Qualia Research Institute

The logo of QRI depicts the CIELAB color space, which has been created to model phenomenal perception of color. Thus, spatial distance in the logo approximates subjective similarity in phenomenal color space. Note that this space has three axes: red-green, blue-yellow, and bright-dark.

The Qualia Research Institute (QRI) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded in 2018 by Andrés Gómez Emilsson and Michael Edward Johnson to research consciousness. QRI does work in neuroscience, philosophy, and phenomenology, and publishes both within and outside academia. QRI frequently collaborates with academics, independent researchers, and advanced meditators and psychonauts.

Core Principles

QRI holds that consciousness is a fundamental feature of the universe that obeys mathematical laws, comparable to a phenomenon like gravity. As a result of this view, QRI pursues a full-stack research paradigm with the explicit goal of developing a complete theory of consciousness.

Since consciousness has causal efficacy (see the section on QRI's philosophical views), it is crucial to understand its computational properties in the human brain. QRI believes that these properties can be analyzed through the lens of physics but not through the lens of standard computation. In other words, while the brain is not a classical computer that operates solely with discrete computational units, it is still a deterministic system that can be understood precisely if analyzed through the proper frame. To this end, QRI is an advocate of the Free Energy Principle and the paradigm of brain eigenmodes and has developed several models that build on these ideas.

For further details, see the section on QRI-original concepts, QRI's research lineages, and the article on computational analogies for human consciousness.

The ITN Case for QRI

QRI's research agenda is motivated by the Importance, Tractability, and Neglectedness framework. Thus, QRI believes that

1. consciousness research is important. Due to the central role of valence in ethics, a gears-level understanding of consciousness has both theoretical implications, such as for judging the moral status of AI systems or rethinking ethical priorities, and practical implications, such as suggesting novel treatments for severely painful conditions or trauma and depression. Furthermore, due to its computational role, understanding consciousness may inform AI capabilities and timelines.
2. consciousness research is tractable. In other words, it is possible to make genuine progress on these problems, as evidenced by QRI's past and current research.
3. the research done by QRI is neglected. Since there are now thousands of papers about consciousness published per year, consciousness research as a whole is hardly neglected, at least not when compared to other cause areas of effective altruism. However, consciousness comes with a unique set of conceptual and philosophical difficulties that make it so different lines of research often have little to no overlap. As of 2024, QRI's work remains virtually unique within the research landscape.

A schematic illustration of three different approaches for studying the effects of psychedelics

As an example of the last point, consider the study of exotic states of consciousness, such as those induced by psychedelics. QRI considers such states to be crucial, similar to how particle accelerators play a crucial role in advancing physical research. While such states are researched within academia, this is usually through third person studies (see graphic on the right), where subjects answer a simple questionnaire with little to no follow-up. On the other hand, individual people sometimes examine the effects of a single substance repeatedly, which allows for much greater depth but provides no feedback to the practitioner, all while repeatedly putting them through extreme psychological experiences. Many people lose their epistemic grounding under these conditions, and begin to devise speculative and often metaphysically questionable theories, often attributing their experiences to the influence of an external intelligence.

QRI believes that a systematic understanding of exotic conscious states requires combining the best of both worlds. Thus, QRI champions a "think-tank" model in which a group of people goes in depth on the effects of a substance but also regularly communicates to exchange ideas and keep each other grounded.

Separately, the focus on semantic content that is popular with third-person studies may be severely limiting due to its idiosyncratic nature. The alternative is to focus on the phenomenal character of an experience, such as its mathematical patterns and symmetries. To advance this cause, QRI has developed the psychophysics toolkit (see also the underlying science) and published a guide for writing rigorous trip reports.

QRI's Philosophical Views

The discourse around consciousness is notorious for its broad range of opinions and conceptual difficulty, which is likely the primary reason for the diversity of approaches in the literature. This section will explain the views of QRI that justify their research agenda.

