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Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

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    Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

    Every mid 20th century physicist you ever heard of on one photo. Amazing


    #2
    Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

    Trust Schroedinger, Compton and Fowler to wear the wrong-coloured suits. I bet the others were taking the piss mercilessly.

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      #3
      Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

      Wot no Ernie Walton innit?

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        #4
        Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

        Schroedinger's main clothing criterion was, I suspect, ease of rapid removal.

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          #5
          Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

          You'd think Schroedinger would have worn a half-black/half-white suit, rather than just a grey one, wouldn't you?

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            #6
            Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

            No, you'd have thought it would be neither black nor white until you looked at it, at which point it would become one or the other.

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              #7
              Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

              Is that how it works? That these things become something definite when observed?

              It's only that I think it might make a kind of metaphor for something I want to talk about in the bit that I am trying to write at the minute. but if I get it wrong then that would be silly.

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                #8
                Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

                Is Langmeir related to Gordon Brown, perchance?

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                  #9
                  Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

                  Is that how it works? That these things become something definite when observed?
                  That's the "Copenhagen Interpretation" of Heisenberg and Bohr, to which Schroedinger was flatly opposed. I can't see that it makes sense myself either, but the thing is the alternatives are all as weird as fuck too.

                  There's been some recent thinking along the lines that observation has nothing to do with it, and actually the state collapses only when amplification takes place (which is always necessary in order for us to "observe" a quantum system). The gravity term, which is always neglected in quantum calculations, is thought by some to be the crucial thing: amplification always means shifting sizeable chunks of mass, the thinking goes, and when that happens the quantum state quickly collapses.

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                    #10
                    Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

                    Oh OK, thank you. I just want to talk about deciding between possibilities when we read, really, and how the reader influences the text. not meant to be in any way precise or anything.

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                      #11
                      Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

                      That's from the Solvay conference isn't it? Christ I'd have loved to have been there.

                      Did you know it was Planck's 150th birthday last week?

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                        #12
                        Planck looks thick, Heisenberg looks uncertain...

                        Schroedinger's looking for his cat. Planck reckons the others are afraid of them - they fear 'em.

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