Schrödinger's Cat. Physics 1.011111111111 Not...

[GlennSprigg]

I watch 'Youtube' videos, to be entertained/educated/.... (ok... to LAUGH !!!!)
SOMETIMES, I love the COMMENTS more than what they are 'trying' to say......
This is one example. Please read 'below' though   


Ok, this was from 2014, and was an 'attempt' to explain 'Quantum Physics'... (Ahem...).
People who do not know about "Schrödinger's cat: A thought experiment in quantum mechanics"
should see the video first, (At least the 1st quarter!), to understand the 'humor' below....

I quickly gave up on being 'edurmicated', and LOVED the following snippet of comments!!..... Like.....

    so if you open the box and the cat is dead, then your curiosity killed the cat ?

    So Schorödinger’s cat went into a bar........ And didn’t....

      schrödinger: doctor, how is my cat doing? doctor: i've got good news and bad news...

      Wanted!!   Schrödinger's cat : Dead and Alive !

     What if you had a camera in the box? !!!!

      But why doesn't the cat count as an observer too?

      Finally, an explanation for the orientation of usb cables.!!!

      Schrödinger got pulled over by a cop. The cop looked in the trunk and said "do you know
      there's a dead cat in the back?"....   "Well now i know, jerk !!!"

      Before clicking on this video, I had a 50% chance of understanding it....
      but now when I DID click, I am Brain-Dead. !

      Disclaimer: No cats were actually hurt in the making of this video.

      (Waits 26 days) Yep that cat's definitely dead now......

      A dog could never accomplish something so great !!!

That about sums it up for acceptance of 'Quantum Physics' hahaha....
This has all come about from numerous OTHER links to a girl/woman by the name of
"Sasha Cullen", who is a 'Flat-Earther' (sigh) on Youtube under the name of "Orphan Red"...
Mein Gott!!!!!  You wouldn't believe the 'shite' she talks about as a 'Flat-Earther', especially
now she supposedly has letter back from MENSA about how 'smart' she is!!!!, and how stupid
'we' are for not doing research & understanding the facts !!!   Here's one of many links, to her
rambling on about 'space' photos being fake, and needing a REAL observer to be real !!!....


I KNOW we feel sorry for these 'people', but it's the mindset/understanding/humor from the
comments in the 1st video that TRULY made me laugh !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[GlennSprigg]

Wow... just... but,,,,,,,, wow.....
I wish I was now drinking what she is right now......
WHAT's 'scary', is that they have so many followers, that's what scares me about the 'world'.
What future have we brought out kids up into... that 'people' like this have a 'current' input
into the future of our 'children' / Nations... There is NO hope

[TimFox]

I've never taken Schroedinger's cat as a serious paradox, since the physics of the contraption would not be affected if you made the box out of transparent Lucite rather than opaque Bakelite.  When the experimenter ignores data that are available to him, that does not change the physical outcome of the experiment.

[schmitt trigger]

I loved the comments in the Schroedinger's video. They are witty and ingenious, and quite funny.

The counterpoint in your post is the flat-earthers video. While we can dismiss them as fringe lunatics we can make fun of, eventually there will be enough of them to influence public policy.
Heck, someday even one of them could become president! (**)

(**) The president of Mexico is also very ignorant.

[cgroen]

That Flat earth video, I would have sworn that there somehow would be limits to how stupid a single person can be. Guess I was wrong....

[magic]

Per your first video, Schrödinger himself realized that quantum mechanics implies such seemingly impossible events as a cat being simultaneously alive and dead while nobody watches and he didn't really have any counter to it, the realization drove him insane like Nietzsche and he became a botanist
So... what exactly is wrong with this lady's argument?

[edy]

That Flat earth video, I would have sworn that there somehow would be limits to how stupid a single person can be. Guess I was wrong....

Is there a chance that this YouTube personality is just trying to rack up viewership to make money, and doesn't necessarily believe it herself or doesn't know, but is following the YouTube money-bags where they lay? NOTE: I didn't click on that video or watch it on purpose, so as not to make her more Adsense money or increase view counts.

[schmitt trigger]

Edy;
I was also going to open the video, but after reading your comment, I realized that you most likely are correct.

Besides, what else there is to know about the flat-earther's arguments?
And like hard drugs, watch enough stupidities,  and you run the risk of permanent brain damage.

