Quantum Lens

by Douglas E. Richards

  “Good question,” said Craft. “The only way I can answer is with an analogy. You’ve seen those giant industrial electromagnets, right? The puck-shaped ones with the circumference of a living room that are suspended from cranes?”

  Alyssa nodded.

  “Well, some of these exert a force so powerful they can yank a train-car off the ground. A train car! But you could be standing right under one, directly in this immense energy field, and you wouldn’t even know it was there. Provided you didn’t have any steel on you, it wouldn’t affect you in the slightest. A field can contain enormous energy, just waiting to be put to use, which we can’t see or feel, and which doesn’t affect us.”

  “Thanks,” said Alyssa. “That helps a lot.”

  Craft picked up his phone, performed a few manipulations, and handed it to Alyssa. “I’ve pulled up an article with impeccable credentials for you to read. To confirm what I’m saying.” One corner of his mouth curled up into a wry smile. “So you don’t, you know, think this is all the ravings of a lunatic.”

  Alyssa had read enough to know the existence of the zero point field, as fantastic and counterintuitive as it seemed, was established scientific fact. Even so, she couldn’t help but take a quick glance at the article. It was entitled, Emerging Possibilities for Space Propulsion Breakthroughs, and it had first appeared in a NASA publication, Interstellar Propulsion Society Newsletter, in July of 1995.

  She scanned it quickly. A few sentences caught her eye. Zero Point Energy is the term used to describe the random electromagnetic oscillations that are left in a vacuum after all other energy has been removed. Overly simplistic, but essentially a good shorthand way to describe it, she decided. She went on to read the numerous experimental observations that supported its existence.

  She read the final two sentences aloud: “If all the energy for all the possible frequencies is summed up, the result is an enormous energy density. In simplistic terms, there is enough energy in a cubic centimeter of empty vacuum to completely boil away all of the Earth's oceans.”

  Alyssa passed Craft’s phone back to him across the table. “I really did believe you,” she said. “But it’s helpful to see this. NASA seems like a pretty sober organization.”

  Craft laughed. “Good way to put it,” he said. He paused for a moment in thought. “Okay, let me move on to the next piece of the puzzle. I apologize for jumping around so much. But how familiar are you with the link between reality and consciousness?”

  “Fairly so,” said Alyssa. “There must be hundreds of books on the subject.”

  “So how would you describe this link?”

  “Quantum physics has shown for a century that reality requires a conscious observer. I’m sure this is an inelegant way to put it, but a particle can be anywhere until you look at it. Then its wave function ‘collapses’ and it chooses where to be. In some sense, no consciousness, no reality.”

  “Nicely summarized,” said Craft. “No one knows exactly why reality works this way. But it’s driven scores of brilliant scientists crazy, including Einstein. A fairly recent idea is that we’re living in the equivalent of a video game.”

  “Really? I hadn’t heard that one.”

  “It actually makes sense in many ways. Imagine you had near-infinite computing power and wanted to create a virtual universe. Like Second Life, World of Warcraft, Sim City—that sort of thing. But on a much grander scale. This universe would be exquisitely tuned to support whatever characters were chosen to inhabit it. Like our universe is.”

  “Although this wouldn’t explain how the programmer came to be,” noted Alyssa.

  Craft nodded. “A fair point. But dismissing this question for a moment, here’s the part I find most interesting. In many of the virtual worlds that we’ve created for our computers, the reality only comes into being when a character in the world observes it.”

  “Say that again.”

  “The programmers don’t waste computer power calculating and rendering images off screen. Why would they? But if you take your joystick, or whatever controller you’re using, and march your character to the left, the landscape in this direction is instantly rendered. But not until your character looks in this direction, so to speak. When the character does, the landscape is calculated and rendered seamlessly, and presented to the character. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?”

  Alyssa whistled. “Eerily familiar,” she said. He had basically described how the universe was known to work. Reality was only rendered when it was observed. Particles were everywhere, until someone peeked, and then they took a discrete location.

