Our First Observation is Observation Itself

Maybe you are like me and are completely engrossed by the question, ‘Why is there something rather than nothing’. Or, maybe your brain does an effective job of protecting itself from this kind of vertigo. Nevertheless, philosophers and scientists have devoted lines of inquiry and reason to attempt a satisfactory answer to this question. At its root, this question emerges from the observation that the existence of the universe itself is not given and that there must be a reason for its presence. Gottfried Leibniz, an 18th century philosopher and mathematician supposed that the reason sufficient for its presence is God. Although most scientists would reject such a solution as satisfactory, the incisive position Leibniz took regarding this question is that there must be a reason something exists. Based on the rapid development of scientific reasoning since then, cosmologists have learned an interesting story that begins ~14 billion years ago.

Although generally framed in terms of the origins of the universe, there is a hidden facet to this question, ‘Why is there something rather than nothing’. What if, instead of projecting the realization that something (the universe) need not exist, but does, we point that realization inward. As such we could ask, why is there something it is like to be, rather than nothing it is like to be? In less abstruse words, why would an internally generated, conscious experience manifest from the inanimate physical processes carried out by our brains?

Before Newton arrived, there was no established law of gravity and yet humans could carry on with their lives without having to even acknowledge that it is weird gravity exists. Why does the apple fall from a tree? ‘Because it does’, was an acceptable answer until a formalization of gravity that could make accurate predictions about its nature emerged. Humans do not need to fascinate themselves with the nature of gravity to effectively interact with it, but a deep understanding of its nature unlocks the ability to do things that fundamentally reshape our lives. For example, launching a satellite into space.

We find ourselves in a unique period of human history, at the peak of understanding in the natural laws that govern the universe. Like gravity, consciousness is a fact of nature that begs for explanation but there is no known law of nature that necessitates the phenomena of a conscious experience. We can be pretty sure that it originates from processes occurring in the brain, but what law says it must be so by virtue of having a brain. Every physical or biochemical feature that one might think is unique to a cell in the brain can be found in other cells in your body. Moreover, a strange observation could be made. Somehow, neurons (or networks of neurons) have acquired the ability to generate specialized forms of consciousness. For example, why do neurons that “encode” visual or auditory features correlate with qualitatively different experiences? As soon as a photon collides with a cone or rod in the retina or a soundwave enters the cochlea, it is transduced and, in a sense, gone into the brain forest. Nobody at this point could demonstrate the difference between a neuron taken from these two different brain areas. But somehow, by virtue of their arrangement within the broader context of the brain they play a role in generating qualitatively different conscious experiences. These are the kinds of observations which a theory that formalizes consciousness as a law of nature ought to account for.

Using fundamental attributes of nature, the brain reconstructs in silent darkness our entire experience, our loves and our fears, our hopes and dreams as well as the blue couch I am sitting on. The juicy and the mundane, ephemerally alight, but lit nonetheless. How it happens precisely, I don’t know. All I’m saying is there is a reason and that reason is not God nor is it as far from understanding as commonly thought.