A friend of mine recently wrote, “Never has it become more apparent that you can be standing next to another person and be existing in two completely alternate realities.”
Those of us nodding our heads in recognition of the reality of this statement may wonder whether we might be literally living in different worlds. Are some groups of people seeing completely different facts and information? How can we best navigate this time when facts and scientific studies can often be found to support opposing sides of various issues? Sometimes, the facts and data can appear to be 100% contradictory, with one person saying yes, something is absolutely good, and another person saying no.
Why are We so Divided in our Beliefs?
Ross Pittman, founder and editor in chief of Conscious Life News recently wrote to me:
I'm hoping you can answer a question that has been bugging me for the longest time regarding our “fractured times.” Why are we so divided on our beliefs? … You've written and made a video about (there being) NO OBJECTIVE REALITY. Is it possible that both sides experience the reality they believe is true? That is, their truth is THE truth for them. I would love your thoughts on this.
This topic runs far deeper than meets the eye, and deserves closer examination. From my more than twenty years researching and reporting on reality shifts, quantum jumps, and the Mandela Effect, I naturally recognize the possibility that just as we might remember past events differently from friends or family members who were standing right next to us at those times, we also might literally be seeking–and finding–completely different, yet equally scientifically valid facts.
Certainty is a False Friend
Peter Lee opens his book, “Truth Wars” with the statement: “Certainty is a false friend in the quest for truth.” [1] While we often unconsciously associate the concept of truth with certainty, this statement makes sense from a quantum physics perspective (such as Werner Heisenberg's uncertainty principle). And even before this new Quantum Age began, the western concept of the scientific method incorporates the concept of constantly seeking truth via ever-evolving scientific models. Ideally, scientists do not ever rest on laurels of success, but rather engage in the higher calling and pursuit of genuine knowledge, based on reproducible scientific studies.
Disinformation in the Post-Truth Era
The idea of disinformation has been around for quite a long time–so the observation of seemingly huge dichotomies between ideas of truth is nothing new. Typically, when the topic of disinformation comes up, it's associated with terms like ‘alternate facts,' denial, and post-truth. Author Lee McIntyre invites us to ponder how we've ended up in a “post-truth era, where ‘alternative facts' replace actual facts, and feelings have more weight than evidence.” McIntyre points out that the term “post-truth” can be traced back to the 1990s, when it first appeared in a political story in a magazine. Peter Lee states toward the beginning of his book, “Truth Wars”:
We live in an age of crisis. There are many types of crisis, of course, but the three that serve as the focus for this book–climate change, military intervention and financial crisis–are widely claimed to be global in scale and potentially apocalyptic in severity. These crises all have one thing in common: they each provide political leaders with the incentive and justification to increasingly govern the lives of millions, even billions, of people through the enactment of policy and the allocation, or withdrawal, of resources. They add a new dimension to Harold Lasswell's famous aphorism that politics is about who gets what, when, and how, because such decisions are based on specific truth claims and the policy priorities that emerge from them. [2]
Lee McIntyre, author of “Post Truth” provides us with further insights into these classical views of this topic, in his description of some fundamental roots of post-truth:
“I think that the main root of post-truth is science denial. This started in the 1950s with cigarette companies going into panic mode when scientists were about to publish a study that showed a link between cigarette smoking and cancer. They decided to “fight the science.” They hired their own experts, did bogus studies, bought full-page ads in newspapers, and got the word out that “no conclusive link between cigarette smoking and cancer has been established.” Well that’s actually true because—due to the problems with inductive reasoning—no conclusive causal relationship has ever been shown between ANY two things. What this did, though, was create doubt in the mind of the general public, and that was the point. The cigarette companies rode this wave of doubt for the next 40 years as they sold cigarettes. And the blueprint for this sort of science denial was then used for other science denial campaigns against acid rain, the ozone hole, evolution by natural selection, the Strategic Defense Initiative, and climate change. Without all that, I don’t think post-truth would have been successful. People learned to doubt facts and truth in general because they started with doubting scientific facts and truth about science. Add to this cognitive bias, the decline of traditional media, the rise of social media, and a dash of postmodernism, and you had a perfect environment for post-truth.” [3]
These factors are certainly concerning on a number of levels, yet we still haven't gotten to the true core of the way we might sometimes be witnessing parallel realities right in front of us, in this environment where some groups are operating with completely different values, perspectives, and agendas.
What if there is no such thing as Objective Reality?
There is something going on with respect to news that a recent Physics Experiment Challenges Objective Reality–which I feel deserved to be the biggest news story of 2019. These scientific experimental results suggest there may be no such thing as objective reality, at least in the way that western collective consciousness typically presumes this foundational idea. Yes we can (and do) find what we are seeking. And yes, this does mean that we sometimes seem to be living in different worlds.
When I think of the way quantum physics disrupts many common assumptions–including scientific assumptions–the first thing that comes to my mind is the title of a wonderful paper published in 2015 in Contemporary Physics by physicists David Jennings and Matthew Leifer, No Return to Classical Reality. Jennings and Leifer audaciously start their paper with the fighting words,
“At a fundamental level, the classical picture of the world is dead, and has been dead now for almost a century.” [4]
This seemingly brash statement is fully backed by demonstrating that there exist fundamental phenomena of quantum theory that cannot be understood in classical terms. And as the authors state,
“We now have a range of precise statements showing that whatever the ultimate laws of Nature are, they cannot be classical.”
