Bell's Theorem and Nonlocality

Billiard balls are also not in every possible state unless observed, or maybe they are. We can not know because they are only doing it when we are not looking, sneaky little devils. It is true, they are not in a superposition of spin states, we have to spin them by hand. We also have to literally push them to get them moving in opposite directions. And yet, they will do the same thing the photons do, they will replicate the experiment and give you identical results, as if they are entangled by some spooky invisible bond and are communicating faster than light.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Do you have any evidence for a pair of billiard balls acting like entangled particles? That would be really interesting.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

My spider-sense is tingling. Think about it. Look at spooky experiment with electrons where they measure spin up and spin down, imagine similar situation with billiard balls, visualize! I will use some physics simulation software to make it run in real-time, hopefully with editable variables and modifiable initial conditions. Possibly Wolfram can do it and even run it online, though I never used it for anything like that before. Any idea what free software might be good for this?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Sorry, but with electrons you can only measure/define the spin along one axis at a time, any measurement along a different axis disturbs whatever the spin was along the original axis. This isn't the case for billiard balls, which can have a well-defined value for the spin along any number of axes simultaneously.

 

If my billiard balls simulation produces identical result, will you submit?

 

Can you show where entanglement theory has been elevated to science fact; laws are fact, theories are about how things work?

Can you even provide a link that shows that any theory of gravity is law, not theory, in the context of law vs. theory? Newton's law of gravity is that objects attract each other, it is a law, but the theories of gravity say how they attract each other; the theories of how are not laws, or do you disagree?

How can you claim to prove anything when you don't understand how science works?

 

If your simulated billiard balls can reproduce quantum behaviour while obeying only classical physics laws, I'll seriously consider it.

 

Entanglement is an experimentally proven fact. I have just proven, mathematically, that no theory that excludes it can possibly account for those experiments, so either you can accept entanglement as a law, or you can postulate that the universe has no laws whatsoever.

Newton's theory of gravity is a law when limited to weak gravitational fields, it's never been contradicted in hundreds of years of testing under those conditions, and you can see that this is the scientific consensus if you go search for "Newton's Law of Gravitation" and notice that many articles include its fundamental formula. Phenomena such as electrons and photons aren't as well-established and directly measurable as is our understanding of weak gravitational fields, but their properties (including entanglement) have been tested sufficiently so that you can't call it "reasonable and responsible" to disregard them, nor can you say that disregarding entanglement doesn't lead to a contradiction with existing experiment.

That's all you've got? I was hoping you'd have something to say about the proof instead of completely ignoring it and repeating more of your stupid ad hominem attacks. If I don't know how science works, then tell me what's wrong with my reasoning or with the associated experiments, none of which need to make any assumptions about QM to prove that you're full of crap?

 

First show where entanglement has been elevated to law, and don't bother to say I am trolling until you do.

Second, quote exactly what I said that you take as an ad hom, before we explore any ad homs in your response.

Third, is it a forum rule that I must participate when it is clear you don't understand how science works, when you evade answering questions that make my case, and you immediately resort to incivility when challenged.

 

Tell me how the proof I gave on page 2, when combined with experiment, fails to establish entanglement beyond any reasonable doubt?

Ok, in post #86 you wrote the following:

That's an ad hominem attack on me. When I say you don't know what you're talking about, I give demonstrations and examples of why that is. You, by contrast, make blanket personal attacks without logical reasoning to accompany them, thus showing that you need to resort to excuses and insults in order to avoid discussing logical deductions.

It's a forum rule that you can't use personal insults as a substitute for discussing and arguing against logical deductions such as the one I just demonstrated on page 2. You asked me whether any knowledge of QM is needed in Bell's Theorem in order to disprove the possibility of local hidden variables explaining experimental facts, and I've clearly told you several times that the answer is no, as you would see for yourself if you bothered to look at the proof and understand grade school math.

 

That doesn't prove entanglement is a law of physics. We can't move forward until you stop saying it is or prove it is. Look at post #41 when I came back to present my side. The first point in that discussion is, do you think entanglement and superposition are fact. I thought professionals knew the difference between theory and fact, and I would have proceeded to the next point, but you surprised me and claimed it was fact.

That is not an ad hom. Look at the ad hom in your response though, and its incivility.

You do it.

On that point, back to post 41 to answer that. You refer to experiments that use entanglement, and then you claim your presentation does not include entanglement or QM. And there's more but for now, let's get to a point were I can continue my presentation, Ok?

You are bullying, and using incivility.

I want you to rewrite post #88 to take out the incivility, and absurd claims, and don't resort to them again. I don't need to participate, and at the rate we are going, it will take a long time to get to the explanation of my actual views on cosmology and QM that are supposed to be at issue.

I thought you were falsifying my position on cosmology and QM. Let me go back and check the OP. ... Wait, you said it was about my views on cosmology, and "Bell's theorem and its associated experimental tests". How is that not about QM. How does it not involve entanglement? These are the reasons we don't get on with it.

You should realize that to go forward, you have to make an admission that you were wrong about the scientific distinction between theory and fact. It is part of my defense that entanglement is theory, and that it is part of the experiments that you refer to. Perhaps the best thing to do is have you describe how entanglement works, the mechanics of how particles become entangled, how we know they are entangled, and how it is proven to be fact, not theory. And do it civily.

 

From post #40

Without connecting and explaining experimental results, nothing is proven. All of the references to experimental tests I have seen, do not represent conclusive tests. There are (so far), always loopholes that still need to be accounted for, or closed.

As example, can you rule out that in the case of photon polarization experiments, the detector mechanisms do not affect the result?

