In this article
- The question behind the comparison
- The single-source and nested-time proposal
- The comparator’s explanatory structure
- The precise agreement and difference
- Worked example: what follows and what does not
- What this comparison contributes
Observer participation and intersubjectivity: SMM/DTT and Integrated information theory
IIT’s intrinsic standpoint and ordinary intersubjective observation concern different access relations. A system’s proposed experience is analyzed from its own causal organization, while an external scientist studies that system through measurements. The comparison develops this distinction through a worked example and explains its implications for SMM/DTT’s nested generation, completed records and account of the observable world.
01The question behind the comparison
Observation involves a relation between an event and a system capable of registering it. Intersubjectivity concerns how different observers can compare perspectives and identify a shared world. SMM/DTT’s outer completion makes accessibility central, while its single source offers an ontological ground for coherence. The challenge is to explain agreement without erasing the real differences among observers. Common origin is not yet a rule for reconciling records.
Participation has several meanings. An observer can physically disturb a system, choose a measurement context, interpret a result or contribute to the constitution of an experienced object. These are distinct relations. A measurement apparatus changes quantum correlations through an interaction whether or not a person immediately experiences its output. A person may later interpret the result differently without changing the recorded count. A clear DTT account states which kind of participation its completion rule describes. This avoids turning every epistemic difference into a physical creation event.
The six nested inner levels can provide a proposed architecture for generating relations accessible to observers. The outer level should then specify whose access is involved and how records from different perspectives become comparable. A shared record does not require identical experiences, and identical reported words do not guarantee identical experiences. A useful physical criterion is consistency when records are brought together through an allowed interaction. A useful phenomenological criterion is that each observer can recognize both common reference and the other’s distinct standpoint. The framework can address both while keeping their tests separate.
02The single-source and nested-time proposal
SMM begins with one nonspatial generative source. DTT distinguishes its inner production from the outer order in which completed results become accessible. The six inner levels are nested functional dependencies within that production; the seventh denotes outer completion. They are not six independent clocks, six spatial directions, or six simultaneously occupied temporal axes. This distinction makes the framework more specific than a general claim that everything changes: it asks how a world of persistent relations can be generated before its spatial representation is taken for granted. [2]
03The comparator’s explanatory structure
IIT proposes that experience corresponds to an intrinsic, irreducible cause-effect structure. Its formal analysis concerns a specified system, its state and counterfactual transitions under a chosen modelling scale. It should not be reduced to the claim that more stored bits mean more consciousness. Integration, information and the identification of a subject are separate requirements within the programme.
Consider two independent memory banks storing the same file. Their data agree, but agreement is not the same as an integrated causal organization. Connecting them through reciprocal operations changes the causal model even if the visible file remains the same. This distinction is useful for SMM/DTT: a common source or a completed archive need not constitute one conscious subject. A bridge to IIT would require a transition structure and an account of system boundaries, then a reason to accept IIT’s proposed identity with experience. The mathematical calculation and that identity claim should remain distinguishable. [1]
04The precise agreement and difference
IIT’s intrinsic standpoint and ordinary intersubjective observation concern different access relations. A system’s proposed experience is analyzed from its own causal organization, while an external scientist studies that system through measurements. SMM/DTT’s distinction between inner production and outer records can clarify this difference, but it should not identify inner time with IIT’s intrinsic perspective without a specific mapping.
Two observers can agree about a stored result while remaining distinct integrated systems. Conversely, a shared input does not merge them into one subject. DTT’s single source must therefore allow both coordinated public records and separate local causal organization. A useful bridge would specify the source-generated transition network, identify candidate system boundaries and explain how reports move between them. IIT’s theory of experience would then be one possible interpretation of that organization. The comparison strengthens SMM by separating source unity, report agreement and experiential unity. The six nested levels can help construct the record architecture, but they do not replace a criterion of subjecthood or an empirical account of how conscious reports arise. [1]
05Worked example: what follows and what does not
Two observers view a rotating sculpture from opposite sides. Their visual appearances differ, yet each can predict how the other’s view changes when the sculpture turns. They can exchange photographs, compare times and agree on a three-dimensional object that explains both records. Their agreement arises through structured transformations among perspectives, not because their images are identical. A source-based account should recover this pattern: local readouts differ in controlled ways, and overlap permits consistent comparison. This is a more demanding notion of a common world than the claim that all appearances originate in one source.
06What this comparison contributes
The constructive opportunity is to make observer diversity part of the model. Records can carry perspective-dependent information while obeying common constraints. Such a theory would illuminate both relativity and ordinary social knowledge without assuming that consciousness collapses every measurement or that a single cosmic observer experiences all local facts. Comparisons with metaphysical and consciousness theories are most useful when they explain how privacy of experience and public reliability can coexist.
THE SAME QUESTION, DIFFERENT STARTING POINTS
The comparison at a glance
| Question | SMM/DTT | Integrated information theory |
|---|---|---|
| Explanatory starting point | One source generates local perspectives whose records differ while remaining connected through lawful transformations and shared accessible events. | A specified substrate is analyzed through intrinsic, irreducible cause-effect organization. |
| Key distinction | Intersubjective agreement requires consistent relations among perspectives; a common origin alone does not establish that their reports describe one world. | IIT’s intrinsic standpoint and ordinary intersubjective observation concern different access relations. |
KEEP THE CONNECTION
Key ideas
- One source generates local perspectives whose records differ while remaining connected through lawful transformations and shared accessible events.
- Two observers can agree about a stored result while remaining distinct integrated systems.
- Intersubjective agreement requires consistent relations among perspectives; a common origin alone does not establish that their reports describe one world.
Continue on SMONAD
- Observer and record: making observation part of the model →
Connects this comparison with the author’s discussion of observers.
- One and many: what a common source must explain →
Connects this comparison with the author’s discussion of observers.
- Physical Time and Spiritual Time →
Connects this comparison with the author’s discussion of observers.
- Relativity and physical clocks →
Connects this comparison with the author’s discussion of observers.
- Discussion & critical questions →
Connects this comparison with the author’s discussion of observers.
Sources and further reading
References support the comparator and the specific mathematical or interpretive claims indicated. SMM/DTT connections are developed in the analysis above.
- L. Albantakis et al., Integrated information theory (IIT) 4.0: Formulating the properties of phenomenal existence in physical terms (2023) ↗Original formal theory; proposed relation of experience to intrinsic irreducible cause-effect structure. Its consciousness identity is a theoretical claim.
- Mohamed Haj Yousef, Philosophy of time and creation, SMONAD ↗Author’s philosophical discussion of source, dependence, renewal and records.
How these comparisons distinguish premises, results and physical claims