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Physics World

Schrodinger's cat

Published Sep 1, 2018• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Schrodinger's cat is a paradoxical thought experiment birthed by Erwin Schrodinger in 1935. Cartoonist Eugenia Viti and physicist Ivan Viti reimagine the experiment as applied to some other everyday situations.
DOI
10.1088/2058-7058/31/9/39

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In a famous 1935 paper, Erwin Schroedinger pointed out the apparently bizarre consequences which flow from the assumption that the formalism of quantum mechanics can be extrapolated from the world of electrons and atoms to the level of our own direct consciousness (the “Cat” paradox). In this paper I first discuss some alleged resolutions of the paradox, then point out that the premise is not self-evident, and define a class of alternative (“macrorealistic”) scenarios. I then review the extent to which the experimental predictions of quantum mechanics are currently tested in the direction of the everyday world, and explain a crucial test, yet to be performed, of these predictions vis-a-vis those of macrorealism.
In 1935 Erwin Schrödinger proposed a thought experiment to show the absurd consequences of applying quantum mechanics to everyday objects. Schrödinger imagined placing a cat in a box, along with a vial of deadly poison that is connected to a radioactive atom. If the atom decays, it releases the poison and kills the cat. When the box is closed we do not know if the atom has decayed or not, which means that it can be in a "superposition" of two states (decayed and non-decayed) at the same time. Therefore, protested Schrödinger, the cat can be both dead and alive at the same time – which is clearly absurd. There was obviously, he thought, some boundary between the microscopic world of atoms and quantum mechanics, and the macroscopic world of cats and classical mechanics.
The physicist Erwin Schrödinger described, back in 1935, one aspect of this strange phenomenon. He placed his cat in a sealed box with a piece of radioactive material which might or might not send out a sub-atomic particle. If it did, the Geiger counter was designed to trigger a release of poisonous gas in the box, and thereby kill his cat. The Geiger counter was set up to be triggered just enough to give a 50–50 chance of a particle being detected, and therefore the cat an even chance of being poisoned or not. (In those days, this sort of experiment was acceptable, particularly as it was only a thought experiment.)