In Search of Schrodingers Cat*

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

From Schrödinger's Cat to Thomistic Ontology

… It is not my intention to propose yet another ad hoc philosophy designed to resolve quantum paradox. I intend in fact to do the opposite: to show, namely, that there is absolutely no need for a new philosophic Ansatz, that the problem at hand can be resolved quite naturally on strictly traditional philosophic ground. What I propose to show, in particular, is that the quantum facts, divested of scientistic encrustations, can be readily integrated into a very ancient and venerable ontology: namely, the Thomistic, which traces back to Aristotle. Rejected by Galileo and Descartes, and subsequently marginalized, this reputedly outmoded medieval speculation proves now to be capable of supplying the philosophic keys for which physicists have been groping since the advent of quantum theory. …

[Hashi Lebwohl]

The original Tomography from Entanglement paper may be found here. Enjoy.

[Vraith]

+JMJ+

From Schrödinger's Cat to Thomistic Ontology

That piece is very pretty in its way.
But it doesn't explain or solve or resolve anything.
Author says, physics reduced:

in Whitehead's words, to "a kind of mystic chant over an unintelligible universe."

But what the paper does,in the end, is reduce it all to an unintelligible chant over an impossible universe.

[Vraith]

Double, but meant to say to peter on:

or does the work described in link 2 move it all beyond that by describing as implied a deeper reality level.

Yes, it is claimed to be that...or at least a step on the path towards that.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Okay, found the article for the "delayed-choice" experiment, as well. I suppose I should register at that site so I can get the full transcript of the publications.

Professor Truscott's team first trapped a collection of helium atoms in a suspended state known as a Bose-Einstein condensate, and then ejected them until there was only a single atom left.

The single atom was then dropped through a pair of counter-propagating laser beams, which formed a grating pattern that acted as crossroads in the same way a solid grating would scatter light.

A second light grating to recombine the paths was randomly added, which led to constructive or destructive interference as if the atom had travelled both paths. When the second light grating was not added, no interference was observed as if the atom chose only one path.

However, the random number determining whether the grating was added was only generated after the atom had passed through the crossroads.

If one chooses to believe that the atom really did take a particular path or paths then one has to accept that a future measurement is affecting the atom's past, said Truscott.

"The atoms did not travel from A to B. It was only when they were measured at the end of the journey that their wave-like or particle-like behavior was brought into existence," he said.

This isn't too terribly surprising once you realize that at the quantum level causality doesn't work like it works for us here. Events don't have to have cause or, equally strangely, cause/effect can happen in reverse order.

[Vraith]

This could have gone into several threads---but it does talk about [briefly] why in the "real world" the cat is either one or the other.
I also like it cuz, if correct, it points in the direction of my favored intuition on how quantum and macro resolve with each other.

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/06/150616102353.htm

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Well what do you know? I never considered that time dilation could account for why quantum behavior stops and macro behavior begins. Neat.

[wayfriend]

If this is true (and it seems sketchy to me) then it would mean larger objects would demonstrate quantum behavior if they were away from the source of any time dilation - in the middle of space.

... except larger objects have their own gravity, and so induce their own time dilation upon themselves. Hmm.

Still, what bothers me here is that it argues as if time dilation was a force, but it's actually an effect - more specifically, it's a difference between two different levels of an effect, and not even the effect itself.

[Zarathustra]

Wow, this seems like a big clue in how to unite the two theories, relativity and quantum theory. Gravity has always been the missing piece, getting a good quantum description of it. If gravity is linked this closely to the most basic division between the two 'worlds,' the macro (where relativity excels) and the micro (where quantum theory excels), then it sure points towards of union of the two theories ... at least it seems so to this layperson.

Time dilation is just a curvature of space/time, which is what the force of gravity is. The force itself (what's 'felt' of it, or is manifest in its effects) is matter trying to follow a straight path through curved space/time. I have no idea why this would cause superposition to collapse, but it's probably appropriate to think of it as a force, or at least one dimension of that force.

[Vraith]

the source of any time dilation - in the middle of space.

... except larger objects have their own gravity, and so induce their own time dilation upon themselves. Hmm.

