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Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by hasenj on Sunday August 28, 2016 @08:44PM (#12379302)
If I understand correctly, there's currently no explanation of how one electron gets picked out of all the gazillions of electrons available; am I correct? Would that just be considered a fundamental randomness in nature?
Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by ars on Sunday August 28, 2016 @09:21PM (#12379415)
I don't understand your question, can you rephrase?

In the experiment here they fire one electron at a time, so you don't have to pick one electron. Rather the final location of that electron is what's random.

Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by hasenj on Monday August 29, 2016 @02:48AM (#12380421)
When you fire a photon on a wall and see a blip, the blip is the location of the atom that had the electron that absorbed the photons energy (The electron that interacted with the photon).

Presumably there are gazillion photons. Presumably they all want that photons energy. Presumably the photon is stretched out in space so it sort of "touches" all of them. Yet, only that one electron got lucky.

Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by srtjstjsj on Sunday August 28, 2016 @10:50PM (#12379689)
That's the question: how is the location picked?

You roll a fair die, 1-6. It lands on 4 this time. Why 4, and not 5? How was the 4 chosen? In classical mechanics, it's a horrendously complicated but fundamentally simple computation. In QM, no one knows.

Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by atemerev on Monday August 29, 2016 @03:44AM (#12380597)
Why the need for full determinism? Unlike Einstein, I have no problem with God playing dice; this allows for free will, among other things (randomness is in the [computational] eye of the beholder).
Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by kawa on Monday August 29, 2016 @04:59AM (#12380798)
Why allows it for free will?

Consider those two situations:

A: You know everything and decide about something based on all the facts known to you

B: You know everything and decide about something based on all the facts known to you plus the result of a random generator

Why is B more "free will" than A? In B there is simply another fact which is beyond your control which modifies your decision. That doesn't makes your decision more free than A, you simply have an additional "input" to consider.

One may argue that B is more free than A because in principle another person with the same knowledge as you would know what's your decision is in A but won't know it in B because of the influence of the random generator. But that doesn't makes B more "free", it only makes it a bit more unpredictable. But in reality it's impossible to always know all facts leading to the decision in A so both have similar unpredictability.

In fact I would consider only A as real "free will" because even if your decision is only determined by (external) facts, it's still all your reasoning based on your beliefs, experiences etc while in B there is a determining factor outside your reasoning you depend on which makes your decision less free (because you may have to decide for a sub-optimal outcome because you're forced by the random generator to do so).

Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by DavidPlumpton on Monday August 29, 2016 @05:49AM (#12380938)
The Many Worlds Interpretation plus Sleeping Beauty can directly explain this.
Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by dogma1138 on Monday August 29, 2016 @03:17AM (#12380517)
Pilot wave theory :)
Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by hasenj on Monday August 29, 2016 @11:50AM (#12382700)
Isn't that theory rooted in the particles view of the universe? It's totally at odds with this paper, it seems to me. Is it not?
Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by naasking on Monday August 29, 2016 @08:09AM (#12381326)
aka Bohmian mechanics, aka the de Broglie-Bohm interpretation of QM. It definitely doesn't get enough serious attention IMO.
Re:There are no particles, there are only fields (2012) by dogma1138 on Monday August 29, 2016 @08:36AM (#12381419)
It's been getting more and more attention especially since many recent QM simulation experiments kinda show that pilot waves are a real phenomena.