Download or read book Biophysics of Consciousness written by Roman R Poznanski and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2016-08-23 with total page 664 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The problem of how the brain produces consciousness, subjectivity and "something it is like to be" remains one of the greatest challenges to a complete science of the natural world. While various scientists and philosophers approach the problem from their own unique perspectives and in the terms of their own respective fields, Biophysics of Consciousness: A Foundational Approach attempts a consilience across disparate disciplines to explain how it is possible that an objective brain produces subjective experience. This volume unites the crème de la crème of physicists, neuroscientists, and psychiatrists in the attempt to understand consciousness through a foundational approach encompassing ontological, evolutionary, neurobiological, and Freudian interpretations with the focus on conscious phenomena occurring in the brain. By integrating the perspectives of these diverse disciplines with the latest research and theories on the biophysics of the brain, the book tries to explain how consciousness can be an adaptive and causal element in the natural world.
Download or read book Sources of Consciousness written by H. S. Green and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 1997 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The phenomenon of consciousness has long been one of the great mysteries of life, perhaps because it is inexplicable in terms of the deterministic theories of classical science. Today there is some consensus that the key to the understanding of the workings of the mind should be sought in the area of indeterministic quantum mechanics, but until recently there has been little substantial progress in unravelling the mystery. This book is the culmination of several decades of research by the authors in the physical sciences, neurosciences and computer sciences, with comprehensive summaries and references to related work by many other scientists, and presents important advances toward solving the problem. Written for the most part in plain language but supported by appropriate symbolism, the book is truly interdisciplinary, designed for the needs of a wide variety of students and scholars.
Download or read book Emotions Qualia And Consciousness written by Alfred Kaszniak and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2001-07-19 with total page 568 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The experience of emotion is a ubiquitous component of the stream of consciousness; emotional qualia interact with other contents and processes of consciousness in complex ways. Recent research has supported the hypothesis that important functional aspects of emotion can operate outside the conscious awareness. Primary types of emotions are found in animals, while secondary, more complex types are involved in interpersonal relationships. Emotions both influence genetic repair mechanisms of individuals and are responsible for group behavior. Many scholars and scientists believe that no scientific or philosophic account of consciousness can be complete without an understanding of the role of emotion.
Download or read book The Emerging Physics of Consciousness written by Jack A. Tuszynski and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2006-09-05 with total page 500 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seeks answers to these questions using the underlying assumption that consciousness can be understood using the intellectual potential of modern physics and other sciences. There are a number of theories of consciousness, some based on classical physics while others require the use of quantum concepts. The latter ones have drawn criticism from the parts of the scientific establishment while simultaneously claiming that classical approaches are doomed to failure. The contributing authors presents a spectrum of opinions from both sides of this on-going scientific debate, allowing readers to decide for themselves which of the approaches are most likely to succeed.
Download or read book Ontology of Consciousness written by Helmut Wautischer and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2008-04-11 with total page 669 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scholars from many different disciplines examine consciousness through the lens of intellectual approaches and cultures ranging from cosmology research and cell biophysics laboratories to pre-Columbian Mesoamerica and Tibetan Tantric Buddhism in a volume that extends consciousness studies beyond the limits of current neuroscience research. The "hard problem" of today's consciousness studies is subjective experience: understanding why some brain processing is accompanied by an experienced inner life. Recent scientific advances offer insights for understanding the physiological and chemical phenomenology of consciousness. But by leaving aside the internal experiential nature of consciousness in favor of mapping neural activity, such science leaves many questions unanswered. In Ontology of Consciousness, scholars from a range of disciplines—from neurophysiology to parapsychology, from mathematics to anthropology and indigenous non-Western modes of thought—go beyond these limits of current neuroscience research to explore insights offered by other intellectual approaches to consciousness. These scholars focus their attention on such philosophical approaches to consciousness as Tibetan Tantric Buddhism, North American Indian insights, pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilization, and the Byzantine Empire. Some draw on artifacts and ethnographic data to make their point. Others translate cultural concepts of consciousness into modern scientific language using models and mathematical mappings. Many consider individual experiences of sentience and existence, as seen in African communalism, Hindi psychology, Zen Buddhism, Indian vibhuti phenomena, existentialism, philosophical realism, and modern psychiatry. Some reveal current views and conundrums in neurobiology to comprehend sentient intellection. Contributors Karim Akerma, Matthijs Cornelissen, Antoine Courban, Mario Crocco, Christian de Quincey, Thomas B. Fowler, Erlendur Haraldsson, David. J. Hufford, Pavel B. Ivanov, Heinz Kimmerle, Stanley Krippner, Armand J. Labbé, James Maffie, Hubert Markl, Graham Parkes, Michael Polemis, E Richard Sorenson, Mircea Steriade, Thomas Szasz, Mariela Szirko, Robert A.F. Thurman, Edith L.B. Turner, Julia Watkin, Helmut Wautischer
Download or read book The Quest for Consciousness written by Christof Koch and published by Roberts Publishers. This book was released on 2004 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Consciousness is the major unsolved problem in biology. Written as an introduction to the field and drawing upon clinical, psychological and physiological observations, this book seeks to answer questions of consciousness within a neuroscientific framework.
