WEBVTT - Spooky Action at a Distance 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from My Heart Radio. 0:00:11.800 --> 0:00:14.680 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:19.240 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with my Heart Radio 0:00:19.320 --> 0:00:23.520 and how the tech are you? And Happy Halloween. This 0:00:23.720 --> 0:00:28.360 episode is publishing on Halloween, October thirty one, two thousand 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:31.200 twenty two. That's for those of you in the future 0:00:31.360 --> 0:00:35.680 who are listening back on this episode. So throughout this month, 0:00:35.760 --> 0:00:39.120 I have published a few episodes that are at least 0:00:39.120 --> 0:00:45.040 tangentially connected if I'm being generous to to scary spooky stuff. 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:47.879 It's a little tricky with tech because I don't want 0:00:47.880 --> 0:00:52.760 to go into like really big paranormal kind of things 0:00:52.880 --> 0:00:56.600 and technology that purports to do stuff that's impossible, because 0:00:57.320 --> 0:01:00.360 that really just comes down to debunking. I want to do, um, 0:01:00.480 --> 0:01:03.640 you know, some stuff that that has spooky names, but 0:01:03.720 --> 0:01:07.280 ultimately it's not that scary stuff like vampire power and 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:11.319 zombie computers, although those are scary. The phrase ghost in 0:01:11.319 --> 0:01:13.520 the Machine was an episode that kind of thing. But 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:16.440 on Halloween itself, I thought we could chat about something 0:01:16.560 --> 0:01:21.800 Einstein himself referred to as spooky action at a distance, 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:26.080 and this does tie into tech. We are going to 0:01:26.160 --> 0:01:29.479 talk about tech, not just theories and physics, and we're 0:01:29.480 --> 0:01:31.560 also going to talk about tech that's in the realistic 0:01:31.600 --> 0:01:36.479 world and in like science fiction ee kind of applications. Now, 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:41.520 Einstein when he said spooky action at a distance, wasn't 0:01:41.600 --> 0:01:45.440 trying to describe, you know, ghosts involved in a long 0:01:45.480 --> 0:01:48.160 distance relationship or anything. So we're not gonna have any 0:01:48.200 --> 0:01:53.080 specters making you know, erotic FaceTime calls to each other. 0:01:53.200 --> 0:01:56.080 That's not what we're talking about here. Instead, we're going 0:01:56.120 --> 0:02:02.200 to talk about quantum mechanics. So at the heart of 0:02:02.240 --> 0:02:05.920 this concept of spooky action at a distance is this 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:13.239 idea of quantum entanglement and how quantum entanglement violates locality. 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:19.840 So Einstein was a truly brilliant physicist and mathematician, but 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:23.120 he was no Einstein. Okay, all right, that makes no sense. 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:27.360 He was and Einstein he was the Einstein. But there 0:02:27.360 --> 0:02:32.080 were certain leaps he wasn't yet ready to make, and 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:36.600 a big one of those is how quantum mechanics isn't 0:02:36.639 --> 0:02:40.639 necessarily confined to locality. Einstein had issues with quantum mechanics 0:02:40.639 --> 0:02:45.240 in general because quantum mechanics has a lot of elements 0:02:45.240 --> 0:02:49.400 to it that seemed completely alien to us based on 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:53.880 our understanding of classical physics, and there were certain bits 0:02:53.960 --> 0:02:57.520 of that that Einstein had some real problems with. So 0:02:57.560 --> 0:03:01.120 what is locality, Well, it what it sounds like, right. 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:04.800 It's locality is it describes that there's a limitation, like 0:03:04.840 --> 0:03:10.360 a regional limitation on physical events and their consequences. So, 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:14.360 in other words, locality would tell us that an event 0:03:14.440 --> 0:03:17.480 in one part of the world could not possibly affect 0:03:17.639 --> 0:03:23.240 something very far away instantaneously, because that would violate locality. 