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I just want to explain what I mean when I say that we should try to hold on to physical reality.
We are ... all aware of the situation regarding what will turn out to be the basic foundational concepts in physics: the point-mass or the particle is surely not among them; the field, in the Faraday-Maxwell sense, might be, but not with certainty. But that which we conceive as existing ("real") should somehow be localized in time and space. That is, the real in one part of space, A, should (in theory) somehow "exist" independently of that which is thought of as real in another part of space, B. If a physical system stretches over A and B, then what is present in B should somehow have an existence independent of what is present in A. What is actually present in B should thus not depend the type of measurement carried out in the part of space A; it should also be independent of whether or not a measurement is made in A.
If one adheres to this program, then one can hardly view the quantum-theoretical description as a complete representation of the physically real. If one attempts, nevertheless, so to view it, then one must assume that the physically real in B undergoes a sudden change because of a measurement in A. My physical instincts bristle at that suggestion.
However, if one renounces the assumption that what is present in different parts of space has an independent, real existence, then I don't see at all what physics is supposed to be describing. For what is thought to be a "system" is after all, just conventional, and I do not see how one is supposed to divide up the world objectively so that one can make statements about parts.
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"What must be an essential feature of any future fundamental physics?" Letter to Max Born (March 1948); published in Albert Einstein-Hedwig und Max Born (1969) "Briefwechsel 1916-55", and in Potentiality, Entanglement and Passion-at-a-Distance: Quantum Mechanical Studies for Abner Shimony, Volume Two edited by Robert Cohen, Michael Horn, and John Stachel (1997), p. 121.

 

Albert Einstein

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Our understanding of the four basic concepts of Physics -- space, time, matter and force -- has undergone radical change in the course of work on unification, starting with Maxwell's unification of electricity with magnetism, all the way to present day string theory. What started as four independent concepts, with space and time postulated and the possible forms of matter and force arbitrarily chosen, now appear as different aspects of a rich and novel dynamically determined structure.

 

Peter Freund

 

The first question we should face is: What is the aim of a physical theory? To this question diverse answers have been made, but all of them may be reduced to two main principles:
"A physical theory," certain logicians have replied, "has for its object the explanation of a group of laws experimentally established."
"A physical theory," other thinkers have said, "is an abstract system whose aim is to summarize and classify logically a group of experimental laws without claiming to explain these laws...
Now these two questions — Does there exist a material reality distinct from sensible appearances? and What is the nature of reality? — do not have their source in experimental method, which is acquainted only with sensible appearances and can discover nothing beyond them. The resolution of these questions transcends the methods used by physics; it is the object of metaphysics.
Therefore, if the aim of physical theories is to explain experimental laws, theoretical physics is not an autonomous science; it is subordinate to metaphysics...
Now, to make physical theories depend on metaphysics is surely not the way to let them enjoy the privilege of universal consent.

 

Pierre Duhem

 

Mental space and its existence is what makes things like remote viewing possible. There shouldn’t be any limit to it. As I understand mental space, one of the differences between it and physical space, is that there is no space in it. All the distances are associative. In the real world, Land's End and John O’Groats are famously far apart. Yet you can’t say one without thinking of the other. In conceptual space they are right next to one another. Distances can only be associative, even vast interstellar distances shouldn’t be a problem. Time would also function like this.

 

Alan Moore

 

There are books that have devastated continents, destroyed thousands. What war hasn’t been a war of fiction? All the religious wars certainly, or the fiction of communism versus the fiction of capitalism – ideas, fictions, shit that people make. They have made a vast impression on the real world. It is the real world. Are thoughts not real? I believe it was Wittgenstein who said a thought is a real event in space and time. I don’t quite agree about the space and time bit, Ludwig, but certainly a real event. It’s only science that cannot consider thought as a real event, and science is not reality. It’s a map of reality, and not a very good one. It’s good, it’s useful, but it has its limits. We have to realise that the map has its edges. One thing that is past the edge is any personal experience. That is why magic is a broader map to me, it includes science. It’s the kind of map we need if we are to survive psychologically in the age that is to come, whatever that is. We need a bigger map because the old one is based on an old universe where not many of us live anymore. We have to understanding what we are dealing with here because it is dangerous. It kills people. Art kills.

 

Alan Moore

 

...there is something about time and space that is not real, and something about us that is. However man may have tumbled into this world of indefinite space, he does not belong to it at all. Real space for him is the eternal here; where we are is always the center of the universe, and the circumference of the universe, just as real time is the 'eternal Now' of our personal experience.

 

Northrop Frye