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  • Does Objective Reality Exist? Great Mysteries of Physics Part 4 -- FQxI Podcast

The relative context is needed first before, ‘measured or observed this way’ is decided.
Prior to measurement or observation It doesn’t have a singular (relative) state that has been isolated from the absolute existence, to be identified nor quantified.
The existing environment, Object reality in which humans bodily exist, and in which physics and chemistry is happening is not an observation product. It isn’t’ spread over time, it is spatially absolute and uni-temporal not 3 or 3+1D.

Observation products and measurement products are relative. Demonstrating relation between the observed and observer or measuring apparatus. Objects and elements of Object reality are observer independent, they do not have to be observed or measured to exist. Macroscopic observation products are formed from processing input stimuli . There is transmission time from material source to observer .Variation in transmission time means the likeness has temporal spread incorporated which doesn't exist for the existing material source. These differences mean the space occupied by existing things is different from the space relative observation products are shown occupying.

5 days later

Are you going to tell us, are you asking without question mark, or is your comment an uncredited quote?
The quantum possibilities don't give rise to classical reality, they are superseded by measurement. No measured or observed this way has been applied to give a singular viewpoint. The unmeasured is absolute, not relative. “Nagel calls that conception the “view from nowhere”, Bernard Williams the “absolute conception” (Williams 1985 [2011]). It represents the world as it is, unmediated by human minds and other “distortions”. “Scientific Objectivity", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, part 2.1 [1] Quantum possibilities are not quite that, but outcome states not yet realized. Upon measurement a relative measurement product is formed. Classical Special relativity is considering from a viewpoint in particular. Classical physics deals with two aspects in its various branches; measurement products and Object Reality or existence. Probability is neither aspect .It is abstract, dealing with what has not yet come to be and what will not come to be. It is therefore neither existence or our 'impression' of existence, through sensory or physical interaction with it ,giving relative observation or measurement product/s.

    Georgina Woodward

    You seem to be somewhat unfamiliar with how FQXi's new website functions:
    1) To reply to a specific post, hover your mouse over that post, until its specific "reply" button appears.
    2) Hyperlinks are now shown in bold; so my quote is also a hyperlink, to an article with that specific quote in its subtitle, and to my comment regarding that article.

    In regards to your own comment, like most people with any interest in physics and "the measurement problem", you continue to confuse "measurement", "detection" and "inference" - and that's another hyperlink - that explains the distinction, and why it is fundamentally important to any understanding of reality:

    Quantum Theory is not a theory dealing with "measurement"; so there can be no possible "measurement" problem. There is only a "Detection" problem, that has been, and continues to be, systematically, totally confused for a "Measurement" Problem.

      Robert McEachern
      Yes, I am not familiar with how the website functions in detail. I knew how to use the old site ! I see now you have linked an article. I can see how to reply to a specific post here now . Thank you for that . When I click on 'measurement, detection, and inference' I get taken to the same article .I do not see where the terms are disambiguated.
      Measurement I think involves setting up some kind of relationship between the measuring apparatus and to be measured, setting up a 'looked at this way ' context. Eg. when looked at this way there are x no. of detections at detector A. Detection: it indicates that there has been an interaction with the existing entity detected. It is a necessary part of measurement. Inference I think is the conclusion, what the measurement indicates, on the basis of the result obtained and reasoning within a certain metaphysical background assumption. I am always working with the assumption that existing things are within absolute uni-temporal time and absolute space. Observation and measurement products are relative ,their display is necessarily not in the same absolute space and time.

        Georgina Woodward

        I get taken to the same article .I do not see where the terms are disambiguated

        Unfortunately, even when one links directly to a specific comment, many web-browsers frequently do not take one to that specific comment, immediately; If you know how, try opening the link in a new tab, but do not open that tab immediately, give the browser enough time to process all its code, required to bring-up the comment, it often requires at least several seconds. If that fails, you can scan through the various comments, at the end of the article, to find the terms described, in my reply to the author of the article, Philip Ball.

