The temporally-integrated causality landscape: A theoretical framework for consciousness and meaning

Winters, Jesse J.

doi:10.1016/j.concog.2020.102976

Cited by 8 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…To accommodate this epistemological fact, and in sympathy with the complementary notion regarding consciousness by Velmans (2009) , we propose a triadic approach to time that simultaneously explains phenomenal, behavioral, and neural dimensionality in cognitive neuroscience, in general, and in consciousness research, in particular. Other recent proposals share this 3-fold emphasis and come to similar conclusions regarding the issues IIT faces around discrete versus continuous time ( Winters 2020 ). A pertinent example of this type of approach is in how Schmidt et al (2016) parse out the neural, phenomenological, and behavioral/psychological aspects of the Libet paradigm to conclude that slow cortical potentials represent dynamic changes in “readiness” to act and not, as some argue, a discrete “moment” of conscious decision-making.…”

Section: Long Continuous and Dynamic: Time Consciousness Can Remedymentioning

confidence: 71%

Time consciousness: the missing link in theories of consciousness

Kent

Wittmann

2021

Neuroscience of Consciousness

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There are plenty of issues to be solved in order for researchers to agree on a neural model of consciousness. Here we emphasize an often under-represented aspect in the debate: time consciousness. Consciousness and the present moment both extend in time. Experience flows through a succession of moments and progresses from future predictions, to present experiences, to past memories. However, a brief review finds that many dominant theories of consciousness only refer to brief, static, and discrete “functional moments” of time. Very few refer to more extended, dynamic, and continuous time, which is associated with conscious experience (cf. the “experienced moment”). This confusion between short and discrete versus long and continuous is, we argue, one of the core issues in theories of consciousness. Given the lack of work dedicated to time consciousness, its study could test novel predictions of rival theories of consciousness. It may be that different theories of consciousness are compatible/complementary if the different aspects of time are taken into account. Or, if it turns out that no existing theory can fully accommodate time consciousness, then perhaps it has something new to add. Regardless of outcome, the crucial step is to make subjective time a central object of study.

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Section: Long Continuous and Dynamic: Time Consciousness Can Remedymentioning

confidence: 71%

Time consciousness: the missing link in theories of consciousness

Kent

Wittmann

2021

Neuroscience of Consciousness

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“…Further, there is debate among theorists as to what the key phenomenal features of human consciousness are. The five axioms of IIT overlap with those presented here, but they are distinguishable at least in the case of intrinsicality and exclusion (Tononi et al, 2016;Winters, 2020). With respect to intrinsicality, an area of contention among current frameworks, often implicitly, is the view that consciousness is one thing altogether and intrinsic to itself (Tononi et al, 2016) rather than one thing containing many nested things intrinsic to and differentiated within it (Fingelkurts et al, 2010(Fingelkurts et al, , 2013Northoff and Huang, 2017;Winters, 2020).…”

Section: Consciousness Is Limited and Coherentmentioning

confidence: 74%

“…Here, I extend the process of bringing the Temporally-Integrated Causality Landscape (TICL) into contact with the larger field. The first article on the TICL focused on a contrast with IIT and GNW (Winters, 2020 ). Beginning from an exploration of phenomenal human consciousness and its contents, I proposed the TICL as a framework for the full neural correlate of consciousness.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…According to the TICL, the portion of thalamocortical activity which corresponds to conscious content (the Subsystems), exists from the point of view of a larger portion of thalamocortical activity (the System). Subsystemic activities are intrinsic to and meaningful within the System (Winters, 2020 ). In physical terms, the EM fields which compose Subsystemic structure of causality are nested, in space and time, within the EM field complex which composes the Systemic structure of causality.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Fourth, consciousness is temporally continuous (Wittmann, 2011 ; Winters, 2020 ; Kent and Wittmann, 2021 ). John Searle defined consciousness as “those states of sentience and awareness that typically begin when we awake from a dreamless sleep and continue until we go to sleep again, or fall into a coma or die or otherwise become unconscious” (Searle, 1997 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Temporally-Integrated Causality Landscape: Reconciling Neuroscientific Theories With the Phenomenology of Consciousness

