Make Quantum Mechanics Work Again!

Image by Dmitry Buterin

“Useful as it is under everyday circumstances to say that the world exists “out there” independent of us, that view can no longer be upheld.” [7]

John Archibald Wheeler

Why don’t we have thermonuclear energy yet? Because quantum mechanics doesn’t work.

Why don’t we have teleportation yet? Because quantum mechanics doesn’t work.

Why haven’t we eradicated cancer yet? Because quantum mechanics doesn’t work.

Why don’t we have a quantum computer yet? Because quantum mechanics doesn’t work.

Why do we still age and die? Because quantum mechanics doesn’t work.

This list goes on and on.

Why doesn’t quantum mechanics work? Because as per Richard Feynman “nobody understands quantum mechanics.” [1]

Why does nobody understand quantum mechanics? Because according to Werner Heisenberg and Erwin Schrödinger, to understand quantum mechanics one has to reject objective reality [2,3].

Why doesn’t anyone give up objective reality? Because we perceive it as the only actual reality, but not just another theory.

Objective reality is a theory that helps us navigate the physical world and predict events which take place in it.

Quantum mechanics is a theory by which we can model the reality of knowledge as per Heisenberg [4,5] in order to predict events which take place in objective reality.

The reality of knowledge reaches far beyond the boundaries of objective reality as John Bell proved with his famous theorem. [6] Therefore with the help of quantum mechanics we can continue to expand the boundaries of our local knowledge into the limitless nonlocal reality of knowledge again as John Wheeler and Anton Zeilinger pointed out [7,8]. To do so we need to understand quantum mechanics in the same way as the first generation of its early adopters — Heisenberg, Schrödinger, Paul Dirac, Wolfgang Pauli, Eugene Wigner, George Gamow, John von Neumann, etc. — understood it.

Quantum reality is the reality of knowledge, not the microworld. The microworld is at the intersection of the reality of knowledge and objective reality. Therefore, quantum mechanics emerged precisely from the need to predict events in the microworld better than objective reality as a theory could do that.

A boundary exists between the reality of knowledge and objective reality, but not between the micro and macro worlds. It is an imaginary border because there’s only knowledge on both sides of this border. It just appears in different forms. The process of quantum measurement [7,9,10] and decoherence [11,12] show how objective reality can emerge from the reality of knowledge (yet not how the macro world emerges from the micro world).

The rejection of objective reality is an act of self-transcendence as described very similarly by very different thinkers of different epochs as an ancient vedic scholar Adi Shankara, a prominent American psychologist Abraham Maslow and a Russian philosopher Nicolas Berdyayev [13,14,15] because we believe in the objective reality of ourselves first and foremost. Perhaps we can accomplish this act as humanity, as a species, and not just as individuals. The elementary act of creation is not just measuring the position of a photon or an electron [7,8,9]. It is an act of human ascent. Therefore, I will perhaps conclude with the words of Berdyaev:

“The fundamental, original problem is the problem of man, the problem of human knowledge, human freedom, human creativity. The riddle of knowledge and the riddle of being are hidden in man. It is man who is that mysterious being in the world, inexplicable from the world, through whom alone a breakthrough to being itself is possible. Man is the bearer of meaning, although man is at the same time a fallen being, in whom meaning has been desecrated. But a fall is possible only from a height, and the very fall of man is a sign of his height, his greatness.”

References:

1. Feynman, Richard P. Probability and Uncertainty: the quantum mechanical view of nature, Messenger Lectures, 1964, MIT
2. Heisenberg, Werner (1971). Physics and Beyond: Encounters and Conversations. World Perspectives vol. 42. Translated by Pomerans, Arnold J. New York: Harper & Row.
3. Schrödinger, Erwin, The Present Status of Quantum Mechanics, Die Naturwissenschaften 1935. Volume 23, Issue 48.
4. Heisenberg, Werner, Philosophie — La manuscrit de 1942, translated from German and introduction by C. Chevalley, Seuil, Paris, 1998.
5. Heisenberg, Werner. The Physicist’s Conception of Nature. 1958. Hutchinson, London.
6. Bell, J.S. (1964). On the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox. Physics, 1, 195–200.
7. Wheeler, John Archibald. Law Without Law. Pages 182–213 in: Quantum Theory and Measurement. Edited by John Archibald Wheeler and Wojciech Hubert Zurek. Princeton Series in Physics Princeton University Press, 1983
8. Zeilinger, Anton. On the Interpretation and Philosophical Foundation of Quantum Mechanics. (2008).
9. W. Pauli’s letter to M. Born, in: A. Einstein, H. and M. Born, Briefwechsel 1916–1956, M. Born (Nymphenburger Verlagshandlung, München 1991). Cited from: Zeh, H. Dieter. The Wave Function: It or Bit? Science and Ultimate Reality, J.D. Barrow, P.C.W. Davies, and C.L. Harper Jr., edts. (Cambridge University Press, 2004), pp. 103–120
10. Neumann, John von, and Robert T. Beyer. Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics: New Edition. Edited by Nicholas A. Wheeler. NED-New edition. Princeton University Press, 2018. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1wq8zhp
11. Zeh, H.D. (1970): On the Interpretation of Measurement in Quantum Theory. Found.Phys. 1, 69
12. Zurek, W.H. (1981): Pointer basis of quantum apparatus: Into what mixture does the wave packet collapse? Phys. Rev. D24, 1516
13. Shankara, Adi, Non-correspondence Comprehension, cited by Zilberman, D.B., Revelation In Advaita Vedanta As An Experience Of Semantic Destruction Of Language, Questions of Philosophy, №5, 1972, pp. 117–129 (Translated from Russian: Д.Б.Зильберман, Откровение в адвайта-веданте как опыт семантической деструкции языка “Вопросы философии”, №5, 1972, с.117–129)
14. Maslow, Abraham. Religions, Values, and Peak-Experiences (Compass). (1965)1994. Penguin Books.
15. Berdyaev (Berdiaev), Nicolas. The Problem of Man.