Questioning the Foundations: Which of Our Basic Physical Assumptions Are Wrong? Experimenter’s Free Will by Joseph Bisognano

Dear Joseph Bisognano,

A very well written, comprehensible and relevant essay, according to the competition judging criteria. The measurement problem is an important topic to address. You have looked at it in an interesting way. I am afraid that by removing the experimenter's free will you are substituting one problem for another worse one, ( red hat dislikes in my own essay). So it is to my mind a provocative suggestion, (other's may find it less so). IMHO it is possible to overcome the measurement problem without having the observer's behaviour fully determined. That difference of opinion over the physics and philosophical implications of your 'solution' does not alter the fact that you have expressed your ideas and arguments clearly in a thought provoking, well crafted essay. Good luck in the competition.

The problem with quantum measurement is really a question about why there is the appearance of a classical world. In this classical world there are eigenstates associated with "large N" that are stable under environmental perturbations. Quantum mechanics by itself is really fairly simple. We can describe it with linear vector spaces, operators on those spaces that are unitary and Hermitian and so forth. The problem comes with trying to get our classical or macroscopic understanding of the world, which is the physical format for most instruments, to jibe with the quantum world.

The free will of the experimenter is interpreted as the context of an experiment. In the EPR experiment the two experimenters can set their Stern-Gerlach apparatuses as they chose. Quantum mechanics does not provide this, for the eigen-basis of the quantum system is just one of an infinite number under unitary transformation. So we invoke the notion of free will, but this does not have to be so. We can well imagine a computer making the choice based on some algorithm, which could be a random number generator. If one is not happy with pseudo-randomness of algorithmic simulations of randomness one could use radioactive decay. A computer reads off a binary stream from the clicks on a Geiger counter, and this rotates the SG apparatus.. Now the reduced state of one quantum system is used to decide the context whereby another quantum system is measured.

The need for freewill might then be argued to be irrelevant. Physics that is not dependent upon such is best. The problem is that freewill is a part of consciousness, where we have little idea of what consciousness really is.

Hi Lawrence,

The eigenstates that we measure are picked randomly by the quantum system. In a way, the quantum system has free will to pick whatever quantum state it wants. In other words, from our point of view, we measure an eigenstate that is random to us. But free will is sort of like how you and I make a decision that is a random choice to someone else. Go to a resteraunt and chose a meal (eigenstate) from the menu. The waitress has no idea what you're going to order. That is free will. Right?

A classical eigenstate is usually the most expected amplitude in a path integral. The orbit of a planet around the sun is a path that is the most expected path if an electron were in that orbit. However, the electron would exhibit an interference of different paths. Yet as a system which has an action S = Nħ for n -- > ∞ exhibits less interference between paths which converge to the most expected path. This destruction of interferences between paths is a measure of the entanglement the system enters into with the environment. The inference phase, or equivalently the overlap phase in the off diagonal portions of the density matrix, is converted into an entanglement with the environment. The density matrix is then reduced to its diagonal probability entries. However, for the large N conversion to macroscopic or classical reality only one of those entries is physically real: the most probable amplitude defines (in most cases) the classical path.

Consciousness or free will is problematic. This is particularly in light of Libet's fMRI experiments. These demonstrated how the neural activity for engaging in motor activity that defines a choice occurs before the subject is aware of the choice or having made a choice. This suggests that what we call free will, or even the consciousness of making a choice, is some epiphenomenon of neurophysiological processes that are more deterministic.

Cheers LC

If you had free will, what would you do with it?

If I had the free will ,I will save this planet Jason with universal faith and real revolutions.:)

REVOLUTION SPHERIZATION ...

Dear Joseph Bisognano,

very well written essay with deep thoughts on the measurement problem and its different "solutions" on the market of theories.

But one has - in my opinion - to be careful to not confuse oneself with the term "consistency".

Consistency is surely needed for every scientific theory, but is it also sufficient? As long as consistency in yours and other's theories/interpretations of QM is the only difference, we have a new problem: it's a matter of personal taste which interpretation the subject prefers. And that would mean - speaking in the language of your theory - that the subject hasn't the free will to choose the "right" interpretation! So "quasi-randomness" in the acceptance/non-acceptance of theories enters the field of our deepest scientific questions!

Would this make sense to you? I see no way out of this new paradox without assuming a meta-level of nature that has some "teleology" built in to lead us (to correlate us) with the true scientific interpretation of QM! So what you've achieved by eliminating free will, is to install a teleologic sense that guids the whole universe (maybe with, maybe without free will....).

