Quantum weirdness in 'chicken or egg' paradox

[Noxasa]

5 hours ago, danydandan said:

The issue with ascribing to one single interpretation is your instantaneously bias, and will effect your conclusions. With that being said I tend to agree with a number of different things, primarily many world's, hidden variables and the general incompleteness of the field.

So instead of the non-unitary evolutionary process that I'm trying (but seemingly failing) to describe as a conscious phase of full collapse of quantum distributions into a single outcome, you would delineate out those same non-unitary processes into a many worlds interpretation of reality (i.e. single outcome experiences and perceptions?)  I'm just not a big proponent of many worlds as I don't experience many worlds in my life (that I know of.)  I do, however, experience consciousness of experience and perceptions which I think is a better, perhaps more empirical to some extent, theoretical instrument to describe the non-unitary evolution process.

I know, there's a lot of loaded words in there but I don't know how to put it any other way at the moment.  And without everyone first agreeing on the terminology it might strike some in a contrary manner.

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It's impossible and will always be impossible to eliminate uncertainty and error.

Your still speaking like a wave function is a tangible object. It isn't its a mathematical construct.

 

I know.  Not having the rigors of a formal education in QM certainly makes my descriptions and choice of words and terminology not as crisp as I would like.  I think that's half the problem I find when I read discussions about QM.  Most of the time they're either arguing about terminology of concept or they're just discussing the topics with different concepts of the terminology used.  I hope to get better at this in the future.  :-(

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I think you'll find the only real logical conclusion to our observations is we don't know, yet!

I think what I'm trying to get a grasp of is the measurement problem of QM.  That QM only describes quantum distributions and not specific outcomes and I find that the experience of specific outcomes only comes from conscious perception and that, itself, is a non-unitary evolutionary process of the collapse of quantum distributions into specific pointer/outcome couplings.  And again, I don't know if that's the right terminology for what I'm trying to describe but I think it is (at this moment.)

[Noxasa]

4 hours ago, Rlyeh said:

I've already given you reasons. Detection devices fulfill the role of "observer", human's can't directly observe quantum states.

By the sounds of it you believe superposition scales up to large scales, until a human sees it. That is ridiculous.

No, that's not what I'm saying.  I'm talking about the non-unitary evolution process that is described in CI, and more "sharply" described by the von Neumann-Wigner interpretation, that says that this process is due to a concept of consciousness interpreting the experience of measurement of a specific outcome.

[Noxasa]

4 hours ago, Rlyeh said:

Isn't Dean Radin the Chief Scientist at the Institute of Noetic Sciences? The same Institute of Noetic Sciences which promotes "What the Bleep Do We Know!?"

I guess, I'm only familiar with his studies and experiments, I don't know much about the Institute of Noetic Sciences or what the organization as a whole, promotes.  He certainly has the education and scientific background to be creditable in the field.  Even so, I'm not always comfortable with the terminology he uses to describe his experiments, like the use of meditation gurus and such, as I'm biased against the concept of directed meditative constructs that affect anything above what is necessary in consciousness to understand a specific outcome experience in QM.  I think the conscious aspect of the non-unitary evolution step in unique outcome measurement is a passive process embedded in the generic nature of consciousness and is not enhanced or modified by so called gurus.  But I'm open to seeing evidence that shows otherwise. 

[Noxasa]

1 hour ago, psyche101 said:

Get this. 

Deepak Chopra publishes his books

 

That's not a valid argument against his experimental data.  You have to do better than an ad hominem representation of his work.

[danydandan]

32 minutes ago, Noxasa said:

So instead of the non-unitary evolutionary process that I'm trying (but seemingly failing) to describe as a conscious phase of full collapse of quantum distributions into a single outcome, you would delineate out those same non-unitary processes into a many worlds interpretation of reality (i.e. single outcome experiences and perceptions?)  I'm just not a big proponent of many worlds as I don't experience many worlds in my life (that I know of.)  I do, however, experience consciousness of experience and perceptions which I think is a better, perhaps more empirical to some extent, theoretical instrument to describe the non-unitary evolution process.

I know, there's a lot of loaded words in there but I don't know how to put it any other way at the moment.  And without everyone first agreeing on the terminology it might strike some in a contrary manner.

Again I think some people are under the impression that the many world's interpretation is meant to assume, real alternative Universe's. It doesn't and it's a Mathematical construct brought about by the statistical mathematical approachs to QM.

[Noxasa]

1 minute ago, danydandan said:

Again I think some people are under the impression that the many world's interpretation is meant to assume, real alternative Universe's. It doesn't and it's a Mathematical construct brought about by the statistical mathematical approachs to QM.

