Backlog

Val has said she would post my blogs for me while I am visiting the People's "Republic" of China (I will tell you about some political discussion I have been having with the Chinese students here...but not until I get back to the States.  I promised mom and dad I won't (i) get killed or (ii) get arrested while in Beijing).  So many thanks to Val! And also, if any of the things I say are ridiculous or a little *too* self-deprecating, it must be something she inserted.  (I joke! I kid!) Elise smells like roast beef and mayonnaise.

Before I begin my chronicles of China, I owe a post to those of you who told me "Reading about all of your adventures in Scotland are fine and all, but what were you actually DOING there?"

Well, you asked for it, you got it. [insert maniacal laughter] You should know better than to ask an academic about her research!  [insert more maniacal laughter]

I was visiting Guido for three major reasons (the secret 4th reason being: "Visit Scotland? Heck. Yes.")

(1) to finish writing a joint paper forthcoming in _Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics_ about Heisenberg's treatment of hidden variables.  Basically when it was first realized that statistical elements were involved in quantum mechanics (1927/1928) Louis de Broglie and others (Einstein, too, and famously David Bohm in the 1950s) tried to develop theories that would account for quantum phenomena but did *not* use probabilities--i.e., fully determinate/complete interpretations of the theory.  The idea was that the quantum system to be measured would be considered to have the full set of values for each of the variables, and it's just that some of these variables are "hidden" --thus the *appearance* of probabilities.  Almost as soon as such deterministic or "complete" theories for QM were attempted, defenders of QM (namely Bohr, Born, Pauli and our boy Heisenberg) attempted to show how such "hidden variables" theories could never work.  These were called "no-go" arguments.  In the essay that I translated several years ago now (and which got me into this gig with Guido in the first place) Heisenberg gives his own version of a "no-go" argument that is (we argue) very different, and in fascinating ways, from the no-go arguments being given by von Neumann (the mathematical genius behind QM), Schrödinger, Pauli, and lots of others at the time.  So that's (in part) what that paper is about.  If you want to know (in full) what the paper is about, you'll have to wait a few months. 

(2) to continue work on our book.  We finally decided on a tentative name for the book (funny how writing grant proposals can force you into such things)-- it is this: _The 'Einstein Paradox': The Debate about Nonlocality and Incompleteness in 1935_. Snappy, eh? Basically it's about the aftershock of Einstein's famous paper of 1935 (The "EPR paper"--Einstein himself didn't actually write it, nor did he agree with the argument's presentation in the final version)--arguing that QM was an incomplete physical theory based on the fact that it had non-local characteristics (i.e. it seemed to entail what Einstein called "spooky action-at-a-distance").  Of course the physics community went nuts when the Great EINSTEIN criticized the Great Quantum Theory, and everybody started writing letters to each other, talking about the paradox presented in the EPR paper, and arguing for/against the completeness of quantum theory, etc. etc.  Erwin Schrdödinger was the instigator and recipient of much of this correspondence, and so what Guido and I are doing is translating all this unpublished/unseen stuff which we dug out of archives, and then writing a historical and philosophical analysis of it all.  And trust me, there's a lot of juicy meat in these letters.   

Anyway, since you can't really do a hist/philo analysis of stuff you haven't yet translated, that's what we're doing first.  And it is a looooong , pain-staking procedure that involves hours and hours for days and days of arguing, haggling, teasing the correct phrasing out of Heisenberg's nearly indecipherable handwriting, and fighting over the English word or phrase that most accurately captures each and every thought of his in the German.  I mean, literally, we spent the better part of two afternoons arguing about the best translation of the word "Zusammenhänge", depending on context. It's a bit like doing a crossword puzzle.  A bit. Actually not at all.  But it can be surprisingly rewarding...believe me or not, as you like.  

(3) We also spend some good time looking for, asking advice about and applying to some serious grants from the U.K.  We're talking ~quarter-mil pounds stirling over 2-3 years, including 1 year postdoc for me at Aberdeen.  Grant-writing is, on a scale from 0 to fun, at about a 1.3 (although I wrote the "first pass" of the proposal, which meant I got to come up with all the possible titles for our book.  Let me tell you, it was one beautiful, ridiculous list of titles.  THAT was fun.  The rest ....eh.  More towards the nil end of the Funness spectrum).

SO, does that answer most of your questions?  Hope so.  It is a very deeply "history and philosophy of science" type project.  My dissertation, on the other hand, will be solidly philosophy of science-- the particular aspect of quantum theory I will be studying-- decoherence-- has only been studied for the last 15 years, so not a lot of history there; but that's a topic for a whole 'nother... book.

Tomorrow I will begin to tell you about China.  There is so much to tell! Until then, enjoy these pictures from my visit yesterday to the White Pagoda-- one of the resting places of the Buddha's remains. In the last picture I attempted to nuzzle one of the most fearsome and noble creatures of Chinese lore. I can't believe they haven't kicked me out yet. Yea verily, America: I am doing my best to represent thy people fairly and accurately.

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