Download or read book Biophysics of Computation written by Christof Koch and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2004-10-28 with total page 587 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Neural network research often builds on the fiction that neurons are simple linear threshold units, completely neglecting the highly dynamic and complex nature of synapses, dendrites, and voltage-dependent ionic currents. Biophysics of Computation: Information Processing in Single Neurons challenges this notion, using richly detailed experimental and theoretical findings from cellular biophysics to explain the repertoire of computational functions available to single neurons. The author shows how individual nerve cells can multiply, integrate, or delay synaptic inputs and how information can be encoded in the voltage across the membrane, in the intracellular calcium concentration, or in the timing of individual spikes.Key topics covered include the linear cable equation; cable theory as applied to passive dendritic trees and dendritic spines; chemical and electrical synapses and how to treat them from a computational point of view; nonlinear interactions of synaptic input in passive and active dendritic trees; the Hodgkin-Huxley model of action potential generation and propagation; phase space analysis; linking stochastic ionic channels to membrane-dependent currents; calcium and potassium currents and their role in information processing; the role of diffusion, buffering and binding of calcium, and other messenger systems in information processing and storage; short- and long-term models of synaptic plasticity; simplified models of single cells; stochastic aspects of neuronal firing; the nature of the neuronal code; and unconventional models of sub-cellular computation.Biophysics of Computation: Information Processing in Single Neurons serves as an ideal text for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses in cellular biophysics, computational neuroscience, and neural networks, and will appeal to students and professionals in neuroscience, electrical and computer engineering, and physics.
Download or read book Being Biology written by Brenda Dunne and published by ICRL Press. This book was released on with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is consciousness actually the Life Force, the animating principle which underlies and unifies mind, body, and spirit in all living things, and which philosopher Henri Bergson termed the élan vital? This book offers a compendium of empirical evidence and theoretical perspectives from a broad range of scholarly disciplines, which suggest that there is an unbroken, non-local, collective aspect of consciousness that links distant individuals and events—a kind of resonant connectedness that defies separation in space and time.
Download or read book The Physics of the Mind and Brain Disorders written by Ioan Opris and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-12-01 with total page 782 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book covers recent advances in the understanding of brain structure, function and disorders based on the fundamental principles of physics. It covers a broad range of physical phenomena occurring in the brain circuits for perception, cognition, emotion and action, representing the building blocks of the mind. It provides novel insights into the devastating brain disorders of the mind such as schizophrenia, dementia, autism, aging or addictions, as well as into the new devices for brain repair. The book is aimed at basic researchers in the fields of neuroscience, physics, biophysics and clinicians in the fields of neurology, neurosurgery, psychology, psychiatry.
Download or read book Consciousness Biology and Fundamental Physics written by Simon Raggett and published by Author House. This book was released on 2012-01-31 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why are we conscious? Why do we experience the taste of almonds or the colour red? What is the experience of choosing between beer and wine, and how do we do it? Why do we think that only organisms with brains can do this, although our brains are based on the same sort of physics as everything else in the universe? The conventional consciousness studies of the last twenty years, wedded to a nineteenth century view of physics and biology, has failed to produce anything of explanatory value. Roger Penrose's hypothesis that consciousness is linked to a fundamental level of the universe is here considered more promising, but may not have responded sufficiently to recent advances in quantum biology and neuroscience. 'Consciousness, Biology and Fundamental Physics' attempts an updating of the original inspiration.
