• On the Unpopularity of Pilot Wave Theory

    From Don@21:1/5 to All on Wed Jan 10 13:47:34 2024
    Pilot Wave theory is a theory I should have been told about
    when I was a child, and it should have been mentioned in
    science fiction stories at least as often as quantum mechanics
    or other post-Newtonian theories of physics. ...

    Pilot wave theory holds that there is no wave particle
    duality, no role for probability, and that reality stays the
    same before and after observation. Particles are guided by
    pilot waves that act like waves, for example, forming
    interference patterns in the double-slit experiment. The
    observable particle behavior is as it is because the particles
    follow non-observable waves. ...

    <https://www.scifiwright.com/2022/09/on-the-unpopularity-of-pilot-wave-theory/>

    Danke,

    --
    Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
    tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.

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  • From Paul S Person@21:1/5 to Don on Wed Jan 10 09:22:43 2024
    On Wed, 10 Jan 2024 13:47:34 -0000 (UTC), Don <[email protected]> wrote:

    Pilot Wave theory is a theory I should have been told about
    when I was a child, and it should have been mentioned in
    science fiction stories at least as often as quantum mechanics
    or other post-Newtonian theories of physics. ...

    Pilot wave theory holds that there is no wave particle
    duality, no role for probability, and that reality stays the
    same before and after observation. Particles are guided by
    pilot waves that act like waves, for example, forming
    interference patterns in the double-slit experiment. The
    observable particle behavior is as it is because the particles
    follow non-observable waves. ...

    <https://www.scifiwright.com/2022/09/on-the-unpopularity-of-pilot-wave-theory/>

    Danke,

    I once read a post on Usenet suggesting that photons do not, in fact,
    behave like particles in some situations and likes waves in other
    situations. Instead, they behave like /photons/, and we are the ones
    trying to force them into boxes that they simply will not fit in.
    --
    "Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
    Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
    Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Peter Fairbrother@21:1/5 to Don on Thu Jan 11 04:41:59 2024
    On 10/01/2024 13:47, Don wrote:
    Pilot Wave theory is a theory I should have been told about
    when I was a child, and it should have been mentioned in
    science fiction stories at least as often as quantum mechanics
    or other post-Newtonian theories of physics. ...

    I agree. It is intuitively simple, gives mathematically correct
    predictions of the results of experiments (as do all other
    interpretations), and there is nothing anywhere to say that any other interpretation is better or closer to reality.

    Pilot wave theory holds that there is no wave particle
    duality, no role for probability, and that reality stays the
    same before and after observation. Particles are guided by
    pilot waves that act like waves, for example, forming
    interference patterns in the double-slit experiment. The
    observable particle behavior is as it is because the particles
    follow non-observable waves. ...

    De Broglie waves. After Comte Victor Louis De Broglie, kinda my hero,
    though iirc he didn't specify much as to the "reality" or
    "observability" of the waves, more to the "actuality".

    Later at Copenhagen, Bohr shouted loudest and de Broglie shut up.

    Bohm did some later work on Pilot Wave theory, as did Bell.


    <https://www.scifiwright.com/2022/09/on-the-unpopularity-of-pilot-wave-theory/>

    also Feynman's sum-over-paths (which I think is getting closer to the
    real situation, but still not quite there) - actually foreshadowed by De
    Broglie in part of his 1924 thesis on the principle of least action.

    or the many-worlds interpretation (which I think is mostly wrong),

    or the transactional interpretation (which I think is wrong but.. maybe contains a hint or two),

    or the ensemble interpretation (hmmm), and so on.


    Incidentally I think Pilot Wave theory is closest to being correct, but
    it needs a bit more, ie an explanation of what is happening.

    just my 2c

    Peter Fairbrother

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  • From Don@21:1/5 to Peter Fairbrother on Thu Jan 11 13:29:52 2024
    Peter Fairbrother wrote:
    Don wrote:
    Pilot Wave theory is a theory I should have been told about
    when I was a child, and it should have been mentioned in
    science fiction stories at least as often as quantum mechanics
    or other post-Newtonian theories of physics. ...

