I see. Are the components of the spinor just complex numbers, or are they themselves vectors? (the latter would make more sense to me, given the state space)
It says that in the "notation" section, right after the sentence with the green words "two component spinor."
So I'm still wondering about my original questions.
I was reading a web page (http://electron6.phys.utk.edu/qm1/modules/m12/spinor.htm) that claims that the state vector of a spin-1/2 particle is completely specified by a two-component spinor, just as the state vector of a spinless particle is completely specified by its components in position...
Hmmm... I think, though, that it is possible to have a finite state vector if there is some limit on the "precision" of the position of a particle described by that state vector. Take, for example, what I was saying before - we have a particle confined to a two-dimensional square, described by...
So when I say "discrete and finite," I mean that I'm interested in the "state vector" (|\psi\rangle) formulation of quantum mechanics rather than the "wavefunction" (\psi(x, t)) formulation. A state vector is like a discrete version of a wavefunction that can be represented as a ray in...
I made a post in the quantum mechanics section, but it hasn't gotten any replies, so I'll try again here. This isn't strictly a homework/coursework problem, but something that I really want to know.
Homework Statement
As a high school student, I only have a basic understanding of quantum...