Your Brain Is Not a Computer. It Is a Transducer
 

Interesting theory.


A new theory of how the brain works — neural transduction theory — might upend everything we know about consciousness and the universe itself.

https://www.discovermagazine.com/min...s-a-transducer

Just a pile of silly speculation. I dropped out early.
"Evidence for Transduction?
Hard evidence that supports a neural transduction theory is lacking at the moment, but we are surrounded by odd phenomena that are at least consistent with such a theory."
That's the best he's got.

It's a theory. So is practically everything else about our existence... No definitive answers yet.

Not where this universe came from, not what was before the Big Bang, not how the anti-matter did not annihilate the matter at the moment of the Big Bang, and after the Big Bang, we have only theories for that as well. But like the article said, the main branches of theories do allow for that which we can't quite wrap our minds around just yet.

One can chose to believe in whatever they are comfortable with. After all, it is much easier to be set in your ways and not bother with the details.


But as far as "If the brain is a self-contained information processor, how can we explain the sudden return of lucidity when the brain is severely damaged?" Well, here I have first hand experience...

A relative of mine was in her mid 80s and suffered multiple strokes to the point she no longer was able to speak nor carry out any normal activities. She would sit in the wheelchair of day long and occasionally make incoherent sounds and gestures with her hands and then go back to a blank stare at the floor... Doctors knew it was only a matter of time.

Her health deteriorated further and she was hospitalized. Doctors warned it would be a matter of days to a week at most. A few evening later, I got a phone call from another relative visiting who said "I have someone here who wants to talk to you"..

I was speechless. The old woman who I knew very well, was conversing with me as if nothing had ever happened to her.. She said she wishes me well and that she remembers the time I used to visit and which dishes I liked and how she enjoyed baking for me and the rest of the family... I was in shock. I was able to come up with a few sentences and she was happy to hear my voice and said that the visiting hours are over and she has to hang up.

She passed sometime at night. I talked to her attending physician and he did not believe neither me nor my relative that was in her room when she called. He said it was impossible for her to speak due to the damage from all the strokes. Well... I certainly did not hallucinate that event and I had a witness.

There is just way too much we don't know and we would be well served to keep an open mind.

Sure but there's no basis for any of his speculations nor can they be tested at this time. I see no reason to entertain them (except, perhaps, for entertainment).

There is no basis for the speculation there was a Big Bang. Technically we shouldn't even be here since the anti-matter would have annihilated matter at the moment of the Big Bang and science knows it. No one can explain the surplus of matter vs anti-matter. That surplus is what we are made of but shouldn't have been....

Exactly, and this type of "science" writing is very popular as entertainment. Many enthusiasts love these fantasies - it's a whole genre.

But a bunch of “theories” about the universe, our planet, life, us, not knowing anything for sure is not a fantasy

Actually while Big Bang is still a theory, there scientifically documented observational evidence to support it. And there are always individual anecdotes to support non-science-based theories.

From the article.

The connection between physics and modern theories of mind and consciousness is tenuous at best, but modern physicists do take the idea of parallel universes seriously. They debate the details, but they can hardly ignore the fact that the mathematics of at least three of the grand theories at the core of modern physics — inflation theory, quantum theory, and string theory — predict the existence of alternate universes.

Some physicists even believe that signals can leak between the universes and that the existence of parallel universes can be confirmed through measurements or experiments. In a recent essay, physicist A. A. Antonov argues that our inability to detect the vast amount of dark energy that almost certainly exists in our own universe is evidence of the existence of parallel universes, six of which, he speculates, are directly adjacent to our own.

Exactly! That's what drives futurist writing and makes it so fascinating for those who like it.

What's interesting about futurists is that history shows how how often they're just wrong. It's like the joke about economists - they've predicted five of the last two recessions.