Questions on a system theory of physics

[j.joerg@posteo.de]

If we believe, for example, that there is a starting point for creation, what can our thinking tell us about that point? After all, our thinking connects things to things, and at this starting point there was nothing to which thought could connect

I think we could say about the starting point, that we cannot say anything about it. But we can be it. And any statement beyond that will always be some sort of illusion, some sort of self deception of the ontic basis of ourselfs...

[j.joerg@posteo.de]

You’re probably best to post that on a physics board, but there are some things we can say about particles ‘before’ they interact. For example, a single photon passes through both both slits in the Young's experiment if not measured, so there is this ‘wave of possible paths’ aspect in relation to space. There is entanglement where two particles are somehow like a single entity or a single form before any interaction. You only ever get properties as part of an interaction, but you can still establish at least something about the nature of ‘it’ before the interaction. Is that what you’re referring to?

In my interpretation only the interaction itself is part of physical reality. Before the interaction would be before the creation of space and time. So maybe we can describe the "before" in terms of space and time, but that results in a mysterious statement. I dont think there is a "particle" before the measurement. Only an interaction (respectively measurement) creates a spacetime incident. But you are right, something is still going on before the interaction. Only you cannot pin it down in terms of spacetime. It might be pure space or pure time...

[Simon Adams]

Is that really so? What is measuring, when a measurement is done? Wittgenstein: "Mathematics as such is always a measurement, not the thing measured".

For the mathematical measurement apparatus of mathematical physics of quantum physics, there is no "outside" of mathematics. Mathematics is measuring the properties of mathematics. Since Arkhimedes, calculus measures some mathematical object by back-and-forth between another mathematical object. Wave property is already inherent in the measurement relation between circles and polygons.

Remember that we don't just have the quantum world to go by, we also have the macro world, and we can talk about the fact that what we measure at the quantum world 'adds up' to the physical macro world. Yes the physical properties of that macro world only appear as part of an interaction, but what is represented in that interaction is consistent. I can throw a stone at a window, turn my back before it hits, and be confident that the window will still be there when the stone hits it. On both the quantum and the macro level, even though the physical properties only appear when measured, there is something there. Now you can call this something 'pure maths', or you can call it a mental form of potentials as I would prefer, but to deny it any level of reality at all is to deny what is self evident in my view.

Semantics is important to keep track of, so that we don't fall into trap of believing that a mathematical language game of measuring "proves" that there is "something outside" of the language game being played when measuring. When you look at a mirror, is the mirror image really outside you? If you think it is outside you, how do you conclude that the self-image that thinking projects is outside the mirror image?

I know for sure that if someone else walks in the room when I am looking in the mirror, they will see both myself and an image of myself in the mirror. The image of me they see in the mirror will be significantly different from the one I see because it's their form connecting to my form (via the mirror in this case), but it's 100% consistent with what I'm seeing.

[Simon Adams]

Right so the experiments are telling us about some aspect of the relationship between whatever the photons are and whatever the measurement device is. They are telling us there is an appearance of the photon, an appearance of observer, and in some way one is dependent on the other. Any claims about the essence of the phenomenon and their relationship are added by our thinking and are not disclosed in the appearances themselves.

So the concepts that "there is this wave like property before it's measured" and "there are two entangled photons" are added to the appearances by us.

Yep, I agree completely with all of that.

That conceptual addition is exactly what re-creates a unity out of the bare multiplicity of appearances.

I think the conceptual addition is our way of re-representing the essence. It isn't the essence and it's purely a way of predicting what the essence will do, rather than what the essence is. But there is some essence/form even though we can't know it directly in a scientific way - because the only way we can observe it is via an interaction, which produces an image of the essence/form. It's a little bit like these rovers on Mars, all we can see of Mars is these images on our screens. We can't walk around and pick rocks up etc because we are not there, but we have good reason to believe that there is something there based on what we see. In terms of the essence behind physical reality, for those of us with an idealist ontology we believe that the only way to visit Mars would be a direct mental connection to the forms (or mental processes in BK's formulation) that are represented as our physical world, rather than observing via our senses.

