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extreme


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Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?)
#26952161 - 09/24/20 04:42 AM (3 years, 4 months ago) |
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I'm not sure if this is the ideal place for this question since physics isn't technically a part of this sub-forum, but I feel like a lot of educated and intelligent minds post here and this may possibly fall into a sort of metaphysical question which is in part philosophy, I think. ** Editing now after I wrote this following paragraph - it's mostly personal you can skip this one (err 2) upcoming paragraph(s) if you want to get to my analogy **
Anyway I'll try to spare all of the personal fluff that's not really important and would just make this more unreadable, so I'll try to be direct, although this analogy made sense to me because it IS somewhat personal. Basically I woke up from a dream (which didn't have much to do with quantum mechanics; it's more that I just had a fresh mind to think about things). Anyway this analogy came to me pretty quickly after awakening. Some of the things I'm trying to tie my analogy to are experiments like the Double Slit, and ideas such as superposition, interpretations of the wave function/collapse, what is actually happening and how to "intuitively" understand it (as good as quantum mechanics will allow... I've always liked astronomy and a pretty simple analogy, although obviously not capturing its full complexity, is the bowling ball on a trampoline as warped spacetime in general relativity, or the "light clock" for special relativity).
Anyway some of those thought experiments, again while extremely rudimentary and surely not capturing the entire ideas, at least can HELP the average person sort of get an idea of what is actually going on at the speed of light, or with very massive bodies, etc. But until the last few months I'd always kept some distance between myself and QM because it was just so bizarre and hard for me to truly wrap my head around and make sense of in like a tangible way. I've never really heard a good analogy for it so it's always been sort of mystical and I don't know, esoteric I guess. Alas my mildly unquenchable thirst of curiosity for the way things truly are at a fundamental level goes back a long time so it was really about time I started getting into QM.
So my analogy I randomly came up with goes like this. If for you you'd like to substitute personal details so it makes more sense to you go ahead I'm more focused on making sense of the idea. Anyway...
My roommates (observers) watch me (particle/wave/photon/electron/quantum thing) leave for work around midnight, 20 nights in a month. They then immediately go to sleep and stay asleep. The times I get back home are something like a bell curve/normal distribution but with dips in the odd minutes between each hour (so like 2:22, 2:30, 2:53 etc) to make things simpler and to be like the probability distribution of a quantum wave function (again think double slit experiment). Say I get home at 1 AM three times, 2 AM four times, 3 AM five times, 4 AM four times, 5 AM three times, then I worked late one night and get home 6 AM one time. So a chart would be like:
Time - # of times arriving home - probability..? 1 AM - 3 - .15 2 AM - 4 - .2 3 AM - 5 - .25 4 AM - 4 - .2 5 AM - 3 - .15 6 AM - 1 - .05
Since it's a small sample size and I wanted an easy 20 times for the data set just pretend if I was scheduled to work the next night I got sent home right away or they told me I could have a day off or something to counterbalance the last .05 at the end at 6 AM and just say I didn't go to work and make that 1 out of 21 the same way 6 AM would then also be 1/21. I just came up with these #'s quickly in my head though so any imperfections just ignore it's about the idea and the crux of my idea/question is as follows:
So my roommates, who are the outside observers/experimenters/measurement taking apparatus, don't know when I'll be coming home until I get home and wake them up or something. That is when I become a little blip on the board behind the slits after being sent through the slits (being at work I guess). Now, while my roommates are asleep, in the normal modern everyday macro world the universe doesn't disappear and I am in fact at work. But if I were a quantum particle/wave, what would I be "doing" at those different hours of the night, would I be in some superposition of all the possible positions on the board (times to arrive home from work) based on probabilities? On any given night, could my roommates expect me to get done working at 3 AM (.25 probability, the "middle/largest wave" in the double slit experiment) and if I'm not done at that time, does that quantum single version of me, as a single photon or whatever, not exist? Does it exist in a different version of the universe where all the possibilities happened like in many worlds? Is this entire example completely meaningless and there is absolutely no way to "make sense" of what is actually happening in quantum mechanics with something like the Copenhagen Interpretation? Again if the specifics of this analogy are kinda weird this is just the first thing I thought of when I woke up that actually made some sense to me so I ran with it, so feel free to adjust to your own sleep schedule, your own macro "observer," going to the movies instead of work or not going anywhere and just performing a certain task... whatever.
