Don’t forget the boundary problem! How EM field topology can address the overlooked cousin to the binding problem for consciousness

"EM-field ToCs regularly reference the ease with which they defeat the binding problem, typically noting that fields are ontologically unified by their physical nature and automatically integrate all the information contained in the underlying EM activity that generates them (Jones, 2016; Keppler, 2021; Ward and Guevara, 2022; McFadden, 2023; etc.)."

2.4. Further EM-field theory perspectives on the boundary problem, p. 5

This passage explicitly links EM fields with intrinsic unity and across-module information integration, aligning with signatures like global integration and binding posited for unified conscious access in brain and AI systems.

"In the context of continually jostling topologies, we can imagine these different modules producing EM fields that “compete” to contribute information to the well-bounded 4D field that is integrated with the relevant memory modules, helping to account for the phenomenology of multiple inputs competing for our attention that inspires advocates of global workspace theories."

4.3.3. Addressing the fifth problem, p. 12

The authors propose selection and gating of information into a dominant field ‘workspace,’ mirroring selective routing mechanisms in both cortex and attention-based AI.

"Closed EM structures with certain durations can be understood as enclosing electromagnetic space so as to temporarily prevent the transit of energy with that same EM spectral range outside of the space.6 For its duration, there is an ontologically closed space for the relevant phenomena in that spectral range... The charged particles nonetheless continue to operate, subject to downward causation from the field, and as the closed structure collapses, causal interactions and information exchange with surrounding entities can continue."

4.1. How field topology can create hard boundaries, p. 9

By positing closed EM pockets that constrain internal interactions via downward causation, the authors sketch a causal handle for interventions to modulate computation within a conscious unit.

"A brief definition of weak emergence is in order, where causal influence rather than ontological fundamentality is sufficient to support non-epiphenomenalism. In this paper, weakly emergent causality is where a structure influences the behaviour of its constituent parts, perhaps by constraining the space of actions available to individual parts."

4.2.4. Weak emergence in the brain, p. 11

Weakly emergent, structure-level causal constraints are proposed as the mechanism by which a unified field could control its parts—an avenue for causal control without strong emergence.

"Bond (2023) suggests coherence fields as atomic nodes within expanses of integrating photonic waves as the fundamental units of 1PP... it is also possible that a phase transition between coherence/decoherence in his electric currents might motivate a hard boundary. Keppler (2021) similarly appeals to phase transitions..."

2.4. Further EM-field theory perspectives on the boundary problem, p. 6

Phase transitions are identified as candidate mechanisms for on/off-like formation of conscious boundaries, consistent with abrupt state changes in conscious processing.

"A more general phenomenon to call upon is that of phase transitions, although a full solution must identify where the transition takes place, the mechanism that drives it, and motivate why the hard boundary it generates is adequate for enclosing phenomenal consciousness."

3.2. The lower-levels boundary problem, p. 7

The authors argue that phase transitions could demarcate conscious from non-conscious regimes, highlighting the need to specify mechanisms and loci of such transitions.

"The temporal binding problem asks how the moments are knitted together over time to feel like part of the same experience. The temporal boundary problem asks how, once we have a boundary around a static experience or a particular moment of 1PP, that boundary can shift mostly contiguously to have different shapes in future moments."

3. Precise statement of five specific boundary problems, p. 8

This specifies a temporal coordination requirement—mechanisms must pace and link successive bounded states to yield continuity of experience over time.

"Ward and Guevara (2022) set out the case for a particular EM field generated by the thalamus, suggesting that axiomatically a 1PP is an EM field that expresses a model of an external environment, a self-entity, and various actions that entity can take to influence its environment."

2.4. Further EM-field theory perspectives on the boundary problem, p. 6

Linking 1PP to an EM-encoded self-model aligns with metacognitive/reportable signatures, tying conscious access to structured representations of self and action.

"Other fields do not express such models, although they may interface with it (e.g., subconscious inputs into our 1PP), and hence are not themselves phenomenally conscious—they lack a 1PP."

2.4. Further EM-field theory perspectives on the boundary problem, p. 6

By distinguishing fields with and without explicit self-environment models, the authors connect model content to reportable consciousness versus non-reporting processing.