Proving quantum mechanics wrong

[Davy]

Is the title of this book.

I know much of modern physics has been criticised by the objectivist community, so wondering whether anyone's read it? (I haven't, yet) the web site referred to doesn't exist unfortunately.

I know very little about QM, but the concept inherent in the Copenhagen interpretation (that randomness is "out there" and not a function of our knowledge) just seems wrong to me.

[BaalChatzaf]

Is the title of this book.

I know much of modern physics has been criticised by the objectivist community, so wondering whether anyone's read it? (I haven't, yet) the web site referred to doesn't exist unfortunately.

I know very little about QM, but the concept inherent in the Copenhagen interpretation (that randomness is "out there" and not a function of our knowledge) just seems wrong to me.

The way you prove quantum mechanics is wrong is to do experiments which have outcomes that differ from the theory and show that the anomalous outcome is not the result of instrumental error or to show that all conditions required by the theory have been met but the outcome is not as predicted.

One does not disprove a scientific theory with another theory. It takes a fact to to falsify a theory, not a principle or a philosophical claim.

So far the Standard Model, Quantum Electrodynamics, Quantum Chromodynamics have met every experimental test (of which millions have been done since the 1920s). While we cannot prove these theories will predict correct under all possible circumstance, neither has a contrary experiment been done and been vetted by independent confirmation. Which means the quantum theories could be wrong or deficient but that has yet to be shown.

Philosophic disputes have no place in science. Physicists gave up that crap after Newton's triumph.

So, if you can provided a reference to a falsifying experiment as described in a reputable scientific journal along with a detailed account of its confirmation, then pray do. If you can't your silence would be golden

By the way if a genuine falsification of any major quantum theory has been done it would a headline story in addition to being in the journals. Consider the the recent OPERA experiments which make a claim that the upper bound of speed for a massive body has been exceeded. The people who got this result after checking and double checking have asked the scientific community for a confirmation. If a confirmation is forthcoming it will take a while and even if the result is duplicated the job of falsification is not yet done. There has to be an effort to account for the anomaly and to test that.

Case in point: The discovery of anomalous motions of the planet Uranus might have implied Newton's law of gravitation was incorrect. But not so fast. Le Verrier and Couch-Adams produced a possible explanation -- another planet not yet seen! The unknown planet was searched for and found, so the anomaly was explained an in effect was yet another confirmation of Newton's law. Now fast forward some years. The motion of Mercury is anomalous. There is precession of the perihelion of its orbit which is not a consequence of the gravitational effects of the other known planets under Newton's law. Such a planet was postulated (a small planet even closer to the Sun than Mercury). A search was made. Not found. Later on it was shown that the perihelion of Venus precesses in a way not accounted for by the other known bodies and even by the hypothetical new planet. However Einstein provided an account not only for all know motions that have been verified by for the precessions as well. Why was Newton's law incorrect. Answer: Space and Time were not as Newton assumed. Einstein gave a better account for the shape of the space-time manifold. So his theory became the accepted theory of gravitation. It gave every experimentally correct prediction of Newton's theory and it also accounted for a prediction incorrectly made by Newton's theory.. Now that is how one falsifies theories.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited October 2, 2011 by BaalChatzaf

[BaalChatzaf]

Any major scientific declaration made in a non-scientific common sense manner is suspect. Particularly a declaration made about a scientific theory that has been experimentally confirmed again and again and again for nearly one hundred years by technology of ever increasing sophistication.

The appropriate place to announce major falsifications is in a scientific journal (not in the popular press) so that scientific experts can vet it, critique it and even confirm it (if the falsification is correct). Furthermore physics cannot be done in "commonsense" terms. The sub atomic world is little like the world of man-scale perception which is why its true nature was hidden from humans for so long. Atoms and subatomic particles and fields do not behave like anything you can see, hear, taste for feel with the bare senses. Examples of such a major possible finding was the recent OPERA findings (done in a scientific context first). The OPERA findings if thoroughly confirmed will cast serious doubts on Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity and send physicists back to their drawing boards and their blackboards. Confirmation of OPERA is still pending and will be for some time.

