The Brain Lateralization Theory

Introduction

The quantum mechanical universe is fundamentally different from our classical perception of the world. To reconcile the two, we must either question quantum mechanics or review the act of perception itself. Century-old experiments have proven the validity of quantum theory. In fact, quantum mechanics is by far the most precise and reliable science that humans have ever grasped. Therefore, in order to resolve the incompatibility, it is reasonable to turn to an assessment of perception itself. The brain is our main tool for examining physical reality, so in order to determine the validity of our perceptions, it makes sense to begin with a study of our brain’s physiology, and in particular how the brain receives sensory stimuli.

The Senses

We perceive the world with our senses. The five common senses are vision, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. Our sense organs are mostly stimulated by waves. Our eyes are sensitive to a certain band of electromagnetic waves called visible light. Our ears sense another wave band, called sound frequency. Our skin also receives stimuli as waves. For example, if we vibrate a tuning fork in close proximity to the skin but without touching it, we perceive a tactile sensation. The vibration theory, suggested by Luca Turin, posits that odor receptors also detect the frequency of vibrations of odor molecules.¹ Taste buds are mainly working with a different mechanism.

The holonomic brain theory by Karl Pribram suggests that memories are preserved in spectral form. According to Pribram the visual cortex also functions as a hologram. Many complex brain functions such as huge capacity to store data, association, photographic memory and face recognition can be explained, if the received data is not converted and remains in spectral form inside the brain.  

If our sensory receptors receive mainly waves from the outside world, how do we perceive these waves as objects? How do we sketch our so-called objective reality out of these waves?

Wave-Particle Duality

To further the discussion, let us explore the nature of matter. Objects are known to have a dualistic wave-particle nature. In 1704 Newton described matter as solid, massy, hard and impenetrable. In the late 1800s, James Clerk Maxwell claimed that light is the propagation of electromagnetic waves. His claims were experimentally verified by Heinrich Hertz in 1887. As a result, the idea of waves as the sole component of light rays became widely accepted at the time. However, wave theory couldn't explain the photoelectric effect, a phenomenon in which electrons are emitted from a metal after it is exposed to light with sufficient energy. To solve the problem, in 1905, Albert Einstein proposed the particle nature of light. He postulated the existence of quanta (or units) of light energy, called photons, that have particulate qualities. This light quanta is solitary and localized. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1921 for his photo-electric theory. However, wave character of light could not be denied, particularly in light of Thomas Young's double slit experiment, which provided solid evidence for the wave nature of light.²  Therefore, it was decided that light must have a simultaneous dual nature of wave and particle.  
In 1924, Louis-Victor de Broglie postulated that not just light but all matter has a wave-like nature as well. De Broglie was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1929 for his hypothesis. Since then, the common belief among physicists has been that matter has a dualistic nature—it concurrently has the characteristics of waves and particles.
Wave characteristics are more apparent in electromagnetic radiation when it is measured over relatively large distances and time spans. On the other hand, particle characteristics are more evident when measuring small time scales and positions. But how can matter exist in this bizarre dualistic state? According to our classical perception, matter has a specific mass and volume. Matter is also perceived as local and tangible. Waves, on the other hand, are spread out. Waves and their associated fields (e.g., electromagnetic fields) unfold without any boundaries. They do not have a specific mass or a specific shape. They imply a sense of fluidity. However, in the majority of everyday experiences, we perceive only the solid characteristics of matter. We see a ball as a solid, localized, and tangible object that is subject to external forces. Why do we not sense a ball as a wave? The fading wave characteristic of matter is known as wave function collapse. In this phenomenon, the spread out and multi-state wave is reduced to a local and distinct particle.
In 1932, John von Neumann suggested that the collapse of wave function occurs in the consciousness of human beings. In other words, he believed that “objectification” (the act of interpreting incoming data as an object) is an invention of the human mind.
Below, I explore whether the modern understanding of brain anatomy and physiology can shed light on this puzzle. This chapter is inspired by Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor’s recent book, My Stroke of Insight. Dr Taylor is a Harvard-trained neurobiologist who had a stroke in 1996 while she was only thirty-seven years old. Following the hemorrhage in her left hemisphere, her left brain gradually lost its performance, while her right hemisphere remained intact and continued to function normally. Being a neurobiologist, she could sense and interpret the gradual changes that her mind went through at the time of stroke and during her recovery, which took about eight years. In her recently published book, she explains her experience with her massive stroke moment by moment. As her ordeal is relevant to the main topic of this article, I will relate her descriptions of the event to show how the different hemispheres of the brain function. I will also add my own take on her experiences to substantiate the main concept in this commentary.

