Interesting: photons seem to know if they will be watched in the future or not. There's a thought experiment that has been for some time and now French researchers have made it real. The results are ... astounding. And slightly creepy. http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/11/2/16/1 http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/11/2/16/1/Wheeler http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/11/2/16/1/Interferometer
I've completed my potentially nobel prize winning reforumaltion of QM that explains this phenomenom, among others, this afternoon. I'll give the rest of you a chance to have a go for yourselves before telling all though.
That's very interesting indeed. Hopefully this means we can throw out the Copenhagen Interpretation forever.
I read about this concept a few years ago in a book (author's name is Walker) called The Physics of Concsciousness. It would seem to indicate, especially now in light of the French experiment, that the outcome of a quantum observation is absolutely affected by the presence of a conscious observer. To me, this confirms a causal link between consciousness, the collapse of the Schroedinger wave function, and what we percieve as reality. Or, if you prefer, that our brains do indeed perform the function of a holistic quantum computer and that they indeed affect the way in which the probability wave function collapses. Which would in turn imply a paradox- if your brain provides the 'conscious observation' that collapses the wave function and so does mine, whose consciousness takes precedence? Well never fear, dear reader, for there is a solution to the paradox- supplied, ironically, by an eastern tenet: there is no individual 'you' or 'me'; these concepts represent the 'trap of ego', as it were. There is only one consciousness, one observation, and one collapse of the wave function. Reality is an abstract, and You are a facet of God. Chew on that, hosers.
Why? As all we have (and are ever likely to have IMO - even with a "TOE") are "interpretations" of the sub-microscopic, we can't absolutely reject one idea or another. The Copenhagen Interpretation has since the birth of QM been the mostly widely accepted, but there have always been objectors, or those who prefer other interpretations. Yeah, much too anthropogenic for me. And anthropogenic arguments often end up with the seemingly necessary result of a "God".
Not necessarily 'God' per se, but at least Consciousness. Do you believe your mind, your thoughts, feelings of love, your enjoyment of music and the taste of food is nothing more than the result of chemicals firing themselves in patterns around your grey matter? Luminous beings are we! Not this crude matter!
There's reason to be surprised about this, but not to become religious Things might not work the way we thought, but as long as they work according to some kind of pattern, we're still in the realm of science.
So you believe humans have something "special" (some metaphysical property) that transcends...the world we are aware of? Is it only humans that possess this, and if not, where is the line drawn? And why? Is it a simple mystery of life argument? Does it belong to the realm of quantum indeterminancy (if, as I believe, this indeterminancy remains)?
We can save that for another thread. I don't want to detract from the tricky photons too much. Beside, theological discussions around here hit brick walls on page 1 anyway.
Someone has already proposed that all electrons (and, I assume, all other subatomic particles) are constantly interacting with all other electrons (" " " " " " ") in the present, past, and future at the same time Or something to that effect.
Isn't that something to the effect that one individul electron could not be distinguished from another, and if that is true, then there is no difference between one electron and the next? Which then, depending on your math and interpretation, could lead you to the conclusion that there is, in fact, only one electron. Which would seem unrealistic at face value, but it might solve a lot of problems in physics and quantum mechanics.
There are quite a lot of people who don't like the Copenhagen Interpretation. It's incredibly arbitrary to collapse the wavefunction through measurement. It's also very anthropocentric, which tends to be unpalatable to physicists. Kill it, I say!
Maybe I'm just dumb to quantum mechanics, but the question that pops into my mind is "how could concious observation affect the outcome?" There's no mechanism. There has to be a mechanism for the effect damn it, otherwise we might as well just throw up our hands and declare "magic exists".
Marso makes sense. If the universe was created by an act of will, then it only follows that will can influence things, especially on the quantum level. Either that, or it's my new meds talking...
The question isn't how it does- the fact that it does has been proven experimentally. The real question is why- and that's one we won't answer in the lab.
The title of this thread needs to be renamed "Photons Be Free". I think, but I'm not certain, that it's similar to the cat in the box thing. Physics has never been my strong suit, though.
Firstly, it's still the most common interpretation used by phycisists, and the measurement doesn't have to be human orientated, and I don't think this experiment wil change that. I think the problem lies somewhere within our interpretation of "measurement". Maybe there are some deeper metaphysical powers at work - though that offers a much less pleasing explanation.
To be honest, Fox, most physicists don't even bother thinking too hard about the interpretations. They just crunch the numbers when they have to, which isn't even that often.
Yep. Still, as far as I understand it (and I haven't dived too deep into quantum mechanics yet), the Copenhagen Interpretation in the sense that a conscious observer is needed to collapse the wave function isn't that common among physicists anymore. In fact, the guys trying too develop the quantum computer would be more than happy if all they had to do to keep their qubits coherent (i.e. prevent the wave function from collapsing) was not looking at them.
mm, if we opt for humans existing in multiple dimensions, maybe we could all be linked in one of them Then we'd have an open door for ESP and lots of other cool stuff. Or maybe I just need more coffee.
So.....people make a living wage studying and experimenting with this type of thing? Damn,I wish I had been born smarter than the average bear.
