What It Is Like To Be A Quantum Computer: A Closed Quantum Global Workspace -- Conscious Access and Integration as Correlation Dynamics in Hilbert Space

Abstract

Motivated by speculative artistic inquiry into quantum-only forms of experience in relation to representation and embodiment, this paper develops a translation of the Global Neuronal Workspace (GNW) theory for closed quantum systems. The work treats classical GNW as an architectural reference and asks how conscious access and memory change under unitary dynamics. We reference a quantum Hopfield-style Hamiltonian that mirrors key organisational features of GNW, such as a distributed workspace and tunable large-scale integration. Within this framework, global availability of information is realised through coherence-preserving correlation distributions and memory is a persistent internal correlation structure. Likewise, ignition becomes a transition in global entanglement as opposed to convergence towards a stable attractor. Reductions of the Hopfield-style Hamiltonian lead to a tractable toy model and GHZ-type entanglement, explicitly showing how relative phase is globally accessible through joint internal operations yet absent from all local subsystems. This closed quantum system approach clarifies which aspects of workspace theories are contingent on classical assumptions. Our model highlights a non-representational regime in which access and memory are entirely relational rather than copies or records. Beyond its scientific contribution, the paper proposes a mode of art-science collaboration where speculative artistic inquiry is pursued through theoretical models rather than illustration or data.