Pons and Flieicher anounded their cold fusion conclusions, not in a physics journal, but in the daily press. It was later demonstrated that their conclusions were erroneous. Had they published their findings as a note in say Physics D or some such refereed publication, other people in the field would have immediately attempted to replicate their findings. As it was many others attempted to replicate their finding and all such attempts produced negative results. In short P and F were wrong. It is not clear why they violated well established scientific protocol and went straight to the public popular press, whose reporters were not competent to judge their claims. Did they think that if enough people believed their results, that would make their results true? That is not the way physical science is done. Maybe sociology, maybe psychology, may be "political science" can be done that way. But none of these are genuine sciences.

Follow Lord Haldane's principle. "My own suspicion is that the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose" Much more is hidden from us than is perceived either directly or indirectly. That is why we have found out in the last 20 years or so that 4/5 of gravitating matter is hidden from our sight. Quite literally the case.

And never believe revolutionary scientific findings that are reported in the popular press and not published first in the journals.or arXiv. Real scientists, even when they are wrong, publish in the journals first. Crackpots go to the press or write books nearly devoid of mathematical material How many equations were in Floit's book?

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited October 2, 2011 by BaalChatzaf

[Selene]

[BaalChatzaf]

Is the title of this book.

I know much of modern physics has been criticised by the objectivist community, so wondering whether anyone's read it? (I haven't, yet) the web site referred to doesn't exist unfortunately.

I know very little about QM, but the concept inherent in the Copenhagen interpretation (that randomness is "out there" and not a function of our knowledge) just seems wrong to me.

Your buddy Randall B. Floit also believes time is absolute (as did Newton). This has been disproved empirically time and again (sic). Time does not exist in isolation, it is an integral part of the space-time manifold in which we all live. It has been shown that the behavior of clocks (which measure time intervals) differ according to their motion and the gravitational fields in which they operate.

The fact that Muons which are the product of secondary cosmic rays last long enough to get to the ground to be detect is experimental confirmation of the Lorentz transformation of the time co-ordinate. The decay of these particles is slowed down relative to an earth surface clock because they move at nearly the speed of light relative to the ground.

Why am I bringing this up. I infer that Floit's scientific judgement is at least questionable.

If I may offer some pieces of advice (which you do not have to take).

1. Be very wary of people who make revolutionary claims outside the normal protocols of confirmation.

2. Be very wary of people who appeal to -common sense-. Common sense, i.e. the set of rules and expectations we develop living at man size scales is a very poor guide to the way the world really works. The actions of the very large, the very small, the very fast and the very slow do not conform to common sense, they never have and they never will.

Aristotle's science is what we get from common sense and it is mostly wrong.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[BaalChatzaf]

Is the title of this book.

I know much of modern physics has been criticised by the objectivist community, so wondering whether anyone's read it? (I haven't, yet) the web site referred to doesn't exist unfortunately.

I know very little about QM, but the concept inherent in the Copenhagen interpretation (that randomness is "out there" and not a function of our knowledge) just seems wrong to me.

"Seems" is one of the most dangerous five letter words in the English language.

Perhaps you would like to see an experimental verification of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.

Please see:

http://pra.aps.org/abstract/PRA/v65/i3/e032109

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1993AmJPh..61..560D

http://www.nature.com/nphys/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nphys2048.html

Enjoy.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Dennis Hardin]

The way you prove quantum mechanics is wrong is to do experiments which have outcomes that differ from the theory and show that the anomalous outcome is not the result of instrumental error or to show that all conditions required by the theory have been met but the outcome is not as predicted.

One does not disprove a scientific theory with another theory. It takes a fact to to falsify a theory, not a principle or a philosophical claim.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Not true, Bob. Has something suddenly inspired you to mount a campaign against reason and reality? First you seem to want to not deny that existence exists. Now this nonsense.

