Is consciousness a cosmic phenomenon?

What is the place of intellect and consciousness in the universe? This is the subject of my article "Consciousness, a Cosmic Phenomenon" my article* in the Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research (JCER). According to the hypothesis, mental processes are analogous to physical ones; like photons and emotions, the fundamental forces of motivation carry energy. Through inspiration, photons generate light, and emotions help recover mental balance. 

Cosmological evolution, which increases complexity, culminates in the intelligent mind; it also gives rise to the poles of the universe, the black and the white holes. Thus, just like material particles, the intellect is an elementary constituent of the cosmos. 

At the time of death, the sensory organs cease to operate. An electric spike can be measured about 60 to 120 ms after the body becomes pulseless. Without sensory interaction, the mind moves toward its polar position, information, or energy. The polarization triggers a journey toward one of the poles of the cosmos. An energy-rich, positive mind converges towards expanding white holes, whereas information-saturated negative souls become part of the black hole horizon. 

In the expanding white hole, space is infinite, yet everything feels neighborly, and the infinite feels like a moment. The opposite is true for black holes, where the moment feels like an eternity but is weighed down by a two-dimensional tightness, where everything is far and beyond reach. As an elementary particle, the universe joins with the mind and matter into an organizational unity. These three interconnected, interdependent building blocks form a fractal structure. Intelligent life is a microcosm of the universe, and the mind is an active participant in cosmic evolution. 

Read the whole article on the Journal website, Academia, or ResearchGate.

Learn more about consciousness on my YouTube channel

*Deli, E., Consciousness, a cosmic phenomenon—A hypothesis. (2016) Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research 7(11): 910-930.


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Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

From Aristotle to Mach's principle

Aristotle, marble portrait bust, Roman copy (2nd century BC) of a Greek original 

Our 21st-century world boasts a highly interconnected society, unprecedented technological development and increasing democratization all over the world, yet scientific literacy is lagging behind. Even science seem to be struggling with some basic questions, such as time, gravity or space. In many ways we still think in terms absolute time and space, inherited from Newtonian physics, However, the need for unique reference frame contradicts some basic, contemporary requirements of science, such as Mach's principle, which disfavors the existence of a particular orientation, i.e., reference frame. Although in a different context, the scientific and philosophical principle was debated since antiquity. For example, Aristotle viewed space only epitomizing the place of objects. Newton, however, built his theory on absolute space.

Aristotle's idea was reformulated in Mach's principle, which strongly motivated Einstein. According to Mach's principle, all locations and all motions are relative; the results of the measurements should not depend on the choice of coordinates assigned to events. Inertial mass is determined by the mass distribution of the universe and inertia is caused by the gravitational action of distant matter. Mach's revolutionary insight is the realization of the impossibility to measure changes with time. "Time is the abstraction at which we arrive by the changes of things." Nevertheless, in contrast to its name, 'relativity' it still contains absolute elements and does not resolve the problem of the origin of inertia and fails to follow Mach's principle.

Let's examine the global picture of the universe about Mach's principle. It is known that black holes have immense field strength. Current findings even show that black hole horizons are information blocking, two-dimensional firewalls that cannot be approached. This is only possible if black holes form the outer boundary of the universe. In this case, Mach's principle is automatically followed due to dimensionality differences of space. The exponentially increasing field strength close to the black holes would lead to greater inertia and the smaller field strength in cosmic voids would generate small inertia.

Ernst Mach, Austrian physicist, and philosopher 

In the Aristotelian view, a vacuum does not exist. In Newtonian physics vacuum is just a void, in quantum mechanics vacuum energy gives rise to virtual particles, in a process of constant creation and annihilation, and dictated by the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. The universe might agree with Aristotle with a twist, however. If a vacuum would increase the dimensions of the universe, then a vacuum would lead to the expansion of space and lead to the experience of dark energy. This vacuum would generate a pressure at opposite regions i. e., the black holes of the universe. The pressure extends into gravitational regions as excess gravity, called dark matter. This simple, organically unified picture of the cosmos leads to an intuitive understanding of space and time as fundamental, interconnected fields. More information can be found in my book, 'The Science of Consciousness.' Such organic unity of the cosmos certainly would fit well with Aristotle.

