There’s an interesting post over at Dailykos today on misconceptions about quantum mechanics, pseudo-science, and confusions about the role played by human activity in quantum phenomena. From the post:
This is the one quantum-mechanical property that’s relevant to this discussion, which is that in quantum mechanics, things can exist in several states at once. (called a superposition) Objects don’t have definite locations; rather they’re ‘smeared out’ over space. The lighter they are, and the faster they move, the more ‘smeared out’ they can be. (those who’ve read about QM before know I’m referring to the famous Uncertainty Principle)
But if a measurement is carried out on the object, it will have a certain value. Which is part of the ‘weirdness’. QM cannot predict what value will be measured, but it can predict the probability of all the possible measurement results. It can predict the average of a large number of measurements. For instance, the electron of a hydrogen atom is most likely to be 53 picometers away from the nucleus. But a single measurement could give any result from zero to infinity.
Heavier, bigger, things on the other hand, get less and less ‘smeared out’, and you end up with the ‘classical’ situation, where things assume definite values for their location and speed and other things.
Chopra (and many, many others) misinterprets what ‘measurement’ means here, assuming that it has something to do with human activity, drawing not only the erroneous conclusion that human (or sentient) perception is what’s meant by ‘measurement’, but indeed that things don’t even exist if they’re not being ‘measured’. Stating: “In fact, everything you are looking at right now depends upon you to exist.”
This is a basic misconception which has been debunked repeatedly (no doubt several times a week on physics newsgroups and message boards). Quantum mechanical measurements have nothing to do with ‘measurement’ per se, and especially not with human activity. It’s also at the basis of the Schrödinger’s cat ‘paradox’, as well as many of the early confusion about quantum mechanics.
In short, it’s a process known as decoherence. It’s not fully understood yet (although a lot of progress has been made since the early days and early confusion of QM). Decoherence is the process whereby quantum systems go from a superposition of different states to a single, definite state, through interactions with their environment. It’s ‘locked’ into this state because there’s an increase in entropy (disorder) associated with that change, making it irreversible (2nd law). It’s not fully understood yet, but it certainly doesn’t resemble the Berkleyian idea Chopra seems to have adopted.
A number of these claims have been advanced in the realism/anti-realism debates, as well as some of the debates between object-oriented ontologists and other speculative realists, so the post is worth a read. The author’s understanding seems to support something like object-oriented ontology in my view.
Larval Subjects . 
November 13, 2009 at 5:40 pm
This is one of my biggest disappointments with Zizek (you know I really admire him on the whole). He always seems to adopt this attitude of: “well, OF COURSE quantum mechanics also supports my idea that the external world does not exist.” If you only read Zizek, you wouldn’t know that any controversy exists over how to interpret quantum mechanics.
I’ve also long felt that the theory of real objects withdrawn from all relations makes an *excellent* fit with quantum theory, and Catren’s work has further encouraged me in that regard.
November 13, 2009 at 6:37 pm
I haven’t kept up with the issue of coherence and QM for quite some time, and I am neither a physicist nor a mathematician.
My understanding, however, is that Young’s double-slit experiment incontrovertibly proves that nature (what you would call objects) actually does change with what we would call measurements or observation. Left to its own, quanta of light remain statistical. It is not until they are observed going through one slit or the other (i.e. one part of the crystal lattice structure) that quant of light actually become particles as we understand them.
I think the author of the article at Dailykos is grasping for certainty in a realm where the ineluctability of uncertainty (statistical probability) is considered uncontroversial by scientists.
November 13, 2009 at 7:53 pm
Thanks for the link to the article. I think we can all agree that the concepts of ‘consciousness’ and ‘quantum mechanics’ should not be allowed within two paragraphs of one another. For some reason it seems as if people who are otherwise quite scientifically or philosophically adept can fall into really horrible philosophical confusions over these things.
However, I don’t entirely see why this supports an object-oriented view over some other ontological approach. Maybe one of you could elaborate?
November 13, 2009 at 9:28 pm
I think it’s far to say that the thing is a tad complicated – and that a good guide (esp. for this forum) would be I. Stengers short book (150 pages) on ‘Mecanique Quantique’ (1997).
