A little riddle i can't answer

[Oorang]

The act of observation alters the outcome.

 

[dwyckoff]

Maybe not...

Oorang was a little too eloquent for me...I had to translate it out so I could understand...

The question really is this...does the crane exist? If no one saw or heard it maybe there was no crane to begin with!

 

[Oorang]

The outcome:
With Observers: Crane Kills Observers
Without Observers: Crane harmlessly falls.

The act of observation altered the outcome.

Like if you were studying how families interact at the dinner table. Your presence at the table alters their behavior. Therefore direct observation alters the outcome which you wished to percieve.

See also schrodinger's cat

 

[Greg Truby]

See also schrodinger's cat
~oorang

?

 

[Oorang]

 

[gingerafro]

I love the ambiguity of smilies in posts.

I'm not sure if Greg has made a joke by posting the link to the MrExcel member 'schrodinger's cat' - or has strangely found / known a member to have that nickname.

Then I don't know if Oorang is laughing at Greg's joke / the fact of discovering a member / his stupidity.

So now is Greg annoyed that Oorang is laughing at him or joingin in with joke.

(Actually i am convinced that Greg knows about the Schrodinger's Cat paradox / found a member and thus created a joke. And Oorang is laughing at Greg's joke, who is in turn pleased that it has been found to be funny).

However, does my observation now change the outcome? Or is it the outcome only revealed once Oorang and Greg confirm my observation?

 

[Greg Truby]

Actually, Greg has been around so long that he was pretty sure he remembered reading a thread in the old lounge where one of the members was names was "Schrödinger's Cat" and just did a quick check to make sure his rickety memory was correct. (Indeed the thread was from five years ago ).

 

[Oaktree]

If a tree falls in a forest, but no one is around to see it... and it happens to land on Schrödinger's cat, I'm pretty sure the universe would just explode.

 

[Oorang]

But until you fell the tree, the state of the existence of the universe is still indeterminate?

 

[Err]

If a radioactive isotope randomly fells a tree and lands on a box which contains a glass vial filled with cyanide gas which kills a cat inside a box -then the whole outcome acts as a "black box" and all we need to know is that it is there.