What is Digg?233 Comments
- jesusfresh, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14i agree with the negative comments on "what the bleep do we know" ...mixing pop science with religious fiction is bad, especially presented as it is, using really interesting science things to draw people to crazy cult crap.
for those not down with physics, the video is basically correct until the "its almost as if the electron knows we're watching." it doesnt know, in order for us to observe which slit it goes through we physically have to touch it (for instance we dont see regular sized things magically, photons have to hit the object and come to our eyes...you can imagine what hitting sub atomic particles with other sub atomic particles might do to their tragectories).
theres a great feynman lecture explaining it better than i could (and i'd wager its in the wikipedia article on the double slit experiment linked above). - jmob, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12"This video subtly promotes the movie "What The Do We Know". While I enjoyed the movie, the content has to be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism. Some of those interviewed (in the movie) claim to have the ability to choose what becomes reality."
I just wanted to add to this comment. The movie "what do we know" is a propaganda video created to further the teachings of the cult leader Ramtha. In essence, this film subverts physics by mixing fact with fiction to further they're own agenda. I would not take this video as gospel by any means. - ericd543, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10"What the Bleep" (movie) is new age propaganda produced by followers of Ramtha. Ramtha is supposedly an ancient warrior from Atlantis channeled by J.Z. Knight.
http://skepdic.com/channel.html
The Wikipedia article on the double-slit experiment explains the observer mystery.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment
These new agers seem to want to believe that thoughts can directly interact with matter. In the movie "What the Bleep Do We Know" they show an experiment where some water has good thoughts projected onto it, and other water has bad thoughts directed on it. When the water is frozen the crystals are photographed and the good water has beautiful crystals, the bad water makes ugly crystals.
http://www.whatthebleep.com/crystals/
It was presented as a scientific experiment and grounds for thought affecting matter. After seeing the movie I did some googling on this because I thought, "that would be amazing if it were true". I was hoping to find a DIY method for conducting the experiment, or at least documentation on his method.
All I found was that the experimenter, Dr. Masaru Emoto, sells a book of water crystal photography. No scientific details. No repeatable experiment.
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=511382
From the Wikipedia article on Dr. Emoto...
"The James Randi Educational Foundation has a standing offer to Emoto since 2003 to give him 1 million U.S. dollars if he can demonstrate his claims with a double blind procedure. Emoto has not responded to the offer."
More links about "What the Bleep"...
http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=83
http://www.wweek.com/story.php?story=5860&page=1 - pureeville, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8This video subtly promotes the movie "What The Do We Know". While I enjoyed the movie, the content has to be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism. Some of those interviewed (in the movie) claim to have the ability to choose what becomes reality.
Consciousness may play an objectifying role, but there is no evidence that these people can curb probabilities in their favour. - dracula7, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7DONT GET UNDRESSED IN FRONT OF ELECTRONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL
- trogdoor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7A quantum physicist gets pulled over by a cop
cop: Do you know how fast you were going?
physicist: No, but I know exactly where I am. - SecondChild, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6
The What the Bleep movie is total new age BS, but this vid is decent, and explains the experiment in simple terms. Dugg. - flintmich, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5"What the Bleep" starts off pretty good, but then descends into Ramtha-type new age phooey. I don't know what is more scary -- religious wackos taking over science (ie Intelligent Design) or scientific wackos taking over religion (ie What the Bleep). Both are alarming. Quantum is sick fun though.
"Where have you gone, Carl Sagan? A lonesome nation turns its eyes to you." - DrEbola, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5If you're crying, you're being really goofy and pretentious about physics. This MOVIE is goofy and pretentious. (And so is the Elegant Universe, to some extent, but I won't get into that.) A wave function "collapses" or "spikes" when something interacts with the object with which the wave function is associated. Now, since getting information about a particle requires interaction, the object naturally acts like a particle when "observed." But the observation process is no more significant than bouncing a photon off an electron. The same is true for light--it acts like a particle when it interacts with electrons in a metal and it acts like a wave when it passes through prism. There is nothing MYSTICAL about it and it has nothing to do with "Esse est ercipi" or Berkeley or anything!
So ffs, stop being a goofball about quantum mechanics. There is nothing even remotely religious about it. You remind me of cavemen staring blankly at fire for the first time. The quantum world isn't any more a religious or philosophical phenomenon than ordinary combustion is. It's quite natural, and, frankly, obvious nowadays. - dracula7, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7torrent to the full length movie : http://thepiratebay.org/details.php?id=3407088
- jguy584, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4great movie
here is the wiki article on the experiment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment - austinwiltshire, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5In soviet russia, electron observes you!
