The theory doesn't anthropomorphize the planet. The article describing the theory does, because that makes it more accessible and interesting to general readers.

Remember, not everyone is an emotionless nerd. Some of us like allegories.

So close... Rainbows End. It even points out the curious lack of an apostrophe in the book itself.

Unless you were talking about the album or the amusement park.

Yeah, I'm nitpicking. :-)

On something tangential: "mobile phones" versus "cell phones". Where I live, "mobile phone" is synonymous with the (less common) "cell phone" - this is a well known difference in language that's been around for a long while. Its interesting to see you use the two terms with different meanings, when I would still say both devices are "mobile" phones. Considering that what you call "mobile" phones will gradually supercede "cell" phones, do you suppose we are seeing the convergence of language, here?

I agree about Scott Ludlum (and, to be fair, I also agree with a number of Greens policies), I just wish the Greens would back a more definite (and left-leaning) free speech idealism rather than the half-hearted "it doesn't work, but if it did, we'd consider it" policy they have at the moment.

I don't hold much faith in the Greens in this area when they pull stunts like this: http://www.nointernetcensorship.com/node/54

The distinction between a religion and a cult, to my mind, isn't the quality of their beliefs-- we all believe utterly ridiculous things. (Do you actually believe in the *electron*? Or that we're all actually collections of waves? Quantum mechanics is as ridiculous as the virgin birth-- in fact, quantum mechanics ALLOWS for the virgin birth, since everything is possible (if highly improbable) in quantum mechanics).

The electron model and quantum mechanics both are predictive and thus testable, experimentally observed, and thoroughly verified to be accurate descriptions of reality. Suggesting that belief in them is "ridiculous" is, well, ridiculous. If something accurately describes reality, how can you distinguish it from reality?

You were right to be suspicious. Never seen a Minkowski diagram before? ;-)

Bacteria evolve. A bacterium doesn't.

I know you didn't start this, but I have to say:

2k10... 2k08...

What the hell? Are these supposed to be short for 2010 and 2008? What's the freaking point of writing them like that?

http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/2708730.htm

If you're lucky, this might work in your region.

Considering the issues of planned obsolescence, how is it that suppliers that lease remain profitable? I must be missing something, because I don't see how they can afford make it more cost effective for their customers to lease from them than to outright buy stuff.

I understand that the ratings system in the US is a voluntary industry system.

In Australia, the rating system is legislated and mandatory, by various agreements between State and Federal governments. Stores can (sometimes do) find themselves in legal trouble if they sell certain stock to people who aren't old enough.

I can't remember much specifics off the top of my head, but it's certainly true that there are restrictions on the sale of DVDs and other media based on their ratings, here.

"i want to now how a literal cat is supposed to be dead and alive (without regard for an observer)."

But what is reality without observation?

It won't work because we'd have "which path" information. You will only find superposition indirectly. No one has ever seen an object in two places (or states) at once. But the effects of an object existing in two states at once have been confirmed by thousands of experiments.

You claim to be in room C. You remember being in room C. We have videotape of you being in room C. Of course it's sensible that I believe you were in room C. You were never in a superposition, because we have measurements of you being in room C.

Now, if there was no way *at all* that anyone (not even you) could know what room you were in, *then* we would be in a regime where a superposition is possible. This situation is exactly analogous to the double-slit experiment, which I suggest you read up on. (Having not thought about it, though, I'm not sure how you'd perform the final measurement for your "room" experiment, but I'd be surprised if something couldn't be worked out.)

All said, your post indirectly touches on why the sort of thing the article is talking about is actually interesting. For very small things, like ions and photons, everything you describe about being in two positions simultaneously is absolutely true and confirmed experimentally. The kicker is that there's no fundamental principle that limits the size of what can be in a superposition. It's just that it's easier to do it with smaller objects, because it gets exponentially tricky to decouple the object from the outside environment, and erase any "which path" memory.

Really now, it's not like the iPhone is a closed black-box environment, for which no outsider can create software.

AFAICT, Apple demands that I register myself with them to access any development tools. I don't wish to do that. Thus, I am an outsider, and the iPhone appears as a closed black-box environment for which I cannot create software.

It's still about control.