#27 – Quantum Soul: What about you survives for a lifetime?

In episode 27 of the Quantum Consciousness series, Justin Riddle discusses the proposal of a quantum soul. The soul is the part of you that survives your entire lifetime. In this episode, we discuss three properties of quantum mechanics that might provide a novel solution to this age-old mystery. First of all, we discuss the curious discovery of Bose-Einstein Condensation. This state of matter was observed in the laboratory when supercooling liquid helium down to two degrees above absolute zero. The liquid helium underwent a mysteries transformation where all of the individual atoms began to share a single wave function and move together coherently. In this carefully constructed scenario, we can witness quantum properties at the macroscopic scale. Bose-Einstein Condensation is relevant to theories of mind because it is the creation of a macroscopic unification of many parts – this might be what it is like to be a single person extended throughout a physical body. What if there was a network of Bose-Einstein Condensation that was quite literally YOU? Alternatively, your mind could be a conceptualized as a “conscious pilot,” a model proposed by Stuart Hameroff, where you move around in your brain shifting between different cognitive streams of information. But this begs the question, how could the conscious pilot survive for your entire lifetime? Even in quantum computer models of the mind, the wave function that is you undergoes a series of collapse events. These collapse events destroy the wave function and then a new wave function is created. What, if anything, could survive the repeated collapse of the wave function? We fall back to the null model wherein the continuity of your life is created through the information stored in the digital aspects of your brain. Each moment is a new experience and you are forever stuck in the present moment. Perhaps there is no soul and this moment is the first and last moment of your life? The continuity of your experience is created through digital storage mechanisms, but nothing beyond this digital information survives past a given moment of experience. The episode wraps up comparing these different quantum theories of the soul. Do you think you have a soul? Which theory best explains the continuity of our lives?

~~~ Timestamps ~~~
0:00 Introduction
3:49 Nothing is off limits to science
6:30 The soul lasts for a lifetime
8:43 Bose-Einstein Condensation
18:50 Quantum Teleportation
20:50 No Cloning Theorem
22:01 Soulless Quantum Mind
26:37 Holographic Soul
31:32 Soul as a Conscious Pilot
37:27 Three quantum theories for a soul
43:49 Final thoughts

#quantum #consciousness #soul

Music licensed from and created by Baylor Odabashian. BandCamp: @UnscrewablePooch
Painting behind me by Paul Seli, Instagram: @Paul.Seli.Art

[sailingby]

Justin, again a very thought provoking video. It’s refreshing to hear your exploration of the quantum world in context of consciousness. Like Roger Penrose, you challenge the scientific status quo - which is after all how new discoveries are made.
Keep up the good work!

[chrisconey]

41:46 I like the idea. This would make the quantum soul essentially the 'user' of the quantum computer which is directing the collapse of the wave function through intention.

[vladalbata]

I love your channel. Felt like writing this comment before watching the episode.

[RaeRaesRaveReviews]

the intro song makes me really happy for some reason.

[AbdulHadi-yxrh]

Great videos you are one of my new favourite you tubers

[alastairbowie]

Thanks for the uploads @Justin Riddle. Super interesting subject matter.

[WZ-kgwx]

What is the essence and physical foundation of memory?

[mikejurney]

The mind processes these various shows, or as l like to call them, scenarios or possibilities. All these possibilities interfere with each other until they collapse to form beliefs or intentions. The lower animals react out of instinct to what they see. But we humans have an extra layer of interpretations that we have to sort through. We have to weigh the possible interpretations to come to beliefs that we can act on. It's this set of core beliefs that is the self that adjudicates between all the It's the self, or more specifically, your set of core beliefs, that is prioritizing or weighting the various scenarios to form intentions to act.

[melparadise]

I saw something like that pilot consciousness you talked about whilst in an altered state. Dude was narrating about how that's exactly what's happening. haha wild man, wild.

[mikejurney]

Why do we need special quantum effects? The fact that we have signals propagating through a series of neurons and synapses acts like one path in a path integral. Since there are all sorts of these signals, they act together to form a type of path integral, which is another way of describing a wave function. So, yes, our minds act like wavefunctions, but at slower rate.

Question: can a neural net simulate quantum mechanics?

[chrisconey]

12:00
Justin: "And what's super cool about this is..."
Me: "The temperature of the Helium?" :D

[AbhiramN_]

@Justin Riddle Is it possible for the quantum information that is you to survive after death?

[davidfield]

I wonder how your “Nested Hierarchical Consciousness” could bridge Karl Pribram’s holographic model of the brain with the holographic principle of the universe…

Could these ideas collectively support the notion of a cosmically holistic “soul” underlying each of our respective minds on a fundamental level to space & time? This to me approaches philosophical idealism.

In that case, perhaps the question “What survives through time” could be reconstrued into “What aspect of ourselves is fundamental to / unconstrained by space & time?”

[arandomguyontheinternet]

Nice video, but I'm interested in how by Orch OR would NDEs work?

[TheAverythomas]

If you’re interested in the quantum soul from a consciousness perspective I recommend reading the law of one!

[davidkingnews]

I delieve when we dream our consciousness goes into a free form state within the quantum realm and the dreams arise from a paradox of uncertainty. I also believe it's the realm we go to in the after life, because our memories are free from the physical restrains of the brain and have no other option but to roam the quantum realm in free form, we use our memories to form dreams and we can interact with other souls that we have became entangled with during our lifetime, and this will either last forever or until another reincarnation. Just a wild theory that I have little evidence for.. haha

[jeffr]

Yeah, anything that is in superposition would have this property, it wouldn't need to be supercooled or whatever, that just happens to be the requisite to make helium/litium etc attain the macroscopic superposition state. If the OR guys are right, then microtubules are doing this already just as they are. The superposition they create would no longer exist as or be reducible to or measurable by its constituent parts. That is a property of superposition in any form, it's not specific to things that are supercooled etc.

[aleczanderbarnes]

I have trouble understanding the extreme need of some to link consciousness to quantum physics. None of the concepts in quantum physics you talked about were linked to the brains production of consciousness in a coherent way. It seems like these kinds of videos start with quantum physics in one hand and consciousness in the other and sloppily try drawing parallels between them. If consciousness is a quantum process, then that finding should come directly out of studying the brain itself. Rather than deciding you want the answer to be quantum and then trying to make it fit (and in the process of doing so revealing a lack of solid understanding of either quantum physics or neuroscience)

[pakkuman]

If you understand Ancient Hindu texts example Bhagawad gita. It's been mentioned that our soul is a quantam physics phenomenon. It moves from one body to another after death. Til it reaches salvation state

[EduNauta]

The soul is to the mind what reverb is to music