What is the Role of Consciousness in Quantum Mechanics? - Ask a Spaceman!

I told myself that I wouldn't let this series go beyond Eight Episodes that eight was the absolute limit the tippy top anything beyond eight would just end up being self-indulgent because if I didn't stop at Aid then I might as well go to 20 or 50 or a thousand episodes on quantum mechanics folks we've barely scratched the thinnest edge of the outermost layer of the topmost surface of quantum mechanics I hope I've given you enough Taste of the various interpretations and enough of the fundamental core of quantum mechanics the postulates the history the implications but to squeeze it down to just Eight Episodes I've had to leave out a lot I barely talked about the Heisenberg uncertainty principle I just kind of breezed by entanglement in explaining how it works on my way to other topics Bohr's correspondence principal barely got talked about I only mentioned Paul Dirac twice in magnetic fields poor magnetic fields always playing second fiddle and Belle's inequalities I didn't even talk about that a mathematical proof when combined with some very clever experiments that proved that quantum mechanics cannot have local hidden variables smart particles can't carry around private information that's hidden from us you can only have Global hidden variable theories where everything is non-local like pilot wave theory I could have spent an entire episode just on that or a refresher on the double slit experiments or the quantum eraser experiment folks I'm doing you a favor by only keeping it to eight episodes that have now become nine but here we are I couldn't do it I simply couldn't do it to explore the meaning of quantum mechanics we had to just keep going and going exploring the interpretations and how we got to those interpretations and what those interpretations meant and I swear from the bottom of my Spaceman heart that this will be our last discussion on the topic unless I pick it up again in the future feel free to ask about Belle's inequalities or the quantum eraser experiment or anything else that strikes your fancy but seriously it's the last of this series so let's take stock and see where we are in a highly simplified way as as you're tucking in your kid tonight what do you tell them well how about a quantum mechanics tells us how really really tiny stuff works in B quantum mechanics makes no sense whatsoever that's that's pretty much it that's the problem in a nutshell I started this series and we were so young then by saying that nobody likes quantum mechanics and this is why from the theory from the mathematics it's not clear what's real and what's merely a mathematical trick the mathematical statements that we developed in response to the experiments and observations of the early 20th century don't make any connection to our natural understanding of the world we can't tell if what we're seeing in quantum mechanics the non-locality the entanglement the nature and evolution of the wave function the uncertainty the probabilities all of it represents something real and fundamental and true about the subatomic universe or if it's all just a bunch of mathematical tricks we use to solve problems quantum mechanics really does stand out when it comes to this with other theories of physics we usually have a pretty easy time deciding which is real and which is a trick sometimes there's a debate when a new physical Theory comes along but usually everyone agrees pretty quickly for example a Newtonian gravity had this feature called action at a distance where where objects could instantaneously gravitationally influence other objects regardless of the distance it's there in the mathematics there was there was a big uproar about it in its early days but eventually everyone agreed that it's not real and it was just a mathematical trick and now we accept our modern understanding of gravity which is general relativity we say in general relativity that space-time warps and deforms and that's our experience of gravity we accept that as real and not a mathematical trick we accept that the electric current in a wire is real and not a mathematical trick we accept that the normal force or the force of friction are mathematical tricks and not real they're actually caused by more fundamental interactions as an aside yes it's possible to argue that all of physics is a series of mathematical tricks and we are all simply always developing approximations to what nature is and we develop tools to help us make predictions and that's it you can take the logical extension of this and say that the electron doesn't exist it's just a mathematical trick we use to try to explain what's really going on and what's really going on we can never truly understand I personally tend to lean towards this view but that's a different episode but in quantum mechanics this distinction isn't so clear obviously if we had a more fundamental theory that led to Quantum Mechanics then we could easily say that quantum mechanics was full of mathematical tricks in the more fundamental theory is real unless the more fundamental Theory had even more headaches these arguments about the reality of quantum mechanics started in the very beginning as the field was being developed and I talked about in those episodes about the arguments made by Schrodinger Heisenberg bore Einstein