- #1
benk99nenm312
- 302
- 0
I have a question on collapsing wave functions. Suppose one observes the wave function of an electron. The wave function should collapse, but would it collapse instantaneously? If so, wouldn't this violate relativity?
There's no way to use wavefunction collapse to send a message faster than light, so there's no violation of relativity.
I have a question on collapsing wave functions. Suppose one observes the wave function of an electron. The wave function should collapse, but would it collapse instantaneously? If so, wouldn't this violate relativity?
I have a question on collapsing wave functions. Suppose one observes the wave function of an electron. The wave function should collapse, but would it collapse instantaneously? If so, wouldn't this violate relativity?
Do you believe the moon is Not there if nobody is looking at it?
>>Einstein's ironic statement was "Does the moon disappear when I'm not looking at it?" This was stated in order to show the absurdity of the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, which states that there are no particles in the universe until scientists perform experiments; i.e. the experiments themselves 'create' reality ahead of them, creating an illusion that scientists are exploring a reality that is independent of their mental existence.
Do you believe the moon is Not there if nobody is looking at it?
>>Einstein's ironic statement was "Does the moon disappear when I'm not looking at it?"
I hold Bohr's spirit that
"It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature"
very high.
The conclusion here is that no matter what "nature is", ALL a real observer can EVER know about this, must be acuqired by means of interactions ~ questioning ~ measurements. So you never get closer to reality than your own perspective. Anything beyond that is IMHO at least, a naive realist ideal that doesn't match the standards of a good theory of science and measurement.
It is a completely different thing to exclude the alternatives from science. That is simply the totalitarian spirit of that time.
This is positivistic theory of science, which has been refuted by Popper long ago. Realism is, instead, the true method of science. We propose theories, as hypotheses how nature really works. From these hypotheses, we derive what can be observed, and compare these derivations with observation. Even if this does not help, if there are different realistic theories able to preserve the phenomena, we have criteria for comparison (simplicity, beauty, explanatory power, internal consistency) which allow to reject some if not most of the alternatives even without support from observation.
The problem is that there is no objective measure of simplicity. You can probably make anything simple, by constructing a custom measure.
To me simplicity is closely related to speculation. A simple "theory" is a one which contains a minimum of speculation. To stick to what we know, and not adapt to realist constructs are to me simple, beucase it does away with the redundant baggage.
/Fredrik
It would be possible to take an information theoretic approach here (as Norretranders in his pop sci book, The User Illustion, argued).
Simplicity involves a reduction in the information required to specify a particular theory or law.
E=MC^2 excites people because it is compact enough to fit on a t-shirt. It is simple in an information theoretic sense.
This is of course why we want to go generally from philosophy (much waffling) to mathematics (abrupt equations).
Modelling involves a reduction of information. Of course, models often end up too simple to apply to more than small (particular scale) applications.
But the general point is that modelling theory (the modern stuff post popper, positivism, etc - so Rosen, Pattee, those kind of modern era guys) can operationalise the notion of simplicity.