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:27.040 You know, if I were to sneeze right now and 0:03:27.080 --> 0:03:29.880 then a tree where to fall over in the Philippines, 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:33.680 you wouldn't say those two things were immediately connected because 0:03:33.720 --> 0:03:40.880 that violates locality. There's no there's no causal, uh agent 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:44.320 there to make that happen, right to to go from 0:03:44.360 --> 0:03:46.640 my sneeze to the tree falling over in the same 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:50.320 instant to make that makes sense. So this is a 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:54.320 little different. Actually, it's a lot different from the classic 0:03:54.440 --> 0:04:00.760 butterfly effect. That is another concept that doesn't violate low cality. 0:04:00.800 --> 0:04:04.600 So the butterfly effect is a way to describe aspects 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:09.240 of chaos theory, and in the butterfly effect, a small 0:04:09.320 --> 0:04:13.120 change in a variable or a state can lead to 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:18.320 a much larger change in a later state. So a 0:04:18.360 --> 0:04:22.560 classic example is a butterfly flaps its wings on one day, 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:27.120 and that little disturbance in the air ultimately contributes to 0:04:27.240 --> 0:04:32.479 potentially provides the necessary impetus for a tornado that happens 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:36.039 several weeks later. Or you might hear another version of 0:04:36.040 --> 0:04:38.480 this where a butterfly flaps its wings in South America 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.640 and that contributes to a tsunami that later hits Southeast Asia. 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:46.960 That kind of thing. The idea that little things can 0:04:47.080 --> 0:04:51.560 be the changing factor that determines whether or not a 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:55.400 larger thing in the future happens or doesn't. Right, But 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:59.200 this doesn't violate locality because you have that aspect of 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:05.679 time that allows something to develop further from an initial event. 0:05:06.279 --> 0:05:09.640 With the quantum entanglement, the idea is that these things 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:14.400 are happening instantaneously. There is no time between event one 0:05:14.520 --> 0:05:17.920 an event too. You have event one, an event two 0:05:17.960 --> 0:05:20.880 is a consequence of event one, even if those two 0:05:20.920 --> 0:05:24.239 events are happening on opposite sides of the world. That 0:05:24.720 --> 0:05:28.080 is what Einstein had a problem with, you know, because 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:31.280 he wanted to try and figure out how can you 0:05:31.320 --> 0:05:36.640 describe event one making event to possible if they're not 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:40.480 in the same locality, and quantum mechanics said that does happen, 0:05:40.480 --> 0:05:44.400 and Einstein was like, no, that that can't be the 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:47.159 way it works. It has to be that there are 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:53.560 local events, local variables, perhaps hidden variables, that explain why 0:05:53.600 --> 0:05:57.599 these things happen. And it looks like there's some sort 0:05:57.640 --> 0:06:03.240 of correlation or perhaps cause relationship between these events to us. 0:06:03.279 --> 0:06:06.280 But that's because we're misinterpreting things. We're not looking at 0:06:06.320 --> 0:06:08.919 the actual cause. That's what Einstein was saying. He was 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:14.919 just not able to make a jump to understanding quantum entanglement. 0:06:15.400 --> 0:06:18.880 You can understand why, right, because this idea that something 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:22.479 happens in one place and that can cause a reaction 0:06:22.560 --> 0:06:25.760 that is literally a world away at the very same time. 