This quote, from Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness by Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner (2006), illustrates what is perhaps the biggest psychological obstacle to the 'Smearland Interpretation' of quantum physics...
"Since your looking collapsed the superposition state of the cat, are you guilty of killing the cat if you find it dead? ... You could not have chosen how the wavefunction of this entire system would collapse. The collapse into either the living or the dead state was random." (p. 119)
The quote is referring to Schrodinger's cat, but it brought to mind a discussion about another cat. (Bear in mind that the 'Smearland Interpretation' of quantum mechanics disagrees with the idea that you could not have chosen the outcome.)
A cat-loving friend of mine had several cats. One day one of the cats got sick and had to be rushed to the vet. I don't remember the details of its illness, but I do remember the discussion I had with my friend later about what she was thinking about in the car while racing to the vet. (The cat died en-route to the vet.)
My friend knew about my theory wherein one can 'pick the universe' but she had never had the 'lightbulb moment' wherein her worldview was irreversibly altered. She did know enough to wonder about how her thoughts and expectations might have contributed to her ending up in the universe where the cat died. We started to have the discussion, but because of the painful nature of the topic, I didn't push the point by going into explicit details about 5-dimensional navigation.
Was she guilty of killing the cat? Absolutely not. 'Guilty' requires intent to kill, and she had none.
Nor do I argue that selecting the universe where the cat lived would necessarily have been an easy task. Evidence from psi research shows that 'selecting outcomes' at will is a hard task. I spent three years simply investigating the effect and what it took to produce it before I decided to look for a possible physical mechanism.
The good news is the effect gets easier to produce. Just as you would train to master various types of motion in 4 dimensions, you train to master them in 5 dimensions.
Oh, and one more thing while we're talking about this quote... We assume that the wavefunction collapses because most of the time subsequent observations are consistent with the first observation. Most of the time. If it were possible for subsequent observations to be incompatible with prior observations, we would assume that some type of law of conservation or energy dynamic was responsible for observational consistency, rather than assuming an absolute and irreversible wave collapse. Enter the UNDO project...
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Friday, December 22, 2006
Riddle Me This
"Newton was not the first of the Age of Reason. He was the last of the magicians, the last of the Babylonians and the Sumerians... because he looked on the universe and all that is in it as a riddle, as a secret which could be read by applying pure thought to certain evidence, certain mystic clues which God had lain about the world to allow a sort of philosopher's treasure hunt..."
(No comments. I just thought that was a cool quote.)
(No comments. I just thought that was a cool quote.)
Thursday, December 21, 2006
There Are No Accidents (Pt II)
Okay, I will now officially add this book to the "25 Best" list.
There Are No Accidents: Synchronicity and the Stories of Our Lives, by Robert H. Hopcke (1997)
Why this book?
1) This book contains the best of several other books on synchronicity. The bibliography even contains a book or two that has not found its way into my collection.
2) The author is not afraid to tackle religion, miracles, magic, or painful experiences in the search for a comprehensive explanation for synchronicity.
3) As mentioned earlier, the author relays a broad spectrum of synchronistic experiences from a variety of people. Reading these detailed accounts will no doubt remind you of your own synchronistic experiences. This, in turn, will help you break through to the 5-dimensional Smearland.
The author makes one point that I would argue with...
"...synchronicities always occur within a transitional context" (p. 46) and "Meaningful coincidences, which always occur at points of change and transition..." (p. 47)
Naturally I'm protesting the use of the word 'always'. Synchronicities may manifest in the most unusual or improbable ways during times of great stress, for the average person. This does not mean that synchronicities are limited to times of great stress, or that they cannot be observed or cultivated on a daily basis.
The author even begins to acknowledge that synchronicities might be something one can cultivate. "If you want a meaningful coincidence to change the story of your life, wander the world randomly and be willing to listen to whatever life presents... an attitude of openness" (p.101) Interestingly, the authors of the two versions of The Luck Factor also acknowledge openness as a key attribute in obtaining good luck. Why openness? Perhaps because it is a state free of explicit expectations about outcomes.
