Quantum Architects: How We Construct Worlds With Our Thoughts
And Eternity in an hour. (William Blake)
What you think you become. Your vibe attracts your tribe. The law of attraction. Tracht gut vit zein gut.
Whether you’re a hipster yuppie in your mid-20s, a middle-aged suburban mother of four, a chasidic Jew or a Buddhist monk, your tradition speaks of the power of thought to construct your reality in the most literal way.
While the power of a ‘don’t worry, be happy’ mindset is stressed to us from an early age, we are rational, sophisticated human beings unmoved by the dogmatic approach our parents’ generation. Our millennial crew needs a theory to be flavored with a data-driven, scientific approach in order for it to resonate.
Thankfully, the teachings of quantum mechanics can make these ideas more palatable to our skeptical generation. They allow us to take a submarine down to the subatomic level, where we can get a glimpse of the behavior of the fundamental particles of matter and how our conscious attitude effectively shapes their arrangement.
Wanted: Kitty, Dead or Alive
Classical mechanics is obsessed with predictability. It deals with the movement of matter through space and time by applying a simple set of equations to particles in order to determine their positioning. From falling apples to the motion of heavenly bodies, when we wish to calculate the movement of matter we use the neat, coherent theories of classical mechanics and can expect the same results for experiments repeated under the same conditions.
Quantum mechanics is like the brash newcomer who walks into the office on his first day of work and proceeds to flip the main table on its head.
Scientists were playing with subatomic particles — electrons, photons and other particles comprising the fundamental building blocks of matter — when they discovered something weird. Instead of behaving like their conventional cousins, these subatomic particles displayed certain characteristics which caught the scientists completely off guard. For starters, they no longer seemed to occupy a fixed position in space and time. Instead, subatomic particles are said to be superimposed, existing in a variety of states simultaneously. Schrodinger's cat, a famous thought experiment used to illustrate the weirdness of quantum physics, sees a poor, innocent feline locked into a box containing a vial of poison and a subatomic particle with two possible states, one and zero. If the particle fixes itself in a state of ‘one’, the particle emits energy which shatters the vial and murders the kitty. Otherwise, long live Kitty.
However, we can only know whether Kitty has survived once we open the box and observe the quantum particle. This is due to another wacky characteristic of quantum mechanics, the observer effect. Only once a conscious observer is introduced into a quantum system is a particle’s superposition broken, allowing it begins to behave in a predictable manner that can be measured using classical theories. The particle’s range of possible outcomes, known as the quantum wave, collapses into a single point in space and time and we can now know if it’s time to start preparing a cat funeral.
G-d’s Casino
Science is great at explaining how things happen, but when it comes to uncovering why they happen, it starts to stutter. This stutter of science is especially pronounced when it attempts to explain why a particle fixes itself in a given point in space-time.
Before being observed by a conscious observer, a sub-atomic particle exists in a state of probability. It can be everywhere and nowhere. It can be transitioning violently through space and time or not moving at all. The range of possible coordinates that the particle can assume in space and time is known as a quantum wave. Once observed, however, the particle assumes a fixed position and starts to behave a more predictably. When asked as to why the particle fixed itself in such a way — why, when we open the box, do we discover that the poor Kitty is dead — science does not posit any intentionality. The sole determining factor for why a particle fixes itself in a particular point in space-time is, according to scientist, complete randomness. Not only do we not know why Kitty was killed, but we also can never know why. It is unknowable because it is random.
Religion, on the other hand, posits Ultimate intentionality. From the fluttering of a leaf in the wind to erupting a volcano, every sub-atomic particle is fixed according to a master plan. We, humans, were endowed with a unique capacity for consciousness, allowing us to be active architects of this Master plan, instead of merely serving as its building blocks.
The purple-orange of a gorgeous sunset, the smile of baby and the wings of a butterfly. One interpretation sees the phenomena we experience through the lens of randomness. Life is the outcome of a hand of black-jack, completely random and meaningless. The other interpretation, the one most spiritually-sensitive people gravitate towards, sees conscious free will as that which collapses the quantum wave. Our mode of observation determines the way in which particles are fixed. By choosing to view each moment with a positive outlook, we become partners with the Master architect in constructing a light-filled universe.
Albert Einstein was extremely uncomfortable with the chaos of quantum mechanics, leading him to declare that ‘G-d does not play dice with the universe’, to which his contemporary Niels Bohr replied ‘don’t tell G-d what to do with his dice.’ While the fabric of the cosmos may seem random, in reality, there is a Dealer who has stacked the odds firmly in our favor and whose Hand controls all. We are His partners, using our Gd-given capacity for consciousness to transforms the quantum potential into the present actual. How we choose to focus our thoughts is how we choose to fix the subatomic particles that make up our reality.
Architect wisely.
