Artificial Prophets

Walter Ratjen, paper presented at The Julian Jaynes Society Conference on Consciousness and Bicameral Studies, Charleston, WV, June 2013.

Abstract: The work of Jaynes has a structural part and a qualia part. These correspond to a pure consciousness, or science thereof, and to an applied consciousness, or science thereof, respectively. Comparing this to Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason and Critique of Judgment, we find that Jaynes’s work can be considered a Critique of Pure Consciousness and a Critique of Conscious Consciousness. You can’t be conscious without being conscious of something. This is identical to Kant’s concept of the “transcendental ego.” Thus, the pragmatic, part deals with voices in the bicameral mind and, in consciousness, with their vestiges. The pure part deals with the Metaphor Me and the Analog I, i.e. with metaphors, which are explained as properties of the imagined space. Consciousness, according to Jaynes, consists of the trinity of the Analog I, of the Metaphor Me, and of the Imagined Space that separates the former two and renders them discernable. It is defined by structural properties. Dealing with the pure, not the pragmatic part we must understand language as logos in the sense of the Stoa and of the 4th Gospel. And, we must understand the 4th Gospel from the concept of logos as implied in Jaynesian Pure Consciousness. Then we get the four components that constitute the structure of the latter, i.e. Metaphor Me, Analog I, Imagined Space, and Logos. The logos is the vestige of the quality of the bicameral mind, i.e. the voice, or voices. On turning into pure consciousness, the bicameral mind has been stripped of sound and of any manifest message, and has been reduced to pure form, or Logos.

The concept of the Imagined Space is central to Jaynes’s definition of pure consciousness, if not in fact identical to it. In the bicameral mind, the Analog I is located outside of the mind, as it is represented by gods who are audible and visible, if only to the cognizing person. In consciousness, exterior representations of cognitive functions turn into the interior Analog-I that has no shape and is inaudible. When the hypostasis “god” crosses the border of the three-dimensional surface of the human body, it turns mute, becomes imperceptible, and sequential revelations turn into static concepts. The three-dimensional surface closes again, thus providing for a three-dimensional interior, or imagined space. One would expect the volume of this space to vary depending on the shape and size of the hypostasis that took its home inside. What is more, one can expect the volume of this space to vary between cultures, and to evolve in history, as different cultures incorporated different deities, even evolved these deities before incorporating them. Cultures and minds should vary in correlation with the volume of their imagined space, as the latter has direct consequences for their ability to think metaphorically, i.e. to construct metaphors and metaphrands. All of these processes can be formalized. Space can be defined and measured. The imagined space individuals are capable of applying in problem solving has extensively been tested, and has been defined in units of the mks-system by experimental psychologists. Notwithstanding human beings being possibly capable of featuring other forms of consciousness, it is clear that Jaynes consciousness can be emulated on an appropriate artificial system, the single requirement for emulation being formalizability inprinciple. Jaynes’s theory of consciousness is IT-based consciousness “ante rem,” and thus is destined to grow in importance and reach.