TEMPORAL ENTANGLEMENT
So many people saw this story and sent it to me that I have to talk about it. Indeed, if I had seen the story myself, I would have anyway, but in any case thanks to all of you who saw it and shared it, because if you've been following the wild and wacky world of quantum physics, and particularly the very strange phenomena of entanglement and non-locality, then it just became a whole lot weirder, for it seems that non-locality and entanglement are not restricted just to space, but also incorporate time, as I have speculated on this website before, and indeed, as many of the regular readers here - and in the members' vidchats - have as well.
Here's the story:
If You Thought Quantum Mechanics Was Weird, You Need to Check Out Entangled Time
The temporal non-locality experiment was conducted in 2013 by physicists at the University of Jerusalem, and here, as they say, is where "ye olde plotte thickeneth":
Up to today, most experiments have tested entanglement over spatial gaps.
The assumption is that the 'nonlocal' part of quantum nonlocality refers to the entanglement of properties across space. But what if entanglement also occurs across time? Is there such a thing as temporal nonlocality?
The answer, as it turns out, is yes.
Just when you thought quantum mechanics couldn't get any weirder, a team of physicists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem reported in 2013 that they had successfully entangled photons that never coexisted.
Previous experiments involving a technique called 'entanglement swapping' had already showed quantum correlations across time, by delaying the measurement of one of the coexisting entangled particles; but Eli Megidish and his collaborators were the first to show entanglement between photons whose lifespans did not overlap at all.
Here's how they did it.
First, they created an entangled pair of photons, '1-2' (step I in the diagram below). Soon after, they measured the polarisation of photon 1 (a property describing the direction of light's oscillation) – thus 'killing' it (step II).
Photon 2 was sent on a wild goose chase while a new entangled pair, '3-4', was created (step III). Photon 3 was then measured along with the itinerant photon 2 in such a way that the entanglement relation was 'swapped' from the old pairs ('1-2' and '3-4') onto the new '2-3' combo (step IV).
Some time later (step V), the polarisation of the lone survivor, photon 4, is measured, and the results are compared with those of the long-dead photon 1 (back at step II).
The upshot? The data revealed the existence of quantum correlations between 'temporally nonlocal' photons 1 and 4. That is, entanglement can occur across two quantum systems that never coexisted.
What on Earth can this mean? Prima facie, it seems as troubling as saying that the polarity of starlight in the far-distant past – say, greater than twice Earth's lifetime – nevertheless influenced the polarity of starlight falling through your amateur telescope this winter.
Even more bizarrely: maybe it implies that the measurements carried out by your eye upon starlight falling through your telescope this winter somehow dictated the polarity of photons more than 9 billion years old.
...
In both forward and backward directions, quantum correlations span the causal void between the death of one photon and the birth of the other.
...
Temporal nonlocality further complicates this picture: how does one describe an entity whose constituent parts are not even coexistent?
(When I read that last sentence, I couldn't help but think of that strange saying in the Gospel of St. John, "Before Abraham was, I am," but I digress.)
Anyway, thus far, if you've been following that strange work (and world) of Dr. Nikolai Kozyrev in the Soviet Union's black projects community, or for that matter, the strange experiments of future-causation of past events that seems to be indicated by some paranormal psychic research, this won't sound all that unfamiliar. What it does perhaps portend is a quantum basis relationship to consciousness (such as Roger Penrose has posited), and perhaps a way to figure out the bizarre relationship between consciousness and the flow of time. Many of us, I suspect, have had some sort of "strange" experience with time, where it seems to flow faster, or slower, depending on a bizarre set of circumstances and our state of consciousness, such as we experience listening to certain kinds of music, or that momentary glance at a digital clock, when the interval between seconds seems somehow to have momentarily "frozen" and then "stretched".
But before I crawl way out on to (or rather, in today's case, completely off) the twig of high octane speculation, we can all breathe easier, because the "relativity ex machina" is ready to swoop in on its broom and save the day:
Just a spoonful of relativity helps the spookiness go down, though.
In developing his theory of special relativity, Einstein deposed the concept of simultaneity from its Newtonian pedestal.
As a consequence, simultaneity went from being an absolute property to being a relative one. There is no single timekeeper for the Universe; precisely when something is occurring depends on your precise location relative to what you are observing, known as your frame of reference.
So the key to avoiding strange causal behaviour (steering the future or rewriting the past) in instances of temporal separation is to accept that calling events 'simultaneous' carries little metaphysical weight.
It is only a frame-specific property, a choice among many alternative but equally viable ones – a matter of convention, or record-keeping.
Whew! I feel so much better now; order restored, once again thanks to The Great Albert. Oh, but wait...
Einstein showed that no sequence of events can be metaphysically privileged – can be considered more real – than any other. Only by accepting this insight can one make headway on such quantum puzzles.
