This essay should be easier to digest if my paper on Duplication theory (DT) had first been read but even so, some brief description of the salient points and assumptions of the latter are described herein, which make possible for the general gist and direction of the text to be understood. This is done as a preliminary to a second and following paper which is intended to outline implications for the future development of the mind, its operation and artificial intelligence, on the assumption that the central rationale of DT might be validated. The theory (more correctly a hypothesis) was initially intended to define a possible explanation of memory that was based on a system of resonance, as follows.
A particular thought in an individual’s mind (defined as that part of the brain that controls thought and consciousness) is created by a structure of firing neurons and synapses. If at a later time, a similar thought structure is registered in the present, and if it is similar enough, then that will initiate a resonance with actions of the past structure. This connection will have the ability to continue momentarily to duplicate the resulting sequence of that observed and/or experienced in the past. This will enable the later mind to take actions that will increase that individual’s chances of survival which I have assumed was the initial function of memory, as indeed it still is at a basic level.
In short, the workings of one mind at an earlier time can become duplicated later via a system of resonance brought about by quantum entanglement. This resonance can act not only simultaneously through space but also through time provided it occurs in relatively the same location i.e. the mind of one individual in the form of his memory. Quantum entanglement experiments carried over the last couple of decades have now shown convincingly how instant communication between two separate entities is not limited in any way by the speed of light, and there are more recently experiments indicating that there is a non local quantum connection through time as well.
I have shown in earlier papers how current research and experiments on quantum entanglement involve processes which are remarkably similar to those evoked by central argument put up to explain DT (Duplication Theory).
Identical structures, the Uncertainty Principle, Exclusion Principle and the No-cloning Theorem
My initial approach was to devise a possible mechanism for memory when 40 years ago I was astounded to learn there was no authoritative explanation for this ability so crucial in the makeup of human intelligence, and the position is little better today. My initial version was based on the following assumptions and conjectures. It had occurred to me that a single thought had to be generated from a specific structure of firing neurons and synapses in the brain. As a parallel but connected issue I also concluded that due to the fact that all fermions (elementary particles) were in constant motion, other than at absolute zero of temperature, it was impossible to ever be sure of the precise position of any tiny particle. This was due to Heisenberg’s Uncertainty principle, and it occurred to me that when structures were considered, then it would be impossible to ever be sure that one structure had exactly the same shape as another, due to this uncertainty at very small scales.
I learned later that the same conclusion could be made in quantum terms by Pauli’s exclusion principle, and also later still to the 1982 no-cloning theorem of Wootters and Zureck (1982). It occurred to me that that it would be impossible for two identical structures to ever be identical for the same reason that two particles cannot occupy the same space at the same time to achieve perfect penetrability, although the latter instance might seem obvious enough from simple experience and observation.
Singularity States and close approaches
That was my first proposal which to which I was then able to add another observation as follows. I had noticed that there were instances of fascinating phenomena that I described as singularity states, and whenever a new one of these was discovered, science usually made a large step forward. Some major examples of these are as follows: light speed, absolute zero, Planck dimensions of space and time, infinity together with other lesser derivations of such states: super conductivity and fluidity for instance. What was common to all was that a theoretical final state could be approached but could never be achieved, and such instances I described generally as a class which I defined as singularity states.
I also realised that although such singularity states could never be physically achieved, it would be possible for close approaches to be made thereto. But every time this happens it seems that unanticipated and curious side effects are observed which results in the existing laws of nature and physics as we are familiar with them, having to be revised and amended for these novel effects to be accommodated and rationalised. Indeed, whenever a new singularity state is ascertained, challenging existing belief structures, then advances in science and understanding are nearly always brought about thereafter: dark matter for instance might turn out to be such a result. Certainly, special relativity and quantum theory developed resulting from such observations. Electromagnetism and its extraordinary effects were hardly now to exist until Faraday sorted carried out experiments and devised some rules for this new science to lay the foundations of the electronic age, and far more recently it was found that light or electromagnetic radiation was transmitted and then measured and now known to be at a constant and singular velocity of light, which knowledge change science radically over the years.
