How much of our consciousness and identity is physical? I've started thinking of this again recently, having recently read Galileo's Dream and The Unwind Trilogy as well as having this exact conversation with a friend recovering from a surgery. You hear about organ recipients having strange new memories or cravings that can be attributed to the donor. Somehow some part of identity of the donor got transmitted via a kidney or liver. This is not consistent with our western idea of identity and consciousness living in the brain. I have not heard discussions of what happens to the donor. Do they lose part of their identity? A friend recently had a gall bladder removed as well as part of some intestine. I asked her if she felt something missing. I personally couldn't tell you if I feel more complete because I have my gall bladder. Like most of my physical body parts, the better they function, the less I know they are there. You are not supposed to feel your kidney, or your knee ligaments. But what is it like to suddenly have something like that taken out? To intellectually know it is missing as well as to viscerally know. My friend talked about the surgery causing a feeling of being disconnected from herself, having several experiences of watching from outside of herself. However, she also admitted that this may not exactly be because of the gall bladder removal, but due to a series of surgeries and just not quite knowing how to process the massive change in her life.
Which leads to the problem with the question: How would a scientist quantify the physicality of consciousness? One way would be to follow the cult practices described by Christopher Paolini in his Inheritance Cycle books, where the priests of Helgrind would amputate portions of their body in sacrifice to the Ra'zac. More senior priests have more amputated parts and eventually need to be carried around. If we could interview these subjects about identity, we might get some clues. Or since this is just a fantasy novel, we might interview trauma victims who have lost body parts, or even organ donors. But the entire exercise is completely subjective. As a physical scientist, I might want to get an MRI brain scan before and after a donation. But that takes me back to relying on western thinking about consciousness, which presupposes that the brain is where we will find answers.
One difficulty is that the physicality of life is so massively complex (100 billion nuerons in the brain, many trillions of cells in the human body) that objective, physical-science, particle-by-particle determinism is not possible. So I will be satisfied with remaining fascinated by consciousness and the complexity of life. I will continue to be intrigued by the physical connection to consciousness and the implications for universe sized intelligence and artificial intelligences.
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