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Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

The physical foundation of the cosmos leads to Zeno's paradox

Zeno's paradox centers on the relative movement that can be viewed as a discrete series. The above illustration portrays the relative movement of Achilles and a turtle. In the paradox, Achilles is in a footrace with the tortoise. Achilles allows the tortoise a head start of 100 meters. Each racer starts running at some constant speed, one faster than the other. When Achilles will have run 100 meters, he is at the tortoise's starting point. During this time, the tortoise has run a much shorter distance, say 2 meters. It will then take Achilles some further time to run that distance, by which time the tortoise will have advanced farther; and then more time still to reach this third point, while the tortoise moves ahead. Thus, whenever Achilles arrives somewhere the tortoise has been, he still has some distance to go before he can even reach the tortoise. 

Intuitively, the running Achilles reaches and overtakes the turtle in a finite time. Nevertheless, Zeno's logic takes apart the movement into a series of discrete distances, which sections Achilles' motion into an infinite sequence regarding the turtle's position. Although Achilles gets infinitesimally closer to the turtle, he can never reach it.

The old philosophical puzzle might be representative of the universe's deep structure, the separate entities of space and time. Time represents compact dimensions forming standing waves of discrete energy vibrations. In contrast, space is the smooth spatial topology of the gravity field. The contrasting dynamics of time and space leads to the many contradiction of quantum mechanics and can lead to Zeno’s paradox. Zeno's paradox is an example of a discrete system interacting with a smoothly changing one.

The topology of space between the poles (black and white holes), demonstrated by a Breton hat

The global topology of the universe is formulated by the spatial field, demonstrated by a Breton hat above. The field curvature changes smoothly from the black holes toward expansion near the white holes, whereas the micro dimensions form standing waves, a quantized, step-wise progression between the poles. Constant frequency waves of the micro dimensions organize along the constant field curvature of space. The macro-and micro dimensions are connected via interaction, or decoherence, which ensures their congruent development and interdependent relationship, as shown in Zenon's paradox. This is the quality of wave decoherence in quantum mechanics. The connection between sequences formed of discrete series (quantum mechanics) and a field with smooth gradation (gravity) has been featured in my earlier post and YouTube video. Such orthogonal relationships can also be found in many other areas, from physical sciences to social phenomena. 

Gaussian (left) and Power-law distribution (right)

The compact dimensions maintain a minimal closed surface within each standing wave succession between the poles; inverse volume changes by Lorentz transformations enhance field curvature and pressure differences (above left). However, the curving field directs the participant's decision, and the participant's choice further modifies the field (as observed along the brim and the top of the hat). Hence, deterministic, irreversible, and self-perpetuating changes give rise to singularities, called poles in the curving field. The polar singularities stabilize the structure of the cosmos (shown above, right). 

The increasing gravitational differences of space versus the compact dimensions' minimal surface engender the large-scale spatial-temporal complexities and cellular structure of the universe and reflect the contradiction of Zeno's paradox: the smooth changes of the field occur parallel to the step-wise changes of energy. These discrete fluctuations in space might give rise to quantum phenomena in physical systems and form the basis of the quantum computer. Fractal and cellular structure reappears on many scales in the material world, biology, and society. Hence, quantum phenomena (correlation between discrete and smoothly changing systems) might be more general in the material world, biological systems, conscious processing, and society.

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The benefits of cognitive and physical training on mental functioning

Older women

Executive function refers to the ability to flexibly select information, maintain, update, and generalize meanings and fluidly innovate ideas, while at the same time sustaining a goal in mind. Older adults consistently perform lower in executive and memory tests, than younger people, because physical, cognitive and memory decline lead to problems in executive function. However, physically active adults tend to maintain greater flexibility, energy (mental and physical) in old age. With increasing life expectancy and skyrocketing costs of end-of-life care, preserving psychological and physical health into old age is also a social, economic issue.

