Bohm: The Implicate Order

[sophiaserpentia]

Bohm's theory about the nature of reality is difficult to properly summarize, because it requires a revolution in one's way of thinking about "things."

It is perhaps easiest to start with the analogy of two rotating glass cylinders, and viscous glycerin between them. This is taken from an introductory essay, David Bohm and the Implicate Order:

In the 1960s Bohm began to take a closer look at the notion of order. One day he saw a device on a television program that immediately fired his imagination. It consisted of two concentric glass cylinders, the space between them being filled with glycerin, a highly viscous fluid. If a droplet of ink is placed in the fluid and the outer cylinder is turned, the droplet is drawn out into a thread that eventually becomes so thin that it disappears from view; the ink particles are enfolded into the glycerin. But if the cylinder is then turned in the opposite direction, the thread-form reappears and rebecomes a droplet; the droplet is unfolded again. Bohm realized that when the ink was diffused through the glycerin it was not in a state of 'disorder' but possessed a hidden, or nonmanifest, order.

In Bohm's view, all the separate objects, entities, structures, and events in the visible or explicate world around us are relatively autonomous, stable, and temporary 'subtotalities' derived from a deeper, implicate order of unbroken wholeness.

Bohm also compares the implicate state to the storage of information on a hologram. Taken from the same essay:

To make a hologram a laser light is split into two beams, one of which is reflected off an object onto a photographic plate where it interferes with the second beam. The complex swirls of the interference pattern recorded on the photographic plate appear meaningless and disordered to the naked eye. But like the ink drop dispersed in the glycerin, the pattern possesses a hidden or enfolded order, for when illuminated with laser light it produces a three-dimensional image of the original object, which can be viewed from any angle. A remarkable feature of a hologram is that if a holographic film is cut into pieces, each piece produces an image of the whole object, though the smaller the piece the hazier the image. Clearly the form and structure of the entire object are encoded within each region of the photographic record.

Bohm suggests that the whole universe can be thought of as a kind of giant, flowing hologram, or holomovement, in which a total order is contained, in some implicit sense, in each region of space and time. The explicate order is a projection from higher dimensional levels of reality, and the apparent stability and solidity of the objects and entities composing it are generated and sustained by a ceaseless process of enfoldment and unfoldment, for subatomic particles are constantly dissolving into the implicate order and then recrystallizing.

To get an idea of the way Bohm saw the relationship between the implicate or enfolded mode of existence, and the explicate or unfolded mode, he utilized again the analogy of the cylinders and glycerin:

Suppose that we first put in a droplet of dye and turn the stirring mechanism n times. We could then place another droplet of dye nearby and stir once again through n turns. We could repeat this process indefinitely, with a long series of droplets, arranged more or less along a line.

Suppose, then, that after thus "enfolding" a large number of droplets, we turn the stirring device in a reverse direction, but so rapidly that the individual droplets are not resolved in perception. Then we will see what appears to be a 'solid' object (e.g. a particle) moving continuously through space. This form of a moving object appears in immediate perception primarily because the eye is not sensitive to concentrations of dye lower than a certain minimum, so that one does not directly see the 'whole movement' of the dye. Rather, such perception relevates a certain aspect. That is to say, it makes this aspect stand out 'in relief' while the rest of the fluid is seen only as a 'grey background' within which the relevated 'object' seems to be moving. (Wholeness and the Implicate Order, p. 191-192)

As for the 'grey background' of "the vacuum of space," Bohm asserts that it is not a vacuum at all, but a vast, whole, enfolded, interconnected field of quantum potential -- akin to the plenum or pregnant potential-wholeness of ancient philosophy. (Compare to the pleroma of Gnostic cosmology.)

Just how pregnant is the plenum? Recall that a quantum particle can also be thought of as a wave-front which stretches out, however thinly, to the entire universe.

If one were to add up the energies of all the 'wave-particle' modes of excitation in any region of space, the result would be infinite, because an infinite number of wavelengths is present. However, there is good reason to suppose that one need not keep on adding the energies corresponding to shorter and shorter wavelengths. There may be a certain shortest possible wavelength, so that the total number of modes of excitation, and therefore the energy, may be finite.

... When this length is estimated it turns out to be about 10^-33 cm. ... If one computes the amount of energy that would be within one cubic centimeter of space, with this shortest possible wavelength, it turns out to be very far beyond the total energy of all the matter in the known universe.

What is implied by this proposal is that what we call empty space contains an immense background of energy, and that matter as we know it is a small, 'quantized' wavelike excitation on top of this background, rather like a tiny ripple on a vast sea. (Wholeness, p. 241-242)

To account for the paradox of non-connectedness first observed by Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen, Bohm suggests (following Bohr) that quantum particles are truly indivisible, and that what appears to our senses as "two separate particles" remains an interconnected whole within the implicate order. Bohm offers another analogy:

Let us begin with a rectangular tank full of water with transparent walls. Suppose further that there are two television cameras, A and B, directed at what is going on in the water as seen through two walls at right angles to each other. Now let the corresponding television images be made visible on screens A and B in another room. What we will see there is a certain relationship between the images appearing on the two screens. For example, on screen A we may see the image of a fish, and on screen B we will see another such image. At any given moment each image will generally look different from the other. Nevertheless, the images will be related, in the sense that when one image is seen to execute certain movements, the other will be seen to execute corresponding movements. (Wholeness, p. 237)

See also:
http://www.qedcorp.com/pcr/pcr/bohm/bohm1.html
http://www.fdavidpeat.com/ideas/implicate.htm
http://www.justpacific.com/bits'n'pieces/bohm~implicateorder.html

Theological notes. I have commented in previous entries that the divine presence feels to me like potential. That seems to be compatible with the Implicate Order and Quantum Potential as described by Bohm.

