Scivillage.com Casual Discussion Science Forum

https://iai.tv/articles/is-your-brain-re..._auid=2020

INTRO: We think that the bigger the brain, the more developed the consciousness. Humanity prides itself over the rest of the animal kingdom for having larger brains, but neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga and his colleague Bridget Queenan explore cases of people living full lives with shockingly little brain matter. Challenging the “more is better” bias, they suggest consciousness may be less about structures, and more about harmony and improvisation... (MORE - details)

Quote:We tend to talk about consciousness as an object: you can have it or not, you can lose it, you can regain it, you can acquire it. But consciousness is not an object—it’s a rhythm.

When it comes to brains, the only absolute requirement—for life—is that the bandleader in the brainstem keeps time. If your brainstem can no longer keep time, you are “braindead”: your body can no longer generate the rhythms needed to beat your heart, expand your lungs, etc.

When it comes to brains, the only absolute requirement for consciousness is that you have a choir in your cortex making music. You can’t be awake and conscious without any cortex. But a small cortex choir that knows what it’s doing can handle things just fine.

This is simply mindboggling. It raises all sorts of questions about the modular theory of brain functioning, the location of memories, the electrochemical origin of feeling and moods and emotions, the physiology of pain, and tons of other issues. What is consciousness if NOT the brain? The rhythm or count of the "conductor". IOW, a clock or time itself as happening for us in our brains. Time, which is the reciprocal of frequency, as the essence of consciousness? With the brain, as Chalmers says, it's all about access to, not generation of, of experiences. The brain is a mansion of many doors. And consciousness is the master key that unlocks all of them!