Re: Physicists Losing Their Grip??

From: Bill Hobba (bhobba_at_rubbish.net.au)
Date: 12/22/04 

Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 14:36:36 GMT

"Consc" <cons_cie@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1103719993.670932.218330@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
>
> Got the following from somewhere. If you have time this holiday,
> pls. go over it. It's a serious comment about what is occuring
> inside quantum physics. What quantum reality versions (he
> mentions a lot) do you believe in. What part did the author
> make a wrong assumption, if ever. Thanks. - Consc.

I have not read the entire article - it looks long so I only may be able to
touch on a few points. So here goes.

>
> Nick Herbert talks about "Quantum Reality":
>
> "Physicists Losing Their Grip
>
> One of the best-kept secrets of science is that physicists have
> lost their grip on reality.

Well one problem here is you will not see reality as discussed in physics
books (at least the ones I read) - it really is a philosophical issue.

>
> News of the reality crisis hardly exists outside the physics
> community. What shuts out the public is partly a language
> barrier-the mathematical formalism that facilitates communication
> between scientists is incomprehensible to outsiders-and partly
> the human tendency of physicists to publicize their successes
> while soft-pedalling their confusions and uncertainties. Even
> among themselves, physicists prefer to pass over the
> uncomfortable reality issue in favor of questions "more
> concrete".

And for good reason - as I said above it really is a philosophical issue.

>
> "No development of modem science has had a more profound impact
> on human thinking than the advent of quantum theory. Wrenched out
> of centuries-old thought patterns, physicists of a generation ago
> found themselves compelled to embrace a new metaphysics. The
> distress which this reorientation caused continues to the present
> day. Basically physicists have suffered a severe loss: their hold
> on reality." - Bryce DeWitt Neill Graham

That depends on a number of factors such as what interpretation of QM one
holds to and what one thinks 'reality' is.

>
> Recent popularizations such as Heinz Pagels' Cosmic Code have
> begun to inform the public about the reality crisis in physics.
> In Quantum Reality I intend to examine how physicists deal with
> reality -- or fall to deal with it-in clear and unprecedented
> detail.
>
> Nothing exposes the perplexity at the heart of physics more
> starkly than certain preposterous-sounding claims a few outspoken
> physicists are making concerning how the world really works. If
> we take these claims at face value, the stories physicists tell
> resemble the tales of mystics and madmen. Physicists are quick to
> reject such unsavory associations and insist that they speak
> sober fact.

They do - usually the outcomes of experiment.

> We do not make these claims out of ignorance, they
> say, like ancient mapmakers filling In terra incognitas with
> plausi ble geography. Not ignorance, but the emergence of
> unexpected knowledge forces on us all new visions of the way
> things really are.
>
> The new physics vision is still clouded, as evidenced by the
> multiplicity of its claims, but whatever the outcome it is sure
> to be far from ordinary.

Sure QM is out of the ordinary; but so are plenty of ideas in physics like
the existence of unseen fields that can transmit electrical influences in
antenna to other antenna on the other side of the world by bouncing of an
unseen ionosphere. QM is not alone is being out of the ordinary.

> To give you a taste of quantum reality,
> I summarize here the views of its foremost Creators in the form
> of eight realities which represent eight major guesses as to
> what's really going on behind the scenes. Later we will look at
> each of these realities in more detail and see how different
> physicists use the same data to justify so many different
> pictures of th e world.

So we come ot the crux of the issue - QM has a number of differnt
inteprestions.

