Panel: Quantum Theory and Free Will

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A panel discussion recorded at SAND14 with Chris Fields, Henry Stapp and Donald Hoffman.

Quantum theory incorporates two seemingly-contradictory ideas about free will. On the one hand, an observer can choose both the system to measure and the kind of measurement to make; given these choices, the theory predicts a probability distribution over the possible outcomes and nothing more. It is quantum indeterminism. On the other hand, a system that no one is looking at evolves through time according the dynamics that are perfectly deterministic. No one is “looking at” the universe as a whole – all observers are inside the universe by definition – so the time evolution of the whole universe must be perfectly deterministic. This clash between indeterminism and determinism is sharpened by the existence of a strong theorem, the Conway-Kochen “free will theorem,” that says that if human (or any other kind of) observers are assumed to have free will, everything
else in the universe, even electrons, has to be assumed to have free will, too.

Is this conflict real, or might it dissolve on further analysis? This panel will examine some of the strikingly different views advanced by physicists on this question, illuminating the concept and role of entanglement in the process.

#117 Minds Under Siege

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Exploring the complex intersection of collective trauma, political power in Israel/Palestine

Minds Under Siege

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Journalist Naomi Klein and trauma expert Dr. Gabor Maté explored the complex intersection of collective trauma, political power, and memory.

Dr. King’s Last Speech: I’ve Been to the Mountaintop

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"These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression, and out of the wombs of a frail world new systems of justice and equality are being born."

Mind-Brain Consciousness Field

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Between quantum physics and neuroscience, a theory emerges of a mental field we each have, existing in another dimension and behaving in some ways like a black hole

#115 Remembering Nature’s Ways

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A SAND Community gathering on evolved morality, child development, and human flourishing in communities.

Remembering Elisabet Sahtouris

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It's with a heavy heart that we remember frequent SAND speaker and contributor, Elisabet Sahtouris (1936-2024)

Nature’s Way of Raising Children

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All animals share with humans brain structures and processes that give us the capacities for life’s rainbow of experiences: consciousness, thinking, feeling, loving, and dreaming.

Evolved Nest (Foreword)

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The Evolved Nest: Nature’s Way of Raising Children and Creating Connected Communities by Darcia Narvaez, PhD and G

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