So, i can not see how you can say that

"having "...eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." -And that truth is that the universe is fully determined"

is the truth - because assumptions about what's possible and what's not cannot be proven in advance, there are only verifications of possibilities allowed in this case. And for this case you need at least a practical demonstration that predicts every measurement outcome!

Hi Joseph:

A Solution to QM Measurement Paradox

I enjoyed reading your clear and well-written essay describing the QM Measurement Paradox and offering a compromise interim solution - "It appears that accepting that the experimenter's free will assumption is wrong offers a powerful foundation to move forward."

I would like to draw your attention to my posted paper - - -" From Absurd to Elegant Universe" and my book - -" The Hidden Factor......" wherein I describe the following alternative approach to resolve the QM measurement paradox:

A Gravity Nullification Model is developed that describes the physics of the dynamics of the spontaneous particle decay. This model allows a mathematical description as to how a particle responds deterministically to the experimental apparatus or measurement characteristic in terms of the velocity V of the measuring frame of reference that interferes with the quantum particle being observed. The observed mass, energy, space, and time for the particle are relativistically determined by the model in terms of velocity V chosen by the Free-willed observer to observe the photon moving at the speed of light C. If V=0, the photon is stopped to provide the classical result in a Newtonian frame of reference. If V is chosen to be a higher value, then V/C determines the actual photon mass, frequency, and wavelength as shown in the attached figure 4-14 (pdf file). Thus, the results of the observation are deterministic and dependent upon the free willed choice (V of the measuring device) of the observer.

This also resolves the paradox of the Spooky Action at a Distance as follows. The photon moving at C experiences a fully dilated space and time (due to specific relativity, figure 1 in my posted paper) in its own frame of reference. Hence, a photon that is apparently broken into two subsystems remains correlated or entangled in spite of the appearance of separation experienced in the observer's frame of reference moving at V less than C.

I would greatly appreciate your comments on my paper that also resolves many existing paradoxes and inconsistencies of QM and explains its inner workings in deterministic relativistic formulations.

Best regards

Avtar SinghAttachment #1: Waveparticle_behavior_of_a_photon.pdf

Joseph,

Citation from my article "Free will and the incomleteness of physics" published in Internet at January 30, 2010: "Usual explanation of physical laws started with word "if". If we do [some action], then we will see [some result]. But in deterministic world word "if" is senseless! Nobody can do something that is not on the unique track of the world development. In the deterministic world physics does not exist - history only exists.". Also: "Physicist makes his experiments in the places and moments written in the "main book of history". And he cannot freely repeat these experiments. He has no more freedom of experiments, than mechanical doll. Question: what is happened in the world in moments and places that are not scheduled for an observation?,- is senseless. We never will know that."

Article is at the address: http://yosefalberton.wordpress.com/article/free-will-and-the-incompleteness-of-1hm3pfkdolphw-39/

I have often thought that the Sherlock Holmes that you quote is appropriate, but I've never dared to quote it myself. The insistence on free will could be said to require classical physicists not to take the initial conditions in the past to be what they have to be to obtain (given whatever the dynamics might be) what we see now, setting up a classic straw man.

I suppose you are aware of the various attempts in the literature to take on the free will assumption, or, as it might also be called, the no-conspiracy assumption, but have chosen not to cite 't Hooft, for example, in this context. For that matter, Wolfram takes this approach in his discussion of finite automata. FWIW, you will find a discussion of this aspect in my solitary contribution to the Bell literature, "Bell inequalities for random fields", J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 39 (2006) 7441-7455, http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0305-4470/39/23/018, cond-mat/0403692, although I certainly cannot claim any precedence.

There are quite a few difficulties with *using* a conspiracy approach, the intractability of available deterministic models relative to Hilbert space models for a given set of experiments (that are only repeatable in a statistical sense) being the most awkward, IMO. One can take solace in the possibility of such models, without troubling oneself with actually constructing them.

give me the tool of money, and I will insert harmonious parameters of universal equilibriums. 1 composting at Big scale

2 vegetal multiplication

3 opimization of soils

...

101 SPHERIZATION

Dear Joseph:

I would greatly appreciate it if you could respond to my comments above.

Thanks in advance,

Avtar

Joseph,

I liked your essay and believe you got it right. The observer needs to be taken into account.

If the free will of the observer is not taken into account you get the standard QM.

Here is an page from my website that gives an unorthodox view of Feynman's mysterious e.

