Longhorn

Source: <a href="http://www.wie.org" target="_blank">http://www.wie.org</a>
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Before you read any further, stop and close your eyes for a moment. Now consider the following question: for the moment your eyes were closed, did the world still exist even though you weren't conscious of it? How do you know? If this sounds like the kind of unanswerable brain teaser your Philosophy 101 professor used to employ to stretch your philosophical imagination, you might be surprised to discover that there are actually physicists at reputable universities who believe they have answered this question—and their answer, believe it or not, is no.
Now consider something even more intriguing. Imagine for a moment the entire history of the universe. According to all the data scientists have been able to gather, it exploded into existence some fifteen billion years ago, setting the stage for a cosmic dance of energy and light that continues to this day. Now imagine the history of planet Earth. An amorphous cloud of dust emerging out of that primordial fireball, it slowly coalesced into a solid orb, found its way into gravitational orbit around the sun, and through a complex interaction of light and gases over billions of years, generated an atmosphere and a biosphere capable of not only giving birth to, but sustaining and proliferating, life.
Now imagine that none of the above ever happened. Consider instead the possibility that the entire story only existed as an abstract potential—a cosmic dream among countless other cosmic dreams—until, in that dream, life somehow evolved to the point that a conscious, sentient being came into existence. At that moment, solely because of the conscious observation of that individual, the entire universe, including all of the history leading up to that point, suddenly came into being. Until that moment, nothing had actually ever happened. In that moment, fifteen billion years happened. If this sounds like nothing more than a complicated backdrop for a science fiction story or a secular version of one of the world's great creation myths, hold on to your hat. According to physicist Amit Goswami, the above description is a scientifically viable explanation of how the universe came into being.
Goswami is convinced, along with a number of others who subscribe to the same view, that the universe, in order to exist, requires a conscious sentient being to be aware of it. Without an observer, he claims, it only exists as a possibility. And as they say in the world of science, Goswami has done his math. Marshalling evidence from recent research in cognitive psychology, biology, parapsychology and quantum physics, and leaning heavily on the ancient mystical traditions of the world, Goswami is building a case for a new paradigm that he calls "monistic idealism," the view that consciousness, not matter, is the foundation of everything that is.
A professor of physics at the University of Oregon and a member of its Institute of Theoretical Science, Dr. Goswami is part of a growing body of renegade scientists who in recent years have ventured into the domain of the spiritual in an attempt both to interpret the seemingly inexplicable findings of their experiments and to validate their intuitions about the existence of a spiritual dimension of life. The culmination of Goswami's own work is his book The Self-Aware Universe: How Consciousness Creates the Material World. Rooted in an interpretation of the experimental data of quantum physics (the physics of elementary particles), the book weaves together a myriad of findings and theories in fields from artificial intelligence to astronomy to Hindu mysticism in an attempt to show that the discoveries of modern science are in perfect accord with the deepest mystical truths.
Quantum physics, as well as a number of other modern sciences, he feels, is demonstrating that the essential unity underlying all of reality is a fact which can be experimentally verified. Because of the enormous implications he sees in this scientific confirmation of the spiritual, Goswami is ardently devoted to explaining his theory to as many people as possible in order to help bring about what he feels is a much needed paradigm shift. He feels that because science is now capable of validating mysticism, much that before required a leap of faith can now be empirically proven and, hence, the materialist paradigm which has dominated scientific and philosophical thought for over two hundred years can finally be called into question.
Interviewing Amit Goswami was a mind-bending and concept-challenging experience. Listening to him explain many ideas with which he seemed perfectly at home, required, for me, such a suspension of disbelief that I at times found myself having to stretch far beyond anything I had previously considered. (Goswami is also a great fan of science fiction whose first book, The Cosmic Dancers, was a look at science fiction through the eyes of a physicist.)
But whether or not one ultimately accepts some of his more esoteric theories, one has to respect the creativity and passion with which he is willing to inquire. Goswami is clearly willing to take risks with his ideas and is fervently dedicated to sharing his investigation with audiences around the world. He speaks widely at conferences and other forums about the exciting discoveries of the new science and their significance, not only for the way science is done, but for society as a whole. In India, the country of his birth, he is actively involved in a growing organized movement to bridge the gap between science and spirituality, through which he is helping to pioneer a graduate institute in "consciousness studies" based on the premise that consciousness is the ground of all being.
Goswami is considered by some to be a pioneer in his field. By attempting to bring material realism to its knees and to integrate all fields of knowledge in a single unified paradigm, he hopes to pave the way for a new holistic worldview in which spirit is put first. In fact, as far as we know, he is the only new paradigm scientist who is taking a clear stand against the relativism so popular among new age thinkers. At a time when the decay of human values and the erosion of any sense of meaning has reached epidemic scale, it is hard to imagine what could be more important than this.
And yet, for all the important and valuable work he seems to be doing, in the end we are left with serious reservations as to whether Goswami's approach will ultimately lead to the kind of transformation he hopes for. Thinkers such as Huston Smith and E. F. Schumacher have pointed to what they feel is an arrogance, or at least, a kind of naiveté, on the part of scientists who believe they can expand the reach of their discipline to somehow include or explain the spiritual dimension of life. Such critics suggest that the very attempt to scientifically validate the spiritual is itself a product of the same materialistic impulses it intends to uproot and, because of this, is ultimately only capable of reducing spirit, God and the transcendent to mere objects of scientific fascination.
Is science capable of proving the reality of the transcendent dimension of life? Or would science better serve the spiritual potential of the human race by acknowledging the inherent limits of its domain? The following interview confronts us with these questions.

