The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle/HUP
Robert Howard Kroepel
Copyright © 2006
'Lakeside Studios
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New Durham, NH USA 03855
Do causality and determinism occur at Quantum Mechanics/QM scalar
levels?
The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle/HUP basically says that we cannot,
at
QM scalar levels, observe or measure simultaneously both the position
and
the momentum of individual small stuffs. The measurement process
requires
hitting individual small stuffs with other small stuffs and thereby
causes
changes in the position and momentum of the small stuffs intended to be
observed
or measured.
Einstein said that QM was basically an incomplete theory; he argued
that
causality, and therefore determinism, occurred between and among small
stuffs
at QM levels.
QM derives its prediction formulas by observing finite volumes filled
with
known quantities of small stuffs and observing the percentage of the
total
quantities of small stuffs which undergo changes of inertial states
(from
being at rest to being in motion and from being in motion to being at
rest,
atomic decay, etc.); these observations are statistically averaged to
give
the QM prediction formulas for QM-level small stuffs.
Where we cannot observe and predict the causality and determinism which
cause
changes of inertial states of individual small stuffs we can predict
the
causality and determinism which cause changes of inertial states of
percentages
of small stuffs in crowds of small stuffs within finite volumes.
But does causality and therefore determinism occur at QM small stuff
levels?
Consider:
Charles Proteus Steinmetz: The Fundamental Law
of
Physics
Charles Proteus Steinmetz.
Four Lectures on Relativity and Space.
Dover Publications, Inc., 180 Varick Street, New York, NY 10014 1967
pp. 49–50.
The fundamental law of physics is the law of inertia. "A body keeps the
same
state as long as there is no cause to change its state." That is, it
remains
at rest or continues the same kind of motion—that is, motion with the
same
velocity in the same direction—until some cause changes it, and such
cause
we call a 'force.' " [Quotes in the original, but not attributed to
anyone.]
This is really not merely a law of physics, but it is the fundamental
law
of logic. It is the law of cause and effect: "Any effect must have a
cause,
and without cause there can be no effect." This is axiomatic and is the
fundamental
conception of all knowledge, because all knowledge consists in finding
the
cause of some effect or the effect of some cause, and therefore must
presuppose
that every effect has some cause, and inversely. [Quotes in the
original
but not attributed to anyone.]
R. H. Kroepel: The Corollaries of the Law of
Inertia
From the Law of Inertia the following Corollaries can be derived
The Corollaries of the Law of Inertia
1. A force—a push or a pull which causes accelerations or
decelerations—is
the cause of the effect which is a change of inertial state or inertial
reference
frame.
2. The observation of a change of inertial state or inertial reference
frame
implies the cause to be a force of some kind.]
Note Corollary #2.
Corollary #2 suggests that causality and determinism occur at any
scalar
levels.
Any observation of a change of inertial states of groups of small
stuffs
in crowds of small stuffs (which gives us the average percentage of
changes
of inertial states of small stuffs in crowds of known quantities of
small
stuffs within finite volumes needed for QM prediction formulas) implies
the
causes of such changes to be forces of some kind, therefore causality
and
determinism do in fact occur at QM small stuff levels.
An observation of the changes of inertial states of percentages of
small
stuffs in crowds of small stuffs at QM levels and the implication that
those
changes were caused by forces of some kind is an indirect observation
of
the occurrence of causality and determinism at QM levels, but that
observation
is real and cannot be ignored—it won't ever go away, and that
observation
is a bridge between QM and classical mechanics.
Einstein was righte—inre observing and measuring the forces that are
involved
in the causality and determinism that cause changes of inertial states
of
individual small stuffs at QM scalar levels, QM is an incomplete theory.
These considerations do not imply that QM is a false theory—the success
of the statistically derived QM prediction formulas proves that QM is
in
fact a successful theory.
References:
The Oxford Dictionary of Physics
Uncertainty Principle (Heisenberg uncertainty principle; principle of
indeterminism) The principle that it is not possible to know with
unlimited accuracy both the position and momentum of a particle. This
principle, discovered in 1927 by Werner Heisenberg, is usually
stated in the form: ∆x∆px
≥ h/4π, where ∆x is the uncertainty of the x-coordinate
of the particle, ∆px is the uncertainty in the
x-component
of the particle's momentum, and h is the Planck constant. An
explanation
of the uncertainty is that in order to locate a particle exactly, an
observer must be able to bounce off it a photon of radiation; this act
of
location itself alters the position of the particle in an unpredictable
way.
To locate the position exactly photons of short wavelength would have
to
be used. The high momenta of such photons would cause a large effect on
the
position. On the other hand, using photons of lower momenta would have
less
effect on the particle's position, but would be less accurate because
of
the longer wavelength.
Gleiser, Marcello
The Dancing Universe: From Creation Myths to the Big Bang
Plume Books, Penguin Group, Penguin-Putnam, Inc., 375 Hudson St., New
York,
NY USA, 10014 1998
pp. 234-237.
Greene, Brian R.
The Elegant Universe
Vintage Books, Random House, New York, 2000
pp. 112-116.
Hawking, Stephen
A Brief History of Time
Bantam Books, Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc, 666 Fifth Avenue,
New
York, NY 10103
pp. 53-55.
Lerner, Eric
The Big Bang Never Happened
Vintage Books, Random House, Inc. New York, 1991
pp. 354-355.