Some notes on Chapter 7: Schrodinger’s Equation: The New Universal Law of Motion
Since discussing the nature of the wavefunction encounters the hard-to-believe quantum enigma head on, we review the earlier discussion of the scientific method. In particular, for this situation, if a theory’s many testable predictions are all confirmed by challenging experiments, you’re logically compelled to accept the theory as (tentatively) reliable science.
A bit of the basic idea of a mathematical function, e.g., f(x), might need tol be reviewed for some students. (We write and “respectfully nod” at the Schrodinger equation.) We emphasize that accepting this equation REDUCES the number of postulates in physics since it encompasses Newton’s equation of motion, Bohr’s and de Brroglie’s relations, etc.
Should not think of our “object” in the box pair as either a particle or a spread out thing (a “fog ball”). We try to get students to keep an open mind. In the boxes the object bounces back and forth (or is reflected back and forth) and therefore shoots out or leaks out when we open holes in the boxes.
A clearer way (than is in our book) to state the contradictory results we can demonstrate: “We can chooses to demonstrate that the object is wholly in a single box, or we can choose to demonstrate that the object is not wholly in a single box.”