brag
10-22-2009, 09:43 AM
How God as consciousness becomes the illusion of the many.
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_p ... holo06.htm (http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_paradigmaholo06.htm)
Abstract
Quantum theory is open to different interpretations, and this paper reviews some of the points of contention. The standard interpretation of quantum physics assumes that the quantum world is characterized by absolute indeterminism and that quantum systems exist objectively only when they are being measured or observed.
David Bohm’s ontological interpretation of quantum theory rejects both these assumptions. Bohm’s theory that quantum events are party determined by subtler forces operating at deeper levels of reality ties in with John Eccles’ theory that our minds exist outside the material world and interact with our brains at the quantum level.
Paranormal phenomena indicate that our minds can communicate with other minds and affect distant physical systems by nonordinary means.
Whether such phenomena can be adequately explained in terms of nonlocality and the quantum vacuum or whether they involve superphysical forces and states of matter as yet unknown to science is still an open question, and one which merits further experimental study.
Introduction
Quantum theory is generally regarded as one of the most successful scientific theories ever formulated. But while the mathematical description of the quantum world allows the probabilities of experimental results to be calculated with a high degree of accuracy, there is no consensus on what it means in conceptual terms.
Some of the issues involved are explored below.
Quantum uncertainty
According to the uncertainty principle, the position and momentum of a subatomic particle cannot be measured simultaneously with an accuracy greater than that set by Planck’s constant. This is because in any measurement a particle must interact with at least one photon, or quantum of energy, which acts both like a particle and like a wave, and disturbs it in an unpredictable and uncontrollable manner.
An accurate measurement of the position of an orbiting electron by means of a microscope, for example, requires the use of light of short wavelengths, with the result that a large but unpredictable momentum is transferred to the electron. An accurate measurement of the electron’s momentum, on the other hand, requires light quanta of very low momentum (and therefore long wavelength), which leads to a large angle of diffraction in the lens and a poor definition of the position.
According to the conventional interpretation of quantum physics, however, not only is it impossible for us to measure a particle’s position and momentum simultaneously with equal precision, a particle does not possess well-defined properties when it is not interacting with a measuring instrument. Furthermore, the uncertainty principle implies that a particle can never be at rest, but is subject to constant fluctuations even when no measurement is taking place, and these fluctuations are assumed to have no causes at all. In other words, the quantum world is believed to be characterized by absolute indeterminism, intrinsic ambiguity, and irreducible lawlessness.
As the late physicist David Bohm (1984, p. 87) put it:
"it is assumed that in any particular experiment, the precise result that will be obtained is completely arbitrary in the sense that it has no relationship whatever to anything else that exists in the world or that ever has existed."
Bohm (ibid., p. 95) took the view that the abandonment of causality had been too hasty:
"it is quite possible that while the quantum theory, and with it the indeterminacy principle, are valid to a very high degree of approximation in a certain domain, they both cease to have relevance in new domains below that in which the current theory is applicable. Thus, the conclusion that there is no deeper level of causally determined motion is just a piece of circular reasoning, since it will follow only if we assume beforehand that no such level exists."
Most physicists, however, are content to accept the assumption of absolute chance. We shall return to this issue later in connection with free will.
Collapsing the wave function
A quantum system is represented mathematically by a wave function, which is derived from Schrödinger’s equation. The wave function can be used to calculate the probability of finding a particle at any particular point in space. When a measurement is made, the particle is of course found in only one place, but if the wave function is assumed to provide a complete and literal description of the state of a quantum system - as it is in the conventional interpretation - it would mean that in between measurements the particle dissolves into a "superposition of probability waves" and is potentially present in many different places at once.
Then, when the next measurement is made, this wave packet is supposed to instantaneously "collapse," in some random and mysterious manner, into a localized particle again. This sudden and discontinuous "collapse" violates the Schrödinger equation, and is not further explained in the conventional interpretation.
Since the measuring device that is supposed to collapse a particle’s wave function is itself made up of subatomic particles, it seems that its own wave function would have to be collapsed by another measuring device (which might be the eye and brain of a human observer), which would in turn need to be collapsed by a further measuring device, and so on, leading to an infinite regress. In fact, the standard interpretation of quantum theory implies that all the macroscopic objects we see around us exist in an objective, unambiguous state only when they are being measured or observed. Schrödinger devised a famous thought-experiment to expose the absurd implications of this interpretation.
