[Excerpts and trace work of the lecture of Sir Roger Penrose delivered at Nandan, Calcutta on Consciousness as a Fundamental missing point in the present laws of Physics]
With a tradition of quantum mechanics in the background, the philosophical and metaphysical debate regarding Consciousness that no art or science can avoid but evade, there are few who are equipped to maintain rigour with lucidity while communicating on the subject. Sir Roger Penrose is one of the rare scientists of our age, who has found joy in writing for common and lay readers. His two books – The Emperor’s New Mind and Shadows of the Mind laid the discussion on the diverse topics such as Computation, Artificial Intelligence, Mathematical Truths, Quantum Phenomena and its implication to the processes of the brain and finally looking into Consciousness. His lecture at Nandan, Calcutta, organized by local British Council with the subject as above was part of his lecture-tour. Professor Penrose’s lecture was given along with some OHP slides, which were handmade, multi-coloured and simple. They actually aided the lecture rather than becoming an exhibition of itself as I have suffered many a business presentations where speakers with all high-tech computing devices show something on the screen and read them either looking at the audience or looking at the screen. Thank you, Professor.
The first general model of phenomenal world and the simplest of all is that picture of triangles - one point is the world of ideas, another is the physical world and the third point is not a point but a line, a connection – the incomprehensible connection by which we comprehend them. Sir Roger justly calls this picture as 3 worlds, 3 mysteries. It is our everyday experience and shared by scientists and artists that we can understand aspects of physical world by mental processes or roughly by Mind. Evoking the famous aphorism of Einstein that the greatest incomprehensibility of cosmos is its comprehensibility, Professor Penrose approached the great why or rather the underpinnings of the reason why there is a resonance between the ways mind works and universe operates. The laws of Physics (and in its most general and successful offering of the contemporary age – quantum physics) are derived from physical world and the picture of it we manipulate in our mind give rise to processes and a selective part of it crystallizes into set of laws and these are the Laws of Physics. Professor Penrose now approached the enquiry in understanding these processes of the Mind/Brain, their nature and the next – whether this has any similarity with something we are accustomed with. In moving to study by comparison, came the subject matter of Computation and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
The core of any AI system is an algorithm and hence arose the next question – whether the mind/brain processes are algorithmic or non-algorithmic. More closely and more non-technically – Can we ever build up a computer of sufficient complexity that will behave as a conscious Mind? The entire discussion now took the turn to Mathematics with reference to Godel’s theorem and Professor’s belief assured us – Consciousness is fundamentally different from Computational Complexity. In technical terms, parts of the Mind/Brain process are non-computable.
Mathematics, the exact of the sciences made a tremendous advance when Godel put forward his theorem which says something like this: Let us take a system S where we take R set of rules to be true. Now we can continue spewing sets of rules R(x)…….. and can prove them true only if we believe that R is true. This theorem is a cornerstone as well as a landmark of Mathematics and as S can be any system, the theorem is valid for all mathematical and logical systems. In other words, the theorem has provided the negative capabilities of logical systems where I use negative capability in the exactly same sense literary critics use them. Professor Penrose now made a distinction between mathematics as being computable and non-computable. Most of the mathematics is non-computable. Now, if mathematics has been so successful in being the language of science, logically, computation can only be a part of the processes that constitute our understanding of the physical world. Hence comes the computational world and non-computational world. Consciousness or the essence of it is the subject matter and the core of the non-computable world.
To distinguish between computable and non-computable, mathematician Penrose gives two examples. One is a chess problem and another is a mathematical theorem called Goldstein’s theorem. The chess problem is a snapshot of certain instant of a chess game where Deep Blue cannot make a game draw whereas a lay player only knowing the basic rules can. The algorithmic Deep Blue makes millions of moves but fails to understand in this maze the apparently simple and obvious move that will make the game draw. This insight where we arrive at a result, by selecting from billions of alternatives a single one is not an algorithmic one and has to do something somewhat different from computation. If quantum physics needs to be more generalized, then it has to be broader and the element of consciousness needs to be incorporated into it. Herein lies the missing point in our Laws of Physics. Without including the element of consciousness, we will be getting a partial picture of physical world (3 mysteries 3 worlds) and with the element of consciousness in it, scientists are in the view that whether the Laws will remain in their form and philosophy as they are. In short, incorporation of Consciousness into natural sciences will not stop only giving a New Physics but a whole new world itself.
Professor Penrose entered into the discussion on Quantum Physics, in line with the approach available in his books. However, we get a bonus here where he explained the classical-world (the world of ping-pong and cricket balls) and the quantum world (the world of electrons and sub-atomic particles) by an image – the picture of a Mermaid sitting on a rock, half submerged, half on the surface. At the surface we see a woman’s face, the water, the boats, the jetty far away. Under the same woman, the same woman is having a fish’s body, the fishes swimming and other aquamarine objects. Both are real worlds but both have different rules. However, at any moment when an event of the underworld (the quantum world) crosses the surface, an observer can detect things to which he is accustomed (the classical world) and this interface, where the two worlds are meeting is tremendously interesting, because this is where we are facing physical realities at their first-hand birth. There followed the discussions on the probabilities, wave function and EPR experiments and quantum non-locality. Here again, while speaking of complex number’s role in quantum mechanics [ j = sqrt (-1)], mathematician Penrose was
effusive – “.Earlier mathematicians thought these numbers as mere sort of sports but these numbers became foundations of the mathematics of quantum physics.”. There lies another incomprehensive beauty – Complex numbers, which is not needed for any real world transactions became the language of quantum mechanics, the most successful and general theory to explain physical phenomena.
If quantum mechanics is the most general theory on physical phenomena, cant it be applied to understand the processes between mind/brain and physical world, which provides us laws of physics over generations and after continuous refinement? Or in other words, if we term a large unknown part of the processes as Consciousness, can quantum theory give us insight in studying Consciousness? Like Schrodinger, Professor Penrose went to Science of Life and then to the neurology and the working of the brain. At this point of the lecture and which was also concluding part, Penrose informed us of the recent works on the area where there is a possibility that in the microtubules in the neuron, quantum processes may be taking place and those processes may be the until best known material processes that rise to Consciousness.
Concluding Remarks, thoughts and after-thoughts:
The
subject matter of the Lecture was vast, interdisciplinary and having high
historical background. It also informs quite categorically that we are need of
new insights about which we can approximate but we don’t have one now. In
talking of a more general theory that will incorporate consciousness, we can
visualize how that theory will look like within the present framework but we
have not found one yet.
In
our lives, there are moments when in dim bustle of everyday tinker and clinks,
we hear as if in our dreams a clarion call for knowing things. Those are also
the moments when we understand that our present hunger to know more owes
equally to the previous generations’ efforts and anguish. In the fearful world
of fragmented specialization, Professor Penrose like scientist is an exception.
His subjects of study is varied and in our continuing quest for
knowledge (of the physical and mental world), it is always reassuring as well
as a humbling experience to listen to such people, who though celebrated
themselves are discussing on topics of such
vast and profound nature that it becomes, finally a celebration of
humanity itself. Stephens Hawking, another physicist of our time told this so
beautifully – Humanity’s deepest desire for knowledge is the justification
enough of our continuing quest.
Contributor wordsmith was also a member of the audience at the Lecture Hall. The Hall was packed and wordsmith was delighted to find that Calcutta lives and has not forgotten totally its character to greet a great man or woman wherever she finds one and wherefrom they might have been.