Quantum spin is so strange that when Pauli first proposed it, he wasn’t believed:

“… the spin of a fundamental particle has the curious feature that its magnitude always has the same value, although the direction of its spin axis can vary…” (Penrose, 1994), p270.

If a particle spins in a rotation plane around an axis (Figure 3.17), that axis must be known to measure its spin. Measuring spin on any other axis doesn’t give the total spin, so if its spin axis unknown, one must measure spin on three perpendicular axes to get the total spin. In contrast, the spin of a quantum entity measured on any axis is always the same, so quantum spin doesn’t work like physical spin.

In this model, detecting a photon’s spin on any axis gives all its spin for the same reason that it gives all its energy. In both cases, a physical event is an all or nothing photon restart that gives all its energy or spin, so this is expected.

Physics measures quantum spin in units of Planck’s constant in radians (Note 1). If Planck’s constant represents the basic unit of energy transfer, as proposed earlier, Planck’s constant in radians will represent the basic unit of angular transfer, or spin, so this is also expected.

Finally, quantum theory lets quantum spin occur in both directions at once, but measuring it gives only one direction, randomly. Just as a photon can go through two slits at the same time but is only observed in one, so it can also spin both ways but is only observed in one. Essentially, the same principle applies to both linear and rotational movement, so a photon can rotate both ways at once just as it goes through both slits at once. The spin direction measured is then random because it depends on server access, again as expected.

Quantum entities that are just points in our space actually vibrate in a quantum space that extends outside it, and these structures spread in angular as well as linear directions to give the observed properties of quantum spin.

Note 1. Quantum spin is defined as Plank’s reduced constant ħ = h/2p (in angular radians).

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Quantum spin is a mathematical construct applied to all elementary particles, including photons and electrons. It is called imaginary because electron particles have no size so there’s nothing to spin. And if it had a size, its edges would be moving faster than light for the observed spin rate, so when current physics says that photons and electrons spin, nothing really spins because they are points with no extent. But in this model, they do vibrate outside our space, so a photon for example is a sine wave structure that can really spin on its movement axis. 

QR3.7.1. The Curious Case of Quantum Spin

QR3.7.2. Quantum Space

QR3.7.3. Polarization

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Super-computers running a million-million cycles a second take millions of seconds (months) to simulate not what a photon does in a million-millionth of a second, but in a million-millionth of that (Wilczek, 2008), p113. Why does it take so much computing to copy what these tiniest bits of the universe do if they have no internal structure? The answer proposed is that a photon isn’t a tiny particle taking one path but a processing wave spreading over many.

How then does light travel? Feynman’s sum over histories method predicts how light goes from A to B by calculating all possible paths, then choosing the one with the least action integral (Feynman et al., 1977) p26-7. It was accepted as a method that works not a theory that is true because particles can’t do that. Like quantum theory, it was a physical impossibility that just happened to predict perfectly.

However if a photon is a processing wave, Feynman’s method works because it really does take all possible paths, and the first to trigger a physical event is where we see it arrive. Light then doesn’t need to know the fastest path in advance because it can take every path and let the instance that arrives first reincarnate it in a physical event. Its path is then the one the photon took, and the restart removes all the other instances, like a magician removing the evidence of how a trick is done after it happens.

The physical law of least action that has puzzled science for centuries is then explained by a quantum effect. A particle can’t know the fastest path to an unknown destination in advance, but a quantum wave can take every path and choose fastest later, just as Feynmann’s method does.

To recap, knowing nothing in advance, the photon wave spreads down every path, and restarts when it reaches a detector, as a processing wave can. What reaches a detector by the fastest route isn’t a single particle that magically knows where to go in advance, but a quantum ensemble that explores every path and disbands when the job is done.

Generalizing this quantum effect gives the quantum law of all action, that for any set of physical possibilities, quantum entities take them all. Feynman’s method is based on this law, for as he said “everything that can happen does happen” (Cox & Forshaw, 2011). A particle must travel from point A to B by one path, but quantum entities take every possible path simultaneously, all of them, before generating a physical event. The same law underlies Gellman’s quantum totalitarian principle, that everything not forbidden is compulsory, because it must happen sooner or later. The physical law of least action is then explained by the quantum law of all action, which applies because every physical event arises from a myriad of quantum events.

The quantum world explores every option to take the best (as a physical event) and ignore the rest, so if this isn’t the best of all possible worlds, it isn’t because nature makes it so. For example, if I set fire to my house, I can’t expect a higher power to save it, and the same applies to our earthly home. Nature provides, but if human beings go against it by killing forests and each other, our best of all possible worlds could be a nightmare.

The quantum law of all action is universal, so it applies to quantum spin as well as light.

