Physics
Enforces a New Paradigm; Does God Play Dice with Destiny?
C.W.
Rietdijk, D. Sc.
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The key word of science, of evolution, of history,
of art and of human destiny is coherence. |
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I Physical Laws
Make the World More Orderly by Being Four-Dimensional
1. Many people feel that both the physical world –
such as micro-processes and biological evolution – and our personal destiny
come about chaotically to a major degree.
2. They do so mainly on account of three starting
points:
(a) The indeterminist and probabilistic laws of quantum mechanics (QM);
(b) The “free will” that is assumed to (co-)define many outcomes in the
psycho-physical world;
(c) The circumstance that, if two or more causal chains are separately causally
defined, the result of their possible “chance meeting” may still as such be
coincidental. That is, if two cars follow their own causally defined paths,
their possible collision – though it is causally defined too – does not as
such
follow from any physical order of things as governed by natural law, even aside
from any part played by the “free will” of the drivers and by
quantum-mechanical “fundamental uncertainties”.
3. We pretend to have refuted all starting points
of 1. and 2. above by a number of physical demonstrations and a concomitant
theory (for more details and references see Sect. 6.1):
(a) A number of demonstrations from the Special Theory of relativity to the
effect that what is future for me can be past for another observer, so that it
cannot but be as defined as the past can be. This refutes the “fundamental
uncertainty” of QM and its “new way of thinking”.
(b) Demonstrations of retroaction which embody that – within the “uncertainty
margins” of QM – also the future co-defines the present, thus completing
“traditional” causality that acts from the past. But retroaction acts in a
negative direction as to time. Note that such “influence” from the future is no
longer paradoxical because of the realistic nature of the future on account of
the demonstrations indicated in (a).
(c) This means that – past and future casting their causal and retroactive
shadows after and before, respectively – there is a mutual interaction of their
influences. That is, inter alia, not only effects or outcomes are
(co-)defined by causes, but causes are co-defined retroactively by effects too.
Or, physical law, and not only physical existence, is
four-dimensional in a realistic sense. This also implies that in the case of
the two cars some four-dimensional interaction between causal and retroactive
influences will decide as to a possible crash, not merely causal influences
that are “blind” as regards their consequences. This amounts to that the
four-dimensional laws will decide whether or not a crash fits in the ordered
four-dimensional pattern or structure P of events that constitutes the universe. This
decision is no longer a question of playing dice. Neither are evolution and our
personal destinies. See also 8. below.
4. One among the ideas of our theory is that
everything in nature that is left “open” by causality – think of the
“uncertainty margins” of QM – is defined as yet by retroaction (in a “feedback”
interaction with causality). In such capacity, retroaction is nothing else but
Einstein’s hidden variable (HV) that, in his opinion, determines what QM does
not.
5. The gist of the above, that indeed boils down
to a change of paradigm, is the idea that, just as one cause can have many mutually
coherent
effects, four-dimensional physical laws are of such nature that, conversely,
retroaction from some effect (outcome) may result in a coordination of relevant
causes
so as to amount to their “orchestration” of coherence (to some degree) that is
attuned to the effect in question. In this way the four-dimensional natural
laws of which causality and retroaction are aspects or “components” “find out”
whether or not the crash mentioned earlier fits in pattern P of 3. above that
corresponds to such four-dimensional laws.
Crashes,
wars, injustice, and evolutionary results often indeed seem to make little
sense from our human point of view, but the above strongly indicates that at
least “there is some system, or order due to laws, in the madness”. “Chance
meetings” of “independent” causal developments are no longer pure accidents but
obey laws that “select” the outcomes as to their fitting in four-dimensional
pattern P and its micro-, meso- and macro-architecture that may show deep
coherence or not, but in any case differs from playing dice.
6. The foregoing does not imply that life and the
world have a meaning but still brings us nearer to such a position. For if many
processes are “fundamentally uncertain”, or if mutually independent causal
influences often interact by mere coincidence, “God is playing dice with us” in
important respects, without any meaning can be associated with such game.
But
if the demonstrations indicated above, and corresponding arguments, are
correct, there is at least the possibility of some coherent order
in what happens, so that we can speak of a meaning of our
experiences: our lives are also coherent in what comes to us from outside.
II More Order by
the Non-Local Character of Hidden Variables; “Orchestration” and the Enigma of
Consciousness
7.
J.S. Bell demonstrated that hidden variables that fill in deterministically the
uncertainty margins of QM – if they (the HV) appear at all – cannot but have a
non-local character. (See Ref. 14 of Sect. 6.1.; in Refs. 15, 21 and 23 we
proved that such non-local HV indeed appear.) That is, in some cases the
filling in by a HV of the precise value of observable A within its uncertainty
margin co-depends on how – at a space-like or time-like distance – observable B
is filled in precisely within its own margin. It is already clear a priori that
if, say, all “uncertainty margins” referring to momentum would be filled in
randomly (and, therefore, mutually independently), conservation of momentum
would no longer hold.