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:28.840 That flies in the phase of our own experience. Right 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:31.520 if you were to drop a piece of pizza and 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:35.080 you saw it hit the floor, you would be shocked 0:06:35.120 --> 0:06:37.880 to learn that you caused an earthquake on the other 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:40.720 side of the world at that exact same moment, like 0:06:40.960 --> 0:06:44.200 pizza hits the floor, earthquake across the world from you, 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:46.839 and that you were somehow the cause of it. That 0:06:46.880 --> 0:06:50.480 wouldn't make sense. Even if somehow vibrations from the pizza 0:06:50.520 --> 0:06:53.520 hitting the floor managed to travel all the way through 0:06:53.560 --> 0:06:56.159 the Earth to the other side, it would take time 0:06:56.480 --> 0:06:58.560 for the vibrations to go through the entire planet. It 0:06:58.600 --> 0:07:02.960 would take the speed of sound through that various media 0:07:03.080 --> 0:07:06.039 for it to get there, and then, you know, who 0:07:06.040 --> 0:07:08.240 knows what happens once it hits the core. We'd have 0:07:08.240 --> 0:07:09.920 to watch a lot of science fiction and horror movies 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:13.200 to figure that out. So maybe your whale of anguish 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.120 also would contribute. You know, you just lost a piece 0:07:16.120 --> 0:07:19.000 of pizza, so obviously you're going to have a grieving period. 0:07:19.600 --> 0:07:22.040 But we're still limited to the speed of sound here. 0:07:22.120 --> 0:07:24.560 It takes time for sound to make its way anywhere. 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:26.920 So even if it were somehow able to go through 0:07:26.960 --> 0:07:29.560 the entire Earth and cause this earthquake, it would take 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:32.280 a lot of time. It would not be an instantaneous reaction. 0:07:33.120 --> 0:07:35.080 This really gets to one of the big obstacles when 0:07:35.080 --> 0:07:39.720 it comes to understanding or explaining quantum effects. Because the 0:07:39.840 --> 0:07:44.640 quantum level, the quantum world obeys a different set of 0:07:44.720 --> 0:07:48.880 rules from the classical realm stuff that is impossible in 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:53.120 our day to day existence is commonplace and quantum systems. 0:07:53.480 --> 0:07:58.120 So let me give you another example. Heisenberg's uncertainty principle 0:07:58.400 --> 0:08:00.960 explains that we have a emit when it comes to 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:04.880 describing particles, and we're really talking about like quantum particles, 0:08:04.920 --> 0:08:08.239 sub atomic particles, that kind of thing. So the classic 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:12.960 example is describing a particle's position and its momentum based 0:08:13.000 --> 0:08:17.400 on initial conditions. So Heisenberg hypothesized that the more we 0:08:17.480 --> 0:08:20.920 know about one of these two conditions i e. Its 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:24.120 position or its momentum, well, the less then we can 0:08:24.160 --> 0:08:27.480 know about the other one. So if we had perfect 0:08:27.600 --> 0:08:31.600 knowledge of a particle's position, we would know nothing about 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:34.720 its momentum. We would be unable to describe where and 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:37.720 at what speed this particle was moving, so it'd be 0:08:37.760 --> 0:08:40.440 kind of like a snapshot, Like a perfect snapshot, we 0:08:40.440 --> 0:08:42.559 could see the position of the particle at that moment 0:08:42.559 --> 0:08:46.000 in time, but we would know nothing else about it. Likewise, 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:49.480 if we had perfect knowledge of the particle's momentum, we 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:53.720 would be unable to describe its position at all. So 0:08:53.920 --> 0:08:57.800 because of this limitation, we cannot know with certainty both 0:08:57.840 --> 0:09:02.520 pieces of information. So we typically will describe particles like 0:09:02.559 --> 0:09:07.200 these as existing within a range or zone of potential 0:09:07.320 --> 0:09:09.880 positions at any given time. You can think of it 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:15.360 almost like a cloud that this particle could exist within UH, 0:09:15.400 --> 0:09:18.280 and it could be anywhere within that cloud at any 0:09:18.320 --> 0:09:22.760 given time that you could take the the opportunity to 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:27.840 detect it, and in that instant detect where the particle is. 0:09:28.320 --> 0:09:33.200 Then all those possibilities collapse into one fixed position. But 0:09:33.440 --> 0:09:36.280 before you look, it could be anywhere in that cloud. 