What is 'the nature of reality’? This thought has occupied the minds of scientists and philosophers since time immemorial. This issue is examined scientifically, that, how the views of scientists and western philosophers have undergone a dramatic change over a period of time. This may then answer whether spacetime is a reality of nature or if it is just a figment of our imagination in which to view this cosmos! The article begins with the thoughts of Democritus, and the other Greek philosophers, continuing with the ideas of Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler. With the thoughts of Bacon, Descartes and Isaac Newton, the rise of the ‘mechanical world view’ later the decline of this view is discussed when the phenomenon in optics, electricity and magnetism could not be explained. Then the concept of ‘field’ was evolved, culminating in ‘Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetic fields’.The beginning of twentieth century saw the evolution of the concepts of ‘relativity’, by Einstein, and the birth of ‘quantum theory’, starting with the idea of ‘quanta’, originated by Planck in 1900. The first three decades of the 20th century saw great breakthroughs in the world of theoretical physics - totally new ideas on ‘the nature of reality’ were being conceived. Large numbers of fundamental particles were discovered in the ensuing years. However, not much progress indeed was made in answering some of the most fundamental questions about the existence of human life and the nature of reality. Some interesting ideas on ‘biocentrism’ have now evolved. Biocentrism, along with the ideas of quantum theory and the concept of consciousness, may answer some of the intricate questions about the nature of reality; these will be discussed at length. These concepts will then be viewed from the perspective of Indic thoughts. The ‘Vedic’ and ‘Upanishadic’ knowledge from Indian scriptures may probably answer even more clearly some of the most intriguing questions about the existence of life and the ‘nature of reality’ itself.Beginning of twentieth century saw the evolution of the concepts of ‘Relativity’, by Einstein, and the birth of ‘Quantum Theory’, starting with the idea of ‘Quanta’, originated by Planck in 1900. The first three decades of 20th century saw the great breakthroughs in the world of theoretical physics. Absolutely new ideas on ‘The Nature of Reality’ were being conceived. Large number of fundamental particles was discovered in the ensuing years. But not much progress indeed took place in answering some of the most fundamental questions on existence of human life and the nature of reality. Some interesting ideas on ‘Biocentrism’ have now evolved. Biocentrism along with the ideas of Quantum Theory and the concept of Consciousness may answer some of the intricate questions on nature of reality; these will be discussed at length. These concepts will then be viewed from perspective of Indic thoughts. The ‘Vedic’ and ‘Upanishadic’ knowledge from Indian scriptures may probably answer even more clearly some of the most intriguing questions on the existence of life and the ‘Nature of Reality’ itself.
What is 'the nature of reality’? This thought has occupied the minds of scientists and philosophers since time immemorial. This issue is examined scientifically, that, how the views of scientists and western philosophers have undergone a dramatic change over a period of time. This may then answer whether spacetime is a reality of nature or if it is just a figment of our imagination in which to view this cosmos! The article begins with the thoughts of Democritus, and the other Greek philosophers, continuing with the ideas of Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler. With the thoughts of Bacon, Descartes and Isaac Newton, the rise of the ‘mechanical world view’ later the decline of this view is discussed when the phenomenon in optics, electricity and magnetism could not be explained. Then the concept of ‘field’ was evolved, culminating in ‘Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetic fields’.The beginning of twentieth century saw the evolution of the concepts of ‘relativity’, by Einstein, and the birth of ‘quantum theory’, starting with the idea of ‘quanta’, originated by Planck in 1900. The first three decades of the 20th century saw great breakthroughs in the world of theoretical physics - totally new ideas on ‘the nature of reality’ were being conceived. Large numbers of fundamental particles were discovered in the ensuing years. However, not much progress indeed was made in answering some of the most fundamental questions about the existence of human life and the nature of reality. Some interesting ideas on ‘biocentrism’ have now evolved. Biocentrism, along with the ideas of quantum theory and the concept of consciousness, may answer some of the intricate questions about the nature of reality; these will be discussed at length. These concepts will then be viewed from the perspective of Indic thoughts. The ‘Vedic’ and ‘Upanishadic’ knowledge from Indian scriptures may probably answer even more clearly some of the most intriguing questions about the existence of life and the ‘nature of reality’ itself.Beginning of twentieth century saw the evolution of the concepts of ‘Relativity’, by Einstein, and the birth of ‘Quantum Theory’, starting with the idea of ‘Quanta’, originated by Planck in 1900. The first three decades of 20th century saw the great breakthroughs in the world of theoretical physics. Absolutely new ideas on ‘The Nature of Reality’ were being conceived. Large number of fundamental particles was discovered in the ensuing years. But not much progress indeed took place in answering some of the most fundamental questions on existence of human life and the nature of reality. Some interesting ideas on ‘Biocentrism’ have now evolved. Biocentrism along with the ideas of Quantum Theory and the concept of Consciousness may answer some of the intricate questions on nature of reality; these will be discussed at length. These concepts will then be viewed from perspective of Indic thoughts. The ‘Vedic’ and ‘Upanishadic’ knowledge from Indian scriptures may probably answer even more clearly some of the most intriguing questions on the existence of life and the ‘Nature of Reality’ itself.