  “It’s an interesting idea that is gathering more and more support in the physics community,” said Craft. “But the point I’m really trying to make is that consciousness and the quantum realm are intimately connected. And even beyond this, many believe that consciousness itself is a quantum effect.” He paused. “Would you concede that this is a view held by many prominent scientists.”

  Alyssa nodded. “Absolutely,” she said without hesitation.

  Less than a year earlier she had read a book about the progress of artificial intelligence, which discussed the concept of consciousness at length. Some believed a machine could never become self-aware. Could never truly marvel at the beauty of a sunset, create art, or take an intuitive leap. Because even if a computer could pass the Turing Test, fool someone into thinking it was human, it would simply be obeying a sophisticated set of programming, spitting out answers that could fool humans, but without true comprehension, and without freedom of choice.

  One requirement of consciousness was that it be non-deterministic, non-algorithmic. And this was the very hallmark of the quantum realm, where inherent uncertainties and randomness reigned. So could it be that the magic required to make a lump of physical matter self-aware took place in the quantum realm? Did consciousness only arise when a collection of physical matter, like the human brain, became capable of harnessing quantum effects?

  No less a luminary than Sir Roger Penrose, a giant of physics and mathematics who had worked closely with Stephen Hawking on the physics of black holes, was a chief proponent of this idea, theorizing that this quantum orchestra was conducted by tiny structures within neurons called microtubules.

  “Good,” said Craft, apparently satisfied that Alyssa was with him to this point. “So let me ask you this. What is light?”

  “What is light?” she repeated, taken aback. “Where are you going with this, Bren?”

  A smile flickered over Craft’s face at her use of his first name. “Give it a guess,” he said.

  “Photons?” said Alyssa uncertainly.

  “This is true,” said Craft. “But in the broadest sense, light is electromagnetic radiation. What we commonly think of as light is just the portion of this radiation in the visible frequency range. But ultraviolet waves, radio waves, microwaves, X-rays, and so on, are all forms of light. Forms of electromagnetic radiation. And they are all carried on photons.”

  “I still think I’m missing your point.”

  “My point is that the sea of zero point fluctuations we just spoke about is electromagnetic in nature.”

  Alyssa considered this. “I get it now,” she said finally. “You’re saying the zero point field is actually a sea of light. Just not light in the visible spectrum.”

  “Exactly!” said Craft excitedly. “A sea of light with nearly infinite energy that pervades the entire universe. But some scientists believe it existed before the creation of our universe.” He raised his eyebrows impishly. “Which brings me to the bible.”

  “The bible?” repeated Alyssa, blinking. To say he was jumping around was an understatement.

  Craft grinned, obviously pleased by her confusion. “Are you familiar with the biblical phrase, ‘And God said: let there be light. And there was light?’”

  “Yes. It’s followed by something like, ‘And He saw that it was good.’ You don’t exactly have to be a biblical scholar to have heard that one. It’s on the ve
ry first page. And it’s probably the most well known single sentence in the bible.”

  “I would agree,” said Craft. “But here’s the thing,” he added, clearly enjoying himself. “God created light on the first day. Any guesses when he created the sun and the stars?”

  Alyssa’s eyes widened, and she shook her head.

  “The fourth day,” said Craft enthusiastically. He paused for a moment to let the implications of this fully sink in. “Now isn’t that interesting?”

  “And then some,” agreed Alyssa, finishing the last of her coffee.

  “Seems like you’d need the sun and stars to have light, doesn’t it? Most people read the bible and never think about this. But it’s a discrepancy that didn’t escape the notice of biblical scholars. The Kabbalah, often called Jewish mysticism, explains this discrepancy by saying that the light created on the first day was different than that created on the fourth. Not the kind of light we can see.” Craft raised his eyebrows. “The zero point field, perhaps?”

  Alyssa shook her head in wonder. Fascinating.

