Starboy

Kharakov, QM is much more then Heisenburg's uncertainty principle. As interesting as it is, it has limited predicitive power. I am talking about Schroedinger's equation. This equation provides solutions for particles with mass that can only be interpreted as probabilites. This is what implies that the universe is intrinsically random.

Starboy

Starboy

Kharakov, lookup Bell's inequality.

[ December 16, 2002: Message edited by: Starboy ]</p>

Kharakov

Hasn't been an experiment that succesfully proved that yet. &lt;-- poor wording, please forgive me!!!

[ December 16, 2002: Message edited by: Kharakov ]</p>

Starboy

Ah, Kharakov, lookup scientific method. Science doesn't "prove" things.

Kharakov

Definitely agree that QM is more than uncertainty relations.

Damned if I didn't just delete a large amount of that last post before you responded to it!!

What I had wrote was about probability distributions, such as grades in a physics course. Single out any single student, and the grade result would appear to be random. You will get a distribution of grades and find that it is most probable that the grade will be around 73%. In no way does this indicate that the grade the student received was random.

be back soon, sure you will post (don't have time to write this one out...)

Kharakov

haha. Correct. I know that.. poor wording.

I meant that experimental data has not shown that Bell's inequality is satisfied.

Kharakov

The Schrodinger equation gives us a precise probability distribution. This does not imply that the universe is random. The fact that there is a precise probability distribution implies an innate order.

Look around you. Any order out there? Would you like fries with your order? Stop ordering me around! Would you like to join the Knights of the Random Order? Welcome to a New World Order! Make sure the words in your reply are order in right the.

Thomas Ash

Well... in some fields that's true. But since we're discussing free will or incompatibilist determinism or compatibilism, the possibility of a hidden order is very important. In a sense it may be just speculation, as we can't know about the existence of an unknowable hidden order. But just the fact that there's at least a conceptual possibility of 'classical' determinism underlying quantum mechanics would be important. So do you (and Oxymoron and Starboy and anyone else) think there could be? Or is there some positive reason we have for thinking there's not.
Also, one of the reasons I first got interested in determinism, like a lot of people on this board I think, is because of the all-purpose-free-will-dodge(tm), a platitude rivalled only by the-ways-and-logic-of-god-are-strange(tm) dodge. Does quantum mechanics have any implication to this, at least as applied to the problem of evil?

Thomas Ash

Well, I may have less scientific knowledge than some people here, but this is an area where I can help out. It's allowable to say either Schroedinger or schrodinger, just like you will see both Gerhard Schroeder and Gerhard Schroder in English-language newspapers. The first gets closer to the initial pronunciation.

That seems to make sense to me.

Starboy

Yikes! Kharakov, you philosophers crack me up. So much time and effort spent thinking and talking about reality, yet so little effort to actually learn anything about it. All random events when taken in aggregate can be described by a probability distribution. That doesn't make any given event predictable.

Kharakov, just a little friendly advice. Are you deep into your education? If so, ask for your money back, if not find another school.

Starboy