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UFO's

Someone post a photo of a UFO.

Go on there must be a photo of one somewhere - what with all the window lickers who think they are real

👽🛸
 

Big Jeff said:
Someone post a photo of a UFO.

Go on there must be a photo of one somewhere - what with all the window lickers who think they are real

👽🛸
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There's a conversation about quantum mechanics going on in the thread. All the alien spaceship believers have gone into hiding.
 
fyl2u said:
There's a conversation about quantum mechanics going on in the thread. All the alien spaceship believers have gone into hiding.
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I must confess my knowledge of quantum mechanics is somewhat limited.

Based on what I have read I can only conclude that it sounds like a load of theoretical bollocks.
 
Big Jeff said:
I must confess my knowledge of quantum mechanics is somewhat limited.

Based on what I have read I can only conclude that it sounds like a load of theoretical bollocks.
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It is completely counterintuitive compared with classical mechanics, but it is also an extremely accurate model for describing and predicting particle behaviour.
 
Big Jeff said:
Damn right
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I guess we could debate what their best albums were.

I'm a massive fan of the Grace Under Pressure, Power Windows, Hold Your Fire era, as well as Roll The Bones. (I really should familiarise myself with Presto, seeing as it sits right in the midst of my favourite era).

Test For Echo was also amazing.

I always wished they'd done more stuff like the first couple of tracks of Counterparts. Stick It Out has such a Rage Against The Machine / Alice In Chains era of alt-rock influence.
 
fyl2u said:
I guess we could debate what their best albums were.

I'm a massive fan of the Grace Under Pressure, Power Windows, Hold Your Fire era, as well as Roll The Bones. (I really should familiarise myself with Presto, seeing as it sits right in the midst of my favourite era).

Test For Echo was also amazing.

I always wished they'd done more stuff like the first couple of tracks of Counterparts. Stick It Out has such a Rage Against The Machine / Alice In Chains era of alt-rock influence.
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I like them all but my favourite albums run from All the Worlds a stage through Farewell, Hemisheres, Moving Pictures.
 
fyl2u said:
.


Schrodinger's Cat analogy was originally intended as a criticism of the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics, which states that a quantum system remains in superposition until exposed to the outside world. The thought experiement was a reductio ad absurdum to an extent, but one that fit so well it was adopted by the scientific community.

In Schrodinger's example, the cat can be said to be both alive and dead at the same time because the cat is considered to be the quantum system of the thought experiment. As you rightly say, the cat is purely analogous to a particle in superposition, where the two states of superposition are "alive" and "dead". Until the box is opened, the wavefunction is yet to collapse. Once opened, it collapses into one state or the other. Until then, it is in both states according to Copenhagen.

Of course there's the argument that the cat can be considered an observer. The Relational Interpretation for example suggests that the cat is an observer of the internal system, whereas the experimenter is an observer of the larger system, allowing the two observers to have different information about the system. In this interpretation, the cat has already witnessed the wavefunction collapse before the box has opened, whereas to the experimenter the system remains in superposition until the box is opened.

In the Wigner's Friend thought experiment, a friend of the experimenter checks the box without telling the experimenter. In this scenario, from the perspective of the experimenter, the friend becomes a part of the wavefunction, having different information about the quantum system than the experimenter has.

There are other interpretations that deny that superposition ever happens at all, and the cat is only ever alive or dead.

There's also the often misquoted Many Worlds Interpretation that states that the universe itself splits into two separate decoherent universes, one within which the cat is alive and one within which the cat is dead.

That's the one that bugs the shit out of me when I see folks misquoting it. Entire sci-fi TV shows and movies have been created based on the concept that "every decision you make splits off another universe, and there are an infinite number of universes where everything is possible..." NO, JUST f***ing NO. :lol:
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Think about it. Change the cat for a human. Put yourself in the box, I'll be the observer and we'll run the experiment. You don't need me to open the box and tell you whether you're alive or dead. You'll know whether you're alive or dead long before I open the box. You won't be alive and dead at the same time, you'll either die, or say open the bloody box. The quantum measurement was already made, by you inside the box, long before I open it. Same for cats.

He was talking about what happens at the quantum level when you measure particles.
 
Roker Rick said:
Think about it. Change the cat for a human. Put yourself in the box, I'll be the observer and we'll run the experiment. You don't need me to open the box and tell you whether you're alive or dead. You'll know whether you're alive or dead long before I open the box. You won't be alive and dead at the same time, you'll either die, or say open the bloody box. The quantum measurement was already made, by you inside the box, long before I open it. Same for cats.
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To quote myself in the previous post:

"Of course there's the argument that the cat can be considered an observer. The Relational Interpretation for example suggests that the cat is an observer of the internal system, whereas the experimenter is an observer of the larger system, allowing the two observers to have different information about the system. In this interpretation, the cat has already witnessed the wavefunction collapse before the box has opened, whereas to the experimenter the system remains in superposition until the box is opened."


Roker Rick said:
He was talking about what happens at the quantum level when you measure particles.
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Yes, we already established this. The analogy gets used as a way to discuss the different interpretations and where they each propose is the moment of wavefunction collapse.
 
fyl2u said:
To quote myself in the previous post:

"Of course there's the argument that the cat can be considered an observer. The Relational Interpretation for example suggests that the cat is an observer of the internal system, whereas the experimenter is an observer of the larger system, allowing the two observers to have different information about the system. In this interpretation, the cat has already witnessed the wavefunction collapse before the box has opened, whereas to the experimenter the system remains in superposition until the box is opened."




Yes, we already established this. The analogy gets used as a way to discuss the different interpretations and where they each propose is the moment of wavefunction collapse.
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Fine. All I was saying to the lad was stop telling people it applies to actual cats.
 
Roker Rick said:
You did. The fact you're now trying to backtrack instead of just holding your hands up and admitting you didn't know is embarrassing.
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You're a liar !

Roker Rick said:
The cat isn't dead or alive at the same time. That's a classic misrepresentation of the argument Shrodinger put forward.
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You knew it wasn't a real cat and what I was really representing because you got your knickers in a twist trying to tell me you can't really visualise it, which is exactly what I was saying to another poster :oops::oops:
 
High Entropy said:
You're a liar !



You knew it wasn't a real cat and what I was really representing because you got your knickers in a twist trying to tell me you can't really visualise it, which is exactly what I was saying to another poster :oops::oops:
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Emoji's won't hide your embarrassment. They highlight it.

Stop telling people the cat is both dead and alive. It's incorrect. You're misleading people.

End of.
 
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