Let me know if you think this analogy makes any sense or actually kind of works, in a simple way, and if you're more knowledgeable about QM than I am (I'm sure there are many of you here) feel free to tweak the parts I got wrong or left out as long as at least part of it is on the right track. I feel like there were a few more things I could have added, but this is a pretty long post as is so I think I'll just leave it as is for whatever that's worth and see if it resonates with anyone or anyone understands what I'm trying to get at or ask, even if it's completely wrong. Any corrections that would make it better are more than welcome I just want to try to understand what is actually going on down there in the quantum world if I can... even if it's only the quantum-iest bit (ha get it? )
"If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't understand quantum mechanics" - was just thinking of this popular quote by Richard Feynman and it's actually really clever I'm not sure if it's intended or not but the sort of "uncertainty" of understanding QM could maybe be a reference to the nature of QM itself and its literal uncertainty at fully knowing two or more traits of a particle/wave at one time? That's what the gist of the uncertainty principle is yea? If you know the spin, you can't know the momentum, or something like that? And like in my analogy you also can't understand where a particle would be until it is measured; until then it could be anywhere based solely on probability of being in a certain place, right? If I'm way off on some of this I'm sorry, I genuinely only started researching QM within the past few moths really so I'm still very new to most of this.
PS this quote also by Feynman is just golden, and spot on I'd say "Physics is to math what sex is to masturbation."
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redgreenvines
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: extreme]
#26952263 - 09/24/20 07:16 AM (3 years, 4 months ago) |
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In the extreme microscopic world of molecules and atoms, and more so among subatomic particles including photons, the fabric of this universe becomes more vibratory and less of a particulate affair.
As we keep discovering subatomic particles by observing behaviors in controlled macro environments, like hadron colliders our resolution of the sub atomic world increases incrementally.
This is not like you getting home at different times on different days; it is more like you getting home at different times on the same day but not all of you all of the time.
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O667
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: extreme] 1
#26953685 - 09/24/20 11:46 PM (3 years, 4 months ago) |
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Based on my understanding (coming from a physical chemistry grad student), when an electron is observed it is in all possible places simultaneously until observed. When observed the probability distribution effectively collapses and it is definitively in a single space. This is why something like the dual slit experiment works, and part of what makes quantum mechanics so hard to understand. It seems to interact with time in some capacity, in that it simultaneously exists in every spot, performing every possible action at once. If you're familiar with the phrase-joke-thing of "time is a flat circle" it actually makes some semblance of sense.
Now for an electron with a clearly defined probability density, this problem is still technically impossible to definitively solve without looking, but we can get a pretty good idea in some cases.
In your analogy, you would be the electron, and being in every possible place is to the electron what performing EVERY possible action and set of actions you are physically capable of within the time frame. There is a possibility that you will be going on a spontaneous road trip, there is a possibility of you going to a skating rink and sliding on mayo you stole from a gas station. You would be considered doing all potential actions simultaneously in order to exist at all. The mayo thing may have an extremely low probability on the probability density scale of activities you could take relative to, say writing with your dominant hand, but both would be said to be happening concurrently. You can imagine images of yourself spreading out of your doorway, with the most recently occurring ones from the time you reenter being opaque and the initial ones being almost entirely transparent. Just massive paths of your image diverging at every single action you made the entire time you were gone.
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: O667]
#26956276 - 09/26/20 03:14 PM (3 years, 4 months ago) |
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Congratulations on post #1!
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The Blind Ass
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
#26956290 - 09/26/20 03:23 PM (3 years, 4 months ago) |
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(And)
Twas delightful!
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: extreme]
#26956330 - 09/26/20 03:54 PM (3 years, 4 months ago) |
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While interested and read up on as a non-mathematician, my first impression is that what applies on the quantum level does not operate on the macro level of human interactions. One is attempting to apply literally unimaginable processes (because there are no 'things' to image on the quantum level for one) regarding quanta, to a conventional reality governed by physics, chemistry, biology, social, cultural, anthropological and other complex systemic organizations. If one applies Ken Wilber's AQAL (All Quadrants All Levels) meta-model one is not merely comparing apples to oranges but one has run up against a juxtaposition like quantum mechanics vs. general relativity. Maybe this is a poor example.
The relevance of consciousness at the quantum level as well as on the macro levels may turn out to be a new kind of Constant that transcends (mathematically) the Constant C² as Einstein asserted. I do not mean human consciousness taken materialistically as some epiphenomenon of biology, a 'field effect' of neuronal bioelectrical signatures or an emergent phenomenon. I mean consciousness as a metaphysical (prior-to-physics) eternal substratum of existence. So simultaneity as in quantum entanglement in which interactive particles as great distances from each other may have nothing to do with the physical impossibility of exceeding the speed of light. The notion of unitary consciousness transcends temporality and does not have possess the dimension of spacial extension. Consciousness therefore does not suffuse the universe because it has no extension in space but operates from 'outside' or 'above' the physical universe so-to-speak.
IF and only IF consciousness is more fundamental than energy and matter and is the Eternal Ground from which energy-matter emerges, perhaps a Grand Unified Theory will appear that reconciles quantum reality with relativity. Such a theory would serve to explain both physical interactions that operate simultaneously as well as psychical interactions like clairvoyance (but which have yet to be tested at great enough physical distances, say between Earth and a moon of Jupiter where simultaneity would mean some other governing principle was operating. The psyche is not governed by physics and that thought is not a physical energy that 'moves' faster than light-speed).
Geez, does ANY of this make sense to anyone else but me?
