- #1
Weeping Rupee
- 1
- 0
I'm not a physics major and I have only a minimal/mild understanding of physics at best, and I have a question.
I've heard and read a lot of people say that using the phrase "observation collapses the wave function" is very misleading, and that it should more accurately be said that "measurement collapses the wave function."
I realize that the detector is interacting with the particle and that the experiment as a whole does not mean anything like "consciousness determines the way the universe behaves" necessarily (as so many self help doctrines have used to justify ideas similar to "the secret")
BUT! I'm wondering then; what is the point/justification for the cat existing in two states until observed in the Schrodinger's Cat analogy? Is it just an analogy used to describe how certain very very small things act in QM or is the argument that for objects of our size this is a reality? If the latter is true, is there some other experiment or principal that shows this is the case?
thanks in advance.
I've heard and read a lot of people say that using the phrase "observation collapses the wave function" is very misleading, and that it should more accurately be said that "measurement collapses the wave function."
I realize that the detector is interacting with the particle and that the experiment as a whole does not mean anything like "consciousness determines the way the universe behaves" necessarily (as so many self help doctrines have used to justify ideas similar to "the secret")
BUT! I'm wondering then; what is the point/justification for the cat existing in two states until observed in the Schrodinger's Cat analogy? Is it just an analogy used to describe how certain very very small things act in QM or is the argument that for objects of our size this is a reality? If the latter is true, is there some other experiment or principal that shows this is the case?
thanks in advance.