February 8, :5 World Scientific Book - 9in x 6in bk. Contents. Part I. The Nature of Physical Law 1

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1 Preface vii Part I. The Nature of Physical Law 1 1. A Bird s Eye View of our Quest Duality, plurality, and reality Contextuality, non-locality and de-coherence The standard model of matter according to physics Atoms, nuclei, quarks and quantum fields Scales of energy and length Hierarchical structure in logic, language and life The direct approach and its modern critics The reductionist approach and its alternatives Evolution, and human questions Evolution as a physical process Existential and social questions Exorcising the soul and inducting new notions An Epistemic Hunt for Scientific Truth The fundamental questions The morality debate science as a vocation Belief, probability and doubt Scientific knowledge and model construction Induction Using data to model, verify or refute a theory Verification, assimilation and falsification ix

2 x A Physicist s View of Matter and Mind Isaac Newton and the Copernican revolution Neural-networks for modeling natural phenomena Searle s Chinese room and child s play Description, complexity and quantifiability Simplicity as a desirable attribute of a theory Definition of holistic systems and complexity Normal modes of a holism Reduction of a holism, and external interactions Measuring complexity Energy scales, length scales, and complexity Paradigms and scientific revolutions Scientific revolutions and their genesis Cross sections of reality Plato s cave, shadows and their explanations Attempts to discuss scientific method The scientific revolution in high-energy physics A mini-revolution in condensed-matter physics Scientific method viewed as a simulation The cognitive conundrum Leaping over energy, length and time scales The Laws of Nature and the Supremacy of Symmetry A grand-stand view of the laws of nature What do we mean by symmetry? Crystal defects and information clay crystals Coordinate transformations and Galilean symmetries Before Galileo and Newton Modern critics of Galileo Subatomic symmetry The principle of least action and the simplicity of nature How does a particle know the best path? The local texture of the world and the simplicity of nature The worm s eye view The Euler-Lagrange equations The inverse square laws The unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics Maxwell s Magical Trinity Electricity, Magnetism and Light Electricity and magnetism

3 xi 4.2 The equation of continuity The gauge principle Maxwell s equations and the ether (aether) The Aharanov-Bohm effect The four-dimensional structure of Maxwell s equations The Michelson-Morley experiment Lorentz, Fitzgerald, Poincaré and the dawn of relativity The Theory of Relativity The historical context Special relativity Einstein s two postulates Marrying space and time to get spacetime General relativity Black-holes, white dwarfs and neutron stars The metric of spacetime Specifying the curvature of spacetime Einstein s equations of general relativity The Friedmann-Robertson-Walker equations The cosmological constant The Inflationary Universe M-branes and cosmology The paradoxes of relativity Paradoxes involving the size of fast-moving objects The Andromeda-attack paradox The clock paradox or the traveling-twin paradox Our quotidian sense of space and time Physics and our innate notion of time The Quantum World and Reality Innate reality and deduced reality Quantum reality as a prepared reality The probability weight function A new ball game: amplitudes and probabilities Leggett s views regarding quantum reality Copenhagen school and hidden variables Bohm s causal quantum dynamics The intuitive ontology of the working physicist Quantum particles and wave fields

4 xii A Physicist s View of Matter and Mind Electrons as quantum particles Light waves and quantum particles Polaritons as detectable photons The wave nature of particles Schrödinger s equation for a trapped particle Harmonic wells, zero-point energy, and tunneling Is the wavefunction a real physical object? The uncertainty principle and particle trajectories The Planck scales of length and time Heisenberg Operators and state vectors Bohm s interpretation of the Schrödinger equation Bohm s quantum potential Bohm s picture of a particle trapped in a well Feynman-path formulation of quantum mechanics Quantum mechanics as a theory about information Relativistic quantum mechanics Klein-Gordon equation Dirac equation Vacuum fluctuations and the Lamb shift Wavefunction of the universe Entanglement, Measurement and Quantum Paradoxes Introduction Superposition and interference Qubits, qbits or quantum binary states Double quantum wells and hydrogen bonds Entangled states The chemical bond, an ubiquitous entangled pair LCAO approaches to chemical bonding Entangling atoms and field modes Entangled photons Pure states and mixed states Quantum computers Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen objections to entanglement The Bell inequalities and quantum correlations Violation of CHSH bounds by entangled photons The collapse of the wavefunction and measurement Measurement as a sampling process Weak measurement and post selection