I have also, following the example of Valentinus and Eckhart, described the divine as residing in a realm of perfect stillness, or comparable in essence to stillness. That does not seem to be incompatible with the Implicate Order, though demonstrating compatability would require some effort.

Some connection with the idea of the Tao seems to be implied as well.

F. David Peat noted that Rupert Sheldrake compared Bohm's conception of the Implicate Order to Platonism. Will have to follow that line of thought to see where it goes.

Comments

[inkyblue2.livejournal.com]

I am beginning to get confused. (Maybe I should just read the book.) Is Bohm specifically setting out to make an untestable claim with his description of an "implicate order," or is he trying to clear up problems of a scientific nature? Up until you presented the part about energies and suchlike (which unfortunately I lack the physics background to evaluate), I thought he was making a purely unfalsifiable conjecture about the metaphysical nature of the universe.

Actually, what worries me is not which type of claim he is making, but that he seems to be mixing the two together and deriving physical claims from metaphysical articles of faith. To me, the most salient feature of an "implicate order" such as he describes in the first three passages is its total inaccessibility to the observer. The problem is not just an empirical difficulty in observing the obscure levels of organization. It's a theoretical impossibility to ever know to what extent what you've seen of "explicate" reality is representative of reality at it's deepest, most "implicate" level. The epistemic barrier between explicate and implicate is by definition uncrossable. One can extend this principle - as I do - to a general mistrust of any supposed language about the "implicate." As someone once told me: you can't eff the ineffable.

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

Bohm's proposal is meant to be purely scientific, not metaphysical, though of course because of its nature it is popular among the metaphysical fringes of science.

I suppose my interjections might be confusing the matter, too; I was excited by the implications of some of what he suggested that mirrored philosophical thoughts of my own. Perhaps I should edit the entry to be more explicit about which parts are mine, and which are strictly related to Bohm's ideas.

Yes, do read the book.

Included in Bohm's proposal is a mathematical elaboration on the nature of implication. An appendix to Chapter 6 outlines in mathematical terms an algebra of implication and explication as a new order of transformation (akin to movement from one set of coordinates in spacetime to another set of coordinates).

[sophiaserpentia.livejournal.com]

I'd have to follow the history a bit more, but I understand that Bell was a student of Bohm's, and that Bell's Interconnectedness Theorem was inspired by Bohm's thoughts on the implicate order and his approach to solving the EPR paradox. So, I think it is safe to say that Bohm was very much interested in testing his ideas.

[anosognosia.livejournal.com]

Bohm's work is theoretical, but not unscientific. To understand this, you have to be aware of the context and history of his theory.

The essence of a theory is some number of axiomatic concepts - presumptions about reality. Working from the starting point of these axioms, a good theory logically concludes some perspective on the issue in question. To be scientific, a theory must include some such conclusions which are testable in observing reality.

There are numerous ways to attack a theory, scientific or not. Following Ockham's Razor, for example, we can suggest that one axiom is superfluous - that it can be discarded completely, and the theory accounts for the pertinent observations just as well. Another method of attack is to suggest an entirely different set of axioms which nonetheless accounts for the observations. Such an attack is the basis of Bohm's work. In this instance, it can be difficult to critically compare competing theories - as it comes down to deciding which set of axioms is most reasonable.

Technically, when we say quantum theory we do not mean precisely one such set of axioms: but rather, a certain set of observations, a certain feature of reality, which is being explained.

The most popular theory in this regard is the Copenhagen Interpretation.

Bohm's theory resulted from the aforementioned logical attack against this model and its other competitors. Insofar as you accept quantum theory to be a scientific enterprise, Bohm's work is, then, scientific.

Central to his attack is that a fundamental axiom of the Copenhagen Interpretation, irreducible lawlessness, is profoundly unacceptable. Thus, he presents us with the problem of trying to explain what the Copenhagen Interpretation explains - but without such a problematic assumption.

Irreducible lawlessness is the assumption that quantum particles behave in a nondeterministic manner simply because that is their nature - that is, there is no underlying reason or mechanism for this lawlessness.

Bohm believes that so assuming an unexplainable feature of reality is not an acceptable manner of determining a scientific theory.

If you agree with that belief, Bohm's theory will probably be persuasive. If you disagree, it probably won't. In either case, it is essentially scientific.

[inkyblue2.livejournal.com]

Thanks. That jives with what I found digging around on Wikipedia just now. I didn't realize that Bohm's context was primarily quantum physics.

:)

[anosognosia.livejournal.com]

Yeah: he actually wrote a classic text (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0486659690/qid=1091568620/sr=1-5/ref=sr_1_5/002-7950132-8833647?v=glance&s=books) on quantum physics from the classical perspective. The development of his thought can be traced from there to an elabortion of the problems (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0415174406/qid=1091568699/sr=1-15/ref=sr_1_15/002-7950132-8833647?v=glance&s=books) in that position, and then to his proposed solution (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/041512185X/qid=1091568841/sr=ka-1/ref=pd_ka_1/002-7950132-8833647).