The Spooky World Of Quantum Biology | h+ MagazineThey were trying to establish exactly how organic photosynthesis approaches 95% efficiency, whereas the most sophisticated human solar cells operate at only half that. What they discovered is nothing short of remarkable. Using femtosecond lasers to follow the movement of light energy through a photosynthetic bacterial cell, Engel et al. observed the energy traveling along every possible direction at the same time. Instead of following a single trajectory like the electrons on a silicon chip, the energy in photosynthesis explores all of its options and collapses the quantum process only after the fact, retroactively “deciding” upon the most efficient pathway. What does this all mean? Not only does quantum phenomena occur in living systems, but the basic processes of life we take for granted rely on the transfer of information backward in time. Life is so magical because it cheats.
Although the mechanisms by which a living cell can prevent decoherence by dampening its own chemical “noise” remain utterly mysterious, findings such as Engels' conclusively demonstrate that room-temperature quantum computing is possible (and knowing how something works isn’t always necessary in order to use it). And Engel’s group isn’t the only team to detect it: other laboratories have implicated a phenomenon called electron tunneling (micro-teleportation, in which an electron disappears in one location and instantaneously appears somewhere else without having traveled the intermediate distance) at work behind a range of organic phenomena, from our sense of smell and the activities of our enzymes to the neutralization of free radicals with anti-oxidants… possibly even consciousness itself. Paul Davies (Arizona State University) and JohnJoe McFadden (The University of Surrey) have independently suggested that computation in the netherworld of quantum coherence might explain how the earliest self-replicating molecules overcame the inestimable odds against them –- life’s very existence may be the consequence and continued operation of a quantum computer. We may ultimately have to accept our human quest for qubit calculation as a kind of biomimicry, rather than something new and unique.
Quantum biology stands to answer other big questions, as well –- questions that many contemporary biologists prefer to ignore. McFadden, in his excellent primer Quantum Evolution, cites several experiments that suggest certain mutations are “intelligent,” even “anticipatory.” For example, bacterial cultures have been observed to evolve clever responses to lab toxins at speeds that – just like the emergence of DNA from a primordial soup – defy astronomical odds. Can biological quantum calculation account for this? McFadden thinks so. (His hypothesis was itself anticipated in the science fiction of Greg Egan, whose novel Teranesia featured some very “spooky” retrocausal mutations – including the instantaneous appearance of entire new ecosystems via competing future evolutionary scenarios. Whether such extreme examples of quantum biological principles are possible remains to be seen.)
As we continue to probe biological phenomena that beat quantum computer scientists to the punch, a new picture emerges of evolutionary computing and design. Huxley’s prophecy that we will eventually take the reins of our own evolution might come true sooner than predicted by establishment geneticists. But by appealing to the quantum oracle, we may be acting in service of something far older and more intelligent than we can even guess. Ultrafast computing, accelerated by our explorations into the new science of quantum biology, could well be the critical technology that pushes us over the edge into the Singularity – a timeless and transcendent event in which we already live, because it is the nature of life itself – a vast sentience beyond human comprehension, and we are merely the newest avenue for its expression in the world. Classical or quantum, human or ecological, natural selection still gets the last laugh
If this is an ink blot test, I say the ink clearly and without a doubt shows that common descent didn't happen but that God created and creates all life. Ie, that is a statement too broad to argue against in an epistemological sense. All you can do is offer a different point of view.
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