Imaging methodologies can study how cognition and brain function is related to functional changes in the brain. When advanced reasoning training, cognitive training and physical training were compared in a randomized, comparative trial in on older adults (56–75 years), both physical and cognitive exercises were found beneficial. However, while advanced reasoning training could increase the resilience of neural function and overall cognitive brain health, Goal Management Training benefited working memory, verbal and abstract reasoning; it also reduced depressive symptoms. Interval training might stall and even reverse the signs of aging because it triggers the formation of new neurons in the hippocampus, a critical brain region for learning, memory and mood regulation. Learning to play a musical instrument also has been shown to prevent mental decline. 

The present results thus provide clinically-relevant evidence that aerobic exercise and cognitive reasoning training improves brain health differently. As life expectancy increases, the cognitive benefits of healthy habits, such as complex reasoning and aerobic exercise is becoming more critical to understand. Future trials might determine the possible additive effects of combined protocols, such as reasoning training/physical activity, in cognitive vitality. Evidence supports the intuitive view that any exercise program is better than none and that exercise improves life functionality more than specific cognitive training protocols. However, there is no better time to start exercising then right now. Do not forget weight-bearing exercises, which improve coordination and balance, and prevent osteoporosis! However, exercise is beneficial at any age, and if you start right now, you will be way ahead of the competition by the time your hair turns gray. 

  
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Brain stimulation, potentials and limitations

Human brain By NIDA

Electrodes placed on the cortical surface can measure the brain's electric activity. An EEG or electroencephalogram picks up voltage fluctuations resulting from an ionic current of the cortical neurons located close to the brain's surface. Recently, it has been noted that the process can be reversed. Electrical, magnetic, radio waves or focally targeted sources can modulate the brain's electric activity. Brain stimulation can be used in the treatment of disease and for mental manipulation of healthy subjects. 

In disease:

The number of brain areas that can be manipulated with electric impulses toward physiological and physical changes is growing. Brain stimulation uses electrodes implanted deep in the brain to influence activity there. It can be an effective treatment for Parkinson's disease, depression, chronic pain, and other movement disorders, but the results have been inconsistent so far. For example, individual differences in the position of brain structures can influence the procedure's effectiveness. Potentially dangerous side effects can occur due to the incision. Deep brain stimulation without incision is a brainwave "mirroring" of neural oscillations between the two hemispheres. The new technique is a promising treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) patients. It improves insomnia, depressive mood, and anxiety, and the results seem to be durable through 6 months after the treatment. 

In healthy subjects:

In healthy subjects, brain stimulation can enhance creativity. Stimulation of the frontal brain has increased performance and endurance in tasks requiring sustained attention and focus. Magnetic stimulation improved spatial-precision memory. Transcranial direct current stimulation with slow oscillations during slow-wave sleep almost doubles overnight memory retention. It improves the piloting skills of novice pilots. Studies in rodents have shown motivation and behavior modification by manipulating the VTA  (small area at the base of the brain, marked on the human brain image), potentially treating addiction and other mental problems. However, the treatments are based exclusively on empirical studies because the theoretical background for brain stimulation still needs to be included.

A new, physics-based hypothesis of consciousness is urgently needed to give brain stimulation a strong predictive power. The book 'The Science of Consciousness considers brain frequencies and emotions as the brain's energy states. For example, enhanced brain frequencies are essential in focused activities and during physical or emotional pain. In contrast, decreasing frequencies correspond to joy and creative states. However, in the brain's complex operation, the relative change of the frequencies and their rhythm is essential, not their absolute value. Changing the energy balance through manipulating brain frequencies has a powerful physiological influence, making it an efficient modulator of thinking, emotional states, and behavior. Long-term stimulation can modify the strength or even induce the formation of new synaptic paths, leading to learning and some possible long-term consequences. 

