Re: OT: 'Quantum Enigma', part 1

On Jun 30, 12:40 am, calvin <cri...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jun 29, 10:53 pm, moviePig <pwall...@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I don't understand why you say that the apparent nature of light
doesn't depend on which of the book's two profferred means of
observation you choose.

Because they're not mutually exclusive.  You can combine the
two means of observation:

Use slits to show a diffraction pattern, hence waves; while
projecting onto a proper metal surface (through those slits)
to show electron discharge, hence particles (photons).

But combining the two means of observation was not
proposed by the book's authors.  They summed it up this
way on page 61 of the softback (ch.6):

"Choosing to demonstrate interference, something explicable
only in terms of waves, you could prove light to be a widely
spread-out wave.  However, by choosing a photoelectric
demonstration [where electrons each absorb single light
quanta], you could prove light to be a stream of tiny compact
objects [photons].  There seems to be an inconsistency."
...
"The implicatons of our being able to choose to prove either
of two contradictory things extend beyond physics to the
nature of conscious observation.  It's the quantum enigma."

(The 'photoelectric demonstration' is the shining of light,
*not* through slits, onto a metal surface, and observing
electrons being discharged from the metal.)

What I want to know is (1) why didn't they mention combining
the two experiments, and (2) if the two experiments were
combined, what would be the observed results?  My
uneducated guess is that there would be a diffraction
pattern on the metal surface, and that the photoelectric
effect would be present too, and be strongest on the
bright bands, and weakest on the dim bands.  And if
this is correct, then we don't have a demonstration of the
quantum enigma, yet.  That comes later.

To me, the authors' silence on this is deafening, but it does
not discredit anything else that they say (as near as I
can understand the other things they say, which declines
steadily after chapter 6).

The two experiments are mutually exclusive and can't be
combined ...because any(first) observation of results is part of the
experiment, and concludes it. E.g., any photon that you observe
dislodging an electron becomes, at the moment of observation and
forevermore, a particle rather than a wave, and can thus no longer
participate in any wave-interference that a subsequent observation
might seek. (I've little doubt the book includes all these
concepts... though I won't speak to the order in which they're
presented.)

--

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