Beyond the Einstein-Bohr Debate: Cognitive Complementarity and the Emergence of Quantum Intuition

TL;DR

This paper reinterprets quantum complementarity as an epistemic principle, introduces cognitive complementarity as a structural reasoning principle, and proposes quantum intuition as a testable cognitive capacity linking quantum theory and cognition.

Contribution

It offers a novel epistemic interpretation of quantum complementarity, introduces the concept of cognitive complementarity, and formulates quantum intuition as a measurable cognitive ability.

Findings

Quantum complementarity is best viewed as an epistemic constraint.

Cognitive complementarity governs reasoning under non-classical uncertainty.

Quantum intuition can be empirically studied as a cognitive capacity.

Abstract

Recent high-precision experimental confirmations of quantum complementarity have revitalized foundational debates about measurement, description, and realism. This article argues that complementarity is most productively interpreted as an epistemic principle--constraining what can be simultaneously accessed and represented--rather than as an ontological claim about quantum reality. Reexamining the Einstein-Bohr debate through this lens reveals a persistent tension between descriptive completeness and contextual meaning, a tension experiments clarify but do not dissolve. Building on this analysis, we introduce cognitive complementarity as a structural principle governing reasoning under non-classical uncertainty, where mutually constraining representations cannot be jointly optimized. Within this framework, we propose quantum intuition as a testable cognitive capacity: the ability to sustain representational plurality, regulate commitment timing, and resolve perspective-incompatibilities in a context-sensitive manner. Formulated as a naturalistic construct grounded in shared informational constraints, quantum intuition offers a principled bridge between quantum measurement theory and cognition. This work reframes the historical debate, extends epistemic lessons from quantum foundations into cognitive science, and outlines empirical pathways for studying decision-making in contexts of irreducible uncertainty.