About revolutionizing Physics
The FQXi contests provide some topics to discuss which I always find interesting, and I like to engage in exchanges about the main theme. Every time the contest is announced, a warning like the following is made "While this topic is broad, successful essays will not use this breadth as an excuse to shoehorn in the author's pet topic, but will rather keep as their central focus the theme of the contest." But one of the central attractions of this contest are everyone's foundational views, particularly those pet theories. And I agree that the rule is not to avoid them, but to focus on the theme, so if your pet topic is relevant to addressing the questions of the contest, then of course it should be there. I do this, in my essays I talk about my work, as long as it is relevant to the topic. Otherwise I prefer the standard platforms, which are publishing peer reviewed articles, and attending conferences.
There are some recurrent such "pet topics" though, which usually don't find their way in good peer reviewed journals and conferences. They usually deal with disproofs of the theory of relativity, or of essential aspects of quantum mechanics. These theories are considered well-verified and solid by most physicists, so this is why they don't spend time indefinitely discussing them. It is not that they are brainwashed, it is just that they spend much more time with these theories, they know how well are tested, they did countless times the mathematics, and they know how well they explain the world from a small number of basic assumptions.
I am a strong supporter of the idea that we should come back from time to time to question each of the basic assumptions of our theories, but at the same time we can't discuss the same arguments over and over, we also need to advance. To be more specific, I confess that as a kid, when I first read about relativity and quantum mechanics, I was very shocked, and I tried to find a more acceptable explanation for both of them. I turned them upside down in many ways, trying to figure out how I can get the same experimental results out of less shocking or less counterintuitive principles. I'm not ashamed of it, in fact I recommend it to be done by every future researcher. I consider that one should question everything. Of course, this is not feasible nowadays, because there's so much to learn, and if you want to do research, you need to progress very quickly with your understanding. But I still think it is necessary to start by questioning everything, and you should never stop.
Now here is a trap though, because sometimes you get caught in a loop in this process. You may end out spending your entire life trying to disprove "mainstream" physics, motivated by a wrong vision. To get out of this circle, you need to question not only the standard assumptions, but also your own. But it is tempting not to do this, because what could be more gratifying than disproving Einstein or at least quantum mechanics? People endowed with brilliant minds, with great critical thinking when dealing with other areas where they didn't bet as much, can get caught in this trap. I won't say they should do something better, because I consider as fundamental ethical principle that everyone should be allowed to have their best experiences, and working at really important things is one of them.
I had my share of such discussions of the foundations, where I was in the position to play the role of the "defender of the status-quo". Actually I didn't see myself like this, I was under the impression that we discuss honestly about some ideas, no matter how well-established they are considered. So I tried to explain why relativity works, why quantum mechanics is as it is and is not classical. Let me make a parallel: imagine you invented a mechanical device that would give you energy for free, by spinning forever. You know you can't discuss this with physicists, because they would say that the energy is conserved, period. And they are right. But I also know that by trying to explain why various perpetual motion devices didn't work, sometimes in the history we arrived at better understanding of physics. They still didn't work, but at least there was a gain. So I used to allow myself to engage in such discussions, in the idea that I can help a person escape this prison, and learn something in the process. But it was pointless, there was never a gain. And when people try to refute Bell's theorem the things are even clearer. While we can still imagine the possibility that energy is violated, considering that our theories are an approximation of the true physics, with Bell's theorem the things are different. Because Bell's theorem is a theorem. Trying to refute it is like trying to find in Euclidean geometry a right triangle which violates Pythagoras's theorem. It is simply impossible. Now, I'm not quantum police to try to show everyone's how illegal is to violate a theorem, but I just no longer want to be part of such discussions, because I have limited time. And I saw tons of disproofs of special relativity and Bell's theorem. A recurrent disproof is to take a very special setup, where Alice and Bob measure the spin along the same axis, and to assume that the two entangled particles have some definite opposite spin directions, not perpendicular to the direction along which Alice and Bob measure, and that instead of Born's rule each spin simply projects to the axis in 3D. To anyone who studied EPR and Bell's theorem is obvious that in this case you get the same result as in classical physics, because it is exactly classical. The real problem, usually not mentioned, is the general case. So limiting to this case doesn't solve the problem, no matter how fancy graphics one makes using a modification of a script I wrote in 2011.
Bell's theorem has a hypothesis, consisting of two assumptions, and a conclusion. The conclusion is an inequality, which is satisfied in classical physics, but not in quantum mechanics. Since our universe is quantum, it means that one of the two assumptions is wrong. The two assumptions are (1) all interactions are local, and (2) the initial conditions of the systems in this game are statistically independent. It is a widespread opinion that condition (1) is violated by nature, but it is also possible that (2) or both are actually violated. So while there are still many quantum theorists who claim it makes no sense to discuss what happens with a particle between measurements, some of us want to know. And if you want to know, you have to choose what to sacrifice, (1) or (2), but it is not possible to save both. Just like it is impossible to have in Euclidean geometry a triangle which violates Pythagoras's theorem, and to maintain that the triangle has a right angle.
The guy with the perpetual motion device may insist that it works, and when proven it doesn't, he may think that he can change this or that and still make it work. Many discussions I've had so far about relativity and quantum mechanics were just like this, as being caught in a loop. This is why I decided years ago to no longer engage in such discussions, with the risk of missing the opportunity to witness the birth of a new revolution in physics. I'd rather spend my time with my own pet theories :) In the foundations of quantum mechanics, I prefer to keep (1) as true, and sacrifice (2) (1, 2, 3, 4, 5).
As for the contest, I see that some essays feature such ideas, and I think it is a good place to discuss them, but I prefer to focus on the part related to the current topic in my feedback, and to evaluate them solely by this.
Success to everyone in this contest, and may we all have enlightening exchanges of ideas!
Cristi