[Simon Adams]

In my interpretation only the interaction itself is part of physical reality. Before the interaction would be before the creation of space and time. So maybe we can describe the "before" in terms of space and time, but that results in a mysterious statement. I dont think there is a "particle" before the measurement. Only an interaction (respectively measurement) creates a spacetime incident. But you are right, something is still going on before the interaction. Only you cannot pin it down in terms of spacetime. It might be pure space or pure time...

Yes exactly, there does seem to be a way in which space and time are emergent. There is a way in Relativity in which everything is travelling at the speed of light (c). For weightless particles this just means that their velocity is c, which also means there is no time. However once you have mass, a component of this 'velocity' is directed instead to time. The more mass there is, the slower time moves, and there is a way in which this slowing of time becomes the well of gravity that pulls things into it.

To go into speculation mode, from an idealist perspective you could say that time emerges from the presence of forms interacting with each other, the more forms there are interacting with each other, the more time there is. Which begs the question about what is the difference between the forms with mass, and the forms without mass? I feel there must be several fundamentally different types of forms; natural forms, living forms, weightless forms and 'artificial' forms. In some ways the artificial forms are the same as the natural forms, but there is a way in which the idea that shaped them was generated by another living form.

[SanteriSatama]

Remember that we don't just have the quantum world to go by, we also have the macro world, and we can talk about the fact that what we measure at the quantum world 'adds up' to the physical macro world. Yes the physical properties of that macro world only appear as part of an interaction, but what is represented in that interaction is consistent. I can throw a stone at a window, turn my back before it hits, and be confident that the window will still be there when the stone hits it. On both the quantum and the macro level, even though the physical properties only appear when measured, there is something there. Now you can call this something 'pure maths', or you can call it a mental form of potentials as I would prefer, but to deny it any level of reality at all is to deny what is self evident in my view.

Actualizing keeps actualizing, phenomenal sentience keeps on appearing. This is not problematic. What is highly problematic is to claim that actualizing not just happens but is a) "something" b) "there" but not "here".

I know for sure that if someone else walks in the room when I am looking in the mirror, they will see both myself and an image of myself in the mirror. The image of me they see in the mirror will be significantly different from the one I see because it's their form connecting to my form (via the mirror in this case), but it's 100% consistent with what I'm seeing.

Are You the image that someone sees? Or did you just objectify and externalize yourself?

[Eugene I]

Isn´t that a very profound ontological statement!? It basically says ontology is not a subject of science. That is probably the deepest statement on ontology science could possibly contribute...

Exactly, ontology is simply not the science's business. Moreover, most QM paradoxes occur only when ontological assumptions are added to pure physics (specifically, physicalistic ontological assumptions).

[Simon Adams]

Actualizing keeps actualizing, phenomenal sentience keeps on appearing. This is not problematic. What is highly problematic is to claim that actualizing not just happens but is a) "something" b) "there" but not "here".

I'm assuming that what you are calling "actualising" is physical representation? If so then yes I agree there is not a "thing" "there". However there clearly is a world out there that exists and is stable, there are photons before they are measured. The representation of these things is not these things, but you seem to be denying them any essence at all?

Are You the image that someone sees? Or did you just objectify and externalize yourself?

No of course I am not the image of myself. Nonetheless I present an image of myself, even if it's to myself in a mirror. The image is not the thing, the representation is not the form.

[AshvinP]

Right so the experiments are telling us about some aspect of the relationship between whatever the photons are and whatever the measurement device is. They are telling us there is an appearance of the photon, an appearance of observer, and in some way one is dependent on the other. Any claims about the essence of the phenomenon and their relationship are added by our thinking and are not disclosed in the appearances themselves.

So the concepts that "there is this wave like property before it's measured" and "there are two entangled photons" are added to the appearances by us.

Yep, I agree completely with all of that.

That conceptual addition is exactly what re-creates a unity out of the bare multiplicity of appearances.

