From biology to physics and the unknown: What would it mean to understand consciousness?
Academia Biology July 15, 2025 Charles Capaday
None of the three classical theories of the mind–brain relation—Cartesian dualism, epiphenomenalism, and brain–mind identity theory—are based on explicit biological or physical mechanisms and are therefore not scientific. The Penrose–Hameroff orchestrated objective reduction theory does make testable biological predictions, but recent experimental tests require cautious interpretation. The neural correlates of consciousness do not support or falsify any of the three main ideas. To make the mind–brain problem scientific, conscious states must be measured directly, like electric current or blood pressure, with such measurements termed 'conscions' causally linked to neural activity. Even then, a deep gap remains, illustrated by Tyndall's point: knowing a molecule's handedness associated with love or hate does not explain why those feelings occur.