SCHRODINGER’S CAT DEFIES YOUR WORLD-PERCEPTION

Oftentimes, Einstein claimed that “God does not play dice”, asserting that everything can be anticipated should we be capable enough, and with sufficient data.

11 min readApr 12, 2022

“There exists no law to rule that quantum physics must be compelling, nor explicit”, said a scientist [*].

Which is explicit. Nevertheless, to “bear with” such an incomprehensibility seems somewhat beyond bearing, for quantum mechanics did indirectly claim that “there exists no law to rule that a cat may not subsist and succumb coevally”.

In quantum physics, a cat can indeed coetaneously be superpositioned in-between life and de-ath. To put it into perspective, neither has it been any human law (except for common sense) to hold that such a state is contrary to all reason.

Bewildering as it may seem, this even urges us to jog through our modest knowledge memory — from the Conservation of Energy to how biology defines beings — to “nitpick” such a statement. Which is fair enough, for it was the very reactions of Einstein and other scientists a century ago: not only is it counterintuitive, quantum physics even “counters” the subjective facts of this world.

Or isn’t it? What if we do not understand this world that much?

1. An used-to to scientists

Before Schrodinger, the physics field was in its heyday. Back then, Einstein, upon series after series of axioms and conflicting theories with the absolute accuracy inherited from classic physics, had already gained himself the very title of one of the greatest human physicists, thence propelling forward innovative directions of physics study.

To be the one to put forward every leading-edge theory, Einstein was by no means a diehard. He, nonetheless, was profoundly influenced by classical physics’ predictability. Oftentimes, he claimed that “God does not play dice” [1], asserting that everything can be anticipated should we be capable enough, and with sufficient data. Results of coin-flipping, and dice-tossing, thus, could be predicted, or even manipulated. Further, humans could, by the book, forecast every future hurricane should we hold the very data of every atmospheric particle, and be capable of processing which.

Indeed, it had been such a raging view among physicists before quantum physics.

At an atomic level, the world, however, operates wildy differently. Wherein space-time becomes somewhat counterintuitive: a particle can coevally continuously pop up at several points, insofar as neither classical mechanics nor Einstein’s theory of relativity can “quell” every other atomic law. Above all, it bears with another woefully controversial thing: the probability and absolute randomness of particles.

At its core, such a thing as absolute randomness sticks out from our human randomness in results of coin-flipping, dicing, and lottery. A particle’s position is absolutely random: however advanced we may be, we can rarely grasp every information, nor maneuver how it must get along; and we have long taken this as incontrovertibly true [2]. Whereas, not-that-absolute randomness can only pop up unpredictably since they bear with an insurmountable amount of data, thus limited applications (a riddle only a handful of persons can solve, for example). By the book, we, however, are all too heedful of which [3].

Einstein, on the other hand, assumed that everything was ordinarily random. Forasmuch as he eventually accepted the final results of quantum physicists, Einstein did hardly buy into their reasonings. He purported that there must have been more tough quantum-nut to crack, which have been spiritually championed, thus spending the rest of his life debating opposing quantum physicists. In EPR Paradox, a collaboration of Einstein with two other prominent scientists, Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen, he stated that “We are thus forced to conclude that the quantum-mechanical description of physical reality given by wave functions is not complete [4].

Also within which, they were sure that they had come up with the silver bullet to do away with the quantum physics vampire — quantum entanglement [5]. Given the quantum formula, Einstein extracted another formula to evidence that quantum physics indirectly upholded the special relationship between two random particles — an intangible, yet woefully strong rope that binds their “fates”. Calling which “eccentric”, the scientist must have implied that quantum physics had been somewhat religious.

To put into perspective, this school did propel forward the so-called “particle spin” to claim that fundamentally, every particle forevermore haphazardly spins until it is observed. We can thereby think of an ever-spinning electron observed by a scientist as downward spinning, thence heading downward forever.

Which, however, is both absurd and somewhat hilarious.

Scientists, at this point, had no choice but to buy into a fact that before their observations, every particle is “rebelliously unidentified”, which, upon observation, opt for a certain property, adhering to which forever.

Einstein, with his every theory on quantum entanglement, was even more wildly compelling. Simply put, he leveraged exactly every former quantum formula to scrutinize the relationship of two particles — that as soon as one is observed spinning downward, the other immediately heads upward.

