If it's wet and cold outside, an enjoyable way to pass some hours is to watch Feynman videos. He's got to be one of my heroes - smart, funny, and full of exuberance. I love the above video because not only does it show his quirkiness, it shows how a trained scientific mind works.
I'm still on my quantum mechanics kick. It's some seriously cool stuff, Maynard. I should have taken more physics as a university student. I'm now trying to wrap my head around Bell's Theorem, which (in a nutshell) states that either things don't have an objective existence when they're not interacting with other things, or faster than light interactions are possible. One of the two is truth, but not both, and it's been experimentally verified.
Einstein was horrified by the possibility of the latter (faster than light interactions), because of course it appears to contradict general relativity. It doesn't really, since no information can be transmitted -- but the very idea of faster than light quantum entanglement disturbed him. He called it spukhafte Fernwirkung, or spooky action at a distance.
The possibility of no objective existence bothered him even more. "I refuse to believe," he wrote, "that the moon does not exist when I am not looking at it." That's a simplification and exaggeration of the concept, but it demonstrates the weirdness of it.
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I knew about Feynman from his book "Surely You're joking, Mr. Feynman". I was totally hooked. He was not just smart. He had a great sense of humour. I was so lucky that I was working for a library at the time and so I borrowed some documentary films on his life and works. Obviously I didn't understand too much about physics but I loved the story of his life. He was a very charismatic man.
ReplyDeleteI wish I studied physics in university.
The G had an early fascination with physics, I'm still waiting to see what direction that might take.
ReplyDeleteI think I've spent much of my life wondering if "things don't have an objective existence when they're not interacting with other things" - except in reference to myself. It has only been the last 6 years or so that I've really grokked that I just yam who I yam, regardless of who is nearby.
How fun, I think Iam in love!!
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