- #1
balabanscott
- 2
- 0
I had a quick question on the uncertainty principle. I'm not a physicist but I'm familiar with the basic theories. I've never had anyone explain it to me like this, but this seems to be an intuitive way to look at it. So I need to know if I'm framing this right.
In classical, you start from point A and after undergoing the laws of nature you end up at point B. This also works perfectly valid in reverse: You could also say that given you are only allowed to end up at B, it means you must start at point A. Quantum mechanics seems to be the same thing except that instead of there being only one allowed state in the future, multiple states are allowed.
So if you have a "particle" that can end up at either A, B, or C say 1 second in the future any of which are perfectly valid, what would you expect to see when observing the particle right now? The answer would be exactly what we are seeing. If you fix the objects position, you have no way of knowing where it's going, since it is allowed to freely move to A, B, or C. If you measure its motion, let's say it is moving south, then the particle would appear to be exactly north of all three spots A, B, and C. Where a quantum particle is allowed to be in the future, determines what we observe now in the present.
Is this a proper way to frame what we are looking at with the uncertainty principle?
In classical, you start from point A and after undergoing the laws of nature you end up at point B. This also works perfectly valid in reverse: You could also say that given you are only allowed to end up at B, it means you must start at point A. Quantum mechanics seems to be the same thing except that instead of there being only one allowed state in the future, multiple states are allowed.
So if you have a "particle" that can end up at either A, B, or C say 1 second in the future any of which are perfectly valid, what would you expect to see when observing the particle right now? The answer would be exactly what we are seeing. If you fix the objects position, you have no way of knowing where it's going, since it is allowed to freely move to A, B, or C. If you measure its motion, let's say it is moving south, then the particle would appear to be exactly north of all three spots A, B, and C. Where a quantum particle is allowed to be in the future, determines what we observe now in the present.
Is this a proper way to frame what we are looking at with the uncertainty principle?