>
> Quantum Reality #1 The Copenhagen Interpretation, Part I (There
> is no deep reality.) No one has influenced more our notions of
> what the quantum world is really about than Danish physicist
> Niels Bohr, and it is Bohr who puts forth one of quantum physics'
> most outrageous claims: that there is no deep reality. Bohr does
> not deny the evidence of his senses. The World we see around us
> is real enough, he affirms, but it floats on a world that is not
> as real. Everyday phenomena are themselves built not out of phe
> nomena but out of an utterly different kind of being.
>
> Far from being a crank or minority position, "There is no deep
> reality" represents the prevailing doctrine of establishment
> physics. Because this quantum reality was developed at Niels
> Bohr's Copenhagen institute, it is called the "Copenhagen
> interpretation." Undaunted by occasional challenges by mavericks
> of realist persuasion, the majority of physicists swear at least
> nominal allegiance to Bohr's anti-realist creed. What more
> glaring indication of the depth of the reality crisis than the
> official rejectio n of reality itself by the bulk of the physics
> community?
>
> Einstein and other prominent physicists felt that Bohr went too
> far in his call for ruthless renunciation of deep reality. Surely
> all Bohr meant to say was that we must all be good pragmatists
> and not extend our speculations beyond the range of our
> experiments. From the results of experiments carried out in the
> twenties, how could Bohr conclude that no future technology would
> ever reveal a deeper truth? Certainly Bohr never in tended
> actually to deny deep reality but merely counseled a cautious
> skepticism t oward speculative hidden realities.
>
> Bohr refused to accept such a watered-down version of the
> Copenhagen doctrine. In words that must chill every realist's
> heart, Bohr insisted: "There is no quantum world. There is only
> an abstract quantum description"
>
> Werner Heisenberg, the Christopher Columbus of quantum theory,
> first to set foot on the new mathematical World, took an equally
> tough stand against reality-nostalgic physicists such as Einstein
> when he wrote: "The hope that new experiments will lead us back
> to objective events in time and space is about as well founded as
> the hope of discovering the end of the world in the unexplored
> regions of the Antarctic."
>
> The writings of Bohr and Heisenberg have been criticized as
> obscure and open to many interpretations. Recently Cornell
> physicist N. David Mermin neatly summed up Bohr's anti-realist
> position in words that leave little room for misunderstanding:
> "We now know that the moon is demonstrably not there when nobody
> looks." (We will take a look at Mermin's "demonstration" in
> Chapter 13.)
>
> Quantum Reality #2. The Copenhagen interpretation, Part 11
> (Reality is created by observation.) Although the numerous
> physicists of the Copenhagen school do not believe in deep
> reality, they do assert the existence of phenomenal reality. What
> we see is undoubtedly real, they say, but these phenomena are not
> really there in the absence of an observation. The Copenhagen
> interpretation properly consists of two distinct parts: I. There
> is no reality in the absence of observation; 2. Observation
> creates reality . "You create your own reality," is the theme of
> Fred Wolf's Taking the Quantum Leap.
>
> Which of the world's myriad processes qualify as observations?
> What special feature of an observation endows it with the power
> to create reality?

Here we have another example of the philosophical flavor the whole thing.
There is a well known issue - what is called the collapse of the wave
function - the issue being exactly what can be counted as an observation and
what property does it posses that collapses a wave function. But linking
such to a problem with 'reality' is something else again - something not
necessarily suggested by the facts. Because we do not know exactly what
counts as an observation does not mean we in principle have a problem - it
means no more and no less than the theory in mute on the issue. However
recent investigations into the phenomena of decoherence has clarified a lot
about what is happening. For example primary state diffusion is a possible
answer and may in fact be experimentally verifiable -
http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/9508021

> Questions like these split the
> observer-created reality school into several camps, but all
> generally subscribe to quantum theorist John Wheeler's memorable
> maxim for separating what is real in the world from what is not.
> "No elementary phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is an
> observed phenomenon," Wheeler proclaims. Without a doubt,
> Mermin's description of the inconstant moon qualifies him for
> membership in the observer-created reality school.

It depends on the context Wheeler meant by 'real'. I take it to mean as
registered in controlled experiments.

>
> The belief that reality is observer-created is commonplace in
> philosophy, where it serves as the theme for various forms of
> idealism. Bertrand Russell recalls his fascination with idealism
> during his student days at Trinity College: "In this philosophy I
> found comfort for a time . . . There was a curious pleasure in
> making oneself believe that time and space are unreal, that
> matter is an illusion and that the world really consist of
> nothing but mind."
>
> Since pondering matter is their bread and butter, not many
> physicists would share Russell's enjoyment of matter as mere
> mirage. However, like it or not, through their conscientious
> practice of quantum theory more than a few physicists have
> strayed within hailing distance of the idealist's dreamworld.

I suggest only to those who want to read more into the evidence than is
required.

Basically that seems to be the slant of the whole article - a desire to read
more into the facts than the evidence indicates. It might be good for
selling popular books on the subject (and I seem to recall buying and
reading a copy of Herbert's book ages ago) but not necessarily about being
balanced.

For brevity rest snipped - not because it is rubbish but purely because I do
not think it would serve any purpose examining the same theme over and over
ie reading more into the facts than is warranted.

For a modern take on an interpretation that resolves most if not all the
issues see http://quantum.phys.cmu.edu/histories.html

Thanks
Bill

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