Quantum Field Theory: The Woo Stops Here

[tsig]

What Carroll says is that the discovery of the Higgs has confirmed QFT to the extent that we can be confident of its accuracy within the known bounds he describes. These bounds include the everyday energies and scales relevant to humans. Consequently we now know with confidence what particles and forces are relevant and, in that respect, what is and is not possible at these everyday energies and scales. He explains quite clearly why forces and particles outside the bounds of confidence are not relevant and can be ignored.


Yes, they can be ruled out within the bounds of everyday energies and scales, for reasons he makes explicit.

If you have a problem with those reasons, why not save us all a lot of time and explain how or why you think they are incorrect?

People keep positing some force that is undetectable by science yet is able to have an effect in reality. The squirming to try and somehow shoehorn in a gap for woo is pitiful to behold.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

I found this, which is interesting - a disagreement from Henry Stapp, who is a quantum physicist whose field of research is consciousness. It's comments 45 and 46:

A friend of mine sent this article to Henry Stapp. There is room for a soul and afterlife in his reply in the following posts (too long for one post):

When he says that "the laws of physics underlying everyday
life are completely understood", then I would insist that insofar as they
are completely understood, and are in fact the laws spelled out by von
Neumann’s orthodox ontologicalization of the pragmatically extremely
successful Copenhagen interpretation, then these laws are *dynamically incomplete*. These basic laws, involve at their conceptual core the concept of "measurement", which concerns the problem of how the aspect of nature represented in the theory by physical descriptions are connected to our human experiences. The quantum laws are about the connection between our conscious thoughts and the activities in our physically described brains.

This connection is defined by von Neumann’s "process 1". This process
chooses some probing question, which is expressed in terms of a possible conscious experience and a closely associated "neural correlate". The known quantum mechanical physical law, the Schroedinger equation, governs only an underlying physically described substrate, which evolves via this physical law into a continuous smear of possible physical worlds of the kind that can be correlated to definite experiences of the kinds that occur in our streams of consciousness. The known laws do not specify or determine how the crucial "process 1" choice linking brain to conscious experience is determined: there is a huge *dynamical gap* in the theory, as it is known today!

[...]

Stapp continued:

There is a certain prejudice among physicists—stemming perhaps from the experiences of scientists with the now-superceded classical mechanics, or perhaps from a professional wish for a universe controlled by mathematical laws of a familiar kind—that asserts that the process 1 connection between mind and brain should be bottom-up, controlled in full by the brain, which is imbedded in a physically described universe, or at least that the process that generates the process 1 choice have an essential bottom-up component. If this physicalist notion were to be veridical then it would seem to follow a person’s mind could not survive the death of that person’s body.

But there is a serious difficulty seeing how a definite possible
conscious experience (and an associated neural correlate) could
be naturally generated by a continuous smear of possibilies if the
person’s physical described body/brain is itself a smear of
possibilities.

A viable rational alternative would be a *completely top-down* process-1 choice, in which "the mental being" that is the person’s mental aspect, is continually probing that person’s physically evolving brain, via a virtual process that searches for possible neural correlates (in the person’s current brain state) corresponding to possible process 1 actions. Such a theory would constitute the basis of a quantum theory
involving human *souls*: mental entities that could become detached from temporary bodily hosts.

The point here is that *IF* the evidence demands reincarnation, or
some form of survival of personality traits after bodily death, then
a TOP-DOWN resolution of the open question of "What determines the
experimenter/observer’s process 1 choice?" would be indicated:
quantum could tolerate a soul-containing version of the von Neumann
ontology, if the data in fact demands survival. In the end, it is the
empirical data that must rule, and an empirical demand for suvival can
be accommodated rationally within the von Neumann ontology by exploiting the dynamical gap arising from the lack of determination within that "ontology" of the causal origin of the process 1 choice!

 

[The Man]

The many worlds interpretation is just as successful as the Copenhagen interpretation. Also Stapps criticism seems to rely on a confusion between "measurement" and interaction. The latter results in a particular system state without the need of "human experiences". Additionally "The quantum laws" are differential field equations and the "the connection between our conscious thoughts and the activities in our physically described brains" ain't one of those fields.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

The many worlds interpretation is just as successful as the Copenhagen interpretation.