- emiles, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4It's only amazing if you hang on to the idea that electrons are like tiny balls. The more you study physics you see that they rarely, rarely act like tiny balls. To explain the times that they do, haven't you ever seen a rock dropping into a pond? Sure, the water ripples are all bunched up in one place for a moment, but then they quickly go everywhere. The "particle" that we know as the electron acts the same way.
Unfortunately, most physicists still think in the same terms this video used, which I think would be an outdated point of view except for its 'wow' factor.
Miles Stoudenmire (Ph.D. Physics student, UC Santa Barbara) - Werdock, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Gordon Freeman himself, I see...
- slamm6, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6Schroedinger, Erwin! Professor of physics!
Wrote daring equations! Confounded his critics!
(Not bad, eh? Don't worry. This part of the verse
Starts off pretty good, but it gets a lot worse.)
Win saw that the theory that Newton'd invented
By Einstein's discov'ries had been badly dented.
What now? wailed his colleagues. Said Erwin, "Don't panic,
No grease monkey I, but a quantum mechanic.
Consider electrons. Now, these teeny articles
Are sometimes like waves, and then sometimes like particles.
If that's not confusing, the nuclear dance
Of electrons and suchlike is governed by chance!
No sweat, though--my theory permits us to judge
Where some of 'em is and the rest of 'em was."
Not everyone bought this. It threatened to wreck
The comforting linkage of cause and effect.
E'en Einstein had doubts, and so Schroedinger tried
To tell him what quantum mechanics implied.
Said Win to Al, "Brother, suppose we've a cat,
And inside a tube we have put that cat at--
Along with a solitaire deck and some Fritos,
A bottle of Night Train, a couple mosquitoes
(Or something else rhyming) and, oh, if you got 'em,
One vial prussic acid, one decaying ottom
Or atom--whatever--but when it emits,
A trigger device blasts the vial into bits
Which snuffs our poor kitty. The odds of this crime
Are 50 to 50 per hour each time.
The cylinder's sealed. The hour's passed away. Is
Our pussy still purring--or pushing up daisies?
Now, you'd say the cat either lives or it don't
But quantum mechanics is stubborn and won't.
Statistically speaking, the cat (goes the joke),
Is half a cat breathing and half a cat croaked.
To some this may seem a ridiculous split,
But quantum mechanics must answer, "Tough @#&!
We may not know much, but one thing's fo' sho':
There's things in the cosmos that we cannot know.
Shine light on electrons--you'll cause them to swerve.
The act of observing disturbs the observed--
Which ruins your test. But then if there's no testing
To see if a particle's moving or resting
Why try to conjecture? Pure useless endeavor!
We know probability--certainty, never.'
The effect of this notion? I very much fear
'Twill make doubtful all things that were formerly clear.
Till soon the cat doctors will say in reports,
"We've just flipped a coin and we've learned he's a corpse."'
So saith Herr Erwin. Quoth Albert, "You're nuts.
God doesn't play dice with the universe, putz.
I'll prove it!" he said, and the Lord knows he tried--
In vain--until fin'ly he more or less died.
Win spoke at the funeral: "Listen, dear friends,
Sweet Al was my buddy. I must make amends.
Though he doubted my theory, I'll say of this saint:
Ten-to-one he's in heaven--but five bucks says he ain't."
CECIL ADAMS - Robin110, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3It really could have done without the mysticism. It left me with chills, not because of the science depicted, but from the creepy propaganda found through out this video and the whole movie What the BLEEP!?
Quantum theories do pose a lot of interesting questions, but it sucks when they are bent to support nut cases like JZ Knight. - mr_mechanics, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Something must be used to observe the electron (like a photon). Photons have momentum and affect the electron coming through the slit, making the distribution like that for particles. If you use photons with less momentum you will get a distribution like waves, but you will not longer be able to detect where the electron went through, since the photons momentum is inversely proportional to its wavelength; since the resolution is determined by the wavelength you end up in a situation where you can no longer tell where the electron when through. Pretty much the first thing you talk about in a QM class.
- moojj, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3If you click on the link in the video description on the google video page (for those who actually read), it redirects you to the following site:
http://www.whatthebleep.com/
The movie isnt from "What the bleep do we know", it's from "What the BLEEP!? - Down the Rabbit Hole
Extended Director’s Cut". It looks like they are trying to promote a "directors cut" version of the movie that explains the concepts in cartoonish format. A very interesting idea for those, like me, who were overwhelmed by the amount of information in the original movie. - robusteza, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3the sleaze factor of that comment is vastly raised by the fact that it is unclear that i am female.
