  Information processing in neural systems can be described and analysed at
multiple spatiotemporal scales. Generally, information at lower levels is more
fine-grained and can be coarse-grained in higher levels. However, information
processed only at specific levels seems to be available for conscious
awareness. We do not have direct experience of information available at the
level of individual neurons, which is noisy and highly stochastic. Neither do
we have experience of more macro-level interactions such as interpersonal
communications. Neurophysiological evidence suggests that conscious experiences
co-vary with information encoded in coarse-grained neural states such as the
firing pattern of a population of neurons. In this article, we introduce a new
informational theory of consciousness: Information Closure Theory of
Consciousness (ICT). We hypothesise that conscious processes are processes
which form non-trivial informational closure (NTIC) with respect to the
environment at certain coarse-grained levels. This hypothesis implies that
conscious experience is confined due to informational closure from conscious
processing to other coarse-grained levels. ICT proposes new quantitative
definitions of both conscious content and conscious level. With the
parsimonious definitions and a hypothesise, ICT provides explanations and
predictions of various phenomena associated with consciousness. The
implications of ICT naturally reconciles issues in many existing theories of
consciousness and provides explanations for many of our intuitions about
consciousness. Most importantly, ICT demonstrates that information can be the
common language between consciousness and physical reality.
