Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness

The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness. Proceedings of the Francis CrickMemorial Conference, Churchill College, Cambridge University, July 7 2012, pp 1-2.]

The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness*

On this day of July 7, 2012, a prominent international group of cognitive neuroscientists, neuropharmacologists, neurophysiologists, neuroanatomists and computational neuroscientists gathered at The University of Cambridge to reassess the neurobiological substrates of conscious experience and related behaviors in human and non-human animals. While comparative research on this topic is naturally hampered by the inability of non-human animals, and often humans, to clearly and readily communicate about their internal states, the following observations can be stated unequivocally:

The field of Consciousness research is rapidly evolving. Abundant new techniques and strategies for human and non-human animal research have been developed. Consequently, more data is becoming readily available, and this calls for a periodic reevaluation of previously held preconceptions in this field. Studies of non-human animals have shown that homologous brain circuits correlated with conscious experience and perception can be selectively facilitated and disrupted to assess whether they are in fact necessary for those experiences. Moreover, in humans, new non-invasive techniques are readily available to survey the correlates of consciousness.

The neural substrates of emotions do not appear to be confined to cortical structures. In fact, subcortical neural networks aroused during affective states in humans are also critically important for generating emotional behaviors in animals. Artificial arousal of the same brain regions generates corresponding behavior and feeling states in both humans and non-human animals.

Wherever in the brain one evokes instinctual emotional behaviors in non-human animals, many of the ensuing behaviors are consistent with experienced feeling states, including those internal states that are rewarding and punishing. Deep brain stimulation of these systems in humans can also generate similar affective states. Systems associated with affect are concentrated in subcortical regions where neural homologies abound. Young human and non-human animals without neocortices retain these brain-mind functions. Furthermore, neural circuits supporting behavioral/electrophysiological states of attentiveness, sleep and decision making appear to have arisen in evolution as early as the invertebrate radiation, being evident in insects and cephalopod mollusks (e.g., octopus).

Birds appear to offer, in their behavior, neurophysiology, and neuroanatomy a striking case of parallel evolution of consciousness. Evidence of near human-like levels of consciousness has been most dramatically observed in African grey parrots. Mammalian and avian emotional networks and cognitive microcircuitries appear to be far more homologous than previously thought. 

Moreover, certain species of birds have been found to exhibit neural sleep patterns similar to those of mammals, including REM sleep and, as was demonstrated in zebra finches, neurophysiological patterns, previously thought to require a mammalian neocortex. 

Magpies in[Low, P. The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness. Proceedings of the Francis Crick Memorial Conference, Churchill College, Cambridge University, July 7 2012, pp 1-2.] particular have been shown to exhibit striking similarities to humans, great apes, dolphins, and elephants in studies of mirror self-recognition.

In humans, the effect of certain hallucinogens appears to be associated with a disruption in cortical feedforward and feedback processing. Pharmacological interventions in non-human animals with compounds known to affect conscious behavior in humans can lead to similar perturbations in behavior in non-human animals. In humans, there is evidence to suggest that awareness is correlated with cortical activity, which does not exclude possible contributions by subcortical or early cortical processing, as in visual awareness. Evidence that human and non- human animal emotional feelings arise from homologous subcortical brain networks provide compelling evidence for evolutionarily shared primal affective qualia.

We declare the following: “The absence of a neocortex does not appear to preclude an organism from experiencing affective states. Convergent evidence indicates that non-human animals have the neuroanatomical, neurochemical, and neurophysiological substrates of conscious states along with the capacity to exhibit intentional behaviors. Consequently, the weight of evidence indicates that humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate consciousness. Non-human animals, including all mammals and birds, and many other creatures, including octopuses also possess these neurological substrates.

The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness was written by Philip Low and edited by Jaak Panksepp, Diana Reiss, David Edelman, Bruno Van Swinderen, Philip Low and Christof Koch. The Declaration was publicly proclaimed in Cambridge, UK, on July 7, 2012, at the Francis Crick Memorial

Conference on Consciousness in Human and non-Human Animals, at Churchill College, University of Cambridge, by Low, Edelman and Koch. The

Declaration was signed by the conference participants that very evening, in the presence of Stephen Hawking, in the Balfour Room at the Hoteldu Vin in Cambridge, UK. The signing ceremony was memorialized by CBS 60 Minutes.

The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness was written as the summary of the Francis Crick Memorial Conference hosted by Philip Low at Cambridge University. While it is indisputable that all vertebrates, including fish and reptiles do possess the neurological substrates of consciousness, and that there is further very strong evidence to support that invertebrates, including but not limited to decapod crustaceans, cephalopod mollusks, and insects, also do, only octopuses were explicitly named because there was a scientific presentation on them.

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Dear Friends,,

As we discern how to more fully live into our Peace Testimony, it may be helpful to distinguish between “personal practice” and our “shared practice” within the Meeting.

Friends hold a range of personal lifestyles and choices and ways of living that may differ from one another. Some may consume animal products, alcohol, or tobacco in private life, while others do not. These are matters of individual conscience and are not to be judged. At the same time, we recognize that within the Meeting we sometimes hold ourselves to different standards, setting certain personal practices aside in order to reflect our shared commitments. Doing so is not inconsistency or hypocrisy, but a natural expression of faithfulness in community.

We see this pattern in many areas of life. When visiting a mosque, we remove our shoes. In a synagogue, we may cover our heads. In a Quaker meeting, we settle into silence.  At a lecture, we listen and do not speak. We adapt to the norms of a space out of respect for its purpose and for those gathered. In the same way, being together in Meeting calls forth “shared practices” that express a willingness to live into values that may extend beyond our individual daily practices.

In this spirit, Friends and visitors who are not vegetarian in private life are called to embrace vegetarianism while at the Meetinghouse as an expression of the Peace Testimony. This, too, reflects integrity rather than inconsistency or hypocrisy. What we do together matters. A potluck following worship is part of our gathered way of being together and reflects what we are willing to uphold as a community.

We already have a long-standing practice of vegetarian potlucks. A “minute” would not create something new, but would name, strengthen, and give clearer expression to what we are already living. It may also offer a witness to other Meetings that we are seeking to extend our practice of nonviolence in the spirit of the Peace Testimony.

The question before us, then, is not how each of us lives privately, but how we are led to “bear witness” to the fullness of the Peace Testimony during our time together at the Meetinghouse. This witnessing has long been understood not only as a testimony against war, but as a call to attend to suffering, exploitation, and violence in all its forms, and to extend our care to all sentient beings.

In seeking to live more fully into our Peace Testimony, Friends have been led to feel that vegetarian practice is a fitting and consistent norm for our shared life when we gather as a Meeting. At the same time, we acknowledge and honor that individual Friends may hold different personal practices, which are respected within the community.

I would be grateful to know how I might best help hold and facilitate this conversation, which has been in my heart and on my mind.

In the spirit of the Friends Peace Testimony,

Lewis