Stengers goes on to note that it is the meaning of the site called ‘laboratory’ that is at stake. And the statements of labs never leave labs – labs proliferate wherever the statements must be pertinent.
Stengers is particularly impressed by Nany Cartwright’s ‘How the Laws of physics lie’ – which includes the essay ‘How the measurement problem is an artefact of mathematics.’
I precis:
To speak of a ‘problem’ already means abandoning the Copenhagen interpretation for that of John von Neumann.
What turns a piece of equipment into a measuring device?
For Von Neumann it is the consciousness of the observer…..which would end the infinite regress of quantum objects requiring something to bring about the collapse of the wave function
The problem of measurement as it is usually presented starts with Neumann but tries to avoid his conclusions.
In technical terms it is centred on the contrast between superposition of quantum states and a statistical mixture of systems characterized by a quantum state.
Measurement becomes a physical problem ending in a permanent mark.
And whowever says ‘permanent mark’ indicates a manner of highlighting the specificity of the interaction in question.
It will imply an ‘evolution towards equilibrium’ and thus it will be from statistical mechanics that the secret of the apparent reduction will be disclosed.
I won’t continue but Stengers notes that Cartwright discovers (‘the artefact of mathematics’) that the reduction of the wave function is not specifically tied to measurement.
And for Prigogine (and Stengers) qm and dynamics are unsatisfactory because one reduces the difference between past and future to the imperfection of our knowledge (qm is time symmetric), and the other to the act of measurement, or consciousness..
So although Chopra may be ‘wrong’ there is still a lot of open country out there.
Partic Prigogine’s (in collab with Stengers) attempt to show that the reduction the wave function is irrelevant.
See the chapter ‘A unified formulation of quantum theory’ in ‘The End of certainty: Time, Chaos and the new laws of nature’.
They arrive at a ‘realistic’ interpretation of qm because the transition from wave functions to ensembles is understood as the result of ‘Poincare Resonances’ without the introduction of an ‘observer’ or other uncontrollable assumptions.
Excuse the ramble – just writing out aloud.
There certainly are anthropocentric features in the traditional formalism of qm .
Prigogine speculates that his approach might have been more acceptable to Einstein. However, there is today no common agreement – as far as I can see…’it’s not quite fully understood’ – as Dailykos charmingly puts it.
November 13, 2009 at 11:10 pm
Btw, it would be valuable and instructive if Dr Zamalek could indicate one or two ways in which ‘objects withdrawn from all relations’ are an excellent fit with quantum theory.
And in what way Catren’s work confirms this fit. I’m sure this would clarify many things about quantum theory and vacuum sealed objects/withdrawn objects
November 13, 2009 at 11:39 pm
Deontologistics claim that ‘we can all agree’ demonstrates a rather cursory attitude to the real debates and differences of interpretation that continue today – and have done so for over 70yrs.
I’m not sure how well I would have argued with Von neumann or many others..
Obviously the physicists, like Alan Wolf (ph.d theoretical physics), featured in ‘What the bleep do we know’ are horribly confused:
http://www.fredalanwolf.com/
November 13, 2009 at 11:41 pm
Pete,
I think there are a couple of reasons that this portrayal of quantum mechanics sits nicely within an OOO framework. First, the manner in which particles are actualized, selected, or transformed when encountering other physical entities nicely illustrates the idea of translation. One of the central claims of OOO is that objects never “touch” or, within my framework, encounter one another as they are. This is precisely what takes place when one particle encounters another entity (the slit), translating the particle or actualizing it in a particular way. As I’ve said before, the principle of translation is the most overlooked aspect of OOO in discussions of object-oriented realism, which is problematic because it’s such a central element of that ontology. Second, and I think a bit more importantly, discussions of QM– at least by some participants on this blog by a few physics enthusiasts who have participated here –tend to treat the quantum level as the “really real” and everything else as epiphenomenal or unreal. Here the general charge has been that any talk of entities beyond the quantum level falls into “folk ontology”, treating what counts as objects for mind (sic.) as real when they’re just epiphenomenal. What this post nicely captures is the non-epiphenomenal reality of molecules. This fits nicely with the mereology of OOO where you have objects containing other objects and the independence of objects from one another. That would be just a thumbnail of what I have in mind. I would also add that under the authors portrayal we shouldn’t even talk about “observation” when talking about what’s going on with quantum actualization. It is not “observation” that collapses the probability, but a genuine interaction between objects— the particle and slit –that collapses the interaction. “Observation” is a very unfortunate word choice filled with all sorts of anthropological connotations for what is a physical process or event.
