Reality, physicists and philosophers have long assumed, must bottom out somewhere: in particles, fields, consciousness, or some other fundamental layer of being. But philosopher Emma Jaura, who is working on the foundations of quantum mechanics, argues that we should give up this quest for ultimate building blocks, and instead see reality as radically interdependent, where nothing enjoys absolute metaphysical priority, not even the universe as a whole. While this vision cuts sharply against the grain of Western thought, Indian and Chinese philosophy have explored how we might understand reality in this way for centuries. 

In order to understand our reality, we commonly find ourselves focusing on individual phenomena, zooming in on them until their “true nature” is revealed. An alternative approach is to zoom out, and redirect our attention to the connections between the phenomenon and others that surround it. Carlo Rovelli’s relational quantum mechanics (RQM) suggests that we take the latter approach, and paints a picture of reality where we can find a vast web of dependence relations that connect all sorts of unlikely parts of the universe. A striking feature of this picture is that amongst the phenomena connected through dependence, we can find no sign of any part of the universe that is ultimately fundamental.

Nothing is fundamental

It is natural to assume that there is some part of reality that is fundamental. Scientific and philosophical enquiry offer compelling explanations for what “underlies” our everyday experiences. It seems reasonable (and perhaps comforting) to think that the day will come when some phenomenon is uncovered that has nothing underlying it. Chains of explanation will finally come to an end, and the foundational and fundamental building blocks that give rise to all the things we experience will be exposed. Even if this ultimate discovery is never made by humanity, then it is common to think that these “fundamentalia” are still somewhere “out there.”

Whatever is fundamental, whether it be some form of deity or impartite particle, is supremely special. It violates Leibniz’s principle of sufficient reason, which demands some explanation of all existing phenomena in terms of something other. All things depend on it, whilst it depends on nothing. Hence, it is common to characterise fundamentalia in terms of metaphysical independence. Throughout the history of Western philosophy, the existence of some special, independent, fundamental phenomena has gone widely assumed, and under-scrutinized.

___

Any physical system can play the role of an observer, regardless of whether it is a physicist with measuring apparatus, or even a being with consciousness.

___

One thing that philosophers working on quantum physics tend to agree upon, is that the success of quantum theory over the past 100 years strongly suggests that we will need to accept some major metaphysical revisions, of some kind or other. One of the novel revisions that Rovelli’s relational interpretation of quantum mechanics suggests that we must make, or so I argue, is to the existence of some special, independent fundamentalia. A relational interpretation of quantum mechanics comes with a commitment to a relational view of all existent physical phenomena. This view suggests that all things are dependent for their existence and nature on something other than themselves, and as a result, nothing can exist completely independently. There is nothing ultimately fundamental.

This alternative to the typical picture can be called anti-foundationalism. The particular flavour of anti-foundationalism that results from a relational interpretation of quantum mechanics is one where a vast web of dependence relations connects phenomena, and structure reality.

Everything is relational