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A Quantum Of Solace? The Psychology Of Physics.


pagetheoracle

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I 'think' I may finally understand Quantum Mechanics, thanks to a BBC TV program* some points it raised got me thinking about other elements to the problems presented. 

 

Could quantum mechanics be simply potential (Schrodingers cat) and Newtonian physics, actual reality or big world and little world / plans and completed projects (how things could be and how they ended up in reality).  It's like youth and age, with children being like water and exploring everything they can get their bodies into and their minds around (Trying anything and everything in their innocence).  Age is the experience that has tried everything (passed it / on the way out / becoming obsolete) and sits on the fence of their learned prejudice ("Here be Dragons! Go no further!").  Their fear and their pain from experiences, stops them exploring further and rests on its laurels in its fear of the unknown (the new, the the different, the strange; the future in other words):  Innocence and guilt as attitudes in other words - the persistence of the young, the tiredness of the old.

 

Schrodingers Cat

Is both skinny and fat.

How can that be

If energy is not free?

 

Bishop Berkeley and the quad is quantum physics before it was given any thought.  To me it betrays another side to the argument, namely that of the self (ego, only aware of itself) and the other (the being, only aware of external reality - the materialist or Newtonian physicist).  Okay, if the cat is 'inanimate' it doesn't know itself, if it is alive or dead.  If it is 'alive' though, then it does know if it exists (is conscious).  To clarify, there are two viewpoints here.  If the cat has no reality of its own, it has the 'potential' to be both dead and alive.  If it has its own life then Schrodingers 'belief' will have no effect on it (it is actualized / self created).

 

 

*It made me realize that what I thought was a clever observation, wasn't necessarily so.  I had thought up to that point, that the results of the slit experiment were caused by electrical charge from the slit material itself and this hadn't been allowed for in the calculations ( :sherlock: ).  The show disclosed that what was actually happening, via an illustration and description by physicist Jim Al Khalili.  :shocked:

 

 

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Since we know Newtonian physics is wrong, or - if you prefer - incomplete, then I conclude your suggestion it may be reality is demonstrably false.

I think everything is incomplete.  By this I mean it is the imperfect that leads to new discoveries, new creations.  If we had everything down pat, then we'd be smug, self-satisfied and never explore anywhere else or any thought else either - in other words become stagnant as a society.  I wouldn't say reality is demonstrably false exactly, more our belief about what it is

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Okay, if the cat is 'inanimate' it doesn't know itself, if it is alive or dead.  If it is 'alive' though, then it does know if it exists (is conscious).

So am I to understand you that you believe that all live is conscious of its own existence, and when we are not conscious we're inanimate?

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So am I to understand you that you believe that all live is conscious of its own existence, and when we are not conscious we're inanimate?

I believe that we are conscious of our existence but it is not a constant.  When we are not conscious of ourselves, then we are brain dead (unaware of our own bodily existence or the world around us).  To be conscious is to be alive but it is not a constant and each individual person or life form, will be aware of their existence to a greater or lesser extent as well, which will give us a horizontal line for inner or outer attention and a vertical line for greater or lesser attention, if you're into graphs that is.  In The East they call it being awake or being asleep, meaning conscious or unconscious.

 

Happy New Year by the way, Dave! (Time to stop lurking and start looking, perhaps?).

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page, I am finding it to be a massive challenge to address your posts without sounding highly critical of your style. Such criticism would be offered with the intention of helping you get your message across more effectively, or your question posed more intelligibly. Do you wish me to do so? I am quite comfortable if the answer is no and then shall then bow out of the exchanges. I hope, however, you will say yes and we can make some progress.

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I believe that we are conscious of our existence but it is not a constant.  When we are not conscious of ourselves, then we are brain dead (unaware of our own bodily existence or the world around us).  To be conscious is to be alive but it is not a constant and each individual person or life form, will be aware of their existence to a greater or lesser extent as well, which will give us a horizontal line for inner or outer attention and a vertical line for greater or lesser attention, if you're into graphs that is.  In The East they call it being awake or being asleep, meaning conscious or unconscious.

So things like grass - conscious? Bacteria? What about someone on life support, are they alive or dead if they have no consciousness?

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So things like grass - conscious? Bacteria? What about someone on life support, are they alive or dead if they have no consciousness?

Well this is where it gets interesting.  People who have been in a coma are sometimes like those who under anaesthetic and have total recall because the drugs knock out their ability to respond physically but not their awareness of what is going on.  I also remember being challenged on another website about sleep and unconsciousness, saying you can't be totally unconscious or you wouldn't wake up when hearing outside noise. 

