Seems to be an over-use of quantum physics when pop speakers are talking about how the mind works. Quantum physics is the basis of chemistry and electronics... and those are important for brain function, but you often don't need to get deep into the weirdness of QM to understand and characterize brain function. The cells are often computing in the more deterministic way that we are familiar with rather than the weird "quantum computer" way. Scientists build good models of single brain cells without using quantum mechanics (see NEURON simulator). As a thought experiment, you could replace each of the cells in your brain with a simulated neuron. You certainly wouldn't notice the different if you just replaced one with a machine that somehow received and created the same signals. (For an example, a pacemaker for a heart is sort of is a virtual cell signal simulator that works pretty well.) You could eventually replace every cell with a machine that does the same thing. I assume after all that you wouldn't know the difference. You'd be like the same program running on a different computer at that point. I suppose it's theoretically possible that something funny is going on specifically with organic biology that makes conciousness more real, but honestly I doubt it. So, why do the pop speakers talk about QM so much? - because it sounds cool. Nobody wants to be just an extremely complex computer or machine - we want to be something that we cannot understand. We want some magic. Quantum mechanics is strange enough at the level of single atom interactions to seem almost magical. But lets get real, cell are not atoms, and the brain is an analog computer, period.
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