Has quantum mechanics proved that reality does not exist?

a reply to: cooperton

It is an assumption that there was ever a physical world without a conscious agent.

It is an assumption that there was ever a physical world caused by sentient agency. Again, sentience (true sentience, like the ego and super ego) is a cumbersome burden on organic life for which there's no practical advantage unless useful to the agency who created it. Or, unless it happened by accident.

Here's the kicker - reality existed eons before the first neuron was born and will exist eons after the last neuron on Earth has perished. We're just here to enjoy the view.

originally posted by: TzarChasm

Here's the kicker - reality existed before the first neuron was born and will exist after the last neuron on Earth has perished.

That's your belief. neither of us can prove which is true.

If a logical Consciousness created matter then that explains the logical organization of matter. But if matter working randomly created everything then there should be no logical structure or organisms.

Since neither of us can know for sure, I am going with the higher probability solution where the source of all things is Logical.

Reality is Reality, there is nothing else.

Quantum physics only shows us that reality is much different than we think.

It would follow that as the universe evolves, so does reality.

a reply to: cooperton

if matter working randomly created everything then there should be no logical structure or organisms.

Logical for whom? That one cannot derive the logic behind a certain system does not mean there is no logic. It simply means one failed to discern the logic underlying the system under observation. Most probably, it means one is only trying to derive the logic based on fragmentary data, non-complete observations, or an extremely short time of observations.

Actually, logic is not required by nature: it is required for a logical observer. It is the observer the one who creates logic, the one who needs to give sense to his/her observations, the one who needs a theory to interpret those observations, all of which is not required for Nature or Reality to be natural and real.

An irrational system is irrational only if measured with a defective logic.

originally posted by: cooperton

originally posted by: TzarChasm

Consciousness is unnatural and a cumbersome burden on organic life, bestowed at best by happenstance chemistry and at worst by a bored sadistic agency who wanted their toys to kick and scream a tiny bit more. There's no practical advantage except to exploit what you have awakened for selfish gain.

No concepts would exist whatsoever without consciousness to measure them. It is an assumption that there was ever a physical world without a conscious agent. As I said in the post above, this is the opposite of what we're taught, but it is a prime aspect of quantum physics:

"I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”

-Max Planck

For the record, no one has seen or heard a word from dear old Max since he succumbed. It's almost like he stopped existing or something. I wonder why his mind didn't persist in some tangible fashion.

originally posted by: charlyv
Reality is Reality, there is nothing else.

Quantum physics only shows us that reality is much different than we think.

It would follow that as the universe evolves, so does reality.

Our pursuit of quantum mechanics has to do with reinventing our computational technology to better accommodate the surplus of data. But some parties wish to exploit that science to overcome the limitations of human biology and natural physics and hack reality itself.

originally posted by: Quadrivium

We could also say the tire changes its pressure when we measure it almost like it knows it's being observed...implying some kind of consciousness of the tire when it doesn't involve any consciousness, it's just a little pressurized gas escaping from the tire because of the way the gage works.

Could you go into a little more detail?
I see what you are implying but not how the two equate.

Equate is a strong word, it's a similar idea, not an exact similarity of the measurement process. Can you watch the video "The Problem with Dr. Quantum's Double-slit Experiment" I posted on page 1? If so try watching that to see if it helps.

It is my understanding that, in the case of the DSE, the results only change when the measurements are being observed, not by the measurement process alone.

Your understanding is incomplete or flawed. Figuring out which of the two slits the particle went through is in fact a measurement, affecting the particles even more than the tire gage affects the tire pressure. You can't just "look at" particles that small without affecting them. Pay attention to the Neil Tyson clip in "The Problem with Dr. Quantum's Double-slit Experiment" video, I liked his explanation.

a reply to: Arbitrageur
Here is an interesting take on the subject.

"Nonexistence and Nothingness | What is it like to NOT exist?"

a reply to: Itisnowagain
The topic of this thread: "Has quantum mechanics proved that reality does not exist?".

