Panqualia vs Qualia:
Qualia refer to the subjective experiences of consciousness, such as the redness of red or the pain of pain. They pose the hard problem of consciousness: how do physical processes in the brain generate subjective experience? Information theory suggests consciousness arises from complex patterns of information processing in the brain. However, this does not fully explain the emergence of qualia.
Panqualia proposes that qualia are intrinsic properties of all information, not just that in complex systems like brains. According to this view, all information patterns have some inherent phenomenal character. However, only some information systems, like biological brains, have the necessary complexity, connectivity, and organization to express or manifest the qualia they possess. Atoms, molecules and simpler systems have information but lack the means to communicate any qualitative experiences they have.
For intrinsic qualia to be expressed, information likely needs to be structured and organized into detectable informational configurations that a mind can grasp as conscious experiences. Brains appear able to “reduce the qualia resolution” of immense amounts of information at the atomic and molecular level. They filter, integrate and organize this information into perceptual representations and higher-level concepts that form the contents of consciousness. This suggests qualia exist on a continuum. Systems with organized, detectable information have “accessible” qualia that can be expressed. Those with disorganized, microscopic information have “inaccessible” qualia that cannot be communicated. Biological brains may uniquely reduce qualia resolution to a level that enables consciousness while retaining aspects of the original phenomenality in the information.
While potential complexity at the atomic and molecular level in the brain is vast, much remains unrealized due to anatomical and biochemical constraints. In contrast, neural networks in the brain generate highly complex, interactive, dynamic patterns of activity that likely far exceed the complexity of atomic-level processes.But A single conscious thought involves a low-resolution sampling of the brain’s immense representational capabilities, filtering most of the complex information being processed. Meanwhile, the underlying molecular and atomic dynamics maintain an “information resolution” that far exceeds any single conscious experience due to the enormous number of possible states and configurations, even within single neurons producing a thought.
So For qualia to be expressed at all, the high-resolution qualia inherent in atomic and molecular information needs to be reduced through organizational processes forming coherent representations a mind can grasp. The vast qualia resolution at the quantum scale cannot be directly expressed in consciousness; the information must first be organized and structured neurally. The resultant reduction in qualia resolution allows the organized information to form the content of a representational abstraction like a thought that a mind can potentially apprehend as a conscious experience. Biological brains appear optimized to reduce qualia resolution to an intermediate level that generates coherent representations complex enough for consciousness yet retains aspects of the original phenomenality in the quantum information.