8.
Discussing Fig. 2 of Sect. 6.1 we give a specimen of how causal and retroactive
influences can cooperate so as to jointly explain a variant of Young’s
double-slit interference experiment.
In
the last resort, both non-locality and its contribution to the coherence of the
world have their origin in the four-dimensional character of natural law. For
this character means that physical relations and the order they imply refer to
four-dimensional events or processes rather than three-dimensional objects. For
example, the car crash mentioned earlier should fit in pattern P and its
architecture as a whole, which covers more than merely local causes and causal
chains that witness chance meetings. Actually, P as four-dimensional pattern of
events, that shows order and coherence, implies that besides local causality
there are four-dimensional symmetries or (in our three-dimensional language)
“influences” such as non-local retroaction (satisfying Bell non-locality) that
imply more order than mere causality from past via present to future
corresponds with.
All
of this leads to a fundamentally new feature, i.e. that merely local influences
and laws cannot produce P’s (macro-)architecture, no more than local influences
among bricks, pipes, planks etcetera can coordinate the building up of a house.
Some higher-level natural laws are needed. (In the case of the house it is
those acting in the brain of the architect.) The architecture of P is part and
parcel of the complex of four-dimensional laws that order events to non-local
symmetries such as featured by conservation and by the non-local aspects of
retroaction.
The foregoing implies that
four-dimensional laws that order P coherently so as to give evidence of
non-local properties (that, inter alia,
appear in conservation, in Bell non-locality such as with EPR, and in
retroaction) which show a feature of non-local “orchestration” of, say, various fillings-in by the retroactive HV’s. That is,
fillings-in of uncertainty margins at mutually distant space-time locations.
Within this scope, local events should always reckon with the question whether
they correctly fit in macro-symmetries and macro-patterns that are inherent in
four-dimensional natural laws that result in P. (Compare here both Bohr’s “A
micro-process constitutes a whole” and Einstein’s “God does not play dice”.)
The
above strongly suggests a more coherent world, evolution and human destiny than
corresponds with mere local-causal natural laws. This will also change the
basis of philosophy. The “orchestration” suggests an additional dimension of order; or, an additional degree of freedom
for nature. Below, we will see a vital relation
with the concept of consciousness.
9.
In two recent papers in Physics Essays
(Refs. 1 and 2) the idea of “orchestrated” fillings-in – non-locally
coordinated filling in of a (large) number of quantum uncertainty margins via
cooperation of causal and retroactive influences, that is, by such influences’
feedback – has been applied for an in principle explanation of the phenomenon
of consciousness. Our explanation is
based on three guided hypotheses:
(a)At his experiencing one or more Aha-Erlebnisse in discovering Relativity, Einstein “qualitatively” witnessed in his
brain a similar natural process as a micro-process does if all its components
(particles, fields,…) correctly interact according to the relevant physical
laws. Mind that in such process various participating components and their
influences should recognize each other
in order to act according to these laws. Such recognition (Aha-Erlebnis), we
hypothesize, is the essence of ”elementary consciousness”. Elementary consciousness should anyhow
be located somewhere in natural processes; we chose the recognition in question
because of recognition’s intuitive similarity to consciousness such as in
Einstein’s experienc.
(b) Living organisms (such as Einstein’s) discriminate themselves from
inorganic matter (stones,…) by their peculiarity or faculty of integrating (to
some degree) into “larger units” of the elementary consciousnesses of their
component processes, such as those in relevant brains and other organs.
(c) It is a feature of natural processes that imply Aha-Erlebnisse or consciousness (that is, of living organisms) – on an elementary or
more advanced level – that they imply ordered non-local retroaction (HV)
amounting to the coordination (“orchestration”) of many fillings-in of
uncertainty margins. They are in a position to coordinate some or many relevant
fillings-in, say, of uncertainty margins in our arm and shoulder so as to make
this amount to such precise values of physical variables and their mutual
attuning that a certain desired movement of the arm is the consequence.
10.
The theory summarized in 9. radically differs from current ones such as based
on the idea that according to computers getting more and more complicated and
intelligent, they will “logically and automatically” become conscious too.
Neither leaves my theory any room for “free will”: in the first place it
demonstrates the future to be deterministically defined – by its mere
pre-existence – and in the second place it is four-dimensional natural law (that integrates causal and retroactive influences) which defines all
processes, our “free” decisions included. The latter too should fit in pattern
P rather than being defined “non-physically”.
