Quantum Suicide: Walter Benjamin and the multiverse

平行宇宙是小说中常见的主题。从菲利普·普尔曼（Philip Pullman）到《神秘博士》（Doctor Who），各个年龄段的读者和观众都已经习惯了与我们自己的世界几乎相似，但又截然不同的其他世界。这通常以“交替历史”的形式出现，在这种情况下，一个特定的事件被想象成不同的发展，创造了一个新的时间线。这种想法不仅出现在奇幻和科幻小说中，也出现在主流小说和电影中，比如菲利普·罗斯的《反美阴谋》和电影《滑动门》。现代科学似乎提供了这些世界确实存在的证据。包括保罗·戴维斯和加来道雄在内的物理学家都出版了畅销书，书中描述了量子力学和超弦理论如何暗示我们可观测到的宇宙只是一个更丰富的“多元宇宙”的一小部分，在这个宇宙中，所有的可能性都变成了现实。宇宙学家Max Tegmark讨论了“量子自杀”，这是著名的Schrödinger猫思想实验的一个版本，在这个实验中实验者代替了动物。由于一个人的死亡永远无法被观察到，因此有人认为，唯一可能的结果是一个人生存的宇宙。这样的猜测听起来像是豪尔赫·路易斯·博尔赫斯或菲利普·K·迪克的故事情节。是科学影响了艺术，还是艺术影响了科学？本研究将透过构思小说来探讨多元现实的历史与哲学。令人惊讶的是，平行世界的概念是在19世纪路易斯-奥古斯特·布朗基（Louis-Auguste Blanqui）的《永恒之星》（L'Eternite par les astres, 1872）中提出的。布朗基用原子元素理论来论证一定有行星，比如拿破仑在那里赢得了滑铁卢战役。作为一名共产主义者，布朗基一生中大部分时间都因革命阴谋而在监狱中度过，他还对自己自由的世界进行了推测。物理学家完全忽视了布朗基的伪科学工作，但由于沃尔特·本雅明（Walter Benjamin）在20世纪30年代重新发现了它，人们才记住了它。本雅明认为布朗基的宇宙论是他所反对的资产阶级社会的表现。资本主义视世界为赌场；多元宇宙是一个“幻影”，每个人都可以成为赢家。在当今物理学家（如斯蒂芬·霍金）的流行著作中，赌博和获胜的隐喻经常出现。拟议中的小说将以本杰明为主角，但更重要的是，它将反映他的文化，艺术和历史理论。通过几个历史时期的多个故事情节，小说将探索在柏拉图身上发现并被莱布尼茨复兴的古老的多元思想是如何在各个时代被重新诠释的。在现实生活中，布朗基参与了一个共济会的秘密社团（charbonnerie），而本雅明则被神秘而深奥的思想深深吸引。小说将想象一个秘密社团，他们的“量子自杀”导致他们实施恐怖主义行为。本杰明在1940年自杀，而不是面对盖世太保的逮捕。他在《街机计划》中广泛讨论的理论暗示了他自己的生存，即使不是在这个世界，也是在另一个世界。

Parallel universes are a familiar theme in fiction. From Philip Pullman to Doctor Who, readers and viewers of all ages have become attuned to the idea of other worlds almost like our own, but crucially different. Often this takes the form of 'alternate history', where a particular event is imagined to have gone differently, creating a new timeline. The idea has appeared not only in fantasy and science-fiction, but also in mainstream fiction and cinema, with examples such as Philip Roth's The Plot Against America and the movie Sliding Doors.Modern science appears to offer evidence that these worlds really exist. Physicists including Paul Davies and Michio Kaku have published popular books describing how quantum mechanics and superstring theory imply our observable universe is only a tiny part of a far richer 'multiverse', where every possibility becomes actual. Cosmologist Max Tegmark has discussed 'quantum suicide', a version of the famous Schrödinger Cat thought-experiment in which the experimenter takes the place of the animal. Since one's own death can never be observed, it is argued, the only possible result is a universe where one survives. Such speculations sound like plotlines from Jorge Luis Borges or Philip K Dick.Has science influenced art, or has it been the other way round? This research will explore the history and philosophy of multiple realities through the composition of a novel of ideas.Surprisingly, the idea of parallel worlds was put forward in the nineteenth century, in Louis-Auguste Blanqui's L'Eternite par les astres (1872). Blanqui used the theory of atomic elements to argue there must be planets where, for instance, Napoleon won the Battle of Waterloo. A communist who spent most of his life in prison for revolutionary conspiracies, Blanqui also speculated on worlds where he was free.Physicists completely ignored Blanqui's pseudo-scientific work, but it is remembered thanks to Walter Benjamin, who rediscovered it in the 1930s. Benjamin considered Blanqui's cosmology a manifestation of the bourgeois society he fought against. Capitalism views the world as a casino; the multiverse is a 'phantasmogoria' where everyone can be a winner. In the popular writings of present-day physicists such as Stephen Hawking, metaphors of gambling and winning arise frequently.The proposed novel will feature Benjamin as a character, but more importantly, it will reflect on his theories of culture, art and history. Through multiple storylines in several historical periods, the novel will explore how ancient ideas of plurality, found in Plato and revived by Leibniz, have been reinterpreted over the ages. In real life, Blanqui was involved in a masonic secret society (the charbonnerie), while Benjamin was deeply drawn to mystical and esoteric thought. The novel will imagine a secret society whose version of 'quantum suicide' leads them to carry out acts of terrorism. Benjamin committed suicide in 1940 rather than face arrest by the Gestapo. The theory he discussed extensively in his Arcades Project was one that implied his own survival, in another world if not this one.