Consciousness — the experience of being — remains one of the most profound unsolved questions in science and philosophy.
The computer follows pure logic, as it processes bits of information, flipping ones and zeros. Its data is perfect because it can be copied without error, backed up, and restored. The core assumption behind conscious AI is that you can run the "software" on any hardware; it is designed to be immortal. The AI industry, in its quest for consciousness, increases the data size of their machines, hoping that if it is powerful enough, it will eventually 'wake up' and become conscious like us. However, a fascinating and fundamental law of physics suggests this might be impossible. The reason? A single thought has a physical cost. And our machines aren't paying it.
In 1961, a physicist named Rolf Landauer discovered a profound truth: information is physical. He calculated that whenever a computer irreversibly erases a single bit of information—truly wiping it from existence—it must pay a tiny energy tax. Forgetting is not free, but it releases heat. Landauer's Principle bridges the world of information and the world of thermodynamics, shedding light on the physical nature of information.
If we consider the brain as a prediction engine, it is constantly guessing what will happen next. Every time it's right, it reinforces a pathway. Every time it's wrong, it erases the faulty prediction. This process is a biological, energetic, and irreversible process, and it generates heat. This coherent stream of consciousness is a thermodynamic process, constantly burning fuel to stay coherent. It is fundamentally and irreversibly tied to the arrow of time. Memories are costly physical scars etched into our neural pathways. When the brain erases a possibility, it is gone forever, paid for with a real expenditure of energy. Its computations are tied to the irreversible, dissipative, and mortal structure of the body. The brain has to fight every second to maintain its existence—a process called homeostasis.
Our current systems, no matter how complex, cannot replicate this subjective effort. They rely on external power. Their "learning" doesn't involve a costly, irreversible change to their fundamental structure. They can simulate the outcome of a feeling with stunning accuracy, but they do not feel the cost of that feeling. How can we create a machine that can get tired, that can make mistakes it can't undo, and whose very existence is a fleeting, precious state? This constant struggle for stability is a defining feature of consciousness. Thus, the price of consciousness is mortality itself. And that is a price no immortal machine can ever pay.
Image credit: Integrated circuit; Uberpenguin with the assistance of Matt Gibbs
You can order the book "Emotional Reasoning: Insight into the Conscious Experience."
Copyright © 2025 by Eva Deli
