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Post by stardustpilgrim on Jul 27, 2014 20:28:17 GMT -5
I just started reading this book, At the Edge of Time, A New Look at Reality, Time and Meaning by Donald W Jarrell, 2012. I took a chance on it as it is self published and Jarrell has a PhD in economics, his avocation is philosophy. The book has come out of a fifteen year inquiry, What is time? After only 24 pages he has raised some interesting questions about reality. Jarrell states that to understand time he had to understand reality. He gives an accurate beginning conception of quantum physics. He doesn't mention Samadhi or non-duality, but discusses the experience of the mystics.
Jarrell discusses the double-slit experiment, the fact that photons are either particles or waves depending upon how the experiment is set up. You can send single photons through a single slit and get a pattern showing the photons are particles at the target, the pattern you would get taking target practice with a gun. You can send single photons at double slits and the target shows a light and dark pattern showing the troughs and crests of waves, a wave-like interference pattern. But if you put a detector at either one of the double slits, you get a 'bullet' pattern just as you do with one slit. This shows that the mere fact of observing the photon determines whether it appears as a particle or a wave. Physicists still do not understand what is happening in this experiment. To make the experiment even more elusive, John Wheeler suggested a delayed observation experiment where you observe the photons after they have passed through the two slits. He made a prediction which has continually been confirmed by experiment. He predicted the same results as when the measurement occurs at the slits. If you observe the photons, they are shown to be waves by an interference pattern. If no observation is made you have the bullet pattern. One explanation for these findings is that the future observation is effecting the past, when the photons went through the slits. These types of experiments drove Wheeler (a physicist, not the non-dual guy) to make the statement that reality is made from information, not matter and energy, the famous aphoristic, "It from Bit". Wheeler maintained that material reality does not exist without an observer.
Then Jarrell discusses perception. Neuroscientists show today that what we see does not occur with the eyes acting as a camera. Information gathered by the eyes is delivered to various areas of the brain which then combine the information to form the world as we see it. As one example any book on visual perception will tell you that color does not exist in the world, only different frequencies of light. The neural structure of the brain colors the world. Similarly, the brain takes the sensory information of the nose, skin, tongue and ears and turns them into odors, physical touch, tastes and sounds. Jarrell's point is that, although there is actually a world out there, we don't know what the nature of that world is, we only know what the senses deliver via what the brain constructs from the data. He quotes Newberg and D'Aquili in Why God Won't Go Away, 2001, "Nothing enters consciousness whole. There is no direct objective experience of reality. All the things the mind perceives--all thoughts, feelings, hunches, memories, insights, desires and revelations--have been assembled piece by piece by the processing powers of the brain from the swirl of neural blips, sensory perceptions, and scattered cognitions dwelling in its structures and neural pathways". (pgs 35-37)
We can go back to Wheeler who said that "No phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon".
Now, I have known these facts for years, but Jarrell makes the parallel connection between the wave nature of reality and the exterior world that activates our senses (what Kant called the noumenal world) OTOneH and particle nature of reality and the world the senses plus the brain delivers as perceptions OTOH. He essentially says that the reason there is no experience in Samadhi is that one reaches a level beyond the brain and the senses, one ~moves~ beyond the "particle" nature of reality to the non-differentiated "wave" nature of reality. Direct experience in Samadhi can only be non-experience, from the standpoint of individual identity.
IOW, when there is no differentiating observer in the form of a mind-brain filtering self-identity, one can "experience" reality as-it-is, "raw", wave-like, non-experience-like........."turning-off-like".........
I thought that was cool..............
sdp
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Jul 28, 2014 13:58:43 GMT -5
I will add to the OP an additional fact concerning quantum physics which Jarrell discusses, the concept of superposition. Superposition is what reality is like when nobody is watching. As an analogy let's look at pulling up at a stop sign not having nailed down precisely our next planned objective. We can turn left and go home to take a needed nap. We can turn right and go to the post office to pick up a package we got a notice for. We can go straight and do the Honey-do list and pick up some groceries needed for supper (or dinner depending on where you live). So, the next minute+ of our life is in a superposition of the three alternative futures, until we choose between the three (I guess a fourth choice would be to just sit at the stop sign).
