21st August 1984
Dear Dewey:
I just had to write to you as soon as possible. Even though I cannot lay claim to a faultless understanding of R.S., I believe that I have seen an unexpected outcome of your solution to the E.P.R. Paradox on Saturday last.
Please give the accompanying paper, consideration and let me know if there is ‘food for thought’ at least, if not a discovery, or two or three.
Once again it was great to see you again,
THE PARADOX
Can a quantum-mechanical description of physical reality be considered complete? (1935)
Imagine two particles, (A & B), said EPR, that interact with one another and then fly apart, not interacting with anything else at all until the experimenter decides to investigate one of them. Each particle has its own momentum and each is located at some position in space. The original total momentum of the two particles remains unchanged during their flight apart.
Now we must measure the precise position of one particle (A). However this disturbs the momentum of that particle, but supposedly not that of the other particle (B). We should then be able to deduce the present position of B, knowing both its momentum and the original separation of the two particles. So we have deduced both the position and momentum of B in violation of the uncertainty principle.
Either that is the case or the measurements that we made on A affected B in violation of causality, an instantaneous `communication' travelling across space, nominally called “action at a distance”.
The kernel of the alleged paradox is the meaning of `reality'. A `reasonable' definition of reality was the centre of the argument twixt the Copenhagen push, (headed by Niels Bohr), and the EPR triumvirate.
The Copenhagen view makes the reality [of position and momentum in the second system (B)] depend upon the process of measurement carried out on the first system (A), which does not disturb the second system in any way. This means that the position and momentum of B has no objective meaning until the measurement takes place, irrespective of what was done to particle A.
A choice had to be made between a world of objective reality and the quantum world.
EPR remained steadfast in objective reality being the case.
OVERVIEW 21st August 1984
Not only the POSSIBLE answer to the PARADOX, but it also involves a new meaning to SIMULTANEITY, and perhaps contiguity.
Also it may involve an explanation of symmetrical, resulting in the possibility of a `new particle'.
Had Larson been asked to devise a `man-made' `crucial experiment' to demonstrate the validity of R.S., he may have been stymied, since I don't remember such an experiment in any books or writings on R.S. elsewhere. Certainly the observations by man have continually validated his theory. However it seems to me that Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen, in their effort to invalidate Quantum Theory, by denying the experimental results predicted by the simultaneous production of a pair of photons as they did do, had, in fact, devised the first, (and perhaps only), experiment, that validates R.S. in an indisputably new and effective way, which goes further than any other type of validation.
Had we been smart enough, we may have suggested, “Dewey, can you devise a hypothetical experiment to create an event, or existent, in both our material sector and the cosmic sector simultaneously, (new definition of simultaneous required)?
i.e. If we perform the experiment to create the event, or existent, in our physical sector, can we be certain, that, as of then, by our scalar time scale, that the event or existent also occurred in the cosmic sector?
For later consideration, let us then talk about the creation of particle(s) at the exact speed of light, in both sectors simultaneously. This may imply that there is no passing from one sector to another, but that the particles or existents are eternally at the `cross-over' boundary. Of course if we reconsider the concept of two sectors as not really being two entities but a mutual imbeddedness, then there is no boundary ever to consider, but merely an observational capability. This then would mean that there is a commonality to `both sectors' or to `both observers'.
For now, let us consider the creation of particles or existents in both sectors, where, in one sector they move translationary and in the other sector they are stationary.
(Of course, we recognize rotation has a translational equivalent, but, for now, we are considering linear translation.)
This question, as posed, could have been considered to be mind-bogling at first. Then, when we reflect to consider that the origin of these two particles is in the same space unit and the same time unit, (hard to picture), then if they are slower than the speed of light, they occur in our physical sector as moving.
Had they not appeared, they may be deemed to have been created and moving faster than light, and have entered the cosmic sector, or alternatively explained, as being observable by a `cosmic' observer. In this latter case they may be observable in our sector as a stationary existent, if we know what to look for and how to detect it. There are at least 3 possibilities to consider in our search:-
1) What do we look for?
2) Where do we look for it?
3) With what instruments do we conduct this search?
On the assumption that they appear as a linearly moving pair, and since this is a relationship between vector space and scalar time, (coordinate space and clock time, using Larson's terminology), then we consider theoretical outcomes:-
1) Would there be an interconnection twixt the two particles? If so, then this would explain the EPR Paradox, since when one is `flipped' in space, so is the other.
2) We must also consider the possibility that this man-made experiment, may also occur in nature, without man's intervention.
If this is so, can we estimate:
a) the probability of locating these natural phenomena; perhaps they are, as yet, unknown existents.
b) if they are not new to us, what are they?
c) If we want to opine, that they are not possibly able to occur naturally, we must be very articulate, as to why this is so.
Following on from a)
If it does occur naturally, then it also occurs reciprocally and therefore in our physical sector we would have a ‘stationary pair’ of photons, (as opposed to the reciprocal linearly translational pair).
One possibility is that they may rotate, but this brings in the consideration of a gravitating mass, and therefore could be some sort of ‘subatomic’ particle.
The main question that arises, is how we would recognize it?
We have a pair of photons, which constitute a pair of vibrations, but instead of being orthogonal, as in atoms, they might be at some other inclination, perhaps, in one instance, being anti-parallel.
We would have to calculate its theoretical properties, such as mass, magnetic charge, electric charge etc..
Also we would have to ascertain how many varieties are possible, and probable.
Are some of them known to us, are they all known, or are none known????
Yours sincerely,
David Halprin