Those quantum formulas even tolerate such a relationship at universal level: that once one, at one pole of the universe, spins downward, its better half is antrose (spins upward). Suppose that the two particles transmit information back and forth, thus interconnected to each other, that “information” will travel at a speed woefully faster than that of light, which, thence, vehemently violates special relativity. Still, how can particles “deliver” those universally-transmitted-data, which is, at its very core, particles and waves — the very material forms overlapping themselves?

Given every effort to evidence the “quantum ridicules”, Einstein himself was assured that he must have been successful in spelling out the quantum physics’ flaws, and urging his dissidents to do away with their [ridiculous] formulas. Mustn’t he?

“Yes, it is”, replied opposing quantum physicists, conceding to every seemingly absurd phenomena Einstein had pointed to, claiming that it exactly is how quantum physics works, their formulas were “invincible”, expressing their warm gratitude at how Einstein gave them a helping hand and unveiled quite an innovative thing. After all, it was Einstein who actually unearthed another, albeit seemingly unworkable, possible quantum relationship.

Even Schrodinger — the very physicist to win the Nobel Prize in Physics with his Schrodinger equation revolutionizing quantum physics [7] — assented Einstein. He himself confessed that his Nobel-awarded equation was incomplete since it is yet to altogether do away with the absolute randomness of particles, thus needing further modification (note that the equation, to date, has revealed itself as any less perfect). To all appearances, he somehow seemed to side with Einstein in the very controversy regarding quantum physics’ counterintuition and flaws.

2. Schrodinger’s cat

It was Schrodinger who coined a complete name for quantum entanglement in his “catly” thought experiment. The experiment was as follows:

“One can even set up quite ridiculous cases. A cat is penned up in a steel chamber, along with the following device (which must be secured against direct interference by the cat): in a Geiger counter, there is a tiny bit of radioactive substance, so small, that perhaps in the course of the hour one of the atoms decays, but also, with equal probability, perhaps none; if it happens, the counter tube discharges and through a relay releases a hammer that shatters a small flask of hydrocyanic acid. If one has left this entire system to itself for an hour, one would say that the cat still lives if meanwhile no atom has decayed. The first atomic decay would have poisoned it. The psi-function of the entire system would express this by having in it the living and dead cat (pardon the expression) mixed or smeared out in equal parts.

It is typical of these cases that an indeterminacy originally restricted to the atomic domain becomes transformed into macroscopic indeterminacy, which can then be resolved by direct observation. That prevents us from so naïvely accepting as valid a “blurred model” for representing reality. In itself, it would not embody anything unclear or contradictory. There is a difference between a shaky or out-of-focus photograph and a snapshot of clouds and fog banks (t/n: Schrodinger implied that things with seemingly similar appearances may bear with wildly different natures)” [8].

(Note: every descriptive experiment involving neither particle radiation nor wave equation — which are critical — is wrong, and drifted away from both Schrodinger’s initial concept and the nature of this topic).

The very reason for this experiment is to put on trial the absurdity in the interpretation of elementary particles’ superpositions. Again, Schrodinger and Einstein were to get their dissidents on their knees — to concede to the invalidity, either of their formulas or of this reality.

Back then, Einstein was excited at which, in much the same way as how Schrodinger was to him. The former held it that the cat indeed subsists and succumbs, whose fate is to be revealed the moment we open the box, and given its unanticipatability, there precedingly exists a “fate” of which. Akin to coin-flipping, forasmuch as we can never know what side it is unless our hand is lifted, the result is already either head or tail.

The cat may succumb, or keep living, and such a 50/50 thing is indeed unanticipatable. Nevertheless, the act of opening the box is merely to observe and confirm this, thus rarely changing the fact that the cat did live, or cease himself to exist beforehand.

The very same thing happens to quantum entanglement. To put into perspective, Einstein did come up with the eminent glove example to explain quantum physics in a more intuitive manner: given a pair of gloves with each put in a box, which is then transported to the two Poles, as soon as one is open and reveals the left glove in the North Pole, the right one must be in the South Pole box — a common logics. Nonetheless, to open the boxes is to observe only, whilst which glove belonging to which box was determined the very moment they were set apart [9].

In this manner, each of the two elementary particles at two ends of the universe has its own fixed spinning direction before any observation.

However, had it been that straightforward, the controversy would not have lasted among the greatest masterminds for decades.

Having heard of such an experiment, the opposing quantum physicist party, represented by Niels Bohr, replied:

“Yeah, the cat coevally succumbs and subsists. Good job, thanks Schrodinger”.

After all, even the absurdity Einstein and Schrodinger zeroed in was still a perception problem, thus rarely bound by any human law not to work out that way.

