Theories of consciousness and cognition that assume a neural substrate automatically regard phylogenetically basal, nonneural systems as nonconscious and noncognitive. Here, we advance a scale-free characterization of consciousness and cognition that regards basal systems, including synthetic constructs, as not only informative about the structure and function of experience in more complex systems but also as offering distinct advantages for experimental manipulation. Our “minimal physicalist” approach makes no assumptions beyond those of quantum information theory, and hence is applicable from the molecular scale upwards. We show that standard concepts including integrated information, state broadcasting via small-world networks, and hierarchical Bayesian inference emerge naturally in this setting, and that common phenomena including stigmergic memory, perceptual coarse-graining, and attention switching follow directly from the thermodynamic requirements of classical computation. We show that the self-representation that lies at the heart of human autonoetic awareness can be traced as far back as, and serves the same basic functions as, the stress response in bacteria and other basal systems.

中文翻译：

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最小物理主义作为认知和意识的无尺度基础

假设有神经基础的意识和认知理论自动将系统发育基础的非神经系统视为无意识和非认知的。在这里，我们推进了意识和认知的无标度表征，它认为基础系统，包括合成结构，不仅可以提供更复杂系统中经验的结构和功能的信息，还可以为实验操作提供明显的优势。我们的“最小物理主义”方法没有超出量子信息理论的假设，因此适用于分子尺度以上。我们展示了包括集成信息、通过小世界网络的状态广播和分层贝叶斯推理在内的标准概念在这种情况下自然出现，包括污名记忆、感知粗粒度和注意力转换在内的常见现象直接来自经典计算的热力学要求。我们表明，位于人类自主意识核心的自我表征可以追溯到细菌和其他基础系统中的应激反应，并具有相同的基本功能。