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In 1662 Fermat amended Hero’s law that light takes the shortest path to be the path of least time, because when light enters water where it travels slower, it refracts to take the fastest path not the shortest path. In Figure 3.15, light takes the path that bends as it enters water, not the dotted shortest path, because it is faster.

To understand this, suppose the photon is a lifeguard trying to save a drowning swimmer as quickly as possible. The fastest path to the swimmer isn’t the dotted straight line but the solid bent line because the lifeguard can run faster than he swims, so it is better to run further down the beach, then swim a shorter distance. The dotted line is the shortest path but the solid line is the fastest, and that is the path light that takes. But while a lifeguard might know in advance which path is the fastest, how does refracting light know this?

In 1752, Maupertuis generalized further that:

“The quantity of action necessary to cause any change in Nature always is the smallest possible”.

Euler, Leibnitz, Lagrange, Hamilton, and others then developed the mathematics of the law of least action, that nature always does the least work, sparking a furious theological debate on Leibniz’s claim that we live in the best of all possible worlds. Despite Voltaire’s ridicule, how light always finds the path of least action, for any destination, remained a mystery.

For example, light bouncing off the mirror in Figure 3.16 could take any of the dotted paths shown but according to optics, it always takes the solid line fastest path. But as a photon moves forward in time to trace out its path, how does it at each stage know the fastest route? As Feynman said:

“Does it ‘smell’ the neighboring paths to find out if they have more action?” (Feynman et al., 1977), p19-9.

To say that a photon chooses in advance the path of least action is to get causality backwards. That a photon, the simplest of all things, with no known internal mechanism, always finds the fastest path to any destination, for any media combination, any path complexity, any number of alternate paths, and inclusive of relativity, is simply miraculous. The law of least action is a physical law that is no better understood today than it was centuries ago but like all physical laws, it is based on a quantum law.

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He was correct that if light moves as a wave, it should bend round corners as sound waves do, but actually it does. In 1660 Grimaldi found that light does bend but less than sound because its wavelength is shorter. The question is then, how can a spreading wave travel in a straight line?

Detecting photons by screens at different distances confirms this, as the results aren’t a perfect straight line but randomly spread about (Figure 3.14). A physical particle would have to travel in a zigzag path to explain this! When a photon moves, it is most likely to exist in a straight line, but the wave itself spreads in all directions.

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That light always finds the best path to any destination has puzzled thinkers for centuries. Hero of Alexandria observed that light always takes the shortest path but how does it know what that is? It might seem obvious that it is a straight line but how, at each step, does light know what straight is? (Note 1) How light always finds the best path to any destination is still a mystery today.

QR3.6.1. A Wave Moves

QR3.6.2. The Law of Least Action

QR3.6.3. The Law of All Action

Note 1. By relativity, light doesn’t always travel in a straight line, so “straightness” is not self-evident.

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What decides where a photon hits a screen? A photon wave that can potentially hit many screen points always collapses to only one, like a lottery where one result is randomly selected from all the possibilities. Our lotteries give everyone an equal chance but those who buy more tickets get more chances to succeed, and the quantum lottery is the same as screen points where the wave is stronger are more likely to succeed. More precisely, the probability that a photon will hit a point depends on the square of its net wave amplitude. These probabilities add up to one, so it always hits somewhere, but exactly where is a random lottery. Quantum theory then explains two-slit interference as follows:

1. The photon quantum wave spreads through both slits.

2. It then interferes with itself to give a net amplitude at many screen points.

3. This amplitude squared is the photon’s probability to hit each point.

4. Where it actually hits is then randomly chosen from these probabilities.

5. The result is the interference pattern seen.

After the photon wave spreads through both slits, its positive or negative amplitudes combine at the screen to give a net strength, whose square predicts its probability to hit there. Then a random value between zero and one decides where the photon actually hits, regardless of its physical history.

This predicts the interference pattern seen but if quantum waves are imaginary, physicists are like spiritualists who gain knowledge from dead spirits! Real physics requires quantum waves to be real, and processing waves allow this. When a wave of processing overloads many points, they all reboot to request a restart, and the server response will be either:

1. Access. The server accepts the request to restart at that point, so it no longer supports the rest of the wave, which collapses. This then is a physical event at that point, OR,

2. No access. The server doesn’t respond that cycle because it is busy elsewhere, so the point just carries on. This then was a potential physical event that didn’t happen.

The quantum collapse of a photon is then a winner takes all lottery run by its server. When a photon wave overloads many screen points, the one that gets access the server wins the prize of being the photon, and the rest of the wave withers on the grid. And just as in our lotteries, more tickets mean more chance of success, so points that access the server more frequently are more likely to restart it.

