The greatest mystery of all is why a group of atoms, like the ones constituting me, can feel anything. The mind-brain problem has puzzled philosophers for millennia.
Thanks to pioneers like Christof Koch, consciousness studies have recently become a legitimate field of scientific inquiry.
He has written three excellent books on the topic. We discuss many aspects of the phenomenon, including an intriguing candidate theory: Integrated Information Theory.
Links to books by Christof Koch:
- “The feeling of life itself – why consciousness is widespread but can’t be computed” (2020)
- “Consciousness – confessions of a romantic reductionist” (2012)
- “The Quest for Consciousness” (2004)
- “Biophysics of Computation – Information Processing in Single Neurons” (1999)
The podcast was recorded February 13th 2021 and lasts 2 hours and 4 minutes.