I Just Want to Know What I’m Made Of
I have been in love with quantum theory since before I started my Ph.D. in the subject over 30 years ago. Suddenly, however, I feel like we should maybe take a break.
The trigger for this quantum of doubt was a new paper. There’s nothing particularly special about it; it’s just a proposal for an experiment that might tell us something more about how the universe works. But, to me, it felt like the final straw. It has opened my eyes to the possibility that, without radical change, quantum physics may forever let me down.
Essentially, I just want to know what I am made of. One hundred years ago this year, the Danish physicist Niels Bohr received the Nobel prize “for his services in the investigation of the structure of atoms.” But I’m still waiting for a straight answer as to what the structure of the atoms that make up my body is. Quantum theory seems to promise an answer that it can’t deliver, at least not in any way that I can comprehend. As Bohr once put it, “When it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry.”
We cover our ignorance with made-up stories known as “interpretations.”
Bohr is often fêted as the founding father of quantum theory and was one of the champions of its oddness. It’s true that quantum is both mysterious and attractive—as enigmatic as the Mona Lisa’s smile. However, there seems to.