I don't think that matters. His point is that the Standard Model doesn't actually rule out a soul. Saying that the many worlds interpretation is just as successful as the Copenhagen interpretation doesn't counter that. In order to do that you'd have to rule out the Copenhagen interpretation.

Also Stapps criticism seems to rely on a confusion between "measurement" and interaction. The latter results in a particular system state without the need of "human experiences". Additionally "The quantum laws" are differential field equations and the "the connection between our conscious thoughts and the activities in our physically described brains" ain't one of those fields.

These are interesting, though. Thanks.

 

[dlorde]

I found this, which is interesting - a disagreement from Henry Stapp, who is a quantum physicist whose field of research is consciousness.

I've seen some of Stapp's stuff, and, from what I can make out, it's typical quantum consciousness woo, harking back to the Copenhagen Intepretation and biologically implausible.

He's working back from an incoherent cultural/philosophic assumption based on special pleading, and struggling to find a way to connect it to physical reality. In this case the assumption is that people are 'morally responsible agents' because they have a special kind of control that only they can exercise - what he calls "the morally pertinent idea of ‘possessing free will’" - that somehow transcends physical causality (special pleading). Naturally, it's not easy to connect what is beyond physical causality to causal physical processes. The best he can do is find a point of unknown causality in QM (the outcome of decoherence) and say the (unspecified) magic happens there.

He says, "... This rigid enforcement of the physical laws entailed, of course, that men’s thoughts could have no effects upon their actions... It contradicts our deepest intuition about ourselves, namely that we are free agents", and he goes on to build his entire edifice on the assumption that 'our deepest intuition' must be how things really are.

He also says, "Those aspects of the evolutionary process that are not completely fixed by prior developments can be called “choices” or “decisions”. They are in some sense “free”, because they are not completely fixed by what has come before". Sadly, he supplies no evidence or support for this.

He summarises:
"Conscious events can be naturally identified with certain special kinds of quantum events, namely quantum events that create large-scale integrated patterns of neuronal activity in human brains. These events represent “choices” that are not strictly controlled by any known physical laws". No supporting evidence is supplied.

His definition of free will is incoherent - the model seems to require a immaterial Dennettian quantum 'homunculus' to make an appropriate choice to resolve the quantum superposition.

It seems to me it's just another farce or pantomime showing at a Cartesian theatre near you. OTOH, I may have misinterpreted the limited excerpts I read.

 

[Soapy Sam]

It seems to me it's just another farce or pantomime showing at a Cartesian theatre near you. OTOH, I may have misinterpreted the limited excerpts I read.

There is no need for a homunculus, grasshopper. The theatre itself is aware.*



* I'm kidding.**

** I think.

 

[dlorde]

There is no need for a homunculus, grasshopper. The theatre itself is aware.*



* I'm kidding.**

** I think.

I think you're closer than Stapp is

 

[NotEvenWrong]

Can't believe this thread is still going.

Hilited the appropriate phrase.

Rather than listen to the screams of science it would be nice if you would point out the limits .

You mean the limits of reductionism? I would suggest reading about the science of complexity. You can't predict the behavior of complex systems from simple laws. You have to add new axioms and mathematics to describe them. e.g. you can't predict the behavior of brains from QFT. Here is an old, but classic paper:

http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/08/bblonder/phys120/docs/anderson.pdf

For newer stuff I would suggest reading things by Barabasi or from his lab.

So your counter-argument is that QFT does not cover every aspect of our everyday life because of the existence of some particles that are part of QFT?

I don't even understand you at this point. You are like countering an argument to an argument that I wasn't even countering. It's like some weird 2nd level strawman.

My counter-argument is that we have examples of particles that affect us at the relevant every-day energy scales, yet they cannot be detected. This is a direct refutation of the claim by Carroll that all particles which affect us at every-day energy scales can be detected by particle physics experiments. Therefore his conclusion that an afterlife cannot exist because if it did we would see the particle is false.

Sounds cool - so what is the real physical effect that cannot be detected by any apparatus?

What is the point of this question? It has nothing to do with what I was saying, unless you completely misunderstood what I wrote.

Just to refresh, I was saying there are particles which have a physical affect that cannot be detected, therefore Carroll's claim is wrong. Not that there are physical effects which cannot be measured.

