Why I Am Skeptical About the Science of Consciousness

The Quest for Consciousness

Consciousness was once the domain of philosophers and poets. But now scientists are trying to study it empirically. In this post I'll explain why I'm skeptical of this succeeding.

The field of consciousness studies will never become a legitimate science until it has tools to measure consciousness accurately. Especially in "test cases" like the vegetative state, infants, sleep, non-human animals, and other cases that test the limits of consciousness.

But in order to measure something you have to know where to look. You wouldn't go looking for heat in the snow. Consciousness studies doesn't even know where to look because it cannot agree on what it is they are looking for.

Some well-respected theorists believe only fully developed humans are conscious.

Some well-respected theorists believe most animals including humans are conscious.

Some well-respected theorists believe all life forms, even bacteria, are conscious.

Some well-respected theorists believe inorganic matter can be conscious (panpsychism)

Are they even talking about the same thing? Most insist they are all talking about the "subjective" qualia of consciousness - what philosophers often phenomenal consciousness where there is a sense that there is "something-it-is-like" to be conscious.

Building a C-Meter

Surely a goal of consciousness studies is to build a consciousness-meter or C-Meter.

There are numerous problems in trying to build a C-Meter. But without one, how can you have a science of consciousness?

What theory do you use to build it? Different theories of consciousness will instruct you how to build a C-Meter differently. Clearly a panpsychic theory of consciousness will build a C-Meter very differently from a theorist who believes only adult humans are conscious.

Once built, how do you calibrate it?

So you've built your C-Meter. How do you confirm that it's working properly?

Typically you would try to find a "fixed point" akin to the boiling and freezing of water.

But with consciousness we don't know the fixed points with confidence because different fixed points are predicted by different theories and different theories interpret the existence evidence differently making the data indecisive between competing theories.

One might think that a test case for having the C-Meter read "0" would be pointing it at an insect. Suppose it did read "0" for an insect. Some theorists would say that they have good reason to think insects are conscious so it must be the C-Meter is not sensitive enough.

Epistemological circularity

We're trying to measure something that is not directly observable. So we have to indirectly measure it by using something else as a proxy. But we don't know which theory is correct and different theories suggest different proxies. We can't test the theories and how well consciousness actually correlates with the proxies because nobody has built a C-Meter that is universally accepted by the field of scientists studying consciousness to be a valid method of detecting consciousness.

There are as many theories of consciousness as there are people who study consciousness. Everyone has their own pet theory.

Most theorists talk past each other and are engaged in more of a verbal debate than a substantial debate. In other words, the problem is not the data but how to interpret it.

Terminological inconsistencies are rampant and terms are never operationalized. But if they are operationalized at all there is little justification for why that operational definition is the best one to capture consciousness, whatever that means.

The field of consciousness studies is waiting for a theoretical revolution and there are certainly many clever theories out there. But none have a chance to reach consensus when there are so many competing egos.

The state of consciousness studies is very dire if you ask me.

The whole edifice is built on a foundation of sand.

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