Saturday, September 19, 2009

The Quantum Mechanics of LOST

Quantum mechanics, and to a certain point LOST, suggests the existence of a world independent of the observer. It is a theory which is excellent in telling us everything about what we observe, but it meets with serious difficulties in telling us what really is going on (and Jack and Kate and John and Ben seldom talk to each other in plain text about their adventures). This is called the measurement problem. It lead to the developement of Collapse Theories. Because measurements have outcomes… Collapse Theories were needed to close the circle in the precise sense defined by Abner Shimony. Shimony developed the CHSH inequality, in reaction to Bell's theorem, to distinguish between the entanglement hypothesis of quantum mechanics and local hidden variable theories. [I came up with the idea that the time difference between the launch and arrival of Daniels payload rocket resulted from the reason that the Island is located in it's own bubble universe, which could be pierced from certain directions. The freighter satphones could only talk to each other, which led to my assumption that they were quantum-entangled. So they were able to talk from one universe to the next. Just wild guesses]. Bell's Theorem is a Local Realistic Theoriy, and as such incompatible with QM. Dozens of experiments performed so far have favored Quantum Mechanics, but not decisively because of the detection loophole or the communication loophole. That is one loophole too many to be a more coincidence.

So what happened after Desmond turned the failsafe key, where did the Swan disappear to (another universe?), and why did it blew off his underwear? My guess is that Desmond is special, as stated by Faraday, because he turned himself into the Observer. That is the reason for his dreamlike encounter with Faradays mother. The whole outcome of the final season can hinge on Desmond, because his brain is collapsing the timelines and fuse it to the final one, with which LOST will end. The question remaining is, what force snatched Jack and company out of Ajira 316 and hurled them back to 1977? The universe, course correcting itself, by providing the means to collapse into the most propable timeline?

4 comments:

  1. While the quantum mechanics explanation is a bit too heady for me, your question "Where did the Swan disappear to?" is interesting, in that it foreshadows the moving of the island.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Well, good questions. And you've given me some new scientific subjects to study.

    Perhaps if the island moved when the failsafe "blew", the Swan is still out there in the ocean where the island left it, after it moved? Well, it would be at the bottom of the ocean now I suppose.

    Also, is Des the observer outside of Schroedinger's Cat Box?

    ReplyDelete
  3. "Bell's Theorem is a Local Realistic Theoriy, and as such incompatible with QM."

    I'm afraid this is not true. The world is non-local, and has been proven as such by several physical, experiments, most notably Alain Aspect's experiment. Bell's Theorem basically proves that if QM is true, then the universe is non-local. That's been proven, hard---which is why they call it a theorem, not a theory.

    Great blog!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Well, we agree on this quantum mecanics thing as you noticed. :)
    There are just too many hints (box of Schrödinger, paralell realities, etc...). I don't know if the writers went any deeper than that, which is already pretty deep, but the inspiration is clearly there.

    Thanks for the link to your blog. I will have a closer look.

    Nathalie aka Mirabelle

    http://www.leblogdelamirabelle.net/category/46/47/lostj-j-abrams/

    ReplyDelete