I think the question is, in regards to this topic of non-unitary evolutionary processes, what does many worlds say happens when a single pointer/outcome measurement is made?  What happens to the other quantum states that existed prior to, but are not observed in, that measurement?  Doesn't many worlds state that those outcomes are indeed observed, just in other dimensions (i.e. worlds?)  Whereas, what I'm saying is that those other states that are not observed from the decoherence collapse are lost due to the further "collapse" (for lack of a better term) of the wave function into a specific outcome that is only interpreted through consciousness as QM does not model specific outcomes but only distributions.  Again, forgive the terminology mistakes if I've made them but it's the concepts I'm trying to wade through.

[danydandan]

1 hour ago, Noxasa said:

I think the question is, in regards to this topic of non-unitary evolutionary processes, what does many worlds say happens when a single pointer/outcome measurement is made?  What happens to the other quantum states that existed prior to, but are not observed in, that measurement?  Doesn't many worlds state that those outcomes are indeed observed, just in other dimensions (i.e. worlds?)  Whereas, what I'm saying is that those other states that are not observed from the decoherence collapse are lost due to the further "collapse" (for lack of a better term) of the wave function into a specific outcome that is only interpreted through consciousness as QM does not model specific outcomes but only distributions.  Again, forgive the terminology mistakes if I've made them but it's the concepts I'm trying to wade through.

You taking this interpretation and the one you ascribe to , too literally. They aren't intended as such, in my opinion. My reasoning is that the many world's interpretation reconciles the observation of non-deterministic event with the fully deterministic equations of quantum mechanics. Like any good theory it has made predictions and these have been proven true to a good extent. This theory also has two camps, real and unreal. I assume you understand each one and as you can ascertain I'm a realist, thus I side with DeWitt. With the advancement of quantum gravity I feel this interpretation is gaining more traction.

Like I said this interpretation, like all, are because of uncertainty. The reason there are multiple states is because of our use of probability to describe quantum states, which leads to the atom, electron or whatever are only in one state. We don't know what state this is in until we measure its state. The rest of the probabilities are then zero thus my support of the real interpretation.

The many world's is just a Mathematical construct. I don't for one second think that there actually is multiple Universe's, as the probability of other states is zero when we measure. Anyways like I said ascribing fully to one interpretation of quantum mechanics is foolish.

 

Edited September 11, 2018 by danydandan

[Noxasa]

4 hours ago, danydandan said:

Like I said this interpretation, like all, are because of uncertainty. The reason there are multiple states is because of our use of probability to describe quantum states, which leads to the atom, electron or whatever are only in one state. We don't know what state this is in until we measure its state. The rest of the probabilities are then zero thus my support of the real interpretation.

Hmmm, so I gather when a multi-state decoherence is defined as being true for all states at the same time you don't really believe this representation is true at the quantum scale, it's just a mathematical symptom due to uncertainty.  But that the uncertainty is only in the math, that the actual state of the thing being measured is not truly in a multistate phase prior to the measurement.  Like when the theory implies illustratively that Schrodinger's Cat is both alive and dead at the same time before observation, you believe that's a false statement even when applied at a quantum scale.  That the multi-state doesn't really exist because some other process (ie. Quantum Gravity) has finished collapsing the decoherence pattern down to a single pointer/outcome pair that we just don't know about before measurement.  And then when the observation is made, the uncertainty in the math is simply removed and we find out that those unrealized multi-states in the math never really existed in the first place.  Is that what you're saying or am I getting your approach all wrong?

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The many world's is just a Mathematical construct. I don't for one second think that there actually is multiple Universe's, as the probability of other states is zero when we measure. Anyways like I said ascribing fully to one interpretation of quantum mechanics is foolish.

I guess I don't know how you can ascribe to the math that says the probability of those other states are non-zero before measurement and then say they were in reality always zero after measurement.  If that is indeed what you are saying.  Wouldn't that imply the QM mathematical model is all wrong to begin with as it's assumes an uncertainty that really doesn't exist?  But then again, I may not understand your approach due to the way I approached QM.  I always said that if I went back to school it would be to study physics with the end goal of understanding the complexities of QM.  I've been seriously considering doing that.

[danydandan]

30 minutes ago, Noxasa said:

Hmmm, so I gather when a multi-state decoherence is defined as being true for all states at the same time you don't really believe this representation is true at the quantum scale, it's just a mathematical symptom due to uncertainty. 

Yes.

30 minutes ago, Noxasa said:

But that the uncertainty is only in the math, that the actual state of the thing being measured is not truly in a multistate phase prior to the measurement.  Like when the theory implies illustratively that Schrodinger's Cat is both alive and dead at the same time before observation, you believe that's a false statement even when applied at a quantum scale.  That the multi-state doesn't really exist because some other process (ie. Quantum Gravity) has finished collapsing the decoherence pattern down to a single pointer/outcome pair that we just don't know about before measurement.  And then when the observation is made, the uncertainty in the math is simply removed and we find out that those unrealized multi-states in the math never really existed in the first place.  Is that what you're saying or am I getting your approach all wrong?