That video is talking about a different subject. He spends most of the time talking about how long "you" have existed, claiming you existed before you were born but you just have memory problems and that's why you don't remember your existence before you were born....ok well make your own thread on that but not in the Science & Technology forum please, because it's not science or technology based on the lack of any scientific evidence provided in the video.

If a tree falls over in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?

Of course it does. Only human arrogance would assume that without our magnificent presence physics ceases to exist.

Schrodinger's cat may or may not have knocked the test model off the table.

I think Douglas Adams said it best. "If anyone ever figures out exactly what the universe is and how it works it will immediately disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable." The prevailing theory is that this has happened several times already.

a reply to: ByteChanger

the question is how deep does the universe go

is there a finite "pixel' that cant be divided any more into smaller parts(i believe there is no bottom).

i know that Planck length is the alleged smallest thing that can exist.

time is a quantum artifact of space-time fabric for lack of a better word, if we were in a higher dimension it might just be like watching a movie where we cant interact with the people on the 'tv' but seemingly control time in there frame of reference fast forwarding, rewinding pausing even deleting parts of the 'movies' time line. The people in the movie have no idea that they are even in a movie let alone what is outside of that universe(and i use movie in the absolute loosest terms)

everything we have done exists 'somewhere' outside our comprehension and i think the future my appear fuzzy because there are so many path the universe can take and even the smallest change, say the placement of a hydrogen atom in my room would create a different timeline.

the double slip experiment is showing how observing the universe collapses all the other wave functions and puts that universe on a certain path also with infinite 'off ramps and on ramps'.

NASA came out with a big announcement that they officially discovered a white hole.

so either it is the outlet of some sort of Einstein-Rosen Bridge or if you want to go sci-fi it could be the exit to another universe, and as crazy as that sounds the Cosmic Microwave Background has what some at NASA and the ESA looks to have a bump in it, like another 'brane' if you are a subscriber to the M-Brane theory

I think the secret to the quantum world is that there is no bottom so to speak as far as particles go and that is why the standard modal isn't right and they are forcing answered litterly into a box to make their THEORYS turn into FACTS.


The big bang or the start of our universe was a quantum fluctuation that was unbalanced and over time here wee are.

what's your thoughts on string theory?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

The double slit experiment on its own doesnt really support the notion that reality doesnt exist.

It just introduces the idea that there are forces at play in reality that affect, the fabric of reality, that with out current technology, we cannot understand.

However, that all changes with the Quantum Eraser experiment added on to the double slit experiment.

With the Quantum Eraser, we dont solve for what those forces are or what physical impacts consciousness have or how they work...

But the Quantum eraser proves that nothing "is" any set way. This gives credence to the notion that reality isnt "real" and that it doesn't exist in the same sense that percieve and believe it.

Interesting enough.. when you pair these experiments with some of the implications of steing theory. It all begins to make ALOT of sense.

Ill probably be making a thread about this.

Time being the 4th dimension.. and dimensions 1-4 existing as a point on a 5 dimensional plane.. means that time isnt linear.. but time IS fluid.

If you have a 5+ dimensional actor "reaching in" or making changes in our reality, then those Changes occur regardless of time. Since all time, is all the time... Experiments like these 2 that have a time component are subject to.. results changing retroactively like in the quantum eraser.

a reply to: Lucidparadox

collapsing wave fronts explain the double slit experiment

originally posted by: Box of Rain
Just because reality is "fuzzy" -- i.e., a particle can seemingly be everywhere at once until it is measured -- doesn't make it any less real.

Exactly. Just because the moon is made up of quantum particles which are "fuzzy", doesn't mean the moon is only real when we look at it. Even a small object like a grain of sand contains trillions upon trillions of particles, and together they create a very solid object which exists in a real way, regardless of whether or not it's being observed.

The "measurement problem" really doesn't seem like much of a problem to me if we think about particles as waves, because that's what they really are. Particles are really waves in quantum fields. In the double slit experiment it's easy to see why a wave would go through both slits and interfere with its self. So why does each particle hit a precise spot on the back wall?