I then made the assumption that these unanticipated and extraordinary effects occurred only when a close approach was made to any singularity state, and I then wondered if there might be any unregistered side effects made apparent when two similar structures started to become near perfect duplicates of each other to near quantum levels of precision. It did not seem an illogical conclusion and consistent with my hypothesis thus far, and I decided to run with the possibility that the two near duplicate structures would start to resonate across time, and possibly space as well simultaneously although the latter possibility I did not start to consider seriously until a few years ago in 2015 when I started to read as deeply as I could manage about quantum entanglement.
The Trance State, Randomness and Order
The next step in the formulation of the theory was from my observation of the change in ability of anyone whose mind was in trance, either hypnotic or self induced. It was apparent that in trance they were capable of feats of memory, perfect recall and even imagination that was not there when ordinarily conscious. I concluded from observation that a hypnotist would generally start by instructing his subjects to empty their minds, which when under trance they appeared to have been able to do. I made the assumption that the neurons and synapses in the minds of the subjects must be firing randomly, without any degree of structure at all therein. Certainly, most techniques of Eastern mystics to get into a contemplative state involves the attempt to empty the mind, which is very difficult to do when conscious and can take years of training.
Quite some time later when considering singularity states it occurred to me that a cloud of gas molecules in a container would obviously be very much in random motion but that presumably there were degrees of perfection here so that the randomicity would not be absolutely perfect, and this led me to wonder what would happen if a close approach were made to near perfect randomicity: would there start to become apparent curious side effects?
It also occurred to me that if there were two identical vessels with absolutely identical numbers of molecules of the same gas in each, at absolutely identical temperatures and pressures, undisturbed by any other variables, gravitation perhaps, with these molecules all moving in as near perfect random motion as was possible then both quantities of gas would be very close to being identical. In short, the randomicity of both would be the same and the composition of the two separate objects near identical close to a singularity state. The two systems would be highly ordered, which phenomenon was noted and won Ilya Prigogine a Nobel prize in 1977 on chemistry in his work on self organising structures.
Eidetic memory or perfect recall
I recalled the curious behaviour of subjects under trance and their ability to relive through past episodes of their existence and also to have perfect recall. At once it seemed that there might be a connection between near perfect randomicity of the latter’s minds and this ability of perfect recall. I had also read about people who had eidetic memory or photographic memory, and it occurred to me that perhaps such people had some innate ability to blank off their thoughts momentarily into randomicity. If an appropriate prompt from maybe some earlier image perhaps stored physically in a complex memory structure of DNA within the brain, then this might reproduce a sequence of memory flow from an earlier time. This would be especially so if the mind later in time was in trance with instructions for all information via the other senses to be excluded. This would be emphasised even more so if the structure of firing neurons in the present, acting initially in an instigatory role, were very similar or nearly identical to the thought structure of the earlier time. Effectively it would be a phenomenon of similar structures resonating through time, albeit in relatively the same location: the brain of the subject.
To rehearse a crucial point in the development of the rationale, if a specific structure can never be exactly duplicated, then this is yet another singularity state and unattainable. However it would be possible to make very close approaches to a perfect duplicate, and on the assumption that when this occurred it would not be unreasonable to expect the familiar laws of nature would have to be varied, I conjectured that there might be a resonance effect so that the one earlier structure would start to interact with either the other later in time, or simultaneously at a distance. For an explanation of how such resonance might then turn into a specific sequence of eidetic memory, I refer an interested reader to my main thesis paper or website, but it is connected to the second law of thermodynamics and the minimum energy principle.
Thus DT provides an explanation in principle for eidetic memory, and this can be converted to every day working memory by telescoping foreshortened instance of memory sequences together, one leading rapidly to another in the interests of preservation of an individual’s existence rather than running through a whole length of sequence to ascertain what the appropriated response might be to certain circumstances observed and encountered in the external world. This involves the physical storage of instigatory memory structures in the brain, probably similar to DNA molecules, whose existence is reinforced by repetition over time. By using the same rationale, it is also possible to envisage a mechanism for the operation of consciousness and also intuition, albeit only in principle, albeit I would not wish for any reader to take too seriously this spin off implication as a solution to this so famous and perennial hard problem. Nevertheless, it would be pusillanimous not to mention this in passing, and it has always seemed to me that unless there is first a valid explanation for memory, these other problems are unlikely to be resolved. An answer to the operation of memory will be the key.
