# Presentation: 162923

## The basic questions before us here in Doha are:

**What is the fundamental nature of the world?**
- and
**How Do We Fit Into It?**

- Our Basic Beliefs Shape Our Values
- Our Values Shape Our Actions
- Conflicting Basic Beliefs Generate Conflicting Actions!

- These Questions Are Important Because:

## My Topic Is:

- What does _*basic physics*_ say      about the
- Nature of the World,
-              and
- Our Connection To It.

## The Preliminary Main Points.

- Contemporary basic physics is *Quantum Mechanics*.
- Quantum mechanics is fundamentally different from the classical mechanics of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries.
- Quantum mechanics gives answers to our questions that are profoundly different from those given by classical mechanics.

## The Connection to the Future of Humanity

- Different answers to lead to
-    different basic values!
- A shift in basic values can significantly affect the sort of future we will strive to create!
- A shift in science-based beliefs and values opens the door to significant dialogs with non-scientists.

## The Classical-Physics Answer:Materialism

- The Precepts of Nineteenth Century Classical Physics Say:
- There exists a material universe consisting of tiny localized bits of matter that interact only with their close neighbors.
- These interactions are governed by mathematical laws.
- These laws entail that the _material_ future_ _is determined by the _material_ past ALONE.

## “ALONE” means

- There is no reference to human thoughts, choices, or efforts.
- This view is called “The Principle of the Causal Closure of the Physical”
- Contrary to Intuition, but intuition is claimed to be overruled by science!
- Science Ideology and Dogma
-                  Conflict with Religions

## But Quantum Mechanics Rescinds the Dogma of the Causal Closure of the Physical!

- Yet the ideology continues to infect the thinking of many scientists and philosophers!

## Classical Precepts versus Quantum Precepts“Quantum Uncertainty”

## A Conflict Between the Empirical and Theoretical Aspects of Scientific Practice

- Quantum uncertainties at the atomic scale
-    _if left unchecked_, would bubble up,   irrepressibly, to the macroscopic scale.
- But that would conflict with empirical observation!
- “The moon would cover the whole night sky”

## Mind-Matter Parallelism-->Mind-Matter Interaction.The Quantum Process of Measurement/ObservationCreates a Firewall That Protects the Empirical Realm from unfettered intrusion of quantum uncertaintiesfrom the Theoretical Realm

- This process specifies a highly nontrivial     interface between the _empirical_ and the _theoretical_ aspects of scientific practice!
- It specifies an intricate connection between
-                   Mind and Matter!

## Von Neumann/Heisenberg Theory of Measurement/Observation

- Each experience occurs in conjunction with an ACTION!
- This Action Poses a Yes-or-No question!
- The answer, Yes or No, is registered in the realm of experience/mind.
- Heisenberg: “a mathematics that represents...our knowledge...”

## The “Action” Part of the Process of Observation/Measurement!

## The Response Part

## Process 1 Has No Known Sufficient Cause.

- Von Neumann calls the physical/theoretical aspect of the action part by the name “process 1”.
- It enters importantly into the physical dynamics!
- _But it is not controlled or specified by any known rule or law: A Causal Gap!_
- Thus quantum mechanics does not entail the Causal Closure of the Physical!

## Process 3 and the entry of randomness.

- The *answers* to the questions posed by the process 1 action are, according to quantum theory, *random*: they conform only to statistical regularities!
- Dirac calls the choice of answer
-      “a choice on the part of nature”.
- Randomness enters only into the _answer_;
- not into the _action_ that poses the question.

## Process1 and the Freedom of Action

- Heisenberg call the choice of *action*,
-    “a choice on the part of the ‘observer’ constructing the measuring instruments and reading their recordings.”
- Bohr says:
-   “The freedom of experimentation...corresponds to the free choice of experimental arrangements for which the quantum mathematical formalism offers the appropriate latitude.”

## The Entry of Mind?

- This choice of the action is “free”, in the specific sense that it is not specified by any known law
- But our choices of actions _appear_ to be influenced by reasons!
- There is no logical basis for rejecting the possibility that mind-based reason supplies the missing cause.
- Indeed, allowing mind to fill this causal gap gives our experiential aspects a functional role to play in the unfolding of reality!

## The Mind-Matter Connection.

- It is these choices of actions, not controlled by any known physical law, statistical or otherwise, but seemingly influenced by value-based reasons, that, in conjunction with the statistical process 3 choices of feedbacks, controls what passes through the firewall.
- This filtering process constitutes a highly nontrivial connection of mind to matter.

## Conclusion 1

- Quantum Mechanics Rescinds the Materialistic Conception of Human Beings
-    Foisted Upon By the Failed Precepts of
-    Classical Physics.

## Conclusion 2

- Quantum mechanics elevates our science-based image of ourselves from material automata to agents able to act rationally on the basis of values erected upon this science-based image of ourselves.

## Conclusion 3

- This self-image casts us as partial creators of an unfolding universe that is NOT controlled exclusively by the material aspects of reality alone.

## Additionally

- Quantum mechanics entails also a deep interconnectedness of spatially separated
-    aspects of reality that is incompatible with the causal precepts of classical materialistic physics.
-    The next speaker will elaborate upon this important point.

## Main Conclusions

- Physics has shifted from classical materialist physics to a quantum psycho-physics of the mind-matter universe.
- Fundamental questions are thus opened up that are not necessarily completely resolvable within science itself.
- That opens the door to meaningful dialogs with followers of other approaches.
- I will discuss tomorrow the possible impact of this upon the future of humanity.