Quantum fields are consciousness: A groundbreaking new theory by the inventor of the microprocessor
Seeing | Quantum Theory | 2024-06-16
Hans Busstra, MA
Federico Faggin
A new groundbreaking theory of consciousness proposes that qualia — for instance, the scent of a rose — reside in quantum fields. Federico Faggin is one of the greatest luminaries of high technology alive today. A physicist by education, he is the inventor of the microprocessor and the MOS silicon gate technology, both of which underlie the modern world’s entire information technology. With the knowledge and experience of a lifetime in cutting-edge fields, Federico now turns his attention to consciousness and the nature of reality, sharing with us his profound insights on the classical and quantum worlds, artificial intelligence, life and the human mind. In this discussion, he elaborates on an idealist model of reality, produced after years of careful thought and direct experience, according to which nature’s most fundamental level is that of consciousness as a quantum phenomenon, while the classical physical world consists merely of evocative symbols of a deeper reality.
Order “Irreducible: Consciousness, Life, Computers, and Human Nature” on Amazon
00:00 Intro
02:15 Announcing Irreducible: Consciousness, Life, Computers, and Human Nature
03:28 Core Message of Irreducible
05:23 Bernardo Kastrup on Irreducible
13:17 Introduction at ASML by Hans Busstra
18:55 Interview with Federico at ASML
21:37 When did you realize consciousness cannot be computed?
25:43 On the distinction between intelligence and consciousness
36:04 Federico’s theory in relation to The Matrix
37:35 You have to start with consciousness and free will as postulates
42:42 Are emotions a product of consciousness?
43:30 What about a person who is brain-dead?
47:54 Federico on the fact that his theory is speculative but needed
49:24 On the order of consciousness, life, computers, human nature
50:57 The universe wants to know itself
52:37 Quantum theory and pre-modern intuitions
53:55 The evolution of life is cycle of meaning to symbol
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As any essay on free will, the present one is bound to be polemic. We believe the debate on free will is important and the present essay meaningfully contributes to it. Nonetheless, we feel bound to clarify our editorial position here: as a foundation dedicated to promoting objective formulations of metaphysical idealism, we endorse the existence of a reality beyond the seemingly personal self, which behaves in a predictable, lawful manner. An implication of this view is the impossibility of libertarian free will: we do make our own choices, but our choices are determined by that which we, and the universe around us, are. Yet we believe that there is a very important sense in which free will does exist: under idealism, the universe is constituted by the excitations of one, universal field of subjectivity. The impetus towards self-excitation that characterizes this field of subjectivity is free will, for it depends on nothing else. The entire dance of universal unfolding is a dance of universal free will. This is the sense in which, for example, Federico Faggin and our own Bernardo Kastrup defend the fundamental existence of free will in nature. This understanding of free will is entirely compatible with the understanding that our choices are determined but that which we truly are. Finally, objective formulations of metaphysical idealism deny, just as the author of the present essay does, the fundamental existence of a personal self. Instead, the latter is regarded as a transient, reducible configuration of the underlying field of subjectivity. As such, there cannot be such a thing as personal, egoic free will, for the personal self itself isn’t a fundamental construct.
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