There is also the matter of the ontology of space. The idea of a 3-dimensional space is just a convention. If we open that up for questioning, where do we go? Here's one view: https://www.academia.edu/49175956/The_Ontology_of_Space
I might extend DeWitt’s quotation by adding “.. or express it”. They could have better spent their time trying to express it, rather than attempting to extract it from the formalism. That is the reason why we, common folk, are indebted to you.
Talking about the concept of “emergence”, for example, they seem to have gained no ground with the one approach while totally neglecting the other. Take Redhead, he was a deep and meticulous thinker back in the day, he got hold of the expression, and he never departed from it, thankfully. We don’t need to mention Feynman of course, outstanding.
While Tegmark, on the other hand, what is it that he writes about? Many Wows? God knows. He shares that strange privilege with Daniel Dennett. God would have been pleased, humbled, to read at least a few good pages. A few good pages about anything really. If only.
So, going back to the starting point, to the “End of story”. How can “emergence” be at least expressed with some clarity and insight? If the intent is to penetrate the meaning of that which is given, we would be on a much secure footing by trying to understand something like art or religion, instead of science.
Not art as the object of ecstatic contemplation, or the art of the esoteric ritual, but that which “takes place” in the unity of the most common experience. Dewey, in his magnificent “Art as Experience”, also noted the relevance of that generative statement: “There is a wealth of suggestion in the phrase ‘takes place’. The change not only comes but it belongs; it has a definite [indicated] place in a larger whole” (p.160).
Highlighting the subordination of science (and any of the so called “truth” theories) to those disciplines that directly partake on inteligible experience, he warns us against committing this most “supreme instance of intellectual ingratitude” (p.306):
“‘Science’ signifies just that mode of statement that is most helpful as direction. To take the old standard case -which science today seems bent upon modifying- the statement that water is H2O is primarily a statement of the conditions under which water comes into existence. But it is also for those who understand it a direction for producing pure water and for testing anything that is likely to be taken for water. It is a ‘better’ statement than popular and pre-scientific ones just because in stating the conditions for the existence of water comprehensively and exactly, it sets them forth in a way that gives direction concerning generation of water. Such, however, is the newness of scientific statement and its present prestige (due ultimately to its directive efficacy) that scientific statement is often thought to possess more than a signboard function and to disclose or be ‘expressive’ of the inner nature of things. If it did, it would come into competition with art, and we should have to take sides and decide which of the two promulgates the more genuine revelation.” (p.88)
The decision, if we would ever come to that unfortunate day, is straightforward: Do not take the finger for the moon.
We can ask the the same question from a religious standpoint. How can “emergence” be at least expressed with some clarity and insight? This is what Nishida had to say about the subject, followed by John Krummel’s notes (Krummel understands Nishida better than Nishida understood himself).
“[..] out of the interdetermination among things in this world, new things are born in this world. And this world is a world that gives birth to us. While being the world of death it is also the world of birth. Thus in order to say that such a world maintains itself as a single system -as what I have been calling a determination without a determiner- it must contain a nothing within that is absolute. (We can [then] say that what we call God is something like the primary element of the historical world). When I say "creative," people think of the merely linear and temporal. But that would be equivalent to thinking of what life means in terms of vitalism. To be truly creative would have to entail inclusion within of absolute negation, [so that] the spatial is negating the temporal and the temporal is negating the spatial. This must be in terms of formative acts. We can ascribe formativity only to that which first contains inverse determination [inverse correspondence].” (Place and Dialectic, NK, p.128)
Krummel’s touch of brilliancy:
“The point is that creation occurs through the absolute's own self-negation. The only predicate that the absolute as nothing possesses is negation. Absolved from anything else, it is opposed to nothing, and thus can only negate itself. In negating itself, nothing becomes being and the one becomes many. Thus are generated the many beings of THE WORLD.” (Capitals mine)
Naturally, as Dewey wrote (and thanks for the quote), H2O has nothing to do with the inner nature of things. A lab instruction for creating water surely, because lab instructions can be followed without understanding the underlying magic. But a “condition for emergence” only if understood as a lab instruction, not in the sense of an *ontological* condition. In my book, H2O is *instrumental* in the *manifestation* of water — to us, in human experience. Also instrumental in this is our sensory instrumentation, from the sense organs to the cortex, with the caveat that what we know about it is how it appears to us, not its inner nature or (again) the underlying magic. As Sri Aurobindo wrote:
“The mystery of things is the true truth of things; the intellectual presentation is only truth in representation, in abstract symbols, as if in a cubist art of thought-speech, in geometric figure.” (LD 372)
Krummel sounds like “Nishida meets the Upanishads.”
