There's Something There - Part 3

Interaction.

That is, the only way for you to find God is ...

For God to find you.

And how, do you suppose, would he do that?

By interacting with the universe.

Didn't see that coming, didja?

I just read this amaaaazing article on the brain on Aeon.com, so here's some bits of it:

"A few cognitive scientists – notably Anthony Chemero of the University of Cincinnati, the author of Radical Embodied Cognitive Science (2009) – now completely reject the view that the human brain works like a computer.

"The mainstream view is that we, like computers, make sense of the world by performing computations on mental representations of it, but Chemero and others describe another way of understanding intelligent behaviour – as a direct interaction between organisms and their world.

"... if we had the ability to take a snapshot of all of the brain’s 86 billion neurons and then to simulate the state of those neurons in a computer, that vast pattern would mean nothing outside the body of the brain that produced it ... Whereas computers do store exact copies of data – copies that can persist unchanged for long periods of time, even if the power has been turned off – the brain maintains our intellect only as long as it remains alive. There is no on-off switch. Either the brain keeps functioning, or we disappear.

"What’s more, as the neurobiologist Steven Rose pointed out in The Future of the Brain (2005), a snapshot of the brain’s current state might also be meaningless unless we knew the entire life history of that brain’s owner – perhaps even about the social context in which he or she was raised."

Which is to say (I'm back, btw. This is me now.) that each of our brains exists as a direct interaction with the life we have each lived, each brain unique as each life is unique.

Pardon me for a second. I'm going to make that really really large so that you don't miss it.

Direct interaction

Here's what humans do that is so cute. We look for the rules and regulations that make everything happen, and say to ourselves, wow, that's why everything happens.

Rules. Regulations. Laws of physics.

Here's what's curious about that.

Science has decided that religion is ridiculous.

But both science and religion make the same mistake.

Religion ... looks for rules for behavior. Human behavior.

Science ... looks for rules of behavior. Human behavior, ultimately, along with the behavior of everything else in the universe.

Neural circuits in the brain. Looks very much like a fractal.

Science finds its rules in the patterns of mathematics, and then in the patterns of everything. Or vice versa. Sometimes the math tells us what is happening (the Special and General Theories, Quantum Mechanics), sometimes we figure out the math so we can describe what is happening (Newton's Calculus).

But once we had the rules figured out, well, dang it, they stopped making sense about 116 years ago, in 1900, when Quantum Mechanics came on the scene, and then again in 1905 and 1915 when Special and General Relativity arrived, and then in 1961 Chaos Theory didn't help at all, and when Complexity Theory started to mess with Evolution later in the 1960s, well, that was not a happy moment.

The Rules, the Laws of Physics, sort of stopped helping us understand the way things worked. Instead, they didn't help at all.

Religion kinda has the same problem.

But it's kinda the same problem because it's kinda the same source.

Humans.

We want things to make sense.

So. Let's say some guy comes along. Let's call him Isa. Or Joshua. Or Yeshua. Pick your language base.

And he says, alright, jerks, stop being jerks. Start being nice.

And the whole God thing? You really should pay attention.

So what do religious people do?

Instead of just, you know, being nice, they ask, what does it really mean to be nice? I mean, do we have to be nice to everybody? Or can we pick and choose?

And what does being nice really mean?

So then they made up some rules.

And before long, the religions all became to be about following the rules instead of, you know, being nice.

Buddhism does this. So does Hinduism. Judaism. Shintoism. Jainism. Islam. Paganism. Satanism. Witchcraft. Animism. All the -isms do it.

Christianity, too.

Not an -ism grammatically, but still an -ism. And it does it, too.

Somehow they all start with the interaction between God (or gods)(or no gods)(depending) and humans, and then, somehow, along the way,

They all become about the rules.

And here is what science is telling religion.

It's not about the rules.

It's about the interaction.

If the universe is all about interaction,

Then reality is all about interaction,

And the rules of nature come from interaction between particles and forces, and energy and mass and space-time, and observation and reality,

Then, well, religion ...

Is all about interaction. The interaction between us, and God.

So now we gotta figure out what the heck that means.

There's Something There - Part 2

It apparently happened in Korea and became a boy band.
Nothing right and good about that.

I read the other day that the Big Bang didn't happen in space.

Which makes sense, since there was no space yet for it to happen in.

Still. That's hard to get.

So there was no Where that it happened in.

But there was a When.

Big Bang happened in a When, but not a Where.

It happened in time, but not in space.

OK, it's on Mondays at 9. See. It happens in time.
Even if you count syndication.

So if you were to ask, sweetly, naively, where did Big Bang happen, thinking, sweetly, naively, that there had to be a point where it all started, the answer is ...

There is a point where it all started. But it's a point in time, not in space.

So the evidence in science has taken us to a place in nature where our brains cannot go.

Big Bang happened in time. Not in space.

Do you want a list of all the other places that the evidence has taken us that our brains cannot go? Just go back and read some of the earlier posts. Any of them.

So now, let's talk about God.

Pay attention. This is the subtle and clever part.

1) I understand God as well as I understand him because the theologians have gone out of their way to explain him to me, and 2) I understand that my understanding of God will change with further information, and 3) it might change quite radically in quite unexpected sorts of ways, but 4) I have personal experience with God. That is, 5) evidence has been presented to me, and 6) I have personal evidence as well.

This would be the Ironic God. Ha. So funny.

God exists for me because I have some experience with him.

It is not the same experience that anyone else has had, though there is a lot of overlap, so it is both unique and universal at the same time.

Unique and universal. How...

Intriguing.

Now, I could go through the evidence for God that might exist in nature, but I've kinda already done that for like almost an infinite number of earlier posts (OK, 24, but still. It was a lot.), and here's what's happened. I predict. 

Yes, it's a chaotic, unpredictable universe, but only mostly, so I'm gonna live on the edge and make a prediction.

Those who already believe in God were like, YES!, and, AWESOME!, except for those who don't like Big Bang, but you probably stopped reading a long long time ago, which was foolish. No offense. OK, maybe a little. But you're probably not reading anymore anyway. No offense.

And those who don't believe in God were like, oh, seriously, all of this crapload of pseudo-scientific religio-babble AGAIN?!?! When are you religious morons gonna catch a clue that there is NO EVIDENCE for God to be found in nature?!?!

You should maybe dial it down a little. Fewer all caps. By everyone.

Anyway. Here's the thing.

We're all looking at the same evidence. But we are each reaching a different conclusion.

Same evidence. Different beliefs.

So it's not really about the evidence. I mean, it helps. But when one group looks at Big Bang and says, whoa, looks like God to me, and another group looks at the same Big Bang and says, wow, looks like a pretty cool accident of nature to me (and a third group looks at the same Big Bang and says, don't even THINK of trying to tell me that the God that I believe in would have used Big Bang to create the universe.)(Sorry about the all-caps.), then ...

It's not really about the evidence.

I had a guy tell me once over and over for weeks that there could be no evidence for God in nature. Not that there could be but we haven't found it yet. Whatever we found, was not gonna be evidence. No matter what it was. Like, God's t-shirt. His driver's license. His bowling league medals. Even his reserved parking spot.

When I mentioned that there were a host of notable scientists who believed that there was some evidence for God, this guy just said, well, they're all wrong.

When I told him that all of the scientists were a lot smarter than he was, he said, no, they're not.

Gotta admire his commitment to his beliefs. Takes some backbone to say that evidence is not evidence and is never going to be

evidence and that on the basis of this assumption, and this alone, that he is smarter than all the scientists except for the ones that agree with him.

Faith. That's what it takes. Faith.

Of course, what he believes about God or science or evidence or nature or the universe is, as we've said, irrelevant.

God exists, or he does not.

Even if there is no evidence, God still might exist. Even with lots and lots of evidence, he might not.

So how in God's name are we supposed to figure it out? So to speak.

Here's a proposal. Here's what it takes. Here's how to start. 

It's like, an equation.

It's evidence plus experience plus faith.

Plus one more entirely interesting, controversial, subjective thing that depends entirely on one's interpretation. Kinda like quantum mechanics. Lots of interpretations. Only one is right. We just don't know which one.

Anyway. One more thing.

It's evidence plus experience plus faith plus revelation.

Oh, yeah. It's an equation. It's gotta "equals" something.

No, not a revolution. A revelation.
Same thing, maybe.

Evidence plus experience plus faith plus revelation equals maybe there is a God.

We might start with that. Revelation.

If God created time and space, then God is outside of time and space.

And therefore we can't find him unless he wants to be found.

That is, you can't go on a search to find God. Well, you can, but good luck with that.

It's like the Ultimate Hide-&-Seek game. Ha ha, you'll never find me because I'm outside the universe.