I think the conceptual addition is our way of re-representing the essence. It isn't the essence and it's purely a way of predicting what the essence will do, rather than what the essence is. But there is some essence/form even though we can't know it directly in a scientific way - because the only way we can observe it is via an interaction, which produces an image of the essence/form. It's a little bit like these rovers on Mars, all we can see of Mars is these images on our screens. We can't walk around and pick rocks up etc because we are not there, but we have good reason to believe that there is something there based on what we see. In terms of the essence behind physical reality, for those of us with an idealist ontology we believe that the only way to visit Mars would be a direct mental connection to the forms (or mental processes in BK's formulation) that are represented as our physical world, rather than observing via our senses.

I'm not sure whether we are aligned here or not. I would say sensory perception is half of the equation under idealism, and that our concepts (which are fundamentally shared with all humans) complete the equation to bring about a meaningful unity if they are the proper concepts for the perceptions. I like the way Steiner writes about it in The Philosophy of Freedom:

I will make myself clearer by an example. If I throw a stone horizontally through the air, I perceive it in different places one after the other. I connect these places so as to form a line. Mathematics teaches me to know various kinds of lines, one of which is the parabola. I know the parabola to be a line which is produced when a point moves according to a particular law. If I examine the conditions under which the stone thrown by me moves, I find the path traversed is identical with the line I know as a parabola. That the stone moves just in a parabola is a result of the given conditions and follows necessarily from them. The form of the parabola belongs to the whole phenomenon as much as any other feature of it does. The spirit described above who has no need of the detour of thinking would find itself presented not only a sequence of visual percepts at different points but, as part and parcel of these phenomena, also with the parabolic form of the path which we add to the phenomenon only by thinking.

It is not due to the objects that they are given us at first without the corresponding concepts, but to our mental organization. Our whole being functions in such a way that from every real thing the relevant elements come to us from two sides, from perceiving and from thinking.

The way I am organized for apprehending the things has nothing to do with the nature of the things themselves. The gap between perceiving and thinking exists only from the moment that I as spectator confront the things. Which elements do, and which do not, belong to the things cannot depend at all on the manner in which I obtain my knowledge of these elements.

[SanteriSatama]

I'm assuming that what you are calling "actualising" is physical representation? If so then yes I agree there is not a "thing" "there". However there clearly is a world out there that exists and is stable, there are photons before they are measured. The representation of these things is not these things, but you seem to be denying them any essence at all?

Representation of what? No, by actualizing I mean simply phenomenalizing, realizing, as happens, as experienced. Which are poor translations of intransitive verb 'to truth' (toteutua) in my language. Transitive form of the same verb (toteuttaa) would mean 'make happen'.

QM does not claim that "there are photons before they are measured". Time in QM is reversible palindrome, which means that temporal durations of quantum phenomena must grow from their center events. Bohm's ontological interpretation adds another layer of complexity by giving the wave aspect of "pilot waves" ontological status (which is perfectly fine from idealist perspective of ontology), but on the whole Bohm's theory is radically non-local and holistic theory of Holomovement of dynamically pan-relational Indra's Net.

Complementarity of Copenhagen interpretation as well as RQM in essence (pun intended) agree with Bohmian Holomovement, that there is no substantive essence, it's all relational. They share same the basic relational philosophy with Buddhist concept of anatta, phenomena don't have inherent essence.

If any essence could be postulated, compassion and sentience would be the best candidate.

Are You the image that someone sees? Or did you just objectify and externalize yourself?

No of course I am not the image of myself. Nonetheless I present an image of myself, even if it's to myself in a mirror. The image is not the thing, the representation is not the form.

Let's consider this carefully

A) I'm not the image of myself
B) I present an Image of Myself (IM)
C) to Myself In a Mirror (MIM)

B) and C) are layers of imaginary reflections, and A) denies that you are neither IM or MIM.

When you are feeling hungry, is that feeling a) something else than you, outside of you b) how does feeling of hunger manifest even if neither IM and MIM do not show it (ie. does feeling of hunger does disappear by closing your eyes)?

In other words, are you something else than your whole sphere of sentience as happens, as actualizes, including imaginations etc. thoughts that come and go? Is your whole sphere of sentience not you?