gib65

Really? Hmm. So much for my observations. I guess I just hate snow

What about that pilot wave theory? That surely was disproven, wasn't it? To my understanding, a pilot wave would constitute a local hidden variable which I thought was disproven by Bell.

There's this enormous misconception that consciousness and waveform collapse are somehow intertwined, and that idea is being used (by the likes of the site you linked) to argue for quantum mind

In more ways that one. The Copenhagen interpretation seems to say that observation collapses the waveform whereas proponents of quantum consciousness suggest that the waveform collapse causes consciousness when it occurs in microtubules inside our neurons.

This is purely hearsay, but maybe others will back it up.

I heard through someone who got this from BBS that recent satellite photos show 50% of the CO2 in the atmosphere comes from two specific areas on the globe: Nigeria and Siberia. Both these places have problems with natural gas that leaks out of their oil wells. It's a poisonous gas and so they have to burn it in order to get rid of it, and this adds to the greenhouse gases. Russia says it does this because it doesn't have the technology to handle the gas in any other way. Shell is responding to this by implementing a technology that will liquefy the gas which will help in storing it safely. It is apparently a very easy and cheap technology to implement. If they are able to do this for both Siberia and Nigeria, that will be 50% of GW problem solved.

Thanks for replying, severian.

I guess that's why the Copenhagen interpretations remains the only feasible scientific interpretations. All the others are trying to appeal to a non-observable ontology.

Anyway, I'll continue to ask other questions in the slight hope that others (or yourself) might want to take stabs at them. If not - oh well - I guess I'll just let this thread die

About the "multiple worlds" interpretation: it seems to get rid of the need for collapse or superposition states, but there is still some randomness that's left unexplained. Why do we end up perceiving this universe? Presumably, if our minds are multiplied as many times as the universe itself is, there must be a random "collapse" of who we turn out to be - that is, which one of the many copies of ourselves we experience ourselves to actually be in the end (but I guess each other copy is asking the same question ).

Thanks Snail. I see they haven't provided a way to give rep. points yet. Is this still in the works?

I just figured out that I have "10 reputation points"! Where'd I get them from? What are they? Are they good or bad? Can I get a more detailed description of what my reputation is?

Why does nobody care about the topics I'm passionate about? * sigh *

Thanks Severian. I want to devote this thread to a discussion of each interpretation for my own personal curiosity (but everyone's welcome, of course ).

First of all, the Copenhagen interpretation says "conscious observation collapses the wave function". Does this mean to say that only conscious observation collapses the wave function? It seems to be saying that if no conscious beings existed, all material bodies would exist in superposition states of infinite magnitude. So the Sun would not only be at the center of our solar system, but everywhere in the universe, as would every other star, planet, particle, galaxy, etc.

What does that say about human consciousness? The quote above says "the mind constructs reality" but it would have to construct a reality whose underlying rules and structure (i.e. the laws of classical mechanics) are pre-calculated and determined. A good example is the kind of work I do - I'm a computer programmer. Whenever I find a bug, it can rattle my brain. I can scan the program for hours not knowing where the bug lies, not seeing the flaw. But then I suddenly find it, and it all makes sense. Now if my mind was making up reality, I would have had to have known there was a bug on some unconscious level beforehand. Otherwise, the only thing determining reality would be my conscious mind, and as far as that part of me is concerned, the program is supposed to work. What this means, however, is that the unconscious part of my mind which keeps track of all the classical laws and makes sure that we never really observe violations of them, would have to be keeping track of an enormous amount of information. It would have to remember the state of each and every bit in my computer, for if only one of them was off, the program should crash. The same argument could be made for physicists when they conduct experiments or work with technology built upon the nature of physics as they understand it.

What does the Copenhagen interpretation have to say about this?

I found these interpretations of QM from http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/overview.html. Would the QM experts at SFN say these are pretty accurate?

Persisting is the Copenhagen interpretation (measurement or conscious observation collapses the wave function) which is consistent with "positivist" philosophies in which the mind constructs reality. The Copenhagen view puts consciousness outside physics, but doesn't account for fundamental reality; it merely accounts for the results of experiments.

 

The "multiple worlds" or "multiple minds" view follows a suggestion put forth by Hugh Everett that each superposition is amplified, leading to branching off of a new universe and conscious observer; in one universe the cat is dead, and in another universe the cat is alive. There is neither collapse nor reduction, however an infinity of realities (or of conscious minds) is required.

 

Another interpretation which avoids reduction/collapse is that of David Bohm in which objects have both a particle aspect and a "pilot" wave aspect (non-local hidden variable or quantum potential) which acts on and guides the particle. Bohm's approach shows that the quantum world can exist independently of the human mind, offering a "realist" alternative to Bohr's prevailing "positivist" Copenhagen view. But Bohm's view requires another layer of reality.

 

The theory of decoherence reconciles the Copenhagen interpretation with quantum superpositions in the absence of measurement or conscious observation. Any interaction, or loss of isolation, of a quantum superposition with a classical system (e.g. through heat, direct interaction or information exchange) would "decohere" the quantum system to classical states. But decoherence theory doesn't define isolation (no quantum system is truly isolated from its classical surroundings) nor deal with superpositions which are isolated.