Winters

2021

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

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In recent years, there has been a proliferation of neuroscientific theories of consciousness. These include theories which explicitly point to EM fields, notably Operational Architectonics and, more recently, the General Resonance Theory. In phenomenological terms, human consciousness is a unified composition of contents. These contents are specific and meaningful, and they exist from a subjective point of view. Human conscious experience is temporally continuous, limited in content, and coherent. Based upon those phenomenal observations, pre-existing theories of consciousness, and a large body of experimental evidence, I derived the Temporally-Integrated Causality Landscape (TICL). In brief, the TICL proposes that the neural correlate of consciousness is a structure of temporally integrated causality occurring over a large portion of the thalamocortical system. This structure is composed of a large, integrated set of neuronal elements (the System), which contains some subsystems, defined as having a higher level of temporally-integrated causality than the System as a whole. Each Subsystem exists from the point of view of the System, in the form of meaningful content. In this article, I review the TICL and consider the importance of EM forces as a mechanism of neural causality. I compare the fundamentals of TICL to those of several other neuroscientific theories. Using five major characteristics of phenomenal consciousness as a standard, I compare the basic tenets of Integrated Information Theory, Global Neuronal Workspace, General Resonance Theory, Operational Architectonics, and the Temporo-spatial Theory of Consciousness with the framework of the TICL. While the literature concerned with these theories tends to focus on different lines of evidence, there are fundamental areas of agreement. This means that, in time, it may be possible for many of them to converge upon the truth. In this analysis, I conclude that a primary distinction which divides these theories is the feature of spatial and temporal nesting. Interestingly, this distinction does not separate along the fault line between theories explicitly concerned with EM fields and those which are not. I believe that reconciliation is possible, at least in principle, among those theories that recognize the following: just as the contents of consciousness are distinctions within consciousness, the neural correlates of conscious content should be distinguishable from but fall within the spatial and temporal boundaries of the full neural correlates of consciousness.

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Whole‐brain analyses indicate the impairment of posterior integration and thalamo‐frontotemporal broadcasting in disorders of consciousness

Panda,

López‐González,

Gilson

et al. 2023

Human Brain Mapping

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The study of the brain's dynamical activity is opening a window to help the clinical assessment of patients with disorders of consciousness. For example, glucose uptake and the dysfunctional spread of naturalistic and synthetic stimuli has proven useful to characterize hampered consciousness. However, understanding of the mechanisms behind loss of consciousness following brain injury is still missing. Here, we study the propagation of endogenous and in‐silico exogenous perturbations in patients with disorders of consciousness, based upon directed and causal interactions estimated from resting‐state fMRI data, fitted to a linear model of activity propagation. We found that patients with disorders of consciousness suffer decreased capacity for neural propagation and responsiveness to events, and that this can be related to severe reduction of glucose metabolism as measured with [18F]FDG‐PET. In particular, we show that loss of consciousness is related to the malfunctioning of two neural circuits: the posterior cortical regions failing to convey information, in conjunction with reduced broadcasting of information from subcortical, temporal, parietal and frontal regions. These results shed light on the mechanisms behind disorders of consciousness, triangulating network function with basic measures of brain integrity and behavior.

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The temporally-integrated causality landscape: A theoretical framework for consciousness and meaning

Cited by 8 publications

References 43 publications

Time consciousness: the missing link in theories of consciousness

Time consciousness: the missing link in theories of consciousness

The Temporally-Integrated Causality Landscape: Reconciling Neuroscientific Theories With the Phenomenology of Consciousness

Whole‐brain analyses indicate the impairment of posterior integration and thalamo‐frontotemporal broadcasting in disorders of consciousness

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