Download Quantum Reality

The Concepts of Quantum Reality
Wave Complimentarity, Bosons, Fermions and Miscellaneous
(50 slides)
creatively compiled by dr. michael farnworth
The purpose of this lesson is simply to make us more familiar with the
concepts of Quantum theory.
You don’t have to do anything with the information than just allowing it to
register in the memory files of your mind.
1. The wave and particle compound of complimentarity
The Dual Nature of Light
• To understand the dual nature of light, the
Complementarity Principle of Niels Bohr, illustrates that
light has both properties (of wave and particle) but will exhibit
which ever property the observer is testing/looking for.
Janus is a good metaphor for the nature of light…It shows
us what ever face we are looking for.
Roman God Janus. He has two faces, looking in opposite
directions.
Roman God Janus
The classic two slit experiment:
• To illustrate the wave-particle duality of light an experiment
was set up where photons were shot through a plate with two
slits in it and on to a photo (light) sensitive screen.
• If the photons were particles there would be patterns of
random hits.
• If the photons were waves there would be wave like patterns
of interference on the screen.
The photon seems to know how many slits are open.
If the light source were particles they would leave a pattern
similar to…
Particle like patterns…
If the light source were waves they would leave a pattern
similar to…
Wave like patterns…
A Normal Wave…
A wave energy Packet…
For a demonstration of the particle-wave duality two split experiment
click on the below:
http://www.colorado.edu/physics/2000/schroedinger/two-slit2.html
The reason this is important
• It seems everything on the Quantum level of reality has this
dual nature which lives in potentiality and is only brought into
actuality when the quantum state collapses when it is
observed or acted upon.
• More about this later.
3. Fermions and Bosons…
The ancients believed that the world was made up of basic materials or
elements… like:
Air
Water
Fire
Earth
We now know that the basic elements are much more elemental and
sub-atomically small…
Molecule
Atom
Proton
Quark
Now, at this point in time, we have labeled the smallest building
components of reality as:
fermions and bosons.
fermions and bosons
Fermions are Individuals
A fermion is any particle that has an odd half-integer (like
1/2, 3/2, and so forth) spin.
Quarks and leptons, as well as most composite
particles, like protons and neutrons, are fermions.
(For reasons we do not fully understand, a consequence of the odd halfinteger spin is that fermions obey the Pauli Exclusion Principle and
therefore cannot co-exist in the same state at same location at the same
time.)
“Fermions are highly territorial individualists.
If one fermion is in a particular quantum state, then all other fermions are
excluded from that state, resulting in the Pauli exclusion principle.
In a universe where electrons were bosons rather than fermions, no life would be
there to worry about it.
Bosonic electrons around atoms, instead of forming into "shells" providing the
outer valence electrons that make chemistry work, would pile up together in the
most tightly bound inner atomic orbit, making chemistry and also life impossible.
We owe our very existence to the Fermi-Dirac statistics of electrons.”
John G. Cramer
Bosons are ‘groupies’…
Bosons are those particles which have an integer spin
(0, 1, 2...).
All the force carrier particles are bosons.
“Bosons are gregarious groupies.
If one boson is in a particular quantum state, all other bosons are "invited in"
to share the same state.
The more bosons that pile into the state, the stronger becomes the tendency
for others to join them.
In such a state, a very large number of particle will have a single quantum
wave function.
This is what is called a Bose-Einstein condensate.
It is a new state of matter because, although predicted, it has never before
been observed in an atomic system.”
John G. Cramer
The Pauli Exclusion Principle
•
At one time, physicists thought that no two particles in the same
quantum state could exist in the same place at the same time.
This is called the Pauli Exclusion Principle, and it explains
why there is chemistry.
•
But it has been since discovered that a certain group of particles
do not obey this principle. Particles that do obey the Pauli
Exclusion Principle are called fermions, and those that do not
are called bosons.
•
Imagine there is a large family of identical fermion siblings
spending the night at the Fermion Motel, and there is another
large family of identical boson siblings spending the night at the
Boson Inn. Fermions behave like squabbling siblings, and not
only refuse to share a room but also insist on rooms as far as
possible from each other. On the other hand, boson siblings
prefer to share the same room. (Since fermions rent more rooms than
bosons, motel owners prefer doing business with fermions. Some motels even
refuse to rent rooms to bosons!)
We have answered the questions, What is the world made of And What
holds it together?
The world is made of six quarks and six leptons (called fermions).
Everything we see is a conglomeration of quarks and
leptons.