        11 days later
        7 days later

        Velocity is a measurement product not an objective, intrinsic property. It is a vector quantity which means it has been associated with 3 dimensional direction as given by relative measurement.
        All observer reference frames are theoretically equally valid ,though the value of the measurement can be different. So to have just one velocity outcome, first , how it is measured/observed has to be decided. Same for ',so called, properties' that include velocity, like momentum.
        A particle or object moving, moves through absolute space between mutually existing things. The way in which it moves through the pattern of existence is particular. That does not mean it has avelocity. Avelocity is a relative ('measured this way') ,limited 3D characterization. A product generated from what the existent thing is doing, plus the relation established with it.

        17 days later

        Robert McEachern Our conversation seems to have vanished or be hidden, as if it never happened,. i don't like that whole chains of thought have gone without some reason why or obvious way to access them being given. Why or by who is not shown either.

          Robert McEachern I owe the moderators an apology for thinking badly of them. |My mistake. I thought your comment on the same theme was continuing from your previous postings, but it was on a different thread.

            Georgina Woodward
            By observations we deduce that vacuum has energy which is responsible of the Universe expanding. By calculations we deduce from Planck sytem of unities that vacuum energy is huge but there is not until now the means to measure vacuum energy in atoms and so to resolve th conflict between QM and GR about vacuum energy. This is the difference between measurement and observations.

            Alaya Kouki
            Some basic assumptions about objective realty do need to be relinquished, such as 3d space and a physical dimension of time. 3d space is the observation or measurement product space , not where the object (not as identified by any one singular relative perspective), exists. There is foundational passage of time because the pattern of all that is existing -Now changes to a new pattern. Rate of change within the pattern varies. Some change happens very quickly and some slowly, some intermediate. So there is no one relevant speed of time. Regular Time intervals such as light years, eons, years, hours, minutes, seconds, milliseconds and smaller, are useful for characterizing different scales of change. The time dimension of space time observation products is due to the non instantaneous transmission of sensory stimuli used to generate observations, that is incorporated into the products. That time dimension is not a part of observer or measurement independent existence.

              Georgina Woodward
              I think we should include energy as a fifth dimension for corpuscles. The manner is to define a 4-vector swap dualities or a 4-vector identity. a corpuscle has an identity in time and an identity in space. We have the following relationship:
              4-vector swap dualities= universal constant times 4-vector momentum.

              10 days later

              Zeeya Merali

              I come from a neuroscience and evolutionary psychology background so my focus is that the reality we experience is necessarily mediated by the way information is interpreted by our senses and processed by a brain with limits on its speed and capacity of processing, problem solving architecture etc. It is a truism therefore that no two species will experience reality in the same way. A fly operates in an environment where it can move very fast so presumably we will appear to move relatively slowly to it, in fact it is possible to touch a fly if you move your finger slowly towards it as it won’t detect such a ‘slow’ movement. I don’t hold with the idea that reality is entirely illusionary, but I believe we need to ask to what extent is the reality we as scientists believe to be objective and quantifiable is actually so? Perhaps the time frame within which we have evolved means that we are unable to experience quantum phenomena without the need for detection devices. Likewise, our senses of scale is likely to be tuned to the environment in which we have evolved. Perhaps the difficulties science has in explaining counterintuitive quantum phenomena is because we have reached the limits of brain processing. Perhaps science is due for a paradigm shift where it not only examines phenomena at the quantum scale but also tests the limits of our human capacity to experience these phenomena at the scale of the very fast and very small.
              Here’s a thought, what if at the quantum scale all of time happened at the same time, and all of space was in the same space? This would neatly explain quantum phenomena like entanglement and superposition. (NB. The limitations of Plank Time and Plank Space would mean that the word ‘all’ in the statement above would need to be ‘nearly all’).
              A key issue for me is how human intent (or any consciousness organisms intent) converts data into information. I think there is much to be gained by conceiving of consciousness as results an evolved function to seek for predictable outcomes in the environment. Consciousness means we automatically interpret and seek to ‘summarise’ data in a way that is useful to us. This process may also inhibit our understanding of what is going on at the quantum scale as it species specific and should be taken into account when examining quantum effects.

                11 days later