Hmmm... ok... I don't remember reading that, but I'll go with it, because it certainly seems to be one of the many endless and always helpful discoveries that one can make in relativity theory. But I still don't feel very good about it, because it's that little sentence that has me willing to step off the twig: "Temporal nonlocality further complicates this picture: how does one describe an entity whose constituent parts are not even coexistent?" The implication here is that any merely "ordinary" materialistic metaphysical description breaks down entirely. It's unable to do so, it would seem to me, for the sentence is rather like the old biblical adage about being "in" the world but not "of" it. There's a "something" - and perhaps, dare I say, a "someone" standing outside and underneath (a certain Greek word called hypostasis comes to mind here) that makes that entity of non-coexistent parts possible. Without it, there would seem to be no such thing as "histories" or memories to begin with, and therefore, no need for the observation that "no sequence of events can be metaphysically privileged." (And that also sounds uncomfortably like the Mandela effect to me, but I digress once again...)
Or to put all this high octane off-the-end-speculation-twiggery as "country simple" as can be, perhaps we're reaching the point where physics, in order to make any progress, is going to have to start turning serious attention to personhood, and to individual and group consciousness themselves, in order to find a way through the jungle.
See you on the flip side...
21 Comments
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Great article!
I’ve experienced some very intense and turbulent temporal anomalies similar to what is being discussed here. I’ve also discovered physical/circumstantial evidence of some kind of temporal operations. It’s very real and demonstrable.
If/when it ever comes into the open, atheists and/or scientists are going to have to seriously consider the spiritual, while religious fundamentalists and theologians will have to apply the scientific method to their faith. And everyone is going to have to rethink what they thought was reality.
I suspect that, within our lifetime, the world is going to change in a big way. I fear it will be like opening Pandora’s Box though. I am particularly concerned about 4 billion Christians, Jews, and Muslims.
God help us all.
“…behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.”
Tim Rifat is interfering, and hopefully fighting for the good, or at least against the totally evil ones.
https://www.youtube.com/user/GRIDKEEPER/videos
he has told me everything except what his magic stick is made out of (as of episode 4 Unified magic.)
heck, he might be mad, he might be right, he might be both.
bearing in mind though one makes a choice about what universe/path one wished to take.
my conundrum is how to reconcile the individual as centre of their universe with all the other people/entities/clever rocks assuming I am not just a figment of my own imagination.
I blink , therefore I am not.
Pierre,
who is that guy? Clearly he’s had many years of unlimited funds at his fingertips.
This is in the realm of theoretical physics, right? As in not applied?
If memory serves the vast majority of scientists these days are supposedly surveyed as being agnostic/atheists. Especially in regards to physics. Curiouser and curiouser that the farther into Standard Theory Cosmology one gets the more one is required to take on faith. It feels like these agnostic/atheists are crypto religio-fascists. They’re requiring everyone to drop their own religion (or myth when describing someone else’s religion) and worship at a religion that they refuse to label as a religion.
The problem is we live in an either-or society unable or unwilling to see its both and they are intertwined. And if you divide these ideas you render them false or at best incomplete, it’s mentally running around in circles leading nowhere.
This is so absolutely fascinating. The larger structure of history is usually described within a model of cycles, but if you were to view history through the lens of temporal non locality History suddenly is a very different ballgame. Of course the thought crossed my mind that maybe temporal non locality could be weaponized as well..in what fashion i have no idea. Thanks for the high octane leap!
It is interesting the extent physicists will go to, to avoid (at all costs) mention of spirituality. It is beginning to seem that science, when springing free from religion, may have thrown the baby out with the bath water…
There are many ‘myths’ of people who have become unstuck in time. This is kind of like whole-body temporal-entanglement. Vanish now , wake up then (where then can be forward or back in time). Makes you wonder how many of these science experiments are just fishing in the shallow end of what we could once do (either ourselves, or with ‘reaching down’ of Someone/Something from outside SpaceTime).
Long ago, there was an excellent science fiction short story or novella which kind of bears on the temporal-entanglement dilemma. It seemed like there was a ‘forbidden territory’ which quantum physicists could not venture-into. Every top scientist who contemplated a certain set of equations then vanished, exploded, or had some weird mindset which rendered them ‘gone’. The story concerned how some intrepid ”explorer” contemplated those equations and lived. Gad, I wish I could remember the title of that story. (Or maybe not…)
Must be we’re getting Mandela’d. btw, has anyone seen Dolly’s braces?
Thanks for pointing this out as i’d never heard of the Dollys Braces ‘glitch’ until I read your comment, viewed the clip and am left dumbfounded. Dolly definitely had braces as that’s the whole punch line to the joke what with Jaws having metal teeth. It of course begs the question as to what on earth’s going on??? Mandela effect, PC gone mad or are they simply trying to mess with our memories?!?! Wow.
Yep. First I heard about it was from an off the rails son of a Master Mason selling the idea hard. Kid didn’t know his own dogma well enough. Thought he was being trippy. This latest round of marketing drove me to check out Miles Mathis (thank you again Goshawks). Reading further, of course it was the whole punchline. You can see a credit card ad on yt using the same actor (Adams’ Families’ Lurch I think) and the little girl cashier has braces and that’s the ad’s punchline too. It’s gaslighting alright. Imagine the time and expense they went to, to do it. Sound familiar at all? Remember when Cheney ranted about how no one in his administration ever tried to connect Saddam with 911?
