I linked to an article on the paper. — Kenosha Kid

Probably involves mathematical parameters that are difficult to explain in a simple message board post. Not a physicist, but maybe I'll take a look at it.

The interference pattern is the evidence. — Kenosha Kid

What is the evidence that a single emitted electron is a wave spanning multiple slits, and does this evidence obtain for molecules also? When the wavicle contacts the florescent screen, seems to me it is closer to a particle with a definite trajectory than a collapsing wave function of a large swath of the chamber, though electrons do of course evince properties in many contexts that can't be explained unless they are spatially diffuse in ways exceeding for instance a grain of sand.

I think I have a comprehensive theory of how human language was naturally selected, but rather than try to summarize in a brief post, I'll provide links to a couple chapters I wrote on the subject, located at philosophyofhumanism.com . This will give some good insight into how language evolved if you want to trouble reading it.

Phylogenetic Factors and Evolutionary Origins of Humanity's Language and Conception
The Evolution from Precivilized to Civilized Human Conception

It's easier to see it in the case of photons. The photon must travel through the undetected slit and not be destroyed or the detected one and be destroyed. There's no possibility in that case of interference. — Kenosha Kid

I'm not aware of any direct evidence that the particle travels through both slits simultaneously as a wave, then recombines into a particle. It might be the case for photons while not for much more massive particles, but what could possibly be the mechanism?

It seems more plausible to me that the detector at the slit affects overall charge distribution in the chamber such that all possible pathways are influenced to produce bright bands instead, rather than disrupting some sort of superposition or entanglement of the wavicle with itself at multiple slits. Even Schrodinger hated the collapse of the wave function concept and he invented the wave function!

In the textbook example, i.e. in conventional quantum mechanics, each particle goes through every slit, which is why there's an interference pattern. To determine the weighting through each, you'd have to solve the wave equation and take the integral of the absolute square across the area of each slit. It will depend on the distance between the slits. — Kenosha Kid

That interpretation doesn't make sense to me. It fails to account for why a detector at one of the double slits only registers a particle half the time, nor the apparent randomness of localized absorber contact amongst even dozens of particles. Technically its possible for an electron "lightning bolt" to divide in some proportion, travel through all slits, and then recombine on the opposite side to contact a single spot on the florescent screen, but this seems highly unlikely for particles consisting of hundreds of atoms.

I think researchers managed to radically misinterpret the experimental results because of their reificational love affair with solving the wave function. The real source of absorber pattern statistics must be relative distribution of negative charge along its surface, not particle interference.

Sure, light waves are involved in me seeing the rose, but they say nothing about that colour I see in the world, which we call "red". — Manuel

But what if red isn't light waves bouncing off the rose, interacting with neurons (which are decidedly nonredlike), but rather light waves bouncing off a quantum wave rose, perturbing qualia waves in the brain, which are redlike! That's a profound difference. It smacks of a unified theory of reality, which is exciting. Sure, its not going to describe a form of experience that proves to be indescribable, but being optimistic, it might just explain EVERYTHING on some level!

Positivism, overt or covert, is the default view of a lot of people. Many of them don’t understand what it is, so there’s not much use criticising it when you have to explain what it is your criticising first. It’s like explaining a joke. — Wayfarer

But you have to admit I'm getting at something: the "is-ought divide" might be erroneous from the standpoint of well-considered decision making, its more of a divide between is-ought purposefulness on one side, where the qualitative and quantitative are complementary, vs. reflexive arationality. Is Einstein trying to get in contact with his touchy-feely arational side? Not a meaningless activity in any possible sense, but I don't think that should be the basis for moral judgments about what we ought to do. What is should be the basis for what we ought to do, and we should positivistically pursue improvement in our comprehensions of what is if we want to be ethical. Poor ethical judgment is essentially inept assessment of what is, on whatever level it takes effect, not inborn deficiency in pursuing what ought to be.

But the point is, quantification allows for precise measurement, whereas the qualitative is only ever a matter of aesthetics and ethics. This is also the origin of the ‘is-ought’ problem. However, as you say, quantification is itself an idealisation, we could never describe everything in those terms. What was that saying of Einstein’s? ‘ It would be possible to describe everything scientifically, but it would make no sense; it would be without meaning, as if you described a Beethoven symphony as a variation of wave pressure.’ — Wayfarer

I'll be the contrarian: what can't be described scientifically can't be described, it can only stimulate an experience in oneself and someone else without really comprehending anything. It's a distinction between purposeful and reflexive experiencing, not quantity and quality. The word "description" doesn't apply because the unconscious can't describe something. Qualitative and quantitative descriptions are at least currently in the same category, as epistemological approximations, including aesthetics and ethics. "Without meaning" must mean "lacking some experiential element which I can't satisfy myself that I've described", so use of the word "describe" is fallacious. I hope you enjoyed my anal logical positivist argument lol

Maybe an optimal science of brain might be able to say what areas of the brain are responsible for consciousness. But we've mapped all 300 or so neurons of a nematode, and nobody understand why it does what it does. — Manuel

We understand what a nematode does in terms of the physiology of behavior, its simply stimulus and response between cells. What we don't understand is how or to what extent qualitative experience maps onto cells, what the mechanisms of subjectivity are. A vast spectrum of subjectivity must exist that corresponds to different arrays of nervous tissue within differing organisms and during discrepant cognitive states. Its all got to be molecular, but we haven't identified the correct molecules and their collective functions.

Maybe we should give mice LSD or shrooms and then study their brains, what do you think, good idea? lol

Have I been able to answer your question? — synthesis

That makes sense. I'm curious about this section:

The value of this is many-fold of which I am incapable of explaining but what I will tell you is that it enables the practitioner to respond to all kinds of stimuli more accurately — synthesis

Can you experience stimuli that weren't previously even entering into consciousness after you become a proficient meditator, or is it merely controlling your focus within the same cognitive context? Does awareness "expand" somehow? Can a Zen guru for instance induce hallucinations in a new, very specific way and then control them?

The moment after Reality is perception-altered but before our critical thinking begins would seem to be the closest we can get to actual Reality. Although it has already become our personal reality (due to processing by our senses), it's must be considerably purer than what happens once the full monte of our intellect transforms it into some convoluted dystopia. — synthesis

I think it varies more widely between humans than most will admit, and maybe that's why we're so reluctant to get into the details. Deep, honest introspection gives a lot away, though it will probably be key for empowering disciplines such as neuroscience to truly progress rather than merely exploit.

So tell us in the most neutral, noncontroversial way possible, what is the mental content that presents itself to your mind, as a practiced meditator, before performing a cognitive act with resemblance to reasoned decision making or relatively intellectual problem solving?

I do not understand the connection between additive wavelengths and the subjective impression of the smell of roses. — SolarWind

No one understands that yet, but additive wavelengths or "quantum resonances" must exist in ways that are not entirely visual, and that's the substance of our nonoptical sensations. Some of the quantum mechanisms involved are no doubt located in the sense organs themselves as in magnetoreception.

you cannot understand consciousness in all its richness without recognizing its bias in the dynamics of the self-organization of living systems , the fact that body-environment interaction has the feature of structural coupling in which the organism alters its world
at the same time that the world affects the organism. This reciprocity between inside and outside not only is key to understanding of consciousness but indicates that at some point physicists will find it necessary to alter their own models of the ‘physical’. — Joshs

A constructive feedback certainly exists between physical modeling and introspective phenomenology: each new development in either domain gives its complement a better idea of what to look for on the psychological level. They should be collaborators, not rivals, and may one day merge.

Molecules are two or more atoms. Does entanglement occur in molecules? I didn't know you could just hop over the quantum/macroscopic fence like that! That changes everything!!! — counterpunch

If you're interested, you should look at the research on photosynthetic reaction centers, entanglement systems spanning many chlorophyll molecules which produce an emergent quantum architecture responsive to light. That's where I got the idea of additive wavelengths taking effect on a large scale in the brain.

Its not simply an utter dissolution of the quantum/thermodynamic barrier. Organisms as we know them are trillions of pockets of quantum machinery in a thermodynamic chassis saturated by nonlocal reality.

Why does entanglement generate qualia? This also exists in a laboratory and in a much purer form. And every high-voltage line generates more electric fields than a brain. Consequently, a laboratory that studies entanglement and is under a high-voltage line would have to have qualia. — SolarWind

My preliminary guess is that additive wavelengths of entangled particles are qualia, existing everywhere, but usually flit in and out of existence so rapidly as matter moves that they don't get much perceived. It requires a higher order of organization such as that found in the brain to convert this into experience. The range of possible qualia is hugely vast, and the brain is tailored for responding to many specific kinds and tuning out the rest. The electrical field of a high-voltage line for instance must be mostly beyond the portion of the spectrum that registers and does not substantially disrupt perception.

So, here's my question: are you saying the electric fields of the brain are effected? Or is it the quantum fields that register changes? Or the entangled particles? — counterpunch

The field generated by massive electrical flux in the brain is the subjective medium, a binding agent for the mind's perceptual "space". This electric field mutually interacts with quantum fields of entangled molecules (qualia) by the same mechanism as additive wavelength to result in the substance of qualitative experience, what philosophy has traditionally referred to as "ineffable" (but not any more!).

The key points are that qualia can exist outside the brain, perception extends beyond the confines of the head, and qualia together with experiencing can be embodied in forms completely different than carbon-based tissue.

Tell me how quantum mechanics explains how there's a 'something' looking out through my eyeholes. What, in no more than a dozen words, is the relationship between the two? — counterpunch

Have you been watching too much MTV? lol Electric field of brain as registered by EEG interacts with quantum fields of entangled particles (qualia) in additive way (like wavelengths of the visible light spectrum), to produce qualitative experience (sounds, images, feels) in the head. Horribly verbose, I realize, but does that make sense?

You, on the other hand give me five paragraphs of unintelligible jargon, that don't answer the question I asked. What am I to infer? Did you download a quantum mechanics jargon generator? — counterpunch

lol, you could try reading about the terms I used. Was it "Earth" that threw you? Looking back at that I guess its kind of technical, but reading some articles about the terminology should be sufficient, the concepts are all drawn from books I've read by respected scientists. Deconstructing the history of quantum physics is beyond my ability. If some specific aspect of what I wrote is indecipherable to you at this point, I'll be more than willing to attempt a clarification if you want. I've been analyzing this topic awhile and maybe lost track of where earlier stages of comprehension are at.

In the double-slit experiment its not an observer effect, its quantum decoherence induced by the experimental devices. Instrumentalism, not woo. Maybe a fallacious analogy is being made between the double-slit and something else that is an observer effect. Obviously qualia have causal influence in nature via the mind, maybe that's what you mean.

If you would propose a theory of quantum consciousness can you explain why the observer effect in the double slit experiment occurs in response to experimental apparatus - as well as conscious observation. — counterpunch

From what I've read, the observer effect is not initiated by human perception but rather the detection sensor placed at the slit. This dissolves the interference pattern and you get two bright bands on the florescent screen behind the slits instead. It seems that what is going on isn't an observer effect at all but rather decoherence induced by interaction of a thermodynamically complex device with the quantum process.

This is seen in cells also. The most studied example is probably enzyme catalysis (specifically hydrolysis by amino acid metabolizing proteases), shown by multiple sources of indirect experimental evidence to involve quantum processes, perhaps tunneling. The reaction is buffered from surrounding thermodynamic noise with its decoherence effects in order to reach extremely rapid rates, one of the functional roles of an active site. Any chemical process in nature that occurs too fast to be accounted for by diffusion alone probably has quantum features, but quantum weirdness can be dampened in large collections of particles.

Conversely, many circumstances exist where quantum processes trump thermodynamic entropy on the macroscopic level, an example being electrical conductance, where the electrons move as particles through a copper wire at 10% the speed of light but simultaneously transmit a signal via entanglement and tunneling at 90% the speed of light. This extremely rapid "flow" through naturally occurring matter has not been explained in total, though we witness it so clearly in some contexts that it is almost taken for granted.

My theory is that substance itself transcends the dimensionality of sense-perception, but in some specific circumstances that are found on Earth it becomes more parameterized, as four dimensional, three dimensional and two dimensional, with our sense organs and bodies tailored for especially salient instances such as electromagnetic radiation traveling through the atmosphere nearly as if in a vacuum, macroscopic objects subjected to gravity, molecules fitting together like a hand in a glove, etc. In these cases, our perception exaggerates the phenomena to an extent, just as vision enhances the contrast between light and dark, is fooled by shadows, and distorts lines and shapes depending on their surroundings. Our perception can create an illusion that makes us sense degrees of demarcation in nature which don't actually exist.

So supradimensionality flows into lower dimensional form within many conditions, sort of like a cloud of polarity with relatively more definite shape, and our bodies exaggerate some of these states to give us an experience of tangible or inert objects which do not actually exist. What fundamentally goes on is more resemblant of quantum physics than the classical physics that is like an optical illusion.

One way of formulating the hard problem is to ask: if we had a complete, canonical, objective, physicalist account of the natural world, including all the physical facts of the brain and the organism, would it conceptually or logically entail the subjective facts of consciousness? — Joshs

I think all indications are that quantum biology will provide very effective physicalist models of subjective consciousness.

What this extreme emphasis fails to take into account is that the mind as a scientific object has to be constituted as such from the personalistic perspective in the empathic co-determination of self and other. — Joshs

My opinion is that an account of subjective consciousness based on quantum physics will not diminish the sense that subjective experience is real or important in any way because subjective experience is nonetheless a causal aspect of reality. If anything, it will dissolve the sense that mind is intangible and objects are tangible to create a synthetic concept of tangible substance as both mind and matter. It overcomes an antiquated philosophical duality that gives rise to our materialist/spiritualist divide, not the cognizance of causal multiplicity and separate theoretical/practical domains. If anything, it will be a cool additional facet of self-knowledge.

I would only preliminarily say that anything reminiscent of Roger Penrose’s formulations of a quantum basis of consciousness is barking up the wrong tree. — Joshs

I think he had the general idea with his microtubule hypothesis, but my theory is that it is additive superpositions amongst the entangled wavicles of some incompletely known class of molecules, a kind of quantum resonance, that gives rise to qualia in the brain by a similar mechanism to additive properties of the visible light spectrum, and the electric field of the brain is this mechanism's signature, one form of a much vaster coherence field phenomenon that allows consciousness to exist beyond the realm of humanlike nervous tissue. You can read about it in the posts I linked to!

I’m still working on my grasp of your grasp of my grasp of your grasp. — Joshs

graspastic!

You dont want to model subjectivity on the physical but show how models of the physical emerge out of subjective processes. — Joshs

In my opinion, how models of the physical emerge out of subjective processes is simply the question of how unconscious aspects of mind give rise to the rational structuralizing of theory, which is a subset of the issue regarding how consciousness can be physically modeled. Did I grasp your meaning accurately?

The issue of how consciousness can be physically modeled has been discussed at length by me and some additional posters to this forum, and I think we made some significant general progress. If you want a brief selection of casual reading material on the subject, look at my threads:

Qualia and Quantum Mechanics
Qualia and Quantum Mechanics, The Sequel
Qualia and Quantum Mechanics, The Reality Possibly

I'm turning into something of a quantum consciousness missionary lol Be interested to know what anyone thinks...anyone at all...(echo)

Is a triple-slit experiment with the same setup as the textbook double-slit an on average 33% probability, a quadruple-slit 25%, etc.?

My next lecture will explicate quantum mechanics as the golden path to fourth dimensional world peace! Its the advanced wave of the future man! lol

By the way, this experiment has reputedly been performed with more than two slits. My model predicts that, within static total width parameters, the particle has roughly equal chance of traveling through any centered, equally sized and spaced slits. The erroneously-regarded "interference" pattern on the detector screen will then vary symmetrically in proportion to emitter position, also slit quantity, width and placement, predictable according to some kind of mathematical formula. Is this accurate?

So if a system (through whatever system at all) presents the ability to 'think'... then it now presents, in my mind at least, the question of ethics. — Mick Wright

If we do invent generalized AI (a learning organism that problem solves at a humanlike level) vs. specialized AI (a set of algorithms designed to perform particular analytical tasks, fundamentally mediated at stages by human decision-making), the issue will not primarily be ethical treatment but rather justice. Never mind how AI feels or aspires: humans are going to break the law and violate AI, and AI is going to break the law and violate humans. How do we keep generalized AI from destroying us when it wants to break the law?

In my opinion, we won't be able to, why I think we should limit ourselves at this point to specialized AI. And like has been stated in this thread, generalized AI as it is likely to exist in the 21st century will not much resemble a human brain, so we won't learn about ourselves by creating it. Generalized AI is useless for brain research, a legal headache, and ultimately a threat to our species.

AI should be used in data science applications, like for processing patterns in extremely large but specifically parameterized data sets, and not as some kind of companion, because once the Pandora's box is opened, sentient computers will quickly become more powerful than us and kick our asses. We all know this, anyone watch sci-fi movies since the 1980's?

(It all depends on how you write the software, not the type of hardware.)

The idea expressed in the OP, and expressed by yourself above, is a 4D generalisation of this. Each particle is a 4D standing wave that can be decomposed into parts moving forward in time (retarded wavefunction) and parts going backward in time (advanced wavefunction). They're not exactly analogous: in Bloch waves the operation is additive, in these they are multiplicative, but they are very similar. — Kenosha Kid

This is my impression of the ideas so far (solely for educational learnings, don't come down on me too hard). Curious to see the extent that your knowledge corroborates it.

In the double-slit experiment a wave packet or "wavicle" travels through one or the other slits, but either option is equally probable across many trials, though fundamentally deterministic (thus far immeasurably so) in relation to a single wavicle. An apparent "interference pattern" is not generated by diffraction through the slits but rather produced by peaks of charge distribution along the absorber's surface rendered symmetrical by the slits, which initiate the various trajectories of wave packets in coordination with the emitter charge and determine the statistical range of possibility for endpoints.

This is near one pole of the wavicle spectrum as it exists in Earth environments, a case that can be modeled somewhat simplistically as an almost ideal duality of retarded and advanced wave related in a precisely multiplicative way during propagation of the wavicle's path, the total wavicle smeared out in an especially linear four dimensionality as it moves.

A crystal is near the opposite pole of the Earthbound wavicle spectrum, modelable as retarded and advanced waves which are instead a nearly ideal additive duality, amounting to such equilibrated, counterbalanced motion that the wavicle appears stationary even upon very large magnification, an especially polygonal four dimensionality.

Most conventionally multiwavicle matter exists somewhere in between, with waves of many varying and fluctuating rates interfering in complex patterns that may deviate greatly from four dimensionality as it applies to the poles of the retarded/advanced wave model, creating a huge range of relatively local entanglement phenomena.

All of this entanglement exists within fields or clouds of charge that are a medium for nonlocal causality. Charge is the nonlocal facet of entanglement in electromagnetic matter.

The science of atomic chemistry adequately (but perhaps not ideally) models a large portion of the entanglement spectrum.

I'm not sure where holography comes into it though. — Kenosha Kid

A wave function collapsing itself in the double-slit experiment is relatively simple compared to most of what happens in nature, an extremely parameterized holography even in the context of three dimensions, basically like a lightning bolt. In environments outside the lab, the holograph (as viewed in lower dimensions) and its background is usually much greater in complexity, more like a supradimensional tapestry with standing waves and intricate flow at morphing rates. Maybe a particle is merely a standing wave?

I think my model suggests that the particle passing through both slits to interfere with itself in only the third dimension is an illusion. If this is accurate, woohoo! The experiment still suggests a wave function, but a single wave propagates both backwards and forwards in time, intermittently collapsing itself in some sense. This model may only apply to a very specific kind of process and context, with wavicles in nature propagating in many more orientations than temporally forward and backward, hence the complexity of our holographic universe. But the form of this holography is partially an outcome of perception's nature, thus the observer-dependence of experimental observations enigmatically brought into sharp relief by the supraintuitional oddities of quantum physics.

The photon shows up as a single speck on the florescent screen, with an interference pattern built up as the statistics of many individual particles? The original double-slit experiment diffracted a beam of light into a spreading field before it reached the double-slit, so it was most certainly traveling through both slits simultaneously to interfere with itself, but the modern double-slit experiment could be different.

