Abstract
Recent advances in philosophical thinking about consciousness, such as cognitive phenomenology and mereological analysis, provide a framework that facilitates using computational models to explore issues surrounding the nature of consciousness. Here we suggest that, in particular, studying the computational mechanisms of working memory and its cognitive control is highly likely to identify computational correlates of consciousness and thereby lead to a deeper understanding of the nature of consciousness. We describe our recent computational models of human working memory and propose that three computational correlates of consciousness follow from the results of this work: itinerant attractor sequences, top-down gating, and very fast weight changes. Our current investigation is focused on evaluating whether these three correlates are sufficient to create more complex working memory models that encompass compositionality and basic causal inference. We conclude that computational models of working memory are likely to be a fruitful approach to advancing our understanding of consciousness in general and in determining the long-term potential for development of an artificial consciousness specifically.
References
Akam, Thomas, Kullmann, Dimitri. “Oscillatory Multiplexing of Population Codes for Selective Communication in the Mammalian Brain”. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 15 (2014), 111-122.Search in Google Scholar
Ba, Jimmy, Hinton, Geoffrey, Mnih, Volodymyr, Leibo, Joel and Ionescu, Catalin. “Using Fast Weights to Attend to the Recent Past”. Retrieved from arXiv :1610.06258v3, Dec. 2016.Search in Google Scholar
Baars, Bernard. A Cognitive Theory of Consciousness, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1988.Search in Google Scholar
Baars, Bernard, Franklin, Stan. “How Conscious Experience and Working Memory Interact”. Trends in Cognitive Science, 7 (2003), 166-172.Search in Google Scholar
Baddeley, Alan. “Working Memory and Conscious Awareness”. In Theories of Memory, edited by A. Collins, S. Gattercole, et al., NY: Erlbaum (1993), 11-28.10.4324/9781315782119-2Search in Google Scholar
Baddeley, Alan. “Working Memory: Theories, Models and Controversies”. Annual Review of Psychology, 63 (2012), 1-29.10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100422Search in Google Scholar
Bayne, Tim, Montague, Michelle, eds., Cognitive Phenomenology, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199579938.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Bhandari, Apoorva and Badre, David. “A Nimble Working Memory”. Neuron, 91 (2016), 503-505.Search in Google Scholar
Block, Ned. “On a Confusion about a Function of Consciousness”. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18 (1995), 227-287.Search in Google Scholar
Block, Ned. “Perceptual Consciousness Overflows Cognitive Access”. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 15:12 (2011), 567-575.10.1016/j.tics.2011.11.001Search in Google Scholar
Bringsjord, Selmer. “Offer: One Billion Dollars for a Conscious Robot; If You’re Honest, You Must Decline”. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 14 (2007), 28-43.Search in Google Scholar
Carruthers, Peter. The Centered Mind, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.Search in Google Scholar
Chalmers, David. The Conscious Mind, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.Search in Google Scholar
Chalmers, David. “What is a Neural Correlate of Consciousness?” In Neural Correlates of Consciousness, edited by T. Metzinger, Cambridge: MIT Press, 17-39, 2000.Search in Google Scholar
Chatham, Christopher, Frank, Michael and Badre, David. “Corticostriatal Output Gating during Selection from Working Memory”. Neuron, 81 (2014), 930-942.Search in Google Scholar
Chella, Antonio and Manzotti, Riccardo. “Machine Consciousness: A Manifesto for Robotics”. International Journal of Machine Consciousness, 1 (2009), 33-51.10.1142/S1793843009000062Search in Google Scholar
