Vancouver Mind, AI, & Consciousness (MAC) April 2025 meeting

Meeting Summary: Mind, AI, and Consciousness (MAC) Group Discussion - Second Session

The second meeting of the MAC group delved deeper into the nature of consciousness, particularly through the lens of panpsychism and its intersection with the rapid advancements in Artificial Intelligence.

💡 Key Insight: The group acknowledged that the swift emergence of massive scale AI, especially Large Language Models (LLMs), might offer novel information and perspectives that could illuminate long-standing debates on human consciousness.

🗣️ Discussion Highlights:

• Enrico Fagan’s Panpsychism:

  • A significant portion of the discussion revolved around Enrico Fagan’s views, a credited pioneer in microprocessors, whose personal transformative experience led him to study consciousness.

  • Fagan concludes that consciousness is not an emergent property of information systems or matter, but rather a fundamental quantum field that exists beyond space, time, and the physical body.

  • He posits that subjective experience originates from this field, not the brain, and that classical mechanical systems lack the capacity for true consciousness due to their deterministic nature.

  • Fagan expresses concern about the current trajectory of AI, believing it fosters a reductionist, deterministic view that deviates from the “real truth” of consciousness.

  • A notable, though unsubstantiated, claim from Fagan is his belief that trees possess consciousness.

  • He also suggests that consciousness itself created mathematics and sciences, implying they cannot fully describe consciousness.

• Defining Consciousness vs. Awareness:

  • The group explored the distinction between consciousness and awareness. Consciousness was largely defined as the “quality of subjective experience” (e.g., the taste of spearmint, the color red, a feeling of fatigue), while awareness was considered a separate cognitive feature.

• Panpsychism and Spirituality/Atheism:

  • A lively discussion ensued regarding the implications of panpsychism (consciousness as fundamental to reality) for religious texts and atheism, questioning if a scientific version of fundamental consciousness could align with an atheistic stance.

• Micropsychism vs. Cosmopsychism:

  • The conversation touched upon the two main branches of panpsychism:

    • Micropsychism (bottom-up): Where the smallest elements (like atoms) possess experience, and the “combination problem” arises – how these individual experiences combine to form complex consciousness. Quantum entanglement was suggested as a potential link.

    • Cosmopsychism (top-down): Where a cosmic consciousness exists, and individual beings are merely a part of this larger entity.

• Personal Experiences of Consciousness:

  • Several historical figures (Spinoza, Whitman, Newton, Saint Paul) and group members’ personal anecdotes were shared, describing profound experiences of interconnectedness, stillness, and altered perceptions of time, often without external stimuli. These were considered direct, subjective experiences of “being present.”

• AI as Extended Cognition:

  • The group explored the idea of AI not as a separate conscious entity, but as an extension of human cognition. Analogies like cooking pots externalizing the stomach were used, suggesting that AI could augment and expand human consciousness, particularly in states of “flow.”

• Why Panpsychism as a Framework?

  • One of the attractions of panpsychism, which is experiencing a resurgence, is its ability to bypass the “source problem” of consciousness – it simply posits that consciousness is, much like mass.

📚 Resources Mentioned:

• The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s entry on panpsychism was recommended for its comprehensive breakdown of different “flavors” of the theory.

• A specific academic paper on the topic was also noted for its relevance to the group’s ongoing inquiry.