In quantum theory, a photon’s probability to hit depends on its wave amplitude squared at each point. Light is a sine wave, so its amplitude squared is its power, which for a processing wave affects server access. Given that the server cancels positive and negative amplitudes, the net power at each point decides the number of instructions needed and hence server access. It follows that points where the wave has more power will access the server more, and so be more likely to restart it. The probabilities to hit of quantum theory are then based on the net amplitude squared because for a processing wave, that decides the server access, so the strange logic of quantum theory makes sense for a processing wave.

To recap, photon instances overload many screen points, but which one actually restarts the wave is to us unknown, i.e. random. Even so, the net wave power at each point that defines server access predicts the probability to restart there, so the two-slit experiment can now be explained as follows:

a. Photon wave instances spread through both slits.

b. Those that reach the same screen point by different paths interfere.

c. The first instance to restart the photon server is where the photon hits.

d. The wave power that defines server access at each point then predicts its hit probability.

The mysteries of Young’s experiment (3.1.3) are now resolved. How can a photon go through two slits but still arrive at one screen point? A particle can’t do this but a processing wave can spread on a network and restart at a point. How can sending one photon at a time through two slits still produce an interference pattern? Again, a particle can’t go through two slits or interfere with itself but a processing wave can. Why then does light come in little photon packets, as Einstein showed? Physical waves don’t come in packets but processing needs a fundamental process and that is a photon. Why doesn’t the photon wave smear over a screen as a wave would? A physical wave doesn’t hit at a point but one process with one server restarts at a point as an all-or-nothing event.

A detector put in one of the two slits only fires half the time, but not because half the photons go through each slit. Every photon always goes through both slits, but each detector only wins the quantum lottery half the time, as the server is attending to other instances the rest of the time. Likewise, detectors in both slits fire equally often, but not because photon particles choose between the slits equally. Again, each photon always takes both slits but it can only restart in one, as decided by a server that attends equally to all its instances. This mechanism now answers questions like:

a. Does one photon go through both slits at once? Yes, photon instances go through both slits.

b. Does it hit the screen at one point? Yes, the whole photon process restarts at one screen point.

c. Did it take a particular path? Yes, the instance that restarted the photon took a specific path.

d. Did it also take all other possible paths? Yes, other instances, now disbanded, took every path.

Table 3.1 below compares Feynman’s summary of quantum mechanics (Feynman et al., 1977), p37-10 with a processing wave model. Both predict the same results but the first is a theory while the second is just a recipe, so what made no sense fifty years ago is now explained by network processing. In the next section, this theory explains another mystery that has baffled scientists for centuries, of how light travels.

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Table 3.1. Quantum mechanics in processing wave terms
Quantum Mechanics	Processing Wave
1. Existence. The probability a quantum entity exists is the absolute square of its complex quantum amplitude value at a point in space	1. Existence. The probability that a processing wave restarts in a physical event depends on server access that varies as the square of its amplitude at a point in space
2. Interference. If a quantum event can occur in two alternate ways, the positive and negative amplitudes combine, i.e. they interfere	2. Interference. If a processing wave reaches a point by alternate paths, the positive and negative amplitudes combine, i.e. they interfere
3. Observation. Observing one path lets the other occur without interference, so the outcome probability is the simple sum of the alternatives, i.e. the interference is lost	3. Observation. Observing a processing wave on one path lets the other occur without interference, so the outcome probability is the simple sum of the alternatives, i.e. the interference is lost

 

If a photon is a spread-out wave, as quantum theory says, how can it arrive at a point? A wave should hit a barrier as a smear but a photon hits a screen as a dot instead. Radio waves are many meters long, so should take time to arrive, even at light speed, but they don’t. If they did, in the delay between a wave front’s first hit and the rest arriving, the tail could hit something else. One photon could then hit twice, but it never does! Physical waves deliver their energy over time and space, but quantum waves deliver all their energy instantly at a point, which is strange. As Walker says:

“How can electromagnetic energy spread out like a wave … still be deposited all in one neat package when the light is absorbed?” (Walker, 2000), p43.

Current physics can’t explain how any wave could arrive instantly at a point:

“After more than seven decades, no one understands how or even whether the collapse of a probability wave really happens.” (Greene, 2004), p119.

Einstein rejected quantum collapse because it implied faster than light travel, for as he argued:

Before the photon hits a screen, its wave function exists at points A or B with some probability but after, it is entirely at point A say not at B. The moment A knows it is the photon, then B knows it isn’t. Now suppose the screen is moved further away, eventually A and B could be in different galaxies, so how can the collapse happen instantly? That two events anywhere in the universe are instantly correlated faster than light contradicts special relativity.

