The Audio Sensory Guide to Schroedinger's Cat

By William E. Lutz

Drawing upon some of the author’s experiences, The Audio Sensory Guide to Schroedinger’s Cat is a collection of essays and ruminations linked together by the notion that life is for living. The Audio Sensory Guide does not delve into the details of quantum physics; in fact, aside from the book title and a brief one page introduction, no other mention of quantum physics is made in the book. Drawing upon real events and direct experiences, The Audio Sensory Guide to Schroedinger’s Cat reflects on the commonality between theoretical notions of modern quantum physics and the importance of music in our daily lives (The Audio Sensory Guide also comes with suggested soundtracks to listen to while reading the various essays). like the theoretical notion of Schroedinger’s Cat, we’re all held in our respective boxes and often the only thing we can do is listen to the soundtrack of lives as we must constantly ask ourselves: are we living, or are we dead - and what the hell are we doing about it?

• Language: English
• Publisher: William E. Lutz
• Release date: Aug 22, 2012
• ISBN: 9780983359814

William E. Lutz

William E. Lutz possesses a Project Management Professional (PMP) certification from Rutgers School of Business, along with a Master's in Public Administration as well as an A+ from CompTIA and a Geomatics certification (GIS) from Cook College, Rutgers University. Among other talents, Mr. Lutz is a writer with a strong technical background, having worked with such entities as Verisign, A.M. Best and a host of others ranging on issues from telecommunications (future trends) as well as AES (American Encryption Standard) development along with analysis of social trends. Some of his technology and social trend analysis can be found at his "Shockwaverider Blog" at http://shockwaveriderblog.wordpress.com. If you’re looking for a consummate and skilled professional in the realm of technical writing, grants / proposal, non-profit management and records management services, along with website design and development, check out: http://www.welassociates.co Mr. Lutz is also an author of several books which can also be found on Barnes and Nobles and Amazon (click on the "Published Books" link above). Mr. Lutz's work profile inclusive of extensive professional references, skills, projects and works completed can be viewed here: http://www.linkedin.com/in/williamelutz. Some of his work samples can also be found here: http://www.scribd.com/welutz. Mr. Lutz is also available for public / conference speaking, instructional services (including webinars), whether in person or via Skype.

Book preview

THE AUDIO SENSORY GUIDE TO SCHROEDINGER’S CAT

William Lutz

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Published by:

William Lutz at Smashwords

Copyright (c) 2012 by William Lutz

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All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

Smashwords Edition Licence Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy.

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Above all, for my children, Flora and Cora

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To my friends and family who stood by - and continue to stand by - during one of the hardest times of my life

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In memory of Dr. Barbara Flood; one of the most fearless people who ever existed.

And for my grandfather; hopefully, I’ve kept the promises you held me to as you laid dying.

The world doesn’t want you to do a damn thing. If you wait for the time to do something, you’ll never do it. Cause there ain’t no time; world don’t want you to do that. World wants you to go to the zoo and eat cotton candy, preferably seven days a week."

- Harry Crews

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My center is giving way, my right is in retreat; situation excellent: I am attacking.

- French Army Marshal Ferdinand Foch, Message to Marshal Joseph Jeffre during the First Battle of the Marne, September 8th, 1914

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Fuck what they tell you about your future; it’s your’s and not theirs. If you don’t live it, somebody else will have at it - and chances are, you’re going to wind up not liking any of it, so don’t ever let anyone tell you about your future ‘cause they got nothing to say.

- The Skull

This is a work of non-fiction; very minimal embellishments were added. It’s designed to be a quick read. Given everyone’s short attention span nowadays, this is probably the best way to go.

Names and certain details have been changed within this work to protect the innocent - and to keep me from being sued.

This is the second published work by the author; the first was The Shark Tank and can be found at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/41457.

The title and idea for this work was conceived nearly thirty years ago during my college years. Like everything else, my life is still a work in progress.

Contents

Introduction

Learning To Fly: Taking Off

My First Job: Selling Magnetic Levitation Trains for a Moon Base

The Junior Achievement Robber Barons

75 Cases of Soda and Other Assorted Felonies

A Thousand and One Invoices

Death and Ghosts

The Hamburger Generals

My Dinner with Paul Hackett

Welcome to the Bong Recreational Center

Learning To Fly: The Departure

Introduction

Life is about attitude and seeing things as they truly are without the garbage in the way; maybe that’s why I’ve always been attracted to quantum physics.

Quantum physics poses many questions, not the least of which are it’s inquiries into the very nature of existence. A big part of quantum physics is creating thought experiments laying out how things work - and there’s nothing wrong with that; sometimes, thinking about the very nature of existence can be pretty cool, if not fun.

Among other notions, quantum physics suggests continuity is an illusion: what appears solid often consists of a series of discrete events. A drawn line is not really a line, for when you look at it really REALLY closely (preferably with a microscope), it’s actually a series of fine dots making it seem like a solid line; this is no different then the multitude of the moments of our lives creating a seemingly solid whole life.

Another popular notion within the realm of quantum physics is that of Schroedinger’s Cat. Erwin Schroedinger was a noted physicist who posed the following notion:

Place a cat in a box with a hammer on one corner ready to smash a vial of poison, and a bit of radioactive material on the opposite corner of the box. The hammer is triggered to go off should a particle of radioactive material hit the hammer, thereby causing it to fall down on the vial of poison which then kills the cat. Seal the box up with cat, hammer, material and all. You can’t hear what’s going on, you can’t see what’s going on.

Now ask yourself the question: is the cat dead or alive?

What’s the point of all this other than to talk about drawing lines, ticking off the animal rights activists and question the sanity of people who sit around all day thinking up this stuff?

Consider:

We all exist in a box of our own creation based on our beliefs and notions, facing situations beyond our control, held hostage to an unknown fate. You are made up of a multitude of discrete moments; how you draw the lines of your life is entirely up to you. Life feels like we’re living through a film or a book; sometimes the only choice we ultimately have any control over is our choice of soundtrack. Within our respective boxes the only thing you can do is determine what you’re going to do while you’re in your box - and what figure out what music you’ll listen to while you’re doing it. Make each moment worthwhile; draw a life worth remembering and sharing with others. Put together a good soundtrack and turn up the volume REALLY LOUD.

And do it now before the hammer comes down on you.

Learning to Fly

The story is told from the book of time; out of the blue.

The story is old and I know it by heart;

and if you chose, I will tell it forever.

- Ring, Into the Blue

Located on I-94 somewhere between Chicago and Milwaukee was a very large brightly lit and prominent sign which said University of Lawnsonomy. Don’t bother checking; it’s not there anymore (and aside from an old A&W root beer road side stop and several firework stands, there really isn’t much of anything out that way).

The sign was located in the middle of a farm field, with no visible buildings nearby. There was no presence of a university anywhere nearby. For years, it stood there, well-lit at night; noticeable in the day. During the wintertime, it was cleared of snow for all to see while during the fall, the leaves were always removed.

Everybody I asked had no idea what the place was about; everybody knew about the sign, but nobody never bothered to check it out - that is, until one day, my school buddy The Skull and I decided to see for ourselves what this place was about.

We exited off I-94 onto County Road C and took the Frontage Road toward what we assumed would be the entrance to the University. As we approached the sign, there stood only a small, barely used dirt road. No broad avenue, no gates - nothing to indicate that this was indeed some sort of established learning establishment.

We travelled down the dirt road and eventually, as we rounded up and over a small hill, we approached a run down farmhouse; next to the dilapidated farmhouse stood a very large hangar of sorts, where a collection of planes stood about.

The planes were of the old ones: biplanes, the types once flown during World War I.

It was a beautiful day; mid summer, a hot lazy day, with a light breeze, sunny and not a cloud in the sky.

As we approached the end of the driveway, a man came out of the house, seemingly walking, but upon closer look, he was clearly staggering. Wearing only a t-shirt and a pair of blue jeans with severely beat shoes, he placed in his back pocket what appeared to be a small bottle.

As we pulled up, he shouted to us: Good morning! Welcome to the University of Lawnsonomy! He then gestured us into the farmhouse where, upon entering, we discovered that the entire first floor was a museum of sorts: an amazing array of old faded photographs, maps, etching and drawings filling the walls; dusty old glass cases with what were clearly handmade models covered in dust and mold - models of planes from a much earlier time.

You had to enter through the kitchen to get into the museum.

The museum was dedicated to the work of one Alfred William Lawson, a man who is credited as the inventor of the modern passenger airline (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Lawson). Among other things, Lawson also believed in a number of other tenets, ideas and beliefs that, frankly, were simply out in left field (an apt description for a former baseball player, for Lawson not only invented the passenger plane, but was also a professional baseball player).

Lawson was also a loon.

Crazy or not, this was the man who invented the notion of putting a bunch of people onto a single plane and having them pay for the privilege of flying back at a time when flying was strictly for the military or for the adventurous - and when you think about it, that’s how it is with some folks: you gotta be a little loony to come up with ideas that must folks wouldn’t even consider. Thinking back on that time - the 1920’s - the very idea of flying in a plane was a dangerous endeavor; imagine trying (back then) to convince people that flying with a bunch of total strangers in some unheated and noisy contraption was a great way to travel?

One man’s madness often becomes everyone else’s normal.

It was strange, standing there in the farmhouse, looking about to see the remains of a man’s work: now largely forgotten, his impact still greatly experienced everyday by hundreds of thousands - Lawson’s invention of a passenger plane taken literally on a worldwide impact: the passenger plane. Standing there in this quiet, off the highway in some isolated back water Wisconsin farmhouse hours from Chicago, it made for a reflective moment - at which time the Caretaker, (the man in the T-shirt) then made an interesting suggestion: Hey, you guys want to take Jenny up for a ride?

Sure, I said; why not? Who the hell is Jenny? Now what? I wasn’t sure if he was talking about his sister - like, how many teeth does she still have?

Not a who - but a what.

I guess that’s good, murmured The Skull; no telling what would happen if we’d wind up insulting any sister he might’ve had.

The Jenny is a broad winged span bi-plane intended for training; it’s an easy plane (relatively speaking) to learn to fly for it is slow, easy to handle and somewhat reliable. The Jenny was well known and used by many returning wartime (World War I) pilots who, facing the (previous) Great Depression and lack of jobs, turned to conducting ‘wing walking’ and daredevil stunts - with some literally walking on the wings of the plane while in flight to a host of crowds below watching the planes fly. I recall my great grandfather telling me stories of seeing these guys in action (as a young boy it made me sad how it was that these returning war veterans came home from the war and were reduced to acting as aerial stuntmen to make ends meet, but then again, you gotta eat so one does what they can do to get food).

As to the Jenny, well, there are a number of considerations one (I learned) has to take in mind. First of all, when