  “Now this is just a fun exercise,” said Craft. “I’m not saying the bible was divinely inspired. And I’m not saying it wasn’t. And if it wasn’t, I’m not suggesting whoever penned it knew about the zero point field. Maybe this is just the most glaring continuity error in the history of writing. But it is interesting.”

  Craft paused and took a deep breath. “So let me return to extended fasting. Inedia. These people claim to be living off light. Ridiculous. But my crazy thought was, what if they really were? But not sunlight. The zero point field.”

  Alyssa put a hand to her chin in thought.

  “We know it exists everywhere,” he continued enthusiastically. “We know it contains nearly infinite energy. And we know the energy blinks into and out of existence far too quickly for us to ever grab hold of with our machines. But consciousness ties directly into quantum reality. As you’ve conceded, a number of prominent scientists believe our minds are quantum instruments. That consciousness itself is a quantum event. So what if some of these people undergoing prolonged fasts, without knowing it, are able to tap this infinite energy source? With their minds.”

  The audacity of what Craft was suggesting was stunning. And yet Alyssa found it utterly compelling.

  “We can’t catch this lightening in a vacuum, so to speak, with any technology known to science,” continued Craft. “But the mind is a quantum instrument. Something Nobel Laureate James Watson described as ‘The most complex thing we have yet discovered in our universe.’ So what if the mind can do what technology can’t? Succeed where NASA has failed. Crazy, right?”

  “Why do I have the feeling it isn’t going to turn out as crazy as it sounds?”

  “Just to circle back for a moment, fasting plays a big role in many religions. In fact, the world Breatharianism was first used to describe a fast-based lifestyle within Catholicism. One based on the idea that certain saints were able to survive extended fasts without sustenance. Muslims have their Ramadan, during which they only eat at night for the entire month. But what I find even more interesting is that Moses and Jesus—key players in both the old and new testaments—were both said to have survived fasts of forty days and nights.”

  Alyssa vaguely remembered that Jesus had fasted, but she wasn’t aware this was also the case with Moses. “Both for forty days?” she said. “Pretty wild coincidence.”

  “Some believe forty-days was an ancient convention for saying, ‘an extended period of time.’ But either way, they both fasted for a very long time.” He paused. “I’m not suggesting Jesus was divine or wasn’t divine. I have no idea. But it’s interesting to play with the idea that he could tap into the zero point field. Use his mind like a quantum lens. Tapping into an infinite ocean of energy and focusing it wherever he wanted. Fasting, walking on water—this would be easy for someone with this ability.”

  Alyssa marveled at the ease with which this man could make the impossible seem almost reasonable. His biography had been eclectic and his interests seemingly disjointed. But he had taken crazy events from his biography and woven them together to form a compelling tapestry that didn’t seem so crazy at all. The loon who became obsessed with fasting to the point of almost killing himself was becoming less of a loon.

  “The more I read,” said Craft, “and the more I thought, the more I had to investigate this further. I tried extended fasts. Without success. As I’m sure you know.”

  “This might have come up,” said Alyssa, fighting to keep a straight face.

  “Okay, I’ll admit. Without success may be an understatement. But I didn’t let almost dying stop me. I took my nest egg and began to travel the world. Studying the best known cases of people who were undergoing prolonged fasts and still finding energy for their cells somehow. Still surviving. I did think this was a wild idea with little chance of being right. But I thought, if there was any chance I could figure this out, I could solve world hunger. World hunger! What if I could teach everyone to derive energy directly from the zero point field?”

  “Might put some five-hour energy drinks out of business,” said Alyssa in amusement.

  “Not to be too biblical on you, but let me give you another item to chew on. These are all probably just interesting coincidences, but they are fun. The Israelites, after they were freed from the Pharaoh and wandered the dessert for forty years, as described in the Passover story, were said to have been sustained by a substance called manna. Which came from heaven. Manna is thought to derive from an Egyptian word meaning, ‘What is it?’ Good question. But if Moses learned how to tap into the zero point field, perhaps he could have trained his people to do the same. Calling this mysterious sustenance bread from heaven wouldn’t have been entirely crazy.”

