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A Birth–Death Toy Model for a Measure of Consciousness

The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), Strada Costiera 11, I-34151 Trieste, Italy

https://doi.org/10.1142/S2705078524500012Cited by:0 (Source: Crossref)

Abstract

The ancient Ouroboros symbolism (one who eats oneself) is here integrated into a simple birth–death clustering process that needed nothing but itself for a transition from indistinguishable phases to a sort of higher-level “conscious” phases. Birth and death coefficients are formulated in terms of odd and even exponentials used to represent a suitable form for conscious states via the internal transfer of information. This toy model may ideally quantify conscious states having inner causes via an Ouroboros index $0 < Υ_{α, Ω} < 1$ . The value $Υ_{α_{,} Ω}$ = 0 lends to infinite loops and the limiting values $Υ_{α_{,} Ω}$ $\to$ 1 disclose transformation into awareness. Relationships with physics theories of consciousness and the use of the Ouroboros index to discern about conscious-like states in Artificial Intelligence systems are discussed. Consciousness and freedom of will may go side-by-side in the model when $Υ_{α_{,} Ω}$ is extended to be a complex number modulus.

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