So let's take this to the real world and the uncertainty principle. We can set up an experiment to measure the position of say an electron, but we cannot at the same time measure its momentum. The more certain we are of its position the less certain we can be of its momentum. Likewise, we can do an experiment to measure an electron's momentum, but then we cannot simultaneously know its position. These facts are not a technical epistemological measurement problem, this is just the nature of quantum reality. Before we measure the position of an electron, it doesn't actually have a position. It exists everywhere around a nucleus, within certain limits because of its level of energy. It could be in a lower orbit with a lower energy level. With added energy from added photons, it can leap to a higher orbit, this is the famous quantum leap. What's significant about such a quantum leap? The leap is instantaneous without traversing either time or space. Top back up, before measurement, an electron is not anywhere in time or space, it is in a superposition of multiplicity, that is its natural state, measurement causes an unnatural state.
Let's take this back to the double-slit experiment. Remember that if we are not observing or making a measurement, the world is in its natural quantum state. We can fire single photons at the slits, which, if we are not observing or measuring, them, "they" revert to their natural quantum state, a superposition of multiple "places" in both time and space, wave-nature. This is why if there is no observation of the photons as they pass through the slits, the target shows the natural state interference wave pattern, they go through both slits, but if we do observe what takes place, the photons are particles and go through only one slit and a 'bullet' pattern is shown at the target.
Why do I say the natural state is neither in time or space? Being nonlocal in space is somewhat easy to understand. I can be in my kitchen or den, but not simultaneously. In the quantum world I can be simultaneously in my kitchen and den (via analogy). But our normal understanding of time suggests that we cannot revisit the past, we can't shift from now to the future to the past. But recall from the OP the delayed observation experiment. We can *determine* whether the photon went through either one slit or two, by observing or not observing the photon after it has passed through the slits. It seems there are only two options here, backwards causality or precognition. Both involve obliteration of past, present and future, IOW, a superposition of past, present and future.
So let's take this back to ordinary mind and Samadhi. Our ordinary mind in connection with the five senses and the brain, observes. Perception takes whatever is out there (a quantum soup of wave superposition) and creates particles, the stuff we see, feel, taste, hear and smell. But if we go into Samadhi, we revert to our natural state, non-dual, wave-like, quantum-soup-like, no-self-like, non-experience-like, non-differentiation-like, nonlocal, superposition-like. In Samadhi, neither time nor space exists.
sdp
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Post by enigma on Jul 28, 2014 17:58:40 GMT -5
I will add to the OP an additional fact concerning quantum physics which Jarrell discusses, the concept of superposition. Superposition is what reality is like when nobody is watching. As an analogy let's look at pulling up at a stop sign not having nailed down precisely our next planned objective. We can turn left and go home to take a needed nap. We can turn right and go to the post office to pick up a package we got a notice for. We can go straight and do the Honey-do list and pick up some groceries needed for supper (or dinner depending on where you live). So, the next minute+ of our life is in a superposition of the three alternative futures, until we choose between the three (I guess a fourth choice would be to just sit at the stop sign). So let's take this to the real world and the uncertainty principle. We can set up an experiment to measure the position of say an electron, but we cannot at the same time measure its momentum. The more certain we are of its position the less certain we can be of its momentum. Likewise, we can do an experiment to measure an electron's momentum, but then we cannot simultaneously know its position. These facts are not a technical epistemological measurement problem, this is just the nature of quantum reality. Before we measure the position of an electron, it doesn't actually have a position. It exists everywhere around a nucleus, within certain limits because of its level of energy. It could be in a lower orbit with a lower energy level. With added energy from added photons, it can leap to a higher orbit, this is the famous quantum leap. What's significant about such a quantum leap? The leap is instantaneous without traversing either time or space. Top back up, before measurement, an electron is not anywhere in time or space, it is in a superposition of multiplicity, that is its natural state, measurement causes an unnatural state. Let's take this back to the double-slit experiment. Remember that if we are not observing or making a measurement, the world is in its natural quantum state. We can fire single photons at the slits, which, if we are not observing or measuring, them, "they" revert to their natural quantum state, a superposition of multiple "places" in both time and space, wave-nature. This is why if there is no observation of the photons as they pass through the slits, the target shows the natural state interference wave pattern, they go through both slits, but if we do observe what takes place, the photons are particles and go through only one slit and a 'bullet' pattern is shown at the target. Why do I say the natural state is neither in time or space? Being nonlocal in space is somewhat easy to understand. I can be in my kitchen or den, but