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:39.440 So there are regions within that cloud where the particle 0:09:39.480 --> 0:09:41.840 is more likely to be found in a given moment, 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:45.000 but there's at least the possibility that it could be 0:09:45.040 --> 0:09:49.600 at any point within the cloud at any specific time. Now, 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:53.680 not only is this different from what we experience in 0:09:53.679 --> 0:09:56.120 our day to day life, where we can explain with 0:09:56.200 --> 0:10:00.280 decent confidence a person's position and momentum, it can lead 0:10:00.320 --> 0:10:03.680 to other weird quantum effects that really make a difference 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:08.120 in technology, such as quantum tunneling. So this has a 0:10:08.160 --> 0:10:11.839 real effect on electronics and circuits, particularly with things like 0:10:12.600 --> 0:10:17.160 UH processors computer processors. So when we're talking about electronics, 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:20.840 you can think of electronics at a very very very 0:10:20.880 --> 0:10:24.880 basic level as being all about controlling where the flow 0:10:24.920 --> 0:10:28.679 of electrons can go and what work the electrons will 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:31.760 have to do along the way as they make their 0:10:31.800 --> 0:10:35.559 way to their destination, which is typically a positive terminal. 0:10:35.760 --> 0:10:39.160 You know, electrons are negatively charged, and so opposites attract 0:10:39.160 --> 0:10:42.960 it wants to go to the positively charged terminal. Electrons 0:10:43.000 --> 0:10:46.960 are subatomic particles and they behave according to the quantum 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:50.280 effects described by folks like Heisenberg. So if we wanted 0:10:50.320 --> 0:10:54.120 to focus on a single electron within a circuit, we 0:10:54.160 --> 0:10:56.960 would have to describe its location as existing within a 0:10:57.040 --> 0:10:59.960 sort of zone or field. We can't point to the 0:11:00.080 --> 0:11:04.120 specific location as the electron moves through the system, but 0:11:04.240 --> 0:11:09.439 we can describe an area of probabilities where the electron 0:11:09.840 --> 0:11:13.360 could be well. One of the most important components in 0:11:13.440 --> 0:11:18.120 circuitry is the transistor, which acts like a gate. The 0:11:18.200 --> 0:11:21.120 gate can allow electrons to go through or it can 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:24.520 prevent them from going through, So it's really a switch, right. 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:28.480 It forms the basis of much more complicated systems, but 0:11:28.559 --> 0:11:31.720 it only works if you know it can actually keep 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:37.480 electrons from going through. Well, it's possible that a zone 0:11:37.600 --> 0:11:43.080 of probabilities of an electron's position can actually overlap a gate. 0:11:43.320 --> 0:11:46.160 So if the gate is very very thin, it's possible 0:11:46.160 --> 0:11:49.800 for the zone to extend to the other side of 0:11:49.840 --> 0:11:54.120 a closed gate. This means that it's technically possible for 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:56.560 an electron to exist on the other side of the 0:11:56.600 --> 0:11:59.480 closed gate, even though the electron would otherwise have been 0:11:59.520 --> 0:12:04.040 prevented from passing through because again the gate is closed. Well, 0:12:04.080 --> 0:12:09.040 if something is possible, that means that sometimes it happens. Right, 0:12:09.240 --> 0:12:13.720 even if you think, well, the electron didn't physically move 0:12:13.960 --> 0:12:16.840 through the gate, that the fact that there's a chance 0:12:16.880 --> 0:12:18.160 for it to be on the other side means that 0:12:18.240 --> 0:12:20.480 sometimes it is on the other side. So in a 0:12:20.559 --> 0:12:23.079 system like this, an electron can sometimes be on the 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:26.240 opposite side of a closed gate and then keep on going. 