The mathematics is a result of the uncertainty of our observations, not that the uncertainty is a result of the mathematics. The rest yes.

30 minutes ago, Noxasa said:

I guess I don't know how you can ascribe to the math that says the probability of those other states are non-zero before measurement and then say they were in reality always zero after measurement.  If that is indeed what you are saying.  Wouldn't that imply the QM mathematical model is all wrong to begin with as it's assumes an uncertainty that really doesn't exist?  But then again, I may not understand your approach due to the way I approached QM.  I always said that if I went back to school it would be to study physics with the end goal of understanding the complexities of QM.  I've been seriously considering doing that.

Let's look at Schrodinger's cat for an example. Before observations we have a 50/50 chance that the cat is either dead or alive, yes? This is due to uncertainty, we haven't enough information to complete our analysis. We then look, measure, in the box and we know 100% what state the cat is in, yes? Thus whatever starte the cat isn't in has a 0% chance of occuring at thr time of observation. IE we remove uncertainty we are golden. It's not wrong, it's very good Science, makes loads of predictions and these are proven true, like many others in the field, I think it's incomplete. Probably always will be as I can't fathom how we can eliminate uncertainty. Even a simple experiment at a quantum scales, like Schrodinger's cat, would have error and we still couldn't get near a 100% certainty.

Keep your mind open man, don't get bogged down with only one interesting interpretation. I strongly advise people to do a basic math course, then jump into physics. But if your not inclined to go back to college, I'd read Rodger Penrose's Road to Reality and the Feynman Lectures. To get a good solid grounding. Don't do what I did, took me twelve years to get my PhD.

Edited September 11, 2018 by danydandan

[Noxasa]

43 minutes ago, danydandan said:

Yes.

The mathematics is a result of the uncertainty of our observations, not that the uncertainty is a result of the mathematics. The rest yes.

Let's look at Schrodinger's cat for an example. Before observations we have a 50/50 chance that the cat is either dead or alive, yes? This is due to uncertainty, we haven't enough information to complete our analysis. We then look, measure, in the box and we know 100% what state the cat is in, yes? Thus whatever starte the cat isn't in has a 0% chance of occuring at thr time of observation. IE we remove uncertainty we are golden. It's not wrong, it's very good Science, makes loads of predictions and these are proven true, like many others in the field, I think it's incomplete. Probably always will be as I can't fathom how we can eliminate uncertainty. Even a simple experiment at a quantum scales, like Schrodinger's cat, would have error and we still couldn't get near a 100% certainty.

Okay, I think I basically understand your approach. 

I guess I question the concept that a measurement outcome means anything to a non-conscious observer or natural phenomenon (i.e. Quantum Gravity,) since measurement is essentially a perception of experience, which is itself a subset of consciousness (meaning that that experience of measurement means something to the observer.)  Since nature doesn't require quantum energies to be in, or even use, eganstates for quantum interactions, why would the natural quantum interactions of Quantum Gravity require the collapse of a decoherence into an eganstate that is only useful as information to a conscious observer and not in any way useful in natural processes?  It seems to me that if Quantum Gravity has any relation to the collapse of a decoherence then it would itself collapse to a multistate phase because that's how nature operates at the quantum scale.  Nature doesn't operate in eganstate outcomes, only conscious perceptions and experiences do.

I guess that's why I need to study further to see if I'm missing something.  It still seems to me that consciousness is an important factor in how nature is mapped down to our reality.

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Keep your mind open man, don't get bogged down with only one interesting interpretation. I strongly advise people to do a basic math course, then jump into physics. But if your not inclined to go back to college, I'd read Rodger Penrose's Road to Reality and the Feynman Lectures. To get a good solid grounding. Don't do what I did, took me twelve years to get my PhD.

I hope that I've demonstrated that I'm open to all aspects of science, I'm not trying to force the science into a particular paradigm, I'm trying to come to a conclusion based on the best understandings of science and our experiences in the universe.  

As far as going back to school, I might not be alive if it took me 12 years to continue my education.  I have a degree in mathematics so I'm sure I can jump into the math pretty readily.  I will certainly consider your suggestions on reading material.  That's how I've studied this topic so far, although in a very casual setting.

Thanks for the discussion!

[danydandan]

9 hours ago, Noxasa said:

As far as going back to school, I might not be alive if it took me 12 years to continue my education.  I have a degree in mathematics so I'm sure I can jump into the math pretty readily.  I will certainly consider your suggestions on reading material.  That's how I've studied this topic so far, although in a very casual setting.