Your question, as it is written, is nonsensical. You're asking me for a real physical effect that can't be detected. If one exists, I wouldn't know about it since it's never been detected, and there would be no physical explanation since no on even knows about its existence yet in the first place. What are you getting at?

 

[tsig]

Can't believe this thread is still going.



You mean the limits of reductionism? I would suggest reading about the science of complexity. You can't predict the behavior of complex systems from simple laws. You have to add new axioms and mathematics to describe them. e.g. you can't predict the behavior of brains from QFT. Here is an old, but classic paper:

http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/08/bblonder/phys120/docs/anderson.pdf

For newer stuff I would suggest reading things by Barabasi or from his lab.



I don't even understand you at this point. You are like countering an argument to an argument that I wasn't even countering. It's like some weird 2nd level strawman.

My counter-argument is that we have examples of particles that affect us at the relevant every-day energy scales, yet they cannot be detected. This is a direct refutation of the claim by Carroll that all particles which affect us at every-day energy scales can be detected by particle physics experiments. Therefore his conclusion that an afterlife cannot exist because if it did we would see the particle is false.



What is the point of this question? It has nothing to do with what I was saying, unless you completely misunderstood what I wrote.

Just to refresh, I was saying there are particles which have a physical affect that cannot be detected, therefore Carroll's claim is wrong. Not that there are physical effects which cannot be measured.

Your question, as it is written, is nonsensical. You're asking me for a real physical effect that can't be detected. If one exists, I wouldn't know about it since it's never been detected, and there would be no physical explanation since no on even knows about its existence yet in the first place. What are you getting at?

Interesting paper:

Summary:

When things get complicated, magic happens.

 

[NotEvenWrong]

Yikes. You are more... limited than I thought you were.

The author of that paper is Philip Warren Anderson. I suggest you google him. (Hint: You can start with a list of the winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics, if you so choose.)

Did you read any of the papers by Barabasi? He is making predictions using complex network models that are impossible if you assume reductionism. I suggest you read more (not just things by Barabasi, or about complexity. Just read more in general...)

 

[tsig]

Yikes. You are more... limited than I thought you were.

The author of that paper is Philip Warren Anderson. I suggest you google him. (Hint: You can start with a list of the winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics, if you so choose.)

Did you read any of the papers by Barabasi? He is making predictions using complex network models that are impossible if you assume reductionism. I suggest you read more (not just things by Barabasi, or about complexity. Just read more in general...)

Rather than insulting me or trying to dazzle with famous names you could have refuted what I posted but maybe you are too limited to be able to argue your own points.

 

[NotEvenWrong]

Rather than insulting me or trying to dazzle with famous names you could have refuted what I posted but maybe you are too limited to be able to argue your own points.

Uh, I posted a paper by a Nobel Prize winning physicist on complexity and the limits of reductionism, which is what you were asking for. Your response was:

Interesting paper:

Summary:

When things get complicated, magic happens.

So let me get this straight. Your argument against a paper by a Nobel Prize winning physicist and the entire scientific field of complexity is that it is equivalent to "magic" (despite it being one of the most important and active areas of research in all of science), and you want me to refute this? "Magic happens". Like, I don't even understand how "magic happens" is an argument against an entire scientific discipline, or how one refutes "magic happens".

I don't mean to hurt your feelings (or "dazzle you" by posting papers from one of the most important physicists in history), but is something wrong with your reasoning abilities or are you just trolling?

 

[The Norseman]

My counter-argument is that we have examples of particles that affect us at the relevant every-day energy scales, yet they cannot be detected. This is a direct refutation of the claim by Carroll that all particles which affect us at every-day energy scales can be detected by particle physics experiments. Therefore his conclusion that an afterlife cannot exist because if it did we would see the particle is false.

What are these particles that affect us yet cannot be detected? How many are there and what are they called? Is one or more evidence of an afterlife?

 

[tsig]

Uh, I posted a paper by a Nobel Prize winning physicist on complexity and the limits of reductionism, which is what you were asking for. Your response was:



So let me get this straight. Your argument against a paper by a Nobel Prize winning physicist and the entire scientific field of complexity is that it is equivalent to "magic" (despite it being one of the most important and active areas of research in all of science), and you want me to refute this? "Magic happens". Like, I don't even understand how "magic happens" is an argument against an entire scientific discipline, or how one refutes "magic happens".

