The discussion revolves around the possibility of reducing the number of potential locations of a particle described by a wave function without causing the wave function to collapse. It explores concepts from quantum mechanics, particularly wave-particle duality, superposition, and measurement effects.
Participants express differing views on the nature of wave function collapse and the effects of measurement on the wave function. There is no consensus on the initial question regarding reducing possible locations without collapse.
The discussion includes assumptions about the nature of measurements in quantum mechanics and the implications of wave function disturbance, which may not be fully articulated by all participants.
Einstein's Cat said:Is it possible to reduce the amount of possible locations of a particle along a wave function without causing the wave function to collapse? Thank you for your help and of I'm simply being ignorant then please say!
So wave- duality means a particle can act both as a particle and as a wave. A wave function is used to describe the wave, the particle is behaving as. Thereby somewhere along the wave function is the particles position. However because the particles position is in a superposition along the wave function there are many possible places the particle is. My question was that if someonw could reduce the number of possible places the particle is located along the wave function to say a fifty-fifty where the particle is somewhere, if not the other. However doing all these without collapsing the wave function. Thank you for your helpZapperZ said:You will need to elaborate quite a bit more on your question, because as it is, it sounds like a word salad. What exactly is ".. reduce the amount of possible locations of a particle ALONG A WAVE FUNCTION..."?
Zz.
Yes, it's possible, e.g. by turning on a confining potential.Einstein's Cat said:Is it possible to reduce the amount of possible locations of a particle along a wave function without causing the wave function to collapse?
Einstein's Cat said:So wave- duality means a particle can act both as a particle and as a wave. A wave function is used to describe the wave, the particle is behaving as. Thereby somewhere along the wave function is the particles position. However because the particles position is in a superposition along the wave function there are many possible places the particle is. My question was that if someonw could reduce the number of possible places the particle is located along the wave function to say a fifty-fifty where the particle is somewhere, if not the other. However doing all these without collapsing the wave function. Thank you for your help
Einstein's Cat said:Is it possible to reduce the amount of possible locations of a particle along a wave function without causing the wave function to collapse? Thank you for your help and of I'm simply being ignorant then please say!
Thank you very much for your helpjfizzix said:Anything you do to a particle will disturb its wavefunction in one way or another.
If you perform only a slight partial measurement (only learning a little about say, its position), you disturb the wavefunction a correspondingly little amount.
So, you can reduce the number of possible locations of a particle, but the more you narrow down its position, the stronger that measurement disturbs the wavefunction, and the less you'll be able to learn about other observables (like momentum).
Wavefunction "collapse" isn't necessarily an all-or-nothing phenomenon, but can occur in degrees. Measurement can be described as a physical interaction between object and measurement device, also covered by the laws of quantum physics.
As one neat example, it's possible to measure both the position and momentum statistics of a beam of light, by doing multiple partial measurements in position, while measuring strongly in momentum.
See for example: http://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.112.253602