With your essay in mind I would say that the number e is due to not taking into account the free will of the observer.

See if you agree.

http://digitalwavetheory.com/DWT/18_Feynmans_Mysterious_"e".html

Don Limuti

Joseph wrote:

"With all of space-time truly a unified whole, existing outside of the flow of time, determinism and quasi free will coexist."

I think wrong assumption to have space-time and flow of times\

space and time are anisotropic.

See my essay http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1413

Hello. This is group message to you and the writers of some 80 contest essays that I have already read, rated and probably commented on.

This year I feel proud that the following old and new online friends have accepted my suggestion that they submit their ideas to this contest. Please feel free to read, comment on and rate these essays (including mine) if you have not already done so, thanks:

Why We Still Don't Have Quantum Nucleodynamics by Norman D. Cook a summary of his Springer book on the subject.

A Challenge to Quantized Absorption by Experiment and Theory by Eric Stanley Reiter Very important experiments based on Planck's loading theory, proving that Einstein's idea that the photon is a particle is wrong.

An Artist's Modest Proposal by Kenneth Snelson The world-famous inventor of Tensegrity applies his ideas of structure to de Broglie's atom.

Notes on Relativity by Edward Hoerdt Questioning how the Michelson-Morely experiment is analyzed in the context of Special Relativity

Vladimir Tamari's essay Fix Physics! Is Physics like a badly-designed building? A humorous illustrate take. Plus: Seven foundational questions suggest a new beginning.

Thank you and good luck.

Vladimir

If you do not understand why your rating dropped down. As I found ratings in the contest are calculated in the next way. Suppose your rating is [math]R_1 [/math] and [math]N_1 [/math] was the quantity of people which gave you ratings. Then you have [math]S_1=R_1 N_1 [/math] of points. After it anyone give you [math]dS [/math] of points so you have [math]S_2=S_1+ dS [/math] of points and [math]N_2=N_1+1 [/math] is the common quantity of the people which gave you ratings. At the same time you will have [math]S_2=R_2 N_2 [/math] of points. From here, if you want to be R2 > R1 there must be: [math]S_2/ N_2>S_1/ N_1 [/math] or [math] (S_1+ dS) / (N_1+1) >S_1/ N_1 [/math] or [math] dS >S_1/ N_1 =R_1[/math] In other words if you want to increase rating of anyone you must give him more points [math]dS [/math] then the participant`s rating [math]R_1 [/math] was at the moment you rated him. From here it is seen that in the contest are special rules for ratings. And from here there are misunderstanding of some participants what is happened with their ratings. Moreover since community ratings are hided some participants do not sure how increase ratings of others and gives them maximum 10 points. But in the case the scale from 1 to 10 of points do not work, and some essays are overestimated and some essays are drop down. In my opinion it is a bad problem with this Contest rating process. I hope the FQXI community will change the rating process.

Sergey Fedosin

Dear Joseph,

I see that your essay is something what I was should to read. I clarified the problem of measurement, and I got useful references. But, why did you not give reference for t'Hooft http://igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/phys/2005-0622-152928/14728.pdf He has a similar idea of determinism of quantum theory. (I hope that this is here, otherwise this is other o'Hooft article?)

Otherwise, I have a different solution to your problem. (The seventh section.) I claim that every free will decision is a fundamental quantum phenomenon. I speak in favour of panpsychism. Thus, every quantum collapse is one decision of a primitive unit of consciousness. We see them as random, because they are not connected.

Thus, I think, with this model the measurement problem disappears?

Maybe you will object that EPR experiment cannot be explained on this way, because of superluminal effects. But I claim that spacetime is emergent, thus EPR contains three decisions, of two observers, and of one electron-spin pair.

I hope for any remark, that it will give me to think.

Best regards

Janko Kokosar

I'm certainly not the first person to point out that superdeterminism is a loophole for the measurement problem. As I point out, Bell was quite aware of this, and most recently 't Hooft has championed this idea. Rather, my main point is that given the decades of failure to answer the measurement problem without invoking superdeterminism, in the spirit of the Sherlock Holmes quote, this improbable solution may prove to be the only possible solution. As a second point, I offer a holisitic view of an Escher-like self consistency of a space-time net rather than a conspiracy of initial conditions as a way forward.

Hi Joseph,

Please check this link and find how five essays, including yours, were removed from the 35 finalists. I posted some messages with attachments containing the page and screenshots at 0:01.

Good luck,

Cristi Stoica