I've touched on this topic before, and written about it in my 2015 paper, Primacy of Quantum Logic in the Natural World. [5] Support can be found for the primacy of quantum logic in the natural world in the cognitive sciences, where recent research studies recognize quantum logic in studies of: the subconscious, decisions involving unknown interconnected variables, memory, and question sequencing.
So if Nature follows quantum, not classical, laws–what are the implications for us in daily life?
The Wigner's Friend Paradox
One of the many perplexing aspects of quantum physics is something known as the “Wigner's Friend” idea, in which one person conducts an experiment, and a second person observes the first person. While it may seem clear from contemplating this thought experiment that we may not be able to adopt other peoples' observations as being equally valid to our own, what's recently rocked the quantum physics research world is that scientists in Austria and Canada have proved that not only can we not expect our observations to match someone else's–we can't even trust our own observations from the past.
This recent Popular Mechanics article demonstrates that news of the published quantum physics experimental results by Proietti and team in 2019 is a story that is not going away anytime soon: It's impossible to tell if this story exists, according to quantum physics. If anything, this is one of those experiments that will more likely continue to grow in significance, as scientists grasp the full implication of what has been demonstrated.
New Thinking Required in this new Quantum Age
We tend to see what we were looking for–even what we were unconsciously seeking. The so-called “confirmation bias” can be seen to have its roots at the core of quantum physics, where it is better known as the Observer Effect. If we take the ideas from quantum physics seriously as impacting every level of reality, and not purely “the quantum realm,” then we should expect to witness even the most bizarre quantum behaviors in our daily lives. These would include quantum entanglement, which Albert Einstein referred to as “spooky action at a distance;” as well as quantum tunneling; superposition of states; delayed choice (where future decisions influence the past); and quantum teleportation.
Now that we see there may be fundamental underlying qualities to the Cosmos by which elements of quantum physics could be driving the Truth Wars, most of us at this point are saying, “But we don't want Truth Wars! What can we do to create a stable sense of peace? The key to finding optimal outcomes and ‘end games' lies in envisioning and focusing our attention and energy on potential possibilities that have more to do with what we are grateful for, rather than what we are anxious, angry, or despairing about. If we insist on focusing our attention on those who disagree with our views of historical facts and scientific findings, or on proving that we can find better facts and findings than those we disagree with, there is high likelihood that Truth Wars will persist. Now that we are entering this new Quantum Age, we'll thrive best when adopting a Quantum Age mindset, as described in my book, Quantum Jumps:
What’s most amazing to me about the Quantum Age isn’t so much about the quantum computers as how radically our concept of rational thinking is about to change. The seemingly simple transition from bits to qubits takes us from our westernized binary view of True-False logic into a wild and woolly realm of True, True-and-False, Not-True-Not-False, and False. We’re entering a weird, wonderful world of possibilities in which we’ll discover that just because we think something is a certain way doesn’t mean it will stay that way, or that others will experience it that way. Our legal systems will be transformed, and historians, psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists and biologists will recognize alternate histories as being a natural part of existence. Medical professionals will learn to view spontaneous remission as a naturally occurring process, and will encourage people to adopt states of mind that facilitate quantum jumps in healing. Our views of unbiased observers and impartial judges will be forever changed as we appreciate how information can travel anywhere instantaneously, and how everyone and everything is interconnected. The Quantum Age invites us to radically transform our view of who we are and how we work, play, love, and heal in our everyday lives. [6]
Tired of the Truth Wars?
Let's Thrive in Uncertain Times
with Gratitude and Kindness
At this time, humanity needs to care more for one another, regardless of seeming divisions, remembering that each of us can shift to a positive perspective. We need to care more for others than we have before. We need to step up to the challenges of living through uncertain times with kindness and love, as we've been taught by perennial wisdom teachings across all continents and in all religious. We can rise above most any circumstances, through the power of observation. We can choose Revhumanism in apocalyptic times. And of course one of my favorite ways to get and stay focused on optimal outcomes, is to ask my favorite question:
“How good can it get?”
[1] Lee, Peter. Truth wars: the politics of climate change, military intervention and financial crisis. Springer, 2016.
[2] “The Uncertainty Principle,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 12 Jul 2016 revision. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-uncertainty/
[3] McIntyre, Lee. Post-truth. MIt Press, 2018.
[4] Jennings, David, and Matthew Leifer. “No return to classical reality.” Contemporary Physics 57, no. 1 (2016): 60-82.
[5] Larson, Cynthia Sue. “Primacy of quantum logic in the natural world.” Cosmos and History: The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy 11, no. 2 (2015): 326-340.
[6] Larson, Cynthia. Quantum Jumps: An Extraordinary Science of Happiness and Prosperity. 2013.
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You can watch the companion video to this blog here:
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Cynthia Sue Larson is the best-selling author of six books, including Quantum Jumps. Cynthia has a degree in physics from UC Berkeley, an MBA degree, a Doctor of Divinity, and a second degree black belt in Kuk Sool Won. Cynthia is the founder of RealityShifters, and is president of the International Mandela Effect Conference. Cynthia hosts “Living the Quantum Dream” on the DreamVisions7 radio network, and has been featured in numerous shows including Gaia, the History Channel, Coast to Coast AM, One World with Deepak Chopra, and BBC. Cynthia reminds us to ask in every situation, “How good can it get?” Subscribe to her free monthly ezine at:
