  In a recent paper on Cortical Dynamics, Francis and Grossberg raise the
question how visual forms and motion information are integrated to generate a
coherent percept of moving forms? In their investigation of illusory contours
(which are, like Kanizsa squares, mental constructs rather than stimuli on the
retina) they quantify the subjective impression of apparent motion between
illusory contours that are formed by two subsequent stimuli with delay times of
about 0.2 second (called the interstimulus interval ISI). The impression of
apparent motion is due to a back referral of a later experience to an earlier
time in the conscious representation. A model is developed which describes the
state of awareness in the observer in terms of a time dependent Schroedinger
equation to which a second order time derivative is added. This addition
requires as boundary conditions the values of the solution both at the
beginning and after the process. Satisfactory quantitative agreement is found
between the results of the model and the experimental results. We recall that
in the von Neumann interpretation of the collapse of the quantum mechanical
wave-function, the collapse was associated with an observer's awareness. Some
questions of causality and determinism that arise from later-time boundary
conditions are touched upon.
