Qualia

 

Qualia

Abstract

Qualia—the irreducible subjective qualities of experience—are formalized as elements of the closed interval or set defined by moral weight () and reward (). This interval is itself embedded within common sense (), which is understood as the product of an underlying structured capacity . The resulting hierarchy situates conscious experience inside a normative–motivational frame that is already constrained by shared, intersubjective common-sense reasoning. The diagram thereby proposes that any adequate account of qualia must simultaneously respect their moral valence, their role in reward-driven systems, and their grounding in the everyday conceptual repertoire of common sense.

 

Review of the diagram

The handwritten notes present a compact formal framing of qualia in relation to moral and motivational concepts, nested inside common sense:

• Qualia are located inside the interval/set .
• That interval/set itself belongs to (or is a subset of) common sense ().
• is glossed as arising from some underlying structure that yields “common sense.”
• Explicit definitions are supplied:
  moral weight,
  reward,
  common sense.

The notation is informal and mixes set-membership (), interval brackets, and subset () symbols. The top line appears to have been partially revised (the leading or similar mark). Overall the sketch is a concise conceptual claim rather than a fully rigorous formal system: subjective experience (qualia) is bounded by, or constituted within, the dual considerations of moral significance and reward value, and this whole construct sits inside the broader faculty of common sense.

Could it be enclosed by IIT with a (phi)>0?

Integrated Information Theory (IIT) can serve as the outermost necessary condition that encloses the entire structure.

Why it fits

According to IIT, a system possesses qualia (subjective experience) if and only if its integrated information satisfies Φ > 0.
If Φ = 0, there are no qualia at all — therefore the inner relations involving moral weight (Mw), reward (Rw), and common sense (CS) become undefined or empty.

This gives a clean ontological enclosure:

Or, in the dynamic RSI-extended version:

where each successive RSI cycle can also attempt to increase Φ (or at least preserve Φ > 0).

Updated nested hierarchy

 

Φ > 0                          ← IIT necessary condition for consciousness

 └── Common Sense (CS)

      └── [Mw , Rw]

           └── Qualia

In short: IIT with Φ > 0 acts as the outermost gatekeeper. Without positive integrated information, the rest of the model has no experiential content to which moral weight or reward can be assigned.

Updated image