Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> On 9/16/2011 9:49, Warp wrote:
> > Darren New<dne### [at] sanrrcom>  wrote:
> >> But at what point and for what reason wouldn't they apply?
> >
> >    For the same reason that if you kick footballs towards a wall with
> > two slits on it (slightly wider than the football), you don't get a
> > diffraction pattern on a wall behind it where the balls hit.

> Yes you do. It's just that the diffraction pattern is very, very fine. 
> Probably finer than you can actually measure. But theoretically it's there.

  The diffraction pattern isn't there even with elemental particles if you
measure which slit the particles go through.

  How do you set up a situation where it's not possible to tell which slit
the football went through? I don't think it's physically possible.

  You could perhaps try having the experiment in an absolute vacuum (something
which is already very hard), and in an environment with no electromagnetic
radiation of any kind, that could hit the ball and tell its trajectory
(maybe it would be theoretically possible, but I'm not sure it is in
practice). Also anything else that could hit the ball and hence possibly
tell its trajectory (eg. neutrinos and cosmic rays) would have to be
completely absent.

  In fact, thinking about it. would the ball and the walls themselves emit
photons that could tell the trajectory? Are they black body radiators?
I suppose that if that's the case, the ball and the walls would have to be
cooled to absolute zero to stop them from emitting any particles.

  So let's see, absolute vacuum, complete isolation from external
electromagnetic radiation and other particles (such as neutrinos and
cosmic rays), and the objects cooled to absolute zero to stop them from
emitting any particles.

  But is that enough? What about vacuum energy? Virtual particles that
pop up into existence spontaneously, hitting the ball? Could they be used
to measure its trajectory?

  Even if *all* of those things were somehow taken care of, would there
be an interference pattern?

  If yes, what explains the deviation in the trajectory of the ball?
One of the fundamental interactions (gravity, electromagnetism, strong
interaction, weak interaction)? How can they deviate the ball so much?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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