Does Pauli's Exclusion Principle Apply to the Entire Universe?

[gibbson_e]

I discovered the existence of Pauli's exclusion principle from this section of this video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f9wcSLs8ZQ&t=35m30s

If you watch it for a bit, he explains that it applies to the whole universe. Is this true? On Wikipedia it says otherwise:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauli_exclusion_principle
"For example, no two electrons in a single atom can have the same four quantum numbers; if n, l, and ml are the same, ms must be different such that the electrons have opposite spins, and so on."

If it applies to the whole universe, that's ****in insane.

 

[mathman]

The principle is usually to applied to particles in proximity. Particles in different locations are different enough by location.

 

[JesseC]

Already being discussed in this thread:

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=561511&fb_source=message

with responses from Prof. Brian Cox himself. Worth reading.

 

[gibbson_e]

So the jist of that is Brian Cox is wrong about instantaneous? He still persists to say that "And so, every electron in the Universe knows about the state of every other electron"

 

[JesseC]

He isn't wrong, the effect simply isn't measurable and is infact so small as to be slightly meaningless. At least that's how I understands it... seems like you need to learn QFT if you want to go into the nitty gritty details.