Physical waves can’t collapse instantly but processing can restart in what we call a reboot. For example, when a phone, laptop, or printer reboots, it restarts its processing from scratch. A network node is the same but if it is a client, it will request a processing restart from its server. A reboot then has the following properties:

1. It is irreversible. A reboot can’t be undone because the restart loses all prior processing.

2. It conserves processing. The amount of processing before and after a reboot is the same.

3. It can re-allocate processing. A reboot can allocate the processing involved in new ways.

For example, if you are typing on your phone and it reboots, when it restarts, what you typed before is lost irretrievably unless you saved it because the phone that was letting you type has re-allocated its processing to other tasks. A reboot is then essentially when a processing device restarts from scratch.

A phone will typically reboot itself when it overloads because it ran out of processing while doing something. A network client that has an overload error will do the same, except it will request a processing restart from the server that supports it.

If the quantum network is finite, as proposed here, a network point that overloads will reboot and request a server restart. For example, when a photon wave arrives at screen points that are already fully occupied generating its matter, they will overload and request a server restart. The photon is a wave so many points will reboot at once, all requesting a server restart, but a photon has only one server so only one can succeed. The photon then hits the screen at the point that successfully restarts its server, which to us is random.

In these terms, quantum collapse is a processing wave restart when a network point reboots, and while many screen points can overload, only one can restart the photon. When this happens, instances with no server support just disappear as quantum theory says. Quantum collapse is then the inevitable disbanding of child instances when their parent server begins a new child. The wave collapses as if it never was because its instances have no inherent substance.

Why then doesn’t the reboot point overload again when its processing restarts? The pass-it-on protocol (2.4.4) avoids this, because the point passes on its processing before doing anything else, so the photon that caused the overload has an effect.

To recap, a photon arriving at a screen isn’t a lonely particle heading for one hit point but a wave of many instances, any of which can restart the photon. When a screen blocks this wave, where it restarts depends on which reboot request the server accepts, and that is random for us. Many points may request a restart but only one can succeed, and the first to do so is where the photon hits the screen.

Why then is quantum collapse faster even than light? The speed of light depends on how fast the screen of space passes on the points of a spreading image, but that image can disappear instantly no matter how big it is. For a dot travelling point-to-point across a screen, distance matters, but when a laptop deletes a screen image, every pixel is equidistant. The point-to-point screen speed that defines the speed of light is then irrelevant to the server-client speed, so quantum collapse occurs faster than light because it is a server effect not a client effect.

Physicalism sees quantum collapse as things disappearing, but here they are just client events that didn’t happen. When electrons collide and bounce apart, physicalism sees the same particles before and after, but quantum theory tells another story, that the electrons leaving the collision are actually brand-new creations, fresh off the quantum press. A world of things can just sit there and exist but a world of events must be continually recreated, so matter is constantly annihilated and recreated rather than permanently existing.

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Einstein like Newton expected light particles to follow a fixed path from source to screen, so identical photons shot the same way should hit a screen at the same point, but instead they give a random spread. Quantum theory explains this by saying that where each photon hits the screen is randomly chosen from its possible points. Baffled by this, Einstein concluded that either quantum theory was incomplete or there were hidden physical causes:

“This is the fundamental problem: either quantum mechanics is incomplete and needs to be completed by a theory of hidden quantities, or it is complete and then the collapse of the wave function must be made physically plausible. This dilemma has not been solved until today, but on the contrary has become more and more critical.” (Audretsch, 2004), p73.

This problem, which Einstein raised and Bohr covered up, still haunts physics today. All attempts to find physical variables that explain quantum randomness have failed, as have all attempts to show that quantum theory is incomplete. The problem that quantum theory works perfectly but allows random events with no physical cause then remains to this day.

What then is the resolution? Both theories, that quantum theory is incomplete or that there is physical cause, led nowhere, so the answer must lie elsewhere. Physicalism requires quantum theory to be either physically plausible or false but a processing model lets quantum theory be both true and non-physical, hence it always works despite not being physical. It follows that physics can’t find hidden variables to explain randomness because there are none, and it can’t find a fault in quantum theory because there is none. That quantum events create physical events, as proposed here, then allows randomness to arise from outside the physical domain. 

For example, the laws of Minecraft don’t define where we add a block and the laws of chess don’t define where we move a piece because that is outside their domain. If I turn off a game or tip over a chess board, this action has no cause within the game so it can’t be explained by the laws of the game. The randomness of quantum collapse could then arise from a cause outside the physical domain, and that it is a server restart suggests that this is so.

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According to quantum theory, quantum waves spread until they collapse at a random point in a physical event, but why is that point random, not based on any physical history?

QR3.5.1. Hidden Variables?

QR3.5.2. Quantum Collapse

QR3.5.3. The Quantum Lottery

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