Here's what Big Bang cosmology says: Space and time ... came into existence in a tiny tiny tiny fraction of a second, everything coming from nothing, out of nothing, caused by nothing.

And God. Has to be in the nothing.

And we can't go there.

He. Has to come here.

Ah, shoot. I went and gave it all away. Spoiler alert. I HATE it when that happens.

Fewer all caps. Gotta work on that.

And here's the really devious part. Let's just assume for fun that God is in the fifth dimension. No, not the old rock group, though God could clearly be black and groovy. Or hip. Or whatever.

We live in 4 dimensions, 3 of space, 1 of time.

So let's go with God lives in a 4th spatial dimension. I don't know if he does, but I don't know that he doesn't, so it'll work.

Now. Consider that there might be a world that exists in 3 dimensions, 2 of space and 1 of time.

Flatland. Like a table top. The people are flat people and they only know of 2 dimensions. This way, and that way, but not up or down.

And you live in 3 spatial dimensions, just like you actually do right now anyway.

Now. How close can you get to the Flatlanders without them seeing you? Because you are in the 3rd dimension, and they are only in the first two.

Take a flat surface right now and see how close you can move your hand without it touching.

Very very very close.

So if God lives in a 4th spatial dimension, how close can he get to you without you knowing about it?

Very very very close.

And you would never know that he was there. Unless he wanted you to know. And that would only happen if he ...

... touched your version of Flatland.

Now I got goosebumps.

There's Something There - Part 1?

It's Part 1 because there might be other parts, but I don't really know yet. We'll just have to see.

Anyway. Since we're being provocative ...

What you believe about _______ (go ahead, fill in the blank) is irrelevant.

OK, I'll fill in the blank for you.

What you believe about God is irrelevant.

And ...

What you believe about the Universe is irrelevant.

Why, you may ask, am I making such obnoxious statements? Why, you may ask, am I being such a jerk?

Here, let me add some emphasis, see if that helps.

What you believe about God is irrelevant.

What you believe about the Universe is irrelevant.

Let me explain. We'll start with the Universe.

Here's the Thing. The Universe is the way that it is regardless of what you believe about it. It doesn't care what you believe. As we already said that Neal deGrasse Tyson said, the universe is under no obligation to make sense to you. Or to anybody.

If you think it doesn't make sense, that's not the Universe's fault or problem. It's your problem.

This picture is not the universe exploding. It's just your garden-variety
star exploding. Actually, not exploding. Collapsing and bouncing.
The nothing didn't explode either. It just expanded really really fast.

You can believe that it's infinitely large, or not.

You can believe that it had a starting point, or not.

You can believe that it's 6000 years old, or 13.8 billion. Or infinitely old.

All that you, and we, and everybody has to go on is the evidence that we have been able to uncover, and will presumably continue to uncover, and we interpret that evidence from our tiny perch in time and space as best we can.

And as we have seen, the evidence changes, and so our understanding of the Universe changes, and presumably it will continue to do so, whether we like it or not.

If Monte Vaughn had shown this much emotion
when I asked her out, well, a win.

The Universe is indifferent to your feelings about it. It's like that cheerleader that I asked out four times in college. Her name was Monte Vaughn. I still remember her name. She was ... indifferent. And remained indifferent. She did not go out with me. She does not remember my name. She may not have actually been a cheerleader, either. But it's a better story that way.

The Universe does not remember your name. It is the way that it is, and it will continue to be that way (that is, dynamic and constantly changing) regardless of your thoughts, opinions or beliefs about it. 

If it's helpful to rename the Universe "Monte Vaughn", go right ahead. It is unimaginably beautiful. And it is not interested in going out with you.

Now. God.

God is something like the Universe.

Either God exists, or he does not. What you believe about that is irrelevant.

That's harsh, but true. But you will not eliminate God with your lack of belief, if he exists. Nor will you cause him to exist via your beliefs, if he does not.

Either he does, or he does not.

(I'm using "he" because constantly having to say "he, she, it or they" is awkward and irritating and so I'm not really saying God is a man or male, but that he is surely more than an "it". "They" would work, but it will irritate the non-Trinity folks and yadda yadda yadda. Live with it.)

Either he does, or he does not.

Your opinion about that is immaterial.

Now isn't that a curious thing? It causes one to wonder, ok, NOW what am I supposed to do?

Well. We could talk about evidence for, let's say, the universe first. But we will quickly run into theories that say, as we have said in

other earlier blogs, 1) the universe is a hologram (and therefore not really here) or 2) the universe is a computer simulation (and therefore not really here.

Plus, since we don't know what either Dark Matter or Dark Energy are, 95% of the universe is a complete mystery to us.

Plus, the universe might be 10**26th times bigger than the part that we can see, and we'll never see any of the rest of it and will never know anything about it,

Or, it might be infinitely big, which is a lot bigger than just 10**26th times bigger, and so the part that we do know something about is infinitely smaller than the rest of it, and (just do the the math) is therefore not really here,

And that's THE OBSERVABLE UNIVERSE, of which you are not even a measurable part of, either. Well, measurable maybe. But very close to infinitely insignificant,

And the part of the universe that we can see, we will never ever be able to go to any parts of it, apart from the part that we are in. Like, even getting to Neptune seems like a stretch. Frankly, even Mars seems like a stretch. I think you could put all the people who've been to the moon in an egg carton. OK, a large egg carton. One that would fit people. Or a roller coaster that seats 12. Like that one. That many people have been on the moon.

And we will never ever know for sure where the universe came from, or whether it is unique and there are lots of other universes, or maybe just a couple or four, a dozen maybe, a gross of universes.

(OK, to be honest, you can't actually be "very close to infinitely insignificant", but if you could, we would be.)

So your personal evidence for the existence of the universe is anecdotal and highly suspect. I would not choose to believe in the universe based solely upon your personal experience. And I don't give a rat's patootie who you are, because even you, you universe scientists, you cosmologists and astronomers, even you have only seen or experienced a tiny tiny fraction that (if the universe is infinitely big) is infinitely smaller than the actual universe itself, and you don't even have much of a clue what it is, either. And you keep changing the story.

No offense. It's kinda hard. I get that. That's actually the point.

I should say, BTW, that I do in fact believe in the actual universe.

Pay attention. This is the subtle and clever part.

1) I understand the universe as well as I understand it because the cosmologists and astronomers have gone out of their way to explain it to me, and 2) I understand that my understanding of the universe will change with further information, and 3) it might change quite radically in quite unexpected sorts of ways, but 4) I have personal experience with the universe. That is, 5) evidence has been presented to me, and 6) I have personal evidence as well.

The universe exists for me because I have some experience with it.

It is not the same experience that anyone else has had, though there is a lot of overlap, so it is both unique and universal at the same time.

Unique and universal. How...

Intriguing.

There's Nothing There - The End

Now I'm going to say something that will irritate some of you.

Here it comes.

Nobody is smart enough to be an atheist.

Go ahead. Write me nasty letters. Be a troll. Find your inner troll and let it out to stomp me into troll-stomping oblivion.

Wait, though.

I'm going to say something that will irritate the rest of you.

Here it comes.

Nobody is smart enough to be not an atheist.

Go ahead. Write me letters that pray for me and consign me to the darkest depths of hottest hell. Send the demons after me. Find your inner demon and let it out to stomp me into demon-stomping oblivion.

Wait, though.

Let's think about it for a minute.

'Cause what we're really saying is that belief is not really a matter of intelligence.

Now THAT will open up dozens of worm cans. Cans of worms. Whatever.

Belief is also not a matter of information. As in, the more you know, the less you believe.

There you go. More worms in more cans.

Let's do the easy part first.

As in. No matter how smart you are, there's somebody smarter who has different beliefs about The Old One (as Einstein called God).

Bingo. Einstein believed in The Old One, and he is officially smarter than nearly everybody except for maybe Isaac Newton (who believed) and maybe da Vinci (who believed, even though he painted naked people)(that is, he painted pictures of naked people, not, he painted

people who were naked. I mean, he did, but not on their actual nakedness.)( I think he may have opened a tattoo parlor in his later years.)(Some of that was not strictly speaking true.)

So. But. Einstein was not a practicing religious person. Not as a Jew. Not as a Christian. Not as anything.

So he's the metaphor. If you want to disbelieve, you can't point to Einstein as your example, and if you want to believe, you can't point to Einstein.

And you are not smarter than Einstein.

Of course, you're not smarter than Newton or da Vinci, either. Sorry. No offense.

For most of you, there's a lot of people that are smarter than you.

Some of them believe. Some of them don't.

So it's not really an intelligence thing.

How about information then?

