4 ms·

It was indeed a good educational comic, but if you're reading between the lines you're still probably getting things wrong. And there aren't a lot of lines, so

It was indeed a good educational comic, but if you're reading between the lines you're still probably getting things wrong. And there aren't a lot of lines, so if you aren't reading between the lines you aren't getting a lot, period. Probably the best thing to take away is what you don't know. Scott Aaronson is one of the best in the field, though.

mikestew 7y ago
The parallels between Zen Buddhism and quantum anything has been striking to me lately. Not in every way, duh. But mainly "your classical concepts aren't going to work here" and "you nod your head, but you don't really get it yet." But perhaps the biggest parallel is that a lot of people, maybe most, get it way, way wrong starting out.
- dkarl 7y ago
  The comic kind of pokes fun at such parallels, especially in the final panel ("Quantum computing and consciousness are both weird and therefore equivalent,") but I think it's a common experience, and quantum physics in general becomes the canonical example because everybody has the same experience with it. Whereas with many other examples, two people might find different things intuitive or counter-intuitive, depending on their path to the subject. I've even seen a professor confuse an entire classroom by describing something as "counterintuitive" when it was completely straightforward from the perspective they had been taught the previous semester. Quantum mechanics can serve as the byword for needing to absorb an entirely new and counterintuitive set of concepts because everyone experiences it that way.
  - NoodleIncident 7y ago
    > "Quantum computing and consciousness are both weird and therefore equivalent," You call this "poking fun", but it's horrifyingly real: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind
  - Viliam1234 7y ago
    Many years ago, people believed that "magnetism" is the answer for mysteries of life and soul. These days, magnets are considered boring, so people updated to "quantum". Tomorrow... will it be string theory? The true secret of the soul is without any doubt hidden in the 13th dimension.
- aj7 7y ago
  First, do a couple of problems in elementary quantum mechanics. Then, see if still “strikes you lately.”
  - mikestew 7y ago
    That's unlikely to happen. Was there a point you were driving at?
    - mkl 7y ago
      Your comment seems like the kind of problem the comic is arguing against. To paraphrase the final panel: "Quantum computing and Zen Buddhism are easy to get completely wrong and therefore equivalent."
      - mikestew 7y ago
        Umm, no, that's not where I was going at all. But I guess I could see how it might be taken that way with a little squinting.
- mumblemumble 7y ago
  Hmm. I'm no physicist, but I'm a (lapsed) member of a Soto community, and once upon a time my best friend was working on a quantum computing project and occasionally tried to explain his work to me over cocktails. I think I see where you're going there - any attempt at a popular explanation seems doomed to failure. There's no real Cliff's Notes version, you just need to keep grinding through the work (staring at a wall on the one hand, staring at a chalkboard hanging from a wall on the other), and eventually it starts to make intuitive sense just through repeated exposure. Now it's starting to sound a bit like learning a new language, too. Stuff that tries to make it easy and approachable and bite-size like Duolingo just never seems to do the job; the success stories I know of (including my own) always involve accepting that it's going to be unpleasant and confusing for a while, keeping your nose against that grindstone, and giving your brain some time to rewire itself. That said, knowing physics, someone out there has already read this and interpreted it in some Chopraesque way that I can't even anticipate, and someone else is probably getting ready to downvote in reaction to some other Chopraesque interpretation I failed to read into my own words, so I probably should keep my mouth shut instead of posting. People get (understandably) twitchy about this topic. But, effit, I'm going to anyway. The only practical characteristic of HN karma is its combustibility.
  - jrochkind1 7y ago
    What's a Soto community? No luck googling.
    - mumblemumble 7y ago
      Soto is one of the major sects of Zen.
  - elec3647 7y ago
    Sounds like you’re describing a cult! Haha.
- empath75 7y ago
  Quantum mechanics is just math, and it’s possible to work the equations and get valid results even if you haven’t the slightest understanding of what any of it means. There’s no such parallel with Buddhism.

mikestew 7y ago

The parallels between Zen Buddhism and quantum anything has been striking to me lately. Not in every way, duh. But mainly "your classical concepts aren't going to work here" and "you nod your head, but you don't really get it yet." But perhaps the biggest parallel is that a lot of people, maybe most, get it way, way wrong starting out.

dkarl 7y ago
The comic kind of pokes fun at such parallels, especially in the final panel ("Quantum computing and consciousness are both weird and therefore equivalent,") but I think it's a common experience, and quantum physics in general becomes the canonical example because everybody has the same experience with it. Whereas with many other examples, two people might find different things intuitive or counter-intuitive, depending on their path to the subject. I've even seen a professor confuse an entire classroom by describing something as "counterintuitive" when it was completely straightforward from the perspective they had been taught the previous semester. Quantum mechanics can serve as the byword for needing to absorb an entirely new and counterintuitive set of concepts because everyone experiences it that way.
- NoodleIncident 7y ago
  > "Quantum computing and consciousness are both weird and therefore equivalent," You call this "poking fun", but it's horrifyingly real: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind
- Viliam1234 7y ago
  Many years ago, people believed that "magnetism" is the answer for mysteries of life and soul. These days, magnets are considered boring, so people updated to "quantum". Tomorrow... will it be string theory? The true secret of the soul is without any doubt hidden in the 13th dimension.
aj7 7y ago
First, do a couple of problems in elementary quantum mechanics. Then, see if still “strikes you lately.”
- mikestew 7y ago
  That's unlikely to happen. Was there a point you were driving at?
  - mkl 7y ago
    Your comment seems like the kind of problem the comic is arguing against. To paraphrase the final panel: "Quantum computing and Zen Buddhism are easy to get completely wrong and therefore equivalent."
    - mikestew 7y ago
      Umm, no, that's not where I was going at all. But I guess I could see how it might be taken that way with a little squinting.
mumblemumble 7y ago
Hmm. I'm no physicist, but I'm a (lapsed) member of a Soto community, and once upon a time my best friend was working on a quantum computing project and occasionally tried to explain his work to me over cocktails. I think I see where you're going there - any attempt at a popular explanation seems doomed to failure. There's no real Cliff's Notes version, you just need to keep grinding through the work (staring at a wall on the one hand, staring at a chalkboard hanging from a wall on the other), and eventually it starts to make intuitive sense just through repeated exposure. Now it's starting to sound a bit like learning a new language, too. Stuff that tries to make it easy and approachable and bite-size like Duolingo just never seems to do the job; the success stories I know of (including my own) always involve accepting that it's going to be unpleasant and confusing for a while, keeping your nose against that grindstone, and giving your brain some time to rewire itself. That said, knowing physics, someone out there has already read this and interpreted it in some Chopraesque way that I can't even anticipate, and someone else is probably getting ready to downvote in reaction to some other Chopraesque interpretation I failed to read into my own words, so I probably should keep my mouth shut instead of posting. People get (understandably) twitchy about this topic. But, effit, I'm going to anyway. The only practical characteristic of HN karma is its combustibility.
- jrochkind1 7y ago
  What's a Soto community? No luck googling.
  - mumblemumble 7y ago
    Soto is one of the major sects of Zen.
- elec3647 7y ago
  Sounds like you’re describing a cult! Haha.
empath75 7y ago
Quantum mechanics is just math, and it’s possible to work the equations and get valid results even if you haven’t the slightest understanding of what any of it means. There’s no such parallel with Buddhism.