A Fractal / Quantum Query

New Tools for the Study of Psychology

An important book was published at the height of Covid, which may explain why it has had less impact than it otherwise might have. It was aimed at initiating a new paradigm by which the field of transpersonal psychology might gain ground. My take on this work is from the standpoint of a philosopher, theorist, and Substacker, not as a clinical psychologist.

It was a bold attempt by Terry Marks-Tarlow and seventeen hand-picked qualified contributors to set the stage by introducing a new scientific paradigm, one I very much hope to see take root, and out of which might grow a more rigorous scientific psychology. Based in her long-standing fascination with geometry, she titled the book, A Fractal Epistemology for a Scientific Psychology (2020). Fractals were discovered by Benoit Mandelbrot who published his work in 1975. The book Chaos, by James Gleick, is perhaps the best single volume introducing new readers to the concept.

This is not a review of her book. Instead, if I may reposition A Fractal Epistemology as one bookend, I suggest that it needs an opposite supporting bookend. I would put A Fractal Epistemology at one end and propose A Quantum Ontology of a Scientific Psychology at the other. I know. Big words. But they are necessary to capture my point.

The hope and attraction of successfully applying natural science's mathematically-based equations to the inscrutable human psyche is found in their predictive power. If psychology could develop reliable equations as robust as those dominating physics, we would really have something. (Forget for a moment that such equations would very likely and immediately be used to manipulate individual human behavior the way John Nash's "Non Cooperative Games" equations on the smart phone of every Wall Street trader is used to manipulate collective trading behavior.)

Terms: Epistemology studies the nature and limits of knowledge. Ontology studies the nature of being. Now, when psychologists treat their patients or theorize about psychological principles are they fundamentally bringing into play their own stocks of knowledge or their own fullness of being? In my experience, being comes before knowledge; in fact, being animates knowledge. It was precisely because I existed (through no effort of my own) that I was spurred on to find out how and why and what for. Being precedes knowing. Of course, in terms of human experience the two always go together and cannot properly be separated. With this in mind, the question I raise is, when proposing a true paradigm shift, where does one begin? (Sensitive dependence on initial conditions, right?)

For this reason, I recommend that this project take a step back before exploiting hard science paradigms for soft science applications. Examine instead the nature of being as the scientific cornerstone of psychology. After all, cornerstones determine the pattern for what follows, ordering the other interlocking foundation stones, to use a masonic metaphor. If we are convinced that the rigor of hard sciences can supply a meaningful path to rethinking one of our softest sciences then why not begin with the essence of being as physicists understand it: quantum field theory?

Quantum field theorists entertain thoughts of the deepest nature of being. Are there parallels to human thought and behavior?

Here I emphasize again that Marks-Tarlow's goal is to develop a robust new paradigm not just for psychology as a whole, but for transpersonal psychology in particular. Transpersonal psychology takes up aspects of human consciousness the majority of other psychologists are too leery to touch because the elements under study are very difficult to define and measure; they are too idiosyncratic, wistful and don't play by normal spatiotemporal limitations.

Reaching into areas of transpersonal research, the topics are peak experiences, altered states of consciousness, psi, mystic transport, dreams and visions, the expansion of the soul into all things among others. These modes of human experience defy scientific observation, replication and measurement. But deeper sciences such as fractal geometry and quantum theory might provide a theoretical bridge to new vistas on these profoundly meaningful human experiences. Such experiences are more common than we may tend to admit.

So, what of the lessons of quantum theory? Do they approximate the human condition at deeper levels than fractals? Consider, fractals describe infinite self-similar patterns across scales. They offer infinite self-affine boundaries. (Self-replication and boundaries play big roles in psychology, e.g.; the repetition compulsion.) Using these as metaphors for human psychology fertilizes the imagination of the practitioner to see more deeply into the patient than at first. Only, people are not infinite. One's patterns of thought and behavior may be repetitious, but that doesn’t necessarily make them pathological. Besides, after all is said and done, the straight application of fractal geometry to human consciousness almost feels a bit sterile. What can we do?

If we take fractal epistemology as a springboard launching us on a trajectory to what I propose is its sibling, quantum ontology, a more generative paradigm may await us.

Quantum field theory seeks to answer the same question as psychology: what is reality? Psychologists desire the rigor of hard science to legitimize and illuminate the soft. Quantum theory describes existence - being - at the subatomic level. Well, we are all subatomic, right? So, how do waves and fields of quanta define and affect our psyche, our being in the world? I don't know - yet. That's the point of science.

If we gather some really smart transdisciplinary people adept at both the physics of existence and the direct felt meaning of spiritual life they may be able to synthesize or reconcile these two reliable mathematically derived fields of study. Then we may be on to something. Experiments at MIT, using highly focused X-ray beams 70 nanometers wide, have demonstrated the two patterns - fractals at quantum levels - actually joining up. So, if we combine fractal logic with quantum ontology we may - who knows? - generate new psychological insights as well.

References:

Chu, J. (2019.) MIT News.

Gleick, J. (1987). Chaos: Making a New Science. Viking Books.

Marks-Tarlow, T., Shapiro, Y., Wolfe, K.P., Friedman, H. (Editors.) (2020.) A Fractal Epistemology for a Scientific Psychology: Bridging the Personal with the Transpersonal. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Mandelbrot, B. (1977). The Fractal Geometry of Nature.  W. H. Freeman & Co.

Nash, J. (1950). https://library.princeton.edu/sites/g/files/toruqf6021/files/documents/Non-Cooperative_Games_Nash.pdf