Reclusland

June 15, 2010

- Quantum Thoughts? -

Ok, so I know I said I’m not into that new-agey tendency to equate the “quantum” with the “spiritual” (and vice versa) but I came across a few of things on today on tumblr that seemed pretty relate-able nonetheless.  Granted, the first isn’t really “quantum” (though it seems that way at first), and the second and the third aren’t really “spiritual” either…

Is quantum mechanics messing with your memory?

When you observe any system, according to Maccone, you enter into a “quantum entanglement” with it. That is, you and the system are entangled and cannot properly be described separately.

The entanglement, Maccone says, is between your memory and the system. When you disentangle, “the disentangling operation will erase this entanglement, namely the observer’s memory”. His paper derives this conclusion mathematically.

Now, the point of the article seems to be that, if we take this idea as true, it follows that we experience “non-entropic events” (such as our coffee reheating spontaneously) we just simply don’t remember them.  That sounds pretty nonsensical to me, but that bit’s not really relevant to the point I’m making here.  Neither does it really matter whether it’s a “quantum” type of entanglement or not.

The key thing is the hypothesis the article starts out with: when we observe any system, the system and our “selves” cannot properly be described separately.

That strikes me as both true and very important.  And it brings to mind this quote from Eihei Dogen, also recently found on tumblr:

Just at the moment
Ear and sound
Do not interfere—
There is no voice
There is no speaker.

Which I would assume, this being Dogen, could probably be ended with something along the lines of “There is just the hearing”.

See also this excerpt from the Surangama Sutra if you feel like reading something a bit heavier.

Or, if you prefer light, there’s this J. Krishnamurti quote, also found on tumblr today:

Have you watched your thinking? I watched that car go by, it was a blue car. Can I watch my thought in the same way, as it moves from one thing to another? And if it does, find out if it can end; instead of it being a long thread, break it, see what happens. Can you break a thought and say, “Well, that’s enough, enough is enough” and just end that thought and see what happens before the next thought is waiting. Before it springs on you, watch it. In that space, in that interval, what happens?

And I’d like end by mentioning the Buddhist idea of the six sense objects/facilities:
- eye / sight
- ear / hearing
- nose / smell
- tongue / taste
- skin / touch
- mind / thought

Thought can be considered a way of sensing something, and even the english language admits this, in a way.  We “have” thoughts, we don’t “become” thoughts.  And yet, how much of what we think/know of our “self” is based entirely on thoughts we’ve had about it?

Ask yourself: if we “have a thought”, what is it that is doing the “having”?

ramblings —

  1. Cool, must think about much of that. I like the ‘non-entropic events’ thing. Of course sometimes we do remember them, and that’s called High Weirdness.

    A very good thing to ponder is:

    - where did Quantum Mechanics come from?

    Comment by speedbird — June 15, 2010 @ 3:32 pm


  2. Einstein? The future? An imbalance in the space/time continuum?

    Or was it there all along and we simply didn’t notice?

    Pondering…

    Comment by Ian — June 15, 2010 @ 3:49 pm


  3. >> when we observe any system, the system and our “selves” cannot properly be described separately

    This is key, I think.

    It comes from QM. But QM comes from this way of thinking. The two have brought each other into existence in the vacuum left by the Enlightenment. Objective science has brought forth its opposite… (just as reaching the limits of alchemy brought forth the Enlightenment)

    Weirdness.

    Comment by speedbird — June 16, 2010 @ 5:23 am


  4. Yeah, yin changes into yang and back again. Lets hope QM leads to some high alchemical weirdness at some point. Before the empire comes back in and tears down Bohemia again.

    But yeah, to put aside the poetics, QM, or this way of thinking, is exactly where the objective meets the subjective, in a sense, both becoming a single thing that can rightly be called neither. And so what IS that single thing, then?

    Comment by Ian — June 16, 2010 @ 8:48 am


  5. Hi Ian,
    I like the Buddhist objects/facilities thing. It kind of puts thoughts in there rightful place, rather than being the ruler of the whole kingdom.
    Ann

    Comment by Ann Seeker — June 18, 2010 @ 12:30 am


  6. Yeah, definitely Ann. Thought really does not get us anywhere, in the long run, does it?

    Another thing I like about grouping thought in with the 5 senses is that the senses all bring us information from the world. To think that thoughts are things we perceive means they must have an existence separate from us. So what are they, and where do they exist?

    A very interesting thing to think about…. ;)

    Comment by Ian — June 18, 2010 @ 10:52 am


  7. >> And so what IS that single thing, then?

    Ah, trick question. Depends on what IS means.

    *

    Reminds me of A.A. Milne:

    - ‘How are you, Eeyore?’
    - ‘Not very how at all…’

    Comment by speedbird — June 22, 2010 @ 11:45 am


  8. Depends on what IS means.

    Nice one speedibird. Very nice.

    Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in their midst…

    Comment by Ian — June 22, 2010 @ 4:17 pm



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