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PART II. IDEALISM AND THE RESOLUTION OF QUANTUM PARADOXES

Habits of thought are tenacious. Although quantum mechanics has replaced classical mechanics as the fundamental theory of physics, many physicists brought up with the old worldview still find it difficult to accept the idealistic implications of quantum mechanics. They don’t want to ask the difficult questions that quantum mechanics raises. They hope that if such problems are ignored, they will disappear. Once, at the beginning of a discussion of paradoxes in quantum mechanics, Nobel laureate Richard Feynman ridiculed this position in his inimitable ironic manner. He said: “Hush, hush. Close the doors.”

In the next five chapters, we will open doors and unashamedly expose the paradoxes of quantum physics. Our goal will be to demonstrate that, when viewed in the light of monistic idealism, quantum paradoxes are not so shocking or paradoxical after all. Strict adherence to idealistic metaphysics, based on a transcendental, unifying consciousness that “collapses” the quantum wave, naturally resolves all the paradoxes of quantum physics. We will find that it is quite possible to do science within the conceptual framework of monistic idealism. The result is an idealistic science that unites spirit and matter.

The idea that consciousness collapses a quantum wave was originally proposed by the mathematician von Neumann in the 1930s. Why did it take us so long to take this idea seriously? Perhaps a brief discussion of how my own understanding of the problem has developed will help answer this question.

One of the difficulties that prevented me from accepting von Neumann’s hypothesis concerned the experimental data. Apparently, when we look, it always happens consciously. Then the question of consciousness “collapsing” quantum waves seems purely academic. Is it even possible to find a situation in which a person looks, but does it unconsciously? Notice how paradoxical this seems.

In 1983, I was invited to a ten-week seminar on consciousness in the psychology department at the University of Oregon. I was especially flattered that these psychological scientists patiently listened to six hours of lectures in which I talked about quantum concepts. However, I was truly rewarded when one of the graduate students in psychologist Michael Posner’s group reported some cognitive findings from a guy named Tony Marcel. Some of this data concerned “unconscious vision” – exactly what I was looking for.

I listened with bated breath to the report and only relaxed when I realized that these data were completely consistent with the idea that consciousness “collapses” the quantum state of the brain-mind during conscious vision (see Chapter 7). In unconscious vision there is no “collapse” and this really makes a huge experimental difference. I soon also realized how to resolve the small paradox that creates the difference between conscious and unconscious perception.

The trick is to differentiate between consciousness and awareness .

CHAPTER 5. OBJECTS LOCATED IN TWO PLACES AT THE SAME TIME AND EFFECTS THAT PRECEDE THEIR CAUSES

The fundamental principles of material realism simply do not hold up. Instead of causal determinism, locality, strict objectivity and epiphenomenalism, quantum mechanics offers probability and uncertainty, wave-particle complementarity, non-locality and confusion of subjects and objects.

Objecting to the probabilistic interpretation of quantum mechanics, which generates uncertainty and complementarity, Einstein used to declare that “God does not play dice.” To understand what he meant, imagine that you are conducting an experiment with a sample of a radioactive substance, the decay of which, of course, obeys probabilistic quantum laws. Your job is to measure the time during which ten radioactive decay events occur—ten clicks of your Geiger counter. Assume that ten decay events occur in about half an hour. Behind this average lies a probability. Some episodes are 32 minutes, others 25 minutes, etc. To complicate matters further, you need to catch a bus to meet your crush, who hates being kept waiting. And guess what happens? Your final episode takes forty minutes to complete because the random decay of a single atom does not occur as it would on average. So you miss the bus, your lover breaks up with you, and your life is ruined. This may be a somewhat silly and far-fetched example of what happens in a world where God plays dice, but it is quite indicative of the fact that probabilistic events can only be relied upon on average.

The randomness of atomic events—the capriciousness of fate, so to speak—is incompatible with determinism. The determinist thinks of probability as it is commonly thought of in classical physics and in everyday life: it is a property of large collections of objects—collections so large and complex that in practice we cannot predict them, although in principle such a prediction is possible. For a determinist, probability is simply a convenience of thinking: the physical laws governing the movements of individual objects are completely certain, and therefore completely predictable. Einstein believed this was the case in the quantum mechanical universe. Behind quantum uncertainties are hidden variables. The probabilities of quantum mechanics are merely for convenience. If this were so, quantum mechanics would be a theory of aggregates. Indeed, if we had not applied the probabilistic wave description to a single quantum object, we would not have encountered the paradoxes that concern us – particle-wave complementarity and the inseparability of a quantum object from the circumstances of its observation.

Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. Consideration of two quantum mechanical experiments will show how difficult it is to give a rational explanation for the paradoxes of quantum physics.

Double-slit experiment

We can never see the wave aspect of a single particle. Whenever we look, only a localized particle appears to our gaze. Must we, therefore, assume that the solution is a transcendental metaphysics? Or should we abandon the idea that there is a wave aspect to a single wave particle? Perhaps the waves that quantum physics deals with are a property that is inherent only in groups or collections of objects?

To determine whether this is true, we can analyze an experiment commonly used to study wave phenomena, the so-called double-slit experiment. In the setting of this experiment, a flow of electrons passes through a partition with two narrow slits (see Fig. 14). Since electrons are waves, a double-slit baffle divides the electron beam into two sets of waves. These waves then interfere with each other, and experimenters see the result of the interference on a fluorescent screen.

Img. 14.
Double-slit experiment for electrons

Quite simple? Let me consider the phenomenon of wave interference. If you are not familiar with the phenomenon of interference, it can be easily demonstrated by standing in a bathtub filled with water and rhythmically marching in place, causing two series of waves to appear on the water. The waves will create an interference pattern (Fig. 15, a). In some places they will reinforce each other (Fig. 15, b), and in others they will mutually destroy (Fig. 15, c). The result is an interference pattern.

Img. 15.
a – when waves on water interfere, an interesting picture of mutual amplification and cancellation is created; b – when the waves arrive in the same phase, they reinforce each other; c – waves arriving in antiphase cancel each other out

Similarly, there are places on a fluorescent screen where the electron waves from both slits arrive in the same phase; in such places their amplitudes add up, and the total wave intensifies. Between these bright spots there are places where the waves arrive in antiphase and cancel each other out. Thus, the result of this creative and destructive interference appears on the screen as a pattern of alternating light and dark stripes – an interference pattern (Fig. 16). It is important that the intervals between the stripes make it possible to measure the wavelength of electronic waves.

Img. 16.
Interference pattern of flashes on the screen

However, remember that electron waves are probability waves. Therefore, we must talk specifically about probability: electrons falling into bright regions have a high probability, and electrons falling into dark regions have a low probability. We should not get carried away and, based on the interference pattern, conclude that electron waves are classical waves, since electrons still hit the fluorescent screen in the same way as particles should: each electron gives one localized flash. It is the collection of spots formed by a large number of electrons that looks like a pattern of wave interference.

Suppose we take an intellectual risk and make the electron beam very weak—so weak that only one electron reaches the slits at any given moment. Do we still get an interference pattern? Quantum mechanics clearly answers yes. You might object – you can’t get interference without splitting the beam. Don’t you need two waves for interference? Can a single electron split, pass through both slits, and interfere with itself? Yes maybe. Quantum mechanics answers all these questions positively. In the words of one of the pioneers of the new physics, Paul Dirac: “Every photon (or in this case, electron) interferes only with itself.” Quantum mechanics offers a mathematical proof of this absurd claim, but this single claim is responsible for all the amazing magic that quantum systems are capable of and which has been proven by many experiments and technologies.

Try to imagine that an electron passes 50% through one slit and 50% through the other slit. It’s easy to get angry and disbelieve in this strange implication of quantum mathematics. Does an electron actually pass through both slits at the same time? Why should we take this for granted? We can find out through observation. We can shine a flashlight on the slits (metaphorically speaking) to see which slit the electron actually passes through.

So, we turn on the light and, seeing an electron passing through one or another slit, we look where the flash appears on the fluorescent screen (Fig. 17). We find that every time an electron passes through a slit, its flash appears exactly behind the slit through which it passes. The interference pattern has disappeared.

Img. 17.
When we try to determine through which slit an electron passes by shining a flashlight on the slits, the electron demonstrates its corpuscular nature. There are only two bands – exactly as you would expect if electrons were miniature balls

What happens in this experiment can be understood primarily as a consequence of the uncertainty principle. Once we detect an electron and determine which slit it passes through, we lose information about the electron’s momentum. Electrons are very sensitive; a collision with the photon we are using to observe the electron affects it in such a way that its momentum changes by an unpredictable amount. The momentum and wavelength of the electron are interrelated: quantum mechanics includes this great discovery of de Broglie. Therefore, the loss of information about the momentum of an electron is the same as the loss of information about its wavelength. If there were interference fringes, then we could measure the wavelength by the distances between them. The uncertainty principle states that once we determine which slit the electron is passing through, the process of observation destroys the interference pattern.