- OneZeroZeroOne, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Come on people.
Nothing is "watching" us, and the video did a poor job of explaining the "observer" of the electron.
The observer isn't a giant eye, and merely looking at an electron (with your eyes) isn't going to do anything.
By observer, the video means an instrument used to detect the position of the electron. Any instrument that you can use to detect the position of a particle must interact with it. Think of a table in the middle of a dark room. You reach out and feel around for it with your hands until you bump into it, slightly moving the table. Or you bounce sound waves off of it like a bat to locate it, again slightly moving it.
Before an electron or photon is interacted with in such a way, it is in a super position of states, like the video says. This can be represented by a wave where the peaks and valleys indicate the probability that the particle is in a certain position. Once you interact with the particle, this wave "collapses" and assumes a single state. The state it goes into is based on the probabilities. In the case of the slit experiment, 50% goes thru slit A, 50% thru slit B. On average, the same number of electrons collapse and go through each slit, creating the two bands.
If the electron isn't interacted with, the wave function never collapses. Just like a water wave, the "probability wave" representing the state of the electron gets squeased through both slits and the two resulting waves interfere with each other. Just like with water, certain parts of the interference pattern are augmented and some are attenuated. But remember, they're still probabilities. The electron will have a higher chance of of hitting the wall where the peaks are strongest. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3zapco03, that clip is definately the highpoint of the movie, the rest is heavily spiritual pseudo science. Don't bother renting it.
- Otto, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3It was okay right up until the end. Observing changes the outcome because in order to observe (or really "measure"), you have to change something. It's this change that is important, because you can alter the level of what it is that you are changing in your observation. If you don't change it enough, then you still get the interference pattern, however then you can't tell which slit the particle actually went through. Turns out that at the same point that you can tell which slit it goes through, the interference pattern disappears. Heisenberg wins every time.
- dracula7, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3all hail ramtha!!!!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramtha#Film - cully, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2It's weird, but it isn't that weird. The video seems to gloss over the fact that to observe, you actually have to act on the system. How do they know that the particle goes through one slit? Well, they have to act on the particle in some way. I would assume they shoot something at it and observe the reflection (like photons or something). This acting on the particle is what collapses the wave. It's not like the particle is psychic and somehow knows it's being watched. It knows it's being observed because the observer it acting on it.
- drwatson, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2So wait, is Schroedinger's cat dead or not?
- staydead, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Bad science is bad enough without getting into intentionally bad science to mislead the ignorant. And by continuing to promote this garbage everyone thinks it's "science". I feel dirty even replying.
A much better video series: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/elegant/program.html - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Why can't everything be taught like this?
- csyberblue, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2That video made quantum physics both easy to understand and really interesting.
- WaterDragon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I'm still watching it, but the immediate questions i have are:
1.why do they assume there is an absolute class of things called ''waves", that will all behave like the waves of water that were shown? That is quite a stretch, and somewhat arrogant, coming from people who don't undestand the nature of matter or anything, ultimately.
...So much speculation, presented from some egotistical 'high-horse', as if it were true.
2. And even better: How can they say that electrons are 'tiny bits of matter? '
To be matter, as those same scientists define it, it must be one of the known elements of matter. An electron is NOT a particular element.
If all elements have electrons, then you can't say that an electron is in itself one element.
I know, they will say it is a kind of hydrogen ion, but that is just a trick to make the language conform to their liimited scope of ideas.
How can an electron be hydrogen, since it has ZERO protons?
It is just as much ANY OTHER element.
Looks like a fun video to watch, as long as you take it just as entertainment, and not as any kind of real science, related to actual reality!
But it is not nearly as relevent as, say, a typical Southpark episode!
- ziffel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"what? thats from "What the bleep do we know" ? Ive seen that movie... i don't remember that part..."
Same here. At the very end of the google vid, you see the deaf actress who starred in the film, but I certainly don't remember the cartoon scientist guy. I have, however, seen the double slit experiment done for real on a documentary on The Science Channel. While exceeding cool, they didn't mention anything about electrons knowing they were being watched. Take this with a grain of salt for now, folks. - robusteza, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2not nearly as sexy as the phrase "double slit" would have me believe but pretty ***** neat all the same.