Note that the first five points are required to justify the mere feasibility of research: if any one of these were false, consciousness would not exist as a fundamental entity (#1), be impossible to study (#2/#4/#5), or fall outside the paradigm of current scientific research (#3). Conversely, the remaining points heavily dictate the type of approach that is likely to bear fruit. E.g., the sixth point, on which QRI takes a minority position, implies that consciousness must be analyzed through the lens of physics rather than standard computation. According to QRI, the prevalence of functionalism in the literature is likely the primary reason for the limited success of most consciousness research up to this point.

Realism

QRI holds that consciousness is a fundamental and frame-invariant feature of the universe. The opposing position is called eliminativism or illusionism. Note that this terminology can be confusing because skeptics often choose to redefine consciousness rather than deny its existence, usually as the observable biological phenomenon whose existence is uncontroversial. In general, a definition of consciousness as a non-fundamental or frame-dependent entity falls under the illusionist cluster.

Dual-Aspect Monism

Interactionism, Epiphenomenalism, and Dual-Aspect Monism can be classified by the causal roles they ascribe to matter and consciousness. Directed arrows indicate causal influence, and the $\approx$ symbol indicates an underlying substrate with two aspects.

A metaphorical illustration of dual-aspect monism as one entity that casts two shadows corresponding to material structures and qualia.

Main Article: Dual-Aspect Monism

Dual-Aspect Monism is the claim that consciousness is another aspect of physical processes. This view is distinct from Epiphenomenalism, which is the claim that consciousness has no causal power, and is generally considered incompatible with Interactionism, which is the claim that consciousness has causal power operating outside the laws of physics.

The term "dual-aspect monism" refers to a universe consisting of a single substance with two aspects. Another common description is that there is one kind of substance that looks like consciousness from the inside and matter from the outside. Dual-aspect monism is also called neutral monism.

Physicalism

Physicalism, as used in the QRI-memeplex, is the claim that the laws of physics (or a future version thereof) fully describe the causal behavior of the universe. This principle is complementary to dual-aspect monism (but not equivalent since it is also compatible with epiphenomenalism) and usually opposed to interactionism.

In other contexts, physicalism is often defined as the claim that "everything is physical" (or something similar), but the meaning and empirical consequences of such definitions are not clear. Furthermore, some people use "materialism" as equivalent to the above conception of physicalism; however, QRI defines materialism as physicalism plus the additional claim that the fundamental substrate of the universe is non-conscious.

Qualia Formalism

Qualia formalism is the claim that, for any globally bound moment of consciousness, there exists a mathematical object that describes it precisely. Qualia formalism can be considered a consequence of taking both realism and physicalism seriously. The concept was first introduced by QRI co-founder Michael Edward Johnson in his short book PrincipiaQualia and was heavily inspired by Integrated Information Theory.

Qualia Structuralism

Qualia Structuralism (also introduced by Mike in PrincipiaQualia) is the additional claim that such an object has regularity and structure. Roughly speaking, qualia structuralism implies that a solution to consciousness might look more like a set of equations, rather than a table of properties.

Implementation vs. Function

QRI holds that consciousness is determined by the physical state of a system rather than by a higher-level description like a graph or logical circuit. This can be more precisely defined as the claim that consciousness lives on the implementation level of Marr's Levels of Analysis, or alternatively, the claim that no compression algorithm can shorten the physical description of arbitrary systems without losing information about their consciousness.

The most popular opposing view is called functionalism, which holds that consciousness is defined by its functional role, or the Algorithmic Level of Marr's Levels of Analysis.

The Thing vs. Process Distinction

QRI takes the position that consciousness is a thing rather than a process. A more technical phrasing of this claim is that the system's state fully determines the consciousness exhibited by a system at any point in time rather than by how the system changes throughout time. While there is no label for either side of the disagreement, the academically dominant position is to view consciousness as a process.

