I'd like to throw this into the mix.

The Strange Properties of Psychokinesis

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Quantum theory has raised some still puzzling questions with regard to the role of the observer and the nature of reality. At the same time, the mathematical elegance and the logical consistency of quantum theory has suggested that the theory may have universal validity, being applicable even to systems that include human subjects. And with conventional quantum theory apparently experimentally correct, there seemed little demand for modifications with their inherent mathematical complications.

The results of parapsychology, on the other hand, indicate that quantum theory can be experimentally wrong when applied to systems that include a human subject. Experiments like the reported ones, point to specific links between the quantum formalism and psychic effects, suggesting a wealth of further interesting experiments. It remains to be seen whether the results will lead to a new quantum theory that includes psychic effects within its mathematical formalism, or whether they will merely outline some final limitation of the quantum formalism.

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Tom, does this screw up conventional reality?

-- Anonymous, March 30, 2000

Answers

Beats me. As the article says at one point:

"Intuitively, we feel that nature, at this stage, must have decided on one or the other outcome. But the formalism of quantum theory contains no parameter which could tell us when such a decision is "really" made. Rather, the formalism suggests that the appearance of a head or a tail remains as unreal as the position of a particle until the outcome has been observed."

There is expressed my sense that quantum theory itself is counter intuitive, or rather to my way of speaking - counter folk models. Add PK to it and it just gets more so. Once I'm in a muddle, you can add whatever you want...

The thing I haven't unravelled yet to my satisfaction about "quantum theory" is the jump from something not happening yet because an observer hasn't observed it, versus a particular model not being able to predict what has happened. As you know, my formal engineering training was in systems design, which was a glorified compilation of ways of modelling the world (mostly with mathematics and computers - Club of Rome type stuff as well as simple (as in manmade) feedback systems). Lots of times we constructed models that wouldn't yield answers for us - as in the model was inadequate.

So when applying quantum theory to predict something, and you run into an uncertainty point (can predict either momentum or position, not both, etc) I say okay --- I believe that your model yields these results. But the jump to saying "reality" hasn't located the particle leaves me cold. What does a model deficiency look like anyway?

However there are enough smart physicists working with this model that this objection can't be the answer? I don't know, and since the little reading I've done says that the effects aren't observable at the macro level - then it kind of gets irrelevant to my everyday practice. Now, if I were designing very small electronic circuits....

The only other thing is something reminiscent of Churchill's quote: "Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma." Wrapping the observations of the influence within both statistics and quantum theory really kind of obscures what might be going on as opposed to elucidating it.

I did find the part interesting about how PK doesn't seem to register on any standard force measuring instruments. Then it was looked for in influencing "chance". I read the encyclopedia entry on "chance" once, and it seemed a huge philosophical subject on its own. So locating PK there???

It is reminescent of searching for the seat of consciousness - maybe the liver? maybe the ventricles? maybe the pineal gland? maybe in the quantum effect? It reminds me of looking for something that was never there - not that something is not going on, but more that the conception of what is going on is misleading.

Remember that confirmatory observation regarding the bending of the light from a star as it passed near Sol. Newtonian mechanics wouldn't have predicted the bend, Einsteinian relativity model did. Some of these searches feel like having the Newtonian model, observing that the light rays bent, and then going looking for a giant orbiting crystal that must have diffracted the rays...

The idea of exerting force of mind at a distance might just be a logical confusion between what's inside our heads and what's outside (eating the menu as opposed to the meal) but then so are a lot of breakthrough investigations.

Beats me.

-- Anonymous, March 30, 2000

Okay, me too....

It seems odd that PK was unable to physically affect resting masses; that's exactly what the average joe expects it to affect. But rather, affecting chance outcomes, and also decay rates.

I think this is the thing that most people would call "majick", that perception we call precognition, ESP, luck,and/or "evil eye"..... There are millions of "chance happenings" every second of every day, happening in every person's life. Is this "PK" the mechanism we (or some of we) use to affect the outcome of those chance happenings?

-- Anonymous, March 30, 2000

Well - there has to be an intervention point somewhere for there to be an effect.

Maybe when something is a "chance" occurrence there is a particular cusp of opportunity that makes the occurrence especially susceptible to intervention?

Figuratively imagine a knife-edge. If forces available to play with are very small, then won't be able to influence stable cases, or even those cases balanced on a blunt knife-edge, but will be able to influence those cases that pivot on a very sharp edge?

Some of the self-organizing literature talks about the increased opportunities at that edge of a set of processes where it is not stable and not chaotic. (Dave has links.) Maybe there are influences that can be exerted closer to the edge of chaotic behaviour that aren't influential when nearer the stable regime, and situations that invoke chance are somewhat closer.

The flip side though - there's nothing "chancy" about a dice throw. If we knew the forces applied to the dice and the height of the fall, then calculations much simpler than it takes to put something in orbit (ie. routine calculations) would yield which way it would fall. The "chancy-ness" seems to me to be an artifact of our not being able to predict the specific fall as people casually watching the situation - not that the fall is indeterminate in and of itself. If this is the case, then there is no intervention point for PK in terms of intervening at a cusp.

And this is what makes me wonder if the reason things like PK have to retreat to quantum indeterminacy is to find a place to manifest at all.

Whenever increased understanding shrinks the domain of existence of something, I wonder if the something is a folk-model.

-- Anonymous, March 30, 2000

snip

A great surprise of the early work was that PK affected only rolling dice, but could not be measured as a force acting on a stationary die on a sensitive scale. PK seemed to act only where chance processes were involved. This suggested that PK could not be considered as a force, comparable to electric or magnetic forces.

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But it appears PK -does- have an effect on rolling dice, a moving physical mass. So one would think PK is a very weak force, but still, a force. Perhaps the user knows how to "wish" for somthing very strongly, but not how to initiate movement? Maybe some socio- psychological barrier? ("Burn the witch! Burn the witch!")

But regardless, this PK thing affects physical mass, moving systems, known decay rates, muddles up random number generators, maybe interacts with or affects those magnetic fields in and around the physical brain.....

I think this -may- be the tool in play in paranormal events. If so, still, what is the mechanism?

-- Anonymous, March 30, 2000