Sensation versus Perception³

Before we examine our mind’s ability to perceive, it is important to understand how we acquire perception in the first place. Sensation starts during the embryonic era, as our sense organs develop. While they help us to cope and coordinate with physical reality, the accuracy of their intakes is a matter of debate.
It has been shown that tactile sense begins about seven weeks after gestation and gradually develops until the fourth month of fetus life. Babies start to receive sound stimulus by fourteen weeks of embryonic life. Our sense of sight develops before birth as well (for example, babies in the womb react to a flash of light to mother's abdomen). By the time of birth, vision is well advanced, although not yet perfect. The fetus’s taste buds are formed at fourteen weeks, demonstrated by studies that show the fetus has a definite preference for sweetness in amniotic fluid.
A fetus has a virgin brain. At the beginning there is just reception, meaning the stimuli sense organs merely notice and observe; they do not distinguish or interpret. Stimuli cannot be interpreted yet because of a lack of previous experiences to form a contextual framework. Recognition comes by repetition of the same stimulus. Gradually, the baby can differentiate various sensations as favorable or deterrent.
Newborns do not fully understand space, and it is common for them to grasp for objects that are out of reach. Complete perception of space develops later. Objects are unfamiliar to the virgin brain as well. During the embryonic stage and continuing to beyond the first year of life, a baby slowly develops an impression about the nature of material objects. If we define time as the product of accumulated memories, then at the beginning, time does not have any meaning for an embryo either.
As the baby experiments with the outside world, it gradually builds a perception from its environment. This early conceptualization is the ground for building a preliminary logic, which the baby then uses to analyze its surroundings. It uses dreaming as a tool to relate the data it receives and to build perceptions. These perceptions help build the framework for cognition in the future. Storytelling and dreaming are the act of organizing and refining these early perceptions from the environment. This is how we form our logic.
Language and mathematics (and numbers in general), two very important tools to build our perception of reality, are learned gradually during the first two years and refined in the years after. Immanuel Kant, Karl Weierstrass, and later on Albert Einstein believed that mathematics is pure creation of the human mind. Friedrich Nietzsche believed that all of logic and the whole of mathematics are manmade fictions.⁴
Finally, a sense of self gradually develops, whereby the child begins to distinguish himself from his mother, something newborns do not do.
The above concepts are gradually built inside the brain as a result of the data that the organs receive and the brain integration processes.However, our interpretation of this data may not exactly represent the actual data, and it is subject to error. This casts doubt on our perceptual system’s ability to conceptualize data and produce an objective reality. Motion pictures make a good analogy. Individual objects in discrete pictures are perceived as moving objects. In addition to limited abilities of our visual organs to distinguish the fast exchanging pictures, brain's integration process and perception creation out of partial clues is also a major factor. Please note that in quantum mechanics view, the universe is made of discrete elements (such as quanta of matter, space or time), whereas our classical perception of the world sketches a continuous and homologous surroundings in front of our eyes.

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Brain Hemispheres, Brain Lateralization⁵

The forebrain is made of two cerebral hemispheres, left and right. The hemispheres are almost identical in shape, yet they function differently. The inputs from our right sensory organs are usually transferred to the left hemisphere, and vice versa. It seems that for the majority of people who are right handed, the left hemisphere is specialized to perform common tasks. For a long time, it was believed that the left hemisphere was doing the actual work, while the right hemisphere remained mostly dormant for ordinary people.
The right hemisphere has been called the “subordinate” or “minor” hemisphere, and some have even referred to it as “illiterate” and “mentally retarded.” However recently it is understood that each of the hemispheres has its own functions. Each uses its own percepts, mental images, and associations. Each brain half, in other words, appears to have its own distinct cognitive domain with its own private perceptual, learning, and memory experiences, all of which are seemingly unaware of corresponding events in the other hemisphere. As such, they resemble the two aspects of physical reality—classical and quantum mechanical.
The classical and quantum levels of reality are seemingly alien to each other as well, in that they sketch different pictures from the same objective reality. One might say that classical physics and quantum physics portray two different perceptions of the same realm. In 1981, Roger W. Sperry, in his Nobel lecture declared, “Left and right hemispheres are characterized by inbuilt, qualitatively different and mutually antagonistic modes of cognitive processing, the left being basically analytic and sequential, the right spatial and synthetic. A rationale was added for the evolution of cerebral asymmetry based on the functional advantages of having the two cognitive modes develop in separate hemispheres in order to minimize mutual interference.”⁶
Despite their exclusive cognitive roles, the functions of the two hemispheres are somehow mutual and complement each other. In isolated experiments, the same individual can be observed to employ one of two distinct mental strategies, much as if we are dealing with two different people, depending on whether the left or right hemisphere is in use. However, in the normal state, the two hemispheres appear to work closely together as a unit; one does not remain “switched on” while the other idles. ⁶
We usually distinguish the hemispheres by the traits they are linked to—the head versus the heart, thoughts versus feelings, mind versus instinct, sensing versus intuition, and so on. Below, I will elaborate on these two different mental approaches.
Lateralization of brain functions is not clear cut, and the borderlines overlap. Many times right brain, or its different locations, perform or participate in functions that are normally attributed to the left hemisphere. Please note that I apply idealization and simplistic views while describing hemispheric functions. In reality brain tasks are complex undertakings and are carried out by a collaboration of the two hemispheres.  However, in the following lines, I take direct reflection of received data as the perception of the right brain whereas decoding and manipulation of information to create appropriate perception as product of the left brain. This simplistic view should not invalidate the main argument in this article. 

