#note/sourcereview/article | #note/sourcereview/book | #source/book📚/nonfiction ## What is the thesis? Quantum physics is a set of theories with boundaries, they do not describe time travel, multiverses, love, consciousness, give power to crystals, or other mysteries or things to sell you to meet your hidden wishes. ## Am I convinced and why? I am convinced that there is a set of mathematical descriptions of how quantum physics helps describe the sub-atomic world. ## Summarize the argument Quantum physics is founded in classical physics, when Classical physicists (Einstein, Heisenberg, Schroedinger, Bohr, others) thought about sub-atomic particles and how they interacted, and were starting to be able to make observations on the sub-atomic scale, they started to see that Classical physics did not account for their observations. They needed a new way to describe their observations, and a new set of metaphors. The observable world of things like humans, cats, planets, etc. were describable through Classical physics, they could start to unpack the mysteries of how light works, etc. When they started looking at and thinking about the sub-atomic scale, they started to see new mysteries that needed descriptions. Mysteries in quantum physics include: - Wave/particle duality: photons behave like waves and particles at the same time, and their behavior is contextual. - Increasing attempts to describe the velocity of sub-atomic particles decreases the ability to describe the location, and vice versa, both cannot be known at the same time with precision. - Schroedinger's cat was an attempt to translate the silliness of the uncertainty of state of things that are subatomic to the observable world (the cat). So, while the state of an atom can be uncertain (has it decayed, or not) and that cannot be observed without changing the state (hitting it with energy), the same is not true for the observable scale. - Multiple different models or lenses to metaphorically describe the state ψ include the "" multiple simultaneous ψ that split and recombine, this is not the same as the multiverse existing and recombining. ## What is the other side of the argument? Mysteries still exist, quantum physics represents a model or set of models, [[all models are wrong but some are useful]]. Maybe in our lifetime a new set of models will come that do a better job describing the sub-atomic universe. ## What else do I wonder about? Do we want all mysteries to be replaced by mathematically described models? Does this ruin wonder? ## Action - Use the idea of [[not even wrong]] ## When do I want to stumble across this? #on/thinking ## Source: Ferrie, C. (2023). _Quantum bullshit: How to ruin your life with advice from quantum physics_. Sourcebooks. ## References, Quotes, Ideas ### Ideas: - Classical physics shows light to be a wave or particle, quantum physics shows it to be wave-like AND particle-like. This reminds me of [[Leading]] which has to be both like a source of inspiration and a source of management, which has difficulty existing at the same time - There is a key difference between known unknowns (things to work to know), unknown unknowns [[risk is what is left after everything you have thought of]], and unknowables (mysteries): p. 56 - Particles do not exist - they are an idea p. 61 - quantum uncertainty does NOT equal behavioral uncertainty p. 72 - If the quantum world contatins superposition and the classical world does not, where exactly is the boundary? p. 90 - reminds me of [[emergence]] - bullshit is not the same thing as horseshit: _bullshit implies deception_, horseshit is mere ignorance. These are both incorrect, but in meaningfully different ways and should be treated differently. Have _compassion_ for the person who is slinging horseshit. - [[Occums Razor]], [[Hanlon's Razor]], and [[Hitchen's Razor]] are different tools, use them at different times - Finally, the idea of [[not even wrong]] ```dataview table file.mtime.year + "-" + file.mtime.month + "-" + file.mtime.day as Modified from [[ ]] and !outgoing([[ ]]) sort file.mtime desc ```