u/Hip_III

Something I have often wondered about is the scope and coverage of Heaven. Is there a single Heaven that covers all planets in the universe? Or perhaps one Heaven per galaxy, covering all the planets in its galaxy? Or does each planet with conscious life have its own Heaven?

One thing I have noticed with NDE accounts is that in the afterlife realm, it is common to meet deceased relatives and loved ones, sometimes even deceased pets, and sometimes divine or spiritual beings. However, meetings with alien species from other planets is not generally reported. No little green men with four eyes are observed in Heaven. Now if Heaven covered all the planets in the galaxy or covered the entire universe, you might expect it to be bustling with alien souls.

So does this mean the afterlife humans enter into is exclusively for conscious beings from Earth? Or is it simply that in Heaven, you only hook up with deceased people that you know from your life?

It's interesting that during an NDE, after the initial earthbound out-of-body phase is over (the phase where you may visit living loves ones on Earth), the transition into the heavenly realm typically involves rapid travel through a long tunnel, or involves rapid travel through vast distances of space. The fact that you seem to travel to Heaven suggests that the afterlife might have some physical location within the universe. Maybe there are many heavens, scattered throughout the physical cosmos.

Some 30 years ago, I had a genuine encounter with the disembodied soul of a relative who had died in hospital just a few hours earlier. Such events are termed an after-death communication (ADC), and are not that unusual.

The ADC I had was so strong, so blatant, so palpable, that it could not possibly be mistaken for anything else, and could not possibly be just an overactive mind imagining things that are not really there.

The ADC I experienced was not a voice in a dream, nor some unexplained sound at night, but a totally unmistakable sensed presence of that relative in front of me in my bedroom at night while I was awake. I sensed the presence of the relative as strongly as if she were there in body — in fact even stronger than that, because it was an intense, intimate connection of minds that occurred at the level of pure consciousness, rather than something happening through my senses. The whole encounter probably lasted for no longer than 30 seconds before she departed my presence; but I was totally startled, mesmerised, bewildered, and almost frozen with shock as it was happening.

Now some will argue that experiencing a sensed presence can be a mental health phenomenon similar to hallucinations. This of course is true, and I have considered this as a possible explanation. However, I have never had a sensed presence experience before or after that one incident, and I have never suffered from hallucinations or any similar mental health issues. Nor was I suffering from any grief at the time, so my emotional state was completely calm and normal, and the experience could thus not be put down to perturbed emotions.

Thus I think my experience was a genuine ADC, and not a mental health event.

From this personal experience, I am utterly convinced that the soul survives death. Though of course that soul survival evidence does not necessarily imply that God exists. Nor does it imply that we continue to exist as our normal personality after death; it may be that soon after departure from the body, the soul gets subsumed back into some universal mind, and personal identity is lost, or at least diluted into something greater. So while I can say for sure that the soul survives death and departs the physical body, I cannot extrapolate much beyond this to say what happens in the longer term.

My direct empirical experience contrasts to religious faith. Religion teaches that the soul survives death; but even religious people will often question this, because even the most religious are not without their doubts. But when you encounter a disembodied soul yourself, as I did, it is a very different matter. Then the survival of the soul is no longer just an article of faith, but becomes empirical evidence. I feel immensely grateful to be given this experience, because it totally changed my perspective. Though unfortunately this is empirical evidence that you cannot share with others, except those who have had a similar ADC experience. So I fully appreciate that unless you have this experience this yourself, you are unlikely to believe it when recounted by someone else.

Let me say though that that I have studied hard science (I have a BSc in mathematics and physics, and an MSc in cognitive science), so I know how to be scientific and skeptical. I personally do not believe in the miracles detailed in any religion, and nor do I believe in things like UFOs, ghosts, the Loch Ness monster, and suchlike. Nor do I necessarily believe in any of the things that religions teach. So I am not someone who is gullible, or someone who is prone to believing in improbable things. I mention this in order to hopefully convey the idea that I am a reliable witness, and that the evidence I observed for soul survival stands up to all the scientific scrutiny I gave it.

However, I know full well that without it being verified by others under lab conditions, experiences such as mine do not stand any chance of being considered scientifically valid. Which is very unfortunate, because I have no doubt my experience was genuine, an event that if I could prove, would revolutionise our perspective and understanding of the world. Yet I have no means of proving this in a way acceptable to science.

I have chatted to other people who had these experiences, in what appear to be genuine cases, but they do not seem that concerned that they cannot be reproduced in the lab, or demonstrated in a scientific manner. But it bothers me, because I believe in the scientific method and I believe in the scientific progression of our understanding of the universe.

