It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.
Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.
Thank you.
Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.
We just went through the argument of a groundbreaking result in quantum mechanics known as Bell’s theorem. The black boxes don’t really flash red and green lights, but in the details that matter they match real experiments that measure the polarization of entangled photons.
Bell’s theorem draws a line in the sand between the strange quantum world and the familiar classical world that we know and love. It proves that hidden variable theories like the kind that Einstein and his buddies came up with simply aren’t true1. In its place is quantum mechanics, complete with its particles that can be entangled across vast distances. When you perturb the quantum state of one of these entangled particles, you instantaneously also perturb the other one, no matter where in the universe it is.
It’s comforting to think that we could explain away the strangeness of quantum mechanics if we imagined everyday particles with little invisible gears in them, or invisible stamps, or a hidden notebook, or something – some hidden variables that we don’t have access to – and these hidden variables store the “real” position and momentum and other details about the particle. It’s comforting to think that, at a fundamental level, reality behaves classically, and that our incomplete theory doesn’t allow us to peek into this hidden register. But Bell’s theorem robs us of this comfort. Reality is blurry, and we just have to get used to that fact.
A fundamental conclusion of the new physics also acknowledges that the observer creates the reality. As observers, we are personally involved with the creation of our own reality. Physicists are being forced to admit that the universe is a “mental” construction. Pioneering physicist Sir James Jeans wrote: “The stream of knowledge is heading toward a non-mechanical reality; the universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a great machine. Mind no longer appears to be an accidental intruder into the realm of matter, we ought rather hail it as the creator and governor of the realm of matter.
The difficulty is reality. Almost everyone thinks that the world is real. But we know that the world is not real. While science cannot establish that something is true, science can establish that something is not true. In fact, that is the essence of science—that hypotheses are falsifiable. Note not verifiable, falsifiable! And it is a matter of fact that we have verified that the possibility that what you are observing is a real world, can, and must, be rejected. Sir Arthur Eddington and Sir James Jeans recognized this immediately when quantum mechanics was discovered in 1925. Einstein realized it too, but feeling that it could not be true, he spent the rest of his life trying to break quantum mechanics, with complete lack of success. Anton Zeilinger and his colleagues have recently experimentally demonstrated that reality can be ruled out (Nature 446, 871, 2007).
I have created an illustration of the famous John Wheeler delayed choice experiment: (henry.pha.jhu.edu...). What this experiment shows, is that Schrödinger's cat's history is determined by your observation: "If you find a dead cat, an examination by a veterinary forensic pathologist would determine the cat to have died eight hours ago. Your observation not only creates a current reality, it also creates the history appropriate to that reality" (Rosenblum and Kuttner, "Quantum Enigma," Oxford, 2006). This is where evolution comes from! The most recent experimental verification of the delayed-choice result, is by V. Jacques et al., Science, 315, 966, 2007.
A double-slit optical system was used to test the possible role of consciousness in the
collapse of the quantum wavefunction. The ratio of the interference pattern’s double-slit spectral
power to its single-slit spectral power was predicted to decrease when attention was focused toward
the double slit as compared to away from it. Each test session consisted of 40 counterbalanced
attention-toward and attention-away epochs, where each epoch lasted between 15 and 30 s. Data
contributed by 137 people in six experiments, involving a total of 250 test sessions, indicate that on
average the spectral ratio decreased as predicted (z=-4.36, p=6·10-6). Another 250 control
sessions conducted without observers present tested hardware, software, and analytical procedures
for potential artifacts; none were identified (z=0.43, p=0.67). Variables including temperature,
vibration, and signal drift were also tested, and no spurious influences were identified. By contrast,
factors associated with consciousness, such as meditation experience, electrocortical markers of
focused attention, and psychological factors including openness and absorption, significantly
correlated in predicted ways with perturbations in the double-slit interference pattern. The results
appear to be consistent with a consciousness-related interpretation of the quantum measurement
problem. © 2012 Physics Essays Publication.
A recent experiment has, for the first time, closed the fair-sampling loophole for photons [9]. It employed a significantly optimized source of entangled pairs achieving excellent fiber coupling efficiencies and state-of-the-art high-efficiency superconducting detectors to reach the necessary total detection efficiency. The researchers were able to measure about 75% of all photons in each arm. This rules out all local realistic explanations that rely on unfair sampling using a form of Bell’s inequality developed about 20 years ago by the American physicist Philippe Eberhard, which requires an efficiency of only two thirds [10]. The recent experiment makes the photon the first physical system for which all three loopholes have been closed, albeit in different experiments.
Although most scientists do not expect any surprises and believe that quantum physics will prevail over local realism, it is still conceivable that different loopholes are exploited in different experiments. It is this last piece in the history of Bell tests which is still missing – a final and conclusive experiment violating Bell’s inequality while closing all loopholes simultaneously [11]. It is not yet clear whether such an experiment will be achieved first for photons or atoms or some other quantum system, but if it can be successfully performed, one needs to accept at least one of the following radical views: there is a hidden faster-than-light communication in nature, or we indeed live in a world in which physical properties do not always exist independent of observation. Almost 50 years after the formulation of local realism, its endgame clearly has begun
Most working scientists hold fast to the concept of 'realism' - a viewpoint according to which an external reality exists independent of observation. But quantum physics has shattered some of our cornerstone beliefs. According to Bell's theorem, any theory that is based on the joint assumption of realism and locality (meaning that local events cannot be affected by actions in space-like separated regions) is at variance with certain quantum predictions. Experiments with entangled pairs of particles have amply confirmed these quantum predictions, thus rendering local realistic theories untenable. Maintaining realism as a fundamental concept would therefore necessitate the introduction of 'spooky' actions that defy locality. Here we show by both theory and experiment that a broad and rather reasonable class of such non-local realistic theories is incompatible with experimentally observable quantum correlations. In the experiment, we measure previously untested correlations between two entangled photons, and show that these correlations violate an inequality proposed by Leggett for non-local realistic theories. Our result suggests that giving up the concept of locality is not sufficient to be consistent with quantum experiments, unless certain intuitive features of realism are abandoned.
What are you talking about? How will a dictionary define what reality is for someone else?
I am referring to the incarnation/reincarnation of Jesus Christ and Buddha. There is no "serious" misunderstanding on my part. The misunderstanding is on your part.
originally posted by: iosolomon
Now, now, you are poisoning the well. But as a human, I do NOT believe ANYONE should be locked up for delusions or hallucinations (or even suicide attempts or ideation).
originally posted by: SpaceGoatFarts
You live in a society, that means compromises. Maybe society doesn't want you as a god. Have you thought about that?
originally posted by: TheBandit795
originally posted by: SpaceGoatFarts
You live in a society, that means compromises. Maybe society doesn't want you as a god. Have you thought about that?
Who cares what society wants?? What society wants for me will ALWAYS be subservient to what I want for myself.
originally posted by: kauskau
They are not only bringing people down who think they are god...Society does this with everything new...everything different..We are not even in Iran..where this is even stronger.. But this mechanism still works...
Exactly. Thats why I said earlier you can claim to be one with god but not god. That title belongs to everything.
Who said anything about locking up or even taking pills? I don't support this.
You live in a society, that means compromises. Maybe society doesn't want you as a god. Have you thought about that?
finding common ground instead of staying locked in a small bubble of reality centered around you.
originally posted by: SpaceGoatFarts
I am not saying you can not try to do as you please in all circumstances. I'm just saying don't come crying when you have to face the consequences of a total disdain for others.
originally posted by: TheBandit795
originally posted by: SpaceGoatFarts
I am not saying you can not try to do as you please in all circumstances. I'm just saying don't come crying when you have to face the consequences of a total disdain for others.
Who said anything about a disdain for others??
originally posted by: Visitor2012
A dictionary can define what the word Christ means. I never spoke about reality.
Anyone who says they are Jesus Christ or Siddhartha Buddha, must not know what the two words actually mean.
Now if someone says 'I am the resurrection of Jesus of Nazereth' that's something entirely different. But that doesn't necessarily imply 'Christhood'.
At that moment there wasn't yet any consciousness in you.
originally posted by: iosolomon
The common ground, relating to this thread, is that reality is different for each person.