Holographic images from interference patterns
This assumes that a particular thought is produced and somehow projected from or within the brain by a particular structure of firing neurons. The work of neuro scientist Karl Pribram indicates how the electrochemical currents of the brain will cause interference patterns which would be capable of creating holographic images which were viewed as thought in a way which was not yet defined. I adopted that assumption and demonstrated a mechanism of how such three-dimensional images might be projected from the brain. How such images might be viewed directly by an energy detection principle, I will deal with very briefly in a few paragraphs below although it is described in the longer paper on DT from some years ago with updates.
To explain how information or knowledge is registered, I assume that the interference patterns of the electrochemical circuits connecting the neurons in that part of the brain controlling consciousness will be so ordered and highly structured that they will create holographic images projected from the brain. These bring about the ability of vision and sight as well as the less distinct ability of thought. I see thought as closely related to visual images in three dimensions. From experience, when I am trying to see if various alternative answers to a particular problem might seem to deliver an acceptable answer, my ability to judge in this respect is closer to pictorial images than anything else. It is of course a problem in the analysis of thought that the best example we have is that of the processes of our own individual minds. Scientific instruments and techniques might assist later on but initially subjective experience is the best source of study, albeit requiring complete honesty which is not often that easy when perhaps a preconceived answer is already in mind.
As to how this hologram projected from the brain is viewed, (referred to as a holocept in my papers) especially in the form of sight, far more specific and detailed than the less clear concept of thought, is not easy, although I assume they are similar in principle. But we know from personal experience that vision exists and is registered clearly by each one of us. For me sight is the most vital of all the senses and the one without which thought and intelligence of humanity would not have developed to anywhere near the state that it has today: it is the dominant prime mover in the development of understanding. I have an answer in principle which might be regarded as a stand-in until something more concrete and precise can be provided. This is that the whole nervous system is capable of judging how accurate the hologram in the mind duplicates the external world, whether in the form of its appearance (sight) or its construction (mental understanding and detail).
The basic premise is that as the degree of duplication in the mind of the detail of nature and the external world gains increasing accuracy, so does the degree of understanding and pleasure derived therefrom by the observer. The closer and the more complex the two separate structures become, the more the observing body and incorporated mind register a degree of satisfaction. This is due to a potential for the mass of the components involved in creation of the holographic image to convert to radiation energy which is experienced as aesthetic satisfaction or pleasure. This is hard to describe in a limited space but it has equivalence to the circumstances in the fusion process where two separate particles attempt to occupy the same space (a singularity state). For instance, in the fusion of hydrogen protons into helium molecules, some radiation energy, known as binding energy, is converted from the higher mass of the separated molecules into the lesser mass of the helium.
Mental holographic images of external structures
I speculate that there is an equivalent effect here when the holographic image of the external world in the mind (either thought or visual image) increases in accuracy and complexity, then there is an increasing potential for an equivalent effect to binding energy to be released. This is detected by the observer’s physiognomy when the holocept in his mind is duplicate enough to start approach a singularity state. Since there cannot be two identical structures in the universe at the same time, one of them, in this case the more impermanent form of the mental holocept has an increasing potential to convert a minuscule amount of the mass of its causative components to start to convert to radiation energy, but this never reaches fruition due to the continual motion of the electrochemical currents between the neurons and the resulting motion of the created holographic images.
The reason why two particles (fermions) can never occupy the same space at the same time is due to the uncertainty principle in that if each are in continual motion then it is impossible ever to be sure of their respectively exact locations (effectively a singularity state). However, when close approaches are made, we might reasonably expect from some unfamiliar effects to manifest themselves to be consistent with my arguments posited above. This is indeed what occurs on the fusion process where some of their combined mass to be converted into radiation energy. Again, this rationale is described in more detail in my main paper.
