We have proved in both human-based and computer-based tests that natural concepts generally ‘entangle’ when they combine to form complex sentences, violating the rules of classical compositional semantics. In this article, we present the results of an innovative video-based cognitive test on a specific conceptual combination, which significantly violates the Clauser–Horne–Shimony–Holt version of Bell's inequalities (‘CHSH inequality’). We also show that collected data can be faithfully modelled within a quantum-theoretic framework elaborated by ourselves and a ‘strong form of entanglement’ occurs between the component concepts. While the video-based test confirms previous empirical results on entanglement in human cognition, our empirical approach surpasses language barriers and eliminates the need for prior knowledge, enabling universal accessibility. Finally, this transformative methodology allows one to unravel the underlying connections that drive our perception of reality. As a matter of fact, we provide a novel explanation for the appearance of entanglement in both physics and cognitive realms.

The standard Bloch sphere representation has been recently generalized to describe not only systems of arbitrary dimension, but also their measurements, in what has been called the extended Bloch representation of quantum mechanics . This model, which offers a solution to the longstanding measurement problem, is based on the hidden-measurement interpretation of quantum mechanics , according to which the Born rule results from our lack of knowledge of the measurement interaction that each time is actualized between the measuring apparatus and the measured entity. In this article, we present the extended Bloch model and use it to investigate, more specifically, the nature of the quantum spin entities and of their relation to our three-dimensional Euclidean theater. Our analysis shows that spin eigenstates cannot generally be associated with directions in the Euclidean space, but only with generalized directions in the Blochean space, which apart from the special case of spin one-half entities, is a space of higher dimensionality. Accordingly, spin entities have to be considered as genuine non-spatial entities. We also show, however, that specific vectors can be identified in the Blochean theater that are isomorphic to the Euclidean space directions, and therefore representative of them, and that spin eigenstates always have a predetermined orientation with respect to them. We use the details of our results to put forward a new view of realism, that we call multiplex realism , providing a specific framework with which to interpret the human observations and understanding of the component parts of the world. Elements of reality can be represented in different theaters, one being our customary Euclidean space, and another one the quantum realm, revealed to us through our sophisticated experiments, whose elements of reality, in the quantum jargon, are the eigenvalues and eigenstates. Our understanding of the component parts of the world can then be guided by looking for the possible connections, in the form of partial morphisms, between the different representations, which is precisely what we do in this article with regard to spin entities.

We outline the rationale and preliminary results of using the state context property (SCOP) formalism, originally developed as a generalization of quantum mechanics, to describe the contextual manner in which concepts are evoked, used and combined to generate meaning. The quantum formalism was developed to cope with problems arising in the description of (i) the measurement process, and (ii) the generation of new states with new properties when particles become entangled. Similar problems arising with concepts motivated the formal treatment introduced here. Concepts are viewed not as fixed representations, but entities existing in states of potentiality that require interaction with a context—a stimulus or another concept—to ‘collapse’ to an instantiated form (e.g. exemplar, prototype, or other possibly imaginary instance). The stimulus situation plays the role of the measurement in physics, acting as context that induces a change of the cognitive state from superposition state to collapsed state. The collapsed state is more likely to consist of a conjunction of concepts for associative than analytic thought because more stimulus or concept properties take part in the collapse. We provide two contextual measures of conceptual distance—one using collapse probabilities and the other weighted properties—and show how they can be applied to conjunctions using the pet fish problem.