Some uncertainties I'm curious about:

Is an analogy between the double-slit mechanism which produces an interference pattern from a beam of light and that generating a statistical distribution from a beam of electrons entirely fallacious?

Does a statistical distribution similar to that of the electron experiment arise from molecules with up to a thousand atoms by this "lightning bolt" mechanism also, perhaps involving sizable charge polarities and "smearing" within the particle as it travels that temporarily reconstitute its structure into an entirely different form?

What do you guys think?

...a canny comparison. — Kenosha Kid

I'm glad you liked it! I think I can actually specify this pretty well since I've been ruminating on it awhile.

Almost immediately after the retarded "wave" leaves (whichever side it starts from, probably the absorber side paradoxically, just as a lightning bolt originates from the ground, induced by the emission charge that is comparable to a thunder cloud), the complementary advanced wave arrives, then the two interfere to produce a new retarded wave in the forward direction (towards the emitter) while the retarded wave in the backward direction cancels out the original retarded wave.

The new advanced wave dissipates into the absorber somehow and similarly interferes with the emitter's retarded wave. The stair-stepping retarded/advanced waves from the emitter and those from the absorber rapidly close the distance between them until they contact each other and the quantum handshake occurs, a surge of charge briefly connecting the emitter and absorber directly, like a lightning bolt, in this case invisible. (whew, hopefully I didn't retard that description!)

The double-slit produces a symmetry in the chamber’s charge that makes the absorber’s charge-active sites comparably symmetrical, resulting in what looks like a precise interference pattern on the florescent screen despite the haphazard, seemingly randomized nature of each individual transmission “handshake” and its equal likelihood of passing through either slit (though abiding the path integral concept).

It would be fantastic to run this in slow motion or while measuring the charge distribution in the double-slit chamber, and maybe analyzing lightning could give a clue as to the coordination of causal vectors and rates in this type of process.

Not sure if I should resurrect this thread, but feel the compulsion so who am I to resist? Reading a book on quantum physics that describes retarded/advanced wave theory, and while trying to envision this thought experiment it occurred to me that the mechanism seems to be the same as a lightning strike, though the rates of transmission may differ. Does lightning demonstrate this theory observationally, and what level of insight might be lent to a "quantum handshake" model of the double-slit experiment? Since I'm no expert at this point, I'll let you guys ponder the idea from scratch instead of awkwardly trying to explain it all at the outset and see what you think.

It seems that all such concepts through which we try to define or explicate time are already entangled with temporality in our understanding: clock, process, change, rate, periodicity, simultaneity, synchronization (obviously), coordination. — SophistiCat

Those terms are derived from observations of real events in the material world. Perhaps it can be said that the concepts are abstracted from layers of timing mechanism embodied primarily as an emergent property of substance, mechanisms making orderliness amongst differentiation as we know it possible, giving rise to many anthropic and theoretical intuitions that physics is beginning to augment and alter. Difficulty in exceeding our established intuitions, some of which are deeply biological, to attain the progressive is probably this entangling problem you're referring to. Circularity amounts to unexamined assumptions that lead to unnecessarily constrained conclusions. You don't like my definition of temporality, but I think it fully translates time into the domain of objective reality.

The problem with defining time (real, physical time, not a mathematical abstraction) is that any other concepts to which you attempt to reduce it already depend on time for their understanding. — SophistiCat

My assumption is that temporality "is" something, that it exists as somehow instantiated in substance, not an empty, null set concept, and hence not any more "circular" than matter. The same issue comes up with qualia: some philosophers assert the term is vacuous, but the phenomenon it is used to label exists nonetheless and requires an explanation, which I and probably more ponderers have arrived at. The kind of argument you make will probably lead to the proposition that time does not exist, in my opinion clearly false. "Real, physical time" refers to (not is "reducible" to) real, physical objects, and those objects are going to be like a clock, sure, but matter can perform the functions of a clock in multifarious ways, so its not a trivial idea, as the examples I provided make apparent.

that isn't a definition of time.

