From: Russell Wallace (russell.wallace@gmail.com)
Date: Tue Mar 07 2006 - 18:22:18 MST
On 3/8/06, Ben Goertzel <ben@goertzel.org> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> About whether the universe is a simulation, an interesting line of
> argument is given by Ross Rhodes in:
>
> http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/argument/Argument4.html
"To further increase the mystery, it appears that the change from wave to
particle takes place not upon mechanical interaction with the detecting
device, but upon a conscious being's acquiring the knowledge of the results
of the attempt at detection. Although not entirely free from doubt,
experiment seems to indicate that the same experimental set up will yield
different results (clumping pattern or interference pattern at the
projection screen) depending entirely on whether the experimenter chooses to
learn the results of the detection at the slits or not. This inexplicable
change in behavior has been called the central mystery of quantum
mechanics."
That certainly would be a central mystery! I was under the impression it was
not so - that for the whole "measurement at a slit breaks the interference
pattern in the two slit experiment" thing, it qualifies as "measurement" if
the information was recorded, even if you never look at it, even if you
subsequently incinerate the printout, reformat the disk or whatever. This
guy seems to be saying that isn't so, that whether you look at the printout
makes the difference. Can anyone confirm whether this is the case?
- Russell
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