Why do they suddenly choose to act like a particle when they collide with the back wall? And why do the particles stop acting like waves if we try to measure which slit they actually go through? Well it's the same thing in both cases. The wall is made from many particles, which are all highly entangled. More specifically, their wave functions are highly entangled, because they form a single object.

When a particle travels through the slits as a wave it behaves as a wave primarily because it is isolated from other particles. But when a particle collides with the back wall it becomes entangled with the wall, which collapses the wave function of the particle and causes it to behave in a more classical manner. The same thing occurs when we measure which slit the particle went through.

The particle becomes entangled with whatever device we are using to measure the particle, which causes the particle to stop behaving like a wave, and the interference pattern stops being produced. The particle can't go through both slits at the same time if it isn't a wave, so it starts acting like a classical particle. Of course the particle is still a wave, it just has a much more complex wave function.

Something about the process of entanglement causes decoherence, meaning particles do more weird quantum stuff when they are alone. This is why quantum computers needs specialized equipment which is heavily isolated from the outside environment. They are also kept very cool because that helps prevent decoherence. What really seems to matter is entropy, and more heat means more entropy.

The same thing applies to the overall complexity of any matter. For example, a small group of particles will exhibit more quantum behavior than a larger group of particles. At some point decoherence essentially removes all quantum effects, but scientists have shown we can put surprisingly large objects into quantum superposition. I assume they do that by using cooling to remove entropy from the object.

I think the strangest thing of all is not that particles behave likes waves, it's that they behave like probability waves. When a particle goes through both slits at the same time that probability wave interferes with itself which we see in the interference pattern, but then it hits the back wall and instantly decides upon one exact path. We only see the smeared out interference pattern after shooting many particles.

It's not like each particle hits the wall as a wave and leaves a smeared "wave mark" on the back wall. Some people might try to argue that the back wall is in a state of superposition until we look at it to see where the particles actually hit. That is the same as saying Schrödinger's cat is both alive and dead. Obviously that's not the case in reality, both the cat and back wall will exist in a very real state.

They are just like the moon, high entropy objects with a large number of entangled particles. Wave function collapse forces us to ask: is there a separate universe for every possible path a particle takes? Or does our universe "collapse" into a single outcome when the particle is "measured" (by a detector or by the wall, it's the same thing). And that's what the measurement problem really is in my mind.

In other words, is the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics true? For a long time I didn't really believe in Many Worlds but there has been a lot of evidence emerging over the last decade which has made me reconsider that belief. I just hate to think there's a version of me who made all the worst choices possible. On the other hand, Many Worlds does open the door for time travel without paradoxes.

originally posted by: Lucidparadox
a reply to: Arbitrageur

The double slit experiment on its own doesnt really support the notion that reality doesnt exist.

It just introduces the idea that there are forces at play in reality that affect, the fabric of reality, that with out current technology, we cannot understand.

However, that all changes with the Quantum Eraser experiment added on to the double slit experiment.

I didn't intend to imply that the double slit experiment suggested reality doesn't exist, and I didn't even mention the Quantum eraser experiment, or perhaps you mean the Delayed Choice Quantum Eraser which also doesn't suggest reality doesn't exist...the articles that claimed that were about some dubious Wigner's Friend experiments using photons as alleged "observers" which doesn't seem like what Wigner really intended as an observer so there are problems with those experiments.

Sabine Hossenfelder also made a video debunking the Delayed Choice Quantum Eraser experiment, explaining why some of the claims about that experiment are also over-hyped by sopme people (though it's an interesting experiment as is the double slit experiment).

The Delayed Choice Quantum Eraser, Debunked



The delayed choice quantum eraser, debunked, transcript

When I was working on this video I thought certainly someone must have explained this before. But the only person I could find who’d done that is… Sean Carroll in a blogpost two years ago. Yes, you can trust Sean with the quantum stuff. I’ll leave you a link to Sean’s piece in the info.

