The Phenomenological Turn: From Epistemology to QM

Quantum mechanics is widely recognized as one of the most successful theories in the history of science. Yet, even a hundred years after its inception, it is still regarded as mysterious or even incomprehensible. Since its early days, prominent physicists such as Werner Heisenberg and especially Niels Bohr have suggested that quantum mechanics does not describe how external reality evolves over time, but rather that it is a theory about processing information or ordering experience. While such ideas are intriguing, they still lack a rigorous philosophical-epistemological grounding. Drawing on the phenomenological tradition inaugurated by Edmund Husserl, we aim to provide precisely that: a phenomenological-epistemological foundation for understanding quantum mechanics and, by extension, rethinking the relationship between science and epistemology. The central question we address is whether science should be understood as having the primary function of providing the experiencing subject with the formalism that allows her to answer the following question: Based on my actual and previous experiences, what should I believe to experience next? The working hypothesis is that this formalism is the formalism of quantum mechanics, interpreted accordingly.