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redgreenvines
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
#26957070 - 09/27/20 06:11 AM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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I still find that all projections of Quantum concepts relate to events at sub atomic scale, and that the details of it are based upon the particular time slice being observed/considered.
unfortunately people are extrapolating the "being observed" into issues related to consciousness, rather than "time slice" which more appropriately nails attributes into 'temporary' states.
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: redgreenvines]
#26957777 - 09/27/20 05:26 PM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
redgreenvines said: I still find that all projections of Quantum concepts relate to events at sub atomic scale, and that the details of it are based upon the particular time slice being observed/considered.
unfortunately people are extrapolating the "being observed" into issues related to consciousness, rather than "time slice" which more appropriately nails attributes into 'temporary' states.
I am not understanding how you are attributing a temporal aspect to the notion of observation, but I will not pretend that this is any area I am competent in. Human consciousness is very much bound up with space-time even if the Ground of consciousness is atemporal. My intuitive take is that consciousness is a Ground of Being and humans 'constellate' this Ground in such a way as the otherwise unconscious Ground becomes self-conscious, self-aware within the parameters of a human being. That said, an observing human being may shape things at the quantum level in a way analogous to the way massive bodies shape ('deform') the homogeneity of space-time. In other words, human beings have a certain 'gravitas' or palpable presence at the quantum level as we constellate/concentrate the unconscious Ground of Being into self-conscious awareness. I promise I'm not trying to be obtuse.
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redgreenvines
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
#26958398 - 09/28/20 07:14 AM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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to not seem obtuse, remove all references to quantum in your poetic description of consciousness.
the observer effect that collapses the wave to a particle is mistakenly attributed to consciousness but this effect is consistent with the kinds of field disturbances imposed when any detector 'observes' electrons or photons passing through a 1 micron opening.
the truth in this observer effect is that an observer device that does not in some way alter the fields around the 1 micron opening has not yet been invented. Its significance has been blown way out of proportion as regards science and consciousness.
the detector is not conscious, but you could poetically call it an extension of the experimenter's consciousness.
the overall import of quantum science is not about consciousness but it is about matter and energy, and the reality is that the smallest components of atoms and energy have characteristics that are both particulate and wave-like.
each year we get closer to understanding that a field related to space, time, and gravity is at play which enables a localized concentration of wave activity whose field imparts the characteristics of particles which are localized instantiations of attributes of both wave-ness and particulate-ness.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observer_effect_(physics) many links on web if googled or binged or duckgoed
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: redgreenvines]
#26959655 - 09/29/20 02:16 AM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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I really must remain dualist at this level of discourse because (1) physics and quantum mechanics is not an area of competence and (2) consciousness is a non-physical phenomenon which should not be conflated with physical parameters until or unless a new paradigm emerges unifying physics and psyche. Too much Star Trek: Next Generation influence.
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redgreenvines
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
#26959935 - 09/29/20 08:56 AM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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I am not so positronic about that, but ok.
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: redgreenvines]
#26960289 - 09/29/20 12:42 PM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
redgreenvines said: I am not so positronic about that, but ok.
Quote:
redgreenvines said: I am not so positronic about that, but ok.
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: MarkostheGnostic]
#26960313 - 09/29/20 01:05 PM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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# Team Deep Space 9
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thealienthatategod
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: extreme]
#26960675 - 09/29/20 04:38 PM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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if you take a molecule for example, a molecule deciphers and interprets the wave's energy as a mathematical function, which is in turn produces a mathematical answer that matches the energy signature.
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redgreenvines
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absurd
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: redgreenvines]
#26966540 - 10/02/20 07:18 PM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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Like Markos suggests it's above my head, but what little I know about QM suggests that we're still working with very simple procedures involving particles. I remember reading that small molecules might exhibit some QM behavior but there seems to be a grey area between physics and QM. There's also the idea of entanglement, which explains the building blocks of things, space, and time as relationships. So perhaps when the entanglement gets complex enough the potential for certain phenomena is diminished.
The Schrödinger's cat thought experiment was not a serious proposition, rather it was meant to suggest it was unreasonable for larger objects to exhibit such QM properties.
But what is the difference? Perhaps entanglement is the observation which "solidifies" a particles energy. In a cat for instance, the level of entanglement is so high that the fabric of the cat is the observer. In this case, observation does not take eyes or a mind, just the attention/entanglement of enough other particles.
As a layman this is what makes sense to me, and diminishes the mystical feel of QM. Just guessing though.
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redgreenvines
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Re: Quantum Mechanics Analogy Question (metaphysics?) [Re: Rahz]
#26967053 - 10/03/20 07:01 AM (3 years, 3 months ago) |
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I am really not a cat person, but I live with uncertainty all day long.
Until I see something, yeah it's all vibes; but Quantum mechanics is not a ting for me at my scale of interactions with the universe.
quantum computing - so far - is an investor/gambler's dream: using QC they hope to see all encrypted messages, have all our passwords, and we will own less of ourselves once again.
I have not managed to penetrate how entanglement enables such computation, so far it does not work.
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