I don't mean to hurt your feelings (or "dazzle you" by posting papers from one of the most important physicists in history), but is something wrong with your reasoning abilities or are you just trolling?

The paper's thesis:

When things get complicated then we cannot explain them with materiel explanations seems to simplify to when things get complicated magic happens.


What message does it convey to you?

Insults generally mean you cannot answer the arguments rationally.

 

[steenkh]

What are these particles that affect us yet cannot be detected?

I think he is thinking of gravitons, and while it is true that they are not part of quantum physics, I am not sure they are sufficient to claim that our model of the world is seriously deficient.

 

[The Norseman]

I think he is thinking of gravitons, and while it is true that they are not part of quantum physics, I am not sure they are sufficient to claim that our model of the world is seriously deficient.

Ah, thanks. I hope it didn't come across as a 'gotcha' question because I honestly don't know and would like examples.

So far though, I don't see any of his refutations regarding an afterlife (the lack thereof).

 

[NotEvenWrong]

What are these particles that affect us yet cannot be detected? How many are there and what are they called? Is one or more evidence of an afterlife?

An example of a particle that affects us but cannot be detected is a graviton. Virtual particles are another example. How many (different ones?) are there? I don't know -- there are a lot of hypothesized particles that may or may not exist. Tachyons come to mind as well.

None of them would be evidence for an afterlife. This is irrelevant though, because the claim this thread is based on is that QFT proves there is no afterlife for reasons X, Y, and Z. The reasons X, Y, and Z are wrong. This doesn't mean there IS an afterlife, just that QFT does not prove there is NOT one.

I think he is thinking of gravitons, and while it is true that they are not part of quantum physics, I am not sure they are sufficient to claim that our model of the world is seriously deficient.

I wouldn't say seriously deficient. It's the best model we have. It just doesn't explain how brains and consciousness work, which is a necessary component for what we're discussing. Also doesn't explain gravity, dark matter, etc. So, I guess it is in fact "seriously deficient" for these things, since it is not even meant to explain them (which if I recall has been my point from the beginning).

Ah, thanks. I hope it didn't come across as a 'gotcha' question because I honestly don't know and would like examples.

So far though, I don't see any of his refutations regarding an afterlife (the lack thereof).

Sean Carroll's claim is that QFT proves there is no afterlife, since we know it is "right", and if a particle interacts with the brain we would be able to detect it by a particle physics experiment -- and since this interaction would be a necessary component of any kind of information transfer to an "afterlife" we know it can't exist.

My refutation is that everything about these statements is obviously wrong: QFT is just a model, it's not fundamental truth. We cannot know "fundamental truth". QFT can't even model brains or consciousness (see: all, and yes I do mean all, of the known science on complexity). It isn't even compatible with gravity which is equally fundamental to everything else it models. Other things which we have equally strong reasons to believe are true are not modeled by QFT.

Furthermore, even if QFT were 100% "fundamental truth", the claim that if a particle interacts with the brain then we would be able to detect it is wrong. Gravitons affect everything. Therefore they interact with the brain. Yet we cannot detect them. This is an obvious counterexample to the claim that if a particle interacts with the brain than we can detect it by particle physics experiments. There could be other particles we don't know about. This is because we don't know everything. Even at "every day" energy scales (whatever that even means -- gravity isn't considered "every day" energy scales apparently yet I'm pretty sure gravity affects us since we don't float off the planet). The only thing in Carroll's lecture that makes sense is the physics -- his philosophical conclusions are completely nonsensical.

 

[NotEvenWrong]

The paper's thesis:

When things get complicated then we cannot explain them with materiel explanations seems to simplify to when things get complicated magic happens.

The paper says nothing about material vs. non-material explanations. I don't know why you think that is the paper's thesis. The primary point of the paper is that when you increase the scale of a system and go from relatively simple non-living systems to more complicated living systems symmetry breaking occurs, and you need new laws to explain its behavior. In other words you can't explain it in terms of only QFT. An obvious implication of this is that you could never explain the behavior of a brain in terms of the axioms of quantum field theory. Which is why no one does it. And why there are actual disciplines not named quantum field theory. Like complex systems theory, neuroscience, cognitive science, etc.