Introduction We saw in Part I that in addition to explaining consciousness there is another hard problem for the modern scientific worldview – understanding what quantum physics is telling us about reality. And if anything this one is harder. In philosophy of mind there is at least consensus enough for an orthodox position to exist (materialism), and a widespread expectation that it will be vindicated by future neuroscience. By contrast, in philosophy of physics all sides understand that quantum theory is compatible with a variety of metaphysical interpretations, and have little hope that new empirical discoveries will settle the matter. But both problems are “hard” in the sense that, despite tremendous intellectual effort over many decades, no clear progress has been made toward solving them. The basic idea of quantum consciousness theory is that bringing the two problems into contact may be the key to solving both (though I will be addressing only the mind–body problem in what follows). That this could be a novel idea attests to the fact that their philosophical discussions have evolved quite separately. While philosophers of physics have long been interested in the role of consciousness in the measurement process, they have engaged little with the mind–body problem per se; and philosophers of mind have been almost unanimous in dismissing the suggestion that consciousness has anything interesting to do with quantum physics. Social scientists might echo such skepticism, wondering how adding the problem of interpreting quantum theory to the problem of consciousness will help them . Besides piling up jargon and arcane debates, in moving to the sub-atomic level we are now even farther removed from the human world, and seemingly poised to engage in the most vulgar reductionism. Yet, naïvely one might expect the two problems to be related, for two reasons. The first is the intriguing analogies mentioned in Chapter 1 between the mental and quantum domains.
What is real and how does the world function? Humanity has been fascinated by this subject from the beginning of time. The prevalent worldview has needed to be regularly revised since the 16th century, but with the introduction of relativity theory and quantum physics at the start of the 20th century, things became really odd. The function of information is currently the main emphasis, and there is disagreement about whether this is ontological or epistemological. Recently, a hypothesis has been developed according to which microscopic quantum information-more precisely, quantum entanglement via entanglement entropy-is the source of spacetime and gravity. A contemporary idea uses algorithmic information theory and first-person viewpoint experiences to explain how reality itself emerges. Perception and observation are key concepts in quantum physics. Information must be shared in order to see and interact with the world. Information is provided the interpretation required to enable life and consciousness by biological projection.
Nature of Reality has been subject of investigations since historical times both in science and religion. The physical interpretation of Reality has experienced a dynamic change from Aristotle to Einstein. Relativity theory and Quantum mechanics have led to formulations of new concepts regarding space, time, matter and reality. Uncertainty Principle by Heisenberg and the concept of dual nature of matter and radiation by Louis de Broglie gave a serious blow to the philosophy of determinism based on Newtonian Mechanics and Cartesian world view. The great debates between Einstein and Bohr at Solvay Conferences about the inadequacy of quantum mechanics to describe physical aspect of Reality are a part of history of science now. EPR paradox and Bell’s theorem have introduced the idea of connectedness and consciousness in Quantum Reality. Experience is the ultimate test of truth or Reality for the Indian philosopher. The Reality is trans-empirical, hence, it cannot be known through sense experience in the way in which empirical/scientific knowledge is gained. Reality is better understood or comprehended through intuitive experience for it transcends both the rational and the sensory aspects of human experience. Keywords: Reality, Newtonian World view, Copenhagen Interpretation, Uncertainty Principle, EPR Paradox, Metaphysics, Mysticism Cite this Article Hardev Singh Virk. Nature of Reality: Physical, Metaphysical and Mystical Aspects. Omniscience: A Multi-disciplinary Journal (OSMJ). 2015; 5(2): 10–15p.
