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Consciousness is
important because its study has become the focal point for an
interdisciplinary co-operation that is slowly undermining
determinism and materialism in our society. Hence the more we
know about the basics of the evidence for and against the
alternative philosophies, so do we increase our potential to
contribute to the renaissance of true religion. In recent years,
concepts of quantum physics that have long been paradoxical and
contrary to the expectations from both classical physics and
determinist philosophy, have begun to be appreciated by many whose
interests are in other disciplines.
The experimental
and theoretical results of quantum physicists have now demonstrated
that there is much more to our universe than a simple, pre-ordained
dance of the molecules. In fact, much of what goes on at base levels
is probabilistic rather than being predictable and pre-determined.
Determinism.
For many years
now, deterministic materialism has been the dominant philosophy
shaping attitudes in the Western world. Its basic logic is that
things happen because they cannot do otherwise--and whatever happens
does so because of the past events that predetermine which dance of
the molecules must unfold.
According to the
determinists, the universe originated with a random fluctuation in
the primordial vacuum, a Big Bang. All that now is, exists because
of a cause-effect evolutionary progression of exploding matter and
energy.
Determinist logic
assumes that life is inevitable,--a spontaneous consequence in any
universe where conditions are suitable. Having made the start,
natural processes unerringly lead to the emergence of intelligent
life forms.
Determinism
insists that mind, free will, and consciousness, while being
naturally emerging phenomena, nevertheless arise from the
self-delusions of hopeful souls. The determinist world has neither
room for God, nor for purpose.
Determinism
undermined.
Since the early
part of this century, researchers in that branch of physics known as
quantum mechanics have been discovering phenomena that do not fit a
materialist-determinist interpretation of their experimental
findings. Among these discoveries are the dual, wave-particle nature
of the atom and its sub-components, the probabilistic nature of
quantum events, the superpositioning of alternative outcomes to a
potential event, the 'collapse' of all but one superposition by an
observer, the non-local, instantaneous and space independent
communication of closely correlated particles--and many others.
One
intensively-investigated phenomenon is the fact that a single photon
or electron, when presented with two pathways (such as via two slits
or a split beam device) will take both pathways to a target,
provided only that no attempt is made to determine which pathway it
takes. By taking both paths, the particles are enabled to
'interfere' with themselves and exhibit wave-like properties. But
when an observer acquires knowledge of a pathway, the photons,
electrons, or atoms promptly behave purely as particles.
This strange
reluctance of a particle to have its pathway revealed does not
appear to be due to any physical effect on the particle by the
instrumentation used during the attempt to observe it--as shown in
work described below.
A smart ghost.
Independent work
by Pritchard and co-workers, or Chiao and his group, describes
incredibly elaborate schemes attempting to gain knowledge of
pathways in two-slit types of experiment without disturbing the
wave-like performance of a particle--but all to no avail1.
On every occasion the 'ghost in the machine' has been able to
out-think its opponents.
An experiment by
Chiao et al. is illustrative. A polarizer was placed in one of two
pathways to an interference detector so as to attach a label to any
photon that proceeded along that pathway. Doing so immediately
collapsed the interference phenomenon that heralded wave behavior.
While leaving the
polarizer at the same location, two more were added further along
the pathways, one in front of each interference detector. This
action meant that the observers lost the knowledge of the pathway
they had previously gained by labeling photons proceeding along one
path. The consequence was the prompt restoration of the interference
phenomenon, this being signaled by the re-emergence of wave-like
behavior of the photons at the detector system.
An even more
elaborate system was then set up by Chiao's group by substituting
beam splitting polarizers for those in front of the detectors. The
time of arrival and the polarization of all photons reaching the
detectors was automatically recorded and stored in a computer.
Subsequent examination of the data showed that, for similarly
polarized photons, interference patterns persisted--but only when
the path of individual photons remained unknown.
The Central
Order of Things.
When this kind of
evidence is combined with that from other kinds of experiments on
quantum phenomena (such as the apparent communication between
correlated photons and electrons that occurs independently of space
and time, or that described in the July/August issue of Innerface on
electron spin), many researchers are led to believe that there is
some kind of intelligent agency operating in a dimension outside of
space-time that somehow participates in upholding the rules of
quantum physics.
Two of the
originators of quantum theory, Werner Heisenberg and Wolfgang Pauli
(both Nobel Prize winners), gave this controlling agency the name,
the "Central Order of Things" and expressed their belief
that its existence could not be doubted.3 Others call it
"Universal Consciousness" or the "Ground of All Being4."
As would be
expected, there are those who attempt to avoid the implications of
an outside 'intelligence.' One proposal is that the environment
plays a role that is not simply random noise but is an apparatus
that acts as a constant monitor5. But such a proposal
appears to introduce other difficulties--who designed and built the
apparatus, who keeps the records, who ensures that it operates
consistently, and how is it that this 'environment' is clever enough
to outwit some of our smartest experimentalists? Perhaps the truth
is somewhere in between views at the extremities.
One of the
extreme views allows that Universal Consciousness is the major
player. In this scheme the consciousness of an observer is one with
Universal Consciousness (monistic idealism). A semi-materialist view
renames universal consciousness as simply a destabilizing
environment. This latter view appears to sweep too much out of
sight.
Determinism
defused.
The work that
appears to have finally tilted the balance in favor of the bizarre
findings of quantum physics and against the determinism of classical
physics was done by Alaine Aspect6 whose experiments
tested proposals of Irish physicist, John Bell.
Bell developed a
statistical procedure for investigating whether any form of local
signaling ("local" means within our space and time) could
account for communication between closely correlated quantum
particles separated in space. For such to occur within the bounds
set by classical physics and relativity, any signal would need to
proceed at the speed of light or less (if a signal travels faster
than light, the rules require that time would travel backwards and
hence give rise to anomalies like signals arriving before they
left).
Aspect was not
the first to demonstrate that the communication phenomenon between
correlated quantum particles must be instantaneous and independent
of space-time, but his work was perhaps more elegant than others and
certainly caught the attention of the media.
Consciousness
recognized as real.
The publicity
engendered by Aspect's work did a lot to disenthrone determinism.
One consequence is that researchers with an interest in
subjects such as human consciousness, free will, and self
awareness may now have an opportunity to pursue those interests
without being derided as 'unscientific' by their determinist
colleagues.
Recently there
has been an explosion in the number of papers being published on the
topic of consciousness. As with any relatively new field, there are
problems of semantics.
Arthur J. Deikman
from the University of California believes that there is an
"I" which is the same as our awareness or consciousness,
and which needs to be differentiated from other aspects of the
physical person and the mental contents that form the self. He says
that most discussions of consciousness confuse the "I" and
the "self," and that our experience is fundamentally
dualistic--but not the dualism of mind and matter. Rather it is that
of the "I" and that which is observed, of consciousness
and the content of consciousness.
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