What message does it convey to you?

Insults generally mean you cannot answer the arguments rationally.

Can you cut the crap and pretend your little one liners aren't condescending insults? Papers by Nobel Prize winnings physicists that have been cited thousands of times probably don't have as it's main thesis "magic happens".

Or are you actually saying every idea that belongs to a scientific discipline other than quantum field theory (yes, that even includes other areas of physics apparently) is "magic"?

 

[steenkh]

An example of a particle that affects us but cannot be detected is a graviton. Virtual particles are another example. How many (different ones?) are there? I don't know -- there are a lot of hypothesized particles that may or may not exist. Tachyons come to mind as well.

None of them would be evidence for an afterlife. This is irrelevant though, because the claim this thread is based on is that QFT proves there is no afterlife for reasons X, Y, and Z. The reasons X, Y, and Z are wrong. This doesn't mean there IS an afterlife, just that QFT does not prove there is NOT one.

I think I agree with you that some of the reasons X, Y, and Z are wrong. Gravitons is probably the clinching example. I do not see how virtual particles or tachyons would fit into this argument.

I wouldn't say seriously deficient. It's the best model we have. It just doesn't explain how brains and consciousness work, which is a necessary component for what we're discussing. Also doesn't explain gravity, dark matter, etc. So, I guess it is in fact "seriously deficient" for these things, since it is not even meant to explain them (which if I recall has been my point from the beginning).

I agree.

Sean Carroll's claim is that QFT proves there is no afterlife, since we know it is "right", and if a particle interacts with the brain we would be able to detect it by a particle physics experiment -- and since this interaction would be a necessary component of any kind of information transfer to an "afterlife" we know it can't exist.

My refutation is that everything about these statements is obviously wrong: QFT is just a model, it's not fundamental truth. We cannot know "fundamental truth".

Nobody claims it is a fundamental truth. Carroll's argument rested upon QFT being good enough, not that it was fundamentally true.

QFT can't even model brains or consciousness (see: all, and yes I do mean all, of the known science on complexity).

For that matter, QFT can't even model a drop of water, much less the Niagara Falls. This is irrelevant to the argument.

It isn't even compatible with gravity which is equally fundamental to everything else it models. Other things which we have equally strong reasons to believe are true are not modeled by QFT.

Yes the lack of gravity seems a serious defect to me. I have no idea what the "other things" might be.

Furthermore, even if QFT were 100% "fundamental truth", the claim that if a particle interacts with the brain then we would be able to detect it is wrong. Gravitons affect everything. Therefore they interact with the brain. Yet we cannot detect them. This is an obvious counterexample to the claim that if a particle interacts with the brain than we can detect it by particle physics experiments. There could be other particles we don't know about.

Correct. However, gravity does not seem to be important to consciousness. Astronauts are perfectly able to be conscious when the influence of gravity is reduced.

The argument against woo consciousness still stands in its pre-Carroll state: there is nothing in consciousness that needs woo to be explained. However, woo could still be involved even if it is not necessary, so it would have been nice to know that it was ruled out completely.

 

[steenkh]

I would suggest reading about the science of complexity. You can't predict the behavior of complex systems from simple laws. You have to add new axioms and mathematics to describe them. e.g. you can't predict the behavior of brains from QFT. Here is an old, but classic paper:

http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/08/bblonder/phys120/docs/anderson.pdf

I do not agree with the conclusion that the paper's thesis says that "magic happens" with increasing complexity, although I do see why it could be interpreted like this. But I also do not think that the conclusions has to be that we need "new axioms and mathematics" to describe complex systems.

Emergent properties do not need new laws in themselves, but the complexity make calculations from fundamental properties increasingly difficult, or even impossible. That is why it makes sense to study these emergent properties without reference to the underlying laws, and construct new models for them. This is abstraction, and it is of course what we have been doing all along, particularly since the fundamental laws have been unknown or are still unknown.

Modern computing power has in fact made it possible to model increasingly complex systems that were impossible 50 years ago by using fundamental laws (or "more" fundamental laws).