Time consists of the properties of pastness, presentness and futurity. Some would add that it must also include the relations of 'earlier than' 'later than' and 'simultaneous with'. Indeed, some would say that those relations are the more fundamental, with others saying the reverse. — Bartricks

Earlier and later can be described as a special case of my definition, a synchronization of representational memory with the sense-perceptual phenomena that laws of classical physics describe, the disjunction being between the body's cellular structure and the influence of Earth's gravitation on macroscopic objects.

Earlier and later are an ancient form of perception even in the context of all Earth's biology, mediated for hundreds of millions of years by sense organs and fundamental body awareness, so seem extremely intuitive, but an organism such as a bacterium for instance may not experience them in a way analogous to humans if at all, and there could be more borderline cases in animals such as worms perhaps. Earlier and later as we know them are probably relative to fairly advanced brain function parameterized by a narrow portion of the gravitational/particle spectrum.

The frequency of electromagnetic emission from an excited electron that recedes from a higher to a lower energy level is the same for those energy levels, independent of the location in which this occurs. Meaning, that the clocks in nature are tied to fundamental rhythmic qualities that define temporal distance, even if various forms of synchronization to other events are not obviously related (daylight, a traffic conductor signal). I am not sure if I am picking up the scope and intent of the definition. It appears to be divorced from the physical origin of the concept of time. You want to maximally abstract, but it seems to me that you are defining coordination, not temporal synchronization. — simeonz

Traffic signal patterns synchronize driving behavior with roadways, the disjunction being between as many as millions of motorists and the flow of vehicles at an individual intersection.

Perhaps day and night, to the extent that they are temporal, amount for humans and similar species to my description of earlier and later, with vastly discrepant organisms having differing emergent mechanisms for synchronization as per my definition.

You got me with photon absorption and emission from electron orbitals, I'm not familiar enough with the very latest science to even make a confident claim. As far as I know current knowledge is relative to techniques for deriving atomic theory in likeness to those I already referenced when mentioning the synchronization between mathematically recorded chronology and reaction rate. The photoelectric effect is defined in association with quantum mechanics and chronological math as well, and I think investigation of entanglement and quantum coherence will fundamentally change our image of what subatomic particles do within atoms and elsewhere. Modeling quantum mechanisms may make our assumptions about electron orbitals obsolete and completely revise comprehension of their temporal properties. Maybe absolute parameters of temporality exist, but I'm not aware that we've even come close to reaching them yet.

The way periodicity appears depends on frame of reference, and science has no prospect of accounting for every possible frame of reference at this point. But I doubt any frames of reference exist so far that counter my definition of temporality, and if they did it would be because a timing mechanism is not required due to intrinsically sufficing coordination. A phenomenon of this kind would be effectively independent of the need for temporality as an evolutionary function, conceivable as holistically outside of time. When I put it that way, it seems improbable a system could be so ideally coordinated that temporality doesn't obtain.

Time has asymmetries, particularly in connection to the thermodynamic, weak force, and spatial indeterminacy qualities of matter, which have no equivalent for space. Thus, for example, we are making choices for the future based on past experience, and not choices for the past, based on future experience. We have no preferred orientation in space. Another distinction between time and space is that, spatially, the "wave packets" of particles are identical for each type of particle with the same momentum in a given reference frame, yet, the temporal form of any particle is unrestricted and potentially indefinite. — simeonz

I'm failing to fully grasp this, could you elaborate some?

Given your subsequent elaboration, I guess what this horrible mess is trying to get at is a notion of a clock, in its most general sense. In other words, time is what clocks measure. This isn't wrong, but like all other attempts at bootstrapping the notion of time, it does not escape circularity. — SophistiCat

All definitions are tautologously circular, that's not a flaw, but I think my definition's strong point is that it is maximally generalized. No instance of time escapes the definition, and a system that does elude the definition is temporally ideal, like an ideal black body, an ideal gas, an ideal conductor, etc.

How can time singular be systems plural? — tim wood

Basically, its a general definition of every phenomenon that can possibly be considered temporal.

A stopwatch can coordinate (synchronize) laboratory observation with rate of reaction and allow mathematical translation of the macroscopic data into a model of what small quantities of atoms are doing, the disjunction being between human minds and the quantum scale.