There Are No Accidents: Synchronicity and the Stories of Our Lives, by Robert H. Hopcke (1997)
Why this book?
1) This book contains the best of several other books on synchronicity. The bibliography even contains a book or two that has not found its way into my collection.
2) The author is not afraid to tackle religion, miracles, magic, or painful experiences in the search for a comprehensive explanation for synchronicity.
3) As mentioned earlier, the author relays a broad spectrum of synchronistic experiences from a variety of people. Reading these detailed accounts will no doubt remind you of your own synchronistic experiences. This, in turn, will help you break through to the 5-dimensional Smearland.
The author makes one point that I would argue with...
"...synchronicities always occur within a transitional context" (p. 46) and "Meaningful coincidences, which always occur at points of change and transition..." (p. 47)
Naturally I'm protesting the use of the word 'always'. Synchronicities may manifest in the most unusual or improbable ways during times of great stress, for the average person. This does not mean that synchronicities are limited to times of great stress, or that they cannot be observed or cultivated on a daily basis.
The author even begins to acknowledge that synchronicities might be something one can cultivate. "If you want a meaningful coincidence to change the story of your life, wander the world randomly and be willing to listen to whatever life presents... an attitude of openness" (p.101) Interestingly, the authors of the two versions of The Luck Factor also acknowledge openness as a key attribute in obtaining good luck. Why openness? Perhaps because it is a state free of explicit expectations about outcomes.
Monday, December 18, 2006
Quest for A(nother) Scientific Revolution
"Characters tend to either be for or against the quest. If they assist it, they are idolized as simply gallant or pure; if they obstruct it, they are characterized as simply villainous or cowardly."
"What is the future? What is the past? What are we? What is the magic fluid that surrounds us and conceals the things we most need to know? We live and die in the midst of marvels."
Recently I had occasion to be trapped in a small enclosed space with a man who felt compelled to use the time to talk loudly and incessantly on a cell phone to several individuals about a multi-million dollar deal that was, at that very moment, falling apart. Normally I would have ignored this individual and continued to read my book (from which I filched the above quotes). However...
This man, after several phone calls and some time pondering the situation, proceeded to call several more people and tell them that this must be God's will that the deal was falling apart and if God wanted it this way, he wasn't going to fight it. At this point I got a little scared.
You see, the image that sprung to mind at that moment was a picture of the Dark Ages; a time when illness was attributed to evil spirits instead of bacteria or viruses. A time when anything that science hadn't yet shed light on was attributed to gods or spirits or demons. And people do strange (read: irrational) things when they begin to attempt to placate 'beings' whose 'will' can, ultimately, only be guessed at.
For my 5-dimensional viewpoint, this man's arrival at his current situation was entirely explainable without invoking God or a Higher Power. Any 'chance events' that may have played a role in his situation were never really beyond his control. And he could have willfully navigated a course through the multiverse that avoided this outcome.
Similarly, the fact that I was trapped with him long enough to overhear this conversation was never really beyond my control. (I analyzed the navigational antecedents that led to my landing in that universe, made the necessary course adjustments, and landed in an even better outcome than the one I was expecting.)
Hey, if you wish to believe that God occupies himself with the minutia of your life, I won't attempt to stop you. I, however, would give a Creator credit for a much better (built-in) system for determining what your daily experiences are. The ultimate purpose of such a mechanism? Who knows. But certainly the limits of such a mechanism are worth investigating.
"What is the future? What is the past? What are we? What is the magic fluid that surrounds us and conceals the things we most need to know? We live and die in the midst of marvels."
Recently I had occasion to be trapped in a small enclosed space with a man who felt compelled to use the time to talk loudly and incessantly on a cell phone to several individuals about a multi-million dollar deal that was, at that very moment, falling apart. Normally I would have ignored this individual and continued to read my book (from which I filched the above quotes). However...
