Updated: September 29, 2024
As I continue to make the case
for quantum body, quantum mind
and quantum universe as a unified expression of consciousness, I want to address today one of the problems
with the dualist view of mind
and body. Dualist view of mind
and body means that mind and body
are separate. Now, most of science is, in fact, all of science is based on dualism, or subject-object
split, and we've addressed
that before. And I think
the subject-object split is artificial. But let's look
at another objection to the dualist
point of view, which posits
that mind and body are distinct
substances. This view
has been argued to violate the laws
of thermodynamics. Specifically
the second law of thermodynamics
states that the total
amount of energy of an
isolated system always
increases over time. The second law of thermodynamics states that
the total entropy not energy,
the total entropy of a isolated system always increases over time,
and entropy is a measure
of disorder. So that means that the universe is becoming
increasingly disordered over
time. It started as almost
perfectly ordered.
Dualists argue that if the mind is
a nonphysical substance, then it cannot
interact with the physical body
without the physic, without violating
the second law of thermodynamics. So I'll repeat that. Dualists argue that if the mind is a nonphysical
substance, then it cannot
interact with the physical body
without violating the second law
of thermodynamics. This is because any
interaction between the mind and body
would require the transfer of energy. And energy
can only be transferred
from a less disordered system to a more
ordered system. So that's a very important
point. However,
there have been a number of counterarguments
to this claim. One is that the mind may not be a nonphysical
substance. After all, some
scientists believe that the mind is simply a complex function
of the brain and that there is
no need to posit a separate substance
to account for it.
You know, the problem is, of course,
that the brain has no experience.
Okay? The brain only has
neural correlates. And if the brain produces
the mind, then that's
the hard problem of consciousness. Another
counterargument is that even if the mind is a nonphysical
substance, it may still be able
to interact with the body
without violating the law
of thermodynamics. This is because
the mind may be able to interact
with the body through quantum
entanglement, which is
a phenomenon that allows
for the transfer of information,
information between
two particles without any energy
being exchanged. Now, this is very
interesting because there is no
transfer of information,
in my opinion, in quantum
entanglement. The information is the same appearing
differently. Okay. It's the same
information particles and waves are just appearing
differently. So when you measure
a particle, the spin
of a particle here and you immediately
know the spin of a particle here, even though it's
not the same spin that does not require transfer
of information, it's the same organism.
You know, appearing
differently or the same activity, appearing
differently in two seemingly opposite locations. I think the best way
to understand this is David Bohm's
model implicate order
and the explicate order. Same thing
is noumenon and phenomenon. So what we see as entanglement is a misunderstanding
of separation. And David had
a very good analogy. He said,
think of a fish in a fish tank and let's say this is the fish
in the fish tank and this is the head
and this here is the tail.
And you are unable
to see anything except the head
and the tail because
the rest of the fish is invisible to you
because of, let's
say, perceptual limitations,
a narrow band of perceptual
activity that humans are privy to. Visual, say 390
to 700 nanometers. There's
a lot happening that we are
not seeing. But let's say you're
seeing the fish tank and you can see
from here or you can see
from here or you can see
from here. And every time
the fish shows his head, the tail moves
simultaneously. The fish turns
his head, the tail
move simultaneously. And you think that they're transferring
information. The head
to the tail. But actually
it's one phenomenon which is entangled in
the whole organism. So if the universe
is a formless field of possibilities
and it's a unified expression of experience, then the entanglement
is all the way. Qualia entanglement, quantum
entanglement, perceptual
entanglement, modeling
entanglement, emotional
entanglement, meaning
entanglement.
And so the way scientists
are addressing the dualist view of mind
and body is still
being debated by philosophers
and scientists and there has been
no really good consensus amongst
the scientists. Okay, so there are, however many other arguments
against dualism. For example, it is argued
that dualism is conceptually
incoherent because it is
difficult to understand how a nonphysical
substance like the mind
could interact with a physical substance
such as the body. So despite all these arguments,
dualism, appears
a popular view among philosophers
and scientists.
And that is because it's the way we do
science. Naive realism
getting closer through expanding
our experience of virtual reality in which
we are embedded. But mind and body, our universe
and universe are inseparably
one entanglement. In my opinion, with mind and body as two separate entities, is untenable from a scientific
point of view. So let me know
your thoughts. And by the way,
I address all this with quantum
physicists Jack Tuszynski
and Brian Fertig in our upcoming
book, Quantum Body: The New Science
of Living a Longer, Healthier
and More Vital Life..
