# Scientist proposes radical new theory of consciousness - and it rules out AI becoming conscious in the future > Source: > Published: 2026-06-27 10:38:11+00:00 # Scientist proposes radical new theory of consciousness - and it rules out AI becoming conscious in the future **READ MORE:**[Simulations reveal what would happen if AI took over the world](/sciencetech/article-15877085/terrifying-simulation-ai-destroy-society.html)**See more Daily Mail on Google -**[save us as a Preferred Source](https://google.com/preferences/source?q=dailymail.com) Human consciousness is one of the strangest and most mysterious phenomena in the universe, but one scientist says it could be even weirder than we thought. According to a radical new theory, consciousness isn't just a feeling that goes along with our actions; it is the reason that humans are so successful as a species. Professor Igor Rudan, Co-Head of Centre for Global Health at [Edinburgh](/news/edinburgh/index.html) University, claims this elusive part of our experience evolved to 'simulate alternative futures'. According to this approach, being conscious is the key to every choice you make, from deciding when to cross the road to pursuing your wildest dreams. Professor Rudan told the Daily Mail that one of the purposes of consciousness is 'to continuously generate, evaluate, and prioritise ideas.' He adds: 'This allows some "visionaries" among us, who learn to use the brain’s "sense of ideas" skilfully, to achieve remarkable successes in their careers. 'It also allowed the entire humanity to achieve some almost implausible successes that no other species managed to achieve, such as visiting the Moon.' However, this bold new theory also means that artificial intelligence (AI) might never be able to become conscious. According to a radical new theory, consciousness isn't just a feeling that goes along with our actions; it is an ability that allows us to simulate alternative futures Consciousness is the ability to be aware of yourself and the world around you – what it feels like to have thoughts, emotions and experiences. While a lot of neuroscientists have tried to ask what this actually is, an even bigger question might be: 'Why are we conscious in the first place?' Dr Steven Kerr, a physicist and health data scientist from the University of Edinburgh, explains that consciousness is what scientists call 'evolutionarily expensive'. 'It requires substantial metabolic and computational resources, raising the question of what adaptive advantage could justify this cost,' Dr Kerr told the Daily Mail. This is even more baffling if we think that consciousness is simply this passive, extra feeling that floats on top of our experiences and actions without actually doing anything. Professor Rudan's solution is that consciousness is actually critical to our survival and success as a species. According to this theory, our brains are actually a sensory organ in their own right, but instead of sensing light or sound, the brain is finely tuned for sensing ideas. Professor Rudan says: 'At any given moment, the conscious mind is confronted with many competing possibilities: Where to direct attention, whether to cooperate or compete with others, whether to take a risk or remain cautious, what to say or do next. Scientists have proposed that consciousness evolved to help organisms navigate the world. This is why octopi's advanced problem-solving skills are a strong sign that they might have consciousness 'From this perspective, consciousness allows us to do more than passively observe the world – we can actively explore possibilities and select among them.' For example, imagine playing a game of chess; when it comes to your turn, there are thousands of possible moves, each connected to many thousands more sequences and outcomes. What consciousness allows us to do is internally 'simulate' each of these possible futures and assess each of them. However, unlike a computer simply calculating the best move, your conscious subjective experience plays a major role in the move you ultimately make. Perhaps you desperately want to win to impress someone, or don't want to hurt your opponent's feelings, or want to practice a particular set of moves to get better in future games. When you play out the choices in your mind, Professor Rudan argues that your conscious brain is comparing different futures based on their feasibility, potential rewards, and how they make you feel. In this way, consciousness helps us to pick between alternative ideas about the future, and transform our plans and desires into actions. Importantly, this might explain why consciousness evolved in the first place. However, this theory means that artificial intelligences, like Skynet from The Terminator, can't become conscious in the same way that humans are Professor Rudan says: 'The remarkable advantage of this process is that it allows us to "learn" within our internal world, without having to experience the consequences of our actions in an external one. 'The key evolutionary advantage would always be the same: reducing the uncertainty of all possible future states by internally exploring.' What makes this theory even stranger, however, is that it suggests consciousness could be a more fundamental part of the universe than we expected. Time and space as we experience them, for example, could have emerged out of the consciousness's need to order events and simulate outcomes. Dr Kerr explains that some theories in physics have argued that the basic structure of spacetime isn't a forward flowing 'river' or time, but the connections between cause and effect. 'Once one shifts attention from spacetime itself to causal structure, it becomes natural to ask how physical agents embedded in such a structure represent and use it,' he says. 'One common line of thought is that consciousness may be, at least in part, a vehicle for understanding causal relationships. This could allow conscious beings to simulate alternative futures and select actions that lead towards desirable outcomes.' Since this capacity evolved to help organisms survive in a dangerous world, it is natural that we would find other conscious creatures in the animal kingdom. In fact, a striking consequence of this theory is that consciousness might be able to exist in degrees depending on an animal's ability to simulate the future. A wild consequence of this theory is that our perceptions of spacetime itself (illustrated) may be generated by consciousness, as it attempts to provide a framework for assessing the causal connections of future events While octopi have shown sophisticated planning skills that suggest a near-human level of consciousness, rats or mice might have this same capacity at a lower level. This also has some big consequences for the question of whether AI could ever become conscious in the way that a human is. Even though computers can calculate possible future states, they still lack that extra level of conscious experience that makes certain ideas more attractive than others. Professor Rudan says: 'If consciousness only depended on sufficiently sophisticated information processing and simulations of possible future states, the advanced AI already possesses those abilities. 'But for humans, the subjective experience seems to be an irreducible component of consciousness. 'If this component, which is deeply connected with our emotions, doesn’t emerge in AI, then AI might remain highly intelligent without becoming conscious in a sense in which humans.'