0:12:26.840 --> 0:12:30.280 This is not good if your goal is to control 0:12:30.320 --> 0:12:32.640 the flow of electrons, because the whole purpose of the 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:35.320 gate is to stop them from going. So this means 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:39.120 you're gonna start getting errors, and that that's because electrons 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:41.400 are going through parts of your system that they're supposed 0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:45.480 to not be able to go through. So let's imagine 0:12:45.480 --> 0:12:48.120 what this would look like in our day to day existence, Like, 0:12:48.240 --> 0:12:52.200 if this same effect happened in our world, what would 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:56.599 that be like. Well, we would not exist in fixed positions. 0:12:56.600 --> 0:12:59.480 We would exist in a world of possibilities from moment 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:03.199 to moment, and we would only be in a specific 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:06.960 position when someone was actually looking at us. So this 0:13:07.040 --> 0:13:10.040 means that sometimes we're in one spot as opposed to another. 0:13:10.120 --> 0:13:12.000 Maybe you walk up to a door and in the 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:13.760 next moment you're on the other side of the door, 0:13:13.840 --> 0:13:16.400 even though you never opened the door. You didn't physically 0:13:16.679 --> 0:13:19.400 pass through the door. You're just now on the other 0:13:19.480 --> 0:13:22.480 side of the door. Now, you wouldn't want this because 0:13:22.559 --> 0:13:24.640 like imagine writing in a car and then suddenly you're 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:27.920 not in the car, you're next to the car while 0:13:28.000 --> 0:13:30.240 going down the highway. That would be bad, right, So 0:13:30.280 --> 0:13:35.000 we don't want the quantum effects in our classical system, 0:13:35.040 --> 0:13:37.959 so it doesn't have happened in our experience. But this 0:13:38.040 --> 0:13:40.080 does happen at the quantum level, and we know it 0:13:40.120 --> 0:13:43.560 does because we've seen the results as chip manufacturers have 0:13:43.679 --> 0:13:47.319 made chips with smaller and smaller components. If you just 0:13:47.480 --> 0:13:50.840 keep doing that, you start to see errors because you 0:13:50.920 --> 0:13:53.959 got you have this issue with quantum tunneling. So this 0:13:54.040 --> 0:13:59.559 requires computer manufacturing. Chip manufacturing companies to change the architecture 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:03.160 and the materials they're working with when they're creating circuits 0:14:03.440 --> 0:14:08.480 in an effort to mitigate or prevent this from happening. Um. 0:14:08.520 --> 0:14:10.400 It's one of the reasons why people say there is 0:14:10.440 --> 0:14:14.320 an ultimate limit to scaling down individual components on chips, 0:14:14.720 --> 0:14:18.000 because you start run up against quantum effects and they 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:21.680 become harder and harder to manage. All Right, we're just 0:14:21.720 --> 0:14:35.400 getting started, but let's take a quick break. Okay, So 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:39.160 quantum systems behave in ways that are hard for most 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:42.800 of us, myself included, who have limited exposure to the 0:14:42.800 --> 0:14:47.440 subject matter to really understand. I fully admit this, like, 0:14:48.040 --> 0:14:51.920 I quote unquote no about these quantum effects, but I 0:14:52.120 --> 0:14:55.400 by no means understand them. I have looked into them 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:58.240 and read about them extensively, and at the end of it, 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:02.680 I feel like like I understand that these things happen, 0:15:02.800 --> 0:15:05.280 but I don't understand why they do. It's just it's 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:09.280 beyond me. It is a level of mastery with mathematics 0:15:09.320 --> 0:15:14.640 and science that I lack. It feels like science fiction tunneling. Definitely, 0:15:14.960 --> 0:15:19.960 it seems weird. Well, so does entanglement. Getting back to 0:15:20.080 --> 0:15:25.080 that spooky action at a distance. Einstein himself was particularly 0:15:25.120 --> 0:15:28.720 weirded out by this concept. See Einstein was looking over 0:15:28.840 --> 0:15:31.880 quantum hypotheses back in the nineteen thirties and pointed out 0:15:31.960 --> 0:15:34.840 that according to the math, the proposals would mean that 0:15:34.880 --> 0:15:37.240 it would be possible for quantum particles to sort of 0:15:37.800 --> 0:15:41.080 pair up in a way. And in this pairing, one 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:44.760 particles features would depend upon the other particle, and vice versa. 