Prototime, Timelessness, and the Hard Problem of Consciousness

A commentary on Schneider and Bailey's hypothesis that conscious experience may reside in 'prototime', an aspatial, quasi-temporal reality from which space-time emerges. The author agrees this offers a possible solution to the hard problem of consciousness but argues that a timeless reality could serve a similar explanatory role. The author also suggests that the lesson of emergent space-time is not necessarily that consciousness is fundamental to prototime, but that the apparent incomprehensibility of one phenomenon emerging from another should not lead to the conclusion that such emergence is impossible.

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Abstract

Might the seat of conscious experience exist in 'prototime', a conjectured aspatial, quasi-temporal reality out of which space-time emerges? Schneider and Bailey argue that if space-time is emergent, this might help us to understand the place of consciousness in the physical world. Although I agree that their hypothesis suggests a possible solution to the 'hard problem' of consciousness — the challenge of explaining how consciousness arises from particles and processes that are themselves non-conscious — I argue that a timeless rather than prototemporal reality may offer a similar explanatory role. I also consider whether the lesson we should draw from the possibility of emergent space-time is not that consciousness may be a fundamental element of prototime, as Schneider and Bailey see it, but rather that the apparent incomprehensibility of one phenomenon's emergence from another should not lead us to conclude that such emergence is impossible.