Physics and Consciousness
Does consciousness exist? Is consciousness physical? Most physicists would probably answer "yes" to the former of these questions and "no" to the latter - and most physicists consider the topic to have nothing at all to do with their branch of science. Although quite a few physicists have written books and papers, in which they attempt to combine Quantum Mechanics and consciousness, these writings are so far more likely to be called philosophy than physics. At present the topic of consciousness is totally absent from the science of physics but one may ask the question: Is consciousness to be expected to become a physicist's research topic in the future? - The reader is invited to consider the following line of reasoning and make his/hers own conclusions:
First, a little story from the real life: One day you sit relaxing in your lazy-chair thinking of nothing. Then all of a sudden this thought pops up in your mind: "There is work to be done!". Immediately you rise and with hasty steps and rapid movements you start doing whatever is needed to carry out the work. What happened? - You will have to ask other sciences for the details but put in short, this is what happened:
- Consciousness manifested itself as a thought.
- This thought started some interactions in your brain.
- At a certain level these interactions became electromagnetic.
- Electromagnetic signals were sent through your nervous system
- Your legs straightened - and so on.
From this story it should be obvious that consciousness has the power to manifest itself as phenomena which have the power to interact with the electromagnetic force field - either directly or via some intermediate processes. Electromagnetism has been part of physics for centuries and most physicists regard electromagnetism to be perfectly well understood.
Does physics offer any clue on how these instances of electromagnetism, induced by consciousness, come about? Does physics, in its present shape, offer the slightest clue of what kind of forces are involved in the processes exemplified by items 1-3 above?