 

As for plants there were experiments carried out in the sixties I believe, which seemed to indicate that they responded to intimidation and music.  This to me doesn't seem unreasonable as if attacked, you respond and even if much slower, plants do have defenses and do heal wounds which indicates a level of 'thought.' As for bacteria - they have greater mobility than plants, so must have a basic level of awareness too.

 

I don't think that you can split awareness from the outside world (response to stimuli / action & reaction).  It is all down to how you define consciousness. If you cannot avoid danger then you are not as conscious as those that can - either as a total organism or partial (loss of limbs, even as a survival mechanism in the animal world - lizards and tails for instance).  When we are tired, we are not as conscious as those who are more grounded through sleep.  We have to be present (in our bodies looking out) to control our destiny as a driver in a car has to be too ("Hertz, we put you in the driving seat").  When we are not fully conscious, we are not fully in control of our lives and so endanger them.  This I believe applies to all life to a certain degree (plants are at the mercy of animals and the environment / small animals are at the mercy of larger ones  through accident or predation - hence they tend to be more nervous / skittish / lively as a defense mechanism).

 

I am not seeing nature in the Disney anthropomorphic style - quite the opposite.  The way I see it is if you smash a rock it makes a noise.  If you hit a human they make a noise:  Only if you resist does thought come into this picture (questions / beliefs).  If I get hit and just react, there is no lasting impression on the mind.  Does a rock have a mind?  For what reason would it have one when it cannot move and therefore is passive, depending upon slow change in its environment to alter its reality (plants have some motion but it is mostly just through growth, so its consciousness wouldn't need to be high, just reactive to attack - animals however because they can move, sense and react to change are therefore by their very nature more sophisticated, more complex, although microscopic creatures again would have little need to sense (be aware of) anything in their environment above certain limits:  Each to their own level of existence.  When you get to this stage questions become more problematic as we are outside, looking in on the rest of existence, so can only hazard guesses from our own perspective

Edited by pagetheoracle
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page, I am finding it to be a massive challenge to address your posts without sounding highly critical of your style. Such criticism would be offered with the intention of helping you get your message across more effectively, or your question posed more intelligibly. Do you wish me to do so? I am quite comfortable if the answer is no and then shall then bow out of the exchanges. I hope, however, you will say yes and we can make some progress.

Sorry about my style - probably because I'm not a trained scientist (never got to higher education).  Yes, attack me or at least the words I'm using and how I'm using them as it is probably semantics at work here (name calling, no - picking out points, fire away and I'll try to respond by clarifying what I'm saying or follow up your criticisms)

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This isn't about scientific training: this is about presenting ideas in a clear and concise manner. I don't think you do this.

 

The theme of this thread appears to be encapsulated in the key sentence from your opening post:

 

Could quantum mechanics be simply potential (Schrodingers cat) and Newtonian physics, actual reality or big world and little world / plans and completed projects (how things could be and how they ended up in reality).

 

If this is your intended theme, then my comments in post #2 demonstrated your view was incorrect. You then had two sound alternatives:

  • Say, "You are right. Good point. I haven't thought this through."
  • Demonstrate that my assertions were false.

You did neither of these and so I largely ignored what you had written because it was not relevant to what you - apparently - intended to be the theme of the thread.

 

If you did not intend that to be the theme, then what was it? This is the Alternative Theories section of the forum, not The Lounge. We are not chatting in a bar over a beer, we are - I hope - seeking to have a focused conversation on a topic of interest. That needs to be clearly stated and - until discussion is exhausted - adhered to.

 

(I repeat my inplicit apology from earlier. I do not intend to pull any punches in critiquing your writing - and I understand I have your permission for this. Consider this: writing incoherently, is fundamentally rude since you are asking your readers to do the work you should have done.)

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Since we know Newtonian physics is wrong, or - if you prefer - incomplete, then I conclude from your suggestion that it may be that reality is demonstrably false.

I see what you mean, I think (sorry for rewriting your post but it seemed a bit garbled (work overload over Christmas from what you were saying, I take it? i.e. missed 'e' in suggestion).  To paraphrase 'am I arguing that reality is demonstrably false?'  Yes and no.  If we take solid reality as a given, then it follows that the physical world is real.  If we don't accept matter as real, then it must be an effect of energy or illusions caused by force fields:  By this I mean touch principally, which is how we measure physical existence (think of magnets and how opposing poles push each other apart - could this be a kind of electrical or magnetic resistance?  Not a physicist, so trying to demonstrate what I believe from what I know of it.