  The waitress came over and refilled their coffees. They had now taken up a table for a long time and would need to leave a healthy tip. Still, Alyssa was riveted, and didn’t want to interrupt Craft’s flow. She had needed to use the restroom now for some time, but was determined to hold it until he was finished.

  “So I set up a camp with my considerable financial resources, and brought a handful of people who I believed had legitimately fasted for extensive periods. I started in Afghanistan, of all places, because I found a few of the best fasters there. But I was paying big for security, and was planning to move the entire group, en mass, somewhere safer.”

  “Good call,” said Alyssa dryly.

  Craft smiled. “Anyway, I put the fasters I recruited through the wringer to see what made them tick. And I tried to pick up a unique, but characteristic energy signature from their minds. I scanned, and poked, and I studied DNA samples for years. I won’t bore you with the exhaustive studies I did, and things I tried. But to fast forward, while I never did figure out the mechanism behind it, I was finally able to use it.” A triumphant look came over his face. “I really can train people to channel energy from the zero point field with their minds.”

  “Incredible,” whispered Alyssa. But while she would have thought this was a laughable claim a few hours earlier, she now found it, the greatest revelation in the history of science, to be so reasonable as to be almost expected.

  “As I had guessed,” continued Craft, “it’s strictly an ability of the quantum-driven mind. Of the subconscious. The more belief you have that you can tap into this field, the better able you are to do it. Your subconscious picks up on your belief and turns it into reality. You have to have a very different sort of mind to really believe you can sustain yourself on nothing. But the fasters were some . . . unique . . . people to begin with. I mean, some of their reasons for fasting were seriously messed up. And to fast for years, having every confidence you’ll survive. Well, that’s pretty, um . . . special.”

  “Instead of fasting in the name of science like you did, you mean?” said Alyssa. “Intent on ending world hunger.” She couldn’t help but feel silly using this phrase, as though she were a contestant in a beauty pageant. I want to end
world hunger and bring about world peace.

  “Exactly,” said Craft. “So in addition to the successful fasters, I brought in some minds that I thought were sharper, more rational. I ended up with a group of twenty. Fifteen of us couldn’t fast without, you know . . . dying. But we were working on finding other ways to tap into the zero point field. And we had five fasters who were our guinea pigs. Who we verified could live, as far as we could tell, forever, without any food.”

  Alyssa had a sick feeling in her stomach that she now knew exactly where this was heading. It was a wild guess, but it felt right to her. She decided to ask a loaded question and see if her instincts were on target. “Anyone in this group stand out? You know, seem special in any way?”

  Craft nodded. “Very good,” he said approvingly. “As a matter of fact . . . yes. There was one. One of the five fasters. And he was very special. His name was Omar Haddad.” A troubled look appeared on Craft’s face. “Although lately, I understand, he goes by the name, Al Yad.”

  24

  The moment Brennan Craft and Alyssa Aronson had entered the Bluegrass Waffle House, Santosh Patel had set up another call with the four other members of his team. Like him, they each had receivers in their ears and small mikes attached to their shirts. Each was in his own car, encircling their quarry at various distances.

  Each member of Patel’s team had lived in America for some time, but when they congregated it looked like the United Nations was in session. In addition to Patel, who was Indian, Suntai Ahn was Korean, Dmitri Volkov, Russian, and Bruno Haas a German. Hank Ridley was the only native born American in the group of five, and he had considerable experience fighting in other countries and with a variety of soldiers and mercs of different nationalities.

  “While they’re eating,” began Patel, “we have some time. But we don’t know how much, so we need to move quickly.”

  Patel paused. “Ahn, according to my phone there’s a gun store five minutes from you. Get there immediately. Buy them out of blanks and distribute these to each member of the team. We’ll need to use some live ammo during the early part of our campaign. But if this fails to take Craft out, we can’t risk killing the girl during the shock-and-awe phase.”