# Schroedinger’s Cat **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 10, 2000, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801 "2000-08-10T04:43:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/1 "2000-08-10T04:43:55Z")
Schroedinger’s Cat: What the hell is up with this cat? Is it even really a cat? Is he related to Skimpleshanks or Rum Tum Tugger? Does the cat have special powers? Does he sleep with Pavlov’s Dogs? Please someone enlighten me!! ---
**Author:** ![Or\_n\_ry\_Oscar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9de0a6/32.png) [@Or\_n\_ry\_Oscar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Or_n_ry_Oscar)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/2 "2000-08-10T05:13:05Z")
The answer, of course, is one of the master’s classics. I have used it several times to impress those who claim to know. To show someone up, and to do it in verse, is a wonderful thing… [[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1-122.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1-122.html)](schrodinger’s cat) ---
**Author:** ![Or\_n\_ry\_Oscar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9de0a6/32.png) [@Or\_n\_ry\_Oscar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Or_n_ry_Oscar)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/3 "2000-08-10T05:14:31Z")
The answer, of course, is one of the master’s classics. I have used it several times to impress those who claim to know. To show someone up, and to do it in verse, is a wonderful thing… [[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1\_122.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html)](schrodinger’s cat) ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/4 "2000-08-10T05:22:51Z")
The correct link is [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1\_122.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html) . ---
**Author:** ![Or\_n\_ry\_Oscar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9de0a6/32.png) [@Or\_n\_ry\_Oscar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Or_n_ry_Oscar)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/5 "2000-08-10T05:36:54Z")
thanks brother ---
**Author:** ![Merlot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3e96dc/32.png) [@Merlot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merlot)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/6 "2000-08-10T14:01:00Z")
IIRC, Ursula K. LeGuin wrote a short story about Shroedinger’s Cat appropriately called, Shroedinger’s Cat. ---
**Author:** ![ENugent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/4af34b/32.png) [@ENugent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ENugent)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/7 "2000-08-10T14:30:49Z")
There is also an awesome a cappella group in Texas called [url=“[http://mac3.a-cappella.com/prodinfo.asp?number=2630C&variation=&aitem=192&mitem=247](http://mac3.a-cappella.com/prodinfo.asp?number=2630C&variation=&aitem=192&mitem=247)”]Schroedinger’s Cat. ---
**Author:** ![ENugent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/4af34b/32.png) [@ENugent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ENugent)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/8 "2000-08-10T14:32:16Z")
Oops - sorry about that [link](http://mac3.a-cappella.com/prodinfo.asp?number=2630C&variation=&aitem=192&mitem=247). ---
**Author:** ![fredicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/779978/32.png) [@fredicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fredicus)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/9 "2000-08-10T18:45:19Z")
Please feel free to correct me 🙂 Wasn’t Heilein’s " the cat who walked through wall’s " on this subject ? IMHO not one of his better works ☹ ( Long time no read … ) ---
**Author:** ![KeithB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/48db29/32.png) [@KeithB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KeithB)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/10 "2000-08-10T18:50:20Z")
Please feel free to correct me Wasn’t Heilein’s " the cat who walked through wall’s " on this subject ? Not really. I forget just what the book was _about_ but the cat was a character that kept appearing in odd places. It was _named_ Shroedinger’s cat IIRC, and they described the thought experiment, but that is the only connection, again IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/11 "2000-08-10T18:51:27Z")
Heinlein’s book isn’t about Schroedinger’s cat. To tel the truth, I can’t remember what it’s about. Robert Anton Wilson also wrote a book called “Schroedinger’s cat”. In Dan Simmons’ “Endymion” and “The Rise of Endymion” (from which Aenea undoubtedly gets her cognomen)the titular Raul Endymion is sentenced to death inside a “Schroedinger Cat Box”. I’ve got a cartoon up on my cubical wall of “Schroedinger’s Dog”. He’s whispering his idea for an experiment involving the cat into the ear of a sleeping Schroedinger. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/12 "2000-08-10T18:59:00Z")