Left Hemisphere: Objective, Discrete, Logical, Classical

For the majority of individuals, the left hemisphere is trained to be analytical, to look for components and strive for details. The data received from the different sense organs are gathered and assembled to arrive at a general idea and then analyzed to draw a comprehensible, detailed picture consisting of the different components. For example, the information received from a flower is divided and analyzed by the left hemisphere as petal, stem, stamen, and pollen. The left hemisphere is almost always dominant in both speech and handedness as well.
Time is a tool of the left hemisphere. The left side of the brain gathers the information and arranges it in timely succession. That is how we sense the past, present, and future. Since the successive accumulation of memories creates the notion of time for us, time has a trajectory that extends from the past to the future, and not the other way around. As such, it mimics time as understood in classical physics. In contrast, time in quantum mechanics can be symmetric and flows in both directions.
The left brain is responsible for finding meaning in the data it receives. The left brain extracts the details and draws a comprehensible picture out of a wide array of incoming information. Therefore, it has to be judgmental to be able to draw a definite scheme. The analytic left hemisphere critically investigates the information and arranges it in a meaningful, logical, and rational fashion that we can live with, filtering out any unrelated data throughout the process. This is how our left brain hemisphere defines, categorizes, and draws a comprehensible, definite classical portrait out of the “big picture.” It pulls out a tree out of the jungle and displays it in front of our eyes.
Individual pieces of information are methodologically arranged and filed. The sensibly arranged data is the basis of our logic and the origin of our reasoning. Using logic, we can conclude that if A is bigger than B and B is bigger than C, then for sure A has to be bigger than C. Through logic, the left brain sketches a solid and dependable objective reality in front of our eyes. Logic is the domain of classical mechanics. .Therefore, we can conclude that the left brain helps us to sketch the classical level of reality. Classical mechanics is all about definite situations and certainties. Please note that left hemisphere tries to make sense of events even with partial cues. However, the elaborate rationalization effort of the left brain makes it prone to erroneous perceptions
The left brain is also the origin of the sensing self. The left hemisphere creates the sensation that we are isolated as individuals. It defines the boundaries of our body—where we begin and where we are located in space. It perceives the self as an independent character. People with left brain damage do not distinguish themselves from the rest of the world.
In addition, the left hemisphere is responsible for learning motor skills and controlling higher voluntary movements. During bodily movements, we have to identify an isolated body (our own) and its relationship to the environment. It is well known that damage to the left side creates disorders of learned voluntary movements. The asymmetry of motor control in the right and left hemispheres is well demonstrated by the fact that more people are adept at using their right hand that is fed by left brain, than their left. 
Language ability mainly originates in the left hemisphere as well. Damage to the angular gyrus in the left hemisphere may selectively destroy a person's ability to read and speak. Such a patient may see a printed page with the right hemisphere, but the words will have lost their meaning. Damage to the Wernicke's area, near the base of the left temporal lobe, eliminates the capacity to understand spoken language. Speech continues to be heard, but the meaning is lost. Speaking involves isolating sounds and forming specific words. This is in line with the classical level of reality, where components are isolated and separated. At the quantum level, everything is entangled and can be treated as one.
In order to describe the information it receives, the left hemisphere dissects the incoming data into words and probes their meanings individually and within the context of a sentence. This is part of analytic function of the left brain. In the depth of our awareness, we find a vast array of chaotic data playing in the background. The left hemisphere helps us to filter, reduce, and arrange only the related data so that our speech communicates a comprehensible, logical, and classical state of mind. In another words, it helps us to make meaningful statements that communicate a logical situation acceptable to our common sense. If one verbalized whatever passed through his or her background thoughts, we would call that person insane. Autistics and schizophrenics show such left hemisphere disorder and therefore lack the above ability.
“Making sense” means that a huge amount of data is eliminated during the process of speaking. Similarly, data is rigorously reduced as we come from the infinite information at  quantum level, which is related to quantum uncertainties  and superposition of states (simultaneous existence of all possible states of reality-explained later in the article) , to a focused and just one certain and logical state observed in classical level of reality.

