Rethinking the Quantum–Classical Boundary: From Collapse to Construal

One of the most persistent puzzles in modern physics is how to reconcile the quantum with the classical:

• Why do quantum systems exhibit superposition, indeterminacy, and entanglement,
  while classical systems exhibit determinate position, continuity, and separability?

• Where does the transition occur, and why?

Mainstream accounts oscillate between two extremes:

• Collapse theories, which posit a physical mechanism that collapses the wavefunction into a definite outcome;

• Many-worlds theories, which assert that all possible outcomes happen in branching universes.

But both positions assume an underlying problem that may not exist.

From a relational perspective, there is no quantum–classical divide.

There is only a difference in construal — in how potential is resolved under constraint.

Let’s clarify this shift.

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1. The Apparent Divide

In standard ontology, the quantum is described as:

• Probabilistic,

• Wave-like,

• Context-sensitive,

• “Unreal” until measured.

The classical is described as:

• Determinate,

• Particle-like,

• Objective,

• “Real” and independent of observation.

But these contrasts presuppose a framework in which reality is object-based and epistemology is secondary.

From a relational view, this assumption is reversed:

Reality is perspectival and configurational.

Epistemology is constitutive, not derivative.

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2. Measurement as Selection, Not Collapse

In the traditional model, measurement is a problem:

• How does a spread-out wavefunction “choose” a definite outcome?

• What counts as an observer?

• Why is measurement irreversible?

But from a relational view:

Measurement is not a physical interaction between an object and a device.

It is the punctualisation of potential — an actualisation within a field of constraint.

No wavefunction collapses.

The “outcome” is a local resolution of a relational system —

not an effect of observation, but a moment of systemic coherence.

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3. Classicality as High Constraint

What we call “classical” behaviour emerges under certain conditions:

• When relational constraints are dense and stable,

• When interactions amplify redundancy,

• When degrees of freedom are sharply limited.

In such contexts:

Potential collapses into reliability — not because the quantum disappears,

but because the system’s affordances no longer support multiplicity.

The world becomes “object-like” when relational flexibility is suppressed.

Classicality is not a regime of ontology.

It is a regime of construal — one in which coherent pattern becomes overdetermined.

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4. The Myth of Decoherence as Solution

Quantum decoherence theory tries to explain classical emergence via environmental entanglement:

• A system becomes entangled with its surroundings,

• Coherence between alternatives vanishes,

• Classical probabilities appear.

But decoherence does not solve the measurement problem.

It merely re-describes the transition without explaining why one outcome is selected.

From a relational view, however:

There is no “selection” problem — because there is no superposition to be resolved in the first place.

Superposition is a metaphor for unresolved relational structure.

Classicality is what happens when the system constrains itself into a stable trajectory.

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5. Reframing the Question

The boundary between quantum and classical is not a frontier in nature.

It is a projection of our modelling assumptions.

We are not watching a strange reality becoming sensible.

We are watching a flexible system being overconstrained into a stable mode.

The world is always quantum-relational.

It only appears classical when our engagements suppress its degrees of freedom.

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Relational Definition

We might say:

The quantum–classical boundary is not a transition in the world,

but a shift in the system’s construal — from distributed potential to constrained coherence.

The difference lies not in what is, but in how actualisation unfolds under interaction.

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Closing

There is no quantum realm and classical realm.

There is one relational field — whose construal varies with context, constraint, and coupling.

To ask when the quantum becomes classical is like asking when a field becomes a tree.

It becomes a tree only when we cut it that way.

In the next post, we turn to the observer — not as an external agent, but as a perspective constituted within the same relational field.