and all those others all those arguments Echo even today I said that in those episodes and I wasn't wrong the debates they had a hundred years ago continue to be debates today in this series I wanted to ground you in the mathematics the facts of quantum mechanics and the observationally verified statements that quantum mechanics makes about the world entanglements is a thing probabilities are a thing uncertainty is the thing non-locality is a thing some of the arguments of the past were about these aspects of quantum mechanics were the probabilities real was entanglement real was uncertainty real those aspects of quantum mechanics are now seen as real nobody debates them essentially and everyone agrees essentially that these are facts of our universe that probability at the subatomic level is unavoidable that entanglement at a subatomic level is unavoidable that uncertainty at a subatomic level is unavoidable pretty much everyone who talks about quantum mechanics agrees that these aspects of reality are a reality they're real but that still leaves so much room for interpretation and so far we've met three different interpretations and those interpretations differ in discussions about the rest of quantum mechanics they differ in what they regard various parts of quantum theory is real and what they regard as mere mathematical tricks for example the Copenhagen interpretation takes the wave particle duality of Nature and says that particles are real but the waves are just mere mathematical tricks they're a system of accounting of probabilities that tell us where we'll find the particle the next time we look the many worlds interpretation says that the waves are real and what we call particles are just expressions of those ways of various experiments in other words they're just mere mathematical tricks the pilot wave interpretation says that the particles and the waves are real and that nothing is a mere mathematical trick we're just falling short of a real Theory of physics the past three interpretations that we have focused on have themselves centered on this debate on what is the nature of the wave particle duality what are we really talking about when we say that particles have a wave like nature they've differed there are other interpretations available on the table that dig into different aspects of the puzzles of quantum mechanics remember nobody really seriously debates things like non-locality and entanglements and probabilities but they do debate things like the wave nature of reality and what those waves really mean here's another one the measurement problem you know the thing that got Schrodinger so upset he started putting cats in boxes and mailing them to Heisenberg and boar that's that's not true the measurement problem is that quantum mechanics seems to behave in two different modes when nobody's looking when no one's taking a measurement Quantum systems obey the Schrodinger equation they just evolve naturally and then as soon as a measurement happens the schroding your equation goes away and it just quote collapses to some result is this collapse of the wave function a real thing or is it a mere mathematical trick this is a separate question from the existence of the wave function remember things like many worlds interpretation and Copenhagen interpretation and pilot wave theory they debate about the nature of the wave itself now you can ask a more fine-grained question what what does it mean for a wave function to collapse there are some interpretations for example the objective collapse interpretation that says that not only does the wave function really exist the same way it does and say many worlds or Pilot wave but that the wave function collapse is a physical process it happens that when we engage in a measurement there is a real wave function that evolves in a way that we can capture with our mathematical equations it's a subtle subtle difference but it's real it's a valid point the struggle that objective collapse theories have is that they can't really describe that process what does it mean it's one thing to say oh the wave function collapses okay how does it collapse and why doesn't it collapse when two particles interact in the middle of nowhere but then it does a collapse when we're doing a measurement it's hard to actually figure that out here's another one focusing on the nature of collapse the collapse of the wave function that altering State when a measurement happens essentially asking these these interpretations are asking what is actually happening during a measurement here's one Consciousness causes collapse hear me out on this one you ask where or when the collapse actually occurs if measurement is so important in quantum mechanics then what exactly constitutes a measurement of two particles interact in a random gas cloud we don't call that a measurement but if they interact in my laboratory and I'm staring at them that becomes a measurement but at the end of the day it's all atoms interacting with other atoms interacting with other atoms we've been down this road before this is how you get universal wave functions in in many worlds interpretation in the pilot wave theory I put two atoms in the middle of a gas cloud they interact they entangle I put two atoms in the middle of my laboratory and let them interact they entangle uh but but at some point I call it a