drw@cullvax.UUCP (Dale Worley) (05/28/87)
A few terse responses here... djo@pbhyc.UUCP (Dan'l Oakes) writes: > Reasons: (1) It's incredibly arrogant to simply assume that our mathematical > model *is* adequate in the present state of knowledge. Though it does provide excellent predictions of the experimental results. > (2) [and I expect to > be flamed to the stars for this] If we accept indeterminacy, the validity of > scientific method as a whole is called into question. Scientific method is > based on the absolute repeatability of experiments under essentially identical > conditions. The admission of indeterminacy is tantamount to admission that > experiments, even under absolutely identical conditions -- in itself an > impossibility -- are not repeatable, but only statistically similar. A very good point... But if you run two *series* of experiments, and compare the statistical properties of the two sets of results, those properties are "the same" (i.e., within the statistical variation expected -- I don't know the details, but there is a huge body of statistical theory that makes all this quite well-defined). > The only > way to recreate determinacy in QM is through the admission of a "hidden > variable," something which determines the "indeterminate" regardless of our > state of knowledge. True, but since hidden variables imply the Bell inequality, and (so far) the Bell inequality has been *disproved experimentally*, it would not seem to be a fruitful avenue of theoretical development, to say the least. "Let us start developing our theory by assuming something that experiment has disproved..." (Though you can get out of this bind with FTL info transfer, but no one seems to like that choice.) > Or that QM is simply inadequate. You've thrown that possibility out the > window unexamined. Except that QM is fantastic at explaining what we see. This makes physicists less than willing reject it, particularly when the reason for rejecting it is a philosophical distaste of certain aspects of the theory. > To say that the mathematics is "inadequate" is not equal to saying that > it "fails to correspond to reality." Newtonian physics corresponds to > reality, within its limits. When applied to relativistic speeds, masses, > etc., however, Newtonian physics becomes inadequate. > > I suggest that something similar is taking place here: that QM corresponds > to reality, within its limits; but that, just as the level of interpretation > and observation once showed Newtonian physics inadequate, so now QM is proving > inadequate under certain conditions. Newtonian mechanics was shown to be inadequate by the Michelson-Morely experiment (leading to relativity), and by the "ultraviolet catastrophy" (Newtonian theory predicted completely impossible features of the blackbody radiation) (leading to QM). Both of these are failures of the theory to predict observed phenomena. What experiment do you know of in which QM fails to predict what is observed? Stop turning philosophical prejudices into physical principles! Dale -- Dale Worley Cullinet Software UUCP: ...!seismo!harvard!mit-eddie!cullvax!drw ARPA: cullvax!drw@eddie.mit.edu Un*x (a generic name for a class of OS's) != Unix (AT&T's brand of such)
kastin@husc4.UUCP (05/29/87)
Minor, rather unrelated, flame: In article <1224@cullvax.UUCP> drw@cullvax.UUCP (Dale Worley) writes: >Newtonian mechanics was shown to be inadequate by the Michelson-Morely >experiment (leading to relativity), and by the "ultraviolet The Michelson-Morley-Miller experiments did not "lead to relativity" per se. I have a quote from Einstein lying around somewhere to the effect that he started working on relativity before he ever heard of Michelson; Einstein saw the aether-drift experiments merely as a confirmation of his theory. The best book I've read on this subject is Lloyd Swenson Jr., _The Ethereal Aether_. I highly recommend it. /^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^\ |Jonathan Kastin (kastin@husc4.UUCP) My only consolation isn't that | |Canaday F-12/ Harvard University it's not as bad as if it weren't: | |Cambridge, MA 02138-4993 It's that it's not as bad as it is. | \............................................................................./