Practical application

01Jul09

Yesterday in the course of conversation, someone asked if I was familiar with Schroedinger’s cat.  I related what I understood of the principle, which is the idea that a cat placed in a box with a vial of poison has a 50/50% chance of being alive or dead, but that since the cat could not be 50% dead (unless it was hungover presumably, but that’s another experiment) you must proceed with the assumption that the cat is both 100% alive and 100% dead, at the same time.

I admitted that despite my familiarity with the concept, I don’t really understand where he was going with the idea.  But then later in the day someone reminded me of what it’s like to take a pregnancy test.

Filed under: horrible metaphors, science is romantic   |  2 Comments