“What Am I — Qualia, Brahman, Neurons, or just Nothing?”
“Can consciousness be measured mathematically as a physical property?”
Chat with SageIntegrated Information Theory, developed by Giulio Tononi, is a quantitative model of consciousness. It proposes that consciousness is a fundamental property of physical systems, measured by the mathematical value Phi (Φ).
IIT proposes that a system is conscious to the degree that it integrates information irreducibly. If a system's parts interact in a way that cannot be split into independent subsystems, it possesses integrated information, measured by Phi.
Because any system with integrated information has a non-zero Phi, IIT implies that consciousness is graded and present in basic physical structures. A simple photodiode has a small amount of consciousness, while a human brain has a vast amount.
IIT resolves the boundaries of a conscious system using the Exclusion Principle. Only the system with local maxima of Phi (Φ) exists as a conscious subject, preventing sub-parts (like individual neurons) or super-parts (like crowds) from being independent minds.
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