Close Transcript

'What quantum physics taught me about queer identity'

My name is Amrou Al-Kadhi or Glamrou. And I have an identity that you might categorise as intersectional. I'm British-Iraqi, gay, non-binary and also identify as Muslim. And reading about quantum physics has really helped me understand my queer identity. Quantum physics is a beautiful, strange and glorious sect of physics that looks at the subatomic particles that govern our world. So, inside the neutrons, electrons and the protons you're looking at the quarks, leptons, bosons and the Higgs. Whereas classical Newtonian physics is obsessed with the universal formula that govern our reality, it's so fixed on resolute answers. Quantum physics reveals that there is no fixed reality and it's full of beautiful contradictions. We can now observe that the same sub-atomic particle can be in many places at the same time. So if we fire an electron through a wall with two holes, for instance, we should be able to see that it goes through one or the other. But, on a quantum level when you observe what's going on, we see that the same particle is actually going through both holes at the same time. Multiple versions of the same event are happening all at the same time. What's so remarkable about quantum physics is the fact that what's happening on a subatomic level contradicts what we're actually seeing happening in reality. It shows us that reality is itself a construct, and what's going on internally on a subatomic level belies what we're actually observing. Quantum physics to Newtonian physics is, to me, what queer theory is to heteronormativity, i.e. looking for normative constructs of society male, female, of gender, of race categorising everything in a neat, rigid way. I am very comforted by this as a queer person with no real fixed identity. It gives me immense hope that there's this model of the world. This real physical, philosophical model which shows us that reality is just a set of contradictions with no real fixed foundation. It is in this model of space-time as a series of entanglements that I'm able to piece together all of the fragmented sects of my identity being able to identify as British and Iraqi, as queer and Muslim, as someone of many genders and potentially no genders at all.