There are no overt lines of in?uence between the quantum-inspired dual-aspect approaches presented in previous chapters – though Pauli’s and Wheeler’s inspirations might have a common origin in some of Bohr’s ideas, and some of Bohm and Hiley’s speculations build on Eddington. But they were essentially each developed independently from one another, somewhat surprisingly converging onto numerous common features that are compared in this chapter. Connections are sought amongst their deeper philosophical foundations, especially those by Spinoza, Kant, Schelling and Hegel. Also explored is the way in which different elements of the surface structure and deep structure of meaning are positioned at the core of their metaphysical projects, along with the way in which the mind-matter connection is understood. A synoptic overview facilitates the comparison of key concepts and notions utilized in the three approaches.
There are no overt lines of in?uence between the quantum-inspired dual-aspect approaches presented in previous chapters – though Pauli’s and Wheeler’s inspirations might have a common origin in some of Bohr’s ideas, and some of Bohm and Hiley’s speculations build on Eddington. But they were essentially each developed independently from one another, somewhat surprisingly converging onto numerous common features that are compared in this chapter. Connections are sought amongst their deeper philosophical foundations, especially those by Spinoza, Kant, Schelling and Hegel. Also explored is the way in which different elements of the surface structure and deep structure of meaning are positioned at the core of their metaphysical projects, along with the way in which the mind-matter connection is understood. A synoptic overview facilitates the comparison of key concepts and notions utilized in the three approaches.
In simple terms and with little scientific or philosophical jargon, this is an examination of some of the philosophical implications of quantum theory. In particular, the Copenhagen interpretation of Bohr and Heisenberg is systematically explored revealing its neo-Kantian and anti-realist features. As Bohr said: “Natural Science is not nature itself but part of a relation between man and nature, and therefore is dependant on man.” In addition, the physical theories of de Broglie and Bohm are contextualized within the philosophical ideas of Bergson, Deleuze, Kant and Whitehead. In particular, Whitehead’s idea of the “Melodic Metaphor” as an embrace of the matter wave model is seen as a new “Music of the Spheres.” Finally, the notion of aesthetic beauty in scientific theory is examined in some depth, revealing it to be an important criterion for judging the validity of theoretical constructs.
For many years the physical interpretation of quantum theory has been dominated by the “wave-particle duality” attitude of the “Copenhagen school.” This point of view is eloquently described in Bohr's collection of essays on the subject. Despite persistent concerns with apparent paradoxes and limitations to this interpretation (as exemplified by Schrodinger's cat, the paradox of Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen, among others), the Copenhagen view persists de facto in the daily life of the modern physicist. Traditional quantum theory has so successfully explained such a vast amount of data in atomic and molecular physics, solid state physics (and to a lesser extent, elementary particle physics) that little doubt can exist concerning its essential validity. As a consequence of the overwhelming practical success of the “Copenhagen interpretation, ” the latter has acquired the status of dogma. For many years, therefore, most physicists have found it expedient to relegate the puzzling aspects of the theory to philosophers, and mathematicians. Nevertheless, a persistent interest in this subject has produced a significant and fascinating literature, reviewed by Jammer. In recent years, concerns over the proper meaning to be ascribed to quantum theory have produced an increasingly deep and incisive series of investigations. These investigations fall generally into two categories: either (1) discussion of the philosophical content of the theory, or (2) analyses of the mathematical variants of the theory and their connection with differing interpretational schemes. Physicists tend to be detached from a commitment to philosophical issues, because of their realization of the transient character of the meanings attached to theories of the day. As a simple illustration of this we can mention the profound differences between nonrelativistic and relativistic quantum mechanics.
Dual-Aspect Monism and the Deep Structure of Meaning investigates the metaphysical position of dual-aspect monism, with particular emphasis on the concept of meaning as a fundamental feature of the fabric of reality. As an alternative to other positions – mainly dualism, physicalism, idealism – that have been proposed to understand consciousness and its place in nature, the decompositional version of dual-aspect monism considers the mental and the physical as two aspects of one underlying undivided reality that is psychophysically neutral. Inspired by analogies with modern physics and driven by its conceptual problems, Wolfgang Pauli, Carl Gustav Jung, Arthur Eddington, John Wheeler, David Bohm, and Basil Hiley are the originators of the approaches studied. A radically novel common theme in their approaches is the constitutive role of meaning and its deep structure, relating the mental and the physical to a psychophysically neutral base.The authors reconstruct the formal structure of these approaches, and compare their conceptual emphases as well as their relative strengths and weaknesses. They also address a number of challenging themes for current and future interdisciplinary research, both theoretical and empirical, that arise from the presented frameworks of thinking. Dual-Aspect Monism and the Deep Structure of Meaning will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in consciousness studies, philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, philosophy of physics, metaphysics, and the history of 20th-century philosophy and physics.
This novel text directly addresses common claims and misconceptions around quantum mechanics and presents a fresh and modern understanding of this fundamental and essential physical theory. It begins with a non-mathematical introduction to some of the more controversial topics in the foundations of quantum mechanics. For those more familiar with the theoretical framework of quantum mechanics, the text moves on to a general introduction to quantum field theory, followed by a detailed discussion of cutting-edge topics in this area such as decoherence and spontaneous coherence. Several important philosophical problems in quantum mechanics are considered, and their interpretations are compared, notably the Copenhagen and many-worlds interpretations. The inclusion of frequent real-world examples, such as superconductors and superfluids, ensures the book remains grounded in modern research. This book will be a valuable resource for students and researchers in both physics and the philosophy of science interested in the foundations of quantum mechanics.
This chapter focuses on the work of David Bohm carried out together and then pursued and amplified by his collaborator Basil Hiley. Like the case studies in the other chapters, quantum physics played a key role in this approach too, especially the notion of non-local order. Bohm distinguishes between “implicate order” and “explicate order,” with the former constituting the psychophysically neutral realm similar to Pauli and Jung’s Unus Mundus from which both the mental and the physical emerge as explications. In this view, meaning is involved at the deep, implicate level through the notion of “active information”. When the implicate order (an undivided whole) is explicated into a multiplicity, this does naturally imply correlations that constitute the mind-matter connection. We also explore Hiley’s algebraic accounts linking back to Eddington’s ideas, as well as some of Bohm’s views of the relation between perception, language, and reality.
This chapter studies the approaches of Arthur Eddington and John Wheeler, both renowned physicists, who came to dual-aspect monist views from slightly different angles. Both place strong emphasis on concepts of meaningful information. We group them together since their fundamental link connecting the objective (physical) and the subjective (mental) is the notion of participation . The subjectivity of agents is reflexively implicated in the very existence of objective reality – a position now known as “participatory realism”. Eddington called his view “selective subjectivism” while Wheeler’s view was encapsulated in his slogan “it from bit” (whose erroneous reception in contemporary discussion we clarify). Both Eddington and Wheeler describe a psychophysically neutral realm with no space and no time (what Wheeler calls “pregeometry”) from which subject and object emerge. We compare similarities and differences between their viewpoints and examine their dual-aspect features together with the deep structure of meaning.