Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 8/28/84; site lll-crg.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!mtuxo!mtunh!mtung!mtunf!ariel!vax135!petsd!pesnta!amd!vecpyr!lll-crg!brooks From: brooks@lll-crg.ARPA (Eugene D. Brooks III) Newsgroups: net.physics Subject: Re: Re: Faster than Light Message-ID: <681@lll-crg.ARPA> Date: Fri, 5-Jul-85 04:36:25 EDT Article-I.D.: lll-crg.681 Posted: Fri Jul 5 04:36:25 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 7-Jul-85 05:56:36 EDT References: <353@sri-arpa.ARPA> Organization: Lawrence Livermore Labs, CRG group Lines: 33 > The wave function is more than just a computational device - it is the actual > probability amplitude, whose mod-squared gives the probability density of > seeing a photon at a given point. The wave function collapse is the stronger I certainly agree that the wavefunction is a probability amplitude which mathematically propagates according to a set of equations of motion. It is not however real physical entity like for instance an electric field. It is just a probability amplitude that you square to get the probability of various results. People get unhappy with the idea of it "collapsing instantanously" because they think of it as a real physical object. This causes them to think that someting is moving faster than light when it "collapses". Nothing is moving! There wasn't anything there in the first place. The only real things that happend were the release of a photon at one place and its later capture somewhere else. Nothing happens in between. You conjure the wavefunction up in your head to explain the probability distribution of the results and it works, I will be the last to argue with that, but the wave function is in your head. The only real physical happenings are the release and detection of the photon. Only the "event", ie the firing of a phototube is real. Insisting on believing that the wavefunction is a real physical object will only keep you from developing an intuition that removes any headaches over the EPR paradox and the like. There is no such thing as a wave function meter, you can't measure it directly. You can only see the phototube fire and that it all there is to it. If you don't repeat the experiment many times you can't even find out anything about the supposed "wave function". You can only know that the phototube fired. Physics is what happens on the experimental table, theorists should not get their backs up about this statement as I am a theorist, theory is what goes on in your head. The wave function which is a figment of ones imagination is a computational tool. Can you loan me a cup of wavefunction just like a cup of sugar?