<a href="http://www.wie.org/j11/goswam1.asp" target="_blank">http://www.wie.org/j11/goswam1.asp</a>

[ March 31, 2002: Message edited by: Longhorn ]</p>

Vorkosigan

Perhaps Goswami should just stick to physics.....

lpetrich

I agree. I'm familiar with some of the intricacies of modern physics, and I find a lot of the "mystic physics" theorizing to be nonsensical. They almost seem to be claiming that quantum mechanics indicates that wishing will make it so.

However, I think that there is a serious theoretical issue here, and that is the "collapse of the wavefunction". Here's how it comes about. In quantum mechanics, elementary entities have particle and wave properties; they are sort of like waves with quantized overall intensities.

However, on a macroscopic scale, entities act either as waves or as particles, and the wave-to-particle crossover is the "collapse of the wavefunction". Here's an example.

Consider a light source, two slits, and a photographic film. The light will travel through both slits, spread outward from each one, and interfere with itself, producing an interference pattern on the film. This is all wavelike behavior.

Now consider what the light does to the film. It causes a chemical reaction in some molecule, like a silver-halide one; the resulting chemical change is then utilized in the photograph-development chemical processes to produce the final photographic image. But the important thing is that this requires the absorption of exactly one quantum of light.

But this quantum had been spead over the entire photographic film! And also the area outside the slits! So it must somehow become collapsed! Which is the whole problem.

However, where it collapsed fits the probability distribution calculated from the light-wave intensity, and it faithfully reproduces the wave-behavior interference pattern -- even when the flux of photons is very low.

One common interpretation of quantum mechanics, the Copenhagen Interpretation, states that it is an act of observation that collapses the wavefunction. But what is "observation"? Any possible theory of observation must take into account the fact that all known observers are subject to quantum mechanics.

The "mystic physics" school of thought takes off from this, and states that it is the presence of consciousness that does the collapse of the wavefunction. And it often implies that, as a result, consciousness can somehow control phenomena at the quantum level.

However, wavefunction collapse shows no signs of following a "wishing will make it so" scenario; as I'd pointed out, it strictly follows the probability distribution found from the original waves.

Answerer

Well, this I agree that physicists are becoming more and more like fantasy writers.

Jayhawker Soule

You have a penchant for dismissive generalizations.

kctan

If they don't think that way, where else do you think those fantastic thingies nowadays are coming from ?

Wyrdsmyth

Intriguing, but how can one possibly test such a hyphothesis?

I mean, this guy can do all the math he wants, and quote lots of sources and refer to cutting edge physics, cognitive psychology, etc. but ultimately -- so what? Can we test his theory? No!

"Let's see if the universe still exists when it is not being observed."

How?!?

Koyaanisqatsi

Well, like most armchair quantum physicists, the facts are misconstrued here when transliterated to philosophical paradigms. The "observer" spoken of in quantum physics is not a human being nor human consciousness per se nor does it do anything mystical at all.

Because we're talking about the fundamental building blocks of matter and matter is in a constant state of possibility, any action will result in a reaction.

That's all it means to say that the obersver "collapses" the wave. It is only our homocentric self-importance that takes such a simple concept and explodes it into yet another ridiculous quest for god (aka, ourselves).

Think of it this way. You know those rooms full of plastic balls that kids love to play in? You're the "observer" in that pit and as such your mass is interacting with the balls. That's it. Your legs "collapse the wave function" by hitting one of those balls that would not have been hit (necessarily) had you not been in that pit.

That's it. Nothing too difficult to grasp. No calls to The Great And Powerful Too RAH Loo.

As I said, it's just another example of homocentric self-importance; we don't consider ourselves to be a part of nature, so anytime we witness nature working around us, we think we have some sort of external view.

There's nothing mystical or mysterious about it. We're a glowing fog of infinitely possible energy states awaiting interaction. If one wishes to take this fact into a philosophical speculatory theory about consciousness and mind/matter paradox, by all means, but it constitutes little more than mental masturbation.

As with the other kind, it's certainly enjoyable and you might get your metaphysical rocks off, but that's all it would be.

Consciousness as "cause" or "result of" or, most probably, "symbiotic with" still does not mean that there is anything involving a deity, unless you want to simply grow up and understand that deity is just another word for ourselves only we're too terrified to admit it.

Perhaps if we can just understand that "consciousness" means "decisive behavior" and leave the homocentric self-aggrandizement out of the equation, we'll see that self-referential systems are endemic and therefore reflected into matterenergy.

In other words, matter is thought and vice versa. The Theory of Relativity gave us spacetime. Quantum physics gives us thoughtmatter.

Either way, samey same.

joedad

Semantics. What of a blind person reading brail, or a blind/deaf person feeling another person sign?

joe

99Percent

I also agree that this Amit Goswami should stick with physics. (Name sounds like a joke: Go- Swami!). Science is subset of philosophy. He is trying to equate science with philosophy. He should go back to high school and study Philosophy 101.

lpetrich: Consider a light source, two slits, and a photographic film. The light will travel through both slits, spread outward from each one, and interfere with itself, producing an interference pattern on the film. This is all wavelike behavior.

Now consider what the light does to the film. It causes a chemical reaction in some molecule, like a silver-halide one; the resulting chemical change is then utilized in the photograph-development chemical processes to produce the final photographic image. But the important thing is that this requires the absorption of exactly one quantum of light.

But this quantum had been spead over the entire photographic film! And also the area outside the slits! So it must somehow become collapsed! Which is the whole problem.

Isn't this possible because of the fact that time does not exist for photons, so this allows particles to be waves and particles at the same time?