Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by mrpg on Saturday July 08 2017, @07:30AM   Printer-friendly
from the the-future-was-yesterday dept.

Biochemist Dr. Isaac Asimov was joking, of course, when he came up with the substance (it came up in his orals for his doctorate, and it terrified him), but some theoretical physicists have suggested that something similar to Asimov's fictional chemical actually exists at the quantum level.

Phys Org reports that "Physicists provide support for retrocausal quantum theory, in which the future influences the past."

(Phys.org)—Although there are many counterintuitive ideas in quantum theory, the idea that influences can travel backwards in time (from the future to the past) is generally not one of them. However, recently some physicists have been looking into this idea, called "retrocausality," because it can potentially resolve some long-standing puzzles in quantum physics. In particular, if retrocausality is allowed, then the famous Bell tests can be interpreted as evidence for retrocausality and not for action-at-a-distance—a result that Einstein and others skeptical of that "spooky" property may have appreciated.

It's a long and informative article that I found fascinating.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 08 2017, @09:44AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 08 2017, @09:44AM (#536482)

    Retrocausality vs. action at a distance is a problem only for those religious bigots who insist on modeling a mechanically evolving, impersonal, universe based upon traditional models of the macroscopic world. [...]

    Unconvincing argumentation.No mention to black lives matter, neither to dark energy.
    The social aspects have a very weak and pale representation in your argumentation, this letting aside freedom of speech, the rights to bear arms and. last but not least, immigration.

    Starting Score:    0  points
    Moderation   0  
       Troll=1, Funny=1, Total=2
    Extra 'Funny' Modifier   0  

    Total Score:   0