The 3Qs: Quantum Quandaries and Quackery: The Philosophy of Science Applied to Modern Physics (en Inglés)
Reseña del libro "The 3Qs: Quantum Quandaries and Quackery: The Philosophy of Science Applied to Modern Physics (en Inglés)"
This book is a continuation in the series entitled THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE APPLIED TO MODERN PHYSICS. Although Quantum physics is a technical field, it can be critiqued in terms of the assumptions, inferences and the philosophy of science used in building theory. While the picture of the atom works very well, the conclusions drawn from double-slit experiments lead to contradictory interpretations as to what is going on at the invisible atomic and subatomic levels regarding waves and particles. Despite the conceptual contradictions, the formal math of each interpretation is said to equally valid and accords well with experimental results. Some of the contradictions include: the wave collapses to a particle in the Copenhagen interpretation vs. the wave doesn’t collapse in the Many Worlds theory, the particle doesn’t have a definite state until observed in Copenhagen vs. the particle has a definite state from inception in Bohmian Mechanics. Much of the theory of Quantum Mechanics has been largely influenced by Eastern mysticism, and its founders, including Bohr, Heisenberg, Bohm and Capra, were mentored by Eastern mystics of one tradition or another. The influence of Eastern mysticism is apparent in Quantum mysticism which some physicists deny, and others embrace with the passion of devotees. Thus, much of Quantum theory is unscientific and violates the principles of empiricism, scientific realism and objective, mind-independent reality. Entanglement theory and experiments are examined from the point of view of scientific, critical thinking. There is much vagueness and ambiguity in entanglement theory allowing physicists much slipperiness in denying obvious contradictions. For example, some physicists claim that if the experimenter forces a particle into a particular state, entanglement is destroyed and communication between particles is lost. Of course, the only way to test for non-local communication between entangled particles is to change one particle to see if the other changes accordingly. The hedge for this contradiction is that the quantum rule allows one such change to the particle to determine if the other particle responds in a complementary way. After that one change, entanglement is destroyed, and thus entanglement cannot be used as a system for instant communication at any distance. String Theory represents the culmination of the trend in Quantum physics toward mysticism and mathematical metaphysics. After decades of vain mathematical speculation on the behavior and shapes of strings, no empirical evidence has been found to support this decidedly unscientific theory. Overall, this book is an application of the scientific philosophy of rational-empiricism upon which the scientific method is based to critique the concepts of Quantum theory.