Well. The problem with information is that it changes all the time.

And when information changes, evidence changes.

And when evidence changes, facts change. 

And when fact change, science changes.

'Cause science is about facts, facts come from evidence, and evidence changes all the time.

We used to think, for example, that the universe made sense. That it was predictable. That the laws of physics caused everything to happen. That we didn't need God to explain anything. That the universe was infinitely large and old and everything had always been here, including the laws of physics.

But we didn't know what the laws of physics were yet.

We thought there was just gravity. And as it turns out, we didn't even understand gravity.

And then when Einstein explained gravity to us, all of sudden, the universe wasn't infinite at all.

And the laws of physics hadn't always been here. Which means that something that wasn't the laws of physics caused the laws of physics.

And boy, were they weird.

So everything changed. All of science changed. All the evidence changed. All the information changed.

And it might change again.

No. That's wrong.

It will change again.

So you can't base your beliefs on information that can and will change.

Sometimes it'll make it seem like there is no God, no creator.

Sometimes it'll make it seem like there might be one. Or there must be one.

And then. It'll change again.

So even if you are Ed Witten. He's the smartest guy alive at the moment. Or Stephen Hawking. Or Marilyn Vos Savant (she has the highest IQ on the planet). Or my friend Chip Diggins (his IQ is scary high.) Or Richard Dawkins (he's only kinda smart.) Or Father Andrew Pinsent at Oxford (my very very smart friend Simon says Fr. Andrew is smarter than Simon is.)(Simon got his PhD in particle physics from Oxford and did his dissertation at CERN, so as we say in Texas, he's pretty dad-gummed smart.) Or Rev. John Polkinghorne. Or Paul Davies. Or Fred Hoyle. Or Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or Stephen Weinberg. Or, frankly, anybody. Even Sheldon Cooper.

It doesn't matter how smart you are, or how much you know. Because there's someone smarter who believes differently than you do, and what you know, will change. And then it will change again.

It's not about intelligence. It's not about information. It's about something else.

And what, you may ask, might that be?

Now that is a stellar question.

There's Nothing There - Part 23

Now. Although nobody is all that crazy about reality not existing unless some sort of observation or measurement is made (apparently by some sort of intelligent being, like a human or ET, but not by a really smart animal, like a bonobo)(You need to go look up "bonobo" right now), nobody can get away from it.

The best that anyone can do is to try to figure out what happens AFTER the observation is made. But nobody has been able to say that the observation is NOT the thing. The Thing. The Thing that makes reality come into being.

And nobody can really define what an observation actually is.

Or what the observer actually is. Or who.

Now. I'm fully aware that all of this sounds insane. Which is part of the problem. It just sounds crazy. OK, that's ALL of the problem. It's lunacy. But it's the way the universe works.

The Copenhagen Interpretation says that all possible realities exist together (cat both alive and dead) until the observation is made, and then all the possible realities go away except for one. Live cat universe OR dead cat universe.

The Many Worlds Interpretation says that when the observation is made, the universe splits into two universes. Live cat universe AND dead cat universe.

That would mean that there are many many many universes. Except, of course, there aren't. At least none that we have any evidence for. This one, of course. Ours. But not a single other one.

Something like two out of three physicists accept the Copenhagen. Something like one out of nine accept Many Worlds. That's about three out of four of all physicists. The other one physicist likes any of the other nine interpretations. So they aren't too popular.

Really what's going on is that a lot of very smart people are hoping that there's (and this is what they call it, so use your deep professional American Idol voice) ...

A DEEPER REALITY THAT MAKES SENSE.

Albert Einstein wanted this. Stephen Hawking wants it. Roger Penrose. Lots of folks. Most everyone.

And here's what's interesting about that.

It's that ... they don't like it because it doesn't make sense to them, even though it's perfect and it's always right and it's never wrong.

That is to say that they fully believe that the universe should be understandable to us, the beings that live in it. Since ET hasn't shown up yet.

Even though Neil deGrasse Tyson says quite firmly, "The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you," he really does want it to make sense to him, even though it's under no obligation to do so. That's what he himself said to him himself, along with all the rest of us ourselves.

We could note here that we are the only creatures on earth, and maybe the only creatures in the universe, that gives a rat's patootie about understanding the universe.

All the other creatures just eat, sleep, excrete, procreate, and try to keep daddy from eating the babies.

