/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.2841201]

Does cause and effect exist at a quantum level? Why/why not?

[Anonymous No.2841204]

Smells like assignment question...

[Anonymous No.2841209]

>>2841201
lold so hard at the gif

[Anonymous No.2841213]

>>2841204
I thought someone might say that. It isn't, I'm genuinely curious.

[Anonymous No.2841226]

anyone?

[Anonymous No.2841239]

>>2841213
Then "not really". it still applies somewhat, but at that scale events that would normally be impossible (e.g. an electron tunneling through solid matter) stand a reasonable chance of happening, and other events can happen spontaneously with no obvious cause (e.g. radioactive decay).

That is - doing a certain thing won't always produce the same result, and thus cause and effect doesn't strictly apply. Sometimes the electron will stop, sometimes it will go through, and there's no way to predict what any individual one will do - just the percentage that will.

That's just an individual example. I was going to suggest you read the wikipedia page but it's really quite terrible.

[Anonymous No.2841245]

>>2841201
Yes. At least in Quantum Field Theory you can show it appears with some commuter/anticommuter shit I don't really want to remember.

[Anonymous No.2841261]

>>2841239
I had a look, I couldn't make head or tail of it. Thanks for the reply though.

[a strong ai No.2841289]

if it doesn't, those of us with high enough IQ's and analytical skills to really understand these issues know that whatever does exist is something that is utter nonsense relative everything we currently know and therefore how we currently think.

So either it does exist at the quantum level, or we have no experience of how it doesn't, what that would mean, or how to even begin to think about it.

So yeah. As long as I think, it does exist at the quantum level. However note that if future events can effect past events, that still is a form of cause and effect from the perspective of a sort of unraveled absolute time.

[Anonymous No.2841292]

>>2841201
Sure, even in quantum mechanics you encounter different situations in which a certain time ordering becomes important, and you often choose the solution that incorporates causality. Mathematically, you of course can always write down something anti-causal - these things are often used in particle-hole transformations etc..

Short answer: yes, because we simply demand causality.

[a strong ai No.2841294]

just because we can't see the cause as a matter of principal doesn't mean there isn't one...

[Anonymous No.2841300]

interesting replies.

[Diogenes of Sinope No.2841302]

>>2841294

Beautifully answered my friend. In fact, ore couldn't have put it better myself.

[Diogenes of Sinope No.2841359]

>>2841302

Actually I could.

You have to understand that all consideration necessitates conceptualisation, and thus how we perceive a phenomena as being is entirely dependent on how we approach the phenomena - with what theoretical/conceptual framework we approach the phenomena.

To understand a phenomena we must first articulate it within a language, with its own inherent meanings and inherent rules - and for more complex phenomena, with a set of ideas.

How we interpret that phenomena will be founded upon the language and the set of ideas we understand the phenomena with.

Now for the crucial point: All languages are fashioned by human experience; even the seemingly absolute mathematics, and logic that it is founded upon.

And, or, not? Who is to say there are other operators that are inherent in this reality? Who is to say so forth, so on.

We must at the very least accept our limitations before claiming phenomena as truly preposterous, or impossible.

For more practical examples - simply look into complexity and emergance.

With what language would you come understand consciousness? With what language would you so on, so forth.

*I'd have liked to write all this better, but too tired.

[Anonymous No.2841417]

nobody has a clear idea what a cause is
old problems don't just go away

[Anonymous No.2841445]

>>2841417

I see I could have just left it to Hume.
T'was fun nevertheless.