5 ms·

I can only see the introduction, but it already shows some confused thinking. Whether something exists, and whether you call it X only because there are humans

I can only see the introduction, but it already shows some confused thinking. Whether something exists, and whether you call it X only because there are humans who call it X, those are two different things. On a planet without humans, stones exists, but no one is there to call them "stones". So they don't really exist, is that what the article is trying to tell me? Also, the stones do not exist, because only atoms exist, mwa-ha-ha-ha! Or maybe just someone equivocates "exists" and "is not made of smaller components". The example with red color, again confuses "this object reflects red light" with "there is an eye that perceives the reflected red light". Also, good point that things can't reflect red light if they are in complete darkness. Does anything of the above have anything in common with quantum physics? Would adding quantum physics to this confused thinking make it any more meaningful?

naringas 6y ago
> So they don't really exist > because only atoms exist but don't only exist because humans call them atoms?
meroes 6y ago
What about Dirac's words ~ there being a fundamental size where any experiment will disturb the subject non negligibly, thus science can never speak causally prior to quantum measurements. This has little to do with humans. The photon is irreducible yet is our (anyone's) smallest investigative tool. Would you ever modify the meaning of exits in this context? The planet with rocks could be traveled to by something physical. In QM, the causal relation is broken due to measurement by any physical object we know of, down to fundamental particles. If there is no physical setup -> it does not exist. Right? Or maybe Popper is 100% wrong?
- Viliam1234 6y ago
  > Or maybe Popper is 100% wrong? Maybe just not 100% right. That happens to many people. If we can't observe something directly, because a photon disturbs it, there may be other ways. Like, create the same situation thousand times, always throw one photon at it, make a statistics of how the photon deflects, and try to explain it. Or just find the simplest model that fits the known data, and assume that the parts you cannot observe directly still follow the model... simply because there is no good reason to assume they don't. If we take the logic of "if I can't verify it by experiment, it does not exist" too far, then Big Bang is also not real, because we can't replicate it in the lab. Actually, we should take quite seriously the idea that the universe was created at this very moment, because we can't create the yesterday in the lab either.
  - meroes 6y ago
    > because we can't create the yesterday in the lab either. We have access to memories of the past which are physical. Records in the rock strata of Earth's formation, neuronal connections in our brain of Grandma's barbecue and who was in attendance, red-shifted EM signals traveling since a few seconds after the big bang. The information of these processes and events is never lost. "The present is the key to the past" and such. Even every causal relation since t=0 could be worked back to arbitrary accuracy from t=n for a near-omnipotent civilization. One still following all laws of physics, just very advanced and capable. QM creates a novel situation imo where nothing, not even near-omnipotence, allows one to probe "pre-measurement". The very act of measuring causes something to occur. Scattering a photon or electron or proton with something is the smallest tool in quantum field theory, probably the most well studied near-fundamental theory in physics. There is no way in principle to ever probe pre-measurement because there is no disturbance-free way to observe. There is no sub-photon. There's nothing besides particles and fields to investigate with. There's no tool to build to improve things. The type of knowing in knowing the superposition of states pre-measumrent is not the same as knowing the past. We can arbitrarily improve tech to investigate the past to arbitrary degrees. The information of the past is out there, physically accessible to some kind of observer. In QM, there is no way to improve that lack of knowledge. It is forever inaccessible to any type of observer. If this still all exists for you, then what about the past? Why doesn't that exist? What notion of "exists" could you thread that denies the past's existence yet asserts the existence other inaccessibles? Surely there are kinds of existence in each of these ideas. (To be clear absolute size isn't the only motivator for QM, just one aspect of it).
    - Viliam1234 6y ago
      > The information of these processes and events is never lost. The photons we send to the atoms encoding the information about the past also cause disturbances, don't they?
weatherlight 6y ago
What I'm gathering from the introduction of the article is all properties are emergent behaviors that are particular to the observer. In the case of the stone, the atoms in the stone, observe and interact with each other, the atoms themselves come it being because of on the interaction of their subatomic particles.
vehemenz 6y ago
I don't see any confused thinking here. This is not run-of-the-mill ontological reductionism; this is a rejection of ontological realism, which nearly everyone takes for granted (including you, from the sound of it), but many philosophers do not. The connection between ontological anti-realism and relational quantum mechanics (Rovelli's brainchild) is pretty straightforward. I think Rovelli is arguing that the quantum measurement problem is only a problem if we assert things ontologically, in terms of what's exactly here and there, rather than an expression of a relation between the measuring device and the system.
- beaconstudios 6y ago
  This is interesting, does Rovelli lay these ideas out in a book? The idea that quantum mechanics are based in causality but not realism aligns closely with my own metaphysical beliefs based in an interpretation of idealism from a cybernetic (study of nonlinear causality) perspective. It would be interesting to hear his case.
  - vehemenz 6y ago
    The idea of RQM was a originally a paper by Rovelli. It is one of the major interpretations of quantum mechanics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_quantum_mechanics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_quantum_mechanics https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-relational/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-relational/
  - slibhb 6y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helgoland_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helgoland_(book)
beaconstudios 6y ago
the point is that what we call distinct objects are not inherently distinct - it is us that draw the distinctions. Also, that our labels for things are not labels of identity, but labels of function/purpose - if I point at an object and call it a "chair", what I am saying is that it can be sat on, not that "chair" summarises its inherent characteristics. The point being that base reality is not accessible to us, only our perceptions and interpretations of reality. We have no way of knowing what the reality is beyond our perceptions.