Jill Taylor talks about “brain chatter” as another phenomenon attributed to the left brain. We are all familiar with it. It’s the voice in our mind that is always talking. It tells us what everything is. It tells us what is right and what is wrong, what are we allowed to do and what we should avoid. It repeats over and over again the details of our life so we can remember them. It is the creator of self. The left hemisphere strives for individuality and independence. Without it, we lose track of our life and our identity. In its absence, we are like electrons in a Bose-Einstein condensate, in which we lose our identity.⁷ What is left is a feeling of oneness, an immersing into the whole of existence.
Another function of the left hemisphere is platform formation. By this process, the brain creates a library of past experiences, so that when we are faced with a similar situation we draw on scenes that we have filed away, evaluating and responding to the new situation with minimal attention and assessment. One might say that the left hemisphere has already “set the stage” for new events to arrive. It has pre-created a familiar scene based on our previous experiences and its understanding and interpretations of those experiences. Our left brain is filled with these ingrained patterns, which we use to predict, plan, and carry out everyday activities. When we talk about a winter day, a cold and snowy condition automatically comes to mind. However, sometimes a day in winter can surprise us by being mild. This illustrates that although these patterns are usually very helpful, at times they distance us from reality. These pre-established patterns are the origin of our beliefs as well. We evaluate and judge every new encounter based on these established beliefs.
We may speculate that these thought pattern loops also create our classical level of reality. If the left hemisphere already has established logical loops and scenes that are consistent with rational classical level of reality, then any new incoming data is perceived within the context of these scenes. Any unrelated and illogical data is ignored during the process. New experiences only further develop these modules and fortify the pre-established classical level patterns.
Calculation and arithmetical reasoning are also attributed to the left brain. In mathematics, we divide the whole into the integers and assess and calculate the individual integers and detect the abstract relations between them.
Considering all this, one may suppose that the left brain is the leading, more highly evolved, and intellectual hemisphere. All of our higher functions relating to the environment, at the classical level, are carried out by the left brain. Mind you, the above sensations and functions are learned from the embryonic era onward. It seems that the left hemisphere exists as a clean slate at the beginning. The learning and conditioning comes after. After severe damage to her left hemisphere, Dr. Taylor had to retrain herself to obtain the above skills during her recovery.
It seems that the left brain receives the incoming data from sense organs. Then by conditioning and analyzing, the left hemisphere creates a simpler, more comprehensible, and dependable objective world. In most instances this fabricated world is sufficient for us to run our everyday life. In fact, the left hemisphere in the human brain is bigger than the right hemisphere when compared to lower species, and its functioning distinguishes us as a more sophisticated animal. We owe most of our progress and scientific achievements to the left hemisphere’s function. However, it is notable that the perception it creates is manipulated to certain degree and can be different from actual reality.
Anosognosia is a rare syndrome associated with right brain damage. Patients who suffer from this disease have only one functioning hemisphere, the left. Neurologist Vilayanur Ramachandran reported on a patient of his who suffered with the above syndrome; the left side of her body was paralyzed, but she was ignorant of this fact. When she was asked to point to the examiner’s nose with her paralyzed left hand, she truly believed that her fingers were a couple of inches from the examiner’s nose, when in reality her hand lay paralyzed next to her. According to Ramachandran, this kind of self-deception arises from a defense mechanism in normal persons, wherein the left brain tries to maintain a consistent picture of the world despite the staggering amount of information flooding the brain at any minute. This mechanism keeps the brain from succumbing to directionless and indecision due to the explosion of possible scenarios produced from the material available to the senses.¹³
In addition, the patient’s response may be a defense mechanism of the left brain whereby it tries to keep perception of self intact. By denying the paralysis of her left side, her left brain was trying to maintain the integrity of the person.

Right Hemisphere: Informational, Continuous, Subjective, Quantum Mechanical

The right hemisphere, on the other hand, specializes in tasks that are nonverbal, nonmathematical, and non-sequential in nature. Its function is mainly imaginative. Time does not exist in its domain, and everything is sensed as happening in the present. The now is expanded forever.
Dr. Jerre Levy from department of psychology, University of Chicago, has studied the cognitive specialties of the right hemisphere. She found that the mental capacity to make inter-modal spatial transformations from three-dimensional to unfolded two-dimensional forms was much better developed in the right hemisphere. This indicates complex visual and spatial functions of the right hemisphere, where the perception of part-whole relations originates. It suggests that right hemisphere is not specifically bounded to spatial dimensions, but rather it perceives the the object under investigation within the whole picture. Three- to two-dimensional transformation capability also suggests that the sense of depth is pale in the right hemisphere.⁸ Since their left hemisphere is not yet developed, newborns do not have the sense of depth. Space as an isolated notion is not perceived by right hemisphere; merely the relations are noted. Coming to a logical conclusion that space must exist to accommodate different events is a function of left brain. It is interesting to note that space in quantum mechanics is quite different from space as we know it at the classical level. Quantum entanglement, where two particles are in direct contact with each other, even if they are miles apart—puts the very notion of space and locality in question and suggests non-locality as a fundamental feature of the universe. Bose -Einstein condensate is another evidence for non-locality in the quantum level.

