Quantum Enigma

[Mitch Cronin]

Holy smokes! Thanks Greg! This stuff is incredibly fascinating! I can totally understand how knowing all of this could strengthen a fella's beliefs in a Creator.

The Enigma, for those curious, is -- in my own words, that surely don't come anything close to what one needs to understand -- the point that particles in quantum mechanics, and, by extension, the rest of all matter... exist in particle form only because they're observed to exist, where they're observed. A particle - an atom for example... exists in wave form, and can be in any place, and is in all places, within it's probability wave, until it is observed, when it will then be only where it was observed to be. Seriously! That's why they keep saying that if you think you understand this stuff, you don't understand.

Again, thanks Greg, for the recommendation. I'm only a little more than half way through this and I'm thoroughly enjoying it! (The Fabric of the Cosmos is waiting beside my screen here. )

[GDR]

Glad that you're enjoying the book Mitch. Usually when I start on about this stuff people's eyes glaze over. One little thing, an atom is not an example of a particle, an atom is made up of particles.

As I mentioned earlier what is even more surprising is that the particle when it is observed goes back in time to create the history to get the result.

As for the idea of it as evidence for a creator is concerned I would agree that it points in that direction but of course it can be argued the other way as well. Also of course it doesn't tell you anything tangible about the creator except that the he/she/it has a very imaginative intelligence. I tend to view science in all of its forms as a natural theology.

I think that as you get on you'll find the enigma is that consciousness seems to be the fundamental reality in the universe. It seems that things are the way they are because that is how our consciousness, through our senses, perceives them to be. In other words, no consciousness - no universe as we know it.

Cheers

Greg

[Don Hudson]

Greg;

In other words, no consciousness - no universe as we know it.

I think so.

We could even say, "no language, no universe as we 'speak' it".

Mitch, seeker is right; you've got talent for writing (which first starts with thinking!) and you should be story-telling. Like Joseph Cambell said, "follow your bliss", and writing's yours.

[Seeker]

I think that as you get on you'll find the enigma is that consciousness seems to be the fundamental reality in the universe. It seems that things are the way they are because that is how our consciousness, through our senses, perceives them to be. In other words, no consciousness - no universe as we know it.

The next thing you know someone will start a post asking whether Schrödinger's cat would make a noise if it fell out out of a tree in the forest and no one was there to hear it.

[J.O.]

How could he? The tree isn't there unless someone is there to see it!

[GDR]

The next thing you know someone will start a post asking whether Schrödinger's cat would make a noise if it fell out out of a tree in the forest and no one was there to hear it.

There would always be the cat......maybe

[BoomerPete]

Given that Schrödinger's cat is both dead & alive until someone observes it, perhaps we should forget about looking (or listening) lest we provoke the less favourable result.

Speaking of cats ...

How's Fluffy?

[Moon The Loon]

FLUFFY?

Never heard it called that before!

Hey Pete: You and Rich holding out on us?

[Kip Powick]

Moon...Moon....Moon.....

[Canus Chinookus]

I was gonna post the one article, but when I searched, I realized there were a few good articles on the subject.

http://discovermagazine.com/search?Searcha....x=0&Submit.y=0

[GDR]

That is a great site. Thanks CC.

Here is an excerpt from the interview of Wheeler on that site that covers pretty much all that we have talked about.

In his concern for the nature of quantum measurements, Wheeler is addressing one of the most confounding aspects of modern physics: the relationship between the observations and the outcomes of experiments on quantum systems. The problem goes back to the earliest days of quantum mechanics and was formulated most famously by the Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger, who imagined a Rube Goldberg-type of quantum experiment with a cat.

Put a cat in a closed box, along with a vial of poison gas, a piece of uranium, and a Geiger counter hooked up to a hammer suspended above the gas vial. During the course of the experiment, the radioactive uranium may or may not emit a particle. If the particle is released, the Geiger counter will detect it and send a signal to a mechanism controlling the hammer, which will strike the vial and release the gas, killing the cat. If the particle is not released, the cat will live. Schrödinger asked, What could be known about the cat before opening the box?

If there were no such thing as quantum mechanics, the answer would be simple: The cat is either alive or dead, depending on whether a particle hit the Geiger counter. But in the quantum world, things are not so straightforward. The particle and the cat now form a quantum system consisting of all possible outcomes of the experiment. One outcome includes a dead cat; another, a live one. Neither becomes real until someone opens the box and looks inside. With that observation, an entire consistent sequence of events— the particle jettisoned from the uranium, the release of the poison gas, the cat's death— at once becomes real, giving the appearance of something that has taken weeks to transpire. Stanford University physicist Andrei Linde believes this quantum paradox gets to the heart of Wheeler's idea about the nature of the universe: The principles of quantum mechanics dictate severe limits on the certainty of our knowledge.

"You may ask whether the universe really existed before you start looking at it," he says. "That's the same Schrödinger cat question. And my answer would be that the universe looks as if it existed before I started looking at it. When you open the cat's box after a week, you're going to find either a live cat or a smelly piece of meat. You can say that the cat looks as if it were dead or as if it were alive during the whole week. Likewise, when we look at the universe, the best we can say is that it looks as if it were there 10 billion years ago."

Linde believes that Wheeler's intuition of the participatory nature of reality is probably right. But he differs with Wheeler on one crucial point. Linde believes that conscious observers are an essential component of the universe and cannot be replaced by inanimate objects.

"The universe and the observer exist as a pair," Linde says. "You can say that the universe is there only when there is an observer who can say, Yes, I see the universe there. These small words— it looks like it was here— for practical purposes it may not matter much, but for me as a human being, I do not know any sense in which I could claim that the universe is here in the absence of observers. We are together, the universe and us. The moment you say that the universe exists without any observers, I cannot make any sense out of that. I cannot imagine a consistent theory of everything that ignores consciousness. A recording device cannot play the role of an observer, because who will read what is written on this recording device? In order for us to see that something happens, and say to one another that something happens, you need to have a universe, you need to have a recording device, and you need to have us. It's not enough for the information to be stored somewhere, completely inaccessible to anybody. It's necessary for somebody to look at it. You need an observer who looks at the universe. In the absence of observers, our universe is dead."

[MURRAY]

As a product of the punk rock movement (the original one, not the recent faux revisitation) I suggest reading: Is Belief in God Good, Bad or Irrelevant?: A Professor and a Punk Rocker Discuss Science, Religion, Naturalism & Christianity.

It focuses on a series of e-mail correspondences between Dr. Preston Jones, a published professor of history at John Brown University, and Dr. Greg Graffin, a part time professor at U.C.L.A., avowed naturalist, and current lead singer for the Southern California punk band Bad Religion. Creationism versus naturalism at its finest.

[conehead]

"The moment you say that the universe exists without any observers, I cannot make any sense out of that. I cannot imagine a consistent theory of everything that ignores consciousness. A recording device cannot play the role of an observer, because who will read what is written on this recording device? In order for us to see that something happens, and say to one another that something happens, you need to have a universe, you need to have a recording device, and you need to have us. It's not enough for the information to be stored somewhere, completely inaccessible to anybody. It's necessary for somebody to look at it. You need an observer who looks at the universe. In the absence of observers, our universe is dead."

That's just arrogant. The statement assumes that Mankind can be the only observer. The universe will still exist long after Man is gone.

[Canus Chinookus]

That's kind of the conundrum Conehead. Philosophy is now being blended with quantum physics. I don't like it either, to be honest. But, maybe they're on to something.

[GDR]

That's just arrogant.  The statement assumes that Mankind can be the only observer.  The universe will still exist long after Man is gone.

He was talking about a human observer as you would need a human to read a man made recording device. I think though that he would agree that animal life would constitute as an observer as they have a consciuosness as well.

They are saying though, that if there is no conscious life to perceive it the universe, at least as we know it, would cease to exist.

[deicer]

Jeez Guys...

Life is easier if you really try not to think past the glass that's half full that you look forward to at the end of the day.

Iceman

[Spinnaker]

Jeez Guys...

Life is easier if you really try not to think past the glass that's half full that you look forward to at the end of the day.

Iceman

I feel like I've walked in to the pot-smoking section here....

[conehead]

They are saying though, that if there is no conscious life to perceive it the universe, at least as we know it, would cease to exist.

There is a nice rock sitting in my backyard. I'm saying that if all life on Earth perished, including animal, insect, fish and fowl, that rock would still be there. I know it would. That rock has been there for a long, long time and it will continue to be there for a long time, regardless of who's around to trip over it!

[conehead]

[i can't accept quantum mechanics because] "I like to think the moon is there even if I am not looking at it."

Albert Einstein

[Canus Chinookus]

[i can't accept quantum mechanics because] "I like to think the moon is there even if I am not looking at it."

Albert Einstein

From what I've read I tend to agree with that Einstein quote, and when I first read about this idea of theirs regarding an observer, I thought it was BS. But when you read about the properties of a light particle/wave and how you can manipulate 2 entangled particles, it's so weird it could be true. Is this not part of what the LHC is about? Figuring this stuff out?

[Moon The Loon]

[i can't accept quantum mechanics because] "I like to think the moon is there even if I am not looking at it."

Albert Einstein

So do I, if not for obvious reasons!

I think this "observer" stuff has gone off track. One of the fundamental contradictions Schroedinger addresses is that just by observing a particle, its state is changed. The dilemma is to predict how that particle would behave if NOT observed. It's one of the basic contradictions that has confronted quantum mechanics since its inception.

[Mitch Cronin]

Well.... the moon is still there... even if you're not looking. In fact, from what I've been reading, physicists of all stripes are either having a difficult time accepting what their physics tells them, or they've found a way to not even consider it. It's evidently undisputed fact. The "quantum state" of the excruciatingly small... the "waveform", exists until it's observed. Whereafter it will continue to follow Newtonian physics, (for the most part, I think?) even if it is no longer observed. (I think?) No one disputes the facts... Every test ever done has failed to disprove it, and all of quantum physics predictions of results have so far proven true.

The interconnectedness of all things that quantum physics deals with (and again, by extension, that would mean all things, as everything is entirely composed of these very tiny things), is evidently not in dispute either... and people are even working on ways to use it in computer technology. Instant - not light speed, but absolutely instantaneous transfer of information, regardless of space, is evidently a real phenomenon. Apparently physicists do their best to leave the implications to the philosophers, but they readily dive right into "how can we use it?".

Greg, thanks for the correction, I should have said "electron" or "photon" or something, or said "thing", not "particle"... This is all mind numbing stuff! I'm having to slow down and grasp some notions near the back now... (maybe 4/5th's through)... getting a little flustered with their repetition of some stuff.... But all in all... this is a great read.

WOW! What an incredible world! ....it's really puzzling me that, if they've known of this wacky science for so long now, why is it I'm only just now learning it? Surely the basics of it could be introduced in grade school after they discuss the structure of an atom... I think I know the answer though, and it speaks to how we stay in the stone age in some ways. ...or has it just taken this long for other people to believe it?

...dogs need attention... (having 3 dogs is more work than 2! 'specially in the backyard .... with one eating 3 times a day, and ....you get it...!)

Cheers!

[boestar]

Mitch:

I would think disproving the theory would be technically impossible since, in order to preove it, it must be observed. when something is observed it takes on the observed state. How can you test without testing?

Now I have gone and broke my brain. I need a drink?

[Mitch Cronin]

I would think disproving the theory would be technically impossible since, in order to preove it, it must be observed. when something is observed it takes on the observed state. How can you test without testing?

When they test without looking, results prove the particle existed in a wave form. When they test while looking, the particle's wave form "collapses" and it continues on as a particle.

[boestar]

I still need a drink...