I should add that I think most cases of what are assumed to be ADCs are not genuine. Or at least, most instances do not provide incontrovertible evidence for the survival of consciousness after death. For example, many people say they saw a deceased loved one appear in a dream, where the deceased spoke to them, or gave them a message. They then claim this was an ADC, and that this was the soul of the relative visiting them. But in fact a dream does not provide any evidence at all for a genuine ADC, because in your dream your mind can conjure up anything, including the voice and appearance of a deceased loved one.

By contrast, my ADC occurred while I was awake and fully conscious. And these are the only type of ADCs that I think can be genuine. Because unless you have some mental health issues, your mind is not going to be conjuring up these sensed presence events while you are fully awake.

Other people may attribute physical events in the world to an ADC. For example, some unusual noise they hear in the middle of the night, or some strange coincidence that happens to them, they may believe are signs from a deceased loved one. But I discount these sort of things as genuine ADCs, because I think encountering a disembodied soul only occurs at the level of mind, via direct mind to mind connection, and is not something that occurs in the physical world. Thus anything you perceive through your physical senses is not an ADC, in my view. I think you only become aware of the presence of the soul of a recently-deceased person at the level of pure consciousness. I also suspect that disembodied souls do not hang around long after death. So I think these ADCs can only occur in the hours immediately after death.

Do atheists actually understand that the Abrahamic faiths are religions of higher consciousness?

Whereas the pagan religions that came before them are founded on base instincts, especially the African origin pagan religions.

Note: to understand this post, you have to know what consciousness and higher consciousness are. Consciousness as in the hard problem of consciousness. Higher consciousness as in the enhanced conscious awareness that can be obtained from mindfulness meditation.

Never heard of the hard problem? Then you will probably not understand this post. Never tried mindfulness meditation or read about its effects? Then this post may be equally beyond you. But if you are familiar with these things, then read on.

With higher consciousness, it is consciousness itself that becomes in command of the mind, as the executive controller, rather than the wayward base instincts. Anyone who has spent a lot of time doing mindfulness meditation will tell you that is creates a more poised disposition, it makes you more calm and collected, an in control of your own mind, as well as the stressors that life throws at you.

God can even be viewed as a metaphor or focus point of higher consciousness. Focusing on the concept of God is one way that you might increase higher consciousness.

And monotheism also enhances higher consciousness, because by its nature, consciousness is all encompassing and overarching phenomenon of mind, spanning all aspects of the mind. So one God that rules all is metaphor for the overarching nature of consciousness. Whereas the multiple deities you find in paganism, one for each of the instincts or emotions, emphasises the ragtag of base unruly instincts humans have, rather than the in control force of higher consciousness.

This is why the religions of higher consciousness tend to have a problem with sex, because sex is one of the strongest base instincts, and can thus be detrimental to the development of higher consciousness as an executive controller, if sex becomes an obsession (as anyone who has ruined a good marriage or relationship by foolishly having an affair can testify).

Base instincts like are fine in animals, but humans have the capacity for greater mental refinement. The Buddhist religion is also one of higher consciousness, demonstrating that you do not need to have a God to align your psyche to higher consciousness.

Why am I posting this? Because some atheists throw the baby out with the bathwater. In their antagonistic stance towards religion, they fail to see the important features religion that can help create a civilised society, and help raise the levels of consciousness in humanity.

I had what I consider to be a startling and genuine after-death communication (ADC), that occurred five hours after the death of a relative in hospital. That ADC I detail in this post.

This ADC I had was so strong, so blatant, so stark, that it could not possibly be mistaken for anything else, and could not possibly be just an over active mind imagining things that are not really there. The ADC I experienced was not a voice in a dream, or some unexplained sound at night, but a totally glaring sensed presence of that relative, right in front of me while I was awake. I sensed the presence of the relative as strongly as if she were there in body — in fact even stronger than that, because it was an intense, intimate connection of minds that occurred at the level of pure consciousness, rather than something happening through the senses.

Now some will argue that experiencing a sensed presence can be a mental health phenomenon similar to hallucinations. This of course is true. However, I have never had a sensed presence experience before or after that one incident, and I have never suffered from hallucinations nor any similar mental issues. So I think my experience was a genuine ADC, and not a mental health event. Thus from this personal experience, I am completely convinced that ADCs do occur. I have also come across similar accounts of ADCs from other people that seem to me equally genuine.

However, I am sceptical about many accounts of ADCs, especially those which occur weeks, months or years after the person died, as I suspect the soul may have long since departed the earthly realm at that point, having transferred to the heavenly sphere. Once in Heaven, I suspect the soul can no longer communicate with the living. My hunch is that communications between disembodied souls of the recently deceased and the living can only occur when these souls are still roaming the earthly sphere in the hours just after their death.

