Mary Martin

An experiment seven years in the making has uncovered new insights into the nature of consciousness and challenges two prominent, competing scientific theories: Integrated Information Theory (IIT) and Global Neuronal Workspace Theory (GNWT).

1. IIT suggests that consciousness emerges when information inside a system (like the brain) is highly connected

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If an AI companion becomes someone’s most consistent emotional presence, the right question isn’t “how do we stop this?” It’s “what does that say about the world around them?” Technological relationships are not new. What’s new is how effective they’ve become; and how clearly they mirror the gaps we’ve refused to address.

We’ve tried prohibition... See more

When the mind searches for the future, it sees the past.

what would education look like if the goal is human and planetary flourishing?

Are mental health awareness efforts contributing to the rise in reported mental health problems? A call to test the prevalence inflation hypothesis

A popular narrative now casts all living entities as ‘machines’ built by genes, as Richard Dawkins called them. For Mayr, biology was unique among the sciences precisely because its objects of study possessed a program that encoded apparent purpose, design and agency into what they do. On this view, agency doesn’t actually manifest in the moment of... See more

"A lot of how we feel," she explains, "is all about the systems we interact with, whether they're other people or technology. We're interacting increasingly with technology over time, and I think things like how much time we spend staring at screens, our phones and social media is impacting our mental health. So maybe, by having machines that have... See more