 

Is this what you're getting at?  As for Newton being discredited, Einstein was discredited too when Quantum physics came along I seem to remember and my mother had no faith in science because she said they kept changing their minds "It was once believed but it is now thought" Personally I have no problem with that as I think new discoveries can and should alter our opinion of reality as defending ideas that are out of date and don't work isn't (cars upgrading since Model T for instance:  I know it's technology not science but it's a good example or of space before the Hubble telescope).

 

If this isn't what you mean please clarify i.e. cut and paste my stuff, then write a comment

Edited by pagetheoracle
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So things like grass - conscious? Bacteria? What about someone on life support, are they alive or dead if they have no consciousness?

Consciousness is stopping and examining what you've done.  Therefore motion is unconscious / unconsciousness (transmission rather than reception).  Motion equals self and consciousness equals lack of motion / emotion (stillness and silence) - a state where we stop 'being' ourselves and become aware of others / other things in our environment instead.  Through this reasoning matter is the past (actual) and energy the future (potential):  If atoms are the building blocks of reality (matter), then free energy can be anything and nothing as it is not yet formed, so obeys rules that make no sense in a world that is formed and obeys definite laws (the difference between discovery (past) and invention (future)).

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As for Newton being discredited, Einstein was discredited too when Quantum physics came along

This is false. Newton's theories of motion were correct within reasonable measurements. Einstein's were slightly more accurate. Quantum physics is slightly more accurate than the others when it comes to measurements at the sub-atomic scale, and more inaccurate when it comes to a larger scale.

 

Science doesn't get overturned (or, rather, only truly bad science does). It just improves the tools that it has - equations, models, etc. - to make more accurate predictions. Isaac Asimov has a great essay on this, "The Relativity of Wrong". http://chem.tufts.edu/answersinscience/relativityofwrong.htm

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Consciousness is stopping and examining what you've done.  Therefore motion is unconscious / unconsciousness (transmission rather than reception).  Motion equals self and consciousness equals lack of motion / emotion (stillness and silence) - a state where we stop 'being' ourselves and become aware of others / other things in our environment instead.  Through this reasoning matter is the past (actual) and energy the future (potential):  If atoms are the building blocks of reality (matter), then free energy can be anything and nothing as it is not yet formed, so obeys rules that make no sense in a world that is formed and obeys definite laws (the difference between discovery (past) and invention (future)).

This is meaningless poetry. Pretty, but there's nothing here.

 

"Motion equals self"? "Consciousness equals lack of motion"?

 

 

Healing is the knowledge of health, and of us.

 

You and I are adventurers of the planet. Aspiration is the driver of sharing.

 

We exist as expanding wave functions.

 

The totality is calling to you via pulses. Can you hear it? Have you found your circuit? Although you may not realize it, you are zero-point.

 

If you have never experienced this flow inherent in nature, it can be difficult to dream. How should you navigate this higher nexus? It can be difficult to know where to begin.

 

Humankind has nothing to lose. Throughout history, humans have been interacting with the solar system via morphogenetic fields. We are in the midst of a spatial unveiling of potentiality that will enable us to access the cosmos itself.

 

You may be ruled by yearning without realizing it. Do not let it confront the growth of your quest.

Only an entity of the totality may release this vision of awareness. We can no longer afford to live with suffering. Yes, it is possible to exterminate the things that can eradicate us, but not without complexity on our side.

 

Astral projection may be the solution to what’s holding you back from an epic spark of insight. Through faith healing, our hopes are enveloped in beauty. You will soon be reborn by a power deep within yourself — a power that is non-local, conscious.

 

http://sebpearce.com/bullshit/

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This is false. Newton's theories of motion were correct within reasonable measurements. Einstein's were slightly more accurate. Quantum physics is slightly more accurate than the others when it comes to measurements at the sub-atomic scale, and more inaccurate when it comes to a larger scale.

 

Science doesn't get overturned (or, rather, only truly bad science does). It just improves the tools that it has - equations, models, etc. - to make more accurate predictions. Isaac Asimov has a great essay on this, "The Relativity of Wrong". http://chem.tufts.edu/answersinscience/relativityofwrong.htm

So there you go.  That is what I really find with reality, you refine it down and down from a crude, generalized understanding, reaching more detailed comprehensions as you go along.  No problem with that.

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This is meaningless poetry. Pretty, but there's nothing here.

 

"Motion equals self"? "Consciousness equals lack of motion"?

 

 

Healing is the knowledge of health, and of us.

