Challenges to a Quantum-Theoretic Social Theory
| Published date | 01 September 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0305829818781691 |
| Author | Badredine Arfi |
| Date | 01 September 2018 |
| Subject Matter | Forum: Social Theory Going Quantum-Theoretic? Questions, Alternatives and Challenges |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0305829818781691
Millennium: Journal of
International Studies
2018, Vol. 47(1) 99 –113
© The Author(s) 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/0305829818781691
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Challenges to a Quantum-
Theoretic Social Theory
Badredine Arfi
University of Florida, USA
Keywords
quantum theory, time, will, category theory, social theory
Mots-clés
Théorie quantique, temps, volonté, théorie quantique, théories sociales
Palabras clave
teoría cuántica, tiempo, voluntad, teoría de las categorías, teoría social
A key claim that Alexander Wendt makes in his book Quantum Mind and Social Science:
Unifying Physical and Social Ontology is that he is not using the ‘quantum’ as a meta-
phor. Nor is he drawing analogies either. He argues that he is constructing a quantum
theory of the human subject and social structures through a quantum-theoretic explana-
tion of consciousness undergirded by a panpsychist hypothesis of primitive proto-
consciousness. In this article I show how Wendt’s insistence that he is developing a liter-
ally-speaking quantum-theoretic approach presents him with a number of must-not-
ignore challenges that originate in quantum theory. I specifically discuss three
challenges:
1. the quantum-theoretic challenge to Wendt’s ‘Will’
2. the challenge of background-independence to Wendt’s ‘flat ontology’
3. a challenge posed by what philosophers of physics call ‘the problem of time’ to
Wendt’s notion of time emerging through symmetry breaking.
Corresponding author:
Badredine Arfi, University of Florida, Political Science, 234 Anderson Hall, POB 117325, Gainsville, FL
32611, USA.
Email: barfi@ufl.edu
781691MIL0010.1177/0305829818781691Millennium: Journal of International StudiesAr
research-article2018
Forum: Social Theory Going Quantum-Theoretic? Questions,
Alternatives and Challenges
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