{"id":656,"date":"2008-10-07T00:59:34","date_gmt":"2008-10-07T05:59:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/?p=656"},"modified":"2008-10-07T00:59:42","modified_gmt":"2008-10-07T05:59:42","slug":"how-to-test-the-many-worlds-interpretation-of-quantum-mechanics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/?p=656","title":{"rendered":"How to test the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/mwi1.jpg\" title=\"mwi1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/mwi1.jpg\" alt=\"mwi1.jpg\" \/><\/a><br \/>\nThe many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics holds that before a measurement is made, identical copies of the observer exist in parallel universes and that all possible results  of a measurement actually take place in these universes.<\/p>\n<p>Until now there has been no way to distinguish between this and the Born interpretation. This holds that each outcome of a measurement has a specific probability and that, while an ensemble of measurements will match that distribution, there is no way to determine the outcome of specific measurement.<\/p>\n<p>Now Frank Tipler, a physicist at Tulane University in New Orleans says he has hit upon a way in which these interpretations must produce different experimental results.<\/p>\n<p>His idea is to measure how quickly individual photons hitting a screen build into a pattern.  According to the many worlds interpretation, this pattern should build more quickly, says Tipler.<\/p>\n<p>And he points out that an experiment to test this idea would be easy to perform. Simply send photons through a double slit, onto a screen and measure where each one hits. Once the experiment is over, a simple mathematical test of the data tells you how quickly the pattern formed.<\/p>\n<p>This experiment is almost trivial so we should find out pretty quickly which interpretation of quantum mechanics Tipler&#8217;s test tells us is right.<\/p>\n<p>Then it boils down to whether you believe his reasoning.<\/p>\n<p>(And not everybody does. When Tipler published his book The Physics of Immortality one reviewer described it as &#8221; a masterpiece  of pseudoscience&#8221;.)<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s hope this paper is received a little more positively than his books.<\/p>\n<p>Ref: <a href=\"http:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/0809.4422\">arxiv.org\/abs\/0809.4422<\/a>: Testing Many-Worlds Quantum Theory By Measuring Pattern Convergence Rates<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics holds that before a measurement is made, identical copies of the observer exist in parallel universes and that all possible results of a measurement actually take place in these universes. Until now there has been no way to distinguish between this and the Born interpretation. This holds that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-changin-the-world","category-hellraisin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arxivblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}