Quantum Measurement: From Collapse to Construal

Few concepts in quantum theory have attracted more philosophical attention — and generated more confusion — than measurement. What does it mean to “measure” a quantum system? Does the act of observation collapse a wavefunction? Does the system “choose” an outcome when we look?

Conventional interpretations differ in how they address these questions, but most share a core assumption: that measurement is an event where something definite emerges from an indeterminate state. Whether this is due to collapse, decoherence, or branching universes, the basic picture is similar:

Before measurement: a superposition of possibilities

After measurement: a determinate outcome

Measurement: a special process that bridges the two

But this framing retains an object-based metaphysics. It assumes:

• That there is a system with intrinsic properties,

• That the measurement process reveals (or determines) those properties,

• And that the observer plays a role either as external trigger or embedded subsystem.

A relational ontology takes a different approach. Measurement is not an interface between subject and object, nor an event in which the system “settles.” It is a cut in potential: a punctualisation — a locally constrained resolution within a relational field.

---

1. No System, No Observer

• The split between system and observer is perspectival, not ontological,

• There are no pre-given entities with definite boundaries awaiting measurement; the system and the measuring apparatus co-arise as mutually constrained construals,

• A measurement is not something done to a system. It is a reconfiguration of relational coherence that localises a transition.

---

2. Collapse Reimagined

• In standard quantum mechanics, wavefunction collapse is problematic: it introduces discontinuity and non-unitarity without a clear mechanism,

• But from a relational standpoint, no collapse occurs — because no global superposition exists “out there” to begin with,

• The wavefunction is not a thing evolving in time. It is a perspectival expression of potential — a field of affordances relative to a given construal.

---

3. Measurement as Punctualisation

• What we call “measurement” is a local stabilisation of coherence: a point where previously extended potential resolves into a constrained configuration,

• This resolution is not a detection of a property. It is an actualisation: a systemic shift conditioned by constraints (experimental setup, boundary conditions, interaction history),

• The “outcome” is not selected from a list of options. It is brought forth through the configuration of relation.

---

4. The Role of Decoherence

• Decoherence is often invoked to explain how quantum systems appear classical when entangled with their environments,

• From a relational view, decoherence is not a physical process but a structural transformation: a redistribution of potential across an enlarged relational topology,

• What becomes “classical” is not the system, but our construal — what becomes selectable, nameable, stably describable in a given cut.

---

5. Probabilities as Index of Constraint

• In standard QM, probabilities arise from the squared amplitude of the wavefunction components — Born’s rule,

• But in relational terms, probability is not about ignorance or intrinsic randomness,

• It indexes the tension between coherence and constraint — how readily a given actualisation aligns with the topology of potential under a particular cut.

---

Closing

Quantum measurement, recast relationally, is no longer a mystery in need of interpretation. It is an instance of construal under constraint — a localised resolution within a field of structured potential. There is no collapse, no hidden variable, no branching. Only the ongoing dynamics of relation — and the moments where that relation stabilises into a phenomenon.

This reframing dissolves the so-called “measurement problem” and refocuses inquiry not on what is measured, but on how a system punctuates itself into the measurable through relation.

In the next post, we will explore how this reorientation bears on entanglement and separability — and why, from a relational standpoint, the very idea of “separate systems” is a construal, not a fact.