REVOLUTIONARY or reckless? One of these terms will eventually be used to
describe the claim made by Humphrey Maris, a British physicist based in the US.
He contends that the electron, a fundamental particle, can be split in half
(see p 24).
His idea is even stranger than you might think because it鈥檚 not just the
electron鈥檚 integrity that鈥檚 at stake. Maris has calculated that the electron鈥檚
鈥渨ave function鈥� can be split. For eight decades, physicists have considered the
wave function as no more than a convenient mathematical tool for calculating the
behaviour of electrons and other players on the atomic stage.
But if it can be split, and stays split, the wave function must have physical
reality, says Maris. If he鈥檚 right, you and I aren鈥檛 just described by wave
functions, we鈥檙e made of them.
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Whether or not this claim is confirmed by experiment鈥攁nd we should get
the answer within a year or so鈥攖he fact remains that it is an enormous
surprise to everyone. Even leading quantum theorists, who are convinced that
Maris must be wrong, cannot find where his mistake lies.
All of which provokes an observation about quantum theory, which describes
the atomic world where the wave function plays its role. Some 80 years after its
birth, the theory is still throwing up surprises as fast as it ever did. Even if
Maris鈥檚 claim falls by the way, just look at the past decade. Physicists have
been stunned by quantum information theory, which has brought us quantum
computers, quantum cryptography and quantum teleportation.
American Nobel prizewinner Richard Feynman once said that although quantum
theory seemed weird and counterintuitive to its pioneers, there would come a
generation of physicists who would feel comfortable with it and cease to be
surprised by the things it threw up. What Feynman envisaged has patently not
come to pass. There is no sign that quantum theory will run out of novelty.
Why is this? Perhaps we were lulled into complacency by Newton鈥檚 physics,
which successfully explained the everyday world for 300 years. We assumed that
atoms and their constituents鈥攖he ultimate reality that underlies our
world鈥攚ould dance to the same tune as the world around us. Quantum theory
has taught us the stupidity, even arrogance, of that assumption. The ultimate
reality is extraordinarily different from the familiar reality of trees, people
and spiral galaxies.
The weirdness underlying nature was recognised by one of the founders of
quantum theory, Niels Bohr, who said of another physicist鈥檚 theory: 鈥淵our idea
is crazy. The question is: is it crazy enough to be true?鈥� Craziness, it seems,
has become the guiding light for modern physicists.
So all these years we have been asking the wrong question. It is not 鈥渨hy is
ultimate reality so different from the world of our senses?鈥�, but 鈥渨hy should it
be the same?鈥� And the answer is, no reason. No reason at all.