Infrared light (IR) has recently become popular as a high spatial resolution and safe method to regulate neural function. Although the underlying mechanism remains unclear, infrared neuromodulation methods have been used to treat neural activation, central nervous system disorders, and cognitive enhancement. IR neural modulation (INM) can increase cerebral blood flow and improve emotional and mental functions. Behavioral modifications can stabilize brain stimulation's effects. 

Brain stimulation is intriguing and has enormous promise, meaning it is here to stay. Currently, it is easier to justify balancing the potential benefits and side effects in the clinic than in education, in a classroom, or at home.

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The book Emotional Reasoning: Insight into the Conscious Experience is published on August 30, 2024. 

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Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

Belief and emotional gravity; the opposing poles of the mental universe

Gravity curving the fabric of space

Gravity is an ever-present force. It causes material interaction, which acts back on gravity. It governs the movement of objects and dictates the posture of living creatures, plants, and animals. Yet, we take gravity for granted, only becoming aware of it when we lose our balance or accelerate. 

Gravity underlies material existence, and temporal gravity gives a stable foundation for our mental world and formulates temporal or emotional gravity. Because gravity is a pressure characteristic of massive objects, temporal gravity is both a supporting social net and the stress of expectations and restrictions (temporal pressure). Emotional gravity depends on the social environment. Immense temporal gravity is constricting. Temporal gravity triggers detail orientation and a negative attitude, making problems—even the easiest ones—difficult. For this reason, enormous individual differences in emotional gravity among animals and people exist. As density and mass determine material structures, emotional gravity gives rise to a hierarchic society. Nevertheless, constant change degrades the feeling of security and can even lead to madness. 

Characteristics of high temporal gravity: 

• A critical tendency, resistance to change 
• Enthusiastic about starting projects but not having the patience to finish them 
• The propensity for highly repetitious language 
• Insecurity causes a need for control but creates a vulnerability to cheating 
• Prone to emotional swings (personal attacks, violence followed by regret, and accommodation)

Emotional gravity depends on individual characteristics and even age. Young people's small emotional gravity lends flexibility and resiliency, allowing them to adapt well to changes, including fashion trends. Temporal gravity increases with age, muting the intensity of emotions, so the difference between joy and pain decreases. Deterministic brain frequencies form a detail-oriented and highly uncertain mental world requiring constant assurance. Because temporal gravity is stable in time, it provides the energy to hold on and maintain old habits, relationships, and belongings. 

People with high emotional gravity often resort to criticism in an inherent search to test the environment's temporal limitation. Their insecurity and neediness prompt a quest to increase control, leading to abusive tendencies. Gaslighting is the intentional creation of insecurity by falsifying reality, named after a film with the same title. 

Opposite to gravity, belief and trust are sources of emotional strength and prerequisite of intellect, permitting positive emotional states. Even suffering and pain have a meaning for them. Belief is inner confidence of trust, which gives courage and inspires selflessness and altruism. Even in difficult, adverse consequences, it permits adherence to moral principles. Belief is the stable intellectual ground on which to formulate a system of thought in the mind. This organizational reflection of the world and society is called a worldview. What is your worldview? Does it support your goals with trust and confidence, or does it undermine your future by filling you with hesitation and fear?

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Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

How to prepare for major life changes

Summitting Island Peak By Mountaineer

Mountain climbing is a sport that requires not only physical preparation but careful forethought and resilience as well. Getting appropriate gear is essential. Once on the mountain, every step needs to be negotiated carefully and crossing big boulders, hiatuses must occur in one jump, in the first try, because an unsuccessful attempt can be fatal. In addition, unsuccessful attempts tire the climber physically and mentally, dramatically increasing the chances of failure in subsequent attempts. This rule and pattern are also true for life, where big changes are difficult to execute and can be excruciating to adjust. Even positive events, such as carrier opportunities can throw an unprepared person off guard. Attempting to execute major transformations without proper preparation can force a person to fall back to where they have started, often saddled with remorse, skeptical environment, and emotional turmoil, leading to an eventual resignation. Careful preparation and forethought increase the chances of success and encourages a patience to wait for the right time to carry them out. Preparation includes, but not limited to, saving up money, mental or physical training or learning about the details of the planned change. Diligent preparation is the key to manage changes.