Support from other sources
Biochemist Rupert Sheldrake published his book ‘A new Science of life’ in 1981, which has sold maybe about a million copies since. His conclusions are that information can be passed through time via a process that he calls morphic resonance, and he uses this to explain a number of phenomena within the life sciences which otherwise have no satisfactory answers which he summarises as follows:
“The hypothesis put forward in this book is based on the idea that morphogenetic fields do indeed have measurable physical effects. It proposes that specific morphogenetic fields are responsible for the characteristic form and organisation of systems at all level of complexity, not only in the realm of biology, but also in the realms of chemistry and physics. These fields order the systems with which they are associated by affecting events which, from an energetic point of view, appear to be indeterminate or probabilistic; they impose patterned restrictions on the energetically possible outcomes of physical processes. ………….. This hypothesis is concerned with the repetition of forms and patterns of organisation; the question of the origin of these forms and patterns lies outside its scope. This question can be answered in several different ways, but all of them seem to be equally compatible with the suggested means of repetition.”
Sheldrake’s conclusions are remarkably similar to mine but from a very different viewpoint which I find unlikely to be just coincidence. His work deals with a number of applications of his hypothesis to the life sciences into which I do not delve much at all, deferring to his greater expertise.
Eminent physicist David Bohm’s theory of implicate order proposed that the universe was coherent and predictable as opposed to the established Copenhagen interpretation which hold that events are indeterminate, discontinuous and not predictable when operating at sub quantum levels, not yet accessible with current instrumentation. In the early 1950s one of his students, John Bell, was encouraged to develop a mathematical proof of non locality which has been verified several times in recent decades. In the closing words of his final published work Bohm confirmed:
“Several physicists have already suggested that quantum mechanics and consciousness are closely connected related and that the understanding of the quantum formalism requires that ultimately we bring in consciousness in some role or another….. the intuition that consciousness and quantum theory are in some sense related seems to be a good one…..Our proposals in this regard is that the basic relationship of quantum theory and consciousness is that they have the implicate order in common.”
In 1822 Jean Baptiste Fourier, experimenting with heat flow, discovered there was a mathematical transformation between the frequency and the time domain which much later allowed Paul Dirac, the father of quantum physics to show that a bridge could be made between the spectral and the space time domains. This means that a function of time or a signal can be decomposed into the frequencies that make it up, in a way similar to how a musical chord can be expressed as the frequencies (or pitches) of its constituent notes.
In his later years Bohm worked with neuro scientist Karl Pribram, whose data convinced him that perception and memory follow a holographic Fourier-like transformation process between Bohm’s non local implicate order and the brain’s explicate space-time order. The integrated ideas of Pribram and Bohm present a map and a theory of consciousness that is congruent and coherent with established principles of physics and neurophysiology. This is known as the Pribram-Bohm holoflux theory of consciousness.
Within the last couple of years, I have read accounts of quantum entanglement experiments carried out by Anton Zeilinger of Vienna and others, which show how instant communication between two separate entities is not limited in any way by the speed of light. This work was initiated by the Inequality Theorem published by John Bell in 1964, and it is quite clear that the theory and the experiments require crucially that the source of the generated particles must be random and also that the measurement device or detector at the receiving end must also act completely randomly. I have to say I knew virtually nothing of such research when I first started out with conjectures on DT but it does seem unlikely that the emphasis on randomicity as a vital ingredient in the mechanics of both quantum entanglement and DT seems unlikely to be purely coincidental.
In 2013 physicists at the Hebrew university of Jerusalem carried out experiments to show that they had successfully entangled photons that had never coexisted. Previous attempts involving entanglement swapping had already showed quantum correlation across time but Eli Megedish and his team were the first to show entanglement between photons whose life spans did not overlap at all. This means that entanglement occurs across time and that temporal non locality is possible and exists. This would seem to be a necessary vindication for DT.
Summary Thus far
DT provides an explanation in principle for eidetic memory, and this can be converted to every day working memory by telescoping foreshortened instance of memory sequences together, one leading rapidly to another in the interests of preservation of an individual’s existence rather than running through a whole length of sequence to ascertain what the appropriated response might be to certain circumstances observed and encountered in the external world. This involves the physical storage of instigatory memory structures in the brain, probably similar to DNA molecules, whose existence is reinforced by repletion over time. By using the same rationale, it is also possible to envisage a mechanism for the operation of consciousness and also intuition, albeit only in principle, which seems to me suspiciously simple for this famous hard problem. So much so that I hesitate to refer to the possibility but it would be pusillanimous not to mention this in passing. Besides it has always seemed to me that unless there is first a valid explanation for memory, these other problems are unlikely to be resolved. An answer to the operation of memory will be the key.
