Abstract

Quantum mechanics unites epistemology and ontology: it brings human knowledge explicitly into physical theory, and ties this knowledge into brain dynamics in a causally efficacious way. This development in science provides the basis for a natural resolution of the dualist functionalist controversy, which arises within the classical approach to the mind brain system from the fact that the phenomenal aspects are not derivable from the principles of classical mechanics. A conceptually simple causal quantum mechanical theory of the mind/brain is described, and used to examine the necessity and function of consciousness in brain process