Uncertainty Principle

If you want to get vertigo, start reading about Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. Even if you don't understand it, your imagination will run away with you. It is true of most scientific principles (and you must distinguish between laws, theories, and principles). And if you are anything like me (god forbid), you will begin to feel terribly humble.

Today, I am not so certain I have been using Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle properly. I have conflated it with other things, I think, mainly something called "the observer effect" which says that observation will effect the observed phenomenon. I've been throwing that about a lot lately. Heisenberg's principle, though, seems limited to the use of tools of measurement. It does hold that unobserved events are held in a state of 'superposition,' as if it had not happened. If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there, does is make a sound?

By the time I get to the mathematical proofs, I start to realize my limitations. I have a degree in one of the sciences and had to take much (for me) math and chemistry and physics, and I used to be able to understand some of the higher functions or at least follow along with a certain understanding, but I have not kept up, and now, looking at those signs and symbols, I have to admit that they want to fall back into the realm of cabal and mystery. I tell myself that I could review and get back up to speed, and I even convince myself sometimes that I will, but more and more it is just a pipe dream.

But just in the nick of time, rummaging around the internet, I come to a Will Rogers quote:

"People's minds are changed through observation and not through argument."

By George, as they say. My mood begins to change, and I start to feel as smart as a member of the Texas School Board serving on the state's Textbook Selection Committee. Dadgummit.

I am making a vow to read more in the sciences again, though. Truly, it is fun. I don't know why I ever fell away.