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You should not think of the electron as occupying some fixed point in space. It makes more sense to talk about the probability distribution of the position.
by Yajirobe 7y ago
You should not think of the electron as occupying some fixed point in space. It makes more sense to talk about the probability distribution of the position.
- MisterTea 7y agoWe have decades of ball and stick models along with solar system like atomic diagrams to thank for that. And it's compounded by the fact that we say electrons orbit so people immediatly think spherical planet like objects orbiting a sun like nucleus.
- jacquesm 7y agoDitto for the proton itself.
- Syzygies 7y agoYes, and Bose Einstein statistics can be obtained either by assuming indistinguishable particles, or that this probability distribution fluctuates uniformly. No experiment can decide between these explanations; the physics comes out the same. These are two stories to go with the joint distribution, which is what we actually observe. One could wonder why we need "thought glue" at all to explain particle physics in the language of human-scale physics. The joint distribution is what it is. No need to accept the second story; there are likely others. But one is entitled to roll one's eyes when hearing about indistinguishable particles.