This man, after several phone calls and some time pondering the situation, proceeded to call several more people and tell them that this must be God's will that the deal was falling apart and if God wanted it this way, he wasn't going to fight it. At this point I got a little scared.
You see, the image that sprung to mind at that moment was a picture of the Dark Ages; a time when illness was attributed to evil spirits instead of bacteria or viruses. A time when anything that science hadn't yet shed light on was attributed to gods or spirits or demons. And people do strange (read: irrational) things when they begin to attempt to placate 'beings' whose 'will' can, ultimately, only be guessed at.
For my 5-dimensional viewpoint, this man's arrival at his current situation was entirely explainable without invoking God or a Higher Power. Any 'chance events' that may have played a role in his situation were never really beyond his control. And he could have willfully navigated a course through the multiverse that avoided this outcome.
Similarly, the fact that I was trapped with him long enough to overhear this conversation was never really beyond my control. (I analyzed the navigational antecedents that led to my landing in that universe, made the necessary course adjustments, and landed in an even better outcome than the one I was expecting.)
Hey, if you wish to believe that God occupies himself with the minutia of your life, I won't attempt to stop you. I, however, would give a Creator credit for a much better (built-in) system for determining what your daily experiences are. The ultimate purpose of such a mechanism? Who knows. But certainly the limits of such a mechanism are worth investigating.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Three Wise Men
So I'm reading There Are No Accidents and Hopcke (the author) is talking about Jung's writings on synchronicity. [Aside: I have generally avoided Jung as a source because his collective unconscious idea/explanation makes me cringe.] And I read...
"Jung, in fact, specifically developed his idea of synchronicity as an acausal connecting principle in order to be able to discuss the phenomenon of meaningful coincidences - a universal experience among humans - in a purely descriptive way without obliging himself to make metaphysical statements on the nature and structure of the universe, a theological and philosophical task he considered beyond the purview of empirical psychology." (p. 141)
And I'm thinking "That is a wise man."
And not too much later the author, in a discussion on synchronicity involving dreams, adds a similar bit of wisdom...
"To see this dream as 'predicitive' rather than synchronistic is to understand the event in a wholly different, and much less subjective fashion. If a dream of mine is able to predict the future, then I must certainly be endowed with rather special abilities. It would be these special abilities of mine - my clairvoyence, my psychic talents, my chosenness by God - and not the symbolic subjectiveness of the outer event which would take center stage, a shift in emphasis which, for almost anyone's ego, exerts quite an attraction." (p. 149, my emphasis)
Wouldn't it be great if science has finally reached a place where we can discuss this phenomenon without referred to anything metaphysical?
And, in a accidental quote search of the wrong name, I came upon our third wise man... "It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence."
"Jung, in fact, specifically developed his idea of synchronicity as an acausal connecting principle in order to be able to discuss the phenomenon of meaningful coincidences - a universal experience among humans - in a purely descriptive way without obliging himself to make metaphysical statements on the nature and structure of the universe, a theological and philosophical task he considered beyond the purview of empirical psychology." (p. 141)
And I'm thinking "That is a wise man."
And not too much later the author, in a discussion on synchronicity involving dreams, adds a similar bit of wisdom...
"To see this dream as 'predicitive' rather than synchronistic is to understand the event in a wholly different, and much less subjective fashion. If a dream of mine is able to predict the future, then I must certainly be endowed with rather special abilities. It would be these special abilities of mine - my clairvoyence, my psychic talents, my chosenness by God - and not the symbolic subjectiveness of the outer event which would take center stage, a shift in emphasis which, for almost anyone's ego, exerts quite an attraction." (p. 149, my emphasis)
Wouldn't it be great if science has finally reached a place where we can discuss this phenomenon without referred to anything metaphysical?
And, in a accidental quote search of the wrong name, I came upon our third wise man... "It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence."
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Journal Club #3
Was rummaging around in the hard drive today and found this...
