Michael Edward Johnson, Qualia Research Institute, 11-28-19; contact: mike@qualiaresearchinstitute.org Context: follow-up to The Neuroscience of Meditation and A Future For Neuroscience; a unification of (1) the Entropic Brain & REBUS (Carhart-Harris et al. 2014; 2018; 2019), (2) the Free Energy […]
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State of the Qualia, Fall 2019
Qualia Research Institute’s inaugural newsletter. What is QRI trying to do? Our long-term vision is to end suffering. To destroy hell, and to build tools for exploring all the bright futures which come after. To take the Buddha’s vision of […]
What’s out there?
We think of the great unknowns of cosmology in terms of physics (what was the Big Bang? Why does our physics have the constants it does? What are dark energy and dark matter?) and xenobiology (are there aliens out there? […]
Future of Life interview on AI alignment
Andrés and I were interviewed by the Future of Life Institute (FLI) for their AI alignment podcast back in May. I thought Lucas’s questions were excellent and the whole interview turned out very well. Lucas: Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the […]
Taking Monism Seriously
On weak vs strong dual-aspect monism Sometimes, the solutions to the hardest problems are embarrassingly simple, and all that’s lacking is collecting people with the right research aesthetic, and actually trying. I often feel this way about formalizing consciousness. Thus […]
Recent interviews: Allen Saakyan and Adam Ford
I had the pleasure of being on Allen Saakyan’s The Simulation show along with my colleague Andrés. Very nice interview format, looking forward to the next round. Adam Ford also interviewed me about the Templeton Foundation’s new “Advancing Research into […]
Meditation & Science Jam 2019, Koh Phangan, Thailand
This February I co-organized a small conference on meditation and neuroscience on Koh Phangan, Thailand; I spoke about some of the research we’re doing at QRI, with a focus on the frameworks of Predictive Coding (Karl Friston’s work) Connectome-specific harmonic […]
Intellectual Lineages
One of the most challenging things I’ve done lately is to chart out the Qualia Research Institute‘s intellectual lineages– basically, to try to enumerate the existing threads of research we’ve woven together to create our unique approach. Below is the […]
Consciousness: a Cosmological Perspective (Sharpening the Simulation Argument)
The following is an excerpt from Principia Qualia, Appendix F. I put it at the very end as a special, unexpected treat for people who read everything- but as it could provide independent support for the Symmetry Theory of Valence […]
The Neuroscience of Meditation: Four Models
Background: I’m a philosopher at the Qualia Research Institute (QRI) working on the intersection of neuroscience and phenomenology. As part of this research and to develop my practice, I recently did a 7-day vipassana meditation retreat. The following are some […]