From the very first Physics lesson in secondary school back in the old country, I was confused. I still am but then so are the majority of professional physicists when it comes to what we perceive as reality!
I dropped Physics as soon as I could along with Chemistry although mysteriously I did excel at Biology.
Fast forward to decades later and over the last few years my interest in Physics knows no bounds. Not content with falling asleep to YouTube videos about the cosmos, Einstein and all the befuddling equations, I now watch during the day, trying to get my head around Quantum Mechanics.
I’m reassured by a famous physicist who observed that anyone who says they understand quantum mechanics is lying! I certainly don’t.
For the uninitiated, in modern physics, there is something called the double slit experiment. This demonstrated that pure-wavelength light sent from a source through a pair of vertical slits is diffracted into a pattern of numerous vertical lines spread out on a screen behind the two slits.
This showed that light and matter can exhibit behaviour that is characteristic of either waves or particles. This seeming ambiguity that challenged the classical understanding of particles as opposed to waves, was, and still is, considered evidence for the fundamentally probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics – the science of the incredibly small.
In essence, we can’t tell where any particle is until it is observed. There is only a probability of where it might be. Confused – well that’s natural. Maybe I haven’t explained it very well, maybe it’s wrong! Try getting to grips with it with a bit of your own research….
The reason for my weird “foray into fisics”, for the want of a better expression, came while I was contemplating what toaster to buy online. There were so many of a myriad of different styles. Some retro, some modern.
But the key consideration for me was to go for a two-slit, okay two slot, toaster or four.
Two seemed the obvious choice as the wife is not a great eater of toast and I’m happy with a couple of slices with my morning Vegemite.
But something compelled me to buy the larger four-slot toaster with those neat vertical lines, as it were, conjuring up the two-slit experiment and all the mystery that entails.
I clicked on the four-slot toaster somehow feeling that this robust kitchen item may have greater use in the future.
When the package arrived and I opened it my wife stood there smiling. “Do you like it?” I said, “Thought I might as well get a big one…” She interrupted my ramblings as she held her abdomen.
“That could come in handy,” she said. “I’m pregnant”.
As we embraced the happy news, I laughed out loud at the prospect of the new arrival liking toast.
And contemplated the wonders of Quantum Mechanics and the cosmos that we are yet to understand.