naringas 6y ago

> So they don't really exist > because only atoms exist but don't only exist because humans call them atoms?

meroes 6y ago

What about Dirac's words ~ there being a fundamental size where any experiment will disturb the subject non negligibly, thus science can never speak causally prior to quantum measurements. This has little to do with humans. The photon is irreducible yet is our (anyone's) smallest investigative tool. Would you ever modify the meaning of exits in this context? The planet with rocks could be traveled to by something physical. In QM, the causal relation is broken due to measurement by any physical object we know of, down to fundamental particles. If there is no physical setup -> it does not exist. Right? Or maybe Popper is 100% wrong?

Viliam1234 6y ago
> Or maybe Popper is 100% wrong? Maybe just not 100% right. That happens to many people. If we can't observe something directly, because a photon disturbs it, there may be other ways. Like, create the same situation thousand times, always throw one photon at it, make a statistics of how the photon deflects, and try to explain it. Or just find the simplest model that fits the known data, and assume that the parts you cannot observe directly still follow the model... simply because there is no good reason to assume they don't. If we take the logic of "if I can't verify it by experiment, it does not exist" too far, then Big Bang is also not real, because we can't replicate it in the lab. Actually, we should take quite seriously the idea that the universe was created at this very moment, because we can't create the yesterday in the lab either.
- meroes 6y ago
  > because we can't create the yesterday in the lab either. We have access to memories of the past which are physical. Records in the rock strata of Earth's formation, neuronal connections in our brain of Grandma's barbecue and who was in attendance, red-shifted EM signals traveling since a few seconds after the big bang. The information of these processes and events is never lost. "The present is the key to the past" and such. Even every causal relation since t=0 could be worked back to arbitrary accuracy from t=n for a near-omnipotent civilization. One still following all laws of physics, just very advanced and capable. QM creates a novel situation imo where nothing, not even near-omnipotence, allows one to probe "pre-measurement". The very act of measuring causes something to occur. Scattering a photon or electron or proton with something is the smallest tool in quantum field theory, probably the most well studied near-fundamental theory in physics. There is no way in principle to ever probe pre-measurement because there is no disturbance-free way to observe. There is no sub-photon. There's nothing besides particles and fields to investigate with. There's no tool to build to improve things. The type of knowing in knowing the superposition of states pre-measumrent is not the same as knowing the past. We can arbitrarily improve tech to investigate the past to arbitrary degrees. The information of the past is out there, physically accessible to some kind of observer. In QM, there is no way to improve that lack of knowledge. It is forever inaccessible to any type of observer. If this still all exists for you, then what about the past? Why doesn't that exist? What notion of "exists" could you thread that denies the past's existence yet asserts the existence other inaccessibles? Surely there are kinds of existence in each of these ideas. (To be clear absolute size isn't the only motivator for QM, just one aspect of it).
  - Viliam1234 6y ago
    > The information of these processes and events is never lost. The photons we send to the atoms encoding the information about the past also cause disturbances, don't they?

weatherlight 6y ago

What I'm gathering from the introduction of the article is all properties are emergent behaviors that are particular to the observer. In the case of the stone, the atoms in the stone, observe and interact with each other, the atoms themselves come it being because of on the interaction of their subatomic particles.

vehemenz 6y ago

I don't see any confused thinking here. This is not run-of-the-mill ontological reductionism; this is a rejection of ontological realism, which nearly everyone takes for granted (including you, from the sound of it), but many philosophers do not. The connection between ontological anti-realism and relational quantum mechanics (Rovelli's brainchild) is pretty straightforward. I think Rovelli is arguing that the quantum measurement problem is only a problem if we assert things ontologically, in terms of what's exactly here and there, rather than an expression of a relation between the measuring device and the system.

beaconstudios 6y ago
This is interesting, does Rovelli lay these ideas out in a book? The idea that quantum mechanics are based in causality but not realism aligns closely with my own metaphysical beliefs based in an interpretation of idealism from a cybernetic (study of nonlinear causality) perspective. It would be interesting to hear his case.
- vehemenz 6y ago
  The idea of RQM was a originally a paper by Rovelli. It is one of the major interpretations of quantum mechanics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_quantum_mechanics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_quantum_mechanics https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-relational/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-relational/
- slibhb 6y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helgoland_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helgoland_(book)

beaconstudios 6y ago

the point is that what we call distinct objects are not inherently distinct - it is us that draw the distinctions. Also, that our labels for things are not labels of identity, but labels of function/purpose - if I point at an object and call it a "chair", what I am saying is that it can be sat on, not that "chair" summarises its inherent characteristics. The point being that base reality is not accessible to us, only our perceptions and interpretations of reality. We have no way of knowing what the reality is beyond our perceptions.