Reality (General)

by dhw, Monday, November 18, 2019, 08:11 (1614 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: […] I agree with your conclusion (bolded). My disagreement with Kastner was over the claim that the behaviour of the “raw materials” was MORE real than that of the combined materials. My disagreement with you was over your statement that “quantum mechanics is the basis of reality”. […] All we can agree on, as you so rightly say, is that the two forms of behaviour are real and vastly different, and nobody has yet found an explanatory link.

DAVID: I sense we are in a degree of agreement.

dhw: We are indeed. Out with Kastner’s “more real”, and let’s leave a question mark over your claim that the incomprehensible behaviour of individual particles creates the perfectly comprehensible behaviour of particles en bloc.

DAVID: My continuing disagreement with part of your approach is that the incomprehensible particle behavior somehow does create our reality. We may not understand it, but we should recognize the relationship.

I’m very happy that at least we have agreed to reject the idea that quantum reality is MORE real than our everyday reality. That was my dispute with Kastner. I’m on much shakier ground with your own proposition. Perhaps I should accept it, but I am more inclined to think in terms of our reality existing in spite of incomprehensible particle behaviour rather than because of it! The subjectivity of our perception may lie at the heart of the mystery, but like everyone else I am at a loss in the quest for the missing link. Happy to shake hands, though, on this issue.