What is Reality?

The big issues identified in this thread:

Actuality = ontology
Collapse = both quantum collapse and process collapse
Space = but that space is alive with virtual particles and fields
Wave/Particle Duality = Viator or Potentiality
Space/Time = the dynamic dyad
“I AM” = the hard problem of experience
Perception as speculation = process of concrescence
For human beings reality is defined by our relationships = what we imagine they are
Reality leaves a lot to the imagination = our minds are part of reality not vice versa
Subjective experience of time is, of course, very Einstein-like = in a block universe
Macro vice Macro

On the material side (in terms of “hard core physics”) the universe is some kind of mixture of quantum and relativity physics. On the relativistic side the problem is that Einstein expressed his theory in terms of a “block universe” wherein all spaces and times exist simultaneously. This has been modified over time to account for the non-existence of time and mind which is the metaphysical foundations for many scientists. (Readers of my previous posts should know how much I despise this idea because, unlike Iowa Guy, I do not experience time in this way, but as a flow).

Space is time and time is space; just as particles are waves and waves particles. Viator or wavicles or potentiality (what Heisenberg called wavicles) are all good terms. The quantum building block is neither particle nor wave, but something with the properties of both (depending on what kind of measurement you want to make). Spacetime, something which is neither space nor time is the relativistic building block. The intermediary between the two is inertial mass (what we think gravity arises from). Mass warps space and time and impacts waves and particles.

Space is not nothingness it is an ever-changing flux of fields and virtual particles. But these are potentialities which are only possibilities and not manifest yet. The manifestation can be seen as the result of two things “the collapse of the wavefunction” (the classical quantum definition which includes superposition and other effects) and “the process of concrescence” (a little known and abstract definition within process philosophy which describes how actualities occur).

It is this process of concrescence that moves a possibility to a pre-sensory thing (prehension) to a manifest (physical) thing to a thing to be experienced (a fully manifest occurrence of actuality). It is at this level that the micro/macro split comes into being in both the physical (quantum collapse) and the experiential (concrescence) reality. It is the experiential realm where “I AM” lives. This is the very real “hard problem of consciousness”.

I, as a sentient being, have consciousness (a subjective universe) and, presuming those of you who created this thread are independent sentient beings, so do all human beings. Our relationships not just with other human beings, but the whole universe (physical reality) and the entire Kosmos (physical and mental reality, which is just a superposition of manifest occurrences of actuality or “actual entity”) define “us”.

The miracle and dance we see as Reality is a product of the Kosmos our subjective and objective, physical and mental inputs (though I prefer the notion of “actual entities” to include all four things). Our map of it (our notion of Reality) is a product of both this, our perception of it all, our thoughts about it all, our imaginings, and our feelings.

Yes, it is beyond “knowing” if by knowing you mean using mathematics, deductive knowledge, and physical measurements. If rather by knowing, you mean directly experiencing and subjecting those experiences to rigorous scientific methodology, one can say it is knowable.




Thanks to you all!
 
Okay, I did not introduce the subject of concrescence well. The best diagrams and descriptions I know of are in

www.processphilosophy.com/textlink.pdf

see esp the text and figures in CH 24 and the figures of CH 12-15 (the text is good too).
Thoughts on Process may be the best introduction,

www.concrescence.org/index.php/ajpt/article/download/85/47 is an in-depth philosophical discussion
and
Introduction to Whitehead - Global Process
is an easy to follow slide based introduction to the philosophy of organism (or process philosophy).

If you have questions, I will, of course answer, but I would use these as references.
 
Waves can exist without being tied to a particular particle. (Sound waves travel through air, water, or whatever.)

When a photon strikes something, and its associated wave collaspes, that wave energy is transfered to a different form--like heat (a different vibration in a different medium.)

What happens to the photon when its wave collapses?
 
Yes waves can exist without a particle, on the macro-level (the continuum, the classic physics, the level we directly apprehend). It is at the quantum level (things called photons, electrons, atoms, etc) where the thing-in-itself (the potentiality) is neither wave or particle, but a combination.