My hypothesis is based on reports from people who have had an NDE report, as the following explains:

Numerous NDE reports indicate that the souls of the (temporarily) deceased individual having an NDE do not hang around on Earth for long. Often it is reported that during an NDE, the individual's disembodied soul will view the scene of their death (eg, a hospital room, car accident, etc), and then may briefly visit loved ones at different locations on Earth.

During these visits to living loved ones on Earth, I suspect there may be the opportunity for an ADC to occur, provided that the living person has a receptive mind that can tune into the spiritual dimension (I imagine that the more mystical or spiritually-inclined people will detect disembodied souls more readily).

But in all the NDE accounts I have come across, after this brief time roaming around the Earth, the soul will then depart the earthly realm, and travel to the heavenly sphere, typically through a long tunnel with a light at the other end, or sometimes travelling through vast distances of space at lightning speed in order to reach Heaven.

I have never come across any NDE in which a disembodied soul in Heaven is reported to have communicated with living beings back on Earth. Rather, during their NDE, individuals report communicating with deceased relatives in Heaven, or with divine or spiritual beings in Heaven, but never with living people on Earth.

I have not seen one NDE where there is communication between Heaven and Earth. So there may be no channel of communication between souls in Heaven and people living on Earth.

Once the soul arrives in Heaven, it may also lose interest with the situation on Earth. Indeed, we have heard in many NDE reports that once in Heaven, the individual's disincarnate soul may forget what it is like to be human. The individual having an NDE often reports that in Heaven, they took on a form of consciousness that was different to human consciousness. So once in Heaven, souls may not even be able to relate to the human condition, let alone communicate with living humans.

Thus in conclusion, I suspect that a genuine ADC may only occur in the hours just after death, while the disembodied soul still roams the Earth, but do not occur in the weeks, months, or years that follow a death, because at that stage, the soul has entered Heaven.

This is my theory anyway. What do others think?

I completely accept that life emerged and became more complex over billions of years through evolutionary processes. And I completely accept that Darwin's concepts of natural selection and sexual selection are important drivers of evolution.

However, I wonder if there are additional physical mechanisms at play that contribute to evolution's ability to produce increasingly complex and sophisticated lifeforms. What I have in mind is that evolution might somehow be exploiting the quantum level of reality in ways that are not yet understood.

For example, it is established that quantum entanglement can operate not only over spatial distances, but also over temporal ones. So this might be something that evolution could exploit to create increasingly sophisticated and perfected organisms. I am not sure how, but we know it is possible to perform complex computations at the quantum level, and indeed, the race is on at present to develop quantum computers which exploit the quantum level of reality for this purpose. These computers harness quantum entanglement in their operation. Could nature also exploit natural quantum computation for its own evolutionary purposes?

Perhaps the quantum level of reality might offer evolution some sort of testbed in which it could check out the viability of its random designs before implementing them in a living organism.

Why might the conventional Darwinian mechanisms of mutation, selection and inheritance appear insufficient? Well, there are approximately 3.2 billion base pairs in the human genome, and the development of a new biological structure would require specific changes at many different genomic locations. The chances of all of those changes occurring simultaneously by chance would be astronomically slim.

Thus the argument is that it happens not at once, but incrementally: first, one mutation appears that confers a survival advantage, so it is passed down through the generations; then the next genetic change appears, providing further advantage, and is also passed along. And this proceeds until the genetic changes contributing to the new biological structure have accumulated.

But even this incremental approach seems difficult to reconcile with the evolution of highly complex structures, because it would require that each evolutionary stage (each successive genetic change) on the way to creating the new genetic blueprint for the biological structure results in an increased survival advantage, even though the genetic design is only partially completed.

This would be equivalent to building a car, and expecting the car to function fully even when it is only half built.

Now I know that new genes are also acquired by routes other than simple base-pair mutation. Genes in single-celled organisms may be acquired by horizontal gene transfer or introduced by viruses, such as bacteriophages, and in more complex organisms viral genetic material can become incorporated into the germ line, as occurred with ancient retroviruses and endogenous retroviral sequences.

And then there is endosymbiosis, where two organisms may enter into a long-term symbiotic association, eventually resulting in the incorporation of one organism into another. As is well known, mitochondria and chloroplasts were probably descended from free-living bacteria that were incorporated into other cells and eventually became permanent organelles.

Nevertheless, I still have nagging doubts that the mechanisms currently recognised by evolutionary biology can explain every aspect of the emergence of biological complexity, and I wonder whether there may be additional physical mechanisms involving quantum phenomena that have yet to be discovered.

Most of what humans do is performed automatically, that is to say, unconsciously. For example, when we wake up and make our morning coffee, we are so familiar with this daily routine that we complete it automatically, without any conscious awareness in the process.

Similarly, when we drive a car, most of the time we do it automatically and unconsciously. We are usually thinking about something else while driving, or maybe looking at the scenery.  