November 14, 2009 at 7:55 am
mistersquid:
Well, the author just replaces “measurement” and “observation” by the more physical term “decoherence”.
The major problem with decoherence is that one introduces a classical system in the quantum formalism and then studies the interaction of this one with an entity like a photon. However according to QM this classical system must be a superposition of wave functions as well. Decoherence clearly avoids anthropomorphisms but doesn’t resolve the measurement problem.
November 14, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Paul: I certainly wasn’t suggesting that the arguments over the correct interpretation of QM are over, or that I have a correct way of interpreting it, simply that the concept of ‘consciousness’ and the more weighted concept of ‘observation’ linked to it shouldn’t be allowed in to the debate, as they’re inappropriate kinds of concepts the introduction of which causes some very silly confusions. This doesn’t solve the problem (e.g., as to whether we should adopt the multiple worlds interpretation or not), but it puts the debate on better footing.
Levi: I think I can get behind the point about rejecting the epiphenomenality of higher level entities, although I don’t think that OOO is unique in that respect, but I don’t entirely see how your notion of translation does anything special here.
I might simply be misinterpreting you, but isn’t the point that the ‘receiving’ object translates the action of the ‘acting’ object upon it? This isn’t to say anything about how the action changes either the receiving or acting objects themselves. When the observational set up in some way effects decoherence, it seems fine to say that the setup translates whatever is observed for the observer, but this seems to say nothing about the actual production of the change from wave-behaviour to particle-behaviour, you might want to say that the wave/particle translates the observational set up, but this doesn’t seem to have any intrinsic advantage over just saying that it had an affect upon it. I’m really having difficulty seeing what you’re getting at here.
November 14, 2009 at 2:04 pm
I’m glad the case is still somewhat open. Perhaps Chopra’s point was the same as that of many that have emphasized the influence of the observer, that people cause things to happen without becoming aware that they had something to do with the outcome, an outcome they often find themselves at odds with. Can anyone deny that people undermine themselves without realizing it? It’s a sad, comical and unconscious thing we all do. But I don’t know if this is a theme that OOO/OOP/SR is concerned with, my apologies if not.
On the other hand, I think Chopra and others who’ve used quantum observations that way have overstated the case and shown too much delight in the neat little package of overstuffed solipsism they snatch from the laboratory. I’d hate to live in a world solely deriving from myself, how horrible.
November 14, 2009 at 10:04 pm
This is interesting, almost fascinating, and if pursued could clarify a few things for 000. Btw I claim no special knowledge or training…
Kay is right. The issue is ‘the measurement problem’ and this is why q. theory in most of its guises (except, it seems, for Prigogine’s formulation) is dualistic and unrealistic – and possibly the worst ally that 000 could have.
Why?
Because the need for a measurement is written into the theory.
It’s not just that we need a measurement to know what’s happening – the theory requires a measurement to turn potentiality into actuality. Or, in other words, it would be a measurement that turns a deterministic and time reversible wave function (probability amplitude) into an irreversible actuality.
Or in the lang of qm from a pure state (the wave function) into an ensemble. Orthodox qm requires an observer/measurement – as is well noted and accepted by many physicists (e.g.Weinberg, Pauli…..) This is precisely why there has been so much debate.
Pauli, quoted by Prigogine:
But as Prigogine notes ‘the paper on which we write still ages and becomes yellow, whether or not we observe it.’
Bohr and others avoid the basic question :what type of dynamical processes are responsible for ‘the collapse of the wave function’.?
Btw, appeal to measurement (intrinsically necessary to the theory), becomes more acute for cosmology. Who measures the universe (q.v. Gell-Man and Hartle ‘The quark and the jaguar’).
Prigogine attempt to develop an approach that integrates irreversibility (a real arrow of time) and indeterminism.
As with Abner Shimony and Bernard d’Espagnat, he claims that ‘radical innovations’ are necessary to preserver the achievements of qm but eliminate the difficulties related to the theory’s dualistic structure.
He does this with an approach based on unstable dynamical systems (Large Poincare Systems) which I will certainly not attempt to describe here.
His book ‘The End of Certainty’ (with Stengers as ‘collaborator’) is a general treatment of the subject and pretty accessible (even though it has more equations than most popular accounts of qm). ‘Poincare resonances’ destroy the coherence of ‘superpositions’ and lead to an irreducible statistical description…
The important point is that this formulation does not require a measurement as intrinsically necessary, nor does the analysis take place at the level of the wave function.
It is more ‘realist’ than orthodox qm which requires an ‘observation’/measurement to ‘collapse’ the wave function. For Prigogine there is no collapse of the wave function as the dynamical laws are operating at a different level – that of the ‘density matrix’ – not that of the wave function (probability amplitudes).
It is no longer our measurements that turn potentiality into actuality…
In fact, Prigogine claims that his approach restores ‘sanity’ by eliminating the anthropocentric features which are implicit in the traditional formulation.
So, Deontologistics’ query as to how qm supports 000 is perceptive. It doesn’t in most of its formulations.
However, to say that observation is an inappropriate concept that shouldn’t be allowed into the debate doesn’t really go far enough. The concept is written into the theory! Not allowing it requires a different theory…and I don’t believe qm theory has converted to Prigogine’s formulation yet. Not enough peers consider his research team to be a reliable witness for nature?
November 15, 2009 at 5:09 am
I honestly don’t quite understand it. The particles come into being within a decoherence event. The wave function is a statistical ordering scheme and it is not an object ( at least a physical one ). I wonder who or what is “translating” what into something else? Some objects are missing.
November 15, 2009 at 2:57 pm
Kay,
I’m curious as to why you hold that the particle is not an object. Can you elaborate a bit? Translation refers to the manner in which one object takes up the differences of another objects and transforms that difference according to its own internal structure or organization. Here I think Pete’s or Deontologist’s reference to affectation is too broad to capture what a translation is. My favorite example is the process of photosynthesis. Here you have three objects involved: the photons of sunlight, the cells of the leave, and the sugars that are produced. The cells of the leaf translate the photons of light producing sugars. The agency engaged in the translation in the split screen experiment would be the split screen itself interacting with the particles. The result of the translation would be what appears on the other screen. Translation can also be thought of in terms of information theory.
A central thesis of OOO, at least in my version, is that any interaction between objects involves process of translation. In other words, there is no interaction between objects that doesn’t involve transformation. This is why, I believe, critiques of OOO on the grounds that it is dogmatically making claims within the framework of a representational realist epistemology are so misguided and off mark. Clearly the principle of translation forbids anything like a representational realism because any interaction between objects involves a transformation such that the object “representing” another object can never “reach” the object represented. This is an ontological truth, not an epistemological limit.
I believe that the problem with “observer” talk in QM is that it makes it seem as if it is consciousness or mind doing something to the particle, rather than an interaction between objects (the particles and larger scale objects) producing these transformations.
November 15, 2009 at 6:53 pm
I too would love to hear from Graham his reasons for thinking that “the theory of real objects withdrawn from all relations makes an *excellent* fit with quantum theory” if he would be kind enough to expand on this. I too have often thought that OOP might well be able to shed light on the mysteries of quantum mechanics. Could OOP turn out to be just the “weird” metaphysics you need in order to make sense of this stuff? Is that really too far fetched? After all, it would hardly be the first time that bold metaphysical intuitions have proven to be of service in making sense of the world as revealed by physics, and it is well known that Bohr was strongly influenced by Kierkegaard for example. It seems to me, for example, that there my be a parallel worth edxploring between the way that OOP generalizes the idea of the withdrawal of essences from consciousness to all objects and how in quantum mechanics the trend has been to move away from the idea that consciousness plays a special role in measurement and observation toward the idea that all objects should be considered as observers in some sense. Might it even be that the withdrawn subterranean essences of objects are weirder than we can even imagine, existing in some kind of quantum superposition and that this might have something to do with the way in which space and time supervene on objects? Could vicarious causation be of help in thinking this through? Obviously, I have not been able to formulate more than a few intuitions about this, but these are fasinating questions I would like to explore, so it would be wonderful to hear Graham expand on his thoughts on the matter.
