61–70 of 124 posts
Any ideas on how quantum computing would be explained with this model? If quantum behavior is really classical like I think they're claiming, wouldn't that mean quantum computers wouldn't provide any benefit?
So quantum computing is rather orthogonal to this.
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The Standard Model does not concern itself with the various interpretations of quantum mechanics. It can, as of now, neither verify or falsify any of the interpretations which, consequently, are not scientific theories or even hypotheses, but firmly on the side of philosophy of physics. The interpretations are attempts to answer why Nature works as it does, within the framework of the Standard Model which only appear…
> the interpretations which, consequently, are not scientific theories or even hypotheses, but firmly on the side of philosophy of physics. Thanks, that's exactly what I wanted to know. I'm completely satisfied with the "shut up and calculate" approach. For me, until somebody shows that he/she can calculate (that is, predict) more than what physicists achieve, they are the ones the closest to "the truth" and not the…
The issue here is subtle, and it's that the most popular interpretation, Copenhagen, isn't a complete theory because it doesn't tell you algorithmically when collapse occurs. For any possible algorithmic way to handle collapse, there's a corresponding experiment that could (at least in theory) differentiate between Copenhagen and Many Worlds. But the Copenhagen is inordinately slippery in that collapse is defined to occur ex post facto in whatever way is needed to make the experimental results match the theoretical results.
It's perhaps not so surprising that this shortcoming was overlooked in the beginning because Copenhagen was hypothesized before we really had a clear handle on the study of algorithms. But the fact that Copenhagen is still as popular as it is means that Yudkowski needs to spend a lot of time on philosophy of science, because that's what's holding back most people from seeing the problems with Copenhagen, and why at first glance it looks like philosophy.
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IMHO the many worlds interpretation is one of the least appealing interpretation - millions of millions of millions of universes for nothing. What do you think about the following similar argument? Why are the laws of physics and the physical constants the way they are? There is a universe for every possible set of laws and constants and our universe just happens to be compatible with life. You can just render almost…
On that level I don't have any problem with "many worlds" as it can be seen just a one more extrapolation of "we're not in the designed special position" principle: first we're not the center around which the planets circle, then our Sun also isn't the center of our set of stars, then our set of stars is one of many other galaxies... if our physical universe is just a lucky variant of other possible (and mostly unint…
Liquid dynamics sounds like an interesting hypothesis, but I agree with the critics that entanglement presents a tough analogy. If Pilot Wave theory suggests that the particle-wave duality is actually two distinct actors - a wave and a particle riding the wave - then 1) each particle has an independently generated wave? and 2) it's difficult to see how that wave could be exactly preserved for both particles over the…
In interpretation of dual slit experiment people do the main mistake of mixing up the 2 waves - one is wave like quantization of position and another is de Broglie wave-equivalent of the particle. The mix up is caused by photon where both have the same wavelength. They are different in the case of all other particles. Hitachi experiment shows its the best - it clearly shows interference of the positional waves of dif…
Is it possible that pilot waves are ripples in space-time? We should not make strong assertions especially when a theory is young. You make it sound like nothing more than the a regular QM wave function.
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May I add David Deutsch's (not yet peer-reviewed, but promising) paper on the Contructor Theory of Information? The Physics arXiv Blog writes about it here: https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/deeper-than-quantu... For the curious, the link to the paper can be found at the end of the article. I remember being downvoted by circle of HN folks who weren't comfortable with Information transfer using Quantum Telepor…
I'm skeptical, if only because this should be a big deal and hasn't gotten much press. > We're able to set the spin (rotational direction) of these particles in a predetermined state, verify this spin and subsequently read out the data. This is terribly unclear. I don't have access to the article - maybe its better explained there? The problem with using quantum entanglement for information transfer is that you can't…
Paper in full: http://arxiv.org/abs/1404.4369
To the physicists among the us, please share your opinion on the paper with the rest of us.
It's not easy to digest the paper. The finding is not only going to change finance, but also the whole data economy will speed up. Now 'Quants' can be located anywhere and everyone has can enjoy same advantage of datacenter-closeness, evening out the prestigious role of the select few. Well, not really. It's going to take quite some time until the mid-class can access this technology unless, someone finds out a way for mass-production. That would be stellar.
That's it. I hate nobody with a rational mind of whatever kind, but naysayers really itch me.
Yes! But the best theory is not Copenhagen or Pilot Wave. Eliezer Yudkowski has a brilliant treatise on the Many Worlds interpretation here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/r5/the_quantum_physics_sequence/ that really should be required reading for anyone that wants to talk intelligently on the subject. Edit: seriously, don't even bother reading the article. It (like most science journalism) is garbage. Take the time to work…
Basically, you get a mass density on physical space by integrating over the wave function. Then you have correlations of changes in the mass density. Reality becomes a bit like fuzzy tv reception with overlapping channels.
There is no splitting of the universe or any other nonsense.
I still don't like the theory, but at least it is a well-defined theory.
I was under the impression that Bohmian mechanics were known to be equivalent if and only if hidden variables were strictly non-local (in the case of the macrophysical observations, the "universe" can for a reasonable higher-order approximation be the limits of the chamber being observed). IIRC, There is also an interesting 'alternative' relativity which has non-local effects and a universal frame of reference formul…
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> the interpretations which, consequently, are not scientific theories or even hypotheses, but firmly on the side of philosophy of physics. Thanks, that's exactly what I wanted to know. I'm completely satisfied with the "shut up and calculate" approach. For me, until somebody shows that he/she can calculate (that is, predict) more than what physicists achieve, they are the ones the closest to "the truth" and not the…
Bring it back to the scientific method. The way to differentiate between competing hypotheses is by devising experiments that falsify some of them, and then running the experiments and either falsifying or failing to falsify them. The issue here is subtle, and it's that the most popular interpretation, Copenhagen, isn't a complete theory because it doesn't tell you algorithmically when collapse occurs. For any possib…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In interpretation of dual slit experiment people do the main mistake of mixing up the 2 waves - one is wave like quantization of position and another is de Broglie wave-equivalent of the particle. The mix up is caused by photon where both have the same wavelength. They are different in the case of all other particles. Hitachi experiment shows its the best - it clearly shows interference of the positional waves of dif…
>>The really important thing here is to understand that Pilot Wave isn't a real wave/object. It is just a description of possible positions of the particle at specific times. Is it possible that pilot waves are ripples in space-time? We should not make strong assertions especially when a theory is young. You make it sound like nothing more than the a regular QM wave function.
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You say there: "How they lean will influence what sort of questions they investigate, how they investigate it, and what sort of outcomes they will look for." If I understand you, we can expect that somebody is maybe going to be the first to discover something new thanks to the way he's used to think about the subject. Still, before that happens, what do we have? Edit: Only real hard science. The discoverer we expect…
I don't know, but I'm not sure what you're asking. Kuhn's point (and mine, by transitivity) is that scientists are human with unavoidable biases, and these biases will influence what work they do. The reason I don't know how to answer your question is that I interpret it to mean: what tangible result do we have before we have our first tangible result? Of course, if that's not what you mean, then please clarify. You…