It is only when some gnarly situation arises on the road that we suddenly apply our full conscious attention to handling it. As a survival instinct, we instantly apply our full mental conscious resources to navigate through the challenging circumstances.

We tend to think that we are conscious all day long, but perhaps in reality, we spend most of the day in an unconscious state, with consciousness only appearing fleetingly when we face a difficult situation that we cannot handle on an unconscious basis. 

Indeed, the Russian philosopher P.D. Ouspensky famously said that "man is asleep". He pointed out that people live, work and react mechanically, operating under the illusion that they are fully conscious and in control.

Those who study consciousness (as in the hard problem of consciousness) tend to assume that consciousness is a phenomenon that is with us throughout our waking hours. 

But the reality is that full conscious awareness generally only appears when we are flummoxed by the situation facing us, because it is too difficult or challenging to handle automatically, so consciousness is summoned to try to resolve the situation.  

"The magnitude of loss is about 18% of the dopamine nerve terminals on average".

Does anyone else get this annoying pop-up box?

Any suggestions on how to get rid of it permanently gratefully received.

This is the pop-up which appears on every product page on eBay:

https://preview.redd.it/ols8qdwh6geh1.png?width=609&format=png&auto=webp&s=c89f3ad2ba03c557cafe6a4af3445949a95239d8

URL: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1097/OPX.0000000000001965

DOI: 10.1097/OPX.0000000000001965

PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36705713/

I'd very much like the full paper of this study. Thanks very much.

Ayahuasca means "the vine of the dead", and in Amazonian shamanism, the brew is believed to allow the soul to detach from the physical body and enter otherworldly realms, where it can communicate directly with deceased ancestors, as well as other entities.

Has anyone experienced such communication with deceased friends or relatives while on an ayahuasca?

If so, did you afterwards interpret this as a hallucination, or was there any evidence to suggest that you had a genuine meeting with the soul of the deceased?

In its Greek roots, the word atheist breaks down into:

a: which is prefix meaning "without" or "not"

theós: meaning "deity" or "god"

But when you look at the arguments of atheist online, their focus is on countering or debunking the doctrines religion, rather than directly attempting to counter the possibility of a Heaven in which God resides, and the survival of consciousness after death in this heavenly environment.

In this respect, an atheist might better be described as athreskos (to coin a term), which in its Greek roots, breaks down into:

a: which is prefix meaning "without" or "not"

thréskeia: which is the closest term the ancient Greeks had for religion.

So most atheists might in practice be athreskoi (the plural of athreskos) — people who do not believe in the doctrines of religion.

It might be argued that athreskeia (my term meaning the philosophy which opposes the doctrines of religion) plays an important role in the world, by exposing religion for a manmade set of ideas about God and Heaven (as opposed to the truth about God and Heaven, if this can be known).

But then atheists should make their position clear: that they are against manmade concepts of God and Heaven found within religion.

Interestingly, individuals who say they have direct knowledge of Heaven though a near-death experience (NDE) often also end up opposing religious doctrines, as their heavenly experience does not line up with what religions teach. So these people might also be accurately described as athreskoi, along with many atheists.

Frankincense resin is traditionally burnt as an incense in Catholic and Orthodox churches, and of course, frankincense was one of the gifts the Magi gave to Jesus.

Historically, frankincense used as an incense in temples across ancient Egypt, Greece, and the Middle East.

I have found that taking around 5 drops of frankincense essential oil internally (diluted in around 15 ml of cooking oil) increases my spiritual feelings and spiritual consciousness within about 2 hours.

Of course, the effect is subtle, but noticeable, and may help attain deeper states of meditation.

I guess you could also administer frankincense essential oil via an aromatherapy burner, but I have not tried this method.

I seem to remember at least two NDE accounts where when walking through luscious paradisiacal meadows in the heavenly realm, it was reported that the flowers move aside as you place your feet down, so that they are not crushed beneath the foot?

Has anyone else come across such NDE stories of fields of flowers parting beneath the feet as you walk? Please post a link if you have it handy.

I wonder if this is a common occurrence in NDEs. If it is, then it would be another characteristic that is unique to NDEs, and not found in dreams.

Executive Summary

In this post, I entertain a hypothesis that intuitive information processing taking place in the unconscious mind generates consciousness. This hypothesis may unite the study of the hard problem of consciousness with the established psychological concept of the unconscious mind (the unconscious as conceived by German philosophers like Carl Gustav Carus, and later popularised by Sigmund Freud). I speculate that these intuitive unconscious processes are run in the brain using quantum computation, and that these unconscious processes form the foundations of consciousness. So in this view, consciousness arises as the tip of the iceberg of unconsciousness.