Thanks for the discussion!

Amicable conversation is a dime a dozen here often unfortunately.

The reason I suggested Rodger Penrose's book is because is takes a Mathematician's approach to the science. It's very comprehensive, covers from Euclid to Mathematics behind quantum gravity and everything in between. He peppers the book with his opinion sometimes but he emphatically states that it's just his opinion, and it should not be taken as Gospel. He also have an interesting take on the role consciousness plays. When I was lecturering I used to suggest this book for people who had a good grasp of Mathematics and wanted to understand physics better.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_to_Reality

 

[psyche101]

On 9/11/2018 at 11:30 PM, Noxasa said:

That's not a valid argument against his experimental data.  You have to do better than an ad hominem representation of his work.

Its a good illustration of the only people willing to associate themselves with such unsupported nonsense. 

Can you explain why he promoted the case of the Fox Sisters as genuine when they admitted a hoax? 

 

And how do you feel about Victor Stengers critical evaluation? 

According to Victor Stenger:

“”Radin is aware of the file-drawer effect, in which only positive results tend to get reported and negative ones are left in the filing cabinet. This obviously can greatly bias any analysis of combined results and Radin cannot ignore this as blithely as he ignores other possible, non-paranormal explanations of the data. Even the most fervent parapsychologists recognize this problem. Meta-analysis incorporates a procedure for taking the file-drawer effect into account. Radin says it shows that more than 3,300 unpublished, unsuccessful reports would be needed for each published report in order to “nullify” the statistical significance of psi. In his review of Radin's book for the journal Nature, statistics professor I.J. Good disputes this calculation, calling it "a gross overestimate." He estimates that the number of unpublished, unsuccessful reports needed to account for the results by the file drawer effect should be reduced to fifteen or less. How could two meta-analyses result in such a wide discrepancy? Somebody is doing something wrong, and in this case it is clearly Radin. He has not performed the file-drawer analysis correctly.

 

 

[Noxasa]

8 hours ago, psyche101 said:

Its a good illustration of the only people willing to associate themselves with such unsupported nonsense. 

Can you explain why he promoted the case of the Fox Sisters as genuine when they admitted a hoax? 

 

And how do you feel about Victor Stengers critical evaluation? 

According to Victor Stenger:

“”Radin is aware of the file-drawer effect, in which only positive results tend to get reported and negative ones are left in the filing cabinet. This obviously can greatly bias any analysis of combined results and Radin cannot ignore this as blithely as he ignores other possible, non-paranormal explanations of the data. Even the most fervent parapsychologists recognize this problem. Meta-analysis incorporates a procedure for taking the file-drawer effect into account. Radin says it shows that more than 3,300 unpublished, unsuccessful reports would be needed for each published report in order to “nullify” the statistical significance of psi. In his review of Radin's book for the journal Nature, statistics professor I.J. Good disputes this calculation, calling it "a gross overestimate." He estimates that the number of unpublished, unsuccessful reports needed to account for the results by the file drawer effect should be reduced to fifteen or less. How could two meta-analyses result in such a wide discrepancy? Somebody is doing something wrong, and in this case it is clearly Radin. He has not performed the file-drawer analysis correctly.

 

First off, I'm not really interested in defending Radin or his experiments as I'm still neutral but curious about them.  I was only interested in if anyone had viewed his work since it relates to consciousness, albeit at a different level than my approach.  My response to you was simply pointing out that an ad hominem attack on his character or associations is not a valid argument against his experimental results...and it's not.  

Secondly, I've only heard of one or two other studies done based on Radin's experiments and they failed but I'm not sure if they were accurate studies to his experimental protocols, he thinks that they weren't.  And one or two studies is hardly a file-drawer effect.  If Victor Stenger represents that there's dozens of such studies then I'd like to know where they are.  Perhaps there's more I've not seen but when I search for such studies I can't find but a few.  Even studies that do not confirm his results should be published and available even if they're not famously distributed in the media. 

Thirdly, I don't hold the view of Radin that any of his experiments are paranormal, I'm questioning whether they're related to consciousness interactions at a quantum level to solve the multistate evolution problem in measurement interpretation, which is quite a different thing.  And I reserve the right to realize that his experiments aren't related to the consciousness issue I'm referring to in my approach as a possible solution to the multistate evolution to a single outcome problem.

Regardless, my approach is not based on Radin's argument or experiments as I didn't even know of his work until long after I learned about this type of QM interpretation.  My argument is based on the Copenhagen interpretation expanded on by von Neumann and Wigner and a few others. 

[Noxasa]