Talk:Quantum mysticism/Archive 1

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[edit] let me know what you all think

Hi - let me know what you all think - how detailed should this be? Its main purpose is to comment on the phenomenon of quantum mysticism as a whole, rather than the scattered pages on Capra, What the Bleep, and Quantum Consciousness etc etc. Adambrowne666 09:41, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Its a good start. Good idea for an article. --Brentt 22:43, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Renaming to either Quantum philosphy or Quantum metaphysics. The current title is stupid and makes little sence. 60.41.187.156


I googled the term "Quantum Mysticism" and returned 535 results. Not all of them were articles that considered the term to be a pejorative (though the majority were). The definition of "Quantum Mysticism" as a phrase capable only of carrying mocking, derisive, or pejorative meaning reflects a personal or cultural bias against serious mysticism and I would strongly recommend that anyone discussing here who has not yet read the article on mysticism do so in order to banish any personal prejudices or biases before attempting to contribute a neutral POV. To prejudicially attach the meaning of "invalid" to all topics associated with mysticism amounts to some sort of baconian fundamentalism and is not a neutral POV. Further, the persistent redirection of Quantum Metaphysics to this article seems to ignore the actual definition of metaphysics and I would recommend either reading the article on metaphysics or taking a survey course in Philosophy in order to remove any bizarre preconceptions about metaphysics or how quantum theory might have a legitimate relationship to metaphysics. Metaphysics and mysticism are far from synonymous.

While quantum theory (and any other theory, belief, or body of knowledge) can be and is abused by the ignorant and sophmoric, we cannot insist, a priori, that every attempt to formulate a metaphysics incorporating various theories of physics (no matter how singular) is foolishness. That is not the role of someone writing an Encyclopedia article and should be left to the editors of websites such as sceptic.com or mythbusters. Nor can we legitimately insist that any sphere of science is somehow "not allowed" to inform mystics: the results of scientific inquiry are not copyrighted.

Unless our intent is to hinder the future advancement of human knowledge, we should not preemptively nay-say speculative inquiry of any sort, but rather judge each speculation on its own merits. To do otherwise is to effectively give a draught of hemlock to the public reputation and respect of any thinker whose fundamental premises disagree with our own and is a practice contrary to the spirit of scientific inquiry. Please stop redirecting Quantum Metaphysics to this article, and please stop reflexively treating as a laughing stock (calling a thing "quackery" or "flapdoodle" cannot be characterized as anything but ridicule) any topic associated with mysticism; ridicule only reflects ignorance of its object and is illogical. Use of the phrase as a pejorative term should be fully noted, but should not be the phrase's primary definition. The words constituting the phrase have independent meaning, the phrase therefore has the potential to carry independent meaning beyond its use in name-calling. Defining it first and foremost as a pejorative dead-ends its development as a concept. Kholtyn 19:02, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

'The words constituting the phrase have independent meaning, the phrase therefore has the potential to carry independent meaning beyond its use in name-calling.' - not sure about the logic of this. But in any case, I believe the term 'quantum mysticism' was coined by Margaret Wertheim as a pejorative - but inevitably, the phrase has come to be used in a positive way by proponents of the whole quantum metaphysical idea. Nevertheless, I think you should have a go at trying to redress the balance of the article, try to make it more neutral. Unfortunately, others who have tried to do this have often had an agenda, adding original research etc., which is why the side more sympathetic to quantum mysticism is probably underrepresented here Adambrowne666 23:22, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

I'll do a bit of research and see what I can come up with. I'm a former professional translator and currently a student of philosophy, so my concern is more with linguistic dead-ends created by pejorative usage than any particular familiarity with quantum metaphysics theories. Pejorative language has some curious and unique features in communication, mostly it serves to either redefine an object (e.g. racial slurs effectively serve to redefine their human objects as 'less than human') and to hinder straightforward discussion about the object. It's disturbing to me to see pejorative language come to prevalence in poorly-explored areas of science or philosophy because it means those trails may not be blazed until something profound happens that 'undoes' the derision attached to the subject, freeing up serious investigators and thinkers to explore it without fearing public humilation and damage to their careers. Maybe I can assemble a list of short descriptive blurbs dealing with some of the more popular (and best supported) ideas on this topic and put in links for them. It may take a few days - I'm aware of the glut of weak material in this area; dealing hands-on with mystic philosophies is always slippery work. Kholtyn 15:38, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like a very worthwhile thing to try Adambrowne666 23:35, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quantum philosphy

previous article was removed maybe it can be incorporated into a new one: H0riz0n Whereas the philosophy of quantum mechanics explores what exactly is quantum mechanics talking about? Quantum Philosophy / quantum metaphysics, on the other hand, takes thing much further and muses on what these possibilities and interpretations have on the broader “Who are we? What are we?” questions. It is a relatively new discipline of metaphysics made popular by the philosophical implication and musings of quantum mechanics. The recent box office success of What the Bleep Do We Know!? has also significantly increase popularity in quantum metaphysical ideas.

[edit] Key Questions:

  • What does it mean if we truly exist in a Brane Universe?
  • Where is God in the quantum mechanical universe?
  • What's reality in quantum mechanics?
  • Who/what is quantum mechanical God?

[edit] Authors, Contributors, Philosophers

Steven Hawking, Brian Greene, William Tiller, Amit Goswami, John Hagelin, Fred Alan Wolf, Dr. David Albert, Dean Radin, Stuart Hameroff, Jeffrey Satinover, Andrew B. Newberg, Daniel Monti,Joseph Dispenza, Candace Pert, Larry L Hench, Stanislav Grof

[edit] See also

  • Philosophy of science
  • Philosophy of physics
  • Philosophy of quantum mechanics
  • Philosophy of space and time
  • Philosophy of thermal and statistical physics

[edit] External Links and Related Material

  • "Quantum Physics Quackery", Skeptical Inquirer, January 1997 (discusses book The Self-Aware Universe)
  • PBS Nova The Elegant Universe
  • Movie: What The Beep Do We Know?
  • Distributed unconsciousness

[edit] comment copied from Talk:Quantum pseudo-mysticism

name of page changed from 'mysticism' to 'pseudo-mysticism', as per suggestion by user HOrizOn Adambrowne666 20:55, 26 April 2006 (UTC) [1]

[edit] Moving/renaming this page

Everyone: stop creating new pages by cutting and pasting the contents of this article. See WP:MOVE. I'm putting it back under this title because it's the simplest way for me to resolve the current mess caused by these cut-and-paste moves. I don't really care what title it winds up under as long as (1) the people involved in editing it reach a consensus on what it should be (2) you don't get into move wars (renaming it over and over) (3) you don't do any more of these cut-and-paste moves. FreplySpang (talk) 23:17, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Okay. I think it's done. Feel free to edit. Quantum mysticism and Quantum pseudo-mysticism both redirect to Quantum metaphysics. All the talk pages redirect here. Once again, I'm not doing this because I particularly like or dislike the name "quantum metaphysics," but because the article history was under this name. If you want to move/rename the article, you might ask at Wikipedia:Requested moves. FreplySpang (talk) 23:29, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move

Quantum metaphysics → Quantum mysticism – {- Rationale: the original article was changed from 'quantum mysticism' to 'quantum metaphysics' by user hOrIzOn, who finds the term 'mysticism' offensive to his 'quantum metaphysical' beliefs. After some debate, we compromised on 'pseudo-mysticism'. Adambrowne666 06:39, 8 May 2006 (UTC)}

[edit] Survey

Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your opinion with ~~~~

[edit] Discussion

Add any additional comments

What sources do you have that call this quantum mysticism? What English speakers actually use is our chief test. Septentrionalis 21:18, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, good question. Maybe it should be called Quantum flapdoodle? - this was mooted at one point, but I thought it placed too much emphasis on Murray Gell-Mann - now, I dunno. Adambrowne666

Actually, now that I google the term, it pops up quite often, generally in reference to this social phenomenon - there's even an article by Margaret Wertheim on the topic, which I will include as a link in the article. Also, there's a secion in the Wikipedia article quantum consciousness called 'Quantum mysticism', so it turns out there is quite a bit of precedent. Adambrowne666 03:48, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. —Nightstallion (?) 07:58, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deletion notices on your page

This page is retarded. First such a subject doesnt exist. 60.41.188.125 Delete 60.41.188.125

[edit] What is it?

Just came across this page, and I have to say that it doesn't actually say what quantum metaphysics/(pseudo-)mysticism is. At the least, it touches upon it, but we really could use a concise definition to make this more encyclopedic. blahpers 03:34, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, good point, thanks, I'll get on it Adambrowne666 12:53, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

If the term exists only as a pejorative used by a handful of authors, perhaps it should be merged into their articles or articles handling their work. This would solve the problem of there being no apparent independent meaning for the term. 2 November 2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.100.104.17 (talk) 15:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The 'Quantum metaphysics' redirection

  • Removed redirection from the 'Quantum metaphysics' page to the 'Quantum pseudo-mysticism' page.
  • Removal reverted by Adambrowne666, who said: "i don't agree, pseudo-account - please give your reasons before editing again"

The article 'quantum metaphysics' should not redirect to 'quantum pseudo-mysticism', that was the reason of my edit—I thought it said all that had to be said. Reasons are called for on your redirecting side, not mine. But here is my elaboration: 'quantum metaphysics' and 'quantum pseudo-mysticism' are not synonymous expressions; they are distinct topics, just as 'quantum mechanics' and 'quantum pseudo-science' are. Even if you think you have a case for one being an instance of the other, that warrants no redirects.

I for one was presented the 'Quantum pseudo-mysticism' article when following a link to 'quantum metaphysics', expecting... something —this *is* wikipedia— either on that part of quantum theory that makes assertions concerning the real itself, independent of our located perception of it; or else on that sub-genre of metaphysics— genre whose paradigmatic instances include Aristotle's and Parmenides' — inspired, compatible or otherwise related to quantum theory. Here is the first sentence of the text I was actually given to read: "Quantum mysticism is a term used by Margaret Wertheim and others to describe the metaphysical or New Age interpretation of quantum mechanics". --Pseudo account 18:16, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

ok, fair enough, well argued Adambrowne666 22:11, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

why don't you have a go at writing the Quantum Metaphysics article? Adambrowne666

Quantum Metaphysics still redirects to this article. I would also like to register an objection to such a redirect whether or not an independent article on Quantum Metaphysics exists, as the terms are not synonymous despite being used so by some. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.100.104.17 (talk) 15:30, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "[...] the metaphysical or New Age interpretation of quantum of mechanics."

Irrespective of what Margaret Wertheim or others describe by the term 'quantum mysticism', I hope people realize that such expression inside an encyclopedia is somewhere between humorous and embarrassing, depending on how seriously you take what this project claims to be. I would most certainly remove it, if I were a non-pseudo account.

--Pseudo account 21:17, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

not quite sure what you're saying here - you're unclear in your statement why this article might be considered humorous or embarrassing - doesn't the fact that Quantum Mysticism is a real social phenomenon make this a legitimate article? Adambrowne666 22:19, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article name

Quantum mysticism redirects here. What's the deal? Are mystics insulted by association? Quantum mysticism is the name commonly used in the press and in common usage. Quantum Pseudo-mysticism is not in common usage. I advice a move to Quantum Mysticism. Jefffire 12:44, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree. There was a bit of a scuffle over the name, and this unsatisfactory compromise was reached. I'm going to request a name change soon Adambrowne666 01:47, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] requested move

Quantum Pseudo-mysticism → Quantum mysticism – Rationale: the current title came about as a compromise after much discussion with user:HoRiZoN, but the latter title is now considered preferable because there is precedence [[2]] Adambrowne666 11:51, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Survey

Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your opinion with ~~~~
  • Support. Can an admin move it but now? Jefffire 13:05, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Support If people really are mystical and justify said mysticism with bad physics (which is what this is about), then the article should be called quantum mysticism (or, to a physicist, pseudo-quantum mysticism). Anville 15:06, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion

Add any additional comments

Give it a day, and if no-one objects move it. If they don't then we utilise our linguistic powers to try and convince them. Jefffire 12:02, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Move. Really, I would have thought that "pseudo-mysticism" is even more disparaging than "mysticism", it seems to be one chap's idiosyncracy that led to this in the first place. Quantum mysticism it is. Byrgenwulf 13:41, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Right, unless there are any objections it will be moved. Jefffire 13:43, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
Already listed for admin move. Cool. Jefffire 18:21, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

This article has been renamed as the result of a move request. Vegaswikian 22:44, 28 July 2006 (UTC)


"the 2004 film What tнe ♯$*! Do ωΣ (k)πow!? Made by the Ramtha School of Enlightenment "

nonsense. sorry

-- of course it's nonsense - read the article, then get back to us. Adambrowne666 10:37, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Scientific mysticism

I'm not suggesting a change of name for the article, but you all might be interested to know that the expression "scientific mysticism" currently gets more google hits than "quantum mysticism". I have a sort of conflict of interest, having used the phrase "scientific mysticism" for a long time (and in something like the sense of this article) in a vague attempt to popularise it - so I'll confine myself to the talk page. But someone else might might be interested at least to have a look at what a google search throws up. It's quite interesting. Metamagician3000 11:24, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

It is interesting, I agree, and definitely a valid term - maybe Quantum Mysticism is a subset of Scientific Mysticism. Why don't you start a WP article on it? - maybe in time the Quantum Mysticism article will be merged into it.Adambrowne666 23:55, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't actually think that would be justified - the term doesn't seem to be used often enough or consistently enough (sometimes it is used pejoratively as with "quantum mysticism", but sometimes it seems approvingly). Maybe all that we should be thinking about is mentioning briefly that it isn't just quantum theory that is seized on for "mystical" purposes but sometimes also other things, such as relativity theory. Metamagician3000 04:34, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Sure, go for it. Adambrowne666 10:06, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge

I agree, but the title is going to be a tricky issue. Maybe something like "controversial interpetations of quantum mechanics". 1Z 15:40, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with a merge. I suggest merging first, and renaming afterwards. Daf 15:13, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree - I probably would never have started the article if I'd known of the Quantum Quackery one - should've checked more thoroughly, I guess. Adambrowne666 10:07, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I must say, though, the quantum quackery article is a mess - very hard to read and make sense of - I'm a bit reluctant to merge until something is done about it. Adambrowne666 11:14, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm all for merge and cleanup (do both in one go and save labour). The title is a secondary concern, but don't make it something awkward and weasly. Let usage decide. "quantum quackery": 1,600 google hits, "quantum mysticism" 1,800 hits. "appeal to quantum mechanics" gets 6,000 hits, but many of these are occurrences of the phrase in bona fide physics text. My vote would go to quantum mysticism, but it's not clear-cut either way. I'm opposed to "controversial interpetations", since this is precisely not about "interpretations", but about people throwing about QM terminology without knowing the first or last thing about them: before you can iterpret something, you need to understand the proposition first. dab (𒁳) 10:26, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] edits by ph787

Sorry to undo your work, ph787, but i think you've misinterpreted the intent of the article. The term is pejorative - this is margaret wertheim's intention - the article isn't violating npov, because it is merely reporting the comments made by people like wertheim, greg egan and gell-mann on the social phenomenon herein called quantum mysticism. Whether or not there is evidence for a correlation between quantum physics and buddhism/new age/paranormal beliefs is irrelevent here -- the question is dealt with elsewhere in wikipedia and other forums.

Adambrowne666 09:55, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

is Ph787 (talk · contribs) == LJR565 (talk · contribs)? we seem to be dealing with a sockmaster with a New-Age/quantum-mysticist agenda. dab (𒁳) 10:28, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't consider myself a regular wikipedia contributor, sockmaster, sockpuppet, or any of the range of other colourful wikipedia perjoratives, nor would I describe myself as a committed "follower" of some of these ideas. What I would say is that I'm concerned that wikipedia is being actively used to promote a counter-agenda here. At the moment there is no paralell broader article on these ideas which does not appear to start from the premise of dismissing them, for example. If someone were to start one, and merge both the poor "quantum quackery" article , this one and it together, that could be an improvement, for instance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Uncertainty768 (talk • contribs)

you are welcome to voice your concerns, but please stop creating a new account for every edit you do. Also be aware of WP:UNDUE/WP:FRINGE. Wikipedia by its very WP:NPOV policy will not treat equally views that are widely rejected and views that are widely accepted. We aim at an accurate reflection of mainstream opinion, not at a representation of "truth", and not at an agnostic or relativist treatment of every view ever held no matter how unlikely. Any article on a fringe view ("fringe" does not mean "false", it means "widely rejected") will state up front that its subject is fringy. You may want to try Wikinfo which has a policy of adopting a viewpoint sympathetic to the topic, which will yield vastly different result on topics of "New Age physics". dab (𒁳) 17:23, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Very well put, Dab.

I'm worried this article is being hijacked - I see weasel words, slow attrition by various accounts -- as well as messy grammar and formatting and spelling -- it all feels a bit dodgy to me. Do the people -- or person -- responsible feel comfortable with this? Uncertainty, if you would like to make a 'paralell broader article on these ideas which does not appear to start from the premise of dismissing them', then please do -- start one; be bold, defend your view there from people like DBachmann and me.Adambrowne666

ok, we are seeing a slow edit-war over at quantum quackery. The two articles should be merged asap, cleaned up, and checked for npov and weasling, otherwise they'll just be plucked apart by our polynymous friend. dab (𒁳) 08:54, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your work on this, dab; still, we'd best not panic. In my resistance to the new age attrition, I'm going to try not to be too militant. For example, the line about scientists being suspicious of mysticism in general was my effort to be a bit more fair minded about this - it is true, after all. As for the merge, I'm a good writer, but clumsy with wikipedia-format-type-stuff - always seem to muck up merges and that kind of thing. If you feel like it, Dab, or if anyone else does, and since there seems to be no negative votes on the notion, please feel free to go ahead and do the merge; then I'll start trying to make the prose work, if that's ok with everyone... Adambrowne666 12:10, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Hi, DAB, I agree with your current edit, except for the first para, which originates, I think, from the quantum quackery article - I find it very obscure and difficult to read - would it be possible to keep everything as is, but reinstate the para that started the article in my previous edit, referring to Margaret Wertheim? Adambrowne666

[edit] Bias in the source list?

Obviously, "quantum mysticism" or "quantum quackery" is a term meant in the pejorative sense and has to be treated as such within the body of the article. But the list of sources ("Quantum mysticist publications"), since it simply asserts that the sources listed are mysticist, assumes they are correctly labeled as such. Also, it seems like publications "debunking" other works strongly implies they were wrong in the first place. Now, I hated "What the Bleep do We Know" or "The Secret" as much as the next reasonable person, but doesn't it seem like we shouldn't dismiss the intersection of quantum physics and philosophy a priori? Perhaps we could say "Publications accused of quantum mysticism/quackery" and "Publications challenging quantum metaphysics." --Ungood Crimethink 08:34, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with your idea of separating the list of publications into two groups. I am afraid too that as you suggest the article itself 'dismisses the intersection of quantum physics and philosophy a priori' - perhaps we need to include just that phrase somewhere in the body of the article? Adambrowne666 00:38, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Anything Specific?

This article makes a lot of vague attacks on the "New Age" community of philosophies and any attempt, in general, to decompartmentalize concepts in theoretic physics by relating them directly to biology or psychology but I didn't see a single coherent argument put forth by the supposed Quantum Mystics and clearly debunked by the supposed Scientific Mainstream. The entire article seems like nothing more than a marginally coherent straw-man argument. Who are these Quantum Mystics? What are their beliefs? Why are their beliefs invalid? This article gives no detail but strongly discourages and inhibits multi-disciplinary thinking by creating a negative social stigma. The entire page should be junked if no one has anything precise and meaningful to say. -Anon. 12, October 2007. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.100.104.17 (talk) 19:54, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Go on then, make some additions. Say something precise and meaningful. Adambrowne666 04:35, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 16:23, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quantum Philosophy?

sorry if this is redundant but quantum philosophy redirects here. I dont know if you plan to edit this page to be about the philosophical ramifications of quantum mechanics or to keep it as-is, which seems like a biased attack on mystical relations to quantum theory. But, if the latter is the case, I would like to aid in reconstructing a new quantum philosophy article so that links to quantum philosophy don't redirect to this article.—Lehel Kovach (talk) 23:13, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

I think that this article is really about abuse and misunderstanding of the theory of quantum mechanics. If you think it violates WP:NPOV, please be bold and fix it. Perhaps Quantum philosophy should redirect to Interpretation of quantum mechanics instead? That page treats casewise the implications of the several interpretations, with links to each main article. On the other hand, Philosophy of quantum mechanics already redirects there - does anybody know if this is this an accident of the evolving encyclopedia or if the terms are used differently? Eldereft (talk) 23:39, 12 January 2008 (UTC)