There are four fundamental forces and there are force
carrier particles (called bosons) associated with each force.
3. Miscellaneous Concepts
The Bose Einstein Condensate.
These two men are the ones responsible for
The creation of the Bose-Einstein Condensate.
In the 1920s they collaborated in their work.
Satyendra Nath Bose
Albert Einstein
Bose-Einstein Condensate…
• In some special conditions boson atoms coalesce with other
boson atoms to become identical with, and to them.
• In other words they overlap, coalesce and absorb each other
into one large quantum boson atom sharing the same qualities
and nature.
• The Bose-Einstein Condensate is created when the multiple
atoms unify into one.
A ‘visual’ of atoms coalescing…
into
In a Bose -Einstein Condensate the atoms join together and lose their
individual particle like characteristics and become wave like.
Another way to picture the dynamics of Bose-Einstein condensates…
• Another way to picture the dynamics of the atoms in a BoseEinstein Condensate is vibrationally.
• Tuning forks, singing voices, sounds that are oscillating at the
same frequency and becoming one and the same wave
length.
The brain as a Bose-Einstein Condensate:
• Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall in their book Spiritual
Intelligence suggest that consciousness may be the product of
the coherent alignment and oscillations of electrons in
proteins in the neurons’ membranes or of electrons in the
water of the neurons.
• These neurons are so overlapped and coalesced that they
become one big quantum molecule and this is the basis for
the unitary consciousness and sense of self.
Brain Waves
• We all are probably familiar with brain waves.
• The brain wave oscillations change according to the
different mental activities that are going on:
• Gamma, Beta, Alpha, Theta or Delta.
• What if the brain/spirit were a Bose-Einstein
condensate?
• More about this later.
The four forces of the universe.
The four fundamental forces of the Universe are made of Bosons
• 1. Gravitation
• 2. Electromagnetism
• 3. Strong nuclear forces
• 4. Weak nuclear forces
Research on fundamental particles has indicated that the following 4 forces (mutually
interactive) exist in the universe:
Superstring Theory
The Superstring theory
• Scientists are working to find a theory linking all of the
4 forces.
• This theory postulates that the smallest piece of matter
is not a fundamental particle, but rather an
infinitesimally small, vibrating string.
• The theory is gaining attention as a result of its ability
to contribute to understanding mystifying phenomena
such as the big bang and black holes.
The Superstring Theory
The superstring theory explains everything about space, matter and space-time
and has been called the ultimate theory.
It fulfills Einstein's dream of combining quantum mechanics and the general
theory of relativity.
The Superstring theory, first proposed in 1974 by John Schwarz, a Hungarianborn theoretical physicist from the California Institute of Technology, works using
a principle measurement unit of strings that are 10 to the power of minus 33 cm
in length.
When the strings vibrate or are subjected to an enormous burst of energy they
break and rejoin to create elementary particles.
String Theory is the hope of making General Relativity consistent with
Quantum Theory.
This would be the theory that unifies our understanding of the world we
have created via the two theories.
Black Holes
Black Holes
• The general theory of relativity could be regarded as the law
that confirms the development of time in bent three
dimensional space.
• But having bent space to a certain point it must inevitably
reach a singular point (where time and space become indefinable).
• This is known as the Penrose-Hawking singularity theorem.
• It explains the destruction of space-time by gravity, and black
holes are singular points enclosed by event horizon.
continued…
When objects are sucked into black holes, they continue
falling for an unlimited period of space and time.
At a central point, gravity becomes infinite, time and space
are bent, and concepts of time and space, as we know them,
become irrelevant.
Such an occurrence happened when the Universe was
formed, and this is also known as a singular point.
Objects sucked into singular points disappear from our
Universe without a trace.
Can you ‘see’ the black hole?
Even though Quantum Theory is difficult to understand it has the power to
change how we see the world and the paradigms we choose to live in.
The Newtonian paradigm is ego centric and strokes the ego with a cause and
effect world that it can attempt to control.
The Quantum paradigm is foreign and strange inviting the ego to surrender its
assumptions from the Newtonian world and start reconstructing a world
marinating in mystery and awe.
It will take effort and work.
"In light of knowledge attained, the happy achievement seems almost a
matter of course, and any intelligent student can grasp it without too
much trouble.
But the years of anxious searching in the dark, with their intense longing,
their alterations of confidence and exhaustion and the final emergence
into the light, only those who have experienced it can understand it.”
Albert Einstein
the end