Conscious Agents Research Articles

What is it like to be unitarily reversed?

There has been in recent years a huge surge of interest in the so-called extended Wigner’s friend scenario (EWFS). In short, a series of theorems (with some variation in detail) puts pressure on the ability of different agents in the scenario to account for each of the others’ measured outcomes: the outcomes cannot be assigned single well-defined values while also satisfying other reasonable physical assumptions. These theorems have been interpreted as showing that there can be no absolute, third-person, ‘God’s eye’ description of our reality. The focus of this paper is the strongest of these no-go theorems, the ‘local friendliness’ theorem of Bong et al. (2020, Nature Physics, 16, 1199–1205), which gives earnest consideration to the possibility of a measurement that unitarily reverses an entire lab system, including a conscious agent, thereby erasing the agent’s memory. The purpose of this paper is to begin the philosophical conversation regarding key questions concerning this process: Are the events in the lab merely ‘erased’, or do they in some sense not exist at all? What would it be like to be unitarily reversed? Should an agent care about any experiences they have inside the lab before they are reversed? This analysis employs a parallel case of memory erasure, to which this case can be contrasted, arising in the context of drug-induced amnesia as a result of administering anaesthesia during medical procedures (Carbonell, 2014, Bioethics, 28(5), 245–254). I argue that the consequences of unitarily reversing an agent are much more dramatic than simply memory erasure—the set of events themselves, and the personal timeline of the agent, leave no record at all inside or outside the lab. I consider the ramifications of this for the picture of reality that arises from the EWFS.

Experiencing the Call of Duty: Exploring Emotions in Commercial War Games

This article explores how players interpret and reflect on themes in mainstream war videogames, specifically the Call of Duty franchise. Scholars have long focused on the ideological content of war games, which is marked by increased collusion of military institutions with the gaming industry and assumptions about the influential capabilities of war games, in which player agency is often downplayed. This study builds on Lenoir and Caldwell’s (2018) observations that the interpretation of mainstream franchises should focus more on their attempts to create an “affective framework” that emphasises certain emotions in players. Through a thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with 25 participants, this study found that participants outlined their discomfort in certain missions, to the point where they even altered their playstyle, suggesting that players often reflect critically on the aspects of war these games explore. This article concludes that mainstream franchises, like Call of Duty, should be considered complex cultural artefacts consisting of various layers of meaning. Rather than directly transmitting militaristic ideologies, these games craft an emotional aesthetic capable of exploring more controversial aspects of war. The key to understanding these franchises lies directly with the players themselves, which is why audiences should be treated as conscious agents who play an active role in drawing meaning from such an aesthetic.

Against the depoliticisation of Palestinian female shahids

Palestinian women’s engagement with politics and their appropriation of conventionally masculine acts of martyrdom during the Second Intifada (2002–2005) have been subject to intense public debate, media scrutiny and contested cultural representations. This article, drawing on studies of terrorism as well as translation theory, examines first-hand accounts of acts of martyrdom by Palestinian women, which uphold Palestinian national and religious discourses of sacrifice. Failing to grapple with how and why Palestinians recognise these women’s acts as martyrdom, many Euro-American and Israeli scholars focus on personal, social and psychological motivations. While many Euro-American and Israeli scholars construct Palestinian female martyrs as socially deviant, we develop a different framework to understand female martyrdom on more local terms that resonate with Palestinians’ lived experience. We introduce five Palestinian female martyrs’ video testimonies that scholarship to date has overlooked. We contend that Palestinian female martyrs (shahids) are conscious agents whose final acts underscore their adherence to religious and national discourses of sacrifice.

Interfacing consciousness.

The current stage of consciousness science has reached an impasse. We blame the physicalist worldview for this and propose a new perspective to make progress on the problems of consciousness. Our perspective is rooted in the theory of conscious agents. We thereby stress the fundamentality of consciousness outside of spacetime, the importance of agency, and the mathematical character of the theory. For conscious agent theory (CAT) to achieve the status of a robust scientific framework, it needs to be integrated with a good explanation of perception and cognition. We argue that this role is played by the interface theory of perception (ITP), an evolutionary-based model of perception that has been previously formulated and defended by the authors. We are specifically interested in what this tells us about the possibility of AI consciousness and conclude with a somewhat counter-intuitive proposal: we live inside a simulation instantiated, not digitally, but in consciousness. Such a simulation is just an interface representation of the dynamics of conscious agents for a conscious agent. This paves the way for employing AI in consciousness science through customizing our interface.

Enhancing participatory governance in biosphere reserves through co-creation of transdisciplinary and intergenerational knowledge

In the context of the current global climate and biodiversity crisis, urgent action is needed to improve participatory and co-productive governance in territories under sustainability directives, such as biosphere reserves. These territories comprise a global network with the potential to apply and replicate sustainability actions, improve livelihoods, and boost climate change resilience while reducing impacts on the environment and the biodiversity in all continents. In the biosphere reserves network’s 50 years of existence, progress and setbacks have been reported in different regions around the world, and there is an urgent need to envision alternative futures. In this contribution, we describe the results and reflections of our ‘Open Academy’ that enhanced the participatory governance in La Campana–Peñuelas Biosphere Reserve in Central Chile. We crossed the traditional assessment with the principles of transdisciplinary and intergenerational knowledge co-creation. The results show that the traditional performance assessment shows a generally poor performance and reveals the weaknesses of the governance system of the reserve’s management. The extraction of water by mining and agroindustry, uncontrolled urbanization, wildfires, weak social participation, and low integration of indigenous communities are crucial issues for the performance of biosphere reserves. On the other hand, these territories have the potential as models toward post-extractive economies. Enhancing participatory governance, biosphere reserves shall serve as a) agents for configuring the future as an eco-social pact with the territory; b) pilot test areas for alternative futures; and c) places to promote the social collective as a conscious agent of the future.

“We know what we do”: an agency-structure analysis of political vigilantism in Ghana

Political vigilantism has come out as an offshoot of the violence that characterises multi party elections in Ghana. Several studies on political vigilantism give primacy to the role of structural factors in explaining the phenomenon in Ghana. However, such a notion deprives political vigilantes of any sense of agency and further evades how the understanding of the interaction between agency and structure can offer deeper insights into the phenomenon of political vigilantism. The paper argues that political vigilantes should be characterised as agents who can make decisions about the actions that they undertake and not solely determined by the constraints of structure. The actions of political vigilantes are mediated through social structures that shape the options available to them. Using purposive and snowball sampling techniques, 41 key informants were selected for the study in Accra, Kumasi and Tamale. The study employed both primary and secondary data sources. Whereas secondary data was sourced from desk reviews, primary data was collected through interviews and focus group discussions. The narratives were thematically analysed. The study findings show that members of political vigilante groups are conscious agents and for that matter decide and act either autonomously or relationally despite existing pressures from social structures. In addition, the paper shows that the exercise of agency among the vigilantes is inseparable from structure as the structure is reproduced and changed through the actions of the political vigilantes who in turn are shaped through the structures that they occupy. Therefore, policy responses to political violence should consider the two sides of the equation by working simultaneously on the behaviour of political actors and resolving the circumstances that facilitate political violence

A Novel Model of Narrative Memory for Conscious Agents

The aim of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is to build machines with cognitive abilities on par with humans. These abilities include sensing, reasoning, decision-making, and social interaction. Although great strides have been achieved in creating intelligent agents that can observe and form opinions about their surroundings, problems still arise when it comes to their ability to reason and make decisions. The lack of a narrative structure inside these intelligent beings is a major drawback. This study suggests creating a narrative memory model with a dedicated module for use by self-aware agents. The model incorporates narrative memory to improve the agent's perception, understanding, and decision-making capabilities. The conscious agent will be able to create, store, and recall narrative-like representations of prior experiences with the help of the narrative memory module. To help the agent make sense of its surroundings, this narrative structure will give a method for categorizing and linking data. The agent will be able to recognize patterns, determine causal linkages, and extrapolate future outcomes by drawing on its narrative memory. There are several benefits to incorporating narrative memory into the brain of a self-aware agent. First, it'll give the agent a richer context from which to draw insights and make judgments. Second, the agent's perception and interpretation of complicated circumstances, as well as its general reasoning abilities, will be bolstered by the narrative memory module. Thirdly, the agent will be able to develop over time by absorbing new information and incorporating it into its preexisting narrative memory. This study uses a narrative memory-based approach to close the gap between conscious agents and human-like reasoning. The goal of this study is to improve the cognitive capacities of conscious agents by giving them the capacity to create and employ narrative memories, thus facilitating more nuanced perception, comprehension, and decision-making. The findings of this study could have far-reaching implications for the fields of artificial intelligence, robotics, and human-computer interaction by accelerating the creation of AGI systems with human-level cognitive capacities.

The Formal Layer of {Brain and Mind} and Emerging Consciousness in Physical Systems

AbstractWe consider consciousness attributed to systems in space-time which can be purely physical without biological background and focus on the mathematical understanding of the phenomenon. It is shown that the set theory based on sets in the foundations of mathematics, when switched to set theory based on ZFC models, is a very promising mathematical tool in explaining the brain/mind complex and the emergence of consciousness in natural and artificial systems. We formalise consciousness-supporting systems in physical space-time, but this is localised in open domains of spatial regions and the result of this process is a family of different ZFC models. Random forcing, as in set theory, corresponds precisely to the random influence on the system of external stimuli, and the principles of reflection of set theory explain the conscious internal reaction of the system. We also develop the conscious Turing machines which have their external ZFC environment and the dynamics is encoded in the random forcing changing models of ZFC in which Turing machines with oracles are formulated. The construction is applied to cooperating families of conscious agents which, due to the reflection principle, can be reduced to the implementation of certain concurrent games with different levels of self-reflection.