0:15:44.800 --> 0:15:48.320 They would complement one another, and not in the oh 0:15:48.440 --> 0:15:51.560 you look nice today kind of way. They would compliment 0:15:51.720 --> 0:15:55.720 one another, and that one uh, one feature of one 0:15:55.800 --> 0:15:59.640 particle would be the opposite of another feature of the 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:02.400 same feature of another particle, I should say. So, here's 0:16:02.440 --> 0:16:06.400 an example. We can describe electrons as having a certain 0:16:06.560 --> 0:16:09.440 spin that she has to do with magnetic polls. I'm 0:16:09.440 --> 0:16:11.640 not going to go into the whole thing, but yeah, 0:16:11.680 --> 0:16:15.160 electrons have a spin. They actually have three inherent properties. 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:18.560 They have a mass, they have a charge, and they 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:22.080 have spin. The spin describes how the electron spins around 0:16:22.160 --> 0:16:25.720 its own axis, and we can describe the spin as 0:16:25.760 --> 0:16:29.520 having an up or a down direction. So a pair 0:16:29.600 --> 0:16:33.160 of entangled electrons, this is from a very oversimplified approach, 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:36.200 A pair of entangled electrons would have one electron with 0:16:36.280 --> 0:16:39.040 a spin of up, and the other electron has a 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:42.520 spin of down. And should anything change the spin of 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:46.320 one electron, the spin of the other electron would change instantly. 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:49.960 So if electron one went from up to down, then 0:16:49.960 --> 0:16:52.480 electron two would go from down to up at that 0:16:52.600 --> 0:16:55.440 same moment. No matter how far apart they were. You 0:16:55.480 --> 0:16:59.920 could move them across the universe and this would remain 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:05.840 the same until the system collapses and entanglement is severed. Uh, 0:17:06.560 --> 0:17:12.160 and the bit about you know, disturbing the system really 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:15.639 gets to be important, Like this idea of the system collapsing. 0:17:15.880 --> 0:17:20.440 Quantum systems are extremely delicate things. Yes, you can separate 0:17:20.560 --> 0:17:24.400 these entangled particles and move them across the universe from 0:17:24.400 --> 0:17:27.159 one another and the entanglement will persist. But if you 0:17:27.280 --> 0:17:31.119 disturb the system at any given point, it collapses and 0:17:31.160 --> 0:17:34.960 that entanglement no longer exists. So they can collapse with 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:38.640 the tiniest kinds of disturbances. Observing the system is enough 0:17:38.720 --> 0:17:42.280 to do that, and we call this the observer effect, 0:17:42.520 --> 0:17:46.200 that the act of observing changes the phenomenon we're trying 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:49.560 to observe. Now, this idea, this is one of those 0:17:49.600 --> 0:17:52.280 quantum ideas that I think we can actually kind of 0:17:52.320 --> 0:17:55.719 grab onto if we look at it from a different perspective. Right, 0:17:55.800 --> 0:17:59.800 the idea that just by observing something or measuring something 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:03.000 have changed it. I think that this is something we 0:18:03.040 --> 0:18:06.159 can understand if we take that idea into a totally 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:09.120 different context. So, for example, let's say that we've set 0:18:09.200 --> 0:18:13.960 up a social experiment, and our experiment consists of an 0:18:13.960 --> 0:18:16.240 empty room. You know, maybe there's like a chair and 0:18:16.280 --> 0:18:19.600 a table there, but that's it. And we bring into 0:18:19.640 --> 0:18:23.199 this room a test subject. Uh, maybe we've got one 0:18:23.240 --> 0:18:26.200 group of test subjects and we tell them nothing about 0:18:26.240 --> 0:18:29.120 the experiment. We literally just bring them into the room 0:18:29.200 --> 0:18:31.879 and leave them there, and then we tell them, like, 0:18:32.080 --> 0:18:34.320 you know, you're just gonna wait here. We'll be back. 0:18:34.600 --> 0:18:36.919 That's it. But let's say we have a second group 0:18:37.560 --> 0:18:39.160 and we're doing the same thing with them. We bring 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:41.480 them