Fotini Markopoulou, a researcher from Perimeter institute believes that space may not exist at all. One may assume that space as we perceive it is just an approximation of a more fundamental element, and is created within our perception.

The right brain hears the sounds and sees the world. However, the sounds are not isolated. The image of the world is not divided and is perceived as complex mental camouflages, and recalled in it’s entirely. There is no focus. The right brain witnesses merely a combination of images, kinetics, and functions. Borders between specific entities are softened to the verge of nonexistence.
The sense of self is pale, and skin is not the boundary. The right brain perceives us as connected and one with everything else, not only the human race but everything else as well. Our ability to sense other people’s feelings and our sense of compassion originates here. In its eye, we are immersed in everything else in the planet and the universe. It tends to see the world as holistic and undivided entity. It just sees oneness. As such, it is also the site of spiritual wonder. 
The right hemisphere is “word blind,” or incapable of seeing meaning in printed words. Although the right mind usually does not deal with letters, words, and sentences, it is responsible for understanding nonverbal relations and communications. Unlike the left brain, which deals with the quantitative measures of dialogue, the right brain is in charge of comprehending the meanings of people’s expressions. It senses the emotions that accompany the conversation, not the individual wordings. It deals with the quality of communication. Take music as an example. The left brain sees the individual notes and keys, whereas right brain appreciates the essence of the tune and the emotions associated with it.
The right hemisphere is designed to remember things as they relate to each other. It senses the movements and physiology of organisms in its totality. Dr. Taylor describes how after severe damage to her left brain, she was detached from “normal reality.” She mentions how she was “comforted by an expanding sense of grace … My consciousness soared into an all-knowingness, a ‘being at one’ with the universe, if you will … I could no longer clearly discern the physical boundaries of where I began and where I ended. I sensed the composition of my being as that of a fluid rather than that of a solid.”8
She also describes the experience of living without her defective left brain as a very peaceful state of mind. During her stroke, the judging portion of her brain was absent and her brain chatter was silenced; as a result, she went under a blanket of tranquil euphoria. She describes her experience further: “Even though my thoughts were no longer a constant stream of chatter about the external world and my relationship to it, I was conscious and constantly present within my mind.”
Taylor noted, “The right mind is spontaneous, care free and imaginative. It allows our artistic juices to flow free without inhibition or judgment.”8
The right brain is free from limitations of objective reality and can think intuitively, or “outside of the box.” Dreams belong to right hemisphere and are mostly free from interference from the left hemisphere. Non-locality is a feature of dreams. In addition, dreams are not time bound, as time and locality are features within the perception of the left brain. The right hemisphere is free to envisage all the probabilities and possibilities. (This is in line with quantum physics, where objects are considered to be in each and every possible state simultaneously.) It is spontaneous and imaginative. Logical limitations are not observed by the right hemisphere. It is therefore up to the left brain to pick the best one, based on sequential reasoning and logic. That is how we see the world at the classical level.
Looking at the big picture, imagining every probable state, the right mind somehow visualizes the existence at  a superposition of states. Looking through the right brain’s lens, we can imagine and dream about any possibility at our will. In our dreams, it is not unusual to see that the same figure change faces to symbolize different persons. All the probabilities can be envisaged simultaneously by the right brain without limitations forced upon us by a logical mind. Likewise, reality on the quantum mechanical level also exists concurrently in all possible states. One may postulate that the right brain reveals the quantum mechanical level of reality without interfering, interpreting, or manipulating the received wave stimuli.

Conscious Awareness

Our awareness floats between the dissimilar perceptions of the right and left hemispheres. Therefore, we may show our conscious awareness with a Cartesian diagram as follows. 

 

In the diagram above, the vertical axis indicates the right hemisphere component of perception, and the horizontal indicates the left portion. However, Rene Descartes himself believed that mind domain is not split. He pointed to the pineal gland as the only part of the brain that is not split and therefore can accommodate a homogeneous mind.
Even though our awareness is dominated by the left hemisphere’s perceptions, based on inbuilt molds, the right brain interferes in the case of any major paradigm shift to modify the preexisting pattern. However its interference is subtle. 
In an experiment, M. Gazzaniga and J. LeDoux flashed pictures of a chicken claw in the right visual field and a snow scene in the left visual field of a split-brain patient.¹⁴ Then the patient was asked to choose a related shape out of several pictures presented to him. The patient correctly chose a picture of chicken and a shovel. When he was asked to explain his choices, he said, “I saw a claw and I picked the chicken and you have to clean out the chicken shed with the shovel.”¹³ This example demonstrates the subtle but effective role of the right hemisphere in our perceptions. It also suggests the origin of our intuitions.
One might say the relationship between the two hemispheres in forming our perceptions is a complementary one. For example, while the left brain interprets verbal and material means of communications, the right mind senses something beyond. It recognizes the emotions embedded in the conversation, and it can alert us about the sincerity behind the statements people express.
In the domain of awareness as well, one finds a complementary relationship between self and whole. At times we are so into ourselves that the outside world seems to grow pale. At other times, we almost forget ourselves as we drown in the totality of the universe. This complementary relationship is clearly a function of our brain. One may speculate that the two paradoxical states of reality mentioned above (the classical level and the quantum level) have nothing to do with actual reality out there. Perhaps the classical level is merely the product of the left brain. Studying the duality of brain hemisphere's function can shed light the issue of classic versus quantum level, the two asymmetric aspects of reality.