The EM Hypothesis

The electromagnetic hypothesis, or EM hypothesis, is a term coined in this wiki and another core part of QRI's research agenda. It states that non-local phenomena of the electromagnetic field play a crucial role for human consciousness. While the EM hypothesis itself is not philosophical, QRI considers it to be the only hypothesis that is logically and physically compatible with the philosophical claims listed in the previous section. (The full argument for this conclusion is too complex to explain here, but see the articles on functionalism, computation, and the binding problem.) Note that the EM hypothesis is not a theory but merely a starting point for what a theory could look like. In particular, it is a weaker claim than specific proposals like cemi theory.

Within academia, the EM hypothesis remains a minority position despite a recent increase in interest. The emerging paradigm of brain eigenmodes may also be considered evidence for the EM hypothesis, which provides a principled explanation for why and how synchronization of neuronal activity (which causes a far greater disturbance in the electromagnetic field than the activation of single neurons) fulfills a computational function.

QRI-Original Concepts

The following lists the major concepts that have come out of QRI's research:

• Neural Annealing – developed at QRI and crystallized by Mike Johnson in 2019, Neural Annealing is a model for how the brain self-organizes and maintains plasticity. See Mike's blog post, a presentation from Andrés, as well as a more recent presentation on the latest iteration of the proposal called Neural Field Annealing.
• Logarithmic Scales of Pleasure and Pain – a model and supporting empirical data of human valence following a long-tail distribution, such that it can be linearly plotted on a logarithmic scale. The upshot is that a valence-focused theory of ethics has reason to prioritize the most extreme ends of experience. See the official blog post.
• Topological Segmentation as a solution to the Boundary Problem – QRI's solution for the philosophical Boundary Problem, which is the problem of how (a) many bits of information can appear within the same conscious experience, and (b) there can be discrete, frame-invariant boundaries between such experiences. See the academic paper and the two videos of Andrés about the subject.
• The Symmetry Theory of Valence – originally proposed by Mike Johnson in PrincipiaQualia, the Symmetry Theory of Valence (STV) is a theory about the physical implementation of valence within a moment of consciousness.
• Aesthetics – based on the philosophical study of beauty, QRI proposes that the concept of aesthetics can be applied much more broadly to explain many facets of social identity as well as societal tendencies, and can also be formalized in terms of qualia and valence. See Andrés' talk on The Aesthetic of the Meta-Aesthetic.
• The Hyperbolic Geometry of DMT experiences – a model to explain the phenomenology of conscious states under the influence of LSD. See the QRI blog post as well as the psychophysics toolkit.
• The Pseudo-Time Arrow – a proposal for how the phenomenal sense of time is constructed. See the QRI blog post and the QualiaComputing article.

Resources

Many pages in this wiki include a "Resources" section, usually just before the list of references. This section will provide a list of external webpages that go into more depth (or sometimes breadth) about the topic covered in the article. Since this page is about QRI itself, many the links will go to entire blogs or channels; other articles will often link to particular articles or videos on these platforms.

• qri.org – the official QRI website.
• The YouTube channel of Andrés Gómez Emilsson – this channel contains many 1+ hour long videos that go into and may be the most comprehensive resource for getting acquainted with the QRI memeplex.
• Principles – a list of ten principles that QRI subscribes to.
• The official QRI blog – this is a chronological list of outputs that covers both research outputs and other relevant news.
• QualiaComputing – the personal blog of Andrés.
• OpenTheory – the personal blog of Mike Johnson. Note that even though Mike no longer works at QRI, he has played a crucial role in shaping many of the foundational concepts of QRI, and most of his output since continues to be compatible with QRI's research and world view.
• The QRI YouTube channel – the official YouTube channel of QRI, which includes videos of presentations, conversations, and a series of guided meditations.
• superhappiness.xyz – a book by QRI detailing several approaches for increasing happiness in daily life.
• smoothbrains.net – the blog of QRI collaborator CubeFlipper.
• QRI discord – an invite link to the (unofficial) QRI discord server.