Argument

Orchestrated objective reduction

Overview

Orchestrated objective reduction (Orch OR) is a controversial theory postulating that consciousness originates at the quantum level inside neurons (rather than being a product of neural connections). The mechanism is held to be a quantum process called objective reduction that is orchestrated by cellular structures called microtubules. It is proposed that the theory may answer the hard problem of consciousness and provide a mechanism for free will. The hypothesis was put forward in the 1990s by physicist Roger Penrose and anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff; it combines molecular biology, neuroscience, pharmacology, philosophy, quantum information theory, and quantum gravity.

While some other theories assert that consciousness emerges as the complexity of the computations performed by cerebral neurons increases, Orch OR posits that consciousness is based on non-computable quantum processing performed by qubits formed collectively on cellular microtubules, a process significantly amplified in the neurons. The qubits are based on oscillating dipoles forming superposed resonance rings in helical pathways throughout lattices of microtubules. The oscillations are either electric, due to charge separation from London forces, or magnetic, due to electron spin—and possibly also due to nuclear spins (that can remain isolated for longer periods) that occur in gigahertz, megahertz, and kilohertz frequency ranges. Orchestration refers to the hypothetical process by which connective proteins, such as microtubule-associated proteins, influence or orchestrate qubit state reduction by modifying the spacetime-separation of their superimposed states. The latter is based on Penrose's objective-collapse theory for interpreting quantum mechanics, which postulates the existence of an objective threshold governing the collapse of quantum states, related to the difference of the spacetime curvature of these states in the universe's fine-scale structure.

Orchestrated objective reduction has been criticized from its inception by mathematicians, philosophers, and scientists. These criticisms focus on three issues: Penrose's interpretation of Gödel's theorem; Penrose's abductive reasoning, linking non-computability to quantum events; and the brain's unsuitability to host the quantum phenomena required by the theory, since it is considered too "warm, wet and noisy" to avoid decoherence.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

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But occasionally, either the coherence or the verification fails. We then revise our conceptual scheme so as to preserve the general trust in the symbolic reference, while relegating definite details of that reference to the category of errors. Such errors are termed ‘delusive appearances.’ This error arises from the extreme vagueness of the spatial and temporal perspectives in the case of perception in the pure…
Alfred North Whitehead, Symbolism, its meaning and effect
States what Orchestrated objective reduction is.
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§ 82. _Of the teleological system in the external relations of organised beings_ By external purposiveness I mean that by which one thing of nature serves another as means to a purpose. Now things which have no internal purposiveness and which presuppose none for their possibility, _e.g._ earth, air, water, etc., may at the same time be very purposive externally, _i.e._ in relation to other beings. But these latter…
Immanuel Kant, Kant's Critique of Judgement
States what Orchestrated objective reduction is.
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This long analysis was necessary to show how the real can pass from tension to extension and from freedom to mechanical necessity by way of inversion. It was not enough to prove that this relation between the two terms is suggested to us, at once, by consciousness and by sensible experience. It was necessary to prove that the geometrical order has no need of explanation, being purely and simply the suppression of…
Henri Bergson, Creative Evolution
Close in meaning to Orchestrated objective reduction; the term itself is not named.
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Philosophers who discussed Orchestrated objective reduction

Roger Penrose

Related ideas

Place in the tradition

Part of Consciousness.

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