DT appears to provide explanations for a number of other unknowns in the life sciences into which I delve very little. This synopsis paper does not deal with another element of DT, which discusses the possibility that light speed is governed by the rate of expansion of the universe which assumption is based in turn on the further assumption that the universe is bounded and finite. The latter assumption is not one which is currently favoured by the professional cosmologists although it is one of the possible shapes of the universe first considered in depth by Alexander Friedmann in 1922 and later by LeMaitre, Robinson and Walker. The experts are still by no means yet decided whether the universe is finite, infinite, flat, positively or negatively curved, with or without a boundary. They are also in a terrible muddle about the composition of dark matter despite decades of debate and experiments, and it would complicate matters if I included a description of this part of DT here.
Furthermore, it offers an alternative view on the way in which electromagnetic action is transferred through space. This will be difficult for most physicists to take seriously when there is already a large body of knowledge amassed on this subject. However, I have to say my rationale is easily reconcilable with the ingenious Absorber theory from 1945 up by Feynman and Wheeler, which resolves the serious problem of EM radiation lacking symmetry travelling only outwards.
DT was originally first conceived (see website) by consideration of the significance of equal or similar intervals in space that comprised the concept of order pattern and structure. This led to the notion that there might be involved a resonance through time effect. Having reached some initial conjectures here, I then considered whether there was any significance in the structure of equal or similar intervals in time, which is the underpinning component of the motion of similar charged particles (electrons) to produce electromagnetic radiation and action at a distance. To repeat, I will not complicate this synopsis paper further but just present as a reinforcing example the simplest form of definition I could present of the two effects, the one being the corollary of the other which was nothing if not aesthetically satisfying.
“Equal intervals in one location -similar structures- tend to duplicate themselves through all time in that one location. Equal intervals in time -similar actions- tend to duplicate themselves through all locations at that one time.”
Anticipated Implications of DT assuming its principles might be validated.
All the above is explained in more detail in earlier papers on DT, five in all to date, the last three having been drafted since mid 2017 after I had read about Bell’s Theorem and Zeilinger’s experimental work. One of the papers does not refer to DT and is on Mach’s principle, inertia and gravitation but is a spin off implication from DT. Having set out a brief description of the rationale behind DT, I now intend to set out in a second part of this paper yet to be drafted, my anticipation of what might result if my conjectures on the operation of memory, and a few other allied phenomena, transpire to be valid in principle. Any amateur bold enough to attempt such a task lays himself open to responses of asperity from academic professionals whose jurisdiction this is.
But, given that the huge accretion of scientific knowledge amassed over the last century has not made much palpable progress in this particular and critical quest, I conclude that some assumptions have been made in our existing belief structure that are misleading, and even an obstruction to a break through. If so, then the solution, when it once materialises, will need to include at least one major departure from the main body of our current understanding of nature. Having said that the considerable funding that is being poured into research on quantum computers is encouraging, given that their operation involves principles of superposition and quantum entanglement. Perhaps an unanticipated spin off effect from this new quantum research will become an invigorating source of material for the philosophers and the life sciences generally.
February 2018, & revised 2020
References
Bell J. S. Review Modern Physics, vol 38, p.47, 1966
Bohm D. Wholeness & the Implicate Order. Routledge Kegan Paul, 1980
Chester A. N. A Physical Theory of Psi based on Similarity Psychoenergetics. Vol. 4. nu. 2, P. 89-111 1981
Fourier J.B.J. Theorie analytique de Chaleur, 1822
Megedish E et al Entanglement swapping between photons that have never coexisted, Physical review letters. May 2013
Heisenberg W, Zeitschrift fur Physik, 1927
Nicolis G. Prigogine, Self Organisation in Nonequilibrium Systems, Wiley-Interscience, New York, 1977
Wheeler, J & Feynman, R. “Interaction with the Absorber as the Mechanism of Radiation,” Reviews of Modern Physics, 17, 157–161 (1945).
Pribram K.M. Languages of the Brain. G. Globus et al: eds. p56. Plenum, New York, 1971
Wootters & Zureck. A single quantum cannot be cloned 1982, Nature 299
W. Pauli, Zeitschrift fur Physik, 1925
Zeilinger A. Dance of the photons: from Einstein to teleportation, 2010