Capitalism: An economic theory that operates on the hypothesis that you CAN win.
Communism: An economic theory that operates on the hypothesis that you CAN break even.
Mysticism: A philosophical approach to reality that operates on the hypothesis that you CAN get out of the game.
You’re thinking of phlogiston.
No. we know about where it is, but we can only get it to within a certain range of absolute zero.
A little bit of a digression, but by Bell’s theorem, the debate can be resolved (at least as far as local hidden variable theories are concerned). I.e. there are physical experiments whose results can tell the difference between a universe where quantum uncertainties are resolved by some underlying information that determines them exactly but is hidden to us, and a universe where they aren’t, so long as no faster than light travel is permitted.
The more things seem absolutely counterintuitive, the more I feel like I’ve fallen down some cognitive hole, the more I know I must be in quantum physics land.
But, like the White Queen, I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast. Since deBroglie is dead and buried, and I’ve got you on the line, tell me (at the risk of pissing you off by forcing a retelling of Copenhagen): w/o straying from the 0K issue, I can’t just say to a bunch of atoms “I’ve cornered you, you bastards, you’ve got no where to hide! Not only that, but you’re straightjacketed, so resistance is futile.”
The answer is no because a sunbeam (an electromagnetic wave) cannot be pinned to a wall, like a row of butterflies? (A happy metaphor, if true…)
Also, since you mention him, what was the particular nut that deBroglie’s crowd was trying to crack? The pop histories always introduce new achievements as if the scientist’s work was inevitable, evolutionary in the worst sense (“moving to that great goal”).
Thanks to all for taking the time (I hope), for a too-long post.
Leo
My EX found absolute zero from the waist down…
Well, yes, but according to other posters it is pretty darn close (that analogy about the distance from Boulder, CO to London and the thickness of a pencil lead), and, if I am understanding your post correctly, the colder something gets, the more uncertain we should be about its position. Surely there is not a sudden jump from knowing where it is within a micron or two (or even a millimeter or two) at room temperature, and still knowing that at almost 0ºK, to suddenly not knowing at all as (per impossible) it reaches 0ºK. After all, relativistic effects on length, mass, etc. are detectable, if small, at well below light speed. Should it not be similar for something like this (or is that a bad analogy)?
Yes, there is considerable uncertainty about location in a Bose-Einstein condensate, but “considerable” in this context means “about the size of a bucket”.
Relativistic effects are most apparent for the very large. These are quantum effects so they’re most apparent for the very small.
Uncertainty pairs two quantities - momentum/position or energy/time or many others. The uncertainty in one times the uncertainty in the other has to be greater than or equal to h-bar/2. h-bar is Planck’s Constant divided by 2 pi. And Planck’s constant = 6.626068 × 10[sup]-34[/sup] m[sup]2[/sup] kg / s. That’s ridiculously small, which is why it’s not seen in ordinary life.
Getting to absolute zero isn’t ordinary. Getting there uses quantities that are very, very, very, very small. That ensures that the other half of the equation has to get much larger in response.
There’s no sudden jump. It’s gradual. But it’s also asymptotic. The closer one gets to zero the close the other gets to infinity. Room temperature is about 300 K. Taking that down to 1 K. is minor. We’ve made temperatures of 0.000000002 K. That’s significant. But that’s still very far from 0, so the number of zeros can be in the dozens. When that happens the other half the equation is very large indeed.
Note to self: read more in thread, read more, post fewer idiotic queries.
My Physics Professor mentioned the “Law of the inattainability of absolute zero” when discussing hard vacuums in space, where absolutely NOTHING exists. This was after my question as to whether light waves are totally independent and needed no “medium” through which to pass, including a space totally devoid of any fields or energies, such as dark matter, etc.. It brought to mind the old concept of a primordial “aether”. As you say, the presence of an instrument neccessarily obviates any true zero measurement. So what is the temerature of the center of a black hole? Do they even have centers? A clue? Good luck, pilgrim.
Another admirer of MC Hawking, I see…