Your analogy is fine. But try this:
1) a something (potential) is created by some actual occasion (a change in the energy state of mercury in a compact fluorescent bulb or cfb)--called a photon
2) this potential is not actualized (it does not exist separately from the experience of the environment), so instead of being a thing it is rather a possibility of a thing.
3) the photon strikes the black side of one of those old fashioned Cooke's Radiometers (a light bulb with little spinning flags, remember them?) where the photon is actualized as an absorption event.
4) The black surface is heated (it absorbs the photon, increasing the temperature by a little bit, and at the edge of the flags miniscule temperature gradient results
5) When many many millions of these events happen the little flags spin due to the minor differences in the temperature (expressed as motion) of the air molecules along the edges so the flags spin white-side first
6) the potentiality that was the photon has become the actuality that is the transfer of heat

The key is to visualize the events as a process, not as the interaction of things. The photon never really existed as a discrete thing, it just was created as a potentiality in the cfb that became part of the actuality that is the heating of the black surface.
 
The ultimate reality is that there is no reality.

None from General Relativity, the Quantum Theory blows reality to smithereens, and Godel's Proof says there's no reality the math that science uses.

It's the best of all worlds, deterministic reality is grim. This is much richer and profound.
 
What is the reality of Schrodinger's Cat? How does it feel about being dead and alive at the same time?

Many Worlds says you have your feet in worlds with live cats and worlds with dead cats, when you look in the box, you put both feet in the live cat worlds. (or vice versa). The cat is spared the stress of being alive and dead at the same time, and hairless apes don't have special powers that cats don't have.

But until you look, there is no reality to the cat being dead or alive.
 
Passerby. Depends on what you mean by "reality". I believe (as do all those I mention in passing as process-oriented). That the becoming (the process itself) is the reality. The experiences are real, actual events. Relativity, quantum, and higher math are just ways to try to model it (as is meta-physics, in the classical, not the 19th century, sense).

Not quite with the cat. Of course it knows if it is alive or dead. But we (outside the box) have no way of knowing that. So when you describe the cat (from outside the box) it is literally alive and dead (until the measurement event occurs). Many worlds says that at the moment the measurement event (opening the box) is made, the universe mysteriously "forks" so that all possibilities exist. MWT is way to keep the quantum probability from being a determining factor, and attempting to make the Kosmos deterministic. The extreme form of this is Einstein's "Block Universe" (from which Everett extrapolated his MWT.

Until you measure, the cat is neither alive nor dead (or at least you cannot know that, G-d her/him self cannot know it empirically). Now, there may well by some "superjet" of Creativity or G-d that can know it in a non-empirical way. But that is meta-physics and theology, not physics, not scientific knowledge.

Reality exists it is here and now and all about us. But the reality is not "common-sense", not based in things or opinions. Reality is the Kosmos, a string of possibilities, actual events, and subsequent events that result from the first event (but are not the first event). At least that is how I model it. Whitehead's view (which I am espousing) is, I believe the most realistic of any... it is the one which explains reality (in terms of metaphysics, not empirical science).
 
Well, mass/energy is conserved (at least you can't steal it for long.) We still have the conservation laws to cling to.

I have to think Einstein would have liked Many Words, but you still roll the same dice. It's just Many Worlds instead of magic clouds.
 
Well, he fought against the Copenhagen Interpretation his whole life. I don't blame him, it's absurd. Something had to be wrong.

I've talked to Jack Kilmon occasinally, really getting long in the tooth these days. Linguistic expert, he reads Coptic and sees the Greek and the Aramaic behind it. Can read everything in the original handwriting. Student of Attridge, whiz kid or something, and got to hang out with Einstein and Godel. He says they did mention repeating Big Bangs and Big Crunches, those Many Worlds. And after all it's the same Many Worlds.
 
I think Jack had it right. Einstein was, metaphorically, the last Alchemist. He really wanted the Kosmos to follow his logic, as do I. But he could not jettison his ideas when faced with contradictory evidence (no one has to do this). So on that level (the level of metaphysics), he remained a little dated, hanging out with Mach and Planck (very good company).

Yes, the Copenhagen Interpretation is absurd. But quantum is the most verified theory of physics. That explains the plethora of alternatives to the Copenhagen Interpretation (like multi-verse).

