Mythopoetry Scholar

Matter & Beauty


What's The Matter With Myth
Musings on the Quantum Imagination
-Gene Toews

You could not discover the limits of soul, even if you
traveled by every path to do so;
such is the depth of its meaning.  Heraclitus

If those who lead you say to you:
“See, the Kingdom is in heaven,”
then the birds of the heaven will precede you.
If they say to you:  “It is in the sea,”
Then the fish will precede you.
But the Kingdom is within you and
It is without you.  Gospel of Thomas

But the Kingdom of the Father
is spread upon the earth and
men do not see it.  Gospel of Thomas

What is it that breathes fire into the equations and
Makes a universe for them to describe?  Stephen Hawking

E= MC2.  Albert Einstein

What if?  Take a moment to allow this question to envelope you.  What if? –- Rhetorical possibilities echoed by lovers, poets, and mythologists.  It is also a question of the potentialities opening as a result of advances of understanding of the nature of the universe and all physical realities by quantum physics. So profound are its implications that it led physicist Niels Bohr, Nobel Laureate, to exclaim:  “Anyone who is not shocked by the quantum theory does not understand it” (p. 146).  These shocking potentialities arise from two fundamental findings of experimental research into quantum physics:  First, nothing exists until it is observed, that is, observation creates reality; and second, there is a universal connectedness between everything in the universe.  The latter caused Albert Einstein to assert  “I cannot seriously believe in [quantum theory] because … physics should represent a reality in time and space, free from spooky actions at a distance” (p. 9).  And Carl Jung, whose work on synchronicity was influenced by quantum physics, proclaimed “The no man’s land between Physics and the Psychology of the Unconscious [is] the most fascinating yet the darkest hunting ground of our times (emphasis added)” (p. xv). 

Quantum physics is perhaps the most shocking discovery of the twentieth century—certainly it is one of the most profound.  It deconstructed the classical determinism of Newtonian, or classical physics.  It is bizarre, the stuff of science fiction and the product of wishful thinking.  And yet as Rosenblum and Kuttner point out, it is not subjective; its reality is objective (p. 34).  They further note “Quantum theory has been the subject to challenging tests for eight decades.  No prediction by the theory has ever been shown wrong.  It is the most battle-tested theory in all science—it has no competitors” (pp.51-2).  And yet as Einstein says, it is perhaps the spookiest.

Central to quantum physics are experiments, which have thus far shown that “… the properties of objects in our world have an observation-created reality or that there exists a universal connectedness, or both” (Rosenblum and Kuttner p. 150).  Take a moment to reflect on this:  reality is created by observation and/or all things in the universe are connected.  The implications are profound.

Theoretical physicist Michio Kaku has elaborated on observation-created reality:  “Quantum theory … tells us that observing an object causes it to be there. … according to quantum theory, an object can be in two, or many, places at once—even far distant places.  Its existence at the particular place where it happens to be found becomes an actuality only upon its observation” (p. 12).  As I understand it, this is not quite accurate:  actual objects don’t exist in multiple locations, it is their probabilities of being located that exist simultaneously.  This is explained by the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, which states, “… one cannot measure both an objects position and its momentum precisely and simultaneously” (Walker p. 92).  And this in turn is related to something called Schroedinger’s equation.

Schroedinger’s equation is demonstrated by a famous analogy in physics called “Schroedinger’s cat.”  According to this story, a cat exists in two, simultaneous potential states—one dead and one alive, each with a corresponding box.  The cat will appear either wholly alive or wholly dead, contingent upon the box one opens for observation.  This is because objects, such as the cat, are not comprised of particles.  Objects are particle-waves.  Walters describes experiments with light, which show light to be both particle and wave (43).  And Kaku has reminded us “All energy occurs in discrete packets called quanta” (p. 153).  Remember too that energy and matter are equivalent according to Einstein; E=MC2.  This means all matter also occurs in these discrete packets.  Walker lightheartedly asks, “If light waves of energy behave like particles (discrete packets of quanta) is it possible that ordinary particles of matter behave like waves of energy?  Does it make any sense to speak of, say, a football wave” (p. 45).  Kaku has provided us the answer:  “Matter is represented by point particles, but the probability of finding the particle is given by a wave” (53).  Schroedinger’s cat(s) are equally energy and matter.  They are comprised of discrete point particles which “behave like waves of energy.”  To this, physicist Max Born has added, “…matter waves are actually waves of probability” (Walker 57).
       
As I understand this, Schroedinger’s cat is not really a cat at all, alive or dead, at least until it is observed.  It is a “wave of probability.”  Kaku explains:  “… there is no actual thing in addition to its wavefunction.  The wavefunction is the ‘only physical thing’ “ (p. 96).  It exists not as a cat(s), but as a wavefunction.  This is a little spooky.  Does it sound like something from the original Star Trek television series:  “Beam me up Scotty?”

But let’s not leave  Schroedinger’s cat(s) floating out there.  Rosenblum and Kuttner have informed us that the cat exists “simultaneously in (the) two states,” in two places at the same time, in something called a superposition state (79).  Or as Kaku has noted, “Before an observation is made, an object exists in all states simultaneously” (153).  He continued:  “… the cat was in a superposition state equally alive and dead.  It was not a sick cat.  It was a perfectly healthy cat and a stone-dead cat at the same time” (118).  So which will we find, the healthy cat or the one that is stone dead?

The answer to this depends on which box we open for observation.  Remember each cat has its own box.  But no cheating.  Let’s make a deal.  Before we look in either box number 1 or box number 2, we  need to understand a little more about this thing called “wavefunction” as it relates to where and which state observation will create it to be.  Aren’t you glad you’re not Schroedinger’s cat?  You are simultaneously alive and dead, dependent on observation:  “See ya, bye.”
       
It turns out that Born’s wave probability is not a statistical probability one derived, say, from flipping a coin.  As Kaku explained, “The waviness in a region is the probability of finding the object in that region. … the waviness is not the probability of the object being there.   … The object was not there before you found it.  Your happening to find it there caused it to be there” (75).  Statistical probability would say that one has a greater chance of finding an object in one location or another, or in one state or another, by flipping a coin than by chance.  In statistical probability, the object is already located in the position in which it will be found.  In quantum physics, it is the probability that observation will cause it to be there.  Remember its wavefunction exists simultaneously in multiple locations. 
       
Where observation will cause it to be results from something called a wave collapse.  Kaku has pointed out that “If someone looked in a particular spot and happened to see the atom (or cat), there, that look would collapse the spread-out wave function of the atom to be wholly at that particular spot for everyone” (pp 76-7).  In other words, observation causes an object to be in a particular state/location by collapsing the superposition state of the object’s wavefunction.  And this collapse, caused by observation, caused the object to be there.  Rosenblum and Kuttner have extended this sensibility:  “Each and every atom follows a rule telling it to land in regions of large waviness, and forbidding it to land in regions of zero waviness … Therefore each atom had to somehow ‘know’ its box-pair spacing. According to quantum theory, each atom knows the rule because each atom was in both boxes at the same time; each atom was simultaneously in both boxes” (p 799).  Schroedinger’s poor cat exists simultaneously in superposition states, as equally alive and stone dead, and each particle wave knows in which box it needs to be located.  And, voila, box number one is opened to create Schroedinger’s dead cat.

But wait, there’s more.  Not only is the object created by observation, but also so is its past.  As Kaku has noted, “Your observation not only creates a current reality, it also creates the history appropriate to that reality” (p. 119).  Just imagine.  An action occurring within the present (an observation) creates actions which occurred in the past that are relevant to the present.  Kaku continued:  “Quantum theory is saying that our later choice of observation creates (the object’s) … earlier history—we produce something backward in time” (p. 123).  In terms of the poor, dead cat Kaku stated “… finding the cat deal would create a history of its developing rigor mortis; finding it alive would create a history of its developing hunger – backward in time” (13).  At this juncture it is important to recall that quantum theory is the most rigorously tested theory in all science.  Its predictions have never been proven wrong. 

This observer created history, which produces “something backward in time” has profound “what if” implications.  What if, for example, it was possible to erase one’s history, or parts of it, and recreate it anew.  Talk about human engineering.  James Hillman has written of therapy as healing the fiction of one’s story.  What if it were possible to create a new story altogether.  What if it were possible to make different observations in the past, which would create different material events each with their own histories appropriate to them, by observations made in the present.  And would those changes alter the present observations?  Talk about epic adventures!  What if the Odyssey were reframed along these lines so that Penelope’s weaving/undoing/reweaving was really changes produced by her observations.  Or what if Ahab had a different observation, creating Moby Dick in a different location/state—old and dying perhaps.  The possibilities are endless.

And now it gets spookier.  Everything is made of quantum particles, or as has been demonstrated, wave-particles.  Quantum physics applies to everything.  Theoretically, there can be no distinction between the micro and the macro.  What applies to the most microscopic applies equally to the largest telescopic.  Kaku pointed out that it is only technological limitation that prevents the demonstration of this principle (p. 15).  What applies to Schroedinger’s cat applies equally to the universe.  This means that the universe, and all that exists within it, were created by an act of observation.  If we are the observed, what and from whence comes the observer?  Think for a moment what this implies about the objective psyche and its contents:  they are not the most fundamental patterns, but are the product of something even more fundamental.  They too, were created by observation, as was the collective unconscious.  And there may well be something well beyond it. 
       
Jungian Analyst Paul Ashton stated as much in the introduction to his work on void states.  He noted the “’pre-archetypal stratum of the psyche’ which ‘precedes the archetypal and archetypally based compulsion to manifest in conscious form’ ’’ (p. 4).  My point isn’t to say whether or not this pre-archetypal stratum is that which created the universe.  My purpose is solely to ask what if something lies beyond.  In his work on the relationship of consciousness to quantum physics, Walker suggested “This … view of reality in which we see the observer and the consciousness as central to reality itself is as significant as if we had found the key to the soul.  Perhaps that is what has been found here” (p. 138).

This notion of an observer created universe leads to the idea of multiple universes.  According to Kaku, this is a likely reality.  He argued:  “…the ideal of parallel universes is forced upon us.  Inflation (the expansion of the universe) represents the merger of traditional cosmology with advances in particle physics.  Being a quantum theory, particle physics states that there is a finite probability for unlikely events to occur, such as the creation of parallel universes (emphasis added)” (93).  Recalling the ant of T. H. White’s Once and Future King declaration that what is not forbidden is compulsory, Kaku stated that according to the uncertainty principle “Unless something is forbidden, quantum effects and fluctuations will eventually make it possible if we wait long enough.  Thus unless there is a law forbidding it, it will eventually occur” (p. 136).

Kaku then suggested a profound notion:  “Imagine the stage of life consisting of multistory stages, one on top of the next.  On each stage the actors read their lines and wander around the set, thinking that their stage is the only one, oblivious of the possibilities of alternate realities.  However, if one day they accidentally fall into a trapdoor, they find themselves thrust into an entirely new stage, with new laws, new rules, and a new reality” (p. 112).  What if it was possible to travel between universes?  Imagine Odysseus’s journey if this was possible.  In which universe would Ahab search for Moby Dick?  “The friendly skies” takes on a whole new meaning.  Will there be connecting flights of reality? 

As it turns out, inter-universe travel is theoretically possible via a process termed “tunneling.”  Tunneling, explained Kaku, is the process by which a particle penetrates a barrier (p.54).  He continued:  “Today this idea of tunneling is central to all of physics and is used to explain the properties of electronic devices, black holes, and the big bang.  The universe ‘itself might have been created via tunneling’” (p. 54).  And lastly, he wrote:  “In Einstein’s theory, we have the possible existence of multiple universes, and in quantum theory, we have the possible means of tunneling between them” (p. 107).  And this from the most tested theory of science.  Will inter-universe travel by tunneling eventually occur as predicted by the absence of it being forbidden?  If its possible to travel one direction, it should also be possible to travel the other.  Is simultaneous, multi-directional travel possible via multiple tunnels so that one could go to multiple universes at the same time?  Can one exist in multiple superposition states in different universes?  Do the same or similar laws of physics apply? 

And this leads us to the final notion of quantum theory I wish to discuss:  inseparability.  Classical physics posited that there is not a connection between material objects except through the interaction of an intermediary—they were viewed as separable. (Rosenblum and Kuttner p. 35).  Physicist John Bell tested this theory to see if it would be upheld by quantum theory (Rosenblum and Kuttner p. 143).  He found “… the most profound discovery in science in the last half of the twentieth century. … There is a universal connectedness… Any objects that have ever interacted continue to instantaneously influence eath other.  Events at the edge of the galaxy influence what happens at the edge of your garden” (Rosenblum and Kuttner p. 139).  The term for this inseparability is quantum entanglement.

Wikipedia defined quantum entanglement as “… a … property of a quantum mechanical state of a system of two or more objects in which the quantum states of the constituting objects are linked together so that one object can no longer be adequately described without full mention of its counterpart – even though the individual objects may be spatially separated.”  Physicist Brian Clegg added:  “Even if these entangled particles are then separated to opposite sides of the universe, they retain this strange connection.  Make a change to one particle and that change is instantly reflected in the other(s) – however far apart they may be” (p. 2).  And this happens without the intermediary action of a third object.  Further, physicists at the University of Vienna have shown “… that moments of time can become entangled too” (Brooks p. 2).  Not only is there a universal connection between one edge of the universe and the other, but from one time dimension to another.  What if the theory of quantum entanglement also applied to objects located in different universes?
 