    I agree. It is intuitively simple, gives mathematically correct
    predictions of the results of experiments (as do all other
    interpretations), and there is nothing anywhere to say that any other interpretation is better or closer to reality.

    Pilot wave theory holds that there is no wave particle
    duality, no role for probability, and that reality stays the
    same before and after observation. Particles are guided by
    pilot waves that act like waves, for example, forming
    interference patterns in the double-slit experiment. The
    observable particle behavior is as it is because the particles
    follow non-observable waves. ...

    De Broglie waves. After Comte Victor Louis De Broglie, kinda my hero,
    though iirc he didn't specify much as to the "reality" or
    "observability" of the waves, more to the "actuality".

    Later at Copenhagen, Bohr shouted loudest and de Broglie shut up.

    Bohm did some later work on Pilot Wave theory, as did Bell.


    <https://www.scifiwright.com/2022/09/on-the-unpopularity-of-pilot-wave-theory/>

    also Feynman's sum-over-paths (which I think is getting closer to the
    real situation, but still not quite there) - actually foreshadowed by De
    Broglie in part of his 1924 thesis on the principle of least action.

    or the many-worlds interpretation (which I think is mostly wrong),

    or the transactional interpretation (which I think is wrong but.. maybe contains a hint or two),

    or the ensemble interpretation (hmmm), and so on.


    Incidentally I think Pilot Wave theory is closest to being correct, but
    it needs a bit more, ie an explanation of what is happening.

    just my 2c

    The cultural idiosyncrasies of interpretation intrigue me - Marxist
    materialism as counterpoint to Copenhagen idealistic immaterialism,
    for instance.

    Danke,

    --
    Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
    tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Paul S Person@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Thu Jan 11 08:30:45 2024
    On Wed, 10 Jan 2024 12:07:42 -0800 (PST), Quadibloc
    <[email protected]> wrote:

    On Wednesday, January 10, 2024 at 10:22:49?AM UTC-7, Paul S Person wrote:

    I once read a post on Usenet suggesting that photons do not, in fact,
    behave like particles in some situations and likes waves in other
    situations. Instead, they behave like /photons/, and we are the ones
    trying to force them into boxes that they simply will not fit in.

    I think that this is a principle that practicing scientists already accept, >despite talking about wave-particle duality. The only error in that
    statement is that it isn't just photons. Electrons, for example, behave
    that way too.

    And, indeed, the post referred may well have said "electrons" instead
    of "photons". I made a choice, as I do not recall which was used.
    --
    "Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
    Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
    Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Don@21:1/5 to John Savard on Fri Jan 12 15:06:34 2024
    John Savard wrote:
    Don wrote:

    The cultural idiosyncrasies of interpretation intrigue me - Marxist
    materialism as counterpoint to Copenhagen idealistic immaterialism,
    for instance.

    I recently learned, from a reply to a post of mine in sci.physics,
    that what I had thought of as the Copenhagen Interpretation of
    quantum mechanics -

    quantum systems drop out of superposition, and become classical,
    upon being observed by a conscious human observer

    is _not_ the Copenhagen interpretation, but is, in fact, the
    von Neumann - Wigner Interpretation.

    This is the interpretation, of course, that keeps being used
    by Tarot card readers and the like to claim that Science has
    now shown that Mind has a fundamental role in the Universe,
    and it's not just materialistic.

    When I believed that interpretation to be the Copenhagen Interpretation,
    I had formed the notion that perhaps no one really believed it, but
    that instead they thought the "real" explanation of symmetry-breaking
    was some as-yet undiscovered nonlinear term in the Schrodinger
    equation... and this theory about consciousness being involved was
    merely a *stopgap*, to turn Quantum Mechanics into a complete theory,
    that agrees with the fact that no one ever sees half-dead half-alive superposed stray cats wandering the streets... which stopgap contains
    no claims about what the _actual_ observation mechanism is, so as
    not to bias the search for it.

