"Gænuine quantum ¤mniht¤rmæntings

( issi )
—abs¤lutæ fluxings—
umst¤ppably anihmatæ EIMA quantons
umst¤ppably c¤¤bsfæctings ¤thær
—abs¤lutæ fluxings—
umst¤ppably anihmatæ EIMA quantons."

Doug - 26Aug2003.

p. 106
The Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics
Max Jammer

Page 153
The Strange Story of the Quantum
Our intraquote parentheses and brackets

Doug
2Jun2005

Doug
25Jun2013

 Jul 1999

This is a superb question for Quantonics, for science, and for philosophy. It is superb because it takes those of us interested in philosophy and science directly to core issues of our beliefs.

How one views measurement discloses one's philosophy, one's ontology, one's metaphysics...one's beliefs.

Before we begin our effort to di(omni)stinguish modes of measurement, perhaps we should talk a bit about what measurement is.

From an anthropocentric perspective, measurement is what humans do to understand perceived reality. (Also, see percept.)

From a Western cultural scientific perspective, measurement is what experimenters do to discover reality's presumed underlying rules, laws and principles. Measurement discloses that which recurs, and that which recurs is presumed reliable evidence of underlying rules, laws and principles. Classical scientists insist only classical measurement is unambiguous. Therefore they further insist all measurement is classical. We shall see a source of their concern about ambiguity arises from their adopted ontology and its assumptions.

Assuming one may imagine a larger, more multiversal perspective — and allowing a heuristic that humans are not essential to measurement — we may conjecture measurement is what reality does with itself to make, change and unmake itself. Nature's self measurement, quantumly, we refer "scintillation."

Measurement then depends greatly on assumptions about what is measured and what measures what is measured. This issue, what measurement is, is so fundamental it drives all subsequent ontology, metaphysics and philosophy based on it. If one assumes one is measuring 'objects' when indeed one is measuring something else...well, you can see how important it is to choose better alternatives among a possible list of measurement options.

What we know so far, though, tells us our attempts to measure tend to disclose goodness of any chosen approach. Taken seriously, and given time for learning and evolution of process, measurement tends toward better technique and new assumptions.

We want to emphasize a significant point. We think measurement is not just a scientific method or an anthropocentric method. Measurement appears, fundamentally, to be nature's method.

Now let's continue our di(omni)scussion of July's Quantonic Q&A.

For sake of simplicity, allow us to assume only two modes of measurement:

1. classical measurement
2. quantum measurement

You might assume then, two categories of beliefs, i.e., both quantum and classical: philosophy, metaphysics, and ontology. However, that is not what we see. Instead, there appear to be classicists and quantum scientists/philosophers who adhere only classical measurement techniques and quantum scientists/philosophers who propound either quantum or both classical and quantum measurement:

• classical measurement
• quantum measurement
• both classical and quantum measurement (a la William James on "two legs")

From our perspective, taken individually, regardless of their advocacy, our choices appear to have at least these selection values:

classical measurement preference selection values:

• one reality exists
• 'object' classifies classical stuff which exists
• all observed stuff is class 'object' (particulate)
• all observers are class 'object' (particulate)
• all observation apparatuses are class 'object' (particulate)
• observer, observed, and apparatus are local, isolable, separable, and reducible
• reality is analytic
• real objects (particles) are analytic functions of time
• real objects possess properties (attributes, characteristics)
• all reality may be described by analytic functions of mass, length, time, and gravity (each of which is measurable, but not definable in terms of more rudimentary physical reality)
• reality is anthropocentric (i.e., humans measure)
• measurement is ideal, i.e., it may be accomplished unambiguously, absolute fact/truth may be established

quantum measurement preference selection values:

