Objectivity on Quantum Events： The Principle of Complementarity and the Rortian Perspective

Robert Samuel Matthews

Nalliely Hernández Cornejo

In this writing, I reconstruct the Principle of Complementarity in Quantum Mechanics, elaborated by Niels Bohr, and the conception of objectivity implied in it (and in Bohr's writings).Then, I connect it with the epistemological pragmatism of the philosopher Richard Rorty.My aim is to reinterpret some issues of this quantum description that concern the category of objectivity from the Rortian perspective in a plausible way.This allows me to connect in a positive and a negative sense some quantum (and Bohrian) assumptions to the Rortian perspective, but mainly, it allows to reconsider the framework of scientific objects from the modern perspective to a new pragmatist and anti-essentialist point of view.

Evgeny Vladimirovich Bolshakov

The aim of the research is to develop a dialectical relational-event ontology (DREO), that is, a second-order metaphysical framework designed to resolve the fundamental problems of the philosophy of quantum physics: wave-particle dualism and the irreducible pluralism of interpretations. The scientific novelty of the article lies in the following: for the first time, not just another interpretation of quantum mechanics is proposed, but a meta-framework that dialectically sublates the pluralism of interpretations itself and demonstrates their systemic unity; the category of a "relational event" is introduced as a fundamental unit of being, which marks a transition from substantial metaphysics (debates on the individuality of objects) to a metaphysics of becoming; wave-particle dualism is interpreted not as ontological (two entities) and not as epistemological (N. Bohr's complementarity principle), but as a dialectical contradiction sublated in the concept of "relational potentiality" – a structure of possibilities actualized depending on the perspective; the complementarity of wave and particle for the first time receives ontological status – it is a mode of existence of quantum reality itself as a "pulsation" between modes of actualization; a new model of scientific rationality is substantiated – dialectical pluralism – where truth is not a property of an individual proposition but a property of the entire system of perspectives taken in their dialectical unity, which fundamentally distinguishes DREO from contextual quantum realism (CQR), which remains within the static opposition of "rule – application" and epistemological perspectivism. The key results of the study are the following ideas: a relational event (rather than an object or a relation in itself) is recognized as the fundamental unit of being – a discrete act of transition from the potential to the actual in a specific context of interaction; "particle" and "wave" are interpreted as two extreme, mutually exclusive and simultaneously complementary types of actualization of a single structure of potencies in different perspectives; the multiplicity of incompatible but empirically equivalent interpretations of quantum mechanics is shown not as a flaw in the theory, but as a logical consequence of the relational structure of reality, which requires a multitude of complementary perspectives for its adequate expression. Thus, the century-old opposition between objectivism and relativism in the philosophy of science is removed.

R. W. Menzel

In quantum physics we are confronted with new entities which consist indivisible of an energy packet and a coupled wave. The complementarity principle for certain properties of these quantum objects may be their main mystery. Photons are especially useful to investigate these complementary properties. A series of new experiments using spontaneous parametric down conversion (SPDC) as a tool allowed the detailed analysis of the physical background of this complementarity and offers a new conceptual perspective. Based on these results a straightforward explanation of these sometimes counter-intuitive effects is given.

Richard Healey