a
nonlinear artwork for wild 2002 : : the two slit experiment
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"Two-slit
experiments reveal that photons, the quantum entities giving rise to light and
other forms of electromagnetic radiation, act both like particles and like waves.
A single photon will strike the screen in a particular place, like a particle
(below, left). But as more photons strike the screen, they begin to create an
interference pattern (center). Such a pattern could occur only if each photon
had actually gone through both slits, like a wave (right)."
Source:
http://www.fortunecity.com/emachines/e11/86/qphil.html
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The
double slit experiment was important to 20th century science, as for one thing,
it established the wave/particle duality of light. To have a look at an easy to
grasp, intuitive and not to say colourful example of science's use of the two
slit experiment, go to http://www.colorado.edu/physics/2000/schroedinger/two-slit2.html.
On the table of contents
of the Colorado university site, is among other things a discussion of electromagnetic
theory from the point of view of microwave
ovens.
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"...quantum
theory has deeply disturbing implications. For one, it shattered traditional notions
of causality. The elegant equation devised by Erwin Schrödinger in 1926 to
describe the unfolding of quantum events offered not certainties, as Newtonian
mechanics did, but only an undulating wave of possibilities. Werner Heisenberg's
uncertainty principle then showed that our knowledge of nature is fundamentally
limited - as soon as we grasp one part, another part slips through our fingers.
The founders
of quantum physics wrestled with these issues. Albert Einstein, who in 1905 showed
how Planck's electromagnetic quanta, now called photons,could explain the photoelectric
effect (in which light striking metal induces an electric current), insisted later
that a more detailed, wholly deterministic theory must underlie the vagaries of
quantum mechanics. Arguing that "God does not play dice," he designed
imaginary, "thought" experiments to demonstrate the theory's "unreasonableness."
Defenders of the theory such as Niels Bohr, armed with thought experiments of
their own, asserted that Einstein's objections reflected an obsolete view of reality.
"It is not the job of scientists," Bohr chided his friend, "to
prescribe to God how He should run the world"...." source.
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