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> There is no guiding hand, metaphorical or literal, choosing how a quantum system evolves. Indeed, nicely put. To be even more specific about why not: Bell's
by dlenski 2y ago
> There is no guiding hand, metaphorical or literal, choosing how a quantum system evolves.
Indeed, nicely put.
To be even more specific about why not: Bell's theorem (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell%27s_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell%27s_theorem) shows that, with some reasonable assumptions about locality, quantum mechanics cannot be explained away by a set of hidden variables that guide an "underlying" deterministic/non-random system.
- adastra22 2y agoI think what you're saying might be construed to be the opposite of what you're intending, so just to clarify: Bell's inequality implies that IF there is some sort of underlying force guiding quantum phenomena, then it must be non-local (AKA faster-than-light). For deep technical reasons this is such a hard pill to swallow, that a physicist would choose almost any other theory over this. It's effectively positing an infinite, all-knowing god, as anything less than this would not be able to consistently control selection of these quantum choices. It's an added reason to be dubious though. The primary and most fundamental reason to reject this idea of "quantum selection" is that nothing is actually being selected. In a system with two possible outcomes, both happen. "We" (the current in-this-moment "we") end up in one of those paths with some probability, but both outcomes actually do happen. This is the standard, accepted model of physics today.