Sentiomics: the identification and analysis of dynamical patterns that characterize sentience

Abstract

Sentience, defined as the capacity of feeling, for example, to experience basic sensations such as hunger, thirst and other types of qualitative mental states, is a psychobiological phenomenon that involves dynamic patterns of electrochemical (below 1Hz) and electromagnetic (above 1Hz) waves in living systems. The science we have called Sentiomics studies unconscious dynamic patterns in the brain that define the capacity for feeling. This paper discusses the explanation of creative processes based on unconscious patterns that combine and constructively interfere, generating a conscious output experienced in the living system's first-person perspective. We claim that the Sentiomics approach to wave interferences helps to explain creative intuition, artistic creativity, the formation of dreams, and related phenomena. We raise a hypothesis – based on available evidence, to be experimentally tested – that the dominance of slower synchronized oscillatory frequencies (such as Delta, Theta and Alpha bands) in scalp electroencephalogram spectra makes more room for constructive electrochemical interferences supporting creativity. This research points to the dynamism of the unconscious mind, since such interferences happen without the need of conscious control but are influenced by the degree of attention focusing. Once those dynamic processes are understood, they can be used to enrich mental life, boost creativity in general, and improve decision-making processes.