We (firmly convinced that we are not special)(which we figured out all by ourselves)(based on fairly bad logic, as it happens) spend a good amount of our time trying to understand things.

Physicists - the universe. Other scientists - smaller parts of the universe. Psychologists - why we are such whackadoodles. Historians - why we are such whackadoodles. Marketing people - why we won't buy their crap, and how to make us buy their crap. People - all the other people.

Animals don't do this. Plants don't do this. Galaxies don't do this. Even particles, which apparently are smarter than we are, don't do this. Particles are just flipping coins to figure out what they are going to do, and waiting to see if we are going to try to catch them doing it. But particles are not trying to understand particles.

We're the only ones.

And if we reach a place where we can't understand things (like space-time, black holes, Big Bang, quantum things, relativistic things, bendy time and bendy space, cats both dead and alive until we look at them, particles going backwards and forwards in time, stuff like that), then instead of just saying, wow, we're just not gonna get that, are we?, we say, dang, the universe must be broken, cause it's way weirder than we thought it was going to be.

And what the universe is saying is, hey, it's YOU guys who are weird. The rest of it? That's normal. That's the way it is. You're like little babies afraid of the dark or the bathtub or bunnies or green veg. Or, in my daughter's case, ET, spiders and laundry lint.

So somehow, we who are not special are supposed to be the only creatures in Space-Time who are special enough to be able to figure everything out, how it all works and makes sense to us who are like tiny little rancid carbuncles on the right butt cheek of the solar system.

The universe does throw us a bone. It lets us find and understand the math that describes it all. The math of relativity, of the general theory, of quantum theory and the Standard Model of Particle physics, of Chaos and Complexity, even String Theory (OK, we don't quite get the math and it isn't true yet, but still) and Loop Quantum Gravity (ditto) and Inflation (ditto ditto) and Dark Energy and Dark Matter (which EXIST but we CAN'T FIND THEM!!!).

But the math, the cruel, bitter heartless math, tells us a story that we cannot understand. And will not. But we want

so

badly

to understand it.

It's kind of adorable.

Because we, cute little Minions that we are, make this assumption that has no support. And it is, we can Understand Everything. We who can't see the backs of our own heads, we who live in a universe that is maybe 10**26th times bigger than we can actually see, we who look out at the night sky, see 9110 stars (which is all that we can see with our eyeballs) and assume that we are Seeing It All, we for whom 95% of the universe is Dark Energy and Dark Matter and we have no idea what they are, we who cannot go backwards in time or tunnel instantaneously across vast regions of space or be in 2 places at once, though all of our particles can, we who travel to the Moon and think we have been in space, we who dream of colonizing Mars, which is a lot like dreaming of colonizing that spot in the sand right next to us on the beach, we who are bound to air and water and food and gravity and light and cannot live without any of them,

We

want to Understand it All.

Adorable. Just ... adorable.

There's Nothing There - Part 22

Here's the problem.

You (and everyone else) think that

1) the world and the universe and nature and everything are just the way that you think they are, and that

2) they would be that way whether or not you are here, because

3) the Copernican Principle. Which says that humans are not special and have no special role to play in the universe. Because

4) we are just one more in a very very long series of accidents happening. And

5) the universe could give a rat's patootie whether or not humans are here. That's the Official Cosmological Term, btw. " Rat's Patootie."

So. Schroedinger's Cat.

Two guys, a Dane and a German, walk into a bar.

OK, not really.

I mean, they may have walked into a bar. Probably did. But it's no joke.

They were Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg.

No, no, not the Heisenberg from Breaking Bad. The real one.

He came up with something that has his name on it. It's called the (go ahead, guess) Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. What, you weren't sure? There you go.

It says that you can't know both the momentum and location of any particle.

And then they both came up with something that ought to have Bohr's name on it, but that would be dull. Uninteresting. Um. Boring.

Sorry. Bad physics joke.

It's called the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Physics.

(There are 11 different interpretations of Quantum Physics.

That's not really supposed to happen. It just shows what a 1] totally fascinating field of scientific inquiry Quantum physics is, or 2] mess it is. Or 3]. Both.

It's not really a mess, of course. It's perfect, it's never wrong, it's always right, and it's brilliant.

But nobody agrees how it works.

That's not really supposed to happen. Scientists should automatically just like something that works all the time. I mean, it ought to be their BFF, except BSF, S being Science.)

