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Mind Over Matter with Information Measurement Theory (IMT)

Sean Donothan Franklin

Published May 1, 2015• 0 citations
OpenAlex

Abstract

abstract: This abstract is intended to explain the main ideas and thoughts pertaining to the author's experiences over time while attending Arizona State University and how certain course teachings have created a more positive outcome in life for the author. The goal of this Independent Study Thesis is to convey the great significance that the Information Measurement Theory (IMT) courses' ideas and teachings have contributed to the author's life and how they have increased the author's overall quality and outlook on life, not only from an academic standpoint and setting, but also in every facet. Based on this, the author's intention is to convey the new skills obtained regarding The Kashiwagi Solution Model (KSM) as they pertain to Information Measurement Theory (IMT), based on the author's own recent experiences in college with what he has learned, and to explain how they have helped tremendously. This is mainly comprised of information based on the external sources and writings of Dr. Dean Kashiwagi, and also direct resources and teachings by Dr. Dean Kashiwagi and Dr. Jacob Kashiwagi that have greatly contributed to the author's overall understanding of Information Measurement Theory (IMT), its revolutionary new ways of thinking, and the new skill sets developed from it as well. This will also focus on the benefits that can occur for anyone by applying the various aspects of The Kashiwagi Solution Model (KSM), through the use of the concepts of Information Measurement Theory (IMT), and to convey the author's findings pertinent to helping mitigate stress in life, while also being able to enter into any situation or event with a more positive mindset in order to help conclude that event successfully and with the increased potential for a more positive outcome. This idea of always striving to have a more positive mindset in order to complete a task, goal, or event in life in a more positive and successful way is exactly what the author will focus on, mostly pertaining to the author's own life experiences, referred to as Mind Over Matter with IMT. This Thesis idea of Mind Over Matter with IMT stems from some of the main aspects that the author found to be most impressive and significant in the honors courses offered at ASU by Dr. Dean Kashiwagi and Dr. Jacob Kashiwagi, mainly because of the fact that they inform students of some new ways to help mitigate stresses and anxieties in their lives and to more accurately predict the outcome of future events based on using deductive logic and expertise. This leads to focusing more on dominant information in order to obtain the key ideas and main points of any situation, rather than requiring additional and superfluous details, data, and minutia. The fact that the courses also focus on natural laws and initial conditions of events have proven to be extremely useful because of their significant importance to determining the final conditions and concluding outcome of events, of which many people tend to not even be aware at first when initially learning about Information Measurement Theory (IMT). Because of this, the Deductive Logic and Information Measurement Theory courses offered at ASU have proven to offer invaluable insight, great knowledge, unique ideas, and alternative ways of thinking to the author, which have contributed greatly to the author's increased success as a student enrolled at Arizona State University over these past years. Keywords: Kashiwagi Solution Model (KSM); Information Measurement Theory (IMT); Deductive Logic; initial conditions; final conditions; natural law; Mind Over Matter

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In the first sentence of their article “Improving Students’ Understanding of Quantum Mechanics” ( Physics Today, August 2006, page 43), Chandralekha Singh, Mario Belloni, and Wolfgang Christian refer to Richard Feynman's well-known assertion that nobody understands quantum mechanics. But thereafter they ignore it, and apparently assume that student misconceptions when learning quantum mechanics are not connected with foundational issues. I argue the contrary, that Feynman's statement should be a central concern in all efforts to improve quantum pedagogy. If we teachers do not understand a topic, we pass our own misconceptions on to our students and make the subject much more difficult for them.Many conceptual difficulties, including those Feynman was referring to, arise from the problem of introducing probabilities into quantum theory in a useful and consistent way. 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He seems to have reacted favorably to a preliminary version of the new ideas (see the letter from Murray Gell-Mann and James Hartle in Physics Today, February 1999, page 11), so he might have appreciated the more mature form now available. In brief, we now know how to consistently assign probabilities directly to microscopic systems without referring to measurements, and we can show that under appropriate conditions a properly constructed measurement apparatus, described in fully quantum terms, will reveal properties the measured system possessed before the measurement took place. In such circumstances the probabilities of measurement outcomes are the same as those of the measured properties, and measurements are no longer an essential conceptual tool: One can think directly in physical terms about what the quantum system is doing at different times. This gets rid of a major source of student difficulties and misconceptions.Consider the example reported by Singh and coauthors in which students used a calculation employing 〈A〉 = 〈ψ|A|ψ〉 to find the expectation of an observable A, rather than simply using a probability distribution they had worked out previously. (In that article, A was the energy, but the same principle applies to any observable.) This failure is not surprising given that textbooks lack a good discussion of how to assign probability distributions to observables. So the student memorizes an independent formula 〈A〉 = 〈ψ|A|ψ〉, which is a good way of calculating something that comes up in homework and exams, but whose physical significance is not particularly clear (to student or instructor). What the student should be taught is that A is the quantum counterpart of a random variable in ordinary probability theory, and its average can be obtained from its probability distribution in exactly the same way. Defining 〈A〉 in this manner before introducing 〈ψ|A|ψ〉 as a convenient formula for calculating it would make things clearer. But quantum textbooks do not contain the necessary tools, and for good reason. With two noncommuting observables A and B, it is easy to poke either of them into the 〈ψ|A|ψ〉 formula, whereas assigning probabilities leads into a vast swamp, which work on quantum foundations has shown to be filled with nasty paradoxes ready to bite the unwary. Retreating to macroscopic measurements allows textbook writers to avoid the swamp, but with a serious loss in clarity of thought and physical intuition. It is better to drain the swamp of its root cause: a failed attempt to meld classical and quantum modes of reasoning, instead of consistently applying quantum concepts at all levels, microscopic and macroscopic, which is something we now know how to do.Another misconception reported in the Physics Today article, that measurement of a physical observable causes the system to be stuck forever in the measured eigenstate, is hardly surprising when students are taught that measurements and wavefunction collapse are part of the axiomatic, and thus unanalyzable, structure of quantum theory. Instead, they need to think about measurements as quantum physical processes, governed by the same laws as the rest of the quantum world, and learn how to use conditional probabilities to relate measurement outcomes to the past as well as the future behavior of a measured system. Once again, outdated ideas make the subject harder to learn.For 10 years I have been teaching advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate quantum mechanics courses and courses in quantum information, using the new perspective in which quantum mechanics is based on probabilistic laws of universal validity, with measurements being only one application. Reactions have generally been positive, though the students show signs of shock when I tell them that by the end of the course, provided they do their homework, they will understand some aspects of quantum mechanics better than Feynman did. Presenting the new ideas takes somewhat longer than the material they replace, but not enormously so. Some time will be regained in courses that include an introduction to quantum entanglement and Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen, since circuitous arguments invoking Bell's inequality and the like, which can leave students quite confused, are replaced by a short, clear treatment of the essentials.Although I can see the value of computer simulations of Schrödinger's equation, I think it is more effective to first introduce students to basic quantum dynamics, both unitary and stochastic, through the use of “toy models.” I included various examples in Consistent Quantum Theory . 1 1. R. B. Griffiths, Consistent Quantum Theory, Cambridge U. Press, New York (2002). Some chapters and a few exercises are available at http://quantum.phys.cmu.edu. The properties of such models are easily worked out with a pencil on a small sheet of paper, like the back of an envelope. Working through them helps students master new concepts and get rid of certain misconceptions about quantum measurements. The fact that students in my courses have been able to learn how to apply probabilities consistently to microscopic systems, in a way that disposes of numerous difficulties and conceptual paradoxes, suggests it might be worthwhile for other teachers to invest some time in learning post-Feynman ideas. The main difficulty is the absence of a textbook. I have used reference 1 as a supplement, though it is not ideal. It has no exercises, although a few are available on the corresponding website. I would be happy to hear from anyone skilled in textbook writing who wants to revise an older one or start something new.In conclusion, I strongly favor every effort to improve students’ understanding of quantum mechanics, and I consider the research reported by Singh and coauthors a valuable contribution to that end. However, if we want our students to genuinely understand quantum mechanics and not simply calculate things, I believe a much bigger step forward is possible by combining the efforts reported in the article with advances in quantum foundations.REFERENCESection:ChooseTop of pageREFERENCE <<1. R. B. Griffiths, Consistent Quantum Theory, Cambridge U. Press, New York (2002). Some chapters and a few exercises are available at http://quantum.phys.cmu.edu. Google Scholar© 2007 American Institute of Physics.

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Herbert S. Green

•Nov 29, 1999•11 citations
abstract: This abstract is intended to explain the main ideas and thoughts pertaining to the author's experiences over time while attending Arizona State University and how certain course teachings have created a more positive outcome in life for the author. The goal of this Independent Study Thesis is to convey the great significance that the Information Measurement Theory (IMT) courses' ideas and teachings have contributed to the author's life and how they have increased the author's overall quality and outlook on life, not only from an academic standpoint and setting, but also in every facet. Based on this, the author's intention is to convey the new skills obtained regarding The Kashiwagi Solution Model (KSM) as they pertain to Information Measurement Theory (IMT), based on the author's own recent experiences in college with what he has learned, and to explain how they have helped tremendously. This is mainly comprised of information based on the external sources and writings of Dr. Dean Kashiwagi, and also direct resources and teachings by Dr. Dean Kashiwagi and Dr. Jacob Kashiwagi that have greatly contributed to the author's overall understanding of Information Measurement Theory (IMT), its revolutionary new ways of thinking, and the new skill sets developed from it as well. This will also focus on the benefits that can occur for anyone by applying the various aspects of The Kashiwagi Solution Model (KSM), through the use of the concepts of Information Measurement Theory (IMT), and to convey the author's findings pertinent to helping mitigate stress in life, while also being able to enter into any situation or event with a more positive mindset in order to help conclude that event successfully and with the increased potential for a more positive outcome. This idea of always striving to have a more positive mindset in order to complete a task, goal, or event in life in a more positive and successful way is exactly what the author will focus on, mostly pertaining to the author's own life experiences, referred to as Mind Over Matter with IMT. This Thesis idea of Mind Over Matter with IMT stems from some of the main aspects that the author found to be most impressive and significant in the honors courses offered at ASU by Dr. Dean Kashiwagi and Dr. Jacob Kashiwagi, mainly because of the fact that they inform students of some new ways to help mitigate stresses and anxieties in their lives and to more accurately predict the outcome of future events based on using deductive logic and expertise. This leads to focusing more on dominant information in order to obtain the key ideas and main points of any situation, rather than requiring additional and superfluous details, data, and minutia. The fact that the courses also focus on natural laws and initial conditions of events have proven to be extremely useful because of their significant importance to determining the final conditions and concluding outcome of events, of which many people tend to not even be aware at first when initially learning about Information Measurement Theory (IMT). Because of this, the Deductive Logic and Information Measurement Theory courses offered at ASU have proven to offer invaluable insight, great knowledge, unique ideas, and alternative ways of thinking to the author, which have contributed greatly to the author's increased success as a student enrolled at Arizona State University over these past years. Keywords: Kashiwagi Solution Model (KSM); Information Measurement Theory (IMT); Deductive Logic; initial conditions; final conditions; natural law; Mind Over Matter
THE GREAT CHAIN OF QUANTUM BEING: WHAT THE PHYSICISTS ARE TELLING US / Louis Gallo listen: there's a hell of a good universe next door; let's go —cummings Max Planck's announcement in 1900 that energy flows in discrete bundles rather than uniformly, as energy "should," did not instantly destroy the foundations of a classical world view that had prevailed since Newton's day. It took physicists nearly a quarter of a century to grasp the full significance of quantum theory. But 1900 is too convenient a date to ignore, and without distorting the history of ideas unduly we can refer to it as the point in time when science launched its relentless assault upon reason and common sense, an assault that continues to this day. This is nothing new, of course. Everyone knows how weird quantum theory is, how it toppled the Newtonian clockwork and so on. The purpose of this essay is to explain in ordinary language, if such a thing can be done, why physicists are saying some of the outrageous things we read about in the popular media. Because new particles, along with new theories to account for them, are being created at such a prodigious rate today, it has become extraordinarily difficult for non-scientists to keep up with the latest breakthroughs. The deluge of popular books on black holes and particle physics, outmoded before they go to press, reflects this information gap. I can hardly expect to beat the popularizers at their own game, but my intention is nevertheless to present a non-technical overview of the great chain of quantum being according to current theory. It can be suggested by way of preliminary assessment that the Theater of the Absurd did not die at some point in the early 1970s; its greatest production is and may always have been our meditations on the cosmos itself. We begin, however, with some thoughts on common sense rather than absurdity. Physicists have traditionally linked common sense with the twin doctrines of causality and determinism. Given thorough enough information about prior conditions, causality guarantees the predictability of all events and states ofbeing. French mathematician Pierre Laplace actually believed that such knowledge could be used to chart the entire history of the universe. Causality, then, is a way of thinking about individual events; determinism, a way of thinking about events 264 · The Missouri Review cumulatively. Both doctrines presume the existence of an objective, quantifiable external world populated by observers (ourselves). One cannot overemphasize the importance of the term "objective." It haunts modern physics at every turn. Indeed, the crucial difference between classical and quantum physics lies in their respective acceptance or rejection of objective reality. The early giants of quantum physics had a hard time accepting the implications of their own mathematics. Max Planck and Einstein—who is not, strictly speaking, a quantum physicist but who contributed much to the theory—refused to accept them. Yet the fate of objectivity may be traced by moving from Planck's position on the subject to that of Erwin Schrödinger, whose work culminated in the late 1920s. This chronology roughly reflects the order in which quantum theory emerged. Here is what Planck had to say in his book The New Science: "A science that starts off by predicating the denial of objectivity has already passed sentence on itself"; and "the quantum hypothesis will eventually find its exact expression in certain equations which will be a more exact formulation of the law of causality." Einstein spent most of his life searching for that "exact expression" and failed. Werner Heisenberg offered a similar but highly qualified version of Planck's statement. In Across the Frontiers Heisenberg says that quantum measurements do in fact measure objective states but also intrude upon those states. "It is," he writes, "no longer the objective states but rather the probabilities for the occurrence of certain events that can be stated in mathematical formulae." Schrödinger, in Mind and Matter, comes right out with it: "Mind has erected the objective outside world of the natural philosophers out of its own stuff." He means this literally, and the equations he contributed to quantum theory imply as much. Bohr...
What will we be learning?We are entering a fascinating world that, I expect, will amaze you.Enter this course with an open mind, but also question everything you learn!Since 1895 most physics discoveries have been "modern".The Newtonian physics from your previous physics courses is classed as "Classical Physics" but we're going modern into a world where Newtonian physics does not work and we end up with incredible science.We will study the quantization of multiple physical properties and through the understanding of solids.Welcome to awesome world of quantum mechanics!So get ready to delve into Modern Physics!This course series (PHYS330 & PHYS331) fulfills the requirements of a Science Perspective core class and is a required course of the Physics major(s) and counts as an elective for Physics minors.The scientific method has resulted in historically unprecedented changes in our world.In this course you will learn how science proceeds, and practice the scientific method yourself in a weekly laboratory experience.You will learn the qualities of a good hypothesis or model, how to assess its validity, the significance of a scientific theory, and the elusiveness of "proof."On completing the course, you will be better able to understand and evaluate scientific or pseudoscientific claims that have direct impacts on your personal and professional life.This course is part of the Xavier Core Curriculum, which aims to develop people of learning and reflection, integrity and achievement, in solidarity for and with others.It addresses the following core learning objectives at the introductory level:• Students recognize and cogently discuss significant questions in the humanities, arts, and the natural and social sciences.• Students find, evaluate, and logically convey information and ideas in written and oral presentations.• Students evaluate problems using quantitative methods and arguments.Xavier University is committed to the health, safety, and care of all individuals within our community.As part of our Ignatian values and in the spirit of cura personalis, Xavier University wishes to disincentivize class attendance when students may be sick.For the duration of the pandemic, students who are ill will be excused from classes.We recommend the following procedures:• Students must adhere to University health and wellness procedures for self-evaluation, follow-up, and quarantine as necessary.• Students who are in quarantine due to close contact with a person who has tested positive for COVID-19, but who are not themselves symptomatic, are expected to attend class remotely and complete course assignments.• Untruthful student claims about illness may be regarded as a violation of the Student Handbook.• If Dr. Morris, or a family member, gets sick then you will receive a Canvas message or email.
In the first sentence of their article “Improving Students’ Understanding of Quantum Mechanics” ( Physics Today, August 2006, page 43), Chandralekha Singh, Mario Belloni, and Wolfgang Christian refer to Richard Feynman's well-known assertion that nobody understands quantum mechanics. But thereafter they ignore it, and apparently assume that student misconceptions when learning quantum mechanics are not connected with foundational issues. I argue the contrary, that Feynman's statement should be a central concern in all efforts to improve quantum pedagogy. If we teachers do not understand a topic, we pass our own misconceptions on to our students and make the subject much more difficult for them.Many conceptual difficulties, including those Feynman was referring to, arise from the problem of introducing probabilities into quantum theory in a useful and consistent way. Textbooks avoid the problem by assigning probabilities to macroscopic measurement outcomes rather than to microscopic quantum systems. Although that approach avoids inconsistencies, it gives rise to some serious misconceptions: Measurements are somehow special and unrelated to other quantum phenomena; they require a “classical” apparatus that functions outside the scope of quantum mechanics (where is one to find such a thing nowadays?); they produce physical effects at long distances; one can say nothing sensible about what a quantum system is doing in the absence of measurements; measurements can be used to predict the future of the measured system but tell us nothing about its past; and so forth. These misconceptions are not unrelated to those that Singh and coauthors have reported.Students learning quantum mechanics could benefit greatly if their instructors used advances in our understanding that have occurred during the 40 years since Feynman unashamedly confessed his perplexity. He seems to have reacted favorably to a preliminary version of the new ideas (see the letter from Murray Gell-Mann and James Hartle in Physics Today, February 1999, page 11), so he might have appreciated the more mature form now available. In brief, we now know how to consistently assign probabilities directly to microscopic systems without referring to measurements, and we can show that under appropriate conditions a properly constructed measurement apparatus, described in fully quantum terms, will reveal properties the measured system possessed before the measurement took place. In such circumstances the probabilities of measurement outcomes are the same as those of the measured properties, and measurements are no longer an essential conceptual tool: One can think directly in physical terms about what the quantum system is doing at different times. This gets rid of a major source of student difficulties and misconceptions.Consider the example reported by Singh and coauthors in which students used a calculation employing 〈A〉 = 〈ψ|A|ψ〉 to find the expectation of an observable A, rather than simply using a probability distribution they had worked out previously. (In that article, A was the energy, but the same principle applies to any observable.) This failure is not surprising given that textbooks lack a good discussion of how to assign probability distributions to observables. So the student memorizes an independent formula 〈A〉 = 〈ψ|A|ψ〉, which is a good way of calculating something that comes up in homework and exams, but whose physical significance is not particularly clear (to student or instructor). What the student should be taught is that A is the quantum counterpart of a random variable in ordinary probability theory, and its average can be obtained from its probability distribution in exactly the same way. Defining 〈A〉 in this manner before introducing 〈ψ|A|ψ〉 as a convenient formula for calculating it would make things clearer. But quantum textbooks do not contain the necessary tools, and for good reason. With two noncommuting observables A and B, it is easy to poke either of them into the 〈ψ|A|ψ〉 formula, whereas assigning probabilities leads into a vast swamp, which work on quantum foundations has shown to be filled with nasty paradoxes ready to bite the unwary. Retreating to macroscopic measurements allows textbook writers to avoid the swamp, but with a serious loss in clarity of thought and physical intuition. It is better to drain the swamp of its root cause: a failed attempt to meld classical and quantum modes of reasoning, instead of consistently applying quantum concepts at all levels, microscopic and macroscopic, which is something we now know how to do.Another misconception reported in the Physics Today article, that measurement of a physical observable causes the system to be stuck forever in the measured eigenstate, is hardly surprising when students are taught that measurements and wavefunction collapse are part of the axiomatic, and thus unanalyzable, structure of quantum theory. Instead, they need to think about measurements as quantum physical processes, governed by the same laws as the rest of the quantum world, and learn how to use conditional probabilities to relate measurement outcomes to the past as well as the future behavior of a measured system. Once again, outdated ideas make the subject harder to learn.For 10 years I have been teaching advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate quantum mechanics courses and courses in quantum information, using the new perspective in which quantum mechanics is based on probabilistic laws of universal validity, with measurements being only one application. Reactions have generally been positive, though the students show signs of shock when I tell them that by the end of the course, provided they do their homework, they will understand some aspects of quantum mechanics better than Feynman did. Presenting the new ideas takes somewhat longer than the material they replace, but not enormously so. Some time will be regained in courses that include an introduction to quantum entanglement and Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen, since circuitous arguments invoking Bell's inequality and the like, which can leave students quite confused, are replaced by a short, clear treatment of the essentials.Although I can see the value of computer simulations of Schrödinger's equation, I think it is more effective to first introduce students to basic quantum dynamics, both unitary and stochastic, through the use of “toy models.” I included various examples in Consistent Quantum Theory . 1 1. R. B. Griffiths, Consistent Quantum Theory, Cambridge U. Press, New York (2002). Some chapters and a few exercises are available at http://quantum.phys.cmu.edu. The properties of such models are easily worked out with a pencil on a small sheet of paper, like the back of an envelope. Working through them helps students master new concepts and get rid of certain misconceptions about quantum measurements. The fact that students in my courses have been able to learn how to apply probabilities consistently to microscopic systems, in a way that disposes of numerous difficulties and conceptual paradoxes, suggests it might be worthwhile for other teachers to invest some time in learning post-Feynman ideas. The main difficulty is the absence of a textbook. I have used reference 1 as a supplement, though it is not ideal. It has no exercises, although a few are available on the corresponding website. I would be happy to hear from anyone skilled in textbook writing who wants to revise an older one or start something new.In conclusion, I strongly favor every effort to improve students’ understanding of quantum mechanics, and I consider the research reported by Singh and coauthors a valuable contribution to that end. However, if we want our students to genuinely understand quantum mechanics and not simply calculate things, I believe a much bigger step forward is possible by combining the efforts reported in the article with advances in quantum foundations.REFERENCESection:ChooseTop of pageREFERENCE <<1. R. B. Griffiths, Consistent Quantum Theory, Cambridge U. Press, New York (2002). Some chapters and a few exercises are available at http://quantum.phys.cmu.edu. Google Scholar© 2007 American Institute of Physics.