A cat is placed in a box containing a radioactive substance, so that there is a fifty-fifty chance of an atom decaying in one hour. If an atom decays, it triggers the release of a poison gas, which kills the cat. After one hour the cat is supposedly both dead and alive (and everything in between) until someone opens the box and instantly collapses its wave function into a dead or alive cat.
Various solutions to the "measurement problem" associated with wave-function collapse have been proposed. Some physicists maintain that the classical or macro-world does not suffer from quantum ambiguity because it can store information and is subject to an "arrow of time", whereas the quantum or micro-world is alleged to be unable to store information and time-reversible (Pagels, 1983).
A more extravagant approach is the many-worlds hypothesis, which claims that the universe splits each time a measurement (or measurement-like interaction) takes place, so that all the possibilities represented by the wave function (e.g. a dead cat and a living cat) exist objectively but in different universes. Our own consciousness, too, is supposed to be constantly splitting into different selves, which inhabit these proliferating, non-communicating worlds.
Other theorists speculate that it is consciousness that collapses the wave function and thereby creates reality. In this view, a subatomic particle does not assume definite properties when it interacts with a measuring device, but only when the reading of the measuring device is registered in the mind of an observer (which may of course be long after the measurement has taken place). According to the most extreme, anthropocentric version of this theory, only selfconscious beings such as ourselves can collapse wave functions.
This means that the whole universe must have existed originally as "potentia" in some transcendental realm of quantum probabilities until selfconscious beings evolved and collapsed themselves and the rest of their branch of reality into the material world, and that objects remain in a state of actuality only so long as they are being observed by humans (Goswami, 1993). Other theorists, however, believe that nonselfconscious entities, including cats and possibly even electrons, may be able to collapse their own wave functions (Herbert, 1993).
The theory of wave-function collapse (or state-vector collapse, as it is sometimes called) raises the question of how the "probability waves" that the wave function is thought to represent can collapse into a particle if they are no more than abstract mathematical constructs.
Since the very idea of wave packets spreading out and collapsing is not based on hard experimental evidence but only on a particular interpretation of the wave equation, it is worth taking a look at one of the main alternative interpretations, that of David Bohm and his associates, which provides an intelligible account of what may be taking place at the quantum level...
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_p ... holo06.htm (http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_paradigmaholo06.htm)
Abstract
Quantum theory is open to different interpretations, and this paper reviews some of the points of contention. The standard interpretation of quantum physics assumes that the quantum world is characterized by absolute indeterminism and that quantum systems exist objectively only when they are being measured or observed.
David Bohm’s ontological interpretation of quantum theory rejects both these assumptions. Bohm’s theory that quantum events are party determined by subtler forces operating at deeper levels of reality ties in with John Eccles’ theory that our minds exist outside the material world and interact with our brains at the quantum level.
Paranormal phenomena indicate that our minds can communicate with other minds and affect distant physical systems by nonordinary means.
Whether such phenomena can be adequately explained in terms of nonlocality and the quantum vacuum or whether they involve superphysical forces and states of matter as yet unknown to science is still an open question, and one which merits further experimental study.
Introduction
Quantum theory is generally regarded as one of the most successful scientific theories ever formulated. But while the mathematical description of the quantum world allows the probabilities of experimental results to be calculated with a high degree of accuracy, there is no consensus on what it means in conceptual terms.
Some of the issues involved are explored below.
Quantum uncertainty
According to the uncertainty principle, the position and momentum of a subatomic particle cannot be measured simultaneously with an accuracy greater than that set by Planck’s constant. This is because in any measurement a particle must interact with at least one photon, or quantum of energy, which acts both like a particle and like a wave, and disturbs it in an unpredictable and uncontrollable manner.
An accurate measurement of the position of an orbiting electron by means of a microscope, for example, requires the use of light of short wavelengths, with the result that a large but unpredictable momentum is transferred to the electron. An accurate measurement of the electron’s momentum, on the other hand, requires light quanta of very low momentum (and therefore long wavelength), which leads to a large angle of diffraction in the lens and a poor definition of the position.
According to the conventional interpretation of quantum physics, however, not only is it impossible for us to measure a particle’s position and momentum simultaneously with equal precision, a particle does not possess well-defined properties when it is not interacting with a measuring instrument. Furthermore, the uncertainty principle implies that a particle can never be at rest, but is subject to constant fluctuations even when no measurement is taking place, and these fluctuations are assumed to have no causes at all. In other words, the quantum world is believed to be characterized by absolute indeterminism, intrinsic ambiguity, and irreducible lawlessness.
As the late physicist David Bohm (1984, p. 87) put it:
"it is assumed that in any particular experiment, the precise result that will be obtained is completely arbitrary in the sense that it has no relationship whatever to anything else that exists in the world or that ever has existed."
Bohm (ibid., p. 95) took the view that the abandonment of causality had been too hasty:
"it is quite possible that while the quantum theory, and with it the indeterminacy principle, are valid to a very high degree of approximation in a certain domain, they both cease to have relevance in new domains below that in which the current theory is applicable. Thus, the conclusion that there is no deeper level of causally determined motion is just a piece of circular reasoning, since it will follow only if we assume beforehand that no such level exists."
Most physicists, however, are content to accept the assumption of absolute chance. We shall return to this issue later in connection with free will.
Collapsing the wave function
A quantum system is represented mathematically by a wave function, which is derived from Schrödinger’s equation. The wave function can be used to calculate the probability of finding a particle at any particular point in space. When a measurement is made, the particle is of course found in only one place, but if the wave function is assumed to provide a complete and literal description of the state of a quantum system - as it is in the conventional interpretation - it would mean that in between measurements the particle dissolves into a "superposition of probability waves" and is potentially present in many different places at once.
Then, when the next measurement is made, this wave packet is supposed to instantaneously "collapse," in some random and mysterious manner, into a localized particle again. This sudden and discontinuous "collapse" violates the Schrödinger equation, and is not further explained in the conventional interpretation.
Since the measuring device that is supposed to collapse a particle’s wave function is itself made up of subatomic particles, it seems that its own wave function would have to be collapsed by another measuring device (which might be the eye and brain of a human observer), which would in turn need to be collapsed by a further measuring device, and so on, leading to an infinite regress. In fact, the standard interpretation of quantum theory implies that all the macroscopic objects we see around us exist in an objective, unambiguous state only when they are being measured or observed. Schrödinger devised a famous thought-experiment to expose the absurd implications of this interpretation.
A cat is placed in a box containing a radioactive substance, so that there is a fifty-fifty chance of an atom decaying in one hour. If an atom decays, it triggers the release of a poison gas, which kills the cat. After one hour the cat is supposedly both dead and alive (and everything in between) until someone opens the box and instantly collapses its wave function into a dead or alive cat.
Various solutions to the "measurement problem" associated with wave-function collapse have been proposed. Some physicists maintain that the classical or macro-world does not suffer from quantum ambiguity because it can store information and is subject to an "arrow of time", whereas the quantum or micro-world is alleged to be unable to store information and time-reversible (Pagels, 1983).
A more extravagant approach is the many-worlds hypothesis, which claims that the universe splits each time a measurement (or measurement-like interaction) takes place, so that all the possibilities represented by the wave function (e.g. a dead cat and a living cat) exist objectively but in different universes. Our own consciousness, too, is supposed to be constantly splitting into different selves, which inhabit these proliferating, non-communicating worlds.
Other theorists speculate that it is consciousness that collapses the wave function and thereby creates reality. In this view, a subatomic particle does not assume definite properties when it interacts with a measuring device, but only when the reading of the measuring device is registered in the mind of an observer (which may of course be long after the measurement has taken place). According to the most extreme, anthropocentric version of this theory, only selfconscious beings such as ourselves can collapse wave functions.
This means that the whole universe must have existed originally as "potentia" in some transcendental realm of quantum probabilities until selfconscious beings evolved and collapsed themselves and the rest of their branch of reality into the material world, and that objects remain in a state of actuality only so long as they are being observed by humans (Goswami, 1993). Other theorists, however, believe that nonselfconscious entities, including cats and possibly even electrons, may be able to collapse their own wave functions (Herbert, 1993).
The theory of wave-function collapse (or state-vector collapse, as it is sometimes called) raises the question of how the "probability waves" that the wave function is thought to represent can collapse into a particle if they are no more than abstract mathematical constructs.
Since the very idea of wave packets spreading out and collapsing is not based on hard experimental evidence but only on a particular interpretation of the wave equation, it is worth taking a look at one of the main alternative interpretations, that of David Bohm and his associates, which provides an intelligible account of what may be taking place at the quantum level...