Here's an example of a “scientific theory”:

According to the many experts however, space didn't exist prior to the Big Bang. Back in the late '60s and early '70s, when men first walked upon the moon, "three British astrophysicists, Steven Hawking, George Ellis, and Roger Penrose turned their attention to the Theory of Relativity and its implications regarding our notions of time. In 1968 and 1970, they published papers in which they extended Einstein's Theory of General Relativity to include measurements of time and space. According to their calculations, time and space had a finite beginning that corresponded to the origin of matter and energy." The singularity didn't appear in space; rather, space began inside of the singularity. Prior to the singularity, nothing existed, not space, time, matter, or energy - nothing. So where and in what did the singularity appear if not in space? We don't know. We don't know where it came from, why it's here, or even where it is. All we really know is that we are inside of it and at one time it didn't exist and neither did we.

This quote is from Big Bang Theory.com

Note: I am using the above explanation as an example of an invalid 'scientific theory.' Whether or not it is an accurate representation of the Big Band Theory is beside the point.

The idea that existence suddenly sprang forth out of nothingness is absurd on its face. The book of Genesis is not an empirical foundation for a scientific theory. Nothing is nothing. As that great philosopher Gertrude Stein one said, there is no there there. Something cannot proceed causelessly from nonexistence. The whole theory contradicts the axiomatic concepts of existence, identity and causality, upon which all human knowledge is based. Keep in mind that an axiom refutes its opponents because they are required to use it in the act of denying it. Once you start making knowledge claims that contradict everything else we know, you have removed yourself from the realm of serious discussion.

True science requires that scientists use a rational methodology founded in sound epistemology. If it doesn't – if a given scientific theory is riddled with contradictions, as is the case with much of modern physics – then philosophy can veto such a theory on the self-evident philosophical premise that contradictions cannot exist.

I suppose we should qualify that by saying that contradictions cannot exist in reality. Clearly, many people (present company included) have no problem whatever maintaining contradictions inside their heads.

[BaalChatzaf]

The Big Bang Theory ( modified to allow for an initial "overexpansion", Guth's modification) has yet to be disproved by empirical means. So far the predictions made have been experimentally confirmed. In particular the predictions of the cosmic back-ground radiation have withstood experimental test.

Here is what Big Bang predicted :

Huge advances in Big Bang cosmology were made in the late 1990s and the early 21st century as a result of major advances in telescope technology in combination with large amounts of satellite data, such as that from COBE and the Hubble Space Telescope. In 2003, NASA's WMAP took more detailed pictures of the universe by means of the cosmic microwave background radiation. The images can be interpreted to indicate that the universe is 13.7 billion years old (within one percent error) and that the Lambda-CDM model and the inflationary theory are correct. No other cosmological theory can yet explain such a wide range of observed parameters, from the ratio of the elemental abundances in the early Universe to the structure of the cosmic microwave background, the observed higher abundance of active galactic nuclei in the early Universe and the observed masses of clusters of galaxies.^{[citation needed]}

(from the Wikipedia Article).

There have been other theories proposed. See the theory proposed by Steinhardt and Turok. That put the big bang as an intermediate event, preceded by the interaction of branes. Their theory can be falsified by the existence of gravitational waves.

Facts refute theories,. Theories do not refute theories.

If you wish to falsify the BBT come up with a prediction BBT makes that is not experimentally confirmed. That is how you do it. Invoking philosophical purity is an exercise in hot air.

The original BBT has been falsified and replaced by a modified BBT (For example, Guth's modification) which postulates initial expansion at greater than light speed. This initially inflationary expansion let off in a very short time so the speed of light has been constant for most of the time since the beginning event.