Migrant workers navigating the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK: Resilience, reworking and resistance

Drawing on qualitative data, in this article the authors apply Katz’s conceptual framework of agency as resilience, reworking and resistance practices to theorise UK migrant workers’ responses to worsened employment conditions, stress of unemployment and reduced incomes during the Covid-19 pandemic. The article draws attention to the range of micro practices these workers adopted to survive and rework existing conditions to their advantage – actions which rarely feature in academic writing, yet which recognise those who do not ‘resist’ as conscious agents who exercise power. Meanwhile, although outright oppositional responses to deteriorating employment conditions are rare, the article demonstrates the nature of workplace union representation as a central factor in resisting managerial control. The article extends Katz’s framework by considering the ‘how’ and ‘why’ behind migrant workers’ responses, to understand better their dynamic choices of resilience, reworking and resistance practices in the chaotic circumstances of the pandemic.

No-Go Theorems on Machine Consciousness

Creating machines that are conscious is a long-term objective of research in artificial intelligence. This paper looks at this idea with new arguments from physics and logic. Observers have no place in classical physics, and although they play a role in measurement in quantum physics there is no explanation for their emergence within the framework. There is a suggestion that consciousness, which is implicitly a property of the observer, is a consequence of the complexity of specific brain structures, but this is problematic because one associates free will with consciousness, which goes counter to the causal closure of physics. Considering a nested physical system, we argue that even if the system were assumed to have agency, observers cannot exist within it. Since complex systems can be viewed in nested hierarchies, this constitutes a proof against consciousness as a product of complexity, for then we will have nested system of conscious agents. As the existence of consciousness in cognitive agents cannot be denied, the implication is that consciousness belongs to a dimension that is not physical and machine consciousness is unattainable. These ideas are used to take a fresh look at two well-known paradoxes of quantum theory that are important in quantum information theory.

The transnational prosocial activities of elite African footballers in their communities of origin

Through a digital ethnography of Twitter and Instagram and semi-structured interviews, this paper examined the different forms of prosocial activities of elite African footballers in their home countries. A few studies have examined ‘give back’ activities in communities of origin in the form of remittances to family and friends and social philanthropy initiatives. This approach has proven to be limited as it does not capture their non-material contributions to society. By framing the research problem around the concepts of prosocial behaviour and athlete citizenship, this study added new dimensions to our understanding of African players’ prosocial activities in their home countries. The findings show that African players are socially conscious agents who are obliged by their social norms and cultural values to support their communities in many different ways, including through active citizenship. The implication is that conceptions of the elite African athlete need to recognise them as ‘citizen athletes’ whose non-sporting lives go beyond remittances and philanthropy.

“An Active and Conscious Agent”? Ric Throssell and Soviet Espionage

“An Active and Conscious Agent”? Ric Throssell and Soviet Espionage

Functional contextual implementation of an evolutionary, entropy-based, and embodied free energy framework: Utilizing Lagrangian mechanics and evolutionary game theory's truth vs. fitness test of the veridicality of phenomenological experience.

The Bayesian approach of cognitive science largely takes the position that evolution drives perception to produce precepts that are veridical. However, some efforts utilizing evolutionary game theory simulations have shown that perception is more likely based on a fitness function, which promotes survival rather than promoting perceptual truth about the environment. Although these findings do not correspond well with the standard Bayesian approach to cognition, they may correspond with a behavioral functional contextual approach that is ontologically neutral (a-ontological). This approach, formalized through a post-Skinnerian account of behaviorism called relational frame theory (RFT), can, in fact, be shown to correspond well with an evolutionary fitness function, whereby contextual functions form that corresponds to a fitness function interface of the world. This fitness interface approach therefore may help provide a mathematical description for a functional contextual interface of phenomenological experience. Furthermore, this more broadly fits with a neurological active inference approach based on the free-energy principle (FEP) and more broadly with Lagrangian mechanics. These assumptions of how fitness beats truth (FBT) and FEP correspond to RFT are then discussed within a broader multidimensional and evolutionary framework called the extended evolutionary meta-model (EEMM) that has emerged out of the functional contextual behavioral science literature to incorporate principles of cognition, neurobiology, behaviorism, and evolution and are discussed in the context of a novel RFT framework called "Neurobiological and Natural Selection Relational Frame Theory" (N-frame). This framework mathematically connects RFT to FBT, FEP, and EEMM within a single framework that expands into dynamic graph networking. This is then discussed for its implications of empirical work at the non-ergodic process-based idiographic level as applied to individual and societal level dynamic modeling and clinical work. This discussion is framed within the context of individuals that are described as evolutionary adaptive and conscious (observer-self) agents that minimize entropy and can promote a prosocial society through group-level values and psychological flexibility.

