Emergence is the central theme here. If you know how to look for it, you’ll see it everywhere.

Music has the ability to move people, but a single musical note usually does not. Neither do thousands of random musical notes. It is the coherence of the musical notes and the interaction with the listener that makes the music.

Ludwig Boltzmann has given an interesting explanation for the concept of time [1][2]. The short version of his explanation goes as follows: Individual atoms or particles do not know time. A few particles, isolated from the outside world, don’t know time either. Their movements are reversible. Only when there are many particles, in coherence with the universe, time is created. Compare this to a bucket of water that you empty into the sea, and then try to reverse this action by trying to return the exact same water into the bucket. It won’t work, because the course of events has been given a direction. More is different. Time, and the direction of time, are emergent phenomena.

Despite its omnipresence, the concept of emergence is relatively unknown. Books and studies about the subject are hard to find, whether in your library or in scientific publications. For a long time, the subject received little to no attention. Why? Because emergence is hard to grasp by analytical means. But this could change because there is another way: Quantum Information Theory.

Quantum Information Theory stems from quantum mechanics, a field of physics developed at the beginning of the 20th century. Quantum mechanics and Quantum Information Theory require a completely different way of thinking. That’s not easy, but we’ll try to cover its most important features (quirks) in layman’s terms, hoping to foster your curiosity to learn more.

Thinking in terms of information
Many physicists who deal with quantum mechanics and quantum information argue that we must learn to think in terms of information [3] [4] [5]. And with information they do not mean information that you obtain from reading a newspaper, but information as a representative of everything, including matter (particles) and energy. We will briefly discuss this in two steps.

The smallest unit of classical information is the bit. A bit (binary digit) represents one of two possible states like yes or no, up or down, open or closed, on or off and 1 or 0. A good description from (classical) information theory is: Information arises when an event occurs of which it was uncertain beforehand whether it would actually happen. In this sense, everything is (also) information. Biology is information theory. Our body is an information processor. Information is not only contained in the instructions of genes, memory is not only stored in the brain, but in all (parts of) cells. Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist, puts it this way: “If you want to know anything about life, you have to think about information theory” [6]. With this assumption, a new path is taken that affects all fields of science. Information is more fundamental than matter and energy. Matter stems from information. “It from bit”, said John Wheeler [7], theoretical physicist.

From ‘it from bit’ to ‘it from qubit’.
While a classical bit can only represent one of two possible states (​​0 or 1, et cetera), the quantum mechanical qubit, can represent both states at the same time. This is fundamentally different from what we know from the conventional information theory. Today’s computers served as examples for this conventional way of thinking. Our laptops and desktops work with 0’s and 1’s, and go step-by-step. But to comprehend how countless changes can happen together-and-at-the-same-time, understanding of multiple simultaneous states is essential. This redefines information: Information arises when an event occurs of which it was uncertain beforehand what that event would be. We will elaborate on this in Chapter 12.

For a basic understanding of how things work at the quantum level, here are some important properties of quantum particles [8].

• Superposition of a particle means that, for example, its spin (property of an elementary particle) (normally only one possible state) can take on all possible states ​​simultaneously. Only when something is done to measure the spin, will the particle fall back to one state. The superposition is then disrupted, commonly referred to as collapse or superposition.
• Quantum entanglement of two paired elementary particles means that there is a connection between the two, which is independent of the distance between them. When the state of one particle is measured, the state of the other is immediately known, however far apart they are.
• Interference is a phenomenon whereby the wave character of a quantum particle is amplified, weakened or extinguished by another quantum particle.

When a quantum particle has traveled from A to B, it has traveled not only the shortest route between A and B, but all imaginable routes between A and B [9]. According to quantum theory, the location of a quantum particle is undetermined as long as it is not measured. All these wonderful properties do not fit with one-on-one cause-and-effect relationships. They don’t follow step-by-step processes, but make leaps, together-and-at the same time. Remember that our reality is made up of quantum particles, or rather: quantum information.

Quantum indeterminacy
Quantum particles require a brief explanation. Try to let go of the images of demarcated things from our macroscopic world. At the quantum level, a ‘particle’ can best be represented as a field, a function that assigns a value to each point in space. The term ‘particle’ suggests that it is a defined, isolated entity. However, it is questionable whether isolation exists at all. It is possible that the concept of isolation is only a theoretical representation that helps us to think in models. A quantum particle can be regarded as a set of properties (location, momentum, spin, polarization) including probability distributions for the state of these properties. It doesn’t get any more accurate than a probability distribution. Without measurement the state remains undetermined, because it cannot be calculated or derived from anything. To be able to work with quantum particles in a classical way, they are also described as a wave function. Compare this to the collision of two waves of a water surface (an interaction, measurement, observation). The result of this impact will be an amplification, weakening or extinction of the wave. In summary: a quantum particle is no more (and no less) than a ‘set of probabilities’, it is a superposition of several states ​​at the same time.

Having difficulty wrapping your head around quantum mechanics? Don’t worry, you’re in good company. Remember Schrödinger’s cat in the box, which is both dead and alive until the box is opened. Schrödinger, one of the founding fathers of quantum mechanics, came up with this thought experiment to underscore the problematic nature of superposition for macrostates. Although Schrödinger and his peers soon accepted it on a quantum level, his poor cat still spends his days in a box to prove how enigmatic the phenomenon is. Albert Einstein said he couldn’t believe in quantum mechanics, because, in his opinion, physics is incompatible with the idea of ​​“spooky action at a distance.” Einstein was referring to quantum entanglement. And he also stated: “I am convinced that He (God) does not play with dice” [11]. In our day and age, entanglement and superposition are no longer a ‘spooky’ theories. Their existence has been proven by experiments.

The critical opinions of brilliant minds like Einstein and Schrödinger have been of great importance for the development of quantum mechanics. They stimulated diligence in thought and research. But meanwhile, other controversial issues have arisen, fueling new debates. Considering new perspectives requires a critical yet flexible attitude. In some occasions new theories and models can be so shocking that they provoke resistance. This phenomenon is sometimes described with the term paradigm paralysis; the inability or flatout refusal to venture beyond current thinking patterns. The physicist Kelvin, for example, claimed at the end of the 19th century: “There is nothing new to discover in physics now. All that remains are increasingly accurate measurements.” History proved him wrong. At the turn of the century, Max Planck discovered the first quantum phenomena and five years later Albert Einstein published his special theory of relativity. These developments completely overturned the theories that had been valid until then.

Our project is not intended to deal with complex science. We just want to dispel the idea that everything can be explained by using an analytical approach. And when it comes to a theory in which unpredictability plays a role, you don’t have to understand every nook and cranny to be able to work with it. As Richard Feynman, an authority on quantum mechanics, pointed out: “I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics” and “If someone says he understands quantum mechanics, he doesn’t understand it” [13]. For instance, quantum technology can be found in MRI scanners, computers and cell phones. However, the designers of these devices did not fully understand the principles of quantum mechanics. Perhaps it is sufficient to accept that quantum mechanics creates a lot of interesting opportunities that we can use. The solution-focused approach that we discuss in this book is an example of a method in which the conventional cause-and-effect approach is cast aside. A process of feedback (Chapter 19) selects what is useful and what is to be continued. Unsuccessful developments will expire.