The merit of a scientific theory resides primarily in its ability to make correct predictions. Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists. Experimental verification is. The modifications to BBT or its rejection will be the result of experiments and observations, not philosophical disputations.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Davy]

I haven't read the book, but Floit doesn't seem to be suggesting that he is merely advancing an alternative theory:

"With this book, I dispute those EPR-Bell proofs with simple logic, and provide in this book the experiments that will demonstrate which is correct."

Maybe the title is misleading, in the same way that saying Newtonian mechanics is "wrong" would be misleading. Newton wasn't wrong, it's just that his model turned out to be valid only within a limited domain, so the theory was incomplete rather than wrong.

In any case, no-one is disputing that the mathematical machinery of QM is not correct (it's amazingly accurate), but there is much disagreement regarding the interpretations (what are the wider implications for the nature of reality).

The wikipedia entry on interpretations of quantum mechanics says:

No experimental evidence exists that distinguishes among these interpretations. To that extent, the physical theory stands, and is consistent with itself and with reality; difficulties arise only when one attempts to "interpret" the theory. Nevertheless, designing experiments which would test the various interpretations is the subject of active research.

[BaalChatzaf]

I haven't read the book, but Floit doesn't seem to be suggesting that he is merely advancing an alternative theory:

"With this book, I dispute those EPR-Bell proofs with simple logic, and provide in this book the experiments that will demonstrate which is correct."

Maybe the title is misleading, in the same way that saying Newtonian mechanics is "wrong" would be misleading. Newton wasn't wrong, it's just that his model turned out to be valid only within a limited domain, so the theory was incomplete rather than wrong.

In any case, no-one is disputing that the mathematical machinery of QM is not correct (it's amazingly accurate), but there is much disagreement regarding the interpretations (what are the wider implications for the nature of reality).

The wikipedia entry on interpretations of quantum mechanics says:

No experimental evidence exists that distinguishes among these interpretations. To that extent, the physical theory stands, and is consistent with itself and with reality; difficulties arise only when one attempts to "interpret" the theory. Nevertheless, designing experiments which would test the various interpretations is the subject of active research.

Physicists do theories. Interpretations are for their right brain moments. When a physicist does a prediction he is exercising a -theory-, not an interpretation. When a physicist does a prediction he is doing the following the rule: shut up and calculate. It is the -theory- to be tested, not the interpretation.

The various flavors of quantum theory qua theories have yet to be falsified by empirical means. So far, they are right, so far they work, and so far they have not been falsified. In addition to producing correct predictions (or properly constrained retrodictions) quantum physics has grounded just about every technology you and I use. You will notice first and foremost that the technology works, and it works superlatively. The working of the technology derived from the physics is yet another indirect confirmation of the underlying theory. That fact that your transistor radio or your computer works as advertised is confirmation of the underlying theory, just as the fact that GPS locates us correctly is a further confirmation of the theories of relativity (special and general).

You will also notice that quantum physics in its many aspects and flavors has been fact driven from the git go. Unlike Einstein's theories of relativity which are derived from principle, rather than particular fact, quantum theory was invented by Planck to account for the -fact- that when you open up a furnace door or heat a piece of steel until it glows you are not bathed by x-rays and you don't die from radiation poisoning. Planck run right up against the principle of equipartitioning of radiated energy which is a direct consequence of the classic view that energy is continuous. It isn't. The only way he could account for black-body radiation -at all frequencies- (-at all wave lengths-) was to assume the quantum of action. This immediately led to counter-intuitive results but Planck courageously stayed the course. Subsequent extensions of the quantum view were equally fact driven. The main fact is this: classical physics at the atomic scale DOES NOT WORK. Quantum physics was invented out of factual necessity, not philosophical purity.