 

Finally, several proposals posit an objective threshold for reduction ("objective reduction", "OR"). British mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose suggests that each superposition corresponds with bifurcation/separation of the universe at its most basic level (quantum gravity, or fundamental spacetime geometry at the Planck scale). This is akin to the multiple worlds view, however according to Penrose the separations of the universe at its most fundamental level are unstable and spontaneously reduce ("self-collapse") due to an objective, intrinsic feature of spacetime geometry ("objective reduction"). Moreover the larger the superposition, the more rapidly it reduces. For example an isolated electron in superposition would undergo objective reduction only after 10 million years; a one kilogram cat in superposition would self-collapse in only 10-37 seconds. Penrose's proposal is currently being tested experimentally.

Is it fair to imagine polarized light as waves literally going "left" and "right" (supposing it was horizontal)? I always imagined the peaks and trough of light waves to be more like those of sound waves where it was more like intervals of dense air followed by not so dense air, which sort of makes the whole idea of polarization meaningless. Is this wrong?

What does it mean to polarize light?

Thanks Klaynos

Does anybody know of any good websites that give a quick run down of quantum mechanics in an easy-to-understand manner. Something like the following:

http://particleadventure.org/

except geared solely towards quantum mechanics.

Just answer me this question: can an excitatory connection change to an inhibitory one (and visa-versa)?

Come on. Somebody must have an answer to this one.

What makes a neural network programmable (actual neurons, not the computer simulation of them)? I've learnt that neurons don't physically move their dendritic connections from one cell to another (not in the adult brain, at least), so what changes when we talk about a neural network being "programmed"?

I'm wondering if heavier and more frequent rain falls is an effect of global warming. I live in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, and this past winter has been especially snowy - not colder, but more snowy. This isn't an official statistic, it's just my own observations. Is it possible that GW is responsible?

I wonder,can we call it mental and emotional terrorism? What do you people think? Isn't it sort of brainwash?

Of course it's brainwashing. Is it terrorism? Well, it's only terrorism if they're using terror. I guess they might be frightening these children with ideas of Hell and Satan, but I doubt you'll be able to get child services after them... or the military. A lot of these people really believe they're doing these children a whole lotta good. But whatever it is, it's abuse (IMO).

psychosomatic. if they expect it to happen enough then their brains will probably cause it to happen. as for scientists being able to find out, well, the sorts of people who get like that don't want a scientist within 50 meters of them.

Yes, but children? Would children know to expect that?

I gues you've never heard of the petition signed by 17,000 scientists saying there is insufficient evidence to conclude global warming is caused by man. So 2,000 scientists really isn't anything.

This contradicts this:

Global warming is one of the most well-understood natural phenomenons on the face of the planet. We know more about the climate then we do many other areas of science. It is also one of the oldest fields of science, going back before relativity and quantum mechanics. Climate science is just as sound as evolution or any other field of science.

 

I think it's funny that the three most disputed areas of science, outside of science itself, are actually three of the most well-supported and agreed upon areas of science: global warming, evolution, and the big bang. All three are extraordinarily well supported by both the evidence and the scientists themselves yet people seem to have problems with them.

So my guess is either those 17,000 scientists were screened out of a much larger pool of scientists, the majority of which agreed that GW is caused by man, or, like Dak said, those scientists don't know s**t about GW.

BTW, when was that study conducted?

My question has to do with a scene from the documentary "Jesus Camp". Here's a link to a preview:

There's a brief scene in this where children appear to be having convulsions or epileptic seizures or something. You can see this between 1:40 and 1:45. I've seen this happen before with people who get all caught up in the religious experience. What is this? Do scientists know what's going on in their brains/bodies/minds to make this happen?

Where is the majority of greenhouse gases concentrated? Is it more or less evenly distributed throughout the atmosphere or do they reside in their own distinct layer high above ground level?

I'm going to digress for a moment, but I'll bring what I want to say back into the topic of GW.

I've been listening to some interviews with Mark Pesce lately. He's an expert in the field of nanotechnology and one thing he talks about in an interview with Art Bell is nanites, nano-sized robots or computers whose components are on the order of just a few atoms big. He talks about how these little machines can be deployed into almost any material object in order to manipulate and change their structure and form on a molecular level. They can even be deployed into the human body to seek out cancerous cells or viruses and destroy them.

One thought that occurred to me was that if these things can manipulate matter on the molecular scale, couldn't they be deployed into the atmosphere to deal with CO2 molecules? Even if they can't chemically change CO2 molecules, at least they can bring them back to the ground so that we can do something with them.

The great thing about them is that they are extremely cheap. They are incredibly light and so it wouldn't take much to launch them up there. Also, one of the great things about them is that they are self-replicating. A small group of these things can seek out raw materials that are readily available in the environment and build copies of themselves out of it. So all you'd need is a handful of these guys, and given enough time and the means to go up into the atmosphere, they could probably clean up a lot of our pollution. No?

We do need to watch out for how much value we place on "proof". Don't get me wrong - obviously we need good solid proof that global warming is real and we are the primary cause, but we shouldn't place more importance on this than on solving the problem itself.