on their own, eg. Turing's proof that the halting problem is unsolvable in the general case, or Cantor's proof that more numbers exist between zero and one than integers. Is it controversial in that these arguments cannot be applied the way that Penrose applies them? It seems to me that most rebuttal's are against his theories of quantum gravity. Quantum Gravity however is a field difficult to be taken seriously in anyway, since, to my knowledge, most physicists believe that nothing can be known at that scale. Most theories I've encountered about quantum gravity make little sense to begin with, so I guess Penrose isn't any different that way. I just wonder if anybody has addressed the other points?? 2602:304:5964:8F39:18E:C2D3:46AF:FE57 ( talk) 20:07, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
I am sure that the editor who inserted the following text had good intentions, but as I will explain it is completely wrong, so it would be best if editors without degree in molecular biology restrain themselves from editing topics that they do not understand. The text is: "However, the recent research by Anirban Bandyopadhyay showed that microtubules can change their structure from B-lattice to A-lattice as part of the processing of information, and tubulin in microtubules exists in multiple states" So let me explain what is wrong: experiments IN VITRO have clearly shown that B-lattice microtubules can exist, and that microtubles can flip from one lattice to another. Also numerous in vitro studies have shown that microtubules with 12, 14, 15 etc protofilaments (PFs) can form (all in vivo microtubules have 13). Hameroff and Tuszynski were aware of all that published literature and made a guess that what happens in vitro, should happen in vivo as well. It is very difficult to design an experiment to check the status of microtubules IN VIVO, but Kikkawa and colleagues were able to do exactly that - they performed Quick-Freeze Deep-Etching technique, which allowed to check what the structure of microtubules in the brain looks like. If the microtubules were undergoing transitions from A- to B-lattice in vivo, it would be expected that at any given moment in time, there will be some percentage of A-lattice microtubules and some percentage of B-lattice microtubules. After the freezing, the microtubules cannot undergo further transitions, and the ratio of A- to B-lattice microtubules could be determined. What Kikkawa found is that 100% of IN VIVO microtubles have B-lattice. Citing more and more in vitro experiments, done by Anirban Bandyopadhyay or others, is IRRELEVANT. Orch OR prediction has been found to be false in 1994 and the result has been published in one of the premier journals on molecular and cell biology, namely the Journal of Cell Biology. If Hameroff was actually more carefully reading what others published, he would not have done his wrong prediction four years later in 1998! Danko Georgiev ( talk) 21:15, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
It seems that quote is still in the article three years after your objection... 137.101.94.106 ( talk) 00:06, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Forgive me, but the text isn't clear how this is suppose to work. Non-computable algorithm? What is that? Microtubules and connective proteins influence or orchestrate the state reduction of the qubits by modifying the spacetime-separation of their superimposed states. Is there a step by step description of what Penrose is talking about? I know a little of quantum physics and quite a bit of inorganic + organic chemistry. For now, the article looks like a lot of quantum jargon. Vmelkon ( talk) 20:56, 14 January 2015 (UTC)
Another critic, Charles Seife, has said, "Penrose, the Oxford mathematician famous for his work on tiling the plane with various shapes, is one of a handful of scientists who believe that the ephemeral nature of consciousness suggests a quantum process."
I'm not sure what this quote brings at all, so I removed it altogether. What it can bring to the article completely eludes me. If someone finds it insightful, feel free to put it back. 217.13.235.58 ( talk) 12:55, 12 June 2015 (UTC)
[ [7]] Quantum Cognition: The possibility of processing with nuclear spins in the brain 1Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106
Matthew P. A. Fisher
(Dated: September 1, 2015)
The possibility that quantum processing with nuclear spins might be operative in the brain is explored. Phos- phorus is identified as the unique biological element with a nuclear spin that can serve as a qubit for such
putative quantum processing - a neural qubit - while the phosphate ion is the only possible qubit-transporter.
We identify the “Posner molecule”, Ca9(PO4)6, as the unique molecule that can protect the neural qubits on very
long times and thereby serve as a (working) quantum-memory. A central requirement for quantum-processing
is quantum entanglement. It is argued that the enzyme catalyzed chemical reaction which breaks a pyrophos- phate ion into two phosphate ions can quantum entangle pairs of qubits. Posner molecules, formed by binding
such phosphate pairs with extracellular calcium ions, will inherit the nuclear spin entanglement. A mechanism
for transporting Posner molecules into presynaptic neurons during vesicle endocytosis is proposed. Quantum
measurements can occur when a pair of Posner molecules chemically bind and subsequently melt, releasing a
shower of intra-cellular calcium ions that can trigger further neurotransmitter release and enhance the probability
of post-synaptic neuron firing. Multiple entangled Posner molecules, triggering non-local quantum correlations
of neuron firing rates, would provide the key mechanism for neural quantum processing. Implications, both in
vitro and in vivo, are briefly mentioned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.47.37.101 ( talk) 20:01, 10 September 2015 (UTC)
In 2014 and 2015, very important developments of the theory took place and many aspects of it were proven by experiments. The article stops only in 2013 and criticisms dating back to that year. In the meantime, I find it necessary to inform the reader with a warning, and then, update the page. Even the pages dedicated only to the 2 scientists speak, in a very vague way, of the research that took place in 2014 and 2015. In detail I saw that the Evidences section talks about it, albeit in a vague way. But the criticism section has remained dated and does not incorporate this new data. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.163.248.1 ( talk) 17:06, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi, have to be careful but I think there's evidence for semi classical interaction in graphics cards. My research clearly shows that certain components are able to show inter-processor electron leakage under specific conditions, though not normally used in this way people who overclock cards often get strange effects. As this (used to be) TS SCI I only mention it as better technologies already exist. It was discovered independently here 88.81.156.140 ( talk) 07:52, 26 March 2021 (UTC) and as yet hasn't been replicated. The really strange thing is that it only happens on old cards that have seen some use, under specific conditions that I discovered its possible to make one use a machine version of intuition to "guess" a normally impossible AES key that would require an absurd amount of processor time if certain aspects like the file content and offset are known.
Thanks for the additions here. I found a second citation which I've added even though it's not great - there is no paywall. There is also a paper in 'Nature' https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-10068-4 maybe primary source. Appears to be a different experiment further substantiating the hypothesis. Thelisteninghand ( talk) 17:23, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
The Criticism section is unusual for Wiki, in that it seems to be constructed not to add to the topic but to try to tear it down without exposing the authors to counter-argument. This is particularly obvious in the 'Neuroscience' section, which seems to be authored purely to attack Penrose et al without allowing counterpoints, e.g. it claims there are no gap junctions in microglia etc but it is not up to date and offers none of the large number of references to the opposite - i.e. pushing an argument without allowing dissent. Not very Wiki? 60.226.145.226 ( talk) 03:12, 22 May 2023 (UTC)
I think there should be a section with studies that confirm that microtubules can deliver quantum processes. As this is one of the most disputed topics ( is it possible for Quantum processes to happen in warm & wet environment of microtubules. https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jpcb.3c07936 176.0.203.52 ( talk) 06:59, 13 May 2024 (UTC)