4 ms·

Well, I'm always enthusiastic when I see such new developments and I'm certainly going to read through it later in the evening. That being said, I'm also more s

Well, I'm always enthusiastic when I see such new developments and I'm certainly going to read through it later in the evening. That being said, I'm also more skeptical whether this has a chance to work, especially if it's a classical construction. Why? Well, you'd probably need to study physics for a few years to really appreciate the answer, however I can sum it up quite simply: At the beginning of the 20th century we realized that our models are allowed to contain whatever objects you can imagine (and put in a consistent mathematical form, of course). In particular, theories are allowed to operate on objects which don't even take number values as long as they are objects which obey the defined rules. This realization is so refreshing, so liberating that it allowed for the construction of a number of magnificent things like quantum mechanics, field theory, standard model and strings. However it's hard to convey this truth to someone who's mathematical education finished (even) at an engineer level. Thus, you see the media and half-physicists always focusing on the same stupid "paradoxes" when there was never one to begin with. The insistence of many mediocre people against quantum mechanics (and modern physics in general) is analogous to an ancient Egyptian protesting that: "we should have a theory where everything is explained with natural numbers" which is the only object that his limited imagination can directly connect with reality. Another argument which people tend to use is that "QM is complicated", but nothing stands further from the truth. It might be hard to derive the solutions, but the postulates are really simple and there are no simple alternatives with the scope of validity of QM. The only real way of proceeding is to learn the lessons of quantum theory and build upon it, someday we may be lucky enough to find simple mathematical rules (but likely highly abstract) that govern the universe. So as you see, I partially agree with you. The "spooky action" kind of experiments are stupid, but for the opposite reason!

phkahler 8y ago
Thanks for that. I am that engineer / half-physicist and I can appreciate my own ignorance in this area. I have my own interest where my depth seems to go beyond most people studying it, so I know your frustration if only a little. >> "we should have a theory where everything is explained with natural numbers" which is the only object that his limited imagination can directly connect with reality. That part though... Physics has a problem where the people practicing it can't even make a satisfactory connection to reality. Even from the outside we see this in debates about "interpretation" which go on among physicists. To be satisfied with the mathematics is one thing, to have a satisfactory connection back to reality is quite another. Don't let the beauty of the abstractions blind you to that.
- masteranza 8y ago
  It seems like you've really missed the crucial part. The whole point is to have a theory which will mirror the relations of objects in the world not the objects themselves. The former leads to truth, the latter is silly. All the interpretations stuff you read about is, unluckily (for the public image of physicists), a fools game. QM is as it was 100 years ago and no progress has ever been made in the "foundations of quantum mechanics", most people who work in this area are either philosophers or very confused physicists. Who's to blame for this state of affairs? Well, there has been plenty of wrong stuff said about QM in media and even in academia. Part of the problem is that people still insist on using the old classical language in the description of quantum experiments. Examples: * "nonlocality" - quantum theory is a local theory, it's only when you assume that it's "classical in disguise" you get nonsense * "delayed choice" - should have rather be called "post-factum reasoning" As I said before if you really dig down deep, you'll realize that this is because our classical macroscopic quantities like "value of momentum", "magnetic moment" etc. are not the same things that exist "down there". The language of nature turns out to be much more subtle. Quantum Mechanics is really the best you can get when you try to hold on to the old classical ideas. Thus an alternative to QM would most likely have nothing to do with classical mechanics at all, it would need to be something entirely new.

phkahler 8y ago

Thanks for that. I am that engineer / half-physicist and I can appreciate my own ignorance in this area. I have my own interest where my depth seems to go beyond most people studying it, so I know your frustration if only a little. >> "we should have a theory where everything is explained with natural numbers" which is the only object that his limited imagination can directly connect with reality. That part though... Physics has a problem where the people practicing it can't even make a satisfactory connection to reality. Even from the outside we see this in debates about "interpretation" which go on among physicists. To be satisfied with the mathematics is one thing, to have a satisfactory connection back to reality is quite another. Don't let the beauty of the abstractions blind you to that.

masteranza 8y ago
It seems like you've really missed the crucial part. The whole point is to have a theory which will mirror the relations of objects in the world not the objects themselves. The former leads to truth, the latter is silly. All the interpretations stuff you read about is, unluckily (for the public image of physicists), a fools game. QM is as it was 100 years ago and no progress has ever been made in the "foundations of quantum mechanics", most people who work in this area are either philosophers or very confused physicists. Who's to blame for this state of affairs? Well, there has been plenty of wrong stuff said about QM in media and even in academia. Part of the problem is that people still insist on using the old classical language in the description of quantum experiments. Examples: * "nonlocality" - quantum theory is a local theory, it's only when you assume that it's "classical in disguise" you get nonsense * "delayed choice" - should have rather be called "post-factum reasoning" As I said before if you really dig down deep, you'll realize that this is because our classical macroscopic quantities like "value of momentum", "magnetic moment" etc. are not the same things that exist "down there". The language of nature turns out to be much more subtle. Quantum Mechanics is really the best you can get when you try to hold on to the old classical ideas. Thus an alternative to QM would most likely have nothing to do with classical mechanics at all, it would need to be something entirely new.