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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:39AM   Printer-friendly
from the so-it's-what-you-know,-not-who dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

One of the most striking features of quantum theory is that its predictions are, under virtually all circumstances, probabilistic. If you set up an experiment in a laboratory, and then you use quantum theory to predict the outcomes of various measurements you might perform, the best the theory can offer is probabilities—say, a 50 percent chance that you'll get one outcome, and a 50 percent chance that you'll get a different one. The role the quantum state plays in the theory is to determine, or at least encode, these probabilities. If you know the quantum state, then you can compute the probability of getting any possible outcome to any possible experiment.

But does the quantum state ultimately represent some objective aspect of reality, or is it a way of characterizing something about us, namely, something about what some person knows about reality? This question stretches back to the earliest history of quantum theory, but has recently become an active topic again, inspiring a slew of new theoretical results and even some experimental tests.

If it is just your knowledge that changes, things don't seem so strange.

To see why the quantum state might represent what someone knows, consider another case where we use probabilities. Before your friend rolls a die, you guess what side will face up. If your friend rolls a standard six-sided die, you'd usually say there is about a 17 percent (or one in six) chance that you'll be right, whatever you guess. Here the probability represents something about you: your state of knowledge about the die. Let's say your back is turned while she rolls it, so that she sees the result—a six, say—but not you. As far as you are concerned, the outcome remains uncertain, even though she knows it. Probabilities that represent a person's uncertainty, even though there is some fact of the matter, are called epistemic, from one of the Greek words for knowledge.

This means that you and your friend could assign very different probabilities, without either of you being wrong. You say the probability of the die showing a six is 17 percent, whereas your friend, who has seen the outcome already, says that it is 100 percent. That is because each of you knows different things, and the probabilities are representations of your respective states of knowledge. The only incorrect assignments, in fact, would be ones that said there was no chance at all that the die showed a six.

-- submitted from IRC


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday May 04 2017, @01:55AM (9 children)

    Carlin would be sickened by the left and their attempts to muzzle controversial speech lately. He would shit all over them.

    --
    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by dry on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:28AM (1 child)

    by dry (223) on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:28AM (#504146) Journal

    It would be a change as Carlin traditionally has been sickened by the right and their constant muzzling of controversial speech ("You can prick your finger but you can't finger your prick"). It's kinda funny, the left considers hatred to be controversial and the right considers love to be controversial.
    Personally, Carlin always seemed anti-repression to me whereas the right has always pushed repression.

    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday May 04 2017, @10:28AM

      Yeah, Carlin was a big, honkin liberal but more importantly he understood the way to change things is to embrace speech not to shut it down. Progs today are virulently anti-speech and the man who wrote this [youtube.com] would never back censorship.

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
  • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:51AM (6 children)

    by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:51AM (#504157) Journal

    You seem to think Carlin's entire schtick was shock jock rebelliousness. How dare you. He may have been a comedian but I consider him a humanist almost on level with Terry Pratchett, if far more vulgar. You're not fit to tie the man's decomposing shoes, and you're precisely the kind of no-goodnik authoritarian he hated.

    Yes, he'd be ripping on a good faction of the left these days, but hell, so do I, and for the same reasons.

    --
    I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday May 04 2017, @10:30AM (5 children)

      No, sweety, Carlin was about liberty and equality. Exactly like, oh, who around here is always spouting those words without having to twist their meanings?

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday May 04 2017, @07:08PM (4 children)

        by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Thursday May 04 2017, @07:08PM (#504481) Journal

        You wouldn't know equality or liberty if they bit you on your fat alcoholic ass, Uzzard.

        Let's put this in computer terms: do you understand why the GPL is better, in the long run, for software freedom than the BSD license? It's because the BSD license has forgotten Rule 0, that being "whatever you do with this, you DO NOT get to remove these freedoms from other people." I like the spirit of the BSD license, but I had to laugh back when de Raadt was all pissy over corporations taking OpenSSL and doing what they would with it and not contributing anything. Well, that's what happens when you don't have Rule 0.

        This is the essential problem you personally have: you think "the fewest rules/restrictions possible" translates into "maximal freedom and well-being." It does not. Popper tackled this one, what, half a century ago?

        --
        I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
        • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday May 04 2017, @11:20PM (3 children)

          Congrats! Claiming the people need to be government regulated for purposes of liberty and equality just made Moronic Post of the Day.

          --
          My rights don't end where your fear begins.
          • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday May 05 2017, @04:11AM (2 children)

            by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Friday May 05 2017, @04:11AM (#504672) Journal

            Okay, so all those laws against murder and rape and theft can go then? Dumbass. I knew you were going to say what you did. You're so predictable it's almost sad. Thanks for proving my point for me harder than I ever possibly could on my own.

            --
            I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
            • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday May 05 2017, @10:21AM (1 child)

              Yeah, darlin, if it's a choice between that and your ideas of having the government poking its nose into every little facet of my life, I'd rather take on the responsibility of dealing with those myself.

              --
              My rights don't end where your fear begins.
              • (Score: 3, Touché) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday May 06 2017, @04:35AM

                by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Saturday May 06 2017, @04:35AM (#505321) Journal

                Jesus Christ, Uzzard, you would cut off your nose to spite your face. You seriously just said "I hate what I imagine you think so much I would prefer to live in absolute solipsistic disconnect in a world with no laws against anyone powerful doing anything they want to me."

                Put your money where your beak is, carrion-breath. Live as an outlaw. No more protection or civilization for you. Go out bare-assed naked into the forest and spend the rest of your life fishing for fish and grubbing for grubs. I dare you.

                You won't of course, because you're fucking weak and a hypocrite for the ages.

                --
                I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...