measurement because I'm staring at it but but the particles interact they interact with my measuring device they interact with the light coming out of the display they interact with my eyeballs they interact with my brain where does the buck stop when it comes to measurement maybe it stops with patreon that's a good place to stop your box patreon.com pmsunner that's pmsu-t-t-e-r it's how you can keep this show going if you love this show and I know you do I love it too the number one thing you can do to support the show is go to patreon I sincerely truly appreciate it there is no debate about the reality of my appreciation of your monthly contributions thank you patreon.com pmsetter where does the buck stop when it comes to measurement maybe there's something special about consciousness after all it's the only place in the chain of observations where something different happens if two molecules interact in a gas cloud and nobody's watching we call that a Quantum interaction Schrodinger equation entanglement but now if I'm staring at them as a conscious Observer something special happens I call that a measurement so maybe measurement is real it's a real thing in our universe but the apparatus doing the measurement that is our minds are not well at least not physically real yes for this to work you have to accept that the mind is different than everything else in the universe that the mind is something non-physical that the mind is something special but a whole heck of a lot of people believe in Souls which are not physically connected to this universe so it's not like the idea is sitting in a vacuum also the concept of mind-body separation of dualism goes back centuries if not millennia the idea that the Mind our conscious minds are truly something special and slightly or all the way non-physical and that is what is triggering the collapse of wave functions isn't as crazy as it sounds it it doesn't exactly sound super physical but it's not like the super physical interpretations of quantum mechanics have made a lot of Headway in a hundred years or what about this information collapse Theory you know what let's just say that nothing is real wave functions particles measurement all of it it's all lies lies I tell you are in in this view collapse happens in the mind but only because we're the ones observing nature there is no objective reality except the one we create within ourselves we are just processing information and what we call a wave function collapse or a measurement is just certain bits of information clicking into place in our brains not representing anything physical at all but that kind of thinking goes against the general trend of science which is to say that there is an objective reality that we all share and discover together and I know what you're starting to think like all this is starting to sound like wrong and weird and out there and you know what you're not wrong but sometimes you gotta think outside the box I don't personally subscribe to any of these interpretations but more on that later on my personal take on all this but we shouldn't automatically discount them because they're pretty out there because the in their ideas all have their dramatic shortcomings and there does seem to be something very especially weird about quantum mechanics there are even more published interpretations of quantum mechanics dozens if not hundreds of them but I think we've had enough they all follow the same theme what is real and what's not what does quantum mechanics actually teach us about the universe and what's just a tool for getting answers which interpretation is correct they all have strengths and yet they all have major weaknesses they all explain some of the subatomic world and bring some sense of order and intuition to it but they all come up short in other ways to me every interpretation has some flavor of shut up and calculate you know this is the the famous like summary of The Copenhagen interpretation which is don't mind the details don't think about what's actually going on just shut up and do the math and get results and so people try to come up with other interpretations like the many worlds interpretation or the pilot wave or Consciousness causes collapse or whatever but all of them all of them every single one includes some feature that doesn't make sense and that we can't explain and just sort of happens no matter what every single interpretation you run into a wall called shut up and calculate so where do we go from here well what if we just let go what if we just relaxed a little if all these interpretations make us a little bit uncomfortable why force ourselves into an interpretation now maybe one of the interpretations that I've discussed really resonates with you and really connects with you and you think that's a really cool way to view the universe more power to you I will tell you though that none of the interpretations sit well with me so why do we have to make ourselves believe in an interpretation if you were to ask the average physicist what they think about quantum mechanics and which interpretation is correct they would probably just shrug the vast majority of working physicists including ones who specialize in using or developing quantum theory don't really think about it all that much honestly they might Mumble something about coping and interpretation