Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Quantum Mechanics and Free Will

Here is a short video of Michio Kaku explaining what quantum mechanics says about free will.

 

There you have it. Assuming quantum mechanics is correct, there's no such thing as determinism. We only see determinism at large scales because we are looking at the effects of trillions upon trillions of random events. The physics we see and experience in every day life are known as emergent phenomenon - patterns emerging from an underlying structure to the universe. The rules that govern this structure may not be deterministic (and all evidence points to this...), but it's these rules that give the nearly deterministic reality we witness and experience every day.

6 comments:

  1. This is pretty much amazing, I used to be a bit of a determinist, still am a little tiny bit of one but I am willing to give uncertainty a shot! On a related note, have not been all that happy with Michio Kaku and his over-exaggerating of Japan but thats another rant for another blog.

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  2. That's a really good video. It explains a lot about the history and interpretation of QM. Thanks for posting that!

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  3. I think this is the larger context I've been wanting all semester. It clarifies a lot. Thanks for posting this.

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  4. Indeed. This definitely shakes up a lot of people, and many people I know that studied quantum mechanics still refuse to believe this.

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  5. The problem of free will arose from the brain and its complexity. Although the brain is compose of neurons and neurons are governed by quantum mechanics, you can't easily deduced free will from the indeterminancy of quantum mechanics.

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  6. Why not? If even a single electron is in-determinant, then of course any larger system will be.

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