Article  Quantum mechanics works, but it doesn't describe reality (philosophy of physics)

https://iai.tv/articles/quantum-mechanic..._auid=2020

INTRO: Physicists like Sean Carroll argue not only that quantum mechanics is not only a valuable way of interpreting the world, but actually describes reality, and that the central equation of quantum mechanics – the wave function – describes a real object in the world. But philosophers Raoni Arroyo and Jonas R. Becker Arenhart warn that the arguments for wave-function realism are deeply confused.

At best, they show only that the wave function is a useful element inside the theoretical framework of quantum mechanics. But this goes no way whatsoever to showing that this framework should be interpreted as true or that its elements are real. The wavefunction realists are confusing two different levels of debate and lack any justification for their realism. The real question is: does a theory need to be true to be useful? (MORE - details)

At the very least, the wave function does represent some part of our reality, otherwise QM wouldn't work. But whether wave function collapse actually happens is still an open question.

If we are part of reality then we should get to describe it but if we’re not then how can I accept any description of it?

(Jan 9, 2026 07:00 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote: If we are part of reality then we should get to describe it but if we’re not then how can I accept any description of it?

The one that can be described in detail (with more confidence) is the empirical reality that we encounter in an everyday sense. Not a trans-empirical one that is prone to heavy competition or alternative accounts. Niels Bohr (back during the anti-metaphysical era): "There is no quantum world. There is only an abstract quantum physical description. ... It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature." --Spoken at the Como conference, 1927

Mental illness or taking drugs like LSD and psilocybin adequately debunks direct realism -- the belief that what one sees, hears, feels, etc is "out there" rather than "in here".

So there are two "external worlds". The one as experienced, that is a representation produced by the brain and shared by and objectively coordinated with other human brains. And the one of metaphysics, that would be the truly real or ultimate world.

The reasoning that metaphysics depends upon outputs multiple possibilities for its trans-empirical realm, and there's usually no way to cull them down to a sole candidate. For instance, in the context of scientific realism alone, they can't agree on which interpretation of QM is correct or accept slash agree on what either theory of relativity ontologically implies, no matter how many times those institutions of physics are tested and supported by experiments.

And if you turn off your brain (via suicide or getting killed) in order to apprehend which particular concept the non-psychological world of materialism or scientism is instantiated by, what one encounters (according to that very view itself) is an "absence of everything" that offers no enlightenment about the issue (and includes the absence of one's self). Again, it is the brain that produces manifestations and identifies their content and understands them.

So philosophical orientations like instrumentalism -- that regard theories as only useful for prediction and not validating ultimate existence -- fall out of dismissing the relevance of metaphysics. Because the latter can only dabble in multiple ontological possibilities rather than certainty. Instrumentalism and other stripes of anti-realism are intellectually descended from logical positivism, phenomenalism, classic positivism, Berkeley's immaterialism (etc) that originally rejected metaphysical speculation.

Erwin Schrödinger: The world is a construct of our sensations, perceptions, memories. It is convenient to regard it as existing objectively on its own. But it certainly does not become manifest by its mere existence. Its becoming manifest is conditional on very special goings-on in very special parts of this very world, namely on certain events that happen in a brain. That is an inordinately peculiar kind of implication, which prompts the question: What particular properties distinguish these brain processes and enable them to produce the manifestation? Can we guess which material processes have this power, which not? Or simple: What kind of material process is directly associated with consciousness?