In
Refs. 1 and 2 it is also demonstrated that our theory leaves room for
paranormal phenomena (psychokinesis, precognition, striking coincidence,…) by
calling on retroaction and non-locality that obey coherent physical laws. Two focal points in this context are:
(a) Why would causal influences obey
coherent physical laws but retroactive
influences would not?
(b) Paranormal phenomena are those which, in spite of their showing some order
on the psychological level, cannot be explained by mere causal laws. The answer of our theory to this situation is the following. If
causal influences and local physical laws cannot explain possible paranormal
phenomena (they can neither explain non-local physical phenomena such as in the paradox of Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen: EPR),
the simplest solution is our trying and explaining them by retroaction and the physical laws referring to four-dimensional order.
11.
In Refs. 1 – 3 we also discuss super-individual coherence on the level of
consciousness, such as a possible collective unconscious or “group minds”.
Again, the general tendency is: more coherence (also of the organic kind) and
less coincidence in nature. In Ref. 3 we also extend the idea of “survival of
the fittest” (SF) from biological evolution to the levels of micro-processes
and the universe’s macro-evolution. We find a vital four-dimensional aspect of
it (of SF) that causes its results to be less dependent on coincidence than
according to current conceptions. In the four-dimensional context, SF and its
results should rather be seen within the scope of an “organic” feedback of
causes and effects. That is, they are more coherent – defined by physical law –
than in the current three-dimensional picture co-characterized by randomness.
The
above means one more instance of the four-dimensionally realistic nature of the
physical universe and its laws to imply more order, even with respect to the relations of causes and effects (feedbacks
between them!) and as to events and their relations in general (think of P’s
architecture). The causal relations among three-dimensional objects are only an
aspect of a more comprehensive four-dimensional coherence. (So are retroactive
influences and relations.)
In
a general sense – from biological evolution to micro-processes and collective
unconscious phenomena – the above contains that outcomes no less than causes
have a function (in P) in their own right, i.e. by acting retroactively and by having to fit in the symmetries
and non-local four-dimensional architecture of P. (Again compare the
earlier-mentioned house.) The relevant laws require more than causal influences
from the past. Also keep noting that, four-dimensionally-statically,
“influences” should be understood in the sense in which the foundations of the
house have influence on the rest of it. Also mind that in a broad sense the
“orchestration” or coordination of the fillings-in of many uncertainty margins,
as we hypothesized in consciousness, adds a “creative dimension” to natural
law.
12.
One feature of our physical theory is that a quantum concept as “the influence
of an observer (i.e. his/her instrument)” on the measurement results can easily
be explained by retroaction from the measuring process on earlier stages of the
object of measurement.
More
generally, “subjective” aspects of phenomena – such as consciousness, “free
will”, creativity, moral and other values – are relocated, in our theory and
model of the world, into subtle coherence of natural law that, for example,
coordinatedly guided Newton’s hand so as to cause him write the Principia. In all, the relevant non-local coherence means an extension of simpler
non-local correlations such as with EPR and in wave-particle “duality”.
13.
Non-local retroaction and feedback that, inter alia, cause influences of the measurement process on the object, precisely
embody the factor that restores coherent determinism in nature. This (partly)
puts both Einstein and Bohr in the right: “God does not play dice” as well as
“A micro-process constitutes a whole”. Leaving out such retroaction etcetera,
and also the action metric discussed in Sect. 6.1 (which metric explains EPR
and other quantum non-locality), is responsible for QM’s meeting with paradoxes
in trying to construct coherent models.
Actually,
the world is less dependent on coincidence
and more orderly coherent than even Classical
Physics thought, precisely because of the non-local determinism and feedbacks
consistent argument on both relativity and micro-processes forces upon us.
(Compare again Sect. 6.1, especially Sub-sects. 1 and 2.)
14.
My five demonstrations of four-dimensional realism and four proofs of
retroaction are far from so difficult that this might explain the relative
silence around them. Rather, the latter should be explained by some emotional
taboo around the demonstrations on account of their radical “heretical”
consequences for “free will”, “fundamental uncertainty”, “the new way of
thinking of QM” and human destiny. See also on Internet
<Rietdijk-Putnam-Penrose argument>, <Rietdijk-Putnam argument> and
<Andromeda Paradox>.
References
1. C.W. Rietdijk, Consciousness and the coherence of
natural law, Physics Essays, Vol. 19, No. 2
(2006), pp. 200-224.
2. Ibid. Four-dimensional physics, non-local coherence, and
paranormal phenomena, Vol. 20, No. 2 (2007).
3. Four-dimensional realism and understandable models, submitted to Physics
Essays.
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