Quantum entanglement between a single photon and a trillion rubidium atoms | Hacker News Reader

Quantum entanglement between a single photon and a trillion rubidium atoms

phys.org

55 pointsfeelix9 comments

> In their [Einstein, Podolsky, Rosen] thought experiment, two products of decay were projected in exactly opposite directions—or more scientifically speaking, their momenta were anti-correlated.

> In Einstein's thought experiment, it is possible to measure the momentum of one particle and immediately know the momentum of the other without measurement, as it is exactly opposite. Then, by measuring the position of the second particle, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle is seemingly violated, an apparent paradox that seriously baffled the three physicists.

Isn't it rather obvious that symmetry between the two particles would be disturbed with increasing probabillity as time goes on, if not randomly then at least by either measurement, especially when the two decay products are still close together? Anyway, the uncertainty for the simultaneity of both measurements would fall under Heisenberg's principle, I guess.

It's a thought experiment, so no.

Generally, when something is cited as being a hard problem in a scientific field in which you are not an expert, you can be pretty certain that the first "pretty obvious" thought that comes into your head isn't a shining light into a sea of intellectual darkness but is instead drive-by layman speculation that is almost definitely entirely wrong.

I don't know where and I don't know when, but I'm going to quote you.

Maybe it's one way to ask for clarification on the problem?

I do that, I try to find loopholes and edge cases to better define my mental model and then test them against the knowledge of people who know better than me.

I figure GGP is trying to do the same, and not sending in a paper to Nature right now.

Unrelated to physics, but amusingly in big companies the opposite seems to be true.

For problems cited as hard, the first pretty obvious thought is a bright light into intellectual darkness

I believe you have just coined the definitive formulation of this principle. Would you like to name it? I humbly suggest "dTal's razor".

As a layman, this sort of sounds like the beginnings of a Heisenberg Compensator (from Star Trek transporters), is that way off?

It's fiction. Physics prohibits that kind of device.

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