I also consider whether this unconscious information processing might be computed in a non-material metaphysical realm, given that some physicists argue that quantum computation may take place outside of the physical material universe. This would imply the roots of consciousness are also transcendental, existing outside of space and time.

The Quantum Iceberg Model of Consciousness

I would like to discuss an approach to the hard problem of consciousness which we might call the quantum iceberg model of consciousness, given that the iceberg metaphor is often used when describing the relationship between the conscious and unconscious mind. 

Whenever I've read about the hard problem of consciousness, I've always wondered what the connection might be between consciousness and the unconscious mind, since the life of the unconscious has been a key focus in psychology for over a century.  

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) is credited with popularising the discovery and concept of the unconscious mind, but the notion of the unconscious was first proposed by earlier thinkers, such as the German polymath Carl Gustav Carus (1789–1869). 

Carl Gustav Carus believed the unconscious mind was key to understanding consciousness. For Carus, the unconscious was the creative and intelligent foundation of the mind, with consciousness arising out of the underlying unconscious. Carus considered the unconscious to be the greater entity: in his writings he described consciousness as merely a small flickering light emerging from a vast dark ocean of unconscious mental activity. 

Carus distinguished between three levels of mind: the deepest level is the absolute unconscious, which is entirely inaccessible to conscious awareness; the next level he called the relative unconscious, a region of mind that is normally unconscious, but which consciousness can enter and examine; and finally the top level is consciousness itself.  

Later the work of German philosopher Karl Robert Eduard von Hartmann (1842–1906) reinforced the primacy of the unconscious as the foundation of mind. But Von Hartmann went further, and proposed that the unconscious is the ultimate metaphysical ground of all existence. So for von Hartmann, the unconscious is not merely a psychological phenomenon, but is the bedrock of the universe. 

It's interesting how these days, people postulate that consciousness may be the bedrock of the cosmos; but for von Hartmann, the unconscious was the universal substratum.

The iceberg model of consciousness I outline here follows the ideas of Carus and von Hartmann, that the unconscious forms the foundations of consciousness. 

We know that the unconscious mind has its own life: while we are able to learn things consciously from information we receive about the world through our senses, the unconscious mind also constantly picks up a whole raft of information from our senses; in fact we know from psychological research that the unconscious stores and processes much more information than consciousness can deal with. It is well-established that the unconscious learns from this information, and may adapt our behaviour accordingly, without us being consciously aware that this is happening. This is well-understood by advertisers, who know that in order to get you to buy their product, they need to appeal to your unconscious drives and desires, which are more susceptible to being influenced than your rational conscious mind, which is more astute and guarded.

So both the conscious and unconscious sides of our mind are actively involved in perception, learning, and modifying behaviour. But how do these two sides of the mind interact, and what import does the unconscious mind have for the hard problem of consciousness? 

In the iceberg model of consciousness, like the German philosophers, I entertain a hypothesis that our overt conscious awareness is just the tip of the iceberg, and that the information processing that underlies consciousness takes place outside of conscious awareness, within the often inaccessible depths of the unconscious mind. The iceberg model further postulates that this unconscious information processing underpinning consciousness runs on quantum computation within the brain, for reasons explained shortly.

In this iceberg theory, overt conscious awareness and the hidden unconscious quantum computational operations that underpin consciousness together form the complete iceberg. The iceberg model suggests that you cannot understand consciousness in isolation, you need to bring the unconscious mind into the analysis. 

Intuition and the Unconscious Mind

Before we further expound upon the iceberg model, let's take a brief foray into the mental faculty of intuition, which is one way that the output of the information processing in the unconscious mind is thrust into conscious awareness.

We have all experienced the mysterious phenomenon of intuition. Intuition often manifests when we are trying to figure out a solution to some perplexing problem we have, and may have thought about it rationally for hours or days, but cannot see any answer to the conundrum. 

Then, while taking a break from thinking about the problem (and perhaps while enjoying a relaxing walk, an unwinding bath, or a coffee break), suddenly a possible solution to the problem just pops into our head. This solution was not conceived by the conscious part of the mind, as we were not actively thinking about the problem at the time. The solution appears to have been worked out in the unconscious region of the mind, and once formulated, was then popped into conscious awareness for further examination. This is the process of intuition, which is able to solve problems via background processing in the unconscious mind, occurring while we are relaxing and not consciously working on the problem. 

When intuitive solutions suddenly burst into our conscious awareness, we have no idea how these answers were calculated; the steps of the intuitive analysis underpinning the answer are not made available to us. The brain's intuitive processes always remain hidden from our conscious mind. 

This contrasts with rational or logical thinking, where the steps of the analysis (our rational thought processes) are explicitly available to the conscious mind, and can be communicated to other people. So clearly, the faculty of intuition uses a different type of computation than rational thinking.

