Introduction: On Issues in Complementarity and Beyond M.E. Carvallo. Part I: Complementarity, Epistemology, and Ontology. 1. Complementarity-Polarity-Dialectic-Autology: A Conceptual Analysis of Opposition and Unity A. Locker. 2. Complementarity as Challenge: Prefigurations in the History of Thinking H. Fischer-Barnicol. 3. Bohr's Idea of Complementarity J. Hilgevoord. 4. Complementarity and Our Knowledge of Nature H.J. Folse. 5. Ontological Implications of Complementarity K.V. Laurikainen. 6. Aspects of Complementarity R. Vallee. Part II: Complementarity: Alternative Views and Applications. 7. The Probability Trees of Quantum Mechanics: Probabilistic Meta-Dependence and Meta-Meta-Dependence M. Mugur-Schachter. 8. Complementarity in Language: Toward a General Understanding L. Loefgren. 9. Language, Incompleteness and Continuous Domains: Considerations of Complementarity of Abstractions H.W. Campbell, D.G. Stuart. 10. The Measurement Problem in Physics, Computation, and Brain Theories H.H. Pattee. 11. On the Double Architecture of the Semantic Memory P. Erdi, T. Groebler, P. Marton. 12. Axiomatic Methods in Science P. Suppes. 13. Complementarity in the Theory of Conversations and Lp G. Pask. 14. A Theory of Bargains in Experience S.M. Lindenberg. Part III: Beyond Complementarity, Beyond Physics. 15. Complementarity or Process? T. Bastin. 16. Can Quantum Computation Provide a Physically Realistic Model of the Self and Its Brain? P.J.Marcer. 17. Non-Locality in Nature and Cognition F.D. Peat. 18. Spontaneity of Consciousness V.V. Nalimov. 19. A Brief Prolegomenon to the Principle of Metaphoricity M.E. Carvallo. Name Index. Subject Index.
It is argued that the conclusions obtained by Renninger (Zeitschrift fur Physik 136, 251 (1953)), by means of an interferometer thought experiment, have important implications for a number of still ongoing discussions about quantum mechanics (QM). To these belong the ontology underlying QM, Bohr's complementarity principle, the significance of QM's wave function, the "elements of reality" introduced by Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen (EPR), and Bohm's version of QM (BQM). A slightly extended setup is used to make a physical prediction at variance with the mathematical prediction of QM. An english translation of Renninger's paper, which was originally published in german language, follows the present paper. This should facilitate access to that remarkable, apparently overlooked and forgotten, paper.
This thesis argues that Western thinking may have unwittingly erred with respect to its application of the principle of noncontradiction. It is in the discovery of the quantum phenomenon, and specifically the measurable discontinuity of quantum behaviour, where this hidden error may have finally been revealed. \n\tThe thesis arrives at this conclusion through a critical ontological analysis of the quantum phenomenon as it is defined in Neils Bohr’s complementarity interpretation of quantum behaviour. The thesis employs a method of ontological analysis adopted from the German philosopher Nicolai Hartmann. This method includes the identification and suspension of historical dogma and the analysis of ‘actual data’, which includes the phenomena of our experience and the related history of ideas. The analysis suspends our traditional application of noncontradiction to the underlying world in order to determine whether an alternative application of noncontradiction may be possible based on the quantum phenomenon. It is hypothesized from this that the potential contradiction suggested by quantum discontinuity (and the source of the so-called quantum mystery) may be overcome by acknowledging first our own implication in and as part of the same world and present moment. \n\tThe thesis takes the position, also essentially held by Bohr, that the quantum phenomenon represents the limit of objective knowledge as defined by the Kantian cognitive framework. Unlike Bohr, however, the thesis argues that, by considering our own implication in and as part of the same world and present moment, the limit of the phenomena (and thus objective knowledge) is revealed as complementary, that is to say, both jointly completing and mutually exclusive. The thesis argues that the implications of this are profound and lead ultimately to the need for a reconceptualisation of not just the quantum phenomenon, but also the present moment, reality and our own embodied cognition.