Chapter 657: Incompleteness
Inside the royal palace of the Holy Heilz Empire…
Rudolf II also saw ‘Basics of Quantum Mechanics and the New Alchemy’ that the Congress of Magic did not keep confidential through his intelligence channels.
Ever since the ‘incident’ in the underground palace of the Sun King, he had been paying attention to the studies of the Congress of Magic and benefited a lot from it. Naturally, he wouldn’t let go of the paper which described the most fundamental law of the microscopic domain, even though it was merely an explanation so far. After all, as a knight caster, he did not have a cognitive world and was not scared of its collapse and destruction, but of course, the side effect was that the research products of the Congress of Magic could not improve him directly. He could only seek inspiration from them to figure out his own path.
“Absurd! Is the nature of the world a die? Determinism does not work, and all the initial statues cannot lead to a unique result? Many processes are irreversible?” However incomplete his memories were, Rudolf II believed in ‘determinism’ from the bottom of his heart. That was the essence of his experience and wisdom in the past. He couldn’t help but criticize it angrily.
However, as he read on, his face became rather interesting. Suddenly, his body was twisted and spread out, as if he existed everywhere.
The spreading cloud collapsed, and Rudolf II became normal. He talked to himself half in delight and half in confusion, “Quantum superposition?”
Although he had found a way to transform into such a state by studying the mysteries of the primeval devils and G.o.ds when he was still Thanos, he knew only the application but never knew what the state was and on which theory it was based. Therefore, his path entailed a lot of dangers, and one needed a bit of luck in order to succeed.
“Lucien Evans was inspired by the Pathway of Immortality, which allowed him to a.s.sociate the mysteries of demiG.o.ds with the mysteries of the microworld?” Rudolf II thought to himself. The paper was exactly what he was most desperate to know, but he was more or less anxious since it did not have any convincing proof or subsequent developments. “Is Lucien Evans keeping more information about the quantum superposition to himself, considering that it is about the demiG.o.ds after all?”
At this moment, the determinism in his head was already very dim, because his own status had suggested a lot of things. “It seems that determinism is a nature of the macroscopic world. By transforming oneself into the state of quantum superposition, one would be entering the microscopic domain and getting rid of determinism, thereby turning into a demiG.o.d who could return from the river of fate?”
He tried to understand Lucien’s paper according to his experience. In the end, he sighed and said, “I need more experiments and phenomena to prove it instead of believing it blindly, or it will be very troublesome if it is proven wrong later.”
…
Inside the Atomic Universe, Lucien was gazing at the vast starry sky out of the window. A thick pile of papers were placed on his desk, with words and symbols such as ‘power of mind?’, ‘power of faith?’ and ‘congregation of special electromagnetic waves?’.
They were the vague thoughts that he came up with after studying the fake G.o.ds.
Pinocchio’s voice suddenly echoed. “Master, Mr. Douglas and Mr. Fernando have come.”
Lucien was suddenly back to himself. Hiding the papers on his desk, he went out to greet the guests.
Fernando was still wearing his bright red magic robe. He asked loudly the moment they met, “The quantum superposition you described was inspired by the Pathway of Immortality and the status inside?”
They had obviously found the connection after they calmed down.
In Lucien’s papers, not only was the cloud of probabilities described, but he had also proposed the notion of quantum superposition and even explained certain experiments with it.
“It’s true that I was partly inspired by that.” Lucien admitted ‘frankly’.
While walking to the drawing room under Lucien’s lead, Douglas said, “But it’s a status close to the demiG.o.ds. How can a microscopic particle like the electron boast that? Simple a.n.a.logies and comparisons are inappropriate.”
He sounded as firm and determined as before. The mysteries of demiG.o.ds and immortality made him more considerate, but his beliefs could not be changed so easily. That was his understanding about the world throughout his life.
“When I processed the experiment data and considered the explanation of the wave function, I discovered that it would be easier to solve the problems after introducing the status, so I did it. It was merely a bold hypothesis, and what we should do next is to verify it with rigorous experiments.” Said Lucien gently.
Fernando nodded. “I checked my experiment record. Perhaps, the probabilistic explanation is one way to go, but probabilities and uncertainties shouldn’t be an intrinsic nature of the electron but are caused by external reasons. There must be a certain situation that leads to the electron’s uncertainties and probabilities. As a result, the quantum state is gone when the micro scope transitions to the macro scope. As long as we find the reasons, we will be able to transform and become demiG.o.ds with fewer flaws and insidious problems than Thanos and Viken did.”
The probabilistic explanation was obviously the best theory so far from the perspective of experimentalism. However, Fernando had reached a conclusion from the cla.s.sic law of causality. Now that the result of probabilities and uncertainties had appeared, there must’ve been a reason that caused it.
“Up until now, no signs have indicated that. They can only be described as the intrinsic nature of the electron.” Lucien said gently but persistently, “Or rather, in our current studies, there are still experiments that support external reasons. Do not multiply ent.i.ties without necessity.”
Fernando glared at him, unable to understand his doggedness. “We can boldly a.s.sume a theory that includes a broader range, before we verify it carefully. Have you even forgotten that? How are you going to explain the differences between the micro scope and the macro scope? How can you describe the transition? How can you explain the collapse of the wave function?”