not simultaneously. In the quantum world I can be simultaneously in my kitchen and den (via analogy). But our normal understanding of time suggests that we cannot revisit the past, we can't shift from now to the future to the past. But recall from the OP the delayed observation experiment. We can *determine* whether the photon went through either one slit or two, by observing or not observing the photon after it has passed through the slits. It seems there are only two options here, backwards causality or precognition. Both involve obliteration of past, present and future, IOW, a superposition of past, present and future. So let's take this back to ordinary mind and Samadhi. Our ordinary mind in connection with the five senses and the brain, observes. Perception takes whatever is out there (a quantum soup of wave superposition) and creates particles, the stuff we see, feel, taste, hear and smell. But if we go into Samadhi, we revert to our natural state, non-dual, wave-like, quantum-soup-like, no-self-like, non-experience-like, non-differentiation-like, nonlocal, superposition-like. In Samadhi, neither time nor space exists. sdp You know more about this stuff than I do, but the idea of a wave nature being a time/space superposition state is interesting. At least I think that's what you're saying. Does that mean that a photon is everywhere along the beam of light until it's wave function collapses on the target? If so, is this why a photon can seem to travel at the speed of light while not actually moving?
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Post by zendancer on Jul 28, 2014 19:38:28 GMT -5
I will add to the OP an additional fact concerning quantum physics which Jarrell discusses, the concept of superposition. Superposition is what reality is like when nobody is watching. As an analogy let's look at pulling up at a stop sign not having nailed down precisely our next planned objective. We can turn left and go home to take a needed nap. We can turn right and go to the post office to pick up a package we got a notice for. We can go straight and do the Honey-do list and pick up some groceries needed for supper (or dinner depending on where you live). So, the next minute+ of our life is in a superposition of the three alternative futures, until we choose between the three (I guess a fourth choice would be to just sit at the stop sign). So let's take this to the real world and the uncertainty principle. We can set up an experiment to measure the position of say an electron, but we cannot at the same time measure its momentum. The more certain we are of its position the less certain we can be of its momentum. Likewise, we can do an experiment to measure an electron's momentum, but then we cannot simultaneously know its position. These facts are not a technical epistemological measurement problem, this is just the nature of quantum reality. Before we measure the position of an electron, it doesn't actually have a position. It exists everywhere around a nucleus, within certain limits because of its level of energy. It could be in a lower orbit with a lower energy level. With added energy from added photons, it can leap to a higher orbit, this is the famous quantum leap. What's significant about such a quantum leap? The leap is instantaneous without traversing either time or space. Top back up, before measurement, an electron is not anywhere in time or space, it is in a superposition of multiplicity, that is its natural state, measurement causes an unnatural state. Let's take this back to the double-slit experiment. Remember that if we are not observing or making a measurement, the world is in its natural quantum state. We can fire single photons at the slits, which, if we are not observing or measuring, them, "they" revert to their natural quantum state, a superposition of multiple "places" in both time and space, wave-nature. This is why if there is no observation of the photons as they pass through the slits, the target shows the natural state interference wave pattern, they go through both slits, but if we do observe what takes place, the photons are particles and go through only one slit and a 'bullet' pattern is shown at the target. Why do I say the natural state is neither in time or space? Being nonlocal in space is somewhat easy to understand. I can be in my kitchen or den, but not simultaneously. In the quantum world I can be simultaneously in my kitchen and den (via analogy). But our normal understanding of time suggests that we cannot revisit the past, we can't shift from now to the future to the past. But recall from the OP the delayed observation experiment. We can *determine* whether the photon went through either one slit or two, by observing or not observing the photon after it has passed through the slits. It seems there are only two options here, backwards causality or precognition. Both involve obliteration of past, present and future, IOW, a superposition of past, present and future. So let's take this back to ordinary mind and Samadhi. Our ordinary mind in connection with the five senses and the brain, observes. Perception takes whatever is out there (a quantum soup of wave superposition) and creates particles, the stuff we see, feel, taste, hear and smell. But if we go into Samadhi, we revert to our natural state, non-dual, wave-like, quantum-soup-like, no-self-like, non-experience-like, non-differentiation-like, nonlocal, superposition-like. In Samadhi, neither time nor space exists. sdp You know more about this stuff than I do, but the idea of a wave nature being a time/space superposition state is interesting. At least I think that's what you're saying. Does that mean that a photon is everywhere along the beam of light until it's wave function collapses on the target? If so, is this why a photon can seem to travel at the speed of light while not actually moving? SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense?