Chudnoff, Elijah. Cognitive Phenomenology, Routledge Press, 2015.10.4324/9781315771922Search in Google Scholar
Cleeremans, Axel. “Computational Correlates of Consciousness”. Progress in Brain Research, 150 (2005), 81-98.Search in Google Scholar
Cleeremans, Axel, Timmermans, Bert, Pasquali, Antoine. “Consciousness and Metarepresentation: A Computational Sketch”. Neural Networks, 20 (2007), 1032-1039.Search in Google Scholar
Connor, Dustin, Shanahan, Murray. “A Computational Model of a Global Neuronal Workspace with Stochastic Connections”. Neural Networks, 23 (2010), 1139-1154.Search in Google Scholar
Courtney, Susan, Petit, Laurent, Haxby, James and Ungerleider, Leslie. “The Role of Prefrontal Cortex in Working Memory: Examining the Contents of Consciousness”. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B, 353 (1998), 1819-1828.Search in Google Scholar
Cowan, Nelson, Elliott, Emily, Saults, J. Scott, Morey, Candice, Mattox, Sam, Hismjatullina, Anna, Conway, Andrew. “On the Capacity of Attention: Its Estimation and Its Role in Working Memory and Cognitive Aptitudes”. Cognitive Psychology, 51 (2005), 42-100.Search in Google Scholar
Crick, Francis. The Astonishing Hypothesis, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1994.Search in Google Scholar
Davis, Greg, Katz, Garrett, Soranzo, Daniel, Costanzo, Michelle, Reinhard, Matthew, Gentili, Rodolphe, Reggia, James. “A Neurocomputational Model of Increased Saccade Latency and BOLD Changes in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder”, submitted, 2019.Search in Google Scholar
Dehaene, Stanislas, Naccache, Lionel. “Towards a Cognitive Neuroscience of Consciousness”. Cognition, 79 (2001), 1-37.Search in Google Scholar
Fekete, Tomer, Edelman, Shimon. “Towards a Computational Theory of Experience”. Consciousness and Cognition, 20 (2011), 807-827.10.1016/j.concog.2011.02.010Search in Google Scholar
Feldman, Jerome. “The Neural Binding Problem”. Cognitive Neurodynamics, 7:1 (2013), 1-11.10.1007/s11571-012-9219-8Search in Google Scholar
Frank, Michael, Loughry, Bryan and O’Reilly, Randall. “Interactions Between Frontal Cortex and Basal Ganglia in Working Memory: A Computational Model”. Cognitive, Affective and Behavioral Neuroscience, 1 (2001), 137-160.10.3758/CABN.1.2.137Search in Google Scholar
Garrett, Brian. “What the History of Vitalism Teaches Us about Consciousness and the ‘Hard Problem’.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 72 (2006), 616-628.Search in Google Scholar
Goodfellow, Ian, Bengio, Yoshua and Courville, Aaron. Deep Learning, NY: MIT Press, 2016.Search in Google Scholar
Haikonen, Pentti. Consciousness and Robot Sentience, Singapore: World Scientific, 2019.10.1142/11404Search in Google Scholar
Jorba, Marta, Vincente, Agustin. “Cognitive Phenomenology, Access to Contents, and Inner Speech. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 21:9-10 (2014), 74-99.Search in Google Scholar
Katz, Garrett, Davis, Greg, Gentili, Rodolphe, Reggia, James. “A Programmable Neural Virtual Machine Based on a Fast Store-Erase Learning Rule”. Neural Networks, 119 (2019), 10-30.Search in Google Scholar
Katz, Garrett, Huang, Di-Wei, Hauge, Theresa, Gentili, Rodolphe and Reggia, James. “A Novel Parsimonious Cause-Effect Reasoning Algorithm for Robot Imitation and Plan Recognition”. IEEE Transactions on Cognition and Developmental Systems, 10 (2018), 177-193.Search in Google Scholar
Katz, Garrett, Reggia, James. “Using Directional Fibers to Locate Fixed Points of Recurrent Neural Networks”. IEEE Transaction on Neural Networks and Learning Systems, 29 (2018), 3636-3646.Search in Google Scholar
Lara, Antonio and Wallis, Jonathan. “The Role of Prefrontal Cortex in Working Memory: A Mini Review”. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.3389/fnsys.2015.00173. Accessed December 18, 2015.10.3389/fnsys.2015.00173Search in Google Scholar
Massimini, Marcello, Ferrarelli, Fabio, Huber, Reto, Esser, Steve, Singh, Harpreet, Tononi, Giulio. “Breakdown of Cortical Effective Connectivity During Sleep”. Science, 309 (2005), 2228-2232.Search in Google Scholar
