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Quantum Woo

I have posted regularly in the past about some cutting edge philosophical and scientific ideas based on quantum physics (such as Henry Stapp’s speculation on an afterlife based on modern physics). But such ideas obviously aren’t endorsed by ‘mainstream’ physicists, and so I recommend (as with most things we post here) that readers keep their wits about them, and educate themselves to the various opinions on these controversial debates. On this particular topic, Alan Boyle’s recent interview with physicist Lawrence Krauss over is a good start:

Krauss worries that a lot of people can be fooled by appeals to the admittedly weird world of quantum physics — a world in which particles are said to take every possible path from point A to point B, in which the position and velocity of particles are necessarily cloaked in uncertainty, in which the mere act of observation changes the thing being observed.

In the last of a series of columns written for Scientific American, Krauss says “no area of physics stimulates more nonsense in the public arena than quantum mechanics.” His list of “worst abusers” includes inspirational author Deepak Chopra, the best-selling book “The Secret” and the whole field of Transcendental Meditation. So what constitutes quantum quackery?

For those interested in following up on this interview, you can read a number of Krauss’s articles for various publications via his website.

Previously on TDG:

Editor
  1. Understanding Quantum Physics
    Was it not Richard Feynman who said if anyone who claims to fully understand Quantum Physics does not understand Quantum Physics?

    In a TV interview with Richard Dawkins, Deepak Chopra admitted he was using the “quantum” label as a metaphor and went on to suggest the it was the Physicists who had misappropriated the term.

    Quantum Physics is the new New Age panacea which, like Jungian Psychology, has become somewhat of a misquoted and misrepresented darling of resurgent spiritual movements. Woo Woo merchants are often intellectually corrupt when it comes to their appropriation of science and scientific ideas and models. On the one hand they reject the scientific method and the ‘evil science’ perpetuates on the other they cherry pick the concepts which can be twisted to give their brand of woo seeming credibility.

    http://www.therationalmystic.co.uk

    1. Stuck in the Excluded Middle With You
      [quote=rationalmystic]Quantum Physics is the new New Age panacea which, like Jungian Psychology, has become somewhat of a misquoted and misrepresented darling of resurgent spiritual movements. Woo Woo merchants are often intellectually corrupt when it comes to their appropriation of science and scientific ideas and models. On the one hand they reject the scientific method and the ‘evil science’ perpetuates on the other they cherry pick the concepts which can be twisted to give their brand of woo seeming credibility.[/quote]

      And on the other hand, you have a few physicists who loudly proclaim that quantum physics has nothing to do with consciousness or our ideas about reality. And then you read some books (e.g. The Quantum Enigma) which decry both sides. So hard to find the middle path at times…

  2. There’s Woo and there’s woo…

    no area of physics stimulates more nonsense in the public arena than quantum mechanics

    So says the scientist that not too long ago worried about the possibility we puny humans might have sealed the fate of the Universe, by trying to MEASURE its age and dimension… 😛

  3. ‘all else being equal’
    I’m a bit confused by Krauss’s statement that
    [quote]The quantum mechanical correlations, the spooky action at a distance that quantum mechanics brings up, is true only for very specially prepared systems that are isolated from the rest of the world, completely. And we are certainly not isolated from the rest of the world.[/quote]
    Many correlations in science can only be demonstrated under the strictly-controlled experimental conditions of the lab. Do these relationships not apply in the ‘real’ world either?

  4. The “special preparation”
    The “special preparation” hardly discounts its inclusion in the “world.” Quantum entanglement is quantum entanglement. The “measuring” may require special preparation, but so does measuring anything. A speedometer would probably have been regarded as a “special preparation” two hundred years ago, but is now mundane. I get the feeling he is trying to exclude quantum entanglement from the real world by exclaiming that the measuring set ups are so exotic we can’t consider them a part of the world. What this really sounds like is “reaching” for an excuse.

    Here is the crux of Krauss’ complaint:
    “But what quantum mechanics doesn’t change about the universe is, if you want to change things, you still have to do something. You can’t change the world by thinking about it.”

    That is a wondrously shallow generality that would draw a smirk from any philosopher of the last 2,000 years. A lot of these guys like Krauss have closeted themeselves off from “occult” science and the latest experiments in PSI, etc. They tend to speak not from direct experience but from a calcified position they have probably maintained most of their lives and which they have no intention of changing or disturbing with pesky new discoveries. Someone here posted recently that a lot of these Amazing Randi type thinkers probably have oedipal issues and various emotional problems that put them in the habit of walling off large swaths of the surrounding reality as a defense mechanism. Erecting defense mechanisms becomes a habit developed in early life because of trauma or some maladaptation. I have a few physics professor friends who are mildy aspergerish and who from an early age were terrified by social interaction because they had so much trouble understanding social nuance. They have enormous quantitative reasoning IQ’s, but they also have a high intolerance for anything that smacks of the “unknown.” They have had a bellyful of unknown all their lives and are quite content to sequester themslves in their tenured cubicles where the rules always apply and nothing unknown is likely to pop up and embarrass them.
    I have recently been posting about my expriences with poltergiests in my family’s ranch house near Austin. These experiences have had a profound effect of my ideas about reality.
    I would just love to have an “academic weekend” get together at the ranch for some of my more “skeptical” friends, and see how they react to a real goosing by a real invisible poltergeist. There are four guest rooms and every room is haunted. We could “specially prepare” the rooms by taking all the furniture out of them for awhile the day before the guests arrive. That little move always proves to be an explosive taunt to the spooks who respond colorfully.

    1. In defense of Aspergeric Forteans

      I have a few physics professor friends who are mildy aspergerish and who from an early age were terrified by social interaction because they had so much trouble understanding social nuance. They have enormous quantitative reasoning IQ’s, but they also have a high intolerance for anything that smacks of the “unknown.”

      Gary McKenna has Asperger’s, hasn’t he?

      I’m a bit Aspergerish myself. We like to find patterns and structure in the world, but that doesn’t mean we shun its mysteries 😉

          1. all three of them
            Actually both of them, and the third guy, who’s name I forget.
            But that would be Alzheimer’s, wouldn’t it.

        1. I agree with the famous
          I agree with the famous aspergeree Temple Grandin that aspergers had some selctive advantage. The metaphor she invokes is of the asperger neolithic dude obessessing over flint chipping and achieving technological breakthroughs because of that obsession. Of course, one cannot generalize here as I did for rhetorical purposes. I was citing extreme cases to highlight my point. Many of the more hardened skeptics I know just do not have any spiritual imagination. That is an area to which they have a blind spot, and the blind spot reminds of what is perhaps a related blind spot – abstract human relationships.

          1. Well, truth be told I think I
            Well, truth be told I think I have a touch of it myself. The gradations between aspergers and so called “normal” are infinitely sliding, so it is one of those syndromes touching many people. I know a few bona fide geniuses, and they each have something a tad “wrong” with them, and we are the richer for it. I excuse quite a few of my friends for being unimaginative about the fortean or occult because we all have blind spots anyway, and if you screened you friends for traits you found difficult you wouldn’t have any frieds at all.

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