3 Answers

  1. As briefly and clearly as possible about quantum immortality.

    You walk down the street and a brick falls on your head. Here the universe is divided into two parts: in the first one you died, and in the second one you survived for one reason or another. You can only observe this when you are alive, so you end up in the second universe, where you survived. And so on and so forth. Bottom line: theoretically, you can't die. I.e. you are immortal.

  3. A long post awaits readers ahead. 🙂

    You should start from afar.

    To understand what quantum immortality is, you first need to understand the experiment called “Schrodinger's cat”. So, the cat is locked in a box, which in addition to it contains a small amount of radioactive substance, there is also a Geiger counter that records the level of radiation; a hammer is tied to this counter. Under the hammer is a flask with a dangerous chemical substance.

    The bottom line is that radioactive decay is a random process; it is not predicted, therefore, it will happen with a probability of 50/50 (the chances are equal). If the disintegration does happen, the Geiger counter will fix it, and he will release the hammer, which, in turn, will break the flask, and the cat will be gone. If the decay does not happen, the cat will survive.

    Since we're not sure if the Geiger counter went off or not, we don't know for sure if the cat died until we open the box and look inside. Until we look there, we ask ourselves the question ” what's wrong with the cat?”. It turns out that for us the cat is both alive and dead.

    This is a thought experiment that was invented by the Austrian theoretical physicist Erwin Schrodinger in 1935.

    And this is not just an experiment, but also one of the key points of quantum mechanics.

    Moving on. So, there are many different worlds: microcosm, macrocosm, and megamir.

    The macrocosm is our familiar world, it includes everything that surrounds us: the body, the house, the mug, the light bulb. Megamiru also includes stars, planets, solar systems, etc. But with the microcosm, everything is somewhat more complicated – it is a world of incredibly small objects, it can include molecules, atoms.

    In the macrocosm, everything can be explained by classical mechanics, that is, Newtonian laws work in it, but in the microcosm this does not happen; there the situation is different.

    So, a person sees how cars go, how planes fly, and humanity is used to thinking that everything happens everywhere according to the same laws, and if somewhere classical physics stops working, then this is already a mystery or beyond our understanding.

    Quantum mechanics is just trying to explain the processes that occur in the microcosm.

    In quantum mechanics, everything is in superposition. What does it mean? Let's imagine: we see a fork lying on the floor of a room. Imagine that the room is a quantum system, and the fork is not lying on the floor just like that, it is in a superposition, which means in several possible states at once: it lies in the right corner of the room, in the left, in the middle of the room, and so on.

    It is difficult for us to imagine that some things will be in two different places at the same time, but, as already noted, quantum mechanics has completely different rules.

    In the microcosm, instead of a fork, there are photons, electrons, and anything smaller than an atom, and they are in a state of superposition. As soon as we try to find out their single position, the superposition disappears, and we find only one book in the room, and not all possible ones.

    When we try to measure something in quantum mechanics, the superposition immediately disappears. The objects there are so small and sensitive that even the very fact that we are trying to measure them violates their rules.

    Suppose there is a billiard table that has billiard balls on it. One ball hits another ball, and we want to fix the trajectory. To do this, we take a camera and photograph the balloon. It will continue to roll, we will not harm it, since light and flash are photons. They hit a billiard ball, but the photons are very small, so the ball does not change its trajectory from this.

    Now let's imagine what happens if there are photons on the pool table that we want to register. We take the same camera, roughly speaking, shoot photons at photons, they collide, and since they are the same size, they are certainly the first to change their trajectory. This thought experiment shows that it is impossible to measure the microcosm without interfering with it, that is, observing the microcosm always changes it, and we no longer see the object itself, but what we have done with it.

    But what is “surveillance”? The standard definition of the word doesn't apply here; in quantum mechanics, “observation” is something else entirely.

    After all, when we look at (observe) the photon, we thereby change its trajectory, so we can assume that reality itself is unreal, but it is changed by us, as we look at it.

    We can draw this conclusion based on an experiment on two slits that are located next to each other. If we direct light through two slits, then photons behave like a wave – this is called “interference”, and this is completely illogical at first glance. As soon as we begin to register exactly which slit certain photons pass through, the interference disappears, and a completely logical and expected picture appears for our macrocosm, which we are used to observing. However, as soon as we remove the observation, something strange will happen, namely, interference that is legal for the microcosm will appear again.

    But in fact, the observation and measurement of objects in the microcosm is, in our opinion, not some reasonable intervention, but only a device that captures a photon or something else. This fixation will in any case affect a very small object in the microcosm. With his measurements, a person violates the quantum state of a photon.

    Why is one object in multiple states at once? This is a very important question, and scientists do not have a single answer to it. There are several interpretations of quantum mechanics, and it is necessary to talk about them before moving on to the topic of quantum immortality. However, it should be understood that these are just hypotheses.

    The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics was developed in 1927 by the Danish theoretical physicist Niels Bohr and the German theoretical physicist Werner Heisenberg. This interpretation states that objects in the microcosm are possible in two or more states. And at the very moment when we try to measure them, we choose one of the possibilities, and all the other possibilities disappear.

    This interpretation has both followers and opponents, but we will take a closer look at the multi-world interpretation.

    In 1957, the multi-world interpretation was voiced by the American physicist Hill Everett. Its essence is that when we measure something in the microcosm, the universe is divided into two or more, and we are in the one that happened to come across.

    Currently, this interpretation is held by many scientists. And it is the multi-world interpretation that will help us understand quantum immortality.

    To do this, recall the experiment with Schrodinger's cat. We don't know what's wrong with her until we open the box. Now, let's take a man and put him in a room, close the door; a gun is pointed at this person, which will either shoot or not-this is not known.

    If the Copenhagen interpretation is correct, then when the gun goes off, the person will simply die. However, if the multi-world interpretation is true, then with each pull of the trigger, the universe is divided into two: in one person dies, and in the other – survives.

    However, the paradox: imagine that no matter how much the gun is fired, the person survives. The whole point is that the experiment can only be observed in the world where a person has survived, and, therefore, he is immortal. He will never die, another similar person will die, only the subject will not be affected in any way.

    The experiment can only be considered successful by the subject in the room, because he constantly survives, but this happens only in his universe. In others, when scientists open the door, they will see a dead person.

    Summary of the above – a person survives whenever he is in danger, since the universe is divided into two different, but at the same time true: in one person is necessarily alive, in the other – dead. This is the essence of quantum immortality.

    P.S. The answer was compiled on the basis of the video channel “Utopia Show” on YouTube. A link to the video itself can be found below, in another comment. 🙂

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