What are the steps of careful preparation? In the physical world movement in a straight line is rarely possible, for example, it is necessary to slow down when changing direction or taking a U-turn. Although in the abstract mental world there are no signposts, the challenges are fairly similar in the physical world. When there are blocks in the road, it might be necessary to slow down and change direction. Pushing forcefully toward one objective is tiring and rarely leads to a productive outcome. The best way to progress is to take advantage of the openings offered by life's events. The shortcut to success lies in taking suitable opportunities with courage, which requires the confidence coming from diligent preparation. There might be blind alleys or dead ends, but a well-prepared traveler is patient to wait for the best weather conditions and chooses safe paths. When opportunity knocks, he charges ahead without hesitation. 

Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

After primordial oscillations a Foam: the secondary structure of the universe

Sloan Digital Sky Survey, The accumulation of gravity-bound structures, are shown in yellow. 

The Big Bang, the hundred years old idea that is meant to explain the even distribution of the cosmos, is in trouble. The microwave background radiation, which is the only tell-tale sign of the formation of the universe, is in apparent contradiction with a central origin of space. As my earlier blog demonstrate, large spatial fluctuations could gradually slow down due to friction, which might have given rise to compact dimensions. The existence of compact dimensions means that any change in field curvature requires energy. The energy requirement slows and inhibits changes and stabilizes the spatial structure. Current data well support such a process. Analysis of the universe material distribution at the largest scales shows a filamentary, wavy organization, utterly congruent with mixing and spreading of three-dimensional waves within a perfect fluid. Indeed, gargantuan spring oscillations in an ideal vacuum would lead to highly fluid oscillations. Also, such frictionless oscillations must have ended as space transitioned toward a harder state.

A more detailed analysis of the universe reveals a foamy structure embedded within the immense filaments. The above image is a time-lapse photo of the cosmos; large-scale foam structure evolves toward the more recent, lower portion of the picture. In physical processes, such structure arises, due to whipping or expanding material within a flexible medium, which can retain its inner structure through hardening. The secondary organization of the universe consists of various sized empty bubbles surrounded by galaxies and other gravity bound structures. These secondary formations resulted as expanding space formed huge bubbles and pushed positive curvature regions outward. The above data suggests that the universe, which has started out as a highly flexible system, was subjected to whipping or expansion before gradual hardening.

Laniakea Supercluster of Galaxies  Curved paths indicate material (galactic) movement (Tully, 2014)

The reason for this solidifying can be found in the smallest structure of space in string theory. The birth of the compact dimensions of string theory (called the Calabi-Yau space) must have been a universal break on the oscillations. Interactions of the compact dimensions produce gravity, which hardens spatial structure. Indeed, gravitational regions, accompanied by immense field strength, form rigid structures. The gravity-bound areas retain a solid and stable large-scale structure, whereas smaller-curvature parts are highly flexible. The stiff structures of galaxies can only form outside and around the cosmic voids. The above image clearly shows the opening of the empty void enclosed by gravitational areas. Light converges due to the gravitational pull of large objects and diverges due to the negative-curving field. Thus light follows the: on the grandest scale, the cosmos is like a house of mirrors. More details, such as the role of gravity in the large-scale structure of the universe, can be found in my book, 'The Science of Consciousness.' On the above figure, Laniakea Super-cluster contains the Milky-way galaxy, the home of our own solar system.


THE GROWING CASE AGAINST THE BIG BANG

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Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

Primordial oscillations, an alternative mechanism to the Big Bang

Microwave anisotropy map of the universe

Big Bang is the scientifically accepted theory for the initial formation of the universe. The model accounts for the gargantuan size of the universe and its apparently perfectly even distribution. To solve the presumably extremely high initial density with the resulting uniform structure all over space, an immense and sudden increase in size, explosion, has been put forward. A faster bang, called inflation, was suggested to accommodate observations that showed an extremely smooth distribution of the large-scale structure in the cosmos. However, the driving force of inflation is missing, and the mechanism conflicts on many points with the microwave background radiation. Below I introduce an alternative possibility that can generate a uniform matter distribution throughout the visible cosmos, and it is also coherent with the microwave background radiation.

