[crispyambulance]

It's a highly speculative subject, but one source is Roger Penrose's book from the early 90's: "The Emperor's New Mind". Not sure if that's where the hypothesis originated about quantum mechanics and microtubules... I think there's another work by Bohm and the guy who invented holograms that predates Penrose's thinking (but doesn't mention microtubules).

[kordlessagain]

Penrose speculated about the source, but was Stuart Hameroff that brought the idea it could be the tubules to Penrose's attention. Hameroff thought anesthesia nerfed the tubules properties, which then caused loss of consciousness.

Then there's the recent articles on how the tubes might be able to entangle signals, which was from experimental research on meta materials.

I realize all of this is speculative at this point, and nobody is trying to say YES this is how it works. It's simply exploring one possibility, in a positive way, that allows us to think further outside the box.

[johndunne]

It’s a very interesting hypothesis. And I guess research is difficult given the size of these structures and lack of tools available to monitor them with a high level of granularity.

[PaulHoule]

Makes me think of this discussion which is going on right now

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41694025