You must understand that measuring the position and momentum of an electron are actually complementary, mutually exclusive procedures. We can focus on the pulse and measure the wavelength—and thus the momentum—of the electron from the interference pattern, but then we cannot know which slit the electron is passing through. Or we may focus on the electron’s position and lose the interference pattern—information about its wavelength and momentum.

There is a second, even more clever way of understanding and reconciling all this – using the principle of complementarity. Depending on which device we use, we see the particle aspect (for example, with a flashlight) or the wave aspect (without a flashlight).

To a first approximation, the essence of the principle of complementarity comes down to the fact that quantum objects are both waves and particles, but we can see only one aspect using a particular experimental setting. This is undoubtedly a correct understanding, but experience teaches us some subtleties. For example, we must also say that an electron is neither a wave (since the wave aspect never appears for a single electron) nor a particle (since it appears on the screen in places where particles are prohibited). Then, being careful in our logic, we must say that a photon is neither a non-wave nor a non-particle, in order to avoid misunderstanding our use of the words “wave” and “particle”. This is very similar to the logic of someone who lived in the 1st century. n. e. idealist philosopher Nagarjuna – the most insightful logician of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Eastern philosophers convey their understanding of ultimate reality with the words neti, neti (neither this nor that). Nagarjuna formulated this teaching in the form of four negatives:

She doesn’t exist.
She is not non-existent.
It cannot be said about it
that it both exists and does not exist.
Or that it is neither
existing nor non-existent.

To better understand complementarity, suppose we return to the previous experiment, this time using weak batteries to make the flashlight with which we illuminate the electrons somewhat dimmer. Repeating the experiment shown in Fig. 17, with the lantern light becoming dimmer and dimmer, we find that the interference pattern begins to reappear, becoming increasingly clear as the lantern light becomes dimmer (Fig. 18). When the flashlight is completely turned off, the full interference pattern is returned.

Img. 18.
When using a dimmer flashlight, the interference pattern partially returns

As the flashlight dims, the number of photons scattering the electrons decreases, so that some electrons manage to avoid being “seen” by the light entirely. Those electrons that are visible appear behind slit 1 or slit 2, exactly where we would expect to find them. Each of the unseen electrons splits and interferes with itself, forming an interference pattern on the screen when enough electrons reach it. In the extreme case of bright light, only the corpuscular nature of the electrons is visible; in the limiting case of the absence of light, only the wave nature is visible. In intermediate cases of dim light, both aspects are visible to a similar intermediate degree: that is, here we see electrons (though never the same electron) as both waves and particles. Thus, the wave nature of a wave particle is not a property of the entire aggregate, but must remain valid for each individual wave particle when we are not looking at it. This must mean that the wave aspect of a single quantum object is transcendental since we never see it manifest.

A series of pictures help explain what is happening (Fig. 19). In the picture below on the left we only see the letter W; this corresponds to the use of a bright flashlight, which shows only the corpuscular nature of the electrons. Then, moving upward from picture to picture, we begin to see the eagle – just as when the brightness of light decreases, some electrons escape observation (and localization), and we begin to see their wave nature. Finally, in the last, top right picture, you can only see the eagle; The flashlight is turned off and all electrons are now waves.

Img. 19.
Sequence W—Heads

Niels Bohr once said: “Those who were not shocked when they first encountered quantum theory probably did not understand it.” As we begin to comprehend the workings of the principle of complementarity, this shock gives way to understanding. Then the official march of predictive science, valid for either the wave or the particle, is transformed into the creative dance of the transcendental wave particle. When we localize an electron by finding out which slit it passes through, we discover its corpuscular aspect. When we don’t localize an electron, regardless of which slit it passes through, we discover its wave aspect. In the latter case, the electron passes through both slits.

Delayed choice experiment

This unique property of the principle of complementarity should be clearly understood: what attribute a quantum waveparticle reveals depends on the way we choose to observe it. The importance of conscious choice in shaping manifest reality is best demonstrated by the delayed choice experiment proposed by physicist John Wheeler.

In Fig. 20 shows a device in which a ray of light is divided into two rays of equal intensity – reflected and transmitted – using a semi-transparent mirror M 1. Then both rays are reflected by two ordinary mirrors A and B and reach the intersection point P on the right.

