Everett's Many Worlds Interpretation Of Quantum Theory Through Systemic Functional Linguistics [4]

Gribbin (1990: 241-2):

Everett carefully explained in his Reviews of Modern Physics paper that the argument that the splitting of the universe into many worlds cannot be real because we have no experience of it doesn't hold water.  All the separate elements of a superposition of states obey the wave equation with complete indifference as to the actuality of other elements, and the total lack of any effect of one branch on another implies that no observer can ever be aware of the splitting process.  Arguing otherwise is like arguing that the earth cannot possibly be in orbit around the sun, because if it were we would feel the motion.  "In both cases," says Everett, "the theory itself predicts that our experience will be what in fact it is."

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, 'all the separate elements of a superposition of states' are the construal of experience as potential meaning only. 

Importantly, the relation between a superposition of states and a wave equation is one of symbolic abstraction (intensive identity: realisation), not "obedience"; a wave equation represents a superposition of states, just as a map represents a landscape.  A superposition of states does not "obey" a wave equation, just as a landscape does not "obey" a map.  This type of metaphor leads to very serious epistemological errors in the physical interpretation of mathematical equations.

(Everett's analogy is invalid, because, whereas the earth, sun and orbits are perceived phenomena that can be theorised, the myriad additional universes in the many–worlds interpretation of quantum physics are not.)