Interpretation of Wave-Particle Duality

Brain lateralization theory has the potential to offer answers for many paradoxes in understanding reality. As mentioned above, the dualistic wave-particle nature of matter is a great puzzle. Instead of struggling to find an external model for this dualistic nature, perhaps we should review our tool of perception itself. We mentioned earlier that the act of dividing and quantifying is a function of the left brain. In 1926, Max Born maintained that since the wave portion cannot be observed, it is not a real entity in classical terms. However, he asserted that we probably can find a classically recognizable particle in a region designated by square of the wave function. If the particle portion is merely an invention of our left hemisphere, then it is understandable that our brain would project it to the region where the energy is more concentrated. Energy is more intense as we get closer to the wave’s peak.
The nineteenth century post-modernist Edmund Husserl, like Jean-Paul Sartre and many other post-modernist philosophers, believed that mental objects have nothing to do with sensory perception and result instead from what the mind attends to, or intends. Friedrich Nietzsche, for example, claims, “All truths are evolving fictions that exist only in the subjective reality of single individual.”⁹ I suspect he is pointing to the perception of left brain, which is obtained by manipulating incoming data in order to portray a reality that conforms to preexisting beliefs and logic. Obviously, in the nineteenth century, the left brain–right brain dichotomy was not known, and in the absence of quantum mechanics, Newtonian physics and the classical level of reality was dominant. Therefore, when he talked about all truths, he meant the objective reality sketched by left brain.
Nietzsche’s statement denying the actuality of all truth does not seem acceptable.  Regardless of how much manipulation the left brain performs. If perception is based on incoming waves, it must have something to do with actual sensory stimuli out there.

State Reduction

As mentioned above, quantum mechanics describes the world in a superposition of all possible states. Although this is very difficult to comprehend, challenging one’s conventional wisdom, every related experiment proves the validity of this postulate. But we see the world in just one state. The puzzle of how we come to perceive one state (as seen at the classical level) out of the superposition of states (the simultaneous existence of all possible schemes and states, as predicted by quantum mechanics) is mind boggling. The bizarre antagonism between the classical and quantum mechanical aspects of reality is the question of the century.
The ways the two hemispheres operate are as asymmetrical as the two modes of reality described above. While one hemisphere displays an imaginative, intuitive, random, and chaotic scheme, as predicted by quantum mechanics, the other one describes a concrete, detailed, and definite picture, similar to the classical world that we are familiar with.
We know that left hemisphere perception is descriptive, based on the past experiences of the individual. Data received by the left brain is manipulated and altered and does not necessarily reflect the true nature of the received information. The left hemisphere’s view is just an interpretation and approximation of incoming data. Therefore, the concrete and logical classical level may be just a construct of our left brain. While this classical perception is very useful to us on a daily basis, keeping us from sinking into insanity, its validity is a matter of debate.
One may even further speculate and offer a solution for the observer-and-measurement problem in quantum mechanical experiments. It is shown in related experiments that the observer (experimenter) changes the superposition of states to just one state. For example, a particle is known to spin around all possible axes simultaneously. In addition, it rotates clockwise and counterclockwise concurrently. This concept is very strange to us; it sounds illogical and impossible. However, quantum theory, the most precise knowledge obtained by human beings, confirms its validity.
When the experimenter sends a photon as a probe to assess the particle, its spin, which was in superposition of many spins around all possible axes, is reduced to just one spin, just the one around the  trajectory of the sent photon, and its superposed rotation is reduced to only one rotation, either clockwise or counterclockwise. How can an observer change the actual spin of a particle? Is it actually changing, or is the observer just focusing on rotation around just one axis, the one in line with the trajectory of the photon he sent towards the particle? Is observer problem only a problem of focus and elimination of illogical data? Does the particle continue to rotate about any other possible axes throughout the experiment? 
If every experiment indicates that the universe is quantum mechanical at a fundamental level, is it fair to suppose that we are conditioned to construct the classical level of reality inside our awareness?
Much of the research has shown that we do not see the elements that we are not focused on. This so-called in-attentional blindness can be the reason we fail to see other states and schemes of reality. We ignore and eliminate the schemes that do not fit.
On the other hand, adults normally do not remember much about their memories before age three. In addition, few memories are retained from three to seven years of age. The phenomenon is called childhood amnesia.¹⁰ One of the explanations for childhood amnesia maintains that memories are formed but later become inaccessible as a result of cognitive changes. One may postulate that a newborn can see the super-positioned reality, before logical thinking and conditioning from parental and cultural influences gradually take this super-positioned reality out of focus.
Is it fair to speculate that childhood amnesia is responsible for washing away the inappropriate and unacceptable memories of super-positioned universe? Or are those kinds of perceptions simply condemned and dismissed as childish thinking and fantasy?
As mentioned above, in quantum mechanics, objects exist simultaneously in a “superposition” of different schemes and scenarios.
For example, the consensus in physics is that matter exists in multiple states simultaneously—both wave and particle. The particle-like behavior is most evident when the experimenter measures the particle characteristics of it. In other words, when we look for particle characteristics of matter, we see a particle. When an observer measures the phenomenon, the wave-function will randomly "collapse" to a specific particle at some specific location. Even though the sense organs are stimulated by waves, when we look for these waves, all we see are particles. It therefore seems fair to speculate that that particle portion of matter is a construct of the left hemisphere.

