Jim Baggott, John L. Heilbron
Abstract Our drama lies not only in the clash of ideas, but also in the human passions and social contexts in which the ideas were conceived, debated, refined, accepted, or rejected. Like artists and musicians, the creators of quantum mechanics approached their work with the full range of human emotions. In 2022, Clauser, Aspect, and Zeilinger were at last recognized by the Nobel institution, ‘for experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science’. Their prize came exactly 100 years after those of Einstein and Bohr. Experiment moved the debate to a new level, but it has by no means removed or resolved the fundamental question. There will be no Nobel prize for an answer. That will not shut off discussion. Our drama will continue beyond our telling of it and is unlikely to reach its final scene before science ceases or the world ends.
•Apr 25, 2024•0 citations