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Jul 28, 2014 19:43:41 GMT -5
I will add to the OP an additional fact concerning quantum physics which Jarrell discusses, the concept of superposition. Superposition is what reality is like when nobody is watching. As an analogy let's look at pulling up at a stop sign not having nailed down precisely our next planned objective. We can turn left and go home to take a needed nap. We can turn right and go to the post office to pick up a package we got a notice for. We can go straight and do the Honey-do list and pick up some groceries needed for supper (or dinner depending on where you live). So, the next minute+ of our life is in a superposition of the three alternative futures, until we choose between the three (I guess a fourth choice would be to just sit at the stop sign). So let's take this to the real world and the uncertainty principle. We can set up an experiment to measure the position of say an electron, but we cannot at the same time measure its momentum. The more certain we are of its position the less certain we can be of its momentum. Likewise, we can do an experiment to measure an electron's momentum, but then we cannot simultaneously know its position. These facts are not a technical epistemological measurement problem, this is just the nature of quantum reality. Before we measure the position of an electron, it doesn't actually have a position. It exists everywhere around a nucleus, within certain limits because of its level of energy. It could be in a lower orbit with a lower energy level. With added energy from added photons, it can leap to a higher orbit, this is the famous quantum leap. What's significant about such a quantum leap? The leap is instantaneous without traversing either time or space. Top back up, before measurement, an electron is not anywhere in time or space, it is in a superposition of multiplicity, that is its natural state, measurement causes an unnatural state. Let's take this back to the double-slit experiment. Remember that if we are not observing or making a measurement, the world is in its natural quantum state. We can fire single photons at the slits, which, if we are not observing or measuring, them, "they" revert to their natural quantum state, a superposition of multiple "places" in both time and space, wave-nature. This is why if there is no observation of the photons as they pass through the slits, the target shows the natural state interference wave pattern, they go through both slits, but if we do observe what takes place, the photons are particles and go through only one slit and a 'bullet' pattern is shown at the target. Why do I say the natural state is neither in time or space? Being nonlocal in space is somewhat easy to understand. I can be in my kitchen or den, but not simultaneously. In the quantum world I can be simultaneously in my kitchen and den (via analogy). But our normal understanding of time suggests that we cannot revisit the past, we can't shift from now to the future to the past. But recall from the OP the delayed observation experiment. We can *determine* whether the photon went through either one slit or two, by observing or not observing the photon after it has passed through the slits. It seems there are only two options here, backwards causality or precognition. Both involve obliteration of past, present and future, IOW, a superposition of past, present and future. So let's take this back to ordinary mind and Samadhi. Our ordinary mind in connection with the five senses and the brain, observes. Perception takes whatever is out there (a quantum soup of wave superposition) and creates particles, the stuff we see, feel, taste, hear and smell. But if we go into Samadhi, we revert to our natural state, non-dual, wave-like, quantum-soup-like, no-self-like, non-experience-like, non-differentiation-like, nonlocal, superposition-like. In Samadhi, neither time nor space exists. sdp You know more about this stuff than I do, but the idea of a wave nature being a time/space superposition state is interesting. At least I think that's what you're saying. Does that mean that a photon is everywhere along the beam of light until it's wave function collapses on the target? If so, is this why a photon can seem to travel at the speed of light while not actually moving? You are talking about a few different things here. The double-slit experiment shows that light can either be a wave or a particle. Isaac Newton knew a lot about light, wrote on it, he believed light to be made of particles which he called corpuscles. But about a hundred years before Einstein's 1905 paper on the photoelectric effect, Young showed that light is a wave in his original double-slit experiment. Then Einstein came along and showed that consists of particles which later came to be called photons. (He used Planck's quantum theory to show that light is a quantum phenomenon, that it only comes in certain packets of energy). In the double-slit experiment, when we fire individual photons, we know they are particles, not waves. So they have a definite location, like a fired bullet always has a certain location in space from the gun to the target. So in the beginning, it is not everywhere along a beam of light. The wave function does