into the room and we tell them they're gonna 0:18:41.520 --> 0:18:44.280 wait there. But we also mentioned that the room is 0:18:44.400 --> 0:18:48.960 under constant observation that there are hidden cameras that you 0:18:49.040 --> 0:18:51.880 can't see. They're hidden so well you cannot see them 0:18:51.880 --> 0:18:54.600 in the room, but they will be recording everything, and 0:18:54.640 --> 0:18:57.320 people will be reviewing the footage and even watching a 0:18:57.400 --> 0:19:01.480 live feed but just sit there, weight will be back. Well, 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:04.000 you can easily imagine that if you have a group 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:07.000 where you didn't say anything about the room being under surveillance, 0:19:07.320 --> 0:19:10.879 you're gonna observe some behaviors that you're likely not gonna 0:19:10.960 --> 0:19:13.520 see in the other group, where people are thinking they're 0:19:13.520 --> 0:19:16.720 being watched the whole time. Now, knowing that you're being 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:19.000 observed is enough to influence you so that you don't 0:19:19.040 --> 0:19:22.040 get too wacky while killing time waiting for whatever is 0:19:22.080 --> 0:19:26.720 supposed to happen next. Now, obviously, quantum particles aren't shy 0:19:26.840 --> 0:19:30.800 or embarrassed or feel shame when we observe them. That's 0:19:30.800 --> 0:19:33.240 not what's going on. They don't yell out cheese it. 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:35.919 It's the heat when we observe them. But when we 0:19:36.000 --> 0:19:39.160 do observe them, all the possible quantum states they inhabit 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:42.919 collapse down into just one state, so we get a 0:19:42.960 --> 0:19:48.080 defined outcome as opposed to all possible outcomes. All right, 0:19:48.160 --> 0:19:51.000 let's get back to entangle. In nineteen sixty four, a 0:19:51.000 --> 0:19:55.680 physicist named John Stewart Bell presented a theorem that provided 0:19:55.720 --> 0:20:00.000 a testable means for this entanglement hypothesis, and he showed 0:20:00.200 --> 0:20:05.200 that quantum mechanics could explain correlations between distant quantum events 0:20:05.240 --> 0:20:09.640 better than any sort of local theory could, so unthinkably 0:20:09.920 --> 0:20:14.159 to the Einstein's of the world. Bell's theorem passed Ockham's razor, 0:20:14.720 --> 0:20:17.840 and yes, I brought up Okam's razor, just so I 0:20:17.880 --> 0:20:21.640 could explain what that is. Let's say you've got something 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:25.720 weird going on. You've come up with some potential explanations 0:20:25.760 --> 0:20:29.480 that caused the weird stuff. In fact, let's get specific. 0:20:29.560 --> 0:20:32.359 Let's say that the weird thing is that you found 0:20:32.359 --> 0:20:35.879 a particularly cold spot in your basement, and when you 0:20:35.920 --> 0:20:38.760 walk through it, you get that unsettling feeling that you've 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:43.159 passed through something strange. Now, let's say you come up 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:46.800 with a couple of potential explanations for this cold spot, 0:20:47.480 --> 0:20:50.840 and in one you suggest that the basement is haunted 0:20:51.280 --> 0:20:53.760 and the cold spot represents a ghost, so you passed 0:20:53.800 --> 0:20:57.320 through some spectral form of a spirit. But your other 0:20:57.400 --> 0:21:00.800 explanation is that it's winter and the spot you pass 0:21:00.920 --> 0:21:03.960 through is both far from most hating events, and the 0:21:04.000 --> 0:21:06.960 one that is closest is a bit clogged up and 0:21:07.040 --> 0:21:11.160 needs to be cleaned out. Well. Explanation one that there's 0:21:11.200 --> 0:21:15.640 a ghost requires first that you prove the existence of ghosts, 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:17.919 because you can't say it's something that hasn't been proven 0:21:17.960 --> 0:21:21.240 to exist, right, You have to prove that first. And 0:21:21.280 --> 0:21:24.679 if ghosts do exist, why do they exist? What are they? 0:21:24.720 --> 0:21:27.280 How are they formed? How do they get here? What 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:30.280 keeps them here? All that kind of stuff. For the 0:21:30.280 --> 0:21:32.240 answer to be ghosts, we actually need to be able 0:21:32.280 --> 0:21:36.520 to understand a lot of unanswered and potentially unanswerable questions, 0:21:36.880 --> 0:21:41.600 whereas the second explanation far more straightforward and it's testable, 0:21:41.800 --> 0:21:45.800 So the second explanation is actually the simplest. From that perspective, 0:21:46.560 --> 0:21:49.119 we could also go with Mr. Spocks philosophy. When you 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:53.840 eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. 