OOTS #1250 - The Discussion Thread

[danielxcutter]

Wasn’t that originally a quip about quantum physics?

[Peelee]

Wasn’t that originally a quip about quantum physics?

Schrödinger's thought experiment with the cat in the box ended with "this is, of course, ridiculous". He was arguing against the Copenhagen interpretation at the time, and as the world likes to turn, his thought excitement became synonymous with the very thing he was saying was wrong.

[brian 333]

Okay, then Chekov's Cat must be the quote I'm looking for. Anyway, the idea is that until the cat is shot... No.
If you see a cat in the play... Wait.
If it has to be one or the other you have to assume a gun will go off.

Or something. It has to do with cats, anyway.

[Doug Lampert]

Schrödinger's thought experiment with the cat in the box ended with "this is, of course, ridiculous". He was arguing against the Copenhagen interpretation at the time, and as the world likes to turn, his thought excitement became synonymous with the very thing he was saying was wrong.

And it is still ridiculous, if you accept that the cat can be 50% alive and 50% dead, then there's nothing magic about a scientist opening the box, so after the box is opened you have a scientist who will 50% shortly be dealing with a bunch of PETA protestors and 50% is now being mauled by an angry cat.

Schrödinger was simply pointing out that Copenhagen says that wave functions collapse, and then does NOTHING to define what causes this collapse given that particles can interact with complex systems (like a metal plate with two slits) and the function does not necessarily collapse.

Observer and observation are (carefully) not defined by advocates of Copenhagen, but their interpretation requires that these things sometimes happen and sometimes not. It is all frantic waving of hands and hoping no one will notice that this is all nonsense that doesn't help you understand anything and doesn't make any testable predictions you couldn't make without it. (i.e. it is not science.)

[georgie_leech]

Last I checked, The Copenhagen Interpretation holds that an "observation" is what happens when quantum systems interact with something classical; that is, the thing that is affected by what state the quantum system is in when it collapses. So... yeah, they define what observation means to a quantum system. That's not to say that CI school of thought is definitely correct compared to other alternatives, or that they're able to pin down what the precise delineation between a classical system and a quantum one is, but don't mistake having unanswered questions as "it is not science," anymore than the existence of Dark Energy makes General Relativity not science.

[Fyraltari]

Schrödinger's thought experiment with the cat in the box ended with "this is, of course, ridiculous". He was arguing against the Copenhagen interpretation at the time, and as the world likes to turn, his thought excitement became synonymous with the very thing he was saying was wrong.

Of course, the thought experiment is ridiculous but that's because Schrödinger seems to think cats don't count as observer, for some reason.

(Though, in fact the poison release system is also already an observer with or without the cat.)

[Svata]

There's also the "Yeah, applying quantum stuff to classical objects doesn't exactly work, that's kind of the whole deal. It doesn't interact in the way you'd expect from macro-scale objects. It's unintuitive"

[KorvinStarmast]

Schrödinger was the one who said they couldn't both be true.

Schrödinger can change his mind ~ you don't know what he believes until he tells you this time.

... so after the box is opened you have a scientist who will 50% shortly be dealing with a bunch of PETA protestors and 50% is now being mauled by an angry cat.

But the clever scientist side-steps into a wormhole and lets the cat maul the PETA protesters.

Schrödinger was simply pointing out that Copenhagen says that wave functions collapse, and then does NOTHING to define what causes this collapse given that particles can interact with complex systems (like a metal plate with two slits) and the function does not necessarily collapse.

Meanwhile the cat was coughing up a hair ball...though on a related note, Schroeder's cat can't play Beethoven.

[Peelee]

There's also the "Yeah, applying quantum stuff to classical objects doesn't exactly work, that's kind of the whole deal. It doesn't interact in the way you'd expect from macro-scale objects. It's unintuitive"

Schrödinger can change his mind

IIRC he does not eventually did, for the very reason that Svata said, but the Cat is still sitting around saying "this is stupid".

[KorvinStarmast]

but the Cat is still sitting around saying "this is stupid".

1. I am not sure that my joke landed.
2. Sitting around saying "this is stupd" appears to be a cat's response towards pretty much everything.

[Ruck]

Meanwhile the cat was coughing up a hair ball...though on a related note, Schroeder's cat can't play Beethoven.

Heh, you reminded me of this great observation:

https://twitter.com/shrimpJAJ/status...UVVe99l6Q&s=19

[Doug Lampert]

Last I checked, The Copenhagen Interpretation holds that an "observation" is what happens when quantum systems interact with something classical; that is, the thing that is affected by what state the quantum system is in when it collapses. So... yeah, they define what observation means to a quantum system. That's not to say that CI school of thought is definitely correct compared to other alternatives, or that they're able to pin down what the precise delineation between a classical system and a quantum one is, but don't mistake having unanswered questions as "it is not science," anymore than the existence of Dark Energy makes General Relativity not science.

There's no such thing as an object outside of the QM system being examined, since the entire observable universe is a single QM system.

There's no test that will check anything about Copenhagen, because it makes no predictions. It doesn't tell you what an "classical" system is, since such a thing does not exist, and if one did, a two slit plate would certainly count.

The lack of ANY testable prediction that you do not get from QM without Copenhagen is how you can tell that Copenhagen is not science.