Flat Earth?  Flat Heads, more Like.

Quantum physics has recently become trendy amongst non-physicists, driven by the distorted view of Hollywood. The last couple of years has seen a slew of movies based on the Marvel character ‘Antman’ who has the ability, within a special suit, to shrink by dramatic proportions - actually, sub-atom sized as it turns out. While this might be entertaining, there is a growing number of people who start to have a distorted view of what the quantum world is because they think that this might actually be the case. Undoubtedly weird, the general consensus amongst scientists is despite what Marvel might try to convince us, the quantum world isn’t populated with very tiny people in their own universe.

Normally, physicists would shrug this off as simple light-hearted entertainment, and go about their day, but a number of studies and surveys point to the fact that a growing number of people are convinced of other nonsensical anti-physics notions. One of the largest of these, surpassed only by the belief that the moon-landings were faked, is that the Earth is flat. If people will disbelieve something that is so easily provable, then the existence of atom-sized people is going to go down a storm.

The problem with this is that as a greater number of people believe these things, the more it becomes accepted. And once the number of people who believe passes 50% it is, by definition, commonly-accepted knowledge. Once 51% of people are certain that a particular notion is right, then it becomes the norm, and anyone who doesn’t believe it is a crank. The tables get turned, and to the detriment of us all.

Now, I’m not suggesting that the number of flat-Earthers is nearing that number- a recent flat-Earth conference in the US was attended by the grand total of just 600 people - but it is thought that there are many more who are troubled by the notion of a spherical Earth. A 2022 survey of more than 8,000 American adults found that as many as one in six Americans are not certain the world is round, while a 2019 survey of more than 2,000 Brazilian adults found that 7% of people were ready to reject that concept. Worrying numbers indeed.

And the situation isn’t helped by the fact that some big names not only believe this, but are also ready to peddle it to anyone who cares to listen. the current list of planoterrestrialists - their own title - includes many sportspeople such as Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff, Rapper B.o.B, basketballer Shaquille O'Neal, ‘celebrity’ person Tila Tequila (who is apparently quite mad), and basketballer (I see a thread forming here) Kyrie Irving. Then there’s TV hostess Sherri Shepherd, musician Thomas Dolby, Wrestler A.J. Styles, and Daredevil Mike Hughes. Hughes wanted to build his own rocket and fly it to prove the theory, but backed out of the operation when engineers noted that he would have to be insane to fly his half-designed contraption. He took that - and a lack of funding - to call a halt to the project, though his ire still burns like a urinary-tract infection.

The only way to counter this rising tide of nonsense - for that is what we must do - is to pile on the sensical arguments and show the proof. And so this becomes the issue with quantum physics. If we’re not careful, more people will latch onto the patently false idea that the quantum world is populated by micro-people, and then we start to approach the 50% mark. But since we can’t observe it, it becomes more difficult to convince those people that they are misguided. The physics works to the greater extent, though is still work in progress, but we also need to bring philosophy in to assist us with our ideas and descriptions.

Physics philosophy is a subset of what Newton is attributed stating as being "Natural Philosophy," which arose as an academic discipline in the twentieth century, driven by a thriving international community of philosophers, physicists, and scientists.
Despite its importance in modern physics, there is no agreement among physicists or philosophers of physics on what, if anything, the empirical success of quantum theory tells us about the physical world. We must make assumptions to a higher extent since we cannot directly see quantum states. As a result, a collection of philosophical concerns known as "the interpretation of quantum mechanics" emerges.

This phrase should not lead us to believe that we are dealing with an uninterpreted mathematical formalism with no link to the physical world. Rather, there is a common operational core that consists of recipes for computing probability of outcomes of experiments done on systems that have been exposed to specific state preparation methods. Different "interpretations" of quantum mechanics differ in terms of what, if anything, is added to the common core. Hidden-variables theories and collapse theories, two of the key approaches, involve the creation of physical theories distinct from normal quantum mechanics, making the term "interpretation" even more incorrect. Well, you asked.

But what does all that actually mean? how can we help understand quantum physics with the help of philosophy? Well, let’s find out. over the next few months, we’ll be looking at some of the currently accepted cross-overs and how they impact both us as a race, us as scientists, and the overall notion of quantum physics.

The goal of this channel is to try and get a little more sense back in the world, but also to delve into how physics and philosophy are mutually interchangeable in a bit more of a light-hearted way. Hopefully, we’ll all learn something too.