ULTIMATE COMPUTING - Quantum Consciousness Studies

60 From Brain to Cytoskeleton
presented. The purpose is to provide sufficiently comprehensive background in
order to justify the contention that the cytoskeleton is an underlying medium of
information processing within brain neurons.
4.2.1 Architecture
The central nervous system (CNS) of vertebrates including man is organized
in an ascending hierarchy of parallel structures-spinal cord, brain stem, and brain.
The peripheral nervous system consists of peripheral nerves and the ganglia of the
autonomic nervous system. Human brains contain about a hundred billion
neurons. Evolution has caused a “cephalic” shift of importance, relative size, and
control towards the higher centers or neocortex, which in man is larger and more
complex than in other mammals. There are generalized similarities in structure,
composition and functioning of central nervous systems in all vertebrates.
Neurons within all nervous systems are themselves organized by their component
cytoskeletons.
Brain/Mind
consciousness, “self,” “Mind’s Eye,” attention
Brain Systems, Homunculi, “Centers”
functionally related neurons, anatomical regions,
assemblies of networks, reverberation
Neural Synaptic Networks, Cartels, Modules
cooperativity due to dense interconnectedness, parallelism,
associative memory, learning, synaptic plasticity
Neuron
multiple synaptic inputs and outputs, dendritic processing,
synaptic plasticity, axoplasmic transport
Cytoskeleton
centrioles, microtubules, filaments, synaptic morphology,
spatiotemporal cellular organization,
cellular automata, coherent oscillations
Cytoplasmic Ground Substance (“Infoplasm” )
sol-gel states, geodesic actin, tensegrity structures,
ordered water, dissipative patterns, holographic interference
Table 4-1: Collective hierarchy of parallel information processing systems.
Two types of cells make up nervous tissue: neurons and satellite cells. In the
central nervous system, the satellite cells are called neuroglia and in the
periphery, Schwann cells. These satellite cells wrap layers and layers of myelin
sheeting around neurons forming what is generally considered to be merely
insulation which increases the velocity of propagating signals.
The parts of a neuron are the dendrites, the cell body (or perikaryon) and the
axon which is also referred to as the nerve “fiber.” Dendrites and the cell body
generally receive incoming signals and the cell body transforms these into an
outgoing signal carried by the axon (Figure 4.1). The “white matter” of the central
nervous system consists of fiber tracts and their myelinating glial cells while the