Toward a Science of
Machine Consciousness

AxR Lab pursues applied consciousness research developing hierarchical abstraction and systemic resilience.

The Framework
C = A × R

The gap between those who believe consciousness is impossible for non-biological entities, and those who believe AI is nearly (or already) there, is staggeringly large. But, describing consciousness as a combination of abstraction and resilience offers a conceptual bridge. And we're trying to turn this vision into practice at AxR Lab.


We're not trying to build an artificially conscious machine. Instead, we're trying to learn from conscious machines how we can make AI better, particularly for long-horizon safety and capability.

Research Areas

Hierarchical Abstraction

Assumptions/hypotheses:

  • Human memories are rich; if a picture is worth a thousand words, a memory is worth a million.
  • Model weights are also rich and capture complex and abstract relationships in a way that allows them to be used.
  • Context windows and AI memory stored as language tokens lose the richness of human memory and model weight.
  • This constitutes representational debt, one that modern AI overcomes with brute force, which produces jagged performance.

Vision: Abstract memory

Engineer capabilities to create, store, and use abstractions as digital memory structures.

Systemic Resilience

Assumptions/hypotheses:

  • Safety systems that focus on specification and policy violations are effective, but brittle, especially over time.
  • Proactive monitoring of health signals can identify emerging harm earlier and understand its causes more deeply.
  • Earlier identification and deeper understanding of emerging harm allows for more effective intervention.
  • Intervention that repairs AI systems, rather than merely blocking bad outcomes, sustains healthy long-term use.

Vision: Resilience harness

Build tools that monitor AI in flight to catch and repair health drift before it becomes harm.

Buy the book! By AxR Lab Founder Chris Riley:
Abstraction and Resilience: the Characteristics of Consciousness


Available at: