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Post by laughter on May 14, 2018 22:36:48 GMT -5
The way I understand it, the CI is a bright line that stops where the Physics stops. So it invites speculation about consciousness by implication. Yes, but at that point you have departed from CI. IOW, your sentence one excludes sentence two (as far as CI is concerned). Bohr was smart enough to be ambiguous enough not to say more than can be said. It doesn't exclude the possibility of speculation. It just refrains from it. Physicists can only describe the physical. The possibility of speculation is for folks who aren't Physicists.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 16, 2018 14:52:06 GMT -5
I found this simple video on the double-slit experiment, Dr Quantum. (If memory serves me, Fred Alan Wolf is Dr Quantum).
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Post by zin on May 18, 2018 8:39:33 GMT -5
I believe Schroedinger studied Indian philosophy. The prevalent notion is that objects exist apart from consciousness, but in observing events the photons needed for the observation, impact the results. Most are reluctant to take the step you outline. So in observing the photons going through the one slit, we affect the outcome of the double slit experiment. Einstein proposed that paired particles contained the quantum data of their partners which Bell disproved. I think he was reluctant to discard objects. I might have heard that about Erwin before. When you win a Nobel you have to design a coat of arms, and Bohr had a yin-yang symbol in one of his quadrants. Heisenberg devotes the better part of a chapter writing about how the meaning of the CI beyond Physics will eventually come from various sources concerned with subjective state, and as I recall he mentioned both Western psychology and Buddhism both, specifically. So this is the what we might call the "classical measurement problem": in order to gain information from a system you have to exchange energy with it and that inevitably distorts the information you want to gain. Stick a thermometer in the ocean and the effect is negligible, but at small scales it's not. I've read ZD mention in passing before that the problem is recognized in fields other than physical measurement. Notice how this isn't specific to effects that are stochastic or that don't involve wave/particle duality? The measurement problem is great motivation for considering the uncertainty principle, but the two are very different, and that's because of the underlying mathematics of QM. And neither the classical measurement problem nor the uncertainty principle are the same the issue of the "Quantum Observer", presented most directly by the double-slit. I'll refrain from getting all wonky beyond making those distinctions, unless you want me to wonk-out about 'em that is. (snip)
I'd like to hear if you explain as if talking to a five year-old : )
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Post by laughter on May 18, 2018 13:10:40 GMT -5
I might have heard that about Erwin before. When you win a Nobel you have to design a coat of arms, and Bohr had a yin-yang symbol in one of his quadrants. Heisenberg devotes the better part of a chapter writing about how the meaning of the CI beyond Physics will eventually come from various sources concerned with subjective state, and as I recall he mentioned both Western psychology and Buddhism both, specifically. So this is the what we might call the "classical measurement problem": in order to gain information from a system you have to exchange energy with it and that inevitably distorts the information you want to gain. Stick a thermometer in the ocean and the effect is negligible, but at small scales it's not. I've read ZD mention in passing before that the problem is recognized in fields other than physical measurement. Notice how this isn't specific to effects that are stochastic or that don't involve wave/particle duality? The measurement problem is great motivation for considering the uncertainty principle, but the two are very different, and that's because of the underlying mathematics of QM. And neither the classical measurement problem nor the uncertainty principle are the same the issue of the "Quantum Observer", presented most directly by the double-slit. I'll refrain from getting all wonky beyond making those distinctions, unless you want me to wonk-out about 'em that is. (snip) I'd like to hear if you explain as if talking to a five year-old : ) The Universe plays a game of "peek-a-boo" with scientists. When they don't look at the place on the wall where the light can get through, light acts one way. Whey they do look at the place on the wall where the light can get through, it acts a different way. When they're looking, light acts like it's a bag of marbles dumped on the floor: the individual photons strike the screen at specific points. When they're not looking, light acts like a glob of ice cream: instead of definite spots on the screen where each photon hit, the pattern on the screen is such that every photon appears to effect and interact with every other photon, so they get smeared over it in a continuous mess. So our intuition tells us that it's the scientists fault for trying to look in the first place, and they messed things up by intruding. Think of a horse running: when there's no peep on their back they can run faster. So the version of the double-slit where light acts like ice cream is the fast horse with no rider. The version where light is a bag of marbles is where the horse is slower because there's a peep in the saddle on the horse's back. But the problem is the difference between these two results is what scientists call "non-linear". It can't be explained by whatever energy was added or subtracted from the photons by the act of observation. Instead, it's just the act of observation itself, regardless of the physical interaction, that results in the difference. The difference in the speed of the horse can't be explained by the weight of the missing rider: it's like once you took the rider off the horse, the horse sprouted wings.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 18, 2018 15:04:44 GMT -5
I might have heard that about Erwin before. When you win a Nobel you have to design a coat of arms, and Bohr had a yin-yang symbol in one of his quadrants. Heisenberg devotes the better part of a chapter writing about how the meaning of the CI beyond Physics will eventually come from various sources concerned with subjective state, and as I recall he mentioned both Western psychology and Buddhism both, specifically. So this is the what we might call the "classical measurement problem": in order to gain information from a system you have to exchange energy with it and that inevitably distorts the information you want to gain. Stick a thermometer in the ocean and the effect is negligible, but at small scales it's not. I've read ZD mention in passing before that the problem is recognized in fields other than physical measurement. Notice how this isn't specific to effects that are stochastic or that don't involve wave/particle duality? The measurement problem is great motivation for considering the uncertainty principle, but the two are very different, and that's because of the underlying mathematics of QM. And neither the classical measurement problem nor the uncertainty principle are the same the issue of the "Quantum Observer", presented most directly by the double-slit. I'll refrain from getting all wonky beyond making those distinctions, unless you want me to wonk-out about 'em that is. (snip) I'd like to hear if you explain as if talking to a five year-old : ) Found this yesterday... You can start at minute 4.
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Post by Deleted on May 18, 2018 23:18:44 GMT -5
I believe Schroedinger studied Indian philosophy. The prevalent notion is that objects exist apart from consciousness, but in observing events the photons needed for the observation, impact the results. Most are reluctant to take the step you outline. So in observing the photons going through the one slit, we affect the outcome of the double slit experiment. Einstein proposed that paired particles contained the quantum data of their partners which Bell disproved. I think he was reluctant to discard objects. I might have heard that about Erwin before. When you win a Nobel you have to design a coat of arms, and Bohr had a yin-yang symbol in one of his quadrants. Heisenberg devotes the better part of a chapter writing about how the meaning of the CI beyond Physics will eventually come from various sources concerned with subjective state, and as I recall he mentioned both Western psychology and Buddhism both, specifically. So this is the what we might call the "classical measurement problem": in order to gain information from a system you have to exchange energy with it and that inevitably distorts the information you want to gain. Stick a thermometer in the ocean and the effect is negligible, but at small scales it's not. I've read ZD mention in passing before that the problem is recognized in fields other than physical measurement. Notice how this isn't specific to effects that are stochastic or that don't involve wave/particle duality? The measurement problem is great motivation for considering the uncertainty principle, but the two are very different, and that's because of the underlying mathematics of QM. And neither the classical measurement problem nor the uncertainty principle are the same the issue of the "Quantum Observer", presented most directly by the double-slit. I'll refrain from getting all wonky beyond making those distinctions, unless you want me to wonk-out about 'em that is. From what I've read about what motivated Einstein's objections it was primarily the loss of a deterministic clockwork Universe in terms of LaPlace. He also was of course smart enough to recognize from the get-go that QM wasn't, in the form it emerged (or even now) reconcilable with General Relativity. GR reflects what's been described as Einstein's existential perspective in this regard. "There is no quantum object independent of the observation of it" suffers from the ambiguity of qualitative expression. People might not like what the math implies, but they can't really fight it, either. One of the weirdest things about QM is what the word "Quantum" refers to directly. When an electron changes state in an atom it doesn't transition continuously from one state to another. The atom dances to a strobe light. While Heisenberg's matrix mechanics obsoleted Bohr's "solar-system" atomic model, it's still possible to associate the different energy levels with a distance of the electron from the nucleus in the different states -- it's just that the idea of the electron following a well-defined orbital path doesn't apply. So in terms of a classical metaphor, it would be as if every pitch was a strike, because the ball would leave the pitcher's hand and then suddenly materialize in the catcher's mitt. Without following the arc from the mound to the plate. I heard the "observer effect" used as an explanation for the disappearance of the interference pattern once a photon is detected going through the slits offered by one of my physics profs. Had not heard of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle used to explain that phenomena, but it makes sense since in De Broglie's equation momentum needs a wavelength and the wave disappears once the detector gives the position of the photon through one of the slits.
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Post by laughter on May 18, 2018 23:55:27 GMT -5
I might have heard that about Erwin before. When you win a Nobel you have to design a coat of arms, and Bohr had a yin-yang symbol in one of his quadrants. Heisenberg devotes the better part of a chapter writing about how the meaning of the CI beyond Physics will eventually come from various sources concerned with subjective state, and as I recall he mentioned both Western psychology and Buddhism both, specifically. So this is the what we might call the "classical measurement problem": in order to gain information from a system you have to exchange energy with it and that inevitably distorts the information you want to gain. Stick a thermometer in the ocean and the effect is negligible, but at small scales it's not. I've read ZD mention in passing before that the problem is recognized in fields other than physical measurement. Notice how this isn't specific to effects that are stochastic or that don't involve wave/particle duality? The measurement problem is great motivation for considering the uncertainty principle, but the two are very different, and that's because of the underlying mathematics of QM. And neither the classical measurement problem nor the uncertainty principle are the same the issue of the "Quantum Observer", presented most directly by the double-slit. I'll refrain from getting all wonky beyond making those distinctions, unless you want me to wonk-out about 'em that is. From what I've read about what motivated Einstein's objections it was primarily the loss of a deterministic clockwork Universe in terms of LaPlace. He also was of course smart enough to recognize from the get-go that QM wasn't, in the form it emerged (or even now) reconcilable with General Relativity. GR reflects what's been described as Einstein's existential perspective in this regard. "There is no quantum object independent of the observation of it" suffers from the ambiguity of qualitative expression. People might not like what the math implies, but they can't really fight it, either. One of the weirdest things about QM is what the word "Quantum" refers to directly. When an electron changes state in an atom it doesn't transition continuously from one state to another. The atom dances to a strobe light. While Heisenberg's matrix mechanics obsoleted Bohr's "solar-system" atomic model, it's still possible to associate the different energy levels with a distance of the electron from the nucleus in the different states -- it's just that the idea of the electron following a well-defined orbital path doesn't apply. So in terms of a classical metaphor, it would be as if every pitch was a strike, because the ball would leave the pitcher's hand and then suddenly materialize in the catcher's mitt. Without following the arc from the mound to the plate. I heard the "observer effect" used as an explanation for the disappearance of the interference pattern once a photon is detected going through the slits offered by one of my physics profs. Had not heard of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle used to explain that phenomena, but it makes sense since in De Broglie's equation momentum needs a wavelength and the wave disappears once the detector gives the position of the photon through one of the slits. But if that's the explanation, it isn't a description entirely in the form of the relative amount of energy exchanged during the measurement. In the classical measurement problem, it's theoretically possible to vary the relative scales of what is measured and what's measuring to get an arbitrarily more precise measurement. The result of the uncertainty principle alone blows that up: the more you know about position the less you know about momentum, and vice-versa. The classical measurement problem is defined in terms of one quantity. The uncertainty principle, although necessarily defined in terms of complimentary pairs of quantities, demonstrates that the classical notion of an arbitrary precision of measurement is misconceived for quantum objects. But the tell-tale about the distinction between the problem of the quantum observer and the classical measurement problem as demonstrated by the double-slit is that the effect is non-linear. In the classical problem, the only salient quantity is the amount of energy exchanged with the system under measurement. It's a matter of amplitude. In contrast - as your prof pointed out - the parameter that makes the double-slit work is what's required to get the interference pattern in the unobserved case: the aperture size has to be related to the wavelength of the light or other quantum object source. There's no denying that energy is exchanged with the photons as they interact with the detector. But the classical measurement problem is analog: the less energy you exchange, the more precise your measurement. The double-slit effect is an on off switch. It doesn't matter how light a touch you use. The delayed-measurement (mentioned by 'pilgrim) and other variants of the experiment where the source is slowed to one photon or electron at a time illustrate this even more starkly. Oh, and I always keep forgetting and have to correct myself (doh! ) .. The fifth solvay was where all the rest of them were held: Brussels, not Copenhagen. The Solvay Institute site is in Dutch, and I'd really like to read the original source material from it to see if these criticism about the source of the name of the CI really have any reality behind them.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 19, 2018 14:56:28 GMT -5
I heard the "observer effect" used as an explanation for the disappearance of the interference pattern once a photon is detected going through the slits offered by one of my physics profs. Had not heard of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle used to explain that phenomena, but it makes sense since in De Broglie's equation momentum needs a wavelength and the wave disappears once the detector gives the position of the photon through one of the slits. But if that's the explanation, it isn't a description entirely in the form of the relative amount of energy exchanged during the measurement. In the classical measurement problem, it's theoretically possible to vary the relative scales of what is measured and what's measuring to get an arbitrarily more precise measurement. The result of the uncertainty principle alone blows that up: the more you know about position the less you know about momentum, and vice-versa. The classical measurement problem is defined in terms of one quantity. The uncertainty principle, although necessarily defined in terms of complimentary pairs of quantities, demonstrates that the classical notion of an arbitrary precision of measurement is misconceived for quantum objects. But the tell-tale about the distinction between the problem of the quantum observer and the classical measurement problem as demonstrated by the double-slit is that the effect is non-linear. In the classical problem, the only salient quantity is the amount of energy exchanged with the system under measurement. It's a matter of amplitude. In contrast - as your prof pointed out - the parameter that makes the double-slit work is what's required to get the interference pattern in the unobserved case: the aperture size has to be related to the wavelength of the light or other quantum object source. There's no denying that energy is exchanged with the photons as they interact with the detector. But the classical measurement problem is analog: the less energy you exchange, the more precise your measurement. The double-slit effect is an on off switch. It doesn't matter how light a touch you use. The delayed-measurement (mentioned by 'pilgrim) and other variants of the experiment where the source is slowed to one photon or electron at a time illustrate this even more starkly. Oh, and I always keep forgetting and have to correct myself (doh! ) .. The fifth solvay was where all the rest of them were held: Brussels, not Copenhagen. The Solvay Institute site is in Dutch, and I'd really like to read the original source material from it to see if these criticism about the source of the name of the CI really have any reality behind them. Going a little further as to the reason for the uncertainty principle, and the measurement problem. Take a ceiling fan as an example. In classical physics, although with a fan on high speed with the blades appearing (that is, by mere vision) to be at multiple places at once, each blade at any one time has a specific location and a specific speed. But if we have a quantum fan, the blades are in a superposition, that is, they actually are in multiple places simultaneously, they form a kind of cloud of fan blades. This being the case, it cannot be said that in any real sense that the blades have a specific location or a specific momentum. They are ~smeared out~. Already mentioned, one thing I didn't know (or forgot) until reading the What Is Real? book is that the Schrodinger wave equation is completely deterministic. The Schrodinger wave equation gives the probability of where one might find a *ceiling fan blade*. The Schrodinger wave is always in motion. (You could in a sense say this is similar to using classical physics to calculate the path of a cannon ball fired from a cannon. Using Newtonian physics one can at any time calculate the location and the speed of the cannon ball). But whereas the Newtonian cannonball deals with actuality/certainty the Schrodinger wave deals with probability, in the quantum world the ~fan blades~ have no definite location or momentum (unlike a cannonball), they are smeared out. That is the setup that gets us to our explanation of uncertainty. You can do an experiment to determine the location of the quantum fan blades. However, if you do that then you necessarily automatically cannot know or cannot do an experiment to arrive at the momentum of the quantum fan blades. To be certain of the location of the QF blades makes the momentum uncertain. And likewise if you do the reverse, measure the momentum you cannot simultaneously know the location. This is not a logistical problem of doing both simultaneously. (This is the gist of the 1935 EPR paper where Einstein, Poldosky and Rosen showed a way, in a thought experiment, to do both simultaneously. They thus showed that either QM is incomplete, or the universe is non-local. Einstein was satisfied and that was essentially his final argument to Bohr. In 1964 JB Bell showed a theoretical means to actually do the experiment in his Bell's Inequality paper. Eventually theoretical was turned to actually doing the experiment, without doubt the universe is non-local). Say we take a high speed camera and take a picture of the QF blades, we know the location but eliminate the possibility of knowing the momentum. In taking a "picture" you are altering the quantum reality. In another kind of experiment we can take a *radar gun* and measure the speed/momentum of the QF blades, but likewise, this eliminates the possibility of knowing the location of the QF blades. In the same way, you alter the quantum reality. This gets us back to the measurement problem. The Schrodinger wave equation gives the probability of the location and/or momentum of the QF blades, but when you do either experiment, this is the end of Schrodinger wave, there is a shift from the quantum world to the classical world (from not-knowing to knowing). Traditionally this has been called the collapse of the (Schrodinger) wave function. Now, this is the kicker, nobody knows why this occurs. Measurement takes us from the quantum world to our classical world. Nobody knows what's going on here. Always in the quantum world the stuff of the world is smeared out. Always in our classical world, stuff has a specific location and momentum. (There are other quantum phenomenon similarly paired). Bell showed the way to showing that even in our classical world, non-locality is a defining principle, this smeared-out-ness exists. We (here) call it ND. IOW, ND is more basic than duality. IOW, there would be no dual world without a ND basis. [FAPP non-local = ND].
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Post by laughter on May 19, 2018 22:11:31 GMT -5
Great metaphor 'pilgirm.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 22, 2018 16:36:22 GMT -5
Yes, but at that point you have departed from CI. IOW, your sentence one excludes sentence two (as far as CI is concerned). Bohr was smart enough to be ambiguous enough not to say more than can be said. It doesn't exclude the possibility of speculation. It just refrains from it. Physicists can only describe the physical. The possibility of speculation is for folks who aren't Physicists. "...there is a long history of attempts to link the mystery of consciousness to another famous mystery, that of quantum mechanics. ....There is no doubt that there are real mysteries associated with quantum mechanics, especially what precisely happens when an observer measures a quantum system. ...In the textbook version of quantum mechanics, there is a moment during the observation process at which wave functions "collapse". Before collapse, a particle might have been in a superposition of two different states, like spinning clockwise and spinning counterclockwise; after collapse, only one alternative remains. So what precisely leads to the collapse event? It is not completely crazy to to speculate that it might have something to do with the presence of a conscious observer, and a number of respectable physicists have done so over the years. The possibility that consciousness plays a role in understanding quantum mechanics has lost almost all of whatever support it may have once enjoyed. These days were understand quantum mechanics a lot better than the pioneers did; we have very specific and quantitative theories that can plausibly explain exactly what happens during the process of measurement, without any need to invoke consciousness. We don't know which if any of these theories is right, so mysteries remain--but even without having the final answer, the very existence of respectable alternatives tends to make the way-out ones seem less attractive. ....even in interpretations where wave functions really do collapse when systems are observed, the person doing the observing has no influence whatsoever on what the measurement outcome turns out to be. That just follows a rule, the Born rule for quantum probabilities, which says the probability of each outcome is given by the value of the wave function squared. Nothing spooky, nothing personal, nothing intrinsically human. Just physics". pgs 366, 367 The Big Picture, On the Origins of Life, Meaning and the Universe itself by Sean Carroll (theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology), 2017
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Post by laughter on May 22, 2018 17:04:43 GMT -5
It doesn't exclude the possibility of speculation. It just refrains from it. Physicists can only describe the physical. The possibility of speculation is for folks who aren't Physicists. "...there is a long history of attempts to link the mystery of consciousness to another famous mystery, that of quantum mechanics. ....There is no doubt that there are real mysteries associated with quantum mechanics, especially what precisely happens when an observer measures a quantum system. ...In the textbook version of quantum mechanics, there is a moment during the observation process at which wave functions "collapse". Before collapse, a particle might have been in a superposition of two different states, like spinning clockwise and spinning counterclockwise; after collapse, only one alternative remains. So what precisely leads to the collapse event? It is not completely crazy to to speculate that it might have something to do with the presence of a conscious observer, and a number of respectable physicists have done so over the years. The possibility that consciousness plays a role in understanding quantum mechanics has lost almost all of whatever support it may have once enjoyed. These days were understand quantum mechanics a lot better than the pioneers did; we have very specific and quantitative theories that can plausibly explain exactly what happens during the process of measurement, without any need to invoke consciousness. We don't know which if any of these theories is right, so mysteries remain--but even without having the final answer, the very existence of respectable alternatives tends to make the way-out ones seem less attractive. ....even in interpretations where wave functions really do collapse when systems are observed, the person doing the observing has no influence whatsoever on what the measurement outcome turns out to be. That just follows a rule, the Born rule for quantum probabilities, which says the probability of each outcome is given by the value of the wave function squared. Nothing spooky, nothing personal, nothing intrinsically human. Just physics". pgs 366, 367 The Big Picture, On the Origins of Life, Meaning and the Universe itself by Sean Carroll (theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology), 2017 All the confusion is due to the misconception of consciousness as personalized. I find Carroll's minimization of the issue of the "Quantum Observer" to be wishful thinking. If someone had reduced the nature of this beast to a rational understanding, they certainly would have won a Nobel for it.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 23, 2018 14:42:40 GMT -5
"...there is a long history of attempts to link the mystery of consciousness to another famous mystery, that of quantum mechanics. ....There is no doubt that there are real mysteries associated with quantum mechanics, especially what precisely happens when an observer measures a quantum system. ...In the textbook version of quantum mechanics, there is a moment during the observation process at which wave functions "collapse". Before collapse, a particle might have been in a superposition of two different states, like spinning clockwise and spinning counterclockwise; after collapse, only one alternative remains. So what precisely leads to the collapse event? It is not completely crazy to to speculate that it might have something to do with the presence of a conscious observer, and a number of respectable physicists have done so over the years. The possibility that consciousness plays a role in understanding quantum mechanics has lost almost all of whatever support it may have once enjoyed. These days were understand quantum mechanics a lot better than the pioneers did; we have very specific and quantitative theories that can plausibly explain exactly what happens during the process of measurement, without any need to invoke consciousness. We don't know which if any of these theories is right, so mysteries remain--but even without having the final answer, the very existence of respectable alternatives tends to make the way-out ones seem less attractive. ....even in interpretations where wave functions really do collapse when systems are observed, the person doing the observing has no influence whatsoever on what the measurement outcome turns out to be. That just follows a rule, the Born rule for quantum probabilities, which says the probability of each outcome is given by the value of the wave function squared. Nothing spooky, nothing personal, nothing intrinsically human. Just physics". pgs 366, 367 The Big Picture, On the Origins of Life, Meaning and the Universe itself by Sean Carroll (theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology), 2017 All the confusion is due to the misconception of consciousness as personalized. I find Carroll's minimization of the issue of the "Quantum Observer" to be wishful thinking. If someone had reduced the nature of this beast to a rational understanding, they certainly would have won a Nobel for it. Carroll doesn't understand consciousness in any other way than personal. The following is as close as he comes to a big C (which is further than most [atheistic] scientists will go]). "The universe, and the laws of physics, aren't embedded in any bigger context, as far as we know. They might be--we should be open-minded about the possibility of something outside our physical universe... What we can't do is demand that the universe scratch our explanatory itches. ...we should be at peace with the possibility that, for some questions, the answer doesn't go any deeper than "That's what it is". We're not used to that..". pg 45 Another quote will help. "Quantum mechanics has supplanted classical mechanics as the best way we know to talk about the universe at a deep level. Unfortunately, and to the chagrin of physicists everywhere, we don't fully understand what the theory actually is. We know that the quantum state of a system, left alone, evolves in a perfectly deterministic fashion, free even of the rare but annoying examples of non-determinism that we find in classical mechanics. But when we observe a system, it seems to behave randomly, rather than deterministically. The wave function "collapses", and we can state with very precision the relative probability of observing different outcomes, but never know precisely which one it will be". pgs 35, 36 IOW, physicists accept that the universe of space and time began 13.82 billion years ago, and has progressed to today. Carroll goes into the fact that, beginning with Laplace, what happens next in the universe occurs directly dependent upon and determined by the previous moment. But he doesn't go further than that, he doesn't say five minutes from now is determined by this present moment. It likewise is determined by its previous moment. As previously stated, Schrodinger's wave equation is completely deterministic. The monkey wrench is thrown in by a measurement, which doesn't necessarily involve consciousness in any way (Carroll already previously quoted). Carroll doesn't claim the measurement problem has been solved.
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Post by laughter on May 23, 2018 23:41:08 GMT -5
All the confusion is due to the misconception of consciousness as personalized. I find Carroll's minimization of the issue of the "Quantum Observer" to be wishful thinking. If someone had reduced the nature of this beast to a rational understanding, they certainly would have won a Nobel for it. Carroll doesn't understand consciousness in any other way than personal. The following is as close as he comes to a big C (which is further than most [atheistic] scientists will go]). "The universe, and the laws of physics, aren't embedded in any bigger context, as far as we know. They might be--we should be open-minded about the possibility of something outside our physical universe... What we can't do is demand that the universe scratch our explanatory itches. ...we should be at peace with the possibility that, for some questions, the answer doesn't go any deeper than "That's what it is". We're not used to that..". pg 45 Another quote will help. "Quantum mechanics has supplanted classical mechanics as the best way we know to talk about the universe at a deep level. Unfortunately, and to the chagrin of physicists everywhere, we don't fully understand what the theory actually is. We know that the quantum state of a system, left alone, evolves in a perfectly deterministic fashion, free even of the rare but annoying examples of non-determinism that we find in classical mechanics. But when we observe a system, it seems to behave randomly, rather than deterministically. The wave function "collapses", and we can state with very precision the relative probability of observing different outcomes, but never know precisely which one it will be". pgs 35, 36 IOW, physicists accept that the universe of space and time began 13.82 billion years ago, and has progressed to today. Carroll goes into the fact that, beginning with Laplace, what happens next in the universe occurs directly dependent upon and determined by the previous moment. But he doesn't go further than that, he doesn't say five minutes from now is determined by this present moment. It likewise is determined by its previous moment. As previously stated, Schrodinger's wave equation is completely deterministic. The monkey wrench is thrown in by a measurement, which doesn't necessarily involve consciousness in any way (Carroll already previously quoted). Carroll doesn't claim the measurement problem has been solved. No, he didn't say it was solved but he indicated that it has nothing to do with the question of consciousness. That's ignoring the elephant in the room: "what is the 'Quantum Observer'?". It's frustrating for Physicists because their science will never address it and remain entirely physical. So he sweeps it under the rug with the idea that there "are still mysteries". What is the rationale for referring to Schrodinger's equation as deterministic when it's explicitly defined in terms of a probability function? robertk, if you're reading: what I remember my Physics buddies telling me back in school was that Schrodinger's equation was a simplified special case of matrix mechanics.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 24, 2018 14:47:22 GMT -5
Carroll doesn't understand consciousness in any other way than personal. The following is as close as he comes to a big C (which is further than most [atheistic] scientists will go]). "The universe, and the laws of physics, aren't embedded in any bigger context, as far as we know. They might be--we should be open-minded about the possibility of something outside our physical universe... What we can't do is demand that the universe scratch our explanatory itches. ...we should be at peace with the possibility that, for some questions, the answer doesn't go any deeper than "That's what it is". We're not used to that..". pg 45 Another quote will help. "Quantum mechanics has supplanted classical mechanics as the best way we know to talk about the universe at a deep level. Unfortunately, and to the chagrin of physicists everywhere, we don't fully understand what the theory actually is. We know that the quantum state of a system, left alone, evolves in a perfectly deterministic fashion, free even of the rare but annoying examples of non-determinism that we find in classical mechanics. But when we observe a system, it seems to behave randomly, rather than deterministically. The wave function "collapses", and we can state with very precision the relative probability of observing different outcomes, but never know precisely which one it will be". pgs 35, 36 IOW, physicists accept that the universe of space and time began 13.82 billion years ago, and has progressed to today. Carroll goes into the fact that, beginning with Laplace, what happens next in the universe occurs directly dependent upon and determined by the previous moment. But he doesn't go further than that, he doesn't say five minutes from now is determined by this present moment. It likewise is determined by its previous moment. As previously stated, Schrodinger's wave equation is completely deterministic. The monkey wrench is thrown in by a measurement, which doesn't necessarily involve consciousness in any way (Carroll already previously quoted). Carroll doesn't claim the measurement problem has been solved. No, he didn't say it was solved but he indicated that it has nothing to do with the question of consciousness. That's ignoring the elephant in the room: "what is the 'Quantum Observer'?". It's frustrating for Physicists because their science will never address it and remain entirely physical. So he sweeps it under the rug with the idea that there "are still mysteries". What is the rationale for referring to Schrodinger's equation as deterministic when it's explicitly defined in terms of a probability function? robertk, if you're reading: what I remember my Physics buddies telling me back in school was that Schrodinger's equation was a simplified special case of matrix mechanics. First paragraph. Without saying specifically, Carroll is probably addressing all the "What the bleep do we know"? Depoke Chopra -Amit Goswami quantum consciousness nonsense. This all came from John von Neumann and Wigner who posed that consciousness is what collapses the wave function. Then the ~belief~ that the classical world does not exist apart from a conscious observer came from that. (Einstein asked the incredulous question, Do! You! Mean! to! Say! The! Moon! Doesn't! Exist! If! I! Am! Not! Looking! At! It!? (David Peat wrote a very good book on entanglement called Einstein's Moon). Carroll is just saying we are past that kind of nonsense. He is basically saying this universe has been around 13.8 billion years without conscious observers being necessary. He also says specifically an instrument, for example a camera, acts just as well as a conscious observer, to collapse the wave function. I can't quote the whole book, Carroll is very sensible. The Schrodinger wave equation. First of all, it was later shown that the Schrodinger equation and Heisenberg's matrix mechanics are equivalent. Carroll and the What Is Real ? book both say the Schrodinger equation shows the world moves along deterministically, as long as there is no measurement. What the Schrodinger equation shows, for example, is the probability of where you will find an electron, if you collapse the wave function via a measurement. I don't see any contradiction, but like I said previously, I didn't know the Schrodinger wave equation, itself, was 'operated' deterministically. The ~movement~ from quantum to classical, via measurement, understanding that, is everything, I agree.
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Post by laughter on May 25, 2018 17:33:55 GMT -5
No, he didn't say it was solved but he indicated that it has nothing to do with the question of consciousness. That's ignoring the elephant in the room: "what is the 'Quantum Observer'?". It's frustrating for Physicists because their science will never address it and remain entirely physical. So he sweeps it under the rug with the idea that there "are still mysteries". What is the rationale for referring to Schrodinger's equation as deterministic when it's explicitly defined in terms of a probability function? robertk, if you're reading: what I remember my Physics buddies telling me back in school was that Schrodinger's equation was a simplified special case of matrix mechanics. First paragraph. Without saying specifically, Carroll is probably addressing all the "What the bleep do we know"? Depoke Chopra -Amit Goswami quantum consciousness nonsense. This all came from John von Neumann and Wigner who posed that consciousness is what collapses the wave function. Then the ~belief~ that the classical world does not exist apart from a conscious observer came from that. (Einstein asked the incredulous question, Do! You! Mean! to! Say! The! Moon! Doesn't! Exist! If! I! Am! Not! Looking! At! It!? (David Peat wrote a very good book on entanglement called Einstein's Moon). Carroll is just saying we are past that kind of nonsense. He is basically saying this universe has been around 13.8 billion years without conscious observers being necessary. He also says specifically an instrument, for example a camera, acts just as well as a conscious observer, to collapse the wave function. I can't quote the whole book, Carroll is very sensible. The Schrodinger wave equation. First of all, it was later shown that the Schrodinger equation and Heisenberg's matrix mechanics are equivalent. Carroll and the What Is Real ? book both say the Schrodinger equation shows the world moves along deterministically, as long as there is no measurement. What the Schrodinger equation shows, for example, is the probability of where you will find an electron, if you collapse the wave function via a measurement. I don't see any contradiction, but like I said previously, I didn't know the Schrodinger wave equation, itself, was 'operated' deterministically. The ~movement~ from quantum to classical, via measurement, understanding that, is everything, I agree. First of all, to say that Schrodinger's equation is deterministic is more wishful thinking, it's just word magic. The distinction that matters is that quantum events are ultimately, in Carrol's words, "random". This is as distinct from a clockwork that could be predicted -- in it's entirety -- from initial conditions and natural laws the way that Einstein, and before him, Laplace, envisioned the Universe. Currently, the vogue in the popular literature is to make no distinction between "random" and "stochastic", but, strictly and technically speaking, a "random" process is one with a uniform probability distribution (a constant). White noise, for instance. Event's aren't random, they are predictable, but the prediction is of tendencies, not specific events. You can say that the electron is most likely to be close to the point that's a straight line from the aperture, but you can't say exactly where, and you can't say that the uncertainty is due entirely to a physical process. We can answer the question of what was around to observe the creation of the Universe, with "the Universe". That works, sure. But it's wishful thinking to declare that "the Universe" is a physical machine, that can be described entirely in physical terms. The mystery remains, and some people can still get confused by thinking of consciousness in either entirely personal, or, entirely impersonal terms. The old debate was never resolved, which is why Schrodinger's cat still makes a great koan. And matrix mechanics only simplifies to Schrodinger's equation in one particular, special case. If I was up on the math I could explain in detail what that means. Right now, I'm not, but I'd hate to refrain from disabusing you of the notion that it's otherwise.
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