- #1
MALON
- 13
- 0
Alright, I've been doing a lot of reading and talking with my professors at college, and I just can't seem to wrap my head around the observer effect. Basically, Schrödinger's cat.
I've heard a lot of analogies to compare it to, but I'm still baffled by it.
I've heard "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, it falls everywhere and it doesn't fall".
I've heard of course Schrödinger's cat being half alive and half dead.
I've also heard that if you flip a coin and don't see which way it lands, it's both heads and tails.
Basically, if you don't know the result of the coin flipping, there is no heads or tails when you think of it. You just think "coin" and have no answer. Same goes for the other analogies.
From what I understand, if we shoot a stream of electrons (either a bunch at in a stream, or individually to ensure that they aren't interfering with one another) through two slits, we get an interference pattern on a phosphorus plate which is behind the slits. If we try to observe what slit the electron really went through, it collapses the interference pattern (or their superpositioned wave function) and leaves only two single bands of a pattern, instead of an interference pattern.
Here is what kills me: I asked my professor "Does it matter how we observe the electron?" He said no. I then said "So, if I have a camera sitting next to the slits to observe the electrons that's off, there's an interference pattern. If I turn it on, no interference patter". He said yes.
I just don't understand the connection of how my reality effects the outcome of something that I didn't interfere with, only observed. There are a billion analogies, but I'm missing something.
The only thing I read that makes any sense why an observer would have an effect on this, is that observing creates data. Data creation requires energy. There is a connection between that data creation and the energy is uses, and the path of the electron. What that connection is, I have no idea, but it's the only thing I can even semi-grasp.
Are there any ways for me to better understand the observer effect? My physics prof. said that to understand this is basically philosophy, so I'm hoping for some sort of understandable analogy.
Thanks,
-MALON
I've heard a lot of analogies to compare it to, but I'm still baffled by it.
I've heard "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, it falls everywhere and it doesn't fall".
I've heard of course Schrödinger's cat being half alive and half dead.
I've also heard that if you flip a coin and don't see which way it lands, it's both heads and tails.
Basically, if you don't know the result of the coin flipping, there is no heads or tails when you think of it. You just think "coin" and have no answer. Same goes for the other analogies.
From what I understand, if we shoot a stream of electrons (either a bunch at in a stream, or individually to ensure that they aren't interfering with one another) through two slits, we get an interference pattern on a phosphorus plate which is behind the slits. If we try to observe what slit the electron really went through, it collapses the interference pattern (or their superpositioned wave function) and leaves only two single bands of a pattern, instead of an interference pattern.
Here is what kills me: I asked my professor "Does it matter how we observe the electron?" He said no. I then said "So, if I have a camera sitting next to the slits to observe the electrons that's off, there's an interference pattern. If I turn it on, no interference patter". He said yes.
I just don't understand the connection of how my reality effects the outcome of something that I didn't interfere with, only observed. There are a billion analogies, but I'm missing something.
The only thing I read that makes any sense why an observer would have an effect on this, is that observing creates data. Data creation requires energy. There is a connection between that data creation and the energy is uses, and the path of the electron. What that connection is, I have no idea, but it's the only thing I can even semi-grasp.
Are there any ways for me to better understand the observer effect? My physics prof. said that to understand this is basically philosophy, so I'm hoping for some sort of understandable analogy.
Thanks,
-MALON