You mentioned somewhere that, (paraphrased) Bell's Theorem was not consistent with GR. It is also not consistent with other observations and experience. It can be interpreted as compatible with QM, but then QM is reduced or confined to a statistically predictive tool, rather than a direct description of reality, because QM is statistically deterministic.

I understand (at least superficially) the theorem and your math proof and to a limited extent some of the experiments that have been done... And I agree if the theorem is experimentally proven, the conclusions are valid. But every experiment I have looked at in the past (not as an expert in the field), seems to leave some room for question. Paraphrasing Wiki, there are still loopholes which are not expected to be experimentally addressed until some future date. Which means the theory or theorem has not yet been conclusively proven.

I need to add that I am not supporting quantum wave's model or argument. I am only looking at the Bell's Theorem issue, generally.

 

Of course not. Like me, believe it or not, I think you want to air boths sides of the issue, and are prepared to learn.

You do make a good point that will come up about loopholes, but I do not take exception to his math or the well known experiments that he will convey. I accept that, given the postulates of quantum theory, the conclusion that there is either FTL communication or no local reality, is sound, mathematically, and the experiments confirm that, as long as the hidden variables model can be tested by the experiments employed. That is not where I build my case, and my case also is not the "its theory, not fact" argument, though we have to work through those accusations too, before we get to my defense.

I am at the point where I am trying to move forward, but if he is allowed to ignore my points, be a bully and abusive, make false accusations, and be generally uncivil, it will be slow going. But until he wins an argument with a moderator after he reports me from time to time, I will plod on one tiny step at a time.

 

The third and final loophole regarding detection efficiency was closed just over a year ago: http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2013/apr/23/third-bell-loophole-closed-for-photons, part of it involved a modification of Bell's argument in order to take account of limited detection efficiencies and produce a new resulting inequality.

The only thing one could possibly argue now, until an experiment is performed closing all loopholes simultaneously, is that nature chooses a different loophole with completely different consequences depending on which ones are closed by the experiment, but in such a way that the same result always occurs regardless, which is a truly extraordinary coincidence to claim in comparison to the simple non-local explanation which correctly and precisely predicts the result without making any new assumptions.

Yes I can, because many experiments have been performed where the detector mechanisms are set in such a way that they don't have sufficient time to communicate at lightspeed during the interval between detector initializations and particle detections.

I never said that. Quantum mechanics as a whole is inconsistent with GR, but GR doesn't forbid nonlocal interactions as long as they don't transmit any detectable information faster than light in such a way as to produce a causal effect.

Bell's Theorem on its own is just a theorem, it's consistent and compatible with any reality whatsoever (as long as that reality includes electrons and photons).

Once again, Bell's Theorem is simply a math result, which means it requires no experimental evidence whatsoever to be proven. The theorem has consequences for the experimental results local hidden variable theories are forced to predict, just as calculus has consequences for the electromagnetic behaviour of charges and currents. As mentioned above, all three of the loopholes used as objections to the experimental tests have now been separately closed. The only remaining argument one can still put forward, until future experiments rule it out, is that nature always exploits one loophole or another with completely different mechanisms in order to always match the quantum prediction, which attributes an absurd near-intelligence to nature as if it's always looking for precise ways to trick us.

 

Can you show me where the postulates of quantum theory are used in the theorem's derivation or in the associated experimental tests? I assert that this is a baseless, ignorant claim on your part.

You presume far too much. I haven't argued with moderators here over anything substantial in many years, and the last time I did have a serious argument with them it was over a politics & religion issue. I report you from time to time when you resort to ad hominems and ignore logic and experiment because I want the moderators to keep track of you and your trolling, so that if you continue to parrot the same irrelevant arguments, they'll eventually step in and put a stop to it.

 

You want me to participate, respond to my last post directed to you. Otherwise, talk it out without me.

 

If a theory makes a prediction which doesn't match experimental fact, then it's a fact that the theory is incorrect. It is now a proven fact that no reasonable theory of physics can explain the experimental results without taking entanglement into account. If I'm wrong, tell me what issues my proof specifically fails to address.

No, I only attack the poor quality of your arguments. You, on the other hand, accuse me of sinister motives without any substance to your allegations, and continue to make hand-waving dismissals in lieu of logical reason. Your arguments amount to the same illogic as "yes, you've demonstrated that 1+1 cannot equal 3 under the circumstances we've been able to test so far..."

I refer to experiments in which the photons are set to have correlated polarizations when measured on the same axis (or some related polarization scheme which still permits a Bell test after adjusting the theoretical argument). This setup makes no assumptions about QM, only experimentally demonstrable facts about photons.

Actually you're the one trying to bully everyone else into accepting your claims without addressing the logic and associated experiments that directly disprove them, and I'm not going to back down until you present a genuine logical argument or else retract your claims.

Then as part of your defense, show me where quantum entanglement is made as a theoretical assumption in the proof and/or experiments.

I'll explain how quantum entanglement works and what its consequences are when you show me where I make any assumptions about it in my proof, or how experimenters assume it before testing. The same-axis correlations between photon polarizations are part of the experimental setup and calibration, you don't need to make any assumptions about why they have this property (just like you don't need to explain conservation of angular momentum in order to know that it factually applies when checking for entangled spins).

 

Alright. For my benefit I was saying that I understood the experiments, and you didn't need to present them. But now I see I was wrong, you need to present them and then I will discuss the details that you present.

 

Sorry I am having some problem where I keep working on a reply and suddenly losing it. So I'll try later. I'll just say here that you are correct on the issue re GR. I am sure that is what you said or meant and I just chose my wording poorly in the earlier post.

 

Sounds good to me, I'll do some digging around and see what I can pull up.