Should like we try every conceivable possibility and observe the outcome. How come?
Sounds not should.
Tempted to say/Of course.
As “our” concept of both space/time is,
well… , warped. Quantum mechanics “appear” so absurd to the classical physics’ being, time & time again.
What it hints/shows is perhaps that 3D is a special model brought into being.
This “appears” to be that in that perennial question paradigm of which came first/the chicken/3D physics or the egg/quantum mechanics?
[back to the post]
WOW! what an entangled recipe!
Like getting two radio stations at once/First depress knees and crack two hard boiled eggs & serve in a warm flannel shirt.
Yet, the results do align w/illusion as a primary element of deception, that is inherent in relations between the real[3D] and the unreal[entanglement]. This then becomes entangled within each others worlds; each taking on characteristics of the other, blending as in the humorous recipe. Nonsensical when mixed in experiments; but, reflective of what happens over [infinite]time/or approaching infinity. And that is the third rail/infinity.
[back to the post]
Yes! Consciousness! That’s what its all about! Of course!
[my enthusiasm is often mistaken for sarcasm/my default mode; but this is genuine, this time]
I was on a cliff surrounded by buzzing-mad hornets/then poof; in a dense forest, and running like mad from them
The conclusion is solid. Unfortunately, consciousness is very specific. And that’s the question I keep running into: the group vs the individual. Therein lies a design that is not “natural”. Something is purposely interfering with both group and/or individual realties.
I hear this sort of secular, pure physical apologetic all the time: “Einstein showed that no sequence of events can be metaphysically privileged – can be considered more real – than any other. Only by accepting this insight can one make headway on such quantum puzzles.” This itself is a faith claim. It’s a doctrinal commitment to a materialistic explanation that expresses total arrogance toward, and disregard of, any theistic interpretation. It presumes everything can be explained by materialistic processes, rendering any theistic commitment unnecessary. Should I take such a faith claim seriously?
As a world-view this attitude is just as incapable of “energizing” scientific inquiry as any theologically based system. The tools of scientific inquiry do not require any commitment to any (theistic, atheistic or agnostic) faith claim in particular to yield successful results. Doctrinal commitments can provide a context for analogy or insight, but these are generally restricted to communicating results in familiar language when utilized by genuine scientists within the faith community. In my humble opinion, science represents a serious inquiry into the exploration of the topological metaphor itself using tools, methods and procedures that require no faith commitments to any sort, and as such, any community is perfectly capable of producing serious results when given the same tools, methods and procedures over time. Thousands of years of scientific inquiry have clearly demonstrated a clear disregard to any commitment to any faith claim as a prerequisite for practicing good science–including the secular one to which our modern Western culture clings with a rheumatic grip. But to presume one is cool by taking back-handed shots at another segment of the scientific community demonstrates it’s own fundamentalist express of eschatological hope and expectations. Such silliness has absolutely no effect with respect to the science. It only miniaturizes the stature of the speaker–and assuages the conflated egos of those living within that pettifogged community. This “observation” adds no thing to the “result” in the conversation.
” The implication here is that any merely “ordinary” materialistic metaphysical description breaks down entirely. It’s unable to do so, it would seem to me, for the sentence is rather like the old biblical adage about being “in” the world but not “of” it. There’s a “something” – and perhaps, dare I say, a “someone” standing outside and underneath (a certain Greek word called hypostasis comes to mind here) that makes that entity of non-coexistent parts possible.”
The above….and the whole post…made me think of Sheldrakes’ ‘Morphic resonance’.
It made me think they’re seeing, from a quantum mechanical perspective, the field that Rupert’s resonance, AND the Kozyrev stuff, works in.
Thanks, Doc!
I believe that Sheldrakes’ morphogenetic field research is classified higher than the Manhattan Project. (I am surprised he is still alive.) Daily, the PTB are using ‘tools’ based around it to dig-deeper the primacy of materialistic reality and whittle-away at ‘supernormal’ being the natural state of humanity. Imagine if youngsters grew-up practicing psychic/spiritual realities. That would get us out of this Matrix…
You’re right. If youngsters understood only that they are a body in a mind, rather than a mind in a body, the battle would be half won.
(Thanks for your kind words about my post below.)
Flesh tents are a loops within protective layers. Remove them, and center of loop becomes “eye in the well”.
Fishing in memory hole, defines non-local temporarily. Using Harry Potter terminology, the Runes are horcruxes.
Closing loop defines center; canonical hours are pyramid; and soul is traveling agent, quintessentially. God.
Surely, if the quantum field is not physical, searching for a physical means of measurement is futile? Spiritual phenomena require spiritual understanding, interpretation and description. Just as we exist simultaneously in the physical plane and in the quantum field, so too the science explaining the phenomena must straddle both?
Well said!