not collapse unless we try to look for the photon. Again, when we are not looking, the light is a wave (spread out over space). When we look, IOW, make a measurement, this is when we collapse the wave function, the spread-out-wave-nature of light ceases and the light becomes a particle, a photon. The target doesn't collapse the wave function. It shows either that the wave function had been collapsed (in the case of looking which slit the light went through) and if it had we get a bullet pattern, or, if we did not try to look which slit the light went through, an interference pattern of light and dark shows up at the target showing the light arrives as a wave. OK, that's one set of circumstances. Your last sentence is describing something else. Einstein, as a teenager, first wondered what it would be like to ride upon a beam of light. He eventually developed relativity out of this wondering. Light is always moving. Light is always moving at 186,000 miles a second. Einstein figured out that the speed of light is the only thing constant in the universe, and that even space and time are *deformed* in relation to the speed of light. So, what is it that is not moving in relation to a photon of light at 186,000 miles per second? Let's look at a clock with a second hand at 11:59 (minutes) 59 (seconds) with a photon coming off the clock at that instant. Let's imagine that our photon can look back at the clock. Traveling 186,000 miles the photon will see the second hand stopped. (As comparison, the moon is about 240,000 miles from the earth. As another comparison, it takes a photon of light eight minutes to travel the 93,000,000 miles from the sun to the earth). So it isn't that a photon is not actually moving, it's the second had of the clock that is not moving, in relation to the photon. In fact, from the POV of the photon, everything is standing still for that one second. .......................................... Superposition in the quantum world means the all of the different possible outcomes (more or less). sdp
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Post by enigma on Jul 28, 2014 20:03:53 GMT -5
You know more about this stuff than I do, but the idea of a wave nature being a time/space superposition state is interesting. At least I think that's what you're saying. Does that mean that a photon is everywhere along the beam of light until it's wave function collapses on the target? If so, is this why a photon can seem to travel at the speed of light while not actually moving? SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? Interesting. Yeah, it makes sense. So in non-conceptual seeing, it's not only that we haven't yet conceptualized an objective state that we are observing, but that the wave function hasn't yet collapsed and is still in a superposition. The event is undetermined until the observer determines it conceptually? That's really another way of saying that the observing and the observed are the same.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Jul 28, 2014 20:08:14 GMT -5
You know more about this stuff than I do, but the idea of a wave nature being a time/space superposition state is interesting. At least I think that's what you're saying. Does that mean that a photon is everywhere along the beam of light until it's wave function collapses on the target? If so, is this why a photon can seem to travel at the speed of light while not actually moving? SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? Yes, I will agree with that under your conditions. One question in physics that there is not a lot of agreement on is at what point actually does the measurement take place, what is the dividing line between observer and observed. Some say the measurement takes place in someone's consciousness. Some say all you need is a mechanical measuring device. What you are describing is the still mind being a part of the superposition, a partless whole in the words of Jarrell, undivided wholeness in the words of David Bohm. sdp
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Jul 28, 2014 20:13:37 GMT -5
SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? Interesting. Yeah, it makes sense. So in non-conceptual seeing, it's not only that we haven't yet conceptualized an objective state that we are observing, but that the wave function hasn't yet collapsed and is still in a superposition. The event is undetermined until the observer determines it conceptually? That's really another way of saying that the observing and the observed are the same. Yes and yes. sdp
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Post by enigma on Jul 28, 2014 20:34:39 GMT -5