The looseness of a priori philosophical constraint is one of the reasons why modern physics works, as opposed to the physical theories of Aristotle which were trainwrecks. Aristotle worked from first principle philosophically and he failed. Modern physicists start with the facts and they succeeded

Ba'al Chataf

[anthony]

I haven't read the book, but Floit doesn't seem to be suggesting that he is merely advancing an alternative theory: "With this book, I dispute those EPR-Bell proofs with simple logic, and provide in this book the experiments that will demonstrate which is correct." Maybe the title is misleading, in the same way that saying Newtonian mechanics is "wrong" would be misleading. Newton wasn't wrong, it's just that his model turned out to be valid only within a limited domain, so the theory was incomplete rather than wrong. In any case, no-one is disputing that the mathematical machinery of QM is not correct (it's amazingly accurate), but there is much disagreement regarding the interpretations (what are the wider implications for the nature of reality). The wikipedia entry on interpretations of quantum mechanics says: No experimental evidence exists that distinguishes among these interpretations. To that extent, the physical theory stands, and is consistent with itself and with reality; difficulties arise only when one attempts to "interpret" the theory. Nevertheless, designing experiments which would test the various interpretations is the subject of active research.

The more I find out, the less I know, about QM.

It works, but nobody knows how, or why.

Looks like stumbling in the dark - but physicists have to go through it, until some simple or brilliant breakthrough is made.

In the mean time, we should suspend reason and reality? Specifically, the Law of non-Contradiction? I don't think so.

An analogy could be made with the comprehension of gravity in ancient times :- things - fall - down.

Tony

Edited October 3, 2011 by whYNOT

[BaalChatzaf]

I haven't read the book, but Floit doesn't seem to be suggesting that he is merely advancing an alternative theory: "With this book, I dispute those EPR-Bell proofs with simple logic, and provide in this book the experiments that will demonstrate which is correct." Maybe the title is misleading, in the same way that saying Newtonian mechanics is "wrong" would be misleading. Newton wasn't wrong, it's just that his model turned out to be valid only within a limited domain, so the theory was incomplete rather than wrong. In any case, no-one is disputing that the mathematical machinery of QM is not correct (it's amazingly accurate), but there is much disagreement regarding the interpretations (what are the wider implications for the nature of reality). The wikipedia entry on interpretations of quantum mechanics says: No experimental evidence exists that distinguishes among these interpretations. To that extent, the physical theory stands, and is consistent with itself and with reality; difficulties arise only when one attempts to "interpret" the theory. Nevertheless, designing experiments which would test the various interpretations is the subject of active research.

The more I find out, the less I know, about QM.

It works, but nobody knows how, or why.

Looks like stumbling in the dark - but physicists have to go through it, until some simple or brilliant breakthrough is made.

In the mean time, we should suspend reason and reality? I don't think so.

An analogy could be made with the comprehension of gravity in ancient times :- things - fall - down.

Tony

Yup. An computers work.

Pertaining to gravitation, Newton did not know its cause, and who would not frame a hypothesis to its causes, but he came up with a force law that was consistent with experiment for 300 years. Newton did not let philosophical purity stop him for a second.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Davy]

Ba'al, I'm not sure what you mean by 'philosophical purity'. Do you think that (some) Objectivists are misplaced in their criticism of modern physics, or do you just think it's irrelevant?

[Dennis Hardin]

Ba'al, I'm not sure what you mean by 'philosophical purity'. Do you think that (some) Objectivists are misplaced in their criticism of modern physics, or do you just think it's irrelevant?

Based on his response to my prior post ("Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists"), Bob seems to be saying that if scientists theorize that something suddenly sprang forth from nothing, he is fine with that. The theory still has to be 'empirically disproven.' (I made clear that I was not addressing the Big Bang Theory itself, but one interpretation of it.)

Once someone declares that they have no problem with contradictions, a rational person has to evaluate whether further discussion is likely to be worthwhile.

[BaalChatzaf]

Ba'al, I'm not sure what you mean by 'philosophical purity'. Do you think that (some) Objectivists are misplaced in their criticism of modern physics, or do you just think it's irrelevant?

Based on his response to my prior post ("Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists"), Bob seems to be saying that if scientists theorize that something suddenly sprang forth from nothing, he is fine with that. The theory still has to be 'empirically disproven.' (I made clear that I was not addressing the Big Bang Theory itself, but one interpretation of it.)

