Rethinking Superposition: From Simultaneous States to Unconstrained Potential

Few ideas in quantum mechanics have stirred more confusion — or more metaphor — than superposition.

• A particle is said to be in multiple states at once,

• Schrödinger’s cat is simultaneously dead and alive,

• Only upon observation does the system “collapse” into one outcome.

This framing suggests that the world at the quantum level is somehow both incoherent and undecided — an ontological fog that clears only when watched.

But from a relational perspective, this is not just misleading. It is a misdiagnosis of what superposition actually expresses.

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1. Superposition as Epistemic Confusion

The dominant interpretation imagines a particle “being” in all possible states at once — spin up and spin down, dead and alive.

But this stems from a category error:

Superposition is not a statement about physical coexistence.

It is a representation of unresolved constraint.

In other words, the system is not “in multiple states”.

It is in a state of potential — one whose outcome remains unconstrained relative to the measurement basis.

This is not metaphysical ambiguity.

It is relational indeterminacy: the configuration has not yet actualised in that dimension.

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2. Potential is Not Multiplicity

In relational ontology, potential does not mean “many things existing at once”.

It means:

A field of possible actualisations structured by systemic constraints.

A superposed state represents this unresolved field.

It is not a real, physical mixture of outcomes.

It is an open coherence awaiting further resolution.

The “collapse” upon measurement is not a process.

It is a shift — a punctualisation under new constraints that resolves the field in one direction.

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3. The Cat is Not Both

The Schrödinger’s cat thought experiment relies on extending quantum superposition into macroscopic terms:

• The atom is undecayed and decayed,

• The poison is released and not released,

• The cat is alive and dead.

But this confusion arises only if we assume that quantum states are physical things that propagate into larger systems.

From a relational view:

Superposition is not a property of the cat.

It is a structural feature of an experimental configuration with unresolved constraints.

Once the relational conditions necessary to sustain the superposed state break down (e.g., decoherence), the system no longer supports that potential — not because it “collapsed”, but because the relational configuration changed.

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4. Measurement as Relational Resolution

The standard account sees measurement as a kind of magical event:

an observer appears, and the wavefunction collapses.

But this collapses the ontology along with the wavefunction.

Instead:

Measurement is the application of a new constraint —

a cut that resolves potential along a specific axis of relation.

The superposition is not destroyed.

It is resolved — by the very shift in relational topology introduced through measurement.

The outcome is not selected from an ontological buffet.

It is constituted by the reconfiguration of the field.

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5. Relational Definition

We might say:

Superposition is a mode of relational openness —

a structured indeterminacy within a field of potential that has not yet resolved under constraint.

It does not describe a thing in multiple states.

It describes a state not yet made into a thing.

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Closing

Superposition is not the coexistence of contradictory realities.

It is the signature of a world in process — a system not yet pinned down, because its conditions do not yet demand resolution.

There are no paradoxes in nature — only misfitted descriptions.

In the next post, we examine wavefunction collapse — often treated as the central mystery of quantum theory. But what if there is nothing collapsing at all?