• reality is quantal
• quantal stuff may be called: 'wavicle,' 'qwf,' 'quon,' and 'quanton,'
• quantons express interrelationships, e.g.:
  • wave-particle
  • uncertainty
  • quanton-quanton
  • C¤mplementarity
    • Bell inequalities
    • Bergsonian duration
    • coherence
    • co-inside-nce
    • heterogeneous comtextual hermeneutics
    • included-middle
    • subjective negation
    • etc.
  • self-reference (e.g., fractal ontologies, self-measurement and emergent and n¤vel adaptation)
  • etc.
• all observed stuff is quantonic
• all observers are quantonic
• all observation apparatuses are quantonic
• observer, observed, and apparatus are unified (i.e., they exhibit: both locality and nonlocality, both isolability and nonisolability, both separability and nonseparability, both reducibility and nonreducibility)
• reality is stochastic:
  • probabilistic (pastistic a posteriori measurement, mostly based upon historical distributions; a mostly (conceived as) classical 'causal' stochasticity)
  • quatrocoherentropic (nowistic a praesenti (~a iami) quantum~inemerqational massively heterogeneous ensemble ch³ings; entropa and cohera are quantum~informationings about whatings happenings nowings and nature's selectings of whatings happenings nextings)
  • likelihoodistic (futuristic a priori measurement, mostly based upon future expectations; a mostly quantum affectational stochasticity)
• quantons are probabilistic Planck rate monitoring process (Quantonic description; classical version is 'measurement event') recursive (sorso~nested peaqlo, i.e., REIMAR) ensehmbles
• quantons express value interrelationshipings
• all reality may be described by quantons
• reality is reality-centric (reality measures (i.e., quantum~monitorings) self)
• measurement is ævænt-ensehmble (i.e., sorso monitoring process ensehmblings) probabilistic (to be as general as possible, please use 'stochastic' in place of 'probabilistic' - Doug - 30Jun2008) and outcomes depend on con(m)text/locality/n¤nlocality, absolute change may be established

both classical and quantum measurement selection values:

• reality is b¤th classical and quantum
• classical reality is superatomic (issues of classical notions of quantum uncertainty being uniquely atomic-subatomic)
• quantum reality is mesoatomic and subatomic (Quantonics explains that quantum uncertainty scales across all reality. See our omniscussion on quantum uncertainty scales.)
• when in classical reality, do classical measurement
• when in quantum reality, do quantum monitorings (Quantonic description; classical version is 'measurement')

As you may see, much omniversity of opinion exists regarding measurement vis-à-vis monitorings.

Our preference is for viewing reality as quantum, not classical. Thus, of course, we favor quantum monitorings over classical measurement. Quantum measurement suffers from a problem called decoherence (Note that quantum~monitorings do not suffer from issues of quantum decoherence.). Many folk are working on a concept of quantum measurement which is non-destructive, i.e., which does not alter stuff which is being measured. (An example of how important this is appears in quantum computing. If reading a qubit register destroys its contents, one may not do quantum computing!) If you look at our 24Jul1999 section of Flash, you will see nondestructive measurement of a simple quanton's phase has finally been accomplished.

Begin 22-23May2001 aside:

In our paragraph above, we state, "Quantum measurement suffers from a problem called decoherence." It is important to know that quantum decoherence is a measurement problem. It is n¤t a general quantum reality problem. Quantum reality depends upon decoherence! All actual reality is partially decoherent. It is what Pirsig's MoQ calls "latched reality." It is SQ, or Static Quality.

Our quanton semiotics and notation show decoherent and coherent quantum reality compenetrating one another, e.g., quanton(coherent,decoherent) and as quanton symbol where solid (usually black or dark green) circles represent quantum decoherence, and dotted (usually blue) circles represent quantum coherence and quantum isocoherence.

Reality's means of latching, decohering, and 'creating' and 'emerging' n¤vel actuality is quantum measurement (monitorings). But often we wish to animately measure quantons without causing them to decohere and latch, and to watch their post~decoherence animate quantum~evolutionary pr¤cessings. We are just now learning how to do that. Our animated quantons are semiotics, rather memeotics, for that dynamic process.

Nearly all (very likely all) actuality is both coherent and decoherent (and simultaneously compenetrating VES' isocoherent isoflux => quanton(VESvactuality). For example atoms have both fermionic (decoherent) and bosonic (coherent) spin 'states,' rather quantum spin phasicityings. (See our Quantonic remediation of classical word 'state,' and phasicity.)

End 22-23May2001 aside.

Rev 8Jan2001: As you may have read elsewhere in Quantonics, until recently, quantum science had two large remaining 'problems:' measurement and interpretation. We recently used Pirsig's MoQ and our own QTMs to solve these 'problems' and a related John von Neumann quantum wave function 'collapse' problem. See:

• Recommended Reading, Interpretation and Measurement,
• Problematic Pirsigean Memes, number 2, and
• Quantum Interpretations, go to bottom of page.

One of our favorite quantum measurement sites is Paul G. Kwiat's. Paul is a J. R. Oppenheimer Fellow with US government's LANL. Paul's mentors are both dynamic heavy hitters whom we mention elsewhere on our site:  Raymond Chiao, and Anton Zeilinger's Homepage.

If you want to pursue quantum measurement concepts further, you may wish to visit Paul's web page: The Tao of Interaction-Free Measurements

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