homeostasis-publications

What is phenomenal consciousness, mechanistically? This independent theory-of-consciousness project argues it is not neurological, metaphysical, or informational, but physiological - rooted in homeostasis. The manuscript builds the argument bottom-up, starting at the mitochondrial proton gradient as a fully describable system that nonetheless exhibits embodied agency: a homeostatic force toward a steady state. What it feels like to be such a system, the argument goes, is the visceral feeling of that force acting on it; experience is the felt transition of the force vector. The position is distinct from IIT, GWT, and predictive-processing accounts because it locates the explanatory base in cellular biophysics rather than neural correlates, and engages seriously with the homeostasis literature (Bernard, Cannon, Sterling on allostasis, Waddington) to reconcile competing terminology.

The repo holds the in-progress manuscript (HomeostasisTheory.md) covering Motivation, Homeostasis term reconciliation, Embodied Agency, What it feels like, and Experience, alongside the poster presented at ASSC22 (Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness, 2022) in both color and print-optimized monochrome versions.