Aug 9, 2022·edited Aug 9, 2022Liked by Ulrich Mohrhoff
"the wave function Ψ — should not be taken to represent a physical wave"
I still find it very difficult to understand why anybody does take it to be a physical wave. To add to what you have written:
One has theorems like Gleason's theorem, showing that the quantum state contains no information beyond assigning probabilities to outcomes (represented by PVM or POVM elements), or de Finetti's theorem showing the quantum state has the exact same inferential structure as a classical probability distribution. You can't distinguish between two overlapping quantum states in the exact same manner that you can't distinguish between two classical probability distributions. The list goes on and on.
There's even more advanced effects where say the algebra of observables might have a non-trivial centre, i.e. superselected quantities. In this case superpositions of eigenstates of such superselected observables are formally identical to classical probability distributions. Many modern reconstructions select quantum theory out of the space of general probability theories (GPTs). The conditions that specify quantum theory often take the form "the most general theory supporting inference" or "the most general theory permitting ideal measurements". I particularly like Adán Cabello and Jochen Rau's work in this regard.
Anyway I should stop there, but I just can't grasp this "Ψ is real" stuff. I even saw a paper recently titled "All is Ψ". Utterly flummoxing.
I guess it's rationalist hubris. They need something thinkable or conceivable (preferably mathematical) to represent all or reality. Put the other way round: they need all of reality to be thinkable, forgetting conveniently that conceptual systems are built on axioms that are not rationally justifiable.
There is also the matter of the ontology of space. The idea of a 3-dimensional space is just a convention. If we open that up for questioning, where do we go? Here's one view: https://www.academia.edu/49175956/The_Ontology_of_Space
Hi Subash, I won't sign up to this site since it requires permission to see my contacts. If you like you can mail me your paper.
Will be glad to. What is the email address?
Just reply to the newsletter you received.
I might extend DeWitt’s quotation by adding “.. or express it”. They could have better spent their time trying to express it, rather than attempting to extract it from the formalism. That is the reason why we, common folk, are indebted to you.
Talking about the concept of “emergence”, for example, they seem to have gained no ground with the one approach while totally neglecting the other. Take Redhead, he was a deep and meticulous thinker back in the day, he got hold of the expression, and he never departed from it, thankfully. We don’t need to mention Feynman of course, outstanding.
While Tegmark, on the other hand, what is it that he writes about? Many Wows? God knows. He shares that strange privilege with Daniel Dennett. God would have been pleased, humbled, to read at least a few good pages. A few good pages about anything really. If only.
So, going back to the starting point, to the “End of story”. How can “emergence” be at least expressed with some clarity and insight? If the intent is to penetrate the meaning of that which is given, we would be on a much secure footing by trying to understand something like art or religion, instead of science.
Not art as the object of ecstatic contemplation, or the art of the esoteric ritual, but that which “takes place” in the unity of the most common experience. Dewey, in his magnificent “Art as Experience”, also noted the relevance of that generative statement: “There is a wealth of suggestion in the phrase ‘takes place’. The change not only comes but it belongs; it has a definite [indicated] place in a larger whole” (p.160).