The book ‘The science of consciousness’ shows that the universe's primordial energy is formed by one-dimensional string vibrations. Therefore string theory replaces Big Bang as the originator of the cosmos. Because primordial string vibrations preceded stable spatial structure, temperature, or pressure, they could occur with abundance and fluidity. The kinetic energy of string fluctuations would generate compactification and insulation by a smooth, symmetric, and information blocking the horizon. The energy needs that formed compact dimensions calibrated the constant energy level of space. The compact dimension formation would give rise to the first interactions, time zero of the universe. Interaction, an energy-requiring volume exchange between space and the compact dimensions, stabilized the spatial structure. This is the birth of interacting fermions and the beginning of time.

The time progression from left to right shows the gradual formation of foam (credit: NSF)

The latest cosmological data show a filament structure on the largest scales of the universe, congruent with string oscillations. The above mechanism also fits well with the cosmic background radiation measurements, which shows that the curvature of space is nearly flat, and the fluctuations show almost Gaussian (even) distribution. The series of pictures above indicate how the parallel evolution of gravity-bound structures with the expansion of space. Without a stable spatial field, lissome string fluctuations could not have given rise to gravitational waves. Consequently, Big Bang gravitational waves cannot be detected with even our current, sophisticated technology. (The recently discovered gravitational waves are the result of a black hole collision.) The decreasing amplitude oscillations could very well calibrate the constant energy level of space and, at the moment of creation, spike the temperature, allowing recombination and nucleosynthesis. The high temperature would drive spatial expansion. Secondary interactions would give rise to a foamy structure. This simple mechanism can eliminate many problems that plague the theory of Big Bang and inflation.

Problems with the standard model of Cosmology are listed in a recent publication...

Want to learn more? More information can be found in my book, The science of consciousness.

Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli

The holographic principle, a possible explanation for particle mass

Natural logarithm of three generations of fermion masses. The natural logarithm of fermion masses increases linearly within each particle type (quarks, electrons, and neutrinos). The only deviation is for down quarks. 

Material fermions come in three families. The exponentially increasing masses of particles within one particle family has been a puzzle. 'The science of consciousness,' introduces in a cohesive, coherent physical view that examines particle operation, and cosmology from the same perspective, which shed light to the puzzling differences between masses of fermion generations. Particles are not static objects but can transform into each other within one family by controlling energetic changes of the environment. Landauer’s principle recognizes the thermodynamic connection between energy and information. For the first time ever, converting information into free energy has been demonstrated (Toyabe et al., 2010) and the exact amount of heat released when one bit of information was erased has been measured by Bérut and colleagues (2012). As a consequence, information-saturated regions will heat up, whereas energy-rich areas will be cold. The holographic principle in string theory recognizes that the information of a volume of space is contained on the boundary (Susskind, 1994) and black holes are information-saturated. The regions of black holes, which are known to be information-saturated therefore should display extreme (hot) temperatures. Taken together, the holographic principle and Landauer’s principle mean that information accumulation of particles by the incessant standing-wave tick-tock of the universe eventually uses up energy and turns those particles into black holes. This is an important realization because it means that within one family, particles only differ in their energy-information content and energy information change would exponentially increase mass. If this is true, then the natural logarithm of particle mass within one family would formulate a straight line. The above figure clearly shows this to be the case. The vastly different mass members of the three-particle families are stable only within the corresponding field strength of vastly divergent gravity environments. For example, within Earth’s mild gravity, only the lowest mass of each particle type is stable. However, greater gravity environments, such as neutron stars would favor the second or third generations of fermions.

Want to learn more? More information can be found in my book, The science of consciousness

Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli