edgar-mitchell

Invisible Realities 137
nuances of words, construed literally or metaphorically, can shift the truth
of knowing.
Whenever trees have fallen in the past, they likely behaved just as they
had before humans made an issue of it by asking annoying questions. Likewise,
the universal processes proceeded to unfold as they did before
quantum mechanics, Newtonian mathematics, and telescopes—long before
humans began to second-guess the processes and create these “maps.”
The territory they represent seems to have existed long before our maps
and the anthropoid mentality that created them.
The anthropic consciousness and mentality we experience today certainly
seems important to the future evolution of the universe. We have
radically altered the face of the planet, particularly in recent years, not
only by our very existence, but also because of intentional choices. If consciousness
is important to the universe, what then is its exact nature, and
how did it manifest before we humans evolved to the state of awakened
awareness we currently enjoy An investigation of quantum mechanics with
consciousness in the picture begins to yield some interesting and useful
answers.
The now-classic wave/particle demonstration, called the double-slit
experiment, has undergone exotic refinements through the years to help us
better understand this strange phenomenon, and to shed light on the several
paradoxes of quantum theory. An example of the experiment consists
of a source of light, a photosensitive screen to capture the light, and a
device that can split the light beam into two beams at the will of the experimenter
before it reaches the recording device.
In principle this is a simple experiment. If only one beam of light is
used, all the photons cluster in a blob around the center of the recording
screen, just like a flashlight beam projected on a wall. If the beam is split
into two beams by a beam splitter and then refocused, an interference
pattern showing alternate light and dark areas will appear on the screen.
All wave equations predict this result, but particle equations predict two
independent blobs of light—not an interference pattern. This was the original
proof of wave/particle duality.
All refinements of the double-slit experiment have been made with
one or both of two primary goals in mind: The first goal has been to catch
the wave/particle behaving as a Newtonian particle between measurements,
thereby showing that classical ideas and pictures of reality prevail.
This, of course, would deny the distasteful uncertainty principle, making
the proponents of classical physics very happy. The second goal has been to
discover how, what, or when the wave/particles know. But even though
the wave/particles have remained enigmatic, a few telling facts have been
gleaned.