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Posted by Harvey on October 24, 2003 15:43:40 UTC

Hi Mario,

Good to hear from you. I hope you are doing well in life.

however I am very cautious to use certain quantum mechanical postulates in arguments about the structure of the universe, as I see them as garish approximations and not neccesarily indicative of what is truly going on on the quantum level.

Of course. However, I think it is a legitimate question to ask if QM can be applied to more phenomena than it is currently thought to be applicable. For example, looking at galaxy formations and the 'fringes' of clusters and super clusters of galaxies where vast areas of space are left 'empty', are we perhaps seeing the effects of wave interference? I think it is a legitimate question.

Each particle has a certain probability of hitting different areas on your recieving plate, so no matter over what time interval you send them through or in how many wave packets, you'll get the same pattern. It's like saying "I get the same pattern when I shoot a target with a shotgun that I get when I shoot it 50 times with a B.B. gun."

Well, yes and no. Yes, if the electron behaves like a wave that enters both slits at once, then you should expect wave interference and therefore the fringes should happen regardless if the electron goes through one at a time or many electrons as a wave 'all at once'. But, no, in the sense that the electron is behaving as a particle with each electron firing one by one and with each electron detection, one by one. If we treat the electron as just a particle, then this behavior is not to be expected since a random distribution would look more like a cluster with the center recording the majority of hits, and the edges having the least amount of hits.

One possible explanation is that the electron, even though it appears as a particle, is still behaving also as a wave when passing through the screen, it is just that we don't see the effects of the wave behavior until 20 minutes later when the fringe patterns form in the video. In this view, the quantum-mechanical effects mean the electron is behaving as both a wave and particle. However, this suggests what I am saying, and that is macroscopic phenomena behaves as a wave due to the quantum behavior of quantum particles. Since our universe is made of particles, the accumulated effect is wave-like in the universe. The question is how far to carry this notion. The universe evolving as a wave-like propagation is not out of the question in my opinion since it is made of particles, but what about concepts, beliefs, species, technologies, thoughts, societies, events, etc... Do these 'things' behave as waves due to quantum mechanics? I think these structures are all fair game as being wave-like, and therefore giving authenicity to the notion that things go in cycles, or the 'circle of life', etc. Quantum-mechanical? I think there is a possibility for this to be so.

In any event I consider this an academic exercise as I loathe probabilistic mechanics with a passion normally reserved for Jacques Chirac. It's a way of cancelling out what is truly happening by saying "meh, it's chance" much like I can say that there's a 50/50 chance of a coin landing on "heads," when in fact when I flip the coin there is either a 100% chance of it being heads or a 100% chance of it being tails, depending on angular momentum, air flow and density, and so forth. I don't see why quantum effects should be any different, fundamentally speaking.

It is chance, but it is chance based on wave-like behavior of the electron. To get this effect from probability you must treat the electron as a wave entering both 'slits' at the same time. Of course, this is not what is indicated prior to 20 minutes of the event. The particle 'hits' that are prior to 20 minutes look and act as random particles going through *one* slit as a particle. After 20 minutes we have to dismiss this notion of particles acting as random particle paths since the wave interference fringes clearly show the accumulation of electrons are acting as a wave.

By the way, I have been a skeptic about using quantum mechanics at a classical level since there is so much abuse. But, this shouldn't prevent us from asking the questions that need to be asked. Does our universe follow wave-like behavior because of quantum-mechanical effects? I like the question, I just see no way of answering it yet.

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