The Destruction of Reason in Quantum Mechanics

As Lukács says in his The Destruction of Reason book, "There are no innocent philosophies" [1]. Lukács argued that the rejection of reason in German philosophy paved the way for fascism. He pointed to the 'irrationalist' tradition in German philosophy after Marx which he believed contributed to the ideological foundation of National Socialism.

"In general, irrationalism implies either (in ontology) that the world is devoid of rational structure, meaning, and purpose; or (in epistemology) that reason is inherently defective and incapable of knowing the universe without distortion..." [2]

Perhaps, Heisenberg was influenced by the 'irrationalist' tradition in German philosophy when he said: "The idea of an objective real world whose smallest parts exist objectively in the same sense as stones or trees exist, independently of whether or not we observe them is impossible. The transition from the ‘possible’ to ‘actual’ takes place during the act of observation.”?It is tempting to say "With this, the rejection of reason started in Quantum Mechanics".

Only observable, measurable things have meaning, worrying about unobservable things is pointless. This line of rejection of rational thought eventually evolved into a full-blown Copenhagen interpretation of Quantum Mechanics which, by denying the existence of the quantum world, destroyed Quantum Mechanics as a theory. It effectively sanitized Quantum Mechanics from any ontology. Quantum Mechanics became an algorithm for the calculation of the measurement outcome probabilities.

Schroedinger was concerned with "Why don’t we see a cat in two places at once?" and devised his famous Schroedinger’s cat thought experiment. When the metal gives off radiation, the Geiger counter will register it and drop the hammer, releasing the poison and killing the cat. Giving off radiation is governed by quantum laws so the metal will and will not emit radiation.

This in the end means that the cat will be and will not be alive. And this, as Schroedinger pointed out, is a serious problem.

But, when we open the box, the cat will be dead or alive. So the cat must have been either dead or alive the moment before we opened the box. Yet, many of Schroedinger’s contemporaries denied this “reasonable point”.?

Some claimed that the cat was in a state of both alive and dead until the moment the box was opened and somehow forced into “aliveness” or “deadness” through the action of looking inside the box.

Others believed that talking about what was happening in the box before the box was opened is meaningless since that is not observable.

According to Copenhagen's interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, we constantly transition possibilities into actualities when we observe the outside world.

As Einstein asked Pais, “Do you believe the moon is not there when you are not looking at it?”

The above arguments did not address Schroedinger’s concerns. The concerns were never addressed. His opponents carried the day and the rest of physics moved on with the destruction of reason in Quantum Mechanics.