[russdill]

The standard model is universally understood to be incomplete, but the problem is that it's perfectly able to predict all known interactions we can measure. We need to go to much higher energies to find violations. And the refinements we have been doing (higgs, etc) have no effect on our understanding of biology.

Penrose claims that violations of the standard model must exist within table top experiments. Not because of any specific objections to the standard model, but because of philosophical objections related to the nature of consciousness. And so it doesn't point to where those violations must be, but instead just a blind search.

As far as I know, professionals are too kind to refer to Penrose as a crank due to his extensive contributions to physics and mathematics. But his claims here are related to neither physics not mathematics but the philosophy of consciousness, an area where he hasn't made any discoveries. Professionals are happy to refer to his ideas as "highly implausible" or even as useful as "pixie-dust in the synapses".

[sarchertech]

Penrose’s target is the linear, always-unitary dynamics of quantum mechanics at mesoscopic scales, not the SM’s particle content. If objective reduction is right, you get departures from linear superposition when the gravitational self-energy of a mass distribution in superposition is large enough. That is a modification of quantum dynamics, not “new SM particles.”

The core OR argument is a physics claim about the tension between quantum superpositions and general relativistic spacetime. Orch-OR is the separate move that tries to tie OR events to consciousness. You can reject the neuroscience and still take the collapse model as a testable physical hypothesis.

The search isn’t “blind.” OR gives a quantitative target: a collapse timescale on the order of ħ divided by the gravitational self energy of the superposed mass. That points directly to masses, separations, and coherence times where interference should fail or excess diffusion or heating should appear. That is exactly what the tabletop program probes.

Penrose argues that linear QM should break at some mesoscopic scale set by gravity. Whether today’s experiments reach the right regime is an empirical question.

Penrose objects for reasons beyond his consciousness theories. He has long argued that standard QM is incomplete and needs an objective collapse law tied to gravity, and he has broader critiques of mainstream frameworks. The tabletop predictions come from the OR physics, not from the consciousness story.

Penrose’ treatment by the physics establishment goes far beyond kindness.

He regularly convinces working physicists to work with him. He has even convinced world renowned physicists to publish entire chapters in his books debating him. This isn’t something that happens to someone dismissed as a crank. World renowned physicists don’t engage with crank physics.