A device that exists in two different states at the same time, and coincidentally proves that Albert Einstein was right when he thought he was wrong, has been named as the scientific breakthrough of the year.
The machine, consisting of a sliver of wafer-thin metal, is the first man-made device to be governed by the mysterious quantum forces that operate at the level of atoms and sub-atomic particles.
Normal, everyday objects obey the laws of conventional Newtonian physics, named after Sir Isaac Newton, but these rules break down on the sub-atomic scale and a whole new branch of theoretical physics had to be invented to explain what happens on this sub-microscopic level.
Bilocation is considered a miracle for the purposes of canonization in the RC Church.
I need to hide this news from my wife…
“How can you be two places at once when you’re not anywhere at all?”
The article does not say macroscopic systems can be in two places at once. Rather, it says scientists have built a macroscopic system that can vibrate at two distinct frequencies at once. To be honest, I don’t know the difference between that and a simple overtone or harmonic, but apparently there is one.
I get the impression that the bilocation of microscopic objects such as electrons is old hat in the lab. I continue to suspect, however, that the bilocation is an artifact of the act of observation, not a true characteristic of the oberved object. More work is needed on our understanding of the Background Problem.
This is one of those breathless media stories about a new future just around the corner. As a kid, I had subscribed to “Popular Science” which ran stories like this every month. Since the article did not describe how the quanta of energy was applied to the object I don’t know how we could determine if it is in two physical states or whether the two sets of vibrations are harmonics as suggsted above. One thing folks might question is whether the claim made for the object is a violation of the Pauli-Exclusion Principle. If it is a violation then they are seeing harmonics. If it isn’t, then maybe their assertion is correct.
As for this being “…..the first time that scientists have demonstrated quantum effects in the motion of a human-made object” , I suspect folks working with nano-arrays are going to be looking to dispute that one.
Nonetheless, it’s interesting work that will spawn other efforts, which is the fruit of good scientific investigation.
I approach this subject with vast humility, having taken an excellent college physics course I acutely realize how much I do not know.
But I have mostly thought as Marion above. Studying Quantum Physics is like studying history – one never knows what is, only what seems to have been. All this only leads me to honor and give glory to the Creator who actually made things as they are.
Also, if my observation on history stated above were in error, the whole world would be Christian.
Don
Don,
[blockquote]Also, if my observation on history stated above were in error, the whole world would be Christian.[/blockquote]
I’m not sure what that sentence means.
7. Tamsf:
Strike the whole line. My idea is that if Jesus was a provable scientific fact that then the whole world would believe in Him. this is absurd. I was speaking as a scientist but few believed Jesus when they could observe and touch Him then, why would they now? Besides, we live in an era when the line between superstition and fact is very badly blurred, a proven Jesus would be no more believed than Global Warming is believed. (Man-made significant Global Warming being an generally accepted superstition)
Don