I think it is likely that rational thinking involves classical computing in the brain (along with some quantum computing to generate the consciousness that oversees rational thought), whereas I speculate that intuition may be powered exclusively by quantum computation.

The idea that intuition runs exclusively on quantum computing would explain why we cannot access the steps of the calculation - because those steps are the states of the quantum computer, and as we know from quantum mechanics, the intermediate steps of a quantum computer calculation are not accessible (they cannot be observed without destroying the computation process); only the final answer calculated by a quantum computer is measured and known. So the features of quantum computation match those of unconscious intuition: the computation of intuition is not accessible to consciousness, only the final result of the computation can be consciously known.

Why might the brain run the process of intuition using quantum computation rather than classical computing? Well, because quantum computation excels at handling problems where there are a large number of variables or possibilities. Intuition seems to operate by creatively considering almost an infinite number of conceptual possibilities and combinations, in order to find a configuration that solves the problem at hand. A classical computer would take a long time to run through a very high number of possibilities, but we know that a quantum computer can handle this load exponentially faster (at least for certain classes of calculation). This is why quantum computers of the future will be able to crack current computer encryption methods, because they can sift through trillions of possible passwords in seconds, via massive parallel processing, whereas it would take millions or billions of years for the fastest classical computers to solve the same problem. The parallel processing of quantum computers is based on the fact that a qubit comprises a 0 and 1 at the same time, or more precisely, a qubit can exist in a quantum superposition of the states 0 and 1, allowing a quantum computer to represent many possible computational states simultaneously.

The Unconscious Mind Generates Consciousness

In the iceberg model, I speculate that becoming consciously aware of something involves intuition sifting through an almost infinite number of conceptual possibilities to arrive at a potential solution to the puzzles or problems you are dealing with. In the depths of the unconscious mind, once the quantum computation of intuition is complete, the solution is thrust into conscious awareness. It is when unconscious quantum information arrives at a possible solution that consciousness occurs.

I also think conscious awareness of incoming sensory information may follow the same scheme: I think that as data comes in from the senses, before it reaches consciousness, the data may be run through an unconscious quantum process akin to intuition, where it is tested against an almost infinite number of possible interpretations. When the most probable interpretation of the sensory data is computed by the unconscious, that answer is thrust into consciousness, and becomes a moment of conscious awareness of incoming sensory information. So for example, you may be looking at an object, and ultra-rapid unconscious quantum computation may determine that "it's a cat", and this answer is thrust into your consciousness. 

It is generally accepted that incoming sensory information is initially processed by unconscious regions of the brain. And it is accepted that this sensory information is thrust into conscious awareness if deemed relevant to the individual. Though normally only a small portion of the incoming sensory information reaches consciousness, because there is too much sensory data for consciousness to cope with, so most is filtered out, and only information and interpretations pertinent to your current situation are thrust into conscious awareness.

In other words, just as potential solutions arising from intuitive problem solving are popped into consciousness, so too can an incoming stream of sensory information get popped into consciousness if deemed relevant to the current circumstances of the person.

We tend to study the hard problem of consciousness by examining the tip of the iceberg: by pondering about conscious awareness. But beneath the tip of the iceberg, it is unconscious quantum information processing that actually generates consciousness, in the quantum iceberg model of consciousness that I am offering.

So in this model, I speculate that every moment of overt conscious awareness is the result of an unconscious intuitive quantum calculation. The intermediate steps of the quantum calculation are never known, but its final solution becomes a moment of conscious awareness. The tip of the iceberg is consciousness, but beneath that tip there is an inscrutable ocean of active quantum computation that forms the unconscious mind. 

One piece of supportive evidence for this model is the famous Libet experiments in the 1980s, which found that the decision to initiate an action occurred 300 milliseconds before the person becomes consciously aware of the decision. Thus the decision appears to take place in the unconscious mind, and only after the decision is made does the conscious mind become aware of it. Libet's results suggest that what we believe to be our conscious free will may in fact be a choice made by the unconscious mind.

How does this idea relate to the Hameroff-Penrose quantum theory of consciousness? In the Hameroff-Penrose theory, consciousness is proposed to emerge from quantum processes occurring within the microtubules found inside neurons. Well, it could be that these microtubules are responsible for both the consciousness and unconscious mind. The quantum computations of intuition may run on the microtubule system, and then when these quantum calculations are complete and a solution is arrived at, this creates a moment of consciousness which also is hosted in the microtubules.

Reframing the Hard Problem of Consciousness

Just to remind ourselves, the hard problem of consciousness poses the fundamental question: why does brain activity produce any conscious experience at all, instead of all brain activity just happening "in the dark", with no subjective inner mental experience whatsoever? 

