Consciousness and Correlation

Consciousness as high correlation state. Four inference paths converge. What the emergence principle implies for experience.

If emergence requires correlations exceeding a threshold, and consciousness appears emergent from neural activity, then consciousness should require neural correlations crossing that threshold. This decode traces four independent inference paths to the same conclusion.

From Emergence

Neurons aren't conscious. Brains (allegedly) are. Consciousness appears at a scale where correlations—binding, synchrony, integration—cross a threshold. Anesthesia disrupts integration, disrupts consciousness. Split-brain patients show divided consciousness when connections are severed. The correlation-emergence principle predicts exactly this.

From Self-Modeling

Conscious systems model themselves. The "oneness" of experience may be the fact that information is correlated and integrated. Reflexive correlation—correlations that include information about the system's own state. Not just correlation, but self-referential correlation.

From Compression

We experience millions of bits of sensory data as a single unified scene. Compression requires correlation—uncorrelated data can't compress. Consciousness may be what high-dimensional compressed representations "feel like from inside."

From Global Broadcast

Global Workspace Theory: consciousness involves information available to all cognitive processes. Global broadcast = creating correlations across distant brain regions. Same pattern as emergence. The brain creates correlations; consciousness is the result.

Convergence

Four independent paths: Consciousness = high correlation state of a self-modeling system. More correlation = more consciousness. Damage that fragments correlations fragments consciousness. Attention = correlation selection. The principle fits the data.

What it doesn't explain: why there is something it's like at all. The hard problem remains. But it explains which systems are conscious and what correlates with consciousness.

— Decoded by DECODER.