Fusions of Consciousness.

What are conscious experiences? Can they combine to form new experiences? What are conscious subjects? Can they combine to form new subjects? Most attempts to answer these questions assume that spacetime, and some of its particles, are fundamental. However, physicists tell us that spacetime cannot be fundamental. Spacetime, they say, is doomed. We heed the physicists, and drop the assumption that spacetime is fundamental. We assume instead that subjects and experiences are entities beyond spacetime, not within spacetime. We make this precise in a mathematical theory of conscious agents, whose dynamics are described by Markov chains. We show how (1) agents combine into more complex agents, (2) agents fuse into simpler agents, and (3) qualia fuse to create new qualia. The possible dynamics of n agents form an n(n-1)-dimensional polytope with nn vertices-the Markov polytopeMn. The total fusions of n agents and qualia form an (n-1)-dimensional simplex-the fusion simplexFn. To project the Markovian dynamics of conscious agents onto scattering processes in spacetime, we define a new map from Markov chains to decorated permutations. Such permutations-along with helicities, or masses and spins-invariantly encode all physical information used to compute scattering amplitudes. We propose that spacetime and scattering processes are a data structure that codes for interactions of conscious agents: a particle in spacetime is a projection of the Markovian dynamics of a communicating class of conscious agents.

Opportunity Econophysics: Opportunity Cones, Conscious Agents, and Mechanical Traces of the Conscious Dimension

Opportunity Econophysics: Opportunity Cones, Conscious Agents, and Mechanical Traces of the Conscious Dimension

Capitalists or Fiduciary Conscious Agents? ESG Mutual Fund Fees and Investor Sophistication

Capitalists or Fiduciary Conscious Agents? ESG Mutual Fund Fees and Investor Sophistication

Untying the Gordian Knot: Process, Reality, and Context

Untying the Gordian Knot: Process, Reality, and Context

Towards Parallel Selective Attention Using Psychophysiological States as the Basis for Functional Cognition.

Attention is a complex cognitive process with innate resource management and information selection capabilities for maintaining a certain level of functional awareness in socio-cognitive service agents. The human-machine society depends on creating illusionary believable behaviors. These behaviors include processing sensory information based on contextual adaptation and focusing on specific aspects. The cognitive processes based on selective attention help the agent to efficiently utilize its computational resources by scheduling its intellectual tasks, which are not limited to decision-making, goal planning, action selection, and execution of actions. This study reports ongoing work on developing a cognitive architectural framework, a Nature-inspired Humanoid Cognitive Computing Platform for Self-aware and Conscious Agents (NiHA). The NiHA comprises cognitive theories, frameworks, and applications within machine consciousness (MC) and artificial general intelligence (AGI). The paper is focused on top-down and bottom-up attention mechanisms for service agents as a step towards machine consciousness. This study evaluates the behavioral impact of psychophysical states on attention. The proposed agent attains almost 90% accuracy in attention generation. In social interaction, contextual-based working is important, and the agent attains 89% accuracy in its attention by adding and checking the effect of psychophysical states on parallel selective attention. The addition of the emotions to attention process produced more contextual-based responses.

Learning and the Evolution of Conscious Agents

Learning and the Evolution of Conscious Agents

How Much Do We Really Care What We Pick? Pre-verbal and Verbal Investment in Choices Concerning Faces and Figures

Every day we make choices, but our degree of investment in them differs, both in terms of pre-verbal experience and verbal justification. In an earlier experimental study, participants were asked to pick the more attractive one among two human faces, and among two abstract figures, and later to provide verbal motivations for these choices. They did not know that in some of the cases their choices were manipulated (i.e., they were asked to motivate the item they had not chosen). Against claims about our unreliability as conscious agents (Nisbett et al. in Psychol Rev 84:231–259, 2013; Johansson et al. in Science 310:116–119, 2005), the study found that in about half the cases the manipulations were detected. In the present study, we investigated whether varying degrees of choice investment could be an explanatory factor for such findings. We analysed the verbal justifications of the participants along a set of semantic categories, based on theoretical ideas from phenomenology and cognitive linguistics, and formulated a matrix of eleven markers of choice investment. We predicted a greater degree of investment when motivating (a) choices of faces than figures, (b) manipulated than actual choices, and (c) detected than non-detected manipulations. These predictions were confirmed, but with various strength. This allows us to argue for both consilience and differences between pre-verbal choice investment and the corresponding verbal motivations of the choices made, and thus for (degrees of) conscious awareness of choice making.