You know more about this stuff than I do, but the idea of a wave nature being a time/space superposition state is interesting. At least I think that's what you're saying. Does that mean that a photon is everywhere along the beam of light until it's wave function collapses on the target? If so, is this why a photon can seem to travel at the speed of light while not actually moving? You are talking about a few different things here. The double-slit experiment shows that light can either be a wave or a particle. Isaac Newton knew a lot about light, wrote on it, he believed light to be made of particles which he called corpuscles. But about a hundred years before Einstein's 1905 paper on the photoelectric effect, Young showed that light is a wave in his original double-slit experiment. Then Einstein came along and showed that consists of particles which later came to be called photons. (He used Planck's quantum theory to show that light is a quantum phenomenon, that it only comes in certain packets of energy). In the double-slit experiment, when we fire individual photons, we know they are particles, not waves. So they have a definite location, like a fired bullet always has a certain location in space from the gun to the target. So in the beginning, it is not everywhere along a beam of light. The wave function does not collapse unless we try to look for the photon. Again, when we are not looking, the light is a wave (spread out over space). When we look, IOW, make a measurement, this is when we collapse the wave function, the spread-out-wave-nature of light ceases and the light becomes a particle, a photon. The target doesn't collapse the wave function. It shows either that the wave function had been collapsed (in the case of looking which slit the light went through) and if it had we get a bullet pattern, or, if we did not try to look which slit the light went through, an interference pattern of light and dark shows up at the target showing the light arrives as a wave. OK, that's one set of circumstances. Your last sentence is describing something else. Einstein, as a teenager, first wondered what it would be like to ride upon a beam of light. He eventually developed relativity out of this wondering. Light is always moving. Light is always moving at 186,000 miles a second. Einstein figured out that the speed of light is the only thing constant in the universe, and that even space and time are *deformed* in relation to the speed of light. So, what is it that is not moving in relation to a photon of light at 186,000 miles per second? Let's look at a clock with a second hand at 11:59 (minutes) 59 (seconds) with a photon coming off the clock at that instant. Let's imagine that our photon can look back at the clock. Traveling 186,000 miles the photon will see the second hand stopped. (As comparison, the moon is about 240,000 miles from the earth. As another comparison, it takes a photon of light eight minutes to travel the 93,000,000 miles from the sun to the earth). So it isn't that a photon is not actually moving, it's the second had of the clock that is not moving, in relation to the photon. In fact, from the POV of the photon, everything is standing still for that one second. .......................................... Superposition in the quantum world means the all of the different possible outcomes (more or less). sdp You talked about "a superposition of past, present and future", and implied that the natural state was a quantum state wave function of superposition in time/space. I applied that to the unobserved photon, but apparently I misinterpreted. What I thought you said was an intriguing idea anyhoo. That's how I've always heard it used, but in your analogy you superimposed past, present and future, which doesn't seem to be the same thing as a superposition of all possible outcomes.
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Post by zendancer on Jul 28, 2014 20:48:33 GMT -5
SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? Interesting. Yeah, it makes sense. So in non-conceptual seeing, it's not only that we haven't yet conceptualized an objective state that we are observing, but that the wave function hasn't yet collapsed and is still in a superposition. The event is undetermined until the observer determines it conceptually? That's really another way of saying that the observing and the observed are the same. Yes. That's what I think is really going on vis-à-vis physics, and the whole observer paradox thingy. When I'm looking with a still mind (non-conceptually), there are no particles or waves or slits or even an observer separate from what's happening or being seen. It is only when I conceptualize what I imagine that I'm seeing that what physicists call "the wave function" collapses. As long as I am only seeing with a still mind, and not conceptualizing, the cosmos and I are one, both physically and psychologically. With silent seeing, the potential thingness of the universe is in a state of infinite superposition--nothing is distinct or separate--because I have not yet imagined that I am separate from what is being seen. In the words of Jesus, "I and my Father are one."
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Post by enigma on Jul 28, 2014 20:55:43 GMT -5
SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? Yes, I will agree with that under your conditions. One question in physics that there is not a lot of agreement on is at what point actually does the measurement take place, what is the dividing line between observer and observed. Some say the measurement takes place in someone's consciousness. Some say all you need is a mechanical measuring device. What you are describing is the still mind being a part of the superposition, a partless whole in the words of Jarrell, undivided wholeness in the words of David Bohm. sdp Kinda like a rock being still is part of not being an avalanche?
