Chapter 1 Presenting the Enigma
“Though what you’re saying is correct, presenting this material to non-scientists is the intellectual equivalent of allowing children to play with loaded guns.”
– A colleague’s objection to our physics course, “The Quantum Enigma.”
About how we’ll display physics’ “skeleton in the closet.”
Chapter 2 Einstein Called It “Spooky”: And I wish I had known
“I have thought a hundred times as much about the quantum problem as I have about general relativity theory.”
– Albert Einstein
“I cannot seriously believe in [the quantum theory] because…physics should represent a reality in time and space, free from spooky actions at a distance.”
– Albert Einstein
About an evening spent with Albert Einstein, who wanted to tell of his problems with quantum mechanics.
Chapter 3 The Visit to Neg Ahne Poc: A Quantum Parable
“If you're going to ham it up, go the whole hog.”
– G. I. Gurdjieff
About a quantum-like bafflement in a magical place.
Chapter 4 Our Newtonian Worldview: A universal law of motion
“Nature and Nature’s laws lay hid in night:
God said, Let Newton be! And all was light.”– Alexander Pope
About the Newtonian worldview, which shapes the thinking of each of us.
Chapter 5 All The Rest of Classical Physics
“There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement.”
– Lord Kelvin (in 1894)
About the only pre-quantum physics needed to understand the quantum enigma.
Hello Quantum Mechanics
“The universe begins to look more like a great thought than a great machine.”
– Sir James Jeans
Chapter 6 How The Quantum Was Forced On Physics
“It was an act of desperation.”
– Max Planck
About how a mystery appeared and deepened.
Chapter 7 Schrödinger's Equation: The new universal law of motion
“If we are still going to put up with these damn quantum jumps, I am sorry that I ever had anything to do with quantum theory.”
– Erwin Schrödinger
About consciousness being encountered, but not yet recognized.
Chapter 8 One Third of Our Economy
“Developing quantum theory was ''the crowning intellectual achievement of the last century,'' says California Institute of Technology physicist John Preskill. It's the underlying principle for many of today's devices, from lasers to magnetic resonance imaging machines. And these may prove to be just the low-hanging fruit. Many scientists foresee revolutionary technologies based on the truly strange properties of the quantum world.”
– Business Week, March 15, 2004
About our looking at the practical use of quantum mechanics before we further explore the mystery it presents.
Chapter 9 Our Skeleton in the Closet
“The interpretation [of quantum mechanics] has remained a source of conflict from its inception… For many thoughtful physicists, it has remained a kind of "skeleton in the closet."”
– J. M. Jauch
About a physicist presenting a “remarkable demonstration” to a group of reasonable and open-minded people. A skit.
Chapter 10 Wonderful, Wonderful Copenhagen
“Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen…
Salty old queen of the sea
Once I sailed away
But I’m home today
Singing Copenhagen, wonderful, wonderful
Copenhagen for me.”– “Wonderful Copenhagen” by Frank Loesser (From the motion picture Hans Christian Andersen)
About our “orthodox” interpretation: how to stop worrying and love the quantum theory, pragmatically.
Chapter 11 Schrödinger’s Controversial Cat
“The entire system would [contain] equal parts of living and dead cat.”
– Erwin Schrödinger
“When I hear about Schrödinger’s cat, I reach for my gun.”
– Stephen Hawking
About Schrödinger’s objection to the theory he created: “It’s absurd!” Some say his objection is absurd.
You decide for yourself.
Chapter 12 Seeking a Real World: EPR
“I think that a particle must have a separate reality independent of the measurements. That is, an electron has spin, location and so forth even when it is not being measured. I like to think the moon is there even if I am not looking at it.”
– Albert Einstein
About Einstein’s showing that quantum theory’s denial of a real world existing independent of its observation depends on “spooky actions.”
Chapter 13 Spooky Actions
“Thou canst not stir a flower
without troubling of a star.”– Francis Thompson
About John Bell’s showing a way to test whether “spooky actions” really exist. They do.
Chapter 14 What’s Going On? Interpreting the quantum enigma
“You know something’s happening here, but you don’t know what it is.”
– Bob Dylan
“Every interpretation of quantum mechanics involves consciousness.”
– Euan Squires
About ten currently contending views on what Nature is trying to tell us with quantum mechanics.
Chapter 15 The Mystery of Consciousness
“What is meant by consciousness we need not discuss; it is beyond all doubt.”
– Sigmund Freud
“Consciousness poses the most baffling problems in the science of the mind. There is nothing that we know more intimately than conscious experience, but there is nothing that is harder to explain.”
– David Chalmers
About our exploring consciousness itself and its “hard problem.”
Chapter 16 The Mystery Meets the Enigma
“When the province of physical theory was extended to encompass microscopic phenomena through the creation of quantum mechanics, the concept of consciousness came to the fore again: it was not possible to formulate the laws of quantum mechanics in a fully consistent way without reference to the consciousness.”
– Eugene Wigner
“When there are two mysteries, it is tempting to suppose that they have a common source. This temptation is magnified by the fact that the problems in quantum mechanics seem to be deeply tied to the notion of observership, crucially involving the relation between a subject’s experience and the rest of the world.”
– David Chalmers
About consciousness and quantum mechanics being not just two mysteries, but the two mysteries.
Chapter 17 Consciousness and the Quantum Cosmos
“In the beginning there were only probabilities. The universe could only come into existence if someone observed it. It does not matter that the observers turned up several billion years later. The universe exists because we are aware of it.”
– Martin Rees
About how consciousness appears on the grandest scale of all.
Table of Contents
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