quantum mechanics: at another level (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, June 28, 2013, 12:31 (3957 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Help to solve the mystery by accepting that quantum events are not in space time as we experience it:-http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/critical-opalescence/2013/06/21/can-we-resolve-quan...-I'm way out of my depth here, but I'm trying to understand the arguments, and I hope you (or someone else) will put me right, David. Apologies for the length of the quotes, but they each contain the threads I'm trying to untangle:-In the June issue of Scientific American, physicist and writer Hans Christian von Baeyer describes the current state of "deep confusion about the meaning of quantum theory" and discusses one proposal—a denial that the theory describes anything objectively real—for rendering some of the quantum perplexities "less troubling."-The author writes: "My development of the Transactional Interpretation makes use of an important idea of Werner Heisenberg: "Atoms and the elementary particles themselves ... form a world of potentialities or possibilities rather than things of the facts." This world of potentialities is not contained within space and time; it is a higher-dimensional world whose structure is described by the mathematics of quantum theory. The Transactional Interpretation is best understood by considering both the offer and confirmation as Heisenbergian possibilities—that is, they are only potential events. That removes the possibility of causal-loop inconsistencies, since neither the positive-energy offer wave nor the negative-energy confirmation wave carries real energy, and neither is contained in spacetime. It is only in the encounter between the two that real energy may be conveyed within spacetime from an emitter to an absorber—and when this occurs, all the energy is delivered in the normal future direction."-If I've understood this correctly, it means that quantum mechanics can only take on reality when it is within our own spacetime reality. Otherwise it remains an unreal potential. In that case, isn't it true that the theory does not describe "anything objectively real"? Besides, how can we ever know what is objectively real?-"The transactional picture is conceptually challenging because the underlying processes are so different from what we are used to in our classical world of experience, and we must allow for the startling idea that there is more to reality than what can be contained within spacetime. As is evident from von Baeyer's article, quantum theory truly challenges us to think outside the box—and, in this case, I submit that the box is spacetime itself. If this seems farfetched, consider the eloquent point made by physicist and philosopher Ernan McMullin: "Imaginability must not be made the test for ontology. The realist claim is that the scientist is discovering the structures of the world; it is not required in addition that these structures be imaginable in the categories of the macroworld."-On the surface, this seems to open a scientific gateway to God. But what IS the test for ontology? The fact that something is not imaginable in the categories of the macroworld does not mean that it has any objective reality! The idea that there is more to reality that what can be contained within spacetime seems to be borne out by psychic experiences such as NDEs, but the only way we can test these is through verifiability within spacetime. Doesn't the same apply to all so-called quantum events? Quantum theory described in these terms seems to me to be a licence for people to believe whatever they want to believe.
 
Let me repeat, though, this is a field that leaves me floundering, and so I'd be grateful for any corrections you can make to my interpretation of the above.