To detect the wave aspect of a wave particle, we use the phenomenon of wave interference and place a second semi-transparent mirror M 2 at point P (Fig. 20, bottom left). Now the mirror M 2 causes both waves created by the beam that is split by the mirror M 1 to interfere creatively on one side of P (if you put a photon counter there, it will click) and destructively interfere on the other side (where the counter never clicks). Note that when detecting the wave mode of photons, we must recognize that each photon is separated in the mirror M 1 and travels in both paths A and B, otherwise how can there be interference?

Therefore, when mirror M 1 splits the beam, each photon is potentially ready to travel in both ways. If we now decide to detect the corpuscular mode of photon wave particles, we remove the mirror M 2 from point P (to prevent recombination and interference) and place counters behind the intersection point P, as shown in Fig. 20 bottom right. One or the other counter will click, identifying the localized path of the wave particle—reflected path A or transmitted path B —and demonstrating the particle aspect.

Img. 20.
Delayed choice experiment. BOTTOM LEFT: Experimental setup for seeing the wave nature of photons. One of the detectors never detects any photons, indicating extinction due to wave interference. The photon had to split and travel along two paths at the same time. BOTTOM RIGHT: Setting for seeing the corpuscular nature of photons. Both detectors click, but alternately, indicating which path the photon is taking.

The trickiest part of the experiment is this: in the delayed choice experiment, the experimenter decides whether or not to place a translucent mirror at point P – to measure the wave aspect or not – at the very last moment, at the very last picosecond (10 ^-12 s) (this was real carried out in the laboratory). This essentially means that the photons have already passed the separation point (if you think of them as classical objects). Even in this case, placing a mirror at point P always shows the wave aspect, and not placing a mirror shows the particle aspect. Did each photon travel along one path or two? Apparently, photons react instantly and retroactively even to our delayed choices. The photon travels along one path or both exactly according to our choice. How does he know about it? Does the effect of our choice precede its cause in time? In the words of John Wheeler: “Nature at the quantum level is not a machine going its inexorable path. Instead, the answer we get depends on what question we ask, what experiment we set up, what recording device we choose. We inevitably become involved in causing what happens.”

There is no manifest photon before we see it, and so how we see it determines its attributes. Before our observation, the photon is split into two wave packets (one packet for each path), but these packets are only packets of possibilities for the photon; in M 1 there is no reality in space-time, no decision-making. Does the effect precede its cause, thereby violating the law of causation? Undoubtedly, yes – if you think of the photon as a classical particle, always manifested in space-time. However, the photon is not a classical particle.

From a quantum physics perspective, by placing a second mirror at point P in our delayed choice experiment, both separated packets potentially connect and interfere; there is no problem here. If there were a mirror at point P and we removed it at the last possible picosecond, finding a photon on, say, path A, then the photon would appear to react retroactively to our delayed choice by moving along only one path. Therefore, in this case it would seem that the effect precedes the cause. This result does not violate the law of causality. How so?

It is necessary to understand a more subtle way of looking at the second experiment to detect the corpuscular aspect of photons; as Heisenberg explains: “If the experimental result now indicates that a photon is located in, say, the reflected part of the [wave] packet [path A], then the probability of finding a photon in another part of the beam immediately becomes zero. Then the experiment with the position of the reflected packet produces a kind of effect… at a distant point occupied by the passing packet, and the observer sees [that] this effect propagates at a speed exceeding the speed of light. However, it is also obvious that this type of action can never be used to transmit a signal, so it … does not contradict the postulates of the theory of relativity.”

This action at a distance constitutes an important aspect of the collapse of the wave packet. To denote such an action, a special term is used – non-locality – an action transmitted without signals that propagate in space. Signals that propagate in space in a finite time, due to the speed limit established by Einstein, are called local signals. Therefore, the collapse of a quantum wave is not local.

Note that Heisenberg’s statement is true both in the presence and absence of delayed choice. From a quantum point of view, the important thing is that we choose one or another outcome, which manifests itself; when in time we choose this outcome does not matter. The wave divides whenever there are two paths available, but the division occurs only in potency. When, later, we observe a photon on one path because we choose that outcome (removing the mirror from point P), the collapse we cause of the wave on one path has a non-local effect on the wave on the other path, which negates the possibility of seeing the photon on this other way. Such nonlocal influence may seem retroactive (i.e., transmitted back in time), but we influence only potentialities; There is no violation of the law of causality here, since, as Heisenberg says, we cannot transmit a signal using this kind of device.