Houtkooper, J.M. Arguing for an Observational Theory of Paranormal Phenomena, Journal of Scientific Exploration, 16, 2002, pp. 171-185. (here)
A good summary of published research attempting to explaining psi phenomena by invoking the observer problem of quantum physics. Full of statements like...
"the statistics of single events become biased if the observer is motivated and prefers one of the possible outcomes over the other" (p. 171)
"The act of observation by a motivated observer of an event with a quantum mechanically uncertain outcome influences that outcome." (p.172)
"the only possible... mechanism for psi lies in the measurement problem and in hypothesizing a role for the conscious observer" (p.176)
This article is worth reading because 1) it wasn't written that long ago, 2) there just aren't that many people thinking along these lines, so it pays to pay attention to those who are, and 3) Houtkooper does a good job of explaining the complications that arise when trying to design experiments from this perspective.
Houtkooper makes some statements that are dead on - "that psi effects are independent of the complexity of the random process involved can be explained by the act of observation as the crucial event at which a psi effect is mediated" (p.180) - and some statements that contain erroneous assumptions - "an observer who adds information at the collapse of the wave function" (p.171).
This article should provoke several questions...
Why only give the observer a critical role in special case psi events? What about regular everday observations?
Where is the mechanism by which this observer influences the outcome? And how is it that it kicks in only in special cases? Or is it active all the time?
A hearty salute to Houtkooper for this contribution, especially that part where he takes on DAT. ;)
Houtkooper, J.M. Arguing for an Observational Theory of Paranormal Phenomena, Journal of Scientific Exploration, 16, 2002, pp. 171-185. (here)
A good summary of published research attempting to explaining psi phenomena by invoking the observer problem of quantum physics. Full of statements like...
"the statistics of single events become biased if the observer is motivated and prefers one of the possible outcomes over the other" (p. 171)
"The act of observation by a motivated observer of an event with a quantum mechanically uncertain outcome influences that outcome." (p.172)
"the only possible... mechanism for psi lies in the measurement problem and in hypothesizing a role for the conscious observer" (p.176)
This article is worth reading because 1) it wasn't written that long ago, 2) there just aren't that many people thinking along these lines, so it pays to pay attention to those who are, and 3) Houtkooper does a good job of explaining the complications that arise when trying to design experiments from this perspective.
Houtkooper makes some statements that are dead on - "that psi effects are independent of the complexity of the random process involved can be explained by the act of observation as the crucial event at which a psi effect is mediated" (p.180) - and some statements that contain erroneous assumptions - "an observer who adds information at the collapse of the wave function" (p.171).
This article should provoke several questions...
Why only give the observer a critical role in special case psi events? What about regular everday observations?
Where is the mechanism by which this observer influences the outcome? And how is it that it kicks in only in special cases? Or is it active all the time?
A hearty salute to Houtkooper for this contribution, especially that part where he takes on DAT. ;)
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
There Are No Accidents (Pt I)
Yesterday's training exercise yielded a double dose of synchronicity... There Are No Accidents: Synchronicity and the Stories of Our Lives by Robert H. Hopcke (1997). A national best-seller apparently, that I have not yet read.
Based on what I have read so far in the first 30 pages, I'm thinking of putting this book on the 25 Best Books and Papers to Read to Understand Smearland list. (Yeah, hereafter I'll have to shorten that name.) The author gives you detailed accounts of synchronistic experiences; enough detail in fact, that you can almost imagine yourself having the experience. And that may help you to understand what navigating Smearland is like, and prime you for the transition to a 5-dimensional view of the Universe.
Based on what I have read so far in the first 30 pages, I'm thinking of putting this book on the 25 Best Books and Papers to Read to Understand Smearland list. (Yeah, hereafter I'll have to shorten that name.) The author gives you detailed accounts of synchronistic experiences; enough detail in fact, that you can almost imagine yourself having the experience. And that may help you to understand what navigating Smearland is like, and prime you for the transition to a 5-dimensional view of the Universe.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)