Highlighting the subordination of science (and any of the so called “truth” theories) to those disciplines that directly partake on inteligible experience, he warns us against committing this most “supreme instance of intellectual ingratitude” (p.306):
“‘Science’ signifies just that mode of statement that is most helpful as direction. To take the old standard case -which science today seems bent upon modifying- the statement that water is H2O is primarily a statement of the conditions under which water comes into existence. But it is also for those who understand it a direction for producing pure water and for testing anything that is likely to be taken for water. It is a ‘better’ statement than popular and pre-scientific ones just because in stating the conditions for the existence of water comprehensively and exactly, it sets them forth in a way that gives direction concerning generation of water. Such, however, is the newness of scientific statement and its present prestige (due ultimately to its directive efficacy) that scientific statement is often thought to possess more than a signboard function and to disclose or be ‘expressive’ of the inner nature of things. If it did, it would come into competition with art, and we should have to take sides and decide which of the two promulgates the more genuine revelation.” (p.88)
The decision, if we would ever come to that unfortunate day, is straightforward: Do not take the finger for the moon.
We can ask the the same question from a religious standpoint. How can “emergence” be at least expressed with some clarity and insight? This is what Nishida had to say about the subject, followed by John Krummel’s notes (Krummel understands Nishida better than Nishida understood himself).
“[..] out of the interdetermination among things in this world, new things are born in this world. And this world is a world that gives birth to us. While being the world of death it is also the world of birth. Thus in order to say that such a world maintains itself as a single system -as what I have been calling a determination without a determiner- it must contain a nothing within that is absolute. (We can [then] say that what we call God is something like the primary element of the historical world). When I say "creative," people think of the merely linear and temporal. But that would be equivalent to thinking of what life means in terms of vitalism. To be truly creative would have to entail inclusion within of absolute negation, [so that] the spatial is negating the temporal and the temporal is negating the spatial. This must be in terms of formative acts. We can ascribe formativity only to that which first contains inverse determination [inverse correspondence].” (Place and Dialectic, NK, p.128)
Krummel’s touch of brilliancy:
“The point is that creation occurs through the absolute's own self-negation. The only predicate that the absolute as nothing possesses is negation. Absolved from anything else, it is opposed to nothing, and thus can only negate itself. In negating itself, nothing becomes being and the one becomes many. Thus are generated the many beings of THE WORLD.” (Capitals mine)
Naturally, as Dewey wrote (and thanks for the quote), H2O has nothing to do with the inner nature of things. A lab instruction for creating water surely, because lab instructions can be followed without understanding the underlying magic. But a “condition for emergence” only if understood as a lab instruction, not in the sense of an *ontological* condition. In my book, H2O is *instrumental* in the *manifestation* of water — to us, in human experience. Also instrumental in this is our sensory instrumentation, from the sense organs to the cortex, with the caveat that what we know about it is how it appears to us, not its inner nature or (again) the underlying magic. As Sri Aurobindo wrote:
“The mystery of things is the true truth of things; the intellectual presentation is only truth in representation, in abstract symbols, as if in a cubist art of thought-speech, in geometric figure.” (LD 372)
Krummel sounds like “Nishida meets the Upanishads.”
"the wave function Ψ — should not be taken to represent a physical wave"
I still find it very difficult to understand why anybody does take it to be a physical wave. To add to what you have written:
One has theorems like Gleason's theorem, showing that the quantum state contains no information beyond assigning probabilities to outcomes (represented by PVM or POVM elements), or de Finetti's theorem showing the quantum state has the exact same inferential structure as a classical probability distribution. You can't distinguish between two overlapping quantum states in the exact same manner that you can't distinguish between two classical probability distributions. The list goes on and on.
There's even more advanced effects where say the algebra of observables might have a non-trivial centre, i.e. superselected quantities. In this case superpositions of eigenstates of such superselected observables are formally identical to classical probability distributions. Many modern reconstructions select quantum theory out of the space of general probability theories (GPTs). The conditions that specify quantum theory often take the form "the most general theory supporting inference" or "the most general theory permitting ideal measurements". I particularly like Adán Cabello and Jochen Rau's work in this regard.
Anyway I should stop there, but I just can't grasp this "Ψ is real" stuff. I even saw a paper recently titled "All is Ψ". Utterly flummoxing.
I guess it's rationalist hubris. They need something thinkable or conceivable (preferably mathematical) to represent all or reality. Put the other way round: they need all of reality to be thinkable, forgetting conveniently that conceptual systems are built on axioms that are not rationally justifiable.