Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics (is there a general consensus?)

bohm2

A simple and obvious example is subjectivity/inner experience/qualia. We all seem to have special "access" to it that we have to nothing else. No matter how detailed the physics/molecular biology/neuroscience gets, even if we knew all the neural correlates of consciousness, a scientist will never be able to see/feel/experience/know your thoughts/inner experience/phenomenology. So it's argued that a brain (as presently understood) is not a mind, although the former seems to provide the structure/mechanisms for the latter. The same argument goes with other "material" objects in physics. Russell writes:

mattt

I can not even prove there are other "minds" out there besides my own "mind".

I know I can think/feel/perceive and have to suppose other "things" I perceive as "people" can think/feel/perceive as well, that "they" have a "mind" too.

So if I can not prove that there are other minds out there, neither I can prove there are "anything independent of my mind" (whatever it may mean).

But be it whatever it may be, the thing is that I have perception/sensory inputs, and all Science do is to organize rationally all that "sensory/experimental data" avoiding innecesary dogmas.

Be aware that all that perception/sensory data that I know I have, could be made by some kind of Matrix (you know, the film). In that case, all Science do again is to organize rationally all that "sensory/experimental data" avoiding innecesay dogmas, so that I can have the only one rational and consistent organization of all that data, even if the "world" that data "produce" is the one Matrix show me (and could have nothing to do with "the other world outside Matrix").

So ALL I could ever say about "this world" is "mind-dependent" in exactly that sense.

If all these galaxies, planets, physics, all I can perceive and think of, is "the world Matrix shows me" or just any other thing altogether, is a metaphysical question that Science can not treat.

But again, be it whatever ("trascendentally or mind-independent") it may be, Science is the only rational and consistent way of organizing all the perception/sensory data that constitute my "mind-dependent world" (the only one I will ever have access to).

EDIT: I am just learning English, so probably I didn't use the proper words to express what I wanted.

Ken G

Yes, that is a difficult distinction to make for people who are used to black-and-white thinking (either empirical science is the final truth or truth can be anything I want it to be, so any chink in the armor of the first is an excuse for the second!). Frankly, I don't really care what anyone chooses to believe if it jazzes them to do so, but I do feel sorry for people looking for guidance about where to put their faith such that it will generate empirical returns! To them I just say, if you want empirically meaningful outcomes, stick to empirically established evidence. If you just think something is "cool" to believe, it's a free country.

Ken G

I think that was actually me you quoted, and I agree with you-- the relationship between mathematics and reality is even harder to understand than the relationship between physics and reality! Physics is fairly straightforward-- we make observations and build mathematical models that make sense of how we interact with what we are observing. But what then is the meaning of a mathematical proof, and why do we care what can be proven rather than what can be tested? It's a place to get into the Godel theorems.

jambaugh

Yea, freedom is necessarily freedom to make mistakes. And I'm just as ambivalent about what others choose to believe privately. What gets my goat is public misrepresentations about what science says. I've cringed and yelled too many times when Sci. Fi. show X has the line "Quantum theory predicts __[insert nonsense here]__". Yes I know its a plot device and its just TV. BUT the same people who hear this nonsense and buys it, vote for representatives who control e.g. research appropriations, and education funding, and curriculum policy in public schools. When people either believe the nonsense, or knowing its nonsense believe that legitimate scientists believe the nonsense, then this will affect their social and political behavior. There's a growing movement away from the trust in science that we had in the 40's 50's and into the 60's. A rise in belief in mystic nonsense and confusion about what science actually is. I see a "proper" interpretation of QM as the culmination of true science (and what I consider "silly nonsense interpretations" as total anti-scientific mysticism). But the lesson is lost in the drone of nonsense.

Well I'm ranting and I'll cease. It's the teacher in me, both the desire to lecture and the lament at a lost opportunity for people to understand.

Ken G

I see what you mean, though I don't think the biggest problem comes from quantum mysticism. If people even know the word "quantum" in relation to science, even if only science fiction, they are well ahead of a lot of the people who are doing that voting. Is the problem with people who want their own religious beliefs in schools that they think physics is too mystical, or not mystical enough?

jambaugh

Ahead? as in "lost but I'm making good time!"? I don't know. I'm just venting my spleen. Bad science in popular culture is to me worse than rising mystic fantasy.

I think they can't appreciate the distinction between mysticism and science. They take either on authority and they (by my ranting reckoning) don't get a valid picture of scientific authority with which to compare to the televangelists and colonic irrigation quacks. You have people dying who might not because they put their trust in the wrong authority (e.g. Steve Jobs). You have government healthcare paying for pseudo-scientific crap-for-treatments. You have... [nipping rant in the bud...] other stuff I don't need to get my blood pressure up about. Anyway, it gets my dander up and I can go on and on. But that's another thread.

Ken G

I hear you. And I agree that recognizing the human role in physics is not the same thing as saying every person can have their own physics. The problem is in the term "subjective"-- it has two very different possible meanings. One is "up to each person, with no requirement to agree", and that is what most people mean. But that isn't subjectivity in physics, the latter is more like "depending in some way on the subject rather than just the object". Since all humans are more or less the same, in regard to physics observation anyway, subjectivity does not imply we all have our own physics, in the way that we all have our own subjective beliefs.
Yes, I think there are two very separate issues here-- one is alternative medicine, and there the "mystical" elements of science are most problematic, and the other is education around things like evolution, which is more about whether people pay any attention to science in the first place. Science needs to distinguish itself from both of those, which forces science to sometimes mischaracterize itself as "an exact science." Then on the other hand you have people like Feynman who understand science much better and define it as maintaining a constant state of skepticism and higher regard for evidence than authority. So what do we do, be honest about what science is, and risk people misappropriating it, or lie about what science is, and violate one of the most central principles of science itself? It's clear what Feynman thought-- always say what's true, and to heck with the consequences! But he could get away with that, having a reputation as a bit of an eccentric...