I saw a documentary tonight that was explaining how an atom can be shown to be in different places at the same time
The scientist was demonstrating this using laser beams and a device that reflected or split the beam.
Can you explain?
2007-07-10 19:02:42 · 7 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
what are you thinking?
we are not that smart and those scientist dont have time to be here on YA...
2007-07-10 19:10:59 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
I believe what they are referring to is called Spooky Action. This states that whenever an observer goes about altering the atomic structure of an entangled atom that a change to one entangled particle does indeed affect the other instantaneously. Such a result would suggest that although it is thought impossible to travel faster than the speed of light this may not be the case. If one atoms end result is observed at a calculable distance and is instantaneously changed before light is able to travel the same distance either one of two things is possible.
1. The two atoms are actually the same atom and exist in two different locations.
2. It is possible to travel at speeds greater than that of Light.
Either way I would say that it is really cool!
2007-07-11 03:26:29 · answer #2 · answered by Josh L 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are talking about electron diffraction in case you want to google or wiki it. It is the phenomenon that best illustrates the basic idea that matter can be represented as a wave. The laser was employed in the demonstration, no doubt, because its beam is a nice, pure wave to demonstrate wave phenomena. The whole idea was not to say a corpuscular electron or atom is in two positions but that there is a wave nature to matter that manifests itself in what would be peculiar effects as simple hard sphere particles.
2007-07-11 02:37:38 · answer #3 · answered by jcsuperstar714 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It's something called entanglement. Just look online for quantum mechanics, superposition, entanglement, quantum encryption... etc.
You can actually transmit information using entangled photons. It has been done.
When you get two particles 'entangled' they act like one single object. So let say there are two particles, A and B, and they are entangled. If you spin A then B will do the same even if B is miles away. If you bounce A, B will also bounce. B will do whatever A does, vice versa. It's like one atom being at two different places.
There's also something called 'superposition' in quantum mechanic. That's like a particle existing in 2 different state at same time. Kind of like you standing up and sitting down at same time. Yea it sounds weird, but atoms and subatomic particles really do act this way.
http://www.abc.net.au/science/features/quantum/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-entangle/
2007-07-11 03:13:51 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
It's called uncertainty....
There is nothing to explain, its just a simple fact of nature at the quantum level that we can never really know where something is at any given moment.... we can only talk about probability.
2007-07-11 02:14:41 · answer #5 · answered by bluecuriosity 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
no "an atom can be in two places at the same time" is not correct. the correct one is "an atom can be FOUND in two places at the same time"
2007-07-11 05:42:47 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Illusion shows us many things that are not really true.
2007-07-11 02:11:16 · answer #7 · answered by Helmut 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