In our search for the meaning and structure of reality, we are faced with the same riddle that Winnie the Pooh faced:
“  Hello, Pooh,” said Piglet, “what are you doing?”
“I’m hunting,” said Pooh.
Are you hunting? On whom?
“  I’m tracking someone,” Winnie the Pooh answered very mysteriously.
–  Who are you tracking? – asked Piglet, coming closer.
“  That’s exactly what I’m asking myself.” This is the whole question – who?
–  And how do you think you will answer this question?
“  I’ll have to wait until I catch up with him,” said Winnie the Pooh.
–  Look here. “He pointed to the ground directly in front of him. – What do you see here?
“  Traces,” said Piglet. – Paw prints! “He even squealed a little with excitement.
–  Oh, Pooh! Do you think this is… this is the scary Buka?
“  Maybe,” said Pooh. “Sometimes it’s like he is, and sometimes it’s like he’s not.” Can you guess by the footprints?..
“  …Just a minute,” said Winnie the Pooh, raising his paw. He sat down and thought as deeply as he could. Then he tried his paw on one of the Footprints… and then scratched his ear twice and stood up. “Yes,” said Winnie the Pooh. – Now I understand. “I was a stupid simpleton,” he said.
“  And I’m the most stupid bear cub in the world!”
–  What you! You are the best teddy bear in the world! – Christopher Robin consoled him.

Indeed, it is somewhat puzzling that, according to new physics, the “beech” traces that electrons and other submicroscopic particles leave in our condensation chambers are simply an extension of ourselves.

Classical science invariably saw only division in the world. Two centuries ago, the English Romantic poet William Blake wrote:

God save us from uniform vision and Newtonian sleep.

Quantum physics is the answer to Blake’s prayer. The modern scientist, having learned the lesson of the principle of complementarity, is not so stupid as to “obsess” with (apparent) separateness.

Quantum measurements bring our consciousness onto the stage of the so-called objective world. There is no paradox in the delayed choice experiment if we give up the idea that a constant and independent world exists even when we do not observe it. Ultimately it comes down to what you, the observer, want to see. This reminds me of a Zen story.

Two monks were arguing about the movement of a flag in the wind. One said: “The flag is moving.” Another objected: “No, it’s the wind that moves.” A third monk, passing by the debaters, made a remark that Wheeler would have approved: “The flag is not moving. The wind doesn’t move. Your mind moves.”

The book “The Self-Aware Universe. How consciousness creates the material world.” Amit Goswami

Contents

PREFACE
PART I. The Union of Science and Spirituality
CHAPTER 1. THE CHAPTER AND THE BRIDGE
CHAPTER 2. OLD PHYSICS AND ITS PHILOSOPHICAL HERITAGE
CHAPTER 3. QUANTUM PHYSICS AND THE DEATH OF MATERIAL REALISM
CHAPTER 4. THE PHILOSOPHY OF MONISTIC IDEALISM
PART II. IDEALISM AND THE RESOLUTION OF QUANTUM PARADOXES
CHAPTER 5. OBJECTS IN TWO PLACES AT THE SAME TIME AND EFFECTS THAT PRECEDE THEIR CAUSES
CHAPTER 6. THE NINE LIVES OF SCHRODINGER’S CAT
CHAPTER 7. I CHOOSE WITH THEREFORE, I AM
CHAPTER 8. THE EINSTEIN-PODOLSKY-ROSEN PARADOX
CHAPTER 9. RECONCILIATION OF REALISM AND IDEALISM
PART III. SELF-REFERENCE: HOW ONE BECOMES MANY
CHAPTER 10. EXPLORING THE MIND-BODY PROBLEM
CHAPTER 11. IN SEARCH OF THE QUANTUM MIND
CHAPTER 12. PARADOXES AND COMPLEX HIERARCHIES
CHAPTER 13. “I” OF CONSCIOUSNESS
CHAPTER 14. UNIFICATION OF PSYCHOLOGIES
PART IV . RETURN OF CHARM
CHAPTER 15. WAR AND PEACE
CHAPTER 16. EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL CREATIVITY
CHAPTER 17. THE AWAKENING OF BUDDHA
CHAPTER 18. IDEALISMAL THEORY OF ETHICS
CHAPTER 19. SPIRITUAL JOY
GLOBAR OF TERMS