It may take several more centuries to fully understand the biological foundations of consciousness. But if only a couple of decades ago they did not even dare to start solving this problem, today scientific methods of research in this area have appeared.
In short, the answer is that science does not yet have a satisfactory explanation for this process. Satisfactory in the sense that Richard Feynman had in mind when he said: "What I cannot build, I cannot understand." We cannot yet create a device that thinks, and this is largely due not to technical difficulties, but to the fact that we are not yet able to understand how the brain works.
What is known now? We cannot say how a thought is born, but we already know a lot about what happens in the brain at its birth, what unique conditions for the brain are created when a thought arises. This is investigated in special experiments, when they compare the presentation to the brain of some conscious situations (giving rise to thought) and the same situations that it cannot be aware of. For example, if the event is too short: visual and auditory components of what is happening enter the brain, but do not reach the level of consciousness. When scientists compare what happens in the brain during the conscious and unconscious processing of information, it turns out that awareness is associated with several things.
What happens when you realize:
Secrets of the nerve code
We also know that the impact on different stages of these four components (sometimes they are observed in medicine, in trauma, in addition, they can be artificially caused by magnetic simulation) can destroy consciousness, and a person will find himself in the subconscious or simply in a coma.
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The brain is often compared to a computer, but this is a very crude and imprecise analogy. The nerve code is structured very differently than the codes of the Turing machine. The brain does not work on binary logic, it does not work as a clock processor, it functions as a massive parallel network, where the main element of the code is the moment of synchronization of different cells with their experience, as a result of which that subjective sensation, thought or action arises. this moment is a theater of consciousness, a field of our attention. This is the synchronization code for many elements, not a step-by-step calculation progress.
Neurons and images
At the moment of formation of connections between cells, something similar to mental information is not transmitted. Chemicals are transferred between them, which allow neurons to unite in one system or another. Each of these systems is unique because cells are specialized. For example, these are cells that perceive the image of a blue sky, a white window frame, a face, etc. All together, they give for a short time that conscious image that occupies our attention. Such "frames" can change very quickly, and in the next few tens of milliseconds a different configuration of cells will appear in the brain, which is connected with a different set of neurons. And this is a constant flow, only a small part of which is realized through the arising synchronizations. There are a lot of things that work in parallel to the central link. They are not realized and are built on automated processes. I sit, balance, maintain body temperature, pressure, breathing. All this is controlled by a mass of functional systems that should not be broadcast to the entire brain.
OS-controlled brain
However, for all the dissimilarity of the nervous and binary codes, some parallels between the brain and the computer can still be drawn.
The brain resembles an operating system, and there are several hypotheses on this score. In one of them - the theory of functional systems - there is the concept of the operational architectonics of the system. This is a kind of synthesis of sensory and motivational signals, extracts from memory, which involves all these components into a single workspace - where a goal is set and a decision is made. There is also a theory of consciousness as a global workspace. According to it, there is a certain operational architecture, which as an operating system is capable of involving different cells in the processes of awareness. It involves neurons in the anterior cortical areas, which have long projections into all other areas of the cortex, and when these neurons are “fired”, they begin to “twist” information in all other areas. It's a kind of central processing unitand it turns on only when there is consciousness. Otherwise, the brain can work automatically. You can drive a car, and your consciousness will be occupied with some internal questions, and the "processor" will work for them. And only at the moment when something unexpected happens (someone is crossing the road, for example), the operating system begins to work in the external world mode.
Konstantin Vladimirovich Anokhin, Russian scientist, neurobiologist, professor, corresponding member of RAS and RAMS. Winner of the Lenin Komsomol Prize, De Weed Prize of the Netherlands Academy of Sciences, the Presidium of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences and the National Prize "Person of the Year" in the nomination "Potential and Prospects in Science".
Interviewed by: Alexey Levin, Oleg Makarov, Dmitry Mamontov