[Buriedcode]

I've never taken Schroedinger's cat as a serious paradox, since the physics of the contraption would not be affected if you made the box out of transparent Lucite rather than opaque Bakelite.  When the experimenter ignores data that are available to him, that does not change the physical outcome of the experiment.

It was never meant as a serious paradox.  Schrodinger wrote the thought experiment in a letter out of derision - and to this day people still use it either to "prove" the weirdness of quantum mechanics or invoke it as part of the theory despite the fact it really was mocking the Copenhagen interpretation.

There are also, many - not just that nut in that video - who believe that the measurement required to collapse wave functions must be some kind of conscious being "observer".  Its quite a persistent myth that the lady in that vid just took literally to explain her beliefs.

Edit: typos

[donotdespisethesnake]

I guess instead of Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment, we now have Orphan Red's youtube experiment. In separate ways, they both illustrate that if quantum mechanics applied at macro scales, it would lead to absurd results. Ie. a cat that is both dead and alive, or a camera that can only take pictures when there is a observer looking through the eyepiece (or viewing the preview).

Clearly, we know both of those things are absurd, so there is still something missing from our understanding of physics. Namely, how and why the wave function collapses so that at macro scale we see "classical" physics.

[hamster_nz]

I guess instead of Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment, we now have Orphan Red's youtube experiment. In separate ways, they both illustrate that if quantum mechanics applied at macro scales, it would lead to absurd results. Ie. a cat that is both dead and alive, or a camera that can only take pictures when there is a observer looking through the eyepiece (or viewing the preview).

Clearly, we know both of those things are absurd, so there is still something missing from our understanding of physics. Namely, how and why the wave function collapses so that at macro scale we see "classical" physics.

Just because something seems absurd it doesn't mean it isn't true. Especially if the model it has predictive powers.

[helius]

I don't think that is particularly puzzling. The wave function "collapses" simply because it becomes entangled with a larger system that is classically characterized. Carver Mead has written a book called "Collective Electrodynamics" that explores this in some detail for solid state systems. Another book that treats this subject is "Are Quanta Real?" by Jauch.

It's kind of sad how many reams of paper have been written about the supposed "flawed" Copenhagen interpretation that are hung up about this particular point.

[hamster_nz]

Me? I'm firmly a "many worlds" sort of guy.

Why? People/Observers are just not that special...  the cat riddle is that we just don't have enough information to determine which reality we are in (the "live cat" or "dead cat" reality). No 'collapsing of the wave function' occurs, you just find out which reality you are in, and your reality then matches that of the cat's state.

If that is not the case, then I would strongly worry we are a simulation, with some large random number used to resolve the finest details of the simulation, like a stochastic ray tracer for our reality.

[legacy]

The complex thing is how to apply to fields the same kind of operators you need to use for describing photons and electrons. Why do you need so? because of bosons, and it's damn complex math 

The real problem here is that those operators are not as intuitive as everything we have always used with classical physics, it's something completely new, not intuitive, and it's something that relies only on mathematical spaces rather than anything from the real world.

So ... concerning this topic, basically, it means: it cannot go to Youtube because it will be catastrophic for the audience.

[sokoloff]

"Have you heard about Schrödinger's cat?"
"Now you have."

[GlennSprigg]

.......... so there is still something missing from our understanding of physics. Namely, how and why the wave
            function collapses so that at macro scale we see "classical" physics...........

Maybe what was THOUGHT to be taking place, regarding 'Wave Functions' in our mind/consciousness,
merely 'collapsed' at the moment of REAL thought/Physics !!   
As a 'simplistic' (and maybe irrelevant?) attempt at an 'Analogy'...
Think of a digital Multimeter showing erratic 'spurious' numbers on the screen, while the 'probes' are
not connected. Do we hail the Aether-Gods for what we are not understanding ?, or simply wait until
the probes are connected, and sensibility/stability ensues !!   

I LOVED this snippet of knowledge I found the other day......
When you swim near the shore of the sea of knowledge, and then venture out a bit deeper ... and drown. 

[SG-1]

That Flat earth video, I would have sworn that there somehow would be limits to how stupid a single person can be. Guess I was wrong....

The main difference between genius & stupidity is that genius has limits !