now serious example, Alan Guth’s inflation theory is really at the edge of our
collective human knowledge. This theory predicts the existence of gravitational
waves but they have never been detected with certainty (in spite of a premature
announcement in 2014). A momentous multi-year, multi-team data collection
project set up on the South Pole, can still not decide if gravitational waves exist or
not. The signal could be due only to galactic dust. It remains important to settle this
question for once or for all. Falsification is needed to make true progress.
The main question is now if the process of falsification (whether smoothly
controlled or erratic is not important) is relevant for the interpretation of chemical
phenomena. Is the above analysis of the two examples discussed too simple? Does
the mechanism of falsification apply to theoretical interpretative chemistry? I
believe it does but we should be aware of one more notion. Let us discuss what I
call the non-question, again starting with an example.
How can we come to grips with the particle-wave duality? Is there an experiment
that can decide, for once and for all, if a quantum object is either a particle or a
wave? The textbook answer is no: the quantum object is both. But then we ask why
this question cannot be settled. In fact, there are enough experiments that decide in
favour of a wave, while others decide in favour of a particle. How can this be? A
way out is suggesting that the wave-particle question is a non-question. A
non-question is a question that cannot be settled one way or the other because it
makes a fundamentally wrong assumption. The problem here, however, is that it is
not clear which assumption exactly. But there are several clear examples of
non-questions. One is “what is north of the North Pole?”, another is “What came
first: the chicken of the egg?” The latter cannot be solved because it ignores what
really happened in evolution: a pre-chicken “lays” a pre-egg and so on. As one
moves back in time the distinction between the two becomes problematic and the
question actually dissolves. This chicken-egg “question” is a non-question because
it wrongly assumes that one can project a binary end point of evolution onto the
very beginning of this evolution. Such a false projection is clearer in a typical
child-like question such as “why does a tree not weep if it is chopped down?” Well,
one needs a pretty highly developed nervous system in order to weep, a system that
the tree clearly lacks. Again, this is a simple example, perhaps ludicrous to adults,
but unfortunately spilling over to the world of some adults who believe plants feel
pain.
Of course, one should be open to new initially mysterious phenomena, such as
X-rays killing living cells. Clearly, X-rays do not emerge from the wonderfully
mature edifice of classical mechanics. But one should beware of the non-question.
One can spend a life time thinking about the question of the beginning and end of a
thing until someone shows that this thing is actually circular. This then means that
the wrong image has been projected onto an object, giving rise to a natural and
innocent question, which turns out to be a vicious non-question. Imagine if this
thing is the Universe. One will then have wasted a life time thinking about this
question because it actually turned out to be a non-question. The earlier one spots a
non-question, the earlier one can ask the real question. This transition is a major
2 On Quantum Chemical Topology
47
collective human knowledge. This theory predicts the existence of gravitational
waves but they have never been detected with certainty (in spite of a premature
announcement in 2014). A momentous multi-year, multi-team data collection
project set up on the South Pole, can still not decide if gravitational waves exist or
not. The signal could be due only to galactic dust. It remains important to settle this
question for once or for all. Falsification is needed to make true progress.
The main question is now if the process of falsification (whether smoothly
controlled or erratic is not important) is relevant for the interpretation of chemical
phenomena. Is the above analysis of the two examples discussed too simple? Does
the mechanism of falsification apply to theoretical interpretative chemistry? I
believe it does but we should be aware of one more notion. Let us discuss what I
call the non-question, again starting with an example.
How can we come to grips with the particle-wave duality? Is there an experiment
that can decide, for once and for all, if a quantum object is either a particle or a
wave? The textbook answer is no: the quantum object is both. But then we ask why
this question cannot be settled. In fact, there are enough experiments that decide in
favour of a wave, while others decide in favour of a particle. How can this be? A
way out is suggesting that the wave-particle question is a non-question. A
non-question is a question that cannot be settled one way or the other because it
makes a fundamentally wrong assumption. The problem here, however, is that it is
not clear which assumption exactly. But there are several clear examples of
non-questions. One is “what is north of the North Pole?”, another is “What came
first: the chicken of the egg?” The latter cannot be solved because it ignores what
really happened in evolution: a pre-chicken “lays” a pre-egg and so on. As one
moves back in time the distinction between the two becomes problematic and the
question actually dissolves. This chicken-egg “question” is a non-question because
it wrongly assumes that one can project a binary end point of evolution onto the
very beginning of this evolution. Such a false projection is clearer in a typical
child-like question such as “why does a tree not weep if it is chopped down?” Well,
one needs a pretty highly developed nervous system in order to weep, a system that
the tree clearly lacks. Again, this is a simple example, perhaps ludicrous to adults,
but unfortunately spilling over to the world of some adults who believe plants feel
pain.
Of course, one should be open to new initially mysterious phenomena, such as
X-rays killing living cells. Clearly, X-rays do not emerge from the wonderfully
mature edifice of classical mechanics. But one should beware of the non-question.
One can spend a life time thinking about the question of the beginning and end of a
thing until someone shows that this thing is actually circular. This then means that
the wrong image has been projected onto an object, giving rise to a natural and
innocent question, which turns out to be a vicious non-question. Imagine if this
thing is the Universe. One will then have wasted a life time thinking about this
question because it actually turned out to be a non-question. The earlier one spots a
non-question, the earlier one can ask the real question. This transition is a major
2 On Quantum Chemical Topology
47