Genesis and Quantum Computing

“In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth – and the earth was without form or shape with darkness over the abyss…” (Genesis)

According to Parmenides (c. 450 BCE), this is Aletheia – Truth: without form, without distinctions, without qualities. This is the state of ‘pure potentiality’ (Aristotle). It is the primal manifestation of God, ‘maker of all things visible and invisible’ (Nicene Creed), ‘without whom nothing that comes to be comes to be’ (Gospel of John)

But it also describes the state of quantum superposition. (Schoedinger) 

Aristotle gave us a model of potentiality (Physics) and Plato gave us a model of forms (Phaedo), but the idea of potentiality per se is woven throughout the Judeo-Christian tradition, especially in Torah and in the Johannine - Pauline corpus.

There is a fine distinction here. God is ‘potentiality’ per se with Trinity as its paradigm. What is potentially is the World…not just the specific world we all know and sometimes love, but all possible worlds (‘cosmic epochs’ – Whitehead) and every possible state-of-affairs within each such world. God is not the World…but God is the potentiality for worlds to be and the potentiality for worlds to be as they are, however that may be.

This is Hugh Everett’s Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics (1957)…on steroids! The known universe consists of at least 10^80 bits of information. Extending Everett’s theory, each bit is in a state of quantum superposition: not 1 or 0, but 1 and 0. 10^160 universes!

Everett assumed that each unique combination of 1’s and 0’s had to constitute a unique universe, but quantum mechanics allows us to achieve the same result within a single universe, as long as that universe and everything in it is in a state of quantum superposition.

Such a Universe functions as a quantum computer where all possible values of every variable co-exist. But why? We inherited a system of logic from Aristotle in which every bit is 1 or 0 – not 1/2, not 1 and 0. It’s called the Law of the Excluded Middle. It’s worked well for us in a wide variety of applications, so why should the Universe behave any differently?

It's a matter of topology. For the purposes of this article at least, all topologies are either ‘orientable’ or ‘non-orientable’. You’re familiar with the orientable. You have a sheet of paper. It has two sides: an obverse side and a reverse side.

Make a mark on the obverse side; you won’t find any mark on the reverse side. Now run your finger along the surface; oops, you’ve fallen off the edge! Sorry about that but that’s orientability for you. You can keep it!

In non-orientable topology a sheet of paper has only one side so any mark is always there, regardless – no hiding; and your finger will never run off the edge. Cool beans! But we don’t live in that sort of universe, do we? Do we?

Fortunately, an orientable universe with at least three spatial dimensions allows us to build a physical model of what a non-orientable world would look like. It’s called a Mobius Strip, and you can create one yourself in about 10 seconds.

First, find a cash register receipt, preferably from CVS or Target (longer is better). Grab onto the two ends. Now twist one end and scotch tape it to the other end. Hello, ‘God’; welcome to my humble universe, you creator of worlds, you!

So now let’s play. If you’ve never played before, prepare to be dazzled. Run your finger along the paper as you did earlier (above). Go on and on and on. You can go on forever. You’ll never fall off. Your two sided strip of paper has become a one sided loop. Amazing!

Now imagine making a virtual mark (like an arrow) anywhere along the strip. Imagine sliding that arrow 360° along the strip until you return to your starting point. What’s happened? Your arrow is still there, but now it’s upside down. So go around another 360° et voila, your arrow has resumed its original orientation. Your loop displays symmetry, but it’s 720° symmetry, not the 360° symmetry you’re used to. Stange world this!

Now let’s go back to your arrow. Place it anywhere on the loop. If it starts out pointing up, then when you’ve gone 360° around the loop it will be pointed down, so over time every spot on the loop is in superposition everywhere: ↑ and ↓ (0 and 1). A Mobius Strip is a quantum computer!

Ok, great fun, but what does this have to do with us. We don’t live in Mobius’ non-orientable space; our universe is orientable, ‘from event horizon to shining event horizon’. Except it isn’t! The observable universe may be orientable, but not the entire universe is observable. 

The event horizon is the limit of the universe we can observe. But as Lewis Carroll realized, there is no reason to believe that the universe ends at its observable limit, especially as bits of the observed universe are slipping across the event horizon every day.

Go back to your Mobius Strip. Take any finite segment of that loop. It’s orientable, even though the loop itself is not. You could say that the non-orientable loop is the overlay of an infinite number of orientable loop-segments. So we may live in a non-orientable universe after all! The observable universe is finite, bounded and orientable, but the Universe per se is likely finite, unbounded (Hawking) and non-orientable. 

But back to Genesis: “God said, let there be light, and there was light (1 and 0)…and God separated the light from the darkness (1 or 0)…Then God said, let there be a dome…to separate…the water below the dome from the water above dome (1 or 0).”

Separating and gathering, in 6 days God built a quantum computer. On the 7th day he rested. Of course he did. Everything was done! All possible values for all possible bits were in place. There was nothing more to do but let it run!  

But we’re still left with a problem. We seem to live in an orientable universe. If the entire Universe is in non-orientable superposition, how is it that regions of Universe (“loop segments”) appear to be orientable?

To understand this we need to look at how local systems in superposition acquire classical values.

Schoedinger’s cat, basking in a sort of suspended animation, acquires its fate only when some outside agency interacts with the experimental apparatus. 

Universe, however, by definition, has no outside agent – unless you wish to invoke God (a la Berkeley). But that is not necessary, at least not at this point. A feature of Universe, indeed a feature of all systems, is that it interacts with itself. Contrary to Bertrand Russell, IRL every ‘real’ set is a subset of itself. I know, “Paradox!” Deal with it (you dealt with Zeno).

That ‘self-assessment’ generates classical values and an orientable topology. In Mobius terms, it creates a ‘loop segment’. How does this process manifest in ‘our’ world? We call it ‘choice’ or ‘action’. Every time an agent makes a choice, exercises free will, the multiplicity of potential values collapses down to a single actual value. 

As Robert Frost noted, every path ‘diverges’ (1 vs. 0). Both paths lead to the same destination (‘Omega Point’) but once a choice is made, that choice becomes irrevocable, effectively annihilating the other option…for that traveler.

As Universe observes and interacts with itself, we experience consciousness and agency (free will). The phenomenon you know as ‘you’ is actually the Universe being aware of itself and acting on itself.

Every action, every choice, however automatic, routine or constrained, is motivated by Value (e.g. Beauty, Truth, Justice). As Nietzsche argued, Value is not part of Universe; it transcends it. So now may be the time to bring God into the picture! God is Good. God is Value and it is Value that underlies choice, that motivates action, that is realized as values.

Absent God, no Value; absent Value, no conscious perception; absent consciousness, no free will; absent free will, no true agency; absent agency, no action; absent action, no events; absent events, no Universe.

So Quantum Mechanics is the secret code that unlocks Genesis and when it does, we are surprised to discover that Genesis may be ‘literally true’ after all.

David Cowles is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aletheia Today Magazine. He lives with his family in Massachusetts where he studies and writes about philosophy, science, theology, and scripture. He can be reached at dtc@gc3incorporated.com

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