Bell’s Theorem

If I am to understand Bell’s theorem correctly, then I must suppose that if we are running a Stern-Gerlach experiment on entangled pairs of electrons and I measure one with spin up then I can be assured that if you measure its entangled partner its spin will be down against a given magnetic field direction. However, I cannot therefore do any physics or build any device that depends on that outcome if only I make a measurement. What does that even mean?

Pandemic question

After a year of masks and social distancing and lockdowns, the pandemic seems to be raging up over and over again with apparently more and more contagious mutations appearing. Could it be possible that what we’re really seeing is a consequence of a weakening in general of everybody’s immune system due to mask wearing? If we’re not exposed on a continual basis to pathogens our immune system lets down its guard so to speak.

Rainy November day thought on a sad anniversary

I’m hearing a lot of talk from even more and more Republicans these days about how Trump should man up and concede defeat and just quietly let the country move on and such. Suppose however, the election were tipped in the same way towards Trump, which it’s not unreasonable to imagine. It was after all a highly charged election with maximum support from both sides. Did not Hillary Clinton herself advise Joe Biden not to concede in such an eventuality? He has every right as well as the permission of Hillary Clinton to proceed with his challenges.

The last leaf

The last leaf. I feel more and more anymore like the last leaf. My infrastructure is disappearing. My web of lifelong connections is falling silent. I am becoming the last leaf.

https://poets.org/poem/last-leaf

I learned a couple of weeks ago that the drummer in one of our long ago bands has passed. The jarring thing is that he passed 6 years ago in 2014. Just a year or so ago I was thinking I should look him up and get together. Now I know that he was gone. He died in 2014, six years ago and I didn’t even know it. Friends, relatives, siblings, bandmates, classmates… one by one they drop. My world is shrinking. I am becoming the last leaf.

Thursday thoughts

I don’t trust the government, I don’t trust the news media, I don’t trust large corporations. Then who do I trust? I have to trust what I see, and I see a lot of people being nice to one another, just trying to get along with their daily routines as best they can.