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Do Subatomic Particles Have Free Will?
An anonymous reader sends in a Science News article that begins: "Human free will might seem like the squishiest of philosophical subjects, way beyond the realm of mathematical demonstration. But two highly regarded Princeton mathematicians, John Conway and Simon Kochen, claim to have proven that if humans have even the tiniest amount of free will, then atoms themselves must also behave unpredictably." Standard interpretations of quantum mechanics, of course, embrace unpredictability. But many physicists aren't comfortable with that, and are working to develop deterministic interpretations of quantum mechanics. Conway and Kochen's proof argues that these efforts will be fruitless — unless one is willing to give up human free will, in a very strong sense. The article quotes Conway: "We can really prove that there's no algorithm, no way that the particle can give an answer that is unique and can be specified ahead of time. I'm still amazed that we can actually manage to prove that."
I've now fulfilled my destiny.
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
I _knew_ you were going to ask that question.
You are just so predictable.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
(and then getting yourself killed at the next zebra crossing)
You know, for years I thought Douglas Adams was talking about actual animals when he wrote that. Then, not so long ago, I stumbled upon the wikipedia entry about the term for what I always called a "crosswalk".
I think my version was funnier.
What does the blue pill taste like? Steak?
It kind of tastes like chicken. In fact, if you take the blue pill, everything tastes like chicken, and vice versa.
No, but it makes for an interesting LSD trip.
Making laws based on opinions that stem up from false informations leads to witch hunts.
That the anger and denial phases last longer than I thought. :)
Well that's their choice.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
Red Bull and mescaline, but that's not important right now.
This is the fallacy you refer to.
Wikipedia is very, very good on mathematics and logic.
Just hold on a sec......
There.
Now it isn't. The mathematics & logic portion of wikipedia is now, however, a very very good authority on Rick Astley's greatest hits.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
Or a very disturbing porno.
The world you experience is only a close approximation of reality.