Scientists may just have discovered one of the MISSING pieces of Quantum theory, and it’s very important and unorthodox according to some. After all, you don’t hear every day that the future could affect the past, right? According to a new, revolutionary theory, the future can affect the past and even more mystery to the already enigmatic world of quantum mechanics. It seems that the more we dig, the stranger it gets.
As if it wasn’t already complicated enough. Scientists still can’t figure it all out and are battling with the quantum world on a theoretical level. In the mysterious world of the quantum theory is one called quantum entanglement. Einstein spoke about it, we still try to understand it. According to many scientists, there are a couple of ways for us to demonstrate what Einstein referred to as “spooky action at a distance” and two physicists have proposed a new view that may help unravel the mysteries behind this quantum effect.
As if it wasn’t already complicated enough. Scientists still can’t figure it all out and are battling with the quantum world on a theoretical level. In the mysterious world of the quantum theory is one called quantum entanglement. Einstein spoke about it, we still try to understand it. According to many scientists, there are a couple of ways for us to demonstrate what Einstein referred to as “spooky action at a distance” and two physicists have proposed a new view that may help unravel the mysteries behind this quantum effect.
Quantum entanglement is a physical phenomenon that occurs when pairs or groups of particles are generated or interact in ways such that the quantum state of each particle cannot be described independently of the others, even when the particles are separated by a large distance—instead, a quantum state must be described for the system as a whole. However, there isn’t really a mechanism that could explain that kind of influence which is why physicists Matthew S. Leifer at Chapman University and Matthew F. Pusey at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics have offered an alternative which they dubbed “retro-causality”. Ok so let’s bring this down a notch and make it easier to understand. Basically, these two researchers took a closer look at some of the many assumptions in quantum theory and said that unless we found that TIME necessarily ran ONE way, any measurements made to a certain particle could echo back in time as well as forward. Complicated huh?
Umm… here’s a video in case you didn’t quite get what we’re trying to say:
Basically “retrocausality” indicates that a given particle can move backward through time to the point where it is entangled and affects its partner along the way. Dr. Leifer and Dr. Pusey basically worked on Bell’s theorem and swapped space for time saying that unless anyone can prove that time should definitely go forwards then retro-causality is a possibility, meaning that quantum particle could travel back in time affecting their partner.
“The reason I think that retro-causality is worth investigating is that we now have a slew of no-go results about realist interpretations of quantum theory, including Bell’s theorem. These say that any interpretation that fits into the standard framework for realist interpretations must have features that I would regard as undesirable. Therefore, the only options seem to be to abandon realism or to break out of the standard realist framework,” said Dr. Leifer.
This means that when a researcher decides he wants to measure a given particle, that choice can influence the properties of the particle itself—or even an entangled particle in the past., making the ‘action at a distance’ part of Einstein’s definition unnecessary. In other words, the entanglement effect becomes retro-causal influence as Futurism explains it.
Speaking to Phys.org Dr. Leifer said: “There is a small group of physicists and philosophers that think this idea is worth pursuing, including Huw Price and Ken Wharton [a physics professor at San José State University],”
Retro-causality may even offer a better quantum theory but like many other theories, this too includes a number of assumptions, though it is noteworthy to mention that it includes one which drastically reformulates the idea of time symmetry. The only options seem to be to abandon realism or to break out of the standard realist framework,” Leifer explained. “Abandoning realism is quite popular, but I think that this robs science of much of its explanatory power and so it is better to find realist accounts where possible.”
“There is not, to my knowledge, a generally agreed upon interpretation of quantum theory that recovers the whole theory and exploits this idea. It is more of an idea for an interpretation at the moment, so I think that other physicists are rightly skeptical, and the onus is on us to flesh out the idea.”
Their discoveries were published in the journal Proceedingsof The Royal Society A in June. (H/T: Phys.org)
Reference: Futurism