Once someone declares that they have no problem with contradictions, a rational person has to evaluate whether further discussion is likely to be worthwhile.

Contradictions? A Contradiction is an assertion of the form P & -P. How is the statement event E has no cause a contradiction? It is a statement that one hesitates to believe, but is does not have the form of a contradiction.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Xray]

Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists. Experimental verification is. The modifications to BBT or its rejection will be the result of experiments and observations, not philosophical disputations.

Ba'al Chatzaf

These crucial statements cannot be refuted.

In ancient times, it was claimed "Philosophia Ancilla Theologiae".

In our time, philosophy seems to have found a new master: Science.

Is it "Philosophia Ancilla Scientiae" now?

Edited October 3, 2011 by Xray

[Dennis Hardin]

Ba'al, I'm not sure what you mean by 'philosophical purity'. Do you think that (some) Objectivists are misplaced in their criticism of modern physics, or do you just think it's irrelevant?

Based on his response to my prior post ("Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists"), Bob seems to be saying that if scientists theorize that something suddenly sprang forth from nothing, he is fine with that. The theory still has to be 'empirically disproven.' (I made clear that I was not addressing the Big Bang Theory itself, but one interpretation of it.)

Once someone declares that they have no problem with contradictions, a rational person has to evaluate whether further discussion is likely to be worthwhile.

Contradictions? A Contradiction is an assertion of the form P & -P. How is the statement event E has no cause a contradiction? It is a statement that one hesitates to believe, but is does not have the form of a contradiction.

Ba'al Chatzaf

The statement that something has no cause is not itself a contradiction. The universe itself had no cause. The statement that nothing existed prior to something is a contradiction. Nothing is not an alternative existent to something. Nothing does not exist. The contradiction has to do with your use of the concept nothing as if (a) it could exist and (b) it could be magically transformed into something.

Symbolically, this means you are saying: P (= "Nothing is the absence of something") & -P (= "Nothing is something")

[Dennis Hardin]

Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists. Experimental verification is. The modifications to BBT or its rejection will be the result of experiments and observations, not philosophical disputations.

Ba'al Chatzaf

These crucial statements cannot be refuted.

In ancient times, it was claimed "Philosophia Ancilla Theologiae".

In our time, philosophy seems to have found a new master: Science.

Is it "Philosophia Ancilla Scientiae" now?

"Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists" translates to "eliminating contradictions from scientific theories" is of no consequence to physicists.

Statements which endorse contradictions are self-refuting.

[Xray]

The statement that something has no cause is not itself a contradiction. The universe itself had no cause.

But how can we definitely know that it had no cause?

Edited October 3, 2011 by Xray

[BaalChatzaf]

Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists. Experimental verification is. The modifications to BBT or its rejection will be the result of experiments and observations, not philosophical disputations.

Ba'al Chatzaf

These crucial statements cannot be refuted.

In ancient times, it was claimed "Philosophia Ancilla Theologiae".

In our time, philosophy seems to have found a new master: Science.

Is it "Philosophia Ancilla Scientiae" now?

"Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists" translates to "eliminating contradictions from scientific theories" is of no consequence to physicists.

Not true. An honest to goodness contradiction, i.e. a statement of the form P & -P makes it possible to infer -any- conclusion from the postulates of a theory. If this is the case prediction is meaningless. A scientific wannabe theory with a genuine contradiction at its heart is no theory at all since prediction would be impossible. Logical inconsistency shoots a theory down forthwith.

The assertion that E has no cause is NOT a formal contradiction. Why? It is NOT of the form P & -P.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Ba'al, I'm not sure what you mean by 'philosophical purity'. Do you think that (some) Objectivists are misplaced in their criticism of modern physics, or do you just think it's irrelevant?

