ASSC2008 (Association for the Scientific Studies of Consciousness) will be held in Taiwan this June. I have submitted my poster abstract, but still not entirely sure if I should go or not, so I decided to go through other poster abstracts and think if I would benefit from the meeting.
Anil Seth has a presentation entitled “Measuring Consciousness”. In the abstract he stated “Presently, behavioral and brain-based measures tend to pick up on different aspects of consciousness: Brain-based measures are especially suited for measuring conscious level, whereas behavioral measures are mostly used for assessing which contents are conscious. Therefore, an integrative approach combining in single studies both types of measures encourages a virtuous circularity in which putative measures and theoretical advances mutually inform, validate, and refine one another”
This is a fair point and certainly applicable to cell consciousness too. Namely measuring intracellular molecules, such as calcium or ATP, can tell the level of cellular activity, but not useful to predict cellular behaviours. On the other hand, watching cell morphology or migration can directly indicate cellular behaviours.
In another abstract, Kinouchi et al proposed “A Model of Consciousness and Self Based on Simple Abstracted Brain-Like Neural Network System”. This is a version of Global Workplace Theory, but emphasize self-recursive perception. Namely the system observe its own emotion and it will avoid “unpleasant” experience and continue “pleasant” experience. As for cells, they do know what is stressful and respond to it, but I am not sure if cells can feel pleasure. It is worth thinking of.
At the end of the day, I am still not sure if I should go to the meeting or not. I would appreciate if you could give me more time and of course any suggestions are most welcome!
You will find several people at this conference who are also interested in the role of cells in this question but from my experience with ASSC (I am a member) the majority are going to report on more macro-issues. Jonathan Edwards from UCL (London) has been talking a lot about the question that interests you and I encourage you to talk to him. I know he was at this event last year.
The stated goal of ASSC is to bring the scientific study of questions of consciousness back into the mainstream of scientific investigation. Despite the stated goal of ASSC it isn’t yet clear to me that they, as a body, are in fact prepared to take the deeper theoretical questions seriously (which are, from my point of view, in the foundations of logic).
From my limited experience with the group, it consists mainly of neuroscientists and philosophers (often one that trying to be the other) but few serious theorists that can bring the necessary rigor to the problem. I mean no disrespect to my colleagues, it is a simple enough observation to confirm.
Steven, thanks for your comment. I agree with your opinion about ASSC and that is exactly why I am unsure about attending the meeting. I haven’t met Jonathan Edwards, but I have read his book on cell consciousness. Probably the main difference between me and him is that he mainly focuses on neurons while I am looking at cells in general. Fortunately he isn’t too far from where I work and hopefully I will have an opportunity to talk to him soon.
I dont understand what is “conscious” on cellular level… but I feel we should look for a new paradigm in molecular/cellular biology. When I read current reviews (eg on NF-kB or proteasome), I am still more convinced the effect depends on extremely complex situation and any singular event can lead to even opposite effects (not so good news for development of new “drug targets”). However, what does “complexity” mean? Is it something as dissipative structures in Prigogine thermodynamics? The question is general: what is life? Why does living matter want to live, to maintain status quo, whereas non-living matter goes from status to status apathetically? Is it consciousness? Btw: do you know Mazzocchis article “Complexity in biology” in EMBO Reports 2008? I am sure, there is something new in the air… we need new theories ( http://www.cbcd.net/nobel.htm ).