Schrödinger's cat in popular culture

Schrödinger's cat is a thought experiment, usually described as a paradox, devised by Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger in 1935. It illustrates what he saw as the problem of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics applied to everyday objects. The thought experiment presents a cat that might be alive or dead, depending on an earlier random event. In the course of developing this experiment, he coined the term Verschränkung (entanglement).[1]

Literature

This artwork by F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, originally published in Analog magazine, illustrates MacIntyre's science-fiction story "Schrödinger's Cat-Sitter". The cat occupies a quantum superposition relative to the tined object, being simultaneously in front of and behind the object, which itself occupies a quantum superposition because it is simultaneously a square-edged object with two tines and a round-edged object with three tines.

It was not long before science-fiction writers picked up this evocative concept, often using it in a humorous vein.[2] Several have taken the thought experiment a step further, pointing out extra complications that could arise should the experiment actually be performed. For example, in his novel American Gods, Neil Gaiman has a character observe, "if they don't ever open the box to feed it, it'll eventually just be two different kinds of dead." Likewise, Terry Pratchett's Lords and Ladies adds the issue of a third possible state, in the case of Greebo, "Bloody Furious". (In Pratchett's later novel The Last Hero, Death attempts the experiment himself, but cannot understand the mechanics of it, wondering if it implies that he will kill the cat just by looking at it.) In Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green and David Levithan, the Cat makes an appearance as an analogy for Will and Jane's relationship.

Robert Anton Wilson wrote a trilogy of novels dealing with themes related to quantum mechanics, collectively known as the Schrödinger's Cat trilogy.

Douglas Adams describes an attempt to enact the experiment in Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency. By using clairvoyance to see inside the box, it was found that the cat was neither alive nor dead, but missing, and Dirk's services were employed in order to recover it, Dirk deducing that the cat had simply grown tired of being subjected to the experiment and wandered off (Although he admits later on that he was actually using the experiment as an attempt to determine the mental state of his friend Richard Macduff, Richard's logical arguments about why the experiment was pointless confirming that he was mentally stable).

In Libba Bray's book Going Bovine, three stoners argue whether the cat is alive or dead, or whether the person who opens the box creates the possibilities. There are constant references to a band called Copenhagen Interpretation, who disappear into thin air in the middle of a benefit concert.

In Adam Felber's comic first novel, "Schrödinger's Ball" (2006), Dr. Erwin Schrödinger is a character, and there is much exploration of quantum mechanics.

In "Schrödinger's Cat-Sitter" by F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre (published in Analog magazine, July/August 2001), a time-traveler named Smedley Faversham visits the past to interview Erwin Schrödinger but gets tricked into taking care of Schrödinger's wife's cat while she is away and Schrödinger is visiting Max Planck. In attempting to take care of the cat, Faversham inadvertently locks it in a cabinet with a Geiger counter, a vial of acid, and a hammer, unintentionally enacting Schrödinger's thought experiment, but with results that remain as uncertain as in the original case.

The title character (though not a main character) of Robert A. Heinlein's "The Cat Who Walks Through Walls", a kitten named Pixel, is of indeterminate existence, and as such, has the ability to turn up in places that are specifically sealed to outside access. When this ability is questioned, the answer is "He's Schrödinger's cat", leading to the response, "Then Schrödinger had better come get him."

In Glynne MacLean's 2009 short story Viennese Meow Schrödinger's cat tells his version of the famous thought experiment.[3]

In the S.M. Stirling "T2" novel trilogy, John Connor mentally compares his, Skynet's technology and ultimately everyone's existence to the Schröedinger principle of entropy.

In the Hellsing manga series by Kouta Hirano, one of the depicted Nazis is an artificial catboy named Schrödinger. He claims that he is everywhere and nowhere at the same time, which is similar to the cat being alive and dead at the same time.[4] It is also said that he can only exist as long as he is aware of himself. In the second anime adaption, he eventually allows himself to be absorbed by the vampire Alucard, which causes his awareness to be clouded. This then spreads to Alucard, who vanishes for thirty years. Alucard returns after destroying the millions of souls within himself, giving him access to all of Schrödinger's abilities.

On a somewhat more serious level, Ian Stewart's novel Flatterland, (a sequel to Flatland) attempts to explain many concepts in modern mathematics and physics through the device of having a young female Flatlander explore other parts of the "Mathiverse". Schrödinger's Cat is just one of the many strange Mathiverse denizens she and her guide meet; the cat is still uncertain whether it is alive or dead, long after it left the box. Her guide, the Space Hopper, reassures the Cat with a modern view of quantum decoherence. Ursula K. Le Guin wrote a story entitled "Schrödinger's Cat" in 1974 (reprinted in The Compass Rose, published in 1982), which also deals with decoherence. Greg Egan's novel Quarantine, billed as "a story of quantum catastrophe", features an alternative solution to the paradox: in Egan's version of quantum mechanics, the wave function does not collapse naturally. Only certain living things—human beings among them—collapse the wave function of things they observe. Humans are therefore highly dangerous to other lifeforms which require the full diversity of uncollapsed wavefunctions to survive.