Download or read book Quantum Brain Dynamics and Consciousness written by Mari Jibu and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1995-01-01 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This change of perspective results in a radically new vision of how the brain functions
Download or read book The Physics of Consciousness written by Evan Harris Walker and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For decades, neuroscientists, psychologists, and an army of brain researchers have been struggling, in vain, to explain the phenomenon of consciousness. Now there is a clear trail to the answer, and it leads through the dense jungle of quantum physics, Zen, and subjective experience and arrives at an unexpected destination. In this tour-de-force of scientific investigation, Evan Harris Walker, a pioneer in the science of consciousness, describes the outcome of his fifty-year search for the true nature of reality. Drawing on a deep knowledge of quantum physics and Zen philosophy, Walker shows how the operation of bizarre yet actual properties of elementary particles support a new and exciting theory of reality, based on the principles of quantum physics; a theory that answers questions such as "What is the nature of consciousness, of will?" "What is the source of material reality?" and "What is God?" Clearly written in non-technical, lyrical prose, The Physics of Consciousness is more than just the explanation of a science - it is a new vision of life.
Download or read book Quantum Information and Consciousness written by Danko D. Georgiev and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2017-12-06 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "I loved the book! This book is not just interesting, it is exciting. I have probably read every significant book in the field, and this is the strongest and most convincing one yet. It is also one of the most comprehensive in its explanations. I shall most certainly recommend the book to colleagues." –Richard G. Petty, MD "a very good introduction to the basic theory of quantum systems.... Dr. Georgiev’s book aptly prepares the reader to confront whatever might be in store later." –from the Foreword by Prof. James F. Glazebrook, Eastern Illinois University This book addresses the fascinating cross-disciplinary field of quantum information theory applied to the study of brain function. It offers a self-study guide to probe the problems of consciousness, including a concise but rigorous introduction to classical and quantum information theory, theoretical neuroscience, and philosophy of the mind. It aims to address long-standing problems related to consciousness within the framework of modern theoretical physics in a comprehensible manner that elucidates the nature of the mind-body relationship. The reader also gains an overview of methods for constructing and testing quantum informational theories of consciousness.
Download or read book Stairway to the Mind written by Alwyn Scott and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Human consciousness has perplexed philosophers, artists and scientists for centuries. Some hold it to be purely physical, while others believe it transcends the material world. Now comes a book that offers a new perspective - based entirely on evidence from the natural sciences - whereby materialism and dualism co-exist. The author - a distinguished pioneer of nonlinear dynamics - bases his argument on a hierarchical view of mental organization; a stairway. Atoms give rise to molecules, neurons form the brain and individual consciousness leads to shared culture. All steps are needed to complete the picture and each level derives from the previous one. The book shows specialists how each of their fields adds to the overall picture, while providing general readers with an introduction to this investigation.
Download or read book Consciousness in Four Dimensions written by Richard M. Pico and published by McGraw-Hill/Contemporary. This book was released on 2002 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard M. Pico unveils a revolutionary new approach to understanding consciousness that pinpoints its origins in the brain. Called Rbiological relativity, S the approach combines the laws of physics to the latest breakthroughs in neuroscience, molecular biology, and computational theory to create a coherent four-dimensional model for explaining the origins of life and the emergence of complex biological systems--from the living cell to the thinking brain.
Download or read book Physics in Mind written by Werner Loewenstein and published by . This book was released on 2013-01-29 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eminent biophysicist Loewenstein seeks an answer in the mechanisms of physics. Bringing information theory--the idea that all information can be quantified and encoded in bits--to bear on recent advances in the neurosciences, he reveals a web of immense computational power inside the brain.
Download or read book Biophysics written by William Bialek and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2012-12-17 with total page 640 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Interactions between the fields of physics and biology reach back over a century, and some of the most significant developments in biology--from the discovery of DNA's structure to imaging of the human brain--have involved collaboration across this disciplinary boundary. For a new generation of physicists, the phenomena of life pose exciting challenges to physics itself, and biophysics has emerged as an important subfield of this discipline. Here, William Bialek provides the first graduate-level introduction to biophysics aimed at physics students. Bialek begins by exploring how photon counting in vision offers important lessons about the opportunities for quantitative, physics-style experiments on diverse biological phenomena. He draws from these lessons three general physical principles--the importance of noise, the need to understand the extraordinary performance of living systems without appealing to finely tuned parameters, and the critical role of the representation and flow of information in the business of life. Bialek then applies these principles to a broad range of phenomena, including the control of gene expression, perception and memory, protein folding, the mechanics of the inner ear, the dynamics of biochemical reactions, and pattern formation in developing embryos. Featuring numerous problems and exercises throughout, Biophysics emphasizes the unifying power of abstract physical principles to motivate new and novel experiments on biological systems. Covers a range of biological phenomena from the physicist's perspective Features 200 problems Draws on statistical mechanics, quantum mechanics, and related mathematical concepts Includes an annotated bibliography and detailed appendixes Instructor's manual (available only to teachers)