because that's the default interpretation in graduate classes or if they've given it some thought and reading they might be a fan of many worlds or one of the other minority viewpoints physicists don't really talk about interpretations much it goes even Beyond shut up and calculate they're just doing the math they're just trying to get work done at the end of the day where you see a lot of debate about interpretations about quantum mechanics is among philosophers even if the interpretations are started by physicists they're usually writing and thinking more philosophically when they write about these interpretations the fact that the interpretations of quantum mechanics dig into philosophy more it isn't surprising because philosophy is great at creating large meetings from small nuggets of information it's also really awesome because I believe that these kinds of discussions are worth having because it elevates physics from a mere precursor to engineering and embeds physics in the larger human quest to understand the universe we find ourselves in honestly if a physicist espouses a certain view on an interpretation the vast majority of them follow the shut up and calculate school of thought anyway sure physicists might say they prefer one interpretation over the other but in the day-to-day work the interpretation doesn't come into play they follow the postulates they outlined in earlier episodes they are equipped with the mathematical tools of Heisenberg Schrodinger Dirac Von Neumann and the others and they and they just get to work yes there's that itch you can't scratch in the back of your mind but doesn't stop you from doing your job as a scientist which is to explain nature and there's no doubt by anybody that quantum mechanics explains nature it's just that we can't explain quantum mechanics but maybe we don't have to let's talk about intuition we've tried in our exploration of these interpretations two approaches one approach is to try to take our intuition from the classical world and attempt to build a better quantum theory that hasn't exactly worked out because we always end up with statements that don't make sense like the measurement problem like the nature of the wave particle duality we end up with statements that that just don't don't fit like entanglement and non-locality we've also tried to use the rules of quantum mechanics to develop a new intuition of Nature and and and that hasn't worked out either like if we just take the reality of the experiments and try to go from there and say okay experiments tell me that a wave function is real let's probe the reality of the wave function and explore what it means well you end up with statements that don't make sense but when you work in quantum mechanics long enough the stuff that initially doesn't make sense well I won't go as far to say that it ends up making sense but at least you get used to it and then after that you get comfortable with it and then after that you develop an intuition based on that when you just stop worrying about the words and the interpretations and just focus on the math the reality the experimental reality that we observe you develop a certain kind of intuition that's separate from your classical intuition of the world so here's a question I have for you if you were to get comfortable enough with the bare statements of quantum mechanics the postulates the math the thing the things I started the series with and now you know why I started the series with how physicists approach quantum mechanics wouldn't that entail its own sort of meaning I'm not telling you to shut up and calculate I'm suggesting that maybe we should calculate and listen I'm not saying to ignore the interpretations of quantum mechanics and just focus on the math I'm saying let yourself breathe a little and allow the lessons of quantum mechanics to alter the way you see the world when we listen to quantum mechanics we have the opportunity to think in ways we've never thought before we have the chance to reach conclusions that we simply couldn't if we got stuck in classical thinking what is one of the ultimate lessons of quantum mechanics that classical thinking doesn't work the subatomic World truly lives by a different set of rules that do not align with our lived experience and what's one of the Hallmarks of classical thinking forcing ourselves into binary choices think of the classical world this is the way the world is this is the beginning the middle the end here is my state here are my laws of physics here's a prediction for the future done deterministic local as soon as we discovered quantum mechanics we realized that we couldn't use classical thinking classical Intuition or classical anything anymore the subatomic world doesn't play by the normal rules it plays by its own rules quantum mechanics teaches us that binary choices don't work you don't get to know exactly where an electron will appear the next time you go looking for it you don't get to say that this system that you're studying is perfectly isolated from the rest of the universe you don't get to say that you can have perfect knowledge of everything the intuition that the mathematics of quantum mechanics teaches us is that we shouldn't be sitting here trying to force a narrative on it we keep trying to craft interpretations but ultimately those interpretations even the wildest