From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!psinntp!norton!brian Wed Feb 26 12:54:28 EST 1992
Article 4003 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: brian@norton.com (Brian Yoder)
Subject: Re: QM nonsense
Message-ID: <1992Feb25.111705.24619@norton.com>
Organization: Symantec / Peter Norton
References: <67000@netnews.upenn.edu>
Date: Tue, 25 Feb 1992 11:17:05 GMT
Lines: 45

weemba@libra.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) writes:
> In article <1992Feb20.225429.5846@norton.com>, brian@norton (Brian Yoder) writes:
> >		    Can anyone explain how "uncertainty" can be "absorbed"
> >by something?  That perspective seems hopelessly confused to me, and I can't
> >see why anyone would fail to see this.
 
> The distinguishing feature in QM is "coherence": different versions of
> what's going on, so to speak, can be kept together as part of the same
> physical situation in a "coherent" manner.  

There you go again...coherence is an epistemological term, togetherness is
a metaphysical one.

> Lowspeak for this is just
> "quantum uncertainty".  Somehow we view the world in a decoherent manner
> --just one aspect of possible realities are seen by us.

"Possible realities"?  There you go again!  Probability is an epistemological
matter, reality (note the singular form) is a metaphysical one.  Just because 
you are not epistemologically aware of what is metaphysically true doesn't
mean that your thinking makes reality something other than what it (singular) is.
 
> How this happens is unknown.  One interesting idea (Zeh and others) is
> that the environment can interact with a macroscopic object and trigger
> a rapid convergence of the different realities associated with the object,

Perhaps you can explain how it can be demonstrated that there are "multiple
realities".  Of course to do so would demand that you show that contradictions
exist (ie. the ball is and is not in the box) which violates scientific 
epistemology but I'll allow you to try it...just please, get your research
funding somewhere else.

> at the expense of the environment itself getting more realities.  Hence
> the above description.

And more of this "multiple reality" stuff.  How can you utter such things 
with a straight face?

--Brian

-- 
-- Brian K. Yoder (brian@norton.com) - Q: What do you get when you cross     --
-- Peter Norton Computing Group      -    Apple & IBM?                       --
-- Symantec Corporation              - A: IBM.                               --
--