In terms of the conscious and unconscious dichotomy, we can reframe this question as: why isn't all mental life unconscious; why does some mental activity emerge out of the "darkness" of the unconscious, and into the light of consciousness?

Psychology tells us that the unconscious can perceive the outside world through the senses, process and store incoming sensory information, and rapidly modify behaviour accordingly, all without any help from consciousness. So why is consciousness needed at all? What is its purpose? 

One possibility is that the unconscious may contain numerous individual quantum computers that operate separately, tasked with a specific role. Each sense may have its own unconscious quantum computer, whose job it is to analyse incoming data from its sense organ. These individual quantum computers do not normally talk to each other, they are normally isolated. So individually they cannot obtain an overview or holistic understanding of the external circumstances. But when the results of their computation are thrust into consciousness, because of the overarching nature of consciousness, which straddles all the senses, as well as spanning across our memory, our learned behavioural responses, and other aspects of our mind, consciousness can form a holistic or gestalt perspective of the whole situation.  

Evidence for the idea that each sense normally has its own separate and isolated unconscious quantum computer comes from the rare neurological phenomenon of synaesthesia, which occurs when this isolation breaks down. In synaesthesia, a stimulus in one sense automatically triggers an experience in another sense, such as seeing colours when hearing musical sounds, or experiencing a taste sensation when reading specific words. So in synaesthesia, there may be some unusual interlinking of the individual unconscious quantum computers that process the incoming information from each sense. But normally there is no such interlinking, thus demonstrating that sensory quantum computers are isolated from each other.

The idea that consciousness unites disparate individual unconscious information processors in the brain was proposed by cognitive scientist Bernard Baars in the late 1980s, with his global workspace theory. In his view, consciousness is a global workspace, into which various unconscious information processors can place their output. The global workspace acts as an integrator of calculations of individual unconscious information processors.

Of course, just how such a global workspace combines these unconscious outputs together remains an unanswered question, known as the binding problem. In quantum theories of consciousness, it is proposed that binding is achieved through quantum entanglement. Here, the separate outputs from each unconscious information processor are bound together into a single quantum state. 

The Iceberg Model of Consciousness and Spiritual Perspectives

Some spiritual philosophies posit that consciousness is transcendental: that it exists outside of space and time in a realm beyond the physical universe. The iceberg model does not contradict such ideas, because some physicists have theorised that the calculations within a quantum computer are performed outside of spacetime. 

If this is the case, then the very roots of conscious awareness may exist beyond the material world, arising out of a transcendental reality. Which would mean that every conscious moment we have is a bridging between the transcendental realm and the material world. It also follows that our unconscious intuitive processes may not be just confined to our physical brain, but may exploit transcendental domains during their operation. 

If unconscious processes are run in a transcendental region of the cosmos, it opens up the possibility of the Jungian concept of a collective unconsciousness. Carl Jung posited that if you go deep enough in the mind, you move past the personal unconscious, and hit the collective unconscious. Quantum physicist Erwin Schrödinger proposed a similar "one mind" idea, that consciousness is at the deepest level singular, not plural, and unified across all beings.

Implications for Research Into the Hard Problem of Consciousness

Many of us who like exploring the nature of consciousness may ponder on its mysteries by staring directly into it. For example, during Zen mindfulness meditation (which I have done plenty of, and highly recommend to any psychonaut), we amplify our conscious awareness and detach it from thought processes and other distractions. We then become acutely aware of our own consciousness. We use our conscious awareness to stare directly into our conscious awareness. But as profound and powerful as mindfulness meditation can be to the refinement of one's own mind, character and spirituality, it does not seem to return any scientific answers about the nature of consciousness. 

And this may be because during mindfulness meditation, we are only focusing on the visible tip of the iceberg, focusing on the experience of consciousness. Whereas the quantum iceberg model posits the roots of consciousness are to be found in the unconscious sphere, which consciousness has no ability to penetrate (consciousness can never view the internal computational operations of intuition; consciousness can only see the final output result of unconscious intuitive processing).

Thus, there are limitations to this first-person approach to consciousness (studying consciousness by means of introspection). The inscrutability of the workings of intuition is a limitation of the first-person examination of consciousness. Consciousness can become aware of itself: we can introspectively become consciously aware of our conscious awareness; but we cannot see where our consciousness originates from, that remains inscrutable. 

We might make more headway in understanding consciousness by focusing on the quantum processes that may underlie consciousness and unconscious intuition. Though this approach will probably require advancements in quantum theory before we are able to get a grip on consciousness. There are already some intriguing new ideas that may shine a light on consciousness, such as the theory that spacetime may emerge from a deeper reality beyond time and space, that reality being fabricated from quantum entanglement - the very same entanglement that is fundamental to the operation of quantum computation. 

This post is about consciousness and NDEs. If you want a summary of the typical set of events that occur during an NDE, you might like to read this post, which succinctly describes them.