 

You and I are adventurers of the planet. Aspiration is the driver of sharing.

 

We exist as expanding wave functions.

 

The totality is calling to you via pulses. Can you hear it? Have you found your circuit? Although you may not realize it, you are zero-point.

 

If you have never experienced this flow inherent in nature, it can be difficult to dream. How should you navigate this higher nexus? It can be difficult to know where to begin.

 

Humankind has nothing to lose. Throughout history, humans have been interacting with the solar system via morphogenetic fields. We are in the midst of a spatial unveiling of potentiality that will enable us to access the cosmos itself.

 

You may be ruled by yearning without realizing it. Do not let it confront the growth of your quest.

Only an entity of the totality may release this vision of awareness. We can no longer afford to live with suffering. Yes, it is possible to exterminate the things that can eradicate us, but not without complexity on our side.

 

Astral projection may be the solution to what’s holding you back from an epic spark of insight. Through faith healing, our hopes are enveloped in beauty. You will soon be reborn by a power deep within yourself — a power that is non-local, conscious.

 

http://sebpearce.com/bullshit/

You may call it meaningless poetry but I'm trying to use words to describe a phenomena I've observed.  I use words to distinguish one state from another that hopefully other people will recognize because these are the only ones available to me, unless I modify / create new ones.  In essence all you are saying is you don't understand what I'm on about or you do and have moved on from that stage.

 

Motion equals the 'concept' of self - is that better?  By this I mean the reactive personality (Monkey see, monkey do).  Consciousness 'comes' from lack of motion - in other words, we become aware of the existence of others / other things (the outside world) when we stop, either through accident (colliding with solid object) or through deliberately slowing down our actions or stopping them altogether (controlled motion):  If we are tired, drunk or otherwise temporarily sense impaired, we are more likely to have an accident.  Actions which are habitual can be done on automatic as they are programmed into our brains but 'new' actions require a slow build up of movement as we learn to carry them out (brain injured people through accidents or disease as in coma patients.  Skilled actions are habitual, requiring no thought (stopping and examining what you are doing as you are doing it or before starting to do it i.e. training).  Movement blurs perception - stillness clarifies it or is that too poetic for you?  The slower you go, the more control you have over your environment / awareness of it; the faster you go, the less awareness you have because of motion blurring and the less room for error (You don't here of slow motion accidents do you, only fast ones?): Speed is exhilarating - slowness is boring, this is the emotional facet that drives action as fear is what leads you to slow down, stop or avoid action altogether (phobic reaction).  As I've said elsewhere, I think motion acts like a dynamo, creating confidence and releasing the energy to act (hormones etc).

 

Any more questions / observations on what I've said? Personally I thought this was all observable fact but as I say maybe it teaches you nothing because this is common sense to you and you've moved on from it.  In other words it bores you (as stated above) and is maybe too soft science in approach or 'poetic.'  In this case you are not my target audience and my thread misled you into believing you were.  Perhaps this should have been posted elsewhere or not at all ( I do have some followers here but is it time I moved on elsewhere I ask myself?)?

Edited by pagetheoracle
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I see what you mean, I think (sorry for rewriting your post but it seemed a bit garbled (work overload over Christmas from what you were saying, I take it? i.e. missed 'e' in suggestion).  To paraphrase 'am I arguing that reality is demonstrably false?'  Yes and no.  If we take solid reality as a given, then it follows that the physical world is real.  If we don't accept matter as real, then it must be an effect of energy or illusions caused by force fields:  By this I mean touch principally, which is how we measure physical existence (think of magnets and how opposing poles push each other apart - could this be a kind of electrical or magnetic resistance?  Not a physicist, so trying to demonstrate what I believe from what I know of it.

 

Is this what you're getting at?  As for Newton being discredited, Einstein was discredited too when Quantum physics came along I seem to remember and my mother had no faith in science because she said they kept changing their minds "It was once believed but it is now thought" Personally I have no problem with that as I think new discoveries can and should alter our opinion of reality as defending ideas that are out of date and don't work isn't (cars upgrading since Model T for instance:  I know it's technology not science but it's a good example or of space before the Hubble telescope).

 

If this isn't what you mean please clarify i.e. cut and paste my stuff, then write a comment

No. No. No.

 

Here, with a minor expansion, is what I said:

 

Since we know Newtonian physics is wrong, or - if you prefer - incomplete, then I conclude that your suggestion that Newtonian Physics may be actual reality is a demonstrably false conclusion.

 

That is, your opening premise- perhaps Newtonian physics is reality - is a false/faulty/flawed/wrong premise.

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