5 xiii Decoherence of correlations in quantum systems Decoherence by localization or quantum gravity Quantum muddles Sir Karl Popper and the Quantum Muddle Mindful universes and entangled brains Quantum paradoxes Einstein s clock-photon paradox The EPR paradox Schrödinger s cat paradox How does one know if the cat is dead? Wheeler s delayed-choice paradox The quantum Zeno (Watchdog) paradox Many Particle Systems and the Classical Limit The real world of many-particle systems Many-electron systems The jellium model Non-interacting electrons Density functional theory The Kohn-Sham method for quantum systems Classical maps for quantum systems Quantum electron distributions from classical methods The quantum to classical transition and decoherence GRW spontaneous localization theory Emergence of indeterminism in complex systems Conclusion Energy, Entropy and Emergent Properties Thermodynamics The laws of thermodynamics Statistical mechanics Ergodicity and mixing Ensembles as the bridge to macroscopic properties Thermodynamic properties and particle-correlations Entropy and statistical mechanics Entropy and information Non-equilibrium thermodynamics? Quantum mechanics and irreversibility

6 xiv A Physicist s View of Matter and Mind 9.3 Dynamic response of a many-particle system Emergent modes of many-particle systems Phase transitions Paradoxes proposed within statistical physics Gibbs paradox Determinism and the demon of Laplace Loschmidt s reversibility paradox Maxwell s demon The paradox of spontaneous ordering in nature Bibliography 343 Part II. Complex Systems and Consciouness Bio-Molecules, the Sub-Slime of Astrochemistry Introduction Chemical elements and molecules in the cosmos Envisioning the early Earth A hydrogen-rich atmosphere for the early Earth The formation of prebiotic molecules Prebiotics from extra-terrestrial sources Prebiotics from electric discharges and photolysis Hydrothermal vents and geological sources Conclusion The Cell as the Basic Unit of Life The nature of cells The main purpose of the cell Exchange between the cell and the environment Generating energy from nutrients Harvesting the sun photosynthesis Reproduction and replication cell division The awareness of the primitive living cell Sensitivity of the cell to its environment The cell as a computer Simulations of life Specialized Cells for Sight, Insight, and Information 403

7 xv 12.1 Adaptation and survival Multicellular specialization Cells adapted for vision Visual perception Neurons: Nature s telecom units Communication among neurons Molecular mechanisms of memory Habituation and sensitization Classical conditioning Declarative memory Neurons and information processing Types of memory and types of consciousness Bit capacity of the brain and the genome Exotic, Quantum Explanations of Consciousness Do we need exotic explanations? Pan-consciousness or pan-psychism Conventional quantum theory in living systems The Penrose-Hameroff Orch-OR model Fröhlich s model of long-range coherence Free will and attempts at quantum explanations Conclusion Addressing the Enigmatic Questions The awareness of self, and of others Why consciousness? Constructing the subjective external world The binding problem Causality and free will Free will as a subdynamical concept Self interest Personality Behaviour and guilt Biology, egalitarianism and democracy Happiness and suffering Bibliography 483 Index 489

PRINCIPLES OF PHYSICS. \Hp. Ni Jun TSINGHUA. Physics. From Quantum Field Theory. to Classical Mechanics. World Scientific. Vol.2. Report and Review in

$PRINCIPLES OF PHYSICS. \Hp. Ni Jun TSINGHUA. Physics. From Quantum Field Theory. to Classical Mechanics. World Scientific. Vol.2. Report and Review in$ LONDON BEIJING HONG TSINGHUA Report and Review in Physics Vol2 PRINCIPLES OF PHYSICS From Quantum Field Theory to Classical Mechanics Ni Jun Tsinghua University, China NEW JERSEY \Hp SINGAPORE World Scientific