Quantum Bong Smoking
By Andrew | March 7, 2009
You want to blow your mind without the use of drugs? Just say “yes” to quantum mechanics.
How about this finding:
In their research on entangled pairs of photons, scientists in Japan have devised a novel method of weak measurement that does not interfere with the path of the photons.
What? How the hell do you do that? You measure one of a pair of entangled photons which thus doesn’t influence the other?
The article begins with this th0ught -
In quantum mechanics, a vanguard of physics where science often merges into philosophy, much of our understanding is based on conjecture and probabilities . . .
What is the difference between science and philosophy? In a word — data. Is there more to the difference than that?
But here’s the problem that this finding seems to circumvent -
How do you observe quantum mechanics, atomic and sub-atomic systems that are so small-scale they cannot be described in classical terms, when the act of looking at them changes them permanently?
My answer (this from a middle-age man who did the vast majority of his marijuana smoking before high school) do a few pulls on a bong and conduct a thought experiment.
But maybe there is a better answer.
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Types of Understanding
By Andrew | March 6, 2009
Are there a number of different types of “understanding”? For example, is there an experiential understanding that can’t really be touched/expressed by scientific understanding?
In a blog post that touches upon the subject of consciousness, Massimo Pigliucci makes this point:
If the point is simply that science can at best hope to describe and explain the neural circuitry that makes subjective experience possible, but that only a subject can “feel” what it is like — in the title of a famous paper by Thomas Nagel — to be a bat (or anything else for that matter), this seems to be rather trivial and not that interesting (although phenomenologists do make a big deal of it). The objective of science is to provide a mechanistic account of feelings, not to feel the emotions themselves. So it isn’t really a failure of science at all, but rather a misconception on the part of some philosophers as to what cognitive research is attempting to do.
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Too Much Skepticism?
By Andrew | March 6, 2009
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Project Hiatus
By Andrew | September 25, 2008
As obvious to any recent visitor, this project is currently “on hold.” Mike and I are contemplating going to a podcast format.
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Math and Representations of Reality
By Andrew | August 28, 2008
Kudos Mike,
Don’t tell AA, but I’m drinking a beer during my lunch hour. At least it’s the “Champagne of Beers.” It says so on the can. Does drinking a Miller High Life - from a can! - make me a low life? Will I have my “cultured” license revoked? And do I care? (No.)
In your thoughtful post you wrote, “I think it’s wrong to say that the math describes reality. Rather, I think the math describes what we observe.” I agree 100%. As for the difference between observations and reality . . . wow, brain overload! Is it akin to the difference between trees of fact (data) and “the” forest we perceive that may in a large part be something our brains construct?
I also agree with your assertion that, “I believe we should erect a wall of separation between math and explanation.” My field, psychology, is rife with people taking the measurements from a study and then running with them into sometimes very convoluted explanations.
There are two points in your post that I find most intriguing and would like to address here.
First: the idea that when a formula (equation) works, we tend to accept the explanation accompanying it is true. It seems to me that people frequently equate accuracy with truth. When an equation accurately explains/predicts things we observe, well, it must be true. And truth we tend to accept as “something out there.” We idealize it. Rather than a “music of the spheres,” we perceive a truth of the numbers. The equations generating the numbers then take on a “reality” (validity?) of their own.
I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase about something or other “obeying the laws of physics.” How the heck do physical laws shape the nature of what we observe? How can a description, mathematical or not, determine anything? A law (formula) that accurately predicts what we then observe seems to carry power. The power, however, is not causal.
A quote from the book I referenced in my previous entry (The Motion Paradox) reads,
In the new math of coordinate geometry, curves and slopes represented how quickly a certain motion changed.
Represented. I think that’s a better word. Can we say that mathematical equations (”laws”) represent reality? They can both describe previous observations as well as predict future observations.
No matter how powerful and accurate a mathematical representation is, it is still a cognitive tool and not substantive feature of reality.
Second point: Explaining observations is different than mathematical descriptions. Particularly with this point I think, “We need more words, better words.” How is a description different from an explanation? Does one stick to solid trees, the other venture into more the more hazy territory of forest-ness?
