Re: psychoceramics: Dilberts double-slit

[Robert Bain <arbane @ idt.net>]

On Fri, 27 Jun 1997, Samantha Fleming wrote:

> Arbane -
> 
> I haven't read the book, but I do know the physics. In what way does he
> reackon that the results depend on the theory? 

I don't have the book handy (I'm too cheap to buy it right now), but what
Scott says it that if you test the double-slit's patter with one theory,
you get a pattern of bars of light, and if you test for the other theory,
you get a blotch of light.

When I read this, I thought, "I know quantum physics is weird, but I'm
pretty sure it's not _THAT_ weird."  Besides, what does he think would
happen if you had _TWO_ pysicists testing the same experiment, each
testing for one theory?

(Also, I think his description of the experiment itself was a little off.)

So, how exactly does this experiment work?

> As for altering the very nature of reality - anyone that can tell me what
> the very nature of reality was in the first place has got my vote. 

Well put!

Arbane the Terrible (Researcher)

ObPsycho:  I just finished reading a very entertaining book caller 'Around
in Circles', by Jim Schnabel.  It's about 'cerealogists'--the folks who
study crop circles, how they got started, their squabbles, how they
altered their theories as the circles got more complicated, and how they
reacted when those two old guys confessed to making many of the circles.