“The cat coetaneously succumb and subsist, forsooth. By the same token, the two gloves were unidentifiable before someone opened one of the two boxes. That opening holds the fate of the cat, forasmuch as the two gloves were superpositioned until one of the containers was open. As soon as the one in the North Pole reveals itself to be the left glove, that in the South Pole must be the right glove, to all appearances. It is what it is theoretically, which is by no means falsifiable even when it sounds bewildering. Why could such a bewilderment, nonetheless, turn it wrong? For these experiments only spell out the bewilderment in which, instead of defying its falsifiability”.

In all likelihood, such a controversy can hardly be put on any empirical experiment. For example, should we open the box and observe a healthy, lively cat, Einstein would interpret it as though “that the box opens and reveals a living cat means it has always been living”, whilst Boht would claim that “it lives, for upon opening the box, we see it alive, insofar as whatever happens in the box before this was unidentified”.

On the whole, the controversy is divided into two major parties, one holding that the quantum world bears with “local rules” which are superpositioned since humans are constrained in terms of technology advent and perception — akin to Einstein and Schrodinger’s, while the other falls for Bohr and Heisenberg, those reckoning that this world thrives on the elementary particles of absolute randomness.

Until the very last days of his life, Einstein still remained his view that quantum physics was a science field yet to be completed, thus contingent upon every metaphysical interpretation as aforementioned.

3. Who was right?

Neither of the two experiments exist in reality. They, together with the theory of quantum entanglement, have been extracted from former quantum formulas Bohr, Heisenberg, or any quantum physicist had come up. Given the theories having laid the very foundation for quantum physics — particle spin, absolute randomness, non-identifiability, uncertainty principle, or wave equation — Einstein and Schrodinger turned which against quantum physics, to spell out the absurdity in this ordinary human reality.

That said, quantum physics have offered many a compelling, innovative things: an electron may haphazardly pop up at different locations in the atom orbit, or an elementary particle holds an non-identifiable spin and velocity; and those non-identifiability are not the human constraint but the nature of which, thus revealing themselves as subjective facts. Which, however, in some mysterious manners, identify themselves as soon as we start observing which. We can rarely puzzle over the exact information of any particle, for that goes wildly against its nature. What we can, meagrely enough, is to question “what is the probability of them turning up at this location?”

After all, the two parties died before the controversy ceased. Reality has proved Einstein wrong, whilst quantum physicists were incontrovertibly right.

Thereon, given the technology advent, series after series of experiments have been conducted, evidencing that: a particle’s spin is yet to be identify before observation, quantum entanglement does exist, identifying one particle defines the other, Schrodinger’s wave equation is right and so is uncertainty principle. Simply put, there has been an experiment to leverage quantum entanglement, what Einstein and Schrodinger used to prove quantum physics’ falsifiability, in “teleporting” a particle and succeeded. To date, this technology has allowed humans to teleport particles at atomic levels [10].

In fact, such things as phones, laptops, or PCs on which you are reading these lines, thanks to quantum physics, could come into being. To be more precise, almost every modern technology originates from the aforementioned counterintuitive quantum theories. Not only is their counterintuition handsomely useful, it has also unlocked an any less auspicious future. We, thus, have to concede to either Schrodinger’s paradoxical cat, or the falsifiability of quantum physics — which would shatter this very world apart.

By the same token, Einstein came up with the two options: to either accept his formulas, which held that quantum physics was wrong, or to heed the subsistence of every seemingly ridiculous thing, to which our perception is too meager to interpret. Close to victory as he was, since the ordinary was set to buy into the former, reality, however, rules that the latter, instead, is what actually happening.

The quantum success has not only brought human civilization onto a dizzier height, but also put forward many a new philosophical questions. Defying determinism, it has also indirectly refuted fore-telling and the so-called “fate” — which are constituted by the very universal particles, operating in absolute randomness.

After all, quantum theories have creeped upon the list of the most counterintuitive, falsifiable theories. But they are not, and this, thus, has woefully enhanced its credibility.

As the acclaimed show Quantum Leap once said, upon studying quantum physics, irregardless of our will, we would never see this world the same way it “used to”.

Thus vulnerable to every pseudo-science theory trumped up by those holding no science knowledge.

Those in quotation marks, unless [numbered], are purely the author’s interpretation, not a citation.

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References:

[1] https://aeon.co/.../what-einstein-meant-by-god-does-not...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncertainty_principle

[3] https://statweb.stanford.edu/~susan/papers/headswithJ.pdf

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPR_paradox

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin_(physics)

[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger_equation

[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger%27s_cat