Mike Johnson is a philosopher and neuroscientist working on the science consciousness. His major works include Principia Qualia (2016), Neural Annealing (2019), Vasocomputation (2023), and A Paradigm for AI Consciousness (2024). In this conversation we work through the three sub-hypotheses of vasocomputation, latches at multiple levels of resolution, Thomas Hanna’s sensory motor amnesia, John Sarno and chronic pain, active inference and Mike Levin’s nested agents, sub-agents as semi-sovereign regimes anchored in organs like the stomach and heart, and what kinds of evidence might ultimately confirm, or falsify, the theory.
Timestamps
0:00:00 – Intro
0:01:30 – Physical signatures and cutting the Gordian knot
0:06:25 – What is vasocomputation?
0:10:15 – The latch mechanism, latch bridges
0:14:20 – Role of the hippocampus, Hebbian reinforcement
0:16:35 – Thomas Hanna and sensory motor amnesia
0:19:30 – Physical and mental decoupling
0:24:00 – “Grabbing” as the core human physical and mental movement
0:26:15 – Treasure maps and maps with treasures, Sarno
0:28:30 – Pain as allostatic imperative and bodily boundaries
0:33:20 – Three types of latches
0:38:00 – Piriformis release and voice-typing anecdotes
0:43:45 – Agents vs priors, what is a subagent
0:48:35 – Internal Family Systems
0:52:00 – Active Inference
0:59:15 – Semi-sovereign regimes
1:05:30 – The stomach as the first brain, cognition as digestion
1:11:00 – Only smooth muscles latch
1:14:00 – Persistence of latches
1:18:50 – Connecting to chronic pain
1:21:10 – Performance envelopes, material science of tissue types
1:23:40 – Fascia
1:28:15 – Open problems in vasocomputation
1:32:00 – The question game
Links
Mike Johnson’s Website:
“The Games of Life” talk:
