Integrated Theory of Intelligence
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(b) Level of consciousness should be directly proportional to the density information. The greater the amount of information (memories) of stored per unit-volume of space, the greater the potential level of consciousness that an organism might achieve. This would be metaphorically reflected by a more finely dispersed foam-like distribution of information. In comparing an infant brain to that of an adult, the latter has a much greater quantity of stored information (memories) even though the physical brain size is only a little larger.

The concept that memory is stored in space rather than within the hard-wiring of the brain would also be in agreement with Rupert Sheldrake's theory of morphic resonance. Morphogenetic fields require space-time to operate and exert their influence. The more space that is available, the greater the number of fields that are potentially possible. As space expands exponentially, the number of fields that could potentially form increases in number exponentially. It is very conceivable, but still yet to be established, that intelligence-consciousness exerts its controlling influence through the presence of fields much like Sheldrake envisions. The number of fields possible and their level of complexity in the early universe would have been far fewer, and more simple, than presently found in the universe of today.

The same generalization could be applied to Jung's collective unconscious, which also requires the presence of space. The more space available, the greater the potential for the existence of a collective unconsciousness.

This concept would also be consistent with Sheldrake's hypothesis of formative causation, which proposes that memory is inherent in nature.70...He suggests that natural systems, such as termite colonies, pigeons, orchid plants, or insulin molecules, inherit a collective memory from all previous things of their kind, however far away they were and however long ago they existed. Because of this cumulative memory through repetition, the nature of things becomes increasingly habitual. They are as they are because they were as they were.71

Sheldrake also proposes that our own memories may not be stored inside our brains, as we have traditionally assumed, but in morphogenetic fields that exist in space. These fields shape all the different kinds of atoms, molecules, crystals, living organisms, societies, customs, and habits of mind.72

Morphogenetic fields are non-material regions of influence extending in space and continuing in time. They surround the systems they organize and are localized within them. When the system that is organized disappears (dies), its influencing effect remains and can appear once again in another time and place whenever physical conditions are appropriate.

Sheldrake has suggested that, "Because all past members of a species influence these fields, their influence is cumulative: it increases as the total number of members of the species grows.".73...He further suggests the possibility that the physical laws we describe in physics are not so much laws, but more like habits impregnated in morphogenetic fields. These laws or habits may have actually evolved with nature itself and are even still evolving.74




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