I think my hypothesis would more naturally predict that schizophrenics would experience these symptoms constantly, and not just during psychotic episodes. Not sure what to make of that. Hmmmm. Maybe I should hypothesize that different parts of the cortex are “completely unmoored from each other” only during psychotic episodes, and the rest of the time they’re merely “mediocre at communicating”?
I am not sure that constant symptoms would be a necessary prediction of your theory: I could easily imagine that the out-of-sync regions with weak connections mostly learn to treat their connections as “mostly a bit of noise, little to gain here” and mostly ignore them during normal functioning (this also seems energetically efficient). But during exceptionally strong activation, they start using all channels and the neighbouring brain regions now need to make sense of the unusual input.
I cannot tell whether this story is more natural than a prediction of constant symptoms, but it does seem plausible to me.
I am not sure that constant symptoms would be a necessary prediction of your theory: I could easily imagine that the out-of-sync regions with weak connections mostly learn to treat their connections as “mostly a bit of noise, little to gain here” and mostly ignore them during normal functioning (this also seems energetically efficient). But during exceptionally strong activation, they start using all channels and the neighbouring brain regions now need to make sense of the unusual input.
I cannot tell whether this story is more natural than a prediction of constant symptoms, but it does seem plausible to me.