Anyway. I digress. Bohr. Heisenberg. Copenhagen. The Copenhagen Interpretation of QM (Quantum Mechanics which is the same as Quantum Physics and Quantum Theory) says that ...

That a particle has neither a momentum nor a location until you look at it.

That is, it is your interaction with the particle that causes it to, I don't know, exist at all.

So two other guys didn't like that at all. A Wuerttembergian /stateless/Swiss/Austrian/not Austrian/German/not German /American guy and a German/Irish guy went into a bar. Yeah, not really. It was Albert Einstein and Erwin Schroedinger, who was named after a famous cat. Quantum Time being what it is, that might be true.

Anyway. They didn't like the whole observer thing, so they sat down and came up with a thought experiment to show why it was all wrong. Of course, Quantum Theory being what it is, they just showed it was all right, instead. Curse you, Quantum Theory. They just might have been in a bar, after all.

So. Here it is. They said, OK, you Copenhageners, what if we take an alpha particle and put it in a box, like this:

This Alpha Particle will eventually decay. Because it's all by itself and not in a big lump of Alpha Particles, we don't know when it will decay and can't predict it:

But here's what you're trying to tell us. You're trying to tell us that if we close the box and we're not looking inside, if it's completely cut off from the outside world (sound, smell, taste, touch, and hearing, and any old measuring type device), then ...

The Alpha Particle is in a state of Quantum Uncertainty (like, the Uncertainty Principle). And THAT means that ... 

It has both decayed and not decayed. Both at the same time.

Not just ONE PARTICLE IN THE TWO PLACES AT THE SAME TIME!

But, ONE PARTICLE IN TWO STATES AT THE SAME TIME!

Which is, Einstein and Schroedinger said, ridiculous.

So we're gonna put a bunch of other stuff in the box, all connected to the particle. What, you might ask, could that be? It will be a Geiger counter, a hammer, some poison, and a cat, like this:

So if the particle decays, the Geiger counter will detect it, let the hammer fall on the poison, which will spill and kill the cat. The cat was Einstein's idea. I don't know why.

So, now, you will be telling us, not only is the particle in two states at the same time, but so is everything else in the box.

And thus ...

The cat will be both dead and alive. At the same time.

THE CAT WILL BE BOTH DEAD AND ALIVE!

And that's ridiculous. Said Albert and Erwin to Niels and Werner.

And Niels and Werner said, ah, we don't wanna make you guys feel all bad and offended, but, um,

That's the way it is.

And they were right. And Einstein and Schroedinger were wrong.

And then, what's more, is you open the box and look inside.

And then what happens is that you, um, ah, cause reality to come into being. As in, the particle was in two states at the same time, which means that reality didn't exist yet, and then you 

interacted

with it, and voila! Reality!

It's like this. When you look inside or make a measurement or whatever, you do what's called ...

... "collapsing the probability wave function" ...

which means (Copenhagenishly) that, where before the cat was both alive and dead, or neither alive nor dead, or whatever, now ...

... the cat is one or the other. But not both.

And this happens only when you look inside the box. Before, dead and alive. After, dead or alive. You did this. You yourself.

You need to know that you don't get to choose whether the cat is alive or dead. The particle does that for you. Because this is a story about a particle.

As in. The particle notices (whatever the heck THAT means) that you have looked in the box, and sort of runs through its options.

Option one - the particle decays sometime in the future.

Option two - the particle decays right now, when you look in the box.

Option three - are you sure you want me to tell you? Your life will be much much easier if you just stick with Options One and Two.

Really? OK, then. No pain, no reality.

Option three - the particle decays sometime in the past. Like, yesterday. Or last week.

But it doesn't decay last week until you look in the box.

Which means that the cat isn't dead until you look in the box.

Which means that when you look in the box, THEN the cat will have been dead for a week.

But not until you look in the box. Which means that 1) the wave function collapsed backwards in time and therefore 2) your interaction with the particle right now affected things that happened in the past. 

Of course, technically they didn't happen in the past until your interaction. That's just confusing.

Interaction killed the cat. Of course, you were curious about what would happen if you looked in the box, so then, of course, like a force of nature ...

... curiosity killed the cat.

Ha. Hysterical.

Anyway. What THIS means is that ...

... without interaction, there is no reality in the universe. 

Do I need to repeat that really loudly so that you'll get it?

I didn't think so.

And reality can come into being ... backwards in time.

I think I have a headache. 

Yesterday.

Ha. Hysterical.