The Matrix Has You.
Why is there something rather than nothing? For some this is a profound question; for others it is a mere exercise in futility as useless as the Pope’s balls. Yet a perennial question of this magnitude may speak to our undying commitment to better understand ourselves by better understanding our cosmological mother. Building on the work of their predecessors, it was in early 20th century that Georges Lemaître and Edwin Hubble discovered redshift, a cosmological measurement that demonstrates the entire observable universe is expanding away from us in all directions. Redshift is so named because light seen coming from an object that is increasingly moving away affects that light’s wavelength, consequently detectable as the color red in our visible spectrum. Inversely, objects moving toward us communicate a detectable blueshift as has been observed by the Andromeda Galaxy heading straight on a collision course with our Milky Way – most certainly a party foul. Another way to understand redshift is to compare it to the more commonly understood Doppler effect by which changes to the frequency of a sound wave are relative to how we perceive the directionality of that sound. If the ambulance sounds like it’s coming toward you it’s because Lindsay Lohan needs help. Now known as Hubble’s Law, the redshift discovery is a staple of Big Bang cosmology, the theory that the universe’s expansion infers a genesis, or beginning. Hypothetically, if astrophysicists could rewind the universe like a VHS tape they would expect to see the universe condense itself into an infinitesimally dense point of gravity from which both space and time were born. Incidentally, Lady Gaga’s mother was ultimately born this way, who gave birth to Lady Gaga who recorded the chart-buster Born This Way. How Meta can you get?
If you’re confused already I’m afraid it only gets worse. While the cornerstones of post-Enlightenment cosmology are Einstein’s General Relativity and Newtonian physics (it’s “Sir” Isaac Newton because he held wine glasses with his pinky extended), more modern theorems and experiments have given rise to esoteric mysteries of quantum mechanics, co-founded by Max Planck. The most interesting thing about quantum mechanics is that it has shaken the foundations of physics and betrayed our most self-assured assumptions about the nature of the real. Because of the fact that our conventional understanding of physics collapses in the quantum realm (subatomic realm), quantum physics has attracted the attention of theists, philosophers, and metaphysicians alike. In other words, as “what in holy fuck!?” can be heard as the wail of bafflement echoing physics labs around the world, Deepak Chopra exploits his opportunity to sell more books. Yet to some extent quantum mechanics has justifiably legitimized some beliefs long-held in the tradition of religion and philosophy. Take for example the 1989 hit show Quantum Leap starring actor-extraordinaire Scott Bakula. In that show Bakula plays a scientist who has the ability to leap into the body of another person and in varying time periods. As unrealistic as this seems it is precisely what quantum physics informs us about the nature of reality at the subatomic level.
This introduces the quantum principle of non-locality. Far from being a physicist myself, non-locality is not exactly simple to explain. A simplistic definition of non-locality is that it is the phenomena of universal connectedness beyond all understanding. To illustrate this consider that particle-W instantly vanishes and reappears at some random location in the universe, followed by particle-T to some other location. Simultaneously and with no measurable lapse in time, particle-F also vanishes instantaneously, only to re-materialize across the universe with no apparent duration of time, speed, or spatial medium. To consider this thought experiment is to gain a clearer understanding of the principle of non-locality and quantum leaps, meaning that all three of those particles can have unmediated connection despite their remote distances from one another – in other words, WTF is connecting across the entire universe. My arguably bad word-gag aside, the knowledge to be gained here is that local interaction is the only principle intuitive to our brains. All of us understand local interaction even if a physicist’s terminology is lost on us. For example, I throw you a football across the yard and you drop it because you’re White. Throwing this football makes sense scientifically because my muscles are exerting energy (supplied by food) that is transferred to the football and this accounts for the measurements of force, velocity, speed, distance, and time. Now imagine that I throw you a football, only this time it instantly vanishes from my hand and you instantly catch it – only I’m in Maryland and you’re on Saturn. Quantum theory explains this by introducing the principle of entanglement, the idea that there is no such thing as “space” and all atoms of the universe born together stay together – like a giant Mexican family. In fact, physicists say everything in the universe is still touching and that the behavior of one atom can affect the behavior of another even if seeming to be separated across the entire universe. This of course brings my hope that my masturbation is inextricably linked to Megan Fox’s twizzad. Such is the behavior of quantum particles that appear to defy the lawful speed of light according to General Relativity. Moreover, this problem of non-locality is compounded by the problem of quantum discontinuity, both indistinguishable from what we would otherwise call supernatural phenomena. In our experience objects move between points while traversing the distance in between (Zeno of Elea, 490 – 430 BC, argued motion is an illusion). If you’re standing at point B and walk to point C your Asian father will demand an A, but I digress. My point is that you have to traverse intermediate stages (cross some middle ground) to get there. This simply isn’t the case with quantum particles. Instead, particles appear, disappear, and then appear again – like Robert Downey Jr.’s career. This is a problem, particularly for Einstein who rejected aspects of quantum mechanics precisely because it upset the intellectual security of the physical realism he held dear (of which Bell’s theorem later proved didn’t exist).
Another mule kick to the physicist’s jewels is The Observer Effect. Discovered by Thomas Young early 19th century, the Observer Effect is an experiment that demonstrates the act of observation/measuring quantum particles alters their expected behavior expression. This phenomenon has been repeatedly demonstrated in what is now infamously called the double split experiment. In this experiment an electron (quantum unit) is projected through a solid stencil that has two vertical, parallel slits in it for the electron to pass through (and with a wall behind it to catch the electrons). Conventional wisdom says that projecting many electrons one at a time in this manner through the stencil should create a pattern of electrons in two vertical, parallel lines on the wall, conforming to the shape of the stencil. Yet the results manifest an unpredictable change in electron behavior. Physicists discovered that electrons do whatever the fuck they want and only get stranger when they’re observed or measured. To further understand this, imagine you have a stencil of your name (Banksy) and you intend to spray paint it on a wall using this stencil. After spraying paint through your stencil you are suddenly shocked to learn the word “Mr. Brainwash” has appeared on the wall instead. Suffice it to say this would catalyze your complete mental breakdown. Yet this is precisely the unpredictable nature of electrons, that is, until they’re observed. In the double split experiment an electron detector (functioning as “the observer”) is used to measure the precise activity of the electrons as they pass through the slits. In every instance this measuring device is used, the electrons fulfill their behavioral expectation. Though as soon as the measuring device is removed the electrons return to defiance and unpredictability. In other words, a kind of Orwellian principle emerges – the electrons “behave” when they’re being closely watched – kind of like a class clown. In physics this is known as particle-wave duality, and this phenomenon of strange quantum behavior has prompted some to seriously consider the existence of multiple realities. The idea is that an electron only appears as either a particle or a wave to us upon observation or measurement, but in fact is both simultaneously in two overlapping realities (called superposition). Quantum superposition is the theory that a quantum particle can co-exist in all its possible states despite that human observation and measurement can only lock in on one of those possible states. Schrödinger’s Cat is the most popular thought experiment exploiting this paradox of superposition. According to the paradox, a cat is concealed in a box along with a Geiger counter contraption, a sealed bottle of poison, and a radioactive source (like a hose fed to the box). The Geiger counter has been calibrated to release the poison only if radiation is detected from the hose. Radiation is then detected and the Geiger contraption shatters the bottle of poison, killing the cat. However, according to Schrödinger in the Copenhagen tradition of quantum physics (which the majority of all physicists accept), the cat is simultaneously both alive and dead despite that we as conscious observers will be locked into an either/or commitment of perception when we look in the box. Either we’ll see the cat is dead or we’ll see the cat is alive, incidentally determining which sub-Reddit category we’ll post the picture of this shit.
Perplexed, the physics community is hard at work trying to figure out why all this sorcery is happening and to what extent it has practical applications. Meanwhile, physicists are fairly conclusive when they say that particles exist as a wave of possibilities, bouncing in and out of stable and chaotic states like Charlie Sheen. In effect, reality is a meta-cloud of unpredictable subatomic potential in which anything could happen anytime (still looking for that one missing sock?). Meanwhile, in attempt to reconcile the supernatural incomprehensibility of the subatomic, physicists have returned to the intellectual boot camp of equation formulation, desperate to find a single mathematical theorem that unifies the school of classical physics with quantum mechanics. Regardless of whether we accept Membrane Theory, String Theory, Quantum Gravity Fluctuation Theory, or Universe Sex Theory (universes have sex to create baby universes), only one thing is clear — the closer we look the stranger things get — and I don’t mean RuPaul’s crotch. Though some are content to say these quantum mysteries justify the belief in a Supernatural Deity, scientists continue to work hard at theories that have demonstrable explanatory power. One such theory popularized by Nick Bolstrom and perhaps inspired by Alan Turing’s work is Simulation Theory — the possibility that we are living in a digital simulation. This theory has been proposed for decades despite its newfound excitement in pop culture thanks to sci-fi films like The Matrix. Simulation Theory has philosophical merit by way of these points: (1) It resolves quantum mysteries like non-locality and Observer Effect, and other phenomena the defies sufficient explanation (2) It builds on the fact that information is an irreducible feature of existence and that genetic switches in organic DNA are analogous to 1′s and 0′s in binary code, and both are prone to viruses (3) It offers an explanation for consciousness as being “virtual” much like dreams and memories are virtual (4) It has statistical probability since we are evolved animals now building Artificial Intelligence that, in turn, could mean some past civilization built AI of which we are now the virtual expression. While Simulation Theory is attractive to several renowned scientific philosophers, it has its naysayers due to the fact that it’s practically unfalsifiable. In fact, simulation theory is so fundamentally axiomatic that its testability eludes our traditional methods of inquiry and demonstration. In other words, if we exist only as the virtual output of a machine built over a million (or billion) years ago there would be no surefire way to awake from this quasi-state, or to be sure that we did. In effect, we would all be Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense — and I shudder to think M. Night Shyamalan is The System Administrator.
Nonetheless, proponents of Simulation Theory defend an interesting case, however fantastic. If we are a simulation creating simulations (e.g. Second Life and Sim City) then perhaps the System Administrator of our simulation left us clues this is the case (e.g. or introduce themselves into their own simulation). Some argue that these clues will express themselves in the form of glitches in the simulation (e.g. déjà vu) or deliberate intelligent signatures embedded in the simulation (e.g. mathematics and digital code). Bear in mind that all of material existence in the universe, including our own bodies, is primarily comprised of space (though theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss is revolutionizing how we define “empty” in quantum mechanics). In some very real sense, we virtually exist. Thus in the science fiction blockbuster The Matrix, as Neo (Keanu Reeves) was challenged to “bend the spoon,” he was instructed to first understand the spoon didn’t exist — the “spoon” was merely a virtual construct; a mental form codified in language. Similarly, when we feel a rock as “hard,” hardness is a property constructed by our brains — a rock is actually made of electrons that whiz in and out of existence at the quantum level in a virtual cloud — though I would never test this proposition with your face.
“I don’t like the idea that the moon disappears when I’m not looking.” — Albert Einstein (1879 – 1955)