Based on his response to my prior post ("Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists"), Bob seems to be saying that if scientists theorize that something suddenly sprang forth from nothing, he is fine with that. The theory still has to be 'empirically disproven.' (I made clear that I was not addressing the Big Bang Theory itself, but one interpretation of it.)

Once someone declares that they have no problem with contradictions, a rational person has to evaluate whether further discussion is likely to be worthwhile.

Contradictions? A Contradiction is an assertion of the form P & -P. How is the statement event E has no cause a contradiction? It is a statement that one hesitates to believe, but is does not have the form of a contradiction.

Ba'al Chatzaf

The statement that something has no cause is not itself a contradiction. The universe itself had no cause. The statement that nothing existed prior to something is a contradiction. Nothing is not an alternative existent to something. Nothing does not exist. The contradiction has to do with your use of the concept nothing as if (a) it could exist and (b) it could be magically transformed into something.

Symbolically, this means you are saying: P (= "Nothing is the absence of something") & -P (= "Nothing is something")

You're conflating the universe with the totality of existence. The two may be a perfect fit and exactly the same thing; maybe not . .

--Brant

[Brant Gaede]

Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists. Experimental verification is. The modifications to BBT or its rejection will be the result of experiments and observations, not philosophical disputations.

Ba'al Chatzaf

These crucial statements cannot be refuted.

In ancient times, it was claimed "Philosophia Ancilla Theologiae".

In our time, philosophy seems to have found a new master: Science.

Is it "Philosophia Ancilla Scientiae" now?

"Philosophical purity is of no consequence to physicists" translates to "eliminating contradictions from scientific theories" is of no consequence to physicists.

Statements which endorse contradictions are self-refuting.

Not to mention that science itself is full of great disputations; never mind philosophy.

--Brant

[Dennis Hardin]

The statement that something has no cause is not itself a contradiction. The universe itself had no cause.

But how can we definitely know that it had no cause?

I'm taking "the universe" as referring to the totality of everything that exists. For the totality of everything to have a cause, there would have to be something outside (or prior to) the totality of everything, which is obviously absurd. You can't get outside of existence--you can only cease to be a part of it.

[Davy]

It seems to me that you can't avoid some kind of philosophical position; some interpretation is always implied. By advocating "shut up and calculate", with regard to QM, doesn't that imply that the universe is nothing but a mathematical structure? that's absurd.

The physicists who pioneered QM seem to have dogmatically rejected identity, causality and non-contradiction. Other interpretations (such as that of De Broglie) were met with unreasonable hostility.

One of my pet peeves is the way that the new age brigade have latched on to this interpretation and used it to peddle their bullshit. In one of the replies to that article, Dr Pamela Gerloff says:

In my worldview, *nothing* is "definitely real." Everything I experience in the external world is of my own interpretation and construction. Everything in life is subjective. (Even scientists have noticed that the observer influences whether a subatomic entity appears as a wave or a particle, so this part should not really seem so strange.)

So you create your own reality; QM proves it!

[Selene]

The physicists who pioneered QM seem to have dogmatically rejected identity, causality and non-contradiction. Other interpretations (such as that of De Broglie) were met with unreasonable hostility.

One of my pet peeves is the way that the new age brigade have latched on to this interpretation and used it to peddle their bullshit. In one of the replies to that article, Dr Pamela Gerloff says:

In my worldview, *nothing* is "definitely real." Everything I experience in the external world is of my own interpretation and construction. Everything in life is subjective. (Even scientists have noticed that the observer influences whether a subatomic entity appears as a wave or a particle, so this part should not really seem so strange.)

So you create your own reality; QM proves it!

Davy:

This is essentially the gestalt that is posited in the film, http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/what-the-bleep-do-we-know/.

This film plunges you into a world where quantum uncertainty is demonstrated – where neurological processes, and perceptual shifts are engaged and lived by its protagonist – where everything is alive, and reality is changed by every thought.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramtha%27s_School_of_Enlightenment this approach was developed by these folks.

Have you seen the "documentary?"

Adam