beatlemaniacj said:If a photon can be observed as a wave or a particle, and that observation decides whether it is in fact a wave or a particle, what happens when to observers observe the same particle differently? Is it both? Is reality different for each observer?
beatlemaniacj said:If a photon can be observed as a wave or a particle, and that observation decides whether it is in fact a wave or a particle, what happens when to observers observe the same particle differently? Is it both? Is reality different for each observer?
tom.stoer said:The smallest portion you can observe is a single photon. And a single photon is always observed as a particle! If you observe a wave-like phenomenon (e.g. an interference pattern) this is always created by interference of many photons (you can have a single photon interfering with itself, but it never creates an interference pattern, it always creates a single, point-like spot or something like that).
That's correct, but you are not able to check this experimentatlly by just using one single photon; you always need multiple photons, either in a beam or single photons in many identical experiments. So in a sense we claim theoretically that a photon can (and does) interfer with itself, but we know that we can never check this directly. The best we can do is to look at the interference pattern created by many individual photons where we make sure that for a certain time interval T=L/c only one single photon does exist inside the experimental setup (with a typical size L).bhobba said:True - a single photon can not create an interference pattern but it will give away that it is interfering with itself by never being detected at certain points.
Wave/particle duality is a concept in quantum mechanics that states that particles, such as electrons or photons, can exhibit both wave-like and particle-like properties depending on how they are observed or measured.
Wave/particle duality challenges the classical, Newtonian view of the world that states that objects can only possess one set of properties at a time. It suggests that the behavior of particles cannot be fully explained by classical physics and that our understanding of reality may be limited.
The double-slit experiment and the delayed-choice quantum eraser experiment are two of the most well-known experiments that demonstrate wave/particle duality. These experiments show that particles can behave like waves or particles depending on how they are observed or measured.
In wave/particle duality, the act of observation or measurement can influence the behavior of particles. This is known as the observer effect, where the act of observing a system can change its behavior. This suggests that the observer plays a vital role in shaping our understanding of reality.
Wave/particle duality has significant implications in the field of science, particularly in quantum mechanics. It challenges our traditional understanding of the behavior of particles and requires us to rethink our models and theories. It also has practical applications, such as in quantum computing and cryptography, that rely on the principles of wave/particle duality.