The "Really" Real

Here is a fun discussion between a theoretical physicist (Sean Carroll, from Cal Tech) and a philosopher (David Albert, from Columbia) talking about the interpretation of Quantum Mechanics.



I find this fascinating, but I want to reach into the screen and grab one or the other and rattle them to say "but you are missing the really essential point!". The two are engaged in dealing with the subtleties of interpretation. Albert even gives three fundamental interpretations of "quantum reality". But it sure seems to me they miss the point.

To puzzle over the Shroedinger wave function and the "collapse" of the wave function when we measure something like the location of an electron appears to me to turn things into a theoretical hocus-pocus. The problem isn't "how to interpret the tension between a theory that gives a statistical evolution of a wave function with the factualness of a measurement". That is a phoney philosophical "problem". The whole thing dissolves if we recognize that it is presumptuous of us to assume that our best physical theory is a complete and consistent account of the scientifically measureable world.

It appears to me that this is yet another point where modern understanding has come to the edge of the abyss. We know as much as we can know given our current approach:

• In mathematics, Goedel showed that formalism as a "philosophy" of math came to its limits which his incompleteness theorem.
• In science, Quantum Mechanics shows that a statistical theory of an evolving wave function comes to a limit as a "theory" of the world out there.
• In discussions of free will and causation, a dicussion that tries to place free will into the context of a causal world comes to the limit of meaningfulness.

The "conundrum" is caused by our conceptual tools, not by the world. The world is what the world is, something that is and always will be ultimately "unknowable". Our theories are our best constructs. To expect them to "fit" the world is hubris. Any approach when pushed far enough will reach a limit. That doesn't mean I'm a pessimist and that I give up on rationality. You can get around Goedel incompeleteness by doing transfinite induction using Gerhard Gentzen's approach. But that's a different kind of math than the formalism of Goedel
envisioned. Can there be a physics that steps beyond the statistical predicitons of quantum mechanics? I don't know, but I would guess "yes". Is there a conceptualization that will allow us to move a bit beyond the limits of free will and causality? I would guess yes. I don't know what it is, but I believe with a new insight, new foundations, some advances can be made. But do I believe that there will be an "ultimate resolution" of these conundrums by some "final theory"? I seriously doubt it. I believe we can move the goal posts, but what the 20th century showed is that if we push our theories far enough we will come to puzzles and enigmas that block advance. They demonstrate the limits of our rationality. Ultimately the world is unknowable. It is the ultimate of human hubris to think that we can build systems to fully capture and lay open the dark heart of "what is out there".

OK... now back to the puzzle over a physics of a wave function that leads up to a measured fact. The physics is a tool. Is it really that surprising that the tool isn't the world it is measuring? Sure, classical physics blurred the line because the tool was just part of the classical system. But with sophistication we learned that in the ultra small world of particle physics deterministic equations didn't "fit". We discovered that by doing experiments over large numbers of "identical" particles we uncovered statistical regularities. So now we have a statistical tool that lets us "measure" the world. That the tool isn't the world is the puzzle we "discover" when we use quantum mechanics to identify probabilities. The fact that the world that we inhabit results in a specific fact resulting from a measurement simply tells us that the tool is separate from the world. The tool is statistical. The world is factual. It would be nice if the world weren't that way, but sadly it appears that our best understanding, our best tool, is ultimately a statistical tool. So talking of "many worlds" interpretations is silly. That is to confuse the tool with the world. Boehm's quantum interpretation "feels" better because it was a search for a theory that fits the world. Sadly, Boehm's approach failed. But if you want a tool that "fits" the world better, then an approach like Boehm's holds more promise than the current statistical approach of quantum mechanics. Is there a Boehmian theory out there to be discovered? Maybe, maybe not. But if you are disturbed by the misfit between your tool and the world, then instead of multiplying possible worlds, you would be better off multiplying theories in an effort to find one that gives a better "fit" to the world.