The behavior of young children in some situations resembles that of split-brain adults. an infant before age 4 months who has one arm restrained will not reach with the other arm across the midline to pick up a toy on the other side of the visual field . Evidently, in younger children, each hemisphere has too little access to information from the opposite hemisphere⁽¹⁶⁾. The major link between right and left hemispheres, corpus callosum, matures gradually between 5 to 10 years of human life (Trevarthen 1974). The mature link can be considered the tool for dominancy of the left hemisphere as well. Adulthood may mean dominance of rational perceptions of the left hemisphere and suppression of holistic insights of right hemisphere.

Reductionism

Even if the left brain does a mere analysis of the parts without imposing its own prejudices or adding elements from its perceptual framework, its reductionist approach (dividing reality to components and assessing the parts to comprehend the whole) still cannot reveal actual reality. To further clarify the differences between a blended reality (as suggested by quantum physics) and a divided picture (as is seen on the classical level), let us, by way of analogy, take the square of sum of two numbers and compare it with the total of each of them squared.

( X + Y )²  ≠ X²  + Y²
X² + Y² + 2xy ≠ X² + Y²

It is clear that two sides are different. The left side has an extra 2xy. For small numbers the difference is small.  However, as numbers get bigger, the difference grows larger. When we have more elements in the whole, the gap grows even further:

( X + Y + Z)² ≠ X² + Y² + Z²
X² + Y² + Z²+2xy + 2xz +2zy ≠ X² + Y² + Z²

The left portion symbolizes a unified process in quantum mechanics, while the right portion represents the sum of parts in classical physics, presented by the left brain. The above show that the whole is different from the sum of the parts. In a universe where almost infinite factors are involved in any process, the difference is humongous. As an analogy just compare the joy of listening to music against listening to individual notes with no harmony, or even worse reading boring abstract notes in a music notebook,.
The analytic function of the left brain can not reveal the actual truth in its totality. Knowing the wavelength and magnitude of the color red does not divulge the experience of the color red. There is something more to the color red. The sum of the parts does not match the actual reality in biology either. By simply adding up different parts of an organism, you cannot create a live creature. That is why analytic science and mathematics, although valuable for our everyday cognition, cannot describe the whole picture.9 Looking outside the box and obtaining a broader view is necessary for the next step in the evolution of the human race. Perhaps we need to pay more attention to the scope of right brain.

Wave-Only World

It was claimed that our five senses are stimulated only by waves. But is the world made just from waves? It is quite probable that waves are the only thing that we can sense from the outside world after all. Waves may be the main building blocks of actual reality. Wave mechanics is a complete theory. It provides a complete description of a quantum system. However, it describes only the probability of events happening, as opposed to definite events or states. At least one physicist proposes that the wave-particle duality can be replaced by a "wave-only" view.
Carver Mead analyzes the behavior of electrons and photons purely in terms of electron wave functions.¹² Mead has cut the Gordian knot of quantum complementarity, in which particles alternatively demonstrate particle-like or wave-like properties. He claims that atoms, with their neutrons, protons, and electrons, are not particles at all but pure waves of matter. Mead refers to the evidence of the exclusively wave nature of both light and matter, obtained between 1933 and 1996. He assesses examples of pure-wave phenomena, such as the ubiquitous laser of CD players, the self-propagating electrical currents of superconductors, and the Bose–Einstein condensate of atoms.¹¹
In conclusion, the act of state reduction and the fact that we perceive only one definite scheme of reality could be due to the function of the left hemisphere. The system as we see it may be partly manufactured by our brain. That is probably why we cannot separate the observer from the system. Objectification may be the product of thought pattern loops used by the brain's left hemisphere.