I am a hard-core believer in the CI. Based on Ockham's razor. As I read most of the other Interpretations, they fall into the same logical category as the Scholastic claim that gravity did not exist, the planets were pulled by masses of tiny invisible angels.
 
So, is the cat dead and alive at the same time?

And why do hairless apes have this special ability to make things real? Hoe about brain damaged hairless apes? Is it a DNA thing?

Many Worlds resolves all that.

radarmark said:
I think Jack had it right. Einstein was, metaphorically, the last Alchemist. He really wanted the Kosmos to follow his logic, as do I. But he could not jettison his ideas when faced with contradictory evidence (no one has to do this). So on that level (the level of metaphysics), he remained a little dated, hanging out with Mach and Planck (very good company).

Yes, the Copenhagen Interpretation is absurd. But quantum is the most verified theory of physics. That explains the plethora of alternatives to the Copenhagen Interpretation (like multi-verse).

I am a hard-core believer in the CI. Based on Ockham's razor. As I read most of the other Interpretations, they fall into the same logical category as the Scholastic claim that gravity did not exist, the planets were pulled by masses of tiny invisible angels.
Click to expand...
 
Do you have a scientifice experiment that measures "consciousness", I have no clue what you are talking about.

How brain damaged does a person have to be to not be able to do the trick and at what point does it stop being conscious? Rats? Roaches? Bacteria? Viruses? The Great Red Spot? If we look close, it just breaks down.

And that in now way alters the mental duress the poor cat is in, being dead and alive at the same time.

radarmark said:
No, it would be any conscious entity outside of the box (a dog, whale, whatever).
Click to expand...
 
(Worth noting we are discussing the meaning of life and death from the viewpoint of the absolute foundation of current science. It has something to say on the subject.)
 
Read "The Problem of Consciousness" or look it up on the Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Some poo-poo it (mainly material monists). Some (like Whitehead and I) think a form of consciousness exists in all actual entities.

Start with looking up "mind/body" and "hard problem of consciousness" in wiki.

I do not know what trick you are talking about. The trick of consciousness? Of experience? Of thought? They are very related and species or brain functionality (other than flat-line) has little to do with any of these.
 
Consciousness is superstition, that's the point of the Turing Test. If you can't measure it with experiments, it doesn't exist.

The trick is the trick of making Schrodinger's Cat either dead or alive when you open the box. You said it had to be a "conscious" entity and I was trying to figure out what you mean by that, Does a rat qualify? A cockroach? A bacteria? When does this special ability to make cats dead or alive, this "consciousness" actually occur?

It all breaks down when you look close, and Many Worlds instantly resolves it, where the cat is never dead and alive at the time time, and "conscious" entities and all that superstition, unmeasurable by science, isn't required.
 
Schrodinger, whose Wave Equation produced all the miracles of modern science, quit the Quantum Theory in disgust, saying he didn't like it and was sorry he ever had anything to do with it.

He took in a much less disturbing subject, "What is Life" and wrote a book by that name.

Watson, as he discusses in The Double Helix, carried the book around, and says it inspired him to discover DNA. Crick used Schrodinger's math to crack it, using the x-rays of the crystal scattering.

Anway, Schrodinger's conclusion is that consciousness isn't confined to our skulls, but is a everywhere and intertwined.

How he resolve taht with the requirement for consicousness in the Copenhagen Interpretation he hated so much, isn't clear.
 
Obviously, you did not look up the references I gave you. Why should I reply to someone who cannot (or will not) read?

Yes, both Schrodinger and Einstein dismissed quantum mechanics. Wow, why did I know that... because I am a nuclear physicist. Does that make them right? No.

It is a matter for the scientific method... real hard reading and thought and mathematics ( and I am very sorry about that) to decide. I am not the one claiming "objective truth"". You are. All I am saying is that there are other ways to see all these issues.

Was Thomas on women pretty advanced? Given the Western Culture at the time yes. But he was not first, nor (IMHO) the best.

Is reality confusing? Hell yes! But unless you have the education and math, do not go there (it is like a "Lolly-Pop Leaguer" singing bass. The metaphysics of the issue is up in the air... but do not confuse that with the empirical content of the issues.
 
You don't have a remote clue about science and couldn't do the math if youf life depended on it, and we both know it, don't we?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top