Related papers: On Math, Matter and Mind
I explore whether it is possible to make sense of the quantum mechanical description of physical reality by taking the proper subject of physics to be correlation and only correlation, and by separating the problem of understanding the…
The possibility of fundamental theories with very many ground states, each with different physical parameters, changes the way that we approach the major questions of particle physics. Most importantly, it raises the possibility that these…
For a century, quantum theorists have been reading the mathematical entrails of quantum mechanics (QM) to divine the nature of quantum reality. But to little avail. In this paper a different approach is taken, namely to identify and explain…
The linear mathematics of quantum mechanics gives many versions of reality instead of the single version we perceive, with the perceived version chosen at random according to a probability law. Because of these peculiarities, the theory…
Though the truths of logic and pure mathematics are objective and independent of any contingent facts or laws of nature, our knowledge of these truths depends entirely on our knowledge of the laws of physics. Recent progress in the quantum…
The geometrical nature of gravity emerges from the universality dictated by the equivalence principle. In the usual formulation of General Relativity, the geometrisation of the gravitational interaction is performed in terms of the…
Many advocates of the Everettian interpretation consider that theirs is the only approach to take quantum mechanics really seriously, and that this approach allows to deduce a fantastic scenario for our reality, one that consists of an…
Our understanding of the four basic concepts of Physics -- space, time, matter and force -- has undergone radical change in the course of work on unification, starting with Maxwell's unification of electricity with magnetism, all the way to…
We briefly review a number of major features of the approach to quantum measurement theory based on environment-induced decoherence of the measuring apparatus, and summarize our observations in the form of a couple of general principles…
A critique of the state of current quantum theory in physics is presented, based on a perspective outside the normal physics training. From this perspective, the acceptance of quantum nonlocality seems unwarranted, and the fundamental…
Finetuning and Naturalness are extra-empirical theory assessments that reflect our expectation how scientific theories should provide an intuitive understanding about the foundations underlying the observed phenomena. Recently, the absence…
What exists at the fundamental level of reality? On the standard picture, the fundamental reality contains (among other things) fundamental matter, such as particles, fields, or even the quantum state. Non-fundamental facts are explained by…
The third quantization formalism of quantum cosmology adds simplicity and conceptual insight into the quantum description of the multiverse. Within such a formalism, the existence of squeezed and entangled states raises the question of…
Basic concepts of theoretical particle physics, including quantum mechanics and Poincar\'e invariance, the leptonic mass spectrum and the proton mass, can be derived, without reference to first principles, from intrinsic properties of the…
The dark matter and dark energy problem, that is now dominating the research in cosmology, makes the question of the origin of mass-energy content of the universe more urgent than ever. There are two philosophies regarding this question:…
In this contribution to FQXi's essay contest 2018, I suggest that it is sometimes a step forward to reverse our intuition on "what is fundamental", a move that is somewhat reminiscent of the idea of noncommutative geometry. I argue that…
The implications of the physical theory of quantum mechanics on the question of realism is much a subject of sustaining interest, while the background questions among physicists on how to think about all the theoretical notion and…
This paper proposes an approach to framing and answering fundamental questions about consciousness. It argues that many of the more theoretical debates about consciousness, such as debates about "when does it begin?", are misplaced and…
This essay is an attempted to address, from a modern perspective, the motion of a particle. Quantum mechanically, motion consists of a series of localizations due to repeated interactions that, taken close to the limit of the continuum,…
Contemporary scientific perspectivism is re-evaluated and extended to a comprehensive perspectivist methodology and 'mediated' realistic epistemology, especially, with reference to quantum mechanics. In the present study, this is realized…