EP 178 Anil Seth on A New Science of Consciousness

Jim talks with Anil Seth about his book Being You: A New Science of Consciousness. They discuss the curious non-experience of general anesthesia, defining consciousness, the difference between consciousness & intelligence, experiential vs functional aspects, the hard problem vs the real problem, measuring consciousness, consciousness vs wakefulness, Lempel-Ziv complexity, zap & zip, consciousness as multidimensional, psychedelic states of consciousness, integrated information theory & phi, Scott Aaronson’s expander grids, quantum IIT, accounting for conscious contents, the Bayesian brain, paying attention, Adelson’s checkerboard, the perception census, prediction error minimization, active inference, the two bridges experiment, aspects of self, the rubber hand illusion, somatoparaphrenia, separating self from personal identity, whether advanced mammals have personal identity, being a beast machine, and much more.

Anil Seth is Professor of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience at the University of Sussex, Co-Director of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research Program on Brain, Mind and Consciousness, a European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Investigator, and Editor-in-Chief of the academic journal Neuroscience of Consciousness (Oxford University Press). With more than two decades of research and outreach experience, Anil’s mission is to advance the science of consciousness and to use its insights for the benefit of society, technology and medicine. An internationally leading researcher, Anil is also a renowned public speaker, best-selling author, and sought-after collaborator on high-profile art-science projects.