“Also, I have my own ideas about uncertainties, and I’ve devised a thought experiment to falsify it.” Douglas suddenly interjected when he listened to their debate. Then, he took out paper and a pen, drawing a picture to ill.u.s.trate his experiment where an indirect approach was adopted to calculate an electron’s momentum while determining its location.
Fernando had obviously seen the experiment before. He looked at Lucien attentively and intimidatingly, waiting for his answer.
Lucien picked up the paper and considered. It was slightly different from the cla.s.sic examples in his spirit library, but the mechanism was more or less the same. After reading carefully for a while, he said, “Mr. President, the change of ma.s.s will result in other changes in the gravitational field. You didn’t take that factor into consideration…”
Douglas and Fernando had been looking at Lucien. After hearing that, they focused their eyes on the paper.
After a long time, Douglas finally said, somewhat bitterly, “I’ve forgotten the general theory of relativity that I’ve been studying recently.”
After that, his bitterness was gone, and he said as firmly as before, “I still believe that your quantum mechanics is incomplete. At the very least, you haven’t considered how the microworld can be transitioned to the macroscopic scale. Perhaps, that’s the mysteries of demiG.o.ds and immortality.”
The conclusion was obvious. There must be an internal reason why the bizarre phenomena of the microworld were not reflected to the macroscopic domain.”
Holding back his temper, Fernando spoke in a low voice, “I’ll propose a hypothesis to explain the collapse of the wave function…”
The experiment result and the Pathway of Immortality reduced their resistance against the probabilistic explanation and the wave-particle duality. Instead, they began to look for the incompleteness in Lucien’s theory and hope to explain everything from a higher level.
After their conversation, Douglas and Fernando both left. One of them was tall and at ease, and the other was short and hasty, but they seemed equally relentless.
Natasha walked into the drawing room and sighed. “Mr. President and Mr. Fernando are truly persistent, or even obstinate, one might say…”
“Not exactly obstinate. Perhaps, they are persisting in the truth…” Remarked Lucien with mixed feelings, which confused Natasha.
Because of the report on the Pathway of Immortality, Brook, Hathaway and Oliver slighted changed their att.i.tude and were less rejective about the quantum superposition and the cloud of probabilities. Instead, they began to try to prove the incompleteness of Lucien’s current theory, and that the world would be in serious trouble if Lucien’s explanation worked!
…
Over the past year, Annick and Sprint had often been to the library to read the recently submitted papers that were not published yet. Their arcana expertise had been soaring, and they had what it took to partic.i.p.ate in the cutting-edge studies now. Reading the papers was no pressure for them, provided that they were not as complicated as the general theory of relativity or matrix mechanics.
When they read the papers, they always checked if their teacher had any new product of research. This time, they found ‘Basics of Quantum Mechanics and the New Alchemy’ as they wished. So, they began to read it on their way back to the inst.i.tution.
Annick tripped over a box in the corridor, forgetting to cast his spell, but he still held the paper tightly, with his eyes fixed on it.
“A probabilistic explanation… The uncertainty principle…” He kept mumbling similar words, and so did Sprint, who showed no intention of helping Annick to be back on his feet.
Hearing the noise, Heidi walked out of the inst.i.tution, only to see them standing and lying like statues. She was stunned. “Are you some sort of performance artist now?”
Because of the economic development, the pace of society had been hastened. Many bards had adapted the light music into popular music that could be sung and spread more easily. As a result, a bunch of peculiar artists had emerged in Rentato. Lucien had nicknamed them ‘performance artists’.
“Cloud of probabilities… Quantum superposition…” The two of them simply ignored Heidi.
Heidi frowned and robbed Sprint of his paper, starting to read it herself. It didn’t take long before she also became a statue.
Then, the same change happened to Katrina, Layria, Ch.e.l.ly, Lowi, Blake and Alfalia. It was not until a long time later that Heidi finally took a long breath and said, “According to our teacher, the microworld is more weird than magic and more unbelievable than imagination… Have we entered the age of fantasies?”
“However, I think it explains the current experiments very well. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t use it from the perspective of pragmatism.” Sprint expressed his opinion.
Katrina also nodded. “Our teacher’s theoretical explanation is basically self-consistent. Determinism only works in the macroscopic world…”
They were as good as senior-rank arcanists in the fields of new alchemy and quantum mechanics. Also, having been lectured by Lucien for a long time, they focused more on experiment results and were less bound by the previous experience and theories.
Annick rose to his feet. “I think that our teacher’s theory explains the wonders of the microworld, but I also believe that such wonders must have their own fundamental reasons.”
With their dissemination, Lucien’s paper had been learnt by most people before the new year. Therefore, while Onore, Clark and the other students of the Holt Magic College cried that the textbook of new alchemy had to be rectified again and that the three papers were so deeply perplexing and unacceptable, they did feel that their hearts were trembling violently.
“If the theory is proven by any experiment… so many people wouldn’t make any progress for the rest of their life, if their heads are still intact above their neck at all…”