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Math Versus Reality Versus Explanation
By Mike | August 27, 2008
Hey Andrew -
I presently don’t have a drink in hand so you might want to take what follows with with a grain of salt. Anyway, in your 8/17 post you asked, “do the mathematical equations of our scientific understanding of the universe represent ‘reality,’ or describe it, or predict it, or what?”
A couple of points. First, I think it’s wrong to say that the math describes reality. Rather, I think the math describes what we observe. And since reality is bigger than what we are able to observe the possibility always exists that tomorrow we could observe something we did not anticipate which would then force us to revise our formulas. So to call these descriptions of reality or, worse, truth, strikes me as presumptuous and probably rash.
For my second point I’m going to need my soapbox. Like church and state I believe we should erect a wall of separation between math and explanation. Let me share with you a hypothetical situation that illustrates why I think this. Let’s say we were to discover some amazing plant that cures cancer. After a great deal of study we discover that if a person with cancer will consume an amount of this plant equal to 1 percent of his body weight his cancer will be cured within a week. And we observe this to work in every case.
So we have this amazing plant that cures cancer. But we have no idea how the plant does it. In other words, we have a formula that describes the observed fact that the plant cures cancer, but we don’t yet have an explanation that describes how the plant actually does it. Now, does this lack of explanation prevent us from using the formula? Of course not. If I’ve got cancer I’m going to eat that plant. I can’t explain how my car works, but that doesn’t keep me from driving the thing to the store to buy beer.
But let’s say someone comes along and offers an explanation of how the plant cures cancer. The explanation entails the existence of microscopic fairies living inside the plant that do battle with the cancer. Now I find this explanation to be loony. But the person advocating this explanation insists that I should not dismiss what he is suggesting. After all, look at how well the formula works. In other words, the formula works; therefore, the explanation is true. But the formula and the explanation are not the same thing. If we fail to see the difference I think we risk swallowing some very bad explanations thinking we are being scientific.
What I’ve said here in no way is meant to discount the value of explanation. Explanations are very important. Explanations articulate the meaning we attach to our experience. But explaining what we observe is very different from describing (mathematically) what we observe. Observations are a product of our senses. Explanations are a product of our imaginations. In formulating an explanation we imagine some underlying process such that what we observe is but a consequence of that underlying process. And so when we confuse the two (observation and explanation) we risk elevating a product of our imagination to the status of observable fact.
This strikes me as a kind of philosophical blaspheme. ~
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Mathematics and Models of the Universe - 1
By Andrew | August 17, 2008
Hi Mike,
It’s Sunday on a scorching-hot afternoon and I’ve just finished my yardwork for the day. So now I’m sucking on a can of ice-cold Tecate, replenishing my fluids. The beer tastes even better than when I first tried it in bottle form in the actual Mexican town of
Here is the quote I mentioned from the book, The Motion Paradox:
Changing the electric field induces a change in the magnetic field, which induces a change in the electric field . . . on and on this system goes, supporting a dynamic and inseparable marriage of electric and magnetic waves, an effect that could be mathematically modeled as a three-dimensional electromagnetic wave [ital. original]. Maxwell’s equations implied that magnetic and electric waves are inseparable components of more comprehensive electromagnetic waves.
This paragraph, besides making me wonder, “When is an oscillation a wave?” made me recall many conversations we’ve had about the meaning of mathematics, if you will. More specifically, do the mathematical equations of our scientific understanding of the universe represent “reality,” or describe it, or predict it, or what?
Hmm. D = Pi R2 . . . Does this equation predict what our observations and measurements will produce? Or does it represent a mathematical reality? Mind you, most circles I’ve seen in the natural world are not ideal, but real, and imperfect.
Maxwell’s equations helped to precipitate Einstein’s advancements which led to today’s avant-garde physical notion of a 4-dimentional space-time. Yes, both you and I have a beef with projecting a successful tool to the status of a truth. Are we just being ignorant curmudgeons?
What say you?
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