0:21:54.520 --> 0:21:57.679 That one's tricky though, because sometimes something that we believe 0:21:57.760 --> 0:22:00.920 to be impossible turns out to act really be possible. 0:22:00.920 --> 0:22:03.480 It's just that we don't understand what's going on yet, 0:22:03.840 --> 0:22:06.359 or we have, you know, uh, the wrong point of 0:22:06.440 --> 0:22:09.640 view when we're looking at the thing, and so we're 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.320 focusing on something that appears to be impossible, when if 0:22:13.320 --> 0:22:15.480 we had a different perspective we would realize what's really 0:22:15.520 --> 0:22:18.639 going on. So Mr Spock I gotta pick some bones 0:22:18.680 --> 0:22:23.200 with you on that one. Well, Bell's theorem showed that, 0:22:23.359 --> 0:22:27.000 as weird as the concept of quantum entanglement is, it 0:22:27.080 --> 0:22:29.840 was a far simpler explanation than trying to jump through 0:22:29.880 --> 0:22:36.560 hoops to explain apparent correlation strictly through locality. It became 0:22:36.640 --> 0:22:41.159 easier to explain these apparently connected events are at a 0:22:41.200 --> 0:22:45.320 distance are happening through entanglement than trying to invent scenarios 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:50.080 in which two separate and unconnected local events produced results 0:22:50.080 --> 0:22:53.320 that only appear to be connected. Bell showed that this 0:22:53.440 --> 0:22:56.960 spooky action at a distance appeared to be a valid thing. 0:22:57.600 --> 0:23:00.560 Now here's the kicker. As soon as you attempt to 0:23:00.680 --> 0:23:05.119 measure an entangled particle, that connection, that interdependence between the 0:23:05.119 --> 0:23:08.640 two particles severs. So if one electron is spinning up 0:23:09.119 --> 0:23:12.879 and the entangled electron is spinning down, which is something 0:23:12.880 --> 0:23:15.639 that we don't know yet, we haven't measured it, and 0:23:15.640 --> 0:23:18.719 then we measure electron one, we see that it's spinning up. 0:23:19.160 --> 0:23:22.159 We know at that moment of measurement that electron two 0:23:22.400 --> 0:23:25.320 was spinning down, But we also know that this connection 0:23:25.359 --> 0:23:28.560 has been severed. It doesn't exist anymore. Now they're going 0:23:28.600 --> 0:23:32.160 to spin independently of one another. So measuring the spin 0:23:32.200 --> 0:23:35.000 of electron one again will give you no information about 0:23:35.040 --> 0:23:39.160 electron two. They're no longer connected. You cannot draw any conclusions. 0:23:39.560 --> 0:23:42.119 Same thing. If you measure electron two, you don't know 0:23:42.200 --> 0:23:45.600 anything about electron one. You only know at the moment 0:23:45.720 --> 0:23:49.680 of that that measurement, when the two were still entangled. 0:23:50.760 --> 0:23:55.399 This is an oversimplification, obviously. Bills there explains how experimental 0:23:55.440 --> 0:23:59.520 results should show that metrics prove correlations above what you 0:23:59.560 --> 0:24:03.879 would exspect if locality and local hidden variables were the 0:24:03.960 --> 0:24:08.040 only factors. So, in other words, practical experiments would prove 0:24:08.119 --> 0:24:12.240 that correlation happens beyond what can be explained if locality 0:24:12.280 --> 0:24:16.200 is a firm, in escapable element, and experiments have shown 0:24:16.240 --> 0:24:19.240 that we do in fact see correlation beyond what we 0:24:19.280 --> 0:24:22.920 can explain by locality. So this might be spooky action 0:24:22.960 --> 0:24:27.000 at a distance, but the point is it's real. We 0:24:27.080 --> 0:24:30.560 have observed the effects. Now, this isn't to say that 0:24:30.600 --> 0:24:35.040 there is universal agreement and acceptance of Bell's theorem, or 0:24:35.160 --> 0:24:39.280 rather the interpretations of Bell's theorem. This is still an 0:24:39.280 --> 0:24:43.120 ongoing area of research and experimentation, but at the very 0:24:43.240 --> 0:24:47.160 least the investigations show that locality, at least the way 0:24:47.160 --> 0:24:50.960 we understand it now, is not a factor, or at 0:24:51.040 --> 0:24:56.720 least not the only factor. Okay, we've got some more spooky, 0:24:56.800 --> 0:25:00.199 complicated quantum things to get through in a moment. But 0:25:00.280 --> 0:25:15.040