I previously mentioned that early research in quantum physics influenced the work of Carl Jung.  Arthur Miller details this in his Deciphering The Cosmic Number:  The Strange Relationship of Wolfgang Pauli  and Carl Jung.  He specifically outlined their collaborative efforts in Jung’s development of this theory of synchronicity.  Their efforts resulted in a mandala of synchronicity in which constant connection through effect (causation) on one end of the continuum and inconsistent connection through contingency equivalence (synchronicity) on the other, with indestructible energy and the space-time continuum on opposing ends of the perpendicular axis (Miller p. 202). It seems apparent that quantum physics and depth psychology interpenetrate one another.  Perhaps synchronistically, the two are acausally connected in the very foundations of the development of the notion of synchronicity.  To take this a step, or many leaps, forward, what if at bottom there is some equivalence between depth psychology and quantum physics? 

Presuming even a limited working knowledge of Jung’s theory of  synchronicity, consider that synchronistic events may possibly arise from entangled connections of objects separated by vast distances in which “normal”  definitions of past, present, and future are nonexistent, and even the possibility that these may occur between objects located within different universes. 

Joseph Campbell has suggested that the function of mythology is to take us deeper into the experiences of life “… so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances within our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive” (1988 p. 5).  This is what quantum physics and the “what if” questions it generates stimulates within me.  James Hillman has instructed us of the metaphorical foundations of myth.  In his Re-Visioning Psychology he wrote:  “Myths do not tell us how.  They simply give the invisible background which starts us imagining, questioning, going deeper” (p. 158).   These are what “what if” questions facilitate by helping one deconstruct the confines of literalism and engage the potentialities of that which lies beyond the borders of one’s prior comprehension. 
         
What if questions engage one with the consciousness of myth, by carrying one beyond the bounds of what is seen, into the depths of the imaginations invisible background.  They enable one, as Carl Kerenyi has suggested, to immerse into the mythological foundations of life where “… the absolute and the relative – coincide … (at the) abyss of the nucleus … and there we must presume, is the mid-point about which and from which our whole being organizes itself”  (pp. 8-9). ).  Could this abyss of the nucleus be synonomous  with the pre-archetypal stratum Ashton discussed in association with his work on void states? 

The “what ifs” of mythic consciousness lead us, simultaneously to the outer limits of soul’s depths, and possibly beyond—for what if there is a limit to soul’s infinity and there is something(s) from whence it arises that is foundational to it?  Further, as a faculty of sense perception, mythic consciousness may illuminate what lies invisible in the abyss of the nuclei enabling one to see what one cannot hope to be aware of with more self limiting physical sense organs.  What if it were possible to “see” the Kingdom of Heaven?  What if it was mythic consciousness that created us.

notes

Clegg, Brian.  (2006).  The God Effect:  Quantum Entanglement, Sciences Strangest Phenomenon.  New York, NY:  St. Martin’s Press.

(27 March 2004). Entanglement:  The Wierdest Link.  New Science 9 (2440).  Retrieved from http://www.biophysics.com/quantum.htm.

Flowers, Betty Sue ed. (1988).  The Power of Myth:  Joseph Campbell with Bill Moyers.  New York, NY:  Doubleday.

Hillman, James. (1975).  Re-Visioning Psychology. New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishing.  

Jung, C. G. and Kerenyi, C. (1963).  Essays on a Science of Mythology:  The Myth of the Divine Child and the Mysteries of Eleusis.  Princeton, NJ:  Princeton University Press.

Kaku, Micho. (2005).  Parallel Worlds:  A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos.  New York, NY:  Random House, Inc.

Miller, Arthur I.  (2009).  Deciphering the Cosmic Number:  The Strange Relationship of Wolfgang Pauli and  Carl Jung.  New York, NY: W. W. Norton and Company.

Quantum Entanglement. (n.d.)  In Wikipedia.  Retrieved from         http://en.wikipedia.org/Quantum.entanglement.

Rosenblum, Bruce and Kuttner, Fred.  (2006).  Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness.  New York, NY:  Oxford   University Press.

Walker, Evan Harris.  (2000).  The Physics of Consciousness: Quantum Minds and the Meaning of Life.  New York, NY: Basic Books.

Wheelwright, Philip ed.  (1966).  The Presocratics.  New York, NY: Macmillan Publishing Company.

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