People who have had an NDE usually report and believe that their disembodied consciousness or soul departed their body, and visited a heavenly reality beyond Earth. 

They report that the NDE world has very different characteristics compared to the material world. For one thing, time behaves differently: there is no linear time in the heavenly sphere, and events tend to occur in parallel. They say Heaven is not exactly timeless; there is a sort of time, but it is not standard earthly linear time, and multiple things happen at once.

As an example of this non-linear time, it is common to have a full life review during an NDE, where every event in your life is examined. However, this review does not occur in temporal order; rather, every life event is examined simultaneously in parallel. Your whole life is reviewed in a flash of parallel processing.

The various unusual characteristics of the NDE realm make people who have had an NDE believe that they have died and gone to a most wonderful heavenly place which is distinct from regular earthly reality. Even former atheists may become convinced of this.

There is no pain or suffering in the heavenly sphere; everything is perfect, blissful, and euphoric. So most people do not want to return to Earth, because they are so happy in the heavenly realm.

Now, of course, the sceptics will have none of that, and claim that the entire NDE is a dream, hallucination, or some other altered state of consciousness that occurs in the physical brain. They argue that the individual's consciousness did not leave their body and travel to some other dimension; but rather, the whole experience was generated by the brain under low oxygen conditions (many NDEs occur when the heart stops for several minutes, or there is some other blockage of oxygen to the brain).

And of course, nobody can prove this either way.

But then, when you think about it, does it really matter? From the point of view of the person experiencing the NDE phenomenon that occurs as you die, they are enjoying a most beautiful, blissful, euphoric reality. They are in paradise, and because time does not flow linearly in this rapturous wonderland, there is no limit to how long they can stay.

So I am thinking: there is no doubt that the NDE phenomenon exists; it has been reported by thousands, if not millions, of people, and as far back as antiquity. Thus, even if it is generated by the physical brain, that does not make it any less of a paradise. 

And even if your deceased brain might only be able to generate this NDE reality for a short time (eg a few days or weeks) before the brain physically deteriorates and ceases to function, because the NDE reality has timeless qualities, a few days of Earth time may correspond to a near eternal life in the NDE realm.

So it seems to me that, assuming everyone has an NDE after dying, we are all guaranteed an eternal life in paradise - even if that paradise is generated by the brain. 

This post is about consciousness and NDEs. If you are not familiar with the typical set of events that occur during an NDE, you might like to read this post, which succinctly describes them.

People who have had an NDE usually report and believe that their disembodied consciousness departed their body, and visited a heavenly reality beyond Earth. 

They report that the NDE world has very different characteristics compared to the material world. For one thing, time behaves differently: there is no linear time in the heavenly sphere, and events tend to occur in parallel. They say Heaven is not exactly timeless; there is a sort of time, but it is not standard earthly linear time, and multiple things happen at once.

As an example of this non-linear time, it is common to have a full life review during an NDE, where every event in your life is examined. However, this review does not occur in temporal order; rather, every life event is examined simultaneously in parallel. Your whole life is reviewed in a flash of parallel processing.

The various unusual characteristics of the NDE realm make people who have had an NDE believe that they have died and gone to a most wonderful heavenly place which is distinct from regular earthly reality. Even former atheists may become convinced of this.

There is no pain or suffering in the heavenly; everything is perfect, blissful, and euphoric. So most people do not want to return to Earth, because they are so happy in the heavenly realm.

Now, of course, the sceptics will have none of that, and claim that the entire NDE is a dream, hallucination, or some other altered state of consciousness that occurs in the physical brain. They argue that the individual's consciousness did not leave their body and travel to some other dimension; but rather, the whole experience was generated by the brain under low oxygen conditions (many NDEs occur when the heart stops for several minutes, or there is some other blockage of oxygen to the brain).

And of course, nobody can prove this either way.

But then, when you think about it, does it really matter? From the point of view of the person experiencing the NDE phenomenon that occurs as you die, they are enjoying a most beautiful, blissful, euphoric reality. They are in paradise, and because time does not flow linearly in this rapturous wonderland, there is no limit to how long they can stay.

So I am thinking: there is no doubt that the NDE phenomenon exists; it has been reported by thousands, if not millions, of people, and as far back as antiquity. Thus, even if it is generated by the physical brain, that does not make it any less of a paradise. 

And even if your deceased brain might only be able to generate this NDE reality for a short time (eg a few days or weeks) before the brain physically deteriorates and ceases to function, because the NDE reality has timeless qualities, a few days of Earth time may correspond to a near eternal life in the NDE realm.

So it seems to me that assuming everyone has an NDE after dying, we are all guaranteed an eternal life in paradise - even if that paradise is generated by the brain.