November 16, 2009 at 1:42 am
There is nothing procedural about the double slit, no “agency” or “interaction”. Or put it differently: if there was one the superposition gets destroyed and the interference pattern vanishes. There is no exchange of energy, much unlike in the photosynthetic assembly line which keeps the photon as an energy source and there is no production of Shannon information which would imply state reduction as well.
The mere fact that the particle can take both slits creates the superposition and the loss of the fact destroys it. Making no difference makes a difference. Hereby the waves filling the apparatus are not physical objects but a statistical ordering scheme and no one has an idea why it exists in the first place. It is more mind-like than thing-like and I do understand why the esoterics gonna love it even though they are misguided.
Sometimes a difference can be undone and the superposition is restored after an incident but only as long as Shannon information won’t leak ( quantum eraser ).
From a QM point of view there is no reason why consciousness should be privileged and perform a state reduction unambiguously instead of getting split into two or more alternative branches.
November 16, 2009 at 1:48 am
LS:
“I believe that the problem with “observer” talk in QM is that it makes it seem as if it is consciousness or mind doing something to the particle, rather than an interaction between objects (the particles and larger scale objects) producing these transformations.”
It’s much worse than this. The theory requires a ‘measurement’.
Again, due to ‘problems’ with what constitutes a measuring device – which can also be treated in quantum terms (as a ‘wave function’) – something else must cause the ‘collapse’…which led von neumann to posit human consciousness (not a wave function) as that which made the collapse….these are ‘problems’ intrinsic to the theory…and led to the continuing debates
Stengers.
Stengers, mecanique quantique.
The compass she chooses is that of Prigogine’s work – discussed in the next tome “Au nom de la fleche du temps: le defi de Prigogine.’
Within the q. formalism ‘nothing happens’ without an ‘exogenous’ measurement – and this is why one needs a compass to get out of this artefact of the theory. Physicists create lying factishes.
November 16, 2009 at 3:50 am
Sure there is, Kay. The particle interacts with the screen. Why is it that you describe it as “mind-like” because it is a wave? Better yet, what presuppositions do you have about what a thing is that lead you to deny that the particle is a thing? Maybe that’s the issue to get clear about. It could very well be that we’re using the term “object” in very different senses.
November 16, 2009 at 9:53 am
The particles interact with the screen – that’s how they become visible – but not with the slit; or they do interact with the slit and the superposition breaks down.
The wave is not mind-like because it has a wave-form but because it is an informational pattern which “fills” a physical medium. It is also mysterious because no one can explain its existence. Everyone uses QM axiomatically today and working with it goes just fine of course. We are all hard boiled pragmatists unless something kicks us.
November 16, 2009 at 2:55 pm
Amusing SR style puzzle: when the universe dies in heat death in about 10^100 years where the last black-holes are decayed according to Hawking and classical matter has disintegrated to nothing, what will there be?
November 18, 2009 at 6:16 am
[…] has an interesting post about quantum mechanics and Speculative Realism. A whole slew of issues arises surrounding […]
June 19, 2010 at 8:43 pm
I think Werner Heisenberg is most instructive when he, in a lecture collected in his Philosophical Problems of Quantum Physics, suggests a four-fold schema of realites in superposition from the quantum level to the mechanical level to the vital level to the psychical level (like a Russian doll in a doll).
Because everything is energy (which for Heisenberg is the hypostasis, not “particles”), quantum reality is in superposition to everything within. But this doesn’t mean quantum reality can tell us anything meaningful about those other realities it envelopes – and vice versa.
So “objects” as we understand them are a phenomenon that are meaningful only within the horizon of mechanical reality and it is inadequate to stretch that term into the quantum realm. This doesn’t mean “trees” are mere epiphenomena but neither does it suggest quantum reality will explain “tree-ness”.
Furthermore, these realities each operate according to different laws. This should be obvious, most of us are familiar with Freud’s illustrations of psychic reality contra mechanical reality (the superimposed Rome through time…). But there is overlap, points of dispute over jurisdiction (neurology is pointing out the intersection between the vital and psychic realms).