The ‘Bohmian’ Interpretation Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Penrose (2004: 789):

In the ‘Bohmian’ (pilot wave) case, the ontological position is, refreshingly, much more down to Earth, although even here there are some considerable subtleties — for there are, in a sense, two levels of reality, one of which is firmer than the other. It is simplest to put the case first for a system consisting of just a single spinless particle. Then this firmer level of reality is given by the particle’s actual position. In a two-slit experiment, since the particle’s location is ontologically real, it actually goes through one slit or it goes through the other, but its motion is ‘guided’, in effect, by ψ, so this provides a secondary, but nevertheless ontologically still ‘real’ status to the ψ also. … the picture is a very non-local one, where ψ is a highly ‘holistic’ entity (as it must be, in order to accord with the holistic nature of wavefunctions … ).

 

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the two levels of reality in the 'Bohmian' interpretation correspond to potential (meaning) and actual (meaning), with the secondary reality of the holistic 'guiding' wavefunction corresponding to probabilistic potential of the quantum system, as a whole, and the 'firmer' level of reality corresponding to actual instances of potential, such as a particle actually passing through one slit or the other.