- #1
jshrager
Gold Member
- 24
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Are macroscopic objects "self-collapsing"?
For fun (and classroom demos) we we regularly calculate the diffraction and time evolution dispersion of macroscopic things like viruses, bullets, and elephants. But it would seem to me that this is actually a pretty misleading. Anything larger than a fundamental particle has structure, so wouldn't anything of any complexity at all, let's say an H2 molecule (or actually, even just a proton!) be self-stabilizing via self-collapse of one another objects' wave functions? Yes, you COULD write down the combined wave function, but in reality wouldn't each object's time-dependent wf be constantly being reset to the initial (delta) state by virtue of the influence of the other object? That is, doesn't the field that holds anything at all together effectively co-collapse the wave functions of each subpart?
For fun (and classroom demos) we we regularly calculate the diffraction and time evolution dispersion of macroscopic things like viruses, bullets, and elephants. But it would seem to me that this is actually a pretty misleading. Anything larger than a fundamental particle has structure, so wouldn't anything of any complexity at all, let's say an H2 molecule (or actually, even just a proton!) be self-stabilizing via self-collapse of one another objects' wave functions? Yes, you COULD write down the combined wave function, but in reality wouldn't each object's time-dependent wf be constantly being reset to the initial (delta) state by virtue of the influence of the other object? That is, doesn't the field that holds anything at all together effectively co-collapse the wave functions of each subpart?