Oh this is super cool, thanks for sharing. I have strong (admittedly mostly irrational) inclinations against determinism, seeing something like this is exciting. Definitely going to have to give it a read.
Sapolski's take on determinism was really a low blow for me, and I've since seen several other intellectuals I respect very highly espouse similar views, and there was a point where I would have agreed in my adolescence, but I've since then developed away from that course of thinking. I often wonder if it's a rationalization which is necessary for the framework of the theory of everything to be coherent.
The problem with arguing quantum non-determinism gives rise to consciousness is that it doesn't really give you free will, it just implies the consciousness is an unpredictable process.
But a quantum physicist would then ask "to what degree?" because quantum mechanics is very deterministic over large sample sizes (and a few trillion proteins in the brain would be a very large sample).
More importantly though, free will implies the ability to make a choice and that has problems when you invoke quantum indeterminacy to explain it: you don't get "a choice" you get random chance deciding things (and other depressing ideas like "human consciousness can't be backed up, saved or transferred - we really are trapped in these meat prisons and doomed to suffer).
Sure, but are we not precluding that the forces which gave rise to the genesis and evolution of life were able to search and select for functional quantum phenomena? We're talking about processes that can turn a pile of water, salt, sugar, nitrogen, and some vitamins into an obscenely complex, highly adaptable, self-replicating, self-regulating machine which can produce a variety of different micro and macromolecules in a baffling concert of physics and chemistry at scales and complexity humans can hardly work at, and certainly not so majestically.
And we've also got eyes, which in principal means that many life forms already have quantum-sensitive apparati, right? Magnetoreceptors as well, and they're also found in "lower lifeforms" in various different forms from the basest phototaxis to extraordinarily refined lens systems which can numerous wavelengths.
And then I suppose when talking in scale — what does it actually mean — to flip that coin when you've only got an N of one in reality.
Of course I would have to concede that I accept an element, even a large one of determinacy, but my experience also precludes the idea of it existing exclusively. I'm really just pattering away right now, frankly I know very little of quantum physics (nothing, really) it's just nice to know someone is willing to furnish a hypothesis contrary to what I believe is the consensus on the topic.
Sapolski's take on determinism was really a low blow for me, and I've since seen several other intellectuals I respect very highly espouse similar views, and there was a point where I would have agreed in my adolescence, but I've since then developed away from that course of thinking. I often wonder if it's a rationalization which is necessary for the framework of the theory of everything to be coherent.