Rich Blinne wrote:
> Kind of. Physicists must drive lawyers crazy. :-)
>
Not just the lawyers! I can't find the book right now but it was
something I read not long ago to the effect that if you don't find
quantum physics scandalous, you simply don't understand.
>> Quantum theory suggests that disturbing
>> one particle can instantaneously determine the properties of a
>> particle with which it is 'entangled', no matter how far away it is.
>> This would violate the usual rule of locality: that local behaviour is
>> governed by local events
>>
As I recall the same book described an experiment such as the one George
talks about in the article below which I found by googling "quantum
physics scandal understand".
Effects can be neither spatially nor temporally local in cases where the
laboratory is the universe and distance is measured in light years.
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/Philosophy/PSCF3-99Murphy.html
Quantum entanglement is not only spatial but temporal, as Wheeler has
pointed out in his discussion of "delayed choice" experiments.37
Wheeler's example, observing light from a quasar which passes through
the "gravitational lens" of an intervening galaxy, dramatically
illustrates this. In such a case, there may be two images of the quasar.
A present day terrestrial observer can decide what experimental setup to
use to observe individual photons from the quasar in order to determine
whether a photon has traveled along both paths around the galaxy or
along only one. That choice today, in some sense, determines what was
the case billions of years ago.
Dave W
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Received on Fri Apr 20 08:31:30 2007
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.8 : Fri Apr 20 2007 - 08:31:30 EDT