Quantum Theory and the Observation Problem

      How does physics describe reality? Theoretical terms are never directly observable, not even in early mechanics. The speculative character of all scientific concepts, even that of 'position' in early mechanics was adequately emphasized by Mach. Newton himself was only too acutely aware of the formal nature of his theory's 'description'.

      Our present view of the everyday world allows for macroscopic objects to factually have only one definite physical state, out of many logical possibilities. If we toss a coin, logically speaking, both heads and tails are possibilities. In an actual toss, however, only heads or tails will show up. We shall refer to this view of the objects of the everyday world as the classically-definite (CDEF) conception of an object and its state. According to this CDEF conception, an object is always (factually) in only one of its many (logically) possible states. In addition, all the properties that we can associate with such a factual state of the object will have determinate values at all times, whether measured or not. This CDEF conception is independent of any physical theory and is basic to everyday naive realism.

      In this paper I shall argue the possibility for abandoning the CDEF conceptions altogether while interpreting quantum theory, even at the observational level, despite their demonstrated pragmatic usefulness. I shall argue for this move by raising both theoretical and experimental considerations that call into question how far terms such as wave-particle duality and superposition adequately convey the quantum implications of the corresponding formal terms. Indeed, the central thesis of this paper will be that we cannot even begin to comprehend the essential nature of the quantum mechanical description unless we develop an alternative, quantum-compatible conception of everyday objects in everyday thinking.

      We shall call the task of identifying such a conception of everyday objects and developing appropriate formal ideas based on it as the 'observation problem'. We then discuss certain interpretive insights of Einstein and Bohr that shows both of them recognized the observation problem as the principal one. Toward solving the observation problem, I identify a range of properties I label as ‘relational properties’. We routinely attribute to macroscopic objects in everyday thinking, and I discuss how in fact they are quantum-compatible. I discuss in broad terms how incorporating this relational property viewpoint into quantum physics would solve the observation problem. Such a solution would also simultaneously altogether avoid the measurement problem, which is an artifact of our current pragmatically successful strategy of retaining a classical view of the macroscopic world, while applying quantum theory to the microscopic world.

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Creation and Quantum Mechanics

Background

      December 14, 1900, is called the birthday of quantum mechanics. On this date German physicist Max Planck first presented his new quantum concepts. At this time it was generally thought that the classical physics of Isaac Newton fully explained all the physical processes of nature. Planck instead showed that many deep mysteries remained. For the past century, scientists have struggled with the meaning and implications of quantum mechanics. There are several different quantum interpretations, some of them quite philosophical. Certain experimental results agree with quantum theory to astounding accuracy. Other quantum predictions appear to defy common sense. A few scientists, both secular and creationist, reject the validity of quantum mechanics entirely. Creationist Thomas Barnes has offered one alternative model (Barnes, 1983).

Four Traditional Quantum Concepts

Max Planck (1858-1947) German scientist, founder of quantum mechanics.

  

    Max Planck showed that the energy content of an object cannot be any arbitrary amount. Instead, energy occurs only in small discrete bundles called quanta. Increasing energy must not be pictured as a smooth ramp, but instead as a stairway (figure 1). Quantum effects only become apparent on the small scale of atomic particles. For larger objects, such as a person, the individual energy steps are extremely small and unnoticeable. Otherwise we might find ourselves living in a bizarre quantum world where everything happened in jumps, as with a blinking strobe light.
      The second well-known concept is that light and matter show both wave and particle behavior. The light meter of a camera illustrates the particle nature of light. In this device, incident light photons collide with electrons, somewhat like marbles, and produce an electric current which indicates the light intensity. Likewise, the wave nature of electrons is used to produce magnified images in an electron microscope. As with energy quantization, the wave nature of larger objects is not noticeable.

Figure 1. In the older classical view an object's energy may be any amount (a). In the quantum view, energy may only occur in discrete levels or steps (b).

      A third concept is called the Uncertainty Principle, formulated by Werner Heisenberg in 1927. It describes an inherent limitation on our measuring ability. For example, as we determine the position of a particle more precisely, its motion (actually momentum) and thus its future location become less well known. Likewise, precise knowledge of a particle's motion hinders knowledge of its present location. This limitation is far different from classical physics where it is thought possible to know an object's position and speed exactly. In this olderdeterministic view, the exact future course of an object theoretically can be calculated. The Uncertainty Principle invalidates this exact knowledge for any particle. Note that this principle does not place a limit on the Creator who makes the particles and rules in the first place, but only on ourselves.

      Fourth, particles are usually described by such properties as their mass, speed, size, and electric charge. In quantum mechanics these quantities can be incorporated into a wave function, given the symbol y . This wave function is a descriptive model of particles. It is mathematically complex and unobservable. The square of y (with its complex conjugate) is found to give the probability of the particle's location, a very useful but poorly-understood concept. The wave function y can further be substituted into a famous equation constructed by Erwin Schrodinger in 1926. From this equation many particle properties can be calculated. Mystery cloaks these computational steps, although the results agree closely with experiment. The Schrodinger Equation cannot be derived from theory; it simply "works." Albert Einstein was uncomfortable with the equation and never fully accepted it.

New Quantum Concepts

      Three newer quantum ideas will be presented. Each had enjoyed experimental success in recent years. First is the "nonlocality" of particles. Interference experiments show that a single electron somehow is able to "spread out" and pass through two separate openings at the same time. Instead of a single particle, the electron can be pictured as a "wave packet" which can shrink or expand with time. Similar experiments also have detected a single beryllium atom in two slightly different locations at once (Monroe, et al., 1996).

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Quantum Physics and Vedic Metaphysics

      Consciousness is the primary issue in human life. Indeed, without consciousness, there are no other issues. Consciousness and its corollaries are fundamental to every thought, word and action. Yet how strange it is that no universally accepted, comprehensive theory of consciousness exists in Western science. The reason for this is clear: until recently, science intentionally restricted its domain to empirical investigations of the manifest objective world, while consciousness is intrinsically subjective and immanent.
      However, without a practical theory of consciousness, science cannot adequately explain the world in which we live. Consciousness is the most basic experiential fact of existence. Without a theory of consciousness, Quantum Mechanics in particular has nowhere to turn but to mathematical theories of chance and probability to explain observations of subatomic energy transactions. Einstein famously expressed his discomfort with this by saying, “God does not play dice with the Universe. ” Quantum Mechanics cannot predict the behavior of a quantum system until a macroscopic conscious entity interferes with it, decohering the indeterminate superposition of the quantum wave function into a definite classical result.
      Clearly, Quantum Mechanics is missing something; just as clearly, what is missing is a workable theory of consciousness. The sometimes bizarre concepts and calculations of quantum theory all depend on the existence and actions of an observer. Any observer must be conscious, and therefore the consciousness of the observer is critical to the outcome of any quantum experiment. However, so far Quantum Mechanics still treats the observer ’s consciousness as a ‘black box,’ as if consciousness were proscribed from serious scientific inquiry. Whether this is a consequence of Western science’s origins as a weapon against the intellectual repression of the Church, or because of materialistic empirical bias of theorists and researchers, is not the issue here. The intent of this work is to present and explore an extant theory of consciousness from an ancient tradition of vital, living importance to hundreds of millions of adherents and practitioners all over the world, and to evaluate its potential value to modern science.

Translating Vedanta

      With recent developments in Quantum Mechanics and the philosophy of science, the dialogue of Western scientific thought has advanced to the point where its cutting edge exposes many issues equivalent to those discussed in Vedanta. Now that this has occurred, the timeless principles of Vedanta can be expressed in the technical language of Quantum Mechanics and the philosophy of science, with little or no attenuation of meaning. Quantum physics and Vedanta address the same philosophical object: the inconceivable, immeasurable and immanent nature of Absolute Reality, of which the observable phenomenological cosmos is but a tiny subset. The two disciplines approach the subject from widely divergent points of view and use vastly different language to treat it. Nevertheless, the commonality of subject between Western science and Vedanta makes it possible to reconcile them without diminishing the importance or subtlety of either. Scientific Vedanta is the first attempt to translate the enduring wisdom of Vedanta into the new scientific language of Quantum Physics.
      The insights of Vedanta philosophy and practice provide tremendous theoretical and practical advantages over a strictly Western scientific approach to the mysteries of life and existence. The keys to these advantages are thatVedanta recognizes the transcendental nature of consciousness, and the practical ability of directed consciousness to act, in effect, as co-creator of the universe to realize its full potential. Vedantic consciousness theory provides a workable interface between the individual and the Universal Quantum Wave Function, which contains all possibilities of all possible universes. Through this interface, one can enter into a direct personal relationship with the Infinite and engage in an eternal, ecstatic dance of mutual reciprocation. Translating the recondite philosophy and practical methods of Vedanta into accessible Western scientific language opens profound possibilities of expanded consciousness to millions of scientific-minded people all over the world.
What is Vedanta?
      The Sanskrit term Vedanta is a compound of veda + anta. Veda can refer to the Vedas, the sacred sanatana-dharma tradition of Bharata (India), or in a more general sense, it simply means true knowledge. Anta means the conclusion or end. So Vedanta can be interpreted either literally, as the final conclusion of the voluminous literature of the Vedic tradition; or more figuratively, as the ultimate knowledge, once knowing which, there is nothing further to be known. Vedanta appears herein in both meanings, but chiefly in the latter sense. In other words, Vedanta is the highest knowledge of the Vedic tradition, exactly as Quantum Mechanics and allied fields are the most advanced subjects in Western science.

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The mystery of mass: What makes one particle light and another heavy?

The author of 'Massive' introduces a short film that summarises quantum mechanics and the quest for the Higgs boson

Large Hadron Collider (LHC) generates a 'mini-Big Bang'

      The Large Hadron Collider has successfully created a "mini-Big Bang" by smashing together lead ions instead of protons.
      The scientists working at the enormous machine on Franco-Swiss border achieved the unique conditions on 7 November.

      

      The experiment created temperatures a million times hotter than the centre of the Sun.
    

      The LHC is housed in a 27km-long circular tunnel under the French-Swiss border near Geneva.
Up until now, the world's highest-energy particle accelerator - which is run by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Cern) - has been colliding protons, in a bid to uncover mysteries of the Universe's formation.
      Proton collisions could help spot the elusive Higgs boson particle and signs of new physical laws, such as a framework called supersymmetry.
      But for the next four weeks, scientists at the LHC will concentrate on analysing the data obtained from the lead ion collisions.
      This way, they hope to learn more about the plasma the Universe was made of a millionth of a second after the Big Bang, 13.7 billion years ago.
      One of the accelerator's experiments, ALICE, has been specifically designed to smash together lead ions, but the ATLAS and Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiments have also switched to the new mode.

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Freud's approach to dreams

      With his psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud opened the door for dreams to become a subject of scientifical research. He became interested in dreams when dealing with his patients because they were telling dreams spontaneously. He soon systematically included interpretation of dreams in psychoanalysis right besidehypnosis and free association. In the end of 19th century he eventually researched the mechanism of dreaming. The analysis of dreams is indispensable tool in therapy for each psychoanalyst since then, and for Freud, dreams are even the key to theoretical understanding ofsubconscious. He explained also dreams of people, who did not suffer from mental illness, in psychoanalytic way and so he was changing hispsychotherapy in theory in the very beginning.
      When we become tired of receiving of and responding to stimuli from environment we try to fall asleep. The main characteristic of psychical state of a sleeper is therefore a withdrawal from reality and cessation of taking all interests in it. We try to fall asleep by disconnecting from all sources of external stimuli. We lay down in a silent, dark room and cover our body to keep it comfortably warm and so minimize input from environment. Of course, an absolute withdrawal in which we would stop to perceive environment is not possible. In other words, the sleeper does not have a 'switch' to switch off at the time of sleeping and switch on back, when the time for awakening comes. After all, if such absolute withdrawal was possible to achieve, the sleeper would risk not to wake up again, since more and more strong stimuli in the morning are exactly what wakes up the sleeper. These stimuli disturb us also during the sleep, and our mentality is forced to respond to them - with dreams.

Dream Symbolism

      Freud derived dream symbols from the resistance of dream interpretation. He noticed that resistance regularly occurred with certain elements of dreams even in dreams of mentally healthy people. He claimed that formation of visual answer on stimulus (dream) is not coincidental. He figured out that some parts of manifestcontent typically correspond with certain latent content. Freud called these manifest elements symbols - to which he ascribed constant meaning. The dream symbols are in his opinion more or less sexual.
      Number three has in dreams symbolic meaning of man's sexual organ. All dream ideas which consist of three parts can mean the man's sexual organ. Phallus is symbolically substituted with all things that are similar to it by their form, namely long things that jut out: mountains, rocks, sticks, umbrellas, poles, trees... Then objects for which the penetration in the body and harming is characteristic - weapons: knifes, daggers, lances, sabres, swords... and fire arms: guns, rifles, revolvers, cannons... Obviously, the phallus is also substituted with objects from which water runs: pipes, watering-pots, fountains... and with objects that can be lengthened: hanging lights, extensible pens, aerials... Balloons, airplanes, helicopters, rockets, etc. are symbols of erection. Less evident male sexual symbols are reptiles and fish, especially a symbol of snake. A hat and a coat as well as various machines and appliances have the same meaning.
      Female genitalia are symbolically represented with hollow objects that can contain things: shafts, pits and caves, vessels and bottles, boxes, suitcases, tins, pockets, closets, stoves, ships... The same holds for house with entrances, passages and doors, churches, chapels, castles, mansions, fortresses and even landscape itself. The material such as wood and paper as well as objects made of them: a table, a book... symbolize the same. Typical female symbols among animals are snails and mussels and their shells. Apples, peaches and fruits in general symbolize breasts.
      All kind of playing (playing instruments also), sliding, slipping and breaking branches are symbols of masturbation. The teeth falling out and extraction of them are symbols of castration as a punishment for masturbating (castration's complex).
      Various rhythmical activities such as dance, riding, raising and threatening with weapon symbolize sexual intercourse itself. Typical activities that symbolize sexual intercourse are also climbing and going down the ladder or stairs and running inside a house. The queen and king or empress and emperor and similar relations symbolize parents. The fall into water or raising out of it symbolizes birth.
      Many dreams which seemed puzzling before, become more clear when considering Freud's symbols and the censorship of dream. Although dream symbols allow for direct interpretation of dreams, we must never do that without previous knowledge of patient's psychological background. The dream can be understood, Freud held, only in light of the dreamer's associations to it. After telling the dream, the therapist has to ask the patient to engage in free associations stimulated by certain element of the dream. When following the spontaneous flow of thoughts and feelings, the patient is asked to describe it as fully as possible. The patient, however, has to consider an agreement that s/he will tell every idea without trying to censor or control it in any way. We tell the patient "a rule that must not be broken: when telling [dreams] s/he must not leave out any idea even if s/he gets one of four objections: that idea is irrelevant, too senseless, that is not connected with the issue or is too embarrassing." (Freud 1977) Only such a rule will ensure efficient relationship between the dream teller and dream interpreter.

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Absolute zero

      Absolute zero is the theoretical temperature at which entropy would reach its minimum value. The laws of thermodynamics state that absolute zero cannot be reached because this would require a thermodynamic system to be fully removed from the rest of the universe.
      A system at absolute zero would still possess quantum mechanical zero-point energy. While molecular motion would not cease entirely at absolute zero, the system would not have enough energy for transference to other systems. It is therefore correct to say that molecular kinetic energy is minimal at absolute zero.
      By international agreement, absolute zero is defined as 0K on the Kelvin scale and as −273.15°C on the Celsius scale. This equates to −459.67°F on the Fahrenheit scale. Scientists have achieved temperatures very close to absolute zero, where matter exhibits quantum effects such as superconductivity and super-fluidity.

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Scientific mysteries of the 21st century

Dr. Arie Melamed - Katz
Released: 25.10.2010

      A decade after the beginning of the century is quite a bit of science to the secrets yet to be solved: identification of dark matter makes up the universe and the possibility to produce black holes. Who will answer the challenge and succeed to crack these puzzles? Part One
      British physicist Lord Kelvin in 1900 gave an important scientific lecture on the occasion of the end of the 19th century. He told her colleagues on the two phenomena could not explain.
      A young man named Albert Einstein, accepted the challenge. Only five years after he published a series of articles that provided a full explanation of those phenomena, and in the process revolutionized the real scientific.
      Einstein himself won the Nobel Prize in Physics and became the most famous person in the world. It took 110 years and today stands science of physics to the mysteries of new challenges have not yet found an explanation. We've gathered for you the ten most burning issues in the field, and today we present the top five. You are invited to meet the challenge.

1. Dark Side of the Universe
      We know pretty much about the universe. For example, he created the big bang nearly 14 billion years, which is composed of billions of galaxies where stars, it expands and continues to expand now.
      In fact, we would expect its rate of expansion will decrease, because between the galaxies is a force of gravity - which is gravity. But this does not happen. Observations of distant galaxies show that the rate of their distance from each other actually increasing, which means that there is a mysterious force causing the universe to rejection.
      This phenomenon is called "dark energy", and not quite known what was happening. The only clue is prescribed Einstein equations: He thought about the possibility of rejection power fills the universe, but then changed his mind and said the idea was "the biggest mistake of my life."
      Another problem is related to the amount of matter in the universe. The stars in the galaxy spinning around its center, like planets rotating around the sun. Rotational speed of the planets as small as they are farther from the sun, and we expect that this will also be the rotation speed of stars at the galaxy.
      But observations show otherwise - all the stars spinning around the galactic center at the same speed, more or less. The usual explanation is that galaxies more material than what you see, just that nobody knows what it is. So he has been called "dark matter", and scientists are making every effort to find him and still did not succeed.
      Away from Minnesota, underground, scientists working on finding concrete evidence of the existence of an invisible substance 90% from the universe component. At the end of the week are the first reported achievement, despite Ahlkiotam arouse much excitement. "If dark matter is found, it is the most important discoveries of the century - no doubt about it," says Professor Avishai Dekel of Hebrew University
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      In other words, requires an understanding of two main components of the universe - dark energy and dark matter.

2. Following the earliest galaxies
      Big Bang Theory is one of the greatest achievements of science. Can help restore what had happened during the first 400 thousand years existence of the universe. Then she began a long period of hundreds of millions of years, we have no evidence for her, after which the first galaxies appeared.
      Light out of them then comes to us just now, and with huge telescopes can observe these galaxies and see them as they were when she was born.
      So how galaxies? It does not have an answer. But we have an important clue: the center of every galaxy is a giant black hole probably formed together with her. Regular black hole created Achskoachab ends his life collapses to the size of a few kilometers, but the centers of galaxies and black holes are huge.
      The amount of material equal to the amount of material which millions of stars, their creative mechanism should be different. Now just need to figure out how giant black holes are created ...

3. Hole (black) pocket
      Black holes are extremely dense objects including gravity so great that even light can not get out of them. So are black on the outside. They also have a disturbing feature, that anything can go in - but there is no way out.
      So why do scientists want to create black holes on Earth? First, a word of reassurance: trying to produce black holes in particle accelerators are really tiny, much smaller than a single atom. Such black holes evaporating in a split second, and probably not dangerous at all.
      If we can produce them, we first investigate black holes close up. There is also a practical reason: a tiny black hole, while the short existence, can produce energy - is attracting material and increases the speed, that is giving him energy.
      If we produce a lot of tiny black holes at a steady pace and use the energy they produce, perhaps we can solve the world's energy problems.

4. Cracking seeds
      Coal and oil are the main energy sources of mankind. Achsshurafim them creates energy that can be converted through electricity or moving vehicles and machinery. The problem is that in that carbon dioxide is emitted into the atmosphere - carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that can cause further global warming.
      Another problem is air pollution and soil, hazardous byproducts. In the coming years many power plants will use an environmentally friendly alternative energy, like solar and wind energy, but not sure it would do to the population of Earth spendthrift.
      Another solution is nuclear energy. Atom consists of nucleus with positive electric charge, surrounded by moving negatively charged electrons.Achsgeraen liver, for example the nucleus of uranium, splits into lighter nuclei - energy is released.
      On this principle are built nuclear reactors, and unlike the atomic bombs.The downside of a nuclear reactor here is that hazardous byproducts should not be near them.
      Another method that does not have nearly byproducts, grain sources of light elements, such as hydrogen, collide. Nuclei come together through a process called nuclear fusion, and here creates a lot of energy.
      This is what happens in the sun, or the infamous hydrogen bomb. Nuclear fusion could become the main energy source of mankind if we overcome one problem: to positively charged nuclei collide and be rejected from each other, they should be high energy in advance.
      In other words - should raise the temperature of the material to millions of degrees Celsius. This is a difficult task, and fusion reactors built to date spent more energy than they produced, so this thing is still not really worthwhile. Conclusion: Energy production facility required by nuclear fusion.

5. Unopposed
      Produced electricity power station is pumped to homes via the electricity network. Some of the energy is lost due to electrical resistance of power cables themselves, and the electric company has to produce more electricity than necessary.
      If only we could build the electrical grid electrical conductivity has no objection, was spared the wasted electricity. Actually have such materials, and call them superconductors - a. The only problem is that they function as a conduit - the only very low temperatures, close to absolute zero (minus 273 degrees Celsius).
      It makes no sense to cool the temperature power grid such that the cost of much higher cooling power savings. But there is another way - to find superconductors - to maintain their properties even at higher temperatures.
      Today, it is conductive - the operating temperature of 150 degrees Celsius below zero, but it's still not enough. Conclusion: Require a conductor - the works at room temperature.

6. Fly
      If we want to visit other planets, maybe even other solar systems, we must increase the speed of spacecraft ours. Fastest spacecraft did not reach even a hundredth percent the speed of light, which means it would take thousands of years until they reach the nearest star (Proxima Centaurus).
      Their engines today use ion engines (the language of ion - an electrically charged atom). In the first stage produce ions from gas, then accelerate to high speed electric or magnetic means, flow of ions coming from the back of the spacecraft makes it to increase its speed ahead.
      The method would take us outside our solar system should be more efficient. Engine anti - matter is such a brilliant idea: a clash of material particles with other particles called anti - matter creates a lot of energy, which can be used to power spacecraft.
      There are only two problems "small": We do not produce large quantities of anti - matter, we do not know where to save it, because any contact of anti - matter with matter will both disappear and turn into energy. Conclusion: A new method is required to power spaceships.

7. Changes in the calculation
      Regular computer performs calculations using bits - binary digits. Bit can have only the value 0 or the value 1. Future computers will be based on quantum theory. They will do calculations using units of qubit, the quantum equivalent bit.
      How it sounds strange, one qubit can be 0 and 1 simultaneously, two Akiobittim can be in four states, eight Akiobittim can be up to 256 different states!
      The result is that it could be doing a lot of parallel actions, and the computer's calculation will wonders. Up to now succeeded in creating quantum computers with single Akiobittim still do not know how to produce a real quantum computer. But when he shows up, the fastest computer today will become immediately antiques.

8. As a creative hand
      Today we are not able to bring a person even to the planet Mars, near us, because spacecraft can not protect astronauts from space radiation. To this end, new materials need to be light as a feather, strong as steel and impenetrable to radiation as a heavy lump of lead.
      New materials development can help us in other areas. For example, construction of earthquake resistant houses, manufacturing wear clothes that make them invisible, even developing a mobile phone that can change shape and turn in a split second bracelet. In other words, we need new materials to be flexible, lightweight, strong and durable.

9. Return time
      Remember the spacecraft speed we were going to build? So it turns out that if you are flying for a few days at near the speed of light, discovering Earth Achshachuzarym moved here many years.
      In other words, a very fast spaceship lets make some kind of time travel to the future. Time travel at is a more complicated story, and though science does not rule it is not clear if at all possible.
      Consider the following situation: A man goes back in time, accidentally kills his grandfather before he met his grandmother. If it does happen that person could be born, let alone go back in time.
      But if he was not born and did not return back in time, so his grandfather would meet his grandmother and eventually that person will be born. It's called "grandfather paradox", and before you invent a time machine, you must find an explanation.

10. The most important discovery
      We presented you with nine very difficult challenges, no one failed to meet them. To deal with them should start a good understanding of the problem, continue to collect research material and finish times of deep thought.
      The truth is that even luck, and most of all have similarities - the most important discovery is not written here. The most important scientific discovery is that nobody yet thought of her, one that was not even the wildest dreams. This discovery will advance the science to new places and make the 21st century a turning point in human history.

The Moral Life of Babies

By PAUL BLOOM

Published: May 5, 2010

      A growing body of evidence, suggests that humans do have a rudimentary moral sense from the very start of life. With the help of well-designed experiments, you can see glimmers of moral thought, moral judgment and moral feeling even in the first year of life. Some sense of good and evil seems to be bred in the bone. Which is not to say that parents are wrong to concern themselves with moral development or that their interactions with their children are a waste of time. Socialization is critically important. But this is not because babies and young children lack a sense of right and wrong; it’s because the sense of right and wrong that they naturally possess diverges in important ways from what we adults would want it to be.

      Not long ago, a team of researchers watched a 1-year-old boy take justice into his own hands. The boy had just seen a puppet show in which one puppet played with a ball while interacting with two other puppets. The center puppet would slide the ball to the puppet on the right, who would pass it back. And the center puppet would slide the ball to the puppet on the left . . . who would run away with it. Then the two puppets on the ends were brought down from the stage and set before the toddler. Each was placed next to a pile of treats. At this point, the toddler was asked to take a treat away from one puppet. Like most children in this situation, the boy took it from the pile of the “naughty” one. But this punishment wasn’t enough — he then leaned over and smacked the puppet in the head.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/09/magazine/09babies-t.html

Information Technology, Globalization and Social Development

UNRISD Discussion Paper No. 114, September 1999, Manuel Castells

      There is a raging debate in the world on the mixed record of the information technology revolution, and of globalization—especially when we consider their social dimensions on a planetary scale. As is always the case with a fundamental debate, it is most often framed ideologically and cast in simplistic terms. For the prophets of technology, for the true believers in the magic of the market, everything will be just fine, as long as ingenuity and competition are set free. All we need are a few regulatory fixes, to prevent corruption and to remove bureaucratic impediments in the path of our flight to hyper-modernity. For those around the world who are not ecstatic about surfing on the Internet, but who are affected by layoffs, lack of basic social services, crime, poverty and disruption of their lives, globalization is nothing more than a warmed up version of traditional capitalist ideology. In their view, information technology is a tool for renewed exploitation, destruction of jobs, environmental degradation and the invasion of privacy. Techno-elites versus neo-luddites.

      Of course, the real issues are not in-between, but elsewhere. Social development today is determined by the ability to establish a synergistic interaction between technological innovation and human values, leading to a new set of organizations and institutions that create positive feedback loops between productivity, flexibility, solidarity, safety, participation and accountability, in a new model of development that could be socially and environmentally sustainable.

      It is easy to agree on these goals, but difficult to develop the policies and strategies that could lead to them. Some of the disagreement comes, certainly, from conflicting interests, values and priorities. But a considerable source of current disarray in social and economic policies stems from the lack of a common understanding of the processes of transformation under way, of their origins and their implications. This paper aims to clarify the meaning of this transformation, particularly by focusing on the processes that are usually considered to be its triggers: the information technology revolution and the process of globalization. As we shall see, in fact, these two processes interact with others, in a very complex set of actions and reactions. But they offer a fruitful entry point to discuss the connection between the new socio-economic system and the generation of inequality and social exclusion on an unprecedented, planetary scale.

      Thus, after having characterized technological innovation, organizational change and globalization, I will analyse the various dimensions of inequality and social exclusion, showing the depth of our social crisis, and I will provide some hypotheses on the reasons for its accentuation in the last decade. I will conclude by proposing a redefinition of the field of social development, appropriate to tackle the issues that condition our capacity to live together in the new context of the “information age”. In proceeding along the lines of this argument, I have in mind a variety of data, from reliable sources, that make somewhat plausible the analysis presented here. However, since I have just published a book that brings together many of these data, I take the liberty of referring the reader to it, in order to concentrate here on the schematic presentation (and expanded elaboration) of my argument without repeating the presentation of data sources (see Castells, 1996, 1997 and 1998 as well as the synthesis of data on world poverty presented in UNDP, 1997).

Read more: http://www.unrisd.org/unrisd/website/document.nsf/(httpPublications)/F270E0C066F3DE7780256B67005B728C?OpenDocument

The Higgs Boson

     When you get on the scale in the morning, you may be hoping that it registers a smaller number than the day before -- you may be hoping that you've lost weight. It's the quantity of mass in you, plus the force of gravity, that determines your weight. But what determines your mass?
     That's one of the most-asked, most-hotly pursued questions in physics today. Many of the experiments circulating in the world's particle accelerators are looking into the mechanism that gives rise to mass. Scientists at CERN, as well as at Fermilab in Illinois, are hoping to find what they call the "Higgs boson." Higgs, they believe, is a particle, or set of particles, that might give others mass.
     The idea of one particle giving another mass is a bit counter-intuitive... Isn't mass an inherent characteristic of matter? If not, how can one entity impart mass on all the others by simply floating by and interacting with them?
     An oft-cited analogy describes it well: Imagine you're at a Hollywood party. The crowd is rather thick, and evenly distributed around the room, chatting. When the big star arrives, the people nearest the door gather around her. As she moves through the party, she attracts the people closest to her, and those she moves away from return to their other conversations. By gathering a fawning cluster of people around her, she's gained momentum, an indication of mass. She's harder to slow down than she would be without the crowd. Once she's stopped, it's harder to get her going again.
     This clustering effect is the Higgs mechanism, postulated by British physicist Peter Higgs in the 1960s. The theory hypothesizes that a sort of lattice, referred to as the Higgs field, fills the universe. This is something like an electromagnetic field, in that it affects the particles that move through it, but it is also related to the physics of solid materials. Scientists know that when an electron passes through a positively charged crystal lattice of atoms (a solid), the electron's mass can increase as much as 40 times. The same might be true in the Higgs field: a particle moving through it creates a little bit of distortion -- like the crowd around the star at the party -- and that lends mass to the particle.

Read more: http://www.exploratorium.edu/origins/cern/ideas/higgs.html

Buddhism And The Family

Marriage and family relationships. Buddhism is not a family-centered religion. For a variety of reasons, it does not possess doctrinal standards or institutionalized models of the family. Some of these reasons include the role of renunciation, detachment, and the individual's pursuit of enlightenment. The virtue of renunciation derives from Siddhartha's Great Going Forth, at which point he forsook his family and familial obligations as son, husband, and father. The monastic lifestyle and the role of the religious community (sangha) formalized the renouncing of familial relationships. The goal of detachment also impinges negatively upon family life. The inherent nature of families and family relationships produces attachments that constitute formidable obstacles to achieving detachment from worldly affairs and desires. Finally, the practices for pursuing enlightenment are adult-oriented disciplines requiring significant amounts of time and effort in solitary study and meditation. Although these three factors adversely affect the role of family life, the vast majority of Buddhists are lay people with immediate and extended families.

Because Buddhism does not espouse any particular form of the family or family relationships, Buddhist family life generally reflects pre-existing cultural and religious values, customs, and socially sanctioned modes of expression. Within Asian Buddhist cultures, this typically translates into a traditional, patriarchal family structure with clearly defined familial roles. Buddhism's primary contribution to the family consists of five ethical prescriptions that inform all aspects of family life, including marriage, roles and expectations, sexuality, children, and divorce. Originally composed by the Buddha ...

Read more: http://family.jrank.org/pages/183/Buddhism-Buddhism-Family.html

Special Relativity Time Dilation phenomenon experiment

The experiment with m-Mesons, is a classic experiment on the time dilation phenomenon, performed by B.Rossi and D. Hall in 1941 .

In the experiment, cosmic rays entering the earth's atmosphere from space were monitored - in particular the production of particles termed 'm-Mesons'.

Here are the essential details of this experiment:

1) A m meson is a charged particle that decays into an electron or positron , a neutrino and an anti neutrino.

2) As produced by cosmic rays the mesons travel through the atmosphere at speeds very close to that of light.

3) With the help of a scintillation counter, the arrival of the mesons may be detected and at a measured time later, their decay into an energetic electron. Observation of the second stage means that the meson has stopped in the detector so the decay of mesons AT REST is being recorded. Detector showed 568 counts that were obtained in one hour at the top of Mt Washington (6300ft above sea level.)

4) Since the mesons travel at nearly the speed of light, the time axis can be relabelled in thousands of feet and then we can see how many mesons should reach sea level if they decay in the same way in flight as they do at rest: On this basis if the detecting equipment is taken to sea level, 27 counts should be recorded in one hour. Accepting the result of this stage means we can go on to predict what fraction of a group of mesons should be lost through decay in a trip of a given distance (d) and duration~ (d /c) .

5) The scintillation counter is now taken down the mountain to sea level. At sea level a full hour's count is taken : Instead of 27 we have 412 mesons left at sea level. 412 counts corresponds to about 0.7msec on the decay clock. 0.7 divided by 6.3 equals 1/9. These mesons moving at near light speed keep time at 1/9 the rate they do when they are at rest with respect to us. To the observer on the ground, the mesons survive the journey in far greater numbers than one would predict from studying their decay at rest. The time-dilation factor of 9 corresponds obviously to a particular value of meson velocity v.

Why doesn't the electron fall into the nucleus?

The picture of electrons "orbiting" the nucleus like planets around the sun remains an enduring one, not only in popular images of the atom but also in the minds of many of us who know better. The proposal, first made in 1913, that the centrifugal force of the revolving electron just exactly balances the attractive force of the nucleus (in analogy with the centrifugal force of the moon in its orbit exactly counteracting the pull of the Earth's gravity) is a nice picture, but is simply untenable.

An electron, unlike a planet or a satellite, is electrically charged, and it has been known since the mid-19th century that an electric charge that undergoes acceleration (changes velocity and direction) will emit electromagnetic radiation, losing energy in the process. A revolving electron would transform the atom into a miniature radio station, the energy output of which would be at the cost of the potential energy of the electron; according to classical mechanics, the electron would simply spiral into the nucleus and the atom would collapse.

Quantum theory to the rescue!

By the 1920's, it became clear that a tiny object such as the electron cannot be treated as a classical particle having a definite position and velocity. The best we can do is specify the probability of its manifesting itself at any point in space. If you had a magic camera that could take a sequence of pictures of the electron in the 1s orbital of a hydrogen atom, and could combine the resulting dots in a single image, you would see something like this. Clearly, the electron is more likely to be found the closer we move toward the nucleus. This is confirmed by this plot which shows the quantity ...


Read more: http://www.chem1.com/acad/webtut/atomic/WhyTheElectron.html