Spacetime dimensionality can synchronize astronomical observations with phenomena such as light speed, the disjunctions being between human minds, photons and the galactic scale.

The circadian clock in brains synchronizes need for sleep with days and nights, the disjunction being between unconscious homeostasis and conscious awareness.

I can't think of a contradicting instance, so this seems to me like a comprehensive definition of time, which is essentially an emergent property of complexity in substance, any mechanism that reintegrates as diversification happens. In this view, temporality is simply a natural, inevitable outcome of evolution.

Something is conscious if it involves the physical processes of consciousness. We know that brains are a condition of consciousness or animacy in thousands upon thousands of species: most simplistically, without a working brain, inanimate. Earth organisms with nervous systems but lacking brains have a distantly related and simpler consciousness by many metrics.

My hypothesis is that the qualitative portion of consciousness, as opposed to matter's thermodynamic properties, is also extremely basic to matter's structure, additive superpositions amongst entangled wavicles that amount to qualia. If these qualia prove to be the basic building blocks of consciousness' qualitative dimension in brains and nervous systems, then bacteria might have a modicum of perception and feeling in some sense without self-awareness, not simply a computational array of mechanisms, and the presence of consciousness in matter that varies greatly from carbon-based forms can be explained.

Do you interpret your dreams... — Gnomon

Truth is stranger than fiction and so perhaps is this conversation, but philosophy doesn't have to conform. I couldn't resist bringing a bit of spiritualism and talk of miracles to the panprotopsychism thread because I think the paradigm will verify some traditionally religious ideas, plus its entertaining to talk about the paranormal.

I never had a large spate of profound dreams until a couple years ago, but these are like movies, intricate plots with camera angles and complex dialogue. The problem is I fail to remember many details unless I write it down immediately upon waking, and I don't have an analyst like Carl Jung to help me make sense of the intricately symbolic imagery and verbiage, so I don't bother, though nonetheless get some insight from it.

In the Western world we tend to carelessly dismiss our dreams and don't usually form vivid memories of them, but what I learned while reading Carl Jung's writings a few years ago is that if you start to pay closer attention to your dreams for weeks, they get much more meaningful, as if the unconscious begins trying to impinge upon the conscious mind and guide your perspective on life and the world. Might explain why earlier humans placed such great weight upon dreams: they were tapping into them more deeply with long-term, less distracted contemplation (not necessarily good or safe in all cases, I should caution). Mine were getting vivid while reading his literature until I woke up with my body disturbingly numb for a few minutes after falling from a great height in my dream, like I had received a strong electric shock. I'm guessing some spiritual force was deflecting me, wasn't the appropriate moment. Make of it what you wish.

And what is The Big Secret of Life? — Gnomon

The book I mentioned is about spontaneous organizing, how citizens created an important scientific field from scratch by sheer perseverance. Its great exemplification of collaboration transcending personality quirks, and that might be a secret of life.

But as has likely been mentioned in discussions of this type, this isn't an experiment that is liable to scientific research, and would have to be considered metaphysics, which I have nothing against, In fact, it's a fascinating topic. But the problem is, one has to recognize the limits of scientific enquiry, which certainly exist. — Manuel

If certain kinds of quantum entanglement between particles such as electrons, more aptly described as wavicles, have superposed properties with likeness to the visible light spectrum when arranged amongst molecules and additional corpuscles, mechanisms of superposition may be the basic material unit of qualitative experience. These qualia, as fragments of psychical imagery and feeling, may flit in and out of existence rapidly within the most inorganic conditions, so that components of perception exist on a fundamental level while commonly not giving rise to experience and motive. But when these superpositions are held in prolonged orientations amongst brain matter and in nature generally, consciousness of carbon-based, human and alternative richness can emerge.

So do we have a possible mechanism for qualitative experience and technical definition of qualia: superposition amongst entangled wavicles? Is this a valid foundation for hypothesizing that panprotopsychism resolves the hard problem of consciousness, the long-standing debate about mind/body duality, and perhaps may lay the groundwork for a scientific alliance between materialism and spiritualism? — Enrique

This is a scientifically testable hypothesis, not metaphysical at all.