- jonnyeh, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2From wikipedia's entry on the movie:
"Fred Alan Wolf, Ph.D recently wrote The Yoga of Time Travel: How the Mind Can Defeat Time. (Note: he says he is also known by the name "Captain Quantum" — an animated character that was created for the movie but not used in the released version.) He also appears in videos, including Shamanic Physics: "Fred Alan Wolf discusses his efforts to explain shamanic realities in terms of modern physics. He suggests that shamans interact with parallel universes and are able to enter into the world of the dead."
Looks like this scene was cut from the theatrical release, I'm not crazy! - dracula7, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"Omg i am crying, seriously.... that is way too mind boughling. It gave be chills down my spine and tears in my eyes"
dude, i really respect that. i started crying uncontrollably watching "the elegant universe" nova special which is available here: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/elegant/program.html - its a little more trustworthy, and just as engaging for everyone else.
i still havent gotten to chapter 3 yet though - staydead, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"Why can't you people learn that just because you don't believe it doesn't give you the right to talk ***** abou it!"
Beliefs are one thing. But this stuff isn't about beliefs or even just bad science, it's about intentional antiscience.
Elegant Universe is somewhat cheezy and tries to be more than it is, but the intent to stick to science is there. Unlike this garbage which exists only to try and line the pockets of its founder. - Roger, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2jonnyeh: Racism probably
- ericd543, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"does anyone have any other movies that they would recommend that do a better job of explaining quantum theories?"
Try the PBS series "The Elegant Universe".
http://www.sciencedaily.com/cgi-bin/apf4/amazon_products_feed.cgi?Operation=ItemLookup&ItemId=B0000ZG0TA - seattle98104, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1what the bleep do we know? is a ***** newage anti-science spirituality propaganda movie. trust me, i saw the original, it was made by a bunch of kooks out here in washington state.
- DrEbola, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Electrons can and do have mass (and hence, are matter, or material). Being material does not derive from being made up of entire atoms. I hope you haven't graduated from elementary school yet. Nay, kindergarten.
- robusteza, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2yeah, ***** all you nonhallant dismissers!
there's a built in spellcheck. use it. also, simmer with superfluous exclamation points.
then feel free to berate an entire forum. - ericd543, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"You don't need hokey spiritualism to be filled with wonder."
For sure!
I wonder why I wonder why.
I wonder why I wonder.
I wonder why I wonder why I wonder why I wonder!
--Richard Feynman - Bifurcati, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Try again:
The Illuminating Science discussion on What the Bleep:
http://www.illuminatingscience.org/?p=202 - Urusai, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1We still don't understand quantum phenomena. Sure, we have some nice models, but I have a feeling that the notion of causality will be shot to hell eventually, which, being the underlying model of intelligence itself, means your mind will be officially blown.
- dvdjon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Quote : Can someone YouTube the entire "What the *#&*$ do we know" movie?
Someone already did : http://www.youtube.com/?v=H3JxCZ_SofY - ziffel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"From the Wikipedia article on Dr. Emoto...
"The James Randi Educational Foundation has a standing offer to Emoto since 2003 to give him 1 million U.S. dollars if he can demonstrate his claims with a double blind procedure. Emoto has not responded to the offer."
Randi's offer has done more to get the scammers to STFU than all the debating and arguing in the world combined. If your claims are real, come get your $1M, or STFU. - ericd543, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"Why can't you people learn that just because you don't believe it doesn't give you the right to talk ***** abou it!"
Ramtha's teachings about self empowerment are nice, but the idea that people can use the power of their mind to levitate or manifest objects from thin air are bunk, if you ask me. :-) - sharkez, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1My 11 yo daughter walked away shaking her head---"That's amazing! I've got to show this to my teacher. " That my friends, is what it's all about!
- diggtard, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1If a tree falls in a forest and nobody is around to hear it fall, does it make a sound? .... the tree decided to act differently as though it was aware that it was being watched ...
- PORTAL45, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1For more info check out "The Observer Effect": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observer_effect
- Artifez, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The electron doesn't "know" anything, the acto of collecting information collapsed the wavefunction, the universe is made of energy and information, when you collect the information you alter it.
- Krumley, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Here's a brain fart: What if our "reality" is simply an interference pattern between two (or more) parallel universes? Some rather qualified scientists make a case that many exist very close together (read "The Fabric of Reality"). Maybe you're observing just "one side" of the electron's behavior?
Another cool experiment (from “The Fabric of Reality”): Take a laser pointer, a piece of paper and a dark room, and soon you'll be able to create an effect that some of the best minds in science have no solid explanation for. -
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