McDermott, Drew. “Artificial Intelligence and Consciousness.” In Cambridge Handbook of Consciousness, edited by M. Moscovitch and E. Thompson, 117-150, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.10.1017/CBO9780511816789.007Search in Google Scholar
McGinn, Colin. Can We Solve the Mind-Brain Problem? Mind, 98 (1989), 349-366.Search in Google Scholar
Metzinger, Thomas. Neural Correlates of Consciousness, NY: MIT Press, 2000.10.7551/mitpress/4928.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Mongillo, Gianluigi, Barak, Omri and Tsodyks, Mish. “Synaptic Theory of Working Memory”. Science, 319 (2008), 1543-1346.Search in Google Scholar
Munkhdali, Tsenduren and Trischler, Adam. “Metalearning with Hebbian Fast Weights”. Retrieved from arXiv: 1807.05076v1, 2018.Search in Google Scholar
Nagel, Thomas. “What is it Like to be a Bat?” Philosophical Review, 4 (1974), 435-450.Search in Google Scholar
Pascanu, Razvan and Jaeger, Herbert. “A Neurodynamical Model for Working Memory”. Neural Networks, 24 (2011), 199-207.Search in Google Scholar
Perlis, Don and Brody, Justin. “Operationalizing Consciousness”. AAAI Spring Symposium, Stanford CA, 2019.Search in Google Scholar
Persuh, Marjan, LaRock, Eric and Berger, Jacob. “Working Memory and Consciousness: The Current State of Play”. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00078. Accessed March 2018.10.3389/fnhum.2018.00078Search in Google Scholar
Prentner, Robert. “Process Metaphysics of Consciousness”. Open Philosophy, 2 (2018) 3-13.10.1515/opphil-2018-0002Search in Google Scholar
Prinz, Jesse. The Conscious Brain, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195314595.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Reggia, James. “The Rise of Machine Consciousness”. Neural Networks, 44 (2013), 112-131.10.1016/j.neunet.2013.03.011Search in Google Scholar
Reggia, James, Monner, Derek, Sylvester, Jared. “The Computational Explanatory Gap”. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 21:9 (2014), 153-178.Search in Google Scholar
Regis, Ed. What is Life?, NY: Farber, Strauss and Giroux, 2008.Search in Google Scholar
Sherman, S. Murray, Guillery, R. Exploring the Thalamus and its Role in Cortical Function, NY: MIT Press, 2006.Search in Google Scholar
Singer, Wolf. “Dynamic Formation of Functional Networks by Synchronization”. Neuron, 69 (2011), 191-193.Search in Google Scholar
Squire, Larry and Dede, Adam. “Conscious and Unconscious Memory Systems”. Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Biology, 7 (2015). Retrieved from DOI:10.1101/cshperspect.a021667.10.1101/cshperspect.a021667Search in Google Scholar
Sylvester, Jared, Reggia, James, Weems, Scott, Bunting, Michael. “Controlling Working Memory with Learned Instructions”. Neural Networks, 41 (2013), 23-38.Search in Google Scholar
Sylvester, Jared, Reggia, James. “Engineering Neural Systems for High-Level Problem Solving”. Neural Networks, 79 (2016), 37-52.Search in Google Scholar
Takeno, Junichi. Creation of a Conscious Robot, Singapore: Pan Stanford, 2013.10.1201/b12780Search in Google Scholar
Taylor, John. “Neural Networks for Consciousness”. Neural Networks, 10 (1997), 1207-1225.10.1016/S0893-6080(97)00064-6Search in Google Scholar
Taylor, John. “CODAM: A Neural Network Model of Consciousness”. Neural Networks, 20 (2007), 983-992.Search in Google Scholar
Van Essen, David. “Corticocortical and Thalamocortical Information Flow in the Primate Visual System”. Progress in Brain Research, 149 (2005), 173-185.Search in Google Scholar
Verduzco-Flores, Sergio, Ermentrout, Brad and Bodner, Mark. “Modeling Neuropathologies as Disruption of Normal Sequence Generation in Working Memory Networks”. Neural Networks, 27 (2012), 21-31.Search in Google Scholar
Wolfram, Stephen. A New Kind of Science, Champaign, Illinois: Wolfram Media, 2002.Search in Google Scholar
© 2019 James A. Reggia et al., published by De Gruyter Open
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.