ones are rooted in classical thinking because we are still using our classical brains with classical rules so when faced with this choice of interpretations don't think either or think both and allow yourself to operate in a new way of thinking instead of trying to choose one interpretation over the other maybe we should simply accept the quantum reality for what it is class complex non-classical and potentially unknowable and not understandable maybe we should stop trying to interpret quantum mechanics and instead let it teach us something more fundamental sure pick your favorite interpretation if you want to but maybe allow yourself to float between them maybe on Tuesdays you'll follow the Copenhagen and on Wednesdays you'll be in the mood for many worlds Saturdays maybe both why not it's a mistake of classical thinking to believe that the interpretations are independent of each other and mutually exclude each other think of all the wonderful and strange aspects of quantum mechanics the entanglement the randomness the uncertainty the non-locality isn't that enough isn't the mystery and wonder part of the Journey of living in this universe we have failed for a hundred years to come up with a coherent interpretation of quantum mechanics that makes sense to our classical brains so maybe we should stop listening to our classical brains and start listening to the subatomic particles in our Laboratories at a fundamental subatomic level nature operates by different rules maybe it's a mistake to try to force an interpretation on that again I'm not saying shut up and calculate I'm saying use the mathematics use what we know what we have observationally verified the rules that we know the subatomic World plays by and use those to build new lenses through which we can look at the world and instead of trying to force a classical narrative on the subatomic World which has not gone well what if we took the story of the quantum world and brought that up into our macroscopic experience what if you lived your life like an electron thinking about Quantum Behavior seems absurd absurd but that's only because we live and breathe in a classical world what if we tried to live in a fully Quantum world what if we took those fundamental lessons of quantum mechanics probabilities uncertainties non-locality entanglements and applied those to Everyday Life what if you lived truly accepting the uncertainty of the future setting goals and Visions but without the burdens of concrete expectations but if you acknowledge that your actions had non-local influence across the globe with even small gestures of kindness or charity making an impact what if you accepted that you can't know everything as well as you wish you could what have you stopped yourself from falling into binary classical either or choices allowing situations choices and even people to be more complex and more rich and more interesting and more beautiful than that what if we listened to Schrodinger Heisenberg Einstein bore and all the rest not as physicists but like therapists I'm not saying that we need quantum mechanics to teach us how to be better people but isn't it comforting that nature at its most fundamental level teaches us powerful lessons that make us better people What If instead of trying to find meaning in quantum mechanics we used quantum mechanics to find meaning in ourselves thank you for joining me on this journey through the interpretations of quantum mechanics I have so many people to thank for all the questions about quantum mechanics that led to this series which has been a joy a true joy to dig into and explore and explain I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did but thank you to Mahal iyan email at sharmini on Twitter massimiliano s on Facebook Isaac peon email at groblard on Twitter Chris F on Facebook akanshka be on email at smtr and Twitter Albert r on email Julius em on email Martin E on email John T on Facebook Rhys C on email Nick s on email at Jordi R puchench uh Twitter at Pizza larger on Twitter rocheon email HP Aryan and email Scott M on email Graeme Dion email Martin Nan on email at sample sapiens on Twitter Peter W on email at markcreep on Twitter shawnelle on email Susan s on email Daniel J on email Campbell Dion emailed Timothy be on YouTube Fernando G on email and James W on email and of course thank you to all my patreon contributors it is your contributions that keep this show going hop top contributors this month Justin G Chris L barbicade Duncan M Corey D Justin Z Andrew F nalia Scott M Rob H Justin Lewis M John W Alexis Aaron J Gilbert M Joshua Josh S Thomas D Michael R Simon G it is everyone that I have to thank it is amazing the amount of support I get this is my job this is my life this is my passion patreon.com pmsetter keep sending me questions hashtag ask a Spaceman ask a Spaceman gmail.com any of the lingering topics that we we didn't quite touch on in this series in quantum mechanics feel free to ask it might be a while but we'll get to it don't worry and I'll see you next time for more complete knowledge of time and space [Music]

Channel: Dr. Paul M. Sutter

Views: 19,155

Keywords: space, cosmos, universe, astronomy, physics, astrophysics, cosmology, science, quantum mechanics, metaphysics

Id: R3YwMH7SX9Q

Length: 31min 2sec (1862 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 05 2023