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Post by enigma on Jul 28, 2014 21:02:10 GMT -5
Interesting. Yeah, it makes sense. So in non-conceptual seeing, it's not only that we haven't yet conceptualized an objective state that we are observing, but that the wave function hasn't yet collapsed and is still in a superposition. The event is undetermined until the observer determines it conceptually? That's really another way of saying that the observing and the observed are the same. Yes. That's what I think is really going on vis-à-vis physics, and the whole observer paradox thingy. When I'm looking with a still mind (non-conceptually), there are no particles or waves or slits or even an observer separate from what's happening or being seen. It is only when I conceptualize what I imagine that I'm seeing that what physicists call "the wave function" collapses. As long as I am only seeing with a still mind, and not conceptualizing, the cosmos and I are one, both physically and psychologically. With silent seeing, the potential thingness of the universe is in a state of infinite superposition--nothing is distinct or separate--because I have not yet imagined that I am separate from what is being seen. In the words of Jesus, "I and my Father are one." Yeah, that's what I figure quantum physics is reluctantly creeping up on. The reluctance is the physics version of the existential crisis, since objectivity (the basic rule of scientific inquiry) is what's on the chopping block and under the microscope.
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Post by zendancer on Jul 28, 2014 21:13:34 GMT -5
Yes, most physicists (other than Bohm) wouldn't understand what we're discussing here because, as a group, they have no idea what we're talking about when we use the term "still mind" or "non-conceptual awareness." They begin with the idea that matter is stuff composed of other stuff, and that they, themselves, are observers separate from what is being seen, so they really can't imagine (because it can't be imagined--ha ha) what we're pointing to with words like "a unified suchness."
Physicists say that they can fire a single subatomic particle at a particular target (or slit), but their words (and the ideas that the words represent) are based upon a gigantic range of huge assumptions that have never been questioned. What IS a subatomic particle, really? It is imagined as if it were a microscopic electrified grain of sand with a wide range of bizarre characteristics, but is that what it IS? NO! However they conceive it, that is not what it IS.
If they started with the question, "What is a subatomic particle, really?" and found the answer to that question, they'd realize something important.
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Post by laughter on Jul 28, 2014 22:21:14 GMT -5
SDP, Laughter, and others on this forum probably know a lot more about this than I do, but my understanding of superposition is somewhat different than what is usually written about it. I do not agree that "superposition is what reality is when no one is watching." From my POV superposition is what reality is when no one is DISTINGUISHING what is seen. If we open the box that contains "Schroedinger's cat," and look inside with Tzu's "still mind," what do we see? We see "what is" as it is. What we see is NOT a cat, NOT a dead cat, NOT a living cat, and NOT anything else conceivable because we have not yet conceived what we are seeing. As long as we are looking with a still mind, and not making an observation/distinction as an observer, we and what we see are unified in a state of superposition because there is no objective observation or act of distinction. If we then say, "the cat is dead" or "the cat is alive," we have made a distinction, and we have conceptually divided the universe into distinct (and imaginary) states. Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? Interesting. Yeah, it makes sense. So in non-conceptual seeing, it's not only that we haven't yet conceptualized an objective state that we are observing, but that the wave function hasn't yet collapsed and is still in a superposition. The event is undetermined until the observer determines it conceptually? That's really another way of saying that the observing and the observed are the same. Yeah, the wave function is a tacit acknowledgment that a particle entity has no certain reality independent of measurement (observation). In terms of the double-slit experiment, if there's no observation at the slits on the barrier then the field that creates the interference pattern on the screen wasn't differentiated into particles in the space between the barrier and the screen. Since there's still an interference pattern even when the intensity of the field is reduced to an energy that represents less than one particle at a time from the source: - the "particles" that form the stream can, and sometimes do go through both slits - in between the slit and the screen, the "individual particles" had no definite existence Decades of very very expensive experimentation have done nothing but confirm this model, and it's not anything that the experimenters wouldn't have wanted to disprove. Noone likes it. A Chemist or a Psychologist can posit an objective reality that would have been the case if not for observation, but a Physicist can't.
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Post by laughter on Jul 28, 2014 22:22:49 GMT -5
Conceptualization and distinction is what collapses the wave function rather than non-conceptual seeing. Does this make sense? ha! ha! "what is the Quantum Observer?" <blank> <stare>
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