Quantum physics between consciousness and pain

This review aims at illustrating the contributes of some symposia to the debate on pain and consciousness. The application of quantum mechanics to the study of mind gave rise to a discussion between philosophers and neuroscientists. In particular, in the 80's, John Eccles developed a "dendron theory" to support the interactionist dualism proposed by the Austrian philosopher K. Popper. Embracing an alike probabilistic point of view, psychogenic pain may be elucidated recurring to the concepts of chaos and complex systems. Furthermore, pharmacological and psychoterapeutic approaches are associated to explore the physical correlates of the nociception, and the theory of the oscillatory synchrony corroborates the quantum physics in order to outline the idea of a "conscious pilot", which some years ago had also been successful in philosophy of mind.