Beliefs and Religions

Finally, I would like to comment on the effect the left brain–right brain dichotomy has on human spirituality. Previously, it was mentioned that left brain creates thought pattern loops. These loops are the framework of our thoughts and the origin of our beliefs. By creating these loops, the left brain controls the perceptions of right brain. It receives the observations of the right brain and analyzes them. It then interprets and normalizes them in a way we can comprehend and live with. One may say that left brain “censors” the incoming data, maintaining its dominancy.
Spirituality in philosophy is often defined as the sense of connection and oneness with the whole of existence. The right brain senses the world as a whole. However the left hemisphere, through the above process, creates a logical mold for spiritual experiences as well. These molds are the basis of our religious beliefs. Religion is the “loop” that the left brain utilizes to tame the right brain’s spiritual perspectives. Out of our broad spiritual sensations, it extracts a humanlike god which lives somewhere in heavens in a space-like setting. This god supposedly created the earth and heavens within a defined period of time. (Mind you, space and time are properties of the left brain.) “God” is thought to be logical and wise, creating the universe with a purpose. We are part of this purposeful and logical creation and are subject to judgments and subsequent verdicts. (Again, I would like to remind you that logic and judgment are constructs of the left brain). The left brain also separates the self from the whole. Therefore, it is subject to guilt. Then there is the perception that we are a very insignificant self against the enormous whole (God, in the left brain’s terms). To defend and preserve the self, the mind seeks to legitimize the self through practices like sacrifices, praying, and begging to buy the friendship of this very strong god, so that it stays in our side and do not turn against us.
Spiritual ideologies and religions have been widespread among the human race from prehistory. The spiritual thought pattern loops inherited and engraved in our left mind mostly belongs to ancient times, when humans were primitive. Revisiting these beliefs with one’s modern left mind reveals many of the shortcomings of ancient religions. Surprisingly, humans of twenty-first century still follow the same thought patterns.
People with a very dominant left hemisphere subdue and demean pure spiritual experiences. The left portion of our personality questions the feeling of oneness with existence and casts doubts on sacrifices that we go through in order to help others. 

Conclusion

Notes

1- Since 1996 Turin has been the leading proponent of the vibration theory of olfaction. The theory proposes that a molecule's smell character is due to its vibrational spectroscopy in the infrared range. The theory is opposed to the more widely accepted shape theory of olfaction, which proposes that the vibrational spectroscopic properties of molecules can be an important determinant of their associated smell. See Absolute Astronomy, “Luca Turin,” http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Luca_Turin#encyclopedia.
2- Thomas Young's double-slit experiment showed interference phenomena where two beams of light which are coherent interfere to produce a pattern. See Wikipedia, “Interference (Wave Propagation),” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interference_pattern.
3- David Chamberlain, PhD, Cesarean Voices, “Babies Are Conscious,” http://www.eheart.com/cesarean/babies.html.
4-  Menas Kafatos and Robert Nadeau, The Non-local Universe New York  Oxford University Press, 1999).
5- M. K. Holder, “What Does Handedness Have to Do with Brain Lateralization (and Who Cares?),” http://www.indiana.edu/~primate/brain.html.
6- Roger W. Sperry, Nobel Lecture, 8 December 1981
7- Bose Einstein condensates are extremely low-temperature fluids (about zero Kelvin). In this state, different particles have no identity and cannot be distinguished from each other.
8- Jill Bolte Taylor, My Stroke of Insight New York, Penguin Books Ltd, New York, 2008).
9- Kafatos and Nadeau, Non-local Universe
10- Patricia J. Bauer, the Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, “Oh Where, Oh Where Have Those Early Memories Gone? A Developmental Perspective on Childhood Amnesia,” http://www.apa.org/science/psa/sb-bauer.html.
11- Wikipedia, “Wave-Particle Duality,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave-particle_duality.
12- Carver Mead, Collective Electrodynamics: Quantum Foundations of Electromagnetism Boston: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2000.
13- Sally P. Springer and George Deutsch, Left Brain/ Right Brain (New York: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1998)
14- Split-brain patients are the patients who have had a commissurotomy to separate their two cerebral hemispheres for therapeutic reasons.
 15- Double-slit experiment. In this experiment, electrons are passed through a barrier with two slits and reflected on an observation screen behind it. A pattern of light and dark stripes emerges that indicates wave nature of the electron. However, if we put a detector next to one of the slits to find out which slit electron as particle passed through, we just see two bands, which reflects the particle nature of electron. Therefore we observe what we are focusing at. 

16- James W. Kalat, Biological Psychology, Thompon Wadsworth, 2003

 

The arguments presented are open for debate. The reader is encouraged to email his/her inputs to correct, modify or develop the contents. Please send your emails to; zpfields@yahoo.ca

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