QUANTUM METAPHYSICS - E-thesis

It simply states that creative work cannot be replaced by some mechanical, in the sense of
algorithmic, technique, procedure or system that is described beforehand. 751 The classical image
of mathematics has also changed as a result of the advent of computers. These machines are now
commonly used in the study of non-linear and chaotic processes There are propositions and
computer proofs that can no longer be surveyed by a single human being because they are too
complex and their content has too many ramifications. The personal relationship between man
and mathematics appears to be at stake: computer experiments are moving from the context of
discovery to the context of justification. Imre Lakatos has called present-day mathematics a
”quasi-empirical” science. 752
It has been said that even though few will admit it, most mathematicians and scientists view their
theorems and laws in Platonic terms. 753 For example, the well-known physicist Richard Feynman
considered, in accordance with Pythagorean traditions, that physical laws which observed
mathematical principles represented rhythms and forms in nature which cannot be observed by
the human eye. 754 He noted that all the laws of physics appear to follow great general principles;
examples of which are principles of conservation, certain qualities of symmetry, the general form
of quantum mechanical principles and the fact that all laws are mathematical. 755
Is reality reversible or irreversible?
The relationship between change and eternity was already a subject of debate among the pre-
Socratics. They attempted to reduce the observed movement, change and multiplicity in the
world to some unchanging basis. Modern natural science has espoused the antique Atomists’
concept of unchanging particles and has developed mathematical theories which are assumed to
be founded on nature's eternal unchanging conformity to laws. Classical mechanics, the theory of
relativity and quantum mechanics are, by their nature, reversible theories which handle time as a
750
Gödels incompleteness theorem states that in any consistent and sufficiently powerful axiomatic system,
propositions can be formulated which are true but undecidable. The simplest formulation of the Turing theorem is
perhaps the following: there is no algorithm to decide whether the generic Turing machine will halt or not halt on a
generic input. Cacade 1997, 32.
751
Cacace 1997, 27, 32, Suarez 1997, 45.
752
Reichel 1997, 7-8, 11.
753
Stenger 1995, 7.
754
There is also rhythm and pattern between the phenomena of nature which is not apparent to the eye, but only to
analysis: it is these rhythms and patterns which we call Physical Laws. Feynman 1992, 13.
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