Quantum Model for the Direct Currents of Becker (by Matti Pitkanen): Robert Becker proposed on basis of his experimental work that living matter behaves as a semiconductor in a wide range of length scales ranging from brain scale to the scale of entire body. Direct currents flowing only in preferred direction would be essential for the functioning of living manner in this framework. One of the basic ideas of TGD inspired theory of living matter is that various currents, even ionic currents, are quantal currents. The first possibility is that they are Josephson currents associated with Josephson junctions but already this assumption more or less implies also quantal versions of direct currents. TGD inspired model for nerve pulse assumed that ionic currents through the cell membrane are probably Josephson currents. If this is the case, the situation is automatically stationary and dissipation is small as various anomalies suggest. One can criticize this assumption since the Compton length of ions for the ordinary value of Planck constant is so small that magnetic flux tubes carrying the current through the membrane look rather long in this length scale. Therefore either Planck constant should be rather large or one should have a non-ohmic quantum counterpart of a direct current in the case of ions and perhaps also protons in the case of neuronal membrane: electronic and perhaps also protonic currents could be still Josephson currents. This would conform with the low dissipation rate. Click Here.
Looking for the Physical, Logical, and Computational Roots of the Mind (by Paola Zizzi, Massimo Pregnolato): We discuss the modalities by which we humans should (and in fact, do) compute. That is, we investigate about the logical languages and the computational modes of human reasoning, and the corresponding physical interpretation. In this context, however, the classical world (physical, logical, and computational) does not seem sufficient to give a complete description of the Mind. In fact, the Mind accomplishes different tasks, where it exhibits, alternatively, both classical and quantum features. There are some novelties in two important issues: the long-standing debate on the mind-body relationship, and Turing’s question about a possible identification of the Mind with a computer. The introduction of a quantum metalanguage (QML) for the logic of reasoning is the most important feature to deal with both issues. As far as the first issue is considered, the QML is physically interpreted as a Dissipative Quantum Field Theory (DQFT) of the brain. The corresponding quantum object-language (QOL), which is the logic of reasoning, and is controlled by the QML, is physically interpreted as the Quantum Mechanics of qubits, that is, Quantum Computing (QC). Therefore, the Mind is both language and metalanguage, and the brain is its physical interpretation. Click Here.
