I have previously argued, in this blog, that our universe is derivatively anthropocentric. That is, firstly, that the universe is theocentric in being directly and unqualifiedly determined by the divine will. Secondly, that this divine determination favours the developing flourishing and knowledge of humanity, despite there being nothing in the physical constitution, structure and laws of the universe to explain this privileged continuance of our species. Thus, for example, our understanding of the universe through science is exceptional, yet inexplicable in terms of a scientific understanding of ourselves as physical beings in our local, physical environments. It is as though the universe is harmonised with us, given the depth of our grasp of it, but our privileged position is actually derived from the position of a Creator, rather than any intrinsic relation we bear to the universe.
In this post, I want to provide some further support for this thesis of derivative anthropocentrism by suggesting that it provides a distinctive interpretation of both quantum mechanics and special relativity. I will not try to explain the aspects of quantum mechanics and special relativity to which I refer. Rather, I will simply describe enough to make the proposed position clear. Curious readers can conduct their own research to understand further.
According to quantum mechanics, the states of subatomic particles are indeterminate until measured. For example, the position of an electron in orbit around the nucleus of an atom is regarded as a cloud of more and less probable positions until the position is measured. While it is weird that measurement should play a role in determining that which is being measured, it gets weirder when you measure the state of two particles at once. Those two particles then become entangled, so that when they are measured a second time, there will be a predicable correspondence between their two otherwise probabilistic states. Such entanglement holds even when the particles have been transported great distances apart, meaning that any signal between the particles that could explain the correspondence of their otherwise random states would have to travel faster than the speed of light, thereby contravening a principle of special relativity. This appearance of a deterministic mechanism in otherwise probabilistic systems is both very weird and very reliable.
There are a number of interpretations of these phenomena, none of which is currently amenable to empirical verification and all of them exacting some kind of intuitive cost. The derivatively anthropocentric interpretation is another one of these. However, it has the advantage of offering an interpretation of both quantum mechanics and special relativity. This is not to say that it offers anything like a unified theory of these currently dichotomous areas of physics, dealing divergently with the very small and the very big, respectively. Rather, it provides a common way to think about both, as they presently stand.
So, the thought is that the probability states of quantum-level particles do not describe how the particle exists. Instead, the behaviour of each particle is arbitrary (non-lawlike) except that it stays within the probability range predicted by quantum theory. There is no mechanism to explain these arbitrary behaviours, but they are determined by the same divine will that determines the development in time of the entire universe, big to small. This means that the ability of human observers to make law-like generalisations about the behaviour of quantum systems, and phenomena such as quantum entanglement, are examples of the Deity biasing a probabilistic universe in favour of human intelligibility. We understand the universe, not because it is deterministically ordered, but because God fixes our encounters with an indeterministic universe to comport with our generalisations about it. Thus, our models for understanding the universe are not strictly true across all of spacetime, but they are true of all of our encounters with anything within spacetime, so it is as if the structure of the universe harmonises with the structures of our minds. Hence, it is a derivative anthropocentrism.
Next, to special relativity. When travelling at speeds approaching the speed of light, time slows down in the frame of reference of the traveller relative to the frame of reference of those she leaves behind. So, if one twin travels in a fast rocket away from the other twin, then the travelling twin will be younger than the twin left behind, during the flight, from the perspective of the twin left behind. This is weird, but more importantly, clocks running at comparatively different rates in each frame of reference produce the result that there is no such thing as absolute simultaneity; things cannot be said to be happening at the same time, except from the perspective of one frame of reference or another. As a consequence, it seems that the intuitive view that only the present exists – the past is gone and the future is yet to be – cannot be right. Otherwise, whose present is the actual present when now is only happening relative to your frame of reference?
This problem has led to the popularity of the Minkowski interpretation of special relativity, which treats spacetime as one block of relative frames of reference. It is more complex than a simple block of four-dimensional spacetime, but it seems to imply the same result that the passage of time is illusory. The present is not a privileged moment of the universe that is successively being transformed from what was and into what will be, because each situation has an equal claim on being in the present, relative to its frame of reference. One response to this Minkowski-block view of spacetime is that there can still be a privileged present, resembling a privileged slice or cross-section of the spacetime block. However, the problem with this view is that there is no naturally privileged way to slice the block, so that any such privileged present slice will be arbitrary from the perspective of what can be explained by special relativity (and general relativity and quantum mechanics etc.).
The final response of the derivatively anthropocentric interpretation of special relativity will be, “Bring on the arbitrariness!” As with the determinate behaviour of subatomic particles as per quantum mechanics, the Minkowski-block slice of the present is determined by the Deity so as to best favour the observational perspective of variously positioned human beings. To the extent that this anthropocentric consideration favours no slices, the slice is purely arbitrary within the constraint of the shape of Minkowski spacetime, just as the movement of subatomic particles is arbitrary when not observed, within the constrain of the relevant probability ranges.
Of course, this interpretation does not give the satisfaction of providing elegant physical mechanisms all of the way down. But then, no interpretation currently does that whilst preserving the phenomena. Perhaps, in the future, a more satisfying interpretation of a unified field theory will become available, but the arrival of a more functionally coherent theory, alone, will not guarantee that. In the meantime, the proposed interpretation is as good as any.
Theocentric Posthumanism 