In the 2003 novel, Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre, the concept is discussed by the Vernon and Jesus characters. It is erroneously attributed by Jesus to the German philosopher Immanuel Kant.

Also, in the young adult novel Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by authors John Green and David Levithan, one of the main characters is perplexed by the concept of Schrödinger's Cat, and references it throughout the book.

In the play Schrodinger's Girlfriend, the future Nobel Prize winner finds himself falling under the spell of cabaret singer and seductress Hansi Haas, who has already had her way with Einstein, Planck and Bohr. As he wrestles with his love and the problems of wave theory, Hass throws him over for Paul Dirac, revealing a truth that holds for both love and quantum physics: "if you never ask the question, the answer can still be yes." (Review of play at Playbill [5][6])

This artwork by ADA+Neagoe, originally published in Omagiu magazine.

In MacSchrödinger's Cat a 2010 novel by James Conor O'Brien set in a multi-verse romp across the universes centring on Venice in search of a missing scientific experiment concerning a trans-dimensional cat, Janis Joplin as God, and a panoply of caricatures of physics and physicists ranging from James Clerk Maxwell, Erwin Schrödinger to String Theory, the Big Bang and infinitely annoyed monkeys.

To Say Nothing of the Dog tells the tale of a man named Ned Henry who travels back in time to from 2057 to 1888 to find and return a cat named Princess Arjumand to her owner. In his journey back through time, Ned finds the cat packed away in a covered basket and alludes to the lifelessness of her as they travel down the Thames.[7] It is later discovered that in 1888 the butler, Baine, attempted to drown Princess Arjumand by throwing the box she was in into the Thames, only to be rescued by Verity, another time traveler, and brought to 2057.[8] Many descriptions of Princess Arjumand in this book point back to how she might or should have perished in the Thames but was now alive through an action that occurred and its improbability, alluding specifically to the paradox created in the thought experiment that is created by Schrodinger's cat.[9]

Animals other than cats

Fiction writers have confined other animals besides cats in such contraptions. Dan Simmons's novel Endymion begins with hero Raul Endymion sentenced to death by imprisonment in a "Schrödinger box".

Kōsuke Fujishima's manga series Ah! My Goddess featured a play on Schrödinger's Cat. During one storyline, a storage room was expanded to infinite proportions and the main characters encountered a Schrödinger's Whale, an extremely rare species with the ability to travel through space-time in a five-dimensional quantum state. The male lead in the series, Keiichi Morisato, befriends the whale and teaches it songs by real-life musical group The Carpenters (in the original English translation, it was Matthew Sweet) - but their time spent together is short, for the whale must move on or risk its safety as its wave function collapses. Because of this need to keep moving through quantum states, Schrödinger's Whales hardly ever meet, the reason they are so thin on the ground — but miraculously, Keiichi secured the future of the species by teaching it the songs. After discovering the whale had gone, he found out that it had learned Only Yesterday by itself (Missing Time in the translation) - this gave the whales a call that they could locate each other by.

In Peter Milligan's metaphysical comic Animal Man, Schrödinger's Cat is explained using a theory of pizza delivery mix-ups, resulting in both pepperoni and plain pizzas occupying the unopened box.

In the webzine Aphelion, the short story "Pet Care" has a veterinarian coming out of an examination room to tell Schrodinger he has both good new and bad news about his cat.

Television

Film

Video games

Web comics

Music

Merchandise

Politics

References

  1. E. Schrödinger, Die gegenwärtige Situation in der Quantenmechanik, Naturwissenschaftern. 23: pp. 807–812; 823–823, 844–849. (1935). English translation: John D. Trimmer, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 124, pp. 323–38 (1980), reprinted in Quantum Theory and Measurement, p. 152 (1983).
  2. Sam Stall (2007-05-01). 100 Cats Who Changed Civilization. p. 34. ISBN 978-1-59474-163-0.
  3. "Viennese Meow". Prima Storia. 31 January 2009. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  4. Kouta Hirano, Hellsing: Volume 4. Panini Manga und Comic
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  7. Willis, Connie (1998). To Say Nothing of the Dog. New York City: Bantam. p. 159. ISBN 978-0553575385.
  8. Willis, Connie (1998). To Say Nothing of the Dog. New York City: Bantam. p. 198. ISBN 978-0553575385.
  9. Willis, Connie (1998). To Say Nothing of the Dog. New York City: Bantam. p. 202. ISBN 978-0553575385.
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External links

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