James Bond Taught Me Physics

Today, I finally understood the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, thanks to Daniel Craig in the play Copenhagen.

Five years ago, I took Chem 111 at BYU and was introduced to the uncertainty principle - basically, you can't simultaneously know a particle's position and momentum.  It was explained to me multiple times.  I just didn't get it, and decided to just accept the fact without exactly understanding it.  After all, quantum physics isn't supposed to make any sense, right?  Especially not to a freshman in college who is not a physics major and sucked at math until she got it.

For those of you who don't know me ... I rock at math.  I love it.  I tutored it.  I like math until you hit calculus.  Calculus is awesome, but I have a hard time integrating - not knowing what the answer is supposed to look like.  And then physics is all calculus, and I can listen to people talk about it, but if you ask me to actually do physics and I'll probably start crying while doing the homework.  Freshman year, this really awesome guy named Ben (physics major) helped me with my calculus homework.  I loved him.  He was a genius.

ANYWHO.

BACK TO THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE.

I never got it until my Dad was watching that Copenhagen show (recommended by my mom's dad), and James Bond (I mean Heisenberg ... I mean Daniel Craig ...) was walking around the city at night illustrating random physics concepts.  He said something along the lines of, "I was thinking about what it would be like if someone were observing me with a telescope ... you don't see me, and then I walk past a street light and you can ... then I go back into the darkness and I'm unobservable."

And suddenly, I got it.  You're trying to observe just him, but there's also the light you need to observe him, and now you're messing everything up because you've got extra stuff in there ... and somehow, that particular illustration is all I needed to get it.  And Schrodinger makes more sense now.  I thought I got it before, but now I get it again.  Check.  And my brain just exploded.  I'm so happy!!

Now, I don't care whether or not you understand the uncertainty principle, or know what it is, or whether it made sense to you from the get-go (you darn genius, I hate you!), or even care about it, but I'm feeling really proud of myself.  It's been five years and this concept has been bugging me.  I guess physics is supposed to bug you, huh?

Okay.  I'm a nerd.  I'll go back into my room now. =p