Âé¶¹´«Ã½

Letter: Getting to the bottom of the quantum world (1)

Published 14 May 2025

From Bernd-Juergen Fischer, Berlin, Germany

You say there is no clear reason why the behaviour of subatomic particles can’t be governed by deterministic laws, and the fact that they aren’t demands an explanation(19 April, p 28).

Well, here is one: we are working our way down the chain of causality. This will either end or it won’t. If it doesn’t, then either the search keeps going on and on or causality becomes cyclic and causes may cause themselves. If, on the other hand, the chain of causality comes to an end, then what? The last part can’t have been caused, so it must have been brought about without rhyme or reason, which is a non-scientific way to say randomly. The fact we find only probabilities in quantum theory shows that, with quantum theory, we have come to the end of the chain.

Issue no. 3543 published 17 May 2025

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