The Heinlein book is actually about a cross-time, cross-dimensional effort to save a sentient computer. Go figure. The title cat is Pixel, who is a living representation of the subjective nature of reality in Heinlein’s future history–he doesn’t _know_ he can’t walk through walls, so he can (at least, that’s the theory). The cat demonstrated the ability to traverse mundane walls, alternate realities, and time itself. Neither the book nor the cat have anything to do with Schroedinger’s poor hypothetical kitty, beyond a joking reference or two. ---
**Author:** ![Moe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moe/32/2972_2.png) [@Moe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moe)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/13 "2000-08-10T19:06:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by scr4 \* > \*\*The correct link is [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1\_122.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html) . > \*\* I love Cecil. LOL. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/14 "2000-08-10T19:09:18Z")
Heinlein’s book is about sex, time travel, and alternate universes, in that order. I like Heinlein, but he does have a tendancy to go overboard on sex and politics, unless it’s one of his juveniles. As an aside, I’ve heard that the sequel to _The Cat that Walked through Walls_, _To Sail Beyond the Sunset_, was even worse. The Cat in question was a kitten named Pixel, who had the unexplained (at least in the first book) ability to pass through solid objects. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/15 "2000-08-10T19:47:01Z")
Thanks to the miracle of the Internet, you can now test this unusual theory yourself. Just go here: [http://users.ox.ac.uk/~jsw/Schroedinger.html](http://users.ox.ac.uk/~jsw/Schroedinger.html) and click the “Run the experiment, Professor” button at the bottom of the page. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/16 "2000-08-10T19:59:50Z")
\ This Heinlein book was also after the point where, IMO, he had deteriorated to the point of unreadability. The unfortunate fact was that at the end of his life he could have sent in his used toilet paper and they would have published it. Somewhere along the line, he lost the ability to adequately edit his own drafts, and his publishers either didn’t have the nerve, or didn’t care as long as it would sell. Alfred Bester was another in a long line of SF writers who simply deteriorated into maundering blather at the end of their careers. Sad. This is one reason I like Robert Silverberg - he has had a LONG career without losing it, and generally getting better as he went along - not that I like everything he’s done, but “Hot Sky at Midnight” is fairly recent and was solid and original work. I could utterly strangle him for the ending of “Face of the Waters”, though. When Robert Anton Wilson wrote the “Schrodinger’s Cat” trilogy, his schtick was wearing pretty thin. Read “The Illuminatus Trilogy” instead. \ ---
**Author:** ![JoeyBlades](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a87d85/32.png) [@JoeyBlades](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoeyBlades)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2000, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/17 "2000-08-10T21:30:25Z")
Schrodinger: Wasn’t he the guy that wrote “101 Uses for a Dead Cat… or Not”? ---
**Author:** ![silent\_rob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@silent\_rob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silent_rob)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2000, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/18 "2000-08-11T07:16:46Z")
[small hijack]Yeah, I gotta agree with yabob to some degree. _The Illuminatus!_ Trilogy is better. But _Schrodinger’s Cat_ trilogy is still very good. The only problem was most people that don’t like it feel that way because they thought it was a true sequel to _Illuminatus!_. It isn’t, and just includes some of the same characters. Though I must admit that I liked _Illuminatus!_ much more. [/small hijack] Basically the book follows movement between universes as the previous ones are destroyed every hundred pages or so. Thus where the title comes from. To quote Cecil about the theory: If that’s not confusing, the nuclear dance Of electrons and suchlike is governed by chance! The universe and the people in it change, like the electrons that change by chance. Men change into women, and vice-vera. Just thought I’d clarify the ---
**Author:** ![fierra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/58956e/32.png) [@fierra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fierra)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2000, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/schroedinger-s-cat/28801/19 "2000-08-11T16:30:28Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CalMeacham \* > \*\* > I’ve got a cartoon up on my cubical wall of “Schroedinger’s Dog”. He’s whispering his idea for an experiment involving the cat into the ear of a sleeping Schroedinger. \*\* Cal, do you have an electronic copy of this that you could post to me or somewhere, as it makes a change from the Far Side catfud one & once I explain quantum mechanics to my dogs, I’m sure they’ll love it… & yes, I know this is a personal message in a board,but Cal doesn’t have a mail tag at the base (& I think I forgot to do mine too…)