I didn’t have time to read all of this, so I apologize for commenting. I’m quite familiar with the science of the thalamus and its relation to consciousness. I think all of this looks pretty accurate, but I must object to your framing of the thalamus as the seat of consciousness. Consciousness is the whole shebang. It’s not a little add-on or accident. Substantial processing happens outside of consciousness, of course, but lots of the brain needs to participate to create consciousness; it’s a sophisticated set of information processing functions across areas, particularly the corticothalemic loops.
So calling the thalamus the seat of consciousness is like saying the water comes from the valve because if that stuck closed no water flows. The thalamus is critical for consciousness, but that doesn’t mean consciousness originates there. Most of the sophisticated processing that creates the rich representations we refer to as qualia or consciousness originates in the cortex; The thalamus and basal ganglia are more involved in selecting between possible such representations.
I wish I had time to dig into this more; consciousness is fascinating, and I’m hoping it even becomes important again if people start arguing for AI rights on the basis of consciousness. Until then, I’m going to focus on alignment.
Pardon any errors from phone, voice, transcription.
So calling the thalamus the seat of consciousness is like saying the water comes from the valve because if that stuck closed no water flows.
Pardon the semantic argument, but:
Saying the thalamus is not the seat of consciousness is like saying Washington D. C. is not the seat of US government because voting constituents live all over the country or because Wall Street is a powerful lobbying group. Washington D. C. is considered the seat of US government because although disparate forces influence the decision making process in Washington, the actual process of combining these disparate influences into a coherent unitary final decision happens through the mechanisms present in Washington D. C.
I’ll pardon it but I won’t engage with it. I think saying it’s the seat of consciousness makes you sound like you don’t know what’s going on, when actually you do. I could be right or wrong.
Okay fine, I’ll engage a little. I do love this shit, even though I try not to spend time on it because it’s a mess with little payoff (unless the aforementioned debate over AI consciousness starts to seem relevant to our odds of survival—which it well might).
I don’t think your DC as the seat of government metaphor goes through. DC is indeed the seat of government. The thalamus isn’t in charge of consciousness, it’s just a valve (but far more sophisticated; an arena of competition) that someone else turns: the cortex and basal ganglia, in elaborate collaboration. The thalamus is the mechanism by which their decisions are enforced; it doesn’t seem to play a large role in deciding what’s attended.
I didn’t have time to read all of this, so I apologize for commenting. I’m quite familiar with the science of the thalamus and its relation to consciousness. I think all of this looks pretty accurate, but I must object to your framing of the thalamus as the seat of consciousness. Consciousness is the whole shebang. It’s not a little add-on or accident. Substantial processing happens outside of consciousness, of course, but lots of the brain needs to participate to create consciousness; it’s a sophisticated set of information processing functions across areas, particularly the corticothalemic loops.
So calling the thalamus the seat of consciousness is like saying the water comes from the valve because if that stuck closed no water flows. The thalamus is critical for consciousness, but that doesn’t mean consciousness originates there. Most of the sophisticated processing that creates the rich representations we refer to as qualia or consciousness originates in the cortex; The thalamus and basal ganglia are more involved in selecting between possible such representations.
I wish I had time to dig into this more; consciousness is fascinating, and I’m hoping it even becomes important again if people start arguing for AI rights on the basis of consciousness. Until then, I’m going to focus on alignment.
Pardon any errors from phone, voice, transcription.
Pardon the semantic argument, but:
Saying the thalamus is not the seat of consciousness is like saying Washington D. C. is not the seat of US government because voting constituents live all over the country or because Wall Street is a powerful lobbying group. Washington D. C. is considered the seat of US government because although disparate forces influence the decision making process in Washington, the actual process of combining these disparate influences into a coherent unitary final decision happens through the mechanisms present in Washington D. C.
I’ll pardon it but I won’t engage with it. I think saying it’s the seat of consciousness makes you sound like you don’t know what’s going on, when actually you do. I could be right or wrong.
Okay fine, I’ll engage a little. I do love this shit, even though I try not to spend time on it because it’s a mess with little payoff (unless the aforementioned debate over AI consciousness starts to seem relevant to our odds of survival—which it well might).
I don’t think your DC as the seat of government metaphor goes through. DC is indeed the seat of government. The thalamus isn’t in charge of consciousness, it’s just a valve (but far more sophisticated; an arena of competition) that someone else turns: the cortex and basal ganglia, in elaborate collaboration. The thalamus is the mechanism by which their decisions are enforced; it doesn’t seem to play a large role in deciding what’s attended.