Still, what bothers me here is that it argues as if time dilation was a force, but it's actually an effect

Yea, but---"space"---the stuff itself is a larger object without gravity, it's full of "stuff" because of quantum fluctuations....but once a "piece" of quantum space fluxes, the fluxing "thing" [if large enough itself---or more likely just near enough to another fluxing thing that the two attach] curves space-time, lifting/collapsing itself up out of superposition by its own timeboot-dilationstraps.
It's a GOOD thing [and consistent with known info at both scales---so we don't have to completely reinvent the universe] that it is an effect and not a new force.

Ok, I just strung some stuff together there without justifying it or thinking too much on it.
But if it is correct, even if it just functions as a clue---it's a big deal. Or at least the little deal that leads to the big one.

In a way it seems too easy/convenient...maybe "sketchy" as you said...and a "why the fuck didn't anyone already spot this?"
But the 3 universities mentioned---that's serious damn brainpower from important institutions with reputations to uphold.

[Vraith]

And just when the field looked like it was tilting far enough in the direction of "the function is real/objective" to send anything contrary plunging into the abyss of myth---a thing worth reading [if just for fun].

describes physics as “a dynamic interplay between storytelling and equation writing. Neither one stands alone, not even at the end of the day.” And indeed Fuchs, a physicist at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, has a radical story to tell. The story is called QBism,

[[[[snip]]]
Q:
Let’s talk about probability.
A:
Probability does not exist! Bruno de Finetti, in the intro to his two-volume set on probability theory, writes in all-capital letters, “PROBABILITY DOES NOT EXIST.” He says it will go the way of phlogiston, witches, elves and fairies.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20150604 ... ism-qbism/

[wayfriend]

I liked that. Thanks.

[Vraith]

This would be pretty cool just because it includes this:

"a device that makes it possible for polaritons - hybrid quasi-particles that are part light and part matter - to exist."

But it's cool for other reasons, too.

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/07/150714131551.htm

[Hashi Lebwohl]

The ability to make room-temperature condensates at sizes of 100 micrometers is astonishing. The next step will be to create a series of such condensates then bring them together until they almost touch or are separated by layers only one molecule thick just to see what happens.

We should probably classify Bose-Einstein condensate as a new state of matter, presuming that hasn't already been done.

[Vraith]

We should probably classify Bose-Einstein condensate as a new state of matter, presuming that hasn't already been done.

Heh...the above isn't why I'm here, but the answer is yea, it's its own state of matter.
Apparently a particalist state. Only bosons can be B/E. Fermions prohibited.

What I'm here for is....
It seems that, if a couple of physicists are looking for their lost cat, not ONLY is the cat, at least temporarily, both alive and dead...at the end of the search, one physicist could find it alive, and one find it dead.
It goes from uncertain/neither to certainly BOTH.
Maybe.
Read this for fun:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586- ... technology

[peter]

For now physicists are likely to keep debating. "I don't think we have made sense of this," Liefer says.

"And when we do we'll move on to explain the results of our eight years of study on the process of extracting sunbeams from cucumbers."

[Vraith]

For now physicists are likely to keep debating. "I don't think we have made sense of this," Liefer says.

"And when we do we'll move on to explain the results of our eight years of study on the process of extracting sunbeams from cucumbers."

Hah! Funny.


OTOH...y'know, you CAN extract sunbeams from cucumbers.
Sorta, anyway...
Kinda like TECHNICALLY, coal power IS solar power.

[peter]

Well, odd you should say that V, because as I was posting I was reminded of the simply worst piece of decayed food that ever slipped through the net of constant checking in the shop, which happened to be a cucumber which was (I kid you not) flourescing with crimson light within its cellophane vacu-pack. I've never seen the like before or since!

[Ur Dead]

Wow.. if you just threw in some string theory then
you could tie them to the buckyballs and maybe the
halfdead halfalive cat would have something to play with
while it cramped up in a box.

Aught to report Schrodinger to the SPCA about his
cruelty to cats.

[Cord Hurn]

Ought to report Schrodinger to the SPCA about his
cruelty to cats.

Well said, Ur-Dead! I've often thought it would be poetic justice if the cat slapped Schrodinger's face when he opened the box.