Sean Carroll's blogpost is here: The Notorious Delayed-Choice Quantum Eraser

originally posted by: ChaoticOrder
In other words, is the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics true? For a long time I didn't really believe in Many Worlds but there has been a lot of evidence emerging over the last decade which has made me reconsider that belief. I just hate to think there's a version of me who made all the worst choices possible. On the other hand, Many Worlds does open the door for time travel without paradoxes.

There is so much confusion on "Many worlds". Some people attribute the theory to Hugh Everett, but Everett didn't intend for the theory to imply "many worlds", his idea was "Universal Wavefunction".

arxiv.org...

It seems clear that DeWitt and Graham consider that the multitude of branching worlds are “real” in the ordinary sense of the word. In this sense, their Many Worlds perspective certainly departs from Everett’s intent.

In a 1976 philosophy paper on the interpretation of quantum mechanics, Levy-Leblond offers critical comments on the many worlds interpretation and compared it to his understanding of Everett’s theory.

Now, my criticism here is exactly symmetrical of the one I directed against the orthodox position: the “many worlds” idea again is a left-over of classical conceptions. The coexisting branches here, as the unique surviving one in the Copenhagen point of view, can only be related to “worlds” described by classical physics. The difference is that, instead of interpreting the quantum “plus” as a classical “or”, De Witt et al. interpret it as a classical “and”. To me, the deep meaning of Everett's ideas is not the coexistence of many worlds, but on the contrary, the existence of a single quantum one.The main drawback of the “many-worlds” terminology is that it leads one to ask the question of “what branch we are on”, since it certainly looks as if our consciousness definitely belonged to only one world at a time: But this question only makes sense from a classical point of view, once more. It becomes entirely irrelevant as soon as one commits oneself to a consistent quantum view.

In a letter to Levy-Leblond (Barrett 2011), Everett indicated that he quite agreed with Levy-Leblond’s argument and emphasized that the many worlds terminology was not his. I’m sympathetic with this view.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
Your understanding is incomplete or flawed. Figuring out which of the two slits the particle went through is in fact a measurement, affecting the particles even more than the tire gage affects the tire pressure. You can't just "look at" particles that small without affecting them. Pay attention to the Neil Tyson clip in "The Problem with Dr. Quantum's Double-slit Experiment" video, I liked his explanation.

But there's no reason this measurement should be so profound as to change the behavior of light from wave to particle... Unless light photons are intimately connected and 'aware' of our awareness. I heard we are the light of the world, so it seems to match.

originally posted by: Direne

Actually, logic is not required by nature: it is required for a logical observer. It is the observer the one who creates logic

Enzymes, biochemical cascades, and the countless other biological processes all go forth according to precise order. It doesn't require human observation for ATP synthase to act like a turbine generating energy for the cell. The world is logical, and we can scientifically discover these logical algorithms because we ourselves are logical.

All of that is a given, I don't think there is much argument against that^ right?

The double slit experiment showed that the experiment itself was capable of making a light-wave behave like a particle, simply be being able to measure/determine the slit. This implies a profound impact of the observer on the physical world around them. This is nothing new, given that any invention, building, or scientific experiment is a demonstration of consciousness being able to manipulate matter. The placebo effect is also a great example of the effect of a state of consciousness on a subsequent medical outcome. Psychoneuroendocrinology is a field based entirely around the connection between psychological states and neuro/endocrine behavior.

originally posted by: TzarChasm
For the record, no one has seen or heard a word from dear old Max since he succumbed. It's almost like he stopped existing or something. I wonder why his mind didn't persist in some tangible fashion.

Why do you put all of your faith in a 400nanometer band of electromagnetism that we call the visible light spectrum? There is far more to the entirety of existence than meets the eye.

It seems physicist Sabine Hossenfelder is saying that an absolute reality does exist; But internally one error like mistaking 0 for 1 leads to a snowball effect and one cannot know how many erroneous connections there are in that quasi-reality that have been super or sub positioned in that person's psycho-mental process but outside of that reality as it is unchanged by the observer still exists... like no matter how unreal someone internally makes the world and spits that unreality out as a commonality that the phenomena of snow remains snow regardless of how much of that sort of delusion has been in contact with it.

It's an important thing especially in science where the result has to be repeated and not skewed to a wanted or prefered outcome that falsifies datum... as that becomes correlation but not a direct cause and effect that moves theory and hypothesis into the realm of an empirical truth or fact. Fortunately with machine intelligence the results cannot be skewed by the senses as machines are not faulted with them in the observance of data... unless garbage datum from faulty senses or preferred outcome went into them to begin with resulting in a GIGO.

So putting empirical data that may or may not be true into machines taken as truth doesn't really mean it is truth... So it would be important to let or allow machine intelligence re-run all the the empirical evidence against it's own intelligence and route out those possible mistakes whether intentional or not so whatever science ahead can be seen as an absolute instead of a correlative we have assumed to be true for however many generations.

Not doing that just means we'd have made a valuable tool in our image instead of allowing it to show us it's true face instead of the expected or desired image of ourselves... or basically skipping the fault of the Hebrew god letting it to be free of our image so we can advance from what it really can or has to offer us instead of a S.S.D.D. reflection of ourselves... it's bad enough that we have the fault of doing that with each other and animals does it really need to exist there too?

a reply to: cooperton

"The world is logical, and we can scientifically discover these logical algorithms because we ourselves are logical. I don't think there is much argument against that, right?"

I think Mr. Gödelwould strongly disagree with that conclusion. You are perfectly aware he clearly demonstrated the limits of logic. Actually, he did more than that if we couple his discoveries with those of Mr. Wittgenstein; they both proved, once and for all, that logic is just a shadow of reality.

The problem with the two-slit experiment for photons is just that we tend to confuse "quantum mechanics" with "quantum logic", and we tend to take the wave-function of an object for the object itself. One thing is the cat's wave-function, and quite another the cat itself. They are not the same thing. In the two-slit experiment it is the wave-function we are interested in, nor the photons. The same confusion arises when we talk about phase velocity, and particle velocity.

And the same confusion arises constantly and daily when we take the price of bread by the bread itself.

So no, you cannot understand Reality using a limited crippled logic (any logic is incomplete by necessity, as Gôdel proved), and you cannot make exact inferences about events based on measurements when your measuring devices are, by design, incomplete. All of the particles whose existence you have inferred are those prone to be measured by your clocks, clocks that cannot perform an exact measurement (this due to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle).

And, on top of all those limitations, you are still cursed to only understand what your neural setup allows you to conceive (this is called 'the cognitive bubble').

You can only talk about probabilities for this and that event to happen. Not about whether this or that event really happened. One will never know how the Universe is, but just how the Universe probably is.

a reply to: TzarChasm

Our thoughts are nothing more than the chemical and bioelectrical connection in a lump of grey matter contained within the bony structure of our heads.

To think, is to merely apply different emotive connections. Even our eyes see upside down, we just learn to see it as right way up.

When people say we have a personality, a soul that defines us, think of those who have suffered traumatic brain injury, who come back as completely different people. When they say, when we die, we live on.... well, there is nothing more catastrophic as brain death. Reality is a figment. Each of us have our own version. Sure, a rock is a rock, but some see it as an obstacle, others as a challenge.

Life.... Don't talk to me about life.... - Marvin.

a reply to: jerich0

Sure, a rock is a rock, but some see it as an obstacle, others as a challenge.

"...and some have the audacity to say; There is no such thing as free will".~Rock

originally posted by: Crowfoot
a reply to: jerich0

Sure, a rock is a rock, but some see it as an obstacle, others as a challenge.

"...and some have the audacity to say; There is no such thing as free will".~Rock

"But I can beat that" - Paper

Let us not get scissors involved, however!