In classical physics there is, in accordance with common sense, an objective world ‘out there’. That world evolves in a clear and deterministic way, being governed by precisely formulated mathematical equations. This is as true for the theories of Maxwell and Einstein as it is for the original Newtonian scheme. Physical reality is taken to exist independently of ourselves; and exactly how the classical world ‘is’ is not affected by how we might choose to look at it. Moreover, our bodies and our brains are themselves to be part of that world. They, also, are viewed as evolving according to the same precise and deterministic classical equations. All our actions are to be fixed by these equations - no matter how we might feel that our conscious wills may be influencing how we behave. Such a picture appears to lie at the background of most serious 1 philosophical arguments concerned with the nature of reality, of our conscious perceptions, and of our apparent free will. Some people might have an uncomfortable feeling that there should also be a role for quantum theory - that fundamental but disturbing scheme of things which, in the first quarter of this century, arose out of observations of subtle discrepancies between the actual behaviour of the world and the descriptions of classical physics. To many, the term ‘quantum theory’ evokes merely some vague concept of an ‘uncertainty principle’, which, at the level of particles, atoms or molecules, forbids precision in our descriptions and yields merely probabilistic behaviour. Actually, quantum descriptions are very precise, as we shall see, although radically different from the familiar classical ones. Moreover, we shall find, despite a common view to the contrary, that probabilities do not arise at the minute quantum level of particles, atoms, or molecules - those evolve deterministically - but, seemingly, via some mysterious larger-scale action connected with the emergence of a classical world that we can consciously perceive. We must try to understand this, and how quantum theory forces us to change our view of physical reality.
In this chapter, I offer some personal reflections about the nature of reality, shaped by my work as a quantum physicist, my experimentation with psychedelic drugs during the 1960s, and my more recent studies of modern cognitive science. Traditionally, questions about the essential nature of reality are asked by philosophers. In the twentieth century, these questions were asked for the first time by scientists as well. During the first three decades of the century, the exploration of the atomic and subatomic world brought physicists in contact with a strange and unexpected reality that shattered the foundations of their worldview and forced them to think in entirely new ways. Quantum physics showed scientists “a new reality,” and from that time on, the nature of reality became a popular subject of discussion not only in philosophy but also in science. In recent decades, cognitive scientists took another radical step in the scientific conception of the nature of reality. They asserted that the features of our ordinary, everyday reality are not features of an independently existing world, but are created in the very process of perception. In a way this generalizes the influence of the act of perception on the perceived object, which was famously analyzed in quantum physics by Werner Heisenberg, to everyday perception. In other words, even our everyday reality is just one of many alternate realities.
The mind matter problem is an age old philosophical one which engaged the minds of scholars from the Vedic period through those of neuroscience of modern age and the quantum physicists in the 20th century. The vedic sages considered consciousness not only as primordial, but also universal and ubiquitous, causative of matter (reality in its various aspects). According to neuroscience consciousness is a result of functions of the brain, the neural networks and hence the search for the locality of origin of qualia, the building blocks of conscious experience. The search is still on for the Holy Grail of neuroscience along with the explanation for the mechanism of origin of the nonmaterial, abstract, phenomenon such as consciousness from the material brain, “the hard problem of David Chalmers, 1997”. Physics entered philosophy (W. Heisenberg, 1958) and the physicists began the quest for the site of origin of consciousness. Interestingly, contrary to the view of neuroscientists the quantum physicists viewed consciousness as a primary phenomenon and matter as secondary, (derivative) of consciousness, similar to that of the Vedic seers!. A comparative study of views of Vedanta and quantum physicists makes it interesting. One also finds that the terms consciousness, self, matter and reality have been used synonymously and will be dealt with likewise.