    But apparently von Neumann and Wigner (before the latter changed
    his mind on the merits of this interpretation) did take it seriously,
    so my "stopgap" hypothesis turns out not to be the case.

    Superposition seemingly slipped into sfnal dogma shortly after Bohr
    bellowed the bombast heard round the world - or at least the Occidental
    World. The Orient closed its ears to Copenhagen's cacophonous counter- revolutionary, reactionary rhetoric in 1947, when it censured the
    Copenhagen Interpretation at the yearly Meeting of the Soviet Union's
    Academy of Science.
    Nonetheless, Bohr's bellow bounced round the echo chamber until it
    reached Borges, a boy from way, way Down South. And the bark 'o Bohr
    manifested itself as Borges' "The Garden of Forking Paths."

    Danke,

    --
    Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
    tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Scott Dorsey@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Sat Jan 13 22:41:36 2024
    Quadibloc <[email protected]> wrote:
    On Friday, January 12, 2024 at 8:06:39=E2=80=AFAM UTC-7, Don wrote:

    Superposition seemingly slipped into sfnal dogma shortly after Bohr=20
    bellowed the bombast heard round the world - or at least the Occidental= >=20
    World. The Orient closed its ears to Copenhagen's cacophonous counter-=20
    revolutionary, reactionary rhetoric in 1947, when it censured the=20
    Copenhagen Interpretation at the yearly Meeting of the Soviet Union's=20
    Academy of Science.

    Pardon me, why should I take advice on scientific matters from
    the people who thought Trofim Lysenko had a good idea?

    This is a valid point although some folks are starting to think that there might be something to Lysenkoism in that there are epigenetic traits which
    are inherited in addition to the genetic ones, and some of those may be affected by the environment.
    --scott


    --
    "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

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  • From Scott Dorsey@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Sun Jan 14 14:23:33 2024
    Hamish Laws <[email protected]> wrote:
    On Sunday, January 14, 2024 at 9:41:41=E2=80=AFAM UTC+11, Scott Dorsey wrot= >e:
    Pardon me, why should I take advice on scientific matters from=20
    the people who thought Trofim Lysenko had a good idea?
    This is a valid point although some folks are starting to think that ther= >e=20
    might be something to Lysenkoism in that there are epigenetic traits whic= >h=20
    are inherited in addition to the genetic ones, and some of those may be= >=20
    affected by the environment.=20

    That's a long way off what Lysenko argued, it also seems to be pretty minor=
    compared to the main inheritance approach

    This is true, but it's still interesting to see how things come around.
    --scott

    --
    "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Paul S Person@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Sun Jan 14 09:14:39 2024
    On Sun, 14 Jan 2024 03:55:43 -0800 (PST), Hamish Laws
    <[email protected]> wrote:

    On Sunday, January 14, 2024 at 9:41:41?AM UTC+11, Scott Dorsey wrote:
    Quadibloc <[email protected]> wrote:
    On Friday, January 12, 2024 at 8:06:39=E2=80=AFAM UTC-7, Don wrote:

    Superposition seemingly slipped into sfnal dogma shortly after Bohr=20 >> >> bellowed the bombast heard round the world - or at least the Occidental= >> >=20
    World. The Orient closed its ears to Copenhagen's cacophonous counter-=20
    revolutionary, reactionary rhetoric in 1947, when it censured the=20
    Copenhagen Interpretation at the yearly Meeting of the Soviet Union's=20 >> >> Academy of Science.

    Pardon me, why should I take advice on scientific matters from
    the people who thought Trofim Lysenko had a good idea?
    This is a valid point although some folks are starting to think that there >> might be something to Lysenkoism in that there are epigenetic traits which >> are inherited in addition to the genetic ones, and some of those may be
    affected by the environment.

    That's a long way off what Lysenko argued, it also seems to be pretty minor compared to the main inheritance approach

    Lamarck is the actual originator; Lysenko